Keurig Brewer

When coffee reached North America during the colonial period, it was initially not as successful as it had been in Europe. During the Revolutionary War, however, the demand for coffee increased so much that dealers had to hoard their scarce supplies and raise prices dramatically; this was partly due to the reduced availability of tea from British merchants. After the War of 1812, during which Britain temporarily cut off access to tea imports, the Americans' taste for coffee grew, and high demand during the American Civil War together with advances in brewing technology secured the position of coffee as an everyday commodity in the United States.

The type of grind is often named after the brewing method for which it is generally used. Turkish grind is the finest grind, while coffee percolator or French press are the coarsest grind. The most common grinds are between the extremes; a medium grind is used in most common home coffee brewing machines.[54]

NEW YORK (Reuters) –
Bernard Madoff was sentenced on Monday to 150 years in prison -- the maximum penalty the judge could give him for "extraordinarily evil" crimes in Wall Street's biggest and most brazen investment fraud.

Fleeced investors in the courtroom cheered and applauded as the judge handed down the penalty.

Madoff, 71, stood passively with his hands clasped at his waist, showing no reaction when he heard the sentence that will send him to prison for the rest of his life.

The former nonexecutive chairman of the Nasdaq stock market has been jailed in a Manhattan cell since he pleaded guilty to 11 charges including securities fraud, money laundering and perjury in March.

"Here the message must be sent that Mr. Madoff's crimes were extraordinarily evil," U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said in rejecting defense pleas for a lenient, 12-year sentence. "The breach of trust was massive.

"I simply do not get the sense that Mr. Madoff has done all that he could or told all that he knows."

The gray-haired money manager was dressed in his signature dark gray suit, white shirt and tie instead of a prison jumpsuit.

The disgraced financier sat passively throughout the hour-and-a-half hearing as his victims called him a "beast," an "animal" and a "lowlife."

He apologized to them, at one point turning toward the 250 people in the courtroom.

"I will live with this pain, with this torment, for the rest of my life," he calmly said. "I live in a tormented state knowing the pain and suffering I have created."

Madoff, who has been accused of bilking investors worldwide out of as much as $65 billion, said, "In my business, when you make a trading error, you're expected to make a trading error, it's accepted. My error was much more serious. I made an error of judgment."

CAUGHT OUT BY FINANCIAL CRISIS

Madoff's December arrest came as investors were feeling the brunt of the worst financial crisis since the 1930s Great Depression.

The case has triggered widespread criticism of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which has been accused of missing red flags that could have brought the curtain down on his asset management business.

It was not known where Madoff will serve his sentence for what prosecutors described as a worldwide fraud of small and wealthy investors, charities and financial institutions.

Judge Chin heard wrenching statements from nine of Madoff's victims, some of whom said they had lost their life savings, were forced to sell their homes, or had to apply for government assistance to buy food.

"I only hope that his prison sentence is long enough so that his jail cell will become his coffin," said Michael Schwartz, 33, who said his family had been robbed of savings earmarked for the care of his mentally disabled brother.

The White House said that the judge had sent a strong signal to those who handle other people's money.

"My guess is that that message will be heard loud and clear," said President Barack Obama's spokesman Robert Gibbs.

Madoff was arrested in December after his two sons told authorities that he had confessed to them that his investment empire was a sham.

Prosecutors have said that Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities showed $65 billion in customer accounts weeks before his arrest, but the trustee winding down the firm has so far only been able to collect $1.2 billion to return to investors.

As much as $170 billion flowed through the principle Madoff account over decades. Madoff was symbolically ordered to pay that amount in restitution.

While a much lower sentence would have sent Madoff to prison for life, Chin said he deserved the maximum, typically handed down to organized crime bosses.

"The fraud here was staggering," the judge said.

One law professor said she was surprised by the sentence but uncertain whether it would serve as a deterrent.

"I'd love to think that the mini-Madoffs out there would think that what happened today has something to do with them, but I suspect most of them do not," said Jayne Barnard of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Madoff's lawyer said no decision had been made on whether to appeal the sentence.

None of Madoff's relatives came to court. They have not attended any of his prior court appearances.

The judge said he had not received a single letter on Madoff's behalf, testifying to any good deeds or charitable works. "The absence of such support is telling," Chin said.

Madoff's wife Ruth, 68, has not been charged with any crimes but she has been vilified by defrauded investors, shunned by friends, and pursued by the media. Breaking her long silence, she said in a statement on Monday that she had been "betrayed and confused" by her husband's scam.

