Jillian Michaels: My Son Phoenix Is 'Fiery' Like Me

Mom & Babies
Celebrity Baby Blog

02/04/2013 at 03:00 PM ET

Gregg DeGuire/WireImage

Jillian Michaels‘ son Phoenix is already taking after his mama — just not the expected one!

Although The Biggest Loser trainer expected her baby boy to inherit her partner’s laidback approach to life — Heidi Rhoades delivered their son in May — the 8-month-old’s budding personality is the polar opposite.

“He wants to walk and he gets really pissed about it when he can’t. He gets frustrated,” Michaels, 38, told PEOPLE at the recent TCAs.

“He’s a fiery little sucker, he’s just like me. I’m like, ‘You were supposed to be like Heidi!’ But he’s not. It’s not good, not good.”

Admitting she is “terrified for when he’s a teenager,” Michaels has good reason to be: Recently she spotted her son — who is “crawling aggressively” — putting his electrician skills to the test in the family room.

“He’s into everything, which is kind of a nightmare to be totally honest,” she says. “We have an outlet in the floor in the living room and I caught him eating the outlet on the floor … I was like, ‘Mother of God!’”

Phoenix’s big sister Lukensia, 3, has also been busy keeping her mamas on their toes. “Lu just had her first ski trip and she had a little crush on her teacher, Ollie,” Michaels shares.

“At first I was like, ‘Oh my God, we’re letting our baby go!’ The second day we took her she ran right to him — loves Ollie.”

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Bullying study: It does get better for gay teens

CHICAGO (AP) — It really does get better for gay and bisexual teens when it comes to being bullied, although young gay men have it worse than their lesbian peers, according to the first long-term scientific evidence on how the problem changes over time.

The seven-year study involved more than 4,000 teens in England who were questioned yearly through 2010, until they were 19 and 20 years old. At the start, just over half of the 187 gay, lesbian and bisexual teens said they had been bullied; by 2010 that dropped to 9 percent of gay and bisexual boys and 6 percent of lesbian and bisexual girls.

The researchers said the same results likely would be found in the United States.

In both countries, a "sea change" in cultural acceptance of gays and growing intolerance for bullying occurred during the study years, which partly explains the results, said study co-author Ian Rivers, a psychologist and professor of human development at Brunel University in London.

That includes a government mandate in England that schools work to prevent bullying, and changes in the United States permitting same-sex marriage in several states.

In 2010, syndicated columnist Dan Savage launched the "It Gets Better" video project to encourage bullied gay teens. It was prompted by widely publicized suicides of young gays, and includes videos from politicians and celebrities.

"Bullying tends to decline with age regardless of sexual orientation and gender," and the study confirms that, said co-author Joseph Robinson, a researcher and assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. "In absolute terms, this would suggest that yes, it gets better."

The study appears online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Eliza Byard, executive director of the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, said the results mirror surveys by her anti-bullying advocacy group that show bullying is more common in U.S. middle schools than in high schools.

But the researchers said their results show the situation is more nuanced for young gay men.

In the first years of the study, gay boys and girls were almost twice as likely to be bullied as their straight peers. By the last year, bullying dropped overall and was at about the same level for lesbians and straight girls. But the difference between men got worse by ages 19 and 20, with gay young men almost four times more likely than their straight peers to be bullied.

The mixed results for young gay men may reflect the fact that masculine tendencies in girls and women are more culturally acceptable than femininity in boys and men, Robinson said.

Savage, who was not involved in the study, agreed.

"A lot of the disgust that people feel when you bring up homosexuality ... centers around gay male sexuality," Savage said. "There's more of a comfort level" around gay women, he said.

Kendall Johnson, 21, a junior theater major at the University of Illinois, said he was bullied for being gay in high school, mostly when he brought boyfriends to school dances or football games.

"One year at prom, I had a guy tell us that we were disgusting and he didn't want to see us dancing anymore," Johnson said. A football player and the president of the drama club intervened on his behalf, he recalled.

Johnson hasn't been bullied in college, but he said that's partly because he hangs out with the theater crowd and avoids the fraternity scene. Still, he agreed, that it generally gets better for gays as they mature.

