Missouri beats No. 16 Texas A&M 38-31 in OT

Texas A&M tight end Nehemiah Hicks (81) gains yardage as Missouri defenders Braylon Webb, center, and Kenji Jackson try to slow him down during the first half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011, in College Station, Texas. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

Texas A&M tight end Nehemiah Hicks (81) gains yardage as Missouri defenders Braylon Webb, center, and Kenji Jackson try to slow him down during the first half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011, in College Station, Texas. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

Missouri coach Gary Pinkel watches from the sidelines during the first half of an NCAA college football game against Texas A&M Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011, in College Station, Texas. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

Texas A&M tight end Michael Lamothe (19) weaves his way around Missouri defensive back E.J. Gaines (31) for a touchdown during the first half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011, in College Station, Texas. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

COLLEGE STATION, Texas (AP) ? Missouri quarterback James Franklin had the worst game of his short career last week, with four turnovers in the second half a loss to No. 3 Oklahoma State.

He made up for it on Saturday, throwing two touchdown passes, including the game-winner in overtime, and running for two more scores to lead the Tigers to a 38-31 win over No. 16 Texas A&M.

The winning score came on an 11-yard throw to Marcus Lucas.

Franklin didn't feel like had a great day passing, but he made a perfect throw when it counted most.

"We definitely wanted to run the ball, (but) once we had to get some yardage we went to the pass," Franklin said of the winning score. "We were getting the one-on-one coverage and it worked out."

Texas A&M got the ball after the score, but Ryan Tannehill's pass on fourth down was deflected.

"There was nothing easy about it," Missouri coach Gary Pinkel said of the win. "These kind of games you just have to fight and fight. A lot of players did a lot of good things in critical situations and I'm very proud of them."

The Tigers had a chance to win it in regulation, but a 46-yard field goal attempt sailed wide right as time expired.

Missouri (4-4, 2-3 Big 12) got the ball when Jacquies Smith caused a fumble by Tannehill, which was recovered by Dominique Hamilton.

The Aggies led by 11 at halftime, but Missouri took a 31-28 lead on an 11-yard run by Henry Josey with about eight minutes left. Texas A&M (5-3, 3-2) tied it on a 35-yard field goal about four minutes later.

Franklin threw for 198 yards ran for 97 yards. Josey, the Big 12's leading rusher, had 20 carries for 162 yards.

It was the fifth 100-yard game for Josey and his second in a row.

Missouri has won two straight over the Aggies and unlike the rest of the Big 12 schools, the Tigers could face them again next year. Missouri is expected to soon join Texas A&M in a move to the Southeastern Conference.

Missouri took its first lead of the second half on the 11-yard touchdown run by Josey. To get that drive going, Josey bounced to the outside and dashed down the sideline for 43 yards before being dragged down from behind.

The Tigers went for it on fourth-and-1 from the Texas A&M 43 early in the fourth quarter and Franklin's run was short. Missouri made up for it when Tannehill was hit as he threw a pass which was intercepted by Randy Ponder.

Ponder returned it 45 yards and Franklin cut A&M's lead to 28-24 when he scored on an 8-yard run three plays later.

Pinkel was proud of his team's defensive improvement in the second half.

"We got out of drives. I think we were a little bit more aggressive in the secondary," he said. "We got a lot of balls batted down, we got some turnovers and we forced fourth down punts."

Tannehill threw for three touchdowns in the first half, but the Aggies managed only a field goal after that to lose their third game this season after leading by double digits at halftime.

Texas A&M coach Mike Sherman doesn't have an easy answer for why his team has struggled after halftime in its three losses.

"I just think that we didn't make the plays we needed to make when we needed to make them," Sherman said. "It's definitely something we've got to talk about and get fixed."

Both teams lost fumbles in the third quarter. Texas A&M's Ryan Swope fumbled after a catch, but Missouri gave it back three plays later when Josey coughed it up. The Aggies didn't capitalize on that error and neither team scored in the quarter.

Tannehill hit Cyrus Gray on a short pass and he ran into the corner of the end zone for a 12-yard touchdown to tie the game at 14 early in the second quarter. Missouri's offense stalled on the next drive and they had to punt. The punt was shanked and it went just 22 yards, giving A&M the ball at the Missouri 41.

The Aggies took advantage of the short field when Tannehill found Swope for a 6-yard touchdown pass take a 21-14 lead in the second quarter.

Texas A&M pushed its advantage to 28-14 when Tannehill scored on a 3-yard touchdown run with about three minutes left in the second quarter.

The Tigers had a first down from the Texas A&M 11 late in the second quarter, but the offense stalled and they settled for a 26-yard field goal to make it 28-17 at halftime.

Franklin broke four tackles on a nifty 20-yard run on third-and-1 to give Missouri a 7-0 lead on the team's second drive of the game.

Tannehill's first touchdown pass was a 2-yard strike to Michael Lamothe that tied it at 7-all later in the first quarter.

Eric Waters caught a pass from Franklin and two Texas A&M defenders missed tackles as he dashed 42 yards for a touchdown to put Missouri back on top 14-7 with two seconds left in the first quarter.

Texas A&M's Christine Michael had 21 carries for 104 yards and Gray added 58 yards rushing.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2011-10-29-FBC-T25-Missouri-Texas-AandM/id-d7b80fb689324de5ada7d344ab713781

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Probable WWII submarine found off Papua New Guinea (AP)

CANBERRA, Australia ? A wreck found under water in a Papua New Guinea harbor likely was a Japanese midget submarine from World War II, a historian said Friday.

Australian and New Zealand warships found it while working in the area to clear WWII-era explosives Thursday. Simpson Harbor is in the town of Rabaul, which was a major Japanese military base on the northeast coast of the South Pacific nation.

New Zealand Navy Lt. Commander Matthew Ray told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio the find was initially identified as "a 20-meter (66-feet) long solid, manmade object." Closer inspection confirmed it was a submarine, although its nationality was not yet known, he said.

The only submarines involved in fighting around Rabaul were U.S. and Japanese, and both sides have accounted for most, if not all, of their subs in the area, said Gary Oakley, a Australian War Memorial curator and a former submariner.

As Rabaul was Japan's major base in the Southwest Pacific for most of the war, most of the submarines in the harbor had been Japanese. Previously known submarine wrecks in the harbor were also Japanese, he said.

"My best guess would be it's a Japanese midget submarine. It doesn't look big enough to be an ocean-going ... submarine," Oakley said after examining indistinct images of the wreck released by the Australian Defense Department.

One- and two-man Japanese midget submarines were transported by ship or larger submarines and used covertly to infiltrate enemy targets including Pearl Harbor in Hawaii and Sydney Harbor.

Such a submarine could have been destroyed by an American air raid or naval bombardment or even scuttled by the Japanese toward the end of the war, Oakley said.

Ray said underwater remote-controlled vehicles with cameras will be used to try to identify the wreck.

The Japanese government had no immediate comment, pending the outcome of the Australian investigation.

Oakley said it could be the first Australian submarine lost in World War I, although that submarine, AE1, was thought to have sunk in another harbor 12 miles (20 kilometers) away.

