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Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2013/05/23/deal-of-the-day-refurbished-samsung-galaxy-s-iii-smartphone-att/
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By Terri Moon Cronk
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, May 21, 2013 ? During the busy season of military transfers, adjusting to new communities and registering children for school, more than 2,000 museums across the nation will open their doors, free of charge, to service members and their families as a break from the summer challenges, a Defense Department official said today.
From Memorial Day, May 27, through Labor Day, Sept. 2, all active duty service members, National Guardsmen and reservists and their families can take advantage of this cultural and educational opportunity in all 50 states.
?It?s an exciting, inspiring, educational and economical activity for our families to enjoy this summer,? said Navy Cmdr. Leslie Hull-Ryde, a Pentagon spokeswoman.
Launching its fourth year in a news conference today at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the 2013 Blue Star Museums Program is a collaboration among the Defense Department, Blue Star Families, the National Endowment for the Arts and the museums to give service members and their families a way to spend time together in their local museums.
?After long deployments, rigorous training schedules and very long hours, our time with our families is very limited and extremely precious to us,? Hull-Ryde said. ?We are so grateful [to have] these programs. This program is an investment in our families.?
Arecord number of museums are participating this year. The program began in 2010 with free access to about 600 museums, while this year?s 2,000 is a figure that?s still growing, Blue Star Families and NEA officials said.
?This program is helping us make memories -- memories for our families,? Hull-Ryde said. ?But it?s more than that. It is making a difference not only in the force of today, but in the force of the future.?
?
Source: http://www.defense.gov//news/newsarticle.aspx?id=120101
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BANGOR, Maine (AP) ? When 15-year-old Nichole Cable left home May 12, she told her family she was heading out to see someone she'd met on Facebook.
The high school sophomore never came back.
Now, a 20-year-old man faces charges in her death after a body believed to be the missing teen's was found in a wooded area north of Bangor.
Kyle Dube, of Orono, was charged with murder Tuesday, a day after the remains were found in Old Town, Maine State Police Lt. Christopher Coleman said at a news conference.
Police declined to reveal the circumstances of her death, describe her relationship with Dube or discuss the evidence they have against him. Nor was it clear whether her Facebook relationship had anything to do with her disappearance and homicide.
More details were expected to emerge once police submit an affidavit of probable cause, which could happen as early as Wednesday, when Dube is due to make his first court appearance in the case.
Dube was already in jail serving a sentence for fleeing police on a motorcycle at more than 100 mph, according to state police. Stephen McCausland, a state police spokesman, said investigators believe Dube is "solely responsible for her death."
Tyler-Ann Harris, 16, who described herself as Nichole's best friend, said Tuesday that Dube and Nichole had met a couple of months earlier and planned to see each other the weekend she vanished, before he had to report to jail.
Harris, who attended Old Town High School with Nichole, said she had never met Dube and wasn't sure of his relationship with her friend. But she said Nichole didn't fear him.
"She was really happy even though she went through a lot of hard stuff in her life. She always knew how to see the bright side of things," Harris said, dabbing her eyes with a tissue. "She didn't always get along with people, and she had an attitude. But that's a teenage girl. And she was just happy all the time."
Dube's parents live in a tidy brick and white-sided house in Orono. A young man who answered the door said the family didn't want to talk and closed the door firmly in a reporter's face.
Dube's attorney, Stephen Smith, did not immediately return a call for comment.
Dube had worked for The Getchell Agency, an organization that cares for people with disabilities in Bangor, since June until he quit last week. The agency's CEO, Rena Getchell, said in an email to The Associated Press that his background check and employee reviews were satisfactory.
"He gave us no reason to believe that he might be capable of this crime," she said. "This is devastating news to us as we truly are a family."
The body believed to be Nichole's was found about 9:30 p.m. Monday by a warden who was searching the woods with a dog, officials said. The medical examiner took possession to make a positive identification and issue a ruling on how she died.
Nichole's mother, Kristine Wiley, said after she disappeared that Nichole had said she was going out to meet someone she knew from Facebook. But Wiley said she didn't know the identity of the person.
Dozens of law enforcement officers, using aircraft and dogs, and hundreds of civilian volunteers spent days searching for the teen, who lived in Glenburn.
"This initially started as a missing person's case and sadly it's transitioned to a homicide investigation," said Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross.
He urged parents to keep an eye on their children's online activities.
"This reminds us that parents should have oversight of Internet activities of their children. They should monitor what's going on and then use normal precautions that we all know, as far as how much information we provide," Ross said.
Cable's stepfather, Jason Wiley, said Tuesday that he and Kristine Wiley were still processing Tuesday's news and would take reporters' questions on Wednesday.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/man-charged-death-missing-maine-teenager-160123960.html
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LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Kellie Pickler came into the final "Dancing With the Stars" episode in second place but finished in first.
The 26-year-old country singer won the show's mirror ball trophy Tuesday.
"This is amazing!" she beamed to her professional partner, Derek Hough.
The pair earned two sets of perfect scores Monday night and another on Tuesday. Judges' scores combined with viewer votes determine the winner.
Because there were problems with voting on the ABC website during Monday's East Coast broadcast, host Tom Bergeron said Tuesday those votes weren't counted. Only votes cast by phone, text and Facebook factored into the final count.
Teen Disney Channel star Zendaya danced perfectly during the final two episodes, collecting the most points from the judges, but she fell short of the title.
"I'm very proud and I'm very happy," the 16-year-old said after the results were read. "And I get to leave here with an amazing experience."
Football pro Jacoby Jones finished in third place. Fellow finalist Alexandra Raisman was axed at the beginning of Tuesday's episode.
"This has been the best experience of my life," the gold medalist said. "My whole life, all I've ever known has been gymnastics, so to try something new has been amazing."
The two-hour finale featured the return of the season's already-eliminated contestants: comedians Andy Dick and D.L. Hugely, Olympian Dorothy Hamill, actor Ingo Rademacher, reality stars Lisa Vanderpump and Sean Lowe, singer Wynonna Judd and boxer Victor Ortiz.
Judd opted to sing rather than dance on the final episode, while Hamill celebrated another chance to hit the ballroom floor.
The Olympic skater, who said she was motivated to join the show after watching fellow skater Kristi Yamaguchi, had to withdraw from the competition early in the season because of an injury.
Hamill danced again Tuesday, and Yamaguchi joined her.
"It's such an honor to join my idol out here on the dance floor," said Yamaguchi, the Season 6 "Dancing" champ.
Korean pop star Psy brought his unique moves to the ballroom by dancing along with his new single, "Gentleman." Pitbull and Jessica Sanchez also performed.
ABC announced earlier this month that the next season of "Dancing With the Stars" will air one night a week instead of two.
___
AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen is on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/APSandy .
___
Online:
http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/dancing-with-the-stars
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/singer-kellie-pickler-named-dancing-champ-031443891.html
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Public release date: 22-May-2013
Share ] Contact: Lynn Celmer
lcelmer@aasmnet.org
630-737-9700
American Academy of Sleep Medicine
DARIEN, IL A new study provides neurobiological evidence for dysfunction in the neural circuitry underlying emotion regulation in people with insomnia, which may have implications for the risk relationship between insomnia and depression.
"Insomnia has been consistently identified as a risk factor for depression," said lead author Peter Franzen, PhD, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "Alterations in the brain circuitry underlying emotion regulation may be involved in the pathway for depression, and these results suggest a mechanistic role for sleep disturbance in the development of psychiatric disorders."
