Chicken Burgers with Garlic-Rosemary Mayonnaise

Ingredients

Mayonnaise:

1 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup chopped fresh rosemary leaves
1 clove garlic, minced

Burgers:

1 pound ground chicken
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
4 sandwich rolls or burger buns
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cup arugula, divided

Directions

For the mayonnaise:

In a small bowl, mix together mayonnaise, garlic, and rosemary; set aside.

For the burgers:

Preheat a gas or charcoal grill or place a grill pan over medium-high heat. In a large bowl, add the ground chicken, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper, and 1/2 of the mayonnaise mixture. Using clean hands, gently combine the ingredients and form the chicken mixture into 4 patties. Place the burgers on the grill and cook for about 7 minutes on each side. Transfer to paper towels and let rest for a few minutes.

Brush the cut side of each roll with the olive oil and 1 teaspoon of the mayonnaise mixture. Grill for 1 to 2 minutes until slightly golden.

To assemble the burgers:

Spread a dollop of the remaining mayonnaise mixture on the tops and bottoms of the toasted buns. Place the chicken burgers on the bottom halves of the buns. Top each with 1/4 cup of arugula and finish with the top half of the bun.

Source: Giada De Laurentiis

'Andy Griffith Show' embodied grace, love

I never met Andy Griffith, but for 50 years, through every stage of my life, he has been a frequent guest in my succession of living rooms.

He wasn't just another celebrity.

When he died July 3, I felt as if I'd lost kin. A lifelong friend. A mentor.

He didn't know it, but he taught me how to be a patient dad and how to tell a good yarn and how to be gracious to neighbors who got on my nerves.

He helped me see the small towns I lived in through kinder eyes.

He kept me smiling through some of my worst setbacks.

Evidently, many others felt the same way. I've been reading online commentaries, tributes and obituaries about him from every corner of the nation. Few entertainers have been so beloved.

He brilliantly played a wide range of characters in an unusually long career, from a rube drafted into the Air  Force to an egomaniacal rabble-rouser to a murderous county boss to an eccentric lawyer. He was successful as a stand-up comedian, a Broadway actor and a gospel singer.

But we who admired him most knew him best as Andy Taylor, sheriff of Mayberry, N.C., in The Andy Griffith Show.

I've watched I Love Lucy and The Dick Van Dyke Show and The Mary Tyler Moore Show and All in the Family and Taxi and Cheers and Seinfeld and Friends and Curb Your Enthusiasm and 30 Rock and The Simpsons.

For my money, The Andy Griffith Show is the greatest sitcom of them all.

A day or two after Griffith passed away, I was making a deposit at a drive-through branch bank when the teller, a woman about my age, and I struck up a conversation about his death.

For several minutes we wistfully recited patches of dialogue from our favorite episodes, as frustrated, impatient drivers lined up behind me.

One of mine: the episode in which Barney (Don Knotts) buys a lemon of a used car. Before learning he's been sold a piece of junk, he takes his friends for a celebratory drive. It turns out Gomer (Jim Nabors) tends to get carsick and has to sit next to a window.

During the drive, Andy asks Gomer how he's feeling.

"Sick as a dog but having the time of my life!" Gomer reports.

Across the years, I've used that line a thousand times in a hundred contexts.

I've been such a devotee of the show — I probably know every line of every episode from the first five seasons, when Knotts was still in the cast — that I've long pondered why the series had this mighty effect on me.

It was wonderfully acted and written, of course. But you could say that about all the sitcoms I mentioned above.

For me, Griffith's show had qualities those other comedies didn't.

It embodied grace, for one thing. Griffith reportedly said Andy Taylor was a lot like him, except way nicer.

I think I read somewhere — I've read so much I can't locate all my references — that Griffith said he based Andy Taylor on himself when he was at his best, or on the man he would have liked to be. Words to that effect.

Whatever his exact statement, you could say the same about why so many of us, especially small-town folks, continue to love the show a half-century after we first watched it: It represents us at our best, or at least it reminds us of who we wish we were. It makes us try to be a bit nicer, purer, more generous.

It's uplifting, in the truest and least smarmy sense of that word.

In Mayberry, people are flawed but rarely mean- spirited. If they are mean, within a 30-minute episode they see their errors and make amends. In the end, everybody does right. Mayberry's residents never damage one another permanently.

Of course, a skeptic could argue, and some have, that this is fantasy.

Real people in real towns aren't like that.

Town drunks aren't usually benign, funny oafs like Otis (Hal Smith). Flinty merchants and big-city playboys don't neatly reform themselves in a half-hour.

A sheriff who, like Andy Taylor, hires his incompetent cousin as his deputy and keeps him on the force despite his constant blunders, who arbitrarily releases prisoners whenever he pleases, ought to be voted out of office, if not indicted.

So yes, to an extent the show is fantasy. But it's not just fantasy.

There's plenty enough reality there to make it legitimate — and lasting.

We continue to respond to Mayberry and its citizens partly because they remind us of who we want to be, and who, occasionally, we are: gentle people whose hearts are in the right place, who forgive and make peace.

There's another, related key to The Andy Griffith Show's power.

According to several articles, Griffith once was asked to share the secret to his show's never-ebbing popularity.

"It was all about love," he said.

And so it was. And so it is today.

Source: Lexington Herald-Leader

Bullied bus monitor: one cog in a broken machine

s her story begins to fade from the news cycle, bullied bus monitor Karen Klein will ride off into the sunset a whole lot richer, while the “bad guys” – her seventh-grade tormentors – exit the stage a lot less cocky than they entered, suspended from school for a year and their actions thoroughly condemned.

Don’t cue the happy ending music just yet.

Although the story and the donations it inspired may have turned out well for Ms. Klein, anyone who’s watched the cringe-inducing video of her harassment can see that bullying continues to pervade school environments.

On comment boards, some cynically groused, “I was bullied like that every day all through high school. Where’s my half million?” One blogger posted the news of Klein’s incident under the sarcastic title, “Someone Is Bullied On A School Bus For The First Time Ever.” In short, the feel-good campaign to send Klein on “the vacation of a lifetime” did nothing to solve the problem.  But a good hard look at everything this video shows us could.

Though it lacks horrific violence and disturbing racial implications, the bus-monitor video is in some ways reminiscent of the 1991 video of the police beating motorist Rodney King. That earlier video provided a document of a rarely recorded but frequently occurring behavior, grabbing the nation’s attention – at least for a few days – and exposed us to an oft-ignored injustice. And like the King video, the bus-monitor video shows us something with a far greater significance than the event itself.

The video of King’s beating laid bare an entire culture of institutional failings within the Los Angeles Police Department; the video of the abused yet passive bus monitor lays bare an entire culture of institutional failings within our schools.

The first failure we see is Klein’s. The job description for a bus monitor in the Greece Central School District in New York where she was working specifies requirements to “maintain order on buses,” to “enforce district policy governing student behavior,” and to “report orally and in writing instances of continuing disruptive student behavior.” 

Klein had a responsibility to step up and assert her authority – if not for her own benefit, then for the benefit of the other kids on that bus. Instead, she sat and tolerated the abuse, performing none of her duties and leading by the worst kind of example. The takeaway for a child, witnessing this scene as it unfolded, would be: “If a grown-up can’t do anything to stop them, then I sure can’t.”

That simply isn’t true. When they stay silent, bystanders condone bullying, but when they speak up, they can kill it. Speaking up is scary and difficult. But if children, and certainly their adult guardians, are part of a school culture that consistently encourages and empowers them to do just that, a dramatic change can take place.

A victim might be outnumbered by bullies, but bullies are frequently outnumbered by witnesses. With instruction, encouragement, and support, these witnesses can shift the balance of power by virtue of their numbers.

But they first must be taught that they have that power, and assured that their reports will be taken seriously. Peer intervention is a powerful force. This entire incident went public because a fellow student, under the moniker CapitalTrigga, uploaded the video to YouTube in order to draw attention to the problem, becoming unsung hero in this drama. Once that happened, the bullies were steamrollered into submission by the crushing weight of public opinion.

Apologists for Klein’s total lack of action might insist that she wasn’t trained to handle bullies, or that she simply felt powerless. If either is true, it points to a wider, more systemic problem: that Klein’s school district fails to provide its personnel with adequate training to manage abusive students, thereby putting all students at risk, or that they fail to listen to or act on staff reports of abusive student behavior. Either scenario would allow bullying to flourish.

Had Klein’s employers done more to emphasize an intolerant attitude toward bullying, we might have seen her display a little more backbone, knowing that school officials had her back. But in interviews, Klein said that she didn’t even do so much as write the boys up for their hateful behavior, because, in her words, “What good would it do?”

Eventually, the boys did receive a full year of suspension from school – but only after the video had made the rounds. If this sort of punishment was standard, with or without a viral video, school officials sure didn’t let Klein in on it. Her assumption was that nothing would happen to those kids.

The saddest thing is how familiar the experience of bullying is for children, in all walks of life. Rare is the person who’s been through twelve years of schooling and not witnessed bullying. But since bullying is such an ancient tradition, too many of us have become complacent about it, assuming there’s nothing that can be done instead of doing everything possible to stop it.

It’s a shame what Karen Klein went through, but the bigger shame is that, after all these centuries – despite media attention and efforts in schools – effective bullying prevention measures are still not implemented in all schools – as well as on school buses. And the most successful anti-bullying programs don’t only deal with bullies and victims, but engage everyone on campus.

