So Brian Williams asks President Obama what he thinks of the fact that one fifth all Americans believes he is a Muslim. The President gets defensive and sheepishly responds that this issue was put to bed during the campaign.

But let’s ask ourselves an honest question for a moment. If he were a Muslim, would it matter? Yes, he isn’t, and has said time and again that he is a Christian. But if he were a Muslim I couldn’t care less. My problem with Obama is not his faith or lack thereof but his policies. If Obama were an Islamic president of the United States who berated instead of coddled Arab dictators, like King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, he would have my vote. If he were a practicing Muslim who prayed in the direction of the Had but promoted democracy across the Middle East, rather than Kissingerian realpolitik, which seems to be the foundation of his foreign policy, I would endorse him. If he were a devout Muslim first magistrate of the United States who spoke out against the abuses of women in the Islamic world, I would deeply respect him. If he were a Muslim who prayed in the Oval Office five times a day and fasted all of Ramadan and then lectured Hamas and Hezbollah to stop putting all their money into rockets against Israel and invest it instead into Universities for their people, he would inspire me.

The problem with President Obama is that he does none of these things, rarely holding the Islamic world accountable for its absence of freedoms, refusing to personally condemn Iran for its plan to stone a woman to death, and putting the pressure on Netanyahu of Israel to make territorial concessions rather than place the blame for the failure of the progress toward peace squarely on the real culprits: the terrorist organizations of Hamas and Hezbollah, both Iranian proxies.

I have devout Muslim friends who love Israel and wish Arab countries emulated its democratic institutions, just courts, and freedom of worship and press. Likewise, I have G-dfearing Islamic friends who love America, would fight and die to protect her, and believe America is the light in an increasingly dark world. I would support anyone like this for President any day of the week over, say, Jimmy Carter, a devout and self-declared evangelical Christian, who goes against the stalwart evangelical Christian support for Israel and has the chutzpa to call Israel, a thriving democracy facing existential enemies, an apartheid state. I would take a competent Muslim President who believes in lowering the burden of taxation, controlling runaway spending, and vastly reducing the appalling Federal deficit over a President like Jimmy Carter, who as our leader, ran this country into the ground.

As a Jew I am trained to judge someone by their actions not their beliefs. I will choose an atheist president, who loves and respects all of humanity and would put an end to the genocide in Sudan any day over a religious president who believes that we Americans have no such responsibilities to people beyond our border.

If an American president believed in elves and the Easter bunny but fought Taliban misogynists who pour acid on women who attend University, I would follow him.

And if an American president spoke Klingon in his private moments and worshipped Capt. James T. Kirk of the Starship Enterprise as a divinity, but set up an alternative to the United Nations, to be known as the United Democratic Nations, open only to governments that were of the people and by the people, I would support him, too.

In short, I could not care less what a person believes but in what they do. 

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is the international best-selling author of 23 books and was the London Times Preacher of the Year at the Millennium. As host of ‘Shalom in the Home’ on TLC he won the National Fatherhood Award and his syndicated column was awarded the American Jewish Press Association’s Highest Award for Excellence in Commentary. Newsweek calls him ‘the most famous Rabbi in America.’ He has just published ‘Renewal: A Guide to the Values-Filled Life.’ Shmuley hosts ‘The Shmuley Show’ live every Sunday from 7-9 p.m. on 77 WABC Talk Radio. Follow him on Twitter @RabbiShmuley.

If An American President Were Muslim, Would we Care? by: Emunah Magazine

Moving and grooving NYPD traffic agent Wil bert Castillo (pictured) has been directing the flow of cars and pedestrians under the Brooklyn Bridge for just over a year, keeping everyone safely in sync.

Castillo, 47, a 10-year veteran, says dancing on the job makes him more approachable.

“I keep people safe. That’s my job, but pe destrians and tourists love to come up to me. I want to change the image of New Yorkers so people know we’re approachable,” said the Queens resident.

The married father of three began practicing his moves in the mirror and for his wife — and before long, he’d danced into the hearts of commuting curmudgeons heading to the unforgiving BQE.

