Catch up with Michelle Kwan and the all-star figure skaters who attended her Jan. 19 dream wedding
Credit: Caitlin Maloney
Updated: Friday Jan 25, 2013 | 05:00 PM EST
By: NANCY MATTIA AND CYNTHIA WANG
New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.
Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.
There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.
___
CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/
Video posted online appears to show fans of Cairo’s Al Ahly soccer team celebrating a court verdict.
It was one of the world’s deadliest episodes of soccer violence — a clash between fans of the Egyptian team Al Masry, of Port Said, and players and fans from Al Ahly, of Cairo, a year ago that killed 74 and wounded over 1,000.
On Saturday, a court in Cairo handed down death sentences for 21 of those involved in the riots. The violence that the verdict prompted, involving hard-core “ultra” supporters of both teams, killed at least 28 and wounded at least 300, my colleagues David Kirkpatrick and Mayy El Sheikh reported.
Pictures and video from Port Said and Cairo were markedly different. In Cairo, as the video at the top of this post shows, there were widespread celebrations. In Port Said, a city of about 600,000.
Rioters looted and burned a police barracks and set fire to a police station. They attacked members of the news media, damaging television cameras that sought to film the violence and ending their broadcasts. They closed off all roads into Port Said as well as the railroad station, and the Ministry of Electricity and Energy said rioters had attacked a power facility as well.
Video posted online appears to show protesters in Port Said.
In Cairo, Mr. Kirkpatrick and Ms. El Sheikh reported, the families of those killed in the clash last year “held pictures of the victims in the air. Some danced and chanted. A few fainted. And the Cairo ultras celebrated for hours outside their team’s headquarters.”
Video posted online appears to show celebrations in Cairo.
Tara Todras-Whitehill, a photographer in Cairo, posted further pictures of the celebrations on her Twitter account.
Ultras chanting ‘Min of Interior it’s ur turn next’ and calling for execution of Tantawi. Can’t win in #Egypt #PortSaid http://t.co/Up8vK9hv
— T Todras-Whitehill (@taratw) 26 Jan 13
Ultras celebrate in their Zamalek stadium the verdict of 21 in #PortSaid massacre. #Egypt #Cairo http://t.co/bR5BtvHB
— T Todras-Whitehill (@taratw) 26 Jan 13
It was not immediately clear where the following picture also posted on Twitter, by Tom Gara of The Wall Street Journal, came from. But it apparently shows a man playing an accordion in the midst of one riot.
The craziest photo to come out of Egypt for a long time: http://t.co/PmVRM4K3
— Tom Gara (@tomgara) 26 Jan 13
(Reuters) – Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla, will host a fundraiser for New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie at their California home on February 13, the social networking site said on Thursday.
Zuckerberg and Christie, a potential presidential contender in 2016, have teamed up before, when the tech guru donated $ 100 million to the struggling public schools in Newark, New Jersey, in 2010.
“Mark and Priscilla … admire his leadership on education reform and other issues and look forward to continuing their important work together on behalf of Newark’s school children,” Facebook said in a statement.
The blunt-spoken Christie is seeking re-election in November to a second term as governor. He took office in 2010.
Right now, he doesn’t seem to need much help as his approval rating skyrocketed after Superstorm Sandy hit the state last October. A Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday found that three-quarters of New Jersey voters approved of Christie’s performance and nearly seven in 10 say he deserves to be re-elected.
New Jersey Democrats also have not rallied behind a single challenger. State Senate President Stephen Sweeney has said he is considering running, but the poll found that Christie would easily defeat Sweeney.
Christie would also trounce Barbara Buono – who has said she will run against the governor – and possible challenger Richard Codey, the poll found. Both are Democratic state senators.
(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic in San Francisco and Hilary Russ in New York; Editing by Eric Beech)
Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News
By Dahvi Shira
01/25/2013 at 08:20 PM EST
Liberty Ross
Michael Buckner/Wireimage
The Snow White and the Huntsman actress, 34, filed for divorce Friday from her director-husband Sanders, 41, in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Friday, PEOPLE confirms.
News of the filing comes about six months after Sanders's highly publicized cheating scandal with Huntsman's star, Kristen Stewart.
Stewart has since patched things up with boyfriend Robert Pattinson, who she was dating during the fling.
In the court documents, Ross seeks joint custody of the couple's two kids, 5 and 7, TMZ reports. She also asks for spousal support and attorney's fees.
Sanders, who has filed his response to the divorce petition, also seeks joint custody of the kids, and wants to share legal fees with Ross, according to TMZ.
New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.
Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.
There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.
___
CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks have been on a tear in January, moving major indexes within striking distance of all-time highs. The bearish case is a difficult one to make right now.
Earnings have exceeded expectations, the housing and labor markets have strengthened, lawmakers in Washington no longer seem to be the roadblock that they were for most of 2012, and money has returned to stock funds again.
The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> has gained 5.4 percent this year and closed above 1,500 - climbing to the spot where Wall Street strategists expected it to be by mid-year. The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> is 2.2 percent away from all-time highs reached in October 2007. The Dow ended Friday's session at 13,895.98, its highest close since October 31, 2007.
The S&P has risen for four straight weeks and eight consecutive sessions, the longest streak of days since 2004. On Friday, the benchmark S&P 500 ended at 1,502.96 - its first close above 1,500 in more than five years.
"Once we break above a resistance level at 1,510, we dramatically increase the probability that we break the highs of 2007," said Walter Zimmermann, technical analyst at United-ICAP, in Jersey City, New Jersey. "That may be the start of a rise that could take equities near 1,800 within the next few years."
The most recent Reuters poll of Wall Street strategists estimated the benchmark index would rise to 1,550 by year-end, a target that is 3.1 percent away from current levels. That would put the S&P 500 a stone's throw from the index's all-time intraday high of 1,576.09 reached on October 11, 2007.
The new year has brought a sharp increase in flows into U.S. equity mutual funds, and that has helped stocks rack up four straight weeks of gains, with strength in big- and small-caps alike.
That's not to say there aren't concerns. Economic growth has been steady, but not as strong as many had hoped. The household unemployment rate remains high at 7.8 percent. And more than 75 percent of the stocks in the S&P 500 are above their 26-week highs, suggesting the buying has come too far, too fast.
MUTUAL FUND INVESTORS COME BACK
All 10 S&P 500 industry sectors are higher in 2013, in part because of new money flowing into equity funds. Investors in U.S.-based funds committed $3.66 billion to stock mutual funds in the latest week, the third straight week of big gains for the funds, data from Thomson Reuters' Lipper service showed on Thursday.
Energy shares <.5sp10> lead the way with a gain of 6.6 percent, followed by industrials <.5sp20>, up 6.3 percent. Telecom <.5sp50>, a defensive play that underperforms in periods of growth, is the weakest sector - up 0.1 percent for the year.
More than 350 stocks hit new highs on Friday alone on the New York Stock Exchange. The Dow Jones Transportation Average <.djt> recently climbed to an all-time high, with stocks in this sector and other economic bellwethers posting strong gains almost daily.
"If you peel back the onion a little bit, you start to look at companies like Precision Castparts
The gains have run across asset sizes as well. The S&P small-cap index <.spcy> has jumped 6.7 percent and the S&P mid-cap index <.mid> has shot up 7.5 percent so far this year.
Exchange-traded funds have seen year-to-date inflows of $15.6 billion, with fairly even flows across the small-, mid- and large-cap categories, according to Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at the ConvergEx Group, in New York.
"Investors aren't really differentiating among asset sizes. They just want broad equity exposure," Colas said.
The market has shown resilience to weak news. On Thursday, the S&P 500 held steady despite a 12 percent slide in shares of Apple after the iPhone and iPad maker's results. The tech giant is heavily weighted in both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 <.ndx> and in the past, its drop has suffocated stocks' broader gains.