This incident can help to create an entire culture that is intolerant of bullying – one that obligates, involves, and empowers everyone – administrators, teachers, parents, students, and yes, even bus monitors. Now that would be a happy ending.

Source: Christian Science Monitor

Verse of the day

"So why do you keep calling me 'Lord, Lord!' when you don't do what I say?"

Luke 6:46 NLT

The way life is

“Welcome to Maine: The Way Life Should Be” reads the sign as you cross the border from New Hampshire into Maine on I-95. As someone who loves the pristine waters of Maine’s lakes, its glorious rocky coast, the simplicity of waking up to pull on a pair of well-worn jeans, and the smell of pine needles as I walk through an evergreen forest, it might seem logical that I would agree with that sign. But I always correct that sentiment when I read it. I’ve learned through my study of Christian Science that any good that I see in Maine or anywhere in the world is just a hint of the way Life, God, really is. Life is not conditional on anything but God since God is Life. God is where we truly “live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17:28).

So no matter where we are, and no matter what our circumstances, we are free to discern the way Life really is. We are free to look out into the infinite and to discern that divine Life is perpetually and universally good. It is beautiful, harmonious, simple, pure, invigorating, joyous, loving, and inspiring, because it is infinite Mind infinitely manifesting itself within its own self-completeness. And when we discern even a little of divine Life shining into our human situation, it enlightens and transforms our circumstances, pulling back any limited sense of supply, health, or well-being.

It is our thoughts, then, about our environment and situation that either see life through God’s lens of infinite goodness or filter it through the lens of the personal mind’s finite limitation. The key, I’m finding, is to keep thought in constant relation with the Divine and to perpetually ask God to reveal His presence in every detail of our day. New England spiritual reformer Mary Baker Eddy stated, “To live so as to keep human consciousness in constant relation with the divine, the spiritual, and the eternal, is to individualize infinite power; and this is Christian Science” (“The First Church of Christ, Scientist, Miscellany,” p. 160).

I remind myself often of this beatitude from Christ Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). In other words, the purity of seeing as God sees reveals that the kingdom of heaven is always at hand. It is never far off, but always within consciousness. And if a challenge of inharmony comes up, the need is not to fix the phenomenon that thought is projecting, but to be sure that our lens of thought is the divine Mind.

Recently, I had a simple but meaningful illustration of the power of seeing more clearly the way Life is right here in Maine. A handyman was helping me do some repair work on my little cottage. Suddenly some ground gave way, just enough to reveal that the cover on the septic system had rusted out. The handyman informed me that this was a serious problem, as the local authorities would require me to redo my septic system in order to bring it up to present-day standards.

In his concern for the expense that this might be for me, he suggested we put a temporary cover over it and wait a while before telling the authorities. At first this seemed like it might buy me some time to figure out the best solution; but upon taking some time to pray, I knew this was a limited and fearful approach to life, and not the way I know Life to be. It seemed clear that honesty and forthrightness would express my trust in Life as whole, complete, and harmonious, so I decided to go on the offensive with the situation.

I asked the handyman if he would contact the authorities and see what my options were. After all, Mind is infinite; and there just had to be an honest, joyous, and abundant solution to this need. He was happy to do that, even relieved, as he said, “This is the right way to handle things.” On the way to his appointment with the man in charge of code enforcement, he and his wife dropped by with a basket of canned pickles and relishes for me. As I looked at this beautiful basket of home-canned garden produce, I couldn’t help feeling God’s love and assurance. How loved and supported I felt by these Mainers. No matter what the authorities said, I felt sure there would be a gracious way to see my need met.

Within a couple of hours, they came back with bashful Maine-smiles on their faces. (Folks in Maine tend to be subtle in their joy, but I’ve gotten to the place where I can spot it easily and enjoy it all the more for its quiet twinkling behind the eyes.) They reported that all I needed was to have a soil engineer draw up a plan, get a permit, and then I had as many years as I needed to complete the project. I just had to show that I was making progress. And this is the way Life is, I thought. Life is full of the possible, full of tender care, full of adventure, full of solutions, full of harmony, and baskets full of blessings.

Source: Christian Science Monitor

Corbin couple is accused of trading a woman a pickup truck for her infant

A Corbin couple is accused of trading a woman a 1999 Dodge Dakota pickup truck for her infant child, Laurel County Sheriff John Root said.

Officers with the department arrested Jeremy and Jamiee Brown on Thursday on charges of human trafficking, according to a release from Root's office. The couple had the baby, now 6 months old. The baby was placed in the care of state child-welfare workers, the release said.

The Browns allegedly made the trade soon after the baby was born. Root's office started investigating based on information from a confidential source, and officers were able to find the pickup truck.

The current owner told police he had bought the truck from a woman named Heather Kaminskey for $800, according to Root's office, but a further check showed the Browns had owned it at one point.

Through questioning the couple, police located Kaminskey's mother, who told them Kaminskey had left Florida in  January, when she was nine months pregnant, because she was wanted on meth charges. Kaminskey came to Kentucky to have the child in order to evade child-protective workers in Florida, who had taken away her two other children, according to Root's office.

The human-trafficking charge is punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

The Browns have three biological children. Relatives took them, according to the news release.

Kaminskey has not been seen in Laurel County for several days. Police plan to charge her and seek an order for her to be brought back to Kentucky, according to Root's office.

Detectives Jason Back and Brad Mitchell and Lt. Rodney Van Zant conducted the investigation.

Source: Lexington Herald-Leader

ESPN Tip-Off Marathon schedule is here

For the college basketball fan, there aren't many glorious July days, but this one definitely counts: the release of the 2012 ESPN Tip-Off Marathon schedule, set to take place for all 24 hours (and then some) on Tuesday, Nov. 13. I think you're going to like what's being offered.

First things first. The games are as follows (all times ET):

Midnight: West Virginia at Gonzaga
2 a.m.: Davidson at New Mexico
4 a.m.: Houston Baptist at Hawaii
6 a.m.: Stony Brook at Rider
8 a.m.: Northern Illinois at Valparaiso
10 a.m.: Harvard at Massachusetts
12 p.m.: Temple at Kent State
2 p.m.: Detroit at St. John’s
4 p.m.: Butler at Xavier
7 p.m.: Michigan State vs. Kansas (Champions Classic, Georgia Dome, Atlanta)
30 minutes following MSU/KU: Duke vs. Kentucky (Champions Classic)

Here's the thing: If you're a casual college basketball fan, someone who doesn't spend all summer reading College Basketball Nation in heated anticipation of posts like these, you might be somewhat nonplussed.

Davidson at New Mexico might not do anything for you. Harvard at UMass might not tickle your fancy. I get that. But for the college hoops fan -- the kind who knows how cool it will be to see a midnight game at New Mexico's Pit, the kind who recognizes UMass as a sleeper A-10 contender in 2012-13, the kind who knows how good Detroit guard Ray McCallum Jr. is, the kind who realizes what a tough early road test Kent State will be for Temple -- that schedule has a little bit of everything.

Although the Mountaineers-Zags NCAA tourney rematch is a tantalizing opener, the real showstoppers come late in the day. Butler-Xavier is a strange game, considering Butler's early realignment move to the Atlantic 10 this season. The two will actually be playing a nonconference game in the first week of the season before meeting again during league play. You don't see that often. If the basketball gods shine upon us, this will be the game that truly kicks off a heated Midwestern rivalry between two marquee March programs. They've had some good battles in the recent past -- no reason for that to stop now.

And of course, the Champions Classic, now in its second year, is just going to be flat-out awesome: Michigan State will play Kansas just four days (four days!) after opening its season against Connecticut at a U.S. military base in Germany. Last season, the Spartans flew from the Carrier Classic in San Diego to Madison Square Garden four days later. This year, they'll be making a trip from Germany to Georgia in roughly the same time. If Tom Izzo could schedule a game at the International Space Station, he would. The dude will literally play anybody anywhere.

Then there's Duke versus Kentucky. Two bluebloods. Two powerhouses. Two larger-than-life coaches. One unlikely but very deeply felt rivalry. It exists for one reason: March 28, 1992. It's something you notice as a college hoops writer: Both teams' fan bases go out of their way to tweak each other. They are in many ways cultural and basketball antitheses. There is real hate here.

With all this sturm und drang on both sides -- the trolling of opposition message boards is my personal favorite -- it's easy to forget that these two teams don't play, like, ever. The last time they met was Dec. 18, 2001, over a decade ago, at the Jimmy V Classic in New Jersey. Kentucky had Tayshaun Prince and Keith Bogans; Duke had Jason Williams, Mike Dunleavy, Carlos Boozer, Chris Duhon, Dahntay Jones and future Barack Obama body man Reggie Love. The Blue Devils won 95-92 in an overtime classic.

Despite the huge gap in actual basketball competition, Duke and UK fans have only increased their mutual distaste in the Internet age. The run-up to the game -- not to mention the split Georgia Dome -- is going to be certifiably insane.

And there you have it: The early portions of the marathon may not do much for neophytes, but the hard-core fans will have plenty to chew on ... just before the final three games of the evening (hopefully) blow us away. I can't wait to live blog this thing for too many hours. More than anything, I can't wait for basketball. Only a few more months now. Consider that your new mantra.

Source: ESPN, College Basketball Nation Blog

Amazon smart phone rumors: we could see a 'Kindle Phone' in 2012

An Amazon smart phone -- call it the Kindle Phone -- might be more than a rumor.

