Egypt police raid U.S.-backed pro-democracy groups (Reuters)

CAIRO (Reuters) ? Egyptian prosecutors and police raided offices of 17 pro-democracy and human rights groups on Thursday - drawing criticism from the United States which hinted it could review its $1.3 billion in annual military aid.

The official MENA news agency said the groups had been searched in an investigation into foreign funding.

"The public prosecutor has searched 17 civil society organizations, local and foreign, as part of the foreign funding case," MENA cited the prosecutor's office as saying. "The search is based on evidence showing violation of Egyptian laws including not having permits."

Among groups targeted were the local offices of the U.S.-based International Republican Institute (IRI) and National Democratic Institute (NDI), a security source and employees at the organizations said.

The U.S. State Department said the raids were "inconsistent with the bilateral cooperation we have had over many years" and urged Egyptian authorities to immediately halt "harassment" of non-governmental organization staff.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland indicated to a news briefing that military aid could be difficult to push through Congress if the situation did not improve.

"We do have a number of new reporting and transparency requirements on funding to Egypt that we have to make to Congress," Nuland said. "The Egyptian government is well aware of that and it certainly needs to be aware of that in the context of how quickly this issue gets resolved."

Nuland said U.S. officials had been in touch with Egyptian Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri and with Egypt's ambassador to Washington to underscore Washington's concern.

Germany's Foreign Ministry said it would summon Egypt's ambassador to Berlin on Friday after the raid targeted the German-based Konrad Adenauer Foundation, which is close to Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats.

CRITICISM OF ARMY

Civil society groups, a driving force behind the protests that toppled President Hosni Mubarak in February, have become increasingly vocal in criticizing what they call the army's heavy-handed tactics in dealing with street unrest.

"This is a campaign the military council has launched to defame and stigmatize activists, rights groups and the various forces that have participated in the making of the January 25 revolution," said 27 civil society groups in a joint statement.

The groups added that such a campaign was "unprecedented even in the era of Mubarak and aimed to cover the failures of the military council in its management of the transitional period."

The ruling generals have pledged to stand aside by mid-2012 but many democracy activists say the military is keen to preserve its privileges and broad business interests.

One analyst said the crackdown on civil society groups was an attempt to stymie the protest movement.

"Civil society groups and the media are the two pillars of a successful revolution, because they are radical in their demands. The military council launches intermittent attacks to contain them," said analyst and researcher Yasser Abdel Aziz.

The U.S. State Department comments followed stinging criticism by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over the "systematic degradation" of women during protests in Cairo this month in which 17 people were killed.

Images of troops beating demonstrators as they lay on the ground brought thousands of Egyptians onto the streets in protest. The harsh treatment of women protesters attracted particular attention.

The National Democratic Institute (NDI)said in an e-mailed statement that the raid took place on its offices in Cairo, Alexandria and Assiut, from where police confiscated equipment and documents.

"Cracking down on organizations whose sole purpose is to support the democratic process during Egypt's historic transition sends a disturbing signal," NDI President Kenneth Wollack was quoted as saying.

One person working at NDI, who gave her name as Rawda, said: "They are grabbing all the papers and laptops."

A Reuters television reporter who approached the offices of the International Republican Institute (IRI) in central Cairo found the doors sealed shut with wax and saw several police vehicles driving away from the area.

The NDI and IRI, which are loosely associated with the U.S. Democratic and Republican political parties and receive U.S. government funding, say they take a neutral political stance, fostering democracy in Egypt by training members of nascent parties in democratic processes.

CAMPAIGN

Other groups that were raided included U.S.-based Freedom House and local groups set up to defend judicial independence, individual freedoms and democracy, according to the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights.

"This looks like a campaign against human rights defenders," said prominent Egyptian rights activist Negad al-Borai. He said similar campaigns happened during Mubarak's three-decade rule.

"For this to happen after what we call the 'revolution', I am astonished."

Egypt's military has vowed to investigate how pro-democracy and rights organizations are funded and has said repeatedly it will not tolerate foreign interference in the country's affairs.

Egyptian presidential hopeful and former U.N. nuclear watchdog head Mohamed ElBaradei said: "Human rights organizations are the icon of freedom ... Everyone will be watching closely any illegal attempts to distort them. The revolution will prevail."

(Additional reporting by Yasmine Saleh and Patrick Werr; Christian Ruettger in Berlin; and Andrew Quinn in Washington; Writing by Tom Pfeiffer; Editing by Myra MacDonald)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111229/wl_nm/us_egypt_groups

annie zuccotti park leymah gbowee gabby giffords gabby giffords hunger games trailer hunger games trailer

Nikki Haley's Insurance Director Resigns :: :: FITSNewsFITSNews

David Black ? Gov. Nikki Haley?s choice to lead the S.C. Department of Insurance (SCDOI) ? abruptly resigned his post on Wednesday.

A resident of Greenville, S.C., Black was tapped by Haley to lead the agency less than a year ago. The former president and chief executive officer of Liberty Life Insurance, Black did not say what prompted his decision to step down ? only that it was reached last week.

?After reflection, I decided last week it would be best for me to resign as Director of the Agency,? Black wrote in an email to his employees.

?Since I have enjoyed this work and your friendship, this was not an easy decision,? Black continued. ?I have been touched from the very beginning by your hospitality and inspired by your hard work and dedication to making improvements within the Department for the public benefit. I know you?re proud of how much has been accomplished on every front in 2011.?

A copy of Black?s email was forwarded to a state lawmaker, who in turn provided it to FITS.

Black did not immediately respond to our request for comment. As is its custom, Haley?s office refused to respond to our request for comment.

?We?re thrilled that David Black has agreed to serve at the Department of Insurance,? Haley said in nominating Black on January 20. ?He understands that (SCDOI) can and should be an economic development agency, and that the agency must be as customer friendly and as pro-business as possible.?

?I?m really excited to accept this appointment,? Black said at the time. ?I look forward to working with the whole team.?

What changed in eleven months?

We?re not sure yet ? but we?re digging.

Early speculation centers on Black?s resignation having something to do with the brewing scandal over Haley?s rigged health care exchange committee ? which wasted money from a $1 million Obamacare grant to ?study? the feasibility of implementing a statewide exchange.

Emails published months later revealed that Haley?s administration predetermined the outcome of the hearing ? which has prompted at least one U.S. Senator to call for a federal investigation.

?It was certainly not the intent for those taxpayer funds to be distributed for a predetermined and meaningless outcome,? U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin said of Haley?s health care exchange panel. ?Spending taxpayer funds to construct an ideologically-motivated fa?ade not only violates Congress?s intent, but also the public?s trust in government.?

Compounding the problem is the fact that Haley?s administration failed to produce the emails when they were requested by a mainstream media outlet under the state?s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Black is not the first high-profile member of Haley?s administration to jump ship.

George Schroeder ? who was appointed Inspector General in March ? lasted just six weeks. Schroeder?s resignation was never publicly announced ? with his departure having to be belatedly confirmed by the Associated Press over a month after the fact.

In July, Eleanor Kitzman ? Haley?s choice to lead the quasi-legislative, quasi-executive S.C. Budget and Control Board (SCBCB) ? stepped down to become Commissioner of Insurance in Texas. She was on the job just six months. The following month, Haley?s deputy chief of staff Trey Walker resigned his post.

***

?

?

Source: http://www.fitsnews.com/2011/12/28/nikki-haleys-insurance-director-resigns/

hes just not that into you hes just not that into you monta ellis kawasaki disease dog the bounty hunter jenny mccarthy mega millions

Exercise doesn't prevent pregnancy-related diabetes (Reuters)

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) ? Pregnant women who exercised regularly during the second half of their pregnancies did not lower their odds of developing pregnancy-related diabetes in a new clinical trial.

Researchers in Norway found that when they randomly assigned 855 pregnant women to either exercise three times a week or to stick with regular prenatal care alone, the exercisers were no less likely to develop gestational diabetes.

By the third trimester, seven percent of the exercise group had been diagnosed with gestational diabetes, versus six percent of the comparison group.

The findings were surprising, according to lead researcher Signe N. Stafne of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim.

