At least 16 die in Egyptian clashes over death sentences


PORT SAID, Egypt/CAIRO (Reuters) - At least 22 people died on Saturday when Egyptians rampaged in protest at the sentencing of 21 people to death over a soccer stadium disaster, adding to bloody street turmoil confronting Islamist President Mohamed Mursi.


Armored vehicles and military police fanned through the streets of Port Said after the violence. The state news agency quoted a general as saying the military aimed to "establish calm and stability in Port Said and to protect public institutions".


The unrest began with nationwide rallies on Friday to mark the second anniversary of the overthrow of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, a democratic uprising that protesters now accuse Mursi of betraying by ramming through an Islamist-hued constitution.


While anniversary-related violence subsided, a new flare-up hit Port Said after a court sentenced 21 men to die for involvement in the deaths of 74 people after a local soccer match on February 1, 2012, many of them fans of the visiting team.


Residents ran wildly through the streets of Port Said in rage that men from their city had been blamed for the stadium disaster, and gunshots were reported near the prison where most of the defendants were being held.


State television, citing the Health Ministry, said 22 people were killed and more than 200 wounded. Security sources said at least two of the dead were policemen.


A witness said some men stormed a police station in Port Said, where protesters lit tires in the street, sending black smoke funneling into the air.


At least nine people were killed in clashes with police on Friday, mainly in the port of Suez where the army has also deployed. Hundreds were injured as police rained down tear gas on protesters armed with stones and some with petrol bombs.


The schism between Islamists and secular Egyptians is hurting efforts by Mursi, freely elected in June, to revive an economy in crisis and reverse a slide in Egypt's currency.


The political strife and lack of security that has blighted the Arab world's most populous country over much of the post-Mubarak era is casting a chilling shadow over a parliamentary election expected to start in April.


Highlighting tensions, the opposition National Salvation Front coalition called for a government of national unity and an early presidential vote among other demands. It said it would call for more protests next Friday and could boycott the parliamentary election if its demands are not met.


Mursi's opponents say he has failed to deliver on economic pledges or be a president representing the full political and communal diversity of Egyptians, as he pledged.


His supporters say his critics do not respect the democracy that has given Egypt its first freely elected leader.


VICTIMS' RELATIVES CHEER


At the Port Said soccer stadium a year ago, many spectators were crushed and witnesses saw some thrown off balconies after the match between Cairo's Al Ahly and local team al-Masri.


Families of victims in court cheered and wept for joy when Judge Sobhy Abdel Maguid read a list of 21 names "referred to the Mufti", a phrase used to denote execution, as all death sentences must be reviewed by Egypt's top religious authority.


A total of 73 people have been standing trial. Other rulings will be issued on March 9, the judge said.


One relative in the court shouted: "God is greatest." Outside the Al Ahly club in Cairo, fans also cheered. They had threatened more violence unless the death penalty was meted out.


Thousands took to the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and other cities on Friday to protest against what they call the authoritarianism of Mursi's rule. Protesters in Cairo were again hurling stones at police lines in Cairo on Saturday.


"We want to change the president and the government. We are tired of this regime. Nothing has changed," said Mahmoud Suleiman, 22, in Cairo's Tahrir Square, the cauldron of the 2011 anti-Mubarak revolt and near where youths stoned police.


"PURSUING CRIMINALS"


Ahmed Salama, 28, a protester camped out with dozens of others in Tahrir, said: "The protests will continue until we realize all the demands of the revolution - bread, freedom and social justice."


In a statement in response to Friday's violence, Mursi said the state would not hesitate in "pursuing the criminals and delivering them to justice". He urged Egyptians to respect the principles of the revolution by expressing views peacefully.


The president met on Saturday with the National Defence Council, which includes senior ministers and security officials, to discuss the spate of violence.


In a televised statement, the National Salvation Front said it was holding Mursi responsible.


The Front was formed from disparate groups last year when Mursi awarded himself extra powers and fast-tracked an Islamist-flavored constitution to a referendum, opposed by the Front although the document was passed in the popular vote.


"Egypt will not regain its balance except by a political solution that is transparent and credible, by a government of national salvation to restore order and heal the economy and with a constitution for all Egyptians," prominent opposition politician Mohamed ElBaradei wrote on his Twitter account.


Until the Front was formed, the opposition had struggled to unite and their vote had been split at presidential and parliamentary polls, helping Islamists. The last parliament was dissolved based on court order, demanding a new vote this year.


Mustapha Kamal Al-Sayyid, a professor of political science at Cairo University, said the latest violence reflected the frustration of many liberal-minded Egyptians and others.


"The state of polarization between Islamists and others is most likely to continue and will have a very negative impact on the state's politics, security and economy," he said.


Inspired by the popular uprising in Tunisia, Egypt's revolution spurred further revolts across the Arab world. But the sense of common purpose among Egyptians two years ago has unraveled, triggering bloody street battles last month.


(Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy; Writing by Edmund Blair; Editing by Mark Heinrich)



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Facebook Profile May Expose Mental Illness






A person’s Facebook profile may reveal signs of mental illness that might not necessarily emerge in a session with a psychiatrist, a new study suggests.


“The beauty of social media activity as a tool in psychological diagnosis is that it removes some of the problems associated with patients’ self-reporting,” said study researcher Elizabeth Martin, a psychology doctoral student at the University of Missouri. “For example, questionnaires often depend on a person’s memory, which may or may not be accurate.”






Martin’s team recruited more than 200 college students and had them fill out questionnaires to evaluate their levels of extroversion, paranoia, enjoyment of social interactions, and endorsement of strange beliefs. (For example, they were asked whether they agreed with the statement, “Some people can make me aware of them just by thinking about me.”)


The students also were asked to log onto Facebook. They were told they would have the option to black-out parts of their profile before some of it was printed out for the researchers to examine.


“By asking patients to share their Facebook activity, we were able to see how they expressed themselves naturally,” Martin explained in a statement. “Even the parts of their Facebook activities that they chose to conceal exposed information about their psychological state.”


Participants who showed higher levels of social anhedonia — a condition characterized by lack of pleasure from social interactions — typically had fewer Facebook friends, shared fewer photos, and communicated less frequently on the site, the researchers found.


Meanwhile, those who hid more of their Facebook activity before presenting their profiles to researchers were more likely to hold odd beliefs and show signs of perceptual aberrations, which are irregular experiences of one’s senses. They also exhibited higher levels of paranoia.


“However, it should be noted that participants higher on paranoia did not differ from participants lower in paranoia in terms of the amount of personal information shared,” the researchers wrote in their study detailed Dec. 30, 2012, in the journal Psychiatry Research. That finding suggests this group might be more comfortable sharing information in an online setting than in the face-to-face interactions with the experimenter.


The researchers said information culled from social networking sites potentially could be used to inform diagnostic materials or intervention strategies for people with mental health issues.


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


Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Waiter Michael Garcia Refuses to Serve Man Who Insulted Boy with Down Syndrome















01/26/2013 at 09:00 AM EST



Waiter Michael Garcia made his regular customer Kim Castillo feel like family last week at the Houston restaurant Laurenzo's Prime Rib.

Castillo was eating there with her husband and their 5-year-old son Milo when several waiters came by their table to chat. Milo, who has Down syndrome, has slightly delayed speech. He showed off some new words, while talking about his recent birthday.

The chatter apparently displeased a nearby customer, who, according to NBC affiliate KPRC-TV, said, "Special needs children need to be special somewhere else."

Once Garcia heard the man's comment, "My personal feelings took over, and I told him, 'I'm not going to be able to serve you, Sir,' " he told the news channel. "[I said], 'How could you say that? How could you say that about a beautiful 5-year-old angel?' "

Castillo, "impressed" with Garcia's actions, says the waiter "put [his] job on the line … to stand up for somebody else."

