Powerful Pinoy firecrackers can be turned into military projectiles—Honasan

By Norman Bordadora
Philippine Daily Inquirer

Senator Gregorio Honasan. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines?The explosive punch of every ?Goodbye, Philippines? or ?Super Lolo? is strong enough for them to be categorized as high explosives and developed into indigenous military projectiles, according to Sen. Gregorio Honasan who reflects on Filipinos? fondness for fiery, fatalistic and some say, even mindless New Year?s revelry.

Honasan, a former Army colonel and chair of the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs, took responsibility, on Saturday, for the lack of action on two bills that would have imposed stiffer firecracker control.

?What?s glaring here is the level of our firecrackers.? They?re in the category already of high explosives. The level of destruction and damage is amazing,? Honasan told the Inquirer.

?If we want to be imaginative? if we can push this as a component of our self-reliance program maybe we can develop?even [if] primitive?surface-to-surface missiles and surface-to-air missiles, with the kind of explosives we are using now,? added the senator, an advocate for a local weapons industry.

Honasan, nonetheless, expressed concern over the annual statistics of firecracker-related injuries both in the days leading to the New Year and during the actual New Year?s Eve celebration.

He offered no excuse for the inaction on the pending bills that could have somehow decreased the dangers posed by the firecrackers on Filipinos every year.

?I will have to admit some responsibility for that as the current chairman of the Senate committee on public order because of the workload and other priority bills that I also had pending in my committees. It really seems that these [firecracker control bills] weren?t really given attention,? Honasan said.

?We cannot ignore anymore the statistics related to injuries. So I accept full responsibility,? he added.

There are two firecracker control bills pending in Honasan?s committee.

One, authored by Sen. Manuel Villar, increases the penalty on illegal firecracker trade to a jail term of as long as 12 years and fines of up to P1 million.

The other, by Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, totally bans firecrackers in residential areas and designates a public firecracker area in every barangay.

?What we?ll try to do is consolidate all these proposals and ordinances,? Honasan said.

He said some local government units already have ordinances banning firecrackers.

With only a few session days in before the close of the 15th Congress, Honasan vowed to push for a stronger firecracker control law in time for the next New Year?s Eve ?if we are able to go back in 2013.?

Honasan is a re-electionist, running under the United Nationalist Alliance.

Asked what bills were prioritized by the committee during the past few years, Honasan said the committee passed the upgrading of the country?s fire code and the removal of the height requirement for prospective police officers.

Honasan is also the chair of the Senate committee on public information that shepherded the People?s Ownership of Government Information Bill. The chamber has already passed the Pogi Bill?the Senate?s version of the Freedom of Information Bill?on third and final reading.

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Tags: Explosives , firecracker regulation , Firecrackers , Gregorio Honasan , Legislation , Military , military projectiles , military weaponry , New Year , new year revelry , News , Senate

Factual errors? Contact the Philippine Daily Inquirer's day desk. Believe this article violates journalistic ethics? Contact the Inquirer's Reader's Advocate. Or write The Readers' Advocate:

Source: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/331933/powerful-pinoy-firecrackers-can-be-turned-into-military-projectiles-honasan

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'Extinct' whale found: Odd-looking pygmy whale traced back 2 million years

Extinct whale found? Well, sort of. Scientists have traced the lineage of the pygmy right whale back to an ancient family of whales called cetotheres, who were thought to be extinct.

By Tia Ghose,?LiveScience.com / December 19, 2012

The pygmy whale, a cetacean that looks radically different from all living whales, is actually the last living member of a group thought to have gone extinct 2 million years ago Credit:

Darryl Wilson, University of Otago/LiveScience.com

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The pygmy right whale, a mysterious and elusive creature that rarely comes to shore, is the last living relative of an ancient group of whales long believed to be extinct, a new study suggests.

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The findings, published Tuesday, Dec. 18, in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, may help to explain why the enigmatic marine mammals look so different from any other living whale.

"The living pygmy right whale is, if you like, a remnant, almost like a living fossil," said Felix Marx, a paleontologist at the University of Otago in New Zealand. "It's the last survivor of quite an ancient lineage that until now no one thought was around."

Living fossil

The relatively diminutive pygmy right whale, which grows to just 21 feet (6.5 meters) long, lives out in the open ocean. The elusive marine mammals inhabit the Southern Hemisphere and have only been spotted at sea a few dozen times. As a result, scientists know almost nothing about the species' habits or social structure.

The strange creature's arched, frownlike snout makes it look oddly different from other living whales. DNA analysis suggested pygmy right whales diverged from modern baleen whales such as the blue whale and the humpback whale between 17 million and 25 million years ago. However, the pygmy whales' snouts suggested they were more closely related to the family of whales that includes the bowhead whale. Yet there were no studies of fossils showing how the pygmy whale had evolved, Marx said. [In Photos: Tracking Humpback Whales]

To understand how the pygmy whale fit into the lineage of whales, Marx and his colleagues carefully analyzed the skull bones and other fossil fragments from pygmy right whales and several other ancient cetaceans.

The pygmy whale's skull most closely resembled that of an ancient family of whales called cetotheres that were thought to have gone extinct around 2 million years ago, the researchers found. Cetotheres emerged about 15 million years ago and once occupied oceans across the globe.

The findings help explain how pygmy whales evolved and may also help shed light on how these ancient "lost" whales lived. The new information is also a first step in reconstructing the ancient lineage all the way back to the point when all members of this group first diverged, he said.

Follow LiveScience on Twitter @livescience. We're also on Facebook?& Google+.?

Copyright 2012 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/Rb2Gcti6wv4/Extinct-whale-found-Odd-looking-pygmy-whale-traced-back-2-million-years

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VP says Chavez up, walking; doubts persist

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) ? Vice President Nicolas Maduro surprised Venezuelans with a Christmas Eve announcement that President Hugo Chavez is up and walking two weeks after cancer surgery in Cuba, but the news did little to ease uncertainty surrounding the leader's condition.

Sounding giddy, Maduro told state television Venezolana de Television that he had spoken by phone with Chavez for 20 minutes Monday night. It was the first time a top Venezuelan government official had confirmed talking personally with Chavez since the Dec. 11 operation, his fourth cancer surgery since 2011.

"He was in a good mood," Maduro said. "He was walking, he was exercising."

Yet the statement inspired more questions, given the sparse information the Venezuelan government has provided so far about Chavez's cancer.

Dr. Carlos Castro, director of the Colombian League against Cancer, an association that promotes cancer prevention, treatment and education, said Maduro was providing too few details to paint a clear picture of Chavez's condition following the six-hour Dec. 11 surgery and the complications that followed. Government officials have said the president suffered internal bleeding that was stanched and a respiratory infection that was being treated.

"It's possible (that he is walking) because everything is possible," Castro told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Tuesday. "They probably had him sit in up in bed and take two steps."

"It's unclear what they mean by exercise. Was it four little steps?" he added. "I think he is still in critical condition."

