Thursday, 28 February 2013

Watch: Veteran Uses Mind to Move Bionic Arm

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Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/video/veteran-mind-move-bionic-arm-18592735

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Senate Dems' bill light on deficit cuts in 2013

(AP) ? White House-backed legislation in the Senate to replace $85 billion in across-the-board spending cuts would raise the deficit through the end of the budget year by tens of billions of dollars, officials said late Wednesday as the two parties maneuvered for public support on economic issues.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said that under the Democratic measure, deficits also would rise in each of the next two years before turning downward.

Democratic officials had said earlier in the day their bill would spread one year's worth of anticipated savings ? $85 billion ? over a decade in an attempt to avoid damaging the shaky economic recovery.

The legislation would cancel across-the-board cuts due to begin on Friday. Instead, it would eliminate payments to some farmers, enact defense reductions beginning in two years and impose tax increases, mostly on millionaires.

White House spokesman Jay Carney recently told reporters at the White House the administration supports the measure.

The Senate is expected to vote on Thursday on rival Democratic and Republican plans to replace the spending cuts, known in Washington-speak as a "sequester." Both bills are expected to fail.

In an indication that across-the-board cuts are inevitable, President Barack Obama has set a meeting with congressional leaders for the day they take effect. While the administration has warned of severe cuts in government services as a result of the reductions, few, if any, are likely to be felt for several weeks.

That could give the administration and lawmakers breathing room to negotiate a replacement, although Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said during the day there were limits to what could be negotiated.

"We can either secure those reductions more intelligently, or we can do it the president's way with across-the board cuts. But one thing Americans simply will not accept is another tax increase to replace spending reductions we already agreed to," he said.

Democrats said their proposal to replace across-the-board cuts was designed with the economy in mind.

It "seeks the same amount of savings in a more responsible way" as the $85 billion in cuts that will otherwise take effect, said Adam Jentleson, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

"The impact on the economy is much better. Sequestration as constituted would hurt economic growth and destroy jobs," he added.

Over a decade, the bill would cut deficits by an estimated $110 billion, half from higher taxes and half from the defense and farm program cuts.

That is in keeping with Obama's call for a balanced approach that combines selected spending cuts with closing tax loopholes.

Senate Democrats have been reluctant to spell out the details of their measure, although it is not clear if that results from its relatively small impact on the deficits through the end of the current budget year.

Across the Capitol, though, the party's leaders have talked openly of their desire to spread the cuts in their replacement measure over a longer period.

"It is entirely intentional," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., and the party's senior member on the House Budget Committee. "The whole idea is to achieve the equivalent deficit reduction without hurting jobs and having disruption in the economy. You do that by having targeted cuts and eliminating tax loopholes over a longer period of time," he added.

He said the Democrats' approach is the same as Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's recommendation, which is to help the recovery gain strength before beginning to make cuts.

In the Senate, Republicans have yet to disclose their own sequester replacement measure. Most of the rank and file favors an alternative that lets Obama adjust the cuts to minimize any impact on the public, but that approach has its critics among lawmakers who fear giving the White House that much authority.

____

AP White House Correspondent Julie Pace contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-02-27-Budget-Democrats/id-1e3c39d5260f41a5bc2d0ed76d045052

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Low-key departure as pope steps down and hides away

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict slips quietly from the world stage on Thursday after a private last goodbye to his cardinals and a short flight to a country palace to enter the final phase of his life "hidden from the world".

In keeping with his shy and modest ways, there will be no public ceremony to mark the first papal resignation in six centuries and no solemn declaration ending his nearly eight-year reign at the head of the world's largest church.

His last public appearance will be a short greeting to residents and well-wishers at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence south of Rome, in the late afternoon after his 15-minute helicopter hop from the Vatican.

When the resignation becomes official at 8 p.m. Rome time (02.00 p.m. EST), Benedict will be relaxing inside the 17th century palace. Swiss Guards on duty at the main gate to indicate the pope's presence within will simply quit their posts and return to Rome to await their next pontiff.

Avoiding any special ceremony, Benedict used his weekly general audience on Wednesday to bid an emotional farewell to more than 150,000 people who packed St Peter's Square to cheer for him and wave signs of support.

With a slight smile, his often stern-looking face seemed content and relaxed as he acknowledged the loud applause from the crowd.

"Thank you, I am very moved," he said in Italian. His unusually personal remarks included an admission that "there were moments ... when the seas were rough and the wind blew against us and it seemed that the Lord was sleeping".

CARDINALS PREPARE THE FUTURE

Once the chair of St Peter is vacant, cardinals who have assembled from around the world for Benedict's farewell will begin planning the closed-door conclave that will elect his successor.

One of the first questions facing these "princes of the Church" is when the 115 cardinal electors should enter the Sistine Chapel for the voting. They will hold a first meeting on Friday but a decision may not come until next week.

The Vatican seems to be aiming for an election by mid-March so the new pope can be installed in office before Palm Sunday on March 24 and lead the Holy Week services that culminate in Easter on the following Sunday.

In the meantime, the cardinals will hold daily consultations at the Vatican at which they discuss issues facing the Church, get to know each other better and size up potential candidates for the 2,000-year-old post of pope.

There are no official candidates, no open campaigning and no clear front runner for the job. Cardinals tipped as favorites by Vatican watchers include Brazil's Odilo Scherer, Canadian Marc Ouellet, Ghanaian Peter Turkson, Italy's Angelo Scola and Timothy Dolan of the United States.

BENEDICT'S PLANS

Benedict, a bookish man who did not seek the papacy and did not enjoy the global glare it brought, proved to be an energetic teacher of Catholic doctrine but a poor manager of the Curia, the Vatican bureaucracy that became mired in scandal during his reign.

He leaves his successor a top secret report on rivalries and scandals within the Curia, prompted by leaks of internal files last year that documented the problems hidden behind the Vatican's thick walls and the Church's traditional secrecy.

After about two months at Castel Gandolfo, Benedict plans to move into a refurbished convent in the Vatican Gardens, where he will live out his life in prayer and study, "hidden to the world", as he put it.

Having both a retired and a serving pope at the same time proved such a novelty that the Vatican took nearly two weeks to decide his title and form of clerical dress.

He will be known as the "pope emeritus," wear a simple white cassock rather than his white papal clothes and retire his famous red "shoes of the fisherman," a symbol of the blood of the early Christian martyrs, for more pedestrian brown ones.

(Reporting By Tom Heneghan; editing by Philip Pullella and Giles Elgood)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/low-key-departure-pope-steps-down-hides-away-000419898.html

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93% The Gatekeepers

All Critics (41) | Top Critics (17) | Fresh (38) | Rotten (3)

A sobering but welcome dose of honesty regarding issues and events that have otherwise been shrouded in secrecy and overheated rhetoric.

Israelis, generally speaking, tend to be tough, but the men who've commanded Shin Bet, Israel's secret service, are in a whole other category.

A lesser filmmaker might've been tripped up by such a narrow focus. A lesser filmmaker might've misjudged the melange of archival footage, fabricated surveillance footage and talking heads, which Moreh handles with a blend of cinematic flash and tact.

The film makes explicit and implicit endorsements. The strategy of vengeance and overkill is ineffective and leads Israel to horrific behavior described only through metaphor.

The subjects' openness is refreshing - and sometimes frightening.

A feat - of access and of passionate and appropriately unsettling political commentary.

Filmmaker Dror Moreh gives a unique look, from those in the know, of the inner workings of Israel's home intelligence service.

As Moreh probes the men, we, whether we agree with them or not, find ourselves drawn into their moral maze in all of its complexity.

This is a film that leaves a knot in the stomach, and no easy solutions as to how to get rid of it.