“If they’re sad or worn out and I make them smile, I’ve done my job,” said Castillo.

His spins and pivots are rhythmically timed to the changing lights, and it’s not rare for soccer-mom-driven vans and sedans filled with suits to honk and wave to the affable agent.

“I told my girlfriend to put him on YouTube. He could be the next Internet sensation,” said Sheepshead Bay resident Justin Thomas, 23, who often passes Castillo.

Castillo’s bosses moved him from Canal Street and Hudson to the intersection of Old Fulton Street and Hicks Street because the traffic there was getting too backed up.

The 47-year-old native of Belize stepped up to the challenge and soon cleaned up the flow with his own flow.

And his moves happen rain or shine — often attracting photo requests from tourists.

“I’m a happy man,” Castillo said, “and I want to sell New York.

Source: NY Post

NYPD Traffic Cop Dancing On The Job Under Brooklyn Bridge Traffic by: Emunah Magazine

A band of artists whose job it is to translate special events into those colorful, whimsical versions of Google's corporate logo, the Doodlers almost certainly have one of the best jobs in the world.

This team's members mix artistic skills with an ability to fit into Google's culture–meaning they can speak engineering and hold their own among the uber-geeks–in order to do the one thing at Google designed specifically to put a smile on people's faces the world over.

After working on a story about Google's creation of a special playable Pac-Man doodle back in May, I arranged for a visit with the Doodlers to witness their process and the creation of an actual doodle. So it was on a sunny Tuesday morning last month, I found myself among the Doodlers in a small conference room at the search giant's headquarters here.

A brief history
A little context first. In 1998, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin decided to spoof the whole "out of office" idea by putting up a Burning Man logo behind the Google site's corporate logo while the two were at the annual arts festival in the Nevada desert. "While the first doodle was relatively simple," a corporate history of the Doodle recalls, "the idea of decorating the company logo to celebrate notable events was well received by our users."

In 2000, "Larry and Sergey asked current [Google] Webmaster Dennis Hwang, an intern at the time, to produce a doodle for Bastille Day," the history continues. "Pleased with the result, Dennis was then appointed Google's chief doodler and doodles became a regular occurrence on the Google home page."

The first doodle signaled that Google's co-founders were attending Burning Man.

(Credit: Google)

Today, the team is made up of five people–chief doodler Micheal Lopez and doodlers Susie Sahim, Jennifer Hom, Ryan Germick, and Mike Dutton.

And as part of my visit, they agreed to let me listen to their discussions about–and see their concepts for–future creations, so long as I didn't publish anything before September 4, when one of the new doodles celebrating the discovery of the Buckyball, would run worldwide.

It's notable that the doodle was running globally because just a fraction of the total creations are meant for a world audience. Most of their work is aimed at specific countries and celebrates local events, such as the birthdays of those countries' famed composers, scientists, and artists or national days of independence.

Regardless of whether a doodle is meant for the eyes of billions or just a fraction of that, Lopez said, the creative process is basically the same: the team tries to find a way to conceptualize the event and then tries to find the most fun representation of that idea.

Each year, the team creates about 200 doodles, and with each, it tries to instill Google's technology and its culture.

"The company feels pretty good about it. With all our products, we think of the user first, and this is another example where we really enjoy sharing….We get to have a human hand in our company as part of our interaction with users," said Germick, who led the Pac-Man effort.

Checking the facts 
With huge audiences viewing the doodles, those on the team know that it's important their work accurately represents the subject matter. Because if they get it wrong, the public will let them know.

For example, said Lopez, when the team put out a doodle commemorating the discovery of DNA, "we actually had drawn the double helix the wrong way…Scientists started writing us…[and] we revised it on the fly."

That's why, Germick said, when working on a doodle celebrating Pi Day–March 14, or 3/14–"I made sure to get a Princeton Ph.D.'s check on my representation of different geometric equations before I pushed [the doodle] out to hundreds of millions of users."