Calling the man who insulted her son, "ignorant," Castillo adds, "I know Michael [stood up for Milo] from his heart, and from reacting to the situation. I don't think he stopped and thought about what he was doing."

Following the incident, Castillo wrote a blog post defending her son.

"Was he loud? Maybe a little in the moment, but honestly, the adults at our table were three times louder than he was," she said. "If he had been obnoxious, which like any other 5-year-old he can be, I wouldn't have thought twice about the family asking to move."

Meanwhile the restaurant's Facebook page has lit up with praise for Garcia and the supportive staff there.

"I am a Father of a special needs child and I applaud you and your employee, Michael Garcia, for standing up to intolerance and helping to educate people who fear the most precious of all children, those with special needs and disabilities," read one post.

He added, "Although I am a resident of California, I work for a [company] headquartered in Texas and am there on occasion for business. I will be sure to drop by and say hello and thank you when in town!"

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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West


New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.


Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.


There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.


___


CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/


Read More..

Wall Street Week Ahead: Bears hibernate as stocks near record highs

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks have been on a tear in January, moving major indexes within striking distance of all-time highs. The bearish case is a difficult one to make right now.


Earnings have exceeded expectations, the housing and labor markets have strengthened, lawmakers in Washington no longer seem to be the roadblock that they were for most of 2012, and money has returned to stock funds again.


The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> has gained 5.4 percent this year and closed above 1,500 - climbing to the spot where Wall Street strategists expected it to be by mid-year. The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> is 2.2 percent away from all-time highs reached in October 2007. The Dow ended Friday's session at 13,895.98, its highest close since October 31, 2007.


The S&P has risen for four straight weeks and eight consecutive sessions, the longest streak of days since 2004. On Friday, the benchmark S&P 500 ended at 1,502.96 - its first close above 1,500 in more than five years.


"Once we break above a resistance level at 1,510, we dramatically increase the probability that we break the highs of 2007," said Walter Zimmermann, technical analyst at United-ICAP, in Jersey City, New Jersey. "That may be the start of a rise that could take equities near 1,800 within the next few years."


The most recent Reuters poll of Wall Street strategists estimated the benchmark index would rise to 1,550 by year-end, a target that is 3.1 percent away from current levels. That would put the S&P 500 a stone's throw from the index's all-time intraday high of 1,576.09 reached on October 11, 2007.


The new year has brought a sharp increase in flows into U.S. equity mutual funds, and that has helped stocks rack up four straight weeks of gains, with strength in big- and small-caps alike.


That's not to say there aren't concerns. Economic growth has been steady, but not as strong as many had hoped. The household unemployment rate remains high at 7.8 percent. And more than 75 percent of the stocks in the S&P 500 are above their 26-week highs, suggesting the buying has come too far, too fast.


MUTUAL FUND INVESTORS COME BACK


All 10 S&P 500 industry sectors are higher in 2013, in part because of new money flowing into equity funds. Investors in U.S.-based funds committed $3.66 billion to stock mutual funds in the latest week, the third straight week of big gains for the funds, data from Thomson Reuters' Lipper service showed on Thursday.


Energy shares <.5sp10> lead the way with a gain of 6.6 percent, followed by industrials <.5sp20>, up 6.3 percent. Telecom <.5sp50>, a defensive play that underperforms in periods of growth, is the weakest sector - up 0.1 percent for the year.


More than 350 stocks hit new highs on Friday alone on the New York Stock Exchange. The Dow Jones Transportation Average <.djt> recently climbed to an all-time high, with stocks in this sector and other economic bellwethers posting strong gains almost daily.


"If you peel back the onion a little bit, you start to look at companies like Precision Castparts , Honeywell , 3M Co and Illinois Tool Works - these are big, broad-based industrial companies in the U.S. and they are all hitting new highs, and doing very well. That is the real story," said Mike Binger, portfolio manager at Gradient Investments, in Shoreview, Minnesota.


The gains have run across asset sizes as well. The S&P small-cap index <.spcy> has jumped 6.7 percent and the S&P mid-cap index <.mid> has shot up 7.5 percent so far this year.


Exchange-traded funds have seen year-to-date inflows of $15.6 billion, with fairly even flows across the small-, mid- and large-cap categories, according to Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at the ConvergEx Group, in New York.


"Investors aren't really differentiating among asset sizes. They just want broad equity exposure," Colas said.


The market has shown resilience to weak news. On Thursday, the S&P 500 held steady despite a 12 percent slide in shares of Apple after the iPhone and iPad maker's results. The tech giant is heavily weighted in both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 <.ndx> and in the past, its drop has suffocated stocks' broader gains.


JOBS DATA MAY TEST THE RALLY


In the last few days, the ratio of stocks hitting new highs versus those hitting new lows on a daily basis has started to diminish - a potential sign that the rally is narrowing to fewer names - and could be running out of gas.


Investors have also cited sentiment surveys that indicate high levels of bullishness among newsletter writers, a contrarian indicator, and momentum indicators are starting to also suggest the rally has perhaps come too far.


The market's resilience could be tested next week with Friday's release of the January non-farm payrolls report. About 155,000 jobs are seen being added in the month and the unemployment rate is expected to hold steady at 7.8 percent.


"Staying over 1,500 sends up a flag of profit taking," said Jerry Harris, president of asset management at Sterne Agee, in Birmingham, Alabama. "Since recent jobless claims have made us optimistic on payrolls, if that doesn't come through, it will be a real risk to the rally."


A number of marquee names will report earnings next week, including bellwether companies such as Caterpillar Inc , Amazon.com Inc , Ford Motor Co and Pfizer Inc .


On a historic basis, valuations remain relatively low - the S&P 500's current price-to-earnings ratio sits at 15.66, which is just a tad above the historic level of 15.


Worries about the U.S. stock market's recent strength do not mean the market is in a bubble. Investors clearly don't feel that way at the moment.


"We're seeing more interest in equities overall, and a lot of flows from bonds into stocks," said Paul Zemsky, who helps oversee $445 billion as the New York-based head of asset allocation at ING Investment Management. "We've been increasing our exposure to risky assets."


For the week, the Dow climbed 1.8 percent, the S&P 500 rose 1.1 percent and the Nasdaq advanced 0.5 percent.


(Reporting by Ryan Vlastelica; Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)



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North Korea threatens war with South over U.N. sanctions


SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea threatened to attack rival South Korea if Seoul joined a new round of tightened U.N. sanctions, as Washington unveiled more of its own economic restrictions following Pyongyang's rocket launch last month.


In a third straight day of fiery rhetoric, the North directed its verbal onslaught at its neighbor on Friday, saying: "'Sanctions' mean a war and a declaration of war against us."


The reclusive North has this week declared a boycott of all dialogue aimed at ending its nuclear program and vowed to conduct more rocket and nuclear tests after the U.N. Security Council censured it for a December long-range missile launch.


"If the puppet group of traitors takes a direct part in the U.N. 'sanctions,' the DPRK will take strong physical counter-measures against it," the North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea said, referring to the South.


The committee is the North's front for dealings with the South. DPRK is short for the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.


The U.N. Security Council unanimously condemned North Korea's December rocket launch on Tuesday and expanded existing U.N. sanctions.


On Thursday, the United States slapped economic sanctions on two North Korean bank officials and a Hong Kong trading company that it accused of supporting Pyongyang's proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.


The company, Leader (Hong Kong) International Trading Ltd, was separately blacklisted by the United Nations on Wednesday.


Seoul has said it will look at whether there are any further sanctions that it can implement alongside the United States, but said the focus for now is to follow Security Council resolutions.


