Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/178437467?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Saturday, December 24, 2011
Friday, December 23, 2011
Holiday showdown over payroll tax tests Obama, GOP (AP)
WASHINGTON ? Stuck in a stalemate, President Barack Obama and his Republican rivals are slugging it out in Washington rather than reaching for a holiday season accord to prevent payroll taxes from going up on 160 million workers.
The tax increases, as well as cuts to Medicare doctors' fees and a lapse in jobless benefits, are due Jan. 1. They are looming even though the combatants agree that they shouldn't happen. Instead, the warring factions have painted themselves into a corner.
House Republicans are demanding that the Senate join negotiations to produce an agreement within days; Senate Democrats insist no talks will take place before the House approves a stopgap measure to buy more time.
A House vote Tuesday scuttled a bipartisan Senate deal for a two-month extension of all three policies: the payroll tax cuts, jobless benefits and Medicare fees.
After the House killed the Senate measure on a 229-193 vote, Obama signaled he'll use his presidential megaphone to try to force Republicans controlling the House into submission.
"Now let's be clear," Obama said at the White House. "The bipartisan compromise that was reached on Saturday is the only viable way to prevent a tax hike on Jan. 1. The only one."
The Obama campaign promptly took to Twitter and Facebook to fight it out. With their candidate's poll numbers rising, Democratic operatives seemed almost giddy at the prospect of a prolonged battle.
"The response was overwhelming," said a White House official requiring anonymity to discuss Obama's political efforts.
Republican lawmakers relished the battle as well, though some of them are too inexperienced to know that presidents ? regardless of party ? usually win such high-profile fights, like President Bill Clinton did over a 1995-96 government shutdown or President George W. Bush did in skirmishes on anti-terror policies.
House Republicans instead rallied around a plan passed last week that would have extended the payroll tax cut for one year. But that version also contained spending cuts opposed by Democrats and tighter rules for jobless benefits.
If legislation isn't passed by New Year's Day, payroll taxes will go up by almost $20 a week for a worker making a $50,000 salary. Almost 2 million people could lose unemployment benefits as well, and doctors would bear big cuts in Medicare payments.
Whatever the stakes, there was little indication that Republicans would get their wish for negotiations with the Senate any time soon. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., issued a statement saying he would be happy to resume talks on a yearlong measure ? "but not before" the House ratifies the two-month bill and sends it to Obama for his signature.
Given Obama's remarks and Reid's refusal to negotiate, it was unclear what leverage Republicans had in the year-end standoff. It appeared likely the partisan disagreement could easily persist past Christmas and into the final week of the year.
A little-noticed element of the brawl was that the House-Senate parliamentary situation, which can be a critical factor, is all messed up. The Senate adjourned Saturday until Jan. 23 except for so-called pro forma sessions in which legislative business ? like responding to the House moves ? is basically impossible unless all 100 senators agree. That's never a sure thing.
The standoff was sowing confusion among business executives, who were running out of time to adapt to any new payroll tax regimen. Even the Senate's proposed two-month extension was creating headaches because it contained a two-tiered system geared to ensuring that higher-income earners paid a higher rate on some of their wages, according to a trade group.
"There's not time enough to do that in an orderly fashion," said Pete A. Isberg, president of the National Payroll Reporting Consortium trade group. "We're two weeks away from 2012." He wrote a letter to congressional leaders this week warning that the Senate bill "could create substantial problems, confusion and costs."
Meanwhile, Medicare announced Tuesday that, as it has in the past when doctors' reimbursements have been cut through congressional inaction, it would withhold physicians' payments for two weeks in January to avoid passing on a 27 percent cut in Medicare fees. The hope is that the problem gets fixed by then.
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History of Republican Iowa Caucus Winners (ContributorNetwork)
The Republican Iowa caucus will be on Jan 3. As candidates prepare to face off and scramble for votes, a recent Rasmussen poll indicates Mitt Romney is in the lead. But the front-runner has changed each time a new poll has been released. Historically, the Republican Iowa caucus has helped determine the candidate who might win the nomination. Its importance stems from Iowa remaining the first state to hold a voting event for the future presidential nomination. But the history of the Iowa caucus winners reveals that predictions about GOP nominees are not always accurate.
