US Philadelphia - It's like an easy game for 14-year-old Alyssa Kramer. She can easily say words backwards in seconds. Her video on YouTube quickly got a million hits, and now she has her own channel: alyssatalkingback.com. CBS3 asked when she realized she had the special ability.
"Whenever I learned how to read, I just started doing it. I have a photographic memory, and whenever someone tells me a word, I can see it in my head. And if I want to spell it backwards then, it can flip and I'll read it that way," Alyssa says.
Society's Child
© REX
Women were affected by the situation more clearly than men
Women were affected by the situation more clearly than men
The performance of people in IQ tests after meetings is significantly lower than if they are left on their own, with women more likely to perform worse than men.
Researchers at the Virginia Tech Crilion Research institute in the US said people's performance dropped when they were judged against their peers.
Read Montague, who led the study, said: "You may joke about how committee meetings make you feel brain-dead, but our findings suggest that they may make you act brain-dead as well.
"We started with individuals who were matched for their IQ. Yet when we placed them in small groups, ranked their performance on cognitive tasks against their peers, and broadcast those rankings to them, we saw dramatic drops in the ability of some study subjects to solve problems. The social feedback had a significant effect."
© Associated Press/Ross D. Franklin
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio
In an extensive - and at times combative - press conference in Phoenix, Sheriff Arpaio repeatedly said he is not questioning the president's legal status under the Constitution nor alleging fraud on Mr. Obama's part, but did say there is evidence crimes have been committed by someone and his investigation continues.
"Based on all of the evidence presented and investigated, I cannot in good faith report to you that these documents are authentic," Sheriff Arpaio said. "My investigators believe that the long-form birth certificate was manufactured electronically and that it did not originate in paper format as claimed by the White House."
© Alamy
Can it really be so hard to tend to dementia patients with compassion?
Can it really be so hard to tend to dementia patients with compassion?
The same treatment, let's imagine, is also routine for the mentally disabled: whenever they create too much disturbance, we simply cosh them with chemicals.
There would be a national outcry. Heads would roll. Money would be found immediately to train medical staff and carers so that such a scandal could never, ever happen again.
Now let's stop imagining and face the appalling truth. The nightmare scenario that I've just painted is precisely what's happening to some of the most vulnerable people in the land - the elderly.
A shocking three-year study by Nottingham University has concluded that more than half of all those over 70 who are admitted to hospital have dementia. Yet very few doctors, nurses or healthcare assistants have had any proper training in how to deal with them.
© Jim Wilson/The New York Times
A member of the 214th Reconnaissance Group flies a Predator aircraft drone in support of ground troops in Iraq and Afghanistan at Davis-Monthan Air Base in Tucson, March 10, 2009.
A member of the 214th Reconnaissance Group flies a Predator aircraft drone in support of ground troops in Iraq and Afghanistan at Davis-Monthan Air Base in Tucson, March 10, 2009.
That July, in 2007, Aymal's father was sitting in a garden with four other men. A weaponized drone, what we used to call an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle or UAV, was flying, unseen, overhead, and fired missiles into the garden, killing all five men.
Now Fazillah and Aymal share a small dwelling with the deceased man's mother. According to the tradition, a husband's relatives are responsible to look after a widow with no breadwinner remaining in her immediate family. She and her son have no regular source of bread or income, but Fazillah says that her small family is better off than it might have been: one of the men killed alongside her husband left behind a wife and child but no other living relatives that could provide them with any source of support, at all.
Aymal's grandmother becomes agitated and distraught speaking about her son's death, and that of his four friends. "All of us ask, 'Why?'" she says, raising her voice. "They kill people with computers and they can't tell us why. When we ask why this happened, they say they had doubts, they had suspicions. But they didn't take time to ask 'Who is this person?' or 'Who was that person?' There is no proof, no accountability. Now, there is no reliable person in the home to bring us bread. I am old, and I do not have a peaceful life."
Andrew Breitbart took the podium at CPAC Friday afternoon, introduced to the stage with Rage Against The Machine's Guerrilla Radio, and revealed to the audience he had "videos" of Barack Obama from his college days. "I have videos, this election we're going to vet him," Breitbart disclosed to raucous applause. "We are going to vet him from his college days to show you why racial division and class warfare are central to what hope and change was sold in 2008."
"The videos are going to come out, the narrative is going to come out, that Barack Obama met a bunch of silver ponytails in the 1980s, like Bill (Ayers) and Bernadine (Dohrn), who said one day we would have the presidency, and the rest of us slept as they plotted, and they plotted, and they plotted and they oversaw hundreds of millions of dollars in the Annenberg Challenge and they had real money, from real capitalists. Then they became communists. We got to work on that. That is a parenthesis. Barack Obama is a radical, we should not be afraid to say that! Okay? And Barack Obama was launched from Bill and Bernadine's salon. I've been there."
© Gregg DeGuire/FilmMagic/Getty Images
Davy Jones, the lead singer of The Monkees, died this morning after suffering a heart attack in Indiantown, Fla., his representative confirmed to ABC News. He was 66.
"He passed next to his passions, his horses, and was one hour away from his wife, Jessica Pacheco-Jones," his rep said in a statement.
"All of his family, friends and fans mourn Davy's loss," Joseph Pacheco, Jones' manager and brother-in-law, said. "We were fortunate to have such an incredible human being in our lives. Sadly, his time on Earth was cut far too short and he will be missed tremendously by all who knew him."
The Martin County, Fla. medical examiner's office will be conducting an investigation into Jones' death but said in statement that "there do not appear to be any suspicious circumstances" surrounding it.
Jones is survived by his wife and four daughters from previous marriages.
US - Andrew Breitbart -- founder of the popular news website Breitbart.com -- died early this morning at the age of 43.
According to his website, Breitbart -- the political journalist who broke the Anthony Weiner penis pic story -- died "unexpectedly from natural causes" shortly after midnight this morning in L.A.
A statement on Breitbart reads, "We have lost a husband, a father, a son, a brother, a dear friend, a patriot and a happy warrior."
Riviera Beach, Florida - A woman aboard the Bahamas Celebration ship was reported missing early Wednesday morning after the ship returned from a two-night trip, Celebration Cruise Lines spokesman Glen Ryerson said.
The woman was reported missing at 8 a.m. after the ship docked at 7 a.m., according to Ryerson.
Ryerson said there are confirmed documents that show the woman boarded in the Bahamas.
Her boyfriend shared a cabin with her on board.
According to Celebration President Charlie Kinnear, the boyfriend claims he last saw his girlfriend at 1 a.m. in the gift shop before he headed to the inboard casino.
The woman was reported missing at 8 a.m. after the ship docked at 7 a.m., according to Ryerson.
Ryerson said there are confirmed documents that show the woman boarded in the Bahamas.
Her boyfriend shared a cabin with her on board.
According to Celebration President Charlie Kinnear, the boyfriend claims he last saw his girlfriend at 1 a.m. in the gift shop before he headed to the inboard casino.