AE1 became the first Australian naval loss of the war when it sank on Sept. 15, 1914, with the loss of 35 lives. Rabaul was then the capital of the German New Guineau colony, which was quickly lost to the British.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111028/ap_on_re_as/as_papua_new_guinea_submarine

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Electronic Arts 2Q loss expands; raises forecast (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? Video game maker Electronic Arts Inc. said Thursday that its second-quarter loss expanded from a year ago due to higher costs, even as revenue grew.

It raised its sales forecast for the all-important holiday season slightly above analyst estimates. CEO John Riccitiello said sales of "Battlefield 3," which launched two days earlier, were "very strong."

The net loss in the three-month period ending on Sept. 30 grew to $340 million, or $1.03 per share. Last year, the company had a quarterly loss of $201 million, or 61 cents per share. EA said costs for marketing, research and development increased from last year.

Excluding stock compensation costs, acquisition expenses and other costs, adjusted earnings came to 5 cents per share, beating the adjusted loss of 4 cents per share expected by analysts polled by FactSet.

Adjusted revenue, which accounts for deferred revenue from games with online components, rose 17 percent to $1.03 billion from $884 million, helped by sales of its sports games "FIFA 12" and "Madden NFL 12." That also beat the $955 million expected by analysts.

"Our results reflected a tremendous performance by our EA Sports titles and a strong showing on a new game on the Facebook platform, `The Sims Social,'" Riccitiello said on a conference call with analysts. "We're now focused on our biggest title for the holiday."

The company said it expects adjusted revenue in the current quarter through December of $1.55 billion to $1.65 billion, with the midpoint slightly higher than the $1.59 billion expected by analysts.

EA lifted the bottom end of its full-year adjusted earnings. It now expects a range of 75 cents to 90 cents, instead of 70 cents at the low end. Analysts were already expecting 89 cents.

The results didn't satisfy investors after a broad rally by stocks Thursday. Shares in the Redwood, Calif.-based company were down 80 cents, or 3.3 percent, at $23.50 in after-hours trading after closing up 11 cents at $24.50 in the regular session.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/earnings/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111027/ap_on_hi_te/us_earns_electronic_arts

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Every day is 'Day of the Dead' in Mexico drug war (AP)

MEXICO CITY ? Nearly two decades after I had left Mexico, I arrived back on Day of the Dead, a colorfully macabre celebration harkening back to the Aztecs but observed on the Catholic All Saints' Day.

El Dia de Los Muertos is when families take picnics to the cemeteries and decorate the graves of departed relatives with marigolds, candles and sugar skulls. The Nov. 2 holiday has always been one of my favorites, I told a friend who met me at the Mexico City airport last year.

"Every day is Day of the Dead now," he said flatly. "We have 40,000 days of the dead."

He was referring to the number of people who have died in drug violence since President Felipe Calderon took office and launched an offensive against trafficking cartels. Navigating through a more modern and prosperous capital than the one I had left in 1993, he spoke of a country that had made many advances, but that also had become a miasma of savagery.

More families were visiting more graves.

The Mexico I left was still governed by the aptly named Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, which held onto power for nearly 70 years through a mix of pork barrel politics and vote rigging. Political rhetoric tended toward anti-American. The North American Free Trade Agreement had not been signed yet, so foreign-owned businesses were scarce and imports expensive. With the Internet still in its infancy, most Mexicans got their news from government-subsidized media that focused on presidential activities and public works.

There were cartels back then, moving South American cocaine and Mexican marijuana north to feed a voracious U.S. appetite for illegal drugs. And, to be sure, there was violence in the 1990s. The archbishop of Guadalajara was assassinated by drug lords in what was deemed to be "a mistake," and the head of PRI, Luis Donaldo Colossio, was murdered, a case never quite clarified. Armed Zapatista guerrillas sprang out of the jungles of Chiapas to demand that poor and indigenous Mexicans receive their fair share of Mexico's wealth.

Yet Mexico was not thought to be particularly violent then. There was no running tally of the dead.

Today, I find the country greatly changed, if sometimes seeming to come full circle. Fair elections brought Calderon's National Action Party to power a decade ago, but now Mexicans appear ready to return the PRI to office. Polls give a stunning double-digit lead to the PRI's presumed candidate, Enrique Pena Nieto, the former governor of the state of Mexico who has yet to define his presidential agenda, particularly regarding drug violence.

Like the Aztecs and Spaniards, modern Mexicans have built on the ruins of past generations. Old low-rises along the capital's Paseo de la Reforma have been leveled. The Mexican Stock Exchange, which once stood out of the boulevard like a lone saguaro cactus in the desert, now sits in the shadow of international banks-hotels-office towers. Starbucks cafes on nearly every other block serve as billboards for the globalization of Mexico, while the Mexicanization of Starbucks is evident in the barristas' offer of sugar-coated Pan de Muerto ? Bread for the Dead.

Mexican politicians can be openly pro-American at times, and Mexico is truly multinational now, with everything from Costco megastores to Ferrari dealerships. Speckled enamel dishware traditionally used by the poor no longer comes from local factories but from China. Mexico, meanwhile, exports far more manufactured goods than oil, which is the reverse of 20 years ago and a sign of a more developed economy.

Free trade in foodstuffs has driven more farmers off the land and into the cities, where there is a noticeably larger middle class, but also more of the so-called "ninis," or "neither nors." They are the youth who neither study nor find legitimate jobs, and may seek work or be pressed into service by drug cartels.

Newspapers have grown more professional and independent of government advertising. The pro-government (no matter who's in power) Televisa television network still dominates the countryside, but in big cities, bolder, more critical coverage is available on cable. TV still dishes up voluptuous "weather girls" dressed as if they had stopped by the station on the way home from an after-hours party. Then announcers in dark suits rattle off the daily death toll from the provinces as if delivering a national weather report. One newspaper even has a name for the tally: the ejecutometro ? the execution meter.

The violence often seems far away from bustling Mexico City. It is said that cartel honchos like to shop and launder their money here and don't want undue pressure from the government, so they take their differences outside. Friends in other countries ask if it's safe in the capital, and like many politicians and most people here I say that I feel safe because the slayings usually happen elsewhere. We go out for dinner, go to the movies and to the theater. On Sunday, Paseo de la Reforma is closed to car traffic and resplendent with bicyclists ? ever more so in spring when the jacarandas are in bloom.

And yet, the drug violence is present, seeping into art and film, and even the nightly soap opera. Always inventive with vocabulary, Mexicans speak of narco pets (peacocks) and narco polo T-shirts (knock-off Ralph Lauren). The violence makes a ghostly appearance at family gatherings and holiday parties, where a dinner companion's three missing fingers recall his kidnapping ? and the three messages sent to family with ransom demands. At a Christmas cocktail party, the owner of a chain of cinemas tells stories of extortion and of the hit man who followed his prey into a Ciudad Juarez theater, but waited for the end of the movie to make the kill.

The Mexico that I enjoyed so freely before has shrunk by as much as half if measured in territory no longer considered safe: The states of Durango and Tamaulipas, off limits, as is most of Michoacan. The cities of Monterrey and Guadalajara, the resort of Acapulco, and most recently, the port of Veracruz, bad and getting worse. Bodies are hung from bridges or dumped by truckloads in the street. Many victims are beheaded, and heads are put on display like Aztec trophies ? or Day of the Dead candies.