"From the moment I learned from my husband that he had committed an enormous fraud, I have had two thoughts -- first, that so many people who trusted him would be ruined financially and emotionally, and, second, that my life with the man I have known for over 50 years was over," she said.

Madoff has said he acted alone. The only other person charged criminally is his outside accountant.

Madoff's brother, Peter, and his sons, Mark and Andrew, were executives in his firm's brokerage unit. They have said that they were not aware of or involved in the crooked asset management side.

Madoff and his wife have agreed to the sale of three luxury properties and other assets and valuables. Proceeds from asset sales will be distributed to defrauded investors.

Ruth Madoff will be left with $2.5 million, after forfeiting claim to some $80 million in assets including the couple's Manhattan penthouse apartment.

Madoff told investors in the courtroom that he could offer no excuses, saying he tried to undo his crimes but "the harder I tried, the deeper a hole I dug for myself."

Investors said the apologies left them cold.

"There's something very pathological. He is still making excuses for himself," said George Nierenberg, 57.

(Reporting by Grant McCool, Martha Graybow, Daniel Trotta, Mike Erman and Christine Kearney; Editing by John Wallace, Toni Reinhold)

BEIJING (Reuters) –
What do Johnny Depp, Garfield, Paris Hilton and roast pork have in common? In China, the answer is that a new government-mandated Internet filter rates some pictures of all four of them as bad for your moral health.

Beijing has ordered all personal computers sold in China from July 1 to be preinstalled with the Green Dam software, which it says is designed to block pornographic and violent images, and which critics fear will be used to extend censorship.

But a trial of the programme, which is available online for free download (http://www.skycn.com/soft/46657.html), suggested

its filters may be of limited use to worried parents.

When the software is installed, and an image scanner activated, it blocks even harmless images of a film poster for cartoon cat Garfield, dishes of flesh-colour cooked pork and on one search engine a close-up of film star Johnny Depp's face.

With the image filter off, even though searches with words like "nude" are blocked, a hunt for adult websites throws up links to soft and hardcore pornography sites including one with a video of full penetrative sex playing on its front page.

Green Dam has not detailed how it scans images for obscene content, but computer experts have said it likely uses colour and form recognition to zoom in on potential expanses of naked flesh.

Programme settings allow users to chose how tightly they want images scanned. When too much skin is detected, Green Dam closes all internet browsers with no warning, sometimes flashing up a notice that the viewer is looking at "harmful" content.

But the interpretation of obscene is apparently generous enough to include the orange hue of Garfield's fur and, on the highest security settings, prevent viewers clicking through to any illustrated story on one English language news website.

A programme to scan written content appears less sensitive, with a string of explicit words typed into a word document triggering no response, although some users have complained in online forums of shut-downs similar to those of web browsers.

SEX OR POLITICS?

The software also allows users to choose what they want to filter for, and besides adult websites and violence, categories include "gay" and "illegal activities."

Gay and health activists fear the blanket ban on "gay content," in a country where homosexuality is not criminalised, could damage projects including sexual health and AIDS education.

And government critics worry the "illegal activities" section will cover political and social activities Beijing objects to, tightening access to non-approved information, already filtered by censors and a firewall.

Another setting allows Green Dam to take regular snapshots of a user's screen and store them for up to two weeks -- ostensibly so parents can monitor computer use by minors.

But it could also potentially leave security officials a track of computer use by a suspected dissident, or be a gift to fraudsters hunting online bank details and private information.

Researchers in the U.S. have already said they are concerned Green Dam leaves users vulnerable to malicious sites that might steal personal data or install code on the personal computer.

Western governments and trade groups have also asked China to reconsider, based on concerns ranging from cyber-security and performance of the software to Internet freedoms.

"People say the software is not very stable and has many technological problems," said Joerg Wuttke, the president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, which has dubbed the introduction of Green Dam "hasty."

China's foreign ministry on Tuesday declined to respond to criticisms of the software.

(Additional reporting by Maxim Duncan, Kirby Chien and Alan Wheatley; Editing by Jerry Norton)

