http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=002a1edi
Editorial
La descomposición de la ANP
Mahmoud Abbas, presidente de la Autoridad Nacional Palestina (ANP) y máximo dirigente de Fatah, disolvió ayer el gobierno de unidad nacional encabezado por Ismail Haniyeh, jefe a su vez de Hamas; asimismo, el líder palestino declaró el estado de emergencia y aseguró que solicitará la intervención de una fuerza militar multinacional en la Franja de Gaza, donde desde hace una semana se vive una intensa confrontación armada. Hamas, por su parte, afirmó, por medio de su vocero Sami Abu Zuhri, que Haniyeh continuará al frente del gobierno palestino y rechazó la decisión de Abbas al considerar que ésta "no tiene ningún valor en la práctica". Esta declaración encierra un acertado y doloroso diagnóstico de la situación que se vive en esa región de Medio Oriente: dado el enorme grado de descomposición de la sociedad y la institucionalidad palestinas, resultan inútiles las medidas asumidas por Abbas, porque las instancias formales han perdido significado. En los territorios palestinos imperan hoy en día poderes fragmentados y fácticos, y la viabilidad de las instituciones creadas en el marco del proceso de paz de Oslo es por demás incierta. La ANP sólo puede mandar allí donde los milicianos de Fatah mantengan el control, y otro tanto ocurre con el gobierno de Haniyeh y los combatientes de Hamas.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=politica&article=003n1pol
Plasmadas, ''entregas de dinero'' y regalos, favores varios, así como sus reuniones
Lista de ''favoritos'' de Ahumada, en agenda secretarial de 2003
Funcionarios, políticos, periodistas y árbitros, en sus páginas
Rosario Robles, muy citada
AGUSTIN SALGADO, GABRIELA ROMERO SANCHEZ
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=politica&article=012n2pol
Fueron atacadas luego de operativo en mayo pasado
Violaron militares a dos menores en Michoacán, confirma la CNDH
MARTIN DIEGO RODRIGUEZ
Guanajuato, Gto., 14 de junio. El presidente de la Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos (CNDH), José Luis Soberanes Fernández, informó que han sido confirmados dos de los cuatro casos de violación denunciados por mujeres de Carácuaro, Michoacán, cometidos por miembros del Ejército durante un operativo antidrogas realizado el 2 de mayo pasado.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=economia&article=025n2eco
Decae flujo de remesas: BdeM
ROBERTO GONZALEZ AMADOR
La desaceleración en el flujo de remesas es más que un hecho coyuntural. En un reporte emitido este jueves, el Banco de México confirmó el estancamiento en la captación de ese capital, el más importante después del petróleo. En el primer cuatrimestre del año, los emigrantes mexicanos enviaron 7 mil 310 millones de dólares, cantidad que representó un aumento de apenas 4 por ciento en comparación con el mismo periodo de 2006.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=023a1pol
Luis Javier Garrido
La abdicación
El gobierno de facto de Felipe Calderón está aceptando en los hechos el fracaso que ha tenido durante seis meses en materia de seguridad y de empleo, y en diversos sectores de la derecha mexicana la preocupación es cada vez mayor por el destino del gobierno espurio que contra la razón y el derecho ayudaron a enquistarse y que hoy se halla a la deriva.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=opinion&article=a06a1cul
John Berger
Borrar el pasado (algunas notas en torno a un dibujo)
Como las palabras, las apariencias pueden leerse también y, de entre las apariencias, el rostro humano constituye uno de los textos más largos.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2007/06/15/index.php?section=estados&article=034n1est
Preside la Comisión de Medio Ambiente del Congreso estatal
Arrasa un diputado bosque en Jalapa para hacer residencias
Dice tener autorización
Desoye el gobierno protestas de ecologistas
ANDRES T. MORALES
Jalapa, Ver., 14 de junio. Justo Fernández Garibay, presidente de la Comisión del Medio Ambiente, Recursos Naturales y Aguas del Congreso local y ex dirigente estatal del Partido Verde Ecologista de México, inició la destrucción del predio La Joyita, uno de los últimos reductos de bosque de niebla en esta ciudad, para construir un fraccionamiento habitacional del lujo.