1976 -- Gerald Ford
* Gerald Ford defeated Ronald Reagan with a slim margin in a straw poll.
* Ford received 264 votes, while Reagan received 248 votes, according to the Des Moines Register.
* The Republican Iowa caucus of 1976 did not provide detailed reports. Instead, a summary was made public.
* Ford won the Republican nomination but lost the election to Jimmy Carter.
1980 -- George Bush
* George H.W. Bush defeated Reagan and won the nomination with 31.6 percent of the vote, according to the Des Moines Register.
* Reagan received 29.5 percent, while Howard Baker had 15.3 percent and John Connally had 9.3 percent.
* Despite winning the caucus, Bush later ended his presidential campaign and joined Reagan's ticket. Bush became vice president after Reagan won the election against Carter. The 1980 Iowa caucus did not accurately predict the Republican nominee.
1988 -- Bob Dole
* Bob Dole defeated Pat Robertson and Bush with 37.4 percent and 40,661votes, according to the Des Moines Register. Robertson received 24.6 percent, while Bush had 18.6 percent.
* The caucus failed to predict the GOP nominee. Bush went on to win the Republican nomination and won the election. He selected Dan Quayle, who was not part of the Iowa caucus, as his vice president.
1996 -- Bob Dole
* Dole won the Republican Iowa caucus for the second time in 1996 with 26 percent of the vote, according to the Des Moines Register.
* Dole defeated Pat Buchanan, Lamar Alexander, Steve Forbes, Phil Gramm, Alan Keyes, Richard Lugar and Morry Taylor. In this case, the caucus accurately predicted the GOP nominee.
* Bill Clinton won the 1996 presidential election, while Dole returned to the U.S. Senate.
2000 -- George W. Bush
* George W. Bush faced five candidates at the 2000 Iowa caucus. He defeated the others with 41 percent and 35,231 votes, according to the Des Moines Register.
* Bush went on to win the GOP nomination and the 2000 election.
2008 -- Mike Huckabee
* Mike Huckabee won the 2008 Iowa caucus with 34.4 percent of the vote, according to the New York Times. Huckabee defeated Mitt Romney's 25.2 percent, Fred Thompson's 13.4 percent, John McCain's 13.1 percent, Ron Paul's 10 percent and Rudy Giuliani's 3.5 percent.
* The caucus was another example of a failure to predict the eventual nominee. McCain won the nomination after Huckabee conceded but lost to Barack Obama.
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Thursday, December 22, 2011
EU court upholds carbon trade plan for aviation (AP)
AMSTERDAM ? U.S. airlines failed Wednesday to block an EU law charging airlines flying to Europe for their carbon pollution. The decision by an EU court was widely hailed by environmentalists but the Fitch ratings agency said it raised the spector of a global trade dispute.
The European Court of Justice in Luxembourg dismissed arguments that imposing the European Union's cap-and-trade carbon credits program on flights to and from European airports infringes on national sovereignty or violates international aviation treaties. U.S. and other non-European airlines had sued the EU, arguing that they were exempt from the law.
Environmentalists called the law a first step in controlling carbon emissions in a key economic sector, and EU officials said they expected airlines to comply.
But Fitch Ratings said the decision could deepen rather than quell the dispute, raised in a lawsuit brought by the trade organization Airlines for America and several U.S. airlines and supported by China, India and other countries with international carriers.
"We believe threats of trade retaliation over the EU's cap-and-trade system will pose growing threats to aviation market access in both developed and emerging markets next year," Fitch said.
Retaliation could come in the form of slot allocations at airports and authorizing routes, especially in developing countries, Fitch said.
The U.S. airlines said the regulation was tantamount to "an exorbitant tax," but the EU said the added costs would amount to a few dollars per ticket and would open the way for efficient airlines to make money rather than lose it.
The carbon trading program, due to go into effect Jan. 1, is one of the widest-reaching measures adopted by any country or regional bloc to regulate emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for climate change. It aims to make airlines accountable for their carbon emissions, which contribute to global warming.
Although only 3 percent of total human-caused carbon emissions come from aircraft, aviation is the fastest-growing source of carbon pollution.
U.S. airlines most affected are United Continental, Delta and American Airlines, all of which derive more than 20 percent of global revenues from trans-Atlantic traffic, Fitch said.
