Military Strategy Forum with Major General Steven L. Kwast, Director, U.S. Air Force Quadrennial Defense Review

The Center for Strategic and International Studies presents the latest in the special QDR Discussion Series of the Military Strategy Forum?

The Quadrennial Defense Review:

United States Air Force?

?

a discussion with

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Major General Steven L. Kwast

Director, U.S. Air Force Quadrennial Defense Review

?

and?

?

David J. Berteau

CSIS Senior Vice President and Director of the International Security Program

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The past week has brought renewed focus to the QDR. Please join us for a discussion with Major General Kwast, followed by a Q&A.

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Tuesday, August 6, 2013

1:30 - 2:30 p.m.

?

CSIS

1800 K St NW, B1AB Conference Room

Washington DC 20006

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The Military Strategy Forum Series is Underwritten by?Rolls-Royce North America?

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/csis-events-listing/~3/SmacsfwHRPg/military-strategy-forum-major-general-steven-l-kwast-director-us-air-force-quadrennial-defense

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How Much Is a Sports Rivalry Worth?

New York Yankees' Alex Rodriguez takes one from Boston Red Sox catcher Jason Varitek at Fenway Park July 24, 2004.

Photo by Brian Snyder/Reuters

When I went to my first game at Fenway Park in 2002, I was excited to hear Red Sox fans outside the stadium chanting ?Yankees suck! Yankees suck!?

I turned to the guy who invited me and said, ?Hey, you got me tickets to a Yankees game? Awesome.?

?Nope,? he answered. ?They?re playing the Cleveland Indians.?

By some subjective and completely unscientific measures, the Yankees?Red Sox rivalry is the most storied in American sports. In fact, it has been a rather lopsided affair, even accounting for the Theo Epstein?led resurgence of the Red Sox that began about a decade ago. The Yankees have won 27 world championships. Boston has won seven, with just two of those since 1918. The Red Sox have a .457 winning percentage against the Yankees since 1900, their worst record against any team in the American League. Still, the Sox obsession with the Bronx Bombers has a tangible benefit.

?Boston is a relatively large-market team, but the Red Sox enhance their value by playing up the rivalry with the Yankees,? says Evan Osborne, an economist at Wright State University who has done economic modeling on sports rivalries. ?For the Yankees, it?s much less important. Everyone hates them, so, in a sense, every team is their rival.?

If a sports team needs one thing?well, it?s probably a large market. But if a franchise needs a second thing to ensure its economic health, it?s a good rivalry. How much hay has Boston made by playing David to the Yanks? Goliath? According to the 2013 Forbes rankings, the Red Sox are the third most valuable team in baseball, behind the larger-market Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers. The Red Sox are worth 47 percent more than the Philadelphia Phillies, who occupy a much bigger city. Though there are obviously many factors that come into play here?the added value of a treasured landmark like Fenway Park, Boston?s historic affection for baseball?the Phillies? lack of a historic rival like the Yankees surely factors into the club?s lower standing in the financial standings.

The Forbes baseball rankings, from top to bottom, demonstrate the value of a rivalry. The top few teams are all involved in intense rivalries: The Yankees have the Red Sox, the Dodgers have the Giants, and the Cubs have the Cardinals. Most baseball fans would struggle to identify true rivals for the least valuable teams. (Sorry, Royals fans. The Cardinals don?t really think of you as their main rivals.) It?s hard to separate correlation from causation here, but the correlation is striking.

College football, with only a dozen games a year and enormous stadiums to fill, may be the most extreme example of the economic value of sports rivalries to a community. The game between the University of Idaho and Boise State reportedly brings $1 million to the Moscow, Idaho economy in one weekend. And a local restaurateur reports a 65 to 75 percent increase in sales on the day of the Utah?BYU game. And, where there?s money, politicians are sure to meddle. The South Carolina House of Representatives last year considered, but ultimately rejected, a law mandating an annual football game between Clemson and the University of South Carolina. And a former Texas governor publicly pleaded in vain to keep Texas A&M in the Big 12 to maintain their rivalry with the University of Texas.

Recognizing the value of a good rivalry, American sports leagues go to great lengths to create and promote them. When the NFL realigned its divisions in 2002, the league minimized the combined geographic distances between the teams in each conference, likely as a means to maximize the possibility that nearby fans would develop intense antipathy for each other. The divisions with the least combined distance between the teams, the NFC North and the AFC Central, feature some of the strongest rivalries, according to Osborne?s research. Interleague games in Major League Baseball and interdivision matchups in college football conferences introduce an obvious unfairness into the sport?teams whose traditional rivals are strong are dealt a handicap?but we tolerate it for the sake of entertainment.

Rivalries have an economic value because they seem to tap into the same subconscious processes as other forms of marketing. As Charles Duhigg described in The Power of Habit, marketers use a habit loop consisting of a cue, a routine, and a reward to hook consumers on a product. (Marketing legend Claude Hopkins hooked Americans on toothpaste, for example, by using the film that naturally develops on teeth as a cue and a beautiful smile as a reward.) Rivalries work on the same primitive neurological process. ESPN plays up traditional rivalries on SportsCenter (the cue) in the week leading up to the game (the routine), while the winners take some sort of tangible prize (the reward), like Paul Bunyan?s Axe or the Fremont Cannon. Major League Soccer, unwilling to wait for rivalries to develop organically, has rather unsubtly attempted to push the same buttons in our basal ganglia, with the Rocky Mountain Cup and the Cascadia Cup.

Stoking our primordial passions is a risky economic gambit, though. It may inspire us to care deeply and spend without inhibition, but it also brings out the worst in fans, owners, and athletic directors. Racist chanting and inflatable bananas, directed at superstar Mario Balotelli, interrupted the Milan derby earlier this year. Otherwise good coaches, like Ohio State?s John Cooper, have lost their jobs largely because of poor records against a single team. And rivalry destroyed the Scottish soccer league. As Celtic and Rangers improved, the rest of the league atrophied or regressed, essentially reducing the entire season to the home and away series between the top two teams. In an attempt to finally vanquish their rivals, Rangers owner Sir David Murray boldly declared in 2000, ?For every five pounds Celtic spend, we will spend ten.? The strategy eventually led to the liquidation of his team, with the remnants sent down to a lower division last year.