The resolution said the council "deplores the violations" by North Korea of its previous resolutions, which banned Pyongyang from conducting further ballistic missile and nuclear tests and from importing materials and technology for those programs. It does not impose new sanctions on Pyongyang.


The United States had wanted to punish North Korea for the rocket launch with a Security Council resolution that imposed entirely new sanctions against Pyongyang, but Beijing rejected that option. China agreed to U.N. sanctions against Pyongyang after North Korea's 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.


NUCLEAR TEST WORRY


North Korea's rhetoric this week amounted to some of the angriest outbursts against the outside world coming under the leadership of Kim Jong-un, who took over after the death of his father Kim Jong-il in late 2011.


On Thursday, the North said it would carry out further rocket launches and a nuclear test, directing its ire at the United States, a country it called its "sworn enemy".


U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the comments were worrying.


"We are very concerned with North Korea's continuing provocative behavior," he said at a Pentagon news conference.


"We are fully prepared ... to deal with any kind of provocation from the North Koreans. But I hope in the end that they determine that it is better to make a choice to become part of the international family."


North Korea is not believed to have the technology to deliver a nuclear warhead capable of hitting the continental United States, although its December launch showed it had the capacity to deliver a rocket that could travel 10,000 km (6,200 miles), potentially putting San Francisco in range, according to an intelligence assessment by South Korea.


South Korea and others who have been closely observing activities at the North's known nuclear test grounds believe Pyongyang is technically ready to go ahead with its third atomic test and awaiting the political decision of its leader.


The North's committee also declared on Friday that a landmark agreement it signed with the South in 1992 on eliminating nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula was invalid, repeating its long-standing accusation that Seoul was colluding with Washington.


The foreign ministry of China, the North's sole remaining major diplomatic and economic benefactor, repeated its call for calm on the Korean peninsula at its daily briefing on Friday.


"The current situation on the Korea peninsula is complicated and sensitive," spokesman Hong Lei said.


"We hope all relevant parties can see the big picture, maintain calm and restraint, further maintain contact and dialogue, and improve relations, while not taking actions to further complicate and escalate the situation," Hong said.


But unusually prickly comments in Chinese state media on Friday hinted at Beijing's exasperation.


"It seems that North Korea does not appreciate China's efforts," said the Global Times in an editorial, a sister publication of the official People's Daily.


"Just let North Korea be 'angry' ... China hopes for a stable peninsula, but it's not the end of the world if there's trouble there. This should be the baseline of China's position."


(Additional reporting by Michael Martina in Beijing; editing by Jeremy Laurence and Raju Gopalakrishnan)



Read More..

Nokia CEO closes the door on a potential Android smartphone






Nokia (NOK) CEO Stephen Elop on Thursday shot down rumors that his company might be interested in developing Android-based smartphones. During Nokia’s fourth-quarter earnings call, the executive reiterated his support for the company’s Asha phones and Microsoft’s (MSFT) Windows Phone platform, while shutting the door on earlier Android rumors.


[More from BGR: Unlocking your smartphone will be illegal starting next week]






“We are clearly innovating with Microsoft around Windows Phone, and are focused on taking that to lower and lower price points,” he said, according to TechCrunch. “You will see that over time [we will] compete with Android. But at the same time we’ve said consistently — and we’re just beginning to see it in the Asha full-touch products — that we will continue to innovate around our Asha smartphone line in order to compete with the very lowest levels of Android.”


[More from BGR: Why the iOS-Android feud is so intense: It’s about core philosophy more than products]


The executive also took shots at Google (GOOG) and the openness of its Android operating system, or lack thereof.


“The situation that Android is facing, where the amount of fragmentation that you’re seeing is increasing as people take it in different directions, is of course offset by Google’s efforts to turn an open ecosystem into something that’s quite a bit more closed as you’ve seen quite recently,” Elop said.


Elop concluded by saying that Nokia is “not in a situation where we are considering something other than Windows Phone combined with what we’re doing with Asha.”


This article was originally published on BGR.com


Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Matt Damon Takes Over Jimmy Kimmel Live















01/25/2013 at 08:00 AM EST







Matt Damon (foreground) and Jimmy Kimmel



Matt Damon more than made up for his decade of being bumped from Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Declaring "I am in command of this ship," Damon not only hijacked the show Thursday night, but he brought along a little big-name help.

Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Nicole Kidman, Demi Moore, Amy Adams, Sally Field, Robert De Niro, Don Cheadle, John Krasinski and Oprah Winfrey all played a part.

Andy Garcia sat in as sidekick. Sheryl Crow led the band.

And where was Kimmel? Oh, he was there, all right: gagged and tied on the back of the set, as Damon took over.

"Just for starters," Damon told the ecstatic in-studio crowd, "let me ask you guys this: As an audience, is it weird to see a person with actual talent host this show?"

Admitting he'd been waiting a long time to do this, Damon – before turning his monologue over to Robin Williams – struck a personal note and said, "This is like the time I lost my virginity, except this is going to last way longer than one second."

Damon, tongue planted firmly in cheek for this all-star publicity stunt – earlier this month, Kimmel's show was moved into direct competition with CBS's David Letterman and NBC's Jay Leno – explained the basis for the Kimmel-Damon feud. The comic always wanted to be an actor, claimed Damon.

"I beat him out for every role he ever truly wanted," said the Bourne series star, now starring with Krasinski in Promised Land. "Jimmy has auditioned for every movie I've ever been in, every single one of them. How many did he get? None. So, he hates me."

Then there was the matter of Kimmel's ex, comedian Sarah Silverman, who in 2008 memorably sang a song about cheating with Matt Damon. (Kimmel retaliated at the time by saying he was "dating" Ben Affleck.) Silverman just happened to be Thursday night's guest.

"Is there anything you'd like to say to Jimmy?" Damon asked her, with Kimmel still held firmly in place, squirming. "He's a captive audience."

Replied Silverman: "No, I'm good."

Check out another hilarious moment with Affleck, who trick Damon into saying something nice about his captive:

Read More..

Penalty could keep smokers out of health overhaul


WASHINGTON (AP) — Millions of smokers could be priced out of health insurance because of tobacco penalties in President Barack Obama's health care law, according to experts who are just now teasing out the potential impact of a little-noted provision in the massive legislation.


The Affordable Care Act — "Obamacare" to its detractors — allows health insurers to charge smokers buying individual policies up to 50 percent higher premiums starting next Jan. 1.


For a 55-year-old smoker, the penalty could reach nearly $4,250 a year. A 60-year-old could wind up paying nearly $5,100 on top of premiums.


Younger smokers could be charged lower penalties under rules proposed last fall by the Obama administration. But older smokers could face a heavy hit on their household budgets at a time in life when smoking-related illnesses tend to emerge.


Workers covered on the job would be able to avoid tobacco penalties by joining smoking cessation programs, because employer plans operate under different rules. But experts say that option is not guaranteed to smokers trying to purchase coverage individually.


Nearly one of every five U.S. adults smokes. That share is higher among lower-income people, who also are more likely to work in jobs that don't come with health insurance and would therefore depend on the new federal health care law. Smoking increases the risk of developing heart disease, lung problems and cancer, contributing to nearly 450,000 deaths a year.


Insurers won't be allowed to charge more under the overhaul for people who are overweight, or have a health condition like a bad back or a heart that skips beats — but they can charge more if a person smokes.


Starting next Jan. 1, the federal health care law will make it possible for people who can't get coverage now to buy private policies, providing tax credits to keep the premiums affordable. Although the law prohibits insurance companies from turning away the sick, the penalties for smokers could have the same effect in many cases, keeping out potentially costly patients.


"We don't want to create barriers for people to get health care coverage," said California state Assemblyman Richard Pan, who is working on a law in his state that would limit insurers' ability to charge smokers more. The federal law allows states to limit or change the smoking penalty.