JOBS DATA MAY TEST THE RALLY
In the last few days, the ratio of stocks hitting new highs versus those hitting new lows on a daily basis has started to diminish - a potential sign that the rally is narrowing to fewer names - and could be running out of gas.
Investors have also cited sentiment surveys that indicate high levels of bullishness among newsletter writers, a contrarian indicator, and momentum indicators are starting to also suggest the rally has perhaps come too far.
The market's resilience could be tested next week with Friday's release of the January non-farm payrolls report. About 155,000 jobs are seen being added in the month and the unemployment rate is expected to hold steady at 7.8 percent.
"Staying over 1,500 sends up a flag of profit taking," said Jerry Harris, president of asset management at Sterne Agee, in Birmingham, Alabama. "Since recent jobless claims have made us optimistic on payrolls, if that doesn't come through, it will be a real risk to the rally."
A number of marquee names will report earnings next week, including bellwether companies such as Caterpillar Inc
On a historic basis, valuations remain relatively low - the S&P 500's current price-to-earnings ratio sits at 15.66, which is just a tad above the historic level of 15.
Worries about the U.S. stock market's recent strength do not mean the market is in a bubble. Investors clearly don't feel that way at the moment.
"We're seeing more interest in equities overall, and a lot of flows from bonds into stocks," said Paul Zemsky, who helps oversee $445 billion as the New York-based head of asset allocation at ING Investment Management. "We've been increasing our exposure to risky assets."
For the week, the Dow climbed 1.8 percent, the S&P 500 rose 1.1 percent and the Nasdaq advanced 0.5 percent.
(Reporting by Ryan Vlastelica; Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)
While using Twitter to narrate events in Tahrir Square on Friday, people in Egypt described tires burning in the street, protesters blocking traffic and hurling rocks, and police officers launching tear gas in an effort to break up crowds that had gathered to protest against the Muslim Brotherhood and the country’s new Islamist president.
Many of the actions described on Friday appeared to hew to a script that has become familiar over the past two years, but some in the crowds of protesters appeared to be using new tactics, dressing from head to toe in black, covering their faces with bandannas or kerchiefs and brandishing black flags as they skirmished with security forces.
“Asked one of them who they are they said we don’t talk to media but we are black bloc,” wrote the British-Egyptian journalist Sarah Carr, adding that a member of the group had “mentioned anarchism.”
Shubra march is full of young men wearing wrestling masks.
— أبو كار (@Sarahcarr) 25 Jan 13
Saw a winning ski mask and spectacles combination. We’re banned from photographing them.
— أبو كار (@Sarahcarr) 25 Jan 13
Asked one of them who they are they said we dont talk to media but we are black bloc. Mentioned anarchism.
— أبو كار (@Sarahcarr) 25 Jan 13
An article filed on Thursday by The Associated Press reported the presence of a “previously unknown group calling itself the black block.” The article continued, “Wearing black masks and waving black banners, it warned the Muslim Brotherhood of using its ‘military wing’ to put down protests.”
Although largely new in Cairo, the term “black bloc” has been used for years in the United States and Europe to describe a tactic commonly used by anarchists and anticapitalists during large-scale political demonstrations that occasionally devolve into street fights with the authorities.
Participants in the bloc typically dress in black to foster a sense of unity and to make it difficult for witnesses to differentiate between individuals. Members of the bloc often blend in with larger groups of protesters, then break away, linking arms as they rush down streets.
In the United States, at least, black bloc members usually eschew violence against people but have few compunctions about damaging property.
The tactic received attention during the 1999 protests in Seattle against the World Trade Organization, when youths dressed in black broke windows and spray-painted graffiti on buildings.
In St. Paul, during the 2008 Republican National Convention, black bloc members roamed through the city smashing bank windows and using hammers to batter a police car.
It is unclear whether there are any connections between American and Egyptian black bloc participants, but the site anarchistnews.org posted a message about occurrences in Cairo, quoting the blog Even If Your Voice Shakes.
Last night, anarchism left the graffitied walls, small conversations, and online forums of Egypt, and came to life in Cairo, declaring itself a new force in the ongoing social revolution sparked two years ago with multiple firebombings against Muslim Brotherhood offices. Later, the government shutdown the “Black Blocairo” and “Egyptian Black Bloc” Facebook pages, but they were soon re-launched.
The site went on to say that Egyptian anarchists had firebombed the Shura Council.
As my colleague Robert Mackey reports, an Egyptian journalist, Sarah El Sirgany, wrote on Twitter, “Vendors tell me it was the Black Block group that attempted to storm the Ikhwan Online building sparking the fight.”
Later, she added, “Now those who had continued the fight are heading to Tahrir, flag of Black Block flying high.”
Opinion on the black bloc in Egypt was not united. In a place where sexual assaults and gropings have become common, one Twitter user, Ghazala Irshad @ghazalairshad, seemed to sound an admiring note: “Egypt’s new Black Bloc (self-proclaimed anti-MB militia) has female members too — just saw one running wearing niqab & angle-length skirt.”
Egypt’s new Black Bloc (self-proclaimed anti-MB militia) has female members too–just saw one running wearing niqab & angle-length skirt.
— Ghazala Irshad (@ghazalairshad) 25 Jan 13
But the activist bloggers Gigi Ibrahim and Adel Abdel Ghafar were more skeptical.
This black bloc is just trouble even if they have good revolutionary intentions but it definitely will be used against the revolution
— Gigi Ibrahim (@Gsquare86) 25 Jan 13
Black Bloc: anarchist revolutionaries or 18 year olds who live with their moms & wear black masks thinking life is a video game ? #egypt
— Adel Abdel Ghafar (@dooolism) 25 Jan 13
This week a man named Ahmed Ibrahim, who has previously posted YouTube videos that appear to be from Egypt, posted a video titled “Black Bloc Egypt.”
Accompanied by driving music the video shows masked people marching while holding aloft black banners, a black flag with an anarchy symbol and an Egyptian flag.
Facebook has now clarified why it blocked Twitter’s new video-sharing app Vine, suggesting on its developer blog Friday afternoon that Facebook didn’t think much of Vine’s integration — or lack thereof — with the social network. Basically, Twitter’s pseudo GIF-maker thing connected with Facebook, but only so you could “find Friends” — presumably because Twitter wants people to use the app on Twitter. But for the privilege of its people, Facebook wants apps to give back to the network.
RELATED: Facebook Is Already Trying to Break Twitter’s New Toy
Without mentioning Twitter or Vine explicitly, Facebook’s Justin Osofsky explained in the blog post that some apps “are using Facebook to either replicate our functionality or bootstrap their growth in a way that creates little value for people on Facebook, such as not providing users an easy way to share back to Facebook.” How’s that for passive aggression?
RELATED: Uganda Threatens to Shut Down Social Networking
Osofsky points developers to a policy page updated today, which reflects that sentiment by stating:
Reciprocity and Replicating core functionality: (a) Reciprocity: Facebook Platform enables developers to build personalized, social experiences via the Graph API and related APIs. If you use any Facebook APIs to build personalized or social experiences, you must also enable people to easily share their experiences back with people on Facebook. (b) Replicating core functionality: You may not use Facebook Platform to promote, or to export user data to, a product or service that replicates a core Facebook product or service without our permission.
In short, if apps want access to Facebook’s massive user base of 1 billion-plus friends, they better bring people back to Facebook. And the war raged on.
Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News
American Idol
By Steve Helling
01/24/2013 at 10:00 PM EST
From left: Randy Jackson, Mariah Carey, Ryan Seacrest, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban
George Holz/FOX
That's not to say that things didn't get weird. Nicki Minaj nicknamed one contestant "Mushroom" and rubbed her fingers through his hair to bestow her "special powers" on him. (Whenever Minaj speaks, Mariah Carey simply stares off into space, as if she's just trying to find her happy place.) The Idol producers also began a baffling trend of splicing footage of squealing farm animals between the bad auditions.
But there were some bright spots: Burnell Taylor, a Hurricane Katrina survivor, made Carey cry with his capable rendition of "I'm Here" from the musical The Color Purple. "This is what we came for," said Minaj, who was apparently speaking about Taylor's voice, not Carey's tears. "While everyone else auditioned, you entertained us."
Hulking firefighter Dustin Watts wowed the judges with his version of Garth Brooks's "She's Every Woman." And yes, ladies, he's single. We know this because Minaj continued her practice of asking good-looking guys if they have a girlfriend. "You have a great style," Keith Urban told Watts. "You've got a confidence about you."
Tennessean Paul Jolley's family seemed shocked that he made it to Hollywood, which may have been overdone, considering that the 22-year-old singer has opened for country stars Chely Wright, Lorrie Morgan and Aaron Tippin. His pleasant version of "I Won't Let Go" by Rascal Flatts impressed the judges. "It was effortless," said Carey. "I know that people are going to love you."
Perhaps the most unique contestant of the night was Calvin Peters, a 27-year-old physician from Fort Worth, Texas. The third-year resident is known as "the singing doctor," and wowed the judges with his audition of Maxwell's "Whenever, Wherever, Whatever." Carey called him "handsome," which seems to be a trend this season.
Most of the night's successful women were lumped into a montage, except for Miss Baton Rouge Megan Miller, who impressed the judges while auditioning on crutches. Perhaps the lack of female character development is a reason why the show hasn't crowned a woman champ since Jordin Sparks won in 2007. Then again, the judges this season seem confident a female singer is going to win.
Before the episode could end without a drop of drama, Urban accidentally referred to Minaj as "Mariah." Both women shot him withering looks and commanded him to say more than 1000 Hail Marys.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Millions of smokers could be priced out of health insurance because of tobacco penalties in President Barack Obama's health care law, according to experts who are just now teasing out the potential impact of a little-noted provision in the massive legislation.
The Affordable Care Act — "Obamacare" to its detractors — allows health insurers to charge smokers buying individual policies up to 50 percent higher premiums starting next Jan. 1.
For a 55-year-old smoker, the penalty could reach nearly $4,250 a year. A 60-year-old could wind up paying nearly $5,100 on top of premiums.
Younger smokers could be charged lower penalties under rules proposed last fall by the Obama administration. But older smokers could face a heavy hit on their household budgets at a time in life when smoking-related illnesses tend to emerge.
Workers covered on the job would be able to avoid tobacco penalties by joining smoking cessation programs, because employer plans operate under different rules. But experts say that option is not guaranteed to smokers trying to purchase coverage individually.
Nearly one of every five U.S. adults smokes. That share is higher among lower-income people, who also are more likely to work in jobs that don't come with health insurance and would therefore depend on the new federal health care law. Smoking increases the risk of developing heart disease, lung problems and cancer, contributing to nearly 450,000 deaths a year.
Insurers won't be allowed to charge more under the overhaul for people who are overweight, or have a health condition like a bad back or a heart that skips beats — but they can charge more if a person smokes.
Starting next Jan. 1, the federal health care law will make it possible for people who can't get coverage now to buy private policies, providing tax credits to keep the premiums affordable. Although the law prohibits insurance companies from turning away the sick, the penalties for smokers could have the same effect in many cases, keeping out potentially costly patients.
"We don't want to create barriers for people to get health care coverage," said California state Assemblyman Richard Pan, who is working on a law in his state that would limit insurers' ability to charge smokers more. The federal law allows states to limit or change the smoking penalty.
"We want people who are smoking to get smoking cessation treatment," added Pan, a pediatrician who represents the Sacramento area.
Obama administration officials declined to be interviewed for this article, but a former consumer protection regulator for the government is raising questions.
"If you are an insurer and there is a group of smokers you don't want in your pool, the ones you really don't want are the ones who have been smoking for 20 or 30 years," said Karen Pollitz, an expert on individual health insurance markets with the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. "You would have the flexibility to discourage them."
Several provisions in the federal health care law work together to leave older smokers with a bleak set of financial options, said Pollitz, formerly deputy director of the Office of Consumer Support in the federal Health and Human Services Department.
First, the law allows insurers to charge older adults up to three times as much as their youngest customers.
Second, the law allows insurers to levy the full 50 percent penalty on older smokers while charging less to younger ones.
And finally, government tax credits that will be available to help pay premiums cannot be used to offset the cost of penalties for smokers.
Here's how the math would work:
Take a hypothetical 60-year-old smoker making $35,000 a year. Estimated premiums for coverage in the new private health insurance markets under Obama's law would total $10,172. That person would be eligible for a tax credit that brings the cost down to $3,325.
But the smoking penalty could add $5,086 to the cost. And since federal tax credits can't be used to offset the penalty, the smoker's total cost for health insurance would be $8,411, or 24 percent of income. That's considered unaffordable under the federal law. The numbers were estimated using the online Kaiser Health Reform Subsidy Calculator.
"The effect of the smoking (penalty) allowed under the law would be that lower-income smokers could not afford health insurance," said Richard Curtis, president of the Institute for Health Policy Solutions, a nonpartisan research group that called attention to the issue with a study about the potential impact in California.
In today's world, insurers can simply turn down a smoker. Under Obama's overhaul, would they actually charge the full 50 percent? After all, workplace anti-smoking programs that use penalties usually charge far less, maybe $75 or $100 a month.
Robert Laszewski, a consultant who previously worked in the insurance industry, says there's a good reason to charge the maximum.
"If you don't charge the 50 percent, your competitor is going to do it, and you are going to get a disproportionate share of the less-healthy older smokers," said Laszewski. "They are going to have to play defense."
___
Online:
Kaiser Health Reform Subsidy Calculator — http://healthreform.kff.org/subsidycalculator.aspx
TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares fell on Friday, hurt by a drop in regional technology stocks, although gains in Australia and Japan contained overall losses for equities.
The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> slipped 0.7 percent, led by a 1.7 percent slide in the technology sector <.miapjit00pus>. A sharp fall in tech-heavy markets such as South Korea and Taiwan contributed to the regional retreat.
Seoul shares <.ks11> tumbled 1.3 percent, weighed by weak profits for automakers, while tech shares continued to falter as Samsung Electronics announced cautious spending plans for the first time since the global financial crisis, following rival Apple Inc's below-estimate results announced earlier in the week.
Apple suppliers extended their declines from Thursday, including Taiwan's Largan Precision , while Samsung shares fell 2.8 percent.
A rise in copper and steady gold prices helped push commodity-reliant Australian shares <.axjo> up 0.4 percent to a fresh 21-month high, marking an eighth straight session of gains.
"The U.S. debt ceiling has been pushed out, Japan is stimulating their economy and Europe seems to have digested their debt crisis. There aren't a lot of negatives at the moment," said Lonsec senior client adviser Michael Heffernan in Melbourne.
Japan's Nikkei stock average <.n225> also outperformed its Asian peers with a 2 percent surge as the yen hit fresh lows versus the dollar and the euro on expectations Japan will pursue bold policies to beat deflation and stimulate growth. <.t/>
"Trading on Japan is gaining momentum among foreign investors, centering around the dollar/yen, which has dictated Nikkei's direction," said Tetsuro Ii, the chief executive of Commons Asset Management.
The yen's slide after its brief rebound this week bolstered sentiment for Japanese equities as it lifts earnings prospects for exporters, ahead of the quarterly earnings season set to start next week.
