Hasta La Gadget!

Dr. Karin Hehenberger is the founder of Lyfebulb, an educational and social platform dedicated to helping those with chronic illnesses lead their optimal lifestyles. Prior to founding Lyfebulb, Dr. Hehenberger held executive positions in the life sciences and devoted her career to identifying, analyzing, developing and promoting products across the therapeutics, devices and consumer healthcare industries. Most recently, Dr. Hehenberger was a member of the management team at Coronado Biosciences, a company focused on autoimmune diseases and cancer. Dr. Hehenberger has more than 15 years of experience in the healthcare industry, which she entered after obtaining M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden and conducting her post-doctoral work as a JDRF fellow at the Joslin Diabetes Center at Harvard Medical School. Her research focused on diabetes and its complications, an area in which she has continued to focus throughout her career. Dr. Hehenberger is considered an expert in the field of Metabolic disease and is an invited speaker at numerous conferences on this topic, as well as the subject of innovative products across therapeutic areas. She is a Senior Advisor, Biotechnology and Medical Innovation for the Department of Endocrinology and Surgery at the Karolinska Institute, the Scientific Advisor to the CEO of Helsinn, and sits on the boards of the Lighthouse Foundation and the Rolf Luft Diabetes Research Foundation.

How has your life experience made you the leader you are today?
I believe that my education and upbringing have given me a solid background from a knowledge and ethics basis. My parents are very honest and hard-working people, who early on, taught me that one has to fight for what one wants, and nothing comes for free. We were a very academic and athletic family, most of our time together focused on either doing some sort of sport, or reading/learning. This meant that we did not spend “frivolous” time — no beach holidays, no time during the weekend just for relaxing, and there was always a competitive part involved.

Later on, I continued with this approach, and it is not until lately, that I have understood the pleasures of “doing nothing”, although it is still very hard for me, not being productive at all times. This behavior has given me a strong work ethics, but especially as a younger professional, I was very intolerant of laziness and non-performance in others. I think it affected my career and my personal relationships.

My struggles with my health have clearly affected me as well. I benefited from the fighting spirit my parents engrained in me, but again, my lack of health at some times, made me not like myself very much. Being so very sick multiple times during my early and later years, has taught me not to take anything for granted, and to understand disease and health better. It is made me who I am today, and I think most doctors and healthcare professionals as well as biopharmaceutical executives would be better leaders if they had faced adversity in the form of disease.

Being a woman in an environment dominated by men, is another important part of my career and what has shaped me. I understand better how to deal with work situations and even personal relationships with men, rather than with women. This has helped me but I am still struggling sometimes to be a great listener to women, and to be as tough on women as I can be on men!

How has your previous employment experience aided your position at Lyfebulb?
Everything I have done in the past is coming together at Lyfebulb. My experiences as a scientist/medical doctor, investor/analyst, industry executive and patient advocate are all critical to what we are trying to accomplish. One given advantage is my network in all these different worlds, and my understanding what is missing or what can be used to Lyfebulb’s benefit. I can also see synergies more easily, since I have been in positions much like the people I am trying to engage. Leading a company is hard, and my multiple roles within senior teams have taught me what works and what does not.

What have the highlights and challenges been during your tenure at Lyfebulb?
So far there have been mostly highlights since we have only been around for 6 months! It is fantastic to be creating my own path and my own environment for other people to engage in and with. My highlights have been the interest gained from young people who want to join us, and the overwhelming feedback from patient communities who are helped by what we are doing every day. That is what makes me tick, and what makes me grow. If I can help even one more person each day I am a happy camper. More superficially, I am happy about our content development, including our name and logo. Makes me proud.

What advice can you offer women who are seeking to have their own business?
Be prepared to work hard, develop a strong business plan and seek help from trusted sources! Although you can feel you are doing everything for the first time, others have been there, done that, and they are often willing to share experiences. Ultimately, you are the decision-maker, and do not hesitate to make hard decisions early on. Most personnel questions are not going to improve, and if there is bad chemistry in a team, you have to solve it very quickly.