http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/columnas/65747.html
Bajo Reserva
Los periodistas de EL UNIVERSAL
15 de junio de 2007
Osiel Cárdenas da nervios
La ciudad de Monterrey y municipios aledaños se han convertido en un foco rojo para el gobierno federal en la batalla contra las mafias del narcotráfico. Ahora el tema de conversación en la Sultana del Norte está relacionado con las primeras declaraciones del capo del cártel del Golfo Osiel Cárdenas Guillén ante la justicia de Estados Unidos.
http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/431349.html
Arribarán a NL mil 600 federales
Se reúnen Ramírez Acuña y García Luna con el gobernador
Juan Cedillo
El Universal
Viernes 15 de junio de 2007
MONTERREY, NL.- Los secretarios de Gobernación y de Seguridad Pública federal, Francisco Ramírez Acuña y Genaro García Luna, acordaron con el gobernador Natividad González Parás, el arribo de mil 600 elementos de las fuerzas federales al estado, para reforzar la lucha en contra del crimen organizado.
http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80876/
Rectifica la FIFA y margina sólo a La Paz y Cuzco
Con esta medida, quedan habilitados los estadios de Bogotá (2,640 metros), Quito (2,800 metros), Cochabamba (2,500 metros) y Arequipa (2,300 metros).
Asunción, Paraguay.- La Paz y Cuzco finalmente son las únicas ciudades vetadas por la nueva resolución de FIFA que prohibe la disputa de partidos internacionales en alturas superiores a los 3,000 metros sobre el nivel del mar.
http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80879/
Preocupa a Monsiváis empobrecimiento del lenguaje
“No es que empobrezca solamente el vocabulario de los jóvenes, sino también el de niños y adultos, pero son los jóvenes quienes suelen marcar el rango de utilización de palabras”Â
México, DF.– Reconocido como uno de los mejores escritores de México, Carlos Monsiváis, manifestó su preocupación porque el culto a las imágenes produce, en forma constante, un creciente empobrecimiento del vocabulario oral entre la sociedad.
http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80898/
El futbolista cubano que desertó, llegó a Miami
El delantero Lester Moré dijo que tomó la decisión de dejar el equipo porque “uno no ve el fruto de la profesión que hace. Yo ganaba 10 dólares al mes”.
Miami, Florida.- El delantero Lester Moré, quien desertó de la selección de Cuba durante la Copa Oro se encuentra en esta ciudad donde expresó su deseo de trabajar y jugar en el futbol en Estados Unidos.
http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80887/
Apoya UNAM en reordenamiento ecológico en Michoacán
Posibilita su participación en acciones orientadas al mejoramiento del nivel de vida de los habitantes de las comunidades de alta marginación.Â
México, DF.– En el marco del programa de Servicio Social “La UNAM en tu comunidad”, 136 estudiantes contribuyeron al reordenamiento ecológico territorial en nueve municipios de Michoacán, mediante la estrategia de vinculación universidad-municipio.
http://www.milenio.com/index.php/2007/06/15/80908/
Mezcal, en la Cineteca Nacional
El realizador Ignacio Ortiz destacó la importancia de la función social del cineÂ
México, DF.– El realizador Ignacio Ortiz presentó su pelÃcula “Mezcal” en la Cineteca Nacional, donde se le preguntó sobre algunos inconvenientes enfrentados durante el rodaje en el estado de Oaxaca, el filme se estrena este viernes con 10 copias.
http://www.proceso.com.mx/analisis_int.html?an=51535
Narcotienditas, proletarización de las drogas
josé gil olmos
México, D.F., 13 de junio (apro).- Se encuentran en la esquina de una calle, la casa de un vecino, el departamento contiguo, en el viejo callejón o en supuestas bodegas. Las narcotienditas son el fenómeno más claro de la proletarización de las drogas en México.
http://www.proceso.com.mx/noticia.html?sec=0&nta=51603
Virtual espaldarazo de Calderón a reclamo de Greenspan
carlos acosta córdova
México, D.F., 14 de junio (apro).- Las declaraciones vertidas ayer por el expresidente de la Reserva Federal estadunidense, Alan Greenspan, en torno a abrir Pemex a la inversión privada, generaron airadas reacciones –la mayoría de rechazo-- entre legisladores, exfuncionarios como José Angel Gurría y aun de la actual encargada del sector en el gobierno federal.
