VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – After weeks of anticipation, Pope Benedict sent his first tweet on Wednesday.
“Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart.”
The tweet was sent when the 85-year-old pope tapped on a touch screen at the end of his weekly general audience in the Vatican before thousands of people.
(Reporting By Philip Pullella, editing by Paul Casciato)
Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News
This is the year of the tablet, David Pogue of The Times has told us, and that may be good news for seniors who open holiday wrappings to find one tucked inside. They see better with tablets’ adjustable type size, new research shows. Reading becomes easier again.
This may seem obvious — find me someone over 40 who doesn’t see better when fonts are larger — but it’s the business of science to test our assumptions.
Dr. Daniel Roth, an eye specialist and clinical associate professor at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Brunswick, N.J., offered new evidence of tablets’ potential benefits last month at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology.
His findings, based on tests conducted with 66 adults age 50 and over: older people read faster (a mean reading speed of 128 words per minute) when using an iPad, compared to a newspaper with the same 10-point font size (114 words per minute).
When the font was increased to 18 points — easy to do on an iPad — reading speed increased to 137 words per minute.
“If you read more slowly, it’s tedious,” Dr. Roth said, explaining why reading speed is important. “If you can read more fluidly, it’s more comfortable.”
What makes the real difference, Dr. Roth theorizes, is tablets’ illuminated screen, which heightens contrast between words and the background on which they sit.
Contrast sensitivity — the visual ability to differentiate between foreground and background information — becomes poorer as we age, as does the ability to discriminate fine visual detail, notes Dr. Kevin Paterson, a psychologist at the University of Leicester, who recently published a separate study on why older people struggle to read fine print.
“There are several explanations for the loss of sensitivity to fine detail that occurs with older age,” Dr. Paterson explained in an e-mail. “This may be due to greater opacity of the fluid in the eye, which will scatter incoming light and reduce the quality of the projection of light onto the retina. It’s also hypothesized that changes in neural transmission affect the processing of fine visual detail.”
Combine these changes with a greater prevalence of eye conditions like macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy in older adults, and you get millions of people who cannot easily do what they have done all their lives — read and stay connected to the world of ideas, imagination and human experience.
“The No. 1 complaint I get from older patients is that they love to read but can’t, and this really bothers them,” Dr. Roth said. The main option has been magnifying glasses, which many people find cumbersome and inconvenient.
Some words of caution are in order. First, Dr. Roth’s study has not been published yet; it was presented as a poster at the scientific meeting and publicized by the academy, but it has not yet gone through comprehensive, rigorous peer review.
Second, Dr. Roth’s study was completed before the newest wave of tablets from Microsoft, Google, Samsung and others became available. The doctor made no attempt to compare different products, with one exception. In the second part of his study, he compared results for the iPad with those for a Kindle. But it was not an apples to apples comparison, because the Kindle did not have a back-lit screen.
This section of his study involved 100 adults age 50 and older who read materials in a book, on an iPad and on the Kindle. Book readers recorded a mean reading speed of 187 words per minute when the font size was set at 12; Kindle readers clocked in at 196 words per minute and iPad readers at 224 words per minute at the same type size. Reading speed improved even more drastically for a subset of adults with the poorest vision.
Again, Apple’s product came out on top, but that should not be taken as evidence that it is superior to other tablets with back-lit screens and adjustable font sizes. Both the eye academy and Dr. Roth assert that they have no financial relationship with Apple. My attempts to get in touch with the company were not successful.
A final cautionary note should be sounded. Some older adults find digital technology baffling and simply do not feel comfortable using it. For them, a tablet may sit on a shelf and get little if any use.
Others, however, find the technology fascinating. If you want to see an example that went viral on YouTube, watch this video from 2010 of Virginia Campbell, then 99 years old, and today still going strong at the Mary’s Woods Retirement Community in Lake Oswego, Ore.
Ms. Campbell’s glaucoma made it difficult for her to read, and for her the iPad was a blessing, as she wrote in this tribute quoted in an article in The Oregonian newspaper:
To this technology-ninny it’s clear
In my compromised 100th year,
That to read and to write
Are again within sight
Of this Apple iPad pioneer
Caregivers might be delighted — as Ms. Campbell’s daughter was — by older relatives’ response to this new technology, a potential source of entertainment and engagement for those who can negotiate its demands. Or, they might find that old habits die hard and that their relatives continue to prefer a book or newspaper they can hold in their hands to one that appears on a screen.
