Source: www.nytimes.com --- Friday, December 30, 2011
General Electric is adding Jobs at its appliance factories in Louisville ? even bringing some work back from overseas ? but the newcomers are earning less than longtime workers. ...
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Miley Cyrus is one gushing girlfriend. The singer-actress, who is currently vacationing in Hawaii, took to Twitter Wednesday night to urge her fans to vote for beau Liam Hemsworth as the best boyfriend of the year.
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In many ways, 2011 was the year of the pivot. One startup that successfully switched gears was Fab, which started the year as a gay social network and ended it a design-oriented e-commerce site. Founder Jason Goldberg created the Fab Timeline slideshow below to illustrate all the changes the company has gone through, from its pivot in February to raising $8 million in July, another $40 million in early December, and growing all along the way. But one slide in particular caught my eye. It shows Fab's order growth shooting up from just above 20,000 orders in July to about 40,000 in September and then jumping to nearly 100,000 in November. Orders in december continues to climb, Goldberg tells me, and the company is on an annualized revenue-run-rate of almost $70 million.Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/9WioiAC-n5k/
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Must say even tho the defenses were porous is on the radar of college football fans everywhere...stats this year are on point!!! Source: http://twitter.com/SMOOTHone155/statuses/152665932165165056
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NEW YORK (Reuters) ? U.S. stocks fell more than 1 percent on Wednesday after a hefty year-end rally and the S&P 500 erased gains for the year on renewed concerns about the euro zone's financial health.
The selloff followed the euro's slide to an 11-month low against the U.S. dollar as regional debt worries prompted a wave of selling, with thin trading exacerbating volatility.
"It seems like the weakness in euro, breaking that $1.30 level, really made investors push that 'sell' button," said Ryan Detrick, senior technical strategist with Schaeffer's Investment Research in Cincinnati.
"But it's somewhat of an exaggerated move, considering that there isn't much volume, and this could end in a one-day selloff."
A recent rally on Wall Street had been supported by a series of positive U.S. economic data that encouraged investors to shift their focus from fears about Europe's debt crisis sparking a global recession to optimism that the U.S. economy was on track to recovery.
But "with no domestic economic news to guide the action, much of the focus was on Europe," WhatsTrading.com options strategist Frederic Ruffy said.
U.S. stock index futures had advanced earlier in the session after an Italian debt auction where short-term borrowing costs were halved, potentially a good sign for a sale of longer-dated bonds on Thursday.
But those gains were short-lived, as the euro fell to a session low of $1.2938, its lowest since January, before rising back to trade at $1.2949.
The Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) fell 139.94 points, or 1.14 percent, to end at 12,151.41. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) dropped 15.79 points, or 1.25 percent, to 1,249.64. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) lost 35.22 points, or 1.34 percent, to 2,589.98.
S&P UP 10.5 PCT IN QUARTER
After a 5 percent rally last week that helped Wall Street add to what has been the best quarter in over a year, the S&P 500 pulled back below its 200-day moving average, a closely watched indicator of market strength it has struggled to hold this year.
For the quarter, the S&P 500 is up 10.5 percent.
For the year, the Dow is up 5 percent, while the S&P 500 is down 0.6 percent, and the Nasdaq is off 2.4 percent.
In Wednesday's session, investors concentrated on 2012 with Europe's debt crisis as well as a slowdown in Asia and the impact of Europe's recession on a U.S. recovery on the agenda.
"There are clearly some major hurdles on the horizon," said Peter Kenny, managing director at Knight Capital in Jersey City, New Jersey. "Looking into next year, there is more apprehension about the risks associated with the current climate."
The biggest gaining sectors over the last five days, in cyclical areas like materials and energy, led the market lower on Wednesday, sparked by a drop in commodity prices. The S&P materials sector index (.GSPM) fell 2.2 percent.
Gold sank, tracking industrial metals, on concerns about the prospects for global economic growth next year. It was gold's biggest one-day drop in two weeks.
Medicis Pharmaceutical Corp (MRX.N) fell 1.2 percent to $33.35 a day after cutting its fourth-quarter earnings outlook.
Citigroup Inc (C.N) shed 2.9 percent to $26.13 after U.S. regulators won a delay in a securities fraud lawsuit against the bank. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is seeking to appeal a judge's decision to reject its $285 million settlement with the bank.
Volume was light in the post-Christmas period and ahead of the New Year's Day holiday. Composite volume on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and Amex was 4.31 billion shares, well below the year's daily average of around 7.9 billion shares.
On both the NYSE and the Nasdaq, about four stocks fell for every one that rose.
(Reporting By Angela Moon; Editing by Jan Paschal)
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On a Sony Diskman? RT @alexilalas22: @davisjsn @Jrodius I played a song called "Coming Up Close" by 'Til Tuesday before every WC game in '94 
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WASHINGTON D.C.???If you like offense, the 25,042 fans in RFK Stadium were treated to a special afternoon Wednesday by Air Force and Toledo. The Falcons and Rockets ran up and down the field with little opposition.