Like so many other economic tricks, rivalries can do more damage than good when left unregulated. And it?s risky to rely on rivalry as a primary economic strategy. The Yankees, the team that everyone hates, has long been the richest team in the sport. Boston, which is substantially less reviled, is no closer to surpassing the Bronx Bombers? wealth than they are to exceeding their trophy haul.

Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/rivalries/2013/08/sports_rivalries_the_economics_of_crosstown_hatred.html

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If you can think of a single reason why #faggot wouldn't be blocked on the iPhone app, I'm all ears.

In the slow battle between humankind's love of porn and Tumblr's need to somehow make money, we find ourselves in a sort of ceasefire: boobs can stay, but they won't be easy to find. Caught in the armistice are plenty of inoffensive things. Why can't I search for #gay on my phone, but it's easy to find naked teens?

David Karp, Tumblr's boy king in the middle of a capitalism crash course, has tried to give an explanation:

Some search terms are blocked (returning no results) in some of our mobile apps. Unfortunately, different app environments have different requirements that we do our best to adhere to. The reason you see innocent tags like #gay being blocked on certain platforms is that they are still frequently returning adult content which our entire app was close to being banned for. The solution is more intelligent filtering which our team is working diligently on.

This is true: searching for "gay" or "lesbian" returns porn along with other, visually innocuous stuff about just being gay. But imagine yourself, for a moment, in this position: you're black, or Jewish, or Italian, or something, and you want to look at things you can relate to on Tumblr. This mere act of searching is barred because of the chance that some porn might be included in the sweep, a boot in the fishnet. The way you are is considered objectionable, a blanket offense.

Meanwhile, with this very same Tumblr app, you can easily search for a slur against you:

Or pro-anorexia propoganda, which is a violation of Tumblr's non-enforced community guidelines:

To reiterate: gay, no. Thinspo, yes:

You can cruise this "hot teen" Tumblr on your iPhone?no problem:

There are whole Tumblr sites dedicated to underage girls, fully iPhone compatible:

There are plenty of young girls to cart around on your smartphone:

But remember?this isn't allowed:

What's left unsaid here is "Apple," whose notoriously prudish decency policies have been a sticking point for years. It shouldn't be surprising that Apple would threaten to toss out Tumblr's iOS app over gay erotica?they've done it before!

But let's imagine something for a moment.

Imagine if, instead of hastily scrambling to meet Apple's senile puritan mores with censorship policies that don't make sense, Tumblr had said no. Imagine if Tumblr had said Sorry, but blocking an entire sexual orientation is a little too much for us. Imagine of Tumblr had bluffed and said, Go ahead, block our app. Make more kids start using Android. Imagine if Tumblr had passed the buck to Apple?if the blame truly lies there?and let the millions of gay, straight, and whatever people who comprise its hallowed community write petitions. Imagine if Tumblr could pin its porn war on Apple, if it could've made this someone else's problem. Imagine if Tumblr, instead of obfuscating its porn debacle with talks of "app environments" and "filters," just told the truth?Hi everyone, we're still figuring out how to reconcile porn and advertising, but in the meantime, we don't think it's right to block an entire sexual identity.

Imagine if Tumblr, for all its talk of being The Cool Website worth over a billion dollars to Yahoo! actually did the cool thing here. It's sort of hard to imagine!

Source: http://valleywag.gawker.com/if-you-can-think-of-a-single-reason-why-faggot-wouldnt-1004015215

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Cruz seeks grassroots move against health care law

NEW ORLEANS (AP) ? A grassroots effort against President Barack Obama's health care overhaul could persuade skittish Republicans to deny money for the law and overcome arguments that any resulting shutdown of the government would be the GOP's fault, Sen. Ted Cruz said Friday.

"We have to stand up and win the argument," the Texas Republican said to spirited applause on the opening day of the annual RedState Gathering, a meeting of conservatives highly critical of many established Republican leaders as well as Democrats.

Cruz, a tea party-backed first-term lawmaker, has long suggested that one way of taking money from the law would be to hold up a continuing funding resolution to keep government agencies running after Sept. 30. Several of his Republican colleagues have called such a move counterproductive and detrimental to the party and the nation.

Cruz said the effort should start in the House with passage of a resolution that would fund government with the exception of the health care law.

"We don't have the votes right now. In fact, to be honest, we're not close," Cruz said. But, he noted, he won a come-from-behind victory in Texas' Republican Senate primary last year with strong grassroots support, beginning with conservative bloggers.

On Friday, the GOP-controlled House passed for the 40th time a measure targeting the law that Republicans deride as "Obamacare." The bill preventing the Internal Revenue Service from implementing any part of the health care law passed on a near party-line vote of 232-185. But the legislation is certain to be ignored in the Democratic-controlled Senate.

Liberal groups announced Friday a campaign in Louisiana and nine other states to counter criticism of the health care law. They're also encouraging those who need insurance to enroll in the state exchanges established under the law when the enrollment period opens Oct. 1.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cruz-seeks-grassroots-move-against-health-care-law-224432091.html

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AstraZeneca warns of higher costs as drug sales slide

By Ben Hirschler

LONDON (Reuters) - British drugmaker AstraZeneca warned on Thursday of higher costs in 2013 as it invests through a slump in sales caused by a wave of patent expiries on key medicines.

The prediction that operating costs will now increase by a low-to-mid single digit percentage rate this year amounts to an effective cut in earnings guidance, analysts at Jefferies said.

Deutsche Bank said consensus full-year earnings forecasts could fall by a couple of percent.

New Chief Executive Pascal Soriot is striving to turn around the business after a series of setbacks in research and a wave of patent expiries. He has warned that fixing Britain's second-biggest drugmaker will take several years.

Sales in the second quarter fell by a slightly greater-than-expected 6 percent to $6.23 billion, while earnings tumbled by nearly a quarter due to a higher tax rate.

There were, however, some bright spots, with lung drug Symbicort doing well in the United States and demand picking up for new heart drug Brilinta.