The dollar scaled its highest level since June 2010 to reach 90.695 yen early on Friday and the euro rose to 121.32, its highest since April 2011. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's new administration has made clear it wants a weaker yen, providing investors a reason to short the currency.
The yen has declined sharply since mid-November on expectations the new government will implement aggressive monetary easing and huge fiscal spending polices to end decades of deflation and return Japan to a sustainable growth path.
More than 80 percent of Japanese firms are in favor of Abe's policy mix, though most also feared Japan would face a debt crisis within a few years, according to a Reuters poll.
"JPY weakness should continue over the coming year driven by an expansion of the Bank of Japan's balance sheet relative to the European Central Bank and the Federal Reserve," said Kit Juckes, FX strategist at Societe Generale in a note. "I don't know how long the USD/JPY is going to pause at around 90, but a move to 100 still seems very likely in the longer run."
Solid data from the United States and Germany after similarly upbeat manufacturing figures from China lifted world equity and commodity markets.
The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> briefly topped the symbolic 500 mark for the first time since December 2007 while European shares hit their 2013 peak.
U.S. factory activity grew the most in nearly two years in January while a German business survey showed its private sector expanding at its fastest pace in a year this month.
U.S. crude eased 0.2 percent to $95.78 a barrel and Brent inched down 0.2 percent to $113.11.
London copper rose 0.2 percent to $8,109 a metric ton and spot gold steadied around $1,667.64 an ounce.
(Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
MANY think of India, born of a violent partition in 1947, as itself harboring two identities: a smartphone wielding, English-speaking, fast-growing democracy that prefers macchiatos to masala chai, and a predominantly lower-caste, mystically minded mass of peasants who spend their days herding buffalos and wading through water-clogged rice paddies.
Geographic and class divisions have come to the fore again following the notorious gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old physiotherapy student in New Delhi last month — a case that drew more attention to the status of women in India than any event in recent history.
The sight of thousands of women demanding justice led observers to point to the demonstrations as “a middle-class movement,” akin in style to the Arab Spring. Their power was demonstrated in 2011, when a hunger strike by the anticorruption activist Anna Hazare set off a wave of protests against graft.
Armed with diplomas and aspirations for upward mobility, a rapidly expanding consumer class is said to be driving political activism and, thanks to its media savviness, forcing the government to listen. The woman who was killed fit this narrative: an ambitious college student who had watched “Life of Pi” with a male friend on the night of the attack.
But where does this narrative leave rural women, who make up about 70 percent of India’s female population? There can be no genuine change without them.
After the rape, Mohan Rao Bhagwat, the head of the Hindu nationalist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, said: “Such crimes hardly take place in ‘Bharat,’ but occur frequently in ‘India.’ ” Bharat, the Hindi word for India, is, in this view, a rustic idyll where virtuous women keep their bodies covered, and thereby are safe and protected.
Of course, Mr. Bhagwat was swiftly ridiculed. Using the hashtag #Bharat, many posted tongue-in-cheek online comments. One wrote on Facebook: “Don’t live in India. Migrate to Bharat instead.” They noted the persistence of child marriages, domestic violence and sexual assault in what urban Indians still call “the hinterlands.”
With the record now corrected, attention returned to the capital and its middle-class protesters, whose adroit use of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram had captured the world’s imagination. The gulf separating the women of “Bharat” and “India” seemed all too real.
But urban Indian women owe a debt to their rural forebears. In the 1970s, Himalayan women led one of the country’s most successful grass-roots mobilizations, the Chipko movement. By hugging trees destined to become timber, the women protected their soil from erosion, as well as their supplies of water and firewood. They started what many consider India’s first ecological movement.
Rural women have taken the lead in contemporary battles too. Consider the Pink Gang, or Gulabi Gang, based in Bundelkhand, a remote area of central India that is often written off as “lawless” and “bandit plagued.” Founded by Sampat Devi Pal, who was married off around the age of 13, had her first child at 15 and is essentially illiterate, the Pink Gang — an all-women’s vigilante organization estimated to have around 20,000 members, named after their pink saris and batons — gained fame for beating up men who had abused their wives. The gang has fought corrupt politicians and crooked police officers as well. It also runs vocational centers that empower women.
The women of Khairlanji village, in the state of Maharashtra, are another example. In 2006, after a mob raped and killed a mother and daughter from a dalit (lower-caste) family, and also killed two males in their family, lower-caste women used handbills to organize mass protests that swept across the region. “It was an entirely new kind of protest organization,” said S. P. S. Yadav, the police commissioner in Nagpur, one of Maharashtra’s largest cities.
The fate of India’s women will rely on the uniting of rural and urban activism — and there are signs of hope that this is happening. Shuddhabrata Sengupta, an artist with the Raqs Media Collective who has covered the protest for Kafila.org, a political blog, told me the mass movement “cuts across age, experience and class in ways that I don’t think any other mobilization has in recent times.”
A leading activist, Kavita Krishnan, a leader of the All India Progressive Women’s Association, said: “I met many women who work as domestic help at the protests. There were local protests held in working class slums and localities all over Delhi. I know there were protests in far-flung parts of India.”
Previously, when Ms. Krishnan tried to raise awareness about divisive subjects, like the rape of lower-caste women by upper-caste men, “we did not get support,” she recalled. This has changed. “I think that it is rare that you get this moment where people’s ears are wide open and you get an audience that is thinking of the nature of rape. You can’t compare this moment with any previous moment.”
If rape happens in “Bharat” as well as “India,” then the solution will come only from the mobilization of the women of both “nations.” That would be a double blow to bigots like Mr. Bhagwat, who deny that unity is possible, and to the oppression of women across the subcontinent. If anything can unite Indian women across the divide, it is this moment.
“I think there is an element of discovering solidarity with strangers,” Mr. Sengupta says of the movement. “I think it has even taken protesters by surprise.”
2013 is a huge year for gamers. Nintendo (NTDOY) just launched the Wii U ahead of the holidays and both Sony (SNE) and Microsoft (MSFT) are expected to issue next-generation consoles before the year is through. We’ve seen plenty of rumors about both systems over the past few months, and the latest comes from Kotaku and focuses on Sony’s PlayStation 4.
[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 said to be overhyped, RIM’s comeback chances remain slim]
The site claims to have gotten its hands on documents describing Sony’s developer system given to premier partners so they can build games ahead of the next-generation console launch. The specs, if accurate, will obviously line up with the release version of the system. Included in the specs Kotaku is reporting are an AMD64 “Bulldozer” CPU with eight cores total, an AMD GPU, 8GB of system RAM, 2.2GB of video memory, a 160GB hard drive, a Blu-ray drive, four USB 3.0 ports and more.
[More from BGR: Apple: ‘Bent, not broken’]
Sony also reportedly has a redesigned controller in the works that will include a capacitive touch pad.
This article was originally published on BGR.com
Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News
American Idol
By Jamie Bufalino
01/23/2013 at 10:50 PM EST
From left: Randy Jackson, Mariah Carey, Ryan Seacrest, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban
Michael Becker/FOX.
Things got so heated that the production had to shut down for a bit, leaving a speedway full of aspiring singers sitting idle. The cause of the friction? Disagreements over the judges' varying styles of critique – particularly when it came to 20-year-old Summer Cunningham.
"Why are we picking her apart?" Minaj asked after Carey questioned whether the contestant's voice was best-suited for country music.
"Really? Is that what I did?" responded Carey. "We're trying to help her as opposed to just talk about her outfit."
That retort caused Minaj to throw a fit. "Oh, you're right. I'm sorry I can't help her. Maybe I should just get off the [BLEEP] panel," she said before walking off the set.