But, in the end, Toledo held on for a 42-41 victory in the Military Bowl after Air Force gambled trying for a two-point conversion with 52 seconds left. The Falcons' David Baska, the holder on the fake conversion, pitched wildly to Parker Herrington, who couldn't corral the ball on an option play to the left. The ball bounced out of bounds in the end zone. Air Force then tried an onside kick, but Toledo recovered and ran out the clock.
Toledo scored first and never trailed in a wild back-and-forth
contest, as Air Force kept putting the pressure on.The Rockets' defense pinned Air Force in its territory for much of the fourth quarter. A 33-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Terrance Owens to receiver Bernard Reedy put Toledo ahead, 42-35, with 5:01 to go. But, as they did all game, the Falcons responded, scoring on a fourth-down pass from quarterback Tim Jefferson to a wide-open Zach Kauth to make it 42-41. Coach Troy Calhoun then called for the fake conversion.
There were many bowl-game highs for the Falcons. Jefferson's touchdown pass to Jonathan Warzeka in the second quarter was his first in four postseason games.
Toledo coach Matt Campbell deserted his two-quarterback system most of the way. He stayed mainly with Owens, and the sophomore left-hander delivered with big plays.
Air Force scored late in the second quarter to tied the game at 28. The Rockets took a 35-28 lead on Jermaine Robinson's 37-yard interception return of a tipped pass. The Falcons tied the score at 35 on fullback Mike DeWitt's two-yard slant to the left side later in the period.
There was hardly time to catch a breath in the first half.
The Rockets and Falcons moved up and down the field in just about
every way imaginable, from big kick returns, to long runs to big passing plays. Toledo's 87-yard kickoff return by Eric Paige with 2:17 left in the first period put the Rockets up 21-7. By that point the Falcons already had given up a 17-yard touchdown pass by Owens and a 41-yard touchdown run by Thomas.But, as if an alarm had gone off, the Falcons woke up.
Jefferson signaled there was some life with a 22-yard scoring run that made it 14-7 before the kickoff return by Page. The Falcons scored three times in the second quarter to knot the game by halftime.
Tailback Asher Clark scored from the one on fourth down to tie the score at 21. After Owens hit a 49-yard touchdown pass to put the Rockets up 28-21, Jefferson threw a 37-yard score to Warzeka with 2:07 left in the period.
Source: http://www.denverpost.com/colleges/ci_19634414?source=rss
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Gameloft to put all their paid games on the market on sale for $0.99 this New Year's weekend. Source: http://twitter.com/DroidGamers/statuses/151762240905814016
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APDuring Saturday?s loss to the Eagles, Cowboys owner Jerry Jone went down to the sideline to talk to head coach Jason Garrett, to make sure Garrett knew the Giants had won earlier in the day and therefore the Cowboys didn?t have anything to play for.
Some fans and media members have suggested that Jones was out of line by doing that, but Jones says he can?t understand why anyone would think the owner of a business shouldn?t be involved in every element of that business.
?It has amazed me to be criticized for really walking down on the floor of the company,? Jones said on KTCK-AM 1310, via the Dallas Morning News. ?The more involved your top management, the more involved ownership can be, I?ve always thought made the best way for it to work.?
Jones says he doesn?t act any differently on game days now than he did in the 1990s, and that it worked out pretty well then.
?You didn?t see that kind of criticism very early on, but we were winning Super Bowls,? Jones said. ?And it was the same exact way that we handled our decision-making and the exact same way that we handled our ultimate information gathering system. We?ve been doing it ever since I owned the team. The exact same way.?
Jones says he doesn?t tell Garrett who can play and who can?t, but he did want to make sure Garrett understood that quarterback Tony Romo didn?t need to take any chances by playing in an essentially meaningless game against the Eagles.
?That?s Jason?s decision, but he doesn?t need to be making that one by himself,? Jones said. ?So I wanted to, very briefly, step down there with just a few minutes gone in the first quarter, sit there and say, ?Here?s the lay of the land. Romo?s got a hand injury, but it looks like we?re going to have him for New York.??
And if Jones thinks his coach might not know the lay of the land, Jones is going to make sure his coach knows the lay of the land. That?s going to be the case as long as Jones owns the Cowboys.
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LONDON ? London's subway drivers walked out over a pay dispute Monday, causing trouble for thousands of shoppers out to take advantage of traditional Boxing Day sales.
Transport for London warned that shoppers seeking bargains in the capital's shopping centers face "significant disruption." Several subway lines have been suspended, and limited services are operating on the rest of the network.
The ASLEF union is staging the one-day strike to demand extra pay as well as a day off for members working on the public holiday.
The London Underground ? the organization that manages the subway system ? condemned the move, saying it was pointless and demonstrated "a complete disregard for our customers." Authorities said extra buses are running in the main shopping areas to cater to the increased flow of travelers on one of the year's busiest shopping days.
Despite the disruptions, large crowds of shoppers ? some lining up from midnight ? started flooding department stores in London and other British cities as soon as doors opened early Monday.
Selfridges, one of Britain's most popular department stores, reported its biggest ever first hour of trading Monday morning.