Venezuelan leaders have yet to offer information about Chavez's long-term prognosis. Maduro's announcement came a few hours after Venezuelan Information Minister Ernesto Villegas read a statement saying Chavez was showing "a slight improvement with a progressive trend."

Maduro's near-midnight announcement came just as Venezuelan families were gathering for traditional late Christmas Eve dinners and setting off the usual deafening fireworks that accompany the festivities. There was still little reaction to the news on a quiet Christmas morning.

Dr. Gustavo Medrano, a lung specialist at the Centro Medico hospital in Caracas, said if Chavez is talking, it suggests he is breathing on his own despite the respiratory infection and is not in intensive care, details government officials have not discussed. But Medrano said he remained skeptical about Maduro's comments and could deduce little from them about Chavez's prognosis for recovery.

"I have no idea because if it was such a serious, urgent, important operation, and that was 14 days ago, I don't think he could be walking and exercising after a surgery like that," Medrano said.

Over the weekend, Chavez's ally, Bolivian President Evo Morales, made a lightning visit to Cuba that only added to the uncertainty.

Journalists had been summoned to cover his arrival and departure in Havana, but hours later that invitation was canceled. No explanation was given, though it could have been due to confusion over Morales' itinerary as he apparently arrived later than initially scheduled.

Cuban state media published photos of President Raul Castro receiving Morales at the airport and said he came "to express his support" for Chavez, his close ally, but did not give further details. He left Sunday without making any public comments.

At an event in southern Bolivia on Monday, Morales made no mention of his trip to Cuba, even though aides had told reporters that he might say something about Chavez's recovery. Later, Morales' communications minister refused to respond directly to a question about whether the two South American presidents had met face-to-face, saying only that he "was with the people he wanted to be with" and had no plans to return to Cuba.

Morales was the second Latin American leader to visit since Chavez announced two weeks ago that he would have the operation. Rafael Correa of Ecuador came calling the day of the surgery.

The visits underscore Chavez's importance to regional allies as a prominent voice of the Latin American left, as well as how seriously they are taking his latest bout with cancer.

Yet more questions surround Chavez's political future, with the surgery coming two months after he won re-election to a six-year term.

If he is unable to continue in office, the Venezuelan Constitution calls for new elections to be held. Chavez has asked his followers to back Maduro, his hand-picked successor, in that event.

Venezuelan officials have strongly suggested that Chavez will not return in time for his Jan. 10 inauguration.

Opposition leaders have argued that the constitution does not allow the president's swearing-in to be postponed, and say new elections should be called if Chavez is unable to take the oath on time.

But government officials have said new elections will not be called, and Attorney General Cilia Flores insisted Monday that the constitution lets the Supreme Court administer the oath of office at any time if the National Assembly is unable to do it Jan. 10 as scheduled.

___

Associated Press writers Peter Orsi in Havana, Christopher Toothaker and Vivian Sequera in Caracas, Camilo Hernandez in Bogota, Colombia, and Paola Flores in La Paz, Bolivia, contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/vp-says-chavez-walking-doubts-persist-175119675.html

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Afghanistan says Pakistan serious about backing peace efforts

KABUL (Reuters) - Pakistan is genuine about backing the nascent Afghan peace process and shares the Kabul government's goal of transforming the Taliban insurgency into a political movement, a senior Afghan government official told Reuters.

"This is the vision that they share," said the official, who is closely involved in reconciliation efforts with the insurgent group. He also said recent face-to-face talks between the Taliban and Afghan officials in Paris were "enormously helpful" for peace efforts.

The remarks signaled unprecedented optimism from Afghanistan that Pakistan - long accused of backing Afghan insurgent groups - was now willing to put its weight behind reconciliation efforts, which are still in early stages and are vulnerable to factionalism.

The senior official cautioned that in order to sustain that optimism, Pakistan would need to take further concrete steps after releasing some mid-level Afghan Taliban members from detention, who may be useful in promoting peace.

Pakistan is seen as critical to U.S. and Afghan efforts to stabilize the country before most NATO combat troops withdraw by the end of 2014.

The Haqqani network -- which has far more experience in guerrilla warfare than the Afghan Taliban - would be welcomed to the peace process as long as it met certain conditions, said the official.

(Reporting by Michael Georgy; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pakistan-genuine-backing-afghan-peace-efforts-afghan-official-040032861.html

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Being in a parents presence can be the present? - Be Strong Foster ...

Posted by Robyn Harvey on December 23rd, 2012

My last few blogs have been about the holidays.? Holidays are so important to people for so many reasons.? Regardless of which holiday a family celebrates, the important thing is they are together.? I am sure most Foster parents do what they can to eliminate the sadness, but looking at it from the foster child?s perspective, things may not be that cut and dry.? Recently, I met a beautiful young lady I have known about for years, but ironically, our paths had never crossed.? When we met, I knew she would be strong enough to listen to my opinions, but what I was too foolish to know that it was I who would have to find my strength to listen to hers.? It is crushing to listen to her stories at times. The short story is April grew up separated from her family.? She grew up in different foster families.? Before meeting April, I knew the foster parents? perspective, but what she is teaching me is the other side of the story.

Meet April?

?As the holidays approach I often think back on many holidays without my mother, father, siblings, and family. I think about the many years I sat and wondered how they were doing during the holidays. I know, most of, my foster parents tried to make sure I was a part of their family.? It was the best they knew. ?One things that would have made it better: someone who let me talk to my family or asked me if I wanted to on the holidays instead of waiting for a visit two weeks later. I did have one foster parent that went out of their way to let me see my mom on Christmas Day. I didn?t care about any gifts? all I cared about was my seeing my mother. ?As I got older I would leave during the holidays to find my mom and it did not matter to me if I was missing family dinner with the foster homes; it just mattered that I was able to see my mother. I remember many holiday dinners at the Salvation Army and was thankful to just be with my mom and siblings. I was never truly able to spend the holidays with all my siblings until we were much older and out of foster care. ?Now that I am a mother I could not imagine a holiday without my kids. I always wondered what was going through my parents? heads during this time.

The holidays highlighted the fact that there were some times I felt I did not belong. I remember one home took family pictures, and they did not include us in the photo. When a foster home would buy us (the foster kids) one gift and everyone else had many to open, I would feel even less part ?of the family. I know that I was grateful for the one gift, however, it just hurt as a child to see other kids open more and I had to sit through it.?

Reading April?s words makes me sad, but resolved.? Resolved to do better.? This Christmas I am going to help my children feel connected to people they love.? This can be through calls, visits, emails, or Christmas gifts.? I am also going to really try to see things through my child?s eyes.? How it must have felt when April wasn?t in the family picture.? How it must felt as a child to watch others open more gifts than I.? I am going to try to walk in the shoes of my kids.? Santa is watching, and I do not want coal in my stocking again!