The 'other' Oscar-nominated feature about a war on terror, Dror Moreh's documentary The Gatekeepers proves more intellectually engaging than Hollywood's Zero Dark Thirty, and at least as unsettling.

Important and incomplete.

A blunt, clear-eyed, first-hand take on decades of Middle Eastern history, from practically the founding of the Jewish state up through the recent fits and starts of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Moreh has assembled a thorough, evenhanded and fascinating examination of people and operations straight out of a spy novel.

This brave documentary draws a line in the sand. One just wishes Moreh had asked these men what they were doing to change the situation now other than having changed their minds.

From the moment you hear one of these former insiders admitting his misgivings over an act of violence he perpetrated, you can't help but be drawn in.

The access boggles the mind, and some of the stories are riveting.

[T]houghtfully examines the difficulties of protecting a democracy from internal enemies. . .with realpolitik towards peace [and] repeated criticism of government leaders.

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_gatekeepers_2012/

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NBC, ID partners on Pistorius documentary

FILE - In this Feb. 22, 2013 file photo, Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius arrives for a bail hearing in the shooting death of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp. Pistorius' representatives on Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013 named the substance found in his bedroom after the shooting death of his girlfriend as Testis compositum, and say it is an herbal remedy used "in aid of muscle recovery." South African police say they found needles in Pistorius' bedroom along with the substance, which they initially named as testosterone. Prosecutors later withdrew that statement identifying the substance and said it had been sent for laboratory tests. (AP Photo, File)

FILE - In this Feb. 22, 2013 file photo, Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius arrives for a bail hearing in the shooting death of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp. Pistorius' representatives on Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013 named the substance found in his bedroom after the shooting death of his girlfriend as Testis compositum, and say it is an herbal remedy used "in aid of muscle recovery." South African police say they found needles in Pistorius' bedroom along with the substance, which they initially named as testosterone. Prosecutors later withdrew that statement identifying the substance and said it had been sent for laboratory tests. (AP Photo, File)

(AP) ? The desire to produce a quick documentary on Olympic runner Oscar Pistorius (pihs-TOHR'-ee-uhs) and the shooting death of his live-in girlfriend has led to a new partnership between two television networks.

The Investigation Discovery Network on Sunday will premiere a special, "Beauty & The Blade Runner," about the South African athlete and his role in the shooting death of model Reeva Steenkamp. ID is making the special with the help of NBC News and that company's Peacock Productions.

ID even coined a new phrase to describe the quick specials, calling them instamentaries.

People close to both Pistorius and Steenkamp talk on the special, which examines evidence in the case.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-02-27-US-TV-Pistorius/id-e7c291d2720d45548b1280a43fa85a53

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Wednesday, 27 February 2013

A new Wharton admissions test fuels a consulting boom - Fortune ...

By John A. Byrne

Wharton Business SchoolWebsite and MBA catalogue(Poets&Quants) -- When the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School announced last July that it was going to add a new team-based discussion as part of its MBA admissions process, the school made it clear it wanted to assess applicants in "an unscripted environment," free from the influence of admission consultants and other advice givers.

Instead, Wharton has unwittingly given the admissions consulting business a big boost. Several of the leading MBA admissions firms have since launched specific offerings priced between $400 and $500 a pop to help prepare anxious applicants for the group-based discussions. The online simulations by consultants are largely meant to mimic the real thing at which six applicants are posed a question they are expected to discuss.

"We knew people were going to be freaked out about it, so we developed a way for them to feel more comfortable with it," explains Angela Guido, a consultant with mbaMission who spearheaded the development of a 90-minute simulation for the firm. "It's a pretty exact replica of what happens in their interview. We have four to six participants, and the conversation is modeled on exactly what the real thing is like."

MORE:?Columbia B-school's Glenn Hubbard: Is an MBA worth it?

By month's end, mbaMission expects to run at least 10 sessions. The firm charges applicants $400 for the practice session unless they purchase a full admissions package of consulting, which would run $3,600 for one school to $9,400 for seven schools. Practice sessions run by mbaMission on Feb. 23 and Feb. 24 were sold out, as is a forthcoming Feb. 27 session.

The MBA Exchange and Accepted.com, admissions consulting firms that are among the largest in the business, are selling similar offerings. Several other firms, including Clear Admit, say they are helping applicants prepare for the test with more traditional consulting assistance. Accepted.com said it began offering its $500 service -- which includes mock team and individual interviews, written feedback on both, and a one-on-one telephone consult -- after being "bombarded" with questions about the Wharton interview and requests for specific coaching.

So much for hopes of an unscripted environment...

It's an unintended consequence of Wharton's initial hope to take prospective students "off the page" of a typical MBA application. "Over the last 10 to 20 years, because of blogs and the applicant community and discussion forums, people have developed a really good sense of what the admissions process looks like, down to what kinds of questions are asked and how they manage the interview," Vice Dean Karl T. Ulrich explained in an interview when the school announced the new test. "So in some ways that was one of the reasons we wanted to try some other approaches, because it had become kind of a game in which everyone knew the rules. We wanted to get the applicants in an unscripted environment, with a more dynamic kind of interaction."

But the new test set off a new round of anxiety among applicants and fueled the new offerings by consulting firms. "There is tremendous value in having a dress rehearsal," explains Linda Abraham, founder and CEO of Accepted.com.?"That benefit is why MBA programs provide mock interviews and mock group interviews to their grads."

MORE:?Inside MBA admissions: How a top school decides

Even before Wharton officially announced the new team-discussion admissions test, The MBA Exchange had introduced its new $395 service to help applicants prep for the novel addition to the school's MBA application. The Chicago-based firm announced its offering nearly 10 days before Wharton confirmed it was going forward with the new test. The MBA Exchange product features hour-long video conferences for groups of four to six applicants. MBA Exchange says it has already run 14 sessions for 63 clients and has three more scheduled through early March.

"Because facial?expressions, gestures, body language, etc. are so important, our prep?sessions take place via high-definition video," says Dan Bauer, founder and managing director of The MBA Exchange. A consultant plays the role of Wharton?admission officer, welcoming the participants and presenting the "prompt" for?them to discuss. Clients select and use pseudonyms to ensure?confidentiality. "Immediately after the team discussion, we review the?group's performance ?with them," adds Bauer. "We also video record the entire session and?provide a confidential link so each participant can see and further analyze?both team and individual performance. Finally, we send a written scorecard?to each participant grading his or her individual performance on five key?dimensions along with our specific comments and suggestions on what he or?she did right and which tactics should be improved before the actual team?session with Wharton."

Although initial reactions by applicants to the test have been generally positive, the Wharton discussion has met some controversy. Some applicants say that they have been asked to travel from Asia or Europe at great expense for the test, especially when Wharton's schedule of on-campus and off-campus sessions have been unable to accommodate them. "That has rubbed some people the wrong way," says Guido. "One client was given the option to punt or fly a really long way and she decided not to do it. Wharton was asking her to purchase a really expensive ticket for the group interview, and she just said forget it."

Currently, round two applicants invited to the sessions are shown a video of Dean Thomas Robertson discussing the school's three pillars -- social impact, global presence, and innovation -- and then told about a fictitious donation of $1 million. After each of the six applicants in the session is given one minute for an introduction, they are then asked how they would invest the money in support of one of the pillars. An admissions official observes the session, presumably to assess each candidate's performance.

Admissions consultants: Helpful addition or thwarting the process?

Asked if the consulting sessions? thwart Wharton's efforts to get an "unscripted view" of applicants, most of the firms say it's na?ve to think they wouldn't create new ways to help MBA candidates with the test.

"I really like to think that what we designed is actually honoring their intention," says Guido of mbaMission, "Look, there is tension between ad consultants and admissions committees. They want to see the unpolished candidate and we won't let them. But we are not trying to get people to change their behavior. If we coach them over and over again on what to say, I can see them taking issue with it. But you can't train someone out of who they are."