"As you grow older, you become more accepting of yourself," Johnson said.

___

Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

It Gets Better: http://www.itgetsbetter.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..

Asian shares drop on euro zone worry, soft U.S. data

TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares, oil and the euro fell on Tuesday as investors took profits from recent rallies, while the yen got a respite from broad-based selling.

European markets are seen barely changed, with financial spreadbetters predicting London's FTSE 100 <.ftse>, Paris's CAC-40 <.fchi> and Frankfurt's DAX <.gdaxi> would open up nearly flat. But a 0.1 percent gain in U.S. stock futures suggested a firm open on Wall Street. <.l><.eu><.n/>

The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> tumbled 0.9 percent, dragged lower by a steep 1.7 percent fall in Hong Kong shares <.hsi>. The pan-Asian index climbed to a 18-month high on Monday.

Japan's benchmark Nikkei stock average <.n225> closed down 1.9 percent, after scaling a 33-month high on Monday. <.t/>

Positive data from China failed to brighten the bearish mood, after the Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> had its worst day since November on Monday on discouraging U.S. factory orders and worries that a potential political shake-up could disrupt the euro zone's efforts to resolve its debt crisis.

Analysts and traders said selling was a correction to markets rallying on receding tail risks such as growing euro zone stability and an improving global economic outlook, while global monetary easing still underpinned sentiment.

"This move in equities ... looks to be a healthy correction, nothing more," said Richard Yetsenga, Head of Global Markets at ANZ Research, adding that downside risk would likely convince major central banks globally to stick to easy policy.

In China, the HSBC services purchasing managers' index rose to a four-month high of 54 in January from December's 51.7, underlining confidence in the world's second-biggest economy, which is expected to grow 8.1 percent this year, off a 13-year low of 7.8 percent hit in 2012.

"The data globally is unquestionably better but the recovery still seems gradual. (China) hit the bottom and they had a bit of a bounce but nothing much else happened. We don't really seem to have preconditions for a much stronger bounce than that (8 percent growth)," Yetsenga said.

The Australian dollar fell 0.3 percent to $1.0405 after the Reserve Bank of Australia kept its cash rate steady at 3.0 percent, as expected, having just cut in December. Australian shares <.axjo> fell 0.5 percent but trimmed some earlier losses after the RBA's rate decision.

The euro took the brunt of renewed focus on the euro zone problems, having risen 2.3 percent so far this year against the U.S. dollar, up about 5.4 percent against sterling and 1.8 percent higher against the Australian dollar.

The euro eased 0.2 percent to $1.3485, retreating further from Friday's 14-1/2-month peak of $1.3711, ahead of the European Central Bank's policy meeting on Thursday.

"Markets have been increasingly comfortable with European risks over the past few months and are largely not positioned for this increase in political problems. The outcomes in Spain and Italy are far from certain and may represent stumbling blocks for further expansion in risk appetite," Barclays Capital said in a research note.

Spain's opposition party on Sunday called for Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to resign over corruption allegations, which Rajoy denies, pushing Spanish 10-year bond yields to six-week highs.

In Italy, 10-year Italian government bond yields hit their highest since late December, as chances of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi regaining power raised worries about Rome's ability to fix its fiscal problems.

The yen took a breather, firming from lows against a broad range of currencies.

The dollar steadied at 92.36 yen after scaling its highest since May 2010 of 93.185 on Monday, while the euro eased 0.1 percent to 124.53 yen, off its loftiest since April 2010 of 126.97 hit on Friday.

"Markets are broadly undergoing a correction and the euro is definitely facing profit-taking, given the pace of its climb. Worries about the euro zone debt crisis always remain a downside risk for the euro, and could push it lower to $1.32-$1.33," said Hiroshi Maeba, head of FX trading Japan at UBS in Tokyo. "But the trend is still upward for dollar/yen, cross/yen. The dollar could reach 95 yen by the end of the month."

As long as markets hold out expectations for the Bank of Japan to implement aggressive monetary easing to beat decades of deflation in Japan, the yen will stay pressured. Any correction to the dollar's rise against the yen was also be seen as shallow, with many traders and analysts seeing a firm floor around 87-88 yen.