The study involved 14 individuals with chronic primary insomnia without other primary psychiatric disorders, as well as 30 good sleepers who served as a control group. Participants underwent an fMRI scan during an emotion regulation task in which they were shown negative or neutral pictures. They were asked to passively view the images or to decrease their emotional responses using cognitive reappraisal, a voluntary emotion regulation strategy in which you interpret the meaning depicted in the picture in order to feel less negative.
Results show that in the primary insomnia group, amygdala activity was significantly higher during reappraisal than during passive viewing. Located in the temporal lobe of the brain, the amygdala plays an important role in emotional processing and regulation.
In analysis between groups, amygdala activity during reappraisal trials was significantly greater in the primary insomnia group compared with good sleepers. The two groups did not significantly differ when passively viewing negative pictures.
"Previous studies have demonstrated that successful emotion regulation using reappraisal decreases amygdala response in healthy individuals, yet we were surprised that activity was even higher during reappraisal of, versus passive viewing of, pictures with negative emotional content in this sample of individuals with primary insomnia," said Franzen.
The research abstract was published recently in an online supplement of the journal SLEEP, and Franzen will present the findings Wednesday, June 5, in Baltimore, Md., at SLEEP 2013, the 27th annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies LLC.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine reports that about 10 to 15 percent of adults have an insomnia disorder with distress or daytime impairment. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 6.7 percent of the U.S. adult population suffers from major depressive disorder. Both insomnia and depression are more common in women than in men.
###
For a copy of the abstract, "Elevated amygdala activation during voluntary emotion regulation in primary insomnia," to arrange an interview with Dr. Franzen or an AASM spokesperson, or to register for a press pass to attend SLEEP 2013, please contact AASM Communications Coordinator Lynn Celmer at 630-737-9700, ext. 9364, or lcelmer@aasmnet.org.
A joint venture of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society, the annual SLEEP meeting brings together an international body of more than 5,500 leading clinicians and scientists in the fields of sleep medicine and sleep research. At SLEEP 2013, more than 1,300 research abstract presentations will showcase new findings that contribute to the understanding of sleep and the effective diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders such as insomnia, narcolepsy and sleep apnea.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine considers sleep disorders an illness that has reached epidemic proportions. Board-certified sleep medicine physicians in an AASM-accredited sleep center provide effective treatment. AASM encourages patients to talk to their doctors about sleep problems or visit http://www.sleepeducation.com for a searchable directory of sleep centers.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 22-May-2013 Share ] Contact: Lynn Celmer
lcelmer@aasmnet.org
630-737-9700
American Academy of Sleep Medicine
DARIEN, IL A new study provides neurobiological evidence for dysfunction in the neural circuitry underlying emotion regulation in people with insomnia, which may have implications for the risk relationship between insomnia and depression.
"Insomnia has been consistently identified as a risk factor for depression," said lead author Peter Franzen, PhD, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "Alterations in the brain circuitry underlying emotion regulation may be involved in the pathway for depression, and these results suggest a mechanistic role for sleep disturbance in the development of psychiatric disorders."
The study involved 14 individuals with chronic primary insomnia without other primary psychiatric disorders, as well as 30 good sleepers who served as a control group. Participants underwent an fMRI scan during an emotion regulation task in which they were shown negative or neutral pictures. They were asked to passively view the images or to decrease their emotional responses using cognitive reappraisal, a voluntary emotion regulation strategy in which you interpret the meaning depicted in the picture in order to feel less negative.
Results show that in the primary insomnia group, amygdala activity was significantly higher during reappraisal than during passive viewing. Located in the temporal lobe of the brain, the amygdala plays an important role in emotional processing and regulation.
In analysis between groups, amygdala activity during reappraisal trials was significantly greater in the primary insomnia group compared with good sleepers. The two groups did not significantly differ when passively viewing negative pictures.
"Previous studies have demonstrated that successful emotion regulation using reappraisal decreases amygdala response in healthy individuals, yet we were surprised that activity was even higher during reappraisal of, versus passive viewing of, pictures with negative emotional content in this sample of individuals with primary insomnia," said Franzen.
The research abstract was published recently in an online supplement of the journal SLEEP, and Franzen will present the findings Wednesday, June 5, in Baltimore, Md., at SLEEP 2013, the 27th annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies LLC.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine reports that about 10 to 15 percent of adults have an insomnia disorder with distress or daytime impairment. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 6.7 percent of the U.S. adult population suffers from major depressive disorder. Both insomnia and depression are more common in women than in men.
###
For a copy of the abstract, "Elevated amygdala activation during voluntary emotion regulation in primary insomnia," to arrange an interview with Dr. Franzen or an AASM spokesperson, or to register for a press pass to attend SLEEP 2013, please contact AASM Communications Coordinator Lynn Celmer at 630-737-9700, ext. 9364, or lcelmer@aasmnet.org.
A joint venture of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society, the annual SLEEP meeting brings together an international body of more than 5,500 leading clinicians and scientists in the fields of sleep medicine and sleep research. At SLEEP 2013, more than 1,300 research abstract presentations will showcase new findings that contribute to the understanding of sleep and the effective diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders such as insomnia, narcolepsy and sleep apnea.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine considers sleep disorders an illness that has reached epidemic proportions. Board-certified sleep medicine physicians in an AASM-accredited sleep center provide effective treatment. AASM encourages patients to talk to their doctors about sleep problems or visit http://www.sleepeducation.com for a searchable directory of sleep centers.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-05/aaos-sst052213.php
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CANNES, France (AP) ? Associated Press journalists open their notebooks at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival:
JAMES CAAN GOES BACK TO THE 70S
They don't make movies like they used to ? which is why James Caan was happy to go back to the 1970s in Guillaume Canet's "Blood Ties."
An icon of '70s cinema through his role as Sonny Corleone in "The Godfather," Caan plays the patriarch of a divided family in the Brooklyn-set drama. His younger son, played by Billy Crudup, is a cop; the elder, played by Clive Owen, is an ex-con trying halfheartedly to go straight.
"I've become very negative about the films of today, and that's why (I leapt at) the chance to do a film of the '70s with talent like this," 73-year-old Caan told reporters at a Cannes press conference Monday.
"I was very fortunate in the '70s to work with the best actors, the best directors, the best cinematographers. And (the films) had a beginning, a middle and an end, which was something very odd."
Today, he said, "it seems like most of the films they're doing, in Hollywood anyway, are these franchise films."
Canet is a French screen heartthrob-turned-director who made a splash with his taut 2006 movie "Tell No One." He said he was inspired by the '70s American cinema renaissance ? films like Martin Scorsese's "Mean Streets" and Jerry Schatzberg's "The Panic In Needle Park" ? to revisit the gritty, litter-strewn streets of the era.
A remake of the 2008 French film "Les Liens Du Sang" (Blood Ties), which starred Canet as the policeman's brother in his English-language debut, is playing out of competition in Cannes.
Canet assembled an international cast including "Star Trek'''s Zoe Saldana, Belgian actor Matthias Schoenaerts and French star Marion Cotillard, who is also the director's romantic partner.
Cotillard plays the Owen character's Italian-born ex, adopting a New York-Italian accent ? an experience she admitted was "very, very stressful."
When an Italian reporter complimented her accent, she emitted a loud sigh of relief.
"I'm going to kiss you!" she said. "You can't imagine how much pleasure you've given me."