"We want people who are smoking to get smoking cessation treatment," added Pan, a pediatrician who represents the Sacramento area.


Obama administration officials declined to be interviewed for this article, but a former consumer protection regulator for the government is raising questions.


"If you are an insurer and there is a group of smokers you don't want in your pool, the ones you really don't want are the ones who have been smoking for 20 or 30 years," said Karen Pollitz, an expert on individual health insurance markets with the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. "You would have the flexibility to discourage them."


Several provisions in the federal health care law work together to leave older smokers with a bleak set of financial options, said Pollitz, formerly deputy director of the Office of Consumer Support in the federal Health and Human Services Department.


First, the law allows insurers to charge older adults up to three times as much as their youngest customers.


Second, the law allows insurers to levy the full 50 percent penalty on older smokers while charging less to younger ones.


And finally, government tax credits that will be available to help pay premiums cannot be used to offset the cost of penalties for smokers.


Here's how the math would work:


Take a hypothetical 60-year-old smoker making $35,000 a year. Estimated premiums for coverage in the new private health insurance markets under Obama's law would total $10,172. That person would be eligible for a tax credit that brings the cost down to $3,325.


But the smoking penalty could add $5,086 to the cost. And since federal tax credits can't be used to offset the penalty, the smoker's total cost for health insurance would be $8,411, or 24 percent of income. That's considered unaffordable under the federal law. The numbers were estimated using the online Kaiser Health Reform Subsidy Calculator.


"The effect of the smoking (penalty) allowed under the law would be that lower-income smokers could not afford health insurance," said Richard Curtis, president of the Institute for Health Policy Solutions, a nonpartisan research group that called attention to the issue with a study about the potential impact in California.


In today's world, insurers can simply turn down a smoker. Under Obama's overhaul, would they actually charge the full 50 percent? After all, workplace anti-smoking programs that use penalties usually charge far less, maybe $75 or $100 a month.


Robert Laszewski, a consultant who previously worked in the insurance industry, says there's a good reason to charge the maximum.


"If you don't charge the 50 percent, your competitor is going to do it, and you are going to get a disproportionate share of the less-healthy older smokers," said Laszewski. "They are going to have to play defense."


___


Online:


Kaiser Health Reform Subsidy Calculator — http://healthreform.kff.org/subsidycalculator.aspx


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Stock futures up, S&P 500 poised to rally for an eighth day


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock index futures gained on Friday and the S&P 500 looked set to extend its best winning streak in more than six years, as rosy earnings from Procter & Gamble came amid a broader backdrop of healthy corporate results.


The strong start to the year for the equities market has also been attributed to agreement in Washington to extend the government's borrowing power through mid-May, encouraging signs of recovery in the global economy and seasonal inflows to equity markets.


Those factors helped the S&P 500 rally for a seventh day on Thursday to a five-year peak. Still, the index is struggling to climb convincingly above 1,500, a level it surpassed briefly Thursday for the first time since December 2007.


"You have had more confidence from fund managers to provide more allocations to equity markets," said Rick Meckler, president of investment firm LibertyView Capital Management, who added equities were looking more attractive than bonds or cash.


S&P 500 futures rose 4.7 point and were above fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures rose 44 points and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 12.50 points.


If the S&P 500 rises for an eighth day, it will be its longest winning in eight years. The index had climbed for nine straight days in a run that ended in November 2004.


Procter & Gamble , the world's top household products maker, said Friday quarterly profit soared past expectations and raised its sales and earnings outlook for the fiscal year. Shares were up 1.7 pct at $71.58 in premarket trading.


Pointing to a rotation out of bonds, U.S. 30-year Treasury bonds traded more than a point lower in price on Friday, with yields touching session highs at 3.10 percent.


Recent company earnings have been encouraging. Thomson Reuters data through early Thursday showed that of the 133 S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings so far, 66.9 percent exceeded expectations, more than the 65 percent average over the past four quarters.


Microsoft Corp's reported lower quarterly profit on Thursday as Office software sales slowed ahead of a new launch, offsetting a solid but unspectacular start for its Windows 8 operating system and sending the company's shares down 0.8 percent in premarket trading.


Apple stepped up audits of working conditions at major suppliers last year, discovering multiple cases of underage workers, discrimination and wage problems. The shares, which fell 12 percent Thursday after disappointing earnings, edged up 0.6 percent to $453.40.


German business morale improved for a third consecutive month in January to its highest in more than half a year, providing further evidence that growth in Europe's largest economy was gathering speed after contracting late last year.


Echoing a more positive tone in Europe, ECB President Mario Draghi said he expects the euro zone economy to recover later this year, adding that financial market improvements have not yet trickled into the general economy. Draghi was speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Friday.


The U.S. Commerce Department releases new home sales data for December at 10:00 a.m. Economists forecast a total of 385,000 annualized units, compared with 377,000 in November.


Economic Cycle Research Institute releases its weekly index of economic activity for January 18 at 10:30 a.m. In the prior week the index read 130.


(Editing by Bernadette Baum)



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North Korea to target U.S. with nuclear, rocket tests


SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said on Thursday it would carry out further rocket launches and a nuclear test that would target the United States, dramatically stepping up its threats against a country it called its "sworn enemy".


The announcement by the country's top military body came a day after the U.N. Security Council agreed to a U.S.-backed resolution to censure and sanction North Korea for a rocket launch in December that breached U.N. rules.


North Korea is not believed to have the technology to deliver a nuclear warhead capable of hitting the continental United States, although its December launch showed it had the capacity to deliver a rocket that could travel 10,000 km (6,200 miles), potentially putting San Francisco in range, according to an intelligence assessment by South Korea.


"We are not disguising the fact that the various satellites and long-range rockets that we will fire and the high-level nuclear test we will carry out are targeted at the United States," North Korea's National Defence Commission said, according to state news agency KCNA.


North Korea is believed by South Korea and other observers to be "technically ready" for a third nuclear test, and the decision to go ahead rests with leader Kim Jong-un, who pressed ahead with the December rocket launch in defiance of the U.N. sanctions.


China, the one major diplomatic ally of the isolated and impoverished North, agreed to the U.S.-backed resolution and it also supported resolutions in 2006 and 2009 after Pyongyang's two earlier nuclear tests.


Thursday's statement by North Korea represents a huge challenge to Beijing as it undergoes a leadership transition, with Xi Jinping due to take office in March.


China's Foreign Ministry called for calm and restraint and a return to six-party talks, but effectively singled out North Korea, urging the "relevant party" not to take any steps that would raise tensions.


"We hope the relevant party can remain calm and act and speak in a cautious and prudent way and not take any steps which may further worsen the situation," ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters at a regular press briefing.


North Korea has rejected proposals to restart the talks aimed at reining in its nuclear capacity. The United States, China, Russia, Japan and the two Koreas are the six parties involved.


"After all these years and numerous rounds of six-party talks we can see that China's influence over North Korea is actually very limited. All China can do is try to persuade them not to carry out their threats," said Cai Jian, an expert on Korea at Fudan University in Shanghai.


Analysts said the North could test as early as February as South Korea prepares to install a new, untested president or that it could choose to stage a nuclear explosion to coincide with former ruler Kim Jong-il's Feb 16 birthday.


"North Korea will have felt betrayed by China for agreeing to the latest U.N. resolution and they might be targeting (China) as well (with this statement)," said Lee Seung-yeol, senior research fellow at Ewha Institute of Unification Studies in Seoul.


U.S. URGES NO TEST


Washington urged North Korea not to proceed with a third test just as the North's statement was published on Thursday.


"Whether North Korea tests or not is up to North Korea," Glyn Davies, the top U.S. envoy for North Korean diplomacy, said in the South Korean capital of Seoul.