Robyn Harvey?is the Be Strong Foster Parents Coordinator for Be Strong Families and moderates?www.bestrongfosterparents.com?where she posts an ongoing blog sharing her experiences as a foster parent. ? You can read more about her by?clicking here.

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Source: http://www.bestrongfosterparents.com/being-in-a-parents-presence-can-be-the-present/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=being-in-a-parents-presence-can-be-the-present

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Tennessee Considers Training And Arming Schoolteachers To Protect Against Shootings

Tennessee has emerged this week as a center of the "the answer is more guns in schools" sentiment following the Newtown, Conn. elementary school shooting.

A member of the Republican-controlled legislature plans during its upcoming session to introduce a bill that would allow the state to pay for secretly armed teachers in classrooms so, the sponsor told TPM, potential shooters don't know who has a gun and who doesn't.

Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam (R) has said the idea will be part of his discussions about how to prevent a shooting like the one in Newtown from happening in the Volunteer State.

As has been seen following other mass shootings, there's a strong segment of the gun rights lobby that says the answer to events like the one in Newtown is more guns in more places. But they've said the recent massacre shows how important it is to put guns into elementary schools, where even gun-friendly states like Tennessee don't currently allow them.

State Sen. Frank Niceley (R) told TPM on Tuesday he believes it's time for that to change. He plans to introduce legislation in the next session, which begins Jan. 8, that will require all schools to have an armed staff member of some kind. The current language of the bill -- which is in its early form -- would allow for either a so-called "resource officer" (essentially an armed police officer, the kind which most Tennessee high schools have already) or an armed member of the faculty or staff in every school in the state. The choice would allow schools that can't afford a resource officer to fulfill the requirement without having to pay for anything beyond the cost of the training and, presumably, the weapon. But Niceley said schools should use the wiggle room to train and keep on hand armed staff not in uniform.

That's the best way to protect students, he said.

"Say some madman comes in. The first person he would probably try to take out was the resource officer. But if he doesn't know which teacher has training, then he wouldn't know which one had [a gun]," Niceley said by phone. "These guys are obviously cowards anyway and if someone starts shooting back, they're going to take cover, maybe go ahead and commit suicide like most of them have."

Niceley described himself as a person who as grown up around guns his whole life and a strong supporter of gun owners' rights. He tussled with the NRA during his last election over the letter grade he received from the group, though for the most part he's been rated A+.

Niceley's proposal has gathered some high-level interest. Tennessee's governor told reporters Monday that he's open to including it on the agenda for a January conference to discuss school safety. Nicely said he expect the governor "to be receptive" to his plan to use tax money to arm and train teachers.

Asked about concerns from gun control advocates that putting more guns in schools in the wake of Newtown might make them more dangerous, Niceley said the sentiment was naive. Not only does an unarmed school leave itself unprotected, he said, it also presents a tempting target.

"Look at it this way, you never see one of these whacko shooters go to a gun show and start shooting. They don't go down to the police station and start shooting," he said. "They go to places we advertise are gun-free."

School resource officers are paid jointly by the local sheriff's department and the school district. Niceley's bill would allow schools to pay for background checks and firearms training for teachers that woud allow them to be armed as well. Asked if the guns for the trained teachers would also be part of the taxpayer expense, Niceley laughed.

"Well, that's a minor detail in Tennessee," he said. "We hoped the teachers would have them already."

The teachers that would be trained would be volunteers, he said, and would likely carry their own firearms to school.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/tennessee-considers-training-arming-schoolteachers-protect-against-shootings-192556978--politics.html

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Movistar Venezuela saca sus aplicaciones para iOS y Android

19 de diciembre, 2012, 19:35

El operador azul sigue reestructur?ndose, tratando de cambiar su imagen frente a los usuarios con aire m?s renovados en todo el mundo. Como parte de ello, Movistar Venezuela lanza su aplicaci?n para Android?y su hom?loga para iOS.

Ciertamente una aplicaci?n oficial de una operadora es de agradecer entre los usuarios, ya sea por el simple hecho de consultar nuestro saldo, ver n?meros de informaci?n o ver nuestro consumo de datos.

Concretamente, la aplicaci?n de Movistar nos permitir?, en las dos plataformas, las siguientes acciones, entre otras:

• Acceso a Mi Movistar para gestionar nuestras cuentas.
• Geolocalizar Clubs Movistar.
• Geolocalizar Centros de Servicio.
• Acceder al FAQ.
• Buscar informaci?n general.

Hasta el momento es lo que esperar?amos de una aplicaci?n de operadora, aunque algo que me parece destacable es que la aplicaci?n se lanza para iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad y Android al mismo tiempo; aunque por otro lado, ya era hora de tener una aplicaci?n oficial.

La navegaci?n de las aplicaciones funciona de una forma similar, con una pantalla principal dividida en dos paneles: uno principal y otro deslizante hacia la derecha, donde se encuentra el men?; de forma parecida a como funciona Facebook en m?viles. En este men? encontraremos varias secciones, como los Destacados, Favoritos, Planes y Servicios Disponibles o Promociones.

Dentro de la aplicaci?n tambi?n podemos tener toda la informaci?n de las tarifas de Movistar, aunque, como hemos dicho, no sirve s?lo para dar informaci?n, ya que tiene acceso a Mi Movistar, donde se puede gestionar desde el saldo hasta opciones m?s interesantes como el roaming internacional o consumo de datos.

Descarga: iTunes para iOS | Google Play para Android. Gratuita.

Source: http://hipertextual.feedsportal.com/c/33160/f/538993/s/26c5cc3b/l/0L0Scelularis0N0Capps0Edescarga0Caplicaciones0Emovistar0Evenezuela0Eandroid0Eios0C/story01.htm

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Napoli penalized 2 points for match-fixing

Associated Press Sports

updated 6:50 a.m. ET Dec. 18, 2012

ROME (AP) -Napoli was penalized two points in the Serie A standings for match-fixing after its former goalkeeper confessed to arranging the result of a game three seasons ago.

The sentence by the Italian football federation's disciplinary committee on Tuesday dropped the southern club from a tie for third place into fifth position, 10 points behind league leader Juventus.

The penalty put a severe dent in Napoli's aim of winning the Serie A for the first time since Diego Maradona led the team to titles in 1987 and 1990.

Also, current Napoli captain Paolo Cannavaro and defender Gianluca Grava were each banned for six months for failing to report the fix.

Cannavaro is the younger brother of former Italy captain Fabio Cannavaro.

Napoli was also fined ?70,000 ($92,000).

Both players, along with Napoli, deny any wrongdoing.

The keeper, Matteo Gianello, confessed to prosecutors that he attempted to fix the match between Sampdoria and Napoli on May 16, 2010.

Sampdoria won 1-0 with a goal from current AC Milan player Giampaolo Pazzini in the 51st minute. It was the final round of the season and the victory secured Sampdoria fourth place and a spot in Champions League qualifying.

Gianello was banned for three years and three months.

Appeals were expected.

