Thursday, January 31, 2013

Dayton proposes $86M in spending to create jobs

by Tim Pugmire, Minnesota Public Radio

January 31, 2013


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ST. PAUL, Minn. ? Gov. Mark Dayton has proposed $86.5 million in state subsidies to business over the next two years, spending he contends would create thousands of new, well-paying jobs.

As part of his budget plan, Dayton predicts up to 10,000 new jobs will result from a $30 million boost for the Minnesota Investment Fund, which offers loans to businesses that relocate in Minnesota and helps existing businesses expand.

The governor's budget also includes an estimate of up to 5,000 jobs from a $25 million investment in the Minnesota Job Creation Fund, which would be a revised version of the program now known as JOBZ. The remaining $30 million would go to transportation and housing initiatives linked to business development.

But Republicans warn that the tax changes in governor's budget ? including his call to lower property taxes and a lower but expanded sales tax rate ? will lead to fewer jobs, not more.

The two parties are deeply divided over how government should help Minnesota businesses hire more people. When Republicans controlled the Minnesota House and Senate the past two years, they insisted the state could help create jobs by easing tax and regulatory burdens for businesses. Now that Democrats are in charge of both chambers, their leaders in the legislature are applauding Dayton for proposing to spend money on job-creating incentives.

State Rep. Tim Mahoney, chair of the House Jobs and Economic Development Finance and Policy Committee, said the approach is long overdue.

"We've starved job creation in this state for the last 12 years, while every one of our neighbors has poured money into it, hundreds of millions of dollars," said Mahoney, DFL-St. Paul. "Whether it's Iowa or Wisconsin or South Dakota, they've just been pouring money into it, and we've been doling out pennies, nickels and dimes."

"We've starved job creation in this state for the last 12 years, while every one of our neighbors has poured money into it, hundreds of millions of dollars."

- State Rep. Tim Mahoney

Mahoney's counterpart in the Senate, state Sen. David Tomassoni, DFL-Chisholm, said he thinks incentives can work, and he likes the governor's approach.

"He's sending a very clear signal that what's very, very important to the state of Minnesota is that we figure out from the government level how to invest in jobs and to put people back to work," Tomassoni said.

Dayton's proposed changes to the JOBZ program are more than a name change. Created by former Gov. Tim Pawlenty, a Republican, the JOBZ program offers tax incentives to businesses in communities outside of the Twin Cities metro area. The program, a frequent target of criticism from Democrats during Pawlenty's tenure and today, is set to expire in 2015.

Katie Clark Sieben, Dayton's commissioner of employment and economic development, said the new statewide program will provide grants to businesses once they have created jobs.

"We would specify up front what investment level the company is looking to make and how many jobs they're looking to create and write that into an agreement," she said. "Once the company meets those goals, then they would be eligible for an award up to $1 million. But it's only after those job creation goals are met."

Seiben said she is confident in the job-creation estimates. Republicans, however, aren't so sure. That's because GOP lawmakers contend that tax changes in the governor's budget could force some businesses to reduce their workforces or perhaps move operations to a neighboring state.

State Rep. Tim Sanders, R-Blaine, said he is especially concerned about an income tax increase on top earners and expanding the sales tax to business-to-business services.

"He may be trying to buy some jobs," Sanders said of the governor, "but when the business community is given the signal that their costs are going to go up and go up in a big way, it's difficult for me to see how the business community in general will rally behind that idea."

Sanders also said he found it interesting that Dayton is now proposing a $1.5 million initiative to expand the Minnesota Trade Office, when as a 2010 gubernatorial candidate, he often called for its elimination. Dayton told reporters this week that businesses have convinced him of its value. "I hope I'm learning a little bit here and there as I go along this process," Dayton said. "Situations change. Times change and this would be one of those."

House Democrats are proposing an even larger funding boost for the trade office. One of the first bills they introduced this session called for a $5 million allocation to increase export opportunities.

Tim Pugmire

Tim Pugmire covers politics and state government for Minnesota Public Radio.

Source: http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2013/01/31/politics/dayton-subsidies-job-creation?refid=0

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Flee 'safe' sovereign debt, says Hasenstab

The New York Stock Exchange is pictured after the Fed announced they will keep interest rates near zero on Thursday.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

  • Franklin Templeton asset manager Michael Hasenstab: get out of government debt now
  • Hasenstab: rising interest rates mean losses for holders of long-dated debt
  • Hasenstab: if not for Fed's bond-buying program, U.S. Treasury yields would be much higher

(Financial Times) -- The man who made some of the boldest contrarian bets in the bond market last year has a new message for investors: get out of supposedly safe government debt now, before it is too late.

"The downside of being early is very limited. You're not participating in any 11th-hour rallies, but it's not like you're losing money," says Michael Hasenstab, who oversees $175bn in bonds for Franklin Templeton, the Californian asset manager.

Rising interest rates mean losses for holders of long-dated debt, and he says that if it were not for the Federal Reserve's bond-buying programme, US Treasury yields would be "higher, meaningfully higher".

"The worst has happened and we haven't fallen into a deflation trap. As things either stabilise or get a little bit better, it's hard to imagine deflation coming out of nowhere." Without that, he says, "US 10-year yields below 2 per cent just don't seem consistent with the US economy."

Mr Hasenstab is anything but a bleating Cassandra. The softly spoken 39-year-old has the air of an academic, while he has built a remarkable investment record through a combination of patient optimism and almost preposterous confidence. Last year funds controlled by Mr Hasenstab practically cornered the market for Irish and Hungarian debt as part of aggressive bets that both countries would recover from the financial crisis.

On the risks to "safe" government debt, Mr Hasenstab is not forecasting when rates will rise. But he has adjusted the $66bn Templeton Global Bond Fund he manages in anticipation. For instance, in emerging markets such as South Korea he has been buying short-dated bonds paying 2.5 to 3 per cent, with the prospect of gains from currency movements over time.

"They have an interest rate advantage, so if we look out five years, the value of the Korean won relative to the value of the dollar will probably be higher because we're just flooding the world with dollars," he says.

So while the typical effective duration -- a measure of sensitivity to interest rates -- for global bond mutual funds run by peers is five or six years, his is less than two years.

Mr Hasenstab likens this to a previous bet on the Japanese yen, where Templeton was very early on its negative view of the currency. "It didn't work for years and then when it happens, it happens pretty big, pretty quickly. You can't come in after it starts happening."

Franklin recently became the largest private holder of Irish sovereign bonds with almost a tenth of the market, raising fears that prices would tumble as soon as he stopped buying. This month, however, Ireland sold ?2.5bn of five-year bonds paying 3.3 per cent, a sign of relative financial health. There was ?7bn worth of demand, with 90 per cent of the buyers coming from outside the US.

"This recent access to the market I think finally closed the door on a lot of the naysayers," says Mr Hasenstab.

Some investors are less sanguine. Myles Bradshaw, a portfolio manager at Pimco, says that Spanish bonds offer better value. "Getting the budget deficit down now depends on growth, but it's a small, open economy that needs global growth to pick up, and I can't really see that. So Ireland will need more austerity and I think that will be difficult to implement."

Mr Hasenstab says that his exposure to emerging markets means that he is already exposed to countries such as Spain and Italy, even if he does not own their bonds directly, due to the consequences of another crisis.

"If there's a tidal wave coming from a credit event in Italy, then it doesn't matter how great your thesis is on Malaysia, the ringgit's going to get blown up," he says.

But while Mr Hasenstab forecasts recession for Europe, he still thinks it will hold together, and is more upbeat about the global economy as the effects of quantitative easing by central banks in the developed world are exported to emerging markets.

Indeed, he remains patiently optimistic on one of the other great investment debates of the moment. "There's a lot of perma bears on China who believe that everything there is a Ponzi scheme and it's all artificial. I don't believe that."

He argues that overbuilding in China has helped the country avoid bottlenecks. "Brazil tops out at 4.5 per cent growth because they don't have the infrastructure, such as the roads, the rail systems necessary to grow faster without overheating.

"Were some developments, toll roads, or railroads built that shouldn't have been built? Sure, but I think that's not seeing the forest through the trees. Our sense is they will grow into that infrastructure over the next 10 years," he says.

That belief, he says, is a combination of the big macro themes, with the informed local knowledge behind such bets as Ireland, or Hungary when they are hated by the market. "Really, you can only do so much behind a Bloomberg screen."

? The Financial Times Limited 2013

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/30/business/us-hasenstab-government-bonds/index.html?eref=rss_latest

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Sprint48_Former Ill. Gov. Ryan to be released from prison

CHICAGO (AP) ? George Ryan on Wednesday will become the latest former Illinois governor to go through a prison door. This time, he's headed out.

Ryan is being released from a federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind., after serving five-plus years for corruption. He's expected to spend the first few weeks at a halfway house in Chicago and then return to his home in Kankakee, about 60 miles to the south.

Once reacclimated to life on the outside, Ryan will discover an Illinois that has grown less tolerant of the kind of wheeling and dealing that led to the imprisonment of him and his successor, Rod Blagojevich.

"Public trust really started to falter under Ryan, then it imploded and sunk under Blagojevich," said Cindi Canary, the former head of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.

Historically, Illinois governors haven't been especially adept at getting a message that there are consequences to violating the public trust. Of the state's last seven governors, four have ended up going to prison.

Since Ryan went to prison, the state has also changed because of his legal actions during his one term as governor: Following the Republican's lead, Illinois abolished the death penalty in 2011.

Behind bars, there have been personal tragedies too, including the death of his wife and brother.

Change for the 78-year-old has also included weight loss from walking prison grounds, said friend Rob Warden, who visited Ryan a few months ago.

"When I saw him, he was upbeat," said Warden, who is also the executive director of the Chicago-based Center on Wrongful Convictions. "He has reconciled himself to what happened to him." But Ryan, he added, also still maintains that the actions for which he was convicted in 2006 never crossed the line into criminality.

Jurors convicted Ryan on multiple charges, including racketeering and conspiracy. They agreed that, among other crimes, he had steered state business to insiders as secretary of state and then as governor in exchange for vacations and gifts. He began serving a 6 ?-year prison sentence in November 2007 and is being released early into a halfway house under a work-release program.

Thanks to his long-running legal saga, Ryan comes out of prison with no money, his attorneys have said. His state pension was yanked.

The most jarring change for Ryan is that his wife of 55 years, Lura Lynn, died in 2011. He was allowed to visit her in hospital but not to go to her funeral.

His own health has suffered. He's dealt with kidney disease and infected teeth.

It's unclear how Ryan might support himself. He became a celebrity among activists devoted to abolishing the death penalty and they say he could play a role as their national spokesman, possibly going on speaking tours across the country.

Ryan switched from the pro- to anti-death penalty camp in the early 2000s, clearing death row while he was governor.

"He's stepping into a changed world ? and it's a changed world partly because of the leadership he showed (opposing capital punishment)," said Diann Rust-Tierney, president of the Washington, D.C.-based National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.

Before he even endeavors to take on post-prison challenges or opportunities, Ryan will take in the pleasure of no longer being behind bars, said former Chicago city clerk Jim Laski, who was sentenced to two years in prison for corruption in 2006.

"You never see people enjoying life in prison," said Laski, who recalled the first days after his release. "Suddenly, you're seeing people walk down the street, kids coming out of school. ... It's like, 'Wow, I'm back in society again.'"

For at least a few weeks, Ryan will have to sleep at the halfway house, though he can wear his own clothes, use a cellphone and even drive. He will have to take classes on basic life skills, including how to write a check, said Scott Fawell, Ryan's former chief of staff who also served a sentence at Terre Haute on related charges and went to the same halfway house.

"It's all baby steps and this is a pretty big step where you haven't been able to leave the premises, and haven't had freedom in years," he said. "You get a lot of things that are pretty basic to most people."

Laski, who was at the same halfway house, said Ryan will spend a lot of time complying with rules, filling out forms and getting signatures from one authority after another. Laski called it all "boring and a waste of time."

Ryan's exit from prison doesn't mean there will no longer be a former Illinois governor behind bars.

Blagojevich, a Democrat, last year began serving his 14-year prison sentence on corruption charges, including allegations that he sought to sell President Barack Obama's vacated U.S. Senate seat.

As a direct result of Ryan's misdeeds, a number of ethical safeguards were shored up, including independently-confirmed inspectors generals for each constitutional officer, and a crackdown on political work on state time.

Overall, the mechanism for catching corrupt Illinois politicians has improved since Ryan, said David Morrison of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.

"Ryan and Blagojevich came of age in a culture that tolerated a fair amount of rule-bending," Morrison said. "Everyone has to know now that you can't bend the rules."

___

Follow Michael Tarm at www.twitter.com/mtarm

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/former-ill-gov-ryan-released-prison-081143263.html

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Acceptable approach when delivering cover letter, resume, etc. in ...

Acceptable approach when delivering cover letter, resume, etc. in person?

I'm applying for my first graphic design job outside of free-lancing. I plan on printing my resume on a thick card stock, but should I also do that with my cover letter? That would seem a little tacky handing two thick pieces of paper, so should I print the cover letter on normal paper and the resume on card stock?

Furthermore, what is the most accepted way to deliver this content? Stapling them would seem unprofessional. Paper clipping could be better, but I'm hoping the cover letter doesn't get lost with the resume. Beyond that, I don't know any other way.

I also have a business card I designed for contact convenience, but I'm not sure if I should attach that with the cover letter and resume. Perhaps it would be better to save the business card as a takeaway for an interview?

What do you all recommend?

Source: http://www.graphicdesignforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=83065

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Wednesday, January 30, 2013

20 believed dead in Kazakhstan plane crash

(AP) ? A passenger plane crashed Tuesday near Kazakhstan's principal city, Almaty, likely killing all 20 on board, Kazakhstan airline SCAT said.

Almaty and surrounding areas have been shrouded in fog for the last two days and the accident appears to have been caused by limited visibility.

A SCAT statement said 15 passengers and five crew members were aboard the plane.

Visibility was limited, forcing the plane to make a second approach to Almaty airport, the airline said.

The Emergency Services Ministry said rescue workers have been dispatched.

Details on the crash were sparse, including the kind of plane. SCAT's website shows it flies Boeing 757s and 737s along with the Yak-42 and the An-24.

Interfax news agency cited the Almaty province deputy governor Amandyk Batalov as identifying the aircraft as a Canadian-made Bombardier CRJ200.

The Emergency Services Ministry said the plane, which it said was flying in from the northern city of Kokshetau, disappeared from radar around 13:13 p.m. local time (0713 GMT).

This is the second major aircraft accident recently in Kazakhstan. In December, 27 people died when an An-72 military plane crashed near the southern city of Shymkent during violent snowstorms.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-01-29-Kazakhstan-Plane%20Crash/id-3f4f59ea389f497ba3efec5639970ec0

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Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Why You Should Work From a Coffee Shop, Even When You Have an Office

Why You Should Work From a Coffee Shop, Even When You Have an OfficeHere at Lifehacker, we've often encouraged switching up your working environment to spark creativity and prevent burnout. Even taking a few days each month to work in a new place can benefit you greatly. Here, entrepreneur Wesley Verhoeve explains the benefits of his favorite non-office space: the coffee shop.

While team Family Records was in between offices in early 2012, we had 6 weeks to bridge until our new space was ready. During that time we were fortunate enough to be taken in as guests by awesome companies for stretches of time, and for the remainder we took over corners of coffee shops all over Brooklyn and Manhattan. The experience of working out of coffee shops was so positive that even after we moved into our new home, I made sure to get in a few "coffee shop days" each month. For carpal tunnel related reasons alone, I would not recommend working out of coffee shops every day, but here are some reasons why it might be great to try it for one or two days every month.

A change of environment stimulates creativity. Even in the most awesome of offices we can fall into a routine, and a routine is the enemy of creativity. Changing your environment, even just for a day, brings new types of input and stimulation, which in turn stimulates creativity and inspiration.

Fewer distractions. It sounds counter-intuitive, but working from a bustling coffee shop can be less distracting than working from a quiet office. Being surrounded by awesome team and officemates means being interrupted for water cooler chats and work questions. Being interrupted kills productivity. The coffee shop environment combines the benefit of anonymity with the dull buzz of exciting activity. Unlike working at home, with the ever-present black hole of solitude and procrastination, a coffee shop provides the opportunity of human interaction, on your terms.

Community and meeting new people. Meeting new people always provides me with new ideas, a different perspective at existing problems, or an interesting connection to a new person doing something awesome that inspires me. Today alone I met a top Skillshare teacher whose class I will now take, a sleep consultant, a publicist who offered to help with a project, and a wine consultant who recommended some bars.

To make the best out of your coffee shop days, keep a few things in mind:

Rotate coffee shops. Rather than going to the same coffee shop every time, switch it up, and avoid the stifling feeling of routine you were trying to avoid in the first place.

Buy something. Don't be a cheapskate nursing that one coffee throughout the day. Buy some stuff throughout the day, and tip well. Coffee shop workers are awesome, and they'll be awesome to you if you are a good customer. That hidden power plug will be revealed, an extra free refill will be given, an introduction will be made.

Placement. Don't sit near the door or the register, if you can avoid it. Temperature differences and high traffic don't help you to focus.

Power up. Come with a full charge. I like to not bring a power cord, unlike most folks, because I get 6 hours out of my laptop battery, and it forces me to take a break and work with focus because I will run out eventually.

There you have it, a few reasons why I recommend taking a break from the office at least once a month, and some tips on how to get the most out of it. For those of you located in, or traveling to, the New York City area, I have put together a special Foursquare list with 15 of my favorite local coffee shops to work from. Let us know how it goes!

Why You Should Work From a Coffee Shop, Even When You Have an Office | Fast Company


Wesley Verhoeve is the founder of Family Records and GNTLMN.com. He writes about the intersection of music, tech, and innovation, as well as modern marketing, product strategy, and great customer experiences across different industries.

Image remixed from etraveler (Shutterstock).

Want to see your work on Lifehacker? Email Tessa.

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/DI5WjuG0kX4/why-you-should-work-from-a-coffee-shop-even-when-you-have-an-office

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Romani artist and Holocaust documenter Stojka dies

VIENNA (Reuters) - Romani artist Ceija Stojka, whose work helped expose the Nazis' persecution of the Romani people, died in a Vienna hospital on Monday aged 79, her publisher told the Austria Press Agency on Tuesday.

Holocaust survivor Stojka wrote one of the first Romani autobiographical accounts of Nazi persecution, the 1988 book "We Live in Seclusion: The Memories of a Romani", and dedicated decades to telling her people's story through music and art.

The Romani people, like the Jews, were sent to concentration camps by Germany's Nazis during the Second World War. Up to 1.5 million were murdered in an attempted genocide.

Austrian-born Stojka survived internment in the Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen and Ravensbrueck concentration camps, along with just five other members of her 200-strong family.

"I reached for the pen because I had to open myself, to scream," the activist said at an exhibition in Vienna's Jewish Museum in 2004.

The Budapest-based European Roma Cultural Foundation on Tuesday described Stojka as an "outstanding Austrian Romani woman ... and a key figure for the history, art and literature of Romani culture in Europe".

The foundation's executive director, Timea Junghaus, wrote in an email to Reuters: "She was a role model for the present generation and an inspiration for the future generations of Roma in Europe."

Stojka began painting at the age of 56, often using her fingers or toothpicks instead of brushes to apply acrylic paint and ink.

Her works, many of which are recreations of her experiences in the concentrations camps, have been described as "eerie" and "childlike" by viewers of her exhibitions around the world.

Romani people are still subject to forced assimilation or segregation, cultural repression, eviction and other forms of discrimination in many countries, especially in Europe.

The European Union estimates there are between 10 and 12 million Romani people in Europe, making them the continent's largest ethnic minority, although populations are hard to count, since many choose not to register their ethnic identity.

(Reporting by Georgina Prodhan; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/romani-artist-holocaust-documenter-stojka-dies-185058281.html

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UKIP leader sees EU exit in "few years"

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's withdrawal from the European Union "within a few years" is a certainty as no government will be able to resist demands for an exit from a population incensed by the arrival of low-wage migrants, the leader of the UK Independence Party said.

Nigel Farage, who is siphoning off voters from Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservatives by attacking EU bureaucracy and immigration from eastern Europe, said it was the dramatic rise of his own party that had pressured the premier into promising last week what would be a historic EU referendum.

"Cameron's speech was the moment when the debate on Europe changed," a combative Farage told Reuters, calling it UKIP's "greatest victory to date". Dismissing the idea Cameron had outflanked the anti-EU lobby, he said the reverse was true: Cameron had "let the genie out of the bottle", making "Brexit" - the EU exit of the world's sixth largest economy - certain.

Speaking days after Cameron promised to renegotiate the terms of Britain's 40-year-old membership of the bloc and to hold an "in-out" referendum if re-elected in 2015, Farage said Cameron would probably lose office and, even if he won, would be unable to persuade other EU leaders to amend treaty agreements.

"There is no substantial renegotiation to be had," said Farage. "He'll get nowhere." In any event, the prime minister, who says he wants to stay in a revamped European Union, could not be trusted to keep his referendum promise, he added, noting abandoned talk of a vote on the Lisbon Treaty of 2007.

But with polls showing a slim majority want to cut Britain loose from an expanding European political system, a referendum was not far off, Farage forecast. Even the Labour party, which opposes Cameron's in-out referendum, would, if it took power, be forced by the public to let Britons vote to leave, he argued.

It is a prospect that clearly enthuses Farage, a 48-year-old former metals trader in the City of London who has seen UKIP multiply its support in the six years since Cameron dismissed it as "a bunch of ... fruitcakes and loonies and closet racists".

"I see opportunity. We would have the potential to do so much more for this country," he said at the central London headquarters of a party which has lately polled as much as 16 percent, up from 3 percent at the last election in 2010.

"We'd have the opportunity - through winning back the right to have global trade agreements - to make us much more of a global player than a European player," he said.

FREE BRITAIN

Farage's sharp tongue - pro-EU evangelists were "idiots", he said - and a populist touch that includes a fondness for a smoke and a drink, have made him a familiar figure to voters. He is credited with bringing a new professionalism to a 20-year-old party long dismissed as part of a chaotic, far-right fringe.

Attacked from the left as a "dangerous man" and "political poison", he imagines a Britain thriving outside the EU, a picture that has struck a chord with voters alarmed by the way the debt crisis in the euro zone has hobbled their own economy and at poor immigrants arriving freely from eastern Europe.

EU red tape, Farage said, could be junked along with the bloc's social market model, heavy on regulation and welfare provision. That, he said, would make Britain a more attractive destination for manufacturers. It would also be free to strike bilateral trade deals and to deregulate its own economy.

"I don't want to turn my back on Europe but it's not the future," said Farage. "The future is the emerging world."

While many businessmen support a renegotiation of Britain's EU membership, they have also warned that years of doubt over Britain's EU membership would damage the $2.5 trillion economy and hinder investment. Farage disagrees.

"Europe has a demographic time bomb," he said.

"It's stuck with the idea of a social market model ... which means it's falling behind in competitiveness terms ... and it has a euro zone crisis which it is determined not to admit defeat on which means a decade of agony."

ELECTION TACTICS

Cameron accepts much of that analysis but argues that London can distance itself from the problems while staying in the EU.

His demand for change in Brussels and pledge of a referendum seem to have gone down well with voters. One poll has suggested a swing of up to four percent from UKIP to the Conservatives.

For those keen to vote No to Europe, a vote for Cameron in 2015 may seem a better bet, since voting UKIP is more likely to bring a Labour government not committed to an EU referendum.

But Farage dismisses suggestions Cameron has stolen his thunder and deprived UKIP of its distinctive appeal: "He's let us down on this very same promise once before," he said of a Conservative plan for an EU vote. "He's used up so much trust."

UKIP was still the only party that favoured complete and immediate withdrawal from the EU, he said: "The Conservative party is wedded to political union of the European Union.

"They believe in it, they have done for over 50 years. He's actually calling for deeper integration."

That is a complaint that has found favour in Conservative heartlands across the wealthy suburbs and rural areas of southern England. Though a winner-takes-all constituency voting system means UKIP has no seats in the London parliament, it has 12 in the European legislature in Brussels.

MAN OF CONTRASTS

Once shunned by Britain's mainstream media, Farage rubbishes long-standing accusations his party are "the BNP in blazers" - a middle-class, golfing version of skinhead racists in the British National Party - and is now a regular on political talk shows.

In sharp pinstripe suit, black fedora and colourful silk tie, he dresses like the City trader he once was.

Fast-talking, he peppers his speech with jokes and the odd expletive and professes that though politics is a deadly serious business "it doesn't mean you can't have a bit of fun too".

It is a routine he says he has perfected as "a street scrapper" in many a debate in pubs up and down the country.

Married and a father of four, Farage has survived being run down by a car - when he admits he was drunk - a plane crash during an election stunt, and testicular cancer, but said his lust for "living life" was undimmed.

He smokes, enjoys British beer and French wine, bets on horses, likes sea fishing and some years ago shrugged off tabloid headlines about a night with a young Latvian woman.

Farage is a paradoxical figure. Though frequently derided as "a little Englander" - a jibe at his isolationist views - he is married to a German. And though he says he hates everything about the EU, he is a lawmaker in the European Parliament.

Even the location of his London office - Europe House, a building that also houses the British headquarters of the European Commission - is paradoxical, as is the fact that he uses EU funds to campaign against the bloc.

FREE MARKETS

Some prominent business leaders have warned that the prospect of a referendum on the country's EU membership will create years of uncertainty over trading rules that will scare off foreign investors or, as Labour leader Ed Miliband said, hang a "closed for business" sign over the island nation.

Leaving the EU itself, Britain's biggest trading partner would be folly, they have said, and force Britain to renegotiate a free trade agreement from a position of weakness.

But Farage, who argues that trade with the EU has been routinely "overstated", dismissed such fears, saying a British EU exit "wouldn't make much difference" to trade.

"Do you honestly think that Angela Merkel is going to pick up the phone to the chief executive of Mercedes and say we're very sorry but as a result of putting tariffs on British goods they've just slapped tariffs on you selling your cars in Britain?" he asked with a laugh. "They'd go berserk."

The idea that London would lose its status as Europe's financial centre and forfeit the right to trade the single currency if Britain left was also fantasy, he argued.

"Governments can't control markets," he said. "If they really wanted to prohibit euro trading outside the EU they could do that ... if they want it to become about as rich as Congo in a decade. But they're not going to do that."

IMMIGRATION

Farage told Reuters the biggest reason UKIP was attracting more supporters was because it advocated ending "open door" immigration and curbing the right of other EU nationals to work, settle and claim social security payments in Britain.

"Immigration is a very, very key reason for people voting for us," he said, arguing that local communities had been rendered "unrecognisable" by migrant workers in the last decade.

"The levels of division and enmity that have been created within those communities by government policy a propos open borders with the EU is something that people are really, really angry about," he said.

His immediate campaign goal is to lobby against Romanians and Bulgarians getting full rights to work in Britain next year, something they will obtain because of EU freedom of movement rules, seven years after their countries joined the bloc.

Farage strongly rejects any suggestion he is a racist and said he favoured an Australian-style selective immigration policy that chose people because of their skills.

But allegations his party is racist have dogged him.

A local authority in the north of England took three foster children away from a couple in November, arguing that their support for UKIP was racist, prompting Cameron's office to issue comments suggesting it agreed, at least in part.

Earlier this month, Cameron hinted he did not think Farage should be allowed to take part in TV debates ahead of the next election in 2015, telling a magazine that only parties "that are going to form the government" should be included.

Liberal newspapers in Britain are also sceptical. The Independent published an article in December calling Farage "a dangerous man", his views "political poison", and his party's free-market economic policies "a hard-right wet dream".

UKIP's journey to the political mainstream is far from complete at the ballot box; Britain's first-past-the-post electoral system - which only values a party's support in each constituency rather than nationwide - means it would not win a single parliamentary seat if an election was held today.

And one recent poll, the methodology of which Farage contests, put UKIP support at just seven percent. Most others have, however, estimated its vote at up to 16 percent.

Naming his heroes, Farage listed Robert Peel, a 19th-century Conservative prime minister who defied party aristocrats to end corn tariffs and promote free trade, William Wilberforce, who helped end the slave trade, and Enoch Powell, a leading Conservative ostracised in 1968 after criticising immigration policy in what became known as the "rivers of blood" speech.

What Farage said he admired about them all was that they challenged the status quo, regardless of the consequences.

He didn't spell it out, but it's clear he thinks he is doing the same with Britain and the EU: "The same idiots that are now telling us that unless we stay part of the EU single market we're doomed are the same idiots who told us if we didn't join the euro we'd lose all that business," he said.

"What do they know?"

(This story was refiled to fix typo in 'sixth' in third paragraph)

(Editing by Alastair Macdonald)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/british-anti-eu-leader-sees-exit-few-years-120108057.html

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Student Recreation | InnerVU | Vanderbilt University

Vanderbilt Recreation Center ? Twenty Third Anniversary

Intramural Registration
Registrations can be completed at the Office of Campus Recreation from 9 am ? 5 pm Mon. ? Fri. Each house?s vice president will be responsible for assisting the Office of Campus Recreation in promoting and registering teams for both the Commons sporting events and intramural sports. For more info call 3-8186.

Men?s & Women?s Programs Entry Date?Start Date
Badminton?????????????????????????????????????????? Jan. 28 ? Feb 1 ? ? ? ? ? Feb. 9
Bowling ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Feb 4 ? 8 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?Feb 16
Soccer ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?Feb 25 ? Mar 1 ? ? ? ? ? ? Mar 17

Co-Rec Programs Entry Date?Start Date
Soccer ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Feb 25 ? Mar 1 ? ? ? ? ? ? Mar 17
Ultimate Frisbee????????????????????????????????? Mar 11 ? 15???????????????? Mar 24

For a complete calendar of activities for the 2013 Spring semester, ?please check out our website at?http://www.vanderbilt.edu/studentrec/intramurals/calendar/.

Smoothie King is now open in the Vanderbilt Student Recreation Center.

Work on the Natchez Field has begun. This renovation will create two softball fields. The spring 2013 softball season will be played at this location.

The expansion on the southwest corner of the Rec is well underway. This area will host more fitness room space and
multi-purpose rooms.

Foundations are nearing completion. Steel for the project will be arriving in the next few weeks.

To see aerial shots provided by Aerial Innovations of TN and to see our progress, go tohttp://www.vanderbilt.edu/studentrec/facilities-improvement-for-you/.

Now hiring?Swim Instructors?and?Lifeguards?for Spring / Summer 2013.

Swim Instructors: Swim Instructors are needed for both private and group lessons. Previous experience required.

Lifeguards: Lifeguards are needed for recreational swimming, lap swimming and OCR programs. Duties include opening and closing pool, enforcing pool rules and swimmer safety. Each lifeguard must possess a current lifeguard and CPR-professional rescuer certifications.

Pay is $8.00 per hour

Please contact:?kit.wilson@vanderbilt.edu


CPR/First Aid Classes @ The Rec

Sunday, February 3rd, 2013, 4 ? 9 pm
Sunday, February 17th, 2013, 4 ? 9 pm
Sunday, March 10th 2013, 4 ? 9 pm

Sign up in the Office of Campus Recreation.

Registration

Be sure to register as soon as possible. Class size is limited to 15 participants based on first come, first served and will fill up quickly!

Cost: $120 (Payment is due at the time of registration. Please make checks payable to Vanderbilt University.)

To register, stop by the Office of Campus Recreation during office hours, Monday-Friday 9am-5pm. For more information, email?kate.vanlandingham@vanderbilt.edu or call 343-8186.?No Phone Reservations.

Classes are held in Classroom A & B of the Student Recreation Center.

Group Fitness Classes This Week

For Aerobics & Yoga Class Descriptions, please got to our website athttp://www.vanderbilt.edu/studentrec/fitness/group-fitness/.

Mondays

11:30 ? 12:30 pm?YOGA with Polly
4:00 ? 5:00 pm?HIP HOP CARDIO with Kimberly
5:00 ? 6:00 pm?ZUMBA with Carney
6:15 ? 6:30 pm?HARD@AA with Alyson
6:30 ? 7:00 pm?HARDCORE with Alyson
7:00 ? 8:00 pm?SPIN with Johnny

Tuesdays

6:00 ? 6:45 am?SPIN EXPRESS with Lindey
10:00 ? 11:00 am?CARDIO BLAST with Jennifer
1:00 ? 1:30 pm?CARDIO EXPRESS with Kimberly
3:00 ? 4:00 pm?HARDBODY with Alyson
4:00 ? 5:00 pm?BOOT CAMP with Johnny (meets @ Front Desk)
4:30 ? 5:30 pm?BEGINNER YOGA with Stephen
5:30 ? 6:30?YOGA with Stephen

Wednesdays

6:00 ? 7:00 am??PILATES with Stefanie
7:00 ? 8:00 am?30/20/10 with Kimberly
11:30 ? 12:30 pm ?YOGA with Polly
4:30 ? 5:30 pm??ZUMBA with Carney
5:30 ? 6:30 pm??MEDITATION CLASS with Natalie (meets in classroom A)
5:30 ? 6:30 pm??KICKBOXING with Madeleine
6:30 ? 7:00 pm?HARDCORE with Alyson
7:00 ? 8:00 pm??SPIN with Johnny

Thursday

6:00 ? 6:45 am?SPIN EXPRESS with Lindey
7:00 ? 8:00 am?YOGA with Polly
4:00 ? 5:00 pm?BOOT CAMP with Johnny (meets @ Front Desk)
5:00 ? 5:30 pm?ZUMBA EXPRESS with Hannah
5:30 ? 6:30 pm ?YOGA with Stephen
6:00 ? 7:00 pm?AQUA BOOT CAMP with Kathryn (meets at pool)

Friday

10:00 ? 11:00 am?CARDIO BLAST with Jennifer
3:30 ? 4:30 pm ZUMBA with Carney
4:30 ? 5:30?SPIN with Alyson
5:30 ? 6:30 pm ??BODY BURN with Madeleine

Saturday

10:15 ? 11:15 am ? YOGA with Polly

Sunday

12:30 ? 1:30 pm ?SPIN with Johnny
2:00 ? 3:00 pm?STEP N CORE with Kathryn
3:00 ? 4:00 pm?TURBOKICK with Kathryn
4:00 ? 4:30 pm?AWESOME ABS with Kathryn
4:30 ? 5:30 pm?ZUMBA with Hannah
5:30 ? 6:30 pm?CARDIO CIRCUIT with Carney
6:30 ? 7:30 pm?30/20/10 with Kimberly

Recreation Facility Hours:
Mon.- Thu ?????? 5:30 am ? 11 pm
Fri ?????????????????? 5:30 am ? 12 am
Sat?????????????????? 9 am ? 10 pm
Sun????????????????? 12 pm? ? 11 pm
Visit our website at?http://www.vanderbilt.edu/studentrec/

?



Source: http://www.vanderbilt.edu/innervu/news/student-recreation-27

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In breast cancer metastasis, researchers identify possible drug target

Jan. 27, 2013 ? The spread of breast cancer to distant organs within the body, an event that often leads to death, appears in many cases to involve the loss of a key protein, according to UC San Francisco researchers, whose new discoveries point to possible targets for therapy.

In the January 27, 2013 online edition of Nature Cell Biology, UCSF scientists describe for the first time how the protein, known as GATA3 -- which is abnormal or absent in many cases of human breast cancer -- normally acts downstream in biochemical pathways to prevent the distant spread of cancer, an event called metastasis.

The discovery points to a biochemical control point that simultaneously holds in check several key events required for tumor cells to successfully spread.

"When GATA3 is present, it turns off many genes that are active in metastasis," said Zena Werb, PhD, a UCSF professor of anatomy who led the research. "We now have identified the molecular mechanisms involved."

The key finding of the new study is that GATA3 acts downstream biochemically to activate a molecule -- obscure until now -- called microRNA29b. MicroRNA29b in turn stops protein production from other genes that play vital roles in metastasis.

The absence or loss of GATA3 can free cancerous cells to break free from their defined roles and tethers within a tumor, to move away from the tumor mass, to induce cancer-promoting inflammation, and to stimulate the development of new blood vessels that can help spreading cancerous cells regrow as tumors in new locations.

"People knew that some of these genes were turned on in some cancers, but they did not know they were turned on because GATA3 and microRNA29b were turned off," Werb said. "If you have 20 genes that are becoming less active all at once due to microRNA29b, it could have a profound effect."

Working with mice, the researchers found that restoring microRNA29b to one of the most deadly types of breast cancer stopped metastasis. But the researchers also found that if they knocked out the microRNA29b, tumors spread even in the presence of GATA3, suggesting that microRNA29b can be the driver of metastasis.

In the mouse models of breast cancer studied by Werb's team, GATA3 normally restrains cancerous cells from breaking away from the main tumor and migrating to other organs.

It might be possible, Werb said, to develop drugs that inhibit breast cancer metastasis by re-activating these controls in cancerous cells that have lost the normal protein.

Many researchers who study early stages of cancer focus on abnormal genes and proteins that cause cells to expand their numbers rapidly, a hallmark of cancer.

However, the ability to spread to distant places and to eventually cause lethal complications requires not only cell division and tumor growth, but also changes in how the cancerous cell negotiates with its surroundings. This relationship must be altered to permit cancer to spread, according to earlier research findings by Werb and others.

"Many of the key processes in cancer that GATA3 suppresses take place outside the cell, in the surrounding environment," she said.

GATA3 is a master control for luminal cells, which line the milk-carrying ducts of the breast. In essence, GATA3 dictates the defining characteristics of a normal breast cell, Werb said.

Luminal breast cancers are the most common form of the disease, and the hormones estrogen and progesterone drive their growth. Loss of the normal GATA3 protein as luminal breast cancers evolve is associated with a greater risk of death, Werb said, and occurs in roughly 10 percent of luminal breast cancer cases.

But, along with many other proteins, GATA3 also is absent in "triple negative," breast cancers, which are more often fatal. Triple negative breast cancers, which disproportionately affect black women and younger women, do not depend on the hormones, nor do they require a third growth factor, called HER2.

Triple negative breast cancers, which account for roughly one-in-five breast cancers, have been more difficult to target successfully with newer treatments.

"The targeting we would like to do is to give back microRNA29b specifically to breast tumor cells to prevent metastasis," Werb said.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California - San Francisco, via Newswise.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Jonathan Chou, Jeffrey H. Lin, Audrey Brenot, Jung-whan Kim, Sylvain Provot, Zena Werb. GATA3 suppresses metastasis and modulates the tumour microenvironment by regulating?microRNA-29b expression. Nature Cell Biology, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/ncb2672

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

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

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/9MKEP8kbDFI/130127134214.htm

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Safer way to vaccinate: Polymer film that gradually releases DNA coding for viral proteins may beat traditional vaccines

Jan. 28, 2013 ? Vaccines usually consist of inactivated viruses that prompt the immune system to remember the invader and launch a strong defense if it later encounters the real thing. However, this approach can be too risky with certain viruses, including HIV.

In recent years, many scientists have been exploring DNA as a potential alternative vaccine. About 20 years ago, DNA coding for viral proteins was found to induce strong immune responses in rodents, but so far, tests in humans have failed to duplicate that success.

In a paper appearing in the Jan. 27 online issue of Nature Materials, MIT researchers describe a new type of vaccine-delivery film that holds promise for improving the effectiveness of DNA vaccines. If such vaccines could be successfully delivered to humans, they could overcome not only the safety risks of using viruses to vaccinate against diseases such as HIV, but they would also be more stable, making it possible to ship and store them at room temperature.

This type of vaccine delivery would also eliminate the need to inject vaccines by syringe, says Darrell Irvine, an MIT professor of biological engineering and materials science and engineering. "You just apply the patch for a few minutes, take it off and it leaves behind these thin polymer films embedded in the skin," he says.

Irvine and Paula Hammond, the David H. Koch Professor in Engineering, are the senior authors of the Nature Materials paper. Both are members of MIT's David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. The lead author of the paper is Peter DeMuth, a graduate student in biological engineering.

Gradual vaccine delivery

Scientists have had some recent success delivering DNA vaccines to human patients using a technique called electroporation. This method requires first injecting the DNA under the skin, then using electrodes to create an electric field that opens small pores in the membranes of cells in the skin, allowing DNA to get inside. However, the process can be painful and give varying results, Irvine says.

"It's showing some promise but it's certainly not ideal and it's not something you could imagine in a global prophylactic vaccine setting, especially in resource-poor countries," he says.

Irvine and Hammond took a different approach to delivering DNA to the skin, creating a patch made of many layers of polymers embedded with the DNA vaccine. These polymer films are implanted under the skin using microneedles that penetrate about half a millimeter into the skin -- deep enough to deliver the DNA to immune cells in the epidermis, but not deep enough to cause pain in the nerve endings of the dermis.

Once under the skin, the films degrade as they come in contact with water, releasing the vaccine over days or weeks. As the film breaks apart, the DNA strands become tangled up with pieces of the polymer, which protect the DNA and help it get inside cells.

The researchers can control how much DNA gets delivered by tuning the number of polymer layers. They can also control the rate of delivery by altering how hydrophobic (water-fearing) the film is. DNA injected on its own is usually broken down very quickly, before the immune system can generate a memory response. When the DNA is released over time, the immune system has more time to interact with it, boosting the vaccine's effectiveness.

The polymer film also includes an adjuvant -- a molecule that helps to boost the immune response. In this case, the adjuvant consists of strands of RNA that resemble viral RNA, which provokes inflammation and recruits immune cells to the area.

The ability to provoke inflammation is one of the key advantages of the new delivery system, says Michele Kutzler, an assistant professor at Drexel University College of Medicine. Other benefits include targeting the wealth of immune cells in the skin, the use of a biodegradable delivery material, and the possibility of pain-free vaccine delivery, she says.

"It's an interesting approach that can be applied not just to delivery of DNA-based vaccine antigens, but other small molecules," says Kutzler, who was not part of the research team.

Eliciting immune responses

In tests with mice, the researchers found that the immune response induced by the DNA-delivering film was as good as or better than that achieved with electroporation.

To test whether the vaccine might provoke a response in primates, the researchers applied a polymer film carrying DNA that codes for proteins from the simian form of HIV to macaque skin samples cultured in the lab. In skin treated with the film, DNA was easily detectable, while DNA injected alone was quickly broken down.

"The hope is that that's an indication that this will translate to large animals and hopefully humans," Irvine says.

The researchers now plan to perform further tests in non-human primates before undertaking possible tests in humans. If successful, the vaccine-delivering patch could potentially be used to deliver vaccines for many different diseases, because the DNA sequence can be easily swapped out depending on the disease being targeted.

"If you're making a protein vaccine, every protein has its little quirks, and there are manufacturing issues that have to be solved to scale it up to humans. If you had a DNA platform, the DNA is going to behave the same no matter what antigen it's encoding," Irvine says.

Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The original article was written by Anne Trafton.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Peter C. DeMuth, Younjin Min, Bonnie Huang, Joshua A. Kramer, Andrew D. Miller, Dan H. Barouch, Paula T. Hammond, Darrell J. Irvine. Polymer multilayer tattooing for enhanced DNA?vaccination. Nature Materials, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nmat3550

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

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

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/health_medicine/genes/~3/S-p9Fg4Dyxo/130128113922.htm

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Sunday, January 27, 2013

Today only: Big discounts on hobbies, crafts, & home design ...

Today only, DiscountMags is offering some very low prices on an eclectic collection of what it calls ?hobbies & crafts? magazines starting as low as $4.50 a year. No promotional code is needed for this offer. The discounted prices are for new or renewal subscriptions and may be used for multiple year subscriptions.

The titles include Architectural Digest, Family Handyman, Popular Photography, Outdoor Photographer, Arts & Crafts Homes, Art News, Country Woman, Woodcraft, Digital Photo, and American Photo.

This offer expires at 11:59 p.m. EST on Sunday, January 27, 2013.

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Thousands march for gun control in Washington

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Thousands of people, many holding signs with names of gun violence victims and messages such as "Ban Assault Weapons Now," joined a rally for gun control on Saturday, marching from the Capitol to the Washington Monument.

Participants were led by Mayor Vincent Gray and other officials Saturday morning, and the crowd stretched for about two blocks along Constitution Avenue. Police blocked off half the road.

Participants held signs reading "Gun Control Now" and "Stop NRA," among other messages. Other signs were simple and white, with the names of victims of gun violence.

About 100 residents were expected from Newtown, Conn., where a gunman killed 20 first-graders and six teachers at a school in December. The rally was organized in response to that shooting.

Once the crowd arrived at the monument, speakers called for a ban on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan told the crowd it's not about taking away Second Amendment gun rights, but about gun safety and saving lives. He said he and President Barack Obama would do everything they could to enact gun control policies.

"We must act, we must act, we must act," Duncan said.

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C.'s non-voting representative in Congress, said the gun lobby can be stopped. The crowd chanted back, "Yes, we can."

Norton said the nation didn't act after previous mass killings, but she said "we the people," won't give up this time.

"We are all culpable if we do nothing now," Norton said

Participant Kara Baekey of Norwalk, Conn., said that when she heard about the Newtown shooting, she immediately thought of her two young children. She said she decided she must take action, and that's why she joined the march.

"I wanted to make sure this never happens at my kids' school or any other school," Baekey said. "It just can't happen again."

James Agenbroad, 78, of Garrett Park, Md., carried a handwritten sign on cardboard that read "Repeal the 2nd Amendment." He called it the only way to stop mass killings because he thinks the Supreme Court will strike down any other restrictions on guns.

"You can repeal it," he said. "We repealed prohibition."

Molly Smith, the artistic director of Washington's Arena Stage, and her partner organized the march. Organizers said that in addition to the 100 from Newtown, they expected buses of participants from New Jersey, New York and Philadelphia. Others are flying in from Seattle, San Francisco and even Alaska.

While she's never organized a political march before, Smith said she was compelled to press for a change in the law. The march organizers support President Barack Obama's call for a ban on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines as well as for universal background checks for gun sales. They also want lawmakers to require gun safety training for all buyers of firearms.

"With the drum roll, the consistency of the mass murders and the shock of it, it is always something that is moving and devastating to me. And then, it's as if I move on," Smith said. "And in this moment, I can't move on. I can't move on.

"I think it's because it was children, babies," she said. "I was horrified by it."

After the Connecticut shootings, Smith posted something on Facebook and drew more support to do something. The group One Million Moms for Gun Control, the Washington National Cathedral and two other churches eventually signed on to co-sponsor the march. Organizers have raised more than $46,000 online to pay for equipment and fees to stage the rally.

Lawmakers from the District of Columbia and Maryland were scheduled to speak Saturday. Actress Kathleen Turner was expected to appear, along with Marian Wright Edelman of the Children's Defense Fund and Colin Goddard, a survivor from the Virginia Tech massacre.

Smith said she supports a comprehensive look at mental health and violence in video games and films. But she said the mass killings at Virginia Tech and Aurora, Colo., and Newtown, Conn., all start with guns.

"The issue is guns. The Second Amendment gives us the right to own guns, but it's not the right to own any gun," she said. "These are assault weapons, made for killing people."

___

March on Washington for Gun Control: http://www.guncontrolmarch.com/

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/thousands-march-gun-control-washington-164306917.html

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Lorne Michaels comedy pilot lands at NBC

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - "Saturday Night Live" boss Lorne Michaels is broadening his relationship with NBC via a new comedy pilot.

The untitled project will star stand-up comic (and "SNL" writer) John Mulaney, and is loosely based on his life.

Mulaney will also write and executive-produce the project, with Michaels, Andrew Singer, Dave Becky and David Miner also executive-producing.

The project will be produced by Universal Television, Broadway Video and 3 Arts Entertainment.

Last month, Michaels - along with "Up in the Air" director Jason Reitman and "Girls" co-executive producer Bruce Eric Kaplan - sold a comedy pilot, "People in New Jersey," to HBO. That project centers around an adult brother and sister who puzzle over the big and small mysteries of life while living in New Jersey.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/lorne-michaels-comedy-pilot-lands-nbc-010130687.html

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Tom Harkin: 'It's somebody else's turn' (Washington 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 News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/279786157?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Saturday, January 26, 2013

Big spending China threatens J-League's reign

By JOHN DUERDEN

Associated Press

Associated Press Sports

updated 4:08 a.m. ET Jan. 25, 2013

SINGAPORE (AP) -The Chinese Super League has shaken off corruption scandals and is spending big on international stars sparking debate as to how much ground it has made up on a Japanese J-League coping with a continuing exodus of young talent.

A growing number of the J-League's best players are heading to European teams. 2012 Olympic star Kensuke Nagai left Nagoya Grampus earlier in January to join Standard Liege of Belgium, while Genki Omae became the 11th Japanese player to join Germany's top tier, shifting to Fortuna Dusseldorf from Shimizu S-Pulse.

Shimizu coach Afshin Ghotbi told Associated Press he would like to see more done to ensure talent remains longer, or at least teams receive transfer fees of sufficient size to allow investment in developing talent.

"J-League clubs have to do a better job in keeping players in Japan by signing longer term contracts and renewing them prior to their final year," said Ghotbi who added that the rise of Chinese football is good for Japan.

"Due to the number and quality of the young Japanese players, the J-League has been able to sustain its quality, but unless measures are taken, at some point we will see a decline in the quality and popularity of the league."

The booming Chinese league has overtaken the J-League in terms of average attendance, partly due to major investment in overseas talent.

Guangzhou Evergrande, Guangzhou R&F, Shanghai Shenhua and Dalian Aerbin are also in the process of signing foreign players of higher quality than their Japanese counterparts.

Speculation as to whether Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka will spend another season with Shanghai Shenhua has overshadowed some interesting purchases by Chinese clubs.

Marcello Lippi, who led Italy to the 2006 World Cup, and now coach of Guangzhou Evergrande, splashed out $7.4 million in December on Brazil's Elkeson de Oliveira Cardoso to add to a squad that reached the last eight of the 2012 Asian Champions League.

Guangzhou also won a second successive Chinese championship with a squad of Chinese national team players and highly-rated and highly-paid imports such as Dario Conca and Lucas Barrios.

Dalian Aerbin signed French international Guillaume Hoarau from Paris Saint Germain. At 28, Hourau is no veteran approaching the end of his career, but a talented player at the peak of his career.

U.S.-born Tom Byer played in Japan in the forerunner to the J-League and since retiring has played an influential role in the country's highly-rated youth development system. He is now Head Technical Consultant to the Chinese School Football Program administered by the Ministry of Education.

"China is surely signing bigger marquee players than the J. League," Bayer said. "It seems like the `90s in Japan when every club had to have one or two stars. Time will tell if the Chinese Super League will get it right with the massive investment that some clubs are making."

The departure of talent from Japan has its positives according to Byer, who believes that it has made the J-League more competitive. 2008 Asian Champion Gamba Osaka was relegated in 2012 while seven-time champion Kashima Antlers has fallen on lean times leaving relatively unfashionable teams such as Kashiwa Reysol, Vegalta Sendai and Sanfrecce Hiroshima to challenge for titles.

Philippe Troussier, coach of the Japan national team from 1998 to 2002 who is now plying his trade in China, acknowledges that while the departure of talented players can weaken the J-League in the short-term, it will be of long-term benefit to Japan.

"There are in Japan a high number of talented players for the future and the fact that some of them go to overseas can give to the local players more opportunities to play," the Frenchman said.

When Shinji Kagawa, now of Manchester United, left Cerezo Osaka in 2010 to join Borussia Dortmund, Hiroshi Kiyotake cemented his place in the team's starting lineup. So impressive was the midfielder that he broke into the Japan national team and earned a move to FC Nuremberg in the Bundesliga.

"We have many young players challenging overseas, especially in Europe. Even though many talented players move, we still have a lot of promising young players in the J-League and they grow through actual opportunities to play," the J-League's head of public relations, Kazayuki Hagiwara, said. "Players coming back share their unique experience. In the medium and long term, this virtuous cycle helps Japanese football develop."

And far from being a threat to Japan, Hagiwara also claims that the rise of China is a positive.

"Developing football in Asia, including China, and improving Asian football's position in the world is very important for the J-League."

According to the well-traveled Troussier, China still has some way to go.

"We can compare the current Chinese policies with Japanese policies 20 years ago," he said. "Chinese football looks very attractive at the moment with so many talented foreign players and coaches but it still needs a long time to reach a high football standard."

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


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Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/50584408/ns/sports-soccer/

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Ackman confident JC Penney CEO can turn around company: CNBC

(Reuters) - Activist investor Bill Ackman said on Friday that he was confident in the ability of JC Penney Inc Chief Executive Officer Ron Johnson to turn around the company.

Ackman, whose Pershing Square Capital Management hedge fund has taken a long position in JC Penney, told CNBC that the company would "make progress" under Johnson's leadership.

He added, however, that Johnson might be the wrong choice for chief executive if the company does not recover in three years.

"If three years from now, Ron Johnson is still struggling to turn around JC Penney, he's probably the wrong guy," Ackman said.

Shortly after his comments on JC Penney, Ackman feuded with activist investor Carl Icahn about a nearly 10-year-old investment the two had agreed upon.

They also feuded over Ackman's publicly announced "short" of, or bet against, the shares of weight-loss and nutrition product company Herbalife Inc. .

Meanwhile, shares of Herbalife surged after Icahn said that Ackman, by going public with his big short on the nutritional supplement company, would cause the "mother of all short squeezes" in the stock.

A short squeeze is when short sellers are forced to cover their position, a move that pushes a stock higher.

(Reporting by Sam Forgione; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ackman-confident-jc-penney-ceo-turn-around-company-182828565--sector.html

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How's the anodized aluminum on your iPhone 5 holding up?

How's the anodized aluminum on your iPhone 5 holding up?

How's the anodized aluminum on your iPhone 5 holding up? You know, the chamfer that runs along the display, and the unibody in silver or slate that covers the sides and most of the back of your iPhone? When Apple first announced the latest generation iPhone, there were some concerns that the aluminum was soft, the anodization didn't include sufficient layers, and that it was, in general, too easy to chip, dent, and otherwise scuff. Well, the iPhone 5 has been on the market for just over four months now, plenty of time to get a realistic idea of how it works in, and holds up to, the demands of everyday life.

I use iPhone 5 cases intermittently when I'm testing or reviewing them, but most of the time my iPhone is as naked as the day Jony Ive designed it. I like the look. But I've dropped it on pavement a couple times now and have the chips and dings to show for it. That hasn't encouraged me to slap a permanent case on it any more than blaster fire and asteroid bumps encouraged Han Solo to slap a Corellian freighter bra on the Millennium Falcon, but I know not everyone shares my affection for aged and used objects. I know some people go nuts at even the thought of a hairline scratch...

So how's your iPhone 5 looking? Pampered and perfect, as mint and museum condition as the day it shipped? Or worn in, torn into, and maybe even battered a bit? Fourth months later, how's your iPhone 5 casing holding up?

If you've got a picture, share it with us in the iPhone 5 Forum battle damage thread.



Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/cGdjMLhzDuo/story01.htm

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