http://www.proceso.com.mx/noticia.html?sec=4&nta=51586&nsec=La+Capital
El GDF, listo para poner en marcha su canal de TV: Ebrard
de la redacción
México, D.F., 14 de junio (apro).- Tras destacar el anuncio de la Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones (Cofetel), el jefe de Gobierno del Distrito Federal, Marcelo Ebrard, se declaró listo para iniciar la programación en el Canal 21 digital que se le podría otorgar, para el que en su etapa inicial invertirá 35 millones de pesos.
http://www.proceso.com.mx/columna.html?col=8&nta=51349&ncol=Las+andanzas+de+Talia
Juan José Gurrola
roberto perea
México, D.F., 11 de junio (apro).- “Lo difícil no es llegar a la vanguardia, sino mantenerse en ella.” Así lo afirmó en alguna ocasión el enfant terrible, Juan José Gurrola, controvertido creador de una compleja obra que abarca expresiones tan diversas como dibujo, dramaturgia, traducción, dirección de escena, actuación, coreografía, arquitectura, diseño, música, cine, fotografía, pintura y performance, actividades a las que dedicó más de 50 años de su existencia.
http://www.proceso.com.mx/columna.html?col=5&nta=51347&ncol=Permanencia+Voluntaria
Zodiaco, desquiciante
fausto ponce
México, D.F., 11 de junio (apro).- A finales de los sesenta, un asesino serial que se hacía llamar Zodiac aterrorizó a la ciudad de San Francisco y algunos condados aledaños. Sus acciones acapararon la atención de los medios y tuvieron tal eco que Zodiac sirvió de inspiración para el maloso Scorpio, de la cinta Harry el Sucio (con Clint Eastwood).
Al alza petroprecios
Finanzas - Viernes 15 de junio (15:38 hrs.)
* El WTI cerró en 68 dólares por barril
* El crudo Brent acabó en 71.47 dólares
El Financiero en línea
Nueva York, 15 de junio.- El precio del crudo de Texas siguió al alza hoy en Nueva York, donde cerró por encima de los 68 dólares, debido a la inquietud que generan las tensiones en Nigeria y Oriente Medio y las expectativas de que la demanda en EU seguirá fuerte.
Cuba e Irán apuntalan su comercio
Economía - Viernes 15 de junio (14:35 hrs.)
* Ambos gobiernos firman acuerdos para impulsar su relación bilateral
* El arranque de los convenios cuenta con créditos por 200 mde
El Financiero en línea
México, 15 de junio.- Cuba e Irán, dos de los gobiernos más ardientes críticos de Estados Unidos, firmaron esta semana una serie de acuerdos que buscan hacer despegar su relación política también en el plano comercial.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6756431.stm
Drink headache plagues
By James Rodgers
BBC News,
Heavy vodka-drinking has compounded many Russians' woes
"Drink up and shut up," was the way cynics summed up the Soviet "era of stagnation".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6755789.stm
Angry eBay pulls Google adverts
Auction website eBay has pulled its
The move comes after Google angered eBay with a provocative decision to hold an event on the same evening as eBay's annual merchants' conference.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6755039.stm
The islands will return by "peaceful means", says Mr Kirchner
Argentine President Nestor Kirchner has said
Mr Kirchner was speaking on the 25th anniversary of the end of the conflict over the islands in the south
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6752853.stm
FBI tries to fight zombie hordes
The vast majority of hijacked computers are Windows PCs
The FBI is contacting more than one million PC owners who have had their computers hijacked by cyber criminals.
The initiative is part of an ongoing project to thwart the use of hijacked home computers, or zombies, as launch platforms for hi-tech crimes.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6757729.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6756357.stm
The politics of
By Steven Eke
BBC Russia analyst
Andrei Lugovoi has denied the charges against him
The announcement by the FSB,
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2659712.ece
A triumph for Hamas... but a tragedy for the Palestinians?
A war in
By Donald Macintyre in
Published:
The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas dissolved the "national unity government" last night and sacked its Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh after an especially savage day of internecine violence ended with Hamas in control of the Gaza Strip.
Mr Abbas's move, which Fatah hopes will underpin its dominance of the West Bank after the near-total defeat of its forces in Gaza, underlined the growing separation of the two Palestinian entities and prompted talk among some Israeli analysts of a "three state solution" involving Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.