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Though most states have child abuse laws allowing religious exemptions for parents who shun medicine for their sick children, recent cases have raised the thorny legal issues for parents following less-recognized faiths.
Historically, many of the parents addressed by the laws have embraced faiths like Pentecostalism and Christian Science, while others are Jehovah's Witnesses — all established denominations that the law has gradually taken into account.
It's harder for judges to decide cases involving parents who don't belong to a well-known denomination, yet also don't believe in using medicine for their kids. Legal and religious scholars say it's becoming more difficult for courts to decide when to honor the religious beliefs of parents and when to order conventional medical treatment for extremely sick children.
The manslaughter trial of an Oregon couple who claim they were following their religious beliefs in the 2008 pneumonia death of their 1-year-old daughter was to begin Monday. Carl and Raylene Worthington are members of Followers of Christ Church, which has been investigated for past child deaths.
In Tennessee, Jacqueline Crank and her minister Ariel Sherman face child neglect charges in the death of her 15-year-old daughter Jessica, who died in 2002 with a basketball-sized tumor on her shoulder. Prosecutors say based on Sherman's advice, the girl's mother relied on prayer instead of medicine.
Sherman has been accused of being a cult leader whose Universal Life Church is not a legitimate religion. He has denied such charges and says the church is Christian-based and embraces the Bible.
Believers in faith healing point to a Biblical verse in the Epistle of James, which describes how church elders should be called in to pray over the sick. There's no mention of doctors, and literalists interpret it to mean medical treatment should be eschewed over prayer.
Gregory P. Isaacs, an attorney for Crank, who's out on bond, argues that Tennessee's religious exemption law is untested and too vague.
"It really has a tremendous amount of problems," Isaacs said. "What is an organized religion and what is an ordained minister? What illnesses can you attempt to heal by faith? Those are the two pitfalls in the statute. That's not what's really clear."
Jim Dwyer, a William and Mary Law School professor who's written articles about and participated in litigation on the topic, said it's often more complicated for courts to discern cases with unaffiliated religions because judges and juries aren't as familiar with them and are skeptical of their legitimacy.
"The Supreme Court has adopted a very broad definition of religion," Dwyer said. "But ... you have to show sincere religious beliefs. Some judges might be skeptical of sincerity if it's something they've never heard of, if the person says, 'I don't belong to a certain church. I just have some beliefs that I saw on the Internet,' or 'In our own home, we've developed this set of beliefs.'"
Dr. Ellen Wright Clayton, a pediatrician and co-director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics and Society at Vanderbilt University, says when treatment for an illness is very toxic and the prognosis is dire, courts tend to rule parents don't have to pursue medical treatment. If that's not the case, courts are likely to order the treatment.
"Until medicine became effective, there was no push to say we absolutely have to do medical treatment. There wasn't this notion of deference (to religion) until medicine began to work and to become institutionally powerful."
Besides the states that have religious exemption laws, five states — Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska and North Carolina — have repealed such laws.
Many of the exemption laws were enacted in the 1970s. Rita Swan, director of the Sioux City, Iowa-based advocacy group Children's Healthcare is a Legal Duty, which lobbies states to repeal such laws, said that since 1975, there have been at least 274 known cases of U.S. children who have died after medical care was withheld on religious grounds.
She says the majority of such cases are still associated with established denominations like Pentecostalism, though "the Internet has opened up some more possibilities than it did before" and there have been some cases involving unaffiliated denominations.
At least two recent high-profile cases involve parents whose beliefs were drawn from Internet-based religious groups.
Authorities in Minnesota convinced a judge to force 13-year-old Daniel Hauser into chemotherapy, prompting his mother Colleen to skip a court hearing and — with her son in tow — go on the run for nearly a week in May.

They headed to Southern California, where they considered a trip into Mexico for alternative cancer treatments, before eventually returning to the Hausers' home in Sleepy Eye, Minn., about 100 miles southwest of the Twin Cities. The boy has since received chemotherapy treatments, which appear to be working.

The family prefers natural healing practices suggested by an Internet-based group called the Nemenhah Band, which says it follows American Indian beliefs.

In Wisconsin, a jury convicted Leilani Neumann, of Weston, Wis., of second-degree reckless homicide in May for failing to rush her 11-year-old daughter Madeline Kara Neumann to a doctor. She died of untreated diabetes in March 2008.

Prosecutors argued she killed the girl by ignoring obvious symptoms — she couldn't walk or talk and was believed to be in a coma — until it was too late. The mother testified she didn't realize her daughter was so ill and did all she could to help, in line with the family's belief in faith healing.

Neumann sought the spiritual assistance of the online evangelical Christian ministry Unleavened Bread Ministries.

In the wake of the Wisconsin case, Swan said legislators there are considering a bill that would repeal the state's religious exemption to its child abuse and neglect law.

"In the U.S. under the First Amendment, we're not supposed to be establishing religion or carving out any preferences for prestigious religions," Swan said. "The courts should not be giving any kind of deference to established denominations and making any distinctions."

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On the Net:

Children's Healthcare is a Legal Duty: http://www.childrenshealthcare.org/