Obama’s new political group to lure unlimited donations

In close consultation with President Obama, two of his top political strategists are designing an ambitious new organization funded by donations from wealthy individuals and corporations aimed at making political and legislative gains at the federal and state levels.

The fledgling Organizing for Action says it will be nonpartisan and steer clear of election activity. But the line between issue disputes and electoral politics can be a fuzzy one. The first of an expected wave of ads on gun control, for example, has targeted only Republicans. And OFA board member Jim Messina, who managed Obama’s reelection campaign, has been talking with Democratic Party leaders, including those responsible for success in the 2014 midterm elections.

Over the past month, Messina and Jon Carson, a leading strategist, have traveled the country meeting with members of the Obama 2012 National Finance Committee, who are being pressed back to work to find support for the new organization.

In huddles with Hollywood studio executives, California energy investors and Chicago business titans, they have suggested $500,000 as a target level for OFA bundlers and that top donors get invitations to quarterly OFA board meetings attended by the president.

The next step in converting Obama’s election apparatus to grass-roots lobbying is a “founders summit” March 13 that includes a $50,000-per-person meeting at the Jefferson hotel in Washington led by Messina and Carson. Those planning to attend said they hope the president will be part of the day’s agenda, though the White House and OFA declined to comment on that possibility.

A one-page memo accompanying the invitation lays out the goals of the new OFA: Building grass-roots support for Obama proposals on issues ranging from climate change to immigration reform to women’s health.

In addition, the memo says, the OFA will help “strengthen the progressive movement and train our next generation of leaders.”

It also promises to engage in “state-by-state fights” over issues such as “ballot access and marriage equality.”

Advocates for campaign finance reform see the organization’s goal of raising tens of millions of dollars as a new channel to allow wealthy individuals and corporations to seek favors from the administration. And they criticize Obama for abandoning reform rhetoric in favor of a group that can raise unlimited sums with limited transparency, the very circumstances he complained about publicly in 2010 when the Supreme Court granted corporations and unions the opportunity to contribute to groups seeking to influence elections.

Unlike political parties and other organizations set up to win elections, the OFA is not subject to federal election fundraising restrictions and disclosure requirements, meaning the public will have only limited opportunities to learn about its operations, including how revenue is collected and spent.

OFA officials say they have adopted a voluntary disclosure system that goes beyond that required by law and that will provide sufficient public review.

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MPs, businesses hope Budget will address cost of living, labour crunch

SINGAPORE: Ahead of the delivery of Singapore's Budget on Monday, cost of living and labour crunch are among some issues MPs and businesses hope will be addressed.

Several MPs Channel NewsAsia spoke to said that a key concern especially amongst the sandwiched class is the cost of living in the country.

As for the elderly residents, they are concerned about healthcare costs, said the MPs.

On their part, businesses are worried about the manpower crunch and over the past month, there have been several calls to ease the tightening of the foreign worker inflow.

The government has been calling on companies to make concerted efforts to improve their productivity levels.

Zainudin Nordin, chairman of Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) for Manpower, said: "When we look and talk about productivity, it sounds good. But how do we implement the productivity uplifting of our SMEs and companies? There needs to be a strong collaboration.

"When there is an intent on the part of the government to provide the resources in terms of consultancy and funds, there must also be a commitment and passion amongst the employers to see and understand that whenever they need to do more things, the first thing that must come to their mind is, 'how can I do more without employing more people?'. That is the direct question they have to ask themselves. Productivity is about doing more with lesser resources, that's the question.

"So, that should be the first question that comes to our mind, and when we need assistance from the government we should be able to come in and help in a much more concerted way.

"At the same time we also know the employees must also continue to ensure (they stay) relevant. So machinery, resources and employees must all be in tandem to do this. The partnership must be stronger."

Dr Lim Wee Kiak, chairman of GPC for Defence and Foreign Affairs, said: "We have received feedback as to the cost of childcare, cost of education and tuition, and these add a lot of stress to young parents. On top of that, they have to take care of their elderly parents. I think the key for that is the cost of healthcare.

"So within this Budget itself, I hope there will be some consideration for, especially the young and the old, and that will help the sandwiched class a lot."