Mexicans try to adapt. The highways in Zacatecas are rife with assaults and kidnappings, reports a front-page story in the newspaper Reforma. Take another route. Instead of planning a wedding in Acapulco, the well-to-do bring the wedding planner to Mexico City. Instead of voting for the party in power, it is suggested Mexicans will vote for the other guys out of nostalgia ? or hope ? for a less violent era.

Mexico has become a country of mass murders. The atrocities occur one at a time or in waves, and after an explosion of outrage and condemnation, not much happens. There is rarely clarity or a conviction. The murders are reduced to recognizable phrases: the 72 migrants killed in Tamaulipas, or the 183 bodies dug from mass graves there. The 52 dead in a Monterrey casino torching, the 35 bodies dumped in Boca del Rio, Veracruz, or the clandestine graves in Durango, whose toll ultimately eclipsed those in Tamaulipas: 224.

The government usually plays down the killings as violence between cartels, but the toll of innocents is growing and many Mexicans are asking whether there is a government connection in some cases.

Twelve months have passed since my return and the marigolds are in bloom again. Sugar skulls and Pan de Muerto are on sale. As in years past, I buy cheerful paper cutouts of skeletons to hang for the holiday. But this year, like my friend who picked me up at the airport, I think of the recent dead and fresh graves: 10,000 more this year, according to newspaper counts.

And while Day of the Dead feels eerily familiar, it doesn't feel quite as festive.

___

Marjorie Miller is The Associated Press' regional editor for Latin America.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111029/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_mexico_day_of_the_dead

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Exclusive: Records raise Olympus conflict of interest question (Reuters)

DETROIT/TOKYO (Reuters) ? U.S. patent records point to a possible conflict of interest in an Olympus investment in a cookware company, raising more questions for investors demanding a full explanation from the Japanese company of acquisitions that made heavy losses.

A venture capitalist who managed an Olympus fund that invested $225 million in the new enterprise was part-owner of a cookware patent which he transferred to the target business, just as Olympus was pouring money into it, various documents appear to show.

The records do not reveal if he made any personal gain from the patent deal and Olympus declined to say if the venture capitalist and the patent holder are the same person, even though they have the same name.

Olympus has lost half its market value since its sacked CEO released internal documents showing the firm spent $773 million on the cookware company and two other businesses from 2006-2008 in deals that have largely been written off.

They also show Olympus paid the world's fattest advisory fee, $687 million for the $2.2 billion purchase of British medical-equipment maker Gyrus.

The maker of cameras and medical equipment is under pressure from investors to explain the purchases. The sacked CEO, Michael Woodford, has pressed authorities in Britain and Japan to investigate. The FBI is looking into the $687 million advisory fee, most of it paid to a now-defunct Cayman Islands firm.

Even though Olympus has insisted the acquisitions were strategic and involved no wrongdoing, the number of questions is growing.

Several brokerages have suspended their ratings on the company, citing uncertainty and the difficulty of carrying out accurate analysis in the absence of more information.

The leaked Olympus documents and U.S. patent records shine a light on two brothers, Nobumasa and Akinobu Yokoo, who were engaged in separate capacities by Olympus to scout out new businesses for the group.

Nobumasa, the younger brother, managed an Olympus venture capital fund through which the group began investing in the three businesses that were to soak up $773 million in capital, the leaked documents show.

One of them was Tokyo-based News Chef Inc, specialising in microwave cookware, a radical departure from Olympus's core medical and optical businesses and one that would cost about $186 million in writedowns, the documents show. The News Chef investment started in May 2006 and ended in April 2008.

Shortly after those investments began, records at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office show a rice-cooking patent acquired two years earlier by a man called Nobumasa Yokoo and three others was assigned to a Tokyo-based firm called News Inc.

The records show that at that time News Inc shared the same eight-storey downtown Tokyo building as Olympus's News Chef Inc. The building no longer houses either firm.

Olympus reiterated on Thursday there was nothing improper or illegal about the way it handled deals arranged through the fund, which was set up in 2000 at the peak of the dot-com boom.

CONCERNS MOUNT

"Olympus has been denying all of the various media reports, which makes it difficult to comment, but if a holder of a patent was an advisor on a related deal that could end up being a problem from a conflict of interest perspective," said Yuta Ishinoda, analyst at credit rating agency R&I, which this month put Olympus on watch for possible downgrade.

"That said, we don't know if that is true or not, and that makes it difficult to comment. The desirable course of action for the company would be to disclose information that addresses allegations and is convincing to investors."

U.S. corporate governance expert Charles Elson also said the circumstances raised questions, especially if Olympus's fund manager personally had an interest in a target company.

"That's why typically in U.S. companies transactions between officers and the company, if not prohibited, are severely limited. It depends. If he had no interest in this company then it really isn't an issue," said Elson, director of the University of Delaware's John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance.

The patent records do not show if any payments were involved in the various transfers of the patent for a rice-cooking device for use in microwave ovens. Nobumasa and the other three had obtained the patent, filed in 2004 and granted in 2005, from the inventor.

The patent says it can produce rice in a microwave of "a superior flavor with shiny, silver-like grains and a plump and tender core."

Investors and regulators are starting to question the various deals after they were publicized by Woodford. He says the acquisition of Gyrus in 2008 and the three smaller purchases have destroyed $1.3 billion of shareholder value in the company.

Teikoku Databank, a credit research firm, says News Chef Inc made a loss of 2.2 billion yen ($29 million) on sales of 600 million yen in the year to March 2011.

News Chef's offices are now located in a half-deserted building in Tokyo. It employs a few dozen people.

Reuters visited the Tokyo address given by the U.S. Patent Office as the home of Nobumasa Yokoo. The front gates of the two-storey home in an upmarket neighborhood bear the Yokoo family nameplate and is overlooked by a verandah fringed with flowers.

A woman who answered the doorbell declined to comment when Reuters called to inquire about Nobumasa Yokoo. She did not respond to further rings of the doorbell.

Nobumasa Yokoo was cited in a 2009 audit report commissioned by Olympus after questions were raised internally about the venture capital fund's investments in News Chef and other companies.

The fund was wound up in 2007, a copy of the audit report obtained by Reuters shows.

Nobumasa is listed in a Japanese corporate registry as president of Global Chef, although this listing was dated July 28. It is not clear when he ended his ties to Olympus. Global Chef is also in microwave cookware, its Web site shows.

The audit, which cleared Olympus management of any illegal activity or gross negligence, also looked at the question of a possible conflict of interest between Nobumasa Yokoo and his older brother, Akinobu, then a senior executive of Olympus.

OLDER BROTHER

Akinobu was an Olympus executive officer, not a board position, between 2005 and 2009, which overlapped the period when the Olympus venture fund made investments in News Chef.

He denies any conflict of interest.

"I have never conducted business with my younger brother apart from one time, in an agricultural business using an old Olympus factory site," Akinobu Yokoo said when Reuters spoke with him at his three-storey house in Tokyo.

"I was aware that my brother was pitching deals to Olympus, but I was working in China for them at the time and was not involved," he said as he left for work in his current role as head of JALUX, a unit of Japan Airlines.

Akinobu said he spent much of his time outside head office and generally did not see his brother much. He said he had not seen Nobumasa since the Olympus scandal broke.

