South Florida students learn the effects of hatred

In a high school round table discussion, all eyes turned to 93-year-old Holocaust survivor Julius Eisenstein as he showed his identification tattoo: Number 1208.

The tattoo was proof of the years he spent in the various concentration camps, but also proof of his survival.

Eisenstein was one of 70 survivors who shared their stories Tuesday at Student Awareness Day, organized by the Holocaust Documentation and Education Center’s prejudice reduction program to teach students the dangers of bullying, racism, hatred and bigotry.

“It begins with us, regardless of race, color, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, everyone has the right to live in freedom and harmony and we need to learn to respect each other,” said Rositta Kenigsberg, executive vice president of the Holocaust Documentation and Education Center.

More than 700 students from 20 schools in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties attended the workshop held at the Broward County Convention Center in Fort Lauderdale.

For 27 years, The Holocaust Documentation and Education Center has made it their mission to share the stories of the Holocaust survivors with the students in a nondenominational way.

“They are eyewitnesses that have experienced ultimate hate,’’ said Kenigsberg. “They talk to the students about what happens if they continue to hate and they become the mentors and the eyewitnesses.”

The stories varied like the life Leon Heller, who was part of the U.S. Army team that liberated Buchenwald concentration camp; Samuel Ron who told about the horror of losing his family and starving for long periods of time; and Rita Hofrichter who posed as a Christian to survive the Holocaust.

“It is necessary to tell the story so that everyone sees the steps that lead to the Holocaust. It didn’t start right away in camps, it started slow,” Hofrichter said. “I hope to show the students that hating someone hurts as much as being hated.”

The majority of the students had never met a Holocaust survivor, but at the event were able to ask questions and have one-on-one conversations.

“I think after this I have a lot more tolerance,’’ said Aeirian Exalien, a senior at Coral Gables High School. “This is better than anything you would read in a book.”

Eisenstein told the students about the separation from his family, living in one room with four families in a ghetto, experiencing severe hunger, picking up the dead bodies and arriving at various concentration camps, including Auschwitz.

“A small number of people can contribute a lot to the world,” said Eisenstein as he told the students about his life after the Holocaust. Despite his own experience as a victim of racism and hatred, Eisenstein told the students it was possible to persevere in life.

“I would never think that someone can go through all of that and still be here,” said Ashley Correa, a junior at Everglades High School in Miramar. “This teaches me to appreciate everything and not take anything for granted.”

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Obama election tweet most repeated but Olympics tops on Twitter

(Reuters) – An election victory tweet from President Barack Obama — “Four more years” with a picture of him hugging his wife — was the most retweeted ever, but the U.S. election was topped by the Olympics as the most tweeted event this year.

Obama’s tweet was retweeted (repeated) more than 810,000 times, Twitter said as it published a list of the most tweeted events in 2012. (http://2012.twitter.com/)

“Within hours, that Tweet simultaneously became the most retweeted of 2012, and the most retweeted ever. In fact, retweets of that simple message came from people in more than 200 countries around the world,” Twitter spokeswoman Rachael Horwitz said.

Twitter users were busiest during the final vote count for the presidential elections, sending 327,452 tweets per minute on election night on their way to a tally of 31 million election tweets for the day.

The 2012 Olympic Games in London had the most overall tweets of any event, with 150 million sent over the 16 days.

Usain Bolt’s golden win in the 200 meters topped 80,000 tweets per minute but he did not achieve the highest Olympic peak on Twitter. That was seen during the closing ceremony when 115,000 tweets per minute were sent as 1990s British pop band the Spice Girls performed.

Syria, where a bloody civil war still plays out, was the most talked about country in 2012 but sports and pop culture dominated the tally of tweets.

Behind Obama was pop star Justin Bieber. His tweet, “RIP Avalanna. i love you” sent when a six-year-old fan died from a rare form of brain cancer, was retweeted more than 220,000 times.

Third most repeated in 2012 was a profanity-laced tweet from Green Bay Packers NFL player TJ Lang, when he blasted a controversial call by a substitute referee officiating during a referee dispute. That was retweeted 98,000 times.

This was the third year running that the microblogging site published its top Twitter trends, offering a barometer to assess the biggest events in social media.

Superstorm Sandy, which slammed the densely populated U.S. East Coast in late October, killing more than 100 people, flooding wide areas and knocking out power for millions, attracted more than 20 million tweets between October 27 and November 1.