Shares in the company slipped 0.7 percent by 0825 GMT (4.25 a.m. ET), underperforming a wider London benchmark index that was up 0.2 percent.

Soriot has set out a strategy of revamping research, accelerating certain development projects and striking deals, both to acquire smaller biotech companies and license in promising new medicines.

He added the latest asset to the company's pipeline on Wednesday through a tie-up with U.S. biotech firm FibroGen potentially worth more than $815 million for rights to an experimental anaemia drug.

Sales were hit in the latest quarter by falling revenue from off-patent antipsychotic drug Seroquel, as well as growing competition to top-selling cholesterol fighter Crestor, which has lost patent protection in some countries and faces pricing pressure in the United States.

Sales of Crestor in Canada, for example, were down 77 percent after loss of exclusivity there in April 2012, although overall sales of Crestor at $1.48 billion held up better than some analysts had feared.

$500 MLN PATENT HIT

Overall, the revenue impact from products which have recently lost exclusivity amounted to around $500 million.

The group reiterated its expectation for a mid-to-high single digit percentage fall in revenue this year but said operating costs are now seen increasing by a low-to-mid single digit rate, whereas previously it had forecast costs would only be "slightly higher" than 2012.

Earnings are expected to decline significantly more than revenue in 2013, it said.

Pre-tax profit on a "core" basis, which excludes certain items, fell 12 percent to $1.94 billion, generating earnings per share down 23 percent at $1.20 a share, AstraZeneca said.

Analysts had, on average, forecast sales of $6.25 billion and earnings pre share of $1.20, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Demand for Brilinta - a new heart drug for which AstraZeneca has high hopes - picked up to $65 million from $51 million in the first quarter of 2012.

Emerging markets sales were up 12 percent, with nearly half of the improvement coming from a 21 percent increase in China.

China has been a strong growth market for AstraZeneca for many years, although prospects for Western drug companies in the country have been clouded by a recent high-profile bribery scandal involving GlaxoSmithKline.

AstraZeneca said on July 22 that police in Shanghai were questioning one of its sales representatives in what it believed was a local case involving one individual.

(Editing by Kate Holton and Tom Pfeiffer)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/astrazeneca-drug-sales-fall-patent-expiries-second-quarter-062314338.html

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Stocks close on highs as markets await crucial jobs figures

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JeeYeon Park CNBC

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Stocks soared to fresh closing highs on Thursday, one day before the government releases critical jobs figures that could help determine whether the economy is healthy enough for the Federal Reserve to begin to slow down its stimulus package.

The rally, in which the S&P 500 went through the 1,700-point level for the first time, was sparked by a plethora of upbeat economic data ahead of the widely-watched jobs report set for Friday morning.

Analysts polled by Reuters expect to see a gain of 184,000 jobs in July, after a 195,000 uptick in the previous month.?

(Read more:?July jobs report key to Fed action)

"The jobs numbers have been decent as of late, but the problem is the quality of employment," said Lance Roberts, chief economist at StreetTalk Advisors. "There's also clearly a divergence between the stock market and real economy and that's because of the artificial stimulus from the Fed.

"The problem is that they're not seeing that stimulus being translated into the economy so the worry we should have is that we're inflating valuations and the issue of potentially blowing an asset bubble is very real."

On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve?declined to signal when it would start tapering its bond-buying program, which has buoyed the markets. However, it did raise concerns about rising mortgage rates and flagged the risks of inflation falling too far below its target. In addition, the central bank slightly downgraded its outlook for economic growth.

But several reports on Thursday boosted the views of many analysts that the economy is getting healthier. Weekly jobless claims?dropped to a 5-1/2 year low, according to the Labor Department. And the number of planned layoffs at U.S. firms?declined modestly in July, with employers announcing 37,701 cuts last month, down 4.2 percent from June, according to the report from consultants Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

In another positive sign, the pace of growth in the U.S. manufacturing sector accelerated in July to the?highest level since June 2011 as new orders surged, according to the Institute for Supply Management.?

The positive economic data have stimulated the stock markets recently. Major stock averages closed out their?best July since 2010 on Wednesday and so far this year, the Dow and S&P 500 have spiked more than 19 percent, while the Nasdaq has surged an impressive 21 percent.

On Thursday, the?Dow Jones Industrial Average spiked to close 128 points higher and set a fresh all-time high of 15,650.69, lifted by Bank of America and P&G. ExxonMobil was among the few Dow components in the red.

The?S&P 500 and the?Nasdaq both put on 1 percent, with the S&P 500 piercing the 1700 barrier to close at 1706.87. The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX), widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, slid below 13.

All key S&P sectors closed in positive territory, led by financials and industrials.

"The rising asset prices will help instill confidence and that will breed more confidence," said Matthew Kaufler, portfolio manager of the Clover Value Fund at Federated.?

"However, we've had a great run in the market and at some point there will be a correction in the near point?still, my sense would be that there's enough momentum that we'll end the year up a few percentage points higher than where we currently are."

(Read more:Short the S&P atall-time highs? Absolutely!)

Asian stocks rallied after China's official PMI (purchasing manager's index) data showed the country's manufacturing sector continued to expand in July, defying forecasts of a contraction. But the picture was mixed, with a private gauge of factory activity by HSBC showing an 11-month low of 47.7 in July. Japan's Nikkei rallied to a one-month peak on the news, the Shanghai Composite hit a one-week high and South Korea's Kospi touched a seven-week high.

"Official PMI is more skewed to larger companies, and the HSBC figure reflects the smaller companies and that is where you get this divergence," said Frederic Neumann, co-head of Asian economics research at HSBC.

(Read more: Will China PMI mark the end of negative data surprises?)

In Europe, the European Central Bank kept its main interest rate unchanged at a record low of 0.5 percent, and reiterated that rates would remain at present or lower levels for an extended period of time.

"Labor market conditions remain weak. Looking ahead to the remainder of the year and 2014, euro area growth should benefit from a gradual recovery in global demand," said ECB president Mario Draghi in a press conference following the announcement. "Our monetary policy stance remains accommodative for as long as necessary. We have unanimously confirmed the forward guidance we gave last time."