The U.S. trade group said its members would comply with the EU directive "under protest," while reviewing legal options.
"Today's court decision further isolates the EU from the rest of the world and will keep in place a unilateral scheme that is counterproductive to concerted global action on aviation and climate change," Airlines for America said in a statement from Washington. "Today's decision does not mark the end of this case."
Under the scheme, each airline will be allocated pollution permits slightly less than its average historical emissions record. If it exceeds its limit, it can buy permits from other airlines that have emitted less than allowed and have leftover permits to sell. Emissions are counted for the entire route of an aircraft that touches down in Europe.
The intention is to induce airlines to emit less carbon by upgrading their fleets or becoming more efficient.
The International Air Transport Association voiced disappointment with the ruling, saying that "unilateral, extra-territorial and market distorting initiatives" like the EU's only make it harder to reach a deal through the International Civil Aviation Organization, the U.N. regulatory agency for airlines.
"What is needed now is for Europe to work with the rest of the world through ICAO to achieve a global solution," said IATA director general Tony Tyler.
The U.S. State Department echoed that sentiment.
"We're disappointed by the decision of the court," department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said. "What the EU has done is to do an end run around ICAO, rather than dealing with these issues there... We don't think it's helpful to circumvent the agreed multilateral forum for addressing these issues."
But the EU says it enacted the measure precisely because major airlines had blocked concrete steps in ICAO to rein in carbon emissions.
Connie Hedegaard, the European commissioner for climate action, said she was "satisfied" with the ruling and ready to work with the airlines on implementing it. All revenue derived by the EU from the program will go toward fighting climate change.
An organization of budget airlines, the European Low Fares Airline Association, welcomed the decision, which it said would force big carriers to follow the same rules as small airlines do on internal European flights. It said 80 percent of aviation emissions originate from long-distance routes.
The EU has calculated the cost to passengers will be minimal, ranging up to euro12 ($15.70) on a one-way trans-Atlantic flight. For many flights it will be a euro ($1.32) or two.
But the airlines are receiving most of their permits for free for the first transition years. If the full market price of emissions is passed on to consumers ? as happened with European utilities that received free permits ? the airlines will benefit from windfall profits.
Peter Liese, the German lawmaker who ushered the bill through Parliament, said airlines should be paying about 1 euro ($1.32) to fly to the U.S. east coast, and any airline charging substantially more is either trying to "fool the passenger" or has "a very old and dirty fleet."
The ruling by the 13 judges said the EU was within its rights to impose the scheme on commercial airlines that choose to operate at European airports, and thus fall under EU jurisdiction.
It also rejected the appeal that the measures violate the Open Skies treaty prohibition against unilateral taxation or discriminatory treatment. It said the cost to the airline is subject to an open market, from which it also may profit, and is not a tax. It also treats all flights equally, as long as they land or take off from one of the EU 27's nations.
The directive, enacted in EU law in 2008, aroused an international protest beyond those airlines that joined the lawsuit.
The U.S. House of Representatives passed a measure two months ago directing the transportation secretary to prohibit U.S. carriers from participating in the program if it is unilaterally imposed.
Last week, U.S. transport chief Ray LaHood and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton wrote to the EU commission reiterating Washington's objections on "legal and policy grounds," and said the U.S. would respond with "appropriate action." They did not elaborate.
China and India complained about the issue at the recent 194-nation U.N. climate conference in South Africa. The New Delhi government reportedly told Indian carriers to defy the directive by refusing to submit carbon emissions data to the EU.
But the EU said all major international carriers, including those behind the lawsuit, were among some 900 airlines that have applied for free permits, and that it anticipated full compliance with the law.
___
AP writers Slobodan Lekic and Matthew Lee contributed to this article.
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Monday, December 19, 2011
Zynga dips below IPO price (Reuters)
(Reuters) ? Zynga Inc shares opened as much as 10 percent above their offer price on Friday but then rolled back below the IPO price, showing that investors were still concerned about its dependence on Facebook and its growth prospects and that demand for hot tech IPOs may be waning.
In the opening minutes of trading on the Nasdaq the stock rose 10 percent to $11.00. But then they fall back and were down 1 percent at $9.90.
When asked about the price drop, CEO Mark Pincus said in an interview there were "no regrets."