In northwest London, the Brent Cross shopping center said that 10,000 people had piled through its doors within an hour of opening.
The ASLEF union plans to stage three more strikes in January and February if the dispute is not resolved.
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(HealthDay News) -- Children often perpetuate a behavior when it's rewarded, and stop a behavior when it's ignored, the American Academy of Family Physicians says.
So what can parents do to encourage good behavior? The academy offers these suggestions:
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With winter almost upon us, the Western Carolinian wanted to refresh readers on the university's policy on cancelling classes due to weather, what is done behind the scenes to keep campus safe during winter months and provide a few tips on how to be prepared when winter weather strikes.
The newspaper sat down with Interim Provost Dr. Beth Lofquist to discuss the policy of class cancelation due to weather.
Lofquist referred to the policy in the university handbook that states because WCU is home to more than 3,500 students who live on campus, the university does not cancel classes due to disruptive weather. Exceptions are made for extreme conditions, power outages or if weather is particularly hazardous during a time after a long break when it is apparent that most of the student body will be traveling.
"Typically, what you will be told is to be careful," Lofquist said. "If you can get here, we will have class, but if you cannot get here due to inclement weather, faculty cannot penalize you."
If a commuting student or professor cannot attend class due to an unsafe route, tools like Blackboard make it almost unnecessary to cancel classes, Lofquist added. If classes are canceled, they must be made-up somehow, and it is up to the professor to decide how that will be done.
According to Lofquist, it would be extremely unlikely for students who live on campus to not be able to make it to class due to weather because of the steps the university takes to prepare for it.
Tammi Hudson, Western Carolina University's Emergency Manager, said WCU goes above and beyond to prepare for winter.
"Normally we have relatively mild winters in Cullowhee, with one or two significant snow events a year, but the last two winters have been a couple of the worst on record in the last 30 years," Hudson said. "As a campus community, we've worked hard over the last two years to refine our response efforts and communication to the community during severe weather events."
According to Hudson, areas in the mountains are sometimes a bit unpredictable. Weather in Cashiers or Asheville might not be the same in Cullowhee. It is her team's top priority to not only monitor weather in the Cullowhee area, but also require a detailed check-up of the main roads leading to campus and the roads to local apartments.
Hudson and her team have already started to monitor the weather constantly on their high-tech machines that give up-to-date weather conditions and weather radar. They also receive regular updates and special weather reports from the National Weather Service.
The campus police department patrols 24 hours a day, and during the winter months they keep a special eye on road conditions at night. If they see ice patches or heavy snow on the road, they report it to Hudson and her team. Once potentially dangerous weather conditions are reported, the campus grounds crew is alerted.
"They are absolutely outstanding," Hudson said. "They will work day and night to clean and salt the roads."
Since the coldest part of the day is around 6 a.m., the grounds crewworks mostly at night and early in the morning, before any campus activity starts. Hudson said students, faculty and staff can take comfort in knowing that while they sleep, the grounds crew is working diligently to ensure safety for the morning.
WCU also stays in contact with the Jackson County Department of Transportation to receive detailed reports of road conditions on major roads leading to campus and smaller roads to apartments.
Police, EMS, dining services, residential living, grounds crew and even entertainment services are considered essential campus services. Essential services will never close, even if classes are cancelled and roads leading the campus are not safe to drive. WCU will house critical staff members on campus to guarantee that their services will be available to students at all times.
If the threat of severe winter weather hits, Hudson and her team recommend taking advantage of the wide selection of technology provided by WCU to find out information on schedule changes and road conditions.
Hudson's personal favorite is CatTracker, an alert system that goes straight from WCU's Emergency Management Team to cell phones. All it takes is a few seconds to sign up on the university website, and wherever you are, your cell phone will notify you of any emergencies or updates.
Other resources are MyCat emails, WCU's Facebook or Twitter pages and the WCU website ? which will have an advisory announcement on the homepage that can be clicked for more details.
A few ways to be prepared during winter weather events are to always have your cell phone charged, a full tank of gas, the WCU Police Department's phone number, plenty of bottled water, non-perishable food, a flashlight and an emergency kit in your vehicle. Also, remember that the essential services on campus will always be available.
The more prepared you are for unfavorable conditions, the less you have to worry about when they happen. Keep up with the announcements Hudson and her team sends, monitor road conditions and have a few preparations at your home or dorm.
The weather outside might seem frightful, but because of the steps WCU takes to prepare for it, it could actually be quite delightful.
Source: http://c.moreover.com/click/here.pl?r5663680574
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The only catch is that you will have to purchase the games through Gameloft's online store as the discounts will not be available neither in the Android Market nor in the Amazon Appstore. That way, the developer will be raking in all the revenues from the sale instead of having to share the cash it makes with any of the aforementioned companies.
So, if any of you, gamers, are interested, check the Gameloft online store tomorrow and grab all the games that your itching thumbs desire. About sixty exciting titles await you, including Assassin's Creed, Modern Combat 3: Fallen Nation, and Order & Chaos.