European football made the list of top tweets when Spain’s Juan Mata scored as his side downed Italy 4-0 in the Euro 2012 final — sparking 267,200 tweets a minute.

News of pop star Whitney Houston‘s death in February generated more than 10 million tweets, peaking at 73,662 per minute.

Romantic comedy “Think Like a Man” was the most tweeted movie this year, topping “The Hunger Games”, “The Avengers” and “The Dark Knight Rises.”

Rapper Rick Ross who notched his fourth No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart this year, was the most talked about music artist.

(Editing by Rodney Joyce)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Oscars Flashback '94: Tommy Lee Jones' Only One

In Tommy Lee Jones' long and storied career, he has taken part in many significant projects, including this year's early Oscar favorite Lincoln, as well as No Country For Old Men, Best Picture of 2008.

But while several of Jones' projects hold the honor of winning Oscars, Tommy Lee won his only personal statuette at the '94 Oscars for his supporting role as Samuel Gerald in The Fugitive.

In the press room following his victory, Jones was asked whether he thought the Oscar would make a difference for his career going forward. "Of course it does. You get considered for more parts. Probably offered a few more. You get -- it certainly represents a growth in one's creative life. The most important thing about it."

RELATED: Daniel Day-Lewis Talks Lincoln

The answer in hindsight seems like an understatement for the celebrated actor, who would go on to star in mega-franchises like Men In Black, as well as critical hits like In the Valley of Elah and the aforementioned No Country For Old Men.

While he often takes roles that are more serious in nature, much like his role in the fugitive, Jones doesn't shy away from a chance to lighten the mood. Responding to how his Oscar would affect his ego, Tommy responded, "not at all, as long as they'll let me take it with me every shot that I'm in."

Jones will be looking for another Best Supporting Actor nod this year as he shares the screen with Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln. Following JFK in 1991, if nominated it would mark Jones' second Supporting Actor nomination for a presidential film.

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Father of former firefighter accused of beating transsexual lover describes son's motherless upbringing

He wants his mother.

There were more waterworks in the War of the Hoses assault trial today -- as beefy FDNY calendar boy Taylor Murphy called his own dad to the stand to talk about his motherless upbringing, and the anguished pair cried enough tears in open court to put out a small kitchen fire.

"I had custody [over Taylor and his two older brothers] from practically the time he was born," retired FDNY deputy chief Thomas Murphy, 65, told jurors in poignant testimony in the bizarre case, in which the son is accused of punching, biting and choking his glamorous pre-op transsexual lover.

"His mother gave birth to him -- he was a total blessing," the dad testified. The gray-haired, veteran smoke-eater's voice broke with emotion, and the son, facing him from his seat at the defense table, rubbed tears from his eyes.

"But she needed to -- she was an unfulfilled person," the dad continued awkwardly. "But I had custody. But it was difficult for him. . . For the first two years, I know it sounds incredible, but emotionally he didn't get hardly any nurturing,"

At that point, both the father and son broke into helpless-sounding sobs. Manhattan Supreme Court Justice A. Kirke Bartley called a recess to let the dad compose himself.

Back on the stand 15 minutes later, the dad picked up where he'd left off -- tearfully baring family secrets to help his son, a young man described to jurors by his own lawyer as a tortured, alcohol-abusing bisexual, attracted only to men who live as women.

"I don't seem to be what he needs," the dad told jurors, his face grief-wrenched. "There's a hole that's there and I don't fill it. What's he's always looking for, in my opinion, is the love of his mother."

The dad was barred by Bartley, for reasons of heresay, from giving the testimony he'd primarily been called to the stand for -- testimony detailing two phone calls he received from the alleged victim on the August, 2011 night of the alleged assault.

Charriez had kept hold of Taylor Murphy's phone that night, and was dialing her way through his phone contacts, jurors have been told.

In the first call, a furious Charriez told the dad that his son had attacked her during a love-spat in the Hotel Metro in Midtown.

"She needed to be soothed, and I soothed her," the dad explained, during a brief hearing outside the jury's presence. "I said to her, 'All I know, Claudia, is that Taylor says he loves you. And when I said that, she said 'What!' like that… I really think the phone call ended there."

Charriez called back a half hour later. "She expressed in words that she hoped that the police would dismiss the charges," the dad said.