Which reading enhancement products have you used, and what experiences have you had?
HONG KONG — Even as Wall Street deal makers await a revival of the moribund merger market, Chinese companies are shopping abroad with their wallets out.
Yet they are also facing scrutiny, particularly in Washington, as Chinese corporate buying trips coincide with a growing assertiveness in Chinese foreign policy, including the deployment in recent months of surveillance vessels and even naval destroyers and frigates in a series of territorial confrontations with American allies like Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines.
So far this year, the dollar volume of Chinese acquisitions overseas is up 28 percent from the same period a year ago, according to Thomson Reuters data. That compares with a 2.8 percent slump in global merger and acquisition volume over all.
Chinese international acquisitions are ahead for the year despite a slump during the third quarter, as state-owned enterprises, which are the main Chinese buyers, and some private enterprises waited for a change in the country’s political leadership at the Communist Party Congress in mid-November. But now the Chinese buyers are back.
Two deals by Chinese companies were announced this week, and bankers and lawyers say that discussions are starting or are already under way on numerous other transactions. Many of those, however, may take as long as a year to complete given China’s bureaucratic approval processes.
“You will see an acceleration — you see it now,” although it would not amount to an immediate flood of transactions, said André Loesekrug-Pietri, the chairman and managing partner of A Capital, a Hong Kong-based private equity fund.
Indeed, Beijing is pushing for additional deals, and has encouraged the state-controlled banking sector to finance them.
“An increase in overseas investment by Chinese companies is an inevitable trend,” the commerce minister, Chen Deming, said at a conference two weeks ago, adding that China did not want to remain overwhelmingly invested in fixed-income securities.
“With foreign reserves of $3 trillion in hand,” he added, “we will not sit back and watch the assets depreciate with the third round of quantitative easing. We must inject it into the real economy and make our contribution to global prosperity.”
Wanxiang Group agreed on Sunday to pay $256 million to buy most of A123 Systems, a bankrupt manufacturer of high-tech batteries. And a consortium of Chinese investors agreed on the same day to pay $4.2 billion for a controlling stake in the American International Group’s aircraft leasing business.
On Friday, Canada approved the $15 billion acquisition of Nexen, an energy company, by the China National Offshore Oil Corporation, or Cnooc. That deal is still pending approval by the American committee that reviews foreign investments on national security grounds, commonly known as Cfius.
A few deals may be completed this winter, but the real surge is likely to happen by next summer, bankers and lawyers said. State-owned enterprises account for as much as four-fifths of China’s overseas acquisitions by value and many of their top executives are expected to change jobs this winter as the country’s new leaders start promoting their followers.
While the Communist Party Congress in November produced a new Politburo, a new slate of government ministers and vice premiers must still be selected at the National People’s Congress in March, a process that could also slow down deals.
Chinese regulations further require that at least three different agencies approve each overseas acquisition — the Ministry of Commerce, the National Development and Reform Commission and the State Administration of Exchange Control. The assent of a fourth, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, is needed to qualify for extra financing and faster approval in certain sectors deemed strategic, like clean energy, said Mao Tong, a partner at the law firm Squire Sanders.
But despite the long lead time for Chinese deals, bankers say the process is clearly starting.
Two of the biggest deals by Chinese companies this year were for control of North American companies. The bid for the A.I.G. business, the International Lease Finance Corporation, or I.L.F.C., is the biggest takeover by Chinese entities on record, according to data from Thomson Reuters.
The roots of that transaction were planted last fall. Members of China’s new government wanted to show the country’s seriousness in pursuing investments outside of China, and spent time assembling the most fitting consortium to pursue a deal for the business.
The government chose as the face of the deal Weng Xianding, a veteran of China’s financial regulatory agencies who has turned to investing. His company, New China Trust, is essentially a major Chinese commercial lender, counting Western firms like Barclays among its investors.
Once the preferred consortium was formed around September, it began talking with A.I.G., with many of the details being negotiated between Mr. Weng and the American insurer’s chief executive, Robert H. Benmosche. A goal for the Chinese, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said, was to conduct the talks in a “Western way,” using Western advisers and not getting bogged down in traditional bureaucratic mire.
The talks were completed in just over three months, and the buyers successfully negotiated a discount of nearly half of I.L.F.C.’s book value.