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"As a child, we didn't have much money," sophomore defensive back Tony Jefferson said before the team split up last week. "As a family, we grouped together and kicked it together, just chilled and watched movies and stuff. That was the greatest gift I could have, just being part of my family.
"Since my sister has been gone to Korea for the Army, this Christmas will be the first time we've been together for four years. I'm excited to go home (to San Diego) and be with family again."
Running thin: Sophomore Roy Finch might start the Insight Bowl against Iowa, though there could be some discipline still awaiting for a police citation Finch got for allegedly vandalizing a computer.
Finch said he was taken aback when freshman Brandon Williams announced his transfer last week.
"When J Mill (Jonathan Miller) and Jermie Calhoun left, I was shocked," Finch said. "When Brandon decided to leave, I looked around the locker room and we only had two true running backs in the locker room, beside Dom (Whaley, who's out with a broken leg). We only have three running backs and we started off with seven or eight.
"Looking around the locker room, I was like, 'Coach, we're thin. We're all we've got right now.' We have to stick together and play as a team and fight through it."
Clay work: If Finch doesn't start, look for sophomore Brennan Clay to regain the starting role he had the first three weeks of the season before Whaley's emergence.
Clay has had a tough stretch since he took a hard hit in Game 4 against Ball State. He rushed for 159 yards (3.9 per carry) in the first three games, but has just 71 (2.8 per carry) in the seven games. He missed two games because of a shoulder/neck injury on the hit by Ball State.
"I don't know, man, it's just nerves. It's not muscle or anything you can take care of with therapy. It just takes time," Clay said.
"We keep banging every day, so it never got a chance to settle. I'm constantly strengthening my neck. It's not so much muscles, it's a nerve. Every time it gets triggered by a big hit, it bothers me."
Still, Clay said he's feeling better than he has in a long time.
"I feel good. I feel 100 percent," he said. "My legs feel good and strong."
Getting reps: One reason teams that go to bowls continue to go to bowls is the invaluable extra practice time players get in December. Most of the first week goes strictly to the young players, backups and redshirts and walk-ons who were unable to get many snaps during the season. Most of the rest of the practice time goes to players on the two-deep.
For someone like right tackle Lane Johnson, who's in his first year as a starter, it's a time for growth, perfecting one's technique through intense coaching and repetition. During the season, much of that gets lost in game-planning.
"Bowl practice is sort of like an extra spring for us," Johnson said. "We'll have 10 here (in Norman) and five when we get to Arizona. It's my first year. I'm always looking to improve and get better on my technique. Next year I'll probably move to left, so I'm working both sides."
Iowa connections: Much has been made of Iowa being the alma mater of OU head coach Bob Stoops (1978-82). But two Sooner assistants also played at Iowa: Jay Norvell (1982-86) and Bruce Kittle (1977-79, '81).
At times, things got a bit weird around the Switzer Center last week.
"They all played together," Johnson said. "I've noticed, they know everybody from Iowa. That's where they grew up. Yeah, I want to go out with a win and let them have some trash talking over their old alma mater."
Source: http://www.tulsaworld.com/site/articlepath.aspx?articleid=20111226_92_B4_CUTLIN422824&rss_lnk=92
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MEXICO CITY ? Medical officials say five recovering drug addicts died and dozens of others were sickened by soy sausage served for Christmas dinner at a rehabilitation center in western Mexico.
Authorities were investigating whether the poisoning at the center in the city of Guadalajara was accidental or intentional. Drug cartels have taken over rehabilitation centers in parts of Mexico, forcibly recruiting addicts as hit men and smugglers. The invasions have led to mass shootings at the centers that have left dozens dead.
Alhy Daniel Nunez is a spokesman for the Red Cross in the western state of Jalisco, where Guadalajara is located. He said Monday that 37 people remained hospitalized, three of them in serious condition.
(This version CORRECTS numbers in first paragraph).)
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While gift cards are certainly a useful and practical gift, the act of giving a gift certificate to a store can be construed as impersonal. One startup is trying to change this. Tango Card, which offers a gift card program for consumers, is launching a new personalized experience, called 'What I Got.' For background, here's how Tango Card works. A?purchaser can buy a Tango Card, and give this to a recipient via email. The recipient can then exchanges the value for the card for one or multiple retailer gift cards (Amazon, iTunes, Target, Starbucks, others) or they can donate any portion of their gift card to one of 9 non-profits (National Park Foundation, World of Children, Habitat for Humanity, etc.). Any unused value can actually be redeemed for cash. Basically, it provides a more flexible gift card option which allows recipients to choose and then stagger the proceeds of a gift card across various retailers or charities.Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/dHOlLOy5sNE/
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And The Winner Of The Bob Feller 2001 Topps Archives Baseball Card Is?
Spiegel 83
Congratulations.? Here is one more look at the prize:
And here is how the winner was selected using a randomizer:
Spiegel83, I have sent you an email to get your mailing address!? Congrats again.
Thanks to everyone else that signed up for a chance to win.? I promise that there will be a lot of giveaways in the year to come!
Have a great holiday weekend.
Be the first to like this post.