"We hope they don't do it. We call on them not to do it," Davies said after a meeting with South Korean officials. "This is not a moment to increase tensions on the Korean peninsula."


The North was banned from developing missile and nuclear technology under sanctions dating from its 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.


A South Korean military official said the concern now is that Pyongyang could undertake a third nuclear test using highly enriched uranium for the first time, opening a second path to a bomb.


North Korea's 2006 nuclear test using plutonium produced a puny yield equivalent to one kiloton of TNT - compared with 13-18 kilotons for the Hiroshima bomb - and U.S. intelligence estimates put the 2009 test's yield at roughly two kilotons


North Korea is estimated to have enough fissile material for about a dozen plutonium warheads, although estimates vary, and intelligence reports suggest that it has been enriching uranium to supplement that stock and give it a second path to the bomb.


According to estimates from the Institute for Science and International Security from late 2012, North Korea could have enough weapons grade uranium for 21-32 nuclear weapons by 2016 if it used one centrifuge at its Yongbyon nuclear plant to enrich uranium to weapons grade.


North Korea has not yet mastered the technology needed to make a nuclear warhead small enough for an intercontinental missile, most observers say, and needs to develop the capacity to shield any warhead from re-entry into the earth's atmosphere.


North Korea gave no time-frame for the coming test and often employs harsh rhetoric in response to U.N. and U.S. actions that it sees as hostile.


The bellicose statement on Thursday appeared to dent any remaining hopes that Kim Jong-un, believed to be 30 years old, would pursue a different path from his father, Kim Jong-il, who oversaw the country's military and nuclear programs.


The older Kim died in December 2011.


"The UNSC (Security Council) resolution masterminded by the U.S. has brought its hostile policy towards the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (North Korea) to its most dangerous stage," the commission was quoted as saying.


(Additional reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL, Ben Blanchard and Sui-Lee Wee in Beijing; Writing by David Chance; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Ron Popeski)



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Go forth and Tweet! Pope sees web networks as “portals of truth”






VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict urged Catholics on Thursday to use social networks like Twitter and Facebook to win converts, as he launched his own smartphone app streaming live footage of his speeches.


The websites – often associated with endless postings of idle gossip and baby photos – could be used as “portals of truth and faith” in an increasingly secular age, the pontiff said in his 2013 World Communications Day message.






“Unless the Good News is made known also in the digital world, it may be absent in the experience of many people,” the 85-year old Pope said in the a letter published on the Vatican‘s website.


The Holy See has become an increasingly prolific user of social media since it launched its ‘new evangelization’ of the developed world, where some congregations have fallen in the wake of growing secularization and damage to the Church’s reputation from a series of sex abuse scandals.


The Pope himself reaches around 2.5 million followers through eight Twitter accounts, including one in Latin.


Belying his traditionalist reputation, the Pope praised connections made online which he said could blossom into true friendships. Online life was not a purely virtual world but “increasingly becoming part of the very fabric of society,” he said.


Social networks were also a practical tool that Catholics could use to organize prayer events, the pope suggested. But he called for reasoned debate and respectful dialogue with those with different beliefs, and cautioned against a tendency towards “heated and divisive voices” and “sensationalism”.


The websites were creating a new “agora”, he added, referring to the gathering spaces that were the centers of public life in ancient Greek cities.


The speech coincided with the launch of ‘The Pope App’, a downloadable program that streams live footage of the pontiff’s speaking events and Vatican news onto smartphones.


Pope Benedict‘s embrace of new media responds to the Church’s concern that it is invisible on the internet.


The Vatican commissioned a study of internet use and religion prior to the pope’s Twitter debut, which found the majority of U.S. Catholics surveyed were unaware of any significant Church presence online.


(Reporting by Naomi O’Leary; editing by Andrew Heavens)


Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Adrienne Maloof: Why I'm 'Casually Dating' Rod Stewart's Son















01/24/2013 at 08:00 AM EST







Adrienne Maloof and Sean Stewart


Splash News Online


Adrienne Maloof wants to make one thing clear about Sean Stewart: "We are not living together. He has his own place. He has a nice place."

Otherwise, she tells PEOPLE, what you've read is true: The 51-year-old, recently single star of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills is, in fact, enjoying a budding relationship with the 32-year-old son of Rod Stewart.

"This started as a business relationship and now were casually dating," she says, emphasizing, "It's casual, real casual."

Stewart, she says, is "a lot more mature than a lot of 60-year-olds at this time in his life," and he's long since left behind his partying ways.

"That was when he was a young kid," says Maloof. "He's been clean and sober for years."

Maloof, looking great and sounding carefree, with no sign of her recent, notes that her family "has always been in youth-oriented businesses" – they run a Las Vegas casino among other enterprises – so she can relate.

"I'm a modern business woman," she says. "I don't think of age."

And the fact that Stewart comes from a famous family is a plus. "He understands my world, the entertainment industry and being a public figure," she says.

So what does she think about Sean's father, the legendary Rod, who is still going strong at 68?

"His dad is lovely," she says, "A very nice person."

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AP Interview: UN wants better family planning


DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) — The U.N.'s top population official wants governments to do more to ensure that women have access to family planning.


The U.N. says the world will add a billion people to its current population of some 7 billion within a decade, further straining the planet's resources.


Babatunde Osotimehin, executive director of the U.N. Population Fund, says more than 220 million women in the developing world want family planning but aren't getting it.


Speaking to The Associated Press at the World Economic Forum in Davos, he said many women want to have fewer children and that "30 percent of those who die giving birth we can prevent with family planning."


He also called for providing girls with "comprehensive sexuality education."


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Stock futures drop as Apple revenue miss to halt stocks rally


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock index futures fell Thursday as Apple slid nearly 10 percent following a revenue miss, and analysts said equities may be due for a pullback after a six-day rally for the S&P 500.


Apple Inc missed Wall Street's revenue forecast for a third straight quarter after iPhone sales came in below expectations, fanning fears its dominance of consumer electronics is slipping. The shares dropped 8.8 percent to $468.64 in premarket trading, wiping out about $50 billion of its market value.


However, some positive economic news looked set to put a floor under stock prices. Growth in Chinese manufacturing accelerated to a two-year high this month and a buoyant Germany took the euro zone economy a step closer to recovery, business surveys showed on Thursday.


"The march to 1,500 on the S&P is looking quite strong, the question is will Apple be the spoiler?" said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital in New York.


"My guess is that while Nasdaq might suffer losses today, both the Dow and the S&P may do otherwise based on economic news out of China and Europe."


The S&P 500 rose for a sixth day on Wednesday after stronger-than-expected profits from IBM and Google . But Apple could now halt that rally, which had lifted stocks to five-year highs.


S&P 500 futures fell 3.7 point and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures rose 15 points and Nasdaq 100 futures fell 34.75 points.


Apple's disappointing results drew a round of price-target cuts from brokerages. At least seven brokerages, including Barclays Capital, Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank, cut their price target on the stock by $142 on average to $617.80. Morgan Stanley removed the stock from its 'best ideas' list.


Helping the Dow industrials, diversified U.S. manufacturer 3M Co reported a 3.9 percent rise in profit on solid growth in sales of its wide array of products, which range from Post-It notes to films used in television screens. The shares rose 0.7 percent in premarket trading.


Corporate earnings have helped drive the recent stock market rally. Thomson Reuters data through Wednesday showed that of the 99 S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings, 67.7 percent have exceeded expectations, above the 65 percent average over the past four quarters.


Investors in U.S.-based mutual funds pumped $9.32 billion into stock funds in the week ended January 16, the second consecutive week of inflows for such funds, data from the Investment Company Institute showed Wednesday.