How do you maintain a work/life balance?
I have historically been lousy at this, allowing my career to take precedence over everything. With this business, I am passionate about what I am trying to accomplish, and key is to surround yourself with loved ones who understand and support. If they cannot or will not, they are probably not right for you. Most importantly, I think, is respecting people’s time and passions. If you are a hard-working, ambitious person, you need to allow for your partner, or friends/family to share some of their stories and challenges with you as well. That way, you are part of their world, and they are part of yours. Being open with the issues you are facing at work, will allow better understanding for late night assignments, or canceled dinner dates. However, it is critical to take good care of your body and mind, so not missing out on exercise and relaxing time, is important to the success of your business. I do my best work when I am in good shape physically, and my mind is rested.

What do you think is the biggest issue for women in the workplace?
There are many issues, and some advantages. Details such as being softer spoken and smaller, can impede being heard – literally – but more importantly, some men just cannot deal with women who are strong and successful. In my opinion, those men are not worth bothering with, and I have never been one to try to manipulate my way into good graces of someone who just doesn’t approve of my gender. I just work harder, and show results. If that is not enough, shame on them! The perception that women need to work doubly hard to get the same recognition is true in certain environments, but women also do bad things to themselves, such as quarrel with other women, instead of sticking together. If I had to name one issue that I faced all throughout my career, it is the latter. Communication between women has to be so very careful, since women tend to interpret emotions and words very differently than men do.

How has mentorship made a difference in your professional and personal life?
It has made a huge difference! Since I have embarked on several different careers within healthcare, I have needed different mentors in each environment, and I have never heisted to reach out. Starting with my parents, then my PhD advisor at the Karolinska, followed by several strong people whom I am still very close to, professionally this has helped me tremendously, and I have listened and learned. In fact, my best moments have often been when one of my mentors have related his or her experiences to me over dinner or drinks, and I have eagerly taken it all in.
Personally, it is a different story – I have not had the same kind of mentorship – most of my mentors have been failures in their personal life. Maybe not to the outside, but I know that their careers have taken precedence and their relationships and marriages have taken a toll. Since my friends are mostly in high-powered jobs, their personal lives have never been a priority. I feel that I am in a great place both personally and professionally now, but that has taken a long time to achieve.

Which other female leaders do you admire and why?
My Mother is a strong leader of our family and I admire her tremendously. She has managed to raise three daughters, move often due to my father’s job, and still maintain a certain peace within. She maintains a fantastic home, where everyone feels welcome and she invested her life in us three girls.

My PhD advisor is another strong female leader, who has dedicated her life to medicine and science, without losing her touch of femininity and caring. She always has time for those extra few comforting words, and that second look to make sure all is well. I learned a lot from her and her commitment to work, her patients and her family.

I have a lot of respect for other female CEOs and leaders. Being a leader is difficult, and anyone, woman or man, in that position, has accomplished a lot in my eyes by just accepting the challenge and persevering.

What do you want Lyfebulb to accomplish in the next year?
We want to grow our community of people following us online and offline. We would like to expand our content and make people really appreciate our advice regarding lifestyle and change behavior to become healthier and happier people in general. We would like to identify new, innovative solutions that can benefit a large group of people, and expose these solutions to our constituents and eventually participate in the development both financially and advice-wise.

Most of all, I want us to grow to a strong team of professionals, that all have in common that they are passionate about our cause, and are here for the right reasons. With that passion comes success, and we will generate revenue to allow for further expansion and more people will be embraced by the Lyfebulb story.

Israel’s security forces said on Saturday two soldiers have been killed in a confrontation with Palestinian militants. They were identified as Sgt. Adar Barsano and Maj. (res.) Amotz Greenberg.

Sgt. Adar Barsano, 20, and Maj. (res.) Amotz Greenberg, 45, were killed today while fighting Hamas terrorists.

— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) July 19, 2014

Jodi Rudoren of the New York Times reports the militants entered Israel through a tunnel from Gaza.