Mr Baey Yam Keng, chairman of GPC for Culture, Community and Youth, said: "There has been some anticipation, because there has been a (budget) surplus. People know there is a surplus and people would look forward to investment in infrastructure. The gaps that we are seeing now in transport, housing, healthcare...people want to see their immediate frustrations being addressed...as well as the cost of living, these would be the key issues from residents.

"There is some apprehension over whether rentals will go up, if transport fares will go up.

"At the same time there are also residents operating their own businesses, the SMEs, who also have concerns about the manpower crunch, the cost of dong business and how they can continue to survive in this climate."

The Budget Statement will be delivered in Parliament by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam.

Channel NewsAsia will carry a special Budget programme from 3pm on Monday, together with Mr Tharman's speech live.

Budget 2013 will be tabled in Parliament against the backdrop of a 1.3 percent GDP growth for the entire 2012.

For 2013, the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) has forecast an economic growth of one to three percent.

MTI also revealed on Friday that labour productivity had fallen by 2.6 percent in 2012, a reversal from the growth of 1.3 per cent from the previous year.

The ministry said productivity also dropped by 2.5 per cent in the fourth quarter, the fifth consecutive quarter of decline.

It said the fall was broad-based, with manufacturing, construction and services all experiencing negative growth.

- CNA/ir

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300% rise in suspicious terror financing cases: Report

NEW DELHI: Over 1,400 instances of terror financing in country's economic channels were red-flagged by intelligence and security agencies last year, a latest report of the finance ministry says, marking a 300% jump in such suspicious transactions.

The Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), which functions under the ministry, has reported that it had received 1,444 reports during 2011-12 from agencies like the intelligence bureau, the Research and Analysis Wing and those in the economic domain and affiliated to the Income Tax and Customs departments.

The figure of such reports from these agencies stood at 428 during 2010-11, the agency says.

"The FIU also supports the efforts of domestic intelligence and law enforcement agencies against terror financing by providing information specifically requested by them, either by searching its database or by calling specific information from the reporting entities," the report says.

The FIU is the national agency responsible for receiving, analyzing and disseminating suspicious transaction reports (STRs) to security and anti-money laundering and tax evasion departments of the country.

The agency also reported a more than 100 per cent rise in the number of STRs received during 2011-12 as it collected a total of 69,224 such reports during this period as compared to 20,698 STRs during 2010-11.

The instances of reportage of fake currency in Indian banking channels are also on the rise, the FIU says.

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Elderly Abandoned at World's Largest Religious Festival

Every 12 years, the northern Indian city of Allahabad plays host to a vast gathering of Hindu pilgrims called the Maha Kumbh Mela. This year, Allahabad is expected to host an estimated 80 million pilgrims between January and March. (See Kumbh Mela: Pictures From the Hindu Holy Festival)

People come to Allahabad to wash away their sins in the sacred River Ganges. For many it's the realization of their life's goal, and they emerge feeling joyful and rejuvenated. But there is also a darker side to the world's largest religious gathering, as some take advantage of the swirling crowds to abandon elderly relatives.

"They wait for this Maha Kumbh because many people are there so nobody will know," said one human rights activist who has helped people in this predicament and who wished to remain anonymous. "Old people have become useless, they don't want to look after them, so they leave them and go."

Anshu Malviya, an Allahabad-based social worker, confirmed that both men and women have been abandoned during the religious event, though it has happened more often to elderly widows. Numbers are hard to come by, since many people genuinely become separated from their groups in the crowd, and those who have been abandoned may not admit it. But Malviya estimates that dozens of people are deliberately abandoned during a Maha Kumbh Mela, at a very rough guess.

To a foreigner, it seems puzzling that these people are not capable of finding their own way home. Malviya smiles. "If you were Indian," he said, "you wouldn't be puzzled. Often they have never left their homes. They are not educated, they don't work. A lot of the time they don't even know which district their village is in."

Once the crowd disperses and the volunteer-run lost-and-found camps that provide temporary respite have packed away their tents, the abandoned elderly may have the option of entering a government-run shelter. Conditions are notoriously bad in these homes, however, and many prefer to remain on the streets, begging. Some gravitate to other holy cities such as Varanasi or Vrindavan where, if they're lucky, they are taken in by temples or charity-funded shelters.