"Our approach has always been to focus on the longterm," Pincus said. "We thought this was the right time to go public."
"We're going to focus on the products and business results we deliver in the next four to eight quarters and hope the stock market values and appreciates that as they see us deliver it," he added.
The company, which competes with Electronic Arts, sold 100 million shares of Class A common stock at $10 per share in the IPO, roughly 11 percent of its shares on a diluted basis, at the top end of the $8.50 to $10 indicative range.
Zynga wants to avoid what happened to Groupon Inc, another closely watched Internet IPO that rose on its first day of trading in November but slumped below its $20 issue price about three weeks later
Zynga's IPO had been highly anticipated because it is seen as a way for investors to get a slice of Facebook's growth before the social network itself goes public. About 95 percent of its revenue comes from Facebook, where it makes money from selling virtual items such as virtual jewelry and poker chips in its games.
Unlike Groupon, Zynga is profitable, but less than 3 percent of its players spend money on items in its free games.
At $1 billion in proceeds, Zynga's IPO would still be the largest from a U.S. Internet company since Google Inc raised $1.9 billion in 2004.
(Reporting By Liana B. Baker)
Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tech/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111216/wr_nm/us_zynga
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Sunday, December 18, 2011
Delve into the top ancient mysteries of the year
Peter Schmid / Lee Berger / Univ. of Wits.
The skeletal hand of an adult female Australopithecus sediba is nestled within a modern human hand. The analysis of the A. sediba bones led to what some experts called a "game-changing" view of evolution in 2011.
By Alan Boyle
Do archaeologists ever get tired of delving into ancient mysteries? One of my all-time favorite articles from The Onion is the one about the archaeologist who's fed up with "unearthing unspeakable ancient evils," but in real life,?you can't beat a good story about archaeology, paleontology?or paleoanthropology.
I'm?combining several?different scientific disciplines in?this end-of-year roundup of ancient mysteries. Archaeology has to do with studying?the peoples?of the past through an analysis?of the things they've left behind, ranging from the?bones of ?tzi the Iceman to?the pigeon nests built in a cave near Jerusalem. Paleontology is the branch of geology that focuses on the fossil record left behind by bygone organisms, including dinosaur dung.?And paleoanthropology focuses on our prehistoric ancestors and their relationships to other species.
It's been a busy year for archaeologists coping with the tumult that swept over Egypt and Libya ... for paleontologists debating where different species fit on the org chart for extinct organisms ... and for anthropologists analyzing how humans swapped DNA with heaven knows what other kinds of hominids. Here's a quick rundown, with?assists from the editors of Archaeology magazine and paleo-blogger?Brian Switek.
Archaeology
The top 10 discoveries of 2011, as rated by Archaeology, include revelations about these ancient mysteries:
I would add two late-breaking stories to the mix: one about the mysterious markings on the floor of an ancient complex in Jerusalem, and another about long-hidden 16-foot-wide pits in the ground near Stonehenge.
Paleontology
I asked Switek to help me sort through the year's top stories in paleontology, and he was kind enough to send this recap:
"Last year the big news was that paleontologists had restored the colors of two feathered dinosaurs. This year, there doesn't seem to be any major story that competes. But that's not to say that nothing significant happened in 2011. Here's a rundown of what I thought was interesting and important.
"Dinosaur growth: Over the past few years, paleontologists have been tussling over how many dinosaur species we have collected so far. The great Triceratops-Torosaurus debate of 2010 really brought this ongoing argument into focus, and there were several 2011 papers which continued the conversation. Early in the year paleontologist Andy Farke criticized the 'Torosaurus as Triceratops' hypothesis, and a reply to his reply has just appeared. Likewise, paleontologists suggested that the hadrosaur Anatotitan and the tyrannosaur Raptorex were really just growth stages of already-known dinosaurs (the latter being similar to Tarbosaurus, a juvenile of which was also described this year)." [Here's another take on the tussle over Triceratops.]
"Dinosaur senses: Two big papers - published at about the same time - probed dinosaur senses. One focused on smell, and the other vision. Studies like these represent our broadening understanding of dinosaur biology. It's not all about naming new species." [Learn more about the smell and night vision research]?