"These were her exact words; I'll never forget it: 'I am a very jealous girl. My girlfriends are calling me and telling me that Taylor is having sex with them, and then she said he texts them in front of me. That's what she said."

Summations began this afternoon, with defense lawyer Jason Berland telling jurors that Charriez's own three days of testimony showed her to be a jealous, lying publicity-seeker. "For most of her testimony, Ms. Charriez was putting on a show," he told jurors.

Murphy is charged with felony strangulation and felony violation of an order of protection barring him from contacting Charriez.

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Diageo moving office to Coral Gables

Diageo will move its Miami office to Coral Gables in the fall of 2013.

The world’s leading spirits company will move from its current office at Blue Lagoon when its lease ends and relocate to 396 Alhambra Circle in Coral Gables.

Diageo has 175 people based in its Miami office, the majority of whom work for the Latin American and Caribbean region that is headquartered in Miami. The company has signed a 10-year lease in Coral Gables at 296 Alhambra, which is owned by Agave Holdings. The 32,527 square foot office has received LEED Silver and Gold certification.

“The new office is an important hub for not only Diageo North America, but also serves as the gateway to Latin America and our successful – and growing – business there,” said Randy Millian, Diageo President, Latin America and Caribbean. “We are excited to join the Coral Gables community.”

With the completion of the Diageo lease, the 282,000-square-foot Coral Gables office building is now 65 percent lease just one year after its opening. Diageo will join a roster of existing tenants that includes HBO Latin America, Millicom International Services, law firm Richman Greer, Banco Pichincha and CitiBank

“The addition of Diageo strengthens 396 Alhambra’s standing as the Class A address of choice for major multinational users in the Coral Gables market,” said Danet Linares, executive vice president at Blanca Commercial Real Estate, which represented Agave in the transaction.

“Diageo’s decision to relocate to Coral Gables reaffirms that the area is a vibrant business center for the greater Miami area,” said Jose Antonio Perez Helguera, managing director for Agave Holdings.

Danet Linares and Andres del Corral of Blanca Commercial Real Estate represented 396 Alhambra in the transaction, while Joe Garvey of CLW Real Estate Group represented Diageo.

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Keeping your identity safe during the holidays

I have received many emails regarding identity theft, particularly during this time of the year.

I have turned to our FBI partners for information. Special Agent Darin M. Didier, a six-year veteran of the FBI who investigates identity theft for the FBI’s Miami Division, wrote this column.

Have you ever found unauthorized purchases on your credit card or tried to file a tax return only to find out someone else already filed a return in your name?

If you answered yes, you’re not alone – thousands of South Floridians have become victims of identity theft in recent years by these and other common schemes. Approximately 10 million Americans fall victim to identity theft each year at a cost of roughly $5 billion. The FBI, along with numerous other agencies, investigates many different types of identity theft scams that victimize individuals every day.

Simply put, identity theft is the use of someone’s personal information without their permission. Identity theft can be used to obtain new lines of credit, exploit existing credit cards or bank accounts, obtain a mortgage, file a fraudulent tax return or even to get a job.

What used to be a crime committed by criminals grabbing credit card offers from mailboxes has become a global issue that can be perpetrated by individuals thousands of miles away. With advanced technology, criminals exploit the internet as a means to quickly and anonymously find unsecure personal information. While a daunting problem, proper vigilance can help to safeguard your identity. You can help keep your identity safe by following these tips:

Check your credit report for free at least yearly – then follow-up with the credit bureau if you notice anything unusual.

Contact your credit card companies to close out your accounts that you no longer use – just because you paid off the balance does not mean the account was closed.

Regularly review your bank account and credit card statements to ensure no suspicious charges appear.

Never respond to unsolicited text messages, e-mails or phone calls asking for your personal information. If you have any doubt, use the contact number on your account statement to check on your account.

Ensure the websites you use have a secure connection, which is denoted by “https:” at the beginning of the web address and a lock icon displayed in the address bar.

Set up automatic updates for your antivirus and firewall protection.

Use a shredder to destroy all documentation you wouldn’t want others to see.

For more tips to combat identity theft, visit the Federal Trade Commission website at www.ftc.gov. Report all online crime including identity theft at www.ic3.gov. The FBI and its local, state and federal partners take the investigation and prosecution of identity theft seriously. Contact your local FBI offices at (305)944-9101 if you are a victim.