? Jill Lawless, http://Twitter.com/JillLawless
AHNA O'REILLY FETED AS SHE CELEBRATES TWO CANNES FILMS
Along the water on the yachts where many of the Cannes Film Festival's uber-exclusive parties are thrown, guests are required to take off their shoes before stepping on the boat. And for that "Fruitvale Station" actress Ahna O'Reilly is grateful.
"I can't be in heels for that long ? I'm so uncomfortable!" the smiling actress said Sunday evening aboard the posh Jettee Albert Edouard. "But it's amazing, I love seeing people all dolled up."
This is O'Reilly's first trip to the Cannes Film Festival, and she has two films on display. The actress, who was also in "The Help," is starring in "Fruitvale" with good friend Octavia Spencer and also in "As I Lay Dying," in which she was directed by another friend, James Franco, who also stars in the film. Both were in attendance as she was the guest of honor at the event, hosted by the charity Art of Elysium.
"I'm just pinching myself, I can't believe it, and I'm here with some of my best friends in the world representing projects that I'm deeply passionate about, and also here tonight representing the Art of Elysium, an organization I care a lot about," she said. "So it's just all of these people that I love in the most beautiful setting, where everybody is celebrating their love of cinema, so it's a total dream."
The Art of Elysium has thrown events at Cannes for the past five years. The charity brings artists into hospitals to entertain children afflicted with life-threatening diseases like cancer.
Founder Jennifer Howell said it was a natural to have the event at a film festival: "We're so artist-centric that we want to be tied into what are artists actually do as fundraisers."
O'Reilly hasn't had much down time to explore the Cannes area but had one to-do on her wish list:
"I'm dying to go to the Hotel du Cap," she said of the ritzy hotel outside of Cannes where some of the festival's top events are held. "Everyone says it's the most beautiful location."
? Nekesa Mumbi Moody, http://www.twitter.com/nekesamumbi
'INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS' AFTER-PARTY
What was inside the "Inside Llewyn Davis" after-party? Plenty of bold-faced names and of course, more folk music.
The movie, which got a rapturous reception when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on Sunday, is about the folk-music scene in 1960s New York. The Coen brothers film stars Oscar Isaac and features Justin Timberlake, Carey Mulligan and Garrett Hedlund.
Timberlake was on hand with wife Jessica Biel, while Hedlund cozied with his girlfriend, Kirsten Dunst. Others at the party included Frances McDormand, Grammy-winning producer T Bone Burnett, CBS head Les Moonves and his wife, Julie Chen.
A DJ played music from the film, which is in competition at the festival.
? Nekesa Mumbi Moody, http://www.twitter.com/nekesamumbi
LARS ULRICH WORKING HARDER THAN EXPECTED IN CANNES
Metallica's Lars Ulrich is used to fast-paced action, but even he was a bit taken aback by the pace at the Cannes Film Festival.
"Most people have a romantic notion of Cannes," said Ulrich, who was promoting the band's upcoming film "Metallica Through the Never."
"(But) there is a lot of work that goes on here. And I was a little bit unprepared for. basically the whole infrastructure of worldwide cinema and the movie business is here," he said in an interview.
"People have a tendency to think that is just red carpet and movie stars and sipping champagne but people come here to work. People come here to sell their films, people come here to finance their films, people come here to create hype."
"Metallica Through the Never" marries the concert film format with a dramatic narrative. Directed by Nimrod Antal and released by Picturehouse, the film stars young "Chronicle" actor Dane DeHaan as a member of Metallica's concert tour crew who's sent on a special mission by the band. The movie blends concert footage with a plot that includes computer-generated effects.
"We wanted to challenge ourselves a little bit and try and do something different and try and bring a little bit more of a film element into it," explains Ulrich.
"Whether anybody loves the film as much as we do we'll have to wait and see in a few months. But the one thing I can guarantee you, which there is no question about, is that it is a very unique film. Nobody has ever seen a film quite like this."
"Metallica Through the Never" is scheduled for release on Sept. 27.
? Nekesa Mumbi Moody and Adam Egan, (http://www.twittercom/nekesamumbi)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/seen-heard-cannes-film-festival-105240729.html
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'And the Mountains Echoed,' Hosseini's third novel, is racking up huge pre-sale numbers. The book will be released tomorrow.
One thing that may come as a surprise to readers of Hosseini's third novel: There?s far less "Afghanistan" and "conflict" in this book ? perhaps a deliberate decision by Hosseini to reframe the country in readers? psyches.
EnlargeEarly reviews are in and they?ve confirmed what we?ve known all along: Khaled Hosseini?s latest novel, ?And the Mountains Echoed,? is a hit. It?s also a surprisingly nuanced, morally complex, exquisitely told tear-jerker.
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Take it from the Washington Post?s book reviewer, Marcela Valdes.
?I?m not an easy touch when it comes to novels, but Hosseini?s new book, 'And the Mountains Echoed,' had tears dropping from my eyes by Page 45,? she writes, positing that Hosseini?s ?secret ingredient might be intense emotion.?
Hosseini?s third book, ?And the Mountains Echoed,? hits stores Tuesday, six years after his previous two books captivated millions of readers and spent years on the bestseller list. His 2003 debut novel, ?The Kite Runner,? was published in 70 countries and spent almost two years on bestseller lists. ?A Thousand Splendid Suns? also became a bestseller in 2007. Together, the two books have sold more than 38 million copies.
?And the Mountains Echoed? isn't due out until tomorrow but pre-orders of the book, in both print and e-book versions, have already exceeded those of "A Thousand Splendid Suns" by almost 95 percent on Amazon.com.
Like the previous two, Hosseini?s latest novel is a heart-wrenching story. ?And the Mountains Echoed? is set partly in Afghanistan, but action also takes place in California, Paris, and the Greek Islands. Early reviews have called it a story about family, separation, and sibling relationships. It begins with an Afghan tale about a horrific monster called a div who comes to an Afghan village to demand the sacrifice of a child. The consequences of the resulting sacrifice of a favored son echo through the lives of all the characters explored in the book, most importantly siblings Abdullah and Pari.
Unlike ?The Kite Runner? and ?A Thousand Splendid Suns,? ?And the Mountains Echoed? is constructed as a series of stories, each set in a different place and time and told from a different point of view.
?In less skillful hands, this structure might seem more like a compilation of short stories than a novel,? writes the Post?s Valdes. ?But Hosseini carefully divvies up details about the circumstances preceding and following Abdullah and Pari?s fateful afternoon, giving the book a satisfying sense of momentum and consequence.?
One thing that may come as a surprise to readers: There?s far less "Afghanistan" and "conflict" in this novel. It appears to be a deliberate decision by Hosseini to reframe the country in readers? psyches as any other setting and not as a country defined by war, conflict, and turmoil.
?I hope a day will come when we write about Afghanistan, where we can speak about Afghanistan in a context outside of the wars and the struggles of the last 30 years,? he told NPR. ?In some way I think this book is an attempt to do that.?
Husna Haq is a Monitor correspondent.
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After 27 years as an unobtrusive specialist in satellite-based communications, Carlsbad, CA-based ViaSat (NASDAQ: VSAT) is acquiring a much bigger footprint.
While ViaSat has experienced plenty of success over the years, the company?s business has been focused mostly on its low-profile military and intelligence-agency customers. But that began to change in 2011 with the successful launch of ViaSat-1, the world?s highest capacity communications satellite, which provides commercial broadband Internet service (at 140 gigabits per second) in key U.S. regions. Carlsbad announced plans to build ViaSat-1 in 2008, and acquired WildBlue Communications, a suburban Denver company providing high-speed Internet service, for $568 million in 2009.