Also on Saturday, the Israeli army said it believes militants in Gaza have used up or lost about half of their rockets, Reuters reports. The IDF estimates Palestinian fighters have fired at least 1,705 rockets out of an estimated stockpile of about 10,000 and that the Israeli campaign had left 30 to 40 percent of the remaining rockets destroyed.

In recent years Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have waged crackdowns on local Muslim Brotherhood (MB) movements and their alleged sympathizers under the banner of combating “global terrorism.” These governments claim that the MB’s rhetoric, espousing peaceful democratic reform, is disingenuous, and that it is actually committed to violently overthrowing the Gulf’s monarchies.

At the heart of the issue is these Gulf governments’ belief that the MB’s alternative interpretation of Islam’s role in politics — in which the ballot box serves as the means to acquire political power — threatens the legitimacy of these distinctly undemocratic monarchies. The real threat is what the MB represents in terms of political reform at a time when citizenries from Morocco to Kuwait have demonstrated against their governments’ authoritarianism, corruption, and economic policies.

In contrast to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, Bahrain’s government has nurtured a political alliance with the Bahraini MB, primarily rooted in a sectarian agenda that serves a unique purpose in Bahrain, the only Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) state with a Shi’ite-majority population. For years, Bahrain’s MB has played an open and prominent role in Bahraini civil society while functioning as a charity organization. The MB operates a political wing (Islamic Minbar) that holds seven seats in the parliament. Some members of the ruling Al Khalifa family are deeply connected with key figures in the Brotherhood and Bahrain’s government even reportedly funds Islamic Minbar.

The pains that the Al Khalifa family take to avoid alienating Islamic Minbar are best understood within the context of Bahrain’s Arab Awakening. Since 2011, Islamic Minbar has played a critical role in uniting Bahrain’s Sunni Islamists behind the monarchy that faces steadfast Shi’ite opposition. However, recent geopolitical developments in the GCC and the wider Middle East are complicating this political alliance.

Bahrain has grown increasingly dependent on Saudi Arabia in terms of Manama’s domestic and foreign policies. Saudi security forces (in addition to those of the UAE and Kuwait) played a pivotal role in the crackdown on the Bahraini Shi’ite protestors in March 2011. Bahrain has also come to view Saudi Arabia as an increasingly important ally vis-à-vis Iran at a time when the Bahraini and Saudi governments share paranoia of the U.S. and Iran reaching a rapprochement at the expense of Washington’s alliances with Sunni Arab states. Such fears have increased in light of recent events in Iraq. Authorities in Manama may therefore be challenged to maintain a domestic alliance with Islamic Minbar in an effort not to anger the leadership in Riyadh.

While in Pakistan earlier this year, Bahrain’s Foreign Minister defended Manama’s decision to avoid labeling Islamic Minbar a terrorist organization, given that the group had respected the monarchy’s authority, never posed a security threat, nor belonged to any transnational movement. Yet, he simultaneously acknowledged Bahrain’s acceptance of Saudi Arabia and the UAE’s perceived need to designate the MB as a terrorist organization. The foreign minister wrote on Twitter that “the Muslim Brotherhood is a global movement with a single approach and is spread throughout the world, and will be dealt with according to the law of each country and the covenants to which it is party.”

Bahrain’s decision in March to join Saudi Arabia and the UAE and recall its ambassador to Qatar, as well as to provide financial and moral support to Egypt’s military after the 2013 coup, further underscored Manama’s ambiguous position on the MB’s role in the region. Ultimately, such contradictions can be interpreted as strategic, given Manama’s vested interest in maintaining Saudi backing, while sustaining the alliance with Islamic Minbar in the face of Shi’ite opposition.

Since its establishment in 2002, Bahrain’s main Salafist movement — Al-Asalah Society — has traditionally maintained staunch loyalty to the monarchy, avoided political activism, and refrained from becoming associated with international causes (much like Salafist movements in other Middle Eastern countries). However, Al-Asalah has evolved to become increasingly active in Bahrain’s political landscape by forming a political wing that won six seats in the 2006 parliamentary election. The group’s leader justified the entrance into politics by asserting doing so prevented a greater “evil” from occurring (such as Bahrain’s Sunni minority losing power).