The Wall Street Journal reported today that Amazon's component suppliers are testing a phone with a screen somewhere between 4 and 5 inches, citing those ubiquitous "people familiar with the situation." Add this to last November's rumor that Amazon would release a handset in the fourth quarter of 2012, and a separate Bloomberg report last week that Amazon was working on a phone with Foxconn (Apple's supplier for iPhones and iPads), and it's hard not to wonder if we might see a Kindle Phone within the next year.

It wouldn't be entirely out of character for Amazon to make a move for the smart phone market. The company dominated e-reader sales for years with the original Kindle before moving into tablets last year with the Kindle Fire. Amazon might see a handset as a logical hardware step. Research firms estimatethat Amazon sells both the Kindle and the Kindle Fire at a loss; the company makes up the difference because the devices make it easy for users to buy digital media from Amazon's store. The customer base it's built while following that model could give it an edge if it decides to release a phone.

Chris DeVore, a Seattle-based analyst, even suggested that Amazon could attract customers with a free handset, including unlimited voice and data. (DeVore isn't claiming any special insight, so take his prediction with more grains of salt than usual.) The catch, he cautions, would be that the "free" phone would serve ads and otherwise push owners to make more Amazon purchases -- for example, maybe they'd have to sign up for two years of Amazon Prime -- but it would be affordable for customers and profitable for Amazon, at least over the long term. Plus, such a move would put pressure on Apple and Google, the two biggest players in the mobile phone arena.

The trick for Amazon, of course, would be navigating tricky negotiations with carrier companies, not to mention working out the details of making a handset compatible with global technical standards. Complicating things further is the fact that the iPhone and current Android smart phones have a pretty commanding slice of the market; a Kindle Phone would have to conquer territory that's already fairly well-established.

One thing's almost certain: we'll be seeing some new hardware from Amazon, of one kind or another, before too long. Its popular 7-inch Kindle Fire tablet is now 7 months old, and the China Times reported last week that a new version is already in production. Amazon needs to stay ahead of Google, whose Nexus 7 tablet, released last month, offers a higher-resolution screen and significantly improved specs for the same price as the Kindle Fire.

Source: Christian Science Monitor

Steven Tyler leaving ‘American Idol’

Steven Tyler has announced he’s leaving “American Idol.”

Tyler, who joined the show in its 10th season, sat at the judges table alongside Randy Jackson and Jennifer Lopez for two seasons. (And rumors are swirling that Jackson and Lopez may be looking to leave “Idol,” as well.)

“After some long…hard…thoughts…I’ve decided it’s time for me to let go of my mistress ‘American Idol’ before she boils my rabbit,” Tyler said in a statement from Fox. “I strayed from my first love, Aerosmith, and I’m back — but instead of begging on my hands and knees, I’ve got two fists in the air and I’m kicking the door open with my band.

Aerosmith’s 15th studio album, “Music From Another Dimension,” is due out on November 6.

“‘Idol’ was over-the-top fun,” Tyler said, and I loved every minute of it…Now it’s time to bring Rock Back. ERMAHGERD.”

Source: CNN, "The Marquee Blog"

Material world: Tips to help children grow up free of entitlement

Our three kids are really blessed. They have involved parents that are in a solid enough financial state to provide for them without worry. They have two sets of grandparents and a great-grandparent that dote on them, and they are the first grandchildren of two of the grandparents, so they get a special helping of attention. They have a small army of doting aunts and uncles, great aunts and uncles, cousins, and family friends that care deeply for them.

With all of these relatives and friends that care for these kids, holidays and birthdays sometimes turn into an overwhelming cavalcade of gifts. Even outside of those events, people will sometimes pop in with gifts for the kids.

The challenge that we often face as parents through all of this is entitlement.

How do we keep all of this from rounding a corner into a sense of material entitlement, one that will cause them to spend their lives, on some level, feeling that material abundance is normal and worth spending a great deal of money for? It’s a challenging issue.

What I do know is that a large portion of my sense of right and wrong came from my childhood experiences. I was influenced greatly by what my parents told me and what actions they took themselves. I think that’s a typical result of a childhood with involved parents who showed love, kindness, and attention.

Because of that, Sarah and I are really mindful of how we can use our day-to-day actions and the things we discuss with our children to constantly nudge them away from a sense of material entitlement. Here are some of the things we’re actively doing.

Remind them to be thankful. When someone gives them a gift, we not only remind them to be thankful in the moment (encouraging them to say “thank you” and telling them that they’ve done well later if they remember to say thanks on their own), we also remind them to be thankful later. We encourage the writing of “thank you” notes for gifts or pleasant occasions.

Expose them to others in need. Right now, our children really don’t have a skill set where they can do much effective volunteer work with the disadvantaged, so our goal right now is to simply make them aware that they have more than most of the people in the world. The constant accumulation of “more” can seem less important when compared to the plight of others, and being aware of such situations makes an enormous difference.

Encourage them to give some of what they have to others. We give them an allowance, but a portion of that allowance must be given to a charity of their choice. Every so often, we do a “toy purge,” and out of the purged toys, we give many of them away at Goodwill, and during this purge we involve them in the choice of what to eliminate and also remind them of where these items are going.

Do enjoyable things without material items. Most of our evenings are spent out in the yard. They do a lot of things I did when I was a child – play in the sandbox, help in the garden, play tag, run through the lawn sprinkler, and so on. We go to free parks all the time. You don’t have to have a bunch of stuff to have fun.

Talk about the issues involved. What is a gift? A gift is not something that you should ever expect. A gift is something given to you by someone as a way of showing they care. What are possessions? They can be nice to have, but the fun comes from within you. You can have fun with anything. These are the types of discussions we have regularly.

These are the tactics we’re using to reduce a sense of material entitlement in our children. Will it work? Only time will tell, but I feel pretty good about things when I see our kids choosing to play in a state park instead of hoarding their toys or getting excited about giving some of their allowance to a good cause.

Source: Christian Science Monitor

Study: Sept. 11 most memorable TV moment

The Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attack is by far the most memorable moment shared by television viewers during the past 50 years, a study released on Wednesday concluded.

The only thing that came close was President John F. Kennedy's assassination and its aftermath in 1963, but that was only for the people aged 55 and over who experienced those events as they happened instead of replayed as an historical artifact.

Sony Electronics and the Nielsen television research company collaborated on the survey. They ranked TV moments for their impact not just by asking people if they remembered watching them, but if they recalled where they watched it, who they were with and whether they talked to other people about what they had seen.

By that measure, the Sept. 11 tragedy was nearly twice as impactful as the second-ranked moment, which was the coverage of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Minutes after the first airplane struck New York's World Trade Center on a late summer morning, television networks began covering the events continuously and stayed with them for days.

The other biggest TV events, in order, were the 1995 verdict in O.J. Simpson's murder trial, the Challenger space shuttle explosion in 1986 and the death of Osama bin Laden last year, the survey found.

Sony was interested in the study for clues on consumer interests and behaviors and found "that television is really the grandmother of all the social devices," said Brian Siegel, vice president of television business for the company.

Going into the study, Siegel said he had anticipated that entertainment events like the final episode of "M-A-S-H" (ranked No. 42), the Beatles' appearance on "The Ed Sullivan Show" (No. 43) and the "Who shot J.R.?" episode of "Dallas" (No. 44) would rank higher. Instead, television coverage of news events made the biggest difference in viewers' lives.

The Super Bowl is annually the most-watched TV event, with this year's game between the N.Y. Giants and New England Patriots setting an all-time record with 111 million viewers. The memories don't seem to linger, however: the top-ranked Super Bowl Sunday event in Sony's study came in 2004 and had nothing to do with football. It was Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction (No. 26).

Men and women agreed on the three most impactful television events - Sept. 11, Katrina and Simpson. After that, some of the interests diverged.

For example, women ranked the 1997 funeral of Princess Diana as the fourth most memorable event, while men put that at No. 23. Women ranked last year's death of Whitney Houston at No. 5, with men judging it No. 21.

Similarly, the 2003 bombing of Baghdad at the start of the Iraq War was seen as the No. 14 most impactful moment by men, and No. 37 among women. Men were also far more struck by boxer Mike Tyson biting off a piece of Evander Holyfield's ear.

The passage of time has also diluted some moments once thought as unforgettable, simply because succeeding generations have no personal memory of them. Man's first moon landing in 1969 ranked No. 21.

Age also made a big difference in the survey. JFK's assassination was the second-most impactful TV event among people 55 and over, while for those between 18 and 34, it was the death of Osama bin Laden.

Young people also ranked Barack Obama's Election Night speech in 2008 at No. 3, while that didn't move older viewers quite as much (No. 24).

Simply because of their age, events like the JFK assassination, President Nixon's resignation and the moon landing didn't register at all among viewers 18 to 34. The oldest event to appear in their rankings was the 1980 shooting of John Lennon.

The study was based on an online questionnaire of 1,077 adults selected as a scientific sample from among Nielsen's panel of people measured for television ratings. It was conducted between Feb. 15-17 this year.

The study could be a good baseline for future looks at how television impacts viewers, said Paul Lindstrom, senior vice president for custom research at Nielsen.

"I'd like to see these done on a periodic basis going forward," he said.

Source: Associated Press

Beyond belief

Some 20 years ago, I watched a Tibetan lama puzzle over why so many of his audience members were asking questions about Christian theology when they’d come to learn about Tibetan Buddhism – “What about hell?” “How can I be saved?” they asked.