While team members will often have days, or even weeks, to finish their creations, that's not always the case. Hom recalled the day when water vapor was discovered on the moon, and it was decided that the team should get a doodle up that same day. "It looked like we had inside information," Hom said,"but really, we were reading the news."

When the so-called 'missing link' fossil was found, the team put up this logo within hours.

(Credit: Google)

When the so-called "missing link" fossil, was found in 2009, paleontologists felt it might fill in holes in their understanding of primate evolution, and the news created a splash worldwide. At the time, several of the Doodlers were at an awards ceremony in New York. But this piece of news was considered such geek manna that it was decided on the spot that Google needed to put up a doodle celebrating it. There was no time to lose, Germick said. Within hours, the resulting Doodle was bringing word about the fossil's discovery to untold millions.

Concepts 
While the Pac-Man doodle would have made the news any time, it was particularly notable because it was the first example of a special logo that was fully playable and interactive. But over the years, the team has experimented with a number of dynamic doodles. Among them are the celebration of Isaac Newton's birthday in which an apple falls from a tree, a UFO's creation of a series of crop circles, and one that people could click to collect candy wrappers. That one, of course, ran on Halloween.

After about half an hour of sharing the history of Doodles, it was time for the team to get down to business: discussing current projects and giving one other feedback on their progress.

Generally, one person is assigned a specific doodle, and each usually works on two or three at a time. This means that as a team, they can make progress on a lot of doodles at once.

The first concept doodle they discussed while I was in the room was one that was scheduled to–and did–run in Russia on August 19 celebrating the 50th anniversary of the space flight of Belka and Stelka, the two Russian dogs who became the first animals to go into space–and return alive.

Sahim was creating it. Her design, I was told, was inspired by the famed Nintendo franchise, The Legend of Zelda.

At this point, just two days prior to the doodle's publication, Sahim had already gotten the sign-off from a Google marketing manager in Russia, who had reviewed and approved it.

Next up was a doodle celebrating the 205th birthday of Danish ballet dancer and choreographer August Bournoville, which was scheduled to–and did–run on August 21.

This is one of the doodles–celebrating August Bournoville–that the team discussed during CNET's visit.

(Credit: Google)

Dutton explained that he had wanted to give the doodle a "dreamy feel," a "lost-edge quality," and a sense that the "body mass is fading." In the concept sketch, one could see a chair fading a bit into the background.

Next up was a doodle commemorating Ukraninan Independence Day on August 24, and then one for the 213th birthday of "Frankenstein" creator Mary Shelley on August 30. The Shelley doodle ran in the U.K. that day. In Lopez's conception, the doodle depicted a hallway in Dr. Frankenstein's home to pay homage to Shelley.

I asked why it was important to commemorate Shelley's 213th birthday, rather than one with a rounder number. Lopez said that Google simply likes to celebrate anniversaries and birthdays. "We're not going to wait for a big, round number," Lopez said. "We want to do it now."

Of course, as Germick put it, by celebrating birthdays like Shelley's 213th, it maintains the "element of surprise…We want to be somewhat serendipitous."

Buckyball 
After discussing a couple of more potential doodles, it was time to see some early concepts for a doodle celebrating the 25th anniversary of the discovery of buckminsterfullerene, a molecule that, Wikipedia says, is "composed entirely of carbon, in the form of a hollow sphere, ellipsoid, or tube." Spherical fullerenes are known as "Buckyballs" because these compositions have some of the same elements as geodesic domes, which were invented by Buckminster Fuller.

This logo was created to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the discovery of buckminsterfullerene.

(Credit: Google)

These molecules are commonly used in science, particularly in materials science, nanotechnology, and electronics, according to Wikipedia, yet they are also seen in the design of many different kinds of soccer balls.

That's why, when Hom began drawing her concept for a Buckyball doodle on the whiteboard, she incorporated what looked to everyone like a soccer ball. "Let's just re-use the World Cup doodle," someone joked.

Hom explained that she was thinking of two different ideas for the final design. One was slightly interactive, she said, and would feature a tiny particle rotating in circular motion around the fullerene. "Hopefully, this would spark user interest," she said, "and they'd mouse over it. And when they do, it would zoom in to a gigantic Buckyball. The user's mouse would cause it to rotate and spin."