For the general population, exercise is considered an important part of preventing and treating type 2 diabetes -- the common form of diabetes that most often arises during middle-age or later.

It's possible, Stafne told Reuters Health in an email, that exercise does not have the same effect on gestational diabetes that it does on type 2.

But even if that's true, Stafne pointed out, there are still reasons for pregnant women to get moderate exercise: including their overall health and keeping their weight gain within the recommended limits.

It's estimated that up to 14 percent of pregnant women worldwide develop gestational diabetes, in which blood sugar levels rise too high. The condition goes away after childbirth, but it does raise the risk of certain other pregnancy problems -- like having an abnormally large baby, which may require a cesarean delivery.

Women with gestational diabetes are also at greater-than-normal risk of developing type 2 diabetes later in life.

While exercise can curb people's risk of type 2 diabetes, it has not been clear whether it can stave off gestational diabetes.

So for the new study, reported in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology, Stafne's team randomly assigned 855 pregnant women to either join a supervised exercise program or just continue their usual prenatal care.

All of the women were in their 18th to 22nd week of pregnancy. Those in the exercise program took an hour-long class once a week for 12 weeks -- doing low-impact aerobics, plus strengthening and stretching exercises. They were also given an at-home workout to do twice a week.

In the end, the exercise program showed no effect on gestational diabetes rates.

But an obstetrician not involved in the study cautioned that the findings do not mean exercise is no help to pregnant women.

A key issue is that only 55 percent of women in the exercise group actually stuck with their routine, said Dr. Rita W. Driggers, director of the maternal-fetal medicine fellowship program at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C.

What the study more clearly shows is that it's hard to get pregnant women to exercise regularly, Driggers told Reuters Health in an email -- just as it's hard to get people in general to exercise, she noted.

She also pointed out that only 13 percent of the women in the study were exercising at a moderate to high intensity three times a week when they entered the study. And that's the level the exercisers were asked to adopt.

It might have been asking too much for many women, according to Driggers.

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists suggests that healthy pregnant women try to be active -- with moderate activities like walking -- for 30 minutes a day on most, if not all, days of the week.

One possible explanation for the new study's results, Stafne said, is that starting exercise in the second trimester is too late. "It could be that exercise before pregnancy and in early pregnancy is more important, due to the metabolic changes that occur in early pregnancy."

The women in this study were also at relatively low risk for gestational diabetes because they were in the normal weight range, on average, when they entered the study.

A study focused on overweight and obese women -- who are at increased risk of gestational diabetes -- might find different results, Stafne said.

In general, the researcher noted, more studies are needed to figure out how to best lower women's risk of pregnancy-related diabetes.

"There are still many unanswered questions regarding gestational diabetes and the prevention of it," Stafne said.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/tK07eu Obstetrics & Gynecology, January 2011.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/parenting/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111228/hl_nm/us_exercise_diabetes

jeff garcia big east jesse james pearl harbor day discovery channel jersey shore season 5 lea michele

Top Five Energy Industry Stories of 2011 (ContributorNetwork)

Fukushima Nuclear Meltdown: The Associated Press reported on December 27 that the towns near the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant are now ghost towns, left to wandering cows and stray dogs. On March 11, 2011, the area was hit by a 9.0 earthquake and a tsunami. The events caused a nuclear meltdown at the plant that subsequently led to worldwide concern over the safety of nuclear energy and calls for safety measures on new reactors that would help them to withstand the most rare and unimaginable circumstances. Like a 9.0 earthquake.

Solyndra: According to a December 27 article in the San Francisco Chronicle, when California solar startup, Solyndra, shut the doors of its brand new, $528 million federally-funded factory doors and fired its staff late August, the accusations flew. Investigations into the company's bankruptcy led to the discovery of federal loans that were granted due to political ties inside the Energy Department and the White House, preferential treatment, and a rushed approval of a project with questionable potential.

Keystone XL: After the Obama Administration made the decision to delay approval of a project permit for TransCanada's pipeline, which would tie Canadian oil sands to Texas refineries, the issue became a late-year political football. According to a December 23 Reuters article, Obama recently signed into law a temporary payroll tax extension that forces his decision on the pipeline to be made within 60 days. However, with environmentalists opposing the line and Obama facing an election year in which he needs the support of environmentalists, some - including White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer say that the bill forcing Obama's hand on Keystone will ultimately kill the project.

Fracking: It has been considered a shining star for companies such as Halliburton and Schlumberger. That is until the EPA released a draft report in which it blamed fracking fluids for the chemicals found in a Wyoming community's groundwater. Now, according to a mid-December article in Forbes, concerns over the damage that hydraulic fracturing may (or may not) cause - including water pollution, as well as seismic activity - has become a headache-inducing PR problem for oilfield services companies. With new fracking regulations in Colorado and Texas, public meetings to consider the issue in New York and the brink of an oil boom in the communities of the vast Marcellus Shale region, the pros and cons of hydraulic fracturing have become common conversation.

EPA Regulations: There was no shortage this year of discussions about the looming EPA regulations aimed at controlling pollution from coal-fired power plants in the U.S. According to a December 22 report from ABC's Good Morning America, health campaigners were praising the regulations, which would reportedly prevent such things as childhood asthma and bronchitis. However, industry officials were condemning the same regulations for imposing costly upgrades on power plants across the country and forcing the shutdown of older plants.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111229/bs_ac/10759409_top_five_energy_industry_stories_of2011

kim jong il kim jong il vaclav havel vaclav havel kim jong ii dead snapdragon snapdragon

Can foreign tourists help US economy?

Non-resident visitors from an international flight fill out customs forms while waiting in line at immigration control at McCarran International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011, in Las Vegas. The U.S. Travel Association is pushing Congress to make it easier for foreigners to visit the United States. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

Non-resident visitors from an international flight fill out customs forms while waiting in line at immigration control at McCarran International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011, in Las Vegas. The U.S. Travel Association is pushing Congress to make it easier for foreigners to visit the United States. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

Non-resident visitors to the United States have their passports checked at immigration control after arriving at McCarran International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011, in Las Vegas. The U.S. Travel Association is pushing Congress to make it easier for foreigners to visit the United States. Nearly 7.6 million nonimmigrant visas were issued in 2001, compared to fewer than 6.5 million in 2010. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

A Customs and Border Protection officer checks the passport of a non-resident visitor to the United States inside immigration control at McCarran International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011, in Las Vegas. The U.S. Travel Association is pushing Congress to make it easier for foreigners to visit the United States. Nearly 7.6 million nonimmigrant visas were issued in 2001, compared to fewer than 6.5 million in 2010. Tourism leaders in the United States say the decline symbolizes a diplomacy failure that is costing American businesses $859 billion in untapped revenue. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

Non-resident visitors to the United States wait in line at immigration control after arriving at McCarran International Airport, Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011, in Las Vegas. The U.S. Travel Association is pushing Congress to make it easier for foreigners to visit the United States. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

LAS VEGAS (AP) ? Agustina Ocampo is the kind of foreign traveler businesses salivate over.

The 22-year-old Argentine recently dropped more than $5,000 on food, hotels and clothes in Las Vegas during a trip that also took her to Seattle's Space Needle, Disneyland and the San Diego Zoo. But she doubts she will return soon.

"It is a little bit of a headache," said Ocampo, a student who waited months to find out whether her tourist visa application would be approved.

More than a decade after the federal government strengthened travel requirements after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, foreign visitors say getting a temporary visa remains a daunting and sometimes insurmountable hurdle.

The tourism industry hopes to change that with a campaign to persuade Congress to overhaul the State Department's tourist visa application process.

"After 9/11, we were all shaken and there was a real concern for security, and I still think that concern exists," said Jim Evans, a former hotel chain CEO heading a national effort to promote foreign travel to the U.S.

At the same time, he said, the U.S. needs "to be more cognizant of the importance of every single traveler."

Tourism leaders said the decline in foreign visitors over the past decade is costing American businesses and workers $859 billion in untapped revenue and at least half a million potential jobs at a time when the slowly recovering economy needs both.