Mark Dankberg, ViaSat?s chairman and CEO, laid out his grand strategy for me a few years ago, and the results were evident in record financial results reported last week. For the fiscal year that ended March 29, ViaSat said its new commercial Exede Internet services?which are still based in suburban Denver?have become the biggest factor driving the company?s growth.
?We are closing out the year with revenues surpassing the $1 billion mark, coming [in] at $1.1 billion for fiscal 2013, which reflects a $256 million increase [30 percent] over the prior year,? Shawn Duffy, ViaSat?s chief accounting officer, told investors and analysts in a conference call.
ViaSat-2 Satellite (artist's concept)
ViaSat added about 44,000 subscribers in the quarter, ending March with a total of 512,000 subscribers for its satellite-based Internet service?including nearly 300,000 subscribers on ViaSat-1, with an estimated total capacity of 1 million subscribers. That?s a big jump since March, and to boost subscriber growth even more, the company unveiled long-awaited plans to build and launch a second satellite, ViaSat-2, through an expanded partnership with Boeing.
Using new technology architecture, ViaSat says the second satellite would provide enough capacity for an additional 2.5 million subscribers?and cover seven times the geographic footprint of ViaSat-1. The new satellite, which is scheduled for launch in mid-2016, would cover North America, Central America and the top of South America, and all of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean?as well as the primary airline and maritime routes between the U.S. and Europe. ViaSat already has established partnerships to provide satellite-based Internet service for United Airlines and JetBlue, with ViaSat-1 service for JetBlue passengers beginning this summer.
Internet service could be a particularly attractive added value on trans-Atlantic flights. As Dankberg told analysts and investors: ?Everybody with a mobile device would use it?We can take advantage of our bandwidth effectiveness to drive the cost down to ? Next Page ?
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SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) ? Authorities in hazardous materials suits searched a downtown Spokane apartment Saturday, investigating the recent discovery of a pair of letters containing the deadly poison ricin.
Few details have been released in the case, and no arrests have been made. Federal investigators have been searching for the person who sent the letters, which were postmarked Tuesday in Spokane.
The letters were addressed to the downtown post office and the adjacent federal building, but authorities have not released a potential motive. They also have not said whether the letters targeted anyone in particular.
Ricin is a highly toxic substance made from castor beans. As little as 500 micrograms, the size of the head of a pin, can kill an adult if inhaled or ingested.
There have been no reports of illness connected to the letters.
FBI agents, Spokane police and U.S. Postal Service inspectors descended on the three-story apartment building Saturday morning and the investigation continued into the afternoon.
FBI spokeswoman Ayn Sandalo Dietrich would not say whether agents were questioning anyone in connection with the case.
"We are not actively looking for a subject," Sandalo Dietrich said. "We are not asking the public's help in bringing someone in."
Despite the hazmat suits, officials said apartment residents were not at risk, and people were seen coming in and out of the brick building in the city's historic Browne's Addition neighborhood.
"There's no public risk," Sandalo Dietrich said.
Scott Ward has lived in the building for three years, and lives on the second floor near the apartment that was being searched. He said he does not know the neighbor who lives in that apartment.
"He's a guy with a big beard," Ward said. "He sticks to himself."
"He doesn't talk," said Ward, who added he was awakened about 7 a.m. by the sounds of "banging and what sounded like a big vacuum."
Building resident Jim Lehman said he was asleep when he was called by a friend. "He said, 'hey Jim, you're surrounded,'" Lehman said. Lehman said he saw workers in hazardous material suits working in a second floor apartment.
"It was all gas masks and the door was open and there were hoses in there," Lehman said.
Sandalo Dietrich would not say specifically why the FBI was searching the apartment.
"Information we developed led us to believe this was a productive spot to search," she said.
Two letters containing the substance were intercepted at the downtown Spokane post office Tuesday.
The Postal Service has received no other reports of similar letters, said Jeremy Leder of the Postal Inspection Service on Saturday.
In a statement following the discovery, the Postal Service said the "crude form of the ricin suggests that it does not present a health risk to U.S. Postal Service personnel or to others who may have come in contact with the letter."
The Spokane investigation comes a month after letters containing ricin were addressed to President Barack Obama, a U.S. senator and a Mississippi judge. A Mississippi man has been arrested in that case.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fbi-searches-apartment-ricin-letter-case-191809079.html
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Imagine this scenario at your local home improvement retail chain; you walk in and fill out an application for a credit card to take advantage of a great introductory interest rate or perhaps an interest free or payment period.
Your FICO scores are at or near 800 so you know the processing is just a formality and you expect to be instantly approved.
You are surprised when the customer service agent tells you that you?ve been denied a store credit card not because of your credit risk but rather because YOU don?t have a job.
You calmly explain that you?re a non-working spouse and that your husband has a full time job.
Sorry, no dice. You?ve just been caught up by the ?anti housewife? rule?and you?re not alone.? Fast forward?
Call it a late Mother?s Day present, call it smart rule making, call it what you please but the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau just picked up a bunch of fans by axing that so called ?Anti Housewife? rule caused by the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009, or more informally referred to as the ?CARD Act.?
The Act meant to protect consumers from getting into credit card debt without a way to pay it back, which makes perfect sense.
But, the way the rule was interpreted required lenders to verify that an individual had the ability to pay back their debts, which meant no income, no credit, no exceptions.
The problem is that there?s an army of non-working spouses that were no longer to able to get credit on behalf of their household, even if their spouse was working.
The CFPB figured that some 16,000,000 consumers would be negatively impacted by the rules as written and embarked on the process of modifying such that it made more practical sense.
Last October the CFPB made it known that they were going to change the rule to allow lenders to consider an applicant?s 3rd party income.
The ?anti housewife? moniker comes from the supposition that more non-working spouses are women than they are men. And while I have no data to back this up, I believe it?s true.
The rule was also acting as an incentive for applicants to be dishonest on their credit applications. In the boxes asking for income it was too easy to simply write the household?s income rather than your own individual income.
And, because most credit card applications are processed without any sort of verification of income, being dishonest with your answers would likely work, but also left the applicant in the unenviable position of having just lied on their credit application, which could be considered fraud.
Retailers should also be very pleased with the CFPB?s move. They don?t want to deny any credit worthy applicant, including non-working spouses. The CFPB?s actions now re-open the underwriting process to once again rely on credit risk rather than capacity metrics.
Consumers who are under 21 years old will still have to be able to prove that they?ve got an income or some other capacity with which to pay their bills.
Their alternative?get a co-signer, which is about as dangerous of a credit move as you can make.
And, the CFPB?s move still requires that you have reasonable access to some form of 3rd party income. So, consumers without any access to funds still cannot get a credit card regardless of their age.
John Ulzheimer?is the President of Consumer Education at?SmartCredit.com, the credit blogger for?Mint.com, and a contributor for the?National Foundation for Credit Counseling.? He is an expert on credit reporting, credit scoring and identity theft. Formerly of FICO, Equifax and Credit.com, John is the only recognized credit expert who actually comes from the credit industry. The opinions expressed in his articles are his and not of Mint.com or Intuit.?Follow John on Twitter.
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Source: http://www.mint.com/blog/credit/the-anti-housewife-credit-rule-gets-axed-by-the-cfpb-0513/
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Discover which vegetable oils, herbs, floral waters, essential oils, plant-based emulsifiers, and natural preservatives to use, how to pack and label your own beauty products, and how to store them safely. Facial cleansers, moisturizers, anti aging serums, sun protection creams, hair treatments, and even perfumes and deodorants can be prepared easily at home using only natural, easily available ingredients.