Euro zone manufacturing activity grew for the first time in two years in July, with the purchasing manager's index (PMI) climbing to 50.3 in July. A reading above 50 indicates an expansion.

And the Bank of England left its interest rates unchanged at 0.5 percent, as expected, under its new governor, Mark Carney.

(Read more:July jobs report key to Fed action)

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Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/663286/s/2f731eab/sc/2/l/0L0Snbcnews0N0Cbusiness0Cstocks0Eclose0Ehighs0Emarkets0Eawait0Ecrucial0Ejobs0Efigures0E6C10A817476/story01.htm

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UTEP basketball: NCAA says Isaac Hamilton's case to void letter of intent could take 6-8 weeks

Click photo to enlarge

Isaac Hamilton

August has tiptoed in, registration is roughly four weeks away, portions of the basketball schedule are out ... and UTEP still waits on its star recruit.

Isaac Hamilton, a McDonald's All-American and a national top 20 recruit, has requested permission to get out of his National Letter of Intent, citing an ill grandmother. UTEP has refused the request and now the matter must go to Indianapolis.

The National Letter of Intent Office, located in Indianapolis, will decide on the appeal. And it can be a lengthy process.

"Obviously, the first step is for the student-athlete to ask for his release from the university," said Susan Peal, director of the Letter of Intent Office. "If there is no release granted, then they would appeal to the National Letter of Intent Committee. They must submit documentation as to why they are asking for their release. The committee will hear from both sides and rule.

"Should there be no release granted, the athlete can appeal," Peal said. "At that time, we would arrange a conference call with the committee. As you can see, it can be a drawn out process. We usually tell both parties to allow six to eight weeks. We would try to speed that up. In a case this late, we would try to expedite it but we have to get the committee together and there is only so much we can do."

Peal said she

is not at liberty to say whether or not the office has received a request from Hamilton. But Hamilton's father, Greg, said they would go through the appeal process because "Isaac wants to play where his grandmother can see him play."

Meanwhile, parts of the schedule are being released.

UTEP officials announced this week the Miners will play Tennessee on Thanksgiving evening in the Battle 4 Atlantis, an eight-team tournament Nov. 28-30

at the Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. All games will be televised on the NBC Sports Network.

USC will play Villanova at 11 a.m. MST, Kansas will play Wake Forest at 1:30 p.m. MST, Iowa will face Xavier at 5 p.m. MST and the Miners will meet Tennessee at 7:30 p.m. MST.

"The Battle 4 Atlantis features one of the top two or three fields in the country year in and year out," UTEP coach Tim Floyd said.

The tournament has had 191 teams make NCAA Tournament appearances, 25 Final Four appearances and five national champions.

The Miners should have a strong team -- with or without Hamilton but obviously stronger with him. UTEP has five of its top seven scorers returning, plenty of size and still four strong recruits.

"We have two freshmen who could play for anybody in the country," Floyd said. "Vince Hunter and Matt Willms. Our other two -- Josh Brown (5-foot-10 guard) and Jake Flaggert (6-6 forward) have an incredible opportunity."

And UTEP athletic director Bob Stull said, "Everybody is gloom and doom and that's just not the case. We've got five of our top seven players back and we have four guys over 6-9."

UTEP will have senior John Bohannon, 6-10, junior Cedrick Lang, 6-9, sophomore Hooper Vint, 6-11, and redshirt freshman Matt Willms, 7-1.

And there is still an element of hope that the Miners can have the outstanding 6-5 Hamilton.

But, for now, everyone simply must wait.

Bill Knight may be reached at 546-6171.

Source: http://www.elpasotimes.com/sports/ci_23772974/el-paso-times?source=rss_viewed

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AP PHOTOS: Israeli Jew is devout gay drag queen

JERUSALEM (AP) ? Just shy of midnight, Shahar Hadar trades his knitted white yarmulke for a wavy blond wig and a pink velvet dress.

Cheers greet him in a packed gay bar as he starts to swivel to a Hebrew pop song, his shiny red lips mouthing lyrics that mean more to him than the audience knows: "With God's help you'll have the strength / To overcome and give your all."

It has been a long and agonizing metamorphosis for Hadar, 34, from being a conflicted Orthodox Jew to a proud religious gay man ? and drag queen. Most Orthodox Jewish gay men, like those in other conservative religious communities around the world, are compelled to make a devil's bargain: marry a woman to remain in their tight-knit religious community, or abandon their family, community and religion to live openly gay lives.

But while Orthodox Judaism generally condemns homosexuality, there is a growing group of devout gay Jews in Israel unwilling to abandon their faith and demanding a place in the religious community.

"As much as I fled it, the heavens made it clear to me that that's who I am," Hadar said. He is marching Thursday ? out of costume ? in Jerusalem's annual gay pride parade.

Hadar, a telemarketer by day, has taken the gay Orthodox struggle from the synagogue to the stage, beginning to perform as one of Israel's few religious drag queens. His drag persona is that of a rebbetzin, a female rabbinic advisor ? a wholesome guise that stands out among the sarcastic and raunchy cast of characters on Israel's drag queen circuit.

"She blesses, she loves everyone," said Hadar of his alter-ego, Rebbetzin Malka Falsche. The stage name is a playful take on a Hebrew word meaning "queen" and Hebrew slang for "fake." Her philosophy, and Hadar's, draws from the teachings of the Breslov Hasidic stream of ultra-Orthodox Judaism: embrace life's vicissitudes with joy.

"Usually drag queens are gruff. I decided that I wanted to be happy, entertain people, perform mitzvoth," or religious deeds, he said.

An encounter with a popular Israeli rebbetzin is what launched Hadar's inner journey at age 19.

He began by wearing a yarmulke, a religious skullcap, and reciting morning prayers in his bedroom. He left home to enroll in a Jerusalem yeshiva, or religious seminary, hoping that daily Torah study would make him stop thinking about men.

It didn't.

After a brief nighttime encounter with his roommate at the yeshiva, Hadar said, he was booted from the seminary. He transferred to another religious studies center, where a student matched him up with his wife's ultra-Orthodox friend. They quickly married.