Last week, federation prosecutor Stefano Palazzi requested a one-point penalty for Napoli and a ?100,000 ($129,300) fine for the club, a 39-month ban for Gianello and nine-month suspensions for Cannavaro and Grava.

Napoli issued a statement on its website saying that it does not agree with inflicting point penalties during the season.

"Each decision should be made before a season starts or at the end of a season," the club said. "Plenty of time has passed since the 2009-10 season to evaluate and decide."

Napoli added that it is "confident that in the next two levels of justice real justice can be applied."

"There's no responsibility on the club's part, nor was there a failure to report (fixing)," Napoli lawyer Mattia Grassani said, noting that Gianello was Napoli's third keeper in 2009-10 and never played. "It's an unfair sentence."

Grassani added that Napoli could sue for damages once the appeals process ends.

Also on Tuesday, third-division Portogruaro was penalized two points for fixing a May 2011 match with Crotone, while Crotone was cleared of wrongdoing.

Napoli becomes the fifth Serie A club docked points this season for fixing - although the first to be penalized in midseason. Siena was already docked six points, Atalanta two, and Sampdoria and Torino one each.

Juventus coach Antonio Conte returned this month from his four-month ban for failing to report fixing when he managed Siena two seasons ago.

The federation's justice system provides two levels of sentences: The disciplinary committee's initial verdict and an appeal. Sentences can then be appealed to a national sports arbitration court, which has the final word.

At least 50 people have been arrested in Italy for match-fixing since the middle of last year, with scores more under investigation by prosecutors in Cremona, Bari and Naples.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Racist Zenit fans in denial

PST: Fans of Russian club Zenit St. Petersburg say they aren't racist...but that the team should be all-white and not have gay players.

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/45720816/ns/sports-soccer/

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Asia stocks gain on Japan hopes, China recovery

BEIJING (AP) ? Asian stock markets were mostly higher Tuesday, boosted by signs China's recovery is gaining traction and hopes for a new stimulus in Japan.

Oil prices gained to stay above $87 per barrel amid optimism American leaders can reach a budget deal and avoid automatic tax and spending cuts that might dampen growth.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 rose 1.2 percent to 9,928.07, adding to the previous session's 0.9 percent gain. China's benchmark Shanghai Composite Index was up 0.7 percent to 2,176.01 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 0.2 percent to 22,554.9.

Sentiment in China was supported by signs the world's second-largest economy is emerging from its deepest slump since the 2008 global crisis. Optimism was boosted by last weekend's pledge by new Communist Party leaders to support a recovery with more spending and easy credit if needed. They also promised reforms aimed at expanding private business.

"The economic recovery is gaining further traction, particularly supported by improvement in domestic demand conditions," said JP Morgan economists Haibin Zhu and Grace Ng in a report.

In Japan, markets gained following the weekend election victory of the Liberal Democratic Party, whose leader, Shinzo Abe, in line to become prime minister, wants to shore up growth with higher public works spending. That was despite concern about the consequences of adding to Japan's towering public debts and doubts about the effectiveness of looser policy.

The LDP's campaign platform rejecting "rational measures that might restore fiscal balance" suggests a new government "will lead the nation into an economic and-or financial 'event' that will scar its prosperity for a long time to come," said Carl Weinberg of High-Frequency Economics in a report.

Elsewhere in Asia, Seoul's Kospi added 0.1 percent to 1,985.87 and India's Sensex gained 0.3 percent to 19,308.25. Singapore was up 0.3 percent at 3,168.15 and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 added 0.7 percent to 4,607.40. Taiwan's Taiex was little changed at 7,633.76 while benchmarks in the Philippines and Malaysia declined.

Investors were watching negotiations in Washington over the U.S. budget and the impending "fiscal cliff" of automatic tax increases and spending cuts at the start of next year.

"U.S. markets managed to gain ground as some investors remained optimistic about the fiscal cliff negotiations" despite reports a settlement might be delayed until January, said Australia's IG Markets.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average closed up 0.7 percent at 13,223.70. The broader S&P 500 index rose 1 percent to 1,427.22.

In Europe, Britain's FTSE 100 index closed down 0.2 percent at 5,912.15 while Germany's DAX edged 0.1 percent higher to 7,604.94. The CAC-40 in France slipped 0.1 percent to 3,638.10.

In currencies, the dollar was up 0.1 percent at 84 yen. The euro rose 0.1 percent to $1.3174.

Benchmark crude for January delivery was up 64 cents to $87.84 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract added 47 cents on Monday to settle at $87.20.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/asia-stocks-gain-japan-hopes-china-recovery-032818141--finance.html

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115-year-old Japanese man becomes the world's oldest person

TOKYO - A Japanese mayor has hailed a resident of his city for becoming the world's oldest person.

At 115 years old, Jiroemon Kimura inherited the title from an American woman who died Monday.

Yasushi Nakayama, the mayor of Kyotango, near Japan's ancient capital of Kyoto, confirmed Kimura's status Tuesday, calling him "the pride of our town."

Kimura, born April 19, 1897, is 15 days younger than his predecessor, Dina Manfredini, who died in Iowa less than two weeks after inheriting the title as the world's oldest living person.

Kimura, a former postal employee, has 14 grandchildren, 25 great-grandchildren and 13 great-great-grandchildren. He lives with his son's family.

Kimura's family declined to comment to reporters Tuesday out of consideration for Manfredini's family.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/115-old-japanese-man-becomes-worlds-oldest-person-055801880.html

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Colombia, rebels hope rising trust can yield peace

HAVANA (AP) ? While the angry rhetoric and bombs continue to fly back home, Colombian rebels and government negotiators in peace talks in the Cuban capital describe an increasingly collegial atmosphere and growing trust between otherwise mortal enemies.

Negotiators for the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as the FARC, kibbutz about the latest soccer results and tease the unofficial timekeeper of the talks when it's time for a break. They share cigarettes and aromatic Cuban cigars, and even huddle around a computer screen to hash over design ideas for the website they've developed together for those seeking information about the negotiations.

Participants say it's arresting to see longtime foes who have spent the better part of half a century killing each other's friends and colleagues behaving so cordially ? and the best hope by far that they will find common ground.

Rodrigo Granda, a senior FARC commander who goes by the nom de guerre Ricardo Tellez, said the two sides "never forget that we come from opposing sides of a conflict which has not yet ended."

But he added: "There's still room for a joke, or a smile ... We have been building confidence and that is extremely important."

In interviews with The Associated Press, five participants provided the most extensive peek yet behind the curtain of the secret negotiations, which formally began in Oslo, Norway, in October and have been continuing at a convention center in Havana ever since. In addition, the two main rebel negotiators Ivan Marquez and Rodrigo Granda have spoken publicly about the growing atmosphere of trust.

Three of the participants who spoke to AP about specific details of the talks asked not to be identified because they did not want to risk destabilizing the fragile discussions, which are centered on halting the conflict, agrarian reform, drug trafficking, victim compensation and reinsertion of the rebels into society.