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FRANKFURT (Reuters) ? Volkswagen has agreed to grant workers in Germany a rest from e-mails relentlessly filling the inboxes of their Blackberry devices out of hours.
Europe's biggest carmaker and the body that represents its workers have agreed to have the e-mail function deactivated at night, a spokesman for the company said, confirming an earlier report in a German newspaper.
Workers will only receive e-mails from half an hour before the start of flex-time working hours until half an hour after they end, but will still be able to receive and make phone calls.
Daily Wolfsburger Allgemeine Zeitung this week cited works council member Heinz-Joachim Thust as saying that 1,154 pay-scale employees at Volkswagen's six plants in Germany have a smartphone device furnished by the company.
The works council sought to counter any expectation that employees should be reachable all the times, thanks to their indispensable "CrackBerry" gadgets, which could heighten the risk of burnout, a psychological syndrome that some studies have said causes almost 10 million sick days a year in Germany.
So far, the response to the decision to deactivate e-mails at night has been very positive, VW's Thust told Wolfsburger Allgemeine Zeitung.
The move comes two months after millions of customers of the Blackberry -- made by Research in Motion -- were frustrated by a three-day global service disruption, showing how much many rely on continuous, reliable e-mail and instant messenger service.
Volkswagen, which has about 400,000 employees worldwide, aims to overtake Japan's Toyota as the world's biggest carmaker by 2018 by selling 10 million vehicles per year.
The group logged 7.51 million deliveries for the first 11 months of this year, after a 15 percent gain in November.
(Reporting by Maria Sheahan; Editing by Mike Nesbit)
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Mortenson Construction, best known as a builder of hospitals, offices and sports stadiums, also has become one of North America's leading renewable energy contractors.
Most of the wind power generated in Minnesota comes from turbines installed by the Golden Valley-based company. It has built other wind farms and utility-scale solar power projects across the United States and in Canada.
It's now constructing the nation's largest concentrated solar power station in Colorado, and one of the largest U.S. wind farms in Messena, Iowa. The company says renewable energy work accounted for 28 percent of its $2.4 billion in revenue last year.
Tom Wacker, senior vice president, helped move Mortenson into renewable energy and now leads the five groups focused on wind, solar and transmission. He recently sat down to talk about the business.
QHow did Mortenson get into the wind and solar energy construction business?
AMortenson has always had an industrial side -- wastewater, water-treatment projects, energy projects, pulp and paper mills. In 1995, as the pulp and paper business was slowing down, our guys were out looking for another market and built their first wind turbine down in Iowa. That market continued to grow and expand. Then in 2008 we started building our first solar projects.
QHow many wind farms has Mortenson built and what is the largest one?
AAt the end of this year we'll have finished about 107. The largest one is the Mid-America Energy project in Iowa.
QTell me a little bit about that.
AThat's 443 megawatts, and it is the single largest, single-build wind project in the United States, maybe even in the world. There are larger wind projects in total megawatts but they were built in multiple phases.
QTell us the steps in building a wind farm.
ATypically when we are the engineering, procurement and construction contractor, we will get involved when the wind farm developer has a bunch of dots on a map. We'll work on micro-siting of the turbines with the owner and the wind consultant, and on designing the roads, the electrical collection systems, the substation and transmission lines. We do all the work, with the dozers and graders to build the roads, then pour the foundations, erect the turbines and do all the electrical work.
QDo your workers move around for these projects?
AIt's a combination. We'll move most of our management staff to a project site, then we'll bring in some key travelers from the trades who have been with us for many years. And then we hire local in the local community. We have a lot of people out of northern Minnesota who travel with us around the country; that is where a lot of our millwrights and ironworkers came from. We peaked this year at just under 800 crafts people. If you add in some of the sub-trades, you double or triple that.
QWhat is concentrated solar and where is Mortenson building that?
AIt basically concentrates the sun on much smaller but more efficient solar cells. We're building a large project in Colorado that uses Amonix technology, and that will be 30 megawatts. That currently is the largest concentrating solar facility in North America.
QThe cost of new wind farms has dropped significantly this year. Why is that?
AThe price is down for a variety of reasons. One of course is the turbine suppliers are selling their product at less cost. Part of that is because raw materials are down. Then everybody's prices are just tighter as the cost of electricity has gone down. Everybody through the whole supply chain just tightened up their pricing.
QMortenson recently established a power transmission group. Where are those opportunities and are they related to the concerns about reliability of the power grid?
AEventually if we don't build more transmission, we don't build much more wind power because there is no grid to get it onto. The projects we're looking at today are in the West. We are bidding on a project in Utah. We are looking at work in Texas and at some projects up in Canada. Most of those projects are either moving renewables, or strengthening the grid.
QMuch of the construction industry was badly hurt by the financial crisis and recession. What happened in renewable energy during this period?
AI happened to be out in Washington, D.C., meeting with a bunch of the wind people and senators and representatives just days after Lehman Brothers went under in 2008. Customers were talking about projects going away. 2009 was a down year for us. 2010 started coming back, and 2011 is looking pretty good. But there was an immediate effect, a dampening in the market. 2012 looks pretty good. I don't know if it will be as big as 2008 but it will approach it.
