Monday, November 28, 2011

NASA rover begins long cruise to Mars

With a picture-perfect launch behind it, NASA's new Mars rover has begun the long trek to the Red Planet.

The car-size Curiosity rover blasted off Saturday at 10:02 a.m. ET from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station here and separated from its Atlas 5 rocket right on schedule, about 45 minutes later.

The huge robot ? the centerpiece of NASA's $2.5 billion Mars Science Laboratory mission, or MSL ? is now zipping through space, chewing up the 354 million miles (570 million kilometers) between Earth and Mars. The journey will take eight and a half months.

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"We are in cruise mode," said MSL project manager Pete Theisinger of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Our spacecraft is in excellent health, and it's on its way to Mars." [Video: Curiosity Blasts Off]

A time to celebrate
MSL aims to determine if the Red Planet is, or ever was, capable of supporting microbial life. The mission began taking shape in 2003 and was originally supposed to launch in 2009, but it couldn't meet that deadline. The two-year slip helped boost MSL's overall cost by 56 percent.

The mission's prior troubles may have made today's successful launch especially sweet for the MSL team.

"Today's a great day," Theisinger said. "Very happy guy."

However, Theisinger was quick to point out that liftoff is just phase one of a complicated mission that is slated to last a minimum of about two Earth years.

"We all recognize that this is the prologue to the mission ? necessary, but not sufficient," he said. "We all have our work cut out for us in the next eight and a half months."

Preparing for Mars arrival
Curiosity is slated to touch down on Mars in August 2012. But mission team members won't exactly be putting their feet up during the 1-ton rover's long cruise.

For example, Curiosity's spacecraft will make a series of trajectory corrections, with the first coming in about two weeks. The team will also perform an engineering test in the next few weeks, with a check of the rover's 10 science instruments coming shortly thereafter, Theisinger said.

Mission scientists will spend the cruise phase preparing for Curiosity's work on the Martian surface. They'll stage 10 separate operational readiness tests over the next eight and a half months, gauging their ability to recognize and respond to potential issues that may crop up, researchers said.

"You're basically just kicking the tires and trying to shake it all out," Caltech's John Grotzinger, MSL's project scientist, told Space.com.

Curiosity will land at the 100-mile-wide (160-kilometer-wide) Gale Crater. A mound of sediment rises 3 miles (5 km) into the Martian air from Gale's center. The rover will investigate this mountain's many layers, scrutinizing the red dirt and rocks for any signs that Martian environments may once have been habitable.

Learn more about Curiosity's mission (800kb PDF)

The rover's landing will likely inspire more nervous hand-wringing than its launch did. A rocket-powered sky crane will lower Curiosity down to the Martian surface on cables, a daring maneuver that has never been tried before.

The MSL team spent a lot of time designing and validating this unprecedented landing system, and they'll keep working over the next eight and a half months to give it the best chance of succeeding.

But Saturday offered the scientists and engineers who brought Curiosity from the drawing room to the launchpad a chance to reflect and exult ? at least for a little while.

"Science fiction is now science fact," said Doug McCuistion, head of NASA's Mars exploration program. "We're flying to Mars."?

You can follow Space.com senior writer Mike Wall on Twitter:@michaeldwall. Follow Space.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter@Spacedotcomand on Facebook.

? 2011 Space.com. All rights reserved. More from Space.com.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45453320/ns/technology_and_science-space/

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Sunday, November 27, 2011

CA-CANADA Summary (Reuters)

Canadian troops, doughnuts leaving Kandahar

(Reuters) ? Coffee and doughnut chain Tim Hortons is closing its Kandahar outlet after five years in the war zone, shuttering its store on a Canadian military base as the country's troops leave Afghanistan. Opened on Canada Day 2006, the trailer-like restaurant catered to about 3,000 Canadian troops on a combat mission that was little loved at home. That mission is to wrap up this year, although a 950-strong force will stay to train Afghan soldiers and police until 2014.

Canada farmers earned more in 2011's first 9 months

(Reuters) - Canadian farmers earned nearly 11 percent more during the first nine months of 2011 than they did in the year-before period, Statistics Canada reported on Thursday. Farm cash receipts, which include market receipts from the sale of crops and livestock plus government program payments, climbed 10.9 percent to C$35.8 billion ($34.1 billion) between January and September.

Canada to end 7 a.m. release of key economic data

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada's statistics agency will end its long-running practice of releasing key employment and inflation data at 7 a.m. (1200 GMT) as of April - to the great relief of journalists and economists from coast to coast. Starting next April, Statistics Canada will move the release time of monthly data on jobless numbers and inflation to 8:30 a.m., an official said on Thursday.

TSX hits seven-week low as Europe worries weigh

TORONTO (Reuters) - Toronto's main stock index fell to a seven-week low on Thursday as resource-related issues slid after a meeting of European leaders failed to stem market fears about the euro zone debt crisis. Energy and materials were the main drags on the index, each falling nearly 1 percent, as oil and gas producers and gold miners were hit by fears of a slowdown in Europe.

Ontario cuts growth targets, says budget on track

TORONTO (Reuters) - The Ontario government cut its growth, revenue and reserve targets on Wednesday, but said it was still on track to balance the budget in six years, without lowering total program spending or raising taxes. In its fall economic statement, the government of Canada's most populous province said the timetable for eliminating its 2011-12 deficit of C$16 billion ($15.2 billion) by 2017-18 remains intact, as do medium-term targets, despite pressures from economic turmoil in the United States and Europe.

Provincial court upholds ban on polygamy

VANCOUVER (Reuters) - A Canadian provincial court on Wednesday upheld the country's ban on polygamy, saying the harm that plural marriage causes to women and children outweighed any infringement of religious freedoms. The landmark case was brought by the British Columbia government to test the constitutionality of a 120-year-old ban on polygamy in Canada.

Canada bank regulator warns on Basel supervision

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Global regulators must step up supervision of how so-called Basel III bank standards are implemented in order to ensure a level playing field among lenders, the head of Canada's banking watchdog said on Wednesday. Julie Dickson, who heads the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI), said the regulator has been emphasizing internationally that capital rules must be accompanied by "intensive supervision" to be effective and that there was an effort underway to increase scrutiny.

Police clear Occupy Toronto with few detentions

TORONTO (Reuters) - City workers dismantled tents and cleared debris from a downtown park on Wednesday as part of a restrained, daylong operation by police to peacefully end a five-week encampment by Occupy Toronto protesters. Backed by a court order, police arrived at dawn at St. James Park, a few blocks from the city's financial district, and workers began taking down unoccupied structures and cleaning up the site.

