NFL wants Super Bowl halftime performers to pay them?

By Reva Friedel
Awful Announcing

The Super Bowl halftime show has been quite the hot topic ever since Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction during the 2003 contest. Since then, the NFL has picked its performers with kiddie gloves and added double sided tape to the list of wardrobe requirements. Well, now the league is adding something new: pay it forward.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the NFL is asking the three finalists for the next halftime show to donate post Super Bowl earnings to the league. The finalists include Coldplay (is it still 2005?), Rihanna (would she be sober enough to care?) and Katy Perry (can she trick Russell Brand into paying for her?).
The performers do it for free because of the exposure (literally and figuratively of course), but it's not like the NFL doesn't already have enough money. Why are they asking for more? Pro Football Talk makes an interesting point:
"And it's entirely possible that the league leaked the development in order to pressure one of the three to blink, given that plenty of other performers who would gladly give up a piece of a pie they otherwise don't have will now be calling the league to offer whatever the league wants for the privilege of playing to one of the biggest audiences in TV history."

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Student claims her "bless you" caused suspension

The superintendent of Dyer County Schools hasn't commented on exactly happened, but some of Newbern's residents are more than eager to share their opinions.
One of them is Thomas Autry.
"I do it all the time, right. My wife sneezes at home and I say, 'bless you,'" said Autry.
Autry heard about the alleged "bless you" incident while he was on vacation in Indiana.
"And they were talking about it in Indiana. About the girl saying, 'bless you' when somebody sneezed and they suspended her for it. And that's ridiculous," said Autry.
On the website momdot.com, Kendra Turner tells her side of the story in which she said "bless you" to a student in keyboarding class, after the student sneezed.
According to Turner, who is a senior, she was reprimanded by the teacher, who said, "We will not have Godly speaking in my class."
Turner said she then told the teacher that her pastor said she had a "Constitutional right ... First Amendment Freedom of Speech."
Turner said she was sent to the office and suspended from the keyboarding class.
While the Dyer County Schools superintendent has not commented on the alleged incident, we were told there is a strict policy in the keyboarding classroom against "outbursts," including saying "bless you" when someone sneezes.
We're told the policy is in place to assure students are not distracted, especially during tests.
David Nicholson, who lives in Newbern, said he's waiting to hear the school's version of what happened, but for now thinks the student was treated unfairly .
"Oh no. She should not have been suspended for it at all. If anything, the common courtesy back would be just like, 'thank you.' Not, 'hey you're suspended,'" said David Nicholson.
We are still waiting for a response from the Dyer County Schools superintendent.

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Global warming will soon resume, scientists say

By RYAN GORMAN

A new study has scientists concerned that the recent slowing of global warming is only temporary and that temperatures are poised to resume dramatically rising.

Researchers cited lower-than-expected sun irradiance and fluctuations in the El Niño/La Niña cycles in the Pacific Ocean for the departure, but found both are expected to soon return to expected levels.

Researchers from ETH Zurich found that longer than normal solar cycles have led to lower than expected temperatures as a result of a weaker sun, according to the results of the study published in Science Daily.

Sun irradiance greatly affects the Earth's climate. It has been lower since the turn of the century than climate change models expected, partially explaining the lack of rising temperatures.

Sun spot cycles previously lasted 11 years but have, for an unknown reason, lasted 13 years during a period of weak irradiance. A number of volcanic eruptions have also launched significant amounts pollution into the air, further diluting the sun's effects on the planet, the study found.

Also possibly playing a role are the El Niño warming and La Niña cooling cycles in the Pacific Ocean, according to the team.

"1998 was a strong El Niño year, which is why it was so warm that year," said Reto Knutti, Professor of Climate Physics at ETH Zurich.

Significant gains in global warming science were made at the end of the last century, and many predictions were based on upward trending temperatures during the 1990s.

Knutti explained that the models did not take a strong La Niña in recent years coupled with lower sun irradiance joining forces to keep temperatures stable into account.

This combination is only a speed bump in the climate change steamroller.The models look deep into the future and do not account for these fluctuations.

"Short-term climate fluctuations can easily be explained," said Knutti. "They do not alter the fact that the climate will become considerably warmer in the long term as a result of greenhouse gas emissions

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