While the State Department has beefed up tourist services in recent years, reducing wait times significantly for would-be visitors will likely be a challenge as officials try to balance terrorist threats and illegal immigration with tight budgets that limit hiring.

"Security is job one for us," said Edward Ramotowski, managing director of the department's visa services. "The reason we have a visa system is to enforce the immigration laws of the United States."

That said, the agency announced earlier this month that it would increase its staff in Brazil and China to speed up the process after seeing huge surges in visa applications from both countries during the 2011 fiscal year.

The State Department said in the Dec. 21 statement that while the agency "always puts security first, visitors to the United States make critical contributions to economic growth and job creation."

Anti-immigration proponents argue travel to the U.S. is already too accessible and that allowing more visitors would put the nation at greater risk.

"Everybody would like to find a way to admit as many people as possible to visit here providing that they visit and then go home," said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, an anti-immigration group based in Washington, D.C.

"A lot of consular officers underestimate how much people want to come and live here," she said.

Nearly 7.6 million nonimmigrant visas were issued in 2001, compared with fewer than 6.5 million in 2010. The number of visa applicants also dropped sharply after 2001. Those combined forces pushed the U.S. share of global travelers down to 12 percent last year, from 17 percent before 2001.

The proposed immigration overhaul has largely been driven by the U.S. Travel Association, the tourism industry's lobbying giant, and has been endorsed by business titans such as the National Retail Federation, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, and Walt Disney Parks and Resorts. Republicans and Democrats in Congress are backing the proposed changes through six bills in the House and Senate.

Geoff Freeman, the travel association's chief operating officer, said the State Department should be required to keep visa interview wait times at a maximum of 10 days.

"Every day a person is waiting for that interview is a day a person cannot be here supporting the American economy," he said.

For most foreigners, taking a last-minute business or leisure trip to New York, Los Angeles, Miami or other U.S. travel hubs would be nearly impossible. The average wait time for a visa interview in Rio de Janeiro, for example, was 87 days, according to the State Department.

The Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan agency that audits federal programs, concluded that wait times are likely much longer than reported because some department employees artificially reduce the wait times by not scheduling interviews during high-demand periods.

The vast majority of visitors enter through the country's visa waiver program, which allows travelers from 36 nations with good relationships with the U.S. to temporarily visit without a visa. Travel proponents want to add nations whose residents are unlikely to illegally move to the U.S., including Argentina, Brazil, Poland and Taiwan.

Tourists from the rest of the world, including India, China, Mexico and other nations with affluent travelers looking to use their passports, must obtain a nonimmigrant visa. The process can be expensive and time-consuming.

People living far from a visa processing center must arrange travel to the interview location, not knowing whether they will be approved. Roughly 78 percent of all tourist visas were approved so far in 2011.

Tourism proponents want the department to embrace videoconferencing as a way to interview more people quickly. The department has no plans to implement videoconferencing interviews because of safety and technological concerns, Ramotowski said.

In-person interviews weren't the norm before 9/11, when consular officials had the authority to approve travelers based on an application alone. Since then, however, screenings have become more strenuous, with fingerprint checks and facial recognition screening of photographs.

The State Department has made moves to boost its tourist services in recent years, transferring employees from underworked offices to bustling embassies and consular posts. Many visa processing centers are also operating under extended hours.

Other proposed changes include granting more multi-entry visas and charging premium fees to tourists who want a visa right away, similar to the premium passport fee charged to Americans with last-minute passport requests. The tourism industry also wants more visa processing officers and to allow travelers to submit applications in their native language.

"We can't afford to treat them in a way that gives them an impression that maybe they aren't welcome," said Rolf Lundberg, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's top lobbyist.

To help make the U.S. appear more welcoming, Congress approved last year a $200 million annual marketing campaign.

In Las Vegas, where travelers to the Strip have traditionally kept Nevada's economy afloat, tourism and government leaders are desperate to keep businesses open and create jobs in a state with the nation's highest unemployment rate.

"The industries affected by tourism are all behind it," said Republican Rep. Joe Heck of southern Nevada, who has sponsored a bill in the House that would require shorter visa interview delays, among other measures. "We need the jobs."

Ocampo, who spent her vacation shopping at upscale boutiques and visiting family in California, said she would be more eager to come back if she knew her business was wanted.

"Everyone wants to visit the Statue of Liberty and Disneyland," she said.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/apdefault/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2011-12-28-Tourist%20Visas/id-b86e0c879daa4d7ea3b1506ec18436bc

rachel crow steelers browns albert pujols pau gasol virginia tech va tech duggar miscarriage

dailywireless.org ? Automotive Telematics Goes 4G

PC World reviews car infomatics systems. Broadband concept cars such as the NG Connect Toyota Prius and the Verizon OnStar 4G Buick LaCrosse are moving from concept to production.

The 4G-connected car will perform a whole new set of tricks.

• Audi Connect. Audi recently partnered with Alcatel-Lucent to show off an LTE version of their infotainment system. Audi?s production Connect system is capable of 7.2-mbps in-vehicle speeds, and 2012 models with Connect are considered the first production Web-connected vehicles. Through a partnership with T-Mobile, this SIM-card-activated service-plan system features navigation and weather/news/gas-price travel services that stay up-to-date with a built-in cellular data connection, and its integrated Wi-Fi can connect up to eight devices.
• Cadillac?s CUE System. The Cadillac User Experience, is a combined infotainment, navigation, and communication system that?s easy to use. It enables users to connect up to ten Bluetooth mobile devices?its Bluetooth Audio Streaming AVRCP 1.4 supports wireless browsing of media players?and it features two USB ports and an SD Card slot. CUE will debut in 2012 in the Cadillac XTS and ATS luxury sedans and SRX luxury crossover.
• Kia?s UVO System. Kia?s voice-activated UVO system, like Ford?s Sync, is the result of a partnership with Microsoft. It features Bluetooth smartphone connections, a color touchscreen, an integrated rearview camera, and a 700MB in-dash music hard drive.

Automotive telematics really got going with GM?s pioneering OnStar in 1996, which included an onboard GPS with 3G cellular connection. MyFord Touch enabled drivers to seamlessly integrate nearly all mobile phones and digital media players into their cars with voice commands, and touch-screen inputs enabled by Ford Sync functionality. Others such as Mercedes-Benz mbrace and BMW Assist have run on 2G and 3G connections.

• OnStar. Uses CDMA mobile phone voice and data communication, primarily from Verizon Wireless in the United States and Bell Mobility in Canada. Drivers and passengers can use its audio interface to contact OnStar representatives for emergency services, vehicle diagnostics and directions. A new aftermarket interior rear-view mirror with a built-in OnStar module, branded as OnStar FMV, became available to the public on July 24, 2011. It provides some of the features an OEM system has, such as Automatic Crash Response, Stolen Vehicle Tracking, Turn-by-Turn Navigation, and Roadside Assistance.
• Ford Sync. Ford first announced SYNC in January 2007 at the Detroit International Auto Show. Ford first offered SYNC for sale in 2007 in twelve 2008 model year Ford group vehicles in North America. SYNC is currently offered in North America on 14 Ford vehicle models, 5 Lincoln vehicle models and on the Mercury Milan. The high-end Sync with MyFord Touch package can use a USB modem or a smartphone as an in-vehicle Wi-Fi hotspot.
• Toyota Safety Connect. A subscription-based telematics system introduced by Toyota in 2009. The system provides communications, roadside assistance, car safety, remote diagnostics, and other services. Unlike the earlier Lexus Link service offered on Lexus models, the Safety Connect system is proprietary and not licensed from GM?s OnStar service.
• BMW Assist. Similar to GM?s OnStar or Mercedes-Benz mbrace services as they both use the cellular network and Global Positioning telemetry to locate or guide the vehicle. BMW Assist can provide turn-by-turn directions, remote unlocking, vehicle diagnostics, airbag deployment notification, theft recovery and towing or flat tire repair. The service is included free in most new BMWs. After expiration, it can be purchased at a yearly rate.
• Mercedes-Benz mbrace. Remotely access services such as Concierge, Remote Lock and Unlock, Send2Benz, Vehicle Finder using the mbrace Mobile Application on iPhone and Android, to connect with your Mercedes-Benz.