Carney urges immediate Europe debt action

MONTREAL (Reuters) - European leaders need to act "this week, not next year" to fix their debt crisis, Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney said on Wednesday as fears grew that the crisis is starting to hit the big economies of Germany and France. In a stiff warning that described the sovereign debt crisis in Europe as "barely contained," Carney said the euro zone has the resources needed to clean up the mess, but has not provided enough details on how it plans to put those resources to use.

WestJet wins slots at New York's LaGuardia airport

(Reuters) - WestJet Airlines Ltd said on Wednesday it had won eight takeoff and landing slots at New York's LaGuardia Airport, a shot in arm for the carrier's plans to expand its service in the East. WestJet, Canada's second biggest airline, is locked in a battle for passengers in Eastern Canada and into the United States with No. 1 carrier Air Canada and smaller privately-owned rival Porter Airlines.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/stocks/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111124/wl_canada_nm/canada_summary

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Ian Fletcher: Newt Gingrich, Pseudo-Intellectual Free-Trade Kool-Aid Drinker (Huffington post)

Share With Friends: Share on FacebookTweet ThisPost to Google-BuzzSend on GmailPost to Linked-InSubscribe to This Feed | Rss To Twitter | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/166385662?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Saturday, November 26, 2011

Investing In Quick Sale Belongings | Cheap Home Ideas

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Source: http://cheaphomeideas.com/investing-in-quick-sale-belongings/

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Friday, November 25, 2011

Lawsuit over 'Jew or not Jew' iPhone app dropped (AP)

PARIS ? French anti-racism groups dropped a lawsuit Thursday against Apple Inc. over an iPhone app called "Jew or not Jew?" after it was removed from circulation worldwide.

Lawyer Stephane Lilti, representing four anti-racism associations, said the decision was "motivated by the removal of the application in all countries of the world."

Lilti said at a hearing in a Paris court Thursday that the app's designer, Johann Levy, decided to remove it. Lilti said while the groups agreed to drop the lawsuit, their complaint "had beneficial effects."

Representatives of Apple in France would not comment on the decision, nor did a lawyer for Apple at the hearing, Coline Warin.

The app let users consult a database of celebrities and public figures to see if they are Jewish or not. The app was selling for 0.79 euro cents in France, but was removed from the French online App Store after anti-racism groups initially complained about it in September.

The app remained available outside France, however, selling for $1.99 through Cupertino, California-based Apple's U.S. App Store.

SOS Racisme, MRAP, the Union of Jewish Students of France and a group called J'accuse joined in a lawsuit against Apple, arguing that the app violated France's strict laws banning the compiling of people's personal details without their consent.

Under the French penal code, stocking personal details including race, sexuality, political leanings or religious affiliation is punishable by five-year prison sentences and fines of up to euro300,000 ($411,000).

Such laws were enacted in the decades following the Holocaust, which saw some 76,000 Jews deported from Nazi-occupied France to concentration camps. Fewer than 3,000 returned alive.

In an interview published in September, app developer Levy said he developed the app to be "recreational ... as a Jew myself I know that in our community we often ask whether a such-and-such celebrity is Jewish or not," Levy was quoted as saying in the daily Le Parisien.

Apple has removed numerous apps from the App Store since it launched in mid-2008 for violating the myriad restrictions it imposes on developers.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111124/ap_on_hi_te/eu_france_iphone_app

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GOP presidential rivals to debate foreign policy (AP)

WASHINGTON ? With new trouble appearing in the Middle East and the Pentagon facing possible budget cuts, the Republican White House contenders are debating for the second time in as many weeks how they would do better than President Barack Obama in protecting and extending America's national security.

Six weeks to the day before the first nominating contests in Iowa, the candidates were looking to use the pre-Thanksgiving holiday debate to build or ? for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at the head of the pack ? sustain momentum in the battle to pick a 2012 election challenger for Obama.

Businessman Herman Cain, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Reps. Ron Paul of Texas and Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania also were meeting in Tuesday night's forum put together by CNN, the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute.

With unemployment stubbornly high and the economy sluggish to recover from recession, the candidates also were likely to drive the foreign policy discussion back to pocketbook issues at home.

A day earlier, the congressional deficit supercommittee declared an impasse, and that could trigger deep cuts in 2013 spreading across military as well as domestic spending.

Many of the presidential candidates have called the nation's $15 trillion government debt a national security threat, especially since China is the single largest creditor. Obama's own defense secretary, Leon Panetta, has said big Pentagon cuts "would lead to a hollow force incapable of sustaining the missions it is assigned."

The GOP contenders also were ready to criticize Obama on the Middle East. The administration ordered new sanctions this week aimed at forcing Iran to halt a suspected nuclear weapons program, and protests are under way again in Cairo against the military government.

The Iran sanctions target that country's oil industry as well as companies linked to nuclear activity and Iran's banking system.

They, however, were unlikely to satisfy the GOP contenders who are far more hawkish than Obama and have pledged to carry out military strikes against suspected Iranian nuclear facilities to defend U.S. ally Israel.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111122/ap_on_el_pr/us_gop_debate

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Thursday, November 24, 2011

Rihanna's Talk That Talk Is 'Edgy And Passionate'

'She's at a place right now where her voice just sounds incredible,' vocal producer Kuk Harrell tells MTV News.
By Jocelyn Vena, with reporting by Vanessa White Wolf


Rihanna
Photo: Getty Images

Rihanna is pretty feisty on Talk That Talk. The pop star sings quite candidly about what she likes (and doesn't like) between the sheets on the new album, which relies heavily on dance and house influences.

During her Loud Tour, Rihanna hooked up with frequent vocal producer Kuk Harrell and found her voice for the just-released album.

"They scheduled me to go out to Europe and start recording. It's an amazing process, working with her while she's on the road. It's great to see how she does a show every single night [and then records]," he told MTV News, before adding that, "Sure enough at 2, 3 o'clock in the morning, I get the call: She's on her way."

Making Talk That Talk was a brisk process. "We were in the studio probably like three weeks total," he recalled. When it came to the album's sound, Rihanna and Harrell — as well as producers like The-Dream, Bangladesh, Calvin Harris and Dr. Luke — concocted a mixture of emotions and sounds to define the record.

"At points, it's a combination of edgy and passionate at the same time, and when you listen to the album, it's just like Loud," he explained. "She's at a place right now where her voice just sounds incredible, and she's such a great presence."

Rihanna has certainly experimented with dance music in the past, especially on tracks like "Only Girl (In the World)," but she went deep into the genre on this album. It didn't change the way Harrell and Ri worked together very much, the producer said.

"It doesn't change anything for me. ... The goal is always getting the best performance out of her," he explained. "So it's just a matter of making sure we capture the vibe of the record. If it's up and moving, we gotta make sure her performance matches that.

