New Discovery Leads to Shocking Muscle Gains

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With the recent media coverage exposing steroid use in professional sports, many people are looking for an extra edge to build muscle, get stronger, and look better.
Steroids, although effective, are unhealthful and illegal to use without a prescription. Millions of dollars have been spent in sports medicine research to find a completely safe, natural alternative that produces the same results.
Years of research now show that nitric oxide supplements are the safe way to maximize your muscle gains.
UFC Champion BJ Penn started using a nitric oxide supplement called Force Factor last year. Penn recently told us, “Force Factor blows away the competition. Of everything out there, it’s the only MMA-quality supplement on the market, hands down.”
Other athletes, like 2011 professional basketball MVP Derrick Rose and professional football player Vernon Davis, are just now discovering the dramatic benefits of using a nitric oxide supplement. Davis has been an advocate of Force Factor since first taking it, telling his teammates in San Francisco, “Force Factor has proven results. I believe in results.”
The Science Behind Nitric Oxide
Your body naturally produces nitric oxide to move oxygen to your muscles while you exercise. This burst of oxygen keeps your muscles functioning while you lift weights or blast through your cardio sessions.
Unfortunately, your body can only generate a limited amount of nitric oxide. When the nitric oxide runs out, your muscles can no longer power through the exercise, no matter how much mental determination you have.
Taking a nitric oxide supplement 30 minutes before you work out could be the push your body needs to add weight to your bench press or run that extra mile. This increased stamina results in longer, harder workouts and a healthier, stronger body in less time.
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• Drastic Muscle Gains
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• Total Body Transformation

What’s the Best Nitric Oxide Product?
Now that the science behind nitric oxide has been proven, several companies are rushing to bring a nitric oxide supplement to consumers, but which is the best?
Force Factor is the most popular nitric oxide supplement available. Thousands of people have already purchased Force Factor online or from their local GNC. In fact, Force Factor recently won GNC's “Rising Star” award because of its breakthrough muscle building formula.
Professional basketball superstars, football players, and UFC fighters have all said that Force Factor works for them. Will you continue to struggle at the gym, or will you take this opportunity to finally see the results you want?

Microsoft's Windows 8 makes a strong first impression

You won't typically read about a product in this column many months ahead of its presumed launch. But when that product, however early, is the next version of Windows — and so radically different from the familiar operating system software used by a billion people each day — it's never too soon to take an inside look.

Microsoft unveiled the developer preview version of Windows 8, the code name for its latest operating system, this week at its Build conference here. Though it is way too premature for Microsoft to announce specifics on pricing or availability for Windows 8, I was provided a Samsung test tablet computer loaded with Windows 8, and the touch-friendly software got me jazzed. Even as a fan of Windows 7, I can't remember ever saying that I was jazzed by a Microsoft operating system.

Indeed, my first impressions are so favorable that even Apple should be on alert. But the rosy outlook for Windows 8 comes with all sorts of caveats. First, this isn't a review so much as an early look. There's a lot that has to happen between now and when consumers finally get their hands on Windows 8, probably some time in 2012. And Microsoft by no means revealed everything. I haven't been able to load any of my own software on the test machine or try it with a printer. None of the legacy programs, such as Microsoft Office, were loaded on the computer, though Microsoft insists that all the programs that work on Windows 7 will work even better on Windows 8.

• MORE: Baig columns

You start to notice the dramatic turn in Windows from the very start — even before you get to the newly designed Start screen. At your option, you can log in with a picture password, instead of the standard typed password, by "drawing" a chosen image with your finger on the touch-screen in a predetermined pattern.

Once in, you will want to explore your surroundings because Windows 8, at least from most views, doesn't look at all like its venerable predecessors. At the heart of the new operating system is an attractive customizable user layout called Metro, which uses colorful, live, touchable tiles of different sizes on the Start screen rather than standard icons to display information. From this screen, you can see what the stock market is doing or get the weather. It reminds you of what is already on Windows Phones. The way Microsoft explains it, icons are yesterday's way of representing apps, tiles are the modern way.

Dragging your finger from the right edge of the screen toward the middle reveals five hidden icons or what are called "charms" that represent search, share, devices, settings and a button to return you to Start. Touching each summons different options.