In these cities, they join a much larger population, predominantly women, whose families no longer wish to support them, and who have been brought there because, in the Hindu religion, to die in these holy cities is to achieve moksha or Nirvana. Mohini Giri, a Delhi-based campaigner for women's rights and former chair of India's National Commission for Women, estimates that there are 10,000 such women in Varanasi and 16,000 in Vrindavan.

But even these women are just the tip of the iceberg, says economist Jean Drèze of the University of Allahabad, who has campaigned on social issues in India since 1979. "For one woman who has been explicitly parked in Vrindavan or Varanasi, there are a thousand or ten thousand who are living next door to their sons and are as good as abandoned, literally kept on a starvation diet," he said.

According to the Hindu ideal, a woman should be looked after until the end of her life by her male relatives—with responsibility for her shifting from her father to her husband to her son. But Martha Chen, a lecturer in public policy at Harvard University who published a study of widows in India in 2001, found that the reality was often very different.

Chen's survey of 562 widows of different ages revealed that about half of them were supporting themselves in households that did not include an adult male—either living alone, or with young children or other single women. Many of those who did live with their families reported harassment or even violence.

According to Drèze, the situation hasn't changed since Chen's study, despite the economic growth that has taken place in India, because widows remain vulnerable due to their lack of education and employment. In 2010, the World Bank reported that only 29 percent of the Indian workforce was female. Moreover, despite changes in the law designed to protect women's rights to property, in practice sons predominantly inherit from their parents—leaving women eternally dependent on men. In a country where 37 percent of the population still lives below the poverty line, elderly dependent relatives fall low on many people's lists of priorities.

This bleak picture is all too familiar to Devshran Singh, who oversees the Durga Kund old people's home in Varanasi. People don't pay toward the upkeep of their relatives, he said, and they rarely visit. In one case, a doctor brought an old woman to Durga Kund claiming she had been abandoned. After he had gone, the woman revealed that the doctor was her son. "In modern life," said Singh, "people don't have time for their elderly."

Drèze is currently campaigning for pensions for the elderly, including widows. Giri is working to make more women aware of their rights. And most experts agree that education, which is increasingly accessible to girls in India, will help improve women's plight. "Education is a big force of social change," said Drèze. "There's no doubt about that."

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Las Vegas Strip Shooting Suspect ID'd

Las Vegas police identified a suspect today in a shooting on the strip that caused a Maserati to hit a taxi and burst into flames, killing three people.

Ammar Harris, 26, has been named a suspect in the Thursday skirmish that killed three people, including rapper Kenny Clutch.

The altercation between Harris and Clutch, 27, whose legal name was Kenneth Cherry Jr., is believed to have originated in the valet area of a Las Vegas hotel, police said.

Police said Harris fired several rounds into a Maserati that was being driven by Cherry as both vehicles continued northbound on glitzy Las Vegas Boulevard.

The rapper's expensive sports car careened out of control after he was shot, slamming into several cars, including a taxi. The impact caused the cab to burst into flames, killing the driver, Michael Boldon and a female passenger. Witnesses said it looked like the car exploded.

"He was a number one guy," Carolyn Jean Trimble, Boldon's sister, told ABC News.

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"I looked out my window and I could see one vehicle down here on the corner of the intersection totally engulfed in flames," witness John Lamb told ABC News.

Boldon, 62, and his passenger, who has not yet been identified, were both killed, as was Clutch.

Timble said her brother loved driving his taxi around Vegas.

"He came to live with me in Las Vegas last year to help take care of our mother, and the first day he got here he said, 'I have to get a job.' The second day, I came home from work, and he said he got a job," she recalled.

"He says, 'You'll never guess what it is,' and I said, 'what,' and he said, 'taxi cab driver,' and we both fell out laughing," Trimble said. "He loved that job. He never complained. He'd come home and tell me stories about what happened, who he picked up."

Boldon was a single father who raised a 36-year-old son and was a new grandfather. His grandson was named after him, Trimble said.