"She's definitely ready to do it, but there are times throughout the whole process I do have to — I'm not coaching her, I'm just producing how to get this performance," he continued. "When she sings a line, if I don't think it matches the intensity of the lyric, then I'll go 'Man, push a little harder.' "

Rihanna seems to be pushing herself these days too. She just revealed on Twitter that she's set to work on her second Talk That Talk video, for the track "You Da One." "I can't stop listening to #YouDaOne ... So addictive!!!!" she tweeted. "Maybe because we shooting the vid soon! Workin on treatment all now...."

Have you checked out Rihanna's latest album yet? Share your reviews in the comments!

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1674844/rihanna-talk-that-talk.jhtml

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Wednesday, November 23, 2011

McAfee: Malware loves Android

McAfee

By Athima Chansanchai

Android has a new stalker: malware, and it's put a bull's-eye on Google's mobile operating system, according to a new McAfee report.

If you own an Android phone, the first thing you need to do is not panic. But you do need to be aware of the lurking dangers out there.

The McAfee report, which encompasses the third quarter of 2011, laid it out bluntly from the start of its section on mobile threats:

Last quarter the Android mobile operating system (OS) became the most ?popular? platform for new?malware. This quarter Android became the exclusive platform for all new mobile malware. The Symbian?OS (for Nokia handsets) remains the platform with the all-time greatest number of malware, but Android?is clearly today?s target.?

Users need to be alert to SMS-subscribing, money-making trojans (not for you, unfortunately), malicious apps, data-stealing invaders of all varieties, including those that try to infiltrate through system databases and those that surreptitiously record phone calls.

Android's vulnerability is also highlighted in this story, which gives readers one very eye-catching statistic: Android malware has jumped 472 percent since July. The security experts quoted in that story said that until there's a critical mass of Android owners whose wallets really feel the pinch of the scams, things won't get better. Changing behavior, such as taking the time to read through permissions an app can access, will help deter the changes of being a victim.

But users aren't the only ones at fault. The Android ecosystem, with its lack of standardization across so many manufacturers, isn't able to keep up with the security patches and updates necessary to secure phones in any kind of consistent way.?And as the McAfee report shows, there is no let up in the bad guys trying to take advantage of innocents.

The report shows spam varies from country to country, with?Delivery Service Notifications (fake error messages) the most popular lures in the U.S., which also is ground zero for the majority of new malicious sites.

The U.S. has seen a decline in new botnet senders from October 2010 to October 2011, from 300,000 to 100,000, but McAfee warns that such a decrease doesn't mean we should let up on our vigilance.

Even though?spam volume is way down, McAfee Labs sees targeted spam, often called spearphishing, at its greatest?development in years. So, very much like malware, the noise tells us spam levels have dropped, yet the?signal we need to hear is that the bad guys have changed their tactics. They are protecting their business?models and are doing so with a sophistication that creates a more dangerous threat than before.?

In particular, McAfee saw?"four significant spikes in malicious web content this quarter. They are not linked to any?particular attack but to updates to the internal or external sensors that periodically send data to our web?threat database."?

McAfee also noted the rise of hacktivism during this quarter, with Anonymous attacks against PayPal, police and major financial institutions making a prominent appearance.?

More stories:

Check out Technolog on?Facebook, and on Twitter, follow?Athima Chansanchai, who is also trying to keep her head above water in the?Google+?stream.

Source: http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/21/8932272-mcafee-malware-loves-android

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Stocks plunge as debt talks near collapse (AP)

NEW YORK ? The stock market was not exactly surprised that the so-called supercommittee failed to reach a deal to cut the federal deficit. But since summer, investors have bought at the first sign of hope and sold at the first hint of trouble.

So on Monday, they sold big.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down as much as 342 points after the special committee of Congress assigned to come up with $1.2 trillion in deficit cuts over 10 years indicated that there would be no deal.

"They're essentially giving up," said Robert Robis, head of fixed income macro strategies at ING Investment Management.

The supercommittee stalemate is supposed to trigger automatic spending cuts across the government, but there were already hints that Congress would find a way around them. Analysts say that could lead to another downgrade of the U.S. credit rating.

In addition, the breakdown raises questions about how Congress will find a way to extend a 2 percentage point cut in the Social Security tax. Congress passed it for one year, and some lawmakers support extending it because economic growth remains weak.

Each of those measures puts cash in the pockets of Americans, who can spend it and help the economy grow.

It also shows lawmakers may not be able to make progress on anything budget-related in the coming months, said Robert Pavlik, chief market strategist with Banyan Partners LLC in New York.

"It shows that there's a bigger problem at hand, and if they can't work to resolve these relatively small yet meaningful issues, what's going to happen if we get into a situation like Europe is in?" he said. "And we're kind of headed there."

The result was another day of heavy selling in a market that has grown used to big swings. Just before 3 p.m. EST, the Dow was down 254 points at 11,542, a 2.2 percent decline.

Volatility seized the stock market in late July, when Congress was wrestling with whether to raise the limit on how much the federal government can borrow.

The Dow rose or fell 100 points or more on 15 trading days in August, 16 in September and 15 in October. It was on pace Monday for its 10th triple-digit move this month, with six trading days to go.

"People are getting so short-term oriented now that all they know is how to make day trades," he said.

The selling swung the Dow from a gain for the year to a loss, the first time that has happened in a month.

Across the Atlantic Ocean, Moody's, a prominent ratings agency, warned France that its top-notch AAA credit rating remains "under pressure." In a weekly note, a Moody's analyst said that high borrowing costs for France could have "negative credit implications."

One European country after another has fallen into crisis because of debt. Wary of the ability of countries to pay back their loans, bond investors have insisted on higher returns on national bonds, pushing borrowing costs to dangerous levels.

Stocks fell 3.4 percent in both Germany and France ? bigger declines than in the United States. Germany and France are the two largest economies in Europe.

Investors still see American debt as safe, despite the failure of the supercommittee. On Monday, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.97 percent. It traded at 2.01 percent late Friday.

Because bond yields move in the opposite direction from bond prices, the lower yields are a sign that investors are buying American bonds and believe in their safety.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index dropped 23, or 1.9 percent, to 1,193, and all but a handful of companies in the index declined for the day. The S&P 500 fell 3.8 percent last week, its worst since September.

The Nasdaq composite index declined 51, or 2 percent, to 2,522. In Europe, the main stock indexes in France and Germany lost 3.4 percent.

The steepest falls last week came Wednesday and Thursday, after Fitch, another ratings agency, warned that the European debt crisis could hit the largest American banks. The S&P 500 is down more than 5 percent for the year. On Nov. 15, it was up slightly.