This book contains more than 200 recipes and step-by-step techniques used by the author, holistic nutritionist Julie Gabriel (THE GREEN BEAUTY GUIDE) to create her own organic skincare line, Petite Marie Organics (petitemarieorganics.com)
Practical, straightforward, and fun, these recipes are equally suitable for green beauty enthusiasts as well as professional beauty practitioners.
You can pamper yourself head to toe with luxurious hair masks, deep cleansing home facials, aromatic massage oils, nourishing body lotions, and age-rewinding moisturizers in the most natural, luxuriously green way!
Here is what our reviewers say:
"Green Beauty Recipes" is a timely book since many of us are "going green." We no longer want to use harmful chemicals or accept using animals for testing products. Using products that can be found in our own home, with the addition of essential oils or natural preservatives, will not only nourish our body, but help keep our planet clean. I commend Julie Gabriel on making this book available to us and I encourage everyone to consider having "Green Beauty."
--Irene Watson, Reader Views
Green Beauty Recipes is the second book by author Julie Gabriel. An extension of her first book, The Green Beauty Guide, Green Beauty Recipes is an indispensable collection of not only recipes, but also instructions, explanations and helpful hints for creating your own collection of skin care, hair care and body care products. Julie gives everyone the confidence to get in the kitchen and create their own beauty! Perfect as a gift for just about any woman.
We love this book and read every word cover to cover. How we wish it had images of some of the finished recipes, however. It's fun to create products and get that feeling of accomplishment that goes along with it. It's a book that won't hide on our bookshelf because we'll be too busy finding recipes that work best with our skin. It has a top spot on our holiday gift list this year.
--Jen Adkins, About.com: Skincare
Current edition is an updated and slightly revised version of the 2010 book.
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ZEPHYRHILLS, Fla. (AP) ? Some lucky person walked into a Publix supermarket in suburban Florida over the past few days and bought a ticket now worth an estimated $590.5 million ? the highest Powerball jackpot in history.
But it wasn't Matthew Bogel. On Sunday, he loaded groceries into his car after shopping at the Publix. He shook his head when asked about the jackpot.
"It's crazy, isn't it?" he said. "That's so much money."
It's an amount too high for many to imagine. Compare it to the budget for the city of Zephyrhills: This year's figure is just more than $49 million. The winning Powerball jackpot is 12 times that.
Whoever has the ticket hadn't come forward as of Sunday morning.
"This would be the sixth Florida Powerball winner and right now, it's the sole winner of the largest ever Powerball jackpot," Florida Lottery executive Cindy O'Connell told The Associated Press. "We're delighted right now that we have the sole winner."
Publix spokeswoman Maria Brous said that there are a lot of rumors about who won, but the store doesn't know. "We're excited for the winner or winners," she said.
O'Connell said Florida has had more Powerball winners than any other state but did not give any indication whether anyone had stepped forward with the winning ticket in Saturday's drawing.
But plenty of people in Zephyrhills ? population 13,337 ? are wondering whether it's someone they know.
Joan Albertson drove to the Publix early Sunday morning with her camera in hand, in case the winner emerged. She said she had bought a ticket at a store across the street, and the idea of winning that much money was still something of a shock.
"Oh, there's so much good that you could do with that amount of money." Albertson said. "I don't even know where to begin."
Zephyrhills is a small city in Pasco County, about 30 miles northeast of downtown Tampa. Once a rural farming town, it's now known as a hotbed for skydiving activity, and the home to large retiree mobile home parks and Zephyrhills bottled water.
And now, one lucky lottery ticket.
"I'm getting text messages and messages from Facebook going, 'uh, did you win the lottery?'" Sandra Lewis said. "No, I didn't win, guys. Sorry."
Sara Jeltis said her parents in Michigan texted her with the news Sunday morning.
"Well, it didn't click till I came here," she said, gesturing to the half-dozen TV live trucks humming in the Publix parking lot. "And I'm like, wow I can't believe it, it's shocking! Out of the whole country, this Publix, in little Zephyrhills would be the winner."
With four out of every five possible combinations of Powerball numbers in play, lottery executives said Saturday that someone was almost certain to win the game's highest jackpot, a windfall of hundreds of millions of dollars ? and that's after taxes.
The winning numbers were 10, 13, 14, 22 and 52, with a Powerball of 11.
Estimates had earlier put the jackpot at around $600 million. But Powerball's online site said Sunday that the jackpot had reached an estimated $590.5 million.
The world's largest jackpot was a $656 million Mega Millions jackpot in March 2012.
Terry Rich, CEO of the Iowa Lottery, initially confirmed that one Florida winning ticket had been sold. He told AP that following the Florida winner, the Powerball grand prize was being reset at an estimated jackpot of $40 million, or about $25.1 million cash value.
The chances of winning the prize were astronomically low: 1 in 175.2 million. That's how many different ways you can combine the numbers when you play. But lottery officials estimated that about 80 percent of those possible combinations had been purchased recently.
While the odds are low for any one individual or individuals, O'Connell said, the chance that one hits paydirt is what makes Powerball exciting.
"There is just the chance that you will have the opportunity, and Florida is a huge Powerball state," O'Connell said. "We have had more winners than any other state that participates in Powerball."
The longshot odds didn't deter people across Powerball-playing states ? 43 plus Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands ? from lining up at gas stations and convenience stores Saturday.
Clyde Barrow, a public policy professor at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, specializes in the gaming industry. He said one of the key factors behind the ticket-buying frenzy is the size of the jackpot ? people are interested in the easy investment.
"Even though the odds are very low, the investment is very small," he said. "Two dollars gets you a chance."
Lewis, who went to the Publix on Sunday to buy water, said she didn't play ? and she isn't upset about it.
"Life goes on," she said, shrugging. "I'm good."
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Rodriguez reported from Des Moines, Iowa.
___
Follow Tamara Lush at http://twitter.com/tamaralush.
Follow Barbara Rodriguez at http://twitter.com/bcrodriguez.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/small-fla-city-wonders-won-powerball-jackpot-163342761.html
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CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) ? Do your kids love chocolate milk? It may have more calories on average than you thought.
Same goes for soda.
Until now, the only way to find out what people in the United States eat and how many calories they consume has been government data, which can lag behind the rapidly expanding and changing food marketplace.
Researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are trying to change that by creating a gargantuan map of what foods Americans are buying and eating.
Part of the uniqueness of the database is its ability to sort one product into what it really is ? thousands of brands and variations.
Take the chocolate milk.
The government long has long classified chocolate milk with 2 percent fat as one item. But the UNC researchers, using scanner data from grocery stores and other commercial data, found thousands of different brands and variations of 2 percent chocolate milk and averaged them out. The results show that chocolate milk has about 11 calories per cup more than the government thought.
The researchers led by professor Barry Popkin at the UNC School of Public Health, are figuring out that chocolate milk equation over and over, with every single item in the grocery store. It's a massive project that could be the first evidence of how rapidly the marketplace is changing, and the best data yet on what exact ingredients and nutrients people are consuming.
That kind of information could be used to better target nutritional guidelines, push companies to cut down on certain ingredients and even help with disease research.
Just call it "mapping the food genome."
"The country needs something like this, given all of the questions about our food supply," says Popkin, the head of the UNC Food Research Program. "We're interested in improving the public's health and it really takes this kind of knowledge."