At the same time there is reason to believe that Al-Asalah is indeed becoming increasingly focused on transnational causes. For example, as of July 2013, Abdelhalim Murad, the group’s MP, reportedly organized 1,640 Bahraini jihadists to travel to Syria to fight against Bashar al-Assad’s forces. In August 2012, Murad reportedly entered Syria via the Turkish border to meet with Suqur al-Sham and Liwaa Dawud, two radical jihadist groups.

The incarceration of six Bahrainis at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, along with the Bahraini government’s announcement that between 2003 and 2012 it uncovered cells within Bahrain that were fundraising for al Qaeda, and training militants to target Western interests in the gulf state (which hosts the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet), has raised doubts about Bahraini Salafists’ loyalties to the Khalifa family and its strict focus on domestic affairs.

There is indication that authorities in Manama are increasingly concerned about blowback from the Syrian crisis. Like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain is taking action to prevent its citizens from traveling to Syria to join the ranks of other Mujahideen forces committed to toppling Assad’s government. In May last year, Bahrain’s Interior Minister called on young Bahrainis to “stay away from regional and international conflicts and instead focus on developing yourselves, your country, and your society.”

The de facto establishment of a caliphate — ruled by the world’s most powerful jihadist militia, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) — in portions of Syria and Iraq last month only raises greater concern that young Bahraini jihadists will have new incentives and opportunities to fight in regional battles, especially if ISIS can maintain its territory and establish a launch pad for like-minded terrorist groups in the heart of the Middle East. It also raises into question just how effective the Bahraini government — and indeed all the GCC governments — can be in stemming the flow of sympathetic fighters to the ranks of ISIS and other militant jihadist groups.

Conclusion

Like other GCC members, Bahrain’s position on the sectarian conflicts in Syria and Iraq is confusing and at times contradictory. Certain actions indicate that Manama is committed to supporting the Syrian rebellion, particularly given that the ruling monarchy shares the ISIS agenda of countering Iran’s influence in the Middle East. At the same time, Manama is concerned about militant jihadists returning to the Gulf to point their guns on the ruling monarchies, which many hardline Takfiris view as corrupt puppets of Western powers.

The Bahraini government places a high value on Sunni Islamists such as Islamic Minbar that are committed to backing the monarchy and maintaining staunch loyalty to the Al Khalifa family. The ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Syria, and the rapid development of ISIS, have demonstrated that the multifaceted conflicts in the Middle East have become that much more difficult to control, and threaten to impact the Gulf’s political landscape.

Despite Riyadh’s interest in pressuring Manama to join the campaign to eradicate the MB from the Gulf, it appears doubtful that Bahraini officials will make moves that would risk either pushing the Islamic Minbar members closer to international jihadist forces or weakening the Sunni monarchy vis-à-vis the Shi’ite opposition. For that reason, Bahrain finds itself in an increasingly untenable position. If it misplays its hand, or events in the region outpace the government’s ability to manage domestic politics, the Bahraini government could find itself facing a dire crisis in the near future.

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Giorgio Cafiero is co-founder of Gulf State Analytics. Daniel Wagner is CEO of Country Risk Solutions, Senior Advisor with Gnarus Advisors, and author of the book Managing Country Risk.

Our government is no longer by the people, for the people.

Instead, our government has become a vehicle for corporations and the wealthiest 0.000042 percent of Americans. These select few can afford to give huge sums of money to political campaigns and receive undue influence for it. A recent study by Princeton political scientists showed that the United States is no longer a democracy but an oligarchy — ruled by the wealthy few. Their vast spending in politics gives them a large degree of control over those in office, drowning out the voices of everyday Americans. This amounts to institutionalized bribery.