Italy & Spain bond yields: http://link.reuters.com/gat45t

Asset returns in 2013: http://link.reuters.com/dub25t

China, EU, US Services PMI: http://link.reuters.com/dyh85s

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^>

Asian credit markets faltered with the plunge in equities, widening the spread on the iTraxx Asia ex-Japan investment-grade index by three basis points.

Brent crude slipped towards $115 per barrel, giving up some of its gains from the last three weeks, on renewed euro zone worries and a slightly firmer dollar.

(Editing by Eric Meijer)

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India Ink: 'Lalla Roukh' at the Rose Theater

Richard Termine for The New York Times

Lalla Roukh Marianne Fiset and Emiliano Gonzalez Toro starred in this work presented by Opera Lafayette on Thursday at the Rose Theater.

On Thursday evening Opera Lafayette presented a graceful and witty production of Félicien David’s “Lalla Roukh” at the Rose Theater. This opéra-comique set in Mughal India had fallen into oblivion since its wildly successful premiere in 1862, well ahead of the wave of other French operas like Bizet’s “Pêcheurs de Perles,” Delibes’s “Lakmé” or Meyerbeer’s “Africaine.”

Operas like these, in which the West’s flirtation with distant locales is colored with condescension, can bring on a toothache in the stage director who has to choose between an unreconstructed eye-candy approach or a Splenda version that leaves an aftertaste of postcolonial embarrassment.

Here the director, Bernard Deletré, devised an unusual solution when he brought in an Indian fashion designer, Poonam Bhagat, and the exquisite Kalanidhi dance troupe choreographed by Anuradha Nehru to add vibrant touches of authenticity to the dress and movement of characters who otherwise seem less rooted in South Asia than in commedia dell’arte. The spoken dialogue was edited down to its dramatic essentials and delivered with great clarity by the glowing cast of singers, most of whom were native French speakers. Together with Ryan Brown, who conducted with a fine ear for flow and comic timing, they made a solid case for “Lalla Roukh” as an overlooked gem of more than historical interest.

The heroine is a princess from Delhi who travels to Bukhara to marry its king. On a mountain pass in Kashmir she is waylaid by a silver-tongued poet with whom she falls in love. She arrives at the court determined to throw over the royal match in favor of the penniless poet, but it turns out that he was in fact the king disguised to test Lalla Roukh’s heart.

The opera contains exquisite musical moments, like the ballet in Act I in which the chorus evokes the starry sky reflected in a clear mountain lake with filigree woodwind solos against caressing choral lines. The following ballet of bayadères is carried by lively rhythms on an array of exotic percussion instruments, here joined by the ankle bells of the dancers.

Although David’s Orientalism is never authentic, it is still rich in naturalistic touches. As a young man he spent two years in Cairo and his familiarity with non-Western modes comes through in finely wrought oboe solos, alluring chromatic vocal lines and, in one aria, pizzicato passages meant to imitate the sound of a guzla.

Marianne Fiset sang the title role with a glowing, well-supported soprano that brought out the Jane Austen-like independence and likability of her character. The tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro was outstanding as the poet-king Noureddin, bringing a scintillating array of nuances to a character who is by turns comic, regal and wistful. The role of Lalla Roukh’s quick-witted maid, Mirza, was sung by Nathalie Paulin with a honeyed soprano. Mr. Deletré, the director, stepped into the buffoonish role of Baskir, the king’s chamberlain, with conviction and comic abandon.

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Is it game over for Nintendo?

The Wii U is a bust (so far). And the legendary gaming company’s future is looking increasingly bleak

Nintendo had no choice but to go all in with the Wii U, the newest in a long line of ostensibly childhood-defining game consoles. Unfortunately, the company also inherited the weighty expectations of the original Wii — which, if you’ll remember, became a surprise hit when it debuted in 2006, or just two short years after the world was first introduced to a little-known senator named Barack Obama. But ever since the Wii U hit store shelves last November, sales have been disappointing. Now the company is dramatically lowering its forecasts for the future. 