MORE:?Anatomy of a major B-school turnaround

Adds Abraham of Accepted.com: "As long as there is a need for consulting and editing or interview coaching, we will innovate in response to the schools' new methods of meeting potential students."

Clear Admit, another MBA consulting firm, is taking a different approach from offering applicants a simulation. "We decided that trying to simulate a group interview wasn't the ideal approach for prepping candidates," says Stacey Oyler, a consultant with Clear Admit.?Instead, the firm's consultants are giving their clients expectations for the group interview experience, letting them know what Wharton is assessing, and talking through the types of people they may encounter in the group test.

"We talk with clients about the three pillars and encourage them to come up with great ideas for each one," adds Oyler. "We know from our own group interview experience that Wharton is looking for candidates who can showcase strong interpersonal skills and who are able to facilitate the discussion while contributing their own unique ideas."

The mbaMission service is a WebEx-like experience with audio and whiteboards but no video. Two consultants observe the session and offer both group and then individual feedback. "A lot of people have ... told us that what it helped them to do is think about their role in the group so that they went in with at least a few ideas of how they would orient themselves to the group," says Guido. "Having a plan of how to help move the groups forward while not stepping on people's toes gave them a greater sense of security."

More from Poets&Quants:

Source: http://management.fortune.cnn.com/2013/02/26/wharton-admissions-test/

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Gun laws in selected countries

JOHANNESBURG (AP) ? In South Africa, where Oscar Pistorius is charged with premeditated murder in the Feb. 14 shooting death of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, gun owners can only use lethal force in stringently regulated circumstances. Here is a brief look at gun laws in selected countries:

___

RUSSIA: For self-defense, Russians can only use hunting rifles and non-lethal weapons, such as devices that spray irritants or pistols that fire rubber bullets. Russian law is extremely vague on when such weapons can be used. The law doesn't, for example, spell out when people can shoot at intruders. Courts have handed prison sentences to people for "exceeding the limits of admissible self-defense," even when they used weapons in response to a clear threat to life.

___

COLOMBIA: Citizens have the right to defend themselves with a deadly weapon against "unjust aggression." The response must be proportional to the aggression, the criminal code says. This sanctions deadly force during home invasions. Attorney Jaime Granados said the issue of proportionality is crucial. One cannot, for example, shoot someone simply for petty theft.

___

FRANCE: Firearms can be used for "legitimate defense," said national police spokesman Laurent Ricard. This is only when people face "immediate attack." An armed response must be proportional to the attack. For example, a person cannot use a gun against an attacker who comes at them with a chair.

___

SOUTH AFRICA: Licensed gun owners are allowed to use lethal force only if they believe they are facing an immediate, serious and direct attack or threat of attack that could either be deadly or cause grievous injury, said Johannesburg attorney Martin Hood, who specializes in firearm law.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/gun-laws-selected-countries-173714384--oly.html

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Analysis: Castro successor lacks charisma but is experienced manager

HAVANA (Reuters) - When Cuban President Raul Castro named former engineering professor and long-time Communist Party insider Miguel Diaz-Canel as his first vice president and potential successor on Sunday, he chose managerial skills over flair.

Diaz-Canel, 52, is the youngest non-military man to come so close to the pinnacle of power in Cuba since the Castro brothers took power in 1959.

He was appointed first vice president on Sunday at a meeting of the National Assembly where Castro also announced he would step down in 2018 at the end of his second five-year term as president.

Diaz-Canel would step into the presidency if Raul Castro could not complete his term. He rose through the ruling Communist Party's ranks including key posts outside the capital and enjoys some name recognition at home, though is far less well known abroad.

While he has only two years of routine military service under his belt, Diaz-Canel's ascent through the provincial ranks has earned him strong ties with the military, connections that other up-and-coming figures who fell by the wayside in past reshuffles have lacked.

"This is a major change in Cuba, not just generational," said Arturo Lopez-Levy, an analyst at the University of Denver who used to work for the Cuban interior ministry on intelligence issues and U.S. relations. "The promotion of Diaz-Canel should be seen as part of an institutional change in the way the Cuban elite is promoted."

Before joining the government in Havana, Diaz-Canel held top Communist Party posts in two important provinces, Villa Clara and Holguin, centers of the booming tourism industry as well as new private-sector activity, both key elements of an economic reform process being pushed by Raul Castro.

That experience makes Diaz-Canel well-equipped to help Castro advance those reforms, designed to make the economy more efficient and bring in more foreign currency, without loosening the Communist Party's political control.

"He has ties to the provincial tsars of the party. Those leaders are very important," said Lopez-Levy. "They don't appear in the international media, but they are a very strong power in the island. They are kings in their own provinces."

In Cuba, there is no political campaigning, so proven loyalty and strong connections inside the party and the military are more valuable than a media-savvy style.

"I am not used to making frequent appearances in public, except at times when it is required," Raul Castro said in his first public statement after taking over for his ailing brother Fidel in 2006. "Moreover, I have always been discreet, that is my way, and let me clarify that I plan to continue that way."

Discreet would be an understatement in describing Diaz-Canel's public persona as he worked his way up through the Communist Party over 30 years, even as other young cadres rose and fell.

Like Raul Castro, he is considered a methodical speaker and lacks the charisma of Fidel Castro. Diaz-Canel has so far not made any public comments since his appointment on Sunday.

'STAUNCH COMMUNIST'

He was brought to Havana in 2009 to become minister of higher education and then a vice president of the Council of Ministers.

He arrived soon after a number of high-flying Fidel Castro prot?g?s who lacked Diaz-Canel's party-level managerial experience, most notably former secretary of the Council of Ministers Carlos Lage and Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, were fired by Raul Castro.

A Communist Party source said Diaz-Canel was viewed within the ranks as "sincere, incorruptible, a staunch communist, a nationalist loyal to the Castros' revolutionary vision."

Despite being known as an effective manager, he also has a reputation for negotiating the fine line between Raul Castro's reform agenda and the sometimes more dogmatic doctrine of provincial party members resistant to change.

"Diaz-Canel, while a loyalist of the old style, is young, reformist when reform is called for, a known entity without ever being singled out or even thought of as a threat to Fidel or Raul," said Hal Klepak, professor of history and strategy at the Royal Military College of Canada.

Klepak, who wrote a book on the Cuban military under Raul Castro, pointed out the president is well known for picking the best man for a job. "He is just the sort of man that Raul, looking for continuity and institutionalization of the revolution, can count on, but anxious like Raul to modernize that government."

Fidel Castro, who removed himself from power in 2008 due to ill health, made a rare appearance at the National Assembly meeting on Sunday where Diaz-Canel's appointment was made, appearing to add his seal of approval to the choice.

Diaz-Canel appears in fine shape for his age, with a full head of salt and pepper hair, which he used to wear long, with a chiseled face, square chin and muscular frame.

Lopez-Levy recalled meeting him in the 1990s, describing him as "an articulate, flexible guy," with a reputation for being tolerant of homosexuals at a time when the Communist Party was still mistrustful of the gay community.

John McAuliff, director of the New York-based Fund for Reconciliation and Development who specializes in university level exchanges with Cuba, also met Diaz-Canel at an education conference last year and described him as intelligent and engaging.

"Diaz-Canel stopped by and was very friendly. The keynote speech he gave at the conference could have been made by any serious international educator in the United States," he said.

"I joked with him ... that I could post it without attribution and no one would guess it was by the Cuban minister. He said I should," McAuliff added.