You can also call our office and we will be happy to send you brochures on this topic. We have English and Spanish brochures.

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Busy Philipps Pregnant With Second Child

Cougar Town star Busy Philipps, 33, just revealed that she's expecting baby number two with her husband, screenwriter Marc Silverstein.

"So this happened ..." she tweeted, along with a picture of a Clearblue pregnancy test reading positive.

Related: Busy Philipps Talks 'Cougar Town'

Her rep later confirmed the happy news.

"I can confirm she is pregnant," Busy's rep, Carrie Byalick, told Life & Style.

Video: Busy Philipps Gets 'Mortified'

The newest member of the family will join their daughter Birdie, 4, who the couple welcomed on August 13, 2008.

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Fourth accuser sues Kevin Clash: Elmo's puppeteer had sensitive 'medical condition'

Elmo have hard problem.

The fourth man to accuse “Sesame Street’’ puppeteer Kevin Clash of inappropriate sexual contact says the older man couldn’t get it up when the two were getting it on in Clash’s New York City pad around 1995, according the alleged victim’s civil lawsuit filed today in Manhattan Federal Court.

At the time, Clash, then 35, blamed his penis problems on an unspecified “medical condition,” the lawsuit said.

The accuser, who is now in his 30s, said he was around 16 when he met Clash walking on a Miami beach and that the pair kept in touch over the phone.

Getty Images

Kevin Clash, the former puppeteer for the Elmo character on the long-running children's television show Sesame Street.

After learning that the accuser had problems at home and wanted to run away, Clash, the squeaky voice of Elmo, promised to “be a dad” to him and lured him to the city “with promises to pay for his plane ticket ... and give him cash and a free place to stay,” the lawsuit said. The accuser was allegedly sexually abused after visiting Clash.

A previous accuser who says he was also 16 when he and Clash hooked up also had written in a memoir, “The game we played was father and son.”

Clash’s latest accuser remained unnamed in the suit. His lawyer is also representing two other accusers.

Clash’s rep did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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AutoNation: Back in the fast lane with expansion, higher sales

Despite an agonizingly slow economic recovery, the country’s largest auto retailer, Fort Lauderdale-based AutoNation, is thriving again as demand for vehicles expands.

The company, one of Florida’s largest, is posting increasingly strong profits and revenues. Just last week, in a sign of confidence, Autonation announced a major acquisition — buying six large auto stores in Texas — that will add about 700 employees to its national payroll of 19,400.

In announcing the deal Tuesday, which is expected to provide AutoNation with $575 million in additional revenues next year, the company’s CEO and chairman, Mike Jackson, expressed optimism about the prospects for continued growth in vehicle sales.

“You want to know what I’m thinking, look at what I do,” Jackson told viewers on CNBC’s Squawk Box program.

No information was released on the cost of the transactions, but in recent years auto dealerships sometimes sold for three to five times revenue, which would represent a significant investment for the company.

Tough times

To be sure, AutoNation has struggled through some tough times. It was battered by the Great Recession, which depressed sales and pushed the company into a $1.2 billion loss four years ago. As sales began to improve in 2010 and 2011, it was blindsided by a shortage of Japanese-made cars last year after the earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 shut down Japanese manufacturers of some essential components.

Since then, however, AutoNation has rebounded. Unit sales, revenues and profits all performed well in the first three quarters of this year, and the company expects new vehicle sales to continue their recovery nationwide, rising to the mid-14 million units this year, up from about 12.7 million in 2011. In the third quarter of 2012, AutoNation’s new car unit sales grew by 21 percent over the same period in 2011, doing better than an estimated 15 percent increase industry wide. November’s sales of new vehicles increased by 21 percent over November 2011 .

The big dealerships acquired sell Audi, Porsche, Volkswagen and Chrysler products in the Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth markets. They are expected to sell 14,000 new and used autos this year, and will add substantially to AutoNation’s future sales.

“We are in the right industry at the right time,” Jackson said during an interview. “The recovery in new vehicle sales is being driven by replacement demand,” added Jackson, who has 42 years of experience in the auto business. “The average age of the light vehicle fleet in the country has increased to 11 years, and even though cars and trucks last longer today, they can’t go on forever. About 12 to 13 million vehicles are scrapped every year and need to be replaced.”