Alcatel-Lucent?s LTE demonstrations of public safety mobile broadband show a video-centric force transformed in a variety of day-to-day operational scenarios. Police vehicles with 5 live cameras, iPad-wielding cops, and mobile command centers with hundreds of thousands of dollars in mobile broadband gear. Outside a show flooor ? in the real world ? there is probably not enough bandwidth, infrastructure or money to support all these applications.

TeleNav has announced that it has created the first HTML5 browser-based, voice-guided, turn-by-turn GPS navigation service for mobile devices. By simply adding one line of code, developers of mobile websites or of apps with local content will have a free and easy way to integrate full GPS turn-by-turn directions into their services, creating a more seamless user experience and increasing user engagement and time spent within their applications.

Related DailyWireless stories on transit connectivity include; Ford Lowers SYNC Costs, Google?s Driverless Car Explained, World Congress on Talking Cars, Connected Car Conference, Google + General Motors?, Ford Mobilizes Smartphone Apps, Hands-free Vehicular Calling, Tracking Tools, In-Vehicle Infotainment: Death Race, CradlePoint: Mobile WiFi/WiMAX Hot Spots, Mercedes myCOMAND, BMW iDrive Gets Makeover, Handheld Intelligent Transportation, Chrysler Offers Internet Access, Chrysler Rolls Out U-connect, Ford Sync, Google Transit Maps + WiFi.

Posted by Sam Churchill on Tuesday, December 27th, 2011 at 9:43 am.

Source: http://www.dailywireless.org/2011/12/27/automotive-telematics-goes-4g/

country music awards new earth light year light year michelle rounds michelle rounds cabin in the woods

'Nanoantennas' show promise in optical innovations

ScienceDaily (Dec. 22, 2011) ? Researchers have shown how arrays of tiny "plasmonic nanoantennas" are able to precisely manipulate light in new ways that could make possible a range of optical innovations such as more powerful microscopes, telecommunications and computers.

The researchers at Purdue University used the nanoantennas to abruptly change a property of light called its phase. Light is transmitted as waves analogous to waves of water, which have high and low points. The phase defines these high and low points of light.

"By abruptly changing the phase we can dramatically modify how light propagates, and that opens up the possibility of many potential applications,"said Vladimir Shalaev, scientific director of nanophotonics at Purdue's Birck Nanotechnology Center and a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering.

Findings are described in a paper to be published online on Dec. 22 in the journal Science.

The new work at Purdue extends findings by researchers led by Federico Capasso, the Robert L. Wallace Professor of Applied Physics and Vinton Hayes Senior Research Fellow in Electrical Engineering at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. In that work, described in an October Science paper, Harvard researchers modified Snell's law, a long-held formula used to describe how light reflects and refracts, or bends, while passing from one material into another.

"What they pointed out was revolutionary," Shalaev said.

Until now, Snell's law has implied that when light passes from one material to another there are no abrupt phase changes along the interface between the materials. Harvard researchers, however, conducted experiments showing that the phase of light and the propagation direction can be changed dramatically by using new types of structures called metamaterials, which in this case were based on an array of antennas.

The Purdue researchers took the work a step further, creating arrays of nanoantennas and changing the phase and propagation direction of light over a broad range of near-infrared light. The paper was written by doctoral students Xingjie Ni and Naresh K. Emani, principal research scientist Alexander V. Kildishev, assistant professor Alexandra Boltasseva, and Shalaev.

The wavelength size manipulated by the antennas in the Purdue experiment ranges from 1 to 1.9 microns.

"The near infrared, specifically a wavelength of 1.5 microns, is essential for telecommunications," Shalaev said. "Information is transmitted across optical fibers using this wavelength, which makes this innovation potentially practical for advances in telecommunications."

The Harvard researchers predicted how to modify Snell's law and demonstrated the principle at one wavelength.

"We have extended the Harvard team's applications to the near infrared, which is important, and we also showed that it's not a single frequency effect, it's a very broadband effect," Shalaev said. "Having a broadband effect potentially offers a range of technological applications."

The innovation could bring technologies for steering and shaping laser beams for military and communications applications, nanocircuits for computers that use light to process information, and new types of powerful lenses for microscopes.

Critical to the advance is the ability to alter light so that it exhibits "anomalous" behavior: notably, it bends in ways not possible using conventional materials by radically altering its refraction, a process that occurs as electromagnetic waves, including light, bend when passing from one material into another.

Scientists measure this bending of radiation by its "index of refraction." Refraction causes the bent-stick-in-water effect, which occurs when a stick placed in a glass of water appears bent when viewed from the outside. Each material has its own refraction index, which describes how much light will bend in that particular material. All natural materials, such as glass, air and water, have positive refractive indices.

However, the nanoantenna arrays can cause light to bend in a wide range of angles including negative angles of refraction.

"Importantly, such dramatic deviation from the conventional Snell's law governing reflection and refraction occurs when light passes through structures that are actually much thinner than the width of the light's wavelengths, which is not possible using natural materials," Shalaev said. "Also, not only the bending effect, refraction, but also the reflection of light can be dramatically modified by the antenna arrays on the interface, as the experiments showed."

The nanoantennas are V-shaped structures made of gold and formed on top of a silicon layer. They are an example of metamaterials, which typically include so-called plasmonic structures that conduct clouds of electrons called plasmons. The antennas themselves have a width of 40 nanometers, or billionths of a meter, and researchers have demonstrated they are able to transmit light through an ultrathin "plasmonic nanoantenna layer" about 50 times smaller than the wavelength of light it is transmitting.

"This ultrathin layer of plasmonic nanoantennas makes the phase of light change strongly and abruptly, causing light to change its propagation direction, as required by the momentum conservation for light passing through the interface between materials," Shalaev said.

The work has been funded by the U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the National Science Foundation's Division of Materials Research.

Recommend this story on Facebook, Twitter,
and Google +1:

Other bookmarking and sharing tools:

---

Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Purdue University. The original article was written by Emil Venere.

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

---

Journal Reference:

1. Xingjie Ni, Naresh K. Emani, Alexander V. Kildishev, Alexandra Boltasseva, and Vladimir M. Shalaev. Broadband Light Bending with Plasmonic Nanoantennas. Science, 22 December 2011 DOI: 10.1126/science.1214686

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

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111222142459.htm

sticks and stones sticks and stones top chef powerball winner powerball winner narwhals

Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation receives support from Siemens Medical

Public release date: 20-Dec-2011
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Ellen Acconcia
eacconcia@sirweb.org
703-460-5582
Society of Interventional Radiology

Corporate pledge of $200,000 supports major fund-raising initiative to expand minimally invasive medicine into new areas of discovery

The Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation's Discovery Campaign, which seeks to further the growth of minimally invasive medicine into new areas of discovery, announced a major corporate pledge to that initiative. Siemens Medical Solutions, a provider of imaging and laboratory diagnostic equipment and information technology and management consulting and services to health care customers, pledged $200,000, as a "Pioneer" Supporter.

"The impact that corporate support at this level has on the future of the specialty is immense," said Gordon McLennan, M.D., FSIR, chair of the SIR Foundation board of directors. "The funding will be used to support grants, research consensus panels, registries, clinical trials and educational programming. Support of this kind sends a clear message about investing in the future of interventional radiology, a truly trailblazing specialty," noted McLennan, an interventional radiologist with the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. "We thank Siemens Medical Solutions for coming forward to support us on this venture," he noted.

"We are dedicated to supporting educational and research initiatives and developing technologies to advance image-guided therapies," noted Claus Grill, vice president of Siemens Medical Solutions, USA Inc., based in Malvern, Pa.

The Discovery Campaign was launched initially in 2007 with an SIR membership phase. Last year marked the initiation of the campaign's outreach to the medical technology industry for support. For information about the Society of Interventional Radiology, a national organization of nearly 4,700 doctors, scientists and allied health professionals dedicated to improving health care through minimally invasive treatments, visit online at www.SIRweb.org. For more information about the Discovery Campaign or to learn more about the Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation, visit online at http://www.SIRFoundation.org.