(Additional reporting by David Adams; Editing by David Adams, Kieran Murray and Cynthia Osterman)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-castro-successor-lacks-charisma-experienced-manager-003350615.html

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Monday, 25 February 2013

BPA may affect the developing brain by disrupting gene regulation

Feb. 25, 2013 ? Environmental exposure to bisphenol A (BPA), a widespread chemical found in plastics and resins, may suppress a gene vital to nerve cell function and to the development of the central nervous system, according to a study led by researchers at Duke Medicine.

The researchers published their findings -- which were observed in cortical neurons of mice, rats and humans -- in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Feb. 25, 2013.

"Our study found that BPA may impair the development of the central nervous system, and raises the question as to whether exposure could predispose animals and humans to neurodevelopmental disorders," said lead author Wolfgang Liedtke, M.D., PhD, associate professor of medicine/neurology and neurobiology at Duke.

BPA, a molecule that mimics estrogen and interferes with the body's endocrine system, can be found in a wide variety of manufactured products, including thermal printer paper, some plastic water bottles and the lining of metal cans. The chemical can be ingested if it seeps into the contents of food and beverage containers.

Research in animals has raised concerns that exposure to BPA may cause health problems such as behavioral issues, endocrine and reproductive disorders, obesity, cancer and immune system disorders. Some studies suggest that infants and young children may be the most vulnerable to the effects of BPA, which led the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ban the use of the chemical in baby bottles and cups in July 2012.

While BPA has been shown to affect the developing nervous system, little is understood as to how this occurs. The research team developed a series of experiments in rodent and human nerve cells to learn how BPA induces changes that disrupt gene regulation.

During early development of neurons, high levels of chloride are present in the cells. These levels drop as neurons mature, thanks to a chloride transporter protein called KCC2, which churns chloride ions out of the cells. If the level of chloride within neurons remains elevated, it can damage neural circuits and compromise a developing nerve cell's ability to migrate to its proper position in the brain.

Exposing neurons to minute amounts of BPA alters the chloride levels inside the cells by somehow shutting down the Kcc2 gene, which makes the KCC2 protein, thereby delaying the removal of chloride from neurons.

MECP2, another protein important for normal brain function, was found to be a possible culprit behind this change. When exposed to BPA, MECP2 is more abundant and binds to the Kcc2 gene at a higher rate, which might help to shut it down. This could contribute to problems in the developing brain due to a delay in chloride being removed.

These findings raise the question of whether BPA could contribute to neurodevelopmental disorders such as Rett syndrome, a severe autism spectrum disorder that is only found in girls and is characterized by mutations in the gene that produces MECP2.

While both male and female neurons were affected by BPA in the studies, female neurons were more susceptible to the chemical's toxicity. Further research will dig deeper into the sex-specific effects of BPA exposure and whether certain sex hormone receptors are involved in BPA's effect on KCC2.

"Our findings improve our understanding of how environmental exposure to BPA can affect the regulation of the Kcc2 gene. However, we expect future studies to focus on what targets aside from Kcc2 are affected by BPA," Liedtke said. "This is a chapter in an ongoing story."

In addition to Liedtke, study authors include Michele Yeo and Ken Berglund of the Liedtke Lab in the Division of Neurology at Duke Medicine; Michael Hanna, Maria D. Torres and Jorge Busciglio of the University of California, Irvine; Junjie U. Guo and Yuan Gao of the Lieber Institute for Brain Development and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md.; and Jaya Kittur, Joel Abramowitz and Lutz Birnbaumer of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

The research received funding from Duke University, the Klingenstein Fund, the National Institutes of Health (R21NS066307, HD38466 and AG16573), and intramural funds from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

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Journal Reference:

  1. Michele Yeo, Ken Berglund, Michael Hanna, Junjie U. Guo, Jaya Kittur, Maria D. Torres, Joel Abramowitz, Jorge Busciglio, Yuan Gao, Lutz Birnbaumer, and Wolfgang B. Liedtke. Bisphenol A delays the perinatal chloride shift in cortical neurons by epigenetic effects on the Kcc2 promoter. PNAS, February 25, 2013 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1300959110

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

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

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/health_medicine/genes/~3/NaeyTOnLcT0/130225153122.htm

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Prisoner's death stokes fears of third uprising

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) ? The mysterious death of a 30-year-old Palestinian gas station attendant in Israeli custody stoked new West Bank clashes Sunday, along with Israeli fears of a third Palestinian uprising.

A senior Palestinian official alleged that Arafat Jaradat was tortured by Israel's Shin Bet security service, citing an autopsy he said revealed bruising and two broken ribs.

Israel's Health Ministry said the autopsy did not conclusively determine the cause of death, but that the bruising and broken ribs were likely the result of attempts to revive the detainee.

Jaradat's death came at a time of rising West Bank tensions, including several days of Palestinian marches in support of four hunger-striking prisoners in Israeli lockups. In all, Israel holds nearly 4,600 Palestinians, including dozens who have never been formally charged or tried.

Frozen Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, the recent re-election of Israeli hard-line Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a Palestinian cash crisis and the Palestinians' sense of being abandoned by the Arab world seem to have created fertile ground for a third Palestinian revolt.

Over the weekend, Israel's army chief convened senior commanders to discuss the growing unrest.

Jaradat's death "is liable to become the opening shot" in a third uprising, Israeli military commentator Alex Fishman wrote in the Yediot Ahronot daily Sunday, arguing that the "Palestinian street has been boiling with anger for a number of weeks now."

However, Israeli officials have previously expressed concern about a new uprising, only to see bursts of Palestinian protests fizzle.

The first uprising, marked by stone-throwing protests and commercial strikes, erupted in the late 1980s and led to Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. The second uprising broke out in 2000, after failed talks on a final peace deal, and was far deadlier, with Israel reoccupying the West Bank in response to bombings and shootings.

In recent years, the West Bank has been relatively calm. Despite recent tensions, the Palestinian self-rule government has not broken off security coordination with Israel in their joint campaign against Islamic militants.

Palestinian activists also say they learned from the mistakes of the armed revolt a decade ago and are turning to more creative protests against Israel's 45-year rule over lands they want for a future state.

Former Palestinian security chief Jibril Rajoub, speaking in Hebrew on Israel Radio, tried to reassure Israelis, declaring Sunday "on behalf of the entire Palestinian leadership that there is no plan to lead to bloodshed."

Jaradat, a father of two from the West Bank village of Saeer, died in Megiddo Prison in northern Israel on Saturday, six days after his arrest on suspicion of stone throwing.

Jaradat's attorney, Kamil Sabbagh, said his client told an Israeli military judge Thursday during a hearing that he was being forced to sit for long periods during interrogation. He also complained of back pain and seemed terrified to return to the Shin Bet lockup, although he did not have any apparent signs of physical abuse, Sabbagh said.

After the court hearing, the judge ordered Jaradat to be examined by a prison doctor.

The Shin Bet said that during interrogation, Jaradat was examined several times by a doctor who detected no health problems. On Saturday, he was in his cell and felt unwell after lunch, the agency said.

"Rescue services and a doctor were alerted and treated him," the statement said. But "they didn't succeed in saving his life."

On Sunday, Israel's forensics institute performed an autopsy attended by a physician from the Palestinian Authority.

After being briefed by the Palestinian physician, Issa Karake, the Palestinian minister of prisoner affairs, told a news conference late Sunday that Jaradat had suffered two broken ribs on the right side of his chest. The autopsy also showed bruises on Jaradat's back and chest.

Israeli officials initially said Jaradat apparently died of a heart attack, but Karake said the Palestinian physician told him there was no evidence of that.

Later, Israel's Health Ministry said Jaradat did not suffer from disease and that it was not possible yet to determine his cause of death conclusively.

Jaradat "faced harsh torture, leading to his immediate, direct death. Israel is fully responsible for his killing," Karake said.