As Minaj left, Carey got in one more shot: Referring to Minaj storming off, she said, "I was going to do that the next time she ragged on me."
But the judging panel – including Keith Urban and Randy Jackson – also had plenty moments of togetherness in Charlotte. They gave unanimous thumbs up to Brian Rittenberry, 27 – a dad from Jasper, Ga., whose wife bounced back from battling cancer – for belting out "Let It Be" with a big booming voice.
They also swooned over 16-year-old Isabel Gonzalez, who Jackson plucked out of a high school class to audition for Idol as part of this season's new nomination segments. And they were all in agreement that 20-year-old Joel Nemoyer from Carlisle, Pa., should try a different line of work after he tried crooning a Michael Bublé song while lying flat on his back.
Even without the histrionics, Minaj proved to be the most entertaining of the judges. Between her ongoing habit of assigning nicknames to all the contestants – she dubbed singers everything from "collard greens" to "Jumanji" – Minaj also managed to ask hilariously bizarre questions ("Have you ever lived in Tokyo?") and put new and sometimes creepy twists on her positive critiques. "I want to skin you and wear you," she told one girl she was particularly fond of.
Even with the short interruption due to the judges' kerfuffle, the Idol gang managed to find 36 contestants to put through to Hollywood.
And they'll be back for more auditions in Baton Rouge, La., on Thursday.
Smoke like a man, die like a man.
U.S. women who smoke today have a much greater risk of dying from lung cancer than they did decades ago, partly because they are starting younger and smoking more — that is, they are lighting up like men, new research shows.
Women also have caught up with men in their risk of dying from smoking-related illnesses. Lung cancer risk leveled off in the 1980s for men but is still rising for women.
"It's a massive failure in prevention," said one study leader, Dr. Michael Thun of the American Cancer Society. And it's likely to repeat itself in places like China and Indonesia where smoking is growing, he said. About 1.3 billion people worldwide smoke.
The research is in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine. It is one of the most comprehensive looks ever at long-term trends in the effects of smoking and includes the first generation of U.S. women who started early in life and continued for decades, long enough for health effects to show up.
The U.S. has more than 35 million smokers — about 20 percent of men and 18 percent of women. The percentage of people who smoke is far lower than it used to be; rates peaked around 1960 in men and two decades later in women.
Researchers wanted to know if smoking is still as deadly as it was in the 1980s, given that cigarettes have changed (less tar), many smokers have quit, and treatments for many smoking-related diseases have improved.
They also wanted to know more about smoking and women. The famous surgeon general's report in 1964 said smoking could cause lung cancer in men, but evidence was lacking in women at the time since relatively few of them had smoked long enough.
One study, led by Dr. Prabhat Jha of the Center for Global Health Research in Toronto, looked at about 217,000 Americans in federal health surveys between 1997 and 2004.
A second study, led by Thun, tracked smoking-related deaths through three periods — 1959-65, 1982-88 and 2000-10 — using seven large population health surveys covering more than 2.2 million people.
Among the findings:
— The risk of dying of lung cancer was more than 25 times higher for female smokers in recent years than for women who never smoked. In the 1960s, it was only three times higher. One reason: After World War II, women started taking up the habit at a younger age and began smoking more.
—A person who never smoked was about twice as likely as a current smoker to live to age 80. For women, the chances of surviving that long were 70 percent for those who never smoked and 38 percent for smokers. In men, the numbers were 61 percent and 26 percent.
—Smokers in the U.S. are three times more likely to die between ages 25 and 79 than non-smokers are. About 60 percent of those deaths are attributable to smoking.
—Women are far less likely to quit smoking than men are. Among people 65 to 69, the ratio of former to current smokers is 4-to-1 for men and 2-to-1 for women.
—Smoking shaves more than 10 years off the average life span, but quitting at any age buys time. Quitting by age 40 avoids nearly all the excess risk of death from smoking. Men and women who quit when they were 25 to 34 years old gained 10 years; stopping at ages 35 to 44 gained 9 years; at ages 45 to 54, six years; at ages 55 to 64, four years.
—The risk of dying from other lung diseases such as emphysema and chronic bronchitis is rising in men and women, and the rise in men is a surprise because their lung cancer risk leveled off in 1980s.
Changes in cigarettes since the 1960s are a "plausible explanation" for the rise in non-cancer lung deaths, researchers write. Most smokers switched to cigarettes that were lower in tar and nicotine as measured by tests with machines, "but smokers inhaled more deeply to get the nicotine they were used to," Thun said. Deeper inhalation is consistent with the kind of lung damage seen in the illnesses that are rising, he said.
Scientists have made scant progress against lung cancer compared with other forms of the disease, and it remains the leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide. More than 160,000 people die of it in the U.S. each year.
The federal government, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the cancer society and several universities paid for the new studies. Thun testified against tobacco companies in class-action lawsuits challenging the supposed benefits of cigarettes with reduced tar and nicotine, but he donated his payment to the cancer society.
Smoking needs more attention as a health hazard, Dr. Steven A. Schroeder of the University of California, San Francisco, wrote in a commentary in the journal.
"More women die of lung cancer than of breast cancer. But there is no 'race for the cure' for lung cancer, no brown ribbon" or high-profile advocacy groups for lung cancer, he wrote.
Kathy DeJoseph, 62, of suburban Atlanta, finally quit smoking after 40 years — to qualify for lung cancer surgery last year.
"I tried everything that came along, I just never could do it," even while having chemotherapy, she said.
It's a powerful addiction, she said: "I still every day have to resist wanting to go buy a pack."
___
Online:
American Cancer Society: http://www.cancer.org
National Cancer Institute: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/tobacco/smoking and http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/lung
Medical journal: http://www.nejm.org
___
Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP
TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares edged higher on Thursday after manufacturing data from China confirmed a recovery in the world's second biggest economy was on track, easing nervousness caused by a sharp drop in Apple Inc shares after its earnings report.
China's HSBC flash purchasing managers' index (PMI) rose to 51.9 in January to a two-year high, signaling a rebound in manufacturing activity.
"China has shown signs of recovery recently and the global economic outlook has been improving to give a generally positive direction for markets," said Koichiro Kamei, managing director at financial research firm Market Strategy Institute.
The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> was up 0.1 percent after falling around 0.3 percent earlier, led by its technology sector <.miapjit00pus> which fell about 1 percent in earlier trade. It was recently down 0.5 percent.
Apple, the world's largest technology company, missed Wall Street's revenue forecast for the third straight quarter after iPhone sales came in below expectations, fanning fears that its dominance of the mobile industry was slipping, sending its shares down more than 10 percent in after-hours trading.
Apple's component suppliers such South Korea's LG Display fell, while Taiwan stocks <.twii> were also dragged by Hon Hai and other Apple suppliers.
Shanghai shares <.ssec> extended gains to a 1.5 percent rally from a 0.2 percent rise after the China PMI report. Australian shares <.axjo> built on earlier gains to rise 0.5 percent as the data from China, Australia's largest export market, buoyed sentiment.
South Korean shares <.ks11> nearly wiped earlier losses to trade down 0.1 percent, and the benchmark Nikkei average <.n225> also recouped earlier losses to rise 0.4 percent after falling to a three-week closing low on Tuesday. <.t/>
YEN BUYING HALTED
There was a pause in the two-day yen buying spree, which was driven by the Bank of Japan's latest policy easing steps on Tuesday failing to provide immediate stimulus as expected by some investors. The BOJ pledged to achieve a 2 percent inflation target and promised to start open-ended asset buying from 2014.
The dollar rose 0.4 percent to 88.91 yen while the euro also edged up 0.3 percent to 118.43 yen. The yen is still down 12 percent from its mid-November levels, when markets began pricing in strong monetary accommodation from the BOJ.