###

About the Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation

SIR Foundation is a scientific foundation dedicated to fostering research and education in interventional radiology for the purposes of advancing scientific knowledge, increasing the number of skilled investigators in interventional radiology and developing innovative therapies that lead to improved patient care and quality of life. Visit http://www.SIRFoundation.org.

About the Society of Interventional Radiology

Interventional radiologists are physicians who specialize in minimally invasive, targeted treatments. They offer the most in-depth knowledge of the least invasive treatments available coupled with diagnostic and clinical experience across all specialties. They use X-ray, MRI and other imaging to advance a catheter in the body, such as in an artery, to treat at the source of the disease internally. As the inventors of angioplasty and the catheter-delivered stent, which were first used in the legs to treat peripheral arterial disease, interventional radiologists pioneered minimally invasive modern medicine.

Today, interventional oncology is a growing specialty area of interventional radiology. Interventional radiologists can deliver treatments for cancer directly to the tumor without significant side effects or damage to nearby normal tissue.

Many conditions that once required surgery can be treated less invasively by interventional radiologists. Interventional radiology treatments offer less risk, less pain and less recovery time compared to open surgery. Visit http://www.SIRweb.org.

About Siemens Medical Solutions

The Siemens Healthcare Sector is one of the world's largest suppliers to the healthcare industry and a trendsetter in medical imaging, laboratory diagnostics, medical information technology and hearing aids. Siemens offers its customers products and solutions for the entire range of patient care from a single source from prevention and early detection to diagnosis, and on to treatment and aftercare. By optimizing clinical workflows for the most common diseases, Siemens also makes healthcare faster, better and more cost-effective. Siemens Healthcare employs some 48,000 employees worldwide and operates around the world. In fiscal year 2010 (to September 30), the Sector posted revenue of 12.4 billion euros and profit of around 750 million euros. For further information please visit http://www.siemens.com/healthcare.

---

[ | 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: 20-Dec-2011
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Ellen Acconcia
eacconcia@sirweb.org
703-460-5582
Society of Interventional Radiology

Corporate pledge of $200,000 supports major fund-raising initiative to expand minimally invasive medicine into new areas of discovery

The Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation's Discovery Campaign, which seeks to further the growth of minimally invasive medicine into new areas of discovery, announced a major corporate pledge to that initiative. Siemens Medical Solutions, a provider of imaging and laboratory diagnostic equipment and information technology and management consulting and services to health care customers, pledged $200,000, as a "Pioneer" Supporter.

"The impact that corporate support at this level has on the future of the specialty is immense," said Gordon McLennan, M.D., FSIR, chair of the SIR Foundation board of directors. "The funding will be used to support grants, research consensus panels, registries, clinical trials and educational programming. Support of this kind sends a clear message about investing in the future of interventional radiology, a truly trailblazing specialty," noted McLennan, an interventional radiologist with the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. "We thank Siemens Medical Solutions for coming forward to support us on this venture," he noted.

"We are dedicated to supporting educational and research initiatives and developing technologies to advance image-guided therapies," noted Claus Grill, vice president of Siemens Medical Solutions, USA Inc., based in Malvern, Pa.

The Discovery Campaign was launched initially in 2007 with an SIR membership phase. Last year marked the initiation of the campaign's outreach to the medical technology industry for support. For information about the Society of Interventional Radiology, a national organization of nearly 4,700 doctors, scientists and allied health professionals dedicated to improving health care through minimally invasive treatments, visit online at www.SIRweb.org. For more information about the Discovery Campaign or to learn more about the Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation, visit online at http://www.SIRFoundation.org.

###

About the Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation

SIR Foundation is a scientific foundation dedicated to fostering research and education in interventional radiology for the purposes of advancing scientific knowledge, increasing the number of skilled investigators in interventional radiology and developing innovative therapies that lead to improved patient care and quality of life. Visit http://www.SIRFoundation.org.

About the Society of Interventional Radiology

Interventional radiologists are physicians who specialize in minimally invasive, targeted treatments. They offer the most in-depth knowledge of the least invasive treatments available coupled with diagnostic and clinical experience across all specialties. They use X-ray, MRI and other imaging to advance a catheter in the body, such as in an artery, to treat at the source of the disease internally. As the inventors of angioplasty and the catheter-delivered stent, which were first used in the legs to treat peripheral arterial disease, interventional radiologists pioneered minimally invasive modern medicine.

Today, interventional oncology is a growing specialty area of interventional radiology. Interventional radiologists can deliver treatments for cancer directly to the tumor without significant side effects or damage to nearby normal tissue.

Many conditions that once required surgery can be treated less invasively by interventional radiologists. Interventional radiology treatments offer less risk, less pain and less recovery time compared to open surgery. Visit http://www.SIRweb.org.

About Siemens Medical Solutions

The Siemens Healthcare Sector is one of the world's largest suppliers to the healthcare industry and a trendsetter in medical imaging, laboratory diagnostics, medical information technology and hearing aids. Siemens offers its customers products and solutions for the entire range of patient care from a single source from prevention and early detection to diagnosis, and on to treatment and aftercare. By optimizing clinical workflows for the most common diseases, Siemens also makes healthcare faster, better and more cost-effective. Siemens Healthcare employs some 48,000 employees worldwide and operates around the world. In fiscal year 2010 (to September 30), the Sector posted revenue of 12.4 billion euros and profit of around 750 million euros. For further information please visit http://www.siemens.com/healthcare.

---

[ | 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/2011-12/soir-soi122011.php

willis mcgahee 2013 ford escape stop online piracy act protect ip act spear of destiny rock hill sc kate middleton pregnant

Iraq War Not Worth It: Too Much Blood and Treasure for No Guarantee of Stability (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | According to CNN, the U.S. military intervention in Iraq, which began in 2003, has cost the nation almost 4,500 dead soldiers. Additionally, more than 32,000 U.S. soldiers have been wounded and the financial cost of the 8 1/2-year conflict, as alleged by the Christian Science Monitor, may total up to more money than it cost our nation to fight in World War II.

World War II cost the United States around $3.6 trillion, adjusted for inflation, while the total costs of the Iraq War may amount to more than $4 trillion. Much of this tab goes to cover expenses related to healing and recuperating injured and traumatized soldiers, replacing ruined weapons and equipment, and giving assistance to our allies, some of whom have been less than cost-effective.

So we've lost 4,500 troops, have to help another 32,000 as best we can, and have spent a tremendous amount of money, some of which we could scarcely afford as the recent recession rocked our national economy to its core. What have we gained from this lengthy conflict, which also killed hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians?

Sadly, the United States has won precious little of what it sought prior to the spring 2003 invasion of Iraq: Aside from toppling Saddam Hussein's brutal regime, we have not made ourselves safer from foreign terrorist threats. We have not made the Middle East a safer, more stable region. We have not improved our respectability, prestige, or even intimidation factor among the international community.

If anything, our intervention in Iraq, made costly because we originally underestimated how many troops it would take to hold and secure the vast nation and provide security (according to an article in the National Security Archive), allowing an insurgency to erupt that continues to wreak havoc even today. We tried to fight a war on the cheap by sending in 130,000 troops instead of the 400,000 proposed by Marine General Anthony Zinni in 1999, whose ideas were mirrored in 2003 by General Eric Shinseki, the top-ranking Army officer, in a USA Today article.

By not properly securing Iraq in the beginning we doomed ourselves to a long, expensive, traumatizing war that has helped our enemies more than ourselves. Radical Islamic groups, various terrorist organizations, and hard-liners within Iran and Pakistan have been bolstered by the American mismanagement of the Iraq War. These groups can point to the chaos within Iraq and, regardless of who is genuinely at fault, blame the United States.

