Captain America Dies

Captain America has undertaken his last mission – at least for now.

The venerable superhero is killed in the issue of his namesake comic that hit stands Wednesday, the New York Daily News reported. On the new edition’s pages, a sniper shoots down the shield-wielding hero as he leaves a courthouse.

It ends a long run for the stars-and-stripes-wearing character, created in 1941. Over the years, some 210 million copies of Captain America comic books, published by New York-based Marvel Entertainment Inc. (MVL), have been sold in 75 countries.

But resurrections are not unknown in the world of comics, and Marvel Entertainment Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada said a Captain America comeback wasn’t impossible.

Still, the character’s death came as a blow to co-creator Joe Simon.

“We really need him now,” said Simon, 93, who worked with artist Jack Kirby to devise Captain America as a foe for Adolf Hitler.

The superhero was spawned when a scrawny arts student named Steve Rogers, ineligible for the army because of his poor health but eager to serve his country, agreed to a “Super Soldier Serum” injection. The substance made him a paragon of physical perfection, armed only with his shield, his strength, his smarts and a command of martial arts.

In the comic-book universe, death is not always final. But even if Captain America turns out to have met his end in print, he may not disappear entirely: Marvel is developing a Captain America movie.

This little piggy…HAD 2 MOUTHS…

In the odd animals hall of fame, this little piggy takes the cake.

Pigs are a sign of fertility in China, and in the Year of the Pig, this piglet got more than his fair share, being born with two mouths, two noses and three eyes.

Liu Shuping, a farmer specialising in raising pigs, presented the new-born piglet in Xi an, in north-west China’s Shannxi province yesterday.

But it’s not unique. Only last month there were reports of a pig being born in Quanzhou in East China’s Fujian province with two mouths and four eyes.

U.S. Mint Goof Creates ‘Godless Dollars’

An unknown number of new George Washington dollar coins were mistakenly struck without their edge inscriptions, including “In God We Trust,” and are fetching around $50 apiece online.

The properly struck dollar coins, bearing the likeness of the nation’s first president, are inscribed along the edge with “In God We Trust,””E Pluribus Unum” and the year and mint mark. They made it past inspectors and went into circulation Feb. 15.

The U.S. Mint struck 300 million of the coins, which are golden in color and slightly larger and thicker than a quarter.

About half were made in Philadelphia and the rest in Denver. So far the mint has only received reports of error coins coming from Philadelphia, mint spokeswoman Becky Bailey said.

Bailey said it was unknown how many coins lacked the inscriptions. Ron Guth, president of Professional Coin Grading Service, one of the world’s largest coin authentication companies, said he believes that at least 50,000 error coins were put in circulation.

“The first one sold for $600 before everyone knew how common they actually were,” he said. “They’re going for around $40 to $60 on eBay now, and they’ll probably settle in the $50 range.”

Production of the presidential dollar entails a “new, complex, high-volume manufacturing system” that the mint will adjust to eliminate any future defects, the mint said in a statement.

“We take this matter seriously. We also consider quality control a high priority. The agency is looking into the matter to determine a possible cause in the manufacturing process,” the statement said.

Guth said it appeared from the roughly 50 smooth-edge dollars he has authenticated that the problem had to do with quality control rather than a mechanical error.

“These coins are struck like normal coins, then they go through another machine that adds edge lettering in another process. These apparently skipped that process,” he said. “We’ve seen a couple of instances where the edge lettering may be weak or indistinct, but we’re not talking about that here.”

The coin’s design has already spurred e-mail conspiracy theories claiming that the religious motto was purposely omitted. That rumor may have started because the edge lettering cannot be seen in head-on photographs of the coin.

It is the first U.S. coin to have words stamped around the edge since the storied 1933 $20 gold “double eagle,” among the rarest and most valuable in the world. In 2002, a 1933 double eagle was sold for $7.59 million – the highest price ever paid for a coin.

The Washington dollars are the first in a series of presidential coins slated to run until 2016. After Washington, the presidents to be honored on dollar coins this year will be John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.