Two evolving trends are apparent in Chinese international deal making, Chinese government officials, bankers, lawyers and trade experts said in interviews.
The government is putting heavy pressure on Chinese companies to seek minority stakes, and not to automatically seek full control, so as to tap foreign management expertise, two officials said. At the same time, Chinese companies are broadening their range of acquisition targets to include more industrial manufacturers and consumer brand companies, even as they maintain their interest in natural resources and financial services.
“I wouldn’t say there’s a desire to buy minority stakes, but I think there’s a greater acceptance that’s an appropriate thing to do,” said Michael S. Weiss, the head of China mergers and acquisitions at Morgan Stanley.
Other bankers said that one big obstacle to the purchase of minority stakes lay in the wariness of many foreign companies in accepting a Chinese partner — particularly since nearly four-fifths of Chinese acquirers are state-owned enterprises, and most of the rest tend to have Chinese government links.
Many of today’s buyers have drawn lessons from past failures and moved to assuage government regulators before striking deals. Cnooc, in particular, learned from its failed bid to buy the oil company Unocal seven years ago, and tried to apply those lessons in its pursuit of Nexen.
The Chinese company considered the deal in part because it believed that a takeover could win approval, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. While a big player in Canada’s energy community, Nexen was not one of the country’s iconic companies, heading off the sort of brutal fight that surrounded a takeover battle for Potash, the producer of an important fertilizing ingredient.
Cnooc hired an army of advisers, including lobbyists and public relations specialists, to press the point that a deal would only strengthen the Canadian energy company. And Cnooc was open about much of its financing, aiming to halt concerns that it was being financed cheaply by state-run banks.
Still, national security concerns could also slow some deals. Bankers and lawyers say that Cfius, which stands for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, can sometimes prove frustrating to would-be buyers. The group scrutinizes deals to ensure that they do not harm the country’s national security interests.
Unlike the process in Canada, where negotiations with the foreign investment watchdog are public, the Cfius review takes place largely behind closed doors, and buyers are not always told why deals are rejected.
A Treasury spokeswoman, Natalie Earnest, said in a statement: “As we consider foreign investments in the United States, of course, we have an obligation — like any country — to protect our national security, and that is the exclusive focus of Cfius.”
Michael R. Wessel, a Democratic appointee to the United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission, said that bipartisan concern was growing in Congress about the first of the Chinese deals to be announced this autumn, a $117.6 million acquisition of Complete Genomics, a company in Mountain View, Calif., that does DNA sequencing.
Mr. Wessel, who also advises the United Steelworkers union on trade issues, was also critical of the A.I.G. deal. He said that the Chinese government could pressure airlines to buy Chinese-made parts for their leases, and could eventually urge airlines to lease Chinese-made civilian airliners now being developed.
A spokesman for the buyers’ group said in a statement that I.L.F.C. already had one of the largest aircraft order books in aviation, with a commitment to purchase up to 279 Boeing and Airbus aircraft between now and 2020. “We will continue to add to this order book as we see opportunities in the marketplace based on the market appeal of the aircraft and the economics offered by the manufacturers,” he added.
Some would-be Chinese buyers have not fully considered how much work is needed to ensure that their investments will go through, advisers say.
“I think many Chinese companies in particular have not taken into account the need to be in touch with Washington policy makers about their needs,” said Nancy L. McLernon, the chief executive of the Organization for International Investment, a group that represents domestic subsidiaries of foreign companies. “Those who do, fare best.”
Keith Bradsher reported from Hong Kong, and Michael J. de la Merced from New York.
Stuart Isett for The New York Times
The upper deck of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner being assembled in Everett, Wash. The basic model, called the 787-8, can carry 210 to 250 passengers.
After years of delays in producing its much-anticipated 787 aircraft, Boeing seemed in recent months to be turning a corner, streamlining production and increasing the pace of deliveries.
But a pair of embarrassing problems last week revived concerns about the reliability of the plane, the first commercial aircraft to make extensive use of lightweight carbon composites that promise big fuel savings for airlines.
A United Airlines 787 flying from Houston to Newark was diverted to New Orleans last Tuesday after one of its six electric generators failed midflight. That same day, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered inspections of fuel line connectors on all 787s, warning of a risk of fuel leaks and fires.