Protesting Jaradat's death, Palestinians threw stones at Israeli troops in several locations, including the West Bank city of Hebron and at a checkpoint near the military's Ofer prison on Sunday. In two locations, troops fired tear gas and rubber-coated steel pellets.

In the clash near the checkpoint, troops fired live rounds, shooting the 15-year-old son of the commander of the Palestinian Preventive Security Service in the chest and stomach, said Palestinian health official Dr. Ahmed Bitawi. The teen, Walid Hab al-Reeh, was in stable condition, while another man was wounded in the arm, Bitawi said.

The Preventive Security Service is key to security coordination with Israel. The Israeli military said it was aware of a report that a Palestinian youth was seriously hurt by gunfire, but could not confirm that soldiers used live rounds to disperse the protest.

Kadoura Fares, who heads a Palestinian group advocating for prisoners, urged Palestinians on Sunday to keep demonstrating. He also said that one of the four hunger-striking prisoners, Jafar Izzeldeen, was moved to a hospital Sunday because his condition was deteriorating.

Recent West Bank protests have focused on the fate of prisoners, an emotional Palestinian consensus issue.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians have been imprisoned since Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in 1967, meaning virtually every Palestinian family has had someone locked up.

The detainees are held on a range of charges, from stone-throwing to deadly attacks. Most Palestinians embrace them as heroes resisting occupation, while Israelis tend to view them as terrorists.

___

Associated Press writers Diaa Hadid, Aron Heller and Dalia Nammari in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/prisoners-death-stokes-fears-third-uprising-203359034.html

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Hubble sees a glowing jet from a young star

Feb. 24, 2013 ? The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a new image showing an object known as HH 151, a bright jet of glowing material trailed by an intricate, orange-hued plume of gas and dust.

It is located some 460 light-years away in the constellation of Taurus (The Bull), near to the young, tumultuous star HL Tau.

In the first few hundred thousand years of life, new stars like HL Tau pull in material that falls towards them from the surrounding space. This material forms a hot disc that swirls around the coalescing body, launching narrow streams of material from its poles. These jets are shot out at speeds of several hundred kilometers (or miles) per second and collide violently with nearby clumps of dust and gas, creating wispy, billowing structures known as Herbig-Haro objects -- like HH 151 seen in the image.

Such objects are very common in star-forming regions. They are short-lived, and their motion and evolution can actually be seen over very short timescales, on the order of years. They quickly race away from the newly-forming star that emitted them, colliding with new clumps of material and glowing brightly before fading away.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by NASA.

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

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_technology/~3/qbSvdIFTYxY/130224082136.htm

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In historic UFC bout, Rousey and Carmouche score one for female athletes everywhere

ANAHEIM, Calif. ? Nothing was more predictable, nor nearly as significant, as Ronda Rousey's arm bar victory over Liz Carmouche in the first round of their bantamweight title fight on Saturday.

The fight marked a monumental moment in sports history, a time when the women stood above the men in every way. Ronda Rousey and Liz Carmouche jostle for position Saturday. (USA Today Sports)

For one, Rousey and Carmouche saved UFC 157 after a stinker of a co-main event between Lyoto Machida and Dan Henderson. When the Rousey-Carmouche fight was announced as the main event in December, a small but very vocal portion of the UFC fan base howled in protest.

Of course, they simply showed themselves as clueless bigots because there was no doubt who everybody had come to see Saturday.

All 15,525 fans who jammed the Honda Center and paid a $1.4 million gate were there to see if Rousey could stretch her incredible run of first-round arm bars to 10 in 10 amateur and professional fights.

When Machida won a sleep-inducing split decision in the co-main event, Rousey and Carmouche went out and put on a dynamic show that brought down the house. Rousey got a hero's welcome from the crowd from the moment she entered the arena. It hit a crescendo as she stepped into the cage, men and women, boys and girls, standing and screaming for her in a full-throated roar.

The reception made those who had angrily said they wouldn't buy a ticket or watch the show because the UFC was somehow disrespecting Machida and Henderson look awfully small.

"Imagine how this place would have been had [Machida-Henderson] been the main event," UFC president Dana White said. "Everyone would have left here [angry] and it would have ruined the show."

[Also: Ronda Rousey survives UFC debut, wins via first-round arm bar]

Rousey and Carmouche also carried the show on the promotional end. White said early estimates are that the results will be far higher than anticipated, squelching concerns in some corners that it might flop.

They were witty, colorful and passionate in telling their stories and the public bought in.

This was a moment comparable to the 1973 Battle of the Sexes tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. That match squashed the outdated notion that women were somehow a weaker sex and couldn't compete with men.?

King-Riggs was an exhibition though; Rousey-Carmouche was very much the real deal.

They proved that women could compete on a show featuring men and still be the star attractions. Too often, women's sports are given secondary roles.

The majority of television, print and online coverage of sports is about men. This might be the night that nudges the pendulum closer to the center.

Rousey and Carmouche competed on a card filled with men and looked perfectly at home in the main event.

[Also: Lyoto Machida ekes out split decision win over frustrated Dan Henderson]

The pressure on Rousey was enormous. She carried an unprecedented promotional load, for months filling every waking moment that she wasn't training with interviews.

Not only was there intense pressure on her to win, but it was specifically to win by first-round arm bar. Anything less would have been perceived as a disappointment.

She's ready to hide now after running on fumes for weeks.?Ronda Rousey celebrates after defeating Liz Carmouche. (USA Today Sports)

"For the next week, I'm probably going to fall totally off the grid as much as I can," she said, grinning. "If I see anyone, I'm not going to talk about me at all. No more talking about me for a whole week."

Others, though, will be talking about her for a long time after Saturday's win. She survived a near-submission when Carmouche hopped onto her back early and first caught her in a rear naked choke and then a neck crank.

It looked for a time that Rousey's unbeaten streak would end and that the former Marine, the first openly gay fighter in the UFC, would wrest the title from her.

Carmouche knew that Rousey wouldn't go quietly, and she didn't.

"Neck cranks are hard to pull off and if the person has a lot of heart, she can fight through it, which she did," Carmouche said of Rousey.

Carmouche had Rousey's teeth marks on her arm after, the result of knocking Rousey's mouthpiece out and Rousey's upper teeth coming down on her forearm.

When the news conference ended, Rousey walked over to Carmouche and said, "Sorry, dude. Definitely not intentional," and the two combatants embraced. Both were beaming, and though Carmouche had come up a loser in her biggest fight, it seemed appropriate.

They'd accomplished something together that was far bigger than themselves, and Rousey clearly pulled alongside fighters such as Georges St-Pierre and Anderson Silva as one of the UFC's biggest draws.

"Ronda is a big star, man, and people want to see her," White said afterward.

[Also: Josh Koscheck suffers upset loss to resurgent Robbie Lawler]

The duo did much more, though, for women who have been denied opportunity or not given equal access solely because of their gender. They stood up to the scrutiny and the grind and the pressure and delivered a scintillating performance. Ronda Rousey goes for an arm bar against Liz Carmouche. (Getty)

"I thought it was a great fight and I thought it lived up to all of the hype around it, the fact the place was going nuts," Rousey said. "I'm glad it was a full house. I'm honored to be part of it. It might take a while to sink in."

The ramifications of Saturday's show are potentially significant, not only for MMA but women's sports. A day after Rousey and Carmouche put on a show, Danica Patrick will start on the pole in the Daytona 500.

It's a new world and Ronda Rousey and Liz Carmouche played a significant role in shaping it.