Netflix Inc surprised Wall Street Wednesday with a quarterly profit after the video subscription service added nearly 4 million customers in the U.S. and abroad. Shares jumped nearly 40 percent in premarket trading.


Removing another element of political uncertainty from markets, the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a Republican plan to allow the federal government to keep borrowing money through mid-May, clearing it for fast enactment after the top Senate Democrat and White House endorsed it.


(Editing by Bernadette Baum)



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Cameron promises Britons straight choice on EU exit


LONDON (Reuters) - Prime Minister David Cameron promised on Wednesday to give Britons a referendum choice on whether to stay in the European Union or leave if he wins an election in 2015, placing a question mark over Britain's membership for years.


Cameron ended months of speculation by announcing in a speech the plan for a vote sometime between 2015 and the end of 2017, shrugging off warnings that this could imperil Britain's economic prospects and alienate its biggest trading partner.


He said the island nation, which joined the EU's precursor European Economic Community 40 years ago, did not want to retreat from the world, but public disillusionment with the EU was at "an all-time high".


"It is time for the British people to have their say. It is time for us to settle this question about Britain and Europe," Cameron said. His Conservative party will campaign for the 2015 election promising to renegotiate Britain's EU membership.


"When we have negotiated that new settlement, we will give the British people a referendum with a very simple in or out choice to stay in the European Union on these new terms; or come out altogether. It will be an in-out referendum."


The speech firmly ties Cameron to an issue that was the bane of a generation of Conservative leaders. In the past, he has avoided partisan fights over Europe, the undoing of the last two Conservative prime ministers, John Major and Margaret Thatcher.


Britain would seek to claw back powers from Brussels, he said, a proposal that will be difficult to sell to other European countries. London will do an "audit" to determine which powers Brussels has that should be delegated to member states.


Sterling fell to its lowest in nearly five months against the dollar on Wednesday as Cameron was speaking.


The response from EU partners was predictably frosty. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius quipped: "If Britain wants to leave Europe we will roll out the red carpet for you," echoing Cameron himself, who once used the same words to invite rich Frenchmen alienated by high taxes to move to Britain.


German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said his country wanted Britain to remain a full EU member, but London could not expect to pick and choose the aspects of membership it liked.


Business leaders have warned that the prospect of years of doubt over Britain's EU membership would damage the investment climate.


"Having a referendum creates more uncertainty and we don't need that," Martin Sorrell, chief executive of advertising giant WPP, told the World Economic Forum in Davos.


"This is a political decision. This is not an economic decision. This isn't good news. You added another reason why people will postpone investment decisions."


The speech also opens a rift with Cameron's junior coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats. Their leader, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, said the plan would undermine a fragile economic recovery.


And even allies further afield are wary: the United States has said it wants Britain to remain inside the EU with "a strong voice".


EUROSCEPTICS THRILLED


Cameron has been pushed into taking such a strong position in part by the rise of the UK Independence Party, which favors complete withdrawal from the EU and has climbed to third in opinion polls, mainly at the expense of the Conservatives.


"All he's trying to do is to kick the can down the road and to try and get UKIP off his back," said UKIP leader Nigel Farage.


Eurosceptics in Cameron's party were thrilled by the speech. Conservative lawmaker Peter Bone called it "a terrific victory" that would unify 98 percent of the party. "He's the first prime minister to say he wants to bring back powers from Brussels," Bone told Reuters. "It's pretty powerful stuff".


Whether Cameron will ever hold the referendum remains as uncertain as the Conservatives' chances of winning the next election in 2015.


They trail the opposition Labour party in opinion polls, and the coalition government is grappling with a stagnating economy as it pushes through public spending cuts to reduce Britain's large budget deficit.


Cameron said he would prefer Britain, the world's sixth biggest economy, to remain inside the 27-nation EU. As long as he secured the reforms he wants, he would campaign for Britain to stay inside the EU "with all my heart and soul".


But he also made clear he believed the EU must be radically reformed. It was riskier to maintain the status quo than to change, he said.


"The biggest danger to the European Union comes not from those who advocate change, but from those who denounce new thinking as heresy," he said.


"WAFER THIN" CONSENT


The euro zone debt crisis was forcing the bloc to change, and Britain would fight to make sure new rules were fair to countries that didn't use the common currency, he said. Britain is the largest of the 10 EU members that do not use the euro.


Democratic consent for the EU in Britain was now "wafer thin", he said, reflecting the results of opinion polls that show a slim majority would vote to leave the bloc.


"Some people say that to point this out is irresponsible, creates uncertainty for business and puts a question mark over Britain's place in the European Union," said Cameron. "But the question mark is already there: ignoring it won't make it go away."


Asked after the speech whether other EU countries would agree to renegotiate Britain's membership, Cameron said he was an optimist and that there was "every chance of success."


"I want to be the prime minister who confronts and gets the right answer for Britain on these kind of issues," he said.


It is nearly 40 years since British voters last had a say in a referendum on Britain's membership of the European club. A 1975 vote saw just over 67 percent opt to stay inside with nearly 33 percent wanting to leave.


(Additional reporting by Paul Taylor in Davos and Alexandra Hudson in Berlin; Editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Peter Graff)



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First “Firefox OS” Phones Previewed, to Launch in February






Mozilla, the non-profit organization behind the popular Firefox web browser, has been promoting its Firefox OS project (once known as “Boot to Gecko”) for some time now. A hardware partnership with Telefonica, the international telecom giant, had been announced, but no phones had yet been unveiled.


But in an announcement today on its blog, Mozilla announced the impending launch of its first “developer preview” phones, the Keon and the Peak. Made in partnership with Geeksphone, a Spanish smartphone producer which used to make Android phones, these devices are meant to help app developers preview their work on the small screen. But they may also serve as a sneak preview of Mozilla’s plan to enter the smartphone market.






Introducing Firefox OS


Designed as an alternative to Google’s Android for low-powered smartphones, Firefox OS’ claim to fame is that it’s “built entirely using open web standards,” or open-source code written in the programming languages which make up the web, like JavaScript. Likewise, Firefox OS apps are websites specially formatted to look and feel like apps, and to respond to touchscreen controls and access phone features like vibration and the GPS.


A selection of Firefox apps is already available in the Mozilla Marketplace, but developers will eventually be able to take the open-source code behind it and create their own app markets like it if they so choose. These apps also run on the preview “Aurora” version of Firefox for Android, which is available for download from Mozilla’s website.


“Say ‘hola’” to the Keon and Peak


The Keon is Mozilla’s entry-level developer smartphone, while the Peak has somewhat more modern hardware specs.


The Keon has a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor, 512 MB of RAM, a 3.5-inch touchscreen, and 4 GB of flash memory, plus a microSD card slot to expand storage space. Its built-in camera is a basic 3-megapixel shooter, and lacks an LED flash. It’s roughly comparable to 2010′s iPhone 4 in terms of raw hardware specs, although it probably won’t be able to play the same kinds of 3D games since they’ll be written as web applications.


The Peak has a dual-core 1.2 GHz processor, a 4.3-inch IPS display, and an 8-megapixel camera with a flash, plus a 2-megapixel front-facing camera. It has the same amount of RAM and flash storage as the Keon does, though.


Both the Keon and the Peak are unlocked GSM smartphones, which may mean they will work on AT&T and T-Mobile’s networks in the States.


Pricing and availability


According to Peters, the “First phones will be available in February.” Prices have yet to be announced.


Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.


Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Melissa Rycroft Tricks Her Daughter at the Dinner Table




Celebrity Baby Blog





01/22/2013 at 09:00 AM ET



Melissa Rycroft Tricks Her Daughter at the Dinner Table
FameFlynet


She triumphed with her fancy footwork on the dance floor, but Melissa Rycroft may have finally met her match.


