When she agreed to enter that beauty contest, she agreed to abide by the terms of her contract if she won. But her various appearances in the media to defend her views on marriage were not pre-approved by pageant officials. So she violated her contract. You can speculate that pageant officials may not have approved her appearances to begin with, but the fact is she never sought their approval so the point is moot.

Prejean is entitled to her opinion whether I agree with her (which I don't) or not . But if she is going to use her position to advance her beliefs and morals, she needs to accept the consequences of her actions. You can't take a stand on a controversial issue and then cry when your critics call you on them. And you certainly can't expect to violate a contract and get away with it.

The iPhone still enjoys a huge base but if these new phones start to make gains, will Apple move to open their iTunes platform and allow other phones to purchase music? Don't count on it. Apple has always been reluctant to play with others. When the iPod was first released, only Mac owners were able to use the device. Even when a Windows compatible model came out, buyers had to commit to one platform or the other. Sales of the iPod didn't really take off until Apple removed the platform specific barriers from the product. Since the iPhone sales have been so phenomenal, Apple has no motive to go after non-iPhone mobile users just yet. But they should be anyway.

Amazon's music store has been moving along under the radar for the most part. The flashier iTunes, Zune and Rhapsody have captured the spot-light up to now. But Amazon knows how to be patient. Now that two major mobile devices offer compatibility with the Amazon music store, their patience may be paying off. Because if two manufacturers are going with Amazon, chances are more will follow. That means more competition for Apple. Which may not be good news for the boys in Cupertino.

On the down side, they are behind the curve in developing an app store. It seems to be a CDMA phone, so folks who venture outside the US will look elsewhere until they come out with the GSM model. No apparent ability to buy music with the phone, something Apple just announced for the iPhone. And Sprint is the exclusive carrier for the time being.

For a company that led the way with mobile digital devices for so long, you have to wonder why did it takte them this long to come up with a challenger to the iPhone? It's not as though they couldn't aticipate what was coming. They were already creating devices that used the screen as the main interface, was it that great a leap to ditch the stylus and go with a finger? They seem to have done a great job with this device. But it may not save them.

Consumer confidence is low right now. So I don't see a lot of people going out just to buy this device. They haven't been breaking down the doors to get the G1. They won't be going nut over the Pre either.

The City owns the zoo and the animals. The entity that the City placed in charge of the zoo may be liable. And if the zoological society is liable, then the entity that oversees them (the City) may also be held liable to some extent. This may be the start of some very expensive litigation that the City can't afford.

The City should face the facts. From everything we've heard from experts, the tiger should not have been able to get out no matter what those boys did to provoke it. This tiger had already injured someone else due to (different) poor containment issues. The warning signs were there and neither the zoological society nor the City did anything to prevent another tragedy until is was too late.

They should just pay up now and avoid the legal fees.

What is really concerning these parents is the fact that many of them are not qualified to teach. They've pulled their kids out of the public system because they have certain religious beliefs that they insist on instilling into their children. They can't afford a parochial school, so they resort to homeschooling their kids so that they can teach them things like the Earth is only 6000 years old or some other such nonsense.

It's true that some parents are indeed qualified to teach their children and do so not for religious reasons, but because they insist that the public school system is a mess and can't get the job done. Well they're the ones who are contributing to our schools' demise. Pulling their kids exacerbates a bad situation. If they were as motivated to improve our schools as the are to educate their kids, then maybe our schools would be in much better shape.

Homeschool advocates are constantly citing examples of a child who did so well as a result of homeschooling. But those anecdotes are exceptions to the rule. They cite statistics from homeschool advocacy groups about how well homeschooled students score in tests but can't give you any real independent data. I seriously doubt that someone who was homeschooled by a parent who fared better in Sunday school than they did in public school, could score so well.