She said that if that approach wasn't appealing to the team, she had also been conceiving of a static doodle.

I asked about the animation in her interactive idea. Germick said if they went in that direction, they'd "probably try to con an engineer into working with us in their 20 percent time." He was referring to the Google tradition of giving employees 20 percent of their work time to address personal projects.

"Some of the people I'm talking to about animating this are Buckminster Fuller fanatics," Hom said.

Indeed, she said that working on the project had felt like being in school because she felt a lot of pressure to get it right. "If I get it wrong," she said, "then everyone's going to be upset."

Source: CNET

At Google , Doodling Is Real Work by: Emunah Magazine

According to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday, the GOP leads the Democrats by 7 points on the "generic ballot" question, 52 percent to 45 percent. That 7-point advantage is up from a 3-point margin last month.

The generic ballot question asks respondents if they would vote for a Democrat or Republican in their congressional district, without naming any specific candidates.

"The survey indicates that independents and voters who dislike both parties are starting to break toward the GOP," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "In a year when anger at incumbents is a dominant political force, the key to the election lies among those who aren't rooting for either side."

According to the poll, the two parties are equally unpopular. Forty-nine percent of all Americans have an unfavorable view of the Democrats, with the same percentage feeling the same way about the Republicans. Just over one in five questioned dislike both parties.

Back in April, Americans who dislike both parties appeared to mildly favor the GOP on the generic ballot, by a 43-to-39 percent margin, with a large number saying at the time that they would pick a minor-party candidate or stay at home.

"Now, a lot of those voters appear to be bolting to the GOP," Holland said. "Republicans now have a whopping 38-point advantage on the generic ballot among voters who dislike both parties."

Republicans also have a large and growing advantage among independents. Sixty-two percent of independents questioned say they would vote for the generic Republican in their district, with three in 10 saying they'd cast a ballot for the generic Democrat. That 32-point margin for the Republicans among independents is up from an 8-point advantage last month.

"It's not surprising that those two groups are voting the same way, since almost by definition independents don't like either party," says Holland.

What will the "Obama factor" be in November? The poll indicates that most say that their vote for Congress will not be intended as a message for the president.

Twenty-four percent say their vote will be in opposition to Obama; with one in five saying their vote will be a message of support for the president. In 2006, anti-Bush voters outnumbered pro-Bush voters by more than two-to-one.

"Among those who plan to send a message with their vote this fall, Obama is having a negative effect but nothing like the effect George W. Bush had on Republican candidates in 2006," says Holland.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll was conducted September 1-2, with 1,024 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

GOP Seems To Be Gaining For The Midterm Elections by: Emunah Magazine

Hurd, who stepped down as part of a probe into inaccurate expense reports that were allegedly meant to cover up a personal relationship with a female marketing contractor, is close friends with Oracle CEO Larry Ellison–who, according to Reuters, ripped HP for their handling of the investigation. The news agency, citing an anonymous source, said that a final decision had not yet been made and did not specify exactly what position Hurd would be offered at Oracle.

"Hurd's resignation was stunning because he was widely praised on Wall Street," AP Technology Writer Jordan Robertson said on Sunday. "Investors praised his cost-cutting; HP announced about 50,000 job cuts over the five years Hurd was CEO. Wall Street also liked that he engineered more than $20 billion in acquisitions, which helped HP reduce its dependence on printer ink for the bulk of its profits… Those traits could help Hurd at Oracle, which is also known for aggressive dealmaking and cost cuts."

According to Robertson, Ellison, the co-founder and CEO of Oracle, has gone on record as calling HP's decision to force Hurd to resign the worst personnel decision since Steve Jobs was forced out at Apple a quarter of a century ago. He also ripped the company's decision to make the harassment claims public, as they ultimately found that he did not violate HP's sexual harassment regulations.