"I wanted to take the path that (God) commanded of us. I didn't see any other option," Hadar said. "I thought the marriage would make me straight and I would be cured."

He felt distressed while intimate with his wife, and wouldn't tell her why. She demanded a divorce. She later gave birth to their daughter, who is 11 years old today. His ex-wife still refuses to let them meet.

After Hadar's own sister met a similar fate ? she divorced her husband because he was gay ? homophobic conversation erupted around the Hadar family dinner table. Hadar's brother reprimanded the family, who had also become religious, by simply asking, "Are gays not human beings?"

His brother had stood up for Hadar without even knowing it.

A few months later, in 2010, Hadar mustered up the nerve to march in Tel Aviv's gay pride parade. When he returned home that Sabbath eve, he finally told his mother he was gay. "I thought it would be the blackest day in my life," Hadar said, but she accepted him.

As a practicing Orthodox Jew, it hasn't been easy for Hadar to integrate into mainstream gay life. He used to tuck his shoulder-length religious side locks under a cap to fit in at bars. Eventually, he sheared his side locks and trimmed his beard to thin stubble to increase his luck on the dating scene.

He's still looking for love. But this year, Hadar found acceptance ? and self-expression ? at Drag Yourself, a Tel Aviv school offering 10-month courses for budding drag performers. Students learn how to teeter on high heels, apply false eyelashes and fashion their own drag personas. Hadar, still a beginner, graduates next month.

The drag school, much like Israel's gay community itself, offers a rare opportunity for Israelis to interact with others from disparate and sometimes warring sectors of society. The school may be the only place where a Jewish settler, a lapsed ultra-Orthodox Jew, an Arab-Israeli and Israeli soldiers have stuffed their bras together.

Of all the students in his class, Hadar was the only one to show up wearing a yarmulke.

"I think it's fabulous," said Gil Naveh, a veteran Israeli drag queen and director of the school, as he painted Hadar's lips apple-red before his midnight debut at a Jerusalem gay bar. "He stays true to who he is."

Here's a gallery of Associated Press images featuring the Israeli gay Orthodox Jewish drag queen Shahar Hadar.

___

Online:

Rebbetzin Malka Falsche, Hadar's drag queen persona: www.facebook.com/rabanitmf

___

Follow Daniel Estrin at www.twitter.com/danielestrin . Follow AP photographers and photo editors on Twitter: http://apne.ws/15Oo6jo

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ap-photos-israeli-jew-devout-gay-drag-queen-091325174.html

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New Android apps worth downloading: Transit App, Team Stream update, Riptide GP2

Find your way to wherever you?re going without a car ? at least in some cities ? with today?s first app worth downloading, Transit App. It brings you all kinds of information about public transportation in various places, including itineraries, routes and more. We?ve also got an update to Team Stream, a sports app that brings you all the latest information about your favorite teams. Finally, there?s Riptide GP2, a jet ski-racing title in which players blast across the waves on a number of great-looking 3-D tracks.

What?s it about? Transit is a handy app for figuring out how you can get where you?re going in 43 different cities by using public transit.

What?s cool? A popular app on Apple?s iOS platform, Transit helps you get to wherever you?re going by using buses, trains and other public transit options. The app includes schedules and itineraries for all kinds of different public transport possibilities in 43 different cities, allowing users to figure out how to get from point A to point B by factoring in the real travel time required to get there. You?re also able to save your favorite routes to pull them up later, and track four different routes against one another to make sure you?re taking the fastest public transit route to get where you?re going.

Who?s it for? If you use public transportation in the 43 cities covered by Transit App, you?re going to want to grab this one to help you keep up to date on all the best routes.

What?s it like? Google Maps also provides a ton of useful public transit information to its users, as does HopStop Transit Directions Map.

What?s it about? Get the latest skinny on all your favorite teams with sports news app Team Stream.

What?s cool? There?s a lot of sports news out there on any given day, but what you really want to know about is what?s going on with your favorite teams. Team Stream brings you all the information you need to know about the teams you care about most, allowing you to create streams for your favorite teams that bring you all the latest information about them whenever you want. You can open up Team Stream and fire up streams for scores and other information whenever you want, and you can also stream video, read news stories, and even see Twitter and blog updates from various sources. Team Stream?s latest update adds new streams for UK sport and eliminates a bunch of bugs, as well.

Who?s it for? If you?re a sports fan looking for the latest information on your favorite teams, you?re going to want Team Stream.

What?s it like? Get other options for tons of sports information from ESPN?s ScoreCenter and Yahoo! Sports.

What?s it about? Jump on a jetski and race against other people, controlled either by artificial intelligence or other players, in Riptide GP2.

What?s cool? Most racers focus on roads, even those that put players in hovering vehicles set in the future. Riptide GP2, however, puts players on a jet ski and puts them on water-based tracks filled with hazards and other jet skiiers. The game features high-speed gameplay and great graphics, with an in-depth single-player racing campaign for players to work through. There?s also an online multiplayer mode, allowing players to take on other players from around the world in four-player multiplayer matches. There?s also an all new stunt system to allow players to flex their point-grabbing skills, nine new vehicles for you to unlock to play through, and achievements and leaderboards through Google Play Games.

Who?s it for? If you like racers with the added challenge of dealing with waves and tides, check out Riptide GP2.

What?s it like? You might also want to check out the game to which Riptide GP2 is a sequel, Riptide GP.

Download the Appolicious Android app

Source: http://www.androidapps.com/tech/articles/13619-new-android-apps-worth-downloading-transit-app-team-stream-update-riptide-gp2

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South Texas company investigated as Ponzi scheme

McALLEN, Texas (AP) ? Federal authorities are investigating whether a government-sanctioned business in South Texas that recruits foreign investors for a U.S. visa program is actually a Ponzi scheme.

Search warrants filed in federal court in McAllen indicate the FBI has been investigating USA Now Regional Center since at least early last year on suspicion of wire fraud, money laundering and transportation of stolen property. Federal agents searched the company's office and the owners' home earlier this month. The investigation was first reported by The Monitor in McAllen.