Other popular content on Yahoo! Sports:
? Jimmie Johnson's daughter has a favorite driver -- and it's not JJ
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? Tigers ace Justin Verlander willing to test free-agent waters for $200M deal
? Manti Te'o coached, but poised in combine press conference

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/sports/rss/mma/SIG=136qnmebl/*http%3A//sports.yahoo.com/news/mma--ronda-rousey-liz-carmouche-ufc-157-saved-by-women-084642836.html

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Sunday, 24 February 2013

Cardinal accused of aiding pedophiles will vote on next pope, says he?s scapegoat, like Jesus (Americablog)

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

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New Haven kids see college chances in squash game

NEW HAVEN, Conn. - (AP) -- Every carom of Osuman Imoro's squash ball takes him closer to college.

It's no accident, either. Since he was in fifth grade, Imoro and dozens of other city students have learned and played squash with the express purpose of someday landing spots at the nation's best colleges.

That's how they bounce at Squash Haven.

"People always ask, 'Why squash?'" said Executive Director Julie Greenwood. "But I think squash is uniquely suited to what we're doing. The sport is played at elite institutions around the country, and playing it sends a very subtle message to these kids, that they belong here."

Now in its sixth year, Squash Haven works with 79 New Haven students who come to Yale University's sprawling Payne Whitney Gymnasium three times a week, year-round. The kids get academic tutoring in classrooms on the first floor, plus top-notch squash training on the fourth floor -- where Yale has 15 gleaming courts in the Brady Squash Center and provides a home for the United States Squash Hall of Fame.

The kids are not allowed to use the elevator, incidentally. It's not the Squash Haven way.

"It's pretty cool to think of these kids who started out not even knowing what this sport was, now playing it on a varsity level," said Christi Boscarino-Elligers, Squash Haven's academic director. "There are some kids for whom Squash Haven has been absolutely transformative."

Take Osuman, for instance. He's a 14-year-old freshman at Wilbur Cross High School. A refugee from Ghana, "Oosie" joined Squash Haven when he was a fifth-grader at East Rock Global Studies Magnet School.

He's now the best urban squash player in his age group in the country.

Up on the fourth floor, resting on a bench between matches, Osuman exuded a quiet confidence. "We get more done here than in any other program," he said, keeping one eye fixed on the game on a nearby court. "They motivate us to do well in school."

As for his future, Osuman is leaning toward Drexel University in Philadelphia. "They have a good science program," he said. "And good squash, too."

Squash Haven is part of the National Urban Squash Education Association, a network of independent, nonprofit programs in cities such as Boston, New York, Denver, San Diego, Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago and Baltimore. The first program, Boston's SquashBusters, began in 1996, and the concept reached New Haven in the 2007-08 school year.

It has grown steadily ever since.

"I've been in it since they first started," said Joby Davis, a 15-year-old sophomore at Wilbur Cross. "We weren't really good at the sport then, but we kept going back out on the court. I like how fast and competitive it is."

Over the years, Joby has had to explain the rules of squash many times to his friends and acquaintances. "Oh yeah," he acknowledged. "But we have schools all over that have players now, so some kids know."

Here's something else Joby knows: he's planning to go to college, preferably at Franklin and Marshall or Drexel.

Alexandra Matamoros, a 15-year-old sophomore at Career High School, has her sights on either Columbia or Wesleyan universities, where she'd like to study criminal justice.

"My friends make jokes that I'm hitting a ball with fruit," Alexandra said, still out of breath from a match that ended just seconds earlier. She credited Squash Haven with focusing her on school. "I take it much more seriously now," she said.

Each year, Squash Haven holds open houses and visits city schools to introduce the program to local students and their families. Greenwood said they look for kids with an academic spark who have at least a modest amount of athletic ability.

"We're not looking for the Michael Jordan of squash," Greenwood said.

There are written applications and tryouts for Squash Haven. Once kids are accepted, they must attend at least 90 percent of the practices and classroom sessions. If a student gets more than one C in a grading period, he or she will get additional classroom time.

"We look for motivation and commitment," Greenwood said. "If you're in fifth grade, we're telling you you'll be with us until you go to college."

Greenwood, coach John DeWitt and the Squash Haven staff have nurtured at least 25 ranked players, plus dozens of others who likely will make squash a lifelong recreational sport.

Along the way, they've also worked on kids' writing skills, homework habits and SAT preparation.

"The athletic piece of this is the carrot, especially for the boys," said Boscarino-Elligers, a former New Haven schoolteacher. "Once they're in the door, we do all kinds of good stuff. It's an educator's dream."

Just then, the newbies -- this year's fifth-graders -- pile into the Brady Squash Center. They energetically grab racquets and await their court assignments. They've been playing only since November.

"It's excellent," said 11-year-old Jorge Barrios. "I never held a squash racquet before. It helps me with my academics."

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Source: http://www.newsday.com/news/region-state/new-haven-kids-see-college-chances-in-squash-game-1.4700705

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Jobs Linux System Administrator Job Code J31420

Search job opportunities in world are highest paying jobs. List of jobs opportunties in world are top jobs in world 2013, search latest jobs and apply online free to all. The main keywords to this page are job opportunities, jobs opportunities, jobs opportunities in world, job opportunities by country, jobs by countries, jobs by country, jobs in country, jobs in 2012, jobs in 2013.

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Saturday, 23 February 2013

Analysis: Obama, GOP see no need to stop the cuts

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Unlike in earlier rounds of budget brinkmanship, President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans both seem content to fight out their latest showdown on the current terrain, let across-the-board spending cuts take effect on March 1 and allow them to stay in place for weeks if not much longer.

This time, there is no market-rattling threat of a government default to force the two sides to compromise, no federal shutdown on the short-term horizon and no year-end deadline for preventing a tax increase for every working American.

The rhetoric is reminiscent, for sure.

"So far at least, the ideas that the Republicans have proposed ask nothing of the wealthiest Americans or the biggest corporations," Obama said this week as he campaigned to pin the blame for any negative effects on his political opponents. "So the burden is all on the first responders, or seniors or middle class families," he said in comments similar in tone to his re-election campaign.

Republicans, standing on political ground of their own choosing, responded sharply to the president's fresh demand for higher taxes.

"Spending is the problem, spending must be the focus," said House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, while Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky declared, "There won't be any easy off-ramps on this one. The days of 11th hour negotiations are over."

A crisis atmosphere could yet develop this spring, when hundreds of thousands or even millions of threatened government furloughs begin to take effect and the spending cuts begin to bite. Already, Republicans are considering legislation to give the administration greater flexibility in making the cuts, a step that could minimize the impact on the public. It's a step the White House says it opposes, although the depth of that conviction has yet to be tested.

At heart, the present standoff is yet another indication of the political resistance to a compromise curbing the growth of Medicare, Medicaid and possibly Social Security, a step that both Obama and Republicans say is essential to restoring the nation's fiscal health. It is the last major remaining challenge in divided government's struggle, now in its third year, to reduce deficits by $4 trillion or more over a decade.

Counting the across-the-board cuts now beginning to command the nation's attention ? at a 10-year cost of $1.2 trillion ? the president and Congress have racked up more than $3.6 trillion in savings. Much came from spending, although legislation that Republicans let pass at year's end raised taxes on the wealthy to generate an estimated $600 billion for the Treasury over a decade.

The so-called sequester now approaching was never supposed to happen. It was designed as an unpalatable fallback, to take effect only in case a congressional super-committee failed to come up with $1 trillion or more in savings from benefit programs.

Now, more than a year later, Republicans are fond of saying that the idea itself originated at the White House.

That skips lightly over the fact that their own votes helped enact it into law.

Also that they decided a month ago that it marked the moment of most leverage in their struggle to maneuver Obama and Democrats into curtailing benefit programs. To accomplish that objective, they already have raised the debt limit without winning any cuts in exchange, a step they once vowed not to take. And within two weeks, they are likely to launch legislation making sure the government operates without interruption when current funding authority runs out for most agencies on March 27.

Republicans aren't the only ones partial to verbal sleights of hand.