Hamas Radio underlined Mr Abbas's lack of control over
Hamas's internal grip on
In a decree announced by one of his senior aides, Tayeb Abdel Rahim, in Ramallah and swiftly dismissed by Hamas officials in
But it had been the battle for the headquarters of Preventative Security in
Television pictures had earlier shown some of Hamas's Fatah captives being marched along the street with their hands in the air. The Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri denied reports of executions and insisted: "Whoever was killed was killed in clashes."
He added the Islamic group had been forced to wrest control from Fatah because its security services were corrupt and generated chaos. But a Fatah official said that Hamas shot dead seven of its fighters outside the building and a doctor at
Neither the official nor the medic were prepared to give their names for fear of reprisals. A witness, Amjad, also declined to give his full name when he told the Associated Press from his home: "They are executing them one by one. They are carrying one of them on their shoulders, putting him on a sand dune, turning him around and shooting."
The headquarters has a symbolic importance for Hamas beyond its role as a key military bastion and the bloody assault on the compound appeared to be in part a settling of scores more than a decade old. It was Preventative Security that spearheaded Yasser Arafat's famous crackdown on his Hamas opponents in the mid-1990s. It was also in this building that the interrogations took place in which Hamas figures of the time like Mahmoud Zahar who until a few months ago was the Palestinian Foreign Minister are alleged to have been humiliated and tortured by the Fatah forces.
Some of the masked Hamas gunmen kissed the ground after the building was captured amid thankful cries of "Allah Akbar". Hamas TV said the Preventive Security building would be turned into an Islamic college and displayed a room packed with what the station said was wire-tapping equipment.
The attack came after five days of fighting which have cost 90 Palestinian lives and seen both sides carrying out other summary executions, throwing opponents from the upper floors of high-rise buildings, hijacking ambulances to use as military vehicles, and engaging in gunfire inside the precincts of hospitals.
The dire impact of the conflict on
Mr Haniyeh reaffirmed his belief in the national unity government in a television broadcast early today and insisted it would continue to the " best of its abilities". He appealed once again for the release of Alan Johnston, the kidnapped BBC journalist. And he went out of his way to dismiss the idea that a separate Palestinian state could be created in
Fatah leaders who were blamed by Mr Haniyeh for undermining the national unity government came under criticism from local commanders for absenting themselves from the Strip during the fighting.
In the West Bank Fatah militants rounded up nearly 90 Hamas fighters in the first such effort to reassert its authority since the Arafat crackdown in 1996. Issam Abu Bakr, a Fatah leader in the
The near-rout of Fatah in
While the former appeared ready to try to make the national unity government work, the latter argued that it had failed to achieve a lifting of the international boycott.
Israeli officials were quoted as saying that Ehud Olmert would tell President George Bush that
In fact, even in relatively peaceful times,
Nevertheless the Israeli hints suggested the possibility of a "West Bank first" policy of trying to reach agreements with Mr Abbas which ignore
In terms of progress to a long-term settlement there are paradoxes in this approach, because there is little to negotiate about over
The forces behind this eruption of violence
Who and what are Fatah and Hamas?
Fatah, formed in the 1950s by Yasser Arafat, started as an armed liberation movement trying to take control of the whole of historic
Fatah ran the Palestinian Authority set up under Oslo and lost the PA elections partly because it was seen as inefficient and corrupt, and arguably, partly because it had failed to fulfil its ambition of a Palestinian state. Hamas, formed in 1987 was a Palestinian offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, committed then - and by its charter now - to establishing an Islamic state in the whole of historic
It gained popularity both through its commitment to armed actions against
It has resolutely refused to recognise
How come they are fighting now if they are supposed to be in government together?
The bitter rivalry between the two groups, partly compounded by the refusal of elements in Fatah to accept the results of the 2006 elections, had spilled into serious violence, resulting in some 160 deaths, at the turn of the year, an outbreak supposed to have been stopped by the Saudi-brokered Mecca deal which formed the new "national unity" coalition. But it was a shotgun wedding, based on the deep desire of the Palestinian population for security and the allocation of ministerial posts rather than a joint political programme. And second, it looks as though neither Mahmoud Abbas the (Fatah) President or Ismail Haniyeh the (Hamas) Prime Minister have been able to exercise full control of their forces.
How did the latest round of fighting start?
Almost impossible to identify a single moment though there were a number of incidents on 8 June, including the violent kidnappings of two Hamas figures by Fatah gunmen, a bodyguard to Mr Haniyeh and a doctor, who were respectively beaten and shot and wounded.
