Tiger Woods statement: "I thought I was entitled"

Tiger Woods shifted from near tears to near anger in a prepared public statement he read for cameras today, in which he admitted to irresponsible behaviour and extramarital affairs, said he has spent 45 days in rehab and admitted he brought the controversy on himself, but took issue with people who would "fabricate stories" about his wife beating him up.

WATCH THE LIVE VIDEO NEWS STATEMENT HERE

As national golf writers boycotted a press conference that didn't include any actual confering outside of Woods' pre-prepared statement, worldwide cameras were focused on Woods regardless as the one-time squeaky clean sporting hero of the decade confessed to betraying character and decency.

"Good morning, and thank you for joining me," he started. "Many of you in this room are my friends. Many of you in this room know me. Many of you have cheered for me, have worked with me, always supported me. Now, every one of you has good reason to be critical of me. I want to say to each on of you simply and directly I am deeply sorry for my irresponsible and selfish behaviour I engaged in. I know people want to find out how i could be so selfish and foolish."

Woods read his words at the TPC Sawgrass Clubhouse in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, which is the base of the Professional Golf Association.  Standing at a podium with no visible signs of physical facial damage, Woods read his statement with his mother sitting directly in front of him for thirteen and a half minutes.  He denied strongly that his wife had attacked him on the night his career went haywire, stating with noticeable ire, "On that or any other night, there has never been an episode of domestic violence in our marriage. Elin has shown enormous grace and poise through this ordeal... Elin deserves praise. Not blame."

Woods took full responsibility for his many philanderings, saying he will never repeat the mistakes he's made.  "I had affairs and I cheated. What I did was not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame."  
"I knew my actions were wrong but I convinced myself that the normal rules didn't apply. I never thought about who I was hurting. Instead, I only thought about myself. I ran straight through the boundaries that a normal married couple should live by. I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt that I was entitled. Thanks to money and fame, I didn't have to go far to find them."  "I was wrong. I was foolish. I don't get to play by different rules."

Woods apologized in no uncertain terms to anyone and everyone who might have felt let down by the more than a dozen affairs he is alleged to have had, saying, "My failures have made me look at myself in a way i never wanted to before. It's now up to me to make amends, and that starts with never repeating the mistakes that I've made."  "My real apology to [wife Elin] will not come in the form of words, it will come from my behaviour over time. However, what we say to each other will remain between us. "  Woods didn't discuss the future of his marriage, other than to say, "I understand people want to know whether Elin and I will remain together. Please know that as far as I'm concerned, every one of these questions and answers is between Elin and me."

"Parents used to point to me as a role model for their kids," he said. "I owe all those families a special apology. I want to say to them that I am truly sorry."  Woods said he had let down his friends, employers and had caused "considerable worry" to his business partners. He also admitted that he had spent 45 days in rehab for his alleged sex addiction.  "These are issues between a husband and his wife," he said, railing against continued questions.  Woods denied using performance enhancing drugs and alleged the media fabricated stories and stalked his family.  "[My family] did not do these things. I did."

"When my children were born we only released photographs so that the paparazzi would not chase them. However, my behaviour does not make it right for the media to follow my 2 1/2-year-old daughter, to school and report its location," he seethed. "They staked out my wife and they followed my mom."  "Please leave my wife and kids alone," he said.   Woods stopped short of showing weakness by crying or stammering, but for a quiet sniffle at the very end, showing an inner strength golf fans will recognize as being one that helped him become the best golfer in the world.

"I recognize I have brought this on myself and I know, above all, I am the one who needs to change. I owe it to my family to become a better person. I owe it to those close to me to become a better man. I have a lot of work to do."  Woods discussed his Buddhist faith and talked of how it teaches a craving for things outside ourselves creates an unhappy search for happiness and security.   "It teaches me to stop following every impulse and to learn restraint. Obviously, I lost track of what I was taught. As I move forward, I will continue to receive help."  "In therapy I've learned the importance of looking at my spiritual life," he continued. 

Woods said he needs to learn how to be respectful and responsible when he returns to golf.  "I do plan to return to golf someday, I just don't know when it will be." 

Woods finished with a plea for time to make good on his failings, saying, "I ask you to find room in your heart to one day believe in me again. Thank you."  He then hugged and kissed gathered friends and family and left without another word.  According to a report in the New York Times, the board of directors for the Golf Writers Association of America — which comprises 950 golf writers, editors and broadcasters — voted overwhelmingly to boycott the press conference Woods held at 11 a.m. (ET) Friday.