Aviation experts cast these issues as minor hiccups and said it was typical for new planes to experience such problems, particularly in the first few years of production.
On Monday, an aerospace analyst, David E. Strauss of UBS, raised another concern — whether the cost of building the planes was coming down fast enough for individual plane sales to become profitable by early 2015, as Boeing has projected.
Boeing officials have said that the company will earn enough on subsequent sales to average a percentage profit in the low single digits on the first 1,100 planes, which includes deliveries into 2021. Company officials said late Monday that they remained confident in their projections.
But in a research report, Mr. Strauss said that Boeing’s costs did not appear to be declining rapidly enough for sales to turn profitable in 2015 and that the program could continue to spend $4 billion to $5 billion more than it gained in revenue over the next three years. Unless the company can bring down the costs more quickly as it gains experience in building the planes, Mr. Strauss wrote, Boeing may not begin to make a profit on each plane until 2021.
A lot is riding on the success of the 787 Dreamliner, a risky technological and commercial bet for Boeing, which is based in Chicago. The company has so far delivered 38 of the jets to eight airlines, including United Airlines, All Nippon Airways of Japan and Poland’s LOT. It has outlined ambitious plans to double its production rate to 10 planes a month by the end of 2013. It is also starting to build a stretched-out version and mulling an even larger one after that, to make the venture more profitable.
But with the combination of the problem on the United flight and the F.A.A. directive, “This was too much news about the 787 in one day,” said Addison Schonland, an aviation analyst and a partner at Airinsight.com. “But remember, it’s a brand-new airplane. When you start flying it around, you start discovering things. Over all, the number of hiccups has been fantastic.”
The basic model, called the 787-8, can carry 210 to 250 passengers about 8,000 nautical miles, the distance from New York to Singapore, and has a list price of $206.8 million. Early customers, however, are receiving big discounts to make up for the delays caused by a series of manufacturing problems. The first stretched version for 250 to 290 passengers, the 787-9, is listed at $243.6 million and could be ready in early 2014.
Mr. Strauss estimated that Boeing was recently spending $232 million to build each plane but charged customers, on average, only about half that.
Given Wall Street’s concerns, Boeing’s stock has been in limbo for more than three years, trading in a narrow range around $75 a share.
“Boeing has not had a major snafu on the 787 for over a year now, but we think most investors remain skeptical as to whether Boeing can keep this up,” Robert Stallard, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said in a note to clients last month.
Boeing has acknowledged that it outsourced too much of the work on the plane to suppliers who were willing, collectively, to cover billions of dollars of the development costs. Many parts needed reworking. That and other design changes forced the company to set up a separate line in Everett, Wash., to handle the extra work on the first 65 jets. It has also built a 787 plant in Charleston, S.C., with an entirely new work force.
Still, even with all of the headaches, the 787 has enabled Boeing to jump ahead of its European rival, Airbus, in exploiting the lightweight carbon composites. Half of the plane by weight is made with composites instead of aluminum and other metals. Airbus said last week that it had finished assembly on the first A350, its rival to the 787. Its entry into commercial service is not expected before the second half of 2014.
Passengers who have flown on 787s this year have raved about the experience, and the first airlines using them also seem satisfied.
United will begin using the 787 internationally in January, with flights from Houston to Lagos, Nigeria. “There is a tremendous amount of promise for customers preferring this airplane over others,” said Jeff Smisek, chief executive of United. “It still has a new-plane smell.”
Luke Bryan didn't want the American Country Awards to end.
He cleaned up during the fan-voted show, earning nine awards, including artist and album of the year. His smash hit "I Don't Want This Night To End" was named single and music video of the year.
Miranda Lambert took home the second most guitar trophies with three. Jason Aldean was named touring artist of the year. Carrie Underwood won female artist of the year, and a tearful Lauren Alaina won new artist of the year.
Bryan, Aldean, Keith Urban, Lady Antebellum and Trace Adkins with Lynyrd Skynrd were among the high-energy performances.
The third annual ACAs were held at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas Monday night.
___
Online: http://www.theACAs.com
___
Follow http://www.twitter.com/AP_Country for the latest country music news from The Associated Press.
Jessica Kourkounis for The New York Times
At William H. Ziegler Elementary in Northeast Philadelphia, students are getting acquainted with vegetables and healthy snacks.
PHILADELPHIA — After decades of rising childhood obesity rates, several American cities are reporting their first declines.