"Of all the people to take from this earth," she said. "But I guess the Lord needed him."

A passenger in the Maserati was hit and sustained only a minor injury to his arm. Clutch died at University Medical Center.

His father, Kenneth Cherry Sr., expressed his grief for the loss of his son while speaking with ABC News.

"This is something you never really, really ever want to experience as a parent, to lose a child before you go," he said.

Harris is described as 5-foot-11 and 180 pounds. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Las Vegas Metro Police Department's homicide division.

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White House warns of flight delays if sequester is not averted

Hundreds of air traffic control towers could be closed and travelers could expect lengthy flight delays beginning in April, the White House warned Friday in its latest bid to raise public alarm over the mandatory spending cuts set to kick in next week.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood vowed that airline security would not be compromised, but he emphasized that the Federal Aviation Administration would have no alternative but to furlough thousands of employees as it seeks to slash $600 million.

LaHood’s surprise appearance in the White House briefing room aimed to put a spotlight on the real-world consequences of the political standoff over the across-the-board spending cuts, known as the sequester that will take effect next Friday.

Even as LaHood painted a dire picture, a Pew Research Center/USA Today poll released Thursday shows that most Americans have heard little to nothing about the potential cuts. Only 27 percent said they had heard “a lot” about them.

The White House has sought to change that this week with a public relations campaign that included President Obama’s appearance Tuesday with emergency medical workers and an announcement by the Pentagon that it would furlough up to 800,000 civilian employees one day a week.

But it was the specter of widespread travel delays — up to 90 minutes during peak flight periods — that the White House hoped would rally public opinion and put pressure on Republican lawmakers.

“Your phones are going to start ringing off the hook when these people are delayed at airports,” said LaHood, a former GOP congressman from Illinois. “Nobody likes a delay. Nobody likes waiting in line.”

The sequester was put into motion by the August 2011 debt-ceiling deal, and there have been few signs of progress in negotiations to avert them. Obama has proposed a mix of budget cuts and new revenue through closing corporate loopholes, but Republicans have said they will not raise taxes and instead have pushed to cut federal health spending.

During a photo op in the Oval Office after a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the president said Friday that the impact of the budget cuts would slow growth in an already soft economy.

“It also means that we are not going to be driving down unemployment as quickly as we should,” Obama said. He added that his fellow world leaders understand that drastic budget cuts are the “wrong prescription” for the U.S. economy.

“I don’t need to persuade world leaders of that,” Obama said. “I’ve got to persuade member of Congress, and that can be harder sometimes.”

House Republicans continued to blame Obama for the sequester, which the White House proposed in 2011 and Congress approved.

Several Republicans who serve as leaders on transportation policy released a statement Friday accusing the administration of exaggerating the impact of the scheduled cuts on air travel.

“We are disappointed by the Administration creating alarm about sequestration’s impact on aviation,” said the statement from Sen. John Thune (S.D.) and Reps. Bill Shuster (Pa.) and Frank A. LoBiondo (N.J.). “Before jumping to the conclusion that furloughs must be implemented, the Administration and the agency need to sharpen their pencils and consider all the options. Prematurely outlining the potential impacts before identifying other savings is not helpful.”

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China reports second fatal case of bird flu this year

BEIJING: A man in southwestern China has died of bird flu, health authorities said Saturday, becoming the second fatality from the H5N1 virus this year.

The 31-year-old died in hospital in the city of Guiyang on Friday, the Guizhou province health department said in a statement, adding that no other human cases of avian flu had been reported in the province.

Another city resident, a 21-year-old woman, died from the virus earlier this month.

The Xinhua news agency said both of them had come into close contact with birds but it was not known if the cases were related.

The H5N1 virus typically spreads from birds to humans through direct contact, but experts fear it could mutate into a form transmissible between humans with the potential to trigger a pandemic.

More than 365 people have died of bird flu globally since the virus re-emerged in 2003, according to the World Health Organization.

Its figures show that China saw 25 deadly cases of the virus between 2003 and 2009 before numbers tailed off to one fatality in each of the three following years. The deadliest year of the past decade in China saw eight deaths in 2006.