The project first came together in 2010 after a group of 16 major food companies pledged, as part of first lady Michelle Obama's campaign to combat obesity, to reduce the calories they sell to the public by 1.5 trillion. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation agreed to fund a study to hold the companies accountable, eventually turning to UNC with grants totaling $6.7 million.
Aided by supercomputers on campus, Popkin and his team have taken existing commercial databases of food items in stores and people's homes, including the store-based scanner data of 600,000 different foods, and matched that information with the nutrition facts panels on the back of packages and government data on individuals' dietary intake.
The result is an enormous database that has taken almost three years so far to construct and includes more detail than researchers have ever had on grocery store items ? their individual nutritional content, who is buying them and their part in consumers' diets.
The study will fill gaps in current data about the choices available to consumers and whether they are healthy, says Susan Krebs-Smith, who researches diet and other risk factors related to cancer at the National Cancer Institute.
Government data, long the only source of information about American eating habits, can have a lag of several years and neglect entire categories of new types of products ? Greek yogurt or energy drinks, for example.
With those significant gaps, the government information fails to account for the rapid change now seen in the marketplace. Now more than ever, companies are reformulating products on the fly as they try to make them healthier or better tasting.
While consumers may not notice changes in the ingredient panel on the back of the package, the UNC study will pick up small variations in individual items and also begin to be able to tell how much the marketplace as a whole is evolving.
"When we are done we will probably see 20 percent change in the food supply in a year," Popkin says. "The food supply is changing and no one really knows how."
For example, the researchers have found that there has been an increase in using fruit concentrate as a sweetener in foods and beverages because of a propensity toward natural foods, even though it isn't necessarily healthier than other sugars. While the soda and chocolate milk have more calories on average than the government thought, the federal numbers were more accurate on the calories in milk and cereals.
Popkin and his researchers are hoping their project will only be the beginning of a map that consumers, companies, researchers and even the government can use, breaking the data down to find out who is eating what and where they shop. Is there a racial divide in the brand of potato chips purchased, for example, and what could that mean for health? Does diet depend on where you buy your food ? the grocery store or the convenience store? How has the recession affected dietary intake?
"It's only since I've really started digging into this that I have realized how little we know about what we are eating," says Meghan Slining, a UNC nutrition professor and researcher on the project.
Steven Gortmaker, director of the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center, says the data could help researchers figure out how people are eating in certain communities and then how to address problems in those diets that could lead to obesity or disease.
"The more information we have, the more scientists can be brainstorming about what kinds of interventions or policy changes we could engage in," Gortmaker said.
But the information doesn't include restaurant meals and some prepared foods, about one-third of what Americans eat. If the project receives continued funding, those foods eventually could be added to the study, a prospect that would be made easier by pending menu labeling regulations that will force chain restaurants to post calories for every item.
Popkin and his researchers say that packaged foods have long been the hardest to monitor because of the sheer volume and rapid change in the marketplace.
The Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, an industry group representing the 16 companies that made the pledge to reduce 1.5 trillion calories, says it will report this summer on how successful they've been, according to Lisa Gable, the group's president. The first results from Popkin's study aren't expected until later this year.
Marion Nestle, a New York University professor of nutrition, food studies and public health, says the data could be useful in pressuring companies to make more changes for the better. Companies often use "the research isn't there" as a defense against making changes recommended by public health groups, she notes, and it can be hard to prove them wrong.
"What people eat is the great mystery of nutrition," Nestle says. "It would be wonderful to have a handle on it."
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Online:
UNC Food Research Program: http://uncfoodresearchprogram.web.unc.edu
Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation: http://www.healthyweightcommit.org
___
Find Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/eat-food-map-tell-us-174342840.html
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FILE - In this Feb. 4, 2013 file photo, James Oliver, left, hugs his brother and fellow Eagle Scout, Will Oliver, who is gay, as Will and other supporters carry four boxes filled with petitions to end the ban on gay scouts and leaders in front of the Boy Scouts of America headquarters in Dallas, Texas. With its ranks deeply divided, the Boy Scouts of America is asking its local leaders from across the country to decide whether its contentious membership policy should be overhauled so that openly gay boys can participate in Scout units. The proposal to be put before the roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA's National Council on Thursday, May 23, 2013 at a meeting in Grapevine, Texas, would retain the Scouts' long-standing ban on gays serving in adult leadership positions. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File)
FILE - In this Feb. 4, 2013 file photo, James Oliver, left, hugs his brother and fellow Eagle Scout, Will Oliver, who is gay, as Will and other supporters carry four boxes filled with petitions to end the ban on gay scouts and leaders in front of the Boy Scouts of America headquarters in Dallas, Texas. With its ranks deeply divided, the Boy Scouts of America is asking its local leaders from across the country to decide whether its contentious membership policy should be overhauled so that openly gay boys can participate in Scout units. The proposal to be put before the roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA's National Council on Thursday, May 23, 2013 at a meeting in Grapevine, Texas, would retain the Scouts' long-standing ban on gays serving in adult leadership positions. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File)
FILE - Clockwise from left, Boy Scouts Eric Kusterer, Jacob Sorah, James Sorah, Micah Brownlee and Cub Scout John Sorah hold signs at the "Save Our Scouts" Prayer Vigil and Rally in front of the Boy Scouts of America National Headquarters in Irving, Texas on Wednesday, Feb. 6, 2013. With its ranks deeply divided, the Boy Scouts of America is asking its local leaders from across the country to decide whether its contentious membership policy should be overhauled so that openly gay boys can participate in Scout units. The proposal to be put before the roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA's National Council on Thursday, May 23, 2013 at a meeting in Grapevine, Texas, would retain the Scouts' long-standing ban on gays serving in adult leadership positions. (AP Photo/Richard Rodriguez)
With its ranks deeply divided, the Boy Scouts of America is asking its local leaders from across the country to decide whether its contentious membership policy should be overhauled so that openly gay boys can participate in Scout units.
The proposal to be put before the roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA's National Council on Thursday, at a meeting in Grapevine, Texas, would retain the Scouts' long-standing ban on gays serving in adult leadership positions.
Nonetheless, some conservatives within and outside the BSA community have denounced the proposal, saying the Scouts' traditions would be undermined by the presence of openly gay youth. There have been warnings of mass defections if the ban is even partially lifted.
From the other flank, gay-rights supporters and some Scout leaders from politically liberal areas have welcomed the proposed change as a positive first step, but are calling on the BSA to go further and lift the ban on gay adults as well.
The Scouts' national spokesman, Deron Smith, said the policy toward gays had become "the most complex and challenging issue" facing the BSA at a time when it is struggling to stem a steady drop in membership.
"Ultimately we can't anticipate how people will vote but we do know that the result will not match everyone's personal preference," Smith said in an email.
In January, the BSA floated a plan to give sponsors of local Scout units the option of admitting gays as both youth members and adult leaders or continuing to exclude them. However, it changed course, in part because of surveys sent out starting in February to members of the Scouting community.
Of the more than 200,000 leaders, parents and youth members who responded, 61 percent supported the current policy of excluding gays, while 34 percent opposed it.
Those findings contrasted with a Washington Post-ABC News national poll earlier this month. It said 63 percent of respondents favored letting openly gay youth be Scouts, and 56 percent favored lifting the ban on gay adults.
Over the past several weeks, numerous public events have been staged by advocacy groups on different sides of the debate.
A group called Scouts for Equality has organized rallies in several cities aimed at urging local BSA councils to support an end to the ban on gay youth. Rallies opposing any easing of the ban, for youth or adults, have been organized by a group called OnMyHonor.net, which claims the pending proposal "requires open homosexuality in the Boy Scouts."