The declines Monday were broad. Energy and technology stocks lost the most. All 30 stocks in the Dow average fell, led by Boeing Co. with a 4.7 percent decline.

The dollar rose along with U.S. Treasury prices.

Gilead Sciences Inc. stock plunged almost 10 percent, the most in the S&P 500. The company plans to buy drug developer Pharmasset Inc. for $11 billion. Pharmasset, which has an experimental hepatitis C drug in late-stage clinical trials, jumped 85 percent.

Alleghany Corp. fell 7 percent after the property and casualty insurer said it had agreed to buy the reinsurance company Transatlantic Holdings Inc. for $3.4 billion. Transatlantic edged up 1 percent.

Irish electronics company Cooper Industries PLC bucked the market trend, rising 2.6 percent, after S&P said it will be added to the S&P 500 index. Stocks often rally when they are added to major indexes, because investment funds that mirror the indexes must buy them.

Hewlett-Packard fell 3.5 percent ahead of its fiscal fourth quarter earnings report, due out after the market closes on Monday. An analyst with Baird Equity Research said he expects HP to lower its outlook for the next fiscal year.

___

Wagner reported from Washington.

Daniel Wagner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/wagnerreports.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111121/ap_on_bi_st_ma_re/us_wall_street

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Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Criminal probe into online mortgage scams widens (AP)

SAN FRANCISCO ? A criminal investigation into mortgage swindlers has expanded beyond deceptive advertising on Google's Internet search engine to root out con artists who were luring their victims on Bing and Yahoo, too.

Monday's news of the widening probe confirmed that the Internet's three largest search engines had been turned into tools of prey for crooks looking to bilk homeowners scrambling to avoid foreclosure. The scams involved online ads making bogus promises of help people hold onto their homes under a government-backed program to modify mortgage payments.

After finding their victims using ads triggered by phrases such as "stop foreclosure," the swindlers extracted upfront fees or arranged to have the mortgage payments sent them without providing any assistance. The ruses had become increasingly common.

The crackdown had shuttered 125 mortgage scams by Monday, up from 85 last week, when the Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program announced it was cleaning up the misconduct on Google. The U.S. Treasury Department division said many of the con artists bought ads on all three search engines.

The identities of the alleged swindlers haven't been disclosed, partly because the criminal investigation is still open. A spokesman for agency steering the investigation declined to provide any further details Monday.

Like Google Inc., Microsoft Corp.'s Bing search engine agreed to stop accepting ads from hundreds of Internet advertisers and agencies tied to the scams. The ban also applies to Yahoo Inc., because it depends on Microsoft to sell its search advertising as part of a revenue-sharing partnership.

"Microsoft is committed to preventing fraud within its advertising network and online community and is working closely with the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program to help tackle the problem of fraudulent mortgage-modification advertising," the software maker said in a statement.

The mortgage scams are the latest example of marketing malfeasance on large Internet advertising networks. Critics have complained the largely automated systems for buying ads next to Internet search results are vulnerable to abuse and that the companies running them aren't doing enough to screen the marketing pitches before they appear on websites.

The criminal investigation into fraudulent mortgage ads is surfacing three months after Google agreed to pay $500 million to avoid prosecution in Rhode Island for profiting from online ads from Canadian pharmacies that illegally sold drugs in the U.S.

Consumer Watchdog, a group that published a study about mortgage ad scams nine months ago, is calling for criminal charges and financial penalties against the major search engines in the current investigation.

"These Internet company executives were active enablers of fraud against vulnerable homeowners," said John Simpson, director of Consumer Watchdog's privacy project. "They cannot be allowed to benefit from these ill-gotten gains."

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/search/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111121/ap_on_hi_te/us_microsoft_yahoo_mortgage_fraud

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Monday, November 21, 2011

Mila Kunis' Marine Corps Ball Date: She "Exceeded My Expectations" (omg!)

Mila Kunis' Marine Corps Ball Date: She "Exceeded My Expectations"

Nobody puts Mila Kunis in the corner!

On Friday, the 28-year-old Black Swan star made good on her promise to attend the Marine Corps Ball in Greenville, North Carolina with Sgt. Scott Moore. Not only did Kunis "[exceed] my expectations," Moore said Monday on Good Morning America, she also got down on the dance floor to the Dirty Dancing soundtrack! (Moore asked Kunis to the ball via Youtube earlier this year.)

PHOTOS: Patriotic celebs

"It was a blast. It was a great time," Moore told Good Morning America's Robin Roberts. "[She's] really just a normal girl who's very interested to learn about our history and our traditions."

On CBS' Early Show, Moore added that he and the Friends with Benefits star even danced to "The Time of My Life" from the classic Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze flick, but they didn't do any of the movie's iconic lifts. "This uniform is not as mobile as you might think," he quipped.?

PHOTOS: Stars' good deeds

"She had a lot of questions about my uniform and what to expert as far as the ceremony," Moore added. "And I explained to her that this year was extremely important to us and memorable to us because of the seven Marines and sailors we lost during our deployment. It was very important to express that to her... It was a lot to take in for her, I'm sure, but I hope I did a good job."

Moore also told Good Morning America that while there was no goodnight kiss, he and Kunis "promised to keep in touch."

NEWS: Justin Timberlake reminisces on his Marine Corps Ball experience

Kunis' former costar Justin Timberlake attended a Military Corps Ball earlier this month with Corporal Kelsey De Santis. "He was a complete gentleman!" De Santis gushed to Good Morning America.

Get more Us! Follow us on Twitter, Friend us on Facebook, Subscribe to Us Weekly

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/entertainment/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/omg_rss/rss_omg_en/news_mila_kunis_marine_corps_ball_date_she_exceeded195819553/43674143/*http%3A//omg.yahoo.com/news/mila-kunis-marine-corps-ball-date-she-exceeded-195819553.html

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Regional tensions limit Bhutan climate summit aims (AP)

NEW DELHI, India ? Four Himalayan nations, faced with erratic weather and the threat of melting glaciers and catastrophic floods, are hashing out a plan for preserving the vast mountain range and helping millions living in the foothills cope with climate change.

But as India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Bhutan set to work on a new 10-year management policy, three other major Himalayan nations will be conspicuously absent.

Organizers have downplayed the fact that Pakistan, China and Afghanistan are not attending the Climate Summit for a Living Himalayas, saying the talks Saturday in Bhutan's capital of Thimphu are focused on securing ecosystems, endangered species, forests and food and water sources for only the eastern part of the range.

The summit, to some extent, is the Himalayan answer to an urgent need for action amid the international community's inability to agree on limiting greenhouse gas emissions thought to cause global warming. Expectations are again low for a breakthrough at the next U.N. climate talks, beginning Nov. 28 in Durban, South Africa.