China is considered one of the nations most at risk from bird flu epidemics because it has the world's biggest poultry population and many chickens in rural areas are kept close to humans.

China has in the past been accused of covering up the extent of bird flu outbreaks, exacerbating fears when new cases are reported.

Separate outbreaks among birds were reported last year in the northern region of Ningxia and the remote northwestern region of Xinjiang, prompting massive culls of chickens.

- AFP/ir

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Polling begins in Meghalaya

SHILLONG: Polling began to elect 60 members to the ninth Meghalaya Assembly from among 345 candidates today with an electorate of 15.3 lakh.

Banned Khasi organisation, Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council, has called a 36-hour bandh from 6 PM yesterday till today in the seven districts of Khasi and Jaintia Hills region.

Prominent candidates in the fray are Chief Minister Mukul Sangma, Home Minister H D R Lyngdoh, Education Minister R C Laloo, Congress president D D Lapang, UDP president Don Kupar Roy, former Leader of Opposition and son of P A Sangma Conrad K Sangma and his brother James Sangma.

The Congress has put up candidates in all 60 seats, and ally United Democratic Party in 50.

Of the 15 parties in the fray, the P A Sangma-led National Peoples' Party is contesting at 32 seats, the NCP at 21 and the BJP in 13.

Among the candidates are 25 women. Of the 2,845 polling stations, 900 have been declared 'hyper-sensitive'.

Booths along the international border and the inter-state border with Assam have also been categorised as 'hyper-sensitive'.

The BSF, which has been put on maximum alert along the 498-km border, has deployed 10,000 personnel.

Ninety-one companies of central paramilitary forces have been deployed in the state to maintain law and order and 44 companies in the militant-hit Garo Hills region.

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Space Pictures This Week: Space Rose, Ghostly Horses

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  Space Rose

  Image courtesy T.A. Rector and H. Schweiker, UAA/WIYN/NOAO/NSF

  Planetary nebula Sh2-174 "blooms" like a rose in a picture released this week by the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO).

  Nebulae are created when low-mass stars shed their outer layers at the end of their lives. The core of the dying star, called a white dwarf, usually remains at the center of the nebula.

  But not so for the oddly positioned Sh2-174: Its white dwarf is located in the right part of the nebula, in the blue gas pictured above. (See more nebula pictures.)

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  











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  Universal Delivery

  Photograph courtesy NASA

  An unpiloted resupply vehicle snapped this picture as it approached the International Space Station this week.

  The vehicle provided the 34 crew members on board with essential supplies, including oxygen, water, spare parts, even logistics equipment—2.9 tons of supplies in all. (See pictures of early U.S. spaceflight.)

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  











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  Everglades of Europe

  Image courtesy Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon, EO-1/NASA/USGS

  The Danube cuts a jade path across part of the Danube Biosphere Reserve in the Ukraine on its way to the Black Sea in an image captured February 5 by NASA's Earth Observing-1 satellite.

  Europe's largest river, the Danube spans 309,447 square miles (801,463 square kilometers) and winds its way through 19 countries.

  Called the "Everglades of Europe," the Danube delta is home to more than 300 species of birds and 45 species of fish, according to NASA's Earth Observatory. (See more river pictures.)

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  











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  Bird's-Eye View

  Image by Maurizio Cabibbo, My Shot

  Photographer Maurizio Cabibbo submitted this picture of the chaotic center of the Cygnus, or Swan, constellation on February 11 to the National Geographic photo community My Shot.

  Resembling a swan flying across the night sky, Cygnus is easily seen in the summer in the Northern Hemisphere, according to NASA.

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  











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  Spirit Horses

  Photograph by Andre Erlich, Your Shot

  An aurora casts a ghostly glow over horses in northern Iceland in a picture submitted to National Geographic's My Shot photography community on February 18.

  Named after Aurora, the Roman goddess of dawn, the vivid beams of light from aurora borealis result from collisions between charged particles released from the sun's atmosphere and gaseous particles in Earth's atmosphere. (See more aurora pictures: "Solar Flare Sparks 'Snakes,' 'Spears.'")