Initial sales figures indicate that Nintendo has so far sold just 3.06 million Wii U game consoles, and anticipates moving just four million Wii U units through March — far below previous estimates of 5.5 million, predictions that weren’t even that optimistic to begin with. 

Initial reviews of the Wii U were mixed. Yes, it’s fun. But the console failed to offer a compelling reason for consumers to free up dusty shelf space alongside their Xbox 360s or PlayStation 3s. Some critics say the console is confused, and Nintendo didn’t know if it was targeting mature gamers fixated on first-person shooter games like Call of Duty and Borderlands, or more casual fans like the original Wii did with its motion-sensing nunchuck. Further complicating matters is a nimble new mobile industry, dominated by non-committal, take-anywhere games like Temple Run and Angry Birds. 

“Nintendo needs a change in strategy,” Michael Pachter, a gaming research analyst for Wedbush Securities, tells The New York Times. Even though Nintendo is an instantly recognizable brand the world over, the company still doesn’t license its gaming titles for other platforms (ever see Mario on an iPhone?). To make matters worse, on Thursday, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said that the company has no intention of lowering the price of its $ 300 flagship gaming system anytime soon. “We were already offering it at a good price,” he said. 

That means Nintendo, unless it releases a best-selling breakout title soon (Zelda, perhaps? Super Smash Bros. Brawl?), will continue on its path toward an increasingly dark future. The company already had its worst year ever in 2011. Dramatic restructuring seems imminent.

Consoles — compared to phones, tablets, laptops, and many other gadgets — have a much slower product cycle. Manufacturers only press “reset” every couple of years so that game-makers aren’t constantly readjusting to new hardware.

For quickly aging dinosaurs like Nintendo, that means more plodding along. More disappointing forecasts. More reluctant critics. More lost opportunities to earn the trust of lifelong fans. More, more, more. (Or for Nintendo, less, less, less?)

“People have to try it to see it is fun,” Iwata said of the Wii U. Undoubtedly, it is.

But unfortunately for Nintendo, “fun” just isn’t good enough anymore.

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What Football Game? Beyoncé Rocks the Superdome in Leather & Lace

Stylewatch
Style News Now

02/03/2013 at 09:06 PM ET

One thing was certain going into Super Bowl XLVII: Beyoncé was going to put on a killer halftime show, and she was going to look amazing doing it. And if she practiced until her feet bled, there was no sign of it as she danced in her towering heels.

To strut out onstage during ‘Crazy In Love,’ the star wore an uncharacteristically demure belted lamé mini with wide lapels, but she quickly tore it away to reveal a leather bodysuit with a black lace skirt worn over her signature fishnets. She completed the look with thigh-highs and sexy black booties.

Destiny’s Child fans missing the trio’s epic matching outfits were given a treat when Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams proved the rumors true, joining Beyoncé onstage for a medley that included ‘Bootylicious’ and ‘Single Ladies.’ Their costumes echoed Bey’s: Rowland wore a revealing V-neck Emilio Pucci bodysuit, while Williams was glam in a tough-girl ribbed leather mini.

And to ensure that Beyoncé’s hair was supremely whip-able (as demonstrated during ‘Baby Boy’ and ‘Halo’), stylist Kim Kimble gave her a “soft glam” look by curling it, then brushing out the curls and smoothing them with Kimble Hair Care Brazilian Nut and Acai serum. She sprayed it with L’Oréal’s classic Elnett hairspray to ensure it wouldn’t budge no matter what the superstar put it through.

Tell us: What did you think of Beyoncé’s Super Bowl outfit — and the Destiny’s Child reunion looks?

–Alex Apatoff

PHOTOS: VOTE ON MORE STAR STYLE HERE!

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Bullying study: It does get better for gay teens

CHICAGO (AP) — It really does get better for gay and bisexual teens when it comes to being bullied, although young gay men have it worse than their lesbian peers, according to the first long-term scientific evidence on how the problem changes over time.

The seven-year study involved more than 4,000 teens in England who were questioned yearly through 2010, until they were 19 and 20 years old. At the start, just over half of the 187 gay, lesbian and bisexual teens said they had been bullied; by 2010 that dropped to 9 percent of gay and bisexual boys and 6 percent of lesbian and bisexual girls.