"Climate change is placing extraordinary pressure on the Eastern Himalayas ? its people, iconic landscapes and species are all being hit hard by changing weather patters," Bhutan's Agriculture Minister Pema Gyamtsho said in a statement. "The Eastern Himalayas is now in urgent need of a regional framework of cooperation that combines expertise from governments, NGOs and civil society. Himalayan nations must act now."

But the absence of three key players underscores the difficulty of reaching regional consensus on how best to protect the peaks, known as the "Water Towers of Asia," with snowmelts feeding into the continent's seven largest rivers.

Regional tensions have long prevented Himalayan cooperation, including basic research in the world's largest block of glaciers outside the polar regions, and accounting for 40 percent of the world's fresh water.

"The Himalayas present an opportunity where India and China, for example, could really work together to understand and preserve the glaciers, which are a very important ecosystem not just for the region, but for the global climate," said glaciologist Shakeel Romshoo, head of the geology department at the University of Kashmir.

A first step, scientists say, would be to establish a research framework for the region, where just a few dozen of the tens of thousands of glaciers have been studied.

"There is so much acrimony and mistrust, (the countries) are not able to think logically about what needs to be done," Romshoo said.

Many lower-altitude glaciers are melting faster, with thousands of new lakes appearing and threatening mountain villages and agricultural plateaus with catastrophic floods should they overflow. Weather patterns have changed, with some regions experiencing torrential monsoons and mudslides, and others suffering droughts. The flow of rivers carrying snow melt toward the seas is less predictable.

As populations grow, and economies need more water for agriculture and energy production, establishing and revising water treaties will become a key issue to the seven Himalayan-dependent nations as water is predicted to get more scarce.

But drafting such treaties, experts say, requires a better understanding of the glaciers themselves, how fast they are melting, and what exactly is causing it. Scientists are still unable to say how much of an impact rising world temperatures have versus other influences, including soot coming mainly from Indian and Chinese cities that colors the ice black.

Ramshoo's own study of the Indus glacier system, providing a lifeline downriver in the Pakistani plateaus, has been hobbled by India and Pakistan's rivalry. Ramshoo has access only to small ice caps on the Indian side. "We know they are melting, but we don't know what's happening on the Pakistan side" where reports indicate the larger glaciers at higher altitude are stable or growing, he said. For years, however, Romshoo has been unable even to get meteorological data from Pakistan.

Kashmir's Siachin Glacier, dubbed the world's highest battlefield with Indian and Pakistani troops facing off, remains a question mark for scientists. Despite several wars, the two countries have honored their 1960 Indus Water Treaty, but Pakistan recently has shown concern about its future allotment, twice bringing complaints about Indian hydropower dams to the World Bank for arbitration.

"There are issues, of course, there are areas to improve," Indian Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan said. "We are committed to cooperating with the Himalayan countries, but it will take time. On these issues, though, there is perhaps more understanding than on others."

China's neighbors, meanwhile, worry that Beijing's rapid program of damming major rivers flowing from the Tibetan plateau will trigger natural disasters, degrade fragile ecologies and divert vital water supplies. The worries might be lessened if China shared hydrological and other data, but China, along with Turkey, refuse to sign a key 1997 U.N. convention on transnational rivers.

Tiny Nepal, home to Mount Everest, is still recovering from a decade of civil war and the ensuing political instability.

___

Follow Katy Daigle on Twitter at http://twitter.com/katydaigle

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111118/ap_on_re_as/as_bhutan_climate_summit

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Sunday, November 20, 2011

Steve Wozniak Gets A Galaxy Nexus - Business Insider

Summary

Steve Wozniak, known as "WoZ," founded Apple Computer, Inc.--now called Apple--with Steve Jobs in 1976. Wozniak was personally responsible for developing the Apple I computer, and later, the Apple II, a computer that helped... More ?

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-wozniak-galaxy-nexus-2011-11

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The last time there was no NBA in Utah, college hoops was king

Like a 3 a.m. toothache, the misery of the NBA lockout continues.

The increasingly bitter labor fight threatens the 2011-12 season and leaves professional basketball fans from Madison Square Garden to Staples Center pondering life without Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Kevin Durant.

In Utah, it has been 33 years since there was no pro basketball ? a full season without a single game at the Salt Palace, the Delta Center or EnergySolutions Arena.

Back in 1978-79, the Utah Stars, who provided the state with its first taste of professional basketball and won an ABA championship while doing so, were long gone. The Jazz, limping along as a lame duck in New Orleans, were still months away from packing up and moving to Salt Lake City.

Clearly, it was a different time for basketball fans in a state with 1.4 million residents, about half the population of today.

In The Salt Lake Tribune, Key Airlines advertised a new non-stop flight to Boise, Safeway offered a half-gallon of ice cream for $1.19 and parents were informed they could buy their kids? Christmas foosball table for only $199.

Located on the edge of a downtown district being revitalized by the construction of the ZCMI Center, and later, Crossroads Mall, the Salt Palace did not house a pro basketball team. But Disco Night ? adults only, please ? was a popular event.

For movie-goers, the list of top attractions included Jaws 2, Grease, Heaven Can Wait and the unforgettable cinematic triumph, Going Coconuts.

Story continues below

On the football field, LaVell Edwards was well underway in building a powerhouse program at BYU, though the Cougars were still more of a regional than national power ? the big breakthrough win at Texas A&M was still a year away. And Utah was just beginning to crawl out from underneath the wreckage of the Tom Lovat years under second-year coach Wayne Howard.

Basketball?

In the post-Stars, pre-Jazz era the only option was the state?s colleges and, in ?78-79, fans flocked to the games.

?It really had been a fever with the Stars,? said veteran sportscaster Bill Marcroft, now retired. ?They left a taste that was unquenchable. The only way people had to quench it was by going to see the college games.?

BYU?s average crowd for home games exceeded 19,000 ? second in the country. Utah averaged over 12,000 fans to its games at the then-Special Events Center. The two Western Athletic Conference games between the rivals drew almost 39,000 fans.

?There was tremendous enthusiasm,? said ex-Cougar Fred Roberts. ?BYU people felt we had a chance to be good again, I think.?

Former Utah coach Jerry Pimm remembers students camping outside in freezing temperatures in order to secure tickets for the Utes? biggest games.

It happened at BYU, too.

Next Page ?

Source: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/jazz/52862974-87/byu-utah-basketball-ainge.html.csp

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Saturday, November 19, 2011

Oil near $102 after 36 percent rally in 6 weeks (AP)

SINGAPORE ? Oil prices fell slightly to near $102 a barrel Thursday in Asia, pausing a 36 percent rally during the last six weeks.