Microsoft

A screenshot of Windows 8? running on a tablet. Demonstrated is a split-screen function to see multiple programs running concurrently. Additional programs come into view with the drag of a finger across the screen.

Dragging from the left edge of the screen takes you back to the previous screen.

You can still get all the benefits of Windows 8, Microsoft says, with a standard mouse and keyboard (or a digitized pen in some cases). But, clearly, the mouse and keyboard, at least in terms of early emphasis, seem to have been relegated to second-string status.

If you get the sense that Windows 8 is designed to compete on traditional PCs as well as slate-type tablets, you'd be right. Windows 8 will support standard personal computers and laptops, as well as tablets that run on ARM processors.

My test machine has two touch keyboards, a full-size version with larger buttons and a thumb keyboard that splits the onscreen keyboard into two (and, after my limited tests, takes getting used to). Microsoft lent me a wireless physical Bluetooth keyboard, which I used when the slate was connected to a dock that Microsoft also supplied as part of my tests.

I used the digitized pen to jot handwritten notes in an Ink Pad app, one of several preloaded Metro apps. Among the others: a piano app, paint program, student flash cards, and Twitter program, all produced, incidentally, by Microsoft interns.

A Metro-style version of the Internet Explorer browser was also preloaded. On this IE 10 version, a navigation bar appears only when you need it. You can "pin" favorite websites to the Windows Start screen — and IE 10 will inform you if the site has an associated Metro app.

Such Metro apps take up the full screen (reminding you of the iPad and OS X Lion), and they're lovely to look at.

There's another thing in Windows 8 that will remind you of Apple: a built-in Windows Store, sporting apps Microsoft says will be prescreened for viruses. Microsoft offered a glimpse, but it wasn't available on my test tablet.

Microsoft is promising even more: secure, always-connected machines that sync with one another through the Internet cloud. They can turn on in seconds and, in theory anyway, run all day on a single charge. There's stuff for power users, too, including a revamped Task Manager that gives you a handle on any programs hogging system resources. In Control Panel, you can refresh your PC if it's not running well, without losing your photos, music or other files.

If Windows 8 lives up to its early promise, computer users — on tablets or more traditional PCs — ought to be delighted. Stay tuned for a lot more concerning Windows 8 in the days and months ahead.

Sun comes alive, blasting massive solar flares

WASHINGTON (AP) – After years of quiet, the sun is coming alive with solar storms in a big way.

The sun shot off a flare Thursday afternoon from a region that scientists are calling a "benevolent monster."

Scientists at the federal Space Weather Prediction Center say that area is the most active part of the sun since 2005. It has dozens of sunspots, including one that is the size of 17 Earths. Sunspots are kinks or knots in the sun's magnetic field.

"It's beautiful," said forecaster Jess Whittington. "It's still growing. The size is what blows me away."

Thursday's flare was not aimed at Earth. This active region, however, is now slowly turning toward Earth, and scientists say it will be directly facing Earth in about five days.

That storm region will affect Earth only if it shoots off flares and they hit the planet, which does not always happen with stormy areas, said prediction center space scientist Joe Kunches.

The region will be facing Earth for about two weeks as it rotates, he said.

Solar flares send out bursts of electromagnetic energy that can occasionally disrupt communications and electrical systems.

For the past several years, the sun has been at a quiet end of its cycle and only recently has gotten more active. Solar cycles go in an 11-year period. This cycle has had fewer storms than usual for this time in its cycle. But that may be changing.

"The sun is looking more like we think it should at this point in the solar cycle," Kunches said. "It's got a number of active centers."

Colombian officials: Top FARC leader killed

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) – The top leader of Colombia's main rebel group, the bookish ideologue Alfonso Cano, was killed Friday in a military raid in the country's southwest, authorities said.

The death was a major victory for President Juan Manuel Santos, coming just over a year after the military killed the rebels' military commander. It was anything but a fatal blow, however, to the nearly half-century-old peasant-based insurgency.

"The fingerprints matched," said one senior security official who confirmed the death, adding that Cano was killed in "a standard military operation" in Cauca state in a bombing raid followed by an attack by ground troops.

The official spoke on condition he not be further identified.

Cano, the 63-year-old head of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, had been the top target of Colombian authorities since September 2010, when they killed the insurgency's military chief, Mono Jojoy, in a bombing raid.