Worst of all, Iraq's security is still not guaranteed: When the last American troops pull out by the end of the year, it is unknown whether Iraq's temporary [relative] stability will last ... or crumble.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111216/pl_ac/10682311_iraq_war_not_worth_it_too_much_blood_and_treasure_for_no_guarantee_of_stability

alec baldwin alec baldwin rock and roll hall of fame erin andrews erin andrews blagojevich sentence mythbusters cannonball

Sen. Al Franken gets answers from Carrier IQ, carriers -- 'still very troubled by what's going on'

U.S. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., didn't like what he'd heard about the whole Carrier IQ saga. And after receiving answers from the analytics company, he still doesn't like what he hears. On Thursday,  Franken, chairman of the Senate Subcommitte on Privacy, Technology and the Law, issued a statement on the reponses he received.

More analysis

• AT&T's user of Carrier IQ extends to its own analytics app
• Sprint has 26 million devices with Carrier IQ
• HTC finds dormant Carrier IQ fragments on some phones that shouldn't have them
• Samsung has 26 million devices with Carrier IQ, also finds dormant fragments

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/tbOUdr_15zo/story01.htm

andy irons ethan zohn jeremy mayfield occupy oakland general strike occupy oakland general strike mike quade mike quade

Guest lineups for the Sunday news shows

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Guest lineups for the Sunday TV news shows:

ABC's "This Week" ? Reps. Barney Frank, D-Mass., and Paul Ryan, R-Wis.

___

NBC's "Meet the Press" ? 2012 GOP presidential candidate Michele Bachmann; House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio; Gov. Nikki Haley, R-S.C.

___

CBS' "Face the Nation" ? 2012 GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich.

___

CNN's "State of the Union" ? 2012 GOP presidential candidate Jon Huntsman; Sens. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., and Robert Menendez, D-N.J.

___

"Fox News Sunday" ? 2012 GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2011-12-17-News%20Shows/id-03df72a128df43a0bd2a43efee791d93

dan wheldon walking dead weldon weldon danica patrick david garrard indy car

Suppose We Need an Open Thread (Balloon Juice)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/174781282?client_source=feed&format=rss

port charlotte florida buckyballs buckyballs gilad annie hall jon lester mitchel musso

Tired Jaguars limp home with tough loss (AP)

ATLANTA ? As badly as Atlanta's John Abraham dominated Jacksonville's offense, rookie quarterback Blaine Gabbert blamed himself.

Abraham, a four-time Pro Bowl defensive end, sacked Gabbert 3 1/2 times and forced two fumbles, one of which led to directly to a touchdown by Atlanta nose tackle Corey Peters, in the Falcons' 41-14 win over the Jaguars on Thursday night.

"I've just got to get rid of the ball," Gabbert said. "I can't take those sacks and those fumbles. That's completely on me. I've got to find our checkdowns, find our hot reads and get rid of it."

For Gabbert, the NFL's No. 10 overall draft pick, the night couldn't have gone much worse for his team.

The Jaguars (4-10) trailed 27-0 at halftime and 41-0 midway through the third quarter, but they were still within two scores when Jarett Dillard fumbled away a punt return deep in Jacksonville territory early in the second quarter.

Yet after Atlanta's Sean Weatherspoon recovered the loose ball at the Jaguars' 5-yard line and Michael Turner ran for a touchdown on the next play, Dillard had to recheck his self-confidence.

"It's an easy call," Dillard said. "I should've fair caught it. I thought I had more room than I did. I was just trying to make a play when there was no play to be made. Just fair catch it, and let's go with the offense, but it's something I've learned from and I've just got to move forward."

Unfortunately, Jacksonville kept going backward. The offense followed with a pair of three-and-outs before Gabbert lost his first fumble on Abraham's second sack and Curtis Lofton recovered the ball for Atlanta at the Jags' 19.

Three plays later, Matt Bryant's 31-yard field goal gave the Falcons a 27-0 lead.

"Any time you go on the road against a good football and turn the ball over and you're not able to protect the quarterback consistently enough and the defense isn't able to stop the run like we need to and get off the field on third down, it's going to be a tough day," interim coach Mel Tucker said. "But give them credit. They've got some really good players on both sides of the ball."

Frustration began to boil over as the deficit mounted. Tucker had to calm down Nate Collins when the second-year defensive tackle was called for unnecessary roughness after Atlanta's Julio Jones caught a 9-yard pass in the third quarter.

"I told them to be disciplined," Tucker said. "After the whistle, that is something that we won't stand for. We confronted that immediately and we need to correct that and get better."

Jacksonville had few answers when Atlanta (9-5) paired quarterback Matt Ryan with Roddy White and Jones, the receiving tandem that combined for 15 catches, 220 yards receiving and three touchdowns.

"They did a great job of checking at the line," cornerback Drew Coleman said. "He them into some good plays. My hat's off to them. They came in and they just punched us in the mouth tonight. They just kind of beat us up. It's been tough. It's been like this the whole season, but we'll take tomorrow and get this behind us. We've just got to stay positive with this whole thing."

Running back Maurice Jones-Drew was one of the Jaguars' few bright spots, rushing 17 times for 112 yards, but there wasn't much else to like.

Until their final two possessions, the Jags had minus-29 net yards passing. They had the ball 17 minutes fewer than the Falcons, who have won four of five. Jacksonville, which began the game with a long injury list and then lost right tackle Gus Whimper to a swollen knee, has lost four of five.

New owner Shahid Khan, who bought the franchise for an estimated $760 million, watched as his exhausted team slogged through its third game in 11 days.

It didn't take long to see that the Jags were hurting. Falcons running back Michael Turner broke off a 15-yard run on Atlanta's first play from scrimmage. On Jacksonville's first snap, Abraham sacked Gabbert, who completed 12 of 22 passes for 112 yards, one TD and one interception, for a 10-yard loss.

"Right now, this is a very embarrassing loss," Jones-Drew said. "I think our lack of execution hurt over and over again. We felt that our game plan was solid enough, but we just didn't execute enough."

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/sports/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111216/ap_on_sp_fo_ga_su/fbn_jaguars

pandaria artie lange baby lisa irwin baby lisa irwin pearl jam 20 martha marcy may marlene lacuna

Small business loans fall to 12-year low

By Jacob Fenton, Investigative Reporting Workshop

New federal data show that the number of small bank loans to business has fallen to the lowest point in more than a decade, cutting the flow of money to a sector that's usually a job-creation powerhouse.

"It's usually the smaller business that is more able to bounce back and take advantage of different opportunities faster than a middle-market company," said Linda O'Connell, manager of small business research at Barlow Research Associates, a Minneapolis market research firm that focuses on the financial industries. "We haven't seen that."

An analysis of recently released Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. data by the Investigative Reporting Workshop shows that overall commercial and industrial lending by banks has increased for five straight quarters, but small loans to business of $1 million or less have been shrinking consistently since June 2008. As of Sept. 30, total outstanding loan volume was down 14.7 percent from its peak.

BankTracker: Search for your bank by name or location

The reduction of bank credit has had an even bigger impact on small business than it would on large business, which can borrow money through corporate bonds and "commercial paper." In contrast, small businesses rely almost exclusively on credit provided from banks.

The current situation stands in stark contrast to the recession at the start of the decade, following the dot-com bust. Even though commercial lending dropped severely, small business lending kept chugging upward. In this recession, the number of individual small business loans has fallen even further. Banks reported having just 1.5 million of those loans outstanding on Sept. 30, the smallest number since 1999, according to the FDIC data. Bank regulators define small business lending as loans of $1 million or less, regardless of the size of the business.

The numbers are especially troubling because businesses with fewer than 500 employees?created 65 percent of the jobs between 1993 and 2009, according to the Small Business Administration. But in a November survey conducted by the National Federation of Independent Businesses, a small business advocacy group, only 7 percent said the next three months would be a "good time to expand."

Graphic by Jacob Fenton / Investigative Reporting Workshop

While overall commercial lending has rebounded, lending to small businesses has fallen over the past two years. (Source: FDIC Call Reports)

There are many reasons that mom-and-pop businesses have been hit harder than international behemoths, economists say. Local businesses ? especially service providers ? can't easily tap overseas markets, though small-scale manufacturing firms that can have done slightly better. And construction, which has traditionally driven the local recovery, is expected to linger in the doldrums for years, as it has since the real-estate bubble popped. Finally, the sheer length of the country's economic woes has left small businesses with fewer reserves and hardly ready to jump back up, were conditions to start looking up.