There has been no agreement yet on any of the points.

This is the fourth attempt since the 1980s to bring peace to Colombia, which has been at war even since before the rebels took up arms in 1964. A U.S.-backed military buildup that began in 2000 has reduced the FARC's ranks to about 9,000 fighters and killed several top commanders, though the rebels insist they are still strong.

Building trust is particularly important in these talks, given a history of betrayal on both sides. After a political wing of the FARC laid down its arms in the 1980s, 5,000 partisans were hunted down and killed. Meanwhile, the government accuses the rebels of taking advantage of a safe haven granted in failed peace negotiations a decade ago to strengthen themselves militarily and profit from protecting the drug trade.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has said the negotiations must bear fruit by November 2013 or he will call an end to the effort.

The FARC and government teams, consisting of 10 primary negotiators and about 20 support members for each side, are living in luxury houses on opposite sides of a one-time country club called El Laguito that the Cuban government now uses as a heavily-guarded official compound.

They have each others' phone numbers and often call at night to arrange details of the next day's agenda. At the meetings, both sides tap their wrists insistently to prod Jaime Avendano, a government negotiator who has become the unofficial timekeeper, when they get antsy for a break.

Participants say these 15-30 minute respites are when most informal interactions occur, with negotiators ducking out the back door of a pantry adjoining the meeting room to smoke and stretch their legs.

They talk about everything from the weather to the fortunes of Colombian soccer clubs such as Bogota's Millonarios, America of Cali and Medellin's Atletico Nacional, with sporting allegiances crossing the political boundaries.

"That's when we shoot the breeze," said one rebel negotiator at the table.

FARC and government officials also huddle in small groups with Colombian experts on land reform and other issues brought in to advise the sides, and the informal talks are a good way for both sides to hint at their positions without making formal concessions.

Former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell, a driving force behind the U.S.-brokered Good Friday peace accord in Northern Ireland in 1998, said building personal relationships can help the process, but is not enough to wipe away decades of mistrust.

"Getting to know their opponents as human beings is helpful as a predicate for getting into serious discussions," Mitchell told AP in a phone interview. "But of course it doesn't by itself resolve the differences."

Mitchell, who also served as America's Middle East envoy from 2009-2011, cautioned that familiarity does not always lead to fondness, citing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an example.

"When people got to know each other it validated and fortified their mistrust," he said. "Rather than liking the other side they came to dislike them even more."

Rebels in the Cuban capital say that a small core of negotiators who spent seven months in Havana earlier this year secretly laying the groundwork for the peace process sometimes socialized with their government counterparts, including at cocktails organized by Norwegian diplomats acting as guarantors. The parties also dined together in Oslo.

But no such fraternizing has occurred since the talks returned to Havana, in part because of the large size of the groups and because it has taken time for relationships to develop between the newcomers.

"Like always, at first trust had not yet been built and perhaps there was some distance, but with time the gap has been closing," the rebel's chief negotiator, Ivan Marquez, whose real name is Luciano Marin Arango, said at a Nov. 29 press conference.

Tanja Nijmeijer, a Dutch woman who joined the rebels a decade ago and is one of the only women at the negotiating table, told the AP it was "not an atmosphere among friends, but it is pleasant."

That is a striking contrast to events back home, where the declaration of a unilateral cease-fire by the FARC has not brought a halt to hostilities.

In late November a rebel front destroyed two energy towers; guerrillas later said the front had not yet received word of the cease-fire announced the previous day. A week and a half later the Colombian military bombed a cluster of FARC camps and said at least 20 guerrillas were killed.

But even through those clashes, the negotiators have had kind words to say about each other.

Multiple participants described a striking exchange between Marquez and hardline Colombian army Gen. Jorge Enrique Mora that has come to define the respect between battlefield foes helping drive the negotiations.

While the two men were talking one morning, the former Colombian armed forces chief suddenly said to Marquez: "You know, we already know each other, you and I," before rattling off the names of several battles they had fought in over the decades.

The rebel commander agreed, but added the dates of several other fierce clashes. "You didn't know I was there, but I knew you were," he quipped, breaking the tension in the room.

When asked at a press conference what it was like to face his nemesis across the negotiating table, Marquez said he respected Mora and a former national police chief as adversaries whose experiences as men of the sword would be valuable.

"They have been good at war," Marquez said. "Perhaps they know how to find the path to peace."

___

Associated Press writers Andrea Rodriguez and Peter Orsi in Havana and Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin, Ireland, contributed to this report.

___

Paul Haven on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/paulhaven

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/colombia-rebels-hope-rising-trust-yield-peace-185410260.html

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Mouse brain cells activated, reactivated in learning and memory

Dec. 12, 2012 ? Memories are made of this, the song says. Now neuroscientists have for the first time shown individual mouse brain cells being switched on during learning and later reactivated during memory recall. The results are published Dec. 13 in the journal Current Biology.

We store episodic memories about events in our lives in a part of a brain called the hippocampus, said Brian Wiltgen, now an assistant professor at the Center for Neuroscience and Department of Psychology at the University of California, Davis. (Most of the work was conducted while Wiltgen was working at the University of Virginia.) In animals, the hippocampus is important for navigation and storing memories about places.

"The exciting part is that we are now in a position to answer a fundamental question about memory," Wiltgen said. "It's been assumed for a long time that the hippocampus is essential for memory because it drives reactivation of neurons (nerve cells) in the cortex. The reason you can remember an event from your life is because the hippocampus is able to recreate the pattern of cortical activity that was there at the time."

According to this model, patients with damage to the hippocampus lose their memories because they can't recreate the activity in the cortex from when the memory was made. Wiltgen's mouse experiment makes it possible to test this model for the first time.

"We can now do a nice test of hippocampal function," Wiltgen said.

Current thinking is that learning activates a group of neurons that undergo changes, making new connections with each other to store the memory. Retrieving the memory reactivates the network.

Researchers working with human subjects, at UC Davis and elsewhere, use imaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging to see which areas of the brain are switched on and off in learning and retrieval. But fMRI cannot pick out an object as small as a single cell.

Wiltgen and University of Virginia graduate student Kaycie Tayler used a genetically modified mouse that carries a gene for a modified green fluorescent protein. When nerve cells in the mouse are activated, they produce a long-lived green fluorescence that persists for weeks, as well as a short-lived red fluorescence that decays in a few hours.

However, the whole system can be suppressed by dosing the mouse with the antibiotic doxycycline, so Tayler and Wiltgen could manipulate the point at which they started tagging activated cells.

The mice were put into a new cage with an unfamiliar odor and given a few minutes to explore. Then they were given a mild electrical shock through the cage floor. When returned to the cage a couple of days later, the mice would remember the shock and stay frozen in one place.

When they examined the brains of the mice, the researchers could see which cells had been activated initially to form the memory and which were reactivated later to recall it.