The researchers said the same results likely would be found in the United States.

In both countries, a "sea change" in cultural acceptance of gays and growing intolerance for bullying occurred during the study years, which partly explains the results, said study co-author Ian Rivers, a psychologist and professor of human development at Brunel University in London.

That includes a government mandate in England that schools work to prevent bullying, and changes in the United States permitting same-sex marriage in several states.

In 2010, syndicated columnist Dan Savage launched the "It Gets Better" video project to encourage bullied gay teens. It was prompted by widely publicized suicides of young gays, and includes videos from politicians and celebrities.

"Bullying tends to decline with age regardless of sexual orientation and gender," and the study confirms that, said co-author Joseph Robinson, a researcher and assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. "In absolute terms, this would suggest that yes, it gets better."

The study appears online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Eliza Byard, executive director of the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, said the results mirror surveys by her anti-bullying advocacy group that show bullying is more common in U.S. middle schools than in high schools.

But the researchers said their results show the situation is more nuanced for young gay men.

In the first years of the study, gay boys and girls were almost twice as likely to be bullied as their straight peers. By the last year, bullying dropped overall and was at about the same level for lesbians and straight girls. But the difference between men got worse by ages 19 and 20, with gay young men almost four times more likely than their straight peers to be bullied.

The mixed results for young gay men may reflect the fact that masculine tendencies in girls and women are more culturally acceptable than femininity in boys and men, Robinson said.

Savage, who was not involved in the study, agreed.

"A lot of the disgust that people feel when you bring up homosexuality ... centers around gay male sexuality," Savage said. "There's more of a comfort level" around gay women, he said.

Kendall Johnson, 21, a junior theater major at the University of Illinois, said he was bullied for being gay in high school, mostly when he brought boyfriends to school dances or football games.

"One year at prom, I had a guy tell us that we were disgusting and he didn't want to see us dancing anymore," Johnson said. A football player and the president of the drama club intervened on his behalf, he recalled.

Johnson hasn't been bullied in college, but he said that's partly because he hangs out with the theater crowd and avoids the fraternity scene. Still, he agreed, that it generally gets better for gays as they mature.

"As you grow older, you become more accepting of yourself," Johnson said.

___

Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

It Gets Better: http://www.itgetsbetter.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..

Asian shares advance after U.S. jobs, ISM

TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares climbed to 18-month highs on Monday after U.S. data showed some promise of a credible recovery but not strong enough to threaten the Federal Reserve's easing plans, while momentum also gained on firmer manufacturing data from Europe and China.

The yen took a break from heavy selling against the U.S. dollar and the euro, but fell to its lowest since August 2008 against the Australian and New Zealand dollars early on Monday on confidence of bold monetary support from the Bank of Japan to overcome the country's stubborn deflation.

More confidence in global economic recovery underpinned oil and copper prices while weighing on safe-haven assets, pushing 10-year U.S. Treasury yields to a nine-month high and 10-year Japanese government bond yields to a three-week high.

European markets are likely to inch higher, with financial spreadbetters predicting London's FTSE 100 <.ftse>, Paris's CAC-40 <.fchi> and Frankfurt's DAX <.gdaxi> would open up by around 0.1 percent. U.S. stock futures were little changed, pointing to a steady open on Wall Street. <.l><.eu><.n/>

The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> rose 0.6 percent.

"Prices of risk assets are generally expected to face upward pressures," said Naohiro Niimura, a partner at research and consulting firm Market Risk Advisory. "While risk appetite is returning, prices may become top-heavy for some commodities markets where the relative strength index suggests an overbought territory under the current economic environment."

Brent crude eased 0.2 percent to $116.48 a barrel but held above $116, near a more than four-month high, as data from top consumers United States and China reinforced a view that the global economy was headed for a modest uptick this year.

"We are now seeing a consistent story of moderate growth in the U.S. and China, which is supportive of oil prices in general," said Ric Spooner, chief market analyst at CMC Markets in Sydney. "This will probably be a week of consolidation."

U.S. data out on Friday showed payrolls rose modestly last month, with upward revisions for November and December, while the Institute for Supply Management said its index of national factory activity rose to its highest since April.