The trend has emerged in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, as well as smaller places like Anchorage, Alaska, and Kearney, Neb. The state of Mississippi has also registered a drop, but only among white students.
“It’s been nothing but bad news for 30 years, so the fact that we have any good news is a big story,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, the health commissioner in New York City, which reported a 5.5 percent decline in the number of obese schoolchildren from 2007 to 2011.
The drops are small, just 5 percent here in Philadelphia and 3 percent in Los Angeles. But experts say they are significant because they offer the first indication that the obesity epidemic, one of the nation’s most intractable health problems, may actually be reversing course.
The first dips — noted in a September report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation — were so surprising that some researchers did not believe them.
Deanna M. Hoelscher, a researcher at the University of Texas, who in 2010 recorded one of the earliest declines — among mostly poor Hispanic fourth graders in the El Paso area — did a double-take. “We reran the numbers a couple of times,” she said. “I kept saying, ‘Will you please check that again for me?’ ”
Researchers say they are not sure what is behind the declines. They may be an early sign of a national shift that is visible only in cities that routinely measure the height and weight of schoolchildren. The decline in Los Angeles, for instance, was for fifth, seventh and ninth graders — the grades that are measured each year — between 2005 and 2010. Nor is it clear whether the drops have more to do with fewer obese children entering school or currently enrolled children losing weight. But researchers note that declines occurred in cities that have had obesity reduction policies in place for a number of years.
Though obesity is now part of the national conversation, with aggressive advertising campaigns in major cities and a push by Michelle Obama, many scientists doubt that anti-obesity programs actually work. Individual efforts like one-time exercise programs have rarely produced results. Researchers say that it will take a broad set of policies applied systematically to effectively reverse the trend, a conclusion underscored by an Institute of Medicine report released in May.
Philadelphia has undertaken a broad assault on childhood obesity for years. Sugary drinks like sweetened iced tea, fruit punch and sports drinks started to disappear from school vending machines in 2004. A year later, new snack guidelines set calorie and fat limits, which reduced the size of snack foods like potato chips to single servings. By 2009, deep fryers were gone from cafeterias and whole milk had been replaced by one percent and skim.
Change has been slow. Schools made money on sugary drinks, and some set up rogue drink machines that had to be hunted down. Deep fat fryers, favored by school administrators who did not want to lose popular items like French fries, were unplugged only after Wayne T. Grasela, the head of food services for the school district, stopped buying oil to fill them.
But the message seems to be getting through, even if acting on it is daunting. Josh Monserrat, an eighth grader at John Welsh Elementary, uses words like “carbs,” and “portion size.” He is part of a student group that promotes healthy eating. He has even dressed as an orange to try to get other children to eat better. Still, he struggles with his own weight. He is 5-foot-3 but weighed nearly 200 pounds at his last doctor’s visit.
“I was thinking, ‘Wow, I’m obese for my age,’ ” said Josh, who is 13. “I set a goal for myself to lose 50 pounds.”
Nationally, about 17 percent of children under 20 are obese, or about 12.5 million people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which defines childhood obesity as a body mass index at or above the 95th percentile for children of the same age and sex. That rate, which has tripled since 1980, has leveled off in recent years but has remained at historical highs, and public health experts warn that it could bring long-term health risks.
Obese children are more likely to be obese as adults, creating a higher risk of heart disease and stroke. The American Cancer Society says that being overweight or obese is the culprit in one of seven cancer deaths. Diabetes in children is up by a fifth since 2000, according to federal data.
“I’m deeply worried about it,” said Francis S. Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, who added that obesity is “almost certain to result in a serious downturn in longevity based on the risks people are taking on.”
Stuart Isett for The New York Times
The upper deck of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner being assembled in Everett, Wash. The basic model, called the 787-8, can carry 210 to 250 passengers.
After years of delays in producing its much-anticipated 787 aircraft, Boeing seemed in recent months to be turning a corner, streamlining production and increasing the pace of deliveries.
But a pair of embarrassing problems last week revived concerns about the reliability of the plane, the first commercial aircraft to make extensive use of lightweight carbon composites that promise big fuel savings for airlines.
A United Airlines 787 flying from Houston to Newark was diverted to New Orleans last Tuesday after one of its six electric generators failed midflight. That same day, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered inspections of fuel line connectors on all 787s, warning of a risk of fuel leaks and fires.