About 40 percent of the cells in the hippocampus that were tagged during initial memory formation were reactivated, Wiltgen said. There was also reactivation of cells in parts of the brain cortex associated with place learning and in the amygdala, which is important for emotional memory.

There was no evidence of reactivation when the mice were tested in a new environment that they did not remember, Wiltgen said.

The researchers also looked at whether reactivation changed as memories got older. Over several weeks, reactivation in the cortex and parts of the hippocampus remained stable, but it decreased in other brain regions like the amygdala.

In future work, Wiltgen's team plans to examine the role of the hippocampus and other brain regions in forming memories and explore new ways to activate or block memories.

Other authors of the paper are Kazumasa Tanaka at the University of Virginia and Leon Reijmers at Tufts University School of Medicine. The work was supported by the McKnight Foundation, the National Science Foundation and the Nakajima Foundation.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California Davis (UCD).

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Journal Reference:

1. Kaycie?K. Tayler, Kazumasa?Z. Tanaka, Leon?G. Reijmers, Brian?J. Wiltgen. Reactivation of Neural Ensembles during the Retrieval of Recent and Remote Memory. Current Biology, 2012; DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2012.11.019

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/2eNVa1nrcAE/121213121345.htm

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Meet Chuck Hagel, Your 'Likely' New Secretary of Defense

The Massachusetts Lottery confirmed two Costco co-workers are the winners of a $50 million Powerball prize. According to lottery officials, 52-year-old Rosa DeLeon and 54-year-old Reginald LeBlanc, who work at the Costco in Waltham, Mass., bought the winning ticket to Wednesday?s jackpot. The Boston Globe...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/meet-chuck-hagel-likely-secretary-defense-191347660.html

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Benefits of Choosing a Bed and Breakfast Over Other Types of Hotels

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There's so much data that we're running out of words to describe it

10 hrs.

Devin Coldewey , NBC News

The world is producing and storing data at such a rate that the day isn't far off when we will literally no longer have a proper way of describing it. From mega to giga to tera to peta, the prefixes we use to describe piles of bytes are starting to run out.

It seems like every year we end up having to change the go-to word meaning "lots of data." It wasn't long ago that a gigabyte was an enormous amount of space to have on your computer, and terabytes were strictly for scientists and companies like IBM.

Nowadays, a terabyte (or several) is standard?for personal use, and petabytes are what we talk about when we have to make a point about how much data is stored by Facebook and Google. And soon those terms won't seem so big, either, as we move on to exabytes.

The problem is?that after exabytes, we have zettabytes, and then yottabytes, and then ? nothing. Zetta and yotta (and their submultiple counterparts, zepto and yocto) are the most extreme numerical prefixes we have. They were made official?in 1991 at the 19th General Conference of Weights and Measures. Evidently?they didn't foresee the need to describe anything with a greater multiple than yotta, or 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.

Indeed, yotta-anything sounds like it should be enough. The diameter of the observable universe would be approximately just 880 yottameters, points out Jessica Leber at MIT's Technology Review ? meaning if there were a bigger prefix?than yotta, the entire universe would fit inside one of them.

But the International Bureau of Weights and Measures neglected to consider the needs created by the?exponential increase in data storage. Individual hard drives hold terabytes; a rack of servers might have a few hundred drives, and a data?center could have hundreds or thousands of racks.

We're already well into petabyte territory ? in fact,?Facebook claimed to store around 100 petabytes earlier this year. Add in all the datacenters belonging to Google, Flickr, Apple, and everything else, and exabytes are very much in play.

And that's just the data we've stored; We also have to consider the enormous amount of data being transferred every day on YouTube, Netflix, DropBox, and others involved with "Big Data."

Admittedly, you can always resort to one of the many actual numbers that stretch far beyond the prefix scale: A yottabyte is a septillion bytes, so if you want more, just say octillion, or nonillion, or quattuordecillion. These "dictionary numbers" can be created endlessly by combining Latin prefixes. But giga,?tera, and whatever comes after yotta have to be decided on by the Bureau.

What are they likely to choose, should they convene for a 20th General Conference?

The prefixes so far have been linguistically-neutral (i.e. able to be pronounced by speakers of many languages) variants on Greek and Latin prefixes denoting various sizes and?numbers. Peta, for instance, which indicates 10^15 or?five sets of three zeroes, comes from the Greek word for five:??????, or pente. Zetta and yotta were based loosely?on the Latin "septem" and "octem" respectively.

Speculators on the web suggest the next prefix will be "xenna," after the Greek "ennea" for nine, though they could also go with "nonna," "enna," or any other variation suggestive of the Greek or Latin. After that, even the speculators aren't really sure.

The problem is real, but not exactly pressing. Scientists and data specialists will make do with temporary or arbitrary terms (UC Davis students suggested "hellabytes") until the Bureau meets. And, of course, just because we don't have a word for these amounts doesn't mean we can't reach them.

Devin Coldewey is a contributing writer for NBC?News Digital. His personal website is?coldewey.cc.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/futureoftech/theres-so-much-data-were-running-out-words-describe-it-1C7557410

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Three British men arrested in Libor probe

LONDON/ZURICH (Reuters) - British police and anti-fraud officers made the first arrests in a global interest rate rigging scandal on Tuesday, detaining a former trader and two other men, sources said.

Britain's Serious Fraud Office (SFO), one of a posse of international prosecutors and regulators homing in on rate fixers, said three British men aged 33, 41 and 47 had been taken to a London police station in the early morning for questioning.

"The men are all British nationals currently living in the United Kingdom," the SFO said. A spokesman said late on Tuesday night that the three Libor suspects had been released on bail pending further investigation.

One of those arrested was former Citigroup and UBS trader Thomas Hayes, according to a source familiar with the situation.

The two other were Terry Farr and James Gilmour, who both worked at interdealer broker RP Martin, according to a separate source, who also spoke on condition of anonymity. Hayes, Farr and Gilmour could not be immediately reached for comment.

On his LinkedIn page, Farr is listed as a "money broker at RP Martin". RP Martin declined to comment.

Prosecutors and regulators across Europe, the United States, Canada and Japan have been investigating how traders attempted to rig key interbank lending rates such as Libor, the London interbank offered rate, and its euro equivalent, Euribor.

Dozens of people are under investigation in the probe, but the arrests are the first since the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission initiated an industry-wide investigation into suspected Libor collusion in October 2008.

INVESTIGATION HEATS UP

Designed originally in the late 1960s to estimate the costs at which banks will lend to each other, Libor has become a central cog in the global financial system and a benchmark for $550 trillion (341.3 trillion pounds) in contracts ranging from interest rate derivatives to home loans and credit cards.

According to the Canadian Competition Bureau regulator, which is investigating anti-competitive activity relating to Libor, Hayes and other individuals -- not Farr and Gilmour -- attempted to manipulate yen Libor. This is the average interbank interest rate at which banks are prepared to lend one another unsecured funds denominated in Japanese yen.