The 215-year-old Philadelphia mint, located downtown on Independence Mall, employs about 500 people and last year produced about 7.8 billion coins. The overwhelming majority of error coins are caught by inspectors and melted down.

Bailey said the striking of the Adams coin, expected to roll out in mid-May, will proceed as planned.

“We are adjusting the manufacturing process to try to eliminate the problems,” she said.

—

Say it isn’t so….

NASA Fires Astronaut Lisa Nowak

Astronaut Lisa Nowak was fired from NASA on Wednesday, a month after she was charged with trying to kidnap a woman she regarded as her romantic rival for the affections of a space shuttle pilot. NASA officials said Nowak’s dismissal did not reflect the space agency’s belief in her guilt or innocence. The agency said it lacked an administrative system to handle the allegations because Nowak is a naval officer on assignment to NASA, rather than a NASA civil servant.

If Nowak were a civil servant, NASA would have the choice of placing her on administrative leave, leave without pay or indefinite suspension until the charges are resolved, said NASA spokesman James Hartsfield in Houston. But because she is an officer, those options are not available.

Nowak, a captain in the Navy, instead will return to the military.

Chief astronaut Steve Lindsey notified Nowak late last month that she was to be fired from the astronaut corps.

if ((typeof tag300_2) == ‘function’) { tag300_2(); }

Her dimissal marked the first time NASA has publicly fired an astronaut, according to space historian Roger Launius of the Smithsonian Institution. She is also the first active astronaut to be charged with a felony, he said.

Nowak, a mother of three, is accused of confronting the woman at the Orlando airport after driving from Houston while wearing an astronaut diaper so that she would not have to stop.

She allegedly pepper-sprayed the woman through a partially lowered car window. In Nowak’s vehicle, police found a BB gun, new steel mallet, a knife and rubber tubing.

The woman was the girlfriend of another astronaut, Bill Oefelein, who previously had a romantic relationship with Nowak.

Nowak, 43, pleaded not guilty to attempted kidnapping and burglary with assault. She was released on bail wearing a monitoring device on her ankle.

Makers of Sodas Try a New Pitch: They’re Healthy

Healthy soda?

That may strike some as an oxymoron. But for Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, it’s a marketing opportunity.

In coming months, both companies will introduce new carbonated drinks that are fortified with vitamins and minerals: Diet Coke Plus and Tava, which is PepsiCo’s new offering.

They will be promoted as “sparkling beverages.” The companies are not calling them soft drinks because people are turning away from traditional soda, which has been hurt in part by publicity about its link to obesity.

While the soda business remains a $68 billion industry in the United States, consumers are increasingly reaching for bottled water, sparkling juices and green tea drinks. In 2005, the amount of soda sold in this country dropped for the first time in recent history. Even the diet soda business has slowed.

Coca-Cola’s chief executive, E. Neville Isdell, clearly frustrated that his industry has been singled out in the obesity debate, insisted at a recent conference that his diet products should be included in the health and wellness category because, with few or no calories, they are a logical answer to expanding waistlines.

“Diet and light brands are actually health and wellness brands,” Mr. Isdell said. He asserted that Diet Coke Plus was a way to broaden the category to attract new consumers.

Tom Pirko, president of Bevmark, a food and beverage consulting firm, said it was “a joke” to market artificially sweetened soft drinks as healthy, even if they were fortified with vitamins and minerals. Research by his firm and others shows that consumers think of diet soft drinks as “the antithesis of healthy,” he said.

These consumers “comment on putting something synthetic and not natural into their bodies when they consume diet colas,” Mr. Pirko said. “And in the midst of a health and welfare boom, that ain’t good.”

The idea of healthy soda is not entirely new. In 2004, Cadbury Schweppes caused a stir when it unveiled 7Up Plus, a low-calorie soda fortified with vitamins and minerals.

