AT&T tightens handset upgrade policy to 24 months, following Verizon’s move

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

By Phil Goldstein

ATT-logoAT&T Mobility (NYSE:T) will now make customers wait 24 months instead of 20 months to upgrade to a new, subsidized device. The move mirrors one that rival Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ) announced in April.

The change affects any AT&T customer whose contract expires in March 2014 or later. “Today, we’re announcing a 24-month upgrade policy across all of AT&T’s wireless products and services,” the company said in a blog post. “This aligns device upgrade eligibility with our standard two-year wireless agreement.”

AT&T’s move, like Verizon’s, is likely being done to increase margins at the carrier. AT&T said last week that it expects its second-quarter wireless EBITDA margins to be similar to those from the first quarter of 2013, which would be lower than in the year-ago period. AT&T said its margins will take a hit in the second quarter thanks to promotions, higher gross additions and more smartphone upgrades.

Read more: AT&T tightens handset upgrade policy to 24 months, following Verizon’s move – FierceWireless http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/att-tightens-handset-upgrade-policy-24-months-following-verizons-move/2013-06-10#ixzz2VpcrjT00

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Out of Jail, Does Wesley Snipes Have a Second Act?

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

English: Mug shot of Wesley Snipes.

By Allison Samuels

Actors Wesley Snipes is still a few weeks away from becoming a free man. Still, the 50-year-old one-time star can spend his last days on house arrest secure in the knowledge that he’ll have at least one job waiting for him when he returns to Tinseltown.

Lionsgate Films announced earlier this week that Snipes is set to appear in the third installment of his good friend Sly Stallone’s franchise film series The Expendables. The movie centers on a group of older action heroes solving crimes together and will also star Jackie Chan and Nicolas Cage.

A paying gig is exactly what Snipes needs as he attempts to revive his career after serving nearly two years in jail for tax evasion. He was released into house arrest in New York in April.

Still, while Snipes’s first few months of freedom will find him gainfully employed, many in Hollywood say they see little chance of the actor regaining the top billing he once enjoyed. The reasons, they say, have less to do with time served than with an immensely talented actor too consumed by ego and pride to get out of his own way.

In his early career, the obstacles were different. Dolores Robinson, Snipes’s one-time manager, recalls being told several times by Hollywood bigwigs that Snipes was just too dark for major lead roles. They’d add that Denzel Washington’s brown skin tone was as about as dark as they were willing to go. “The powers that be weren’t shy about letting their true feelings be known,’’ said Robinson.

Read More Out of Jail, Does Wesley Snipes Have a Second Act? – The Daily Beast.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Andrew Solomon – Love, no matter what

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

Give this presentation by Andrew Solomon a few minutes. Bear with him and you will discover how profound his message is.

Posted in Soul Brother Presents | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

How George Zimmerman Could Be Acquitted Of Murder

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

By Judd Legum

George Zimmerman

On June 10, the murder trial of George Zimmerman will begin, 470 days after he shot and killed Trayvon Martin on a rainy evening in Sanford, Florida.

Since that night, Martin’s death has already had a profound impact on Sanford and the nation. But the outcome of the trial, which is expected to last between four to eight weeks, is still uncertain. Since Zimmerman does not dispute that he killed Martin, the defense must establish that Zimmerman acted in self defense.

Here is the key evidence that could support an aquittal.

1. No true eyewitness other than Zimmerman. The most significant evidence supporting the defense’s case is that the only living eyewitness to the entire incident is George Zimmerman. Ultimately, the burden of proof is on the prosecution to prove that Zimmerman was not acting in self-defense. Zimmerman, of course, says that his head was being pounded on the concrete and he had to shoot Trayvon Martin to save his own life. The prosecution will have to completely discredit Zimmerman’s version of the events without any eyewitness testimony supporting their petition.

Zimmerman may not testify during the trial. He has given several statements to the police which could be admitted as evidence.

2. A bloody nose. Photos of Zimmerman taken immediately after the shooting show he was injured — primarily a bloody nose and other lacerations to the head — during his altercation with Martin. Although this does not establish who was the aggressor, it is consistent with Zimmerman’s version of the events.

Read More How George Zimmerman Could Be Acquitted Of Murder | ThinkProgress.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

How George Zimmerman Could Be Convicted Of Murder

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

George Zimmerman

By Judd Legum

On June 10, the murder trial of George Zimmerman will begin, 470 days after he shot and killed Trayvon Martin on a rainy evening in Sanford, Florida.

Since that night, Martin’s death has already had a profound impact on Sanford and the nation. But outcome of the trial, which is expected to last between four to eight weeks, is still uncertain. Since Zimmerman does not dispute that he killed Martin, the defense must establish that Zimmerman acted in self defense.

Here is the key evidence that could support a murder conviction.

1. Expert audio analysis. An audio expert says Trayvon Martin screamed “stop” and “I’m begging you” just before shot was fired. Alan Reich, an audio expert retained by the prosecution, says his analysis of 911 calls that night revealed that it was Martin, not Zimmerman, who was crying out for help prior to the shooting. Another expert, Thomas Owens, said he ruled out Zimmerman as the source of the screams. The defense has retained an expert from the United Kingdom who says the kind of analysis performed by the prosecution experts is not reliable.

If Reich’s testimony is admitted at trial and the jury finds it to be reliable, it would seem to undermine Zimmerman’s claim of self-defense. Its unclear if the testimony will ever reach the jury, however. The judge held a hearing on the admissibility of Reich’s analysis over three days but was unable to conclude it prior to the start of jury selection. The prosecution must show Reich’s “conclusions are based on methods ‘commonly accepted within their particular scientific or expert community‘ as reliable.” It will be completed next week.