Both groups plan to have their leaders and supporters on hand in Grapevine as the vote takes place.
Among those heading to Grapevine to lobby for an easing of the ban are Tracie Felker and her 16-year-old son, Pascal Tessier, who, though openly gay, is on track to become an Eagle Scout as a member of Boy Scout Troop 52 in Chevy Chase, Md.
"We are absolutely dedicated to restoring integrity to Boy Scouting and reinvigorating the program," Felker said. "That can only be done by removing the stain of discrimination."
Passions also run deep on the other side, as evidenced by a live online event titled "Stand With Scouts Sunday" presented May 5 by the conservative Family Research Council. The council opposes lifting the ban on gay youth, saying such a change "will dramatically alter the culture and moral landscape of America."
Among the participants was Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who lauded the Scouts' tradition of character-building.
"For pop culture to come in and try to tear that up because this happens to be the flavor of the month ... that is just not appropriate," Perry said. "Frankly I hope the American people stand up and say, 'Not on my watch.'"
Also appearing on the webcast was Jeremy Miller, a Scout leader from Ohio who said the proposed change "will open the door to boy-on-boy sexual contact, bullying and older Scouts being predators on younger scouts."
The BSA's national leadership has rejected such warnings as ill-founded. "The BSA makes no connection between the sexual abuse or victimization of a child and homosexuality," a new background document says. "The BSA takes strong exception to this assertion."
Of the more than 100,000 Scouting units in the U.S., 70 percent are chartered by religious institutions. While these sponsors include liberal churches opposed to any ban on gays, some of the largest sponsors are relatively conservative denominations that have supported the broad ban ? notably the Roman Catholic Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Southern Baptist churches.
Knowing these churches oppose scouting roles for gay adults, the BSA leadership hopes they will be willing to back the easing of the ban on gay youth. As part of this effort, the BSA is emphasizing that sexual conduct by any Scout ? straight or gay ? would be considered unacceptable.
"We are unaware of any major religious chartered organization that believes a youth member simply stating he or she is attracted to the same sex, but not engaging in sexual activity, should make him or her unwelcome in their congregation," the Scouts say in their new background document.
Southern Baptist leaders were outspoken earlier this year in opposing the tentative plan to let Scout units decide for themselves if they wanted to accept gays as adult leaders.
Frank Page, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee, said the new proposal "is more acceptable to those who hold a biblical form of morality," but he nonetheless favors its defeat.
"A No vote keeps the current policy in place, an outcome we would overwhelmingly support," Page told Baptist Press, the SBC's official news agency.
Baptist Press reported that the Roswell Street Baptist Church in Marietta, Ga., was considering ending a nearly 75-year sponsorship of a Boy Scout troop if the policy change prevails. The church's senior pastor, Ernest Easley, echoed warnings from other Southern Baptist leaders that any BSA accommodation of gays might prompt defections and trigger an expansion of the SBC's own youth group for boys, the Royal Ambassadors. According to BSA figures, Baptist churches sponsor Scout units with about 108,000 youth members.
Leaders of some smaller conservative denominations ? including the Assemblies of God and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod ? have signed a statement opposing the proposal to accept gay youth.
Some larger sponsors have either endorsed the proposal, or ? in the case of the United Methodist Church and Catholic Church ? declined to specify a position. The National Catholic Committee on Scouting issued a statement describing the membership debate as "difficult and sensitive" but stopping short of any explicit recommendation for how Catholic delegates to the BSA meeting should vote.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced in April that it supports the new proposal, saying the BSA made a good-faith effort to address a complex issue. The Mormons sponsor more Scout units than any other organization, serving about 430,000 of the 2.6 million youth in Scouting.
The United Methodists are the second-largest sponsor, serving about 363,000 youth members; the Catholic Church is No. 3, with a youth membership of about 273,000.
Several regional Scout councils already have declared their position on the membership proposal.
In Tennessee, the Nashville-based Middle Tennessee Council and Jackson-based West Tennessee Area Council said they oppose the proposed change and support the current broad ban on gay youth and adults.
"We are continuing to uphold the standards, beliefs and traditions Scouting has held for over 100 years," said Lee Beaman, board president of the Middle Tennessee Council, which says it serves 35,000 youth and adults.
The day after that announcement, Bill Moser, a longtime Scout leader in Clarksville, Tenn., announced his resignation, saying he couldn't support a policy that would force openly gay youth out of Scouting when they turned 18.
The Greater New York Councils, which serve about 43,000 Scouts in New York City, is supporting the proposal to accept gay youths, calling it "a positive step forward." It is among the councils urging the Scouts to also accept gays as adult leaders.
The Los Angeles Area Council said it follows a nondiscrimination policy that extends to sexual orientation and it proposed that the BSA adopt a similar policy nationwide, opening its ranks to openly gay adults as well as youth.
However, the BSA leadership says no such alternative proposals will be put to a vote at the Grapevine meeting ? only the single proposal to lift the ban on gay youth.
If the proposal is approved, the new policy would take effect on Jan. 1, 2014. A task force already has been created to oversee its implementation.
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Online:
Boy Scouts: http://www.scouting.org/
___
Follow David Crary on Twitter at http://twitter.com/CraryAP
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Florida Sen. Marco Rubio hasn?t popped up in an early-primary state in six months, leaving potential Republican rivals like Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal to make the rounds while he carried the torch for his immigration reform plan.
But while furiously working the talk show circuit to sell a bill viewed warily by many Republican voters, Rubio has been just as doggedly laying the groundwork for a successful presidential campaign in 2016.
Since he became the first possible contender in November to swoop into Iowa, which hosts the first nominating contest, Rubio?aired the first television ad from his Reclaim America leadership committee on behalf of Sen. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, which traditionally votes second on the primary calendar;?formed a joint fundraising committee that makes it easier to collect big donations; and reversed his position on Florida?s presidential primary, greasing a?bill through the Legislature?that would ensure the state earns a full slate of convention delegates in 2016.
?It?s good for Florida?s favorite son,? said David Johnson, a former executive director of the Florida Republican Party. Asked if he meant Rubio, Johnson added, ?Any of Florida?s favorite sons, whether it?s Marco Rubio or (former Gov.) Jeb Bush on the ballot.?
Beyond the logistical moves, Rubio is latching onto issues that, unlike immigration reform, excite his conservative base. His latest and juiciest target: the IRS, for singling out tea party groups for special scrutiny.
?Rubio has gone full bore on the IRS,? said Republican consultant Keith Appell, who is active in the conservative movement. ??Immigration is a tough, tough fight he may not win, and these scandals are giving him a bit of a reprieve to talk about something else.?
Rubio was the first member of Congress to call for the resignation of the IRS chief, pre-empting President Obama?s first public comments on the controversy. Rubio followed up his demand Monday morning with a bill that would make it a crime for IRS employees to target political groups, a fiery speech on the Senate floor, and a flurry of television appearances in which he also condemned the administration?s response to the Benghazi attacks and the Justice Department?s seizure of journalists? phone records.
As the son of Cuban immigrants who saw their homeland taken over by a repressive regime, Rubio brings a personal fury to the scandals in Washington.
?These are the tactics of the Third World,? he said on the floor of the U.S. Senate on Wednesday. "These are the tactics of places that don?t have the freedoms and the independence that we have here in this country.?