Benchmark crude for December delivery was down 39 cents at $102.20 a barrel at midday Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract rose $3.22 to settle at $102.59 in New York on Wednesday.

Brent crude for January delivery slumped 54 cents to $111.34 a barrel on the ICE Futures Exchange in London.

Oil has soared from $75 on Oct. 4 amid signs the U.S. economy is growing slowly ? rather than slipping into a recession as some analysts feared during the summer.

Oil prices jumped Wednesday after Canadian pipeline company Enbridge announced it would ship crude away from a key delivery point in Cushing, Oklahoma. The company bought a 50 percent stake in the Seaway pipeline from ConocoPhillips and plans to use it to transport oil from Cushing to refineries along the Gulf Coast, where much of it will be shipped overseas because of rising demand from Latin America.

The benchmark U.S. crude is West Texas Intermediate, or WTI.

"The belief that rising domestic production is flooding Cushing dictated the fate of WTI for most of the year," Barclays Capital said in a report. "This is where the reversal of Seaway has a huge totemic significance, in its ability to debottleneck Cushing."

J.P. Morgan raised its 2012 forecast for the average price of crude to $110 from $97.50.

In other Nymex trading, heating oil fell 0.9 cent to $3.13 per gallon and gasoline futures slid 2.6 cents to $2.61 per gallon. Natural gas gained 0.2 cent at $3.35 per 1,000 cubic feet.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111117/ap_on_bi_ge/oil_prices

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Friday, November 18, 2011

Clinton warns against intimidation in South China Sea (Reuters)

MANILA (Reuters) ? U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday urged claimants to the South China Sea not to resort to intimidation to push their cause in the potentially oil-rich waters, an indirect reference to China ahead of a regional leaders' summit.

Clinton reiterated that the United States wanted a candid discussion of the maritime dispute, which an Australian think tank warned earlier this year could lead to war, when the leaders gather in Bali, Indonesia, this week.

However, China says it does not want the issue discussed, putting it at loggerheads with the United States once again after they exchanged barbs over trade and currency at last week's meeting of Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation forum in Hawaii.

"The United States does not take a position on any territorial claim, because any nation with a claim has a right to assert it," Clinton said in Manila, while marking the 60th anniversary of the U.S.-Philippine Mutual Defense Treaty.

"But they do not have a right to pursue it through intimidation or coercion. They should be following international law, the rule of law, the U.N. Convention on Law of the Sea."

She said disputes in the sea lanes should be resolved through the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which defined rules on how countries can use the world's oceans and their resources.

That could embolden Southeast Asia's hand against China, which has said it would not submit to international arbitration over competing claims to the area, believed to be rich in natural resources and a major shipping lane.

China says it has historical sovereignty over the South China Sea and so supersedes claims of other countries, including the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.

"Introducing a contentious subject into the meeting would only affect the atmosphere of cooperation and mutual trust, damaging the hard-won setting of healthy development in the region," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin said on Wednesday. "That's is beyond any doubt."

Beijing bristles at what it calls U.S. interference and has blamed the maritime tensions on U.S. trouble making.

Estimates of proven and undiscovered oil reserves in the South China Sea range from 28 billion barrels of oil to as high as 213 billion barrels, U.S. figures showed in 2008. Gas deposits could be as high as 3.8 trillion cubic meters, the U.S. Geological Survey has estimated. Both would supply China with energy supplies for decades if proven.

China's resource needs and its risk-taking behavior over staking its claim in the increasingly crowded sea lanes of the maritime region raise the possibility of armed conflict that could draw in the United States and other powers, the Lowy Institute said in a report in June.

Tensions flared again earlier this year with concerns raised over China's enforcement of its claim in areas also claimed by Vietnam and the Philippines, including the cutting of cables on survey ships, threats to ram some vessels and breaches of airspace by military aircraft.

UNITY

On Tuesday, the Philippines criticized its South East Asian neighbors for failing to take a united stand against China.

"ASEAN is now at a critical junction of playing a positive and meaningful role to contribute in the peaceful resolution of the disputes in the South China Sea," said Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario.

Manila wants ASEAN to be able to help resolve sensitive issues without letting them affect bilateral or multilateral relations, he said.

Smaller Southeast Asian claimants view a U.S. presence and a multilateral approach to negotiations as strengthening their stance against China's all-encompassing claim on the sea.

ASEAN and China approved guidelines this year to make a code of conduct agreement signed in 2002 more concrete as they sought to cool tensions.

Indonesia's foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, suggested claimants to the maritime region should pursue the code of conduct negotiations while apparently chiding China and the United States.

"ASEAN now has a clear scenario and approach. So ASEAN countries will not let the Southeast Asia region become a competition arena for countries who consider themselves as big powers, whoever or whenever they maybe," he told a press briefing.

"We have an interest to make a clear code of conduct (for the South China Sea) so that concerns from non-Southeast Asian countries can be reflected based on the interest of ASEAN countries' national interest," he said.

It was important for ASEAN to promote a break from "a self-fulfilling vicious circle of action and counter-reaction," he added.

Washington says its interest in the rift is to make sure a shipping lane that carries some $5 trillion in international trade a year is kept open and can be freely navigated.

"President Obama will reaffirm our national interest in the maintenance of peace and security in the region and internationally," Clinton said.

She said that included freedom of navigation, the rule of law and unimpeded lawful commerce, with the United States seeing UNCLOS as the overriding framework for territorial disputes.

(Additional reporting by Chris Buckley in Beijing and Olivia Rondonuwu and Yoko Nishikawa in Nusa Dua, Indonesia; Writing by John Mair and Neil Fullick; Editing by Jason Szep and Ron Popeski)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111116/pl_nm/us_philippines_clinton

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Stocks tumble late to end sharply lower

By msnbc.com news services

U.S. stocks are set to fall Thursday after a late sell-off in the prior session as investors kept a close eye on rising yields of debt in Europe.

Spain and France struggled with government bond auctions, throwing into sharp relief the threat of larger euro zone economies succumbing to the debt crisis that began in Greece and is already lapping at Italy?s shores.

Spanish bond yields hit 6.98 percent Thursday, their highest level since 1997, at a 10-year auction. A French bond auction also saw high yields.

The 7 percent mark is viewed by investors as unsustainable, with both Greece and Portugal forced to seek bailouts at similar levels, as Spain was pulled deeper into the euro zone debt crisis ahead of a parliamentary election on Sunday.

European shares fell, as the rising euro zone sovereign bond yields heightened worries that the currency bloc?s crisis would spread further and that the region is headed for recession.