It occurred to me that not only do people unwittingly carry around the narrow conceptions of religion that they may have been raised with, but the human mind in general is susceptible to small-minded conceptions of the biggest thing in the room. People mistake words and mental images for the thing itself – like the Zen saying about mistaking the finger pointing at the moon for the moon.

Midway through the last century, Bible translator J.B. Phillips published a little book called “Your God is Too Small.” It cataloged the various ways people imagine deity. His descriptions were apt for those of all faiths as well as unbelievers. Whatever people think of as most basic, powerful, and authoritative – whether it comes from religious education or is founded on scientific materialism – is “God” to them.

They use reason to justify their belief and they defend it out of habit. Often what individuals believe intellectually has little to do with what drives their thoughts and actions in real time. Superstition haunts those considered faithful as well as those who are part of the growing ranks of the unchurched. No one could claim to be absolutely consistent in his or her faith; things happen, paradigms are broken, and people are forced to start again.

Beyond the human faith that is mere belief without understanding, there is a world that many of us have encountered and recognize as spiritual reality. Spiritual because it can’t be seen or measured by the senses. Reality because it is what is consistently found to be there when everything else is cleared away.

I don’t suggest that the words and teachings of all religions (including atheism) can be reconciled with each other. But there is a world of Spirit behind all those words and human attempts at explanation, which we always have access to. Sometimes we find it in our extremity, like those who walk away from near-death experiences with the revelation that life has always been about divine Love. Or it may come to us more gently as an epiphany of real and present unconditional goodness. It is not really a separate world but an understanding of the primitive and original source of all we hold dear in life. Christian Science calls that ever-presence “God,” and defines God as “incorporeal, divine, supreme, infinite Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love” (Mary Baker Eddy, “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” p. 465). We see these expressed in daily life: Mind signifies intelligence; Love, affection and kindness; Truth, honesty; and so forth.

Apply the four words at the beginning of the definition – incorporeal, divine, supreme, infinite – to those terms for God, and it is clear that this is not a small God. Principle, which is never trapped in form, is wholly good, ultimately authoritative, and everywhere all the time, could never be confused with a bearded old man deity in the clouds or some kind of cosmic manager or sectarian judge. The definition is liberating and reconciling in that it is simply a description of the spiritual sense of existence we can all experience and recognize.

Though that sentence was written over 125 years ago, its radical implications for us are far from fully appreciated, and grasping those implications is long overdue. The papers are increasingly filled with stories of abused authority and confused morality. In the words of James Davison Hunter, a professor and author of “The Death of Character”: “We know more, and as a consequence, we no longer trust the authority of traditional institutions who used to be the carriers of moral ideals.... We used to experience morality as imperatives. The consequences of not doing the right thing were not only social, but deeply emotional and psychological. We couldn’t bear to live with ourselves. Now we experience morality more as a choice that we can always change as circumstances call for it” (Maureen Dowd, “Moral Dystopia,”  The New York Times, June 16).

The Bible warns us against being deceived by words and the vanity of human knowledge (see Deuteronomy 11:16, Job 15:31, I Corinthians 2:12-14, Psalms 94:11). Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, adds this: “The looms of crime, hidden in the dark recesses of mortal thought, are every hour weaving webs more complicated and subtle” (“Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” p. 102).

With traditional social structures of morality breaking down even as a world of people earnestly searches for answers to the perennial questions about life, there is now a human and divine imperative to get beyond sectarian doubts and beliefs that divide us. Tribal, sectarian belief systems never will be capable of meeting humanity’s crucial need for unity. But that need can be met in a spiritually scientific approach to faith and understanding, which begins with acknowledging our connection to God as divine Spirit. Then we may find what Eddy saw when she wrote: “Science so reverses the evidence before the corporeal human senses, as to make this Scriptural testimony true in our hearts, ‘The last shall be first, and the first last,’ so that God and His idea may be to us what divinity really is and must of necessity be, – all-inclusive”

Source: Christian Science Monitor

Baseball cards in Ohio attic might fetch millions

TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) -- Karl Kissner picked up a soot-covered cardboard box that had been under a wooden dollhouse in his grandfather's attic. Taking a look inside, he saw baseball cards bundled with twine. They were smaller than the ones he was used to seeing.

But some of the names were familiar: Hall of Famers Ty Cobb, Cy Young and Honus Wagner.

Then he put the box on a dresser and went back to digging through the attic.

It wasn't until two weeks later that he learned that his family had come across what experts say is one of the biggest, most exciting finds in the history of sports card collecting, a discovery probably worth millions.

The cards are from an extremely rare series issued around 1910. The few known to exist are in so-so condition at best, with faded images and worn edges. But the ones from the attic in the Ohio town of Defiance are nearly pristine, untouched for more than a century. The colors are vibrant, the borders crisp and white.

"It's like finding the Mona Lisa in the attic" Kissner said.

Sports card experts who authenticated the find say they may never see something this impressive again.

"Every future find will ultimately be compared to this," said Joe Orlando, president of Professional Sports Authenticator.

The best of the bunch - 37 cards - are expected to bring a total of $500,000 when they are sold at auction in August during the National Sports Collectors Convention in Baltimore. There are about 700 cards in all that could be worth up to $3 million, experts say. They include such legends as Christy Mathewson and Connie Mack.

Kissner and his family say the cards belonged to their grandfather, Carl Hench, who died in the 1940s. Hench ran a meat market in Defiance, and the family suspects he got them as a promotional item from a candy company that distributed them with caramels. They think he gave some away and kept others.

"We guess he stuck them in the attic and forgot about them," Kissner said. "They remained there frozen in time."

After Hench and his wife died, two of his daughters lived in the house. Jean Hench kept the house until she died last October, leaving everything inside to her 20 nieces and nephews. Kissner, 51, is the youngest and was put in charge of the estate. His aunt was a pack rat, and the house was filled with three generations of stuff.

They found calendars from the meat market, turn-of-the-century dresses, a steamer trunk from Germany and a dresser with Grandma's clothes neatly folded in the drawers.

Months went by before they even got to the attic. On Feb. 29, Kissner's cousin Karla Hench pulled out the dirty green box with metal clips at the corners and lifted the lid.

Not knowing whether the cards were valuable, the two cousins put the box aside. But Kissner decided to do a little research. The cards were at his office in the restaurant he owns when he realized they might have something. He immediately took them across the street and put them in a bank vault.

Still not knowing whether the cards were real, they sent eight to expert Peter Calderon at Heritage Auctions in Dallas, which recently sold the baseball that rolled through the legs of Boston Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner in the 1986 World Series for $418,000.

Calderon said his first words were "Oh, my God."

"I was in complete awe," he said. "You just don't see them this nice."

The cards are from what is known as the E98 series. It is not clear who manufactured them or how many were produced, but the series consists of 30 players, half of them Hall of Famers.

The experts at Heritage Auctions checked out the family's background, the age of the home and the history of the meat market. They looked at the cards and how they were printed.

"Everything lines up," said Chris Ivy, the company's director of sports auctions.

They then sent all the cards to Professional Sports Authenticator, which had previously authenticated fewer than 700 E98s. The Ohio cards were the finest examples from the E98 series the company had ever seen.

The company grades cards on a 1-to-10 scale based of their condition. Up to now, the highest grade it had ever given a Ty Cobb card from the E98 series was a 7. Sixteen Cobbs found in the Ohio attic were graded a 9 - almost perfect. A Honus Wagner was judged a 10, a first for the series.

Retired vintage sports card auctioneer Barry Sloate of New York City said: "This is probably the most interesting find I've heard of."

In a measure of what baseball cards can be worth, the owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks paid a record $2.8 million for a rare 1909 Honus Wagner. Another version of the card brought $1.2 million in April.

Heritage Auctions plans to sell most of the cards over the next two of three years through auctions and private sales so that it doesn't flood the market. In all, they could bring $2 or $3 million, Ivy said.

The Hench family is evenly dividing the cards and the money among the 20 cousins named in their aunt's will. All but a few have decided to sell their lot.

"These cards need to be with those people who appreciate and enjoy them," Kissner said.

Source: Associated Press

Kentucky sees payback from successful 'Hatfields & McCoys' miniseries

You can't run away from a good feud. The recent Hatfields & McCoys television miniseries, based on the legendary 19th-century feud between families in Eastern Kentucky and West Virginia, has spawned a wave of prosperity in some of the most unlikely corners of the economy, both nationally and in Kentucky. Let's take a look:

What started Hatfield-McCoy mania?

The History channel's relentlessly promoted miniseries, which initially aired May 28 to 30 on the cable network.

What happened to tourism in Pike County, where the McCoys were based, after Hatfields & McCoys aired?

Pike County continues to be jubilant over the miniseries' success, which has translated into the kind of boost that a county tourist bureau can't buy.

According to county tourism director Tony Tackett, there have been 250 brochure requests a day on the Pike County tourism Web site, Tourpikecounty.com; there are an average 125 visitors a day to the county's tourism office,  seven days a week; and the Web site had 319,000 hits in the month that ended June 27, up from an average of 5,000 a month,

Escorted tours of the Hatfield-McCoy feud sites, at $15 a pop, have sold out during the past six weeks, with the proceeds going toward building a statue of Randolph McCoy, patriarch of the Kentucky side of the feuders.

Also available and selling briskly is a $20 CD for a self-guided, do-it-yourself tour of the sites.

Why is the History channel so happy with the series' success?