The trend has been escalating for some time now, pushed forward by the disastrous Citizens United and Buckley Supreme Court decisions. These decisions run counter to every American’s belief — corporations are not people and should not be treated as such. Huge, multinational corporations can effectively make unlimited donations to campaigns through SuperPACs, which do not have to report the source of their funds.

The result of these decisions is that money has become the criteria for who makes it as an elected official. Politicians are rewarded not for their ability to govern, but their ability to fundraise. Instead of listening to the people, they pander to multinational corporations. This creates an environment where policy is not shaped by the needs of the people, but by the corporations who fund our representatives.

My own Congressman, Representative Dave Reichert, has received over $457,000 this cycle alone from PACSs such as Comcast, AT&T and others. No wonder he ignores the voices and the interests of the people in my home district-he has big business to back him up. No wonder he hasn’t passed a single bill during his time in Congress — he’s been too busy fundraising.

This is not the government laid out by the founding fathers. They argued for free speech as a way to empower the people, not subjugate them to the will of businesses and the super wealthy. We need to return to their vision of democracy, one where the voice of people determined the government’s actions. This means serious changes in the way elections are financed. We need not just structural, but institutional change.

I want my sons to grow up in a country where elections are decided based on issues, not checkbooks. I want them to see a Congress that responds to the concerns of their constituents, not some unnamed corporations. This is why I’m running for Congress, to make sure that my district is represented by someone who cares about the actual people living there, not the corporations. I am committed to serious campaign finance reform — we must return Congress to its roots, “We the People”.

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (AP) — Boko Haram extremists have killed more than 100 people and hoisted their black and white flag over a town left undefended by Nigeria’s military, just 85 kilometers (53 miles) from the northeastern state capital of Maiduguri, a civil defense spokesman and a human rights advocate said Saturday.

Hundreds of villagers in another northeast area, Askira Uba, are fleeing after receiving letters from the Islamic extremists threatening to attack and take over their areas, spokesman Abbas Gava of the Nigerian Vigilante Group said. “Nine major villages are on the run,” he said.

Survivors said Saturday that insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades and lobbed homemade bombs into homes, and then gunned down people as they tried to escape the fires in the attack on Damboa town launched before dawn Friday. Most of the town has burned down, they said.

A human rights advocate said the extremists struck again as people were trying to bury the dead later Friday, and said the death toll is probably much higher than 100. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to reporters.

The only defense came from vigilantes armed with clubs and homemade rifles, Gava said.

The town had been under siege for two weeks since Boko Haram dislodged soldiers from a new tank battalion camp on its outskirts. It seemed that instead of offering protection, the camp drew the wrath of the extremists.

The Defense Ministry had claimed to have repelled the attack and killed at least 50 insurgents for the loss of six soldiers including the commanding officer. But locals said many soldiers were killed and the military was driven from the base. They said the extremists twice have ambushed military convoys trying to reach the base in the past week.

The militants had cut off access to the town from the south on Monday when they blew up a bridge further south. Damboa is on the main road south from Maiduguri, the Borno state capital, and at a strategic crossroads for farmers to bring their produce to market.

Hundreds of thousands of farmers have been driven from their lands in the 5-year-old insurgency, and officials have been warning of imminent food shortages.

Both Nigeria’s military and Boko Haram have been claiming victories on the battlefield in the rapidly spreading Islamic insurgency in Africa’s most populous nation and biggest oil producer.

Boko Haram has attracted international condemnation for the abductions of more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls who have been held in captivity for 3 months.

The insurgents have increased the number and deadliness of attacks this year, particularly in their stronghold in the northeast, though they also have detonated bombs as far away as Lagos, the commercial capital in the southwest. Human Rights Watch published a report this week which said the insurgency has killed at least 2,053 civilians in an estimated 95 attacks during the first half of 2014. That compares to an estimated 3,600 people killed in the first four years of the insurgency.

Boko Haram wants to enforce an Islamic state in Nigeria though half the country’s population of 170 million is Christian.

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Associated Press writer Michelle Faul contributed to this report from Lagos, Nigeria.