Even successful businesses find it hard to get credit
With annual growth of around 40 percent, David Ehreth's six-person sauerkraut and pickle business in Healdsburg, Calif., had a different problem ? he couldn't grow his "Alexander Valley Gourmet" and "Sonoma Brinery" brands fast enough without new machinery. "Everything we were doing, we were doing by hand," he said.

Ehreth's hardly a standard food entrepreneur. He started brining pickles full-time about six years ago, following a lucrative three-decade career in the technology sector. As a tech executive, Ehreth had overseen "hundreds of millions" in sales and peppers his conversation with phrases like "credit facility."

He had reason to be optimistic about borrowing. "I am an individual of relatively high net worth with no debt of any sort. ... When I approached the banks we had about four years' worth of track record of steady growth of about 40 percent year over year."

None of that mattered to the banks, though. "I was just flatly turned down without any discussion," he said.?"Just about everyone I know in the food industry has given up on banks."

Instead, Ehreth and his crew kept working by hand, even though that slowed their growth. Finally, he decided to sell a vacation home, even though the price he got for it wasn't great. The investment in his business, he reasoned, was a sound one.

Banks' unwillingness to lend was especially galling to Ehreth because jobs he would create ? small-scale, blue-collar manufacturing that's unlikely to go overseas ? is the kind of job that's most needed. "For those who are college educated, for those who have engineering degrees, there's plenty of work. But for those who were working in factories, who saw their jobs sent overseas, people like myself create opportunities."

Bank profits reach four-year high
Though small business has suffered, bank results continued to improve in the third quarter of this year. Profits rose to $35.3 billion, the best in more than four years. Most of the improvement came because troubled loans continue to decline. Meanwhile, lending rose for the third straight quarter, though it remains well below pre-recession levels, mostly because of real estate lending remains very sluggish. The number of banks with troubled assets greater than their capital and reserves also declined.

The small-scale, business lending slowdown is all the more remarkable given the federal government's exceptional efforts at reversing it. The 2009 stimulus bill and?2010 Small Business Jobs Act cut fees and included "credit enhancements" that pumped up the Small Business Administration's loan guarantee rate.

The last three months of 2010 was the biggest quarter in the agency's history in terms of total new loan guarantee volume, said spokesman Mike Stamler.? Many of those loans are for amounts greater than $1 million, and don't show up in FDIC's statistics. Yet bank lending during the SBA's biggest quarter ever still declined.

The jobs bill set aside $30 billion to buy preferred stock in midsize banks, with those that actually increased small business lending eligible to lower the dividend rate paid back to the government. But just $4 billion of that money was actually lent out.

"The lending program through the federal government certainly didn't do a whole lot. We've heard from many banks that we've talked to that they have enough money to lend, it's just that there aren't enough borrowers out there," said Holly Wade, a senior policy analyst for the NFIB, the small business group.

Bankers say lending standards aren't the issue, and point to research that backs them up. In 2011, 17 percent of businesses with sales between $100,000 and $10 million applied for additional credit, but of those, only 22 percent were denied, according to Barlow Research surveys.

Overall, the number of businesses that haven't sought credit because they don't think they'll get it has been rising. In 2010, 15 percent of the small businesses that didn't apply for credit did so because they thought they wouldn't succeed, according to NFIB surveys. And 24 percent of small businesses that did seek additional credit reduced the amount they sought for fear of being turned down.

"The longer it goes on, the worse the financial condition for those that are just hanging on becomes, so they become less credit-worthy," said Robert Seiwert, director of the American Bankers Association's Center for Commercial Lending and Business Banking.

"Are credit standards tighter today than they were two years ago? Absolutely. But they should be because we're operating in a different economic climate," said the ABA's Seiwert. "The business that was viable in the past may not be viable in the future."

That?s hardly consolation to upstart entrepreneurs trying to launch. Michael Marquess, chief beer officer of Mother Road Brewing Co., in Flagstaff, Ariz., spent six months trying to get financing to open his brewery and taproom. ?Borrowing has changed dramatically in the past five years from easy lending to extreme process,? he wrote in an e-mail.

?We had the plans in with the city. The contractor was on board. Everything was just waiting on that funding,? he said. But his SBA loan application for less than $300,000 fell apart, he said, because plans for a small craft brewery didn?t match up to numbers loan examiners expected for an established beer manufacturer.

Marquess? story turned out well, though, thanks to the persistent bankers at the National Bank of Arizona, who he said helped him cobble together another application that was finally approved in June. Mother Road Brewing Co. opened last month and now has four employees. ?We sold our first pallet of beer two weeks ago,? he said.

?

Some of the information in this story came from interviews with members of American Public Media's Public Insight Network, which the Investigative Reporting Workshop joined earlier this year.

?

Source: http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/15/9470807-bank-loans-to-small-business-fall-to-12-year-low

powerball winner powerball winner narwhals narwhals gmail app gmail app phentermine

Union leader criticizes Argentine government

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) ? A top union leader who has been a strong ally of Argentina's government is taking an increasingly critical line, and the conflict could have political costs for President Cristina Fernandez.

Union leader Hugo Moyano said Thursday that Argentine workers will keep pressing for wages that they feel they deserve. He also issued a warning to Fernandez, saying that more than half of her votes in her re-election victory in October came thanks to union workers.

Moyano said in a speech that he is resigning his posts within Fernandez's party as interim president in the province of Buenos Aires and as a national vice president.

"I'm quitting my posts, but not the struggle," Moyano said, paraphrasing Eva Peron, the wife of former President Juan Domingo Peron. "We're going to rebuild Peronism."

He accused Fernandez's party of straying from the values of Peron.

Moyano, who spoke at a soccer stadium flanked by leaders of various union groups, questioned Fernandez for her criticisms of union stances during her Dec. 10 inauguration speech. Fernandez said then that "there is a right to strike, but not to blackmail nor to extort."

Moyano heads the General Labor Confederation, the largest union group in the country. He had smoother relations with Fernandez's husband and predecessor as president, Nestor Kirchner, who died last year.

Tensions between the government and unions have grown as the government has sought to show greater restraint in public spending with an eye to shielding Argentina's finances from world economic woes.

The government has sought to limit wage increases. Union leaders say they are concerned those limits are far below inflation. Private economists say prices are rising at an annual rate of at least 27 percent, while the government insists inflation is about one-third that.

Moyano's labor group has said there should be no ceiling in wage talks. The union leader has also said soaring inflation is a major problem.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2011-12-15-LT-Argentina-Union-Leader/id-2dbc09780bff4db3b5af9b274f9dad7d

heavy d dead heavy d dead alaska weather alaska weather election results gop debate live gop debate live

Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player (NSZ-GT1)

Looking to add Google TV to your living room this holiday season? You have three options: Logitech's Revue ($299.99, 4 stars) set-top box, Sony's Internet TV HDTVs (starting at $799) or, the least hyped, but perhaps the most practical, of the trio, Sony's $399.99 (direct) Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player (NSZ-GT1). The differences between the Revue and Sony's Blu-ray player can be simplified to this: The Logitech box costs $100 less and has built-in Harmony remote control technology, but no disc drive. For our money, the $100 more for a Blu-ray drive and basically an identical user interface is the best deal of the group, and it's our latest Editors' Choice Blu-ray player.

[Editors' Note: The NSZ-GT1 has recently gotten an upgrade to Google TV 3.1, a new version of the operating system that uses the 3.1 version of Android and completely changes the interface. The new version has a more visually appealing menu design and supports apps through the Android Market. These changes are good, but they do not warrant changing the player's rating. For more information about the new version of Google TV, please read our hands on coverage, which uses this device.]

Design
Measuring 2.3 by 13 by 9.8 inches (HWD), the 5.3-pound Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player's glossy plastic design makes it look more like a gaming console than a home-theater component. The top panel is black and the rest of the device is white, with the disc drive and Power, Eject, and Connect (for re-syncing the remote) buttons, along with an extra USB port, on the front panel. Connectivity for the player is similar to that of Logitech's Revue: both devices have an HDMI input and output, Ethernet connector, Optical (SPDIF) audio output, and power-adapter connection. The Sony player has one IR blaster connection and the Revue has two; the Sony player has three USB ports and the Revue has two. In other words, there's little difference in terms of connectivity. Both systems, sadly, lack analog audio or video outputs. The box ships with a double-sensor IR blaster, and the remote.