So-called "regional centers" are private businesses designated to recruit foreign investors to the EB-5 investor visa program. The centers pool investors' money for projects that create jobs. No charges have been filed. A lawyer representing the company did not immediately return a call for comment.

Source: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/texas/article/South-Texas-company-investigated-as-Ponzi-scheme-4698225.php

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Google will now host Starbucks' WiFi; is this a move to expand Google Fiber?

Less than a year ago, Google launched its first 1 Gbps Internet service in the Kansas City, Kansas-Missouri area. Since then, Google has announced it will be bringing the same service to Austin, Texas and Provo, Utah. Today, Google revealed yet another Internet connection project, but this time it will offer service all over the US.

In a post on Google's blog site, it announced that it will be serving the many customers that go to Starbucks for coffee in the US with free WiFi. Over the next 18 months, the over 7,000 Starbucks stores in the US will switch over from their current service provided by AT&T to Google's network. Google is saying that the WiFi connection will be up to 10 times faster than the current AT&T solution (which has to sting AT&T a little). If you happen to live in a city that Google Fiber services, that WiFi connection at Starbucks could be up to 100 times faster.

In the blog post, Google's general manager of Google Access, Kevin Lo, stated, "Google has long invested in helping the Internet grow stronger, including projects to make Internet access speedier, more affordable, and more widely available." He adds that many communities have depended on the free WiFi that Starbucks offers, either to just do schoolwork or to communicate with others in times of disaster.

Terms of this new Google-Starbucks partnership were not disclosed. However, the fact that Google is planning to offer much faster net access at Starbucks locations in the US could be a Trojan Horse method to see if there's a bigger audience for the super fast Google Fiber service in other parts of the country.

Source: Google | Image via Starbucks

Source: http://feeds.neowin.net/~r/neowin-all/~3/K5f-4RVKndA/google-will-now-host-starbucks-wifi-is-this-a-move-to-expand-google-fiber

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Despite Design Focus, iOS 7 Doesn't Fix Apple's Horribly Off-Center 1

I had high hopes for iOS 7. It's designed by Jony Ive, the God of Minimalism, Attention to Detail and Tight T-Shirts. I love his work almost as much as I love Phil Schiller (so huggable!) But Jony... you broke my heart, Jony. WHY DIDN'T YOU OPTICALLY CENTER THE 1 IN THE CALENDAR APP ICON?

OK, punks. It's that time of the year again. The time in which a new update to Apple iOS comes out and the calendar hits July 1. Yes, that time. The time I want to take a sledgehammer to my iPhone. The time I want to get a baseball bat, go to an Apple store, and start smashing every genius in their non-centered genitals as retribution for this act of typographic terrorism.

Did really think I was going to let this one slip away? COME ON! No, of course I couldn't let it pass.

Not until Apple fixes it like they fixed off-center calendar days, which they corrected just a few months after I wrote a piece excoriating them for it.

But I digress. The problem with the Apple's centering of the number one goes back to the very beginning of the iPhone. For some reason, Apple decided to use the bounding box to center the digits in the Calendar.app's icon instead of carefully setting them to be optically centered. So what, you ask? You don't have to be a hawk-eyed genius to see the difference:

The difference is obvious. Despite its bounding box being metrically centered in relation to the icon, the number 1 feels off-center. The example on the right shows the correct placement?the 1 feels optically centered, balanced in relation to the icon.

Does this matter? Not unless you are some detail-obsessed twunt like me.

I had hoped that iOS 7 would fix this, but it didn't. And in fact the light typography makes the bad positioning even more obvious, like you can see in the image at the top of this article.

If you are reading this, whoever you are at Apple UI design's department, please, please fix this for the love of all that is sacred and good and made of deep fried rainbow bacon twinkies. I can't stand it anymore and I've run out of pills.

And just in case there's any doubt, this is...

THE RIGHT WAY TO DO IT

Reader Backhome rendered it. The right way is the one on the right. Notice how the 1's stem is not centered in relation to the white area, neither is its bounding box. And yet, the number looks pleasantly centered in relation to the icon surface. The brain makes it work just like the one in the left looks like crap compared to the right one to anyone with eyes except the most rabid and brainless of all the Apple fanboys.

Source: http://gizmodo.com/despite-design-focus-ios-7-doesnt-fix-apples-horribl-637989614

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HP: We're Going to Make Another Smartphone

Despite a shaky track record, it seems HP is keen to stay involved with the smartphone market?with one of its execs insisting that it's planning to release a handset. At some point.

Read more...

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/2X7kVc9cxDk/hp-were-going-to-make-another-smartphone-632511284

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Where should Snowden go? His dad, Russia, and Ecuador all weigh in.

As Edward Snowden?s father lobbies for his return to the United States, other countries are opening their arms to the former NSA contractor turned leaker.

In an interview with NBC, Lonnie Snowden expressed hopes that his son would return to the US, provided that the Justice Department plays ball. Meanwhile, Ecuador has unilaterally renounced trade agreements with the US in defiance of demands that the small South American country not accept Mr. Snowden, and Russia?s Federation Council has invited him to testify as to the extent of NSA spying on Russian citizens.

RECOMMENDED: Six countries where Edward Snowden could get asylum

For almost a week now, Snowden has been thought to be stowed away somewhere in Moscow?s Sheremetyevo airport, after having fled Hong Kong last week. Snowden is wanted by the US on charges of espionage and attempts to have him extradited have failed so far.

Snowden?s father appeared in an interview on NBC?s ?Today Show? this morning, claiming that he believes his son would willingly return to the US if certain conditions were met, reports the Canadian Broadcasting Company. Those conditions include allowing Snowden to choose the trial location, not subjecting him to a gag order, and not detaining him pre-trial.

In an effort to have these conditions met, Snowden?s father has written a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder to convey these conditions and his hopes that they would provide incentive for Snowden to return, writes the New York Daily News.

Snowden Sr., who has not spoken to his son since April, also took the opportunity to defend his son?s honor, reports Reuters:

"I love him. I would like to have the opportunity to communicate with him. I don't want to put him in peril," he said in the interview.