Last year, Cadbury tried to extend the healthy halo over its regular 7Up brand by labeling it “100 percent natural.” But the company changed the label to “100 percent natural flavor” after complaints from a nutrition group that a product containing high-fructose corn syrup should not be considered natural, and 7Up Plus has floundered.

The new fortified soft drinks earned grudging approval from Michael F. Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a nutrition advocacy group and frequent critic of regular soft drinks, which it has labeled “liquid candy.”

“These beverages are certainly a lot better than a regular soft drink,” he said. But he was quick to add that consumers were better off getting their nutrients from natural foods, rather than fortified soft drinks.

A survey by Morgan Stanley found that only 10 percent of consumers interviewed in 2006 considered diet colas a healthy choice, compared with 14 percent in 2003. Furthermore, 30 percent of the consumers who were interviewed last year said that they were reluctant to drink beverages with artificial sweeteners, up from 21 percent in 2004.

Even so, several industry analysts said soft drink makers were smart to experiment with new types of carbonated diet soft drinks to stimulate sales. Besides the vitamin-fortified diet sodas, PepsiCo is introducing Diet Pepsi Max, with increased caffeine and ginseng, and Coca-Cola has started a new marketing campaign for Coke Zero, emphasizing how closely it tastes to Coke Classic.

“Just to ignore it is not the answer,” said Lauren Torres, an analyst at HSBC. “You want to grow what you have going for you. That’s an effort that they have to make.”

John Sicher, publisher of Beverage Digest, an industry newsletter, said it made sense for soft drink companies to “tiptoe” toward health and wellness, given consumer interest in low-calorie drinks and so-called functional beverages, which are supposed to deliver some health benefit beyond any basic nutritional value, like orange juice with added calcium.

Fortified sodas like the new Coke and Pepsi drinks will most likely remain a niche, Mr. Sicher said. But he predicted sales of diet soft drinks over all will increase in coming years with improved marketing, better taste and new products.

He noted that Diet Dr Pepper, made by Cadbury Schweppes, has grown quickly with a simple but effective marketing campaign that says it tastes like regular Dr Pepper, but without the calories.

“Consumers like a product with good taste and no calories,” he said. Diet sodas “will begin rebounding with all the diet innovation we are seeing and more marketing focus on diets.”

The number of cases of soft drinks sold continued to slide last year after its 2005 drop, said Mr. Sicher, who monitors industry sales data.

Over all, diet soda accounted for 29.6 percent of carbonated soft drink sales in 2005, up from 24.7 percent in 2000, Mr. Sicher said.

The efforts to turn around diet soda — and soft drinks in general — are particularly important for Coca-Cola, since, along with energy drinks, they account for 81 percent of the company’s revenue worldwide. By contrast, Pepsi has diversified more into other food and beverage lines, including Frito-Lay, Quaker Oats and Gatorade. Soft drinks account for 31 percent of revenue for PepsiCo beverages in North America; Pepsi-Cola, however, remains by far the company’s largest brand worldwide.

Diet Coke Plus will be introduced this spring, and will cost the same as regular Diet Coke. Tava will be available to consumers this fall; PepsiCo officials say they have not determined the price.

In discussing the sluggishness in diet soda sales, Dawn Hudson, president and chief executive of Pepsi-Cola North America, noted that over the last decade, consumers grew tired of drinking nothing but colas like Coke and Pepsi and sought other beverages. She said the diet category was more “cola-centric” and provided fewer alternatives than regular soda.

But recently, she said, noncola diet drinks like Diet Mountain Dew and Sierra Mist Free have done well.

Tava, the new drink, will be lightly carbonated and offer exotic flavors, she said. It will contain vitamins B3, B6 and E, and chromium.

“Lower-calorie beverages are clearly the growth area,” she said.

Katie Bayne, senior vice president for Coca-Cola Brands at Coca-Cola North America, said lackluster marketing and lack of innovation hurt the diet category. But she too predicted that new products and clever marketing would reinvigorate diet sales.

“In today’s world, it’s not about what we choose to sell, but what consumers want,” Ms. Bayne said. Diet Coke Plus — which will contain niacin, vitamins B6 and B12, magnesium and zinc — “is right for a certain group of consumers,” she said.