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  











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  Image courtesy SDO/NASA

  Published February 22, 2013

  
  

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Great Energy Challenge Blog

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Cyberattacks Bring Attention to Security Reform

Recent accusations of a large-scale cyber crime effort by the Chinese government left many wondering what immediate steps the president and Congress are taking to prevent these attacks from happening again.

On Wednesday, the White House released the administration's Strategy on Mitigating the Theft of U.S. Trade Secrets as a follow-up to the president's executive order. The strategy did not outwardly mention China, but it implied U.S. government awareness of the problem.

"We are taking a whole of government approach to stop the theft of trade secrets by foreign competitors or foreign governments by any means -- cyber or otherwise," U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel said in a White House statement.

As of now, the administration's strategy is the first direct step in addressing cybersecurity, but in order for change to happen Congress needs to be involved. So far, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) is the most notable Congressional legislation addressing the problem, despite its past controversy.

Last April, CISPA was introduced by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, D-Md. The act would allow private companies with consumer information to voluntarily share those details with the NSA and the DOD in order to combat cyber attacks.

Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images

The companies would be protected from any liabilities if the information was somehow mishandled. This portion of the act sounded alarm bells for CISPA's opponents, like the ACLU, which worried that this provision would incentivize companies to share individuals' information with disregard.

CISPA passed in the House of Representatives, despite a veto threat from the White House stemming from similar privacy concerns. The bill then died in the Senate.

This year, CISPA was reintroduced the day after the State of the Union address during which the president declared an executive order targeting similar security concerns from a government standpoint.

In contrast to CISPA, the executive order would be initiated on the end of the government, and federal agencies would share relevant information regarding threats with private industries, rather than asking businesses to supply data details. All information shared by the government would be unclassified.

At the core of both the executive order and CISPA, U.S. businesses and the government would be encouraged to work together to combat cyber threats. However, each option would clearly take a different route to collaboration. The difference seems minimal, but has been the subject of legislative debates between the president and Congress for almost a year, until now.

"My response to the president's executive order is very positive," Ruppersberger told ABC News. "[The president] brought up how important information sharing is [and] by addressing critical infrastructure, he took care of another hurdle that we do not have to deal with."

Addressing privacy roadblocks, CISPA backers said the sharing of private customer information with the government, as long as personal details are stripped, is not unprecedented.

"Think of what we do with HIPAA in the medical professions; [doctors do not need to know] the individual person, just the symptoms to diagnose a disease," Michigan Gov. John Engler testified at a House Intelligence Committee hearing in an attempt to put the problem into context.

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Group releases list of 90 medical ‘don’ts’

Don’t use feeding tubes in patients with advanced dementia. Don’t use drugs to aggressively treat diabetes in those older than 65. Don’t automati­cally use imaging technology for minor head injuries in children and headaches in adults. And don’t give antacids to babies with reflux.

Those are among the 90 medical “don’ts” on a list being released Thursday by a coalition of doctor and consumer groups. They are trying to discourage the use of tests and treatments that have become common practice but may cause harm to patients or unnecessarily drive up the cost of health care.

It is the second set of recommendations from the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation’s “Choosing Wisely” campaign, which launched last year amid nationwide efforts to improve medical care in the United States while making it more affordable.

The recommendations run the gamut, from geriatrics to opthalmology to maternal health. Together, they are meant to convey the message that in medicine, “sometimes less is better,” said Daniel Wolfson, executive vice president of the foundation, which funded the effort.

“Sometimes, it’s easier [for a physician] to just order the test rather than to explain to the patient why the test is not necessary,” Wolfson said. But “this is a new era. People are looking at quality and safety and real outcomes in different ways.”

The guidelines were penned by more than a dozen medical professional organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Obstetricians and ­Gynecologists.

The groups discourage the use of antibiotics in a number of instances in which they are commonly prescribed, such as for sinus infections and pink eye. They caution against using certain sedatives in the elderly and cold medicines in the very young.

In some cases, studies show that the test or treatment is costly but does not improve the quality of care for the patient, according to the groups.

But in many cases, the groups contend, the intervention could cause pain, discomfort or even death. For example, feeding tubes are often used to provide sustenance to dementia patients who cannot feed themselves, even though oral feeding is more effective and humane. And CT scans that are commonly used when children suffer minor head trauma may expose them to cancer-causing radiation.