Hatfields & McCoys, which starred Kevin Costner as William Anderson "Devil Anse" Hatfield and Bill Paxton as Randolph "Ole Ran'l" McCoy, was a cultural phenomenon that set ablaze social networking sites and set a viewing record as the top-rated entertainment telecast ever for ad-supported basic cable. It notched audiences of 13.9 million, 13.1 million and 14.3 million viewers over the three days it first aired, respectively. The previous record was held by TNT's Crossfire Trail, starring Tom Selleck and Virginia Madsen, in 2001. Hatfields & McCoys is being touted for Emmy consideration.

And the books, how did they sell?

The University Press of Kentucky is over the moon with sales of its The Hatfields & the McCoys by Otis K. Rice, first published in 1982. Initially after the miniseries, the book's sales were in e-book format, said John P. Hussey, the press's director of marketing and sales, followed by a rush of orders for the hardback original.

The press has moved 15,000 copies of the book, making it, on the 30th anniversary of its printing, the most popular book the press has sold since Hussey started there in 2004. It beats a book on the use of bourbon in cocktails, with about 13,000 sold.

When can I buy the DVD?

The DVD and Blu-ray of the miniseries will be available July 31. They retail for $45.99 for the DVD and $55.99 for Blu-ray but are discounted considerably at several online outlets.

Did the miniseries 'Hatfields & McCoys' change TV?

TV Guide speculated that it would revive interest in miniseries and made-for-TV movies.

But it depends on the subject and the timing. HBO's Hemingway and Gellhorn starring Nicole Kidman and Clive Owen cost $19.5 million to produce but "was a ratings bust" in late May, TV Guide reported.

The History channel is owned by A&E Television Networks, the same corporate family that includes Lifetime and A&E. That gives it the advantage over, say, HBO, of ample venues for the rebroadcast and continued promotion of its miniseries.

Next up: A&E will broadcast the miniseries Coma from Ridley and Tony Scott on Labor Day weekend. Based on the Robin Cook novel and 1978 Michael Crichton film starring Michael Douglas, it will be a four-hour, two-night event about a hospital where healthy patients fall into comas. Coma stars Geena Davis, James Woods, Ellen Burstyn, Richard Dreyfuss and Lauren Ambrose.

Credit: Lexington Herald-Leader

Record Heat!

Lexington's high temperature of 105 degrees today was the 2nd hottest ever recorded behind 108 degrees dating back to July 10 & July 15, 1936. Louisville's 106 degree reading was also 2nd to 107 degrees.

Credit: Lex18 News

Big upset for cherry-pit spitting title

Ronn Matt's wife encouraged him to enter the annual International Cherry Pit Spitting Championship in southwestern Michigan on Saturday.

It's a good thing she did.

The 46-year-old Chicagoan pulled off a big upset, winning the contest in his initial try and becoming the first champion not named Krause or Lessard in 20 years.

Matt spit a pit 69 feet at Tree-Mendus Fruit Farm near Eau Claire, just north of the Indiana border.

Owner Herb Teichman launched the tournament on a lark nearly four decades ago. It now attracts competitors from the U.S. and beyond, and has six divisions, including dignitaries.

Since 1992, members of the Krause and Lessard families have dominated the event.

Brian "Young Gun" Krause of Dimondale holds the world-record spit -- more than 93 feet -- and had won the past two years. But the 34-year-old finished fifth Saturday with a spit of 52 feet, 10 inches.

Krause's father, Rick "Pellet Gun" Krause, came in second with a spit of 61 feet, 2 inches. And Brian Krause's brother, Matt, earned a third-place finish with his 60-foot, 11-inch spit.

The tournament typically is timed to the start of the cherry harvest, but competition spokeswoman Lynne Sage said that because of an unusually warm spring, it's already complete. Saturday's installment was held in sweltering temperatures.

Credit: ESPN

Morgan Freeman: Obama's not our first black president

My dad is black. My mom is white. That does not make me black. President Obama's dad was African and his mom was white. That does not make him black. I have share Morgan Freeman's sentiments since folks started calling President Obama the United State's first black president back when it looked as though he might win the 2008 election. I am so glad that this statement was finally made by someone who the media would notice.

President Barack Obama is considered by some to be the nation's first black president - but Morgan Freeman isn't one such individual.

The actor told NPR's "Tell Me More" host Michel Martin in an interview posted Thursday that "the first thing" that he thinks of when he thinks of Obama is "all of the people who are setting up this barrier for him," Morgan said.

"They just conveniently forget that Barack had a mama, and she was white - very white American, Kansas, middle America," the Oscar winner continued. "There was no argument about who he is or what he is. America's first black president hasn't arisen yet. He's not America's first black president - he's America's first mixed-race president."

Race aside, however, Freeman also mentioned that he believes the president has been treated unfairly by members of the opposing party.

"He is being purposely, purposely thwarted by the Republican Party, who started out at the beginning of his tenure by saying, 'We are going to do whatever is necessary to make sure that he only has one term,'" Freeman said. "That means they will not cooperate with him on anything. So to say he's ineffective is a misappropriation of the facts."

Credit: The Marquee Blog, CNN

How to beat the heat? Five tips from Arizona

Phoenicians have learned a thing or two about surviving scorching summer days. And folks in the nation's middle section could use the advice.

St. Louis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Chicago and several other Midwest cities already have broken heat records this week or are on the verge of doing so.

The National Weather Service said the record-breaking heat that has baked the nation's midsection for several days was slowly moving into the mid-Atlantic states and Northeast. Excessive-heat warnings remained in place Friday for all of Iowa, Indiana and Illinois as well as much of Wisconsin, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio and Kentucky.

St. Louis hit a record high of 105 on Wednesday and a record low of 83. In Wisconsin, the coolest Milwaukee and Madison got was 81 in the early morning, beating previous low records by 2 and 4 degrees respectively. Temperatures didn't fall below 79 in Chicago, 78 in Grand Rapids, Mich., and 75 in Indianapolis.

"When a day starts out that warm, it doesn't take as much time to reach high temperatures in the low 100s," said Marcia Cronce, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. "You know it'll be a warm day when you start out at 80 degrees."

For people in other parts of the country who aren't used to hearing the weather man say, "It'll be cooling down to 105 tomorrow," here are a few unique tips from the Valley of the Sun:

1. Keep your ride cool. Those cumbersome windshield reflectors are your new best friend. And if you have young children, buy an extra one to strap over a car seat to keep metal clasps from heating up in the sun as your car sits in the parking lot. You might even throw an ice pack or frozen water bottle in the seat to keep it cool for little ones while you shop.

2. Get creative about sleeping arrangements. Set up beds on a porch or back yard. Or just sleep in the shade, during the heat of the day.

3. Avoid the sun. Sure, sunscreen helps. But you can avoid it altogether by waking up and doing yard work before sunrise or going for your daily run at midnight.

4. Think before you touch. Any surface that sits in the sun could be hot enough to burn. There's no shame in using pot holders to open doors. Also, carry a towel to put on hot seats, and keep curtains pulled tight to block out the rays.

5. Water is your friend. Drink it. Swim in it. Spray it on your face. In Phoenix, shopping centers and cafes greet visitors by showering them with a fine, cool mist. You can get the same effect by filling a spray bottle with water.

And if all this talk about smoldering temperatures is getting you down, look on the bright side. You can always bake cookies on the dashboard of your car. We really do that.

Credit: Christian Science Monitor

Happy Birthday, Spam! America's favorite canned meat turns 75

Spam, the legendary canned meat whose very name invokes delight in some and queasiness in many more, turns 75 this month. The product’s parent company, Hormel Foods Corp., is celebrating with what it calls a “Spamtastic” birthday bash at the Spam manufacturing plant in Austin, Minn., complete with a headlining performance by the Temptations.

On the advertising front, Spam is marking the occasion by introducing its first-ever mascot – a stubby, mustachioed cartoon knight named Sir Can-A-Lot. Visit Spam’s surprisingly lush product website, and you can follow the little fellow on an animated journey through the Glorious Spam Tower and up into outer space, where you will be greeted by the knight in constellation form.

Sir Can-A-Lot is just the latest in long tradition of shrewd marketing moves for Spam, which seems to have thrived in the US more by poking gentle fun at itself than by actual taste (though enthusiasts in Hawaii and Asia might disagree).  Hormel first introduced the canned, processed lunch meat in 1937; the name “Spam” came from combining the words “spiced” and “ham.” Shortly thereafter, it became a staple of army diets during World War II, when an estimated 100 million pounds of Spam were shipped overseas to feed Allied troops. Many returned home without much enthusiasm for the stuff – real meat was hard to come by during the war, and low-cost Spam found its way into nearly every meal for the troops, who called it “ham that didn’t pass its physical.” Today, an estimated 3.8 cans of Spam are eaten every second in the United States – even if we don't always like to admit it.

The same can’t be said for parts of Asia and Hawaii, where Spam is hugely – and, unironically – popular. Residents of Hawaii, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands eat the most Spam per capita in the US and its territories.  Burger King and McDonald’s locations in Hawaii both feature Spam on their menus, and Spam musubi – a sort of spam in sushi form, paired with white rice and wrapped in seaweed – is a signature dish of the islands. You can also get certain varieties of Spam in these regions that you won’t find in the mainland US, including Honey Spam, Spam with bacon, and Hot and Spicy Spam (with Tabasco sauce).

Seven billion cans of Spam have been manufactured worldwide as of 2007, but its image in the States is still that of an unappetizing, indestructible mystery meat – a throwback to the Twinkie-dominated era of midcentury non-perishables that have gone largely out of fashion today. Spam even had its own Rockettes-style dance troupe for a time after World War II, the Hormel Girls. Made up of former G.I. women, the group toured around the country promoting Spam and even had a short-lived radio show.