His public appearance was the first since the superstar golfer's spectacular fall from grace three months ago, triggered by a middle-of-the-night car accident, the genesis of which appeared to be a discovery by his wife, Elin Nordegren, of text messages from another woman. Over the ensuing weeks, up to fourteen women either came forward with revelations of affairs with Woods or were linked with the golfer by those supposedly in the know.

[ Source:  Vancouver Sun ]

Tesla Executives Die In Palo Alto Plane Crash

Three employees of Tesla Motors were killed this morning when the Cessna 310 they were flying in crashed in a residential neighborhood in East Palo Alto, California.

LISTEN TO AUDIO OF PLANE CRASH AND PEOPLE SCREAMING HERE

A man who said he had flown with the pilot told KTVU News the man flying the twin-engine plane was “a high-ranking official” at the Silicon Valley automaker, and a Tesla spokesperson told Jalopnik the three people aboard were Tesla employees. And the San Francisco Chronicle reports the plane is owned by Doug Bourn, a senior electric engineer at Tesla, though it is not clear whether he was aboard.

Repeated messages left with Tesla Motors this morning have not been returned, and local police and the Federal Aviation Administration would not identify those aboard the plane.

The plane left Palo Alto Airport at about 7:55 a.m. headed for the Los Angeles suburb of Hawthorne when it lost power after takeoff, said East Palo Alto police Capt. John Chalmers. The plane hit a power line tower about one mile northeast of the airport, shearing a wing, then landed on a home daycare center in the 1200 block of Beech Street. The home caught fire as the plane slid down the street, hitting three cars that also caught fire, authorities said.

The initial crash crated a loud boom followed by a second boom that shook nearby houses, the Chronicle reports. Firefighters extinguished the fires within 30 minutes. No one on the ground was injured, Chalmers said.

Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said the plane is a Cessna 310, tail number N5225J, registered to Unique Air Inc. of Santa Clara, California. The National Transportation Safety Board has an investigator enroute to the scene. Menlo Park Fire Chief Harold Schapelhouman told the San Jose Mercury News mechanical failure or poor visibility due to heavy fog most likely caused the crash.

“The plane landed in the center of the street,” Schapelhouman said. “If not, many more individuals would have been impacted, perhaps killed. It is either very fortunate or intentional that he was able to do that.”

Space-X, Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s aerospace venture, is based in Hawthorne and Tesla has a design studio there. Much of the design and engineering work for the Model S sedan is being done there. Tesla spokeswoman Khobi Brooklyn told the Los Angeles Times the company had not yet received confirmation about who was on the flight.

“I can’t confirm any of the details,” she said, adding that the company would release a statement once it had more information.


[ Source:  Wired Magazine ]

Kiteboarder Killed in Rare Shark Attack in Florida

STUART, Florida - A man kite surfing off a Florida beach died Wednesday after being surrounded and attacked by sharks.  The Martin County Sheriff's Office said a lifeguard first saw the man in distress at 4:15 p.m. about 500 yards from shore near Stuart, on the Atlantic coast.  Lifeguard Daniel Lund said he first spotted the man, later identified as Howard Schafer, 38, from his tower and he could tell the kiteboarder was in trouble. He said Schafer was lying on the large sail he was using to pull himself across the water.

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Lund grabbed his long surfboard and paddled 20 minutes through rough seas, fighting 4- to 6-feet-high waves, to reach Schafer about a quarter-mile offshore. "I get to him, I'm probably within 20 yards or so from him, and there's just a lot of blood in the water," Lund said. He could see several sharks circling nearby. He pulled the injured Schafer onto his board and began paddling back. Lund declined to describe Schafer's injuries, but said he was conscious and speaking when they got to the beach and paramedics began treating him. Paramedics took Schafer to a hospital, where he later died.