China followed with positive news over the weekend, saying growth in its official purchasing managers' index (PMI) for the non-manufacturing sector ticked up in January for the fourth straight monthly rise, confirming the world's second-largest economy was showing a modest recovery.

Australian shares <.axjo>, however, lost their grip on early gains to end 0.3 percent lower, pulled down by weaker-than-expected housing data, slow job advertising and technical resistance. They jumped 0.9 percent to a 21-month high on Friday.

NIKKEI MAY BE PEAKING

Japan's benchmark Nikkei stock average <.n225> rose 0.6 percent after climbing to a fresh 33-month high earlier as the yen declined. The index climbed for a fifth straight day. <.t/>

Nikkei has been moving in tandem with the yen's two-month-long losing streak with investors eyeing the change in the BOJ's top personnel in April for clues to the likely extent of the bank's reflationary measures.

"The Nikkei may be nearing its peak for now as we may get a specific name of the most likely candidate for the next BOJ governor soon. That may provide an opportunity to close long dollar/yen positions, while a firming yen will then likely spur investors to book profits on Japanese stocks," said Tetsuro Ii, the chief executive of Commons Asset Management.

The dollar eased 0.2 percent to 92.64 yen after scaling its highest since May 2010 of 92.97 on Friday, while the euro fell 0.3 percent to 126.26 yen, still near its loftiest since April 2010 of 126.97 touched on Friday.

In early Monday trade, the yen plunged to its lowest since August 2008 against both the Australian dollar, at 96.78 yen, and against the New Zealand dollar at 78.74 yen.

The euro inched down 0.1 percent to $1.3628, off Friday's 14-1/2-month peak of $1.3711 hit after data showed euro zone factories had their best month in January in nearly a year.

On Friday, the dollar index measured against a basket of key currencies fell to a 4-1/2-month low of 78.918 <.dxy>. The index was up 0.2 percent on Monday.

As economic optimism rose and concerns about the euro zone's debt difficulties eased, investors took on more risk.

Research provider TrimTabs Investment Research said on Saturday investors poured a record $77.4 billion in new cash into stock mutual funds and exchange-traded funds in January, surpassing the previous monthly record of $53.7 billion in February 2000.

With the rise in equities on recovering appetite for riskier assets, safe-haven appeal waned, pushing up yields of U.S. Treasury bonds. The U.S. 10-year Treasury yield hit a nine-month high of 2.052 percent in Asia on Monday.

A weekly gauge of sentiment in the Japanese government bond market deteriorated sharply, remaining in negative territory for a fifth straight week as rising global appetite for risk sapped demand for bonds, the latest Reuters poll showed on Monday.

(Additional reporting by Ramya Venugopal in Singapore; Editing by Eric Meijer)

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India Ink: Newswallah: Long Reads Edition

As pilgrims flock to the Maha Kumbh, a mass gathering in which Hindus travel to bathe in the confluence of the Ganga and Yamuna rivers, Soma Basu and Bharat Lal Seth examine the impact on the rivers and the surrounding areas. In their article in Down To Earth magazine, Ms. Basu points out that the large number of people drawn to the event help cause water pollution and demand a large number of resources such as waste disposal, sanitation facilities and basic amenities like food, water and electricity. She writes that despite the authorities’ claim that they are prepared for the pilgrimage, the region remains ill equipped to deal with such crowds.

In the second half of the piece Bharat Lal Seth writes that while temporary measures are taken to clean the Ganga during the festival, the river continues to stay dirty through the rest of the year. He writes, “Maha Kumbh is no Olympics, which leaves behind a legacy of infrastructure. Come March 10, the tents, stalls, offices, ghats and pontoon bridges will be dismantled. The 100 million people will leave behind a mountain of waste, excreta and plastics for the residents of the host city and downstream villages to deal with, for long.”

In Foreign Affairs, Sumit Ganguly analyzes the Congress Party’s decision in January to elevate Rahul Gandhi to the position of party vice president, a role that did not previously exist. The role, he argues, is an attempt to solidify the Congress Party’s position before the national elections in 2014. Mr. Ganguly suggests that as the Indian democracy matures and the Indian electorate demands a meritocratic leadership, this decision might backfire on the Congress.