While the recommendations are aimed in large part at physicians, they are also designed to arm patients with more information in the exam room.

“If you’re a healthy person and you’re having a straightforward surgery, and you get a list of multiple tests you need to have, we want you to sit down and talk with your doctor about whether you need to do these things,” said John Santa, director of the health ratings center at Consumer Reports, which is part of the coalition that created the guidelines.

Health-care spending in the United States has reached 17.9 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product and continues to rise, despite efforts to contain costs. U.S. health-care spending grew 3.9 percent in 2011, reaching $2.7 trillion, according to the journal Health Affairs.

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Cricket: Hyderabad Test still on, says Australia chief

SYDNEY: Australia plan to play the second Test against India in Hyderabad as scheduled next week despite deadly bomb attacks in the city on the eve of the Test series opener, reports said on Friday.

The twin blasts on Thursday killed 14 people and wounded dozens more in a busy neighbourhood in the southern Indian city, raising questions over whether Australia would play the second Test starting on March 2.

But Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland told Fairfax newspapers the match was still on as planned as Australia prepared for the opening match in the four-Test series in Chennai starting later Friday.

"As far as I'm concerned we are playing the second Test in Hyderabad next week. That's where we are at," said Sutherland, who is with the team in Chennai.

Sutherland told Fairfax he was happy to continue to Hyderabad where the team is scheduled to arrive on Wednesday.

"We've got great confidence in the BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) and the relevant authorities here to be able to prepare as best as possible for whatever issues may change from day to day," he said.

"We're very comfortable with everything that has been done so far on this tour."

"We'll obviously take advice from relevant authorities and work with the BCCI and others here to make assessments around Hyderabad but at the same time plans have been in place for a long time," Sutherland said.

"At this stage I wouldn't be calling into question things going ahead in Hyderabad."

He added that team manager Gavin Dovey had sent players text messages overnight updating them on the blasts and that security had been stepped up.

Dozens of extra police reportedly surrounded the Chennai hotel where the Australian and Indian teams are staying.

Captain Michael Clarke said his players were focused on the Chennai game.

"From the team's point of view, our focus is wholly and solely on the field because we've got people off the field who are experts in what is going on. We'll be advised by them," he said.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with all the people of Hyderabad who have been affected."

Earlier, media reports raised doubts over the tour.

"Australia's cricket tour of India has been plunged into uncertainty," said the Herald-Sun newspaper, while the Sydney Morning Herald carried a headline "Hyderabad Test in doubt as bombings rock city".

Australia pulled out of a tour to Pakistan in 2008 over security concerns after a series of bombings in the troubled country. They also refused to play any matches in the 1996 World Cup in Sri Lanka after bombings there.

Cricket Australia, which said the safety of players was paramount, earlier said the tourists had received "no information to suggest there is any threat to the team" but that talks were ongoing.

The attacks targeted a Hindu district in the city, a hub of India's computing industry in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh, home to local offices of Google and Microsoft among other Western IT companies.

After the blasts, the Foreign Affairs Department in Canberra warned Australians following the tour in India that terror attacks could happen anywhere.

"We advise you to exercise a high degree of caution in India at this time because of the risk of terrorism, civil unrest, crime and vehicle accidents," the department said.

"Terrorist attacks could occur anywhere at any time in India with little or no warning," it said.

"Possible targets include public places in New Delhi, Mumbai and other major cities, and Indian security and political interests."

However, the overall level of advice for Australians in India has not changed, with the department recommending people exercise a high degree of caution.

No major international cricket has been played in Pakistan since a deadly attack on the Sri Lankan team bus by armed militants in Lahore in 2009.

- AFP/ck

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BJP calls for shutdown in Andhra Pradesh

HYDERABAD: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has called for a shutdown in Andhra Pradesh on Friday to condemn the twin bomb blasts, which killed 14 people and injured over 100.

The Bharatiya Janata Party today demanded the suspension of question hour and said that in the wake of the Hyderabad blasts there should be a discussion the the Parliament over terror.