While it is too soon to know whether consumers will buy the idea of a vitamin-fortified diet soda, soft drink companies are trying to find other ways to reposition their products as healthy. For instance, all of the major soft drink companies are furiously trying to develop a no-calorie natural sweetener to allay concerns about artificial sweeteners.

“I think it is the holy grail,” said Ms. Hudson of Pepsi-Cola. “But it has to taste great.”

Drink a THUNDERBIRD in his honor….

Ernest Gallo, California Wine-Making Entrepreneur, Dead at 97

Ernest Gallo, whose pioneering use of advertising helped develop the U.S. mass market for wine and built the family-owned E&J Gallo Winery into the largest U.S. maker, died yesterday. He was 97.

Gallo died last afternoon of natural causes at his home in Modesto, California, winery spokesman John Segale said yesterday in a telephone interview. He would have turned 98 on March 18.

Gallo outlived two younger brothers: Julio, his lifelong partner, who died in 1993, and Joseph, 10 years his junior, who died last month. The youngest brother — one of California’s largest cheese producers — was estranged after he lost a protracted court battle to brand his dairy products with the family name.

By all accounts, Ernest Gallo was the more ambitious and driven of the two brothers in the wine business. Ernest had persuaded Julio to join him in starting a winery when Prohibition was repealed. He devised ways to finance, promote and sell wine, while Julio oversaw the vineyards and production.

The Gallo brothers popularized wine as a beverage accessible to the general public. The company’s downscale “Thunderbird” wine, a beverage developed in the 1950s that combined high-alcohol wine and citrus juice, gave way in the 1980s to its Bartles & James wine cooler, which blended wine and fruit juice. The company later developed a line of premium varietal and imported wines.

“Ernest Gallo’s contributions to the wine industry, agriculture and the state of California will endure forever as legacy matched by very few,” Tom Nassif, president of trade group Western Growers Association, said in a statement. “It is hard to imagine a California wine industry without Ernest Gallo.”

As chairman of the company, Ernest Gallo worked until his mid-90s, although he passed his duties as chief executive office to his son, Joseph E. Gallo, in 2001.

Family Control

From the outset, Ernest Gallo was determined to keep the company in private hands. The brothers welcomed the involvement of their children and grandchildren. At least 15 family members worked at the winery in 2006, according to Forbes magazine, which estimates the fortune of Ernest Gallo’s family at $1.3 billion.

The company ranks as the second-largest wine company in the world after Constellation Brands Inc., selling 65 million to 70 million cases each year in more than 90 countries. Although Joseph E. Gallo spearheaded the global expansion, he spoke deferentially of his father’s business skills on National Public Radio’s “Marketplace” program in 2006.

“He’s a very, very clear thinker,” the CEO said. “He can take a complicated issue and get it right down to the basics.”

Ernest Gallo was born in 1909 in Jackson, California, 125 miles east of San Francisco. His parents, Giuseppe and Assunta Gallo, were Italian immigrants who operated a boardinghouse in the Sierra foothills in the waning days of the Gold Rush.

End of Prohibition

His parents soon moved to Oakland to manage a saloon and boardinghouse. His mother — overtaxed by the birth of a second son 12 months after her first — sent Ernest to her parents in the San Joaquin Valley, where he remained until he was 6.

In his autobiography, Gallo described a happy childhood, with memories of his grandfather harvesting and crushing grapes to produce homemade wine. After he rejoined his parents, he shared their hardscrabble years on a series of farms.

His volatile father was a harsh taskmaster and required both Ernest and Julio to work in the fields when they weren’t in school.

Ernest became a salesman at 17 when he volunteered to travel to Chicago to sell carloads of the family’s grapes in the rail yards in 1926. His father had begun growing grapes four years earlier as Prohibition spurred demand for homemade wine. Federal regulators permitted families to produce as much as 200 gallons annually without violating the ban on intoxicating liquor.