But the canned meat may have gone the way of the Twinkie (parent company Hostess filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this year) if not for the British sketch comedy troupe Monty Python. Their classic “Spam” sketch features a woman unsuccessfully trying to avoid Spam on a diner’s breakfast menu (the word “Spam” even badgers its way into the ending credits). The sketch is credited with popularizing the term “spam” for unwanted emails. (Hormel tried to fight this as trademark infringement initially, but eventually just requested that email “spam” remained lowercase.) Hormel has embraced the Monty Python connection, lending Spam’s name and corporate sponsorship to the hit 2004 musical, “Spamalot.” The new knight mascot, too, seems inspired by that show, a remake of the 1975 classic “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”

Spam’s tradition of loving self-deprecation continues, if sometimes reluctantly. In 2001, Hormel opened an expansive Spam musem at the Austin, Minn, manufacturing plant location, where, in addition to canning Spam in a mock assembly line and eating at an all-Spam restaurant, you can screen Monty Python sketches. Another big facet of Spam’s popularity is state fairs, many of which hold Spam recipe contests. The annual “Spamarama” held every April Fool’s Day in Austin, Texas, has a contest with the objective of coming up with a way to make Spam edible, and one suspects that’s the unspoken goal of many other such contests.

And Hormel doesn't always take the Spam bashing in stride. In 2006, the company threatened to sue a local Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands  newspaper for articles decrying Spam, which has a very high salt content, as having adverse effects on the local population.

Still, if it continues selling at its current rate (122 million can per year, according to Hormel), Spam will roll out its 8 billionth can in two years or so. So while many of us may love Spam solely for its joke potential, many more love it honestly, and have for three quarters of a century.

Credit:Christian Science Monitor

Happy Birthday, America

I hope everyone has a fantastic fourth of July. Have fun, be safe and be proud to be an American!!

The true meaning of patriotism

Recently I publicly debated someone who said Arizona and every other state should use whatever means necessary to keep out illegal immigrants. He wants English to be spoken in every classroom in the nation, and the Pledge of Allegiance recited every morning. And he wants to restore every dollar of the $500 billion in defense cuts scheduled to start in January. "We have to preserve and protect America," he said. "That's the meaning of patriotism."

For my debating partner, patriotism is about securing the nation from outsiders eager to overrun us -- whether they're immigrants coming here illegally or foreign powers threatening us with aggression.

But there's another meaning to patriotism that may be more important. It's joining together for the common good -- contributing to a bake sale to raise money for a local school, volunteering in a homeless shelter, paying our fair share of taxes so our community or nation has enough resources to meet all our needs, preserving and protecting our system of government.

This second meaning of patriotism recognizes our responsibilities to one another as citizens of a society. It requires collaboration, teamwork, tolerance and selflessness.

But too often these days we're not practicing this second form of patriotism. We're shouting at each other rather than coming together -- conservative versus liberal, Democrat versus Republican, native-born versus foreign-born, non-unionized versus unionized, religious versus secular.

Our politics has grown nastier and meaner. Negative advertising is filling the airwaves this election year. We're learning more about why we shouldn't vote for someone than why we should.

Some elected officials have substituted partisanship for patriotism, placing party loyalty above loyalty to America. Just after the 2010 election, the Senate minority leader was asked about his party's highest priority for the next two years. You might have expected him to say it was to get the economy going and reduce unemployment, or control the budget deficit, or achieve peace and stability in the Middle East. But he said the highest priority would be to make sure the president did not get a second term of office.

Our system of government is America's most precious and fragile possession, the means we have of joining together as a nation for the common good. It requires not only our loyalty but ongoing vigilance to keep it working well. Yet some of our elected representatives act as if they don't care what happens to it as long as they achieve their partisan aims.

The filibuster used to be rarely used. But over the last decade, the threat of a filibuster has become standard operating procedure, virtually shutting down the Senate for periods of time.

Meanwhile, some members of the House of Representatives have been willing to shut down the entire government in order to get their way. Last summer they were even willing to risk the full faith and credit of the United States in order to achieve their goals.

The Supreme Court has opened the floodgates to unlimited money from billionaires and corporations overwhelming our democracy, on the bizarre theory that corporations are people under the First Amendment. Congress won't even pass legislation requiring their names be disclosed.

Some members of Congress have even signed a pledge -- not of allegiance to the United States, but of allegiance to a man named Grover Norquist who has never been elected by anyone. Norquist's "no-tax" pledge is interpreted only by Norquist, who says closing a tax loophole is tantamount to raising taxes and therefore violates the pledge.

True patriots don't hate the government of the United States. They're proud of it. Generations of Americans have risked their lives to preserve it. They may not like everything it does, and they justifiably worry when special interests gain too much power over it. But true patriots work to improve the U.S. government, not destroy it.

But these days, some Americans loathe the government -- and are doing everything they can to paralyze it, starve it, and make the public so cynical about it that it's no longer capable of doing much of anything. Tea Partiers are out to gut it entirely. Norquist says he wants to shrink it down to a size where it can be "drowned in a bathtub."

When arguing against paying their fair share of taxes, some wealthy Americans claim "it's my money." They forget it's their nation, too. And unless they pay their fair share of taxes, America can't meet the basic needs of our people. True patriotism means paying for America.

So when you hear people talk about "preserving and protecting" the nation, be warned. They may mean securing our nation's borders, not securing our society. Within those borders, each of us is on our own. These people don't want a government that actively works for all our citizens.

Yet true patriotism isn't mainly about excluding outsiders seen as our common adversaries. It's about coming together for our common good.

Credit: Robert Reich, Newsday

July 4th: Musings on the meaning of true patriotism

In the last two weeks, the Supreme Court has allowed police in Arizona to demand proof of citizenship from people they stop on other grounds (while throwing out the rest of Arizona’s immigration law), and has allowed the federal government to require everyone buy health insurance — even younger and healthier people — or pay a penalty. 

What do these decisions — and the national conversations they’ve engendered — have to do with patriotism? A great deal. Because underlying them are two different versions of American patriotism. 

The Arizona law is aimed at securing the nation from outsiders. The purpose of the heatlhcare law is to join together to provide affordable health care for all. 

The first version of patriotism is protecting America from people beyond our borders who might otherwise overrun us — whether immigrants coming here illegally or foreign powers threatening us with aggression. 

The second version of patriotism is joining together for the common good. That might mean contributing to a bake sale to raise money for a local school or volunteering in a homeless shelter. It also means paying our fair share of taxes so our community or nation has enough resources to meet all our needs, and preserving and protecting our system of government. 

This second meaning of patriotism recognizes our responsibilities to one another as citizens of the same society. It requires collaboration, teamwork, tolerance, and selflessness. 

The Affordable Care Act isn’t perfect, but in requiring younger and healthier people to buy insurance that will help pay for the healthcare needs of older and sicker people, it summons the second version of patriotism. 

Too often these days we don’t recognize and don’t practice this second version. We’re shouting at each other rather than coming together — conservative versus liberal, Democrat versus Republican, native-born versus foreign born, non-unionized versus unionized, religious versus secular. 

Our politics has grown nastier and meaner. Negative advertising is filling the airwaves this election year. We’re learning more about why we shouldn’t vote for someone than why we should.

As I’ve said before, some elected officials have substituted partisanship for patriotism, placing party loyalty above loyalty to America. Just after the 2010 election, the Senate minority leader was asked about his party’s highest priority for the next two years. You might have expected him to say it was to get the economy going and reduce unemployment, or control the budge deficit, or achieve peace and stability in the Middle East. But he said the highest priority would be to make sure the President did not get a second term of office.

Our system of government is America’s most precious and fragile possession, the means we have of joining together as a nation for the common good. It requires not only our loyalty but ongoing vigilance to keep it working well. Yet some of our elected representatives act as if they don’t care what happens to it as long as they achieve their partisan aims. 

The filibuster used to be rarely used. But over the last decade the threat of a filibuster has become standard operating procedure, virtually shutting down the Senate for periods of time. 

Meanwhile, some members of the House have been willing to shut down the entire government in order to get their way. Last summer they were even willing to risk the full faith and credit of the United States in order to achieve their goals. 

In 2010 the Supreme Court opened the floodgates to unlimited money from billionaires and corporations overwhelming our democracy, on the bizarre theory that corporations are people under the First Amendment. Congress won’t even pass legislation requiring their names be disclosed. 

Some members of Congress have signed a pledge — not of allegiance to the United States but of allegiance to a man named Grover Norquist, who has never been elected by anyone. Norquist’s “no-tax” pledge is interpreted only by Norquist, who says closing a tax loophole is tantamount to raising taxes and therefore violates the pledge. 

True patriots don’t hate the government of the United States. They’re proud of it. Generations of Americans have risked their lives to preserve and protect it. They may not like everything it does, and they justifiably worry then special interests gain too much power over it. But true patriots work to improve the U.S. government, not destroy it. 

But these days some Americans loathe the government, and are doing everything they can to paralyze it, starve it, and make the public so cynical about it that it’s no longer capable of doing much of anything. Norquist says he wants to shrink it down to a size it can be “drowned in a bathtub.”

When arguing against paying their fair share of taxes, some wealthy Americans claim “it’s my money.” They forget it’s their nation, too. And unless they pay their fair share of taxes, American can’t meet the basic needs of our people. True patriotism means paying for America. 