In a letter to lawmakers earlier this month, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius sounded a series of alarms. The spending cuts "could compromise" the health of more than 373,000 mentally ill or emotionally disturbed individuals, "could slow efforts to improve" health care for American Indians and Alaska Natives, she wrote, and admissions to inpatient addiction facilities "could be reduced."

Could or could not. Soon or later. Nothing pinned down.

The administration hopes to win over the public and bring Republican lawmakers to heel, and it dispatched Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to the White House briefing room on Friday.

"Come to the table and start talking" to find a way to avert the cuts, the former GOP lawmaker urged members of his own Republican Party.

Peppered with skeptical questions, LaHood directed reporters to his department's website, with a listing of more than 300 air traffic facilities where overnight shifts could be eliminated or perhaps closed entirely.

Asked if his office was receiving unhappy calls from the public, he got to the political point.

"My phones will ring from members of Congress (asking) 'why is my control tower being closed?'" he said.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE ? David Espo is AP's chief congressional correspondent.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-obama-gop-see-no-205914262.html

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US investigated Gaza flotilla passengers for terror ties but not Israel's slaying of citizen, new docs show (Maureen Clare Murphy, The Electronic Intifada)

Recently-released US government documents related to Israel?s deadly May 2010 raid on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla shed new light on the extent to which the US disregarded the rights and safety of US citizens participating in the humanitarian mission to the besieged Gaza Strip ? and the lengths to which it shielded Israel from accountability.

Nine passengers, including a US citizen, were killed and many more injured by Israeli commandos who stormed the flagship Mavi Marmara, provoking international outrage and turning world opinion against Israel, possibly irreversibly. Seventeen US citizens were aboard the flotilla, including a former US army colonel and former US ambassador. Passengers were arrested and detained in Israel without charge and eventually deported.

The 5,000 pages of documents from various government agencies ? many of them heavily redacted ? were released after the New York City-based Center for Constitutional Rights sued the US government in May 2011 when the US failed to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests submitted by the CCR one month after the attack.

Murder of Furkan Do?an

The documents show that while the US government tracked citizens participating in the flotilla for months before their scheduled departure to Gaza, but made no efforts to ensure the safety of the passengers and parroted the Israeli government line by characterizing the humanitarian flotilla as a provocation.

The government emails and cables also show the shocking lack of concern regarding the slaying of a US teenager aboard the Mavi Marmara, Furkan Do?an, despite the desperate pleas of his father for information about his son?s whereabouts and safety (see the CCR?s production guide to the documents related to Furkan Do?an).

As the Center for Constitutional Rights summarizes: ?Israeli commandos shot Furkan five times, including one shot to the head at point-blank range. At the time of the attack, it is believed Furkan was filming with a small video camera on the top deck of the Mavi Marmara.? A United Nations inquiry into Israel?s attack on the flotilla states that the teen?s wounds suggest that ?he may already have been lying wounded when the fatal shot was delivered, as suggested by witness accounts to that effect.?

The Obama administration made no inquiry into Furkan Do?an?s death and deferred to Israel?s own investigations into the incident, even though the attack occurred in international waters. And not only did the US fail to investigate Do?an?s killing, it also actively undermined independent international investigations into the siege of the flotilla. The US also made no high-level attempt to retrieve property of US citizens seized during the raid, including cameras that would yield key evidence to understanding the truth of what happened on the Mavi Marmara. Israel is believed to still possess property belonging to US citizens aboard the flotilla.

Passengers investigated for terror ties

It took the US government three days to learn that Furkan Do?an was slain on the Mavi Marmara, and US failed to investigate his death, yet the documents show that the US government wasted no time in investigating passengers on the humanitarian convoy for terror group financing ties.

The CCR notes in one of its production guides to the documents: ?On August 17, 2010, the FBI?s Counterterrorism Financing Operations and Counterterrorism Financing Management Unit issued a memorandum that stated as its synopsis: ?To provide results of research conducted on the 561 individuals associated with the Gaza Freedom flotilla? to Counterterrorism squads in Kansas City, Chicago, San Francisco and Tel Aviv.?

And while the US government was busy investigating humanitarian activists for terror financing crimes, it ignored a request by the Center for Constitutional Rights to investigate an Israeli commando who spoke at New York University about his experience raiding the Mavi Marmara. The Facebook event page for the commando?s speaking event, organized by Birthright Israel and co-sponsored by anti-Palestinian group StandWithUs, promised ?exclusive firsthand footage taken aboard the ship.?

Jessica Lee, a Bertha Fellow in International Human Rights, is part of a team at the Center for Constitutional Rights endeavoring to learn the truth of the US? role regarding the 2010 raid. She spoke to me via Skype about the disturbing conclusions drawn from the government documents.

Maureen Clare Murphy: Just to summarize for readers, the Center for Constitutional Rights announced last week that various US government agencies released to the CCR 5,000 pages of documents related to the 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla. These documents were released after a civil complaint filed by the CCR after a year of non-compliance to Freedom of Information Act requests made by the CCR. Can you briefly describe what is actually in the released documents?

Jessica Lee: The released documents show the US response before, during and immediately following the attack and they also show the US? failure to investigate and it?s stifling of investigations. What we?re seeing in these documents is that the US makes a choice again and again to follow Israel and to have an unquestioning deference to the Government of Israel, even when American lives are at stake.

Just to summarize the documents, we have a large portion from the Department of State; the documents are from multiple embassies, they are from offices in Washington, we have documents from the office of the legal advisor and memos from high-level officials such as [State Department legal advisor] Harold Koh and former Secretary Hillary Clinton. Again and again, they show a deference to Israel in assessing the issue of the flotilla and characterizing the flotilla, and really in their response, which is what I found very disturbing.

MCM: Is the Center for Constitutional Rights satisfied with what the government has produced in response to the FOIA civil complaint?

JL: No, we are not happy with what has been produced. A number of the agencies appear to have done inadequate searches. They don?t appear to have released all of the information that they have, and for the information that has been released, much of it is redacted and we?re finding that a lot of the redactions are inappropriate. We are challenging those redactions based on the FOIA law.

MCM: As you mentioned, the documents show ? in what I found to be a shocking way ? that the US deferred to Israel to investigate itself for its siege on the Mavi Marmara even though the attack occurred in international waters, and even though the autopsy reports strongly suggested that the US citizen who was killed aboard the Mavi Marmara, Furkan Do?an, was shot at extremely close range and possibly summarily executed. It also shows that the US took three days to become aware of his death, and in the meantime his family was calling the US government, desperate for information. Can you comment on what the documents show regarding the US? handling of the killing of a US citizen on the Mavi Marmara?

JL: These documents show what you just described, which is a complete deference to Israel despite this really barbaric murder. Furkan Do?an asked permission from his parents to go on this trip, and they never imagined the violence that would occur. They thought that having a US passport would provide him some level of protection. But what these documents show is that frankly, it doesn?t matter if you?re a US citizen; when it comes to challenging Israel, the US government is going to think of Israel?s interests first and citizens exercising their first amendment rights last.

As you said, [Furkan Do?an?s] father was desperately seeking information about [his son]. His father went to the airport hoping that his son was one of those deported back to Turkey and would be walking off the plane. And instead he was greeted by officials who told him that his son was dead. And of course, meanwhile, the US government was either ignorant or oblivious to the fact that a US citizen was killed.

Something that I thought was interesting about these documents was the scenario of what happened at the morgue. There was a US official who was sent to the morgue in Israel to see if they could identify any of the bodies as US citizens. And instead of being shown the bodies, they were shown pictures. And none of the pictures had bullet wounds, and none of the pictures in any way resembled Furkan, who we know was shot in the face. And so there was what seems to be an effort by Israel to not release the truth to the United States early on and in the months following. It doesn?t seem that the US ever took Israel to task for hiding this information or for the killing itself. They defer again and again to the Israeli investigation even though it was a barbaric murder which occurred at point-blank range.