Asian shares also wobbled as doubts deepened about Europe?s ability to stop the crisis from spinning out of control, with Germany and France split over the European Central Bank's bond buying role.

U.S. stock losses accelerated in the latter part of trading Wednesday after rating agency Fitch said while the outlook on the U.S. banking industry is stable, it could worsen if the euro zone crisis is not resolved quickly.

Investors have recently been forced to weigh the threat of a deepening crisis against U.S. economic data that has been better than expected.

Investors will have some significant economic data to digest Thursday, including weekly jobless claims data and a report on housing starts and permits for October from the Commerce Department.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Source: http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/17/8855732-stocks-set-to-pull-back-amid-european-debt-fears

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Thursday, November 17, 2011

How Ideas Emerge from Society

Image: Illustration by Nick Higgins

Where do great ideas come from?and how do we recognize their significance when they appear?

Danny Hillis, Applied Minds co-founder and a Scientific American adviser, and I were discussing these questions recently as we prepared for a talk in late October at the Compass Summit (compass-summit.com). ?Ideas are a product of society,? an emergent phenomenon, Hillis told me, ?which are almost inevitable.? That?s why, he said, our admiration for individuals who have come up with such ideas is ?almost giving too much credit.? The idea itself is not enough. A lot of people in a society will have a given notion, he explained. Maybe only 1,000 will try to sketch it out. ?Then 100 will try to make something, and 10 of those might actually make something practical. One or two of those might be on the level of an Edison or Tesla.?

In many ways, Hillis and I share a mission of identifying those ideas that just might work. His company, of course, is involved in developing them. As for the magazine and our Web site?s role? ?The interesting thing about Scientific American is it lets you understand those ideas,? he added.

We have both watched with interest recent sweeping trends in the idea machine: how interdisciplinary research is a growing area of focus and the rising force of ?big data? and increasing computing power. Those topics would be part of our on-stage Compass Summit conversation, and they also underpin this issue?s special look at innovation, the third annual ?World Changing Ideas.? The section features 10 out-of-the-lab concepts with the possibility to scale in a practical way.

I?m particularly taken by ?The Machine That Would Predict the Future,? by David Weinberger.. The story covers the work of Dirk Helbing, a physicist and chair of sociology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich. Helbing has proposed a large-scale computing program that would attempt to model global-scale systems and so ?would effectively serve as the world?s crystal ball.?

Perhaps you, like me, will feel forcefully reminded of Isaac Asimov?s Hari Seldon, the ?psychohistorian? whose pattern-predicting math drove the famous Foundation science-fiction series. Asimov, a long-time Scientific American subscriber himself, read the magazine to keep up with science. Increasingly, it feels as if the reverse is also true.

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=8e2d325a08ece8a625035bdf0beca05e

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Wednesday, November 16, 2011

The top 10 songs and albums on the iTunes Store (AP)

iTunes' Official Music Charts for the week ending Nov. 14, 2011:

Top Songs:

1. "We Found Love (feat. Calvin Harris)," Rihanna

2. "Sexy and I Know It," LMFAO

3. "If This Was a Movie," Taylor Swift

4. "Without You (feat. Usher)", David Guetta

5. "Ours," Taylor Swift

6. "Someone Like You," ADELE

7. "Good Feeling," Flo Rida

8. "It Will Rain," Bruno Mars

9. "Moves Like Jagger (Studio Recording from "The Voice" Performance) (feat. Christina Aguilera) , Maroon 5

10. "Pumped Up Kicks," Foster the People

___

Top Albums:

1. "Blue Slide Park," Mac Miller

2. "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, Pt. 1 (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)," Various Artists

3. "Mylo Xyloto," Coldplay

4. "21," ADELE

5. "Ceremonials," Florence + The Machine

6. "Take Care," Drake

7. "Christmas," Michael Buble

8. "The Lost Children," Disturbed

9. "Formula, Vol. 1," Romeo Santos

10. "NOW That's What I Call Music, Vol. 40," Various Artists

___

(copyright) 2011 Apple, Inc.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/digitalmusic/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111115/ap_on_en_mu/us_itunes_music_top10

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Dollar up vs euro as European borrowing costs rise (AP)

NEW YORK ? The dollar rose against the euro Tuesday for the second day in a row as borrowing costs in Italy, Spain and France jumped, stoking fears that Europe's debt crisis may spread to other countries.

Higher borrowing costs are a sign that investors are worried that those countries may have trouble paying their debts. The yield on Italy's 10-year bond jumped above 7 percent again Tuesday, a level widely seen as unsustainable.

Greece, Portugal and Ireland were forced to get financial lifelines after their borrowing rates rose above 7 percent. Unlike those countries, however, Italy is widely seen as too large to be bailed out by its European neighbors.

The yields on 10-year bonds for Spain and France also rose Tuesday, although both were still below 7 percent. The increase is raising fears that more countries may be sucked into Europe's debt crisis.

The euro fell to $1.3543 in late trading Tuesday from $1.3616 late Monday.

In other trading, the British pound fell to $1.5834 from $1.5898. The dollar rose to 0.9149 Swiss franc from 0.9076 Swiss franc and to 1.0200 Canadian dollar from 1.0174 Canadian dollar. It fell to 77.04 Japanese yen from 77.12 Japanese yen.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111115/ap_on_bi_ge/us_dollar

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Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Buffett: My plan to tax the rich (Politico)

Warren Buffett may have inspired President Barack Obama?s ?Buffett Rule,? but the billionaire says the president?s call to tax the wealthy at a higher rate isn?t exactly the same as his own tax proposal.

?I?d rather have some homerun that was hit in Yankee Stadium named after me, that would be the ?Buffet Homerun? or something of that sort,? Buffett joked about the Buffett Rule on CNBC Monday morning, adding, ?But the tax I?m talking about hasn?t really been named after me.?

Continue Reading

Buffett on 'Buffett rule'

Buffett explained that his plan would require everyone making $1 million and more to pay a minimum tax of 30 percent of their income, while those making more than $10 million should pay 35 percent of their earnings, which he agreed many people are already doing.

?Anybody that?s getting hundreds of thousands of capital gains or dividends, it would not change their rates at all,? Buffett said, explaining that his plan would nationally implement the idea of ?shared sacrifice? by making the country?s wealthiest people pay the minimum tax rate.

Buffett has been challenged by a number of parties, including the editorial board of The Wall Street Journal, to make his tax returns public. Last month, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway responded to the calls by saying he would do so if Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of News Corp., took the lead by also revealing his tax returns.

According to Fortune?s ?World?s Billionaires? list, as of March 2011, Buffett was the third-richest person in the world, with a net worth of about $50 billion, while Murdoch came in at 122th place, with an estimated net worth of $7.6 billion.