In keeping with the dynastic politics that have dominated the Congress, the piece argues that Rahul Gandhi has long been groomed to take over the party’s vice presidency, while others among the party have been discouraged from attempting to take the Congress’s top position. However, Mr. Gaguly notes that if the party operated in a democratic manner internally, it is unlikely that Mr. Gandhi would have worked his way to the top position. He points to Mr. Gandhi’s ineffective public speaking, unremarkable career in parliament, inability to lead the Congress to victory in regional elections and lack of engagement with contemporary issues as evidence for this argument. “In the end, the party that has placed all its bets on him could well discover that his dynastic halo has less appeal in India’s evolving political order than it expected,” writes Mr. Ganguly.

In a deeply personal essay in Open, Rahul Pandita writes of the impetus behind his memoir, “Our Moon Has Blood Clots,” which talks about the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits in 1990.  Speaking of his horrific memories from the time, he talks of the forced removal of Kashmiri Pandits from their homes and the experiences they faced in refugee camps. While the pain of the experience has never left him in the 23 years he has been in exile, Mr. Pandita writes that in the last few years he has become angrier over his fate because the story of the Kashmiri Pandit has been marginalized. His said his desire to write the memoir was fueled by his anger over the denial his community faced about the events leading up to the exodus.

The piece describes the events of the night of 19 January 1990 as experienced by Mr. Pandita. He writes:

“Ask any Kashmiri Pandit — any — who left the Valley in 1990, about the night of 19 January 1990, and he will tell you the same story. Of how Muslims from his neighbourhood assembled in mosques, intimidating him and his family with scary slogans. Of how it happened not in one locality or street, or one district, but in the entire Valley at the same time.”

Speaking of those who have tried to suppress the point of view of Kashmiri Pandits, Mr. Pandita says that as in any genocide, the witnesses play a crucial role in shaping public discourse. When the witnesses manipulate the facts for fear of reproach, truth is compromised. He concludes, “There will be some who will live in permanent denial, but the world will overwhelmingly learn and believe and not be able to disregard our story. The war may end, but it won’t be won against us.”

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Meet the Man Who Designed BlackBerry’s New Phones

When BlackBerry set out to design the phones that would take the company into the next decade, it faced a big challenge. The flagship device of the new BlackBerry 10 platform needed to simultaneously satisfy what today’s customers want in a smartphone while at the same time stay true to the essence of BlackBerry — which, if the company’s market over the last few years is any indication, customers didn’t want.

The man tasked with redesigning BlackBerry phones was Todd Wood, the company’s senior vice president of design. Leading industrial design at BlackBerry since 2006, Wood is a veteran of industrial design, previously doing design work for Nokia and, before that, Nortel. Mashable sat down with Wood this week while he was in town for the BlackBerry 10 launch.

[More from Mashable: Here’s a Mysterious Image From BlackBerry’s Super Bowl Ad]

Wood speaks with the same thoughtfulness of other design leaders, such as Apple’s Jony Ive, but with none of the showiness. He’s been with BlackBerry (formerly Research In Motion) for long enough to see its fortunes rise and fall. As he describes the Z10, you feel that he’s heard enough praise and criticism about BlackBerry’s products that it all just bounces off.

[More from Mashable: Don’t Hold Your Breath for More BlackBerry Tablets]

When I bring up the BlackBerry Storm — the company’s previous (failed) attempt to create a touchscreen phone — Wood doesn’t bristle or even acknowledge the disaster it was. He simply describes certain design elements that a similar to the BlackBerry Z10, BlackBerry’s new flagship phone. And he makes them sound kind of cool.

“There’s still the ‘waterfall’ that was pronounced on Storm — these flowing surfaces,” Wood says as he points to the top and bottom of the Z10, which are ever-so-slightly sloped. “We’ve brought that with the margins [on the Z10], but it’s very subtle. There are some principles that we carry forward, but nothing’s been cut and pasted.”