Although completely head over heels in love with daughter Ava Grace, 2 next month, the first-time mom admits her little girl has her beat.


“She pushes my buttons like nobody else on this earth can do,” Rycroft, 29, tells PEOPLE.


“She’s going through that phase right now, the ‘I’m sorry, Mommy, you didn’t want me to touch this? This right here I wasn’t supposed to touch?’ And she just gives you this look and I want to be so angry with her, but I can’t!”


Rycroft isn’t the only one being tested by the toddler; Dad Tye Strickland has been known to be on the receiving end of a few of Ava’s tricks, too.

“It’s Daddy’s day with her while Mommy goes and works and as I was leaving [Ava] pooped in the bathtub,” she says with a laugh. “It’s little things like that where I go, ‘That’s my girl! There you go, Tye!’”


At the end of the day, however, it’s Rycroft versus the father-daughter duo — at least when it comes to the dinner table.


“We don’t want to make her a vegetarian or just a meatatarian or just a hot dogatarian like most toddlers are,” she quips. “It doesn’t help in my house that my husband also eats like a 5-year-old, so it’s almost like I’m raising two kids [and] trying to get vegetables in both of them.”


Noting that “if it’s green [Ava's] not going to eat it,” a crafty Rycroft reveals she may have finally found the secret to her struggles.


“I’m finding new recipes online of how you can kind of hide vegetables in meals and so far they can’t tell that it’s there,” she shares. “There’s a nice stuffed chicken you can do [where] you can put some spinach and cheese right in there. They’ll never know it’s there!”


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Foes of NYC soda size limit doubt racial fairness


NEW YORK (AP) — Opponents of the city's limit on the size of sugary drinks are raising questions of racial fairness alongside other complaints as the novel restriction faces a court test.


The NAACP's New York state branch and the Hispanic Federation have joined beverage makers and sellers in trying to stop the rule from taking effect March 12. With a hearing set Wednesday, critics are attacking what they call an inconsistent and undemocratic regulation, while city officials and health experts defend it as a pioneering and proper move to fight obesity.


The issue is complex for the minority advocates, especially given obesity rates that are higher than average among blacks and Hispanics, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control. The groups say in court papers they're concerned about the discrepancy, but the soda rule will unduly harm minority businesses and "freedom of choice in low-income communities."


The latest in a line of healthy-eating initiatives during Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration, the beverage rule bars restaurants and many other eateries from selling high-sugar drinks in cups or containers bigger than 16 ounces. Violations could bring $200 fines; the city doesn't plan to start imposing those until June.


The city Board of Health OK'd the measure in September. Officials cited the city's rising obesity rate — about 24 percent of adults, up from 18 percent in 2002 — and pointed to studies linking sugary drinks to weight gain. Care for obesity-related illnesses costs more than $4.7 billion a year citywide, with government programs paying about 60 percent of that, according to city Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley.


"It would be irresponsible for (the health board) not to act in the face of an epidemic of this proportion," the city says in court papers. The National Association of Local Boards of Health and several public health scholars have backed the city's position in filings of their own.


Opponents portray the regulation as government nagging that turns sugary drinks into a scapegoat when many factors are at play in the nation's growing girth.


The American Beverage Association and other groups, including movie theater owners and Korean grocers, sued. They argue that the first-of-its-kind restriction should have gone before the elected City Council instead of being approved by the Bloomberg-appointed health board.


Five City Council members echo that view in a court filing, saying the Council is "the proper forum for balancing the city's myriad interests in matters of public health." The Bloomberg administration counters that the health board, made up of doctors and other health professionals, has the "specialized expertise" needed to make the call on limiting cola sizes.


The suit also argues the rule is too narrow to be fair. Alcohol, unsweetened juice and milk-based drinks are excluded, as are supermarkets and many convenience stores — including 7-Eleven, home of the Big Gulp — that aren't subject to city health regulations.


The NAACP and the Hispanic Federation, a network of 100 northeastern groups, say minority-owned delis and corner stores will end up at a disadvantage compared to grocery chains.


"This sweeping regulation will no doubt burden and disproportionally impact minority-owned businesses at a time when these businesses can least afford it," they said in court papers. They say the city should focus instead on increasing physical education in schools.


During Bloomberg's 11-year tenure, the city also has made chain restaurants post calorie counts on their menus and barred artificial trans fats in french fries and other restaurant food.


In general, state and local governments have considerable authority to enact laws intended to protect people's health and safety, but it remains to be seen how a court will view a portion-size restriction, said Neal Fortin, director, Institute for Food Laws and Regulations at Michigan State University.


___


Follow Jennifer Peltz at http://twitter.com/jennpeltz


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Stock futures flat, but techs rally in premarket


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock index futures were flat on Wednesday, with investors reluctant to make big bets following a five-day rally that took major averages to levels not seen since December 2007.


Tech shares will be in focus with earnings due from tech heavyweight Apple and following strong results from both IBM and Google, which rallied in premarket trading and continued the string of major companies outperforming following results.


Investors were also cautious as they awaited another onslaught of earnings reports, including from Dow component McDonald's Corp . Apple Inc reports after the market's close and investors will scour that report for signs the company can continue to grow at an accelerated pace.


"The market has an upward bias because earnings have generally been better than most expected, but whether we take another leg up from here depends on Apple," said Oliver Purshe, president of Gary Goldberg Financial Services in Suffern, New York. "That is such a heavily watched stock that if it doesn't come out with strong numbers we could take a pause."


Google Inc rose 5.1 percent to $738.61 in light premarket trading a day after the search giant's core Internet business outpaced expectations. Revenue was also higher than expected.


International Business Machines Corp late Tuesday forecast better-than-anticipated 2013 results and also posted fourth-quarter earnings and revenue that beat expectations. The results helped to allay concerns about the tech sector that arose when Intel Corp gave a weak outlook last week. IBM, which is a Dow component, rose 3.9 percent to $203.81 before the bell.


Dow component United Technologies Corp reported earnings that fell from the prior year, hurt by large restructuring charges.


Coach Inc slumped 12 percent to $53.20 before the bell after reporting sales that missed expectations.


According to the latest Thomson Reuters data, of the 74 S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings so far, 62.2 percent have topped expectations, roughly even with the 62 percent average since 1994, but below the 65 percent average over the past four quarters.


Overall, S&P 500 fourth-quarter earnings rose 2.6 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data. That estimate is above the 1.9 percent forecast from the start of earnings season, but well below the 9.9 percent fourth-quarter earnings forecast from October 1, the data showed.


S&P 500 futures fell 1.8 points and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures rose 3 points and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 4 points.


Both the S&P 500 and Dow Jones industrial average hit five-year closing highs on Tuesday, and recent gains have largely been fueled by a strong start to the earning season. The S&P has jumped 6.4 percent over the past four weeks.


Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives aim on Wednesday to pass a bill to extend the U.S. debt limit by nearly four months, to May 19. The White House welcomed the move, saying it would remove uncertainty about the issue.


The debt limit issue has been viewed as a market overhang for the past few weeks, with many investors worried that if no deal is reached to raise the limit, it could have a negative impact on the economy.


"We're raising our year-end target from 1,535 to about 1,575, in part because of the strong fourth-quarter earnings, but also because with the debt ceiling off the table that's a headwind removed from the market," Purshe said.


(Editing by W Simon and Kenneth Barry)



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Israel goes to polls, set to re-elect Netanyahu


JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israelis voted on Tuesday in an election that is expected to hand hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a third term, opening the way for a showdown with Iran and bolstering opponents of Palestinian statehood.


However, Netanyahu's own Likud party, running alongside the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu group, looks set to have fewer seats than in the previous parliament, with opinion polls showing a surge in support for the far-right Jewish Home party.