The 2009 audit report found no conflict of interest on Akinobu Yokoo's part. "We did not find any circumstances indicating that Akinobu tried to earn personal gain in connection with the fund, and Akinobu and the directors of Olympus stated that no such circumstances existed," it said.

($1=76.11 yen)

(Additional reporting by Nathan Layne, Taiga Uranaka and Isabel Reynolds in TOKYO; Writing by Mark Bendeich, Editing by Dean Yates and Neil Fullick)

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Scientists Say Texas Agency Edits Out Climate Change

Scientists and conservationists accuse the state environmental agency of editing references to climate change and sea level rise out of a public report ? because the agency, like Gov. Rick Perry, is skeptical of global warming.

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RENEE MONTAGNE, host: The Texas coast has also battled its share of dangerous floodwaters. Now a controversy over alleged scientific censorship is roiling Galveston Bay. It involves the administration of Texas Governor and presidential candidate Rick Perry.

ARI SHAPIRO, host: Scientists and conservationists accuse the state environmental agency of editing references to climate change and sea level rise out of a public report because the agency and the governor remain staunch global warming skeptics. NPR's John Burnett reports.

JOHN BURNETT: Galveston Bay is a large estuary on the upper Texas coast whose deteriorating health is of great concern to stakeholders, from fishermen to boaters to birders. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the TCEQ, commissioned a scientific report called State of the Bay, but it wasn't happy with some of the results. The report's authors are in agreement that sea-level rise caused by global warming is threatening wetlands surrounding Galveston Bay, but the TCEQ did not want any mention of human-caused environmental calamities and pulled out its red pencil.

L'OREAL STEPNEY: Let's call the meeting to order. I'll guess I'll do my official gavel thing.

BURNETT: And that's what brought issue before 50 people Wednesday morning inside a meeting room in a mosquito-infested marsh a few miles from the troubled bay. L'Oreal Stepney is deputy director of the Office of Water at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

STEPNEY: Let me say this clearly. We are not an agency that is about censorship. It is not what we do, it is wrong, it is not who we are.

BURNETT: Stepney played down the firestorm as merely professional differences between her agency and the report's authors. But the scientist who wrote the offending chapter claims what happened is nothing less than the muzzling of an inconvenient truth.

JOHN ANDERSON: One of the most striking edits that was made was the deletion of a figure that was taken from Science magazine that showed the measured rate of sea level rise over the long term in historical time, and the predicted rate of rise, and again, that was taken from Science magazine, one of the most credible journals on Earth.

BURNETT: The author is John Anderson, a ruddy-faced 67-year-old oceanographer from Rice University, who among other things has spent 26 seasons studying ice sheet changes in Antarctica, and its effect on global sea level rise. He says the agency deleted passages that Galveston Bay is currently rising three millimeters a year, a six-fold increase, and that human-induced global warming is the cause.

ANDERSON: And I think the travesty here is that this chapter was actually written for teachers. They're my target audience, and this to me is just an outward attempt to keep scientific information, scientific fact, from getting into classrooms.

BURNETT: The agency also deleted a reference that manmade dams on rivers have disrupted important sediment deposition into the bay. L'Oreal Stepney said in an interview that the report should focus on the overall health of the bay and avoid controversial theories. She said the TCEQ is not ignoring the reality of sea-level rise - it's mentioned elsewhere in the report - it's only Anderson's chapter linking it to global warming that they object to.

STEPNEY: It's unsettled science, in our opinion, and that's our position, and we've been clear about that.

BURNETT: At the meeting, the TCEQ offered a compromise - the agency would publish "State of the Bay" without Anderson's chapter and dissident scientists could publish the unedited chapter on their own. But that didn't placate the Galveston Bay Council that held the meeting. One after another members spoke up. The chair of the council said they wanted the state to publish the complete report unexpurgated. A representative from the EPA, which helped fund the study, echoed her comment. Then concerned citizen Albert Gonzalez spoke his mind.

ALBERT GONZALEZ. TEXAS: The political climate in our nation right now seems to be anti-regulation, anti-science. That just is very, very upsetting, and I just wanted to make that comment.

BURNETT: The world's leading science academies state that most of the global warming in recent decades is likely the result of human activities. Rick Perry, his commissioners on the TCEQ, and some members of Congress, mostly Republicans, say that human-caused climate change is junk science. The governor's office said he would have no comment on the Galveston Bay censorship controversy, which has yet to be resolved. John Burnett, NPR News, Houston.

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Source: http://www.npr.org/2011/10/27/141748024/scientists-say-texas-agency-edits-out-climate-change?ft=1&f=1007

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Rainbow of religious leaders join pope for peace (AP)

ASSISI, Italy ? Pope Benedict XVI joined Buddhist monks, Islamic scholars, Yoruba leaders and a handful of agnostics in making a communal call for peace Thursday, insisting that religion must never be used as a pretext for war or terrorism.

Benedict welcomed some 300 leaders representing a rainbow of faiths to the hilltop town of Assisi to commemorate the 25th anniversary of a daylong prayer for peace here called by Pope John Paul II in 1986 amid Cold War conflicts.

While the event lacked the star power of 1986, when the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa and others came together to pray, Thursday's peace meeting included some novelties that the original lacked. Buddhist monks from mainland China were on hand as were four people who profess no faith at all ? part of Benedict's efforts to reach out to agnostics and atheists who nevertheless are searching for truth.

Thursday's meeting also included Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I and representatives from Greek, Russian, Serbian and Belarusian Orthodox churches as well as Lutheran, Methodist and Baptist leaders. Several rabbis were joined by some 60 Muslims, a half-dozen Hindus and Shinto believers, three Taoists, three Jains and a Zoroastrian.

Traditional Catholics condemned the meeting ? just as they did in 1986 ? saying it was blasphemy for the pope to invite leaders of "false" religions to pray to their Gods for peace. The Society of St. Pius X, a breakaway traditionalist group that Benedict has been working to bring back into Rome's fold, said it would be celebrating 1,000 Masses to atone for the damage done by the event and urged the pope to use it to urge others to convert to Catholicism.

The pope did no such thing.

But Benedict too objected to the 1986 event and didn't go, disapproving of members of different faiths praying in the presence of one another. His 25th anniversary edition stripped away all communal public prayer in an attempt to remove any whiff of syncretism, or the combining of different beliefs and practices.

In his remarks, the German-born Benedict noted that in the 25 years since the landmark peace day, the Berlin Wall had crumbled without bloodshed and the world was without any great new wars. But he said nations are still full of discord and that religion is now frequently being used to justify violence.

"We know that terrorism is often religiously motivated and that the specifically religious character of the attacks is proposed as a justification for the reckless cruelty that considers itself entitled to discard the rules of morality for the sake of the intended 'good,'" he said.

But the pope said it was wrong to demand that faith disappear from daily life to somehow rid the world of a religious pretext for violence. He argued that the absence of God from people's daily lives was even more dangerous, since it deprived men and women of any moral criteria to judge their actions.

"The horrors of the concentration camps reveal with utter clarity the consequences of God's absence," said Benedict, who as a young German was forced to join the Hitler Youth.

A leading Islamic scholar, A. Hasyim Muzadi, also lamented that a misunderstanding of religion was often to blame for the onset of violence, when followers only have a "partial understanding" of their faith.