Aviation experts cast these issues as minor hiccups and said it was typical for new planes to experience such problems, particularly in the first few years of production.
On Monday, an aerospace analyst, David E. Strauss of UBS, raised another concern — whether the cost of building the planes was coming down fast enough for individual plane sales to become profitable by early 2015, as Boeing has projected.
Boeing officials have said that the company will earn enough on subsequent sales to average a percentage profit in the low single digits on the first 1,100 planes, which includes deliveries into 2021. Company officials said late Monday that they remained confident in their projections.
But in a research report, Mr. Strauss said that Boeing’s costs did not appear to be declining rapidly enough for sales to turn profitable in 2015 and that the program could continue to spend $4 billion to $5 billion more than it gained in revenue over the next three years. Unless the company can bring down the costs more quickly as it gains experience in building the planes, Mr. Strauss wrote, Boeing may not begin to make a profit on each plane until 2021.
A lot is riding on the success of the 787 Dreamliner, a risky technological and commercial bet for Boeing, which is based in Chicago. The company has so far delivered 38 of the jets to eight airlines, including United Airlines, All Nippon Airways of Japan and Poland’s LOT. It has outlined ambitious plans to double its production rate to 10 planes a month by the end of 2013. It is also starting to build a stretched-out version and mulling an even larger one after that, to make the venture more profitable.
But with the combination of the problem on the United flight and the F.A.A. directive, “This was too much news about the 787 in one day,” said Addison Schonland, an aviation analyst and a partner at Airinsight.com. “But remember, it’s a brand-new airplane. When you start flying it around, you start discovering things. Over all, the number of hiccups has been fantastic.”
The basic model, called the 787-8, can carry 210 to 250 passengers about 8,000 nautical miles, the distance from New York to Singapore, and has a list price of $206.8 million. Early customers, however, are receiving big discounts to make up for the delays caused by a series of manufacturing problems. The first stretched version for 250 to 290 passengers, the 787-9, is listed at $243.6 million and could be ready in early 2014.
Mr. Strauss estimated that Boeing was recently spending $232 million to build each plane but charged customers, on average, only about half that.
Given Wall Street’s concerns, Boeing’s stock has been in limbo for more than three years, trading in a narrow range around $75 a share.
“Boeing has not had a major snafu on the 787 for over a year now, but we think most investors remain skeptical as to whether Boeing can keep this up,” Robert Stallard, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said in a note to clients last month.
Boeing has acknowledged that it outsourced too much of the work on the plane to suppliers who were willing, collectively, to cover billions of dollars of the development costs. Many parts needed reworking. That and other design changes forced the company to set up a separate line in Everett, Wash., to handle the extra work on the first 65 jets. It has also built a 787 plant in Charleston, S.C., with an entirely new work force.
Still, even with all of the headaches, the 787 has enabled Boeing to jump ahead of its European rival, Airbus, in exploiting the lightweight carbon composites. Half of the plane by weight is made with composites instead of aluminum and other metals. Airbus said last week that it had finished assembly on the first A350, its rival to the 787. Its entry into commercial service is not expected before the second half of 2014.
Passengers who have flown on 787s this year have raved about the experience, and the first airlines using them also seem satisfied.
United will begin using the 787 internationally in January, with flights from Houston to Lagos, Nigeria. “There is a tremendous amount of promise for customers preferring this airplane over others,” said Jeff Smisek, chief executive of United. “It still has a new-plane smell.”
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) — A Taliban bombing killed an Afghan provincial police chief and gunmen fatally shot an official in charge of women's affairs on Monday — the latest victims of a campaign targeting government officials across Afghanistan.
The police chief for Nimroz province was travelling home from neighboring Herat province when his vehicle struck a roadside bomb in the morning hours, said the chief's secretary Obaidullah, who only goes by one name.
The police chief, Gen. Mohammad Musa Rasouli, was seriously wounded and was rushed to the hospital, where he died of his wounds, said the secretary. Rasouli was returning to his job in Nimroz after a short break in Herat province, Obaidullah said.
Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi said the insurgency had been tracking Rasouli and had specifically targeted him.
"We are continuing to target government officials," Ahmadi said.
Also Monday morning, gunmen shot and killed the head of the women's affairs department for the eastern Laghman province, said Sarhadi Zewak, a spokesman for the provincial government.