Many market players believe the yen's weakness will persist due to widespread expectations the BOJ will continue pursuing aggressive monetary easing policies to beat the country's stubborn deflation.
"The BOJ decision probably isn't a big deal in a sense that the new BOJ regime after (Governor Masaaki) Shirakawa is expected to do everything and anything available, so after profit taking, it's a good opportunity to re-enter the 'Abe trade' because it's all about expectations," said Shogo Fujita, chief Japanese bond strategist at Bank of America in Tokyo.
The "Abe trade" refers to investors betting on a weakening yen and rising Japanese equities on perception Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will pursue aggressive fiscal and monetary policies to pull Japan out of deflation and economic stagnation.
Data on Thursday confirming a deteriorating Japanese trade balance also encouraged yen selling, traders said. Japan logged a record annual trade deficit in 2012.
Earlier on Thursday, South Korea said its economy grew 0.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012 on a quarterly basis. But it fell short of around 0.8 percent growth that the Bank of Korea had projected as recently as in October, underscoring a delayed global recovery due to persistent uncertainties hobbling the major economies.
The International Monetary Fund said on Wednesday an unexpectedly stubborn euro zone recession and weakness in Japan will weigh on global economic growth this year before a rebound in 2014.
Asian economies will see weaker growth this year than was expected just three months ago, despite expected policy easing by central banks as inflation pressures taper off, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.
U.S. crude was up 0.2 percent at $95.45 a barrel while Brent fell 0.3 percent to $112.46.
London copper was down 0.1 percent at $8.095 a tonne and spot gold inched down 0.1 percent to $1,683.31 an ounce, slipping from a recent one-month high.
(Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
NEW DELHI — Women in India face systemic discrimination and are regularly confronted with sexual harassment and violence, even as the police often fail to provide protection and the government has failed to enforce laws and policies intended to safeguard women’s rights, according to a scathing special report released on Wednesday.
The government report, drafted in response to the deadly gang rape of a young woman last month in New Delhi, amounted to a broad and damning indictment of the treatment of women by India’s democratic institutions. It also was intended as a call to action: the three-person commission, led by a former chief justice of India’s Supreme Court, challenged Parliament to act swiftly on its recommendations.
“We have submitted the report in 29 days,” the retired chief justice, J.S. Verma, said during a nationally televised news conference, noting that the commissioners worked quickly in order to present their findings before Parliament next meets in February. “If we are able to do it in half the time available, the government, with its might and resources, should also act fast.”
The commission recommended a number of far-reaching changes. Among them were requiring police officers to register every case of reported rape; punishing crimes like stalking and voyeurism with prison terms; changing the humiliating medical examinations endured by rape victims; re-examining every appointed state police chief in the country; cracking down on extralegal village councils, known as khap panchayats, which often issue edicts against women; and making new legal requirements so it is much more difficult for people charged with criminal offenses to hold political office.
India does not lack adequate laws on sexual violence or gender bias, the commissioners found, but rather lacks the political and bureaucratic will to enforce them.
“Failure of good governance is the obvious root cause for the current unsafe environment eroding the rule of law, and not the want of needed legislation,” the report said.
India’s government has often proved immutable to calls for progressive reform. Over the years, different commissions have issued recommendations on a variety of subjects, only to see their reports gather dust. Indeed, even a major 2006 Supreme Court ruling calling for significant changes in policing remains largely stalled, with its recommendations far from being put in place.
But public outrage over the brutal Dec. 16 gang rape of a young woman on a private bus moving through New Delhi has remained fierce, prompting political leaders to promise swift action. The trial of the five adult defendants in the case is expected to begin as soon as Thursday in a new fast-track court. Moreover, many lawmakers have promised legislative changes to address shortcomings in policing and gender bias.
“Women must enjoy freedom,” said Leila Seth, herself a former Supreme Court justice and one of the commission’s three members, speaking at the news conference. “The state must practice equality.”
The commission, with Justice Verma as chairman, was created last month by India’s Home Ministry and charged with making recommendations to improve laws dealing with sexual violence. Justice Verma said that public interest was extremely high and that the commission received more than 80,000 suggestions. He praised the youthful protesters whose demonstrations over the rape case created mounting pressure on the government.
Rather than focusing on narrow changes in criminal law, the commission’s sweeping report goes beyond the issue of rape to assess widespread discrimination against women, societal biases against daughters, workplace sexual harassment, child sexual abuse, the trafficking of women and children and the deep-rooted problems with Indian policing.
In particular, the commission said that many states still needed to comply with the 2006 Supreme Court ruling, which, among other mandates, called for eliminating political influence over police departments, notably in the appointment of police chiefs. Moreover, the commission called on the police to prevent stalking and other harassment on public transportation and urged the construction of separate facilities inside police precincts for women and improved officer training for investigating sex crimes.
But, most of all, the commission urged what it called holistic changes, including nationwide education campaigns on gender equity and related issues.
Indeed, blame was not affixed solely on the Indian state. Justice Verma said the Dec. 16 rape case also exposed a shameful public apathy, noting that many motorists drove past the half-naked victim and her beaten male friend after the suspects had dumped them on the side of a busy highway.
“The nation has to account for the tears of millions of women,” the report concluded.
Research In Motion (RIMM) is gearing up for the impending release of its first BlackBerry 10 devices and the company has now released new mobile device management software to help its customers keep a handle on their shiny new BB10 phones and rival devices. The new BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10, now available for download, aims to be a one-size-fits all MDM platform that’s capable of managing BlackBerry, iOS and Android devices.
[More from BGR: Apple reports Q1 results: $ 13.1 billion profit beats estimates, iPhone sales and Q2 guidance miss big]
RIM says key features of the new service include the integration of BlackBerry Balance functionality to help keep work and personal applications and data separate; BlackBerry World for Work, a new iteration of the company’s traditional app store that gives companies the ability to more easily manage workers’ apps; and an “intuitive enterprise enrollment process for employees that offers a self-service console, and centralized control of assignable profiles for email, SCEP, Wi-Fi, VPN and proxy servers.”
[More from BGR: As data gets cheaper for Verizon to transmit, customers are paying more]
RIM is offering customers a free 60-day trial of the new MDM service.
This article was originally published on BGR.com
Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News
By Chuck Arnold
01/22/2013 at 08:40 PM EST
That's the question surrounding Beyoncé after reports surfaced that she didn't sing "The Star-Spangled Banner" live at yesterday's presidential inauguration.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Marine Band, which backed the pop diva at the ceremony, said Tuesday that Mrs. Jay-Z decided to use a previously recorded vocal track before delivering the national anthem, but later on another spokesperson, this one for the Pentagon, said there was no way of knowing whether the 16-time Grammy winner was guilty of lip-synching or not.
Should it matter? Let's remember that Whitney Houston, in what is widely considered one of the best renditions of "The Star-Spangled Banner" of all time, didn't sing it live either at the 1991 Super Bowl.
There are all sorts of technical reasons why it can be challenging to perform a song as difficult as this on such a large scale, and there are many extenuating circumstances that could have played a role in any decision to lip-synch. Certainly no one is questioning whether Beyoncé – who, in removing her earpiece midway through, may have been experiencing audio problems – has the chops to sing it.
Lip-synching – or at least singing over pre-recorded vocal tracks – has long been acceptable for dance-driven artists like Madonna, Janet Jackson and Britney Spears, whose emphasis on intense, intricate choreography makes it hard to execute the moves fans have come to expect while also singing live. Huffing and puffing into the microphone or barely projecting for the sake of keeping it real just isn't gonna cut it. Of course, there have been other instances – such as Ashlee Simpson's 2004 Saturday Night Live debacle – where faking it crossed the line.
Surely there wouldn't be the same controversy about Beyoncé had she been hoofing across the stage performing "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)" on one of her tour stops. But this was the presidential inauguration, the national anthem, and there was no choreography involved.
Some things have to remain sacred, and for "the land of the free and the home of the brave," this was one of them.
NEW YORK (AP) — Sniffling, groggy and afraid she had caught the flu, Diana Zavala dragged herself in to work anyway for a day she felt she couldn't afford to miss.
A school speech therapist who works as an independent contractor, she doesn't have paid sick days. So the mother of two reported to work and hoped for the best — and was aching, shivering and coughing by the end of the day. She stayed home the next day, then loaded up on medicine and returned to work.
"It's a balancing act" between physical health and financial well-being, she said.
An unusually early and vigorous flu season is drawing attention to a cause that has scored victories but also hit roadblocks in recent years: mandatory paid sick leave for a third of civilian workers — more than 40 million people — who don't have it.
Supporters and opponents are particularly watching New York City, where lawmakers are weighing a sick leave proposal amid a competitive mayoral race.
Pointing to a flu outbreak that the governor has called a public health emergency, dozens of doctors, nurses, lawmakers and activists — some in surgical masks — rallied Friday on the City Hall steps to call for passage of the measure, which has awaited a City Council vote for nearly three years. Two likely mayoral contenders have also pressed the point.
The flu spike is making people more aware of the argument for sick pay, said Ellen Bravo, executive director of Family Values at Work, which promotes paid sick time initiatives around the country. "There's people who say, 'OK, I get it — you don't want your server coughing on your food,'" she said.
Advocates have cast paid sick time as both a workforce issue akin to parental leave and "living wage" laws, and a public health priority.
But to some business owners, paid sick leave is an impractical and unfair burden for small operations. Critics also say the timing is bad, given the choppy economy and the hardships inflicted by Superstorm Sandy.
Michael Sinensky, an owner of seven bars and restaurants around the city, was against the sick time proposal before Sandy. And after the storm shut down four of his restaurants for days or weeks, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars that his insurers have yet to pay, "we're in survival mode."
"We're at the point, right now, where we cannot afford additional social initiatives," said Sinensky, whose roughly 500 employees switch shifts if they can't work, an arrangement that some restaurateurs say benefits workers because paid sick time wouldn't include tips.
Employees without sick days are more likely to go to work with a contagious illness, send an ill child to school or day care and use hospital emergency rooms for care, according to a 2010 survey by the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center. A 2011 study in the American Journal of Public Health estimated that a lack of sick time helped spread 5 million cases of flu-like illness during the 2009 swine flu outbreak.
To be sure, many employees entitled to sick time go to work ill anyway, out of dedication or at least a desire to project it. But the work-through-it ethic is shifting somewhat amid growing awareness about spreading sickness.
"Right now, where companies' incentives lie is butting right up against this concern over people coming into the workplace, infecting others and bringing productivity of a whole company down," said John A. Challenger, CEO of employer consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Paid sick day requirements are often popular in polls, but only four places have them: San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and the state of Connecticut. The specific provisions vary.
Milwaukee voters approved a sick time requirement in 2008, but the state Legislature passed a law blocking it. Philadelphia's mayor vetoed a sick leave measure in 2011; lawmakers have since instituted a sick time requirement for businesses with city contracts. Voters rejected a paid sick day measure in Denver in 2011.
In New York, City Councilwoman Gale Brewer's proposal would require up to five paid sick days a year at businesses with at least five employees. It wouldn't include independent contractors, such as Zavala, who supports the idea nonetheless.
The idea boasts such supporters as feminist Gloria Steinem and "Sex and the City" actress Cynthia Nixon, as well as a majority of City Council members and a coalition of unions, women's groups and public health advocates. But it also faces influential opponents, including business groups, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who has virtually complete control over what matters come to a vote.
Quinn, who is expected to run for mayor, said she considers paid sick leave a worthy goal but doesn't think it would be wise to implement it in a sluggish economy. Two of her likely opponents, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Comptroller John Liu, have reiterated calls for paid sick leave in light of the flu season.
While the debate plays out, Emilio Palaguachi is recovering from the flu and looking for a job. The father of four was abruptly fired without explanation earlier this month from his job at a deli after taking a day off to go to a doctor, he said. His former employer couldn't be reached by telephone.
"I needed work," Palaguachi said after Friday's City Hall rally, but "I needed to see the doctor because I'm sick."
___
Associated Press writer Susan Haigh in Hartford, Conn., contributed to this report.
___
Follow Jennifer Peltz at http://twitter.com/jennpeltz
TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares edged higher on Wednesday as investor appetite for riskier assets improved amid upbeat U.S. earnings and better German investor confidence.
The yen stabilized after firming as realization sank in that monetary easing announced on Tuesday by the Bank of Japan had fallen short of some market expectations, though many analysts acknowledged that the BOJ was showing determination to pull Japan out of years of deflation and economic stagnation.
Copper and gold were underpinned as the BOJ's move was seen supporting a global economic recovery while its 2 percent inflation target boosted bullion's appeal as a hedge against rising prices.
The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> was up 0.1 percent, hovering near Tuesday's 17-1/2-month high, after recent positive data from the United States and China improved investor sentiment.
Australian shares <.axjo> rose 0.3 percent, touching a 20-month high for a second day in a row as top miner BHP Billiton
Japan's benchmark Nikkei average <.n225> fell 0.8 percent as the firmer yen weighed on exporters. The yen has weakened by around 12 percent since mid-November against the dollar, and boosted Nikkei by more than 20 percent as a weaker yen improved exporters' earnings outlook. <.t/>
"Some investors have been waiting for the timing to take profits, as they have chased the market higher," said Hiroichi Nishi, assistant general manager at SMBC Nikko Securities.
The BOJ on Tuesday doubled its inflation target to 2 percent and adopted an open-ended commitment to buy assets starting 2014, sparking an unwinding of yen short positions from speculators looking for more immediate easing step.
The dollar steadied around 88.70 yen while the euro eased 0.1 percent to 118.11 yen. The dollar hit a 2-1/2-year high of 90.25 yen on Monday.
Technically, many believe the yen will resume its recent downtrend, seeing the latest rebound in the Japanese currency as a correction to its rapid and sharp decline.
Tuesday's pullback on dollar/yen has once again held slightly above the 23.6 percent of the rally from 81.69 to 90.25 yen seen on Monday, which comes in at 88.25 yen, some analysts note. They say the dollar's inability to break below minimum retracement levels since the rally from a December 4 low around 81.70 highlights the strength of the dollar/yen's upward move.
With BOJ joining the continued push by global central banks to support growth, Morgan Stanley said in a research note that policy easing by central banks was positive for emerging markets with more bond portfolio inflows increasingly towards local markets.
"Our key themes for 2013 are rebalancing and reflation, with both prevalent so far this year. Even given a migration towards global equities and away from fixed income, emerging market fixed income remains well-placed," it said.
On Tuesday, hopes of an improvement in the global economy led the Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> to a five-year high.
International Business Machines
Investors were also cheered by easing worries over the U.S. budget crisis and the euro zone's debt financing.
Republican leaders in the House of Representatives said they aim to pass on Wednesday a nearly four-month extension of the U.S. debt limit to May 19.
German ZEW investor sentiment rose to its highest level in more than 2-1/2 years in January while Spain has raised around 14 percent of its 2013 funding target.
U.S. crude was down 0.1 percent to $96.62 a barrel and Brent also eased 0.1 percent to $112.34.
Spot gold was at $1,692.66 an ounce, near Tuesday's one-month high of $1,695.76, while London copper traded down 0.3 percent at $8,107 a metric ton but clinging near a one-week high of $$8,144.50 hit on Tuesday.