QWhat is the outlook for your wind business if the federal wind production tax credit (PTC) isn't renewed at the end of 2012?
AAbout 35 percent of our renewables business is in Canada, so there will be a continued market for us there. Every time there has been no PTC, there have been one or two projects built in the United States. There are a couple places where the wind regime is good enough they don't need a PTC to make it competitive. There may be a couple of projects where the turbine vendors, in order to continue manufacturing turbines, will build a project. But I think that will be limited. Most people are going to wait.
David Shaffer ? 612-673-7090
Source: http://www.startribune.com/business/136161243.html
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COMMENTARY | Less than two weeks remain before the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses. On Wednesday an Iowa State University/Gazette/KCRG poll showed Texas Rep. Ron Paul leading the GOP presidential race with 27.5 percent. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich placed second with 25.3 percent followed by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney with 17.5 percent.
Like the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz, Ron Paul is seen by many as a quirky but well-meaning fellow who -- aside from having a few odd-ball ideas -- poses no real threat to the world. However, where a Tin Man in search of a heart may be seen as endearing, when a man who is vacant of heart and the capacity to feel compassion for his fellow man is determined to be the leader of the free world it becomes nothing less than dangerous.
It is said that we are known by the company we keep. Paul's 30-year friendship and frequent guest interviews by radio talk show host and rabid fellow conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his comfort in feeding the suspicious minds of the youthful Student Scholars for 9/11 Truth that Americans are responsible for 9-11 are already a matter of record. Still, where Paul's long-term preference to associate himself with people of irrational mind demonstrates a connate history of obsessive paranoia and loathing for his country, more disturbing is his utter lack of compassion for the suffering of others in the world.
As quoted by Real Clear Politics, Ron Paul believes that "all foreign aid is worthless."
Ambassador Eric Goosby, M.D., who oversees implementation of the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), believes otherwise.
In his remarks during his Dec. 13 speech, in honor of Dr. David Barmes before "fellow laborers in the fight against AIDS," the United States Global AIDS Coordinator said "a Stanford University study demonstrated that over a million deaths were averted in the first 4 years of PEPFAR alone, a number we expect has at least doubled since that time."
As stated in his profile of the official PEPFAR website Goosby has "longstanding working relationships with leading multilateral organizations" like the Global Fund.
"As of December," Global Fund states on their website, their efforts "save an estimated 100,000 lives every month."
Were it left to Ron Paul, rather than funding the "worthless" efforts that save thousands of lives, America would hoard its money and simply "export maybe some principles about free markets and sound money and maybe they can produce some of their own wealth."
Paul also appears to have a cowardly closeted racist streak and, when pressed during an interview on Wednesday with CNN Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger regarding some controversial newsletters printed in the 1980s and 1990s under his name, Paul became irritated to a point of removing his mic and walking out on the interview.
Among the many racially charged comments attributed to Paul in the publications was a 1992 statement that: "Order was only restored in L.A. when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks."
"I never read that stuff," Paul told Borger, oddly reminiscent of Obama's excuse reported by CNN in 2008 that - while sitting in the pew of Jeremiah Wright's church for 20 years -- he never heard the rancid litany of anti America remarks escaping the pastor's mouth.
Still, the most unsettling evidence regarding the warped mind of Ron Paul was revealed -- yet widely overlooked -- by Paul himself during November's Thanksgiving Forum Debate in Des Moines, Iowa.
When the candidates were asked by pollster-moderator Frank Luntz to identify a "failure" in their life from which they learned lessons that would make them a "better president," Paul had a profoundly alarming answer.
"To find one thing where I really goofed it or I had to suffer through it," Paul explained, "it's almost arrogant to think I can't find any one thing."
In other words -- aside from such "incidental" things as hating to watch himself on T.V. because all he can see are his "imperfections" and his lament in losing what he believed was his potential during his teenaged years in having "pretty darn good career in athletics, particularly in track and maybe football and maybe even baseball," were it not for "some severe injuries" - Paul truly believes that he is otherwise perfect.
When someone who has lived for nearly 70 years can say with absolute conviction that they've not made a single mistake it is safe for others to label them as certifiably delusional. For others to place someone with that level of specious conceit in the White House is nothing less than dangerous.
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A cancer drug company founded by UCSF Professor Kevan Shokat, PhD, has been acquired by Japan-based Takeda Pharmaceuticals in an effort to add two novel drug projects to Takeda?s pipeline of potential oncology therapies.
Shokat, who chairs the UCSF Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, launched Intellikine in 2007 to translate his UCSF kinase research into the development of small-molecule drugs. Kinases are enzymes that are known to regulate the majority of cellular pathways. The Intellikine therapies specifically target the PI-3 kinase (PI3K) pathway ? a key target in cancer biology due to its impact on a wide array of cellular functions, including cell growth, proliferation and survival.