Court documents filed by the Canadian regulator also claim Hayes contacted traders at other banks in London to get them to manipulate yen rates.

Hayes, who began his financial career at Britain's RBS, worked at Swiss bank UBS from 2006-09 before leaving for U.S. bank Citigroup, where he stayed until 2010.

The arrests mark a ratcheting up of the complex investigation since Barclays admitted in June that its traders had tried to manipulate Libor and Euribor from 2005 through 2009 and that the bank had low-balled rates during the 2007/08 credit crunch.

The British bank reached a $450 million settlement with U.S. and UK regulators.

But as details emerged about how traders brazenly gamed Libor, it triggered a public and political backlash that saw three of the bank's top executive leave and sparked inquiries into how banks lied about their true costs of borrowing -- and whether regulators either condoned or failed to stop manipulation.

More than a dozen other banks are being investigated. Switzerland's UBS and RBS are expected to be next to reach financial settlements shortly.

Spokespeople for UBS, Barclays, Citigroup and RBS declined to comment on the arrests. Police referred all questions to the SFO.

(Additional reporting by Anjuli Davies and Matt Scuffham; Editing by Matthew Tostevin and Alexander Smith)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/sfo-arrests-three-libor-probe-115115659--finance.html

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Syrian rebels backed by extremists seize army base

BEIRUT (AP) ? Syrian rebels backed by Islamic extremist fighters took full control of a sprawling military base Tuesday after a two-day battle that killed at least 35 government troops, an activist group said.

It was the second major base captured in the country's north by the rebels, who have been racking up victories in the area in recent weeks and making inroads farther south toward Damascus, seat of the government they are fighting to overthrow.

Fighters from jihadi groups including the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusra were among those doing battle in the rebel ranks, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on a network of activists inside Syria. Al-Nusra fighters appear to be among the most effective fighting forces on the rebel side, spearheading many of the recent gains.

The presence of the jihadi groups has raised concerns in the U.S. and other nations that are supporting the opposition in Syria but do not want to see extremists gain power in the region. The U.S. this week blacklisted al-Nusra as a foreign terrorist organization and said the group was part of al-Qaida in Iraq.

The battle for the sprawling Sheik Suleiman military base, near the northern city of Aleppo, ended when the rebels took over the site's main compound and warehouses that housed a military research center, according to the Observatory. They had first breached the base perimeter on Sunday afternoon, after weeks of fighting with soldiers loyal to President Bashar Assad.

The Observatory said 35 soldiers were killed but did not give figures on rebel casualties from the battle.

Also Tuesday in Aleppo ? the country's largest city and commercial center ? four mortar rounds hit the predominantly Kurdish neighborhood of Sheik Maksoud, killing 11, including three children and two women, and wounding a dozen other people, the Observatory said.

The conflict started nearly 21 months ago as an uprising against Assad, whose family has ruled the country for four decades. It quickly morphed into a civil war, with rebels taking up arms to fight back against a bloody crackdown by the government. According to activists, more than 40,000 people have been killed since March 2011.

Western officials have raised concerns that an increasingly desperate Assad might unleash his chemical weapons stockpiles against rebels in an act of desperation.

But U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Tuesday the Syrian government seems to have slowed preparations for the possible use of chemical weapons against rebel targets. Last week U.S. officials said there was evidence that Syrian forces had begun preparing sarin, a nerve agent, for possible use in bombs.

Panetta told reporters flying with him from Washington to Kuwait that the threat was no longer escalating, although he was not specific about any Syrian military preparations. He said the U.S. hasn't seen "anything new indicating any aggressive steps to move forward."

Panetta says he'd like to believe Assad "got the message" when other countries warned against using chemical weapons. But he's still concerned that if "the regime is threatened with collapse, they might resort to these kinds of weapons."

Syria has been careful not to confirm it has chemical weapons, while insisting it would never use such weapons against its own people.

Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi said in an interview aired late Monday that Damascus doesn't possess any internationally prohibited weapons.

"Syria doesn't own any internationally banned weapons, whether chemical, nuclear or biological," al-Zoubi told Al-Manar TV, a station owned by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which is a Syrian ally. "Even if Syria possessed such weapons, it will not use them for moral reasons."

He said Western statements are similar to those that preceded the 2003 invasion of Iraq that accused Saddam Hussein of hiding weapons of mass destruction. After the U.S.-led invasion, no such weapons were found.

The Obama administration is getting ready to tighten its ties to Syria's main opposition group, the newly formed Syrian National Coalition for Opposition and Revolutionary Forces, at an international conference on the crisis in Morocco this week. The move will pave the way for greater U.S. support for those seeking to oust Assad.

The conference on Wednesday comes just days after the U.S. blacklisted al-Nusra, freezing any assets its members may have in U.S. jurisdictions and barring Americans from providing the group with material support.

The designation is largely symbolic because the group is not thought to have holdings or support in the United States, but officials hope the penalties will encourage others to take similar action and discourage Syrians from joining.

Jabhat al-Nusra is a shadowy group with an al-Qaida-style ideology whose fighters come from Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, the Balkans and elsewhere. Many are veterans of previous wars who came to Syria for what they consider a new "jihad" or "holy war" against Assad.

But several hundred fighters from Jabhat al-Nusra ? Arabic for "the Support Front" ? have also been a valued addition to rebel ranks in the grueling battle for control of Aleppo. The group also has claimed responsibility for suicide bombings on Syrian government targets.

Jabhat al-Nusra is the largest grouping of foreign jihadis in Syria, and the rebels say they number about 300 fighters in Aleppo, as well as branches in neighboring Idlib province, the city of Homs and Damascus. U.S. and Iraqi officials also have said they believe members of al-Qaida's branch in Iraq have crossed the border to join the fight against Assad.

The Observatory also reported clashes and shelling in several Damascus suburbs, including Aqraba, near the international airport where fighting started early this month.

The Local Coordination Committees, another activist group, said five people were killed during clashes between troops and rebels in the Damascus suburb of Rankous.

The Observatory and the LCC reported casualties in clashes in the northwestern Jisr al-Shughour area near the border with Turkey.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-rebels-backed-extremists-seize-army-142808403.html

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'Star Trek Into Darkness': What Did We Learn From The First Nine Minutes?

J.J. Abrams gives journalists a sneak peek at the sequel's opening scene, including a glimpse of Benedict Cumberbatch's villain
By Josh Horowitz

Benedict Cumberbatch in "Star Trek Into Darkness"
Photo: Paramount Pictures

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1698594/star-trek-into-darkness-opening-scene.jhtml

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Three food to improve skin roughness | Health and Fitness Tips ...

Rely on expensive skin care products, but not enough to want to have a smooth and good skin whitening. Three improve skin roughness food, allowing you to free themselves from the inside out ?roughness?.