Buffett?s name has repeatedly crept into Obama?s tax plan rhetoric as the president sought support for his plan to hike taxes for the wealthy by pointing out that Buffett has said his secretary pays a higher percentage of her income in taxes than he does.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/politics/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/politico_rss/rss_politico_mostpop/http___www_politico_com_news_stories1111_68302_html/43597299/SIG=11mvfav57/*http%3A//www.politico.com/news/stories/1111/68302.html

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TCU upsets No. 5 Boise St 36-35

Boise State quarterback Kellen Moore reacts after losing to 36-35 to TCU in an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 12, 2011 in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Idaho Press-Tribune, Charlie Litchfield) MANDATORY CREDIT

Boise State quarterback Kellen Moore reacts after losing to 36-35 to TCU in an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 12, 2011 in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Idaho Press-Tribune, Charlie Litchfield) MANDATORY CREDIT

Boise State's Matt Miller (2) pulls down a touchdown reception against TCU's Trevone B oykin (2) during the first half of an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 12, 2011 in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Matt Cilley)

TCU's Skye Dawson (11) holds on to a reception against Boise State during the first half of an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 12, 2011 in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Matt Cilley)

(AP) ? Boise State's quest for perfection and BCS glory were dashed again by a missed field goal.

The fifth-ranked Broncos had a chance win a last-second thriller against TCU on Saturday, but freshman kicker Dan Goodale's 39-yard kick sailed wide right as time expired to give Horned Frogs a 36-35 victory.

TCU now has a clear path to the Mountain West Conference crown.

For the Broncos, losing this way may seem all too familiar. Last year, Boise State's unbeaten season and BCS hopes were spoiled when senior Kyle Brotzman missed from short range in regulation and overtime, enabling Nevada to walk away with a 34-31 overtime win.

Kellen Moore, who drove the Broncos into scoring range in the final 55 seconds, deflected any postgame parallels to the last season's misery in Nevada, arguing instead that losses in big games rarely come down to one player or a single player.

"We missed opportunities. I don't think it's just one play, it's a variety of plays," said Moore, who threw for 320 yards, two touchdowns but lost for the first time at home in his career. "It's a loss so it feels similar, but there's not great feelings."

The Broncos (8-1, 3-1) clearly had their chances to avoid any field goal dramatics in a back-and-forth battle between two perennial BCS busting teams.

Leading 35-28, Boise State got the ball at their own 32 with 5:37 remaining. Moore then engineered a methodical drive and got the Broncos in scoring position when a fumble by backup running back Drew Wright was recovered by TCU (8-2, 5-0) with 2:26 remaining.

Then Casey Pachall took over ? and that was bad news for Boise State.

The sophomore was 24 of 37 for a career-best 473 yards and five touchdown passes, including scores of 75, 74 and 69 yards in the first half.

Pachall calmly marched the Horned Frogs before firing a 25-yard TD pass to Brandon Carter, who leaped over a defender to make the grab in the end zone and pull TCU within 36-35 with 1:05 remaining.

TCU coach Gary Patterson made a gutsy call, opting to put the game in Pachall's hands and go for the lead instead of the tie. It worked. Pachall tossed a short pass to Josh Boyce, who fought his way into the end zone, putting TCU up 36-35 and quieting a raucous Bronco Stadium crowd.

Patterson said the decision to go for two points was easy considering the circumstances.

"We're not going to win this if this keeps going," Patterson said. "So, the only way we're going to be able to do it is to steal it. We were able to get the play and get the points and we were fortunate that they missed a field goal. It's just as simple as that."

The Horned Frogs rolled up 506 total yards, carving up a Boise State secondary riddled with injuries and forced to use backups at the corners.

"It really brings a relief because we've been fighting hard all year, especially in the fourth quarter," Pachall said. "Now that we actually pulled one off, it's a lot of relief. It gives us a lot of motivation and confidence."

It also gives the Horned Frogs the inside track on the league championship in their final year in the Mountain West. TCU wraps up with home games against Colorado State and UNLV; while Boise State has games remaining against San Diego State, Wyoming and New Mexico.

The TCU victory also gives then 22 straight wins against conference foes and sets a new MWC record of 12 straight conference road wins.

For the Broncos, the loss snaps their 35-game home winning streak, which had been the nation's longest. But it also forces Boise State to recalibrate their postseason plans again. No longer a contender for the big money, BCS bowls, the Broncos now look to lesser bowls like the Poinsettia Bowl and Las Vegas Bowl.

"We'll see what these guys are made of," Boise State coach Chris Petersen said. "This is real-life football. You don't win all your games all the time ? as much as we've done that around here."

In the first regular-season meeting between Boise State and TCU, Boise State jumped out first when Moore fired a 22-yard TD pass to Matt Miller.

Pachall responded on the next possession, finding Josh Boyce wide open for a 74-yard pass down the left sideline. Boyce caught five passes for 163 yards and three touchdowns. Pachall found him again in the second quarter for a 69-yard touchdown pass.

TCU kicker Ross Evans missed the extra point attempt, but TCU held a 20-14 lead at the half, the first time Boise State had trailed at the half all season.

Boise State came out strong in the second half, forcing a TCU fumble on the first play. Defensive end Tyrone Crawford picked up the bouncing ball and ran 32 yards for a touchdown. The extra point gave the Broncos a 21-20 lead.

After stopping TCU on their next possession, Moore engineered a 67-yard, 10-pay scoring drive capped by D.J Harper's 3-yard TD run to put Boise state up 28-20.

TCU pulled closed the gap on their next possession when Pachall tossed a 2-yard touchdown pass to Boyce. Pachall followed that by scampering around the right end into the end zone to convert on a 2-point play.

"You saw two really good quarterbacks out there," Patterson said. "I told (Pachall) at the beginning of the week that games like this is how legends are made."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2011-11-12-T25-TCU-Boise%20St/id-3fc452349add431a8abfe07d8c9633e1

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Monday, November 14, 2011

Ex-PM Golding will not seek seat in Jamaica (AP)

KINGSTON, Jamaica ? Jamaica's former prime minister will not seek another term in Parliament representing the patchwork of impoverished neighborhoods in West Kingston.

Officials in the governing Jamaica Labor Party confirmed Sunday that Bruce Golding will not run for re-election. Delegates have picked Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie as his replacement in the gritty district.

Golding shocked many Jamaicans when he announced in late September that he was giving up his post as head of the party and prime minister. He had been Jamaica's prime minister since 2007.

Labor Party lawmakers unanimously chose 39-year-old lawmaker Andrew Holness as their party's leader, and he automatically became prime minister. He was sworn in last month.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/latam/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111114/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/cb_jamaica_politics

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