Intellikine is based on Shokat?s research at UCSF into four common variations of this pathway. In just four years, the company has developed a portfolio of novel small-molecule kinase inhibitors that selectively target the drivers of cancer cell growth and already has moved three potential drugs into human clinical trials. Takeda?s announcement identified two specific drug candidates -- INK128 and INK1117 ? as being potential ?best in class? inhibitors of cancer growth. The third candidate is being developed in partnership with Infinity Pharmaceuticals.
Under the agreement, Takeda America Holdings will purchase Intellikine for $190 million in cash, plus up to $120 million in so-called ?BioBucks,? or projected payments linked to specific milestones in clinical development.
Source: http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2011/12/11207/ucsf-cancer-drug-spinoff-acquired-190m
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LOS ANGELES ? As she developed her story about lovers on opposite sides in the Bosnian War, Angelina Jolie drew on everything she had learned traveling to combat zones. But she started at home, imagining herself and partner Brad Pitt at such extremes.
"In the Land of Blood and Honey," Jolie's writing-directing debut, hurls two lovers ? a Bosnian Muslim woman and a Bosnian-Serbian man ? from their tender relationship before the war into the horrors of work and rape camps, where brutality, betrayal and degradation are daily matters.
"The closest relationship in my life is Brad," Jolie said in an interview for the film, which opens in limited release Friday and expands in January. "It's the man-woman relationship. So for me to put myself in a position to be able to write from, it would be, well, what if it was me, and what would it be like? And what would it take? Could I ever turn on him? Would this ever happen? Would he ever turn on me? So you try to put yourself inside, and that's how that relationship started."
The result is worlds away from the vanity projects some superstars end up with when they play at directing. Jolie holds nothing back in depicting the savagery of the war that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, as ancient ethnic rivalries reignited after decades of communist rule.
As a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations, Jolie, 36, had visited Bosnia and felt a growing compulsion to help dramatize a conflict about which the world at large had been misinformed or even indifferent.
When the war broke out, Jolie herself was a teenager with other things on her mind than conflict in a distant land.
"I was being a 17-year-old. I knew only a little bit about it," Jolie said. "It just felt very far away, and until America got involved, I don't even remember any headlines in our papers."
As the years passed, Jolie remained busy with other preoccupations ? Hollywood party girl, Academy Award winner for "Girl, Interrupted," marriages to actors Jonny Lee Miller and Billy Bob Thornton, the latter a wild love affair that was a gold mine for gossip tabloids.
Then came the action comedy "Mr. and Mrs. Smith," in which Jolie and Pitt starred as married assassins gunning for each other. Home-wrecker headlines followed as Jolie took up with co-star Pitt, who ended his marriage to Jennifer Aniston.
Jolie already had begun her humanitarian makeover, adopting a child from Cambodia and using her celebrity to shine light on children in peril, the plight of refugees and other causes around the world.
As she and Pitt's family has grown ? they now have three adopted and three biological children ? Jolie's image has transformed from sinner to saint.
"I've always tried to step outside my comfort zone. Sometimes that can be good and useful for hopeful things like this," Jolie said, referring to her film. "And sometimes, when you're younger, it can be very destructive and a bad thing."
Visiting war zones changed her perspective, but it was the home front ? taking on children ? that made the big difference.
"That was what changed me completely, and then I knew that once you decide to become a parent, you can no longer be in any way self-destructive or selfish. You live for someone else, and it's over. It's all over," Jolie said, laughing.
"But in the greatest way, because the chaos ? no wild days as a punk are ever as interesting or as chaotic as my life with my children is now. They can out-punk anybody you know."
Jolie said she wrote the screenplay for "In the Land of Blood and Honey" as a private exercise, but once Pitt read it, he told her to put it into circulation and get some feedback.
Without her name attached, she sent the script to people on all sides of the Bosnian conflict. The response was favorable, and before long, Jolie was casting actors, mostly people who lived through the war or had close relatives and friends in the thick of it.
Cast as Muslim artist Ajla, Zana Marjanovic was 8 years old when the war broke out. She and her mother fled to Slovenia while her father stayed behind in Sarajevo. Goran Kostic, who was 20 and living in London when the war started, was cast as Ajla's lover, Danijel, torn between love and duty as a leader at the camp where she is interned.
With graphic scenes of rape, sniper slayings, civilian massacres and soldiers using women as human shields, the film was a balancing act as Jolie sought to tells a story representing all sides.
Jolie's reputation as a humanitarian envoy reassured the locals that the film would be a fair and honest depiction, said Marjanovic, who recalled the stir created by Jolie's visit back to Sarajevo last summer for a film festival.
"We're just too cool to be concerned about various superstars walking around our city," Marjanovic said. "But when it was Angelina ? that was just the one superstar we're not immune to. It wasn't only because of everything she's done as an actress ? it was that and the fact that she's doing this film about Bosnia. I think everyone had really high hopes, and I believe they'll feel that it came from the right place, that she will portray us truthfully and do a great job."
At U.S. theaters, the film mostly will play in a Bosnian-language version with English subtitles. But Jolie and her actors shot a second version in English that's available for domestic and overseas markets where subtitled films might be a hard sell for audiences.
She prefers that viewers see the native-language version, but the English one is "there for whoever wants it, because we want to reach as many people as we can," Jolie said.