"Archaeopteryx: This year marked the 150th anniversary of when Archaeopteryx was discovered. The year has been full of ups and downs. Even though an 11th specimen of the feathered dinosaur was announced, a ballyhooed paper proposed that the creature was not an early bird but rather a non-avian dinosaur more distantly related to the first birds." [Here's more ballyhoo about the claim that Archaeopteryx wasn't a bird.]
"New species: New dinosaurs are named just about every week, but there were at least two that caught my eye. One was Brontomerus - a sauropod whose name translates to "thunder thighs" - and Teratophoneus, a short-snouted tyrannosaur. (I just realized that both were found in Utah, though, so perhaps I have a bias for my adoptive state!)" [Learn more about "Thunder Thighs"?as well as other?ancient wonders?in Utah.]?
"Other paleo: I usually don't cover the really big stories - I like to root around for tales no one is telling - but a few studies from this year got my attention."
? Plesiosaurs gave birth to live young
? Marsupial "wolf" hunted more like a cat
? Late-surviving predator was similar to those that swam the Cambrian
? Earliest saber-toothed herbivore found
? Ammonoids trapped parasites in pearls
? Cache of fossil feathers found in amber
? Woolly and Columbian mammoths may have interbred
Paleoanthropology
To round out this big?list, here are a few of the tales of human ancestors that caught my eye over the past year:
That's more than?30 tales of ancient mysteries to ponder. Which ones do you find most intriguing, or are there other tales we've missed? Feel free to weigh in with your comments below.
Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Source: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/15/9478098-the-top-ancient-mysteries-of-2011
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NYC protesters scale fence at vacant lot (AP)
NEW YORK ? Dozens of Occupy Wall Street protesters were arrested Saturday after they scaled a chain-link fence or crawled under it to get to an Episcopal church-owned lot they want to use for a new camp site.
Protesters used a wooden ladder to scale the fence or lifted it from below while others cheered them on. A man wearing a Santa suit stood on the ladder among others, as they ignored red "Private Property" signs.
As officers made arrests, protesters shouted obscenities and hollered: "Make them catch you!" The group was inside the lot for a short time before being led out by police in single file through a space in the fence. About 50 people were arrested, police said.
"We're just trying to say that this country has gone in the wrong direction, and we need spaces that we can control and we can decide our future in, and that's what this is about," said David Suker, who was among those who scaled the fence.
Before the arrests, several hundred gathered in Duarte Square, a half-acre wedge of a park at the edge of Manhattan's Tribeca neighborhood and across the street from the vacant lot. They gathered partly to mark the three-month anniversary of the Occupy movement and partly to demand use of the lot, owned by Trinity Church.
After police cleared the protesters from the lot, about 200 people regrouped for a march on Seventh Avenue. Police began making arrests, tackling at least two people in the street and handcuffing them. When the protesters cleared the avenue, the crowd continued to march to Times Square under a heavy police presence.
The original Occupy Wall Street camp in Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan was shut down last month. Trinity is a Zuccotti Park neighbor that helped demonstrators assemble, and provided them shelter in the three months since the movement began. The day after authorities moved in and cleaned out Zuccotti Park, about a dozen protesters went to the vacant lot, clipped the fence at the church-owned property and were arrested, along with some journalists.
Since then, some Occupy protesters have launched a bid to gain the church's consent for them to use the space. Trinity's Rev. James H. Cooper said giving the protesters access to the lot would not be a safe or smart move.
"There are no facilities at the Canal Street lot. Demanding access and vandalizing the property by a determined few OWS protesters won't alter the fact that there are no basic elements to sustain an encampment," he wrote in a statement. "The health, safety and security problems posed by an encampment here, compounded by winter weather, would dwarf those experienced at Zuccotti Park."
On Friday, the top bishop of the Episcopal Church asked protesters not to trespass on the property. Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori warned it could result in "legal and police action."
Trinity Church dates back to the colonial era and was a refuge for relief workers after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack. A sculpture out front was made out of a giant sycamore tree destroyed on 9/11.
"I feel it is very much in keeping with the tradition over the years of Trinity to work with poor people, to help poor people," said Stephen Chinlund, 77, a retired Episcopalian priest and one of several at the square Saturday.
Chinlund held a sign that read: Trinity, hero of 9/11, be a hero again!"
___(equals)
Associated Press writer Cristian Salazar and broadcast newsperson Julie Walker contributed to this report.
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