Other factors are contributing to stronger demand for vehicles. “The population is growing, interest rates are low, there is ample credit available and manufacturers are producing a wide range of new models that offer attractive styling, power and greatly improved gas mileage,” said Jackson, who took over as AutoNation’s CEO in 1999. “Auto financing is more available than it has been in recent years. A little known fact is that people are more likely to default on a mortgage than on a vehicle loan.”

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Republican insider fight becomes headache for GOP

MiamiHerald.com/columnists

A Republican is suing the Republican Party of Florida, saying it disenfranchised him and some Republican voters.

On its face, the lawsuit filed last week by former Miami-Dade School Board member Renier Diaz de la Portilla looks like a simple paperwork fight over an obscure party position.

But the underpinnings of the case are much more complicated, involving the byzantine politics of Miami-Dade and the behind-the-scenes battle in Tallahassee for who leads the Florida House in six years.

The lawsuit is also another public-relations headache for the Republican Party of Florida, which would prefer to focus its energies on bigger matters, like promoting Gov. Rick Scott.

But RPOF has no choice. It has to deal with Diaz de la Portilla.

He was elected Aug. 14 as Republican State Executive Committeeman from Miami-Dade. The party, though, refused to seat him. It said he forgot to submit a loyalty oath to the party in Tallahassee.

Diaz de la Portilla said that’s false.

“The law is on my side,” Diaz de la Portilla said. “I won the election. And I filed my loyalty oath. I don’t see what the problem is, why they want to disenfranchise Republican voters.”

Party spokesman Brian Burgess said RPOF isn’t cancelling Republican votes; it’s ensuring the rules are properly followed.

Burgess said he couldn’t comment on Diaz de la Portilla’s suit, filed last Tuesday. A Friday hearing on the case was delayed until another date.

Under party rules, candidates for executive committeeman were supposed to file loyalty oaths to the party between June 4 and June 8.

Diaz de la Portilla signed the oath June 5, got it notarized and promptly submitted it to the county and state elections offices as well as the local Republican Party, according to documents he filed in his lawsuit.

In a sworn affidavit, Miami-Dade Republican Party Executive Director Yulexis Argota said he faxed the loyalty oath to party headquarters in Tallahassee on June 6 and then personally spoke with a party official who confirmed receipt.

Perhaps there’s another twist, but right now it’s tough to see how RPOF can deny Diaz de la Portilla the executive committeeman position, which has limited say and influence over the direction of the party.

But this is law and politics and internal Republican Party infighting we’re talking here. So nothing is as simple as it seems.

After all, the committeeman battle is bound up in the fight over who becomes Florida House Speaker, from 2018 to 2020.

That post appears at the moment to have been won by Hialeah state Rep. Jose Oliva.

Diaz de la Portilla’s brother, Alex Diaz de la Portilla, wanted the job. But he lost his central Miami state House race in a general-election upset to Democrat Jose Javier Rodriguez.

Months before, Renier Diaz de la Portilla also lost his bid for a state House seat that he sought at the same time he ran for committeeman.

Assuming he and his brother won, Alex Diaz de la Portilla would have had a strong shot at the speakership (their oldest brother, Miguel, serves in the state Senate) because Republican House members choose the chamber’s leader in the GOP-controlled Legislature. Democrats essentially have no say.

Alex Diaz de la Portilla knows something about legislative leadership races; he helped engineer a coup that cost former Miami state Sen. Alex Villalobos his shot at becoming state Senate president in the 2009-10 sessions.

This year, as Renier and Alex Diaz de la Portilla ran for their house seats, Renier hedged his bets by simultaneously running for the committeeman slot. He won that post, salvaging a win against the man who beat him for the House seat, newly elected Rep. Manny Diaz Jr. – an ally of Oliva’s.

Then, in mid-October, the state party informed Diaz de la Portilla that he didn’t properly file his paperwork. It said that Diaz, the runner up in the committeeman race, would be seated instead.

Diaz de la Portilla tried to sound reasonable at the time and said all the votes cast for him should count.

"I hope to work with party officials to make sure that 30,000 Miami-Dade Republicans are not disenfranchised by this misunderstanding,” he told The Herald in October.

But the more the case develops, the less it looks like it’s a fight about the preference of rank-and-file voters for a position that few understand.

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