"A mistake in understanding religious comprehension no doubt has caused a misapplication of the religion itself," he said.

Benedict's relations with Muslims got off to a rocky start when in 2006 he delivered a now-infamous speech in which he quoted a Medieval text that characterized some of Muhammad's teachings as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."

Amid post-Sept. 11 tensions, Benedict later said he regretted that the comments offended Muslims and he has sought ever since to mend ties with moderate Islam.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and one of the first speakers at the peace meeting, said the delegates weren't gathered there to come to a "minimum common ground of belief."

Rather, he said, the meeting would show the world that through their distinctiveness, different faiths provide the wisdom to draw upon "in the struggle against the foolishness of a world still obsessed with fear and suspicion, still in love with the idea of a security based on active hostility, and still capable of tolerating or ignoring massive loss of life among the poorest through war and disease."

And there was a lot of distinctiveness on hand. Standing on the altar of St. Mary of the Angels basilica, Wande Abimbola of Nigeria, representing Africa's traditional Yoruba religion, sang and shook a percussion instrument as he told the delegates that peace can only come with greater respect for indigenous religions.

"We must always remember that our own religion, along with the religions practiced by other people, are valid and precious in the eyes of the Almighty, who created all of us with such plural and different ways of life and belief systems," he said.

The presence of the Chinese Buddhists in Assisi was significant given the recent Sino-Vatican tensions over the appointments of Catholic bishops in the country. They came from Henan's Shaolin temple, famous for its kung fu-fighting monks.

One of the nonbelievers, Julia Kristeva, spoke to the delegates about humanism, feminism and a shared commitment to save the world.

All the delegates traveled together to Assisi on a special papal train that left early Thursday from the Vatican's train station. The delegates ate a small lunch together and had time for silent, private prayer before coming together for the joint call for peace. They are to return to Rome together via train Thursday night and have a special audience with Benedict inside the Vatican on Friday.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111027/ap_on_re_eu/eu_vatican_peace_meeting

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China considers new law better defining terrorism (AP)

BEIJING ? China said Tuesday it is considering new legislation better defining terrorism in order to strengthen domestic and international efforts against such acts and those who would commit them.

A proposal before the national legislature would provide more specific legal definitions for terrorists and terrorist acts based on Chinese and international precedents, making it easier to bring terrorism charges, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

The proposal targets those using violence, sabotage or threats in hopes of intimidating or coercing governments or international organizations. Incitement, funding or providing other support would also be considered terrorism.

"Current legislation lacks specific regulations defining terrorism, terrorist organizations, and individual terrorists, affecting the fight against terrorism, control over terrorist assets, and international anti-terrorism cooperation," Xinhua said, quoting deputy Public Security Minister Yang Huanning.

China says it faces an organized terrorist threat from radical Muslim groups in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, although critics say Chinese economic policies and strict rules over cultural and religious expression are creating anger and resentment among the region's traditional Turkic Uighur ethnic group.

The proposal is on track to eventually become a new anti-terrorism law, said Li Wei, a counterterrorism expert at the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, a think tank affiliated with the government's main intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security.

That would for the first time provide a comprehensive mechanism for specifically prosecuting terrorism, including defining such crimes and clarifying the roles of anti-terrorism bodies, as well as laying out procedures for seizing terrorist funds, Li said.

"How often it is used depends on how often such acts occur, but China will now have a law which deals specifically with terrorist crimes," he said.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said the ministry was following the drafting of the new law and China was drawing from the experiences of other countries in dealing with terrorism.

"China will continue to deepen cooperation with regional countries and international organizations to step up contacts and coordination," Jiang said at a daily news briefing.

Most of the government's terrorist accusations focus on groups in Xinjiang, which has been on edge since nearly 200 people were killed in fighting between Uighurs and Han Chinese in 2009 in Urumqi, the regional capital. China accused overseas Uighur activists of orchestrating the violence, but provided no direct evidence.

Violence this year flared anew July 18, when a group of Uighurs stormed a police station in Hotan and took hostages, killing four. Then, just days later on July 30 and 31, Uighurs in Kashgar hijacked a truck, set a restaurant on fire and stabbed people in the street.

Authorities said 14 of the attackers were shot by police in Hotan, and five assailants were killed in the violence in Kashgar.

China again blamed overseas activists for what it described as organized terror attacks, specifically Pakistan-based militants affiliated with al-Qaida. One group, the Turkistan Islamic Party, claimed one of the attackers in Hotan had previously visited one of its training camps.

___

Associated Press writer Gillian Wong contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111025/ap_on_re_as/as_china_terrorism

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Finding Marizela: The Dread Void of Uncertainty (Michellemalkin)

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Mechanical stress can help or hinder wound healing depending on time of application

Mechanical stress can help or hinder wound healing depending on time of application

Monday, October 24, 2011

A new study demonstrates that mechanical forces affect the growth and remodeling of blood vessels during tissue regeneration and wound healing. The forces diminish or enhance the vascularization process and tissue regeneration depending on when they are applied during the healing process.

The study found that applying mechanical forces to an injury site immediately after healing began disrupted vascular growth into the site and prevented bone healing. However, applying mechanical forces later in the healing process enhanced functional bone regeneration. The study's findings could influence treatment of tissue injuries and recommendations for rehabilitation.

"Our finding that mechanical stresses caused by movement can disrupt the initial formation and growth of new blood vessels supports the advice doctors have been giving their patients for years to limit activity early in the healing process," Robert Guldberg, a professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. "However, our findings also suggest applying mechanical stresses to the wound later on can significantly improve healing through a process called adaptive remodeling."

The study was published last month in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative Medicine and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Because blood vessel growth is required for the regeneration of many different tissues, including bone, Guldberg and former Georgia Tech graduate student Joel Boerckel used healing of a bone defect in rats for their study. Following removal of eight millimeters of femur bone, they treated the gap with a polymer scaffold seeded with a growth factor called recombinant human bone morphogenetic protein-2 (rhBMP-2), a potent inducer of bone regeneration. The scaffold was designed in collaboration with Nathaniel Huebsch and David Mooney from Harvard University.

In one group of animals, plates screwed onto the bones to maintain limb stability prevented mechanical forces from being applied to the affected bone. In another group, plates allowed compressive loads along the bone axis to be transferred, but prevented twisting and bending of the limbs. The researchers used contrast-enhanced micro-computed tomography imaging and histology to quantify new bone and blood vessel formation.

The experiments showed that exerting mechanical forces on the injury site immediately after healing began significantly inhibited vascular growth into the bone defect region. The volume of blood vessels and their connectivity were reduced by 66 and 91 percent, respectively, compared to the group for which no force was applied. The lack of vascular growth into the defect produced a 75 percent reduction in bone formation and failure to heal the defect.

But the study found that the same mechanical force that hindered repair early in the healing process became helpful later on.

When the injury site experienced no mechanical force until four weeks after the injury, blood vessels grew into the defect and vascular remodeling began. With delayed loading, the researchers observed a reduction in quantity and connectivity of blood vessels, but the average vessel thickness increased. In addition, bone formation improved by 20 percent compared to when no force was applied, and strong tissue biomaterial integration was evident.