Snowden said he did not think his son had committed treason, even though his son broke US laws in releasing details about the federal monitoring programs.

"He has betrayed his government, but I don't believe that he's betrayed the people of the United States," he said.

THE RUSSIAN OPTION

In Russia, the Federation Council ? the Duma?s upper house ? has set up a special committee to investigate aspects of the NSA?s spying activities in Russia, and has invited Snowden to testify before them. As The Christian Science Monitor reports, the committee would like Snowden to inform it of the extent to which large Internet companies such as Google and Facebook are involved.

"We don't want to get involved in secret service conspiracies. Whatever the NSA was doing is not particularly our concern," [Sen. Ruslan] Gattarov [head of the committee] says.

At the same time, the Snowden issue has caused US relations with Ecuador to deteriorate. Snowden is currently applying for asylum in Ecuador, a decision that could take up to two months, according to The Christian Science Monitor. In response, there have been calls in the US to cut off aid to Ecuador.

Ecuador, it seems, has not taken those threats lightly, and has unilaterally broken off a preferential trade agreement with the US in order to prevent ?blackmail? over the asylum request, reports CNN:

"In the face of threats, insolence, and arrogance of certain US sectors, which have pressured to remove the preferential tariffs because of the Snowden case, Ecuador tells the world we unilaterally and irrevocably renounce the preferential tariffs," President Rafael Correa said Thursday, reiterating comments other officials from his government made earlier in the day.

But Mr. Correa, who has a history of thumbing his nose at the US, also noted that despite its support for Snowden, Ecuador cannot come to a decision on his asylum request, as he is not on Ecuadorian territory, according to Al Jazeera. "You request asylum when you are on a country's territory. Snowden is not on Ecuadorean territory, so technically we cannot even process the asylum request," Correa said.

RECOMMENDED: Six countries where Edward Snowden could get asylum

Related stories

Read this story at csmonitor.com

Become a part of the Monitor community

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/where-snowden-dad-russia-ecuador-weigh-165924579.html

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Building PayPal Galactic for Off-World Payments Will Take Years

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. ? Developing a cosmic cash system to meet the needs of future space tourists and interplanetary settlers is a complicated task that will take several years to complete, leaders of the new project say.

On Thursday (June 27), online-payment company PayPal and the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute unveiled PayPal Galactic, an initiative that aims to figure out the best way to process financial transactions beyond Earth.

This is much easier said than done, with many big questions demanding attention right off the bat, officials said. [9 Ways to Stay Safe Using PayPal]

"What will be our standard currency up there? How will the banking system need to adapt?" PayPal president David Marcus said here at the SETI Institute during the project's unveiling on Thursday. "How will risk and fraud management evolve? IP address from space? That's not a country for us; how are we going to deal with that?"

It's also unclear at the moment how off-world banking transactions will be regulated, and which bodies here on Earth would do the regulating, Marcus added, stressing that such issues will take a while to work out.

"We will focus on answering those questions and inviting everyone around the table who wants to participate ? scientists and the industry as well," Marcus said. "We're really, really looking forward to having the conversation for the next couple of years."

It's important to start this lengthy and involved process now, Marcus said, because private spaceflight is set to open the final frontier up to the masses soon.

Indeed, Virgin Galactic?and XCOR Aerospace may begin commercial flights to suborbital space within the next year or so. These companies are currently charging $250,000 and $95,000, respectively, for seats aboard their spaceships, but Marcus sees the price coming down dramatically before much longer.

"Futurists expect space travel to follow what happened to air travel," he said, adding that a roundtrip plane ticket from New York to Los Angeles cost $4,500 in 1935 ? the equivalent of $80,000 today.

So it's not hard to imagine that Virgin's $250,000 ticket price could come down to just a few thousand dollars in a decade or so, enabling large numbers of people to fly to space, Marcus said.

While brief suborbital flights can easily be booked and paid for here on Earth, Marcus and others see bigger things following in their wake that call out for a new off-planet monetary system ? orbiting hotels, luxury "space yachts" for the megarich and, eventually, outposts on the moon and Mars.

"The time is right," Marcus said. "Space tourism is taking off."

Follow Mike Wall on Twitter?@michaeldwall?and?Google+.?Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook?or Google+. Originally story at?SPACE.com.

Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/building-paypal-galactic-off-world-payments-years-194003872.html

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Grand jury indicts accused Boston Marathon bomber

By Scott Malone

BOSTON (Reuters) - A grand jury has indicted accused Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev on charges of killing four people and using a weapon of mass destruction, federal prosecutors in Boston said on Thursday.

Tsarnaev, 19, is one of two ethnic Chechen brothers accused of carrying out the April 15 attack, which killed three people. A fourth victim, a university police officer, died in a gunfight with the pair four days later as authorities raced to capture them.

The younger Tsarnaev, who was badly injured in that gun battle, has been held in a prison hospital west of Boston since his capture on April 19.

(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/accused-boston-marathon-bomber-indicted-federal-grand-jury-173206491.html

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Khloe Kardashian Turns 29! See Her Cutest Photos With Lamar

As the reality star celebrates her birthday, see the evolution of her romance with her hubby.

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/khloe-kardashian-and-lamar-odoms-cutest-moments/1-b-517071?dst=iv%3AiVillage%3Akhloe-kardashian-and-lamar-odoms-cutest-moments-517071

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Babies can read each other?s moods, study finds

June 27, 2013 ? Although it may seem difficult for adults to understand what an infant is feeling, a new study from Brigham Young University finds that it's so easy a baby could do it.

Psychology professor Ross Flom's study, published in the academic journal Infancy, shows that infants can recognize each other's emotions by five months of age. This study comes on the heels of other significant research by Flom on infants' ability to understand the moods of dogs, monkeys and classical music.

"Newborns can't verbalize to their mom or dad that they are hungry or tired, so the first way they communicate is through affect or emotion," says Flom. "Thus it is not surprising that in early development, infants learn to discriminate changes in affect."

Infants can match emotion in adults at seven months and familiar adults at six months. In order to test infant's perception of their peer's emotions, Flom and his team of researchers tested a baby's ability to match emotional infant vocalizations with a paired infant facial expression.