Najia Sediqi was on her way to the office from her home on the outskirts of the provincial capital when she was attacked, Zewak said. She had taken the job after her predecessor, Anifa Safi, died in a bomb attack in July.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for Sediqi's killing. Police are investigating the incident, Zewak said. A statement from Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the killing of Sediqi as a "terrorist attack."
The latest attacks come after the attempted assassination of the country's spy chief, Asadullah Khalid, on Thursday. He was seriously injured when a suicide bomber posing as a Taliban peace envoy detonated a hidden bomb.
In the Afghan capital, Kabul, about 200 women marched Monday, carrying pictures of victims of war crimes for which they said the perpetrators have never been brought to justice. They called on the Afghan government to prosecute those accused of war crimes during more than 30 years of conflict in the country.
In the south, meanwhile, a NATO service member was killed in a bomb attack, the international military alliance said. The death brings to five the number of international service members killed so far this month.
___
Associated Press Writer Rahim Faiez contributed to this report from Kabul.
As Syria‘s rebels work to overthrow the tank-equipped Assad regime, they’ve learned that it helps to have tanks of their own. They deserve bonus points for integrating video game technology. This is no exaggeration. Have a look at the opposition forces’ “100 percent made in Syria” armored vehicle, the Sham II.
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Named for ancient Syria and assembled out of spare parts over the course of a month, the Sham II sort of rough around the edges, but it’s got impressive guts. It rides on the chassis of an old diesel car and is fully encased in light steel that’s rusted from the elements. Five cameras are mounted around the tanks outside, and there’s a machine gun mounted on a turning turret. Inside, it kind of looks like a man cave. A couple of flat screen TVs are mounted on opposite walls. The driver sits in front of one, controlling the vehicle with a steering wheel, and the gunner sits at the other, aiming the machine gun with a Playstation controller.
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Sham II is heading up to the devastated city of Aleppo to join the combat forces there. Meanwhile, rebel forces continue to close in on Damascus and Assad’s shrinking regime. Diplomats have already begun to speculate about what the Syrian president’s next move would be. We do know that Assad has been exploring the option of seeking political asylum in the Middle East or in Latin American. However, it looks more likely that Assad and his cronies will retreat to the Alawite-controlled mountains on Syria’s Mediterranean coast. The only other alternative — chemical weapons attack notwithstanding — would be for Assad to stay in the palace and fight to the end. And can you imagine standing helpless as a fierce machine like Sham II roared up the palace steps? Run, Bashar. Run.
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Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News
MONTERREY, Mexico (AP) — Mexico's music world mourned Jenni Rivera, the U.S.-born singer presumed killed in a plane crash whose soulful voice and openness about her personal troubles had made her a Mexican-American superstar.
Authorities have not confirmed her death, but Rivera's relatives in the U.S. say they have few doubts that she was on the Learjet 25 that disintegrated on impact Sunday in rugged territory in Nuevo Leon state in northern Mexico.
"My son Lupillo told me that effectively it was Jenni's plane that crashed and that everyone on board died," her father, Pedro Rivera told dozens of reporters gathered in front of his Los Angeles-area home. "I believe my daughter's body is unrecognizable."
He said that his son would fly to Monterrey early Monday to identify her presumed remains
Messages of condolence poured in from fellow musicians and celebrities.
Mexican songstress and actress Lucero wrote on her Twitter account: "What terrible news! Rest in peace ... My deepest condolences for her family and friends." Rivera's colleague on the Mexican show "The Voice of Mexico," pop star Paulina Rubio, said on her Twitter account: "My friend! Why? There is no consolation. God, please help me!"
Born in Long Beach, California, Rivera was at the peak of her career as perhaps the most successful female singer in grupero, a male-dominated regional style influenced by the norteno, cumbia and ranchero styles.
A 43-year-old mother of five children and grandmother of two, the woman known as the "Diva de la Banda" was known for her frank talk about her struggles to give a good life to her children despite a series of setbacks.
She was recently divorced from her third husband, was once detained at a Mexico City airport with tens of thousands of dollars in cash, and she publicly apologized after her brother assaulted a drunken fan who verbally attacked her in 2011.
Her openness about her personal troubles endeared her to millions in the U.S. and Mexico.
"I am the same as the public, as my fans," she told The Associated Press in an interview last March.