"The substance of her claim was that her work helping organize HP events dried up after she rebuffed Hurd's advances," the AP technology writer also said. "Hurd, 53, who is married with two children, denies making any advances on Fisher. Hurd also insists he didn't prepare his own expenses and didn't try to conceal his outings with Fisher, which often included dinner after the events Fisher helped organize and that Hurd attended."

Hurd, a 1979 graduate of Baylor University, spent 25 years with NCR Corporation, and served two years as the ATM and point-of-sale kiosk manufacturer's President and CEO. Under his leadership, HP took over the top spot in laptop computer sales in 2006 and desktop computers in 2007. Shares of the company have fallen 13-percent since he stepped down, according to Reuters.

Oracle To Hire Former HP CEO Hurd by: Emunah Magazine

More than 70 years after a $3 million fund was established for reclusive, eccentric Huguette Clark in 1926, "the trust’s value was still only $3 million" because it was never invested in stocks and bonds as it should have been for at least part of that time, claim explosive documents filed by two former Citibank trust officers.

The money had apparently been parked completely in bonds for decades, generating some income for Clark to live on but little or no growth for the fund balance, the court papers claim.

Citibank’s handling of the fund "needs to be independently investigated because the liability is now about $80 million which [the bank] owes to [Clark’s] trust," according the lawsuit filed by former Citibank trust officers John Cullen and Veronica Juliano.

The two former trust officers are soon set to meet with the DA’s office, which is probing possible mismanagement of Clark’s $500 million fortune by her lawyer, Wallace Bock, and accountant, Irving Kamsler.

In addition to the bank’s alleged mishandling of Clark's so-called charitable remainder trust, the trust officers' lawsuit charges that Bock knew about Citibank’s screw-up at least as far back as 1998.

But the legal papers say Bock dropped his threatened lawsuit against the bank after it hired him for $10,000 to represent it during an accounting of the trust.

"I asked, ‘Isn’t that a conflict of interest, since [Bock] wants to sue us,’¤" Cullen wrote in court documents.

He said his manager told him that that’s what the bank’s legal department had instructed.

Clark's trust fund was set up by the heiress’s mother, Anna, the year after Clark’s father, US Sen. William Clark of Montana, died.

Huguette Clark spent her life obsessively collecting dolls and shunning visitors, marrying once — briefly — and having no children. She has lived for the past two decades in Manhattan hospitals.

Her story only came to light recently after the media reported that Bock has kept her few, distant relatives from visiting her and not objected to a convicted sex offender, Kamsler, serving as her accountant.

Meanwhile, Bock and Kamsler have sold off her $23 million Renoir painting and $6 million Stradivarius violin, supposedly with her blessing, as her two massive mansions have stood vacant for nearly 60 years, costing her millions in upkeep.

Under the terms of the trust that Citibank was managing, Clark received income from the fund's investments, but whatever balance is left when the now-feeble heiress will go to the famed Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington DC, where there is wing named after her father, who donated 800 works to it upon his death.

Cullen, 68, filed a lawsuit against Citibank alleging the trust-fund mismanagement in 2008, after the bank fired him earlier that year. Juliano, who also was terminated, later joined the action, which is pending in White Plains federal court.

At his Westchester County home Friday, when asked if he believed he was fired because of his concerns about Clark’s trust fund, Cullen replied, "I don’t believe it, I know it."

A spokesman for Citibank’s corporate parent, Citi, said "Citi has acted appropriately in carrying out our fiduciary responsibilities in this matter and the allegations first made several years ago by a former employee are entirely baseless."

Bock’s spokesman, Michael McKeon, the lawyer "has and continues to act in the best interests of Ms. Clark. Any allegation to the contrary is without support."

According to the lawsuit, another alleged debacle involving also occurred involving the theft of some of Huguette Clark’s jewelry, which was kept in a bank safety-deposit box.

At one point, Bock told Citibank that "[its] trust department forgot to pay [Clark’s] safe-deposit-box fees," the suit says.

"After a few years, the branch drilled open the box, took an inventory and took [Clark’s] jewelry into a cardboard box, sealed it, and sent it down to its main vault for storage.