Political sources said Netanyahu, concerned by his apparent fall in popularity, might approach center-left parties after the ballot in an effort to broaden his coalition and present a more moderate face to Washington and other concerned allies.


"We want Israel to succeed, we vote Likud-Beitenu ... The bigger it is, the more Israel will succeed," Netanyahu said after voting alongside his wife and two sons.


Some 5.66 million Israelis are eligible to cast a ballot, with polling stations closing at 10 p.m.. Full results are due by Wednesday morning, opening the way for coalition talks that could take several weeks.


By 2 p.m., the Israeli election committee said turnout was 38.3 percent, up from 34 percent at the same time in 2009 and the highest level since 1999. Ahead of the ballot, analysts had speculated that high turnout would benefit center-left parties that have sometimes struggled to motivate their voter base.


The lackluster election campaign failed to focus on any single issue and with a Netanyahu victory predicted by every opinion poll, the two main political blocs seemed to spend more time on internal feuding than confronting each other.


"There is a king sitting on the throne in Israel and I wanted to dethrone him, but it looks like that won't happen," said Yehudit Shimshi, a retired teacher voting in central Israel in balmy winter weather that drew out the electorate.


No Israeli party has ever secured an absolute majority, meaning that Netanyahu, who says that dealing with Iran's nuclear ambitions is his top priority, will have to bring various allies on board to control the 120-seat Knesset.


The former commando has traditionally looked to religious, conservative parties for backing and is widely expected to seek out the surprise star of the campaign, self-made millionaire Naftali Bennett, who heads the Jewish Home party.


Bennett has ruled out any peace pact with the Palestinians and calls for the annexation of much of the occupied West Bank.


His youthful dynamism has struck a chord amongst Israelis, disillusioned after years of failed peace initiatives, and has eroded Netanyahu's support base.


The Likud has also shifted further right in recent months, with hardline candidates who reject the so-called two-state solution dominating the top of the party list.


"TRENDY PARTIES"


Surveys suggest Bennett may take up to 14 seats, many at the expense of Likud-Beitenu, which was projected to win 32 in the last round of opinion polls published on Friday - 10 less than the two parties won in 2009 when they ran separate lists.


Acknowledging the threat, Netanyahu's son Yair urged young Israelis not to abandon the old, established Likud.


"Even if there are more trendy parties, there is one party that has a proven record," he said on Tuesday.


Amongst the new parties standing for the first time in an election were Yesh Atid (There is a Future), a centrist group led by former television host Yair Lapid, seen winning 13 seats.


"All our lives we voted Likud, but today we voted for Lapid because we want a different coalition," said Ahuva Heled, 55, a retired teacher voting with her husband north of Tel Aviv.


Lapid has not ruled out joining a Netanyahu cabinet, but is pushing hard for ultra-Orthodox Jews to do military service - a demand fiercely rejected by some allies of the prime minister.


Israel's main opposition party, Labour, which is seen capturing up to 17 seats, has already ruled out a repeat of 2009, when it initially hooked up with Netanyahu, promising to promote peace negotiations with the Palestinians.


U.S.-brokered talks collapsed just a month after they started in 2010 following a row over settlement building, and have lain in ruins ever since. Netanyahu blamed the Palestinians for the failure and says his door remains open to discussions.


Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas says he won't return to the table unless there is a halt to settlement construction.


That looks unlikely, with Netanyahu approving some 11,000 settler homes in December alone, causing further strains to his already notoriously difficult relations with U.S. President Barack Obama, who was sworn in for a second term on Monday.


IRAN THREAT


Tuesday's vote is the first in Israel since Arab uprisings swept the region two years ago, reshaping the Middle East.


Netanyahu has said the turbulence - which has brought Islamist governments to power in several countries long ruled by secularist autocrats, including neighboring Egypt - shows the importance of strengthening national security.


If he wins on Tuesday, he will seek to put Iran back to the top of the global agenda. Netanyahu has said he will not let Tehran enrich enough uranium to make a single nuclear bomb - a threshold Israeli experts say could arrive as early as mid-2013.


Iran denies it is planning to build the bomb, and says Israel, widely believed to have the only nuclear arsenal in the Middle East, is the biggest threat to the region.


The issue has barely registered during the election campaign, with a poll in Haaretz newspaper on Friday saying 47 percent of Israelis thought social and economic issues were the most pressing concern, against just 10 percent who cited Iran.


One of the first problems to face the next government, which is unlikely to take power before the middle of next month at the earliest, is the stuttering economy.


Data last week showed the budget deficit rose to 4.2 percent of gross domestic product in 2012, double the original estimate, meaning spending cuts and tax hikes look certain.


(Additional reporting by Ori Lewis, Jeffrey Heller and Tova Cohen; Editing by Alistair Lyon)



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I Might Be Too Old for Facebook Graph Search






On Sunday, I turned 30.


That’s not too old, I tell myself, yet the signs of aging are creeping in. Teenagers listen to music that I either haven’t heard of or believe to be mostly terrible. They use slang I don’t recognize, and I imagine my slang would sound to them like “groovy” or “far out” sound to me.






But for the purposes of our tech blog, the most notable sign is how much more active teens are on Facebook than I am. To hear it from my wife, who works with children and teens at her job, they’re constantly signed in and active, to the point that reaching them by voice call is unreliable. Send them a Facebook message, even during school hours, and they’ll respond right away. (The reality isn’t quite that extreme; according to a Pew survey, most teens communicate through text messages and phone calls more than Facebook, but e-mail is far behind.)


So when Facebook announces a new feature, like Graph Search, I imagine those teens getting the most use out of it. Graph Search lets you look up people, places, photos and other things using natural search queries. Think of it like Google for everything that your friends know; instead of searching the Web for somewhere to eat or something to do, you could just search through the collective wisdom of your network.


Here are some of the example searches on Facebook’s Graph Search home page:


  • Music my friends like

  • Restaurants in London my friends have been to

  • People who like cycling and are from my hometown

  • Photos before 1990

Being able to find all that information–and provide your own information for friends–sounds great. But unless you and your pals are putting lots of data in, you’re probably not going to get a lot of data out. I know for sure that I haven’t put much effort into connecting my real life story to Facebook, and as I poke around my network, I see that many of my friends haven’t either. They don’t check in to places they visit. They don’t “Like” everything that they actually like. They haven’t uploaded photos from before 1990. Collectively, we haven’t invested in making Graph Search as useful as it could be.


It might be different if I was part of the generation that uses Facebook more often. Though it’s hard to find data on how Likes and check-ins vary by age, younger users tend to have more Facebook friends than older ones, according to Edison Research, so at least they have a bigger base of people to work with. And according to a 2011 study, teens spend more time on the network per day than older users. If posting on Facebook is part of your social circle’s daily life–that is, it’s not just a way to see what old high school buddies are up to–I imagine Graph Search will be a lot more useful.


That’s not to say Graph Search won’t be of any value to someone like me. It could come in handy as a way to sort through photos, for instance. There’s also a chance that Facebook will improve the ways that it picks up on our interests, and integrate frictionless sharing so there’s less work involved in becoming an information source.


But while I plan to keep up with technology for a long time, I realize it’s hard to keep using social networks like a teenager when your friends are getting older too. Facebook isn’t part of my daily life anymore, so I can’t imagine rewiring my habits and turning it into a primary information source, especially if my friends aren’t doing the same.  It’s much easier to rely on the tools I already have, such as traditional search engines and sites like Yelp–just like it’s easy to stop keeping track of popular music or to pick up on new slang.


Graph Search is in “very limited” beta now, and users who want to try it can join the waiting list. I look forward to seeing what I can do with it, even if it’s not really for me. In the meantime, here’s to growing older.


Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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