So when you hear people talk about patriotism, be warned. They may mean securing the nation’s borders, not securing our society. Within those borders, each of us is on our own. These people don’t want a government that actively works for all our citizens. 

Yet true patriotism isn’t mainly about excluding outsiders seen as our common adversaries. It’s about coming together for the common good.

Credit: Christian Science Monitor

What we love about Andy Griffith

It’s been said that when he was younger, Andy Griffith had aspirations to become an opera singer, but fans of “The Andy Griffith Show” and “Matlock” are undoubtedly happy that he wound up pursuing acting.

The actor, who died at 86 on Tuesday, is most beloved for his portrayal of Sheriff Andy Taylor on the timeless ’60s favorite “The Andy Griffith Show,” as well as for his role as defense attorney Ben Matlock on the late ’80s-mid ’90s series “Matlock.”

1. The example he set:

“The Andy Griffith Show,” with its unforgettable theme song, gave the actor a landmark role in Sheriff Taylor. The widowed father to a young Ron Howard’s Opie, Griffith’s portrayal of the Sheriff, who oversaw Mayberry, North Carolina, still resonates decades later.

Time magazine’s TV critic James Poniewozik nominates the show, which ran from 1960-1968, as one of the cultural touchstones that shaped America.

“This gentle small-town comedy gave us Mayberry’s quirks without ridiculing or patronizing them,” Poniewozik writes. “And Griffith’s Sheriff Taylor, who’d rather wield a wry comment than a gun, was a weekly example of Americans talking through their problems. “

It also served as an example for those watching, a thought we don’t often associate with TV programs today.

CNN.com commenter SnackMonster said, “I never knew my real parents when I grew up, but the home I was in as a kid had the Andy Griffith show on TV almost every day. Thanks Mr. Griffith for providing a role model for me when I needed one. You made a huge difference in my life.”

Concurred commenter DirtSense, “Growing up, I didn’t have a Dad. I had to look for ‘dads’ on TV to show me how to be. Andy Griffith was & still is one of my role models. Thank you for sharing your talent and wisdom.”

2. His love for North Carolina:

Griffith was a North Carolinian through-and-through, having been raised in Mount Airy and attending college at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. North Carolina’s Gov. Bev Perdue told CNN in a statement that Griffith’s birthplace was evident in his work.

“Throughout his career, he represented everything that was good about North Carolina: a small town boy and UNC graduate who took a light-hearted approach to some of the attributes he grew up with and turned them into a spectacularly successful career,” Gov. Perdue said. “And regardless of where that career took him, he always came back to North Carolina and spent his final years here. In an increasingly complicated world, we all yearn for the days of Mayberry. We all will miss Andy, and I will dearly miss my friend.”

Added CNN.com commenter shoyaryt, “Andy Griffith IS North Carolina… there are a lot of things we, in NC, pride ourselves with. Our pine covered mountains, our BBQ and basketball. But we pride ourselves most with our favorite neighbor, NC’s oldest and dearest friend; Andy Griffith.”

3. “Matlock”:

There was also, of course, his role as the argumentative defense attorney Ben Matlock.

The Virginian-Pilot suggested in a 2008 profile of the actor that “if you want the TV comparison, [Griffith is] closer to the analytical braininess of Ben Matlock than he is to the country wisdom of Andy Taylor.”

4. His versatility:

But even those two iconic shows don’t begin to crack the surface of Griffith’s contributions, which is the largest reason we adore Griffith — his talent played well from the stage to the screen.

He rose to fame and proved his wit with this 1953 comedic monologue, “What It Was, Was Football.” The monologue sold more than 800,000 copies and, like a lot of Griffith’s work, is as funny today as it was 59 years ago.

In addition to his Tony-nominated work on Broadway, Griffith made his mark in 1957′s “A Face in the Crowd” as Larry “Lonesome” Rhodes, a country boy with an appetite for power who becomes a media sensation.

CNN.com commenter dgoren found called Griffith’s work in “Face in the Crowd” “amazing, and probably his best single performance. Think how few actors can break the stereotype that can trap them from a famous role. Andy did it with Matlock just like Buddy Ebsen, but few can. That’s a testament to his tremendous talent. He could play a real ‘meanie’ when the role called for it. Extremely versatile.

5. His legacy:

With all of that, plus a Grammy-winning album to his name with “I Love To Tell The Story — 25 Timeless Hymns,” it’s no wonder so many concur with country singer Brad Paisley, who told CNN in a statement that few people will have the impact that Griffith had.

“An actor who never looked like he was acting, a moral compass who saved as many souls as most preachers, and an entertainer who put smiles on more faces than almost anyone; this was as successful a life as is pretty much possible,” Paisley said. “Andy Griffith made the world a better place, and I was so proud to call him a friend.”

Credit: CNN

Mayberry in Mourning, Andy Griffith, tv icon, dead at 86

Actor Andy Griffith, the man who played folksy Sheriff Andy Taylor in the fictional town of Mayberry, has died at the age of 86, Sheriff J.D. “Doug” Doughtie of Dare County, North Carolina, said Tuesday.

Griffith died at about 7 a.m. at his home on Roanoke Island, the sheriff said in a statement. The statement did not provide a cause of death.

Best known for his role on “The Andy Griffith Show,” the actor also starred as a murder-solving Southern attorney in the television series “Matlock” during the 1980s and 1990s. He was also known for his roles in movies and on the stage, as a producer and as a Grammy Award-winning gospel singer.

Ron Howard, who played Taylor’s son, Opie Taylor, on “The Andy Griffith Show,” said he is “forever grateful” to the actor.

“His pursuit of excellence and the joy he took in creating served generations & shaped my life,” Howard said on Twitter.

Credit: CNN

Kentucky likely to dominate 2013 draft, too

The 2012 NBA draft was a familiar scene.

Kentucky players heard their names called in suitably historic fashion -- Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist became the first teammates of the modern era to be selected Nos. 1 and 2 overall -- en route to an expected six total selections, four of which came in the first round. As during his Memphis tenure, and as in 2010 (when John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins both went in the top five) and 2011 (when Brandon Knight led the way) John Calipari was on the draft floor, smiling and hugging and soaking up the countless brand-oriented benefits that come with being at the center of yet another massive NBA draft haul.

This has become the routine for Calipari: Recruit some of the best prospects in the country, accelerate their cohesion and development, make a run at a national title, send them to the NBA draft, rinse, repeat. Whether you believe Calipari can claim credit for developing NBA players or merely recruiting them (I tend to fall on Jay Bilas's side of the argument, but there is some gray area there) the process has become an annual tradition.

There's no reason to expect anything different in 2013.

This morning, I planned to do a more in-depth, listy look at the teams who could challenge Kentucky for most populous draft classes in 2013 -- but, as usual, the pool of challengers looks slim. As Chad Ford wrote in his 2013 lookahead this weekend , Kentucky freshman Nerlens Noel is the early favorite to be the No. 1 overall selection in next year's draft. Even if that doesn't pan out -- scouts already really love Indiana's Cody Zeller, and Zeller should only improve as as sophomore -- it's unlikely we'll see Noel drop much further than the top five. Meanwhile, incoming Kentucky freshman Alex Poythress is ranked No. 5 in Ford's 2013 top 100 , while classmate Archie Goodwin comes in at No. 17 overall. Throw in power forward Kyle Wiltjer, and point guard Ryan Harrow, both of whom could have big seasons in starting roles, and while the Wildcats' talent won't come anywhere close to 2012's heights, it's clear they are still the leaders in the 2013 NBA draft clubhouse.

The closest any squad comes to matching the breadth and depth of UK's potential draft offerings per Ford's top 100 is UCLA. Shabazz Muhammed is a top-five talent, fellow freshman guard Kyle Anderson is ranked No. 15, and there are mock drafts that list forward Joshua Smith as a potential lottery pick (provided he can slim down and harness all the potential in that massive frame).

That's the closest challenger. Those UCLA players (and coach Ben Howland) have much to prove before that comes to fruition, and elite draft picks have not always thrived in Howland's traditional downtempo system. That's true of everyone in next year's draft, of course, and obviously it's much too early to start counting up draft picks. We're still an entire year, and an entire college hoops season, away.

But as of now, it would appear that what's been true of Kentucky under Calipari since he took the job will remain true next summer, too. If any other program matches UK's concentrated draft accolades, it won't just be an expected random blip. It will be a major surprise.

Credit: ESPN

Order up: 6 ways to make more money as a waiter or waitress

An opinion piece in The New York Times last week started like this…

Help wanted: Salary: $19,000 (some may be withheld or stolen). No health insurance, paid sick days or paid vacation. Opportunity for advancement: nearly nil.


That describes the hardships faced by food-service workers – 20 million Americans, with half of them working in restaurants. According to a recent report called The Hands That Feed Us by the Food Chain Workers Alliance (FCWA), the food industry employs more workers than any other, including health care and retail.

Yet food-industry workers are so poorly paid, The Times reports, “The biggest workforce in America can’t put food on the table except when they go to work.”

I’ve been in restaurants for seven years, and I’ve learned to make a living with a combination of hard work and clever schemes. Here’s what you need to know to make it in this harsh world…

1. Focus on your tips

A little-known fact about servers is how little a restaurant pays them. Since they’re tipped employees, they fall under a special minimum wage. Federally, that minimum is set at $2.13 an hour – which hasn’t changed since 1991.