Rivera sold 15 million records, and recently won two Billboard Mexican Music Awards: Female Artist of the Year and Banda Album of the Year for "Joyas prestadas: Banda." She was nominated for Latin Grammys in 2002, 2008 and 2011.
Transportation and Communications Minister Gerardo Ruiz Esparza said "everything points toward" the wreckage belonging to the plane carrying Rivera and six other people to Toluca, outside Mexico City, from Monterrey, where the singer had just given a concert.
"There is nothing recognizable, neither material nor human" in the wreckage found in the state of Nuevo Leon, Ruiz Esparza said. The impact was so powerful that the remains of the plane "are scattered over an area of 250 to 300 meters. It is almost unrecognizable."
A mangled California driver's license with Rivera's name and picture was found in the crash site debris.
No cause was given for the plane's crash, but its wreckage was found near the town of Iturbide in Mexico's Sierra Madre Oriental, where the terrain is very rough.
The Learjet 25, number N345MC, took off from Monterrey at 3:30 a.m. local time and was reported missing about 10 minutes later. It was registered to Starwood Management of Las Vegas, Nevada, according to FAA records. It was built in 1969 and had a current registration through 2015.
Also believed aboard the plane were her publicist, Arturo Rivera, her lawyer, makeup artist and the flight crew.
Though drug trafficking was the theme of some of her songs, she was not considered a singer of "narco corridos," or ballads glorifying drug lords like other groups, such as Los Tigres del Norte. She was better known for singing about her troubles in love and disdain for men.
Her parents were Mexicans who had migrated to the United States. Two of her five brothers, Lupillo and Juan Rivera, are also well-known singers of grupero music.
She studied business administration and formally debuted on the music scene in 1995 with the release of her album "Chacalosa". Due to its success, she recorded two more independent albums, "We Are Rivera" and "Farewell to Selena," a tribute album to slain singer Selena that helped expand her following.
At the end of the 1990s, Rivera was signed by Sony Music and released two more albums. But widespread success came for her when she joined Fonovisa and released her 2005 album titled "Partier, Rebellious and Daring."
Besides being a singer, she is also a businesswoman and actress, appearing in the indie film Filly Brown, which was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, as the incarcerated mother of Filly Brown.
She was filming the third season of "I love Jenni," which followed her as she shared special moments with her children and as she toured through Mexico and the United States. She also has the reality shows: "Jenni Rivera Presents: Chiquis and Raq-C" and her daughter's "Chiquis 'n Control."
In 2009, she was detained at the Mexico City airport when she declared $20,000 in cash but was really carrying $52,167. She was taken into custody. She said it was an innocent mistake and authorities gave her the benefit of the doubt and released her.
In 2011, her brother Juan assaulted a drunken fan at a popular fair in Guanajuato. In the face of heavy criticism among her fans and on social networks, Rivera publicly apologized for the incident during a concert in Mexico City, telling her fans: "Thank you for accepting me as I am, with my virtues and defects."
On Saturday night, Rivera had given a concert before thousands of fans in Monterrey. After the concert she gave a press conference during which she spoke of her emotional state following her recent divorce from former Major League Baseball pitcher Esteban Loaiza, who played for teams including the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers.
"I can't get caught up in the negative because that destroys you. Perhaps trying to move away from my problems and focus on the positive is the best I can do. I am a woman like any other and ugly things happen to me like any other woman," she said Saturday night. "The number of times I have fallen down is the number of times I have gotten up."
Rivera had announced in October that she was divorcing Loaiza after two years of marriage.
There have been several high-profile crashes involving Learjets, known as swift, longer-distance passenger aircraft popular with corporate executives, entertainers and government officials.
A Learjet carrying pro-golfer Payne Stewart and five others crashed in northeastern South Dakota in 1999. Investigators said the plane lost cabin pressure and all on board died after losing consciousness for lack of oxygen. The aircraft flew for several hours on autopilot before running out of fuel and crashing in a corn field.
Former Blink 182 drummer Travis Barker was severely injured in a 2008 Learjet crash in South Carolina that killed four people.
That same year, a Learjet slammed into rush-hour traffic in a posh Mexico City neighborhood, killing Mexico's No. 2 government official, Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino, and eight others on the plane, plus five people on the ground.
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Associated Press Writer Galia Garcia-Palafox and Olga R. Rodriguez contributed to this report from Mexico City.
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