"We found that having a very stable environment initially is very important because mechanical stresses applied early on disrupted very small vessels that were forming," said Guldberg, who is also the director of the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience at Georgia Tech. "If you wait until those vessels have grown in and they're a little more mature, applying a mechanical stimulus then induces remodeling so that you end up with a more robust vascular network."

The study's results may help researchers optimize the mechanical properties of tissue regeneration scaffolds in the future.

"Our study shows that one might want to implant a material that is stiff at the very beginning to stabilize the injury site but becomes more compliant with time, to improve vascularization and tissue regeneration," added Guldberg.

###

Georgia Institute of Technology Research News: http://gtresearchnews.gatech.edu

Thanks to Georgia Institute of Technology Research News for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/114558/Mechanical_stress_can_help_or_hinder_wound_healing_depending_on_time_of_application

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Sheriff: Ga. deputy's killer had drinking problem

ATLANTA?? The girlfriend of an Army National Guard soldier who fatally shot a sheriff's deputy and himself told investigators the gunman "definitely had a drinking problem" and grabbed an assault rifle from his trunk after she made him pull over while he was driving drunk, a Georgia sheriff said Monday.

"She said he had been drinking and he was drunk and that when he gets drunk, he gets violent," Richmond County Sheriff Ronald Strength said. "Why shoot a law enforcement officer? We don't have that answer."

Spc. Christopher Michael Hodges, 26, was randomly firing an assault rifle into traffic from behind his car on the side of an Augusta highway at about 1 a.m. Sunday when Deputy James Paugh pulled over and was shot ? apparently not realizing at first that Hodges posed a threat, authorities said.

Hodges served in the Tennessee National Guard but had been training at Fort Gordon in Augusta for six months. Strength said Hodges' girlfriend told police that they had gotten into an argument in the car after he had gotten drunk at a friend's house.

"She said he definitely had a drinking problem," the sheriff said.

Hodges pulled off the highway and into the grass after "she got mad and said, 'Let me out. I want to go home,'" Strength said. "That's when he got out and got the rifle out of the car and started shooting."

The sheriff said Hodges didn't shoot at the woman, whose name wasn't released, but seemed to be randomly firing as he emptied one magazine on the M4 rifle and loaded another. Investigators found at least 40 shell casings, though no motorists reported being hit, Strength said. He said authorities were working to trace the gun, and Fort Gordon officials had determined it didn't come from the Army post.

Meanwhile investigators were awaiting autopsy results likely ready on Tuesday that are expected to include tests for drugs and alcohol in Hodges' blood.

And investigators were still trying to fill in the details of Hodges' military service for clues to what led to his outburst. Strength said authorities had determined the citizen-soldier had served in Iraq, but he wasn't sure of the timeline. He also cautioned that, while investigators are interested in whether Hodges suffered from any service-related mental problems, "we're not psychiatrists or psychologists."

"There are many things that will never be answered," Strength said.

The military said Hodges had served on active duty and later in the National Guard at least since 2005, when he was stationed at Fort Stewart with the Army's 3rd Infantry Division. His four years based at the southeast Georgia post included a yearlong deployment to Iraq from 2007 to 2008.

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According to the Tennessee National Guard, Hodges joined its ranks in February after he'd spent about two years in the Georgia Guard.

"This is a time of deep sorrow for all involved and in the midst of this tragedy our thoughts are first and foremost with the families," Major Gen. Max Haston, Tennessee's adjutant general, said in a statement Monday. He said the military is working with civilian authorities to figure out what happened.

Neither Tennessee National Guard nor Fort Gordon officials have said what sort of training Hodges was doing at the post in Augusta. He belonged to the 1st Battalion,107th Aviation Regiment based in Smyrna, Tenn., which deployed to Afghanistan in June while Hodges was training at Fort Gordon.

Paugh was one of Richmond County's veteran deputies, having served for 17 years. Strength said the slain deputy was off-duty but still wearing his uniform when he was shot.

He said Paugh, 47, was riding his motorcycle home after spending the evening on patrol outside Augusta's fall fair. Authorities believe the deputy spotted Hodges' car beside the highway and stopped check.

Investigators found Paugh's motorcycle lying on its side in the grass, leading them to believe Hodges opened fire on the deputy before he could put down his kickstand. Evidence shows Paugh fired two shots from his service handgun, but he missed Hodges.

His funeral was planned for 11 a.m. Thursday at First Baptist Church of Augusta.

"We're set up for more than 1,000," said sheriff's Capt. Scott Gay. "We know that people are coming from all over Georgia and from throughout the United States."

Gay said his department has been flooded with emails and notes from well-wishers.

One of them, from a doctor in Ohio, said the deputy "is a true hero" and expressed hope that his family finds some comfort.

"I hope the fact that he is being honored by so many brings them some comfort in this time of loss," the note stated. "May they feel comfort and love from across the nation."

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45023414/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

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Conflicted Iraqis face future without US troops (AP)

BAGHDAD ? For the first time in decades, Iraqis face a future on their own, with neither Saddam Hussein's iron fist nor the United States' military might to hold them together. This has been both their dream and nightmare: They wanted American troops (the occupiers) to go, but they wanted American troops (the protectors) to stay.

Now many fear an increase in violence, growing Iranian influence and political turmoil after President Barack Obama's definitive announcement that all U.S. forces will leave by the end of the year.

In conversations with The Associated Press, Iraqis across the political, religious and geographic spectrum on Saturday questioned what more than eight years of war and tens of thousands of Iraqi and U.S. lives lost had wrought on their country. They wondered how their still struggling democracy could face the challenges ahead.

"Neither the Iraqis nor the Americans have won here," said Adnan Omar, a Sunni from the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk.

Rifaat Khazim, a Shiite from the southern city of Basra, said, "I do not think that this withdrawal will bring anything better to Iraq or that Iraqi leaders will be able to achieve stability and security in this country. Most of the Iraqis yearn now for Saddam's time. Now, Iraq is defenseless in the face of the threats by the neighboring countries."

Across the country there was a strong sense of disbelief. The Americans, having spent hundreds of billions of dollars, lost nearly 4,500 troops' lives and built up sprawling bases as big as many Iraqi cities, would never really leave, many Iraqis thought. Some celebrated the exit of foreign occupiers and the emergence of real sovereignty. But there was also an apprehension, almost a sense of resignation, that things will get worse.

Though greatly reduced from the depths of near civil war from 2006 to 2008, shooting and bombings rattle Iraqis daily. Significantly all the elements from those darkest days remain: al-Qaida militants, Shiite militias, Sunni insurgents. Resentment still simmers among the Sunni Muslim minority over domination by the Shiite majority, Kurds in the north still hold aspirations of breaking away. Despite years of promises of better government services, most of the country gets by on a few hours of electricity a day.

In the eyes of Iraqis, the Americans were both the cause of those woes and the bulwark against them exploding. Many blame the 2003 U.S.-led invasion for unleashing all the demons kept bottled up by Saddam's dictatorship, and allowing new ones ? like al-Qaida ? to slip in.

Yet at the same time, U.S. troop reinforcements helped rein them in by 2008. Many feel the powerful American presence prevents Iraqi politicians from dragging the country into the worst of sectarian reprisals and hatreds. Few believe Iraqi forces are up to keeping security or can avoid falling into the same sectarian splits.

