2 Libyans suing MI6 ex-director over rendition (AP)

LONDON ? Two Libyans who claim that British spies were involved in their torture and rendition are launching legal action against the former director of counterterrorism at the U.K.'s foreign spy agency, lawyers representing them said Tuesday.

Abdel-Hakim Belhaj and Sami al-Saadi, both opponents of Moammar Gadhafi's regime, claim that MI6 ex-director Mark Allen was complicit in torture and want to examine his role in their renditions to Libya. They have sent a letter of claim to Allen to seek his response to the allegations, and to claim damages from him personally for the trauma they said they suffered.

"We are taking this unusual step of preparing a legal action against an individual as the documents we have in our possession suggest Sir Mark was directly involved in the unlawful rendition of our clients and their families," said Sapna Malik of Leigh Day & Co., who is representing the Libyans.

The men are also launching legal challenges against Britain's spy agencies, the Foreign Office, and the Home Office, the law firm said.

Belhaj, Tripoli's military council commander and a former fighter in the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group which had opposed Gadhafi, claims both British and U.S. intelligence may have played a role in his 2004 detention in Thailand's capital Bangkok and transfer to Tripoli.

His accusations are based on a document uncovered during the fall of Tripoli that allegedly contained a message from Allen referring to his rendition. The message, dated March 2004, was purportedly addressed to Gadhafi's former intelligence chief, Moussa Koussa.

"I congratulate you on the safe arrival of Abu 'Abd Allah Sadiq," the message said. "This was the least we could do for you and Libya to demonstrate the remarkable relationship we have built over recent years."

Belhaj is also known as Abu 'Abd Allah Sadiq.

Sami al-Saadi, another Libyan who had been opposed to Gadhafi, also claims MI6 played a role in his rendition.

Last month, British police launched a criminal inquiry into the men's allegations.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120131/ap_on_re_eu/eu_britain_torture_charges

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91% Miss Bala

In "Miss Bala," Laura(Stephanie Sigman), a 23-year old shop girl, and her friend Suzu(Lakshmi Picazo) sign up for a beauty pageant, Miss Baja California. That night instead of shopping for a dress, Suzu drags her friend along to a nightclub. Bored, Laura wanders off where she is found by a gunman who asks her questions about who is inside, gives her a little money and tells her to get lost. Well, not before Laura can get Suzu out but they become separated once the shooting starts and Laura makes it to safety out a window. The following morning Suzu is still missing and Laura does the sensible thing in going to a policeman. But instead of taking her to a police station, he takes her to Lino(Noe Hernandez), the criminal leader, who asks her what she knows before inquiring if she can drive a car. There are statistics given at the end of "Miss Bala" about how many people have died in the drug wars in northern Mexico. Now, using a beauty pageant may seem like a screwy way at first to get there but according to the literature, a beauty queen is supposed to represent her subjects and Laura does, if you mean her subjects include those trapped in between the authorities and the criminals. The movie is on neither side, as it paints the authorities as corrupt and in cold blooded fashion Lino lets the DEA know that they are not welcome in Mexico. All of which is seen through Laura's eyes as she provides a ground level view of what goes on around her for the viewer, as she becomes little more than a commodity to the criminals with her body(notice how it is described, by the way) used and abused, with little choice in her actions. Even with large amounts of money on the table, she is not really tempted, either, with the exception of a scene in an upscale dress shop. The most important lesson in all of this is to always listen to your parents.

January 30, 2012

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/miss_bala_2011/

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EcoSpeed App Saves 30% On Gas With Clever Routing

Still insist on using that gas-guzzling holdover from the 20th century, the automobile? Well, I have a little something for you, you naughty boy, and it will save you a little cash as well as protecting the environment you so callously defile with your every trip. It’s called EcoSpeed, and it’s pretty clever. EcoSpeed consists [...]

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GearFactor/~3/qBeI9r-UD2A/

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Worn-out machines as leading indicator (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? Delivery trucks wear out, computers break down, software becomes outdated -- and finally businesses have to start investing in new equipment. Companies that want to remain competitive have to start spending again as an economy slowly recovers.

Four years after the downturn began, the replacement cycle shows signs of kicking into a higher gear in the United States even among small businesses, and it could give an unexpected boost to growth and employment this year.

That assumes no further shocks to the world economy caused by the euro zone debt crisis.

Greece and its bankers have yet to agree on chopping the country's debt load to 120 percent of gross domestic product by 2020, something the International Monetary Fund is demanding in return for the bailout money Greece needs to avoid a default in March.

But capital spending alone is insufficient to drive a U.S. recovery that will be strong enough to quickly lift employment as consumer demand is still limited by heavy debt loads.

In the United States, large corporations have already dug into huge cash piles to upgrade plant and equipment, adding incrementally to an economy that grew by 2.8 percent in the fourth quarter.

Now small businesses, which drive about half of U.S. economic growth and a big chunk of job creation, are increasing their spending on equipment, too, an important precursor to stronger hiring.

But the U.S. jobs report for January, due on Friday, is unlikely to show marked improvement in the labor market after strong gains in December.

Economists surveyed by Reuters forecast 150,000 new jobs in January against 200,000 the prior month. Some investment banks also warn the 8.5 percent unemployment rate could tick up as signs of a gradual firming of the economy encourages more people to return to the labor force.

Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, said small businesses could start hiring more aggressively as the year progresses.

In the last economic cycle, they contributed about two-thirds of the jobs growth, and when they hang out the "help wanted" signs, they can be a powerful source of employment.

"Dollar for dollar in GDP terms, they generate two jobs for every one generated by a large corporation," Shepherdson said.

For the early signs of this small business revival, Shepherdson points to two factors: access to credit has improved markedly as shown by a surge in banks' commercial and industrial lending, and an index of capital expenditure intentions, as measured by the National Federation of Independent Business, is climbing.

The NFIB in December reported that capital outlays had increased for three straight months, the first solid improvement in three years. Owners planning capital investments in the next three to six months also rose to a 40-month high.

NFIB policy analyst Holly Wade said anecdotally she hears of more businesspeople talking of increasing their budgets.

"They have stretched out their machinery and equipment and would have normally invested in replacement, but they were waiting as long as possible. Now they are starting to see better sales and earnings, and they are more comfortable investing some of those dollars in capex," she said.

"In the next three to six months, it wouldn't be surprising to see the same rate of growth in capital outlays we have seen recently," she said.

A similar pattern is evident in the Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank's Business Outlook Survey. In January the index for capital expenditure plans for the next six months more than doubled to a reading of 22.9 from 10.8. And the U.S. Commerce Department's durable goods report for December showed capital goods orders outside of defense and aircraft rose by 2.9 percent.

Industrial conglomerate Honeywell International IncN> is one of the big companies expanding, although overall corporations give a mixed outlook for their plans.

"We're looking to spend $100 to $150 million more in capital on a year over year basis. Some that is going into facility upgrades, some of that is going into technology centers," Honeywell's chief financial officer, Dave Anderson, said with the release of the company's earnings last week.

"Don't look for it to be a driving force for recovery, but capital spending will continue to be a supportive factor," said Ellen Zentner, economist at Nomura Securities.