Read More How George Zimmerman Could Be Convicted Of Murder | ThinkProgress.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Hunger in America: Food Insecurity disproportionately affects African-Americans

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother
Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Sprint: You Want National Security? We Got Your National Security

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

English: PHILDELPHIA (Oct. 10, 2009) Admiral M...

By David Benoit

Facing noise from Washington and Englewood, Colo. about whether its sale to Japan’s SoftBank Corp. (9984.TO +9.52%) would raise national-security issues Sprint Nextel (S -0.62%) has gone about as high as it could in the national-security system for a board member to assuage those fears.

The telecommunications company announced today that retired Admiral Mike Mullen, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a well-respected voice on national security, will join the board of Sprint after the SoftBank deal closes. Mullen, 66, will take the position to oversee compliance with the agreement the companies reached with the government for “all security-related matters.”

As part of the deal, the new Sprint will have a four-member national-security committee, including a security director who will sit on the wireless carrier’s board, WSJ had reported. Members of the committee would be approved by the government, WSJ said.

Sprint’s deal has run into some political opposition over whether or not it was inviting in Chinese suppliers that could raise concerns for some U.S. government agencies. SoftBank had a relationship with China’s Huawei, a company that the U.S. has blasted, but SoftBank has pledged to remove any equipment from its network.

Read More Sprint: You Want National Security? We Got Your National Security – MoneyBeat – WSJ.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Half Lives: Why the Part-time Economy Is Bad for Everyone

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

By Lynn Stuart Parramore

jobWhy is a whole job getting harder to find every day in America? Ever since the financial crash, a growing number of people have been forced to take part-time gigs when what they really want is something increasingly out of reach: solid, full-time employment. Between late 2007 and May 2013, the number of part-timers jumped from 24.7 million to 27.5 million. A 2013 Gallup poll shows that one in every five workers is now part-time. Some folks, like students, may work part-time because they want to. Nothing wrong with that. But involuntary part-time employment is not a choice, it’s a burden. Often it means substandard jobs with crazy schedules that don’t pay nearly enough. According to the Labor Department, as many as a third of all part-timers fall into the involuntary category. There are signs that their ranks are likely to swell.

Part-Time Nation

Employers have found a new excuse to drop full-time employees to part-time status: the Affordable Care Act. Diane Stafford of the Kansas City Star looks at a trend called the “Obamadodge,” in which bosses around the country, including Regal Entertainment Group, franchise owners of Five Guys, Applebee’s and Denny’s, and the owner of Papa John’s pizza chain, have announced plans to side-step new requirements that businesses with over 50 full-time-equivalent employees offer their full-time workers access to a qualified healthcare plan or pay a penalty.The healthcare law defines a full-time employee as anyone working more than 30 hours a week, so the boss simply cuts workers’ hours and hires additional part-time staff to make up the difference. Stafford notes that as many as 2.3 million workers across the country are at high risk of having their hours slashed to below the 30-hour mark.

Read More Half Lives: Why the Part-time Economy Is Bad for Everyone | Alternet.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Bill Cosby: A plague called apathy

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

English: American entertainer and commentator ...

By Bill Cosby

In terms of health, two things stand out that Mayor Bloomberg has jumped into to find some kind of remedy that will help cut back on illness — the abuse of sodas and tobacco.

No 1: Smoking — and a big howl went up from people who want to smoke. But when you look at it, everything points to smoking as a problem; whether a person dies from cancer or not, it’s still other things — emphysema, all kinds of breathing problems, second-hand smoke onto the children, let alone minute things such as you smell like cigar, cigarette or pipe — it’s in your skin, it’s in your hair. Mayor Bloomberg jumped in on that and people complained. Restaurants complained, people complained, why did they complain?

Money. That’s why. People are greedy. It wasn’t about somebody dying, it is all about money, so they use something called choice, which makes no sense at all. I have the right to smoke myself to death, they say. I don’t know if you ever had relatives who are sitting there and mentally they are in a state of addiction and they say, “No, I want to have my cigarette.” They have a metal bottle and two things going up in their nose and they have a pack of cigarettes in their pocket or pocketbooks and they keep saying, “I know, I know,” and people push them around in the wheelchair to have a smoke.

No. 2: Juvenile diabetes. Children are not being taken out of harm’s way. And there are many things that we also can do, but one is you don’t want your child consuming too much sugar. That is what the mayor tried to do with the sugar in the soft drinks.

Read More Bill Cosby: A plague called apathy – NYPOST.com.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Edward Snowden was NSA Prism leak source

Posted on June 10, 2013 by The Soul Brother

snowden102way_sq-d779e434f052651ef1d564b1ffb82b6566496e56-s6-c30A former CIA technical worker has been identified by the UK’s Guardian newspaper as the source of leaks about US surveillance programmes.

Edward Snowden, 29, is described by the paper as an ex-CIA technical assistant, currently employed by defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton.

The Guardian said his identity was being revealed at his own request.

The recent revelations are that US agencies gathered millions of phone records and monitored internet data.

The Guardian quotes Mr Snowden as saying he flew to Hong Kong on 20 May, where he holed himself up in a hotel.

He told the paper: “I don’t want to live in a society that does these sort of things… I do not want to live in a world where everything I do and say is recorded.”

Asked what he thought would happen to him, he replied: “Nothing good.”

He said he had gone to Hong Kong because of its “strong tradition of free speech”.

Tracking

On Wednesday night, the Guardian reported a US secret court had ordered phone company Verizon to hand over to the National Security Agency (NSA) millions of records on telephone call “metadata”.

Read More BBC News – Edward Snowden was NSA Prism leak source – Guardian.

Posted in News from the Soul Brother | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment