Jack White Drops New Song, 'Love Interruption'

Track is from White's first solo album, Blunderbuss, due April 24.
By James Montgomery

Jack White
Photo: WireImage

Jack White hasn't exactly been living life outside the public eye since announcing the end of the White Stripes last year, making records with everyone from Tom Jones to the Insane Clown Posse and appearing on a (really pretty excellent) episode of "American Pickers," to name just a few of his endeavors.

And on April 24, he'll officially add "solo artist" to that résumé, with the release of Blunderbuss, the first album to bear his name — and his name only. And while we suppose the move was inevitable, according to White, he never really had any plans to go solo. In fact, Blunderbuss, the first album basically began life as a happy accident.

"I didn't really even think of recording under my own name for a long time," White told BBC Radio 1's Zane Lowe on Monday. "A few months ago, we had a session booked and someone didn't show up. So I said, 'I guess we'll do some of my songs' ... It kick-started the whole process."

In further kick-startery, White has also premiered the first song from the album, "Love Interruption" on his brand-new official site. A smoky, sumptuous mix of winsome Wurlitzer, acoustic guitar (and maybe a clarinet?), the song sees White harmonizing with Nashville singer Ruby Amanfu and lamenting over the power and promise of love. Yes, it is pretty great.

Fans can download "Interruption" now, and it will be available on 7-inch (of course) on February 7. Blunderbuss will be released through White's own Third Man Records, in conjunction with Columbia, and will reportedly feature contributions from the likes of Seasick Steve and Chris Thile, formerly of Nickel Creek.

Sound off on Jack's "Love Interruption" on our Facebook page!

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1678225/jack-white-love-interruption.jhtml

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AT&T Galaxy Note available Feb. 19 for $299, preorders start Feb. 5

The AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note will be available Feb. 19 for $299 on contract, Samsung announced this morning. It'll be available in carbon blue and ceramic white, and preorders will begin Feb. 5 and will be delivered by Feb. 17.

Along with the phablet itself -- remember that this bad boy is 5.3 inches -- there are a number of accessories available, including a desktop dock, spare battery charger, flip cover case and pen holder kit.

Be sure to check out our hands-on video with the AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note from CES earlier this month. We've got the full release after the break.

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/uMopp1nJWjc/story01.htm

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EU leaders struggle to reconcile austerity, growth (Reuters)

BRUSSELS (Reuters) ? European leaders struggled to reconcile austerity with growth on Monday at a summit due to approve a permanent rescue fund for the euro zone and put finishing touches to a German-driven pact for stricter budget discipline.

Officially, the half-day summit was meant to focus mainly on ways to revive growth and create jobs at a time when governments across Europe are having to cut public spending and raise taxes to tackle mountains of debt.

But disputes over the limits of austerity, and about Greece's unresolved debt restructuring negotiations with private bondholders, may sour efforts to send a more optimistic message that Europe is getting on top of its debt crisis.

The risk premium on southern European government bonds rose while the euro and stocks fell on concerns about a lack of tangible progress in the Greek debt talks and gloom about Europe's economic outlook.

Highlighting those fears, Spain's economy contracted in the last quarter of 2011 for the first time in two years and looks set to slip into a long recession.

And France halved its 2012 growth forecast to a mere 0.5 percent in another potentially ominous sign for President Nicolas Sarkozy's troubled bid for re-election in May. Prime Minister Francois Fillon said the cut would not entail further budget savings measures.

Conservative Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, attending his first EU summit, said Madrid was clearly not going to meet its target of 2.3 percent growth this year. That has raised big doubts about whether it can cut its budget deficit from around 8 percent of economic output in 2011 to 4.4 percent by the end of this year as promised.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso hinted that Brussels may ease Spain's near-unattainable 2012 deficit target after it updates EU growth forecasts on February 23.

Italy, rushing through sweeping economic reforms under new Prime Minister Mario Monti, was rewarded with a significant fall in its borrowing costs at an auction of 10- and 5-year bonds, despite double-notch downgrades of its credit rating by Standard & Poor's and Fitch this month.

But Portugal's slide towards becoming the next Greece - needing a second bailout to avoid chaotic bankruptcy - gathered pace as banks raised the cost of insuring government bonds against default and insisted the money be paid up front instead of over several years.

The yield spread on 10-year Portuguese bonds over safe haven German Bunds topped 15 percentage points for the first time in the euro era. It cost a record 3.9 million euros ($5.12 million) to insure 10 million euros of Portuguese debt.

OUTLAWING KEYNES?

With Britain standing aloof, most of the other 26 EU leaders were set to approve a fiscal pact to write balanced budget rules into their national law, despite economists' doubts about the wisdom of effectively outlawing deficit spending.

"To write into law a Germanic view of how one should run an economy and that essentially makes Keynesianism illegal is not something we would do," a British official said.

European Parliament President Martin Schulz told the leaders the new fiscal treaty was unnecessary and unbalanced, because it failed to combine budget rigor with necessary investment in public works to create jobs.

The 17th summit in two years as the EU battles to resolve its sovereign debt problems was called to shift the narrative away from politically unpopular austerity and towards growth.

Despite the rhetoric on growth, debate over strengthening the euro zone's financial defenses and lowering Greece's debt burden are likely to dominate the talks.

Negotiations between the Greek government and private bondholders over the restructuring of 200 billion euros of Greek debt made progress over the weekend, but were not concluded before the summit began.

A Greek official said Prime Minister Lucas Papademos would give the summit a brief report on the situation and meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the sidelines.

Until there is a deal between Greece and its private bondholders, EU leaders cannot move forward with a second, 130 billion euro rescue program for Athens, which they originally agreed to at a summit last October.

Germany caused outrage in Greece by proposing last week that a European commissar take control of Greek public finances to ensure it meets fiscal targets. Greek Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said that to make his country choose between national dignity and financial assistance ignored the lessons of history.

The German idea won cautious backing from the Dutch and Swedish prime ministers.

"We need to have things in place for monitoring that they are really doing what they are promising," Swedish Prime Minister Frederik Reinfeldt told reporters on arrival.

But Merkel played down the idea of placing Greece under stewardship, saying: "We are having a debate that we shouldn't be having. This is about how Europe can be supportive so Greece can comply, so there are targets."

PERMANENT RESCUE FUND

The leaders were to sign a treaty creating the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), a 500-billion-euro permanent bailout fund that is due to become operational in July, a year earlier than first planned.

But there was a last-minute hitch over the terms of a 'fiscal compact treaty' tightening budget rules when four central European states demanded that countries planning to join the euro be allowed to attend all euro zone summits.

The prime ministers of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia agreed to seek an amendment to the text as a condition for joining the pact, a Hungarian spokesman said.

The ESM was meant to replace the European Financial Stability Facility, a temporary fund that has been used to bail out Ireland and Portugal.

But pressure is mounting - including from Italy's Monti, IMF chief Christine Lagarde and U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner - to combine the resources of the two funds to create a

super-firewall of 750 billion euros ($1 trillion).

The International Monetary Fund says if Europe puts up more of its own money, that will convince others to contribute more resources to the IMF, boosting its crisis-fighting abilities and improving market sentiment.

But Germany has so far resisted such a step.

Merkel has said she will not discuss the issue of the ESM/EFSF's ceiling until the next EU summit in March. Meanwhile, financial markets will continue to worry that there may not be sufficient rescue funds available to help the likes of Italy and Spain if they run into renewed debt funding problems.

"There are certainly signals that Germany is willing to consider it and it is rather geared towards March from the German side," a senior euro zone official said.

The sticking point is German public opinion which is tired of bailing out the euro zone's financially less prudent.

The summit was expected to announce that up to 20 billion euros of unspent funds from the EU's 2007-2013 budget will be recycled towards job creation, especially among the young, and will commit to freeing up bank lending to small- and medium-sized companies.

But with no new public money available for a stimulus, leaders focused mainly on promoting structural reforms such as loosening labor market regulation, cutting red tape for business and promoting innovation.

However, they were unlikely to resolve a decade-old battle over creating a single European patent which would reduce the high cost of registering inventions and protecting intellectual property. Firms currently have to register patents in each of the 27 member states. The streamlining has long been stymied by disputes over language and the location of an EU patent court.

($1 = 0.7615 euros)

(Additional reporting by Harry Papachristou and Robin Emmott in Brussels, Marius Zaharia, William James, Chris Wickham and Jeremy Gaunt in London,; Roberta Cowan in Amsterdam,; Writing by Paul Taylor; Editing by Mike Peacock/Elizabeth Piper/Janet McBride)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120130/bs_nm/us_eu_summit

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Greek PM seeks backing for reforms, debt deal near (Reuters)

ATHENS (Reuters) ? Prime Minister Lucas Papademos sought backing on Sunday from leading Greek party leaders for painful and unpopular reforms that the near-bankrupt country must negotiate now that a long-awaited debt relief deal seems almost secured.

Attention is shifting to negotiations with Greece's international lenders who want proof that the Papademos coalition will take action on reforms before they hand over funds from a 130 billion euro bailout.

Greece needs the money to avoid a chaotic default when big bond redemptions fall due in March. However, in a sign that the talks will be tough, German Economy Minister Philipp Roesler openly called for Athens to surrender control of its budget policy to outside institutions if it cannot implement the reforms required under the euro zone rescue package.

Such suggestions have raised hackles in Greece and Papademos made clear how hard the talks with its lenders, the IMF and European Union, would be.

"The negotiations are not easy," he said in a statement after meeting the heads of the three parties in his government.

"Despite progress on stabilizing the economy, despite the significant changes and the great sacrifices, deviations from targets and repeated delays in the implementation of specific policies have resulted in our partners setting more terms and commitments."

Greece appears to be close to clinching the bond swap agreement with private creditors after months of talks. This followed suggestions that the creditors are willing to accept a demand made by euro zone ministers for new bonds to carry annual interest of less than 4 percent.

If the deal is sealed, this will ease Greece's debt burden by slashing the value of the creditors' debt holdings and give Papademos a boost, but only briefly.

Exasperated lenders are worried that Greece no longer has the will or ability to ram through changes.

The mix of spending cuts and measures to reshape the economy risk heaping more misery on austerity-weary Greeks in the short term and few politicians want to be associated with them as they gear up for elections expected as early as April.

Papademos, a technocrat who heads a government of politicians, said leaders of the three partners in his coalition - the Socialist PASOK, conservative New Democracy and far-right LAOS parties - had committed themselves to continuing talks and reaching a deal with the lenders.

LEADERSHIP AND MONITORING

In Berlin, Economy Minister Roesler became the first German cabinet member to endorse openly a proposal for Greece to surrender budget control.

"We need more leadership and monitoring when it comes to implementing the reform course," Roesler, who is also vice chancellor, told Bild newspaper, according to advance extracts of an interview to be published on Monday.

"If the Greeks aren't able to succeed themselves with this, then there must be stronger leadership and monitoring from abroad, for example through the EU," added Roesler, chairman of the Free Democrats who share power with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives.

Reuters reported on Friday that Germany wants Greece to give up control of budget policy to European institutions as part of discussions over a second rescue package.

Even before Roesler spoke, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos reacted angrily to the suggestion on Sunday, saying Greece was perfectly capable of making good on its promises.

"Anyone who puts a nation before the dilemma of 'economic assistance or national dignity' ignores some key historical lessons," he said in a statement before heading to Brussels for a European Union summit on Monday.

LAOS chief George Karatzaferis told reporters after meeting Papademos that Greece must examine whether the lenders' demands are in accordance with the Lisbon treaty and that he would not take any action until the European Parliament made a decision.

"The prime minister said that we are running out of time," he said. "I said that for the sake of Greece's future we can find time."

In recent weeks Karatzaferis has stepped up threats to quit the coalition, citing a lack of cohesion among partners. His party's support has slipped in opinion polls since December.

Underscoring the struggle Papademos faces in implementing reforms, Greece's parliament voted last week against extending pharmacy hours soon after officials from the "troika" of lenders - the ECB, European Commission and International Monetary Fund - arrived in town to discuss the bailout.

The lenders have demanded Greece make extra spending cuts worth 1 percent of GDP - or just above 2 billion euros - this year, including slashing defence and health spending as well as cutting redundant state entities.

BOND SWAP PROGRESS

Euro zone leaders at the Brussels summit will have the chance to discuss the debt swap deal, which both sides said late on Saturday was close to being finalised.

Under the swap, private creditors take a 50 percent cut in the nominal value of their Greek holdings in exchange for cash and new bonds. Their actual losses are expected to be much higher depending on the coupon, or interest rate, involved.

Both sides said the deal was along the lines of a proposal made by Jean-Claude Juncker, the chairman of euro zone finance ministers, suggesting creditors had accepted his demand for a coupon of less than 4 percent. That would result in actual losses of close to 70 percent for creditors on their holdings.

Two sources close to the talks on Sunday confirmed a deal was largely in place with a coupon below 4 percent, but that a final agreement could not be clinched until euro zone finance ministers signed off on it.

The talks had earlier run into trouble over the coupon and whether the ECB and other public creditors must also take losses on their holdings.

Negotiations were further complicated by hedge funds that have built up positions in Greek bonds and now either want the country to go under so that insurance against the debt could be paid out, or hope for payment in full by holding out.

Greece has responded by threatening to enforce losses on investors who do not voluntarily sign up to the swap.

The swap deal, aimed at chopping 100 billion euros off the debt load, must be sealed in about three weeks at the latest as Greece has to repay 14.5 billion euros of debt on March 20.

Without a deal and a subsequent release of funds from the bailout plan, Greece would sink into an uncontrolled default that risks spreading turmoil across the euro zone and tipping the global economy back into recession.

(Additional reporting by John O'Donnell in Brussels, Writing by Deepa Babington; editing by David Stamp)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120129/bs_nm/us_greece

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Sarah Palin: ?this ridiculous opposition dump on Newt was nothing ...

Wow.

Sarah Palin just launched a thousand points of?fright at Team Romney and the Republican establishment who have been going after Newt?s relationship with Ronald Reagan, via Facebook:

We have witnessed something very disturbing this week. The Republican establishment which fought Ronald Reagan in the 1970s and which continues to fight the grassroots Tea Party movement today has adopted the tactics of the left in using the media and the politics of personal destruction to attack an opponent?.

I am sadly too familiar with these tactics because they were used against the GOP ticket in 2008?.

But this week a few handpicked and selectively edited comments which Newt made during his 40-year career were used to claim that Newt was somehow anti-Reagan and isn?t conservative enough to go against the accepted moderate in the primary race. (I know, it makes no sense, and the GOP establishment hopes you won?t stop and think about this nonsense. Mark Levin and others have shown the ridiculousness of this.) To add insult to injury, this ?anti-Reagan? claim was made by a candidate who admitted to not even supporting or voting for Reagan. He actually was against the Reagan movement, donated to liberal candidates, and said he didn?t want to go back to the Reagan days. You can?t change history?.

What we saw with this ridiculous opposition dump on Newt was nothing short of Stalin-esque re-writing of history. It was Alinsky tactics at their worst.

But this whole thing isn?t really about Newt Gingrich vs. Mitt Romney. It is about the GOP establishment vs. the Tea Party grassroots and independent Americans who are sick of the politics of personal destruction used now by both parties? operatives with a complicit media egging it on. In fact, the establishment has been just as dismissive of Ron Paul and Rick Santorum. Newt is an imperfect vessel for Tea Party support, but in South Carolina the Tea Party chose to get behind him instead of the old guard?s choice.? ?In response, the GOP establishment voices denounced South Carolinian voters with the same vitriol we usually see from the left when they spew hatred at everyday Americans ?bitterly clinging? to their faith and their Second Amendment rights. The Tea Party was once again told to sit down and shut up and listen to the ?wisdom? of their betters. We were reminded of the litany of Tea Party endorsed candidates in 2010 that didn?t win. Well, here?s a little newsflash to the establishment: without the Tea Party there would have been no historic 2010 victory at all?.

Now, I respect Governor Romney and his success. But there are serious concerns about his record and whether as a politician he consistently applied conservative principles and how this impacts the agenda moving forward. The questions need answers now. That is why this primary should not be rushed to an end.

And I question whether the GOP establishment would ever employ the same harsh tactics they used on Newt against Obama. I didn?t see it in 2008. Many of these same characters sat on their thumbs in ?08 and let Obama escape unvetted. Oddly, they?re now using every available microscope and endoscope ? along with rewriting history ? in attempts to character assassinate anyone challenging their chosen one in their own party?s primary. So, one must ask, who are they really running against?

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Source: http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/01/sarah-palin-this-ridiculous-opposition-dump-on-newt-was-nothing-short-of-stanlin-esque-re-writing-of-history/

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What really happened prior to 'Snowball Earth'?

Friday, January 27, 2012

In a study published in the journal Geology, scientists at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science suggest that the large changes in the carbon isotopic composition of carbonates which occurred prior to the major climatic event more than 500 million years ago, known as 'Snowball Earth,' are unrelated to worldwide glacial events.

"Our study suggests that the geochemical record documented in rocks prior to the Marinoan glaciation or 'Snowball Earth' are unrelated to the glaciation itself," said UM Rosenstiel professor Peter Swart, a co-author of the study. "Instead the changes in the carbon isotopic ratio are related to alteration by freshwater as sea level fell."

In order to better understand the environmental conditions prior to 'Snowball Earth', the research team analyzed geochemical signatures preserved in carbonate rock cores from similar climactic events that happened more recently ? two million years ago ? during the Pliocene-Pleistocene period.

The team analyzed the ratio of the rare isotope of carbon (13C) to the more abundant carbon isotope (12C) from cores drilled in the Bahamas and the Enewetak Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The geochemical patterns that were observed in these cores were nearly identical to the pattern seen prior to the Marinoan glaciation, which suggests that the alteration of rocks by water, a process known as diagenesis, is the source of the changes seen during that time period.

Prior to this study, scientists theorized that large changes in the cycling of carbon between the organic and inorganic reservoirs occurred in the atmosphere and oceans, setting the stage for the global glacial event known as 'Snowball Earth'.

"It is widely accepted that changes in the carbon isotopic ratio during the Pliocene-Pleistocene time are the result of alteration of rocks by freshwater," said Swart. "We believe this is also what occurred during the Neoproterozoic. Instead of being related to massive and complicated changes in the carbon cycle, the variations seen in the Neoproterozoic can be explained by simple process which we understand very well."

Scientists acknowledge that multiple sea level fluctuations occurred during the Pliocene-Pleistocene glaciations resulting from water being locked up in glaciers. Similar sea-level changes during the Neoproterozoic caused the variations in the global carbon isotopic signal preserved in the older rocks, not a change in the distribution of carbon as had been widely postulated.

###

University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science: http://www.rsmas.miami.edu

Thanks to University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/117150/What_really_happened_prior_to__Snowball_Earth__

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Rick Santorum: 'I Wish I Made As Much Money As Mitt Romney'

RealClearPolitics :

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Rick Santorum isn't used to getting asked the first question of a presidential debate.
Throughout the campaign, he has always been one of the underdogs on stage, before and after his surprising Iowa victory, and the former Pennsylvania senator has often faded in the glow of other candidates.

Read the whole story: RealClearPolitics

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/27/rick-santorum-i-wish-i-ma_n_1236266.html

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UK refinery of Petroplus back in production (AP)

LONDON ? The British refinery owned by collapsed Swiss energy company Petroplus Holdings has resumed shipments to customers, while authorities in France are investigating possible misuse of funds by the company.

Delivery trucks were rolling Thursday from Coryton refinery near London ? which accounts for about 10 percent of Britain's refinery output ? for the first time since the British subsidiary was placed in administration two days earlier.

In the French city of Nanterre, an official said have opened an investigation into suspected bankruptcy through misuse of funds at a French unit of Petroplus.

The probe centers on suspicions that a bank account of Petroplus-France was stripped of about euro100 million ($129 million) in funds.

Petroplus said on Wednesday that it had begun various forms of insolvency proceedings in Switzerland, France and Germany.

The company said a court had appointed Jaffe Rechtsanwaelte Insolvenzverwalter as administrator of the German operations. In France, FHB Administrateurs Judiciaires is administering the Petroplus operations.

Petroplus said it had filed in Switzerland for composition proceedings, a form of bankruptcy in which the company claims it acted in good faith.

Petroplus, Europe's largest independent oil refiner, filed for insolvency after failing to agree with its lenders on its $1.75 billion credit line. The company reported a net loss of $413 million in the first nine months of last year.

The company had announced on Dec. 30 that it would temporarily shut down its French and Belgian refineries "given limited credit availability and the economic climate in Europe."

Trading in the Petroplus shares had been suspended on Monday.

Refinery profitability has been squeezed as operating expenses and the cost of crude oil rose faster than the value of the products, and the economic slowdown in Europe has added to the pressure.

A survey by energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie in 2010 found that 29 of 96 refineries in the European Union did not generate a positive net cash margin.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/britain/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_on_bi_ge/eu_britain_petroplus

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Candidates gush about wives as ideal first ladies

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) ? Winning the White House is a package deal, so the Republican presidential candidates are eager to talk up their spouses as ideal first ladies.

Each of the four contenders was asked during Thursday night's debate why his wife would be strong in the role.

Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum highlight their decades-long marriages and describe their spouses as wonderful mothers.

Romney says wife Ann's past battles with multiple sclerosis and breast cancer would make her an ambassador on health causes.

Gingrich, the only candidate married more than once, says his third wife, Callista, is a patron of the arts who has film production and children's books to her credit.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2012-01-26-GOP-Debate-First%20Lady/id-9d7459680a7c4f3ab90d309e0ad522a5

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Kelly Rowland Brags About Relationships With Beyonce, Blue Ivy Carter

Kelly Rowland has been spending time with her BFF Beyonce and the most awesomest baby in the world (Blue Ivy Carter) and is making sure we know about it.

In a recent interview, Bey's former Destiny's Child collaborator gushed about just how beautiful Beyonce and Jay-Z's newborn is, as well as how perfect they are.

Gushed may be an understatement, actually.

"She is just…. more precious than a diamond. She is so stunning. So beautiful. I'm so happy for my sister and her husband. She's beautiful," said Kel of Blue.

They're not actually sisters, but we get the point. Kelly was asked if she's been visiting the baby often. She saod: "Absolutely! You have to be a good aunt!"

Again, not technically Blue's aunt. But point taken.

Kelly went on to say that basically, Jay and Bey are the best parents of ALL TIME (where's Kanye when you need him) and that Blue Ivy is the Messiah.

"She's in mommy-vile and her husband is in daddy-vile, and the baby is SO beautiful! Beyonce is an incredible mother. I'm so proud of her, so proud."

We have no doubt she's sincere, but one gets the sense she's trying to prove something as well. We get it, Kel. Bey rules. And you're friends. But ease up.

[Photo: WENN.com]

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2012/01/kelly-rowland-brags-about-relationships-with-beyonce-blue-ivy-ca/

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Giffords a reality check in chamber of politics (AP)

WASHINGTON ? The chair between Reps. Jeff Flake and Raul Grijalva stood empty at last year's State of the Union address, reserved for their colleague, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. They could hardly have imagined that just one year later she would actually be able to join them one more time.

The two Arizona lawmakers said it was an emotional ride watching Giffords enter the House for only the second time since she was shot in the head last January and just one day before she tenders her resignation so that she can focus on her recovery.

"There was a bit of sadness, but it was kind of uplifting to see what this young woman has done to get herself where she is now. I have nothing but admiration for what's she's done," said Grijalva, a Democratic lawmaker who represents an adjacent congressional district in Southern Arizona.

Giffords was greeted with cheers of "Gabby, Gabby" from many of her colleagues after entering the House chamber. Flake watched as Supreme Court justices, cabinet members and President Barack Obama greeted her. Obama gave Giffords a long embrace and the two swayed from side to side as they hugged.

"It was just a very special experience to be there," said Flake, a Republican who is running for the U.S. Senate seat that Giffords may have challenged him for had she not been wounded. "Knowing what she has gone through, it's just incredibly special. We all know she has given 100 percent."

Limping a little, Giffords beamed around the chamber and raised her left hand to wave. Rep. Louis Gohmert, R-Texas, approached with two bags of chocolate, which Giffords took, grinning.

She looked to the gallery to wave at her husband, astronaut Mark Kelly. When First Lady Michelle Obama took her seat next to him, she waved, too.

She has inspired gestures of bipartisanship. Last year, in the tender days after the shooting, members of both parties sat together across the chamber, rather than Democrats to the president's right and Republicans to his left. Many lawmakers did the same this year.

Throughout the speech, Flake, sitting at Giffords' side, repeatedly helped her stand as her fellow Democrats applauded Obama. Grijalva said he sensed that she was getting tired toward the end of the night.

Giffords' presence may be the only element about the event above politics.

Obama used the highest-profile pulpit in the land to reclaim the spotlight from Republicans battling for the right to face him in the general election. He was speaking to a Congress cranky after a year of the bitterest partisan fighting in recent memory.

But the political subtext seems trivial compared with the wrenching journey Giffords has traveled from the shooting a year ago in Tucson to the House chamber Tuesday night. The shootings left six dead, Giffords recovering from a bullet wound to the head and 12 others injured.

She has since regained a halting ability to speak and walk on her own. She was so disgusted about the way Congress was handling the debate over whether to raise the nation's debt ceiling in August that she made a surprise appearance in the House chamber to cast her vote.

Giffords earned a reputation as someone who tried to reach common ground with her opponents. Grijalva said that even she would have struggled over the past year.

"One of her wonderful legacies is she tried to build consensus. With the emergence of the tea party in the House, she herself would have found it difficult to gain consensus," Grijalva said.

Still, Flake said he believes her example had helped lawmakers to strive to work together more, at least within the Arizona delegation.

Giffords will vote on one last bill, a measure she co-authored to impose tougher penalties on smugglers who use small, low-flying aircraft to avoid radar detection and bring drugs across the Mexican border.

Her office said in a press release that she will then submit her resignation letter.

Giffords' ends her resignation letter with the words: "Every day I am working hard. I will recover and will return and we will work together again for Arizona and for all Americans."

___

Associated Press writer Laurie Kellman contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/uscongress/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120125/ap_on_go_co/us_state_of_the_union_color

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Former White House candidate Bachmann to seek Congress (reuters)

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TV audience drops for Obama's State of Union speech (Reuters)

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) ? Almost 38 million Americans watched President Barack Obama's State of the Union speech live on television - about 5 million fewer than in 2011, according to TV ratings figures on Wednesday.

The Nielsen company said Obama's speech on Tuesday night, in which he defended his record while demanding higher taxes on the wealthy, was carried live on 14 networks, and was seen by 37.7 million TV viewers.

Last year, the TV audience for the address was 42.7 million, while 48 million watched Obama deliver his first State of the Union speech in 2010.

(Reporting By Jill Serjeant; Editing by Eric Walsh)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120125/tv_nm/us_usa_obama_speech_tv

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U.S. housing more affordable than other English countries: study (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? Would-be American home-buyers can take heart: U.S. housing is more affordable than in other English-speaking countries, according to a study of metropolitan areas around the world.

The median home price in the United States as a whole was three times pre-tax household income in the third quarter of 2011, on the cusp of what Demographia, a public policy firm which conducted the survey, deems "affordable."

In major U.S. metropolitan areas, the ratio was 3.1, down from 4.6 in 2007, before the worst of the U.S. housing market slump that dragged the economy into recession, and 3.3 in 2010.

Detroit, at 1.4 times, was the most affordable big city in any of the 325 areas surveyed in six countries and in the Chinese territory of Hong Kong.

In contrast, the index was 12.6 in Hong Kong, by far the priciest market. And Canada, despite being larger in size than the United States with just one ninth of the population, continues to grow less affordable.

A ratio of 3 or less is considered "affordable," according to Demographia which surveyed 325 metropolitan areas in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, the U.K., the United States, Canada and Hong Kong.

"The bubble is over - prices have continued to decline. We have housing prices back to where they're supposed to be," said Wendell Cox, principal of Demographia which is based in Belleville, Illinois.

Not everywhere in the United States is housing looking like a good deal: the most unaffordable U.S. markets were San Jose (6.9), San Francisco (6.7), San Diego (6.1), New York (6.1), Los Angeles (5.7) and Boston (5.3), according to the survey.

Cox blamed stringent land use regulations for choking supply in many of the "unaffordable" U.S. markets, driving up prices.

Signs have appeared in recent months that the U.S. housing slump may have touched bottom and economists mostly expect prices to remain flat in 2012 before small gains next year.

After Hong Kong, Australia's major cities were the most expensive at 6.7 times pretax median household income, followed by New Zealand at 6.4 and Britain at 5.0.

(Reporting By Phil Wahba; Editing by Kim Coghill)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/us/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120123/bs_nm/us_usa_realestate

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Lana Del Rey's Born To Die Leaks

A quick listen to her much-discussed major-label debut finds an artist going big, often.
By James Montgomery

Lana Del Rey in "Born To Die"
Photo: Interscope

You remember that meme from a couple years back about how everything seems more epic when it's set to Sigur Rós music? That's a pretty nice way of summing up how I feel about Lana Del Rey's Born to Die album, which leaked Tuesday (January 24) and which you may very well be listening to on your computer/ mobile device at this very moment.

Simply put, it is a record that is positively brimming with atmospherics — soaring, sonorous strings, echoing electronic boom-bap, morose, maudlin guitar crescendos — all of which imbue it with a truly epic (if not unnecessarily dramatic) scope. Del Rey's critics will undoubtedly point out that scope as nothing more than cover for her perceived shortcomings as a performer, but it still makes Born to Die a rather thrilling headphones experience. This is an album that sounds like it cost a million bucks to make — mostly because it probably did.

This is not to say that Born to Die is a bad album — far from it. In fact, it's certainly w-a-a-y better than most would've expected (tellingly, even less will admit to that fact), and Del Rey does showcase some rather deft songwriting prowess — or at least a knack for penning a catchy chorus — particularly on the album's few bright moments, like "Off to the Races," "Diet MTN Dew" and "Radio."

The majority of the tracks you've already heard — "Born to Die," "Blue Jeans," Video Games," — are prominently placed at the front of the album, and the back half does tend to drag a bit, though, aside from all the additional ephemera (which does leave the album sounding a bit same-y, not to mention cribbed from the Portishead playbook, circa 1997), those are perhaps my biggest criticisms about the album.

Other folks, of course, may have a different opinion. The biggest dart fired at Del Rey seems to be her perceived lack of authenticity, and it's admittedly difficult not to think of criticism like that when she's cooing lines like "Every time I close my eyes/ It's like a dark paradise." Particularly on an album where she spends so much time singing about material excesses (top-shelf booze, glimmering swimming pools, fashion, etc.). Still, no matter how you view her, you've got to give Del Rey and her team credit for creating an album that fills the room and the headphones. Regardless of how they got to this point, it's been a pretty compelling thing to watch come together.

Have you checked out Lana Del Rey's debut album yet? Share your thoughts in the comments!

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1677852/lana-del-rey-born-to-die-leaks.jhtml

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Croatia says 'yes' to EU membership

Croatia's president Ivo Josipovic, center, prime minister Zoran Milanovic, left, and the Parliament speaker Boris Sprem make a toast upon hearing unofficial results of the referendum, at the Croatian Parliament in Zagreb, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. Croatians voted Sunday in favor of joining the European Union despite a poor turnout for the referendum, a sign of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost its appeal within countries aspiring to join. (AP Photo)

Croatia's president Ivo Josipovic, center, prime minister Zoran Milanovic, left, and the Parliament speaker Boris Sprem make a toast upon hearing unofficial results of the referendum, at the Croatian Parliament in Zagreb, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. Croatians voted Sunday in favor of joining the European Union despite a poor turnout for the referendum, a sign of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost its appeal within countries aspiring to join. (AP Photo)

A member of the electoral counts the ballots at a polling station in Zagreb, Croatia, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012.Croatians voted Sunday in a referendum on whether to join the European Union ??? a test of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost in its appeal among aspiring new members because of its crisis. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

A member of the electoral commission empties the ballot box at a polling station in Zagreb, Croatia, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012.Croatians voted Sunday in a referendum on whether to join the European Union ??? a test of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost in its appeal among aspiring new members because of its crisis. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

Members of the electoral commission count ballots at a polling station in Zagreb, Croatia, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012.Croatians voted Sunday in a referendum on whether to join the European Union ??? a test of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost in its appeal among aspiring new members because of its crisis. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

Members of the electoral commission count ballots at a polling station in Zagreb, Croatia, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012.Croatians voted Sunday in a referendum on whether to join the European Union ??? a test of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost in its appeal among aspiring new members because of its crisis. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) ? Croatians voted Sunday in favor of joining the European Union despite a poor turnout for the referendum ? a sign of how much the debt-stricken 27-nation bloc has lost its appeal within countries aspiring to join.

Croatia's state referendum commission said that with nearly all ballots counted, about 66 percent of those who took part in the referendum answered "yes" to the question: "Do you support the membership of the Republic of Croatia in the European Union?"

About 33 percent were against, while the rest of the ballots were invalid. About 47 percent of eligible voters took part in the referendum, illustrating voters' apathy toward the EU. That compares to 84 percent who voted in a referendum for Croatia's independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1992.

"The people are obviously tired," Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic said. "It would have been better that the turnout was larger, but that's reality."

It was among the lowest turnouts in any of the EU states that have held accession referendums before they joined. Nearly 46 percent took part in the vote in Hungary, while more than 90 percent voted in Malta.

Milanovic said: "This is a historic decision, the turning point in our history, as from now on, everything, including success or failure, depends only on us."

The EU congratulated Croatians on their vote, saying it's good news for the whole Balkan region.

"The upcoming accession of Croatia sends a clear signal to the whole region of southeastern Europe," it said in a statement. "It shows that through political courage and determined reforms, EU membership is within reach."

Croatian anti-EU activists were furious.

"The turnout shows that Croatia has turned its back on the EU," said war veteran Zeljko Sacic, who led a campaign against membership. "This referendum is illegitimate. We will never recognize it."

Croatia signed an EU accession treaty last year and will become its 28th member in July 2013 after all the bloc's states ratify the deal.

The Croats were deeply divided before the referendum.

Those who were for the EU say their Balkan country's troubled economy ? burdened by recession, a euro48-billion ($61-billion) foreign debt and a 17 percent unemployment rate ? will revive because of access to wider European markets and job opportunities that the membership should bring.

"It's a big moment in our history ... we are joining more successful countries in Europe," Croatia's President Ivo Josipovic said after casting his ballot. "I'm happy that Europe will become my home."

Opponents said Croatia has nothing to gain by entering the bloc, which is fighting off the bankruptcy of some of its members. They said that Croatia will lose its sovereignty and the national identity it fought for in a war for independence from Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

"I voted against, because I don't think we'll do well in the EU," said university student Matea Kolenc, 23. "I heard a lot of bad things about the EU, its economic situation and what it has to offer."

The Balkan nation started negotiating its EU entry six years ago, but since then the popularity of the bloc has faded, as Croats realized that EU membership would not automatically lead to prosperity.

Many in Croatia ? and the rest of the EU ? also wonder what is the bloc going to gain from the country, which is rife with corruption and has economic woes that are among the deepest in the Balkans.

Croatia's credit rating was last year reduced to a step above junk by ratings agency Standard & Poor's which cited its deteriorating fiscal position and external financing for its decision. If it enters the EU in 2013, Croatia won't be adopting the euro currency for several more years, and is unlikely to contribute to its further plunge.

In a sign of deep divisions in Croatia over the membership, police clashed Saturday in downtown Zagreb with a group of nationalist protesters who attempted to take down an EU flag.

Numerous anti-EU graffiti, some saying "Stop the Destruction, No to EU," appeared Sunday on the walls of voting stations in the Croatian Adriatic coast port of Split, the hotbed of nationalists. Police covered the signs with white paint.

Croatian officials, who have launched a pro-EU campaign before the referendum, warned that a "no" vote would have deprived the country of the much-needed accession funds, and that even the payment of pensions for retirees and war veterans could be in jeopardy.

Croatia has received around euro150 million ($193 million) in pre-accession assistance since 2007. It is to receive another euro150 million for 2012 and euro95 million ($122 million) in 2013.

Croatia's pro-government media have also tried to scare Croatians by saying that if they reject the EU, they would have to return to some sort of a Balkan union with their former wartime foe, Serbia, which has been struggling to gain a candidacy status in the bloc.

The approval rating for EU membership has also dropped to 52 percent in Serbia because of Germany's conditioning for the candidacy with the de facto recognizing of the independence of its former Kosovo province which declared independence in 2008.

___

Eldar Emric contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2012-01-22-EU-Croatia-EU-Referendum/id-9d9fdb1d3d7849a19121bbd8968da25f

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Carbon dioxide is 'driving fish crazy'

Saturday, January 21, 2012

Rising human carbon dioxide emissions may be affecting the brains and central nervous system of sea fishes with serious consequences for their survival, an international scientific team has found.

Carbon dioxide concentrations predicted to occur in the ocean by the end of this century will interfere with fishes' ability to hear, smell, turn and evade predators, says Professor Phillip Munday of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and James Cook University.

"For several years our team have been testing the performance of baby coral fishes in sea water containing higher levels of dissolved CO2 ? and it is now pretty clear that they sustain significant disruption to their central nervous system, which is likely to impair their chances of survival," Prof. Munday says.

In their latest paper, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, Prof. Munday and colleagues report world-first evidence that high CO2 levels in sea water disrupts a key brain receptor in fish, causing marked changes in their behaviour and sensory ability.

"We've found that elevated CO2 in the oceans can directly interfere with fish neurotransmitter functions, which poses a direct and previously unknown threat to sea life," Prof. Munday says.

Prof. Munday and his colleagues began by studying how baby clown and damsel fishes performed alongside their predators in CO2-enriched water. They found that, while the predators were somewhat affected, the baby fish suffered much higher rates of attrition.

"Our early work showed that the sense of smell of baby fish was harmed by higher CO2 in the water ? meaning they found it harder to locate a reef to settle on or detect the warning smell of a predator fish. But we suspected there was much more to it than the loss of ability to smell."

The team then examined whether fishes' sense of hearing ? used to locate and home in on reefs at night, and avoid them during the day ? was affected. "The answer is, yes it was. They were confused and no longer avoided reef sounds during the day. Being attracted to reefs during daylight would make them easy meat for predators."

Other work showed the fish also tended to lose their natural instinct to turn left or right ? an important factor in schooling behaviour which also makes them more vulnerable, as lone fish are easily eaten by predators.

"All this led us to suspect it wasn't simply damage to their individual senses that was going on ? but rather, that higher levels of carbon dioxide were affecting their whole central nervous system."

The team's latest research shows that high CO2 directly stimulates a receptor in the fish brain called GABA-A, leading to a reversal in its normal function and over-excitement of certain nerve signals.

While most animals with brains have GABA-A receptors, the team considers the effects of elevated CO2 are likely to be most felt by those living in water, as they have lower blood CO2 levels normally. The main impact is likely to be felt by some crustaceans and by most fishes, especially those which use a lot of oxygen.

Prof. Munday said that around 2.3 billion tonnes of human CO2 emissions dissolve into the world's oceans every year, causing changes in the chemical environment of the water in which fish and other species live.

"We've now established it isn't simply the acidification of the oceans that is causing disruption ? as is the case with shellfish and plankton with chalky skeletons ? but the actual dissolved CO2 itself is damaging the fishes' nervous systems."

The work shows that fish with high oxygen consumption are likely to be most affected, suggesting the effects of high CO2 may impair some species worse than others ? possibly including important species targeted by the world's fishing industries.

###

ARC Centre of Excellence in Coral Reef Studies: http://www.coralcoe.org.au/

Thanks to ARC Centre of Excellence in Coral Reef Studies for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/116913/Carbon_dioxide_is__driving_fish_crazy_

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Romney and Gingrich refuse to move dueling events (AP)

GREENVILLE, S.C. ? Rival presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich are set to appear at the same breakfast restaurant at the same time on the day of the South Carolina primary.

Both campaigns said Friday they will not change schedules that, by coincidence, have the dueling candidates visiting Tommy's Country Ham House in Greenville at 10:45 a.m. EST.

Romney and Gingrich are locked in a nasty, neck-and-neck fight to win the first-in-the-South primary. They have criticized each other repeatedly on the debate stage, in TV ads, on the radio, in mail and in telephone calls.

Gingrich has surged ahead in recent days, eating into Romney's lead in polls and threatening what had appeared to be a swift march to the nomination.

Romney campaign spokesman Rick Gorka called the scheduling a "pure coincidence and we are not changing our schedule."

Gingrich campaign spokesman Nathan Naidu said Gingrich's schedule came out first and that Gingrich is "more than happy to treat Gov. Romney to ham at our event."

___

Associated Press writer Shannon McCaffrey in Charleston, S.C., contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/gop/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120121/ap_on_el_pr/us_romney_gingrich

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Van Jones: Obama Must Choose on Housing: A Sweetheart Deal for the 1% or a Fair Deal for the 99%

Rumor has it that on Monday, after months of negotiation with big banks, the White House may announce a settlement that would let the banks off the hook for their role in the foreclosure crisis -- paying a tiny fraction of what's needed in exchange for blanket immunity from future lawsuits.

We hope these rumors are untrue.

President Obama has the ability to stop and change the direction of this sweetheart deal. He should reject any deal that benefits the one percent and lets the big banks get away with their crimes. Instead, the president should stand with the 99 percent and push for real accountability and a solution that will help millions of people in this country.

Here are the hard facts about the housing crisis we face:

• 3.5 million Americans are homeless.
• 18.5 million homes sit vacant.
• Since 2007, more than 7.5 million homes have been foreclosed.

Default and foreclosure rates are now several times higher than at any time since the Great Depression.

If President Obama is serious about solving this crisis, he must ensure three things:

First: The banks must pay a minimum $300 billion in principal reduction for homeowners with underwater mortgages and/or restitution for foreclosed-on families. This is essential. Every effort to date to reboot the housing market has failed because it has not done the most essential thing -- actually reduce the massive debt load carried by homeowners.

As it stands, the deal likely to be announced Monday would have the banks pay only $20 billion, an astonishingly small fraction of what's needed. Add up all the underwater homes in America, and there's an estimated $700 billion in negative equity in the country, according to a recent study. If banks fix what they broke and write down principals for all underwater mortgages, this would free up millions of people to pump billions of dollars back into local economies, create jobs, and ultimately generate revenue to help invest in things that will help our economy grow.

Second: There must be a full-fledged, full-blown investigation into Wall Street financial fraud by the Department of Justice. There should be a task force with the staff resources, the authority, and the explicit mission of seriously investigating fraudulent behavior in the way home mortgages were securitized.

Reports of the current deal suggest banks could walk away without any actual investigation into their role in the housing crisis.

Third: There should be no civil or criminal immunity for the banks from future lawsuits. That means there should be no broad release of claims in any current or future negotiation or settlement.

The banks must pay to help solve the crisis they played such a big role in creating. They can afford it.

U.S. banks raked in $35 billion in profits last summer alone and are currently sitting on a historically high level of cash reserves of $1.64 trillion. The six biggest banks -- Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley -- hold assets totaling $9.5 trillion; and together paid an income tax rate of only 11% in 2009 and 2010, far below the federally mandated 35% corporate tax rate.

And that's not all. Despite their bleak performance this year, the nation's top six banks paid out $144 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2011, second only to the record $147 billion they paid out in 2007 at the height of the economic boom.

While banks enjoy record profits and the prospect of total immunity, millions of Americans are drowning in underwater mortgages.

Everyday people are already out front, fighting against the malfeasance of the banks; the White House should stand with them. Our national leaders need look no farther than Atlanta, GA, for an instructive profile in courage. Earlier this month, a community church in Dr. Martin Luther King's old neighborhood refused to be ignored. In 2008, a tornado devastated the historic, 108-year-old Higher Ground Empowerment Center church, and they were forced to take out a loan to cover repairs. The loan went underwater and became harder and harder to pay back. For nearly four years, the church asked the bank to modify their loan, but BB&T bank ignored them. Instead, last week, the bank started to evict the church. Sound familiar? Anyone with an underwater mortgage can tell you: banks these days just can't seem to treat their own customers with decency and manners.

However, after Occupy Atlanta staged a high-profile press conference, and 65,000 people signed a national petition by Rebuild the Dream, the church got BB&T bank to agree to modify their loan to something affordable and reasonable.

This happy ending is, unfortunately, the rare exception. BB&T, after being shaken to their senses (and shamed in the media), came to the table and did the right thing. But millions of homeowners have no way to stage protests and press conferences. Abuse, fraud, conflicts of interest, and lawlessness have been endemic at every stage of the mortgage origination and foreclosure process. This chain of misconduct by many of the nation's largest financial companies is at the root of the foreclosure avalanche and it's time to demand a course of action that will resolve the current crisis and create jobs in the future.

If these folks in Atlanta can show this level of courage in standing up to a big bank, then certainly Obama and state attorneys general can show the same courage.

The banks got their bailout. Now we need a strong and fair settlement to help Americans drowning in underwater mortgages.

Van Jones is the co-founder and president of Rebuild the Dream, a new national organization working to fix America's economy and restore our democracy.

George Goehl is the executive director of National People's Action, a network of metropolitan and statewide membership organizations dedicated to advancing economic and racial justice. National People's Action is a leading organization within a national coalition called New Bottom Line that challenges established big bank interests on behalf of struggling and middle-class communities.

?

Follow Van Jones on Twitter: www.twitter.com/VanJones68

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/van-jones/obama-housing_b_1221921.html

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CDC: U.S. Obesity Rates Temporarily Stabilized (ContributorNetwork)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Tuesday that obesity rates in the U.S. appear to have reached a plateau, at least for now. The CDC's reports indicated that both adult and child overall obesity rates have not significantly increased since 2003, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Here are some of the key details from the CDC's latest reports and obesity statistics.

* The CDC's findings were part of two separate reports, one focusing on the obesity rate in U.S. adults and the other focusing on the obesity rates among American children. Both have been published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

* The report on obesity in adults, "Prevalence of Obesity and Trends in Body Mass Index Among U.S. Adults, 1999-2010," concluded that rates plateaued between 2009-2010 at approximately 35.5 percent for men and 35.8 percent for women.

* While the overall rate of obesity among women has remained essentially the same over the last decade, specific groups have seen increases, particularly Mexican American and non-Hispanic black women.

* The rate of obesity among men remained essentially the same across all groups.

* This leveling off follows more than two decades of marked increases in the rate of obesity in U.S. adults. From 1976 to 1999, the rate had increased by approximately 16 percent.

* The CDC's report on obesity among children, "Prevalence of Obesity and Trends in Body Mass Index Among U.S. Children and Adolescents, 1999-2010," found that the rate of obesity in children had leveled off between 2009-2010 to remain at approximately 16.9 percent.

* Obesity levels did increase significantly among male children between 1999-2010, but not among female children. This is the first time that the obesity rate among male children was found to be higher than among female children.

* These obesity percentages translate into roughly 78 million adults and 13 million children, according to MSNBC.

* The CDC reports are based on health surveys that are conducted across the United States every two years. The most recent report, from 2009-2010, included some 6,000 adults and 4,000 children. Children are charted from infancy all the way up to age 19.

* In addition to the number of adults and children whose BMI indicated that they are obese, another 33 percent of adults and 15 percent of children had a BMI ranking that indicated that they are overweight.

* Obesity raises a person's risk of developing diabetes, heart disease, sleep apnea, stroke, and some cancers, among other health issues, according to a related report by Business Week.

Vanessa Evans is a musician and freelance writer based in Michigan, with a lifelong interest in health and nutrition issues.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/weightloss/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20120119/hl_ac/10854571_cdc_us_obesity_rates_temporarily_stabilized

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Yemen officials: Saleh to depart for Oman

FILE - In this Friday, April 8, 2011 file photo, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh reacts while looking at his supporters, not pictured, during a rally supporting him, in Sanaa,Yemen. Yemeni officials say outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh will leave soon to Oman, en route to medical treatment in the United States. Washington has been trying to get Saleh out of Yemen _ though not to settle in the U.S. _ to allow a peaceful transition from his rule. However, there appear to be differences whether Saleh would remain in exile. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen, File)

FILE - In this Friday, April 8, 2011 file photo, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh reacts while looking at his supporters, not pictured, during a rally supporting him, in Sanaa,Yemen. Yemeni officials say outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh will leave soon to Oman, en route to medical treatment in the United States. Washington has been trying to get Saleh out of Yemen _ though not to settle in the U.S. _ to allow a peaceful transition from his rule. However, there appear to be differences whether Saleh would remain in exile. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen, File)

Members of Yemen's parliament raise their hands to vote on the immunity law for Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh at the House of Representatives in Sanaa, Yemen, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012. Yemen's parliament approved on Saturday a law that it said would limit immunity for officials who worked under President Ali Abdullah Saleh to "political" crimes they committed in an official capacity. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed)

Members of Yemen's parliament raise their hands to vote on the immunity law for Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh at the House of Representatives in Sanaa, Yemen, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012. Yemen's parliament approved on Saturday a law that it said would limit immunity for officials who worked under President Ali Abdullah Saleh to "political" crimes they committed in an official capacity. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed)

Yemen Minister of Defense Mohammed Nasser Ali, center, attends a session on an immunity law for President Ali Abdullah Saleh at the House of Representatives in Sanaa, Yemen, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012. Yemen's parliament approved on Saturday a law that it said would limit immunity for officials who worked under President Ali Abdullah Saleh to "political" crimes they committed in an official capacity. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed)

FILE - In this Saturday, Oct. 8, 2011 file image made from video, Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh speaks on Yemen State Television. Yemeni officials say outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh will leave soon to Oman, en route to medical treatment in the United States. Washington has been trying to get Saleh out of Yemen _ though not to settle in the U.S. _ to allow a peaceful transition from his rule. However, there appear to be differences whether Saleh would remain in exile.(AP Photo/Yemen State TV, File)

SANAA, Yemen (AP) ? Outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh will leave soon to Oman, en route to medical treatment in the United States, Yemeni officials said on Saturday, part of an American effort to get the embattled strongman out of the country to allow a peaceful transition from his rule.

Washington has been trying for weeks to find a country where Saleh can live in exile, since it does not want him to settle permanently in the United States. The mercurial president, who has ruled for more than 33 years, has repeatedly gone back and forth on whether he would leave.

The officials' comments Saturday suggested Oman, Yemen's neighbor, could be a potential home for him. Three officials said he would go, but they were divided on whether he would remain in exile in Oman or return to Yemen after treatment. His return, even if he no longer holds the post of president, could mean continued turmoil for the impoverished nation at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.

After nearly a year of protests demanding his ouster, Saleh in November handed his powers over to his vice president and agreed to step down. A unity government between his party and the opposition has since been created. However, Saleh ? still formally the president ? has continued to influence politics from behind the scenes through his family and loyalists in power positions.

The U.S. does not want to take him in, concerned it would be seen by Yemenis as harboring a leader they say has blood on his hands for the killings of protesters. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates already have rejected Saleh, American officials said.

Senior ruling party figure Mohammed al-Shayef told The Associated Press that Saleh would travel "in the coming days" to Oman, then head to the United States for treatment of wounds he suffered in an June assassination attempt.

After treatment, Saleh would return to Yemen to head his People's Congress Party, said al-Shayef, who is also a prominent tribal leader. Another top party official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk of the plans, gave the same itinerary, though he said Saleh would pass through Ethiopia en route from Oman to the U.S.

Saleh himself has spoken in recent weeks of working as an opposition politician after he leaves the presidency.

However, an official in the prime minister's office said Saleh "is supposed" to return to Oman to stay after his U.S. treatment is completed.

The official said Saleh's powerful son Ahmed was currently in Oman, arranging a residence for his father. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk the press. It did not seem that Ahmed, who commands the elite Republican Guard that has been at the forefront of the crackdown on protests, would remain in Oman.

The unity government has been struggling to establish its authority in the face of Saleh's continuing strength in the country. Like Saleh's son Ahmed, Saleh's nephew also commands one of Yemen's best trained and equipped security forces, and the president's loyalists remain in place in the government and bureaucracy.

Saleh agreed to step down under a U.S.-approved and Gulf-mediated accord with the opposition in return for immunity for prosecution.

Yemen's parliament on Saturday approved the immunity law, a key step toward Saleh's formal retirement from his post.

The law grants Saleh complete immunity for any crimes committed during his rule, including the killing of protesters during the uprising against his regime. However, parliament limited the scope of immunity for other regime officials and excluded immunity for terrorism-related crimes.

Initially, the law would have similarly given complete immunity to everyone who served Saleh's governments throughout his rule, sparking a public outcry and a new wave of protests. In response, the law was changed to grant them immunity only on "politically motivated" criminal acts. That apparently would not cover corruption charges.

Most protesters have rejected the accord entirely, saying Saleh should not be given immunity and demanding he be prosecuted.

Human Rights Watch said Saturday in a statement that the law allows senior officials to "get away with murder" and "sends the disgraceful message that there is no consequence for killing those who express dissent."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-01-21-ML-Yemen/id-c3edfc1761b6473d9145340cfdfbd645

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