A Fatah activist was also shot dead by Hamas gunmen after they complained he had been among gunmen who attacked Hamas supporters outside a mosque. But these incidents were triggers rather than causes.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2660512.ece
Man guilty of 'Ku Klux Klan' kidnaps
AP
Published:
A reputed member of white supremacist group the Ku Klux Klan has been found guilty in the
James Ford Seale, 71, had pleaded not guilty to charges related to the deaths of Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee in south-west
The 19-year-olds disappeared from
The jury in
Federal prosecutors indicted Seale in January almost 43 years after the murders. When he is sentenced on August 24, he faces life in prison on the two counts of kidnapping and one count of conspiracy.
Jurors deliberated just a few hours before convicting Seale last night.
The prosecution's star witness was Charles Marcus Edwards, a confessed Klansman. During closing arguments earlier yesterday, prosecutors acknowledged they made "a deal with the devil" but said that offering immunity to a Edwards to get his testimony against Seale was the only way to get justice.
Edwards testified that he and Seale belonged to the same Klan chapter, or "klavern," that was led by Seale's father. Seale has denied he belonged to the Klan.
Edwards testified that Dee and Moore were stuffed, alive, into the trunk of Seale's Volkswagen and driven to a farm. They were later tied up and driven across the
"Those two 19-year-old kids had to have been absolutely terrified,"
In its closing arguments, the defence asserted that Seale should be acquitted because the case was based on the word of an "admitted liar."
"This case all comes down to the word of one man, an admitted liar, a man out to save his own skin," federal public defence lawyer Kathy Nester said. "A case based on his word is no case at all."
In the final part of closing arguments, federal prosecutor Paige Fitzgerald rebutted Nester's claims that Edwards could not be trusted. Fitzgerald also suggested that Seale's own words incriminated him.
"Let me tell you about one man's word. 'Yes. But I'm not going to admit it. You're going to have to prove it,"' Fitzgerald said, repeating a statement that a retired FBI agent testified he heard Seale make after being arrested on a state murder charge in 1964. That charge was later dropped.
The defence claimed that the prosecution failed to prove key elements needed for conviction and did not establish that Seale had crossed state lines while committing a crime, which is vital because that's what gives the federal government jurisdiction.
http://news.independent.co.uk/fisk/article2659694.ece
Robert Fisk: Disgraced UN chief and Nazi war criminal Waldheim, dies aged 88
Published:
So the old rogue is dead. That is all I could say when I heard yesterday that Kurt Waldheim had reached the end of his days at 88.I spent months, years, investigating his dark past in what we now call Bosnia, when he - let us not be coy about this - was part of the Bosnien-Kampfgruppen of Wehrmacht Army Group E of General Löhr, fighting "terroristen" (yes, indeed, the Nazis called them terrorists, just as they talked about the "RAF Terroristenfliegen") in the Balkans. Waldheim had been secretary general of the UN, had lectured UN officers in
I remember, when Waldheim was President of Austria - stamps were issued, heaven spare us; no mention of course of 1943 or 1944 or 1945 - how he turned up in
Waldheim - how his friends would prefer that they didn't read these words this morning - was based at a town called
It was an Austrian journalist who alerted me to Waldheim, a reporter whose father had fought in the Wehrmacht, who had survived the evacuation of north Africa ("I do hope I didn't kill him," the "Enigma" cryptologist said to me when I told her of his attempt to escape by air - his plane got through the Allied net). "Look for the letter W," the Austrian journalist said, the letter W after each debriefing, each Allied commando captured by the Gestapo, each prisoner to be extinguished by "nacht und nebel" - by night and fog.
No, Waldheim didn't order their deaths. He didn't even interview the captured British commandoes, or so he said, but merely "collated" their reports. His junior officers did the interviewing (let us not contemplate what that meant). Then the British prisoners disappeared into night and fog.
I recall finding the German interrogation papers of a young Briton who had been caught trying to escape from
I remember how I visited
I even visited his interrogation office, next to an execution pit wherein Serbs and Jews were massacred daily. Did the rifle shots not disturb Kurt Waldheim's concentration? Oh, what it must have been to have the peace and quiet of the UN headquarters on the
Monty Woodhouse was the top man for SOE - Special Operations Executive - in
So what memories did Waldheim carry with him to the grave? During the war, Woodhouse's Greek partisans captured a Gypsy who was spying on his comrades for the Italians. Woodhouse decided that he should be hanged.