1, sesame beneficial to dry smooth skin

2, lotus root can keep skin shiny

Lotus root is rich in vitamin C and minerals, efficacy, its hemostatic effect is better known. Recently demonstrated lotus root good for the heart, can be controlled to promote metabolism, prevent skin roughness effect.

3, roughness skin caused by the fungus treatment of constipation

Fungus is rich in vitamins and minerals, purify the blood, and the food is very good for the skin. The fungus, there are a lot of dietary fiber, it is suitable for normal food skin roughness caused by constipation.

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• Vitamin A and Vitamin D on the impact of the child
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• Peanuts can prevent heart disease
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  Seaweed foods include: Nostoc, laver, kelp, sea lettuce, wakame. Seaweed contains minerals up to calcium, iron, sodium, magnesium, phosphorus, iodine and so on. Modern science that, eat seaweed food c...
• How to prevent intracerebral hemorrhage (Cerebral hemorrhage)?
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• The benefits and nutritional value of eating Chili (hot peppers)
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Tags: how to improve skin roughness, improve skin roughness, skin roughness
This entry was posted on Sunday, December 9th, 2012 and is filed under Health Tips, Skin Care. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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War on Pain (Unqualified Offerings)

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Makings of a fiscal deal behind the hot rhetoric

President Barack Obama, flanked by National Governors Association (NGA) Chairman, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell, and NGA Vice Chair, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, meets with the NGA executive committee regarding the fiscal cliff, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is at right. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama, flanked by National Governors Association (NGA) Chairman, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell, and NGA Vice Chair, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, meets with the NGA executive committee regarding the fiscal cliff, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is at right. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

National Governors Association (NGA) Vice Chair, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, center, talks to reporters outside the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, following a meeting between the NGA executive committee and President Barack Obama regarding the fiscal cliff. From left are, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert, Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Fallin, Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, and NGA Chairman, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney gestures as he briefs reporters at the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012.(AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama, flanked by National Governors Association (NGA) Chairman, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell, left, and NGA Vice Chair, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, meets with the NGA executive committee regarding the fiscal cliff, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is at right. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

Members of the National Governors Association (NGA) Executive Committee, from left, Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe; Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker; Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton; Chairman, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell; Utah Gov. Gary Herbert; and Vice Chair Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, leave together after speaking to members of the media outside the West Wing of the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, following their meeting with President Barack Obama regarding the fiscal cliff. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Bluster and hot rhetoric aside, the White House and House Republicans have identified areas of significant overlap that could form the basis for a final agreement after "fiscal cliff" posturing gives way to hard bargaining.

Both sides now concede that tax revenue and reductions in entitlement spending are essential elements of any deal. If the talks succeed, it probably will be because House Speaker John Boehner yields on raising tax rates for top earners and the White House bends on how to reduce spending on Medicare and accepts some changes in Social Security.

The White House and Boehner kept up the ridicule of each other's negotiating stances on Tuesday. But beneath the tough words were the possible makings of a deal that could borrow heavily from a near-bargain last year during debt-limit negotiations.

Then, President Barack Obama was willing to reduce cost-of-living increases for Social Security beneficiaries and increase the eligibility age for Medicare, as Boehner and other top Republicans have demanded. On Tuesday, Obama did not shut the door on Republican ideas on such entitlement programs.

"I'm prepared to make some tough decisions on some of these issues," Obama said, "but I can't ask folks who are, you know, middle class seniors who are on Medicare, young people who are trying to get student loans to go to college, I can't ask them to sacrifice and not ask anything of higher income folks."

"I'm happy to entertain other ideas that the Republicans may present," he added in an interview with Bloomberg Television.

At the core, the negotiations center on three key points: whether tax rates for upper income taxpayers should go up, how deeply to cut spending on entitlements such as Medicare and how to deal with raising the government's borrowing limit early next year.

White House spokesman Jay Carney dismissed Boehner's proposals as "magic beans and fairy dust."

Boehner countered: "If the president really wants to avoid sending the economy over the fiscal cliff, he has done nothing to demonstrate it."

Tax rates have emerged as one of the most intractable issues, with Obama insisting the rates on the top 2 percent of earners must go up and Boehner standing steadfast that they must not.

Boehner, instead, has proposed raising $800 billion through unspecified loophole closings and limits on tax deductions.

On Tuesday, the president said he would consider lowering rates for the top 2 percent of earners ? next year, not now ? as part of a broader tax overhaul effort that would close loopholes, limit deductions and find other sources of government revenue. "It's possible that we may be able to lower rates by broadening the base at that point," Obama said.

On Medicare and Social Security, the Republican proposals would do relatively little to curb the deficit over the next decade, but the impact would grow over the longer term.

Raising the Medicare retirement age from 65 to 67, for instance, would wring $148 billion from the program over 10 years, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate last year, about one-fourth of the savings House Republicans hope to claim from federal health programs.

Another idea that gained currency during the Obama-Boehner talks last year would change the annual inflation measure used for Social Security cost-of-living increases and the indexation of tax brackets for inflation.

Many economists and government budget specialists believe the system is a more accurate measure of inflation because it takes into account changes in purchasing behavior

This "chained consumer price index" idea makes modest cuts to Social Security benefits at first ? curbing program costs by $112 billion over a decade according to the 2011 CBO report. But those reductions build up more over time in a fashion comparable to the way compound interest builds personal savings.

The White House has not foreclosed the idea of addressing Social Security cost-of living changes in a new deal, but it has not embraced it because Obama's aides argue Social Security is not contributing to the federal deficit.

The stingier inflation measure also could raise tax revenue by $87 billion over the coming decade. Taxes would slowly increase because annual adjustments to income tax brackets would be smaller, pushing more people into higher brackets.

But the alternative inflation measure, while a favorite of budget hawks, has run into fierce opposition from defenders of Social Security.

"I've never been a part of that," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., a top Obama ally.

The two sides are also close, at least in theory, on curbing spending on a host of miscellaneous programs, as well as new fees. These could lead to higher airline ticket prices, for example, an end to Saturday mail delivery, fewer food stamps and lower farm subsidies.

Republicans claim they could glean $300 billion from such cuts and fees over 10 years; the White House promises $250 billion.

So far, the public seems ready to hold Republicans responsible if negotiations fail. A new Washington Post-Pew Research Center poll shows that 53 percent say the Republicans would deserve blame if the nation tips over the fiscal cliff, and only 27 percent of those surveyed say Obama would be to blame.

Forty-nine percent don't believe Obama and Congress will reach a deal by Jan. 1, whereas 40 percent are more optimistic.

Republicans were quick to say on Tuesday that Boehner's plan was attracting criticism from the right, particularly from Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, a leader of tea party conservatives, and as such represented more of a compromise than Obama's stance. DeMint said Boehner's plan "will destroy American jobs and allow politicians in Washington to spend even more."

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Associated Press writer Donna Cassata contributed to this article.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2012-12-04-Fiscal%20Cliff/id-55d77adea0774e0fadd4e9ff54878619

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