"A vault attendant slit open the box from the bottom, and took the jewelry. The jewelry was put into a Sotheby’s catalog, recognized and recovered," the suit says.

Citibank Being Sued for Depriving $80m From Heiress by: Emunah Magazine

KITTY HAWK, N.C. — Hurricane Earl hit hard and flooded roads that left thousands of people without power along North Carolina’s coastline on Friday morning, but the storm was weakening and seemed to have passed without inflicting any serious harm as it tore north through the Atlantic.

Two families from Newport, Va., stood on the deck of their house on Avon Beach on the Outer Banks of North Carolina as Hurricane Earl was heading for the East Coast.

The storm was still thrashing the Outer Banks with heavy rain and torrid winds, but it was downgraded to a Category 2 hurricane from a Category 3 early Friday morning.

In Hyde County, there were reports coming in of 5,000 people without power and three feet of flooding along barrier islands that received the brunt of the storm’s impact. But all emergency officials in neighboring Dare County said that thankly the night had passed quietly, with few and moderate calls for help from the residents who had decided not to evacuate the area.

“It’s been sort of a brush-by blow,” said Mark Van Sciver, a spokesman for the state’s Emergency Operations Center, who said that there were no reports of injuries or deaths.

At 5 a.m., Hurricane Earl was roughly 85 miles east of Cape Hatteras with winds of 105 miles per hour, and was steadily marching north, unleashing severe rain and gusts of wind.

Hurricane Earl is expected to reach Cape Cod in Massachusetts by early Saturday morning, and the National Weather Service warned Friday morning it would remain a “large hurricane” expected of bringing four to eight inches of rain and ripping away strips of beach even as it gradually loses weakens over the next three days as it steadily heads into colder waters.

At the inns on seaside Long Island and the Jersey Shore, owners had boarded up windows, pulled down their canvas awnings, and were handing out flashlights to guests who had come to try to enjoy in an extended Labor Day weekend.

On the eastern tip of Long Island, surfers in Montauk zipped up their wetsuits and were paddling out to take advantage of the waves before the weather grew too severe, and surfcasting fishermen were exulting that the approaching hurricane had pushed their catch of striped bass closer to shore.

“The fish here have been blitzing,” said Gerry Muro, 70, who spends his summers in Montauk.

On Nantucket, officials urged people to pull in their boats and planned to open an emergency shelter at a high school Friday morning.

Forecasters said that after passing North Carolina, the storm would most likely continue weakening as it headed north into colder waters.

In Massachusetts, where Earl is expected to pass perilously close to Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket Friday night, Gov. Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency and asked residents near the coast to consider relocating. In New York, the Long Island Railroad said it was canceling all service on the East End of the island for Friday, with trains set to shut down east of Speonk and Ronkonkoma. And in many communities along the Atlantic seaboard, residents and business owners began boarding up their windows and shuttering their homes as they anticipated the lashing from the storm.

The National Weather Service said Earl was heading north with winds of 105 miles per hour, and issued a tropical storm warning for parts of Long Island and a hurricane warning for coastal Massachusetts, including Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, which lie along the storm’s expected path as it curves to the northeast and sweeps up the coast. The storm could bring winds of at least 75 miles per hour, four to eight inches of rain and severe coastal flooding and erosion.

By 8 p.m. Friday, the hurricane should reach a point about 100 to 120 miles southeast of Montauk at Long Island’s eastern tip, bringing tropical-storm force winds of up to 74 miles per hour to parts of Long Island itself, said Ross Dickman, the meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service’s office in Brookhaven. He warned that such winds and heavy rains could start knocking down trees and power lines even earlier in the day Friday and urged residents to stock up on batteries and secure boats, beach chairs, outdoor umbrellas and any other objects that could turn into missiles.

On Nantucket, officials said they planned to open an emergency shelter at a high school Friday morning. No one has been asked to evacuate, and it would be very difficult, said Gregg Tivnan, the assistant town administrator.

Hurricane Earl Weakens As It Hits The Coast by: Emunah Magazine

Why Do Heavy Drinkers Outlive Non Drinkers? by: Emunah Magazine