Daniel Wouters, of Martin County Fire Rescue, told ABC-affiliate WPBF that when he was spotted Schafer was "just hanging onto his board... not normal activity for a kite surfer." "When (lifeguards) got there, they found a number of sharks in the water and they found the victim had been bitten several times," Wouters said, according to a report on WPBF's Web site. "They were able to maneuver him onto the kite to basically somewhat protect him and bring him on shore." Jim Smith, who witnessed the rescue, told WPBF that the rescuers had done all they could. "I can't emphasize enough — they did their best. The guy just wasn't moving," he said. Friends said Schafer always followed the buddy system while surfing and were surprised he was in the water alone. "We always know that (sharks) are out there. You see them this time of the year," said Teague Taylor, a childhood friend who says Schafer taught him to surf. "It's hard to believed that such an experienced waterman would make that one mistake." Schafer, a gifted artist and graphic designer, was drawn to the water as a child. He surfed competitively and later started sailing, windsurfing and kiteboarding. Kiteboarders surf across the water on boards strapped to their feet, using large curved sails to pull them along.

"He had to be around the water," said Taylor, who manages a local surf shop. "I've never heard of multiple sharks in this area surrounding someone and fatally wounding him," Taylor told The Palm Beach Post. Jordan Schwartz told the paper that Schafer was a very experienced kiteboard surfer and "a super nice guy, always mellow."

Shark attacks, especially fatal ones, are extremely rare, said George Burgess, a leading shark expert who directs the International Shark Attack File at the University of Florida's Museum of Natural History. The file lists 1,032 attacks in the U.S. documented since 1690. Only 50 of them were fatal. "Internationally, we've been averaging four fatalities per year, despite the fact that there are billions and billions of human hours spent in the sea every year," Burgess said. "Your chances of dying in the mouth of a shark are close to infinitesimal." The last fatal shark attack in the state was in 2005 off the Florida Panhandle, where a 14-year-old Louisiana girl was attacked while swimming on a body board about 100 yards off shore. "Florida as a geographic entity has more than any other place in the world," Burgess said, noting that most attacks are minor, "the equivalent of a dog bite." However, Burgess noted that this time of year there are typically fewer shark attacks in Florida because temperatures are cooler and not as many people are in the water. He said sharks are lining "up in South Florida getting ready to move north" as temperatures begin to warm. "The sharks gradually move their way northward and disperse," Burgess said. "The message to take home is this is a rare and unusual event. It should put the antennae up for people, in terms of, 'Yeah, we need to be careful when we enter the sea, but we need to do that every time because we're never guaranteed safety 100 percent of the time when we enter a wild world.'"

Behold, The World's Tallest Model

Talk about a big splash! An American model measuring 205 cm (she's about 6'9") is set to be featured on the cover of Australian magazine Zoo Weekly.

You think you've seen it all. The model, named Eve, appears on the cover of the magazine's current issue alongside a 162 cm-tall (5'3") Aussie model.

On Seinfeld, George Constanza dreamed of one day sleeping with a giant woman. But George was a short, bald fella. To him, tall meant about 5'11".

Eve is truly head and shoulders above the other models out there.

"No other magazine has put a woman who's nearly seven feel tall on the cover," editor Paul Merrill said, and he's probably correct in that assumption.

"We had ... her bikini specially made, but it was worth it."

Haiti Earthquake Original Video

Security cameras at the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince record the Haiti earthquake on 12 January as the ground starts to shake and a building in the distance crumbles to the ground.

Video provided to us courtesy U.S. State Department

The Jay Leno Show Ends

NBC affiliates are pleased over Jay Leno’s exit from prime-time television, and are hoping that replacement shows can draw higher ratings.

“The Jay Leno Show” had been touted by NBC as the future of television–although the program was expected to draw lower ratings than scripted shows, it cost less to produce. Now that experiment is over, clearing the way for more dramas, comedies and news programs in the time slot.

NBC affiliates had been grumbling about the low ratings of “The Jay Leno Show” at 10 p.m. and that the program was bringing down the ratings for the shows that followed it, including local news shows and “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien.”

Casey Johnson Death Linked to Diabetes

Casey Johnson, heiress to the Johnson and Johnson fortune and Tila Tequila's fiance died yesterday evening at her LA home, and although the cause of death has not yet been determined, Casey Johnson did have a history of diabetic comas and there is some talk that this could have contributed to her death.

Casey Johnson's autopsy has now been completed but the cause of death is still pending toxicology tests. The LA County Coroner has stated that there were no signs on trauma on Casey's body and foul play is not suspected.

Insulin needles were found in Casey's home however, but there has been no official cause of death at this time.

Casey Johnson was diagnosed with diabetes at eight years old and she was involved in the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation in the hopes to find a cure.

Before her death on January 4th, Casey Johnson had twice fallen in to a diabetic coma and had to be taken to hospital at least once.