It's hard to say who wins the Google TV remote control war. The Revue's remote features excellent Logitech Harmony functionality, but is the size of a canoe. The Sony remote, while ideally sized, would benefit from a more streamlined design and better reception. Without a doubt, the Logitech remote is faster than Sony's, which depends far more on angle and finding a direct line to a sensor than the Revue remote does. Both remotes have QWERTY keyboards (the Revue's remote is, essentially, a full-size keyboard), but Sony's remote almost resembles a PlayStation game controller. The great thing about having a plethora of buttons and options on a remote?Sony's has far too many to name here?is that you can do just about anything.

Sometimes, however, it's possible to have too many. Why are there two click-wheel-esque areas on the remote, for instance? The left-hand set of buttons has Up/Down, Left/Right navigation controls surrounding an Enter button in the circle's center?a familiar array. The right side of the remote is laid out similarly, except that surrounding buttons are Home, Window Minimize (for simultaneous TV watching and access to the main screen), Settings, and Previous Screen. The center button, though click-able, is also a mini-trackpad for your finger. It works splendidly, utilizing just the right amount of sensitivity to guide a cursor around your television screen. The problem: it's also a button, and often does things one might assume an Enter button does. Except when it doesn't. Sometimes you can use either the Enter button or the trackpad button, sometimes you need to use one, specifically. Which button is the right one is rarely obvious, however, and the learning curve can be annoying. Why couldn't there just be one master trackpad and separate, dedicated Home and Settings buttons? Despite this gripe, typing is easy on the remote, and you eventually get the hang of everything else.

Setting Up
The processes of setting up the Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player and the Logitech Revue are quite similar. The first time you boot up and establish an Internet connection, you'll likely need to reboot after the firmware is updated, which can take upwards of 15 minutes. Once that's finished, the process is quick and painless. You'll need a Google account if you don't already have one (they are free) and obviously, you need an Internet connection?either wired via Ethernet or wireless. This box supports up to 802.11n Wi-Fi signals.

Getting the box and remote to control your AV receiver and DVR is also a simple process, that you're walked through with on-screen instructions. If you own certain DISH Network DVR boxes, you can integrate your live and recorded television content into searches you perform when looking for media?more on that in a bit.

Interface and Features
Google TV, if you aren't already familiar, is a new user interface that aims to organize all of your media into one easy-to-search system. The interface is well-designed and has fluid graphics. A main menu sits on the left side of your screen with the following choices: Bookmarks, Applications, Spotlight, Most Visited, Queue, What's On, Sony Recommends, and (if you have DISH), DISH Cinema. The primary differences between the Logitech Revue's interface and the Sony Internet TV interface involve which apps are preloaded. For instance, Sony's interface comes with Sony pay-on-demand content via an app called Qriocity. The Revue does not have Sony's app preloaded, but comes with Logitech's Media Player?a clunky-but-functional media streaming app that plays files wirelessly from your computer's hard drive. The Media Player on the Sony Blu-ray player accesses content from connected USB drives and also streams media from computers on your Wi-Fi network. It was slightly easier to use than Logitech's media player app, but the two work quite similarly. Other than these minor differences, which will be negated once the Android Marketplace for Google TV goes live in 2011 and all apps become available for download on both devices, the Google TV user interface remains pretty uniform. It looks great, and navigating it is a fairly intuitive process.

For your own files, the Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player supports playback of MPEG4 and H.264 for video, AAC and MP3 for audio files, and JPEG, GIF, and PNG for photos. This is pretty meager file support, but with so much on-demand content at your fingertips, it feels like less of a limitation.

Google's Chrome browser offers a slightly different Web experience than you may be familiar with. The browser keeps track of the sites you visit most and presents them to you as "live" icons?click on them and you are immediately taken to the site?that act as quicker, more visual bookmarks. This is a great experience on a personal computer, but if you plan on sharing access to the Google TV interface with household members, just remember: They will always be able to see what you were perusing on the Internet. So, remember to log out of your Web e-mail account, at the very least. Aside from the privacy issues, the basic annoyance is that a browser like Chrome uses frequency of visits to determine the order of its icons, so the order on a Google TV device will be determined not only by your preferences, but by others who use the device as well. This is the same on both the Revue and Sony's Blu-ray player. Multiple user logins would solve this problem, but alas, there's no option for it. On the bright side, the browser offers full Flash support.

Sony's Blu-ray player also comes preloaded with an assortment of familiar apps, like Amazon Video On Demand, Netflix, YouTube, and Napster. Again, down the road, you'll be able to add to these, but for now, what you see on the player is what you get. And remember: while some of these apps, like the New York Times videos, are free, much of the on-demand content requires an account and is available either by subscription (Netflix) or pay-per-view (Amazon).

If you're a DISH Network subscriber, both the Revue and Sony's Blu-ray player have the same built-in compatibility. All DVRs, for the most part, can be controlled by both boxes?they're armed with pretty capable remotes. DISH Network, however, is the only partnered television provider, and thus, when you search for content using the excellent Google search tool (the magnifying glass on your remote), your results will include your DVR recordings when appropriate. For instance, searching "NFL" will turn up the NFL Web site, NFL TV content you can access, and any recordings of NFL content. DVRs for other providers can be controlled remotely, but won't show up in your search results. Not all DISH DVRs are supported, either. Only the DISH 622, 722n, and 722k have fully integrated functionality with Sony Internet TV products and the Logitech Revue. The latest DISH DVR, the ViP922 ($200 and up, 4.5 stars), is not supported.

Blu-ray Performance
Oh yeah, this thing plays Blu-ray discs too. The player features a Quick Start mode that seems to put it into a sleep state when idle. In this mode, the player springs to life from the "sleep" state to the main menu, retaining everything in memory, in approximately two seconds. The sleep state may save some power, but not as much as just powering the box down does. With Quick Start disabled, the player boots up in an average of 34 seconds from fully off.

In our disc-loading tests, BD-Live-equipped discs took an average of 33 seconds to load from disc insertion to the first appearance of content, and older, non-BD-Live discs took an average of 16 seconds to load. The player's Blu-ray disc speed isn't blazing fast like the Sony BDP-S570 ($199, 4 stars) or the Samsung BD-C6500 ($249, 4 stars) players' approximate 10-second disc loading times, but not horribly long, either. These times are average?more than acceptable for a convergence device that does so many things.

The HD HQV Benchmark Blu-ray Disc didn't uncover any big surprises with the player; it passed all of our tests, with a minor caveat. Video processing is functional, but the noise reduction algorithm didn't quite get the job done, showing some grain and slight detail reduction in the test picture. Generally speaking, however, this Blu-ray player performs quite well and its minor noise issue is unlikely to irk anyone but the pickiest videophile.

The Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Player isn't flawless?the remote's design could be improved and file support is limited. But let's talk money. You'd be lucky to find a quality Blu-ray player for $100. The Revue and the Sony player are nearly identical?their primary difference is the Revue's Harmony remote advantage. But for only $100 more, you get the same user interface and basic functionality, plus a drive for Blu-ray discs, DVDs and CDs. With the Sony Google TV HDTVs starting at $800, the company's $400 Blu-ray player strikes me as the soundest investment if you want Google TV. It may not be the fastest loading player with the highest video quality, but Sony's Internet TV Blu-ray Player earns our Editors' Choice by integrating Google TV at a reasonable price.

More Blu-ray Player Reviews:
??? Sony Internet TV Blu-ray Disc Player (NSZ-GT1)
??? Samsung BD-D5500
??? Panasonic DMP-BDT110
??? Oppo BDP-93
??? Sony BDP-S780
?? more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/mJXpjet_r2k/0,2817,2372228,00.asp

ron white alcs alcs miguel cabrera pay it forward pay it forward haunted houses