Cano's death does not by any means signal the imminent demise of Latin America's last remaining leftist rebel army, analysts said. The FARC, which is mostly financed by drug trafficking, is comprised largely of peasants from backwater areas who have few other opportunities in a country where land ownership is highly concentrated in the hands of a few.

The government's peace commissioner during failed 1998-2002 talks with the FARC, Victor Ricardo, said Cano's death by no means signals the end of the rebels, who are believed to number about 9,000.

"It must of course be said with great clarity: This is a blow to the FARC's morale," Ricardo told The Associated Press. "But by no means can people imagine that this can bring an end to the FARC."

The FARC has a disciplined military hierarchy and there is always someone waiting to advance, he said.

Ricardo said the next leader could be the rebels known as Ivan Marquez or Timochenko. Both are members of the FARC secretariat.

Still, Cano's death was the latest in a series of withering blows to the rebel leadership that began in March 2008, when the FARC's foreign minister, Raul Reyes, was killed in a bombing raid on a rebel camp across the border in Ecuador.

That same month, the FARC's revered co-founder, Manuel Marulanda, died in a mountain hideout of a heart attack. He was believed to be 78.

Several other top commanders were subsequently killed and rebel desertions, including of midlevel cadres, reached record levels.

That all happened when Colombia's current president, Santos, was defense minister under Alvaro Uribe.

The two built military success on billions of dollars of U.S. aid, including training and close intelligence-sharing, and Santos took office in August 2010.

However, the FARC has in recent months been regrouping and rural violence has been on an uptick, so Friday's killing was a major boon to Santos.

The governor of Cauca state, Alberto Gonzalez, confirmed the death. His state has in recent months been a locus of stepped up FARC violence.

A second security official said Cano's body was being taken to Popayan, the Cauca state capital. The official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, had no further information.

The official said Cano, whose real name was Guillermo Leon Saenz, was practically alone when he died in the attack in a rural area of the town of Suarez.

Santos had no immediate comment. A news conference was called for late Friday at the Defense Ministry.

Ironically, Cano had in a New Year's message praised the president for an initiative that later became enacted as law to redress and return stolen land to some 4 million victims of Colombia's long-running conflict.

Most of those had been victims of far-right militias known as paramilitaries that have fought against the FARC, which was formed in 1964.

Cano, who wore thick glasses and a beard, released a number of video messages after Santos took office in which he urged the president to engage in dialogue with the rebels.

But Santos insisted that Cano needed make a peace gesture, such as halting all kidnappings. The FARC has not done that, and its fighters were blamed for two attacks last month that killed more than 20 soldiers.

The group also holds an unknown number of kidnap victims, apparently including four Chinese oil workers seized in June.

———

Swiss politics

I have explained to you before how certain things work in Swiss politics, like that the president is in "power" for one year or that the ministers get elected by the Parliament.

Well, the Parliament (both chambers) is having a legislative period of 4 years and then the members have to stand up for election again. Last month we had this election.

You also know that I have been complaining about the strongest party in Switzerland, the "Swiss People's Party SVP".

It is a right wing party, very far right and to me almost extreme right. They are narrowsighted. And there is a cleavage within this party. The Zurich branch are extremely hardliners, whilst the Berne branch are more concilliant.

Now, during this election, the SVP lost seats. They are though still the strongest party. The lost seats went mainly to

"The Citizen's Democratic Party BDP". This party was created in 2008 by members of the SVP who got sick and tired from the Zurich branch dictature. And they were able to bring in our actual Finance Minister. Who, most probably, will loose her seat in December when the new Parliament elects the ministers. Because the BDP is not one of the big parties (3 of them) who can claim two minister seats.

So, from January next year, the new legislative period of 4 years will start with a new parliament and a new government. Where SVP will be a member.

I do not have much sympathies for the SVP and I said that many times. They do, even though they are the strongest, not represent what Switzerland really is. A country that opens to the world inspite of SVP's effort to keep us locked in the Alps.

I don't like their leaders either. Except one.

Oskar Freysinger from the Valais branch of the party. He has only one problem: He is in the wrong party :-)

But he is honest and he stands to his word. He does not turn around according to which way the wind blows. In forum discussions he remains straight forward (though defending the wrong position of SVP), making his point, listens to his contrahents and accepts their arguments.