"We found that 5 month old infants can match their peer's positive and negative vocalizations with the appropriate facial expression," says Flom. "This is the first study to show a matching ability with an infant this young. They are exposed to affect in a peer's voice and face which is likely more familiar to them because it's how they themselves convey or communicate positive and negative emotions."

In the study, infants were seated in front of two monitors. One of the monitors displayed video of a happy, smiling baby while the other monitor displayed video of a second sad, frowning baby. When audio was played of a third happy baby, the infant participating in the study looked longer to the video of the baby with positive facial expressions. The infant also was able to match negative vocalizations with video of the sad frowning baby. The audio recordings were from a third baby and not in sync with the lip movements of the babies in either video.

"These findings add to our understanding of early infant development by reiterating the fact that babies are highly sensitive to and comprehend some level of emotion," says Flom. "Babies learn more in their first 2 1/2 years of life than they do the rest of their lifespan, making it critical to examine how and what young infants learn and how this helps them learn other things."

Flom co-authored the study of 40 infants from Utah and Florida with Professor Lorraine Bahrick from Florida International University.

Flom's next step in studying infant perception is to run the experiments with a twist: test whether babies could do this at even younger ages if instead they were watching and hearing clips of themselves.

And while the talking twin babies in this popular YouTube clip are older, it's still a lot of fun to watch them babble at each other.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_JmA2ClUvUY

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/mind_brain/child_development/~3/ttEOJhEX-Xk/130627102835.htm

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Noel, Len atop an NBA draft full of questions

NEW YORK (AP) ? Nerlens Noel is coming off a major knee injury. Alex Len is in a walking boot.

One of them could be the No. 1 pick Thursday in an NBA draft that appears short on stardom, and neither looks ready to get his career off to a running start.

"This draft is really unpredictable, a lot of guys with injuries and you don't have any, like, LeBron James," Len said Wednesday. "So it's going to be interesting."

Ten years after James climbed on stage to start a draft that goes down as one of the best in recent memory, the No. 1 pick again belongs to Cleveland.

The Cavaliers won't find anyone who can play like James on the court ? if they keep the pick ? and even the climbing the stage part will be a challenge for the big men who opened their college seasons against each other and are competing again now.

Noel tore the ACL in his left knee on Feb. 12, ending his lone season at Kentucky. The 6-foot-11 freshman led the nation in shot blocking and his conference in rebounding, but hasn't been able to show the Cavaliers if his offensive game has grown.

The only basketball work he did during his visit to Cleveland was shooting some free throws. Perhaps the pants he wore with his sports jacket and orange tie were just too tight, but Noel was walking gingerly as he exited a hotel ballroom after meeting with the media Wednesday.

"I wanted to do more. Unfortunately I got hurt, but I mean I definitely felt right before I got injured I was really coming along as a player and just really coming into my own during that part of the season," Noel said. "But like I said, unfortunately I got hurt, so I wasn't able to show as much as I wanted to."

Nor has Len, but that hasn't stopped the 7-1 center from the Ukraine who spent two seasons at Maryland from climbing into the mix at No. 1. His left foot started bothering him around February, and he found out after the season that it was a stress fracture.

He was aware he was projected as a top-10 pick before the draft combine, but may go much higher even though his visits to teams have consisted of nothing more than interviews. He no longer needs crutches but will be in the boot for perhaps two more weeks.

So, with all these injury questions, what about playing it safe and picking a healthy guy?

"I mean, probably a lot of people wish it could be that easy," Kansas guard Ben McLemore said. "But it's a process for the teams, they've got to see what's available and what they really need. And like I said, this draft is up in the air and nobody knows what's going to happen, who's going to get drafted in which order."

Orlando has the No. 2 pick, followed by Washington, Charlotte and Phoenix.

McLemore, Indiana's Victor Oladipo, Georgetown forward Otto Porter and national player of the year Trey Burke of Michigan are among the other players who will hear their names called early at Barclays Center by NBA Commissioner David Stern in his final draft.

It's a class that won't draw any comparisons to the one that James led, which featured future Miami Heat teammates Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, along with NBA scoring champion Carmelo Anthony among the first five picks.

Brooklyn Nets general manager Billy King said a number of teams are trying to trade out of the draft and acquire extra picks for next year, which is expected to be a stronger class. But he doesn't know if there will be enough teams interested in being trade partners to get those deals done.

"There are good players in this draft, but right now, there are not impact players. What I mean by that is that there's no one you look at in this draft that within two years will be an All-Star, say like Kyrie Irving was, players like that," said Minnesota Timberwolves president Flip Saunders, referring to the guard Cleveland took with the No. 1 pick in 2011.

"And so in order for you to move up and dilute your talent pool and your roster, you've got to get an impact-type player, and I just don't believe ... there's good players, probably pretty good players in this league, but are they going to be that impact player who's going to be an All-Star or future Hall of Famer? That's what you don't see. And sometimes that's something you don't see for two or three years in a row."

McLemore has in some ways been hurt by healthy, since by being able to work out he's given teams something to nitpick. Noel and Len have been largely free of criticism while sitting on the sideline.

Instead, Len is hoping his first impression of the season is one that holds up, when he had a career-high 23 points, 12 rebounds and four blocks against Noel in Maryland's loss to Kentucky, right in the building where they will be Thursday.

"I did well against him. So, it's not up to me, it's up to teams," Len said of a team choosing between the two.

Neither player said he knows what the Cavs will do. There has been speculation they are open to dealing the pick, something teams rarely consider in a year with a clear-cut No. 1.

Noel said he had gotten no sense from the Cavs that they had concern about his knee, which could keep him off the court until early in the regular season. And in a draft full of questions, he believes selecting him is the right answer.

"I'm a good teammate, I definitely love to work," Noel said. "I want to get better. I want to be great, I want to reach my potential, be the best player I can be. I definitely do countless hours in the gym and I'm definitely working to get there."

___

AP Basketball Writer Jon Krawczynski in Minneapolis contributed to this report.

___

Follow Brian Mahoney on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Briancmahoney

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/noel-len-atop-nba-draft-full-questions-211509916.html

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