Taking Control

The stock market crash of 1929 decimated the elder Gallo’s finances. In 1932, he retreated to a rundown raisin-grape ranch south of Fresno, while Ernest and Julio tried to keep his Modesto vineyard going.

On June 21, 1933, hired hands discovered the bodies of the elder Gallos at the Fresno ranch, dead from an apparent murder- suicide. The father’s debts totaled almost $30,000, while his assets were scarcely a 10th of that amount.

Ernest Gallo sought a probate judge’s permission to continue his father’s grape-growing business. He persuaded Julio to start a winery in a leased building in Modesto with equipment bought on credit. It was Ernest who devised a profit-sharing plan to pay grape growers only after their wine was sold. Then he went to a local public library to research commercial winemaking.

Financial Recovery

The shelves were bare of helpful books, in the same way Prohibition had decimated the ranks of experienced winemakers. But in the basement, a librarian unearthed pre-Prohibition pamphlets written by a research scientist at the University of California at Davis.

“Those old pamphlets probably saved us from going out of business our very first year,” the winery founder said in “Ernest & Julio: Our Story,” a joint autobiography written with Bruce B. Henderson.

Remarkably, the Gallos turned a profit in their first year. By 1935, they had paid off the obligations of their parents’ estates and had outgrown their first winery. They expanded their operation in 1936, even though Ernest was hospitalized for six months with tuberculosis. When he recovered, he resumed his practice of traveling five or six months of the year.

Even in his 80s, Ernest Gallo set a relentless pace. He enjoyed telling the story of how one hapless employee was left behind on a tour of Florida stores. As he recounted in his autobiography, Gallo refused to backtrack for the man, saying, “How valuable can a guy be if he wasn’t missed in three hours?”

Industry Leader

The brothers readily turned to new technologies or methods to improve their business. They invested in a bottling room with sterile conditions in 1946 that became a model for the industry. They built their own glass plant in 1957 to supply bottles.

After World War II, Ernest Gallo became a leader in wine industry advertising and promotion, providing retailers with Gallo wine racks and point-of-sale displays. He used billboards in local markets, and nabbed national publicity by staging a wine “crush festival” with pretty girls for the benefit of Life Magazine photographers.

Careful research preceded almost every agricultural, product or marketing decision. “Thunderbird” was developed over two years before its market debut in 1957.

Made of wine and citrus flavoring, the low-priced “Thunderbird” broadened Gallo’s customer base but also gained popularity in slums. In 1989, Ernest Gallo ordered distributors to quit selling the product to stores frequented by derelicts.

Imported Brands

Both brothers adapted to changes in the marketplace. Julio, the winemaker, had preferred to blend grapes to achieve consistent quality, but he agreed to begin vintage-dating some Gallo varietal wines in 1983. Later, he embraced the company’s move into premium estate wines, produced from grapes grown within a single viticultural area.

Ernest, a fierce opponent of imported wine, eventually supported his son’s overseas expansion. Joseph E. Gallo opened the company’s first international sales office in the U.K. in 1985.

The company now not only exports U.S. products, but also imports wine produced with partners in France, Italy, Australia, New Zealand and a growing number of countries. “Ecco Domani” from Italy and “Red Bicyclette” from France are two of its leading imports.

The Gallo family was riven in the 1980s by legal disputes between Ernest and Julio and their younger sibling Joseph, after the latter branded cheese products with the family name. Sued for trademark infringement, Joseph Gallo lost the case and changed his label to “Joseph Farms.”

Joseph Gallo in turn sued his older brothers in 1986, asserting ownership of one-third of the winery. A federal judge dismissed the claim in 1988 and the ruling was upheld on appeal in 1992.

A year later, Julio Gallo was killed in a jeep accident on a family ranch. Ernest Gallo was also preceded in death by his wife, Amelia, and elder son, David. Survivors include son Joseph, five grandchildren and three great grandchildren.

mmmmmmgood….

El Kabong

Holy Drinking Water

Get yours HERE.

Flirt Vodka …