I asked him what it felt like to do such a thing - to commit what, I suppose, we would call a war crime, were it Waldheim whom it had been proved had done it. Woodhouse replied to me - and I have his words in my own handwriting as I write this: "It was terrible - I felt terrible. I still bring the scene back to me from time to time. He was a wretched youth. He didn't say anything really - he was so shaken. He was a sort of halfwit. I was at the hanging. He was hanged from a tree. They simply pulled a chair from beneath his feet. I don't think it took long for him to die. I don't know exactly how long. We were only a hundred men or so - it was the early days of the occupation. If we had let him go, he would have told the Italians... After that, I told Zervas not to take any prisoners."
When I left Bosnia in the summer of 1988 in the aftermath of my Waldheim investigations, I called my foreign news editor, Ivan Barnes of the The Times, to tell him that I saw so many parallels in modern-day Yugoslavia with Lebanon on the eve of conflict in 1975 that I believed a civil war would break out in Bosnia in the near future. The local Serbs even abused me for driving to Waldheim's ex-headquarters with a Croatian driver. "We'll report it if it happens," Barnes roared down the phone at me. In 1992, I did report the Bosnian war - for The Independent.
And what of Waldheim? The Austrian state defended him. He appeared on postage stamps. He went to the opera. He was forbidden entry to the
His former United Nations colleagues clucked and re-clucked over his hypocrisy. And I well remember his number two at the UN telling me how he always knew that "KW" was a "crook" - this just three days before I came across a second-hand copy of Waldheim's memoirs in Waterstone's bookshop in Piccadilly with the very same man's warm appraisal of Waldheim as a "man of principle" in the frontispiece.
In 1987, King Hussein took Waldheim to the heights of Um Queiss to overlook the Israeli-occupied West Bank and awarded him the Hussein bin Ali medal - named after Hussein's grandfather. The Plucky Little King praised Waldheim for his patriotism, integrity, wisdom and "noble human values". General Löhr, I should add - Waldheim's superior officer in
http://news.independent.co.uk/sci_tech/article2659713.ece
Giving money away makes you feel better - especially if you're a woman
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Published:
Economists have looked inside the heads of people prepared to give money to a good cause and found the warm glow of true altruism really does exist, at least in women.
People who volunteer to donate money to charity feel much better about giving it away in this way than they do when paying their taxes, shows a study in which a sophisticated brain-scanner analyses the biological basis of spending money.
Two economists and a cognitive psychologist studied how different regions of the brain reacted when female volunteers were given money to spend - or not to spend - on a food aid project and on government taxes.
They found that as the volunteers watched the financial transactions on a computer screen, deep-seated parts of the brain associated with the pleasure of eating began to be stimulated. Nerve cells in the caudate nucleus and the nucleus accumbens normally fire when someone eats a favourite food such as a chocolate or a sweet but this time they became excited when the money went to a food charity, but less so when it went to a government tax office.
"The surprising element for us was that in a situation in which your money is simply given to others - where you do not have a free choice - you still get reward-centre activity," said Professor Ulrich Mayr, a psychologist at the
The research, published in the journal Science, centred on 19 women who were each given $100 to "spend" on computer transactions while they were being scanned by a functional magnetic resonance imager, which measures brain activity in real time.
None of the women was aware of what the others were doing and everyone was given a degree of anonymity so that the act of giving was not constrained by the thought of what others may think of them.
Professor William Harbaugh, an economist at
"To economists, the surprising thing about this study is that we actually see people getting rewards as they give up money. Neural firing in this fundamental, primitive part of the brain is larger when your money goes to a non-profit charity to help other people," Professor Harbaugh said. "On top of that, people experience more brain activation when they give voluntarily, even though everything here is anonymous. That's a very surprising result, and an optimistic one."
The researchers warned that society could not rely on people to give voluntarily to good causes because some took a "free ride" on the charitable donations of others.
"Taxes aren't all bad," Professor Mayr said. "Paying taxes can make citizens happy. People are, to varying degrees, pure altruists. On top of that ,they like the warm glow they get from charitable giving. Until now we couldn't trace that in the brain," .