According to the FCWA report, that means that only 13.5 percent of those surveyed made a “livable wage” – giving them the ability to cover basic needs like housing, clothing, and nutrition.

I’ve made as little as the minimum when I worked in Texas five years ago and as much as $4.26 an hour in Florida last year. But neither would be enough to live on if you don’t…

Forget about the hourly peanuts you make. It’ll all be sucked into the taxes you pay anyway. Concentrate on finding restaurants that are known for big tippers, not hourly wages.

Keep track of your tips. If your tips don’t make up the difference between the tipped minimum wage and the regular minimum wage – last updated in 2009 to $7.25 – your employer is forced by law to pay you the difference. But there’s a caveat. The numbers are based on weekly totals. A bad shift today might be countered by a good shift tomorrow.

Be responsible with the cash you get every day. Just because there are bills in your wallet doesn’t mean you can spend them. If you’re going out to have a good time, set a chunk of cash aside in your sock drawer – and don’t touch it. This is a big problem with some servers who let that cash burn a hole in their pocket.

2. Work long hours the right way

According to the report, only 11 percent of those surveyed worked more than 60 hours, with two or more jobs. I expected the number to be higher — working two jobs is smart.

Since employers are forced by law to pay you at least 150 percent of your hourly when you work more than 40 hours a week, most of them keep you from doing so. In the restaurant business, this translates to keeping you from picking up too many shifts or just sending you home in the middle of your shift. (I’ve had both happen to me.)

So, if your boss is stringent, work two jobs that’ll give you 25 or 30 hours a week. This way, you work as much as you want, and your wallet will reflect your hours.


3. Get insured one way or the other

Turnover in restaurants is high, so most of them see little value in investing for benefits. One of my managers used to joke that it’s only when restaurants force you to wear a tie that they care about you sticking around.

At my last job, we got a few minutes of vacation pay for every week we worked more than 25 hours. After four years there, I had accrued just a few days. According to the FCWA report, of those surveyed…

79 percent don’t have paid sick leave – or don’t know if they do
83 percent don’t get health insurance from their employer
58 percent don’t have health care at all
53 percent worked while they were sick
35 percent have used the emergency room as their primary care

Working for a chain of restaurants is more likely to get you health insurance – at the chain where I last worked, we had plans for both full-time and part-time employees. But don’t count on the job to give you benefits. Get health care on your own, if only to cover the basics. Check out our health care page to find discount rates in your state.


4. Move on up

If benefits are scarce, so is training and promotions. According to the report, of those surveyed…

81 percent never received a promotion
75 percent never had an opportunity to apply for a promotion
74 percent had no ongoing training from their employer
32 percent received no training at all after their first day

This doesn’t mean a salad prep can’t become a grill cook (which usually pays more). It just means that moving up is up to you. Like I told you in my guide to getting and keeping a restaurant job:

Don’t stop learning. Ask the bartender what good wine or drink goes with what dish. Memorize two or three suggestions a week. Within a month, you’ll know more than the others, meaning you’ll upsell more, getting guests to buy more than just what they wanted at first. Your wallet and your schedule will reflect this newfound knowledge.

This applies to cooks too. The kitchen manager at my last job started off as a busser and would stay late to help the cooks clean up – and in turn, they taught him how their equipment worked.


5. Take your breaks responsibly

Unfortunately, federal law doesn’t require an employer to give you a break. Thankfully, some state laws have this provision. In California, an employer has to give you at least a 30-minute break every five hours. In Florida, you get nothing unless you’re under 18. However, federal law says that if an employer does give you a break – five to 20 minutes – you get paid during that break.

According to the report, 40 percent of those surveyed never got even a 10-minute break. And 30 percent didn’t break for lunch.

I’ve never seen a manager object to someone taking a short bathroom break (which can translate to a cigarette or a quick phone call). But don’t be stupid about it. No matter what, never take even a five-minute break without your section (whether in the kitchen or out on the floor) being taken care of by a co-worker. That’s a quick recipe to get fired.


6. Be safe

According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, 4,960 workers died on the job in 2010. While serving food is a low-risk job, you can get hurt.

I once had a guest back into me and knock over a cocktail tray I was holding with four hot tea cups on it. I worked through my shift – but later found out I suffered third-degree burns on my neck and shoulder. Since this happened on the job, my restaurant paid for it all.

Back to the survey…

57.2 percent suffered injury or a health problem on the job
52 percent did not receive health and safety training from their employer
32.7 percent did not receive proper equipment to do the job
11.7 percent did something that put their own safety at risk

Most restaurants force you to wear slip-resistant shoes, or shoes that are specially made to stick to a wet floor. It’s not that they care for your well-being, it’s that they don’t want to be sued. If you slip and fall, and aren’t wearing the right shoes, they don’t owe you zilch.

For example, the first thing my manager did the night I spilled tea was…check my shoes. Only then did he authorize me to go to the hospital.

Federal Agency Wades Into Mermaid Debate

In an attempt to bring clarity to one of the great scientific debates of our time—of any time—the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has taken a strong stand on the existence of mermaids.

“No evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found,” the federal agency declares in a statement on its website.

NOAA, better known for issuing reports on such topics as fishery stocks and climate trends, was apparently moved to wade into the mermaid debate by an Animal Planet special that made the case for the mythical creatures’ existence. The special, called “Mermaids: The Body Found,” threw together “evidence” such as cave drawings, injuries to beached whales, and mysterious deep-ocean bloops to paint what it calls “a wildly convincing picture of mermaids, what they may look like, and why they’ve stayed hidden… until now.”

Discovery News notes that the show was intended as science fiction, but that didn’t stop viewers from pelting NOAA with demands for more transparency on the mermaid question.

History suggests NOAA’s statement won’t put the issue to rest, either. After all, the agency has issued one report after another showing that the world’s climate is warming dramatically, and there are still a few conspiracy theorists out there who maintain that the science doesn’t hold water.

Credit:Slate Magazine

Your Tomatoes Are Flavorless, Right? Here's Why

There are two pieces of late-breaking news on the tomato beat this week. First of all, tomatoes have shoulders. Second, tomatoes taste lousy. If you're younger than 70, you probably already know about the lousy part. The shoulders are surely more of a surprise — but they're both key parts of a new study published in Science that explains what's going on in the sorry world of supermarket tomatoes, and why they taste nothing like their sweet, flavorful cousins in the wild.

It was a good 70 years ago that marketers first started catching wise to something farmers knew already: a tomato on the vine that's uniformly light green may hardly be ready for eating, but it's exactly ready for picking — at least if it's destined for somewhere far away. By the time it's packed, shipped, unloaded at the store and displayed on the shelves, it will have turned a perfect, even red, which is eye-candy to shoppers.

Not all tomatoes send so clear a pick-me signal when they're ripening on the vine. Some have a more uneven look, with patches of darker green, particularly on the shoulders — the raised area at the top of the fruit that circles the depression where the stem attaches. Some of these might be ready for picking too — but some might not be, leading to a mixed shipment arriving at the store, half of which gets left on the shelves. So for that same seven decades, plant breeders have been selecting seeds from the uniformly green tomatoes, crossing them with other uniformly green ones and producing an uber-race of perfect visual specimens. But as with other very pretty things — the sea anemone, wolfbane, John Edwards — looks can mislead.

Perfect tomatoes may have the appearance, cookability and mouth-feel of the genuine article, but more often than not, the flavor is missing — a fact many people never even realize until they buy a tomato at a farmer's market or travel overseas to a place without massive grocery stores and marvel at this wonderful fruit they seem to be tasting for the first time. To learn at last why beautiful equals bland, a group of plant researchers headed by Ann Powell of the University of California, Davis, decided to look at the tomato's genes and see if there was something that was coding for — or at least affecting — both flavor and appearance.

Sifting through the tomato genome wasn't even possible until the entire thing was sequenced in the first place — something that happened just last summer and was announced in the journal Nature. With that sequence in their hip pockets, Powell and her colleagues collected some wild tomatoes with dark green shoulders and crossed them with their prettified, citified cousins. This allowed them to compare the similarities and differences between the two and eventually narrow the search for the culpable gene down to chromosome number 10. Studying that single chromosome more closely, they found a gene called SIGLK2, a sort of genetic master switch that regulates whether other genes are activated or remain inactive.

The genes that SIGLK2 controls regulate the formation of chloroplasts, components of cells that control photosynthesis. A heavy concentration of chloroplasts in a tomato leads to a heavy shading of green — which is precisely the quality plant breeders look to avoid. The problem is, chloroplasts also increase sugar levels in the tomato, and sugars play a key role in creating flavor.

"We looked at about a dozen varieties, one from Asia, some from Europe, and all of them had the same mutation," Powell told Science. That mutation was tiny: DNA is made up of combinations four nucleic acid bases — adenine, cytosine, thymine, and guanine, better known simply as A, C, T and G. One string of bases in the flavorless tomatoes is made up of a series of seven A's. In wild, tastier tomatoes there are only six. The proof that that infinitesimal flaw is the mutation responsible for poor taste came when Powell's team inserted a gene with the shorter sequence into a supermarket variety tomato genome and the sugars in the resulting fruit jumped 40%.

Ironically, the investigators in the current study never got to taste the tomato and enjoy the results of their work. Safety regulations forbid researchers from sampling genetically modified foods until they are certified safe. That may happen in the future, but until then, plant scientists, like the rest of us, will be left to get by on supermarket tomatoes that may look a lot lovelier than the box that they came in, but alas, taste pretty much the same.

Credit: Time Magazine