U.S. car and truck sales, due on Wednesday, are getting a boost from businesses replacing worn out models. They are seen holding at the 13.5 million annual rate in January.

The Institute of Supply Management, an industry group, will also release its U.S. manufacturing index on Wednesday; it is seen rising to 54.5 in January from 53.9.

(Reporting By Stella Dawson; additional reporting by Nick Zieminski)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120129/bs_nm/us_global_economy_weekahead

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Egyptians move to reclaim streets through graffiti

In this Monday, Jan. 23, 2012 photo, Egyptian women walk past graffiti depicting a military tank on a wall under a bridge in Cairo, Egypt. In May, Mohamed Fahmy, known in the graffiti world as Gazneer, made one of Cairo's largest and longest surviving pieces of street art under a bridge used by taxi drivers to urinate. It was an image of a military tank pointed toward a boy on a bike who, rather than carrying a traditional bread delivery, was carrying the city on his head. It was a symbolic reference to youth who care for the nation and are heading toward a collision with Egypt's military rulers. On his blog, Ganzeer wrote: "Our only hope right now is to destroy the military council using the weapon of art." (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Monday, Jan. 23, 2012 photo, Egyptian women walk past graffiti depicting a military tank on a wall under a bridge in Cairo, Egypt. In May, Mohamed Fahmy, known in the graffiti world as Gazneer, made one of Cairo's largest and longest surviving pieces of street art under a bridge used by taxi drivers to urinate. It was an image of a military tank pointed toward a boy on a bike who, rather than carrying a traditional bread delivery, was carrying the city on his head. It was a symbolic reference to youth who care for the nation and are heading toward a collision with Egypt's military rulers. On his blog, Ganzeer wrote: "Our only hope right now is to destroy the military council using the weapon of art." (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012 an Egyptian girl, left, posts an art piece made by Sad Panda, unseen, on a wall as flower vendors prepare a bouquet outside their shop in Cairo, Egypt. Taking control of the streets was critical for the thousands of Egyptians who eventually overthrew their authoritarian leader nearly one year ago, but the battle for freedom of expression continues to be fought by graffiti artists who support the country's military rulers and those who want them to relinquish power. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012 photo, a man walks past graffiti depicting the Egyptian military in Cairo, Egypt. Taking control of the streets was critical for the thousands of Egyptians who eventually overthrew their authoritarian leader nearly one year ago, but the battle for freedom of expression continues to be fought by graffiti artists who support the country's military rulers and those who want them to relinquish power. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012 photo, a man cleans a side walk as graffiti is shown on the wall with Arabic writing from top left to top right that reads, "the answer and the other answer, we will not forget these dates, the people will still revolt, raise the revolutionary flag, hit Tantawy, the revolution will bring justice, we are for Tahrir, " in Cairo, Egypt. Taking control of the streets was critical for the thousands of Egyptians who eventually overthrew their authoritarian leader nearly one year ago, but the battle for freedom of expression continues to be fought by graffiti artists who support the country's military rulers and those who want them to relinquish power. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

In this Saturday, Dec. 24, 2011 photo, two boys look through concrete blocks built by Egyptian military with Arabic writing that reads, "freedom," near Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt. Taking control of the streets was critical for the thousands of Egyptians who eventually overthrew their authoritarian leader nearly one year ago, but the battle for freedom of expression continues to be fought by graffiti artists who support the country's military rulers and those who want them to relinquish power. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

CAIRO (AP) ? The conflict between Egypt's ruling military and pro-democracy protesters isn't just on the streets of Cairo, it's on the walls as well, as graffiti artists from each side duel it out with spray paint and stencils.

Earlier this month, supporters of the ruling generals painted over part of the largest and most famous antimilitary graffiti pieces in the capital.

The military's supporters then made a 15-minute video using footage posted by two young men stenciling pro-revolution graffiti and wearing Guy Fawkes masks, the grinning face made famous by the movie "V for Vendetta". In an attempt mock the revolutionary street art, the military supporters declared in their video, "The police, military and people are one hand," and, "The military is a red line."

They posted the video online, calling themselves the "Badr Battalion" and describing themselves as "distinguished Egyptian youth who are against the spies and traitors that burn Egypt."

It was an ironic turnabout, with backers of the authorities picking up the renegade street art medium of revolutionary youth.

During the regime of Hosni Mubarak, Egypt had almost no graffiti on the walls of its cities. But when the uprising against Mubarak's rule erupted a year ago, there was an explosion of the art.

Taking control of the streets was critical for the thousands of Egyptians who eventually overthrew the country's authoritarian leader. The battle continues to be fought by graffiti artists who support the country's military rulers and those who want them to relinquish power.

Since Mubarak's fall on Feb. 11, graffiti is everywhere in Cairo and other cities, proclaiming the goals of the revolution and mocking the regime. Graffiti artists have continued to work, using walls, buildings, bridges and sidewalks as a canvas to denounce the generals who took power after Mubarak as new dictators and to press the revolution's demands.

Usually anti-military graffiti has a short lifetime before it is quickly painted over or defaced with black spray paint. And just as quickly the artists put up more.

The graffito that pro-military supporters painted over had survived remarkably long. Mohamed Fahmy, known by his pseudonym Ganzeer, put it up in May under a bridge. It depicts a military tank with its turret aimed at a boy on his bike who balances on his head one of the wooden racks that are traditionally used to deliver bread ? though instead of bread, he's carrying a city. It was a symbolic reference to revolutionary youth who care for the nation, heading into a collision with the generals.

Quickly after it was partially stenciled over, a new graffiti was up, depicting the country's military leader as a large snake with a bloody corpse coming out of his mouth.

Graffiti has turned into perhaps the most fertile artistic expression of Egypt's uprising, shifting rapidly to keep up with events. Faces of protesters killed or arrested in crackdowns are common subjects ? and as soon as a new one falls, his face is ubiquitous nearly the next day.

The face of Khaled Said, a young man whose beating death at the hands of police officers in 2010 helped fuel the anti-Mubarak uprising, even appeared briefly on the walls of the Interior Ministry, the daunting security headquarters that few would dare even approach in the past.

Other pieces mock members of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, the council of generals that is now in power, or figures from Mubarak's regime.

When a police officer was captured on an Internet video shooting at the eyes of protesters during clashes, his image immediately dotted walls, urging people to find the "Eye-Sniper."

State television is another frequent target because it has become the mouthpiece for the military's proclamations that protesters are vandals, thugs and part of a plot to throw Egypt into chaos. One graffito shows the word "Occupy" written in the shape of the State TV building. Stickers plastered on walls show the words "Go down to the street" emerging from a television set, a message to the so-called "Couch Party," people who sit and watch the protests on TV.

"It's about a message in the street. It reaches the poor, the rich, the trash collector, the taxi driver," graffiti artist Karim Gouda said. "Most of these people are away from the Internet and the social networking world so it's a way to reach them."

Not everyone is receptive. Gouda said he was accosted by residents as he put up posters depicting a rotting face with the words "open your eyes before it's too late" in the impoverished Cairo district of Sayeda Zeinab. They accused him of trying to create civil strife and of trying to encourage Egypt's Christian minority to take over from the Muslim majority. Such accusations about activists were rife at the time after an October protest by Christians in Cairo, which was crushed by soldiers, killing more than 20.

The residents tore down Gouda's posters and chased him out of the neighborhood.

Under Mubarak's nearly 30-year rule, political expression on the streets was repressed by his powerful police forces. Once every five years, parliamentary elections would see the country littered with posters for elections that always favored the ruling party. Billboards advertising a lifestyle that only a privileged few could afford for companies whose owners were often closely affiliated with the regime towered over the sprawling slums of Cairo, a bustling city of some 18 million people.

"It's liberating to see," blogger Soraya Morayef said of the proliferation of street art.

Morayef, who has dedicated her blog Suzeeinthecity to documenting graffiti artists' work, said the street art reflects what happened in the whole country.

"The fear barrier was broken," she said.

___

Soraya Morayef's blog on graffiti: http://suzeeinthecity.wordpress.com/

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-29-ML-Egypt-Graffiti/id-1d2064e70e664ed9b906547847adb72c

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Inside Congress, no one beats the beet lobby (Star Tribune)

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

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/192800157?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Romney pressures Gingrich at Florida debate

Republican presidential candidate former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (L) listens as Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney makes a point during the Republican presidential candidates debate in Jacksonville, Florida January 26, 2012. (REUTERS/Scott Audette)

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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney took the fight to chief rival Newt Gingrich on Thursday in his most aggressive debate performance yet, five days ahead of Florida?s primary vote.

A neck-and-neck race for Florida and its importance for the Republican presidential nomination made for a combustible atmosphere at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville as the candidates sparred repeatedly.

Gingrich, who has displayed a mastery of debating skills during previous debates, was frequently caught flat-footed under attack from Romney who went after his chief rival in an attempt to put his campaign back on track after losing South Carolina last Saturday.

Gingrich and Romney are running close in polls before next Tuesday?s primary vote in Florida, the biggest state so far in the early voting for the Republican nomination to face President Barack Obama in November. The most recent polls put Romney ahead.

Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, took umbrage at Gingrich?s description of him as ?anti-immigrant.?

?That?s inexcusable,? Romney said, turning to his rival. ?I?m not anti-immigrant. My father was born in Mexico. ... The idea that I?m anti-immigrant is repulsive. Don?t use a term like that.?

Gingrich, who has offered a softer version of immigration policy than most Republican conservatives, insisted the United States could not rationally deport millions of people and that some who had lived here for decades should be allowed to stay.

But he added some confusion to his position by saying he would support some version of ?self-deportation,? the very issue he has criticized Romney for supporting.

?Newt needed a big night to turn around the momentum and he didn?t get it. He struck me as tired and too ticked for his own good,? wrote conservative columnist Rich Lowry on the National Review?s website. His blog post was titled ?Newt?s worst night.?

GINGRICH ATTACK FELL FLAT

Gingrich has enjoyed support from rock-ribbed conservatives in debate audiences by attacking debate moderators.

But this time, his effort to chastise CNN moderator Wolf Blitzer over a question about Romney?s tax disclosures fell flat when Blitzer stood his ground and insisted Gingrich explain a comment he made in a TV interview that Romney ?lives in a world of Swiss bank and Cayman Island bank accounts.?

Gingrich did draw attention to Romney?s vast wealth, which was put under the microscope this week when the former private equity executive release two years of tax documents.

?I don?t know of any American president who has had a Swiss bank account. I?d be glad for you to explain that sort of thing,? he said.

But Gingrich was ridiculed by Romney, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul for telling laid-off space workers near Cape Canaveral on Wednesday that if elected president next November he would seek to build a permanent colony on the lunar surface.

It was the kind of claim that supports criticism that Gingrich has grandiose yet far-fetched ideas.

Romney said the money could be better spent elsewhere, that Gingrich?s proposal was a big idea but not a good one. Paul, a Texas congressman and libertarian, got off the zinger of the night.

?I don?t think we should go to the moon,? said Paul. ?I think maybe we should send some politicians up there.?

Bickering erupted from the first question over illegal immigration, and intensified over Gingrich?s past work for the troubled mortgage giant Freddie Mac.

Romney raised Gingrich?s work for Freddie Mac as a sign that his rival was an influence peddler, a ?horn tooter? for Freddie Mac. Romney has attacked Gingrich all week for accepting $1.6 million in consulting fees from Freddie Mac.

Gingrich fought back. ?Romney made $1 million dollars on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,? he said, an attack that fell flat when Romney pointed out that Gingrich owns stock in the two government-sponsored entities at the heart of the U.S. housing crisis.

The candidates, asked which of their wives would make the best first lady of the White House, chose their own, except for Gingrich, who said they would all be terrific, including his wife, Callista.

?I would rather just talk about why I like Callista, and why I?d like her to be first lady, but she?s not necessarily in any way better. These are wonderful people, and they would be wonderful first ladies,? he said.

Source: http://www.torontosun.com/2012/01/26/romney-pressures-gingrich-at-florida-debate

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Video: Boomers Fear 'Cash Drought' in Retirement

With the prolonged environment of low interest rates, more boomers are afraid of running out of cash in retirement, reports CNBC's Sharon Epperson.

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Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/cnbc/46153480/

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Family history of psychiatric disorders shapes intellectual interests, study suggests

ScienceDaily (Jan. 26, 2012) ? A hallmark of the individual is the cultivation of personal interests, but for some people, their intellectual pursuits might actually be genetically predetermined. Survey results published by Princeton University researchers in the journal PLoS ONE suggest that a family history of psychiatric conditions such as autism and depression could influence the subjects a person finds engaging.

Although preliminary, the findings provide a new look at the oft-studied link between psychiatric conditions and aptitude in the arts or sciences. While previous studies have explored this link by focusing on highly creative individuals or a person's occupation, the Princeton research indicates that the influence of familial neuropsychiatric traits on personal interests is apparently independent of a person's talent or career path, and could help form a person's basic preferences and personality.

Princeton researchers surveyed nearly 1,100 students from the University's Class of 2014 early in their freshman year to learn which major they would choose based on their intellectual interests. The students were then asked to indicate the incidence of mood disorders, substance abuse or autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in their family, including parents, siblings and grandparents.

Students interested in pursuing a major in the humanities or social sciences were twice as likely to report that a family member had a mood disorder or a problem with substance abuse. Students with an interest in science and technical majors, on the other hand, were three times more likely to report a sibling with an ASD, a range of developmental disorders that includes autism and Asperger syndrome.

Senior researcher Sam Wang, an associate professor in Princeton's Department of Molecular Biology and the Princeton Neuroscience Institute, said that the survey -- though not exhaustive nor based on direct clinical diagnoses -- presents the idea that certain heritable psychiatric conditions are more closely linked to a person's intellectual interests than is currently supposed.

During the past several decades, Wang said, various researchers have found that, in certain people and their relatives, mood or behavior disorders are associated with a higher-than-average representation in careers related to writing and the humanities, while conditions related to autism exhibit a similar correlation with scientific and technical careers.

By focusing on poets, writers and scientists, however, those studies only include people who have advanced far in "artistic" or "scientific" pursuits and professions, potentially excluding a large group of people who have those interests but no particular aptitude or related career, Wang said. He and lead author Benjamin Campbell, a graduate student at Rockefeller University, selected incoming freshmen because the students are old enough to have defined interests, but are not yet on a set career path. (Princeton students do not declare a major until the end of sophomore year.)

"Until our work, evidence of a connection between neuropsychiatric disorders and artistic aptitude, for example, was based on surveying creative people, where creativity is usually defined in terms of occupation or proficiency in an artistic field," Wang said. "But what if there is a broader category of people associated with bipolar or depression, namely people who think that the arts are interesting? The students we surveyed are not all F. Scott Fitzgerald, but many more of them might like to read F. Scott Fitzgerald."

The Princeton research provides a new and "provocative" consideration that other scientists in this area can build upon, said Kay Redfield Jamison, a psychiatry and behavioral science professor at Johns Hopkins University and co-director of the university's Mood Disorders Center.

Jamison, who is well known for her research on bipolar disorder and her work on the artistic/mood disorder connection, said that while interests and choice of career are presumably related, Wang and Campbell present data suggesting that intellectual interests might also be independently shaped by psychiatric conditions, which provides the issue larger context.

In addition, the researchers focused on an age group that is not typically looked at specifically, but that is usually included in analyses that span various ages. Such a targeted approach lends the results a unique perspective, she said. Though the incidence of psychiatric conditions in the Princeton study was based on the students' own reporting and not definitive diagnoses, the rates Wang and Campbell found are not different from other populations, she noted.

"This is an additional way of looking at a complex problem that is very interesting," said Jamison, who played no role in the research project. "This work provides a piece of the puzzle in understanding why people go into particular occupations. In this field, it's important to do as many different kinds of studies as possible, and this is an interesting initial study with very interesting findings. It will provoke people to think about this question and it will provoke people to design other kinds of studies."

An implied connection between psychiatric conditions and a flair for art or science dates to at least Aristotle, who famously noted that those "eminent in philosophy, politics, poetry and the arts have all had tendencies toward melancholia."

Modern explorations of that relationship have examined the actual prevalence of people with neuropsychiatric disorders and their relatives in particular fields.

Among the most recent work, researchers at Sweden's Karolinska Institute reported in the British Journal of Psychiatry in November that of the 300,000 people studied, people with bipolar disorder, as well as their healthy parents and siblings, were more likely to have a "creative" job -- including a field in the arts or sciences -- than people with no familial history of the condition. Parents and siblings of people with schizophrenia also exhibited a greater tendency to have a creative job, though people with schizophrenia did not.

Various other studies in the past few decades have found a similar correlation between psychiatric disorders and "creativity," which is typically defined by a person's career or eminence in an artistic field such as writing or music. In their work, however, Wang and Campbell present those criteria as too narrow. They instead suggest that psychiatric disorders can predispose a person to a predilection for the subject matter independent of any concrete measure of creativity.

Jamison, in an editorial regarding the Karolinska study and published in the same journal issue, wrote that "having a creative occupation is not the same thing as being creative." Wang and Campbell approached their project from the inverse of that statement: Being creative does not necessarily mean a person has a creative occupation.

"A person is not just what they do for a living," Wang said. "I am a scientist, but not just a scientist. I'm also a guy who reads blogs, listens to jazz and likes to cook. In that same respect, I believe we have potentially broadened the original assertion of Aristotle by including not just the artistically creative, but a larger category -- all people whose thought processes gravitate to the humanistic and artistic."

As past studies have, Wang and Campbell suggest a genetic basis for their results. The correlation with interests and psychiatric conditions they observed implies that a common genetic path could lead relatives in similar directions, but with some people developing psychiatric disorders while their kin only possess certain traits of those conditions. Those traits can manifest as preferences for and talents in certain areas, Wang said.

"Altogether, results of our study and those like it suggest that scientists should start thinking about the genetic roots of normal function as much as we discuss the genetic causes of abnormal function. This survey helps show that there might be common cause between the two," Wang said.

"Everyone has specific individual interests that result from experiences in life, but these interests arise from a genetic starting point," Wang said. "This doesn't mean that our genes determine our fate. It just means that our genes launch us down a path in life, leading most people to pursue specific interests and, in extreme cases, leading others toward psychiatric disorders."

This study was published Jan. 26 in the journal PLoS ONE.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Princeton University. The original article was written by Morgan Kelly.

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

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Journal Reference:

1. Benjamin C. Campbell, Samuel S.-H. Wang. Familial Linkage between Neuropsychiatric Disorders and Intellectual Interests. PLoS ONE, 2012; 7 (1): e30405 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0030405

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

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

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120126224317.htm

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This Indiana Jones Ring Is Worth Way More Than Any Golden Idol [Wtf]

How do you propose to the ultimate Indy fan? Not with snakes or crystal skulls, that's for sure. You pop the question with the snap of a whip. Or at least a whip ring. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/CXJUDWIx1v4/this-indiana-jones-ring-is-worth-way-more-than-any-golden-idol

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Russia launches cargo spaceship (AP)

MOSCOW ? Russia's space agency says an unmanned cargo ship carrying 2.6 tons of supplies and equipment has lifted off for the International Space Station.

Roskosmos says the Progress M-14M blasted off early Thursday from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan atop a Soyuz-U booster rocket.

The ship is scheduled to dock at the space station early Saturday with a cargo of oxygen, food, scientific equipment and gifts for the crew.

The space station's six members include three Russians, two Americans and a Dutchman.

The decade-old station is orbiting about 225 miles (360 kilometers) above Earth and consists of 13 modules.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/russia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_on_re_eu/eu_russia_space_station

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FM says Syria has duty to confront armed groups

An anti-Syrian regime protester colors his fingers with the revolutionary flag colors during a protest outside the Arab League headquarters in Cairo, Egypt Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. Arab League foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, extended the much-criticized observers mission for another month, officials from the 22-member organization said. The League decided to add more observers and provide them with additional resources, the officials said. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

An anti-Syrian regime protester colors his fingers with the revolutionary flag colors during a protest outside the Arab League headquarters in Cairo, Egypt Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. Arab League foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, extended the much-criticized observers mission for another month, officials from the 22-member organization said. The League decided to add more observers and provide them with additional resources, the officials said. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

Anti-Syrian regime protesters carry revolutionary flags while performing a traditional dance during a protest outside the Arab League headquarters in Cairo, Egypt Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. Arab League foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, extended the much-criticized observers mission for another month, officials from the 22-member organization said. The League decided to add more observers and provide them with additional resources, the officials said. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

BEIRUT (AP) ? Syria's foreign minister said Tuesday that "half the universe" is conspiring against his country, as Gulf Arab nations withdrew from a monitoring mission in Syria because the government has failed to stop 10 months of violence.

International pressure is building on Syria, not only from the West but increasingly from Arab nations as well. The U.N. estimates more than 5,400 people have been killed since Syria's uprising began in March, sparked by the arrest of a group of teenagers who scrawled anti-government graffiti on a wall in the country's south.

Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem on Tuesday signaled the crackdown will continue, saying in Damascus that the government will take any steps necessary to defend against chaos.

Syria has long held that armed gangs acting out a foreign conspiracy are behind the revolt, not protesters seeking change in one of the most authoritarian states in the Middle East.

"It is the duty of the Syrian government to take what it sees as necessary measures to deal with those armed groups that spread chaos," al-Moallem said during a televised news conference.

He also said it was clear that some Arab countries have joined the conspiracy against Syria ? a clear reference to the Gulf countries and to Sunday's call by the Arab League for Syria to create a national unity government in two months.

The plan also provides for Assad to give his vice president full powers to cooperate with the proposed government to enable it to carry out its duties during a transitional period.

Damascus has rejected the plan as a violation of national sovereignty.

Tuesday's decision by Gulf nations to pull out their monitors is a blow to an Arab League observer mission that has been mired by controversy, but which for many represented the only hope for an Arab solution to the crisis in Syria, away from outside intervention.

Now, the Gulf Cooperation Council has called on the U.N. Security Council to take all "necessary measures" to force Syria to implement the Arab League's peace plan.

"The decision was made after careful and thorough monitoring of events in Syria and the conviction by the GCC that the bloodshed and the killing of innocent people there is continuing," the statement by the six-nation GCC said.

Al-Moallem brushed off the threat of the Security Council.

"If they go to (U.N. headquarters in) New York or the moon, as long as we don't pay their tickets, this is their business," he said.

But he acknowledged there is little hope for an Arab solution.

He said some (Gulf) Arabs have "assassinated" the role of the Arab League in ending the crisis in Syria, and went to the Security Council instead. He tried to portray confidence, however, saying Syria had the strong support of powerful allies in Iran and Russia.

An official at the Cairo-based Arab League said an emergency meeting of permanent representatives of the group's 22 members will be held later Tuesday in the Egyptian capital to "review the situation" following the GCC's decision.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The GCC ? which includes Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates ? has long advocated referring Syria to the Security Council, putting it in conflict with other Arab states.

The Arab League's observer mission, which includes 52 monitors from the Gulf nations, has encountered heavy criticism for its failure to stop the Assad regime's crackdown. The GCC withdrawal will leave about 110 observers on the ground, League officials said.

Saudi Arabia had announced Monday that it would pull out its observers.

"This is their business," al-Moallem said. "Maybe the Saudi brothers in the mission don't want to see the realities on the ground, which don't satisfy their plots," he added.

Activists, meanwhile, reported more violence Tuesday.

Syrian troops opened fire to disperse hundreds of people in al-Barra village in the Jabal al-Zawiya region of northern Syria who had gathered for the funeral of Radwan Rabih Hamadi, a 46-year-old prominent opposition figure who was ambushed and assassinated by gunmen on Monday, activists said.

Activists say Hamadi was instrumental in the uprising against Assad in the northern Idlib province.

Six people were reported wounded in Tuesday's shooting.

___

Associated Press writers Bassem Mroue and Elizabeth A. Kennedy in Beirut, and Abdullah al-Shihri in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-01-24-ML-Syria/id-cfe291c51c904702a4ca897d17b43432

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Epic clash: Silicon Valley blindsides Hollywood on piracy (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? The massive online protest last Wednesday, in which Wikipedia and thousands of other websites closed down or otherwise protested and helped to kill controversial online piracy legislation, was widely heralded as an unprecedented case of a grassroots uprising overcoming backroom lobbying.

Yet a close look at how the debate unfolded suggests that traditional means of influencing policy in Washington had its place too. The technology industry has ramped up its political activities dramatically in recent years, and in fact, has spent more than the entertainment industry -- $1.2 billion between 1998 and 2011, compared with $906.4 million spent by entertainment companies.

The latest chapter in what has become an epic, decades-long battle between the two industries over copyrighted digital content began innocuously enough. Hollywood movie studios, frustrated by online theft that they claim already costs them billions of dollars a year and will only get worse, in 2010 started pushing for a law that would make it possible to block access and cut off payments to foreign websites offering pirated material.

In 2010, longtime industry friend Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont, introduced a bill, the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously but never went further.

In May last year, Leahy tried again, introducing his Protect IP (Intellectual Property) Act. In October, Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, introduced a similar bill. The last major piece of copyright law, the Pro-IP Act of 2008, moved through Congress with little controversy, so the industry felt hopeful.

Through the end of September, Hollywood had outspent the tech industry 2-to-1 in donations to key supporters of measures it was backing. More than $950,000 from the TV, music and movie industries has gone to original sponsors of the House and Senate bills in the 2012 election cycle, compared with about $400,000 from computer and Internet companies, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Tech companies preferred backers of a narrower alternative bill. The computer and Internet industries gave more than $291,000 to supporters of that measure vs. about $185,000 from the content makers.

"They're both very powerful. They're all big players. They give a lot of money to politicians. This has to be a tough choice for many members of Congress," said Larry Sabato, a campaign finance expert who teaches at the University of Virginia.

PAY ATTENTION

The bills had attracted no public attention, but in early September, Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman wrote to senators to oppose the bill. Later that month, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce marshaled a group of 350 companies to write in supporting it.

The introduction of the House bill in late October prompted more scrutiny. Critics including the Consumer Electronics Association fretted over issues such as whether U.S. websites could be shut down under the bill, and security risks to Internet infrastructure that they said may arise.

By mid November, technology executives were paying close attention. Many watched online as Google copyright counsel Katherine Oyama testified before a House Judiciary Committee hearing November 16. Another, Ben Huh, chief executive of the online media network Cheezburger Inc, would eventually help organize the Web blackout.

Members of Congress "basically beat up Google," said Huh, who tuned in from the office. "We were watching it going, 'This is incredibly unfair.'"

Later that day, he talked over the testimony with Erik Martin, general manager of the social news site Reddit.com. The two would later help lead the online blackout efforts, along with others such as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.

Meanwhile, the White House was taking meetings from both sides. The first week of December, Motion Picture Association of America chief and former Senator Chris Dodd moved the MPAA's board meeting from its traditional site of Los Angeles to Washington, in part so executives could lobby on the issues.

Dodd, along with movie executives including Warner Bros Chairman and CEO Barry Meyer and Fox Filmed Entertainment co-Chairmen Jim Gianopulos and Tom Rothman, met with White House officials including chief of staff Bill Daley and Vice President Joe Biden, according to a person familiar with the situation. They hammered home why the law was needed to go after foreign sites.

TAKING TURNS

The following week, it was the tech companies' turn. Executives including LinkedIn's Hoffman, Google Chairman Eric Schmidt, and venture capitalists Brad Burnham and Paul Maeder met with the same officials to press their case.

Major tech companies then took out advertisements in newspapers including the Washington Post and The New York Times, saying the bills would allow U.S. government censorship of the Internet. The ads ran December 14 in the form of an open letter to Washington, signed by heavyweights such as Google co-founder Sergey Brin and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.

The ads ran as the House Judiciary Committee was turning back the bill. The proceedings streamed live over the Internet, allowing the public to watch many members struggling to fully understand terms such as IP address and DNS server.

North Carolina Rep. Mel Watt, for example, professed that he was "not a nerd and didn't understand a lot of the technological stuff." That opened them up to mockery in the blogosphere, with commentators questioning their ability to craft law around the Internet. "Dear Congress, It's No Longer OK To Not Know How the Internet Works," Motherboard blogger Joshua Kopstein wrote in a widely circulated post.

The weekend after the committee adjourned its hearing, opponents started an online petition to veto SOPA at the White House's "We the People" website. Within days, the petition had acquired 38,500 signatures, far exceeding the 25,000 required for review by the administration. An separate petition started in late October had already gathered more than 52,000 signatures.

A few days before Christmas, the House Judiciary Committee released the names of the many companies that supported SOPA. But that succeeded only in galvanizing further opposition: influential Silicon Valley investor Paul Graham took the unusual step of saying that any company that supported SOPA would be barred from Demo Day, an industry showcase.

People posting to the social-news site Reddit then suggested a boycott of one of the bill's supporters, the domain-name registrar GoDaddy, asking people to transfer their domains to another registrar. Many sites, among them Huh's Cheezburger, said they would switch. Just before New Year's Day, GoDaddy dropped its support for the bill amid widespread publicity.

Meanwhile, the White House was crafting its response to the online petitions. Three top aides to President Barack Obama, who won election in 2008 supported by online organizing and who has long been friendly to Internet industry concerns, weighed in on the issue in mid-January just as Hollywood was preparing to celebrate the Golden Globe Awards. The officials posted a response to the online petition and voiced concerns about the bills, while calling for improved antipiracy legislation.

That sparked a flood of media coverage and helped expand the Internet blackout to more sites. One popular protest, the brainchild of Instagram engineer Greg Hochmuth and YouTube Product Management Director Hunter Wall, allowed people to add black "Stop SOPA" banners to their Twitter and Facebook profile photos. On Wednesday, some 30 people a minute were adding the banners to their photos, Hochmuth told Reuters.

A FORMIDABLE COMBO

The combination of White House concerns, the impending online protest and the intense pressure on legislators from high-profile Internet industry leaders abruptly changed the dynamic on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday, as the blackout unfolded, support for the bills quickly crumbled.

Some Hollywood executives acknowledge their own flat-footedness in trying to marshal public opinion as opposition mounted. While technology companies brandished the power of the Internet, Hollywood relied on old-media weapons such as television commercials and a billboard in New York's Times Square. It proved to be too little, too late.

One entertainment-company lawyer complained that opposing arguments were often inaccurate but spread like wildfire anyway on the Internet, leaving supporters scrambling to correct the information without the benefit of a strong online network.

"We do some of that (online) stuff, but it has to go through a committee of 14 people," he said. "The other side doesn't have conference calls. They just put stuff out there."

Both friends and foes of SOPA and PIPA do not think they have seen the end of this battle.

"Bills are a lot like zombies," said Cheezburger's Huh. "You never know if they're dead or going to come back."

When it comes around again, lobbyists on both sides will have learned some valuable lessons.

(Reporting by Sarah McBride in San Francisco and Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles, with additional reporting by Jasmin Melvin and Diane Bartz in Washington; Editing by Jonathan Weber and Maureen Bavdek)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/movies/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120122/film_nm/us_congress_piracy

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How can Americans compete globally?

Who should have the primary responsibility for making American workers globally competitive ? the private sector or government?

Who should have the primary strategic responsibility for making American workers globally competitive ? the private sector or government? This will be a defining issue in the 2012 campaign.

Skip to next paragraph Robert Reich

Robert is chancellor's professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Clinton. He has written 13 books, including 'The Work of Nations,' 'Locked in the Cabinet,' and his most recent book, 'Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future.' His 'Marketplace' commentaries can be found on publicradio.com and iTunes.

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In his State of the Union address, President Obama will make the case that government has a vital role. His Republican rivals disagree. Mitt Romney charges the President is putting ?free enterprise on trial,? while Newt Gingrich merely fulminates about ?liberal elites.?

American business won?t and can?t lead the way to more and better jobs in the United States. First, the private sector is increasingly global, with less and less stake in America. Second, it?s driven by the necessity of creating profits, not better jobs.

The National Science Foundation has just released its biennial report on global investment in science, engineering and technology. The NSF warns that the United States is quickly losing ground to Asia, especially to China. America?s share of global R&D spending is tumbling. In the decade to 2009, it dropped from 38 percent to 31 percent, while Asia?s share rose from 24 to 35 percent.

One big reason: According to the NSF, American firms nearly doubled their R&D investment in Asia over these years, to over $7.5 billion.

GE recently announced a $500 million expansion of its R&D facilities in China. The firm has already invested $2 billion.

GE?s CEO Jeffrey Immelt chairs Obama?s council on work and competitiveness. I?d wager that as an American citizen, Immelt is concerned about working Americans. But as CEO of GE, Immelt?s job is to be concerned about GE?s shareholders. They aren?t the same.

GE has also been creating more jobs outside the United States than in it. A decade ago, fewer than half of GE?s employees were non-American; today, 54 percent are.

This is all good for GE and its shareholders, but it?s not necessarily good for America or American workers. The Commerce Department says U.S. based global corporations added 2.4 million workers abroad in first decade of 21^st century, while cutting their US workforce by 2.9 million.

According to the New York Times, Apple Computer employs 43,000 people in the United States but contracts with over 700,000 workers abroad. It makes iPhones in China not only because of low wages there but also the ease and speed with which its Chinese contractor can mobilize their workers ? from company dormitories at almost any hour of the day or night.

An Apple executive says ?We don?t have an obligation to solve America?s problems. Our only obligation is making the best product possible.? He might have added ?and showing a big enough profits to continually increase our share price.?

Most executives of American companies agree. If they can make it best and cheapest in China, or anywhere else, that?s where it will be made. Don?t blame them. That?s what they?re getting paid to do.

What they want in America is lower corporate taxes, less regulation, and fewer unionized workers. But none of these will bring good jobs to America. These steps may lower the costs of production here, but global companies can always find even lower costs abroad.

Global corporations ? wherever they?re based ? will create good jobs for Americans only if Americans are productive enough to summon them. Problem is, a large and growing portion of our workforce?isn?t equipped to be productive. ?

Put simply, American workers are hobbled by deteriorating schools, unaffordable college tuitions, decaying infrastructure, and declining basic R&D. All of this is putting us on a glide path toward even lousier jobs and lower wages.

Get it? The strategic responsibility for making Americans more globally competitive can?t be centered in the private sector because the private sector is rapidly going global, and it?s designed to make profits rather than good jobs. The core responsibility has to be in government because government is?supposed to?be looking out for?the public, and investing in?public schools, colleges, infrastructure, and basic R&D. ?

But here?s the political problem. American firms have huge clout in Washington. They maintain legions of lobbyists and are pouring boatloads of money into political campaigns. After the Supreme Court?s Citizen?s United decision, there?s no limit.

Who represents the American workforce? Organized labor represents fewer than 7 percent of private-sector workers and has all it can do to protect a dwindling number of unionized jobs.

Republicans like it this way, and for three decades have been trying to convince average working Americans government is their enemy. Yet corporate America isn?t their friend. Without bold government action on behalf of our workforce, good American jobs will continue to disappear.

The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger, click here. This post originally ran on www.robertreich.org.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/XSWsbnqFYtc/How-can-Americans-compete-globally

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Fannie, Freddie writedowns too costly: regulator (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? The regulator for Fannie Mae (FNMA.OB) and Freddie Mac (FMCC.OB) told lawmakers that forcing the government-controlled mortgage firms to write down the principal on underwater home loans would require more than $100 billion in fresh taxpayer funds.

In a letter sent on Friday to the Republican and Democratic leaders of a U.S. House of Representatives government oversight panel, the Federal Housing Finance Agency explained why it has long opposed principal reductions for borrowers who owe more than their homes are worth. In that situation, the mortgage is deemed "underwater."

About 22 percent of U.S. home mortgages have negative equity totaling about $750 billion, meaning that about one in five U.S. home mortgages is "underwater" with the amount owed exceeding the home's value, according to CoreLogic, a financial information and analytics company based in Santa Ana, California.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency said it had determined that such reductions would be more costly for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac than forbearance, which was the less expensive option by comparison. The two mortgage firms have been using forbearance to help borrowers struggling to make payments.

Forbearance lets the borrow reduce or suspend payments on a loan for a specific amount of time.

The regulator, also known as the FHFA, has been under pressure from Democrats to permit the writedown of principal by the two government-controlled mortgage finance providers as a way to help some of the millions of U.S. homeowners whose mortgages are "underwater."

Representative Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has pushed the housing regulator to explain its thinking in deciding not to offer principal reductions.

PRESERVING ASSETS A CONCERN

The FHFA, however, has maintained that widespread principal forgiveness would undercut the finances of Fannie and Freddie, which have already received about $169 billion in taxpayer aid. Republicans have supported the FHFA's decision.

"FHFA has a statutory responsibility as conservator to preserve and conserve the assets and property of the regulated entities," FHFA's acting director, Edward DeMarco, wrote in the letter to lawmakers dated January 20.

The Obama administration wants to secure widespread principal reductions in a legal settlement between the government and some of the biggest mortgage servicers. The settlement is aimed at cleaning up alleged foreclosure abuses.

"Given that any money spent on this endeavor would ultimately come from taxpayers and given that our analysis does not indicate a preservation of assets for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac substantial enough to offset costs, an expenditure of this nature at this time would, in my judgment, require congressional action," DeMarco said in the letter.

In 2008, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taken over by the government as mortgage losses mounted. Millions of loans issued during the housing bubble, many of them made to subprime borrowers with spotty credit histories, soured after the housing bust -- yet they remain on Fannie's and Freddie's books. Delinquencies on those loans continue to rise.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac own or guarantee roughly half of all outstanding mortgages in the United States. Of the approximately 30 million mortgages guaranteed by the two firms, close to 3 million of those loans were held by underwater borrowers as of last summer, according to an analysis provided in the letter.

Another barrier to principal writedowns, aside from pushing losses at the two firms even higher, DeMarco said, was the cost associated with new technology and training to servicers that would be needed to launch a program that offers principal forgiveness.

The FHFA told lawmakers that forbearance is a less costly option. Principal forbearance limits accounting losses and allows Fannie and Freddie to recoup the principal at some later point, according to the regulatory agency's letter.

"The net result of the analysis is that forbearance achieves marginally lower losses for the taxpayer than forgiveness, although both forgiveness and forbearance reduce the borrower's payment to the same affordable level," the FHFA's letter said.

The housing regulator also assured lawmakers that the FHFA remains committed to helping borrowers stay in their homes and will continue to work on such principal forbearance plans and government initiatives to modify or refinance loans.

The Federal Reserve, in a white paper to Congress earlier this month, said writedowns "had the potential to decrease the probability of default" and "improve migration between labor markets."

However, the Fed stopped short of endorsing such an initiative and noted concern that writing down loan balances would create a moral hazard - the concept that rescue efforts breed further behavior that exacerbates the existing problem - and could prompt other borrowers to stop making timely loan payments.

(Reporting By Margaret Chadbourn; Editing by Jan Paschal)

(This story was corrected to substitute 7th paragraph quote. The original was a summary of the question posed to the FHFA and was used in error)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/personalfinance/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120124/bs_nm/us_usa_housing_fhfa

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Van Jones: Obama Must Choose on Housing: A Sweetheart Deal for the 1% or a Fair Deal for the 99%

Rumor has it that on Monday, after months of negotiation with big banks, the White House may announce a settlement that would let the banks off the hook for their role in the foreclosure crisis -- paying a tiny fraction of what's needed in exchange for blanket immunity from future lawsuits.

We hope these rumors are untrue.

President Obama has the ability to stop and change the direction of this sweetheart deal. He should reject any deal that benefits the one percent and lets the big banks get away with their crimes. Instead, the president should stand with the 99 percent and push for real accountability and a solution that will help millions of people in this country.

Here are the hard facts about the housing crisis we face:

• 3.5 million Americans are homeless.
• 18.5 million homes sit vacant.
• Since 2007, more than 7.5 million homes have been foreclosed.

Default and foreclosure rates are now several times higher than at any time since the Great Depression.

If President Obama is serious about solving this crisis, he must ensure three things:

First: The banks must pay a minimum $300 billion in principal reduction for homeowners with underwater mortgages and/or restitution for foreclosed-on families. This is essential. Every effort to date to reboot the housing market has failed because it has not done the most essential thing -- actually reduce the massive debt load carried by homeowners.

As it stands, the deal likely to be announced Monday would have the banks pay only $20 billion, an astonishingly small fraction of what's needed. Add up all the underwater homes in America, and there's an estimated $700 billion in negative equity in the country, according to a recent study. If banks fix what they broke and write down principals for all underwater mortgages, this would free up millions of people to pump billions of dollars back into local economies, create jobs, and ultimately generate revenue to help invest in things that will help our economy grow.

Second: There must be a full-fledged, full-blown investigation into Wall Street financial fraud by the Department of Justice. There should be a task force with the staff resources, the authority, and the explicit mission of seriously investigating fraudulent behavior in the way home mortgages were securitized.

Reports of the current deal suggest banks could walk away without any actual investigation into their role in the housing crisis.

Third: There should be no civil or criminal immunity for the banks from future lawsuits. That means there should be no broad release of claims in any current or future negotiation or settlement.

The banks must pay to help solve the crisis they played such a big role in creating. They can afford it.

U.S. banks raked in $35 billion in profits last summer alone and are currently sitting on a historically high level of cash reserves of $1.64 trillion. The six biggest banks -- Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley -- hold assets totaling $9.5 trillion; and together paid an income tax rate of only 11% in 2009 and 2010, far below the federally mandated 35% corporate tax rate.

And that's not all. Despite their bleak performance this year, the nation's top six banks paid out $144 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2011, second only to the record $147 billion they paid out in 2007 at the height of the economic boom.

While banks enjoy record profits and the prospect of total immunity, millions of Americans are drowning in underwater mortgages.

Everyday people are already out front, fighting against the malfeasance of the banks; the White House should stand with them. Our national leaders need look no farther than Atlanta, GA, for an instructive profile in courage. Earlier this month, a community church in Dr. Martin Luther King's old neighborhood refused to be ignored. In 2008, a tornado devastated the historic, 108-year-old Higher Ground Empowerment Center church, and they were forced to take out a loan to cover repairs. The loan went underwater and became harder and harder to pay back. For nearly four years, the church asked the bank to modify their loan, but BB&T bank ignored them. Instead, last week, the bank started to evict the church. Sound familiar? Anyone with an underwater mortgage can tell you: banks these days just can't seem to treat their own customers with decency and manners.

However, after Occupy Atlanta staged a high-profile press conference, and 65,000 people signed a national petition by Rebuild the Dream, the church got BB&T bank to agree to modify their loan to something affordable and reasonable.

This happy ending is, unfortunately, the rare exception. BB&T, after being shaken to their senses (and shamed in the media), came to the table and did the right thing. But millions of homeowners have no way to stage protests and press conferences. Abuse, fraud, conflicts of interest, and lawlessness have been endemic at every stage of the mortgage origination and foreclosure process. This chain of misconduct by many of the nation's largest financial companies is at the root of the foreclosure avalanche and it's time to demand a course of action that will resolve the current crisis and create jobs in the future.

If these folks in Atlanta can show this level of courage in standing up to a big bank, then certainly Obama and state attorneys general can show the same courage.

The banks got their bailout. Now we need a strong and fair settlement to help Americans drowning in underwater mortgages.

Van Jones is the co-founder and president of Rebuild the Dream, a new national organization working to fix America's economy and restore our democracy.

George Goehl is the executive director of National People's Action, a network of metropolitan and statewide membership organizations dedicated to advancing economic and racial justice. National People's Action is a leading organization within a national coalition called New Bottom Line that challenges established big bank interests on behalf of struggling and middle-class communities.

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Follow Van Jones on Twitter: www.twitter.com/VanJones68

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/van-jones/obama-housing_b_1221921.html

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Pacific Northwest storm causes flooding and outages (Reuters)

SEATTLE/PORTLAND (Reuters) ? A deadly ice storm and heavy rains swept across the Pacific Northwest on Thursday, leading to flooding and evacuations in Oregon and heightening the misery of residents in Washington state struggling with power outages and treacherous roads since an earlier record snowfall.

The governors of Washington and Oregon declared emergencies in their states, and the storm was blamed for at least three deaths, including those of a 20-month-old boy and his mother in Oregon who police said were sitting in a car that was surrounded with flood waters and swept into a rain-swollen creek.

In Seattle, which normally sees mild temperatures and wet weather but not heavy snow, the storm has resulted in airport and school closures, car crashes, downed trees and lost power. Overall, some 275,000 customers across the state were without power, officials said.

Nicknamed "Snowmageddon," the storm walloped Seattle and other parts of Washington with snow on Tuesday night and later developed into icy rains that downed power lines and made driving treacherous. To the south in Oregon, residents were dealing with heavy downpours and flooding.

On an icy stretch of Interstate 90 in Washington near the town of Cle Elum, about 80 miles inland from Seattle, six semi-trailer trucks were involved in a chain-reaction collision that snarled traffic on the state's major thoroughfare through the Cascade Range of mountains, said Washington State Patrol spokesman Kandi Patrick.

Amtrak said in a statement on Thursday that it had suspended its Cascades train service because of downed trees and debris scattered on tracks.

The emergency proclamation by Washington Governor Chris Gregoire allows for the activation of the Washington National Guard if needed, but the governor has not asked for the guard to assist, said her spokeswoman Karina Shagren.

Record-setting daily snowfall of 6.8 inches was measured early Thursday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, shattering the previous record of 2.9 inches in 1954, said meteorologist Dan DePodwin of AccuWeather.com.

The airport had to conduct de-icing operations, and at one point all runways were shut, Sea-Tac spokeswoman Charla Skaggs.

Seattle officials in the afternoon urged area residents to get home before dark because of icy road conditions.

SEATTLE SCHOOLS CLOSED

The roughly 100 public schools in Seattle were all closed on Thursday for the second day in a row, and they would be closed on Friday as well, said Lesley Rogers, a spokeswoman for Seattle Public Schools.

"It's the ice, we have really steep hills in Seattle, and all our buses are equipped with chains on their tires but if we can't get the buses safely up and down the hills that's a problem," Rogers said.

Schools in other parts of the state were also closed, according to statements on a number of school district websites.

The largest share of the 275,000 customers without power are in King County, which includes Seattle, said Rob Harper, spokesman for the state Emergency Operations Center. Pierce and Thurston counties in southwest Washington state was also hard hit with a combined 75,000 customers without power, he said.

Near Issaquah, a suburb of Seattle, a 60-year-old man was killed on Thursday when a snow-laden tree fell on him as he drove an all-terrain vehicle, said King County sheriff's spokeswoman Sergeant Cindi West.

Sixty miles south of Portland in Albany, Oregon, rescuers on Thursday recovered the body of Aiden McLaughlin, the toddler who was killed the night before when the car he was in was swept from a grocery store parking lot into a creek, the city's police department said in a statement.

Family members of Catherine McLaughlin, 18, who was in the car with her son, found her body in the creek on Thursday and it was recovered by authorities, police said. Two other occupants in the car both survived and were taken to hospitals.

Meanwhile, the National Park Service at Mount Rainier called an elite team of 10 searchers to find two separate overdue parties, with a total of four people missing since earlier this week, the Park Service said in a statement.

The storm and related worries about avalanches heightened the urgency to find the four missing hikers and campers, but freezing rain made it difficult to deploy a search helicopter, the Park Service said.

In Oregon, Governor John Kitzhaber's declaration of emergency mentioned hard-hit Marion, Coos, Benton and Lincoln counties, but not the more heavily populated Portland area.

In Portland, 3.4 inches of rain and snow has fallen since the storm began on Tuesday, said Andy Mussoline, meteorologist with AccuWeather.com.

Other areas received higher amounts of precipitation, with Silverton, 35 miles south of Portland, receiving 8.8 inches, Mussoline said.

Marion County emergency officials asked residents in the town of Turner, with a population of about 1,900, to evacuate to higher ground, the local sheriff's office said in a statement. About 50 families were evacuated earlier in the day.

About 20 people were evacuated overnight and Thursday in the tiny town of Scio, about 75 miles south of Portland, said City Manager Ginger Griffith. Scio, with a population of 840, had waist deep water in some neighborhoods, she said.

(Additional reporting by Teresa Carson in Portland: Writing By Alex Dobuzinskis; editing by Paul Thomasch and Dan Burns)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/weather/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120120/us_nm/us_weather

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