"After the American withdrawal, the security in Iraq will definitely deteriorate. More attacks by al-Qaida are likely to happen," said Dhia Abdullah, a Shiite from eastern Baghdad. "The security elements are not loyal to Iraq but to parties and militias therefore the security situation will be very bad after the withdrawal."

Nearly 40,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, all of whom will withdraw by Dec. 31, a deadline set in a 2008 security agreement between Baghdad and the administration of then-President George W. Bush.

The Obama administration, concerned over continued violence and growing Iranian influence, for much of this year pushed to keep thousands of U.S. troops here in a significant-sized training mission. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other Iraqi officials expressed support of the idea, and they negotiated for months.

It was politically delicate for both Obama and al-Maliki, who each faced widespread opposition from their respective publics to continue a war that was never popular in either nation.

But talks ran aground over Iraqi opposition to giving American troops legal immunity that would shield them from Iraqi prosecution. Legal protection for U.S. troops has always angered everyday Iraqis who saw it as simply a way for the Americans to run roughshod over the country. Many Iraqi lawmakers were hesitant to grant immunity for fear of a backlash from constituents.

"When the Americans asked for immunity, the Iraqi side answered that it was not possible," al-Maliki told a news conference Saturday. "The discussions over the number of trainers and the place of training stopped. Now that the issue of immunity was decided and that no immunity to be given, the withdrawal has started."

When Obama announced Friday that all American forces would leave Iraq by the end of the year, he did not mention the immunity issue, portraying the decision as the fulfillment of one of his main campaign promises to end the conflict.

The impression of the U.S. as all-powerful has always permeated Iraqi society, leaving many Iraqis assuming that the decision was purely an American one instead of an Iraqi choice.

Many, both Sunnis and Shiites, were sure the departure of American forces inevitably will lead to a rise in Iranian influence.

"The withdrawal announcement is a message to the Iranians to come and take over Iraq. The Iraqis are the real losers here because they have replaced the U.S. occupation with Iranian occupation," said Adel al-Dulaimi, a Sunni from northern Baghdad.

In an interview released Saturday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Tehran has "a very good relationship" with Iraq's government that will continue to grow.

"We have deepened our ties day by day," Ahmadinejad said in an interview Saturday with CNN.

To be sure, many Iraqis were happy. Iraqis resented years of having to pull to the side of the road when American troops drove by or putting up with raids of their homes in the middle of the night.

"The Iraqi people are the winner because a few months from now, we will walk in the streets without seeing U.S. troops and this is a source of joy to us because Iraq has restored its full sovereignty," said Saif Qassim, a Sunni from the northern city of Mosul.

Others suspicious of the U.S. questioned whether the American military would ever give up its toehold here.

"I believe that the full withdrawal will be only in the media but there must be secret deals with the Americans to keep some American forces or members of the American intelligence," said Raja Haidr, a Shiite from eastern Baghdad. "They won't leave."

Al-Maliki told reporters he still wants American help in training Iraqi forces to use billions of dollars worth of military equipment that Baghdad is buying from the United States. About 160 U.S. troops will remain at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad to help oversee training plans ? a duty that is common at most American diplomatic posts worldwide.

U.S. officials, from Obama to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, stressed that Washington will continue to have a strong diplomatic relationship with Baghdad.

Michael O'Hanlon, an expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington said continued violence in Iraq was a threat whether or not U.S. troops remain.

"But it's true that their frequency may increase absent U.S. help in areas of intelligence and special operations," said O'Hanlon, who had been lobbying for a larger U.S. force to remain behind. "In addition, I do fear the residual risk of civil war goes up with this decision."

__

Rebecca Santana can be reached at http://twitter.com/@ruskygal

Lara Jakes can be reached at http://twitter.com/@larajakesAP

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111022/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_iraq

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Travel & Leisure: America's Most Scenic Drives (PHOTOS) (Huffington post)

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Basque group ETA ends armed independence campaign (AP)

BILBAO, Spain ? The Basque militant group ETA called an end to a 43-year violent campaign for independence Thursday and said it now wants talks with Spain and France ? a groundbreaking move that could pave the way for ending Europe's last armed militancy.

ETA had already declared a cease-fire last year ? one of nearly a dozen over the years ? but up to now had not renounced armed struggle as a tool for achieving an independent Basque state, a key demand by the Spanish government. The group made the latest announcement to Basque daily Gara, which it regularly uses as a mouthpiece.

The Basque country is a small but wealthy and verdent region of northern Spain, with its own distinct culture and an ancient language that linguists cannot trace and sounds nothing like Spanish. Under the dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco, who was obsessed with the idea of Spain as a unitary state and suppressed Basque culture, ETA emerged as a national liberation movement in the late 1960s.

It was most violent in the 1980s, staging hundreds of shootings of police and politicians and even occasional indiscriminate bombings of civilians.

But in more recent times it has been decimated by arrests and weakening support from Basques with little stomach for terrorism after Sept. 11 and the Madrid train bombings of 2004 by Islamic militants. It has not killed anyone in Spain in two years, and was reportedly down to as few as 50 fighters, many of them young and inexperienced.

In many ways Thursday's announcement was the culmination of a drum roll that has sounded for years.

"ETA has decided on the definitive end of its armed struggle," the group said in the statement. "ETA calls upon the Spanish and French governments to open a process of a direct dialogue."

ETA, which has killed 829 people in bombings and shootings since the late 1960s, is classified as a terrorist organization by Spain, the European Union and the U.S. Its first killing was in 1968.

The statement made no mention of what the group intended to do with its weapons.

Some kind of announcement from ETA has been expected as part of what seemed to be a carefully choreographed process. It began a year ago when its political supporters renounced violence, ETA called a cease-fire and international figures like former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan this week attended a conference that called on ETA to lay down its weapons.

Basque newspaper Berria showed video and still photos of three hooded ETA members wearing berets and masks with their fists in the air after reading the statement. They also shouted in favor of Basque independence, suggesting they have not completely given up the fight.

The statement made no mention of dissolving outright and unconditionally as the government has demanded, and asserted what it says is the right of the Basque people to decide their own future ? the status quo as part of Spain or independence.

Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero hailed the news as a victory for Spanish democracy. In a brief appearance before reporters, however, he made no mention of prospects for dialogue with ETA. Talks in 2006 went nowhere and ETA ended a cease-fire after just a few months.

Zapatero's Socialist party is expected to lose general elections scheduled for Nov. 20. So it is likely up to the conservative Popular Party to decide how to proceed now.

Zapatero credited his and previous governments' fight against ETA, police and soldiers who have died in it, and thanked France for its collaboration. He remembered all the people killed in ETA shootings and bombings, and their families.

"They will be with us always. They will be with future generations of Spaniards," he said.

Zapatero's former Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, the man most people credit with coordinating the legal and police battle to bring ETA to its knees, said, "If only this day had come before."

Rubalcaba stepped down as minister recently in order to run as candidate for the Socialist party in next month's general elections. Zapatero is not running for re-election.

Popular Party leader Mariano Rajoy, who is widely expected to become the next prime minister, said his party welcomed the news but said Spain would only be fully at ease when ETA disbands.