Rubio?s leadership committee has sent out two e-mail blasts this week to capitalize on outrage over the IRS scandal. ?Your donation will ensure that we have the resources to take this fight to the highest levels possible,? the missive said. ?Together we?ll turn back the frightening tide of our rapidly expanding, unaccountable government.?
A second e-mail presented a petition protesting the IRS?s tactics. After submitting personal information, the web site sends supporters to a fundraising page for Reclaim America.
The IRS controversy adds to a growing portfolio that will help inoculate Rubio from being pigeonholed as the Hispanic senator who wants to allow 11 million illegal immigrants to earn citizenship. He?s sponsoring a bill called the ?Student Right to Know Before You Go Act,? which would help students get data about the costs of a college education. When he delivered the Republican response to the president?s State of the Union speech, he railed against the president?s health care law and tax hikes on the wealthy. Rubio rarely misses an opportunity to weigh in on an issue -- whether it?s Obama?s Cabinet appointments, the Internet sales tax, or the civil war in Syria ? and the media is always willing to oblige the charismatic political comer with a quote or a television hit.
?He?s leading on the immigration issue, and I?m grateful, but he?s also stacking one brick after another, and people down the road will see what he is doing,? said Florida Republican Party Chairman Lenny Curry. ?He?s leading on a lot of issues.?
And it was Rubio who quietly pushed Florida?s Republican?controlled Legislature to tack a last-minute change to a sweeping election bill, moving back Florida?s presidential primary so that it would comply with national party rules. The move came seven years after Rubio, then a rising star in the Florida Legislature, led the charge to move the state?s primary to its earliest date ever so that it would have the biggest impact on the nominating process.
?Florida is the microcosm of the entire nation,? Rubio told The Miami Herald in March 2006. ?With all due respect to New Hampshire and Iowa, nowhere are you going to be on a national stage like Florida.?
Rubio allies say he changed his mind because the national party ratcheted up the penalties for states that flouted its calendar. The winner of Florida?s 2016 presidential primary would have reaped only 12 delegates instead of 99 if the state kept its early primary in January or early February. (It received 50 in 2012.) Under the new law, the primary is expected to be in early March, depriving Florida of its early imprint on the race but ensuring it will make a big difference in the delegate count.
Rubio?s reversal earned him a ?full flop? from Politifact.
In addition to losing delegates, Florida was assigned a far-flung hotel even though the 2012 convention was held in Tampa, forcing participants to endure long bus rides to get to the event.
?We don?t want to have to go through the same mess we went through last year,? said Curry, the party chairman. ?I thought moving up the primary was a good idea because Florida ought to have a big voice given the size and diversity of our state, but it turned out to be a pretty painful process.?
About one week after Florida set the new primary date, Rubio?s Reclaim America organization began airing an ad defending Sen. Ayotte for voting against expanding background checks for gun buyers. The spot looks like a commercial for Johnson & Johnson baby shampoo, showing images of attractive mothers cuddling their babies before featuring Ayotte. ?Safety, security, family. No one understands these things like a mom, and no one works harder for them than this one.?
The "six-figure" media buy is noteworthy because until now, Rubio has spent much of his leadership committee money on political consultants, fundraising and direct mail.
Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party and the founder of a pro-immigration reform group, noted that Ayotte will be a key vote on the bill. ?Maybe Sen. Rubio is just being a nice guy,? Cullen quipped. ?It?s a win-win-win. It?s good all around. It?s good for Rubio.?
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/marco-rubio-makes-move-2016-102117914.html
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In the wake of the sobering news that atmospheric carbon dioxide is now at its highest level in at least three million years, an important advance in the race to develop carbon-neutral renewable energy sources has been achieved. Scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have reported the first fully integrated nanosystem for artificial photosynthesis. While "artificial leaf" is the popular term for such a system, the key to this success was an "artificial forest."
"Similar to the chloroplasts in green plants that carry out photosynthesis, our artificial photosynthetic system is composed of two semiconductor light absorbers, an interfacial layer for charge transport, and spatially separated co-catalysts," says Peidong Yang, a chemist with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division, who led this research. "To facilitate solar water- splitting in our system, we synthesized tree-like nanowire heterostructures, consisting of silicon trunks and titanium oxide branches. Visually, arrays of these nanostructures very much resemble an artificial forest."
Yang, who also holds appointments with the University of California Berkeley's Chemistry Department and Department of Materials Science and Engineering, is the corresponding author of a paper describing this research in the journal NANO Letters. The paper is titled "A Fully Integrated Nanosystem of Semiconductor Nanowires for Direct Solar Water Splitting." Co-authors are Chong Liu, Jinyao Tang, Hao Ming Chen and Bin Liu.
Solar technologies are the ideal solutions for carbon-neutral renewable energy ? there's enough energy in one hour's worth of global sunlight to meet all human needs for a year. Artificial photosynthesis, in which solar energy is directly converted into chemical fuels, is regarded as one of the most promising of solar technologies. A major challenge for artificial photosynthesis is to produce hydrogen cheaply enough to compete with fossil fuels. Meeting this challenge requires an integrated system that can efficiently absorb sunlight and produce charge-carriers to drive separate water reduction and oxidation half-reactions.
"In natural photosynthesis the energy of absorbed sunlight produces energized charge-carriers that execute chemical reactions in separate regions of the chloroplast," Yang says. "We've integrated our nanowire nanoscale heterostructure into a functional system that mimics the integration in chloroplasts and provides a conceptual blueprint for better solar-to-fuel conversion efficiencies in the future."
When sunlight is absorbed by pigment molecules in a chloroplast, an energized electron is generated that moves from molecule to molecule through a transport chain until ultimately it drives the conversion of carbon dioxide into carbohydrate sugars. This electron transport chain is called a "Z-scheme" because the pattern of movement resembles the letter Z on its side. Yang and his colleagues also use a Z-scheme in their system only they deploy two Earth abundant and stable semiconductors ? silicon and titanium oxide - loaded with co-catalysts and with an ohmic contact inserted between them. Silicon was used for the hydrogen-generating photocathode and titanium oxide for the oxygen-generating photoanode. The tree-like architecture was used to maximize the system's performance. Like trees in a real forest, the dense arrays of artificial nanowire trees suppress sunlight reflection and provide more surface area for fuel producing reactions.
"Upon illumination photo-excited electron?hole pairs are generated in silicon and titanium oxide, which absorb different regions of the solar spectrum," Yang says. "The photo-generated electrons in the silicon nanowires migrate to the surface and reduce protons to generate hydrogen while the photo-generated holes in the titanium oxide nanowires oxidize water to evolve oxygen molecules. The majority charge carriers from both semiconductors recombine at the ohmic contact, completing the relay of the Z-scheme, similar to that of natural photosynthesis."
Under simulated sunlight, this integrated nanowire-based artificial photosynthesis system achieved a 0.12-percent solar-to-fuel conversion efficiency. Although comparable to some natural photosynthetic conversion efficiencies, this rate will have to be substantially improved for commercial use. However, the modular design of this system allows for newly discovered individual components to be readily incorporated to improve its performance. For example, Yang notes that the photocurrent output from the system's silicon cathodes and titanium oxide anodes do not match, and that the lower photocurrent output from the anodes is limiting the system's overall performance.
"We have some good ideas to develop stable photoanodes with better performance than titanium oxide," Yang says. "We're confident that we will be able to replace titanium oxide anodes in the near future and push the energy conversion efficiency up into single digit percentages."
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DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory: http://www.lbl.gov
Thanks to DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for this article.
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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/128299/Artificial_forest_for_solar_water_splitting
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