As CEO Thorsten Heins described at the launch, BlackBerry faced a decision three years ago: adopt someone else’s mobile OS or go it alone. It opted for the latter, acquiring QNX software in 2010 and adapting it to build first the PlayBook, then BlackBerry 10.

Completely switching mobile platforms was risky and extremely challenging, but it was also a huge design opportunity, says Wood.

“We were starting the platform from scratch. We wanted to build on the design DNA [BlackBerry] had, and we wanted to keep certain attributes — the fit to face, fit to hand — the general comfort of the device, the build quality of the device.”

No Home Button

Key decisions about the device itself depended on how the software worked. There’s no home button on the Z10, for example — a user controls basic functions (like switching between apps) via gestures, such as swiping up from the edge of the screen.

Much of the design was influenced by the need for easy, one-handed operation.

“How can you design a system where you could multitask more elegantly?” Wood asks, rhetorically. “It’s not unlike shuffling cards. And we started to realize you can really do that with one hand and one thumb.

“Almost every phone has a UI paradigm of ‘You go home to go somewhere else.’ Here you can flow from app to app.”

Soft Touch Backside

The phone has a semi-rubberized back, a material that BlackBerry refers to as “soft touch.” The company has used it before — in the trim of the latest Bold smartphone, for example. But in the Z10, Wood’s team added a perforated pattern.

“Soft touch is a special coating that we use,” he explains. “It provides grip, and it’s very silky. What we did was add some microtexture to it, which is something that you don’t notice until you pick the phone up and run your hand across it. It’s a nice subtlety.”

Button Shapes

If you’ve ever thought the physical buttons on Samsung’s phones felt cheap, or the iPhone’s too bland, you’ll appreciate RIM’s contoured buttons for volume and media playback. The volume buttons have a slight notch on one side, and the play/pause button has a small upraised piece — all detectable by touch.

“We wanted to keep them really precise and clean,” says Wood. “We sculpted the keys so it’s always really apparent without looking, almost like braille, exactly where you are.”

Font

Wood also played a role in choosing the system font for BlackBerry 10, which is called Slate. Designed by Canadian Rod McDonald (who also designed the font for Maclean’s, one of Canada’s top national news magazines), BlackBerry chose Slate for its legibility, Wood says.

“Slate really works for screen and print, so we decided to adopt it. When you have such a high-res display, you get really accurate letterforms. When you have a really great font design, that improves productivity. You’re not squinting, and letters are not misinterpreted.”

The Q10

Of course, Wood also led the team that designed the Q10, the BlackBerry 10 phone with a physical QWERTY keyboard, coming about a month after the Z10 debuts. Although the Q10 borrows more design DNA from the BlackBerry of old, BB10 afforded some big departures as well.

For starters, the Q10′s keyboard is straight whereas most previous BlackBerry phone keyboards had a curve to them — which even led to the company calling one of its product lines the Curve.

“That is a big change,” Wood says of straightening out the keyboard for the Q10. “It was very logical, but also it signals ‘This is different.’ And there’s no performance tradeoff with it being straight — we’ve measured it.”

Besides being straight, the keyboard is larger than the ones on previous BlackBerry phones.

“What allows us to get that extra size is we’ve replaced the home key, the back key and the send/end keys, since everything in BB10 is controlled by gestures and direct manipulation of the data. Without the curve, each key is the same size, and they’re 3% larger.”

The Red LED

No BlackBerry phone would be complete without the trademark — and at times notorious — blinking red LED that indicates a message is waiting. Wood says the attribute is hard-wired into BlackBerry design at this point and at no point did the company consider ditching it.

“That’s probably the strongest, most iconic element of the DNA we carry forward,” he says. “It’s origins were ‘Let’s save on battery life,’ and it continues today. For us, we call it the spark, or the splat. It’s a hallmark of BlackBerry it makes some people excited, and it makes some people neurotic, but it’s up to end users to manage that.”

How do you like the design of BlackBerry’s new phones? Let us know in the comments.

BONUS: BlackBerry Z10 Review

Click here to view the gallery: BlackBerry Z10 Review

Lead image by Nina Frazier, Mashable

Images by Nina Frazier, Christina Warren and Pete Pachal, Mashable

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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