Jolie eventually wants her children to see "In the Land of Blood and Honey" ? though for now, she's keeping them on a cinema diet that includes her "Kung Fu Panda" animated tales.
Of her own movies, "I think the most fun one for them will be `Mr. and Mrs. Smith,' because who doesn't want to see their parents try to kill each other?" Jolie said. "'Wow, mom and dad are going crazy.'"
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Memorable wedding proposal using Internet memes: And now they've become a meme-orable addition to a cute wedding... Source: http://twitter.com/CarloAtYourServ/statuses/150096808582975488
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I watched the recent documentary film about William Colby, who headed the Central Intelligence Agency during the Vietnam War, with more than casual interest, even before it stirred up a hornet's nest of controversy because of its suggestion that he killed himself in 1996 because of guilt over his failure to comfort his oldest daughter before she died in 1973 from epilepsy and anorexia.
The film, The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby, was made by his son Carl, who narrated it. The film touched off a huge family fight, not only because Colby's second wife criticized it but because three of Carl's siblings were equally critical.
Sally Shelton-Colby told the Washington Post last month that her stepson portrayed his father "in the way he did to sell his film," while Paul Colby said the pain and sadness of losing his father "has now been intensified by my brother Carl's inexplicable and unfounded attempt to debase the reputation and memory of a modest and decent man, a dedicated father, and an exemplary public servant."
Their criticism was sparked by the film's portrayal of Colby's role in running the CIA's notorious Phoenix Program, in which thousands of suspected Viet Cong agents in South Vietnam were killed in what some members of Congress denounced as an assassination program. Colby revealed the details of the Phoenix Program and other CIA misdeeds, including eavesdropping on war protestors, in testimony before Congress, which made him a pariah to CIA officers.
The film includes extensive interviews with Colby's first wife, Barbara (but not his second) and graphic archival footage of bloody violence in Vietnam. I found it engrossing, partly because of the sheer drama of Colby's life, but also because I had a passing acquaintance with him.
I first met him in 1974, shortly after President Ford named him CIA director, when I interviewed him at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., for his -- and my -- hometown newspaper in St. Paul.
At the time, Colby and the CIA were the focus of an investigation into illegal clandestine activities by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which was chaired by the late Frank Church (D-Idaho) and included then-Sen. Walter Mondale (D-Minn.) as a member. I described Colby as "a private man in a very private business, and reported that he "has apparently decided to lift some of the secrecy that has shrouded both him and his business for so many years."
I was referring to Colby's decision to cooperate with the Church committee and tell Congress about some of the CIA's darkest secrets, including the Phoenix Program, which earned his many enemies in the intelligence community and eventually led to his firing by President Ford.
As I wrote in a retrospective column in The Hill two days after Colby's body was recovered when he vanished on a solo canoe trip in the Chesapeake Bay in May, 1996, his death "was one of those events that seems destined to provoke endless controversy, just as his life did."
I noted that we had kept in occasional touch, and several years earlier, "he asked my help in getting a friend's novel published, but I didn't think it was up to par and I told him so. Then, in 1995, when I was writing about congressional oversight of the intelligence community in The Hill, I called him to ask for an interview.
We met for lunch, and he spoke a length about his experience in intelligence, some of which he had written about in his 1978 memoir, Honorable Men: My Life in the CIA. He was dismissive of the plans for a fundamental restructuring of the intelligence community, as many in Congress were calling for.
"I'm not a great believer in the importance of wiring diagrams," he told me. "That's led to a lot of bureaucratic posturing. The main thing is having some leadership, telling people what you want them to do and following up. That's the key to any organization, and intelligence is no different."
Colby expressed no regrets about his controversial tenure at the CIA. "My major contribution was to bring intelligence into the public policy process, to make it part of the separation of powers," he declared.
I asked him if that was right decision. "We had to do it," he replied. "And when you do, you end up stronger, not weaker. If you get [Congress] to understand what you're doing and why they should vote for it, when something goes wrong, it's not just some dumb thing the CIA did, but what we did as Americans."
Colby clearly believed that congressional oversight of the intelligence community was essential in a democratic society. "The lack of oversight and accountability was the basic weakness then," he said. "Now, Congress is energized, and there is congressional oversight."
After our lunch, I called a retired top CIA official who knew Colby and was privy to the agency's secrets, and asked him if Colby was an honorable man in an often dishonorable business.
"I think Bill was an extremely honorable man," he replied. "In fact, in my view, he was one of the most decent, intelligent and honorable officers, with one or two exceptions, that I ever knew at the agency."
I didn't identify my source at the time because I promised him anonymity. But I can do it now because he is no longer living. He was Cleveland Cram, a fellow alum of my alma mater, St. John's University in Collegeville, Minn., and a veteran CIA officer who later wrote a history of the agency, which is still highly classified.
I don't know who's right or wrong in the contretemps over Carl Colby's documentary film about his father, or what really caused his death, but I'm convinced that William Colby was an honorable man.
?
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/al-eisele/bill-colby-an-honorable-man_b_1168503.html
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