MCM: Related to that, not only did the US not seem terribly concerned about whether US citizens were killed on the Mavi Marmara, the Center for Constitutional Rights shows that the US did very little to restore the property that was seized by Israel when it stormed the ships. The CCR mentions that it was likely that Furkan was holding a camera when he was killed and comments in its summary of the documents that ?Israel?s apparent loss of this property and rejection of responsibility in its return is tantamount to destruction of evidence, since it impedes the investigation of the causalities that occurred during the incident.? Can you comment further on this?

JL: It?s really a travesty that the United States had an opportunity to press for this evidence and time and time again, they accepted Israel?s justifications for not turning it over. If you look at the documents, Israeli government officials delayed returning property for years now and there?s no high-level discussion of it, there was no US acknowledgement that this wasn?t just someone?s property with economic value, but that this was evidence. This wasn?t raised in any meaningful manner and it?s a really disappointing showing that the US was not interested in getting the truth out about what happened on this flotilla.

And something else that I think is very telling [is that] this property again and again was raised by consular officials but you don?t see it at the high level whatsoever. It?s not even on their radar that this evidence is important. The [Israeli government-sponsored] Turkel II commission report references how the IDF [Israeli military] seized all of these electronic equipments, and how that provided the Turkel commission such great insight about what happened on the ship. But even the Turkel II commission notes that some of the material appeared to have been edited. So having an outside body look at this electronic evidence would have been revolutionary when it comes to the investigation. But the US did very, very little to actually get the property back, either for an international investigation or for Furkan?s family or the US passengers themselves.

MCM: Something else that struck me in the documents is that they also suggest that the US government took Israel?s claims for granted that two US citizens participating in the 2010 flotilla were involved with ?terror groups.? The documents released by the FBI are almost entirely redacted, yielding very little useful information. But the parts that aren?t redacted suggest that while the US was failing to investigate Israel?s killing of a US citizen, it was actively investigating US citizens who participated in the flotilla for violations of the laws forbidding material support for foreign terrorist organizations. Can you comment on this?

JL: It?s absolutely tragic that the United States failed to investigate the killing of US citizen at point-blank range yet somehow decided that it was worthwhile to investigate the passengers who were in a humanitarian assistance flotilla. I think this shows very clearly where the US priorities are. The government?s priorities are not about protecting US citizens or their free speech rights when it comes to challenging Israel. It?s all about what Israel?s needs are and following the line that the IDF has said to the American government, that these protesters were actually terrorists.

And I think it?s also telling that the government officials, from the very beginning, they didn?t necessarily say that the passengers were terrorists, but they used strong language to characterize them: they?re involved in the flotilla as a provocation, they?re trying to illicit conflict. It?s all painting this idea that Israel really preferences, which is that these are people who are interested in just a confrontation, rather than what we all know is true, which is that this was a humanitarian assistance flotilla.

MCM: One of the documents from the US government reads that the participation of US citizens aboard a future ship organized by the Turkish humanitarian group IHH is ?especially unwelcome given our perception that IHH would almost certain [sic] welcome the publicity arising from confrontation at sea between the flotilla and the IDF. Many media representatives promise to be on hand.? Do you think this is characteristic of the US government?s assignment of blame for what happened on the Mavi Marmara?

JL: Definitely. Throughout these documents we see a dismissal of the first-amendment rights of the protesters. We see a dismissal of their very genuine concerns about the suffering occurring in Gaza, and we see them painted instead as people seeking a confrontation without any addressing of these very real claims that the flotilla participants had, and without a strong condemnation of what Israel did. Like we said a minute ago, I think it?s really telling that they were investigating the passengers but weren?t investigating Israel for this barbaric murder of an American teenager, and that?s the sort of mindset that we see evidenced throughout these documents that they produced ? that Israel can do no wrong, their story is the one that is received and preferrenced and echoed throughout these government agencies ? even when they?ve committed these barbaric acts and even when American lives are at stake.

MCM: Related to that, this question of investigation and accountability, the Center for Constitutional Rights communicated with the US government about a visit made to New York University by an Israeli combatant who was one of the first commandos to board the Mavi Marmara. Did the government take any action on this?

JL: It doesn?t appear that they took any action. The request that the Center for Constitutional Rights that they investigation was forwarded on but it didn?t appear that anything actually came of it.

MCM: So he was able to come to a major university and talk about his experience on the Mavi Marmara.

JL: That?s my understanding. I wasn?t here then but a trial attorney at the Department of Justice forwarded on our message about the event and basically said, ?feel free to do whatever you want with this,? and we got no follow up response from this and no idea that anything was happening. But we had no reason to think that they would do anything different because time and time again, they?ve chosen not to investigate. So I don?t think this is out of line with what we?ve been seeing from the Department of State and the FBI when it comes to Furkan Do?an?s murder; there?s just no desire from the US government to seek accountability.

MCM: What steps are the Center for Constitutional Rights and other groups taking, whether in the US or internationally, to pursue justice for Furkan Do?an and the other passengers killed aboard the Mavi Marmara?

JL: Well first off, we?re just trying to learn as much as we can about what happened and what the US role was in that. We are continuing this litigation to uncover more documents and to have the documents that we currently have in our possession unredacted as possible. We?re challenging the US government to find out what their role was. And we?re hoping that this will be a tool for activists and maybe, one day, for courts that are seeking accountability.

We?re hopeful ? there?s been a case in Turkey, this IHH case, and there?s been discussion in Spain about Spain potentially forwarding on the case of the Mavi Marmara to the International Criminal Court. So we?re hopeful that one of these actions or a new case will come of this. But in the meanwhile, we?re going to fight to learn everything that we can so that protesters and future flotilla passengers will be able to really hold the government accountable and demand a response from them.

Something that was very much in our mind when pursuing this litigation is that these flotillas are not going to stop. And so we need to know as much as we can about whether the US will make efforts to protect citizens. And if not, we need to take as much advocacy as possible here in the States to pressure the State Department and other government agencies to stand up for the rights of American citizens and ultimately, one day, hopefully stand up to Israel for what they are doing to Gaza.

Something that I thought was pretty important and we haven?t produced a production guide on it yet, but is very much related to Furkan, is the United States? efforts to stifle the international investigations. We have documents from the US mission in Geneva ? this is the mission to the [United Nations] Human Rights Council ? where they?re writing in a cable to the Secretary of State that they?re exploring ways to ?turn off? the fact-finding mission, and they want the mission to fall away. So not only do we have the US government here declining to investigate, but there?s an active effort to try to stop the credible investigations that were being done by UN bodies.

MCM: Not only was the United States failing to conduct its own meaningful investigation into the slaying of a US citizen, but it was also actively undermining international efforts for investigation.

JL: Right. There?s these repeated contradictions that we?re seeing. They tracked the US passengers for weeks but they didn?t take action to protect them. They won?t conduct an investigation themselves, but they?re trying to stop those who will. And they?re choosing instead to have a counter-terrorism investigation of the other passengers. The choices that the US government makes again and again are all in line with following Israel rather than protecting their citizens or working for accountability.

In the next few weeks we will be releasing another production guide and part of this will be focused on US efforts to block flotillas. Something that we found which was pretty striking was that in 2011, instead of seeing documents pressuring Israel to not take violent action against the flotilla, we actually saw a concerted US government and State Department effort to block flotillas from launching from across the world. And it appears that this was done after a direct request from the government of Israel to prevent the flotillas.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/imeu/~3/oUS9ORmnSxw/us-investigated-gaza-flotilla-passengers-terror-ties-not-israels-slaying

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