(Additional reporting by Reuters FX analyst Krishna Kumar in Sydney, Miranda Maxwell in Melbourne and Ayai Tomisawa in Tokyo; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
NEW DELHI — Indian officials are advising residents of strife-torn Kashmir to prepare for a possible nuclear war by building bombproof basements and stockpiling food and water, adding to tensions between India and Pakistan, both nuclear powers, after deadly cross-border skirmishes in recent weeks.
“People should construct basements where the whole family can stay for a fortnight,” read the advisory, which was published Monday in the newspaper Greater Kashmir. It comes in the midst of the worst fighting in Kashmir between India and Pakistan since a cease-fire was signed in 2003. Three Pakistani and two Indian soldiers have been killed, and one of the Indian soldiers was found without his head.
News of the mutilation infuriated Indians, with Sushma Swaraj, the leader of the opposition in the lower house of Parliament, calling for India “to get at least 10 heads from their side” if the Pakistanis did not return the soldier’s head. After criticism that he was not doing enough, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India said he was reviewing ties with Pakistan. A special visa program between the two countries has been suspended, and Pakistani players in a new Indian field hockey league have been sent home.
Officials insisted that the advisory published Monday was unrelated to these developments. Yoginder Kaul, the inspector general of the Civil Defense and State Disaster Response Force, said the advisory was meant to commemorate the first anniversary of the creation of his unit.
“It has nothing to do with anything else,” Mr. Kaul said in a telephone interview. “It was a routine advisory issued on our raising day to create awareness among people.”
If so, it was remarkably ill timed. The advisory suggested that people build shelters in open spaces in front of their houses if they did not have basements because “some protection was better than no protection,” according to an article about the advisory in Greater Kashmir. Food and water should be restocked regularly, and ample candles and battery-operated lights should be included, it said.
If in the open during a nuclear attack, a person should “immediately drop to ground and remain in lying position,” the advisory said.
“Stay down after the initial shock wave, wait for the winds to die down and debris to stop falling. If blast wave does not arrive within five seconds of the flash, you were far enough from the ground zero.”
“Expect some initial disorientation,” the advisory added, “as the blast wave may blow down and carry away many prominent and familiar features.”
Abdul Qaiuum of Silikote, a village close to the dividing line on the Indian side, said in a telephone interview that neither he nor his neighbors were constructing new bunkers. “No firing is taking place,” he said. Besides, he added, “we are under two to three feet of snow in the village.”
Even after both governments embarked on efforts to improve ties after decades of war and recriminations, Kashmir remains a troubled region. India, heavily Hindu, controls the bulk of the predominantly Muslim region of Kashmir, which has been at the heart of disputes between the two nations since they won independence from Britain in 1947. The land along the cease-fire Line of Control is one of the most heavily militarized areas in the world.
The latest clashes started when an elderly woman on the Indian side decided to use a secret entrance into Pakistani territory so that she could see her children living on the other side, according to a report in The Hindu, an Indian newspaper. After the Indian military discovered the tunnel, it built emplacements to prevent its use.
But those emplacements violated the terms of the cease-fire with Pakistan, and Pakistani soldiers repeatedly warned their Indian counterparts to desist, which the Indians ignored.
Firing weapons across the cease-fire line is not unusual, but the beheading, which the Pakistan government denies responsibility for, added a volatile mix to the politically charged debate. Previous mutilations of soldiers’ bodies have generally been kept secret to avoid just the sort of news media firestorm that has erupted. National elections are scheduled to be held in Pakistan by May and in India by sometime in 2014.
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
México, 22 Ene. (Notimex).- Del 24 al 26 de enero en el Centro Nacional de las Artes (Cenart) se llevará a cabo el “Live Performers Meeting” (LPM), el evento más importante a nivel mundial dedicado a la manipulación y mezcla de video en tiempo real.
Mediante un comunicado de la oficina de prensa del Cenart, se informó que el encuentro incluirá otras actividades en el Centro Cultural Border y la Fundación Alumnos47.
El LPM ofrece la oportunidad de experimentar tres días de actuaciones audiovisuales, talleres, mesas redondas, muestra de productos presentados por cientos de VJs, artistas audiovisuales, profesionales de los nuevos medios y pensadores de todo el mundo.
El evento promueve la práctica de las actuaciones de video en directo, gracias a un programa rico e impredecible que busca explorar temas diferentes a través de nuevos lenguajes audiovisuales, técnicas y tecnologías.
Las atracciones principales de la edición mexicana serán una gran variedad de presentaciones audiovisuales en vivo, talleres, showcases y sesiones de Djs con Vjs, así como un concurso internacional de video jockeys.
El público interesado encontrará espectáculos que van desde el live cinema, videodanza, interacción en vivo, videoarte, mapping, instalaciones multimedia, programación, arte generativo, live coding, danza y teatro con visuales, entre otras.
El LPM empezó en Italia hace ocho años y ha reunido a más de dos mil artistas de todo el mundo en sus 11 ediciones pasadas. Más de 50 mil personas han asistido a sus actividades ya que ofrece una gran gama de talleres y showcases gratuitos para el público en general, así como algunos de paga.
En esta edición en la Ciudad de México, más de 200 artistas provenientes de Argentina, Bolivia, Brasil, Canadá, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, España, Estados Unidos, Francia, Italia, México, Perú, Turquía, Reino Unido, Rusia, Uruguay y Venezuela, participarán en casi 100 presentaciones y talleres.
Las presentaciones audiovisuales se realizarán del 24 al 26 de enero, en el Centro Nacional de las Artes. Éstas que van desde el video teatro a la video danza, actuaciones de live cinema, visuales y música generativa, live coding, hasta las fiestas finales animadas por DJs y VJs internacionales.
El Cenart, el Centro Cultural Border y la Fundación Alumnos47 albergarán en un horario de 10:00 a 18:00 horas talleres y presentaciones dedicados a aprender y compartir, basándose en el tema de la cultura de video en vivo.
Se explorarán las teorías de producción de contenidos y el procesamiento de imágenes, además de estudiar y experimentar con nuevas tecnologías así como desarrollar debates sobre la cultura de prácticas libres y Open Source.
NTX/LGZ/MAG
Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News
By Cynthia Wang
01/21/2013 at 07:00 PM EST
Michelle Kwan and Clay Pell
Courtesy of Caitlin Maloney
"I wore so many skating dresses designed by her, whole skating shows and everything," Kwan, 32, tells PEOPLE. "I have a long relationship with her."
And that made picking a wedding dress designer a fairly easy decision.
For Kwan's Rhode Island nuptials on Jan. 19 to Clay Pell, 31, Wang put plenty of consideration into her creation.
"She is marrying someone whose family has a political history, and Michelle is living and working in Washington, D.C.," the designer says. "[The dress] had to have a certain dignity and a certain classicism, and I think it was a lot about a new way of looking at tradition."
So Wang created an ivory, strapless mermaid gown for Kwan, made with layers of silk organza and featuring lace appliqué.
"The fact that it's got an inordinate amount of handwork in terms of lace is really a tribute to the art of hand-piecing lace," Wang says. "There is a princess-slash-queenly level of sophistication and quiet without sacrificing a lot of detail."
To complement the formal wedding gown, Kwan asked Wang what she thought of designing a second dress for the reception. "She said, 'Yeah, I got it,' " Kwan says. "She said, 'First dance, yes, and then you've got to change into something else.' "
Her history with the skater was not lost on Wang. "I'm really very honored and very thrilled that a, Michelle has found the love of her life and b, that I am the one to dress her for that special day just as I did for world championships, national championships, and Olympics," she said. "It's just the ongoing saga of our friendship."
For more on Kwan's wedding, including photos and details from the ceremony, pick up a copy of next week's PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday
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