He is a decent man, the SVP does not have many of them.

Jefferies Group Shares Plunge on Sovereign Debt Fears

Trading in the Jefferies Group was temporarily halted on Thursday morning after shares plunged on sovereign debt fears.
Jefferies shares dropped more than 20 percent, to $9.79, prompting the exchange to halt trading. After trading resumed, the stock recovered to more than $11, down about 8 percent from the closing price on Wednesday.
The sharp drop came after the Egan-Jones Ratings Company cut its rating on Jefferies.

Egan-Jones flagged a handful of issues that investors should be concerned about, including the company’s leverage ratio and its exposure to European sovereign debt, which it estimated at $2.7 billion.
Since the bankruptcy of MF Global on Monday, Jefferies has been fighting heightened fears about its exposure to debt problems on the Continent. On Tuesday, Jefferies said it had “no meaningful exposure to the sovereign debt of the nations of Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain.” It said it took positions in the debt of these countries from time to time but that those positions tended to “short-term in nature.”
After the share volatility on Thursday, Jefferies issued a statement clarifying its position, saying it had “no meaningful net exposure to European sovereign debt.”
“Recent reports and calculations appear to have been focusing only on long inventory of $2.684 billion but not taking into account the fact that there were offsetting short positions in such sovereign debt of $2.545 billion as well as offsetting positions in futures instruments,” the firm said.
Jefferies added later that it “has no credit-default swaps hedging its sovereign debt positions, which as previously indicated are short-term trading positions that turn over approximately three to four times per week. ”
In an interview on Thursday, Sean Egan, the rating firm’s president, said his firm’s main concern “is the significant change in the operating environment for mid-size broker dealers, post-Lehman and MF Global.”
Jefferies’ leverage ratio, or the amount of borrowed money used against its capital, is roughly 13:1, in line with bigger firms like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Mr. Egan said it would be “foolish” to put Jefferies in the league of those firms and it should be operating with a lower leverage ratio.

But Mr. Egan said his main concern is the changed environment Jefferies is operating in. “No company is an island,” he said. “The operating environment for broker dealers has changed and the old ways of doing business won’t do.”
Leucadia National, a public investment vehicle that owns nearly 30 percent of Jefferies, has been caught in the downdraft. Leucadia stock was down more than 7 percent in morning trading on Thursday.

Gensler Testifies on MF Global’s Downfall

The top regulator tasked with overseeing the bankrupt brokerage firm MF Global said Thursday that the search continued for more than $630 million in missing customer money, warning that the protection of client assets is essential to doing business on Wall Street.
Gary Gensler, chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, said his agency was investigating the firm, a powerhouse commodities brokerage run by a former New Jersey governor, Jon S. Corzine.
“The most troubling aspect about the MF Global situation is the shortfall of customer money at the firm. Segregation of customer funds is the core foundation of customer protection in the commodity futures and swaps markets,” he said in prepared testimony. “Segregation must be maintained at all times. Simply put, that’s every moment of every day, down to the nanosecond.”
Mr. Gensler added that taxpayers aren’t on the hook for MF Global’s bankruptcy.

“This was an example of a financial institution having the freedom to fail,” he said in response to questioning from Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. “I don’t think there’s any taxpayer money behind this.”
A basic tenet of the brokerage business requires that money handed to the firm by one customer is not mixed with the firm’s own money. MF Global filed for bankruptcy on Monday after weeks of anxiety weighed on the firms stock and liquidity. Investors were spooked by the revelation of an outsize bet Mr. Corzine had placed on European sovereign debt, a risky trade given the uncertainty clouding the Continent.
The exposure prompted regulators to force MF Global to set aside more cash as a cushion in the event of losses, and helped persuade Moody’s rating agency to downgrade the firm. That set in motion a week of panic, where it drew down its credit line and lenders demanded extra cash to protect themselves. MF Global had hoped to orchestrate an 11th-hour deal to sell a piece of itself, but those hopes were dashed when the money came up missing. It is unclear where the money went.
Mr. Gensler first spotted a potential shortfall late last week, calling MF Global’s lawyer to alert the firm. But it was not until around 2 a.m. Monday that the firm fully recognized the magnitude of the missing money. The disclosure sent bidders fleeing and the firm had no choice but to file for bankruptcy.