The women in the study whose brains responded the most when giving to charity rather than keeping it for themselves were called true altruists. "The others are egoists," the professor added. "Based on what we saw in the experiments, we can use this classification to predict how much people are willing to give when the choice is theirs."
About Schmidt
Retired middle-American Warren Schmidt (Jack Nicholson) gives belated meaning to his life by sponsoring a Tanzanian boy, Ndugu.
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
Robin of Locksley (Kevin Costner) and his men rebel against the grasping King John and the Sheriff of Nottingham's tyrannical reign by robbing the rich and giving to the poor.
It's A Wonderful Life
An angel recounts the deeds of suicidal George Bailey (James Stewart), which include lending money to avert a financial crisis in his town.
Scrooge
The spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come help miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Albert Finney) rediscover his generous side, and buy Christmas dinner for the Cratchits.
Brewster's Millions
Monty Brewster (Richard Pryor) splashes $30m on charities and pointless but well-paid jobs for his friends (among other things) so he can claim a $300m inheritance.
http://football.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/0,,2104130,00.html
Stevens names and shames 17 transfers in bungs inquiry
'Whoever he is, Lord Stevens, he is a liar. They will rue the day they were ever born,' fumes implicated agent
James Dart and agencies
Guardian Unlimited
http://www.guardian.co.uk/weather/Story/0,,2103903,00.html
Further storms forecast as floods hit
James Sturcke and agencies
Guardian Unlimited
Torrential overnight rain triggered floods and transport disruption today as forecasters warned the severe weather would continue into the weekend.
http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/story/0,,2103771,00.html
Study links drug use with crisis in sexual health
John Carvel, social affairs editor
The Guardian
Increasing numbers of young people are using ecstasy, cannabis, amphetamines and cocaine to prolong sexual pleasure, government advisers said last night.
http://music.guardian.co.uk/rock/story/0,,2102991,00.html
Sgt Pepper must die!
Ever get the feeling you've been cheated? It's meant to be a classic album, but all you can hear is a load of boring tripe ... we've all felt that way. And so have the musicians we asked to nominate the supposedly great records they'd gladly never hear again
Interviews by Paul Lester
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2103555,00.html
So bad it's good
The bestseller charts are groaning with real-life accounts of neglect, violence and sexual abuse. The worse your childhood, it seems, the more people want to read about it. Have we turned into a nation of ghouls? Esther Addley investigates the remarkable rise of 'misery lit'
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2103557,00.html
If you are looking for God, try prison. Paris Hilton found Him there in no time, like others before her
Alexander Chancellor
The Guardian
Those of us who have no religious faith have every reason to envy those who do. It must be wonderful to understand the meaning of life and to see death as a mere stepping-stone on the path to eternity. But if this state of grace eludes you, there is something you can do that might be of help: commit a crime and go to prison. For prison is the place in which people find God most easily.
http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/biography/story/0,,1991328,00.html
The monster I loved
When Boy George's mother announced that she was writing her memoirs, everyone expected a tale of a parent's support for her heroin-addicted son. In the event, she had a more shocking story to tell - of how she kept on loving her husband despite years of intimidation and brutality. Dinah O'Dowd talks to Chrissy Iley
The Guardian
http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,,1984961,00.html
Power, corruption and lies
To the west,
The Guardian
http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,,1985172,00.html
'I was just waiting for my time'
Alicia Keys grew up carrying a knife in Hell's Kitchen,
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1984847,00.html
My husband, the serial cheat
Until six weeks ago Sue Langley was enjoying the good life and looking forward to a happy middle-age with her partner of 30 years. Then she found a letter that revealed a shocking secret ...
The Guardian
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985049,00.html
Call yourself a critic?
Ever since our arts team began writing blogs, readers have responded with praise - but also scorn. Film critic Peter Bradshaw explains how this new world of rough and tumble keeps his wits sharp and his ego in check
The Guardian
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985066,00.html
Calling all my hecklers
Blogs will be a great place for debate - once all that anger dies down, says music critic Dorian Lynskey
The Guardian
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1985075,00.html
Culture criticism
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Another view
Maya archaeologist Elizabeth Graham on Apocalypto
The Guardian
The chases were terrific, and I cheered for the good guys. But if Apocalypto is supposed to bear some relation to Maya civilisation, then I have to hate it. It conflates 2,000 years of Maya history into a single period - the equivalent, in
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