"We think this is a very important step but Spaniards' peace of mind will only be complete with the irreversible disbanding of ETA and its complete dissolution," he added.

The ETA statement said talks with Spain and France ? the independent homeland the group has fought to create includes part of southwest France ? should address "the resolution of the consequences of the conflict." This language usually refers to the around 1,000 ETA prisoners held in Spanish and French jails and ETA weapons.

The announcement came just three days after several international figures, including Annan and Ireland's Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams, attended a conference on ETA in the Basque city of San Sebastian and called on the group to end the violence.

Adams welcomed ETA's statement Thursday.

"We called upon ETA to make a public declaration of the definitive cessation of all armed action and to request talks with the governments of Spain and France to address exclusively the consequences of the conflict," Adams said.

"I believe that their statement today meets that requirement and I would urge the governments of Spain and France to welcome it and agree to talks exclusively to deal with the consequences of the conflict," he said.

_____

Woolls reported from Madrid. Ciaran Giles and Alan Clendenning contributed from Madrid.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111020/ap_on_re_eu/eu_spain_basque_peace

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Slideshow: Slideshow: 2011 World Series images

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Anlaysis: Intel's outlook, buybacks, add shine to shares (Reuters)

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) ? Record earnings, a better-than-expected outlook and potential to buy back $10 billion in stock have put some shine back on the world's top chipmaker although investors are wary of jumping in for the long haul.

Stock in the world's largest chipmaker has lagged its tech counterparts, punished by fears the longtime PC gargantuan is being left out of the mobile device boom. But stellar earnings this week lent credence to its argument that the PC market is still growing at a healthy rate.

The question is for how long. At least for now, the Street is giving Intel -- which hopes to get into mobile devices through its new Ultrabook initiative -- the benefit of the doubt.

Investors a little less worried that tablets and a shaky economy are eating in to demand for personal computers pushed Intel's stock up 3.6 percent on Wednesday, bringing its gain this year to 16 percent, but it still looks cheap compared with other tech companies.

"The reason the multiple isn't greater than it is is there isn't the sizzle of the next iPhone or the next iPad, that market-expanding opportunity into future, more touch-friendly devices," said JMP analyst Alex Gauna, who recommends the stock.

The Santa Clara, California company's earnings and outlook beat expectations on Tuesday, as has become common in recent quarters, with demand for China helping offset weakness in Europe and helping deliver record cash flow.

Intel also authorized $10 billion to buy back shares, which currently pay a dividend yield of over 3.5 percent.

Shares of Intel trade at 10 times earnings, lower than an average of 14 for tech companies but better than Hewlett-Packard Co and Dell Inc, which also depend heavily on PC sales pinched by a lackluster economy and the growing popularity of tablets.

One of a handful of analysts who do not recommend buying Intel, CLSA's Srini Pajjuri is concerned that the company's outlook for personal computer sales has been consistently higher than forecasts by market research groups in recent quarters.

"My best guess at this point is that there's an inventory build somewhere. Within the next one to two quarters I expect Intel (earnings) to underperform the market."

Intel's processors are used in 80 percent of the world's PCs but the company has failed to gain traction in mobile gadgets like Google Inc's Android smartphones and Apple Inc's iPad.

Chips made by Samsung, Texas Instruments and Nvidia using an energy-efficient technology licensed by Britain's ARM Holdings dominate the smartphone and tablet market.

Proponents of ARM say its power-sipping architecture used to design its chips gives such a large advantage that Intel will be unable to dominate the mobile market. Competitors also plan to make inexpensive ARM chips for PCs -- challenging Intel on its own turf.

Intel says its formidable lead in manufacturing technology, letting it pack more transistors onto a silicon chip than its competitors can, will eventually allow it to deliver superior processors for mobile devices.

Concerns that ARM, tablets and other mobile gadgets will decimate the PC market dominated by Intel, or at least cut in to the chip giant's margins, are a key factor weighing on many investors.

Intel is promoting Ultrabooks, a new super-thin category of laptops using Intel processors -- similar to Apple's MacBook Air.

Early Ultrabook models, meant to combine the best features of tablets and laptops, may seem expensive to consumers, analysts say. But as they get new features, such as touchscreens and "instant on" capability, Intel expects the Ultrabooks to account for 40 percent of the consumer PC market by the end of next year.

Gauna said it is tough to predict how technology advantages in the mobile market will play out down the road but sees Intel's dependable cashflow and investor-friendly share buyback and dividends as reasons to own the stock now.

"I don't need the tablets or iPhones to make this an attractive investment today," he said.

(Reporting by Noel Randewich, editing by Matthew Lewis)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/semiconductor/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111019/tc_nm/us_intel

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Social Security increase coming in 2012

WASHINGTON (AP) ? After two years without an increase in benefits, 55 million Social Security recipients will finally get a raise next year.

Experts project the increase will be about 3.5 percent. The Social Security Administration is scheduled to make it official Wednesday when the government releases an inflation measure that determines the annual cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA.

Monthly Social Security payments average $1,082, or about $13,000 a year. A 3.5 percent increase would amount to an additional $38 a month, or about $455 a year.

There was no COLA in 2010 or 2011 because inflation was too low. Those were the first two years without a COLA since automatic increases were adopted in 1975.

It's been a long two years for the millions of retirees and disabled people who have been struggling through the economic downturn, said Web Phillips of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.

"If you've been at the grocery store lately and remember what you used to pay for things, see what you're paying for things today," Phillips said. "The cost-of-living adjustment makes sure that the Social Security benefit that you qualify for when you retire or you become disabled continues to stay current with prices so that the buying power of your benefit does not decline over time."

Some of the increase in January will be lost to higher Medicare premiums, which are deducted from Social Security payments. Medicare Part B premiums for 2012 are expected to be announced next week, and the trustees who oversee the program are projecting an increase.

Most retirees rely on Social Security for a majority of their income, according to the Social Security Administration. Many rely on it for more than 90 percent of their income.

"For people at that income level every dollar makes a difference, particularly coming in this economic downtown," said David Certner, legislative policy director for AARP. "None of them feel as if their cost of living was not increasing in the last couple of years."

Federal law requires the program to base annual payment increases on the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W). Officials compare inflation in the third quarter of each year ? the months of July, August and September ? with the same months in the previous year.

If consumer prices increase from year to year, Social Security recipients automatically get higher payments, starting the following January. If price changes are negative, the payments stay unchanged.

Social Security payments increased by 5.8 percent in 2009, the largest increase in 27 years, after energy prices spiked in 2008. But energy prices quickly dropped and home prices became soft in markets across the country, contributing to lower inflation in the past two years.

As a result, Social Security recipients got an increase that was far larger than actual overall inflation. However, they can't get another increase until consumer prices exceed the levels measured in 2008.

So far this year, prices have been higher than in 2008, said Polina Vlasenko, an economist at the American Institute for Economic Research, based in Great Barrington, Mass.

Based on consumer prices in July and August, the COLA for 2012 would be about 3.5 percent. Vlasenko estimates the COLA will be from 3.5 percent to 3.7 percent.

___

Online:

Social Security Administration's COLA site: http://www.ssa.gov/cola/

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2011-10-19-Social%20Security-COLA/id-b4b0c3ef88f34f9dbbff708e0c15c7be

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