BJP state president G Kishan Reddy appealed to all people to voluntarily observe the shutdown to protest the blasts and show their sympathies with the victims' families.

Talking to reporters, he said the state government failed to take steps to prevent the blasts despite warnings from the intelligence agencies. He demanded the government to act firmly against terrorists.

Police have stepped up security in the city and other major towns in view of the shutdown call and Friday prayers.

The Bharatiya Janata Party today demanded the suspension of question hour and said that in the wake of the Hyderabad blasts there should be a discussion the the Parliament over terror.

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Oldest Known Wild Bird Hatches Chick at 62

Wisdom, the oldest known wild bird, has yet another feather in her cap—a new chick.

The Laysan albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis)—62 years old at least—recently hatched a healthy baby in the U.S. Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, her sixth in a row and possibly the 35th of her lifetime, according to the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) North American Bird Banding Program. (Related: "51-Year-Old Albatross Breaks N. American Age Record [2003].")

But Wisdom's longevity would be unknown if it weren't for a longtime bird-banding project founded by USGS research wildlife biologist Chandler Robbins.

Now 94, Robbins was the first scientist to band Wisdom in 1956, who at the time was "just another nesting bird," he said. Over the next ten years, Robbins banded tens of thousands of black-footed albatrosses (Phoebastria nigripes) and Laysan albatrosses as part of a project to study the behavior of the large seabirds, which at the time were colliding with U.S. Navy aircraft.

Robbins didn't return to the tiny Pacific island—now part of the U.S. Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument—until 2002, when he "recaptured as many birds as I could in hopes that some of them would be the old-timers."

Indeed, Robbins did recapture Wisdom—but he didn't know it until he got back to his office at the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel, Maryland, and checked her band number in the database.

"That was real exciting, because we didn't think the chances of finding one that old would be that good," Robbins said Wednesday in an interview from his office at the Patuxent center, where he still works.

Chandler Robbins counts birds in Maryland's Patuxent Research Refuge.

Photograph by David H. Wells, Corbis

Albatrosses No Bird Brains

Bigger birds such as the albatross generally live longer than smaller ones: The oldest bird in the Guinness Book of Animal Records, a Siberian white crane (Leucogeranus leucogeranus), lived an unconfirmed 82 years. Captive parrots are known to live into their 80s. (See National Geographic's bird pictures.)

The Laysan albatross spends most of the year at sea, nesting on the Midway Atoll (map) in the colder months. Birds start nesting around five years of age, which is how scientists knew that Wisdom was at least five years old in 1956.

Because albatrosses defend their nests, banding them doesn't require a net or a trap as in the case of other bird species, Robbins said—but they're far from tame.

"They've got a long, sharp bill and long, sharp claws—they could do a job on you if you're not careful how to handle them," said Robbins, who estimates he's banded a hundred thousand birds.

For instance, "when you're not looking, the black-footed albatross will sneak up from behind and bite you in the seat of the pants."

But Robbins has a fondness for albatrosses, and Wisdom in particular, especially considering the new dangers that these birds face.

Navy planes are no longer a problem—albatross nesting dunes were moved farther from the runway—but the birds can ingest floating bits of plastic that now inundate parts of the Pacific, get hooked in longlines meant for fish, and be poisoned by lead paint that's still on some of Midway Atoll's buildings. (Also see "Birds in 'Big Trouble' Due to Drugs, Fishing, More.")

That Wisdom survived so many years avoiding all those hazards and is still raising young is quite extraordinary, Robbins said.

"Those birds have a tremendous amount of knowledge in their little skulls."

"Simply Incredible"

Wisdom's accomplishments have caught the attention of other scientists, in particular Sylvia Earle, an oceanographer and National Geographic Explorer in Residence, who said by email that Wisdom is a "symbol of hope for the ocean." (National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society.)

Earle visited Wisdom at her nest in January 2012, where she "appeared serenely indifferent to our presence," Earle wrote in the fall 2012 issue of the Virginia Quarterly Review.

"I marveled at the perils she had survived during six decades, including the first ten or so years before she found a lifetime mate. She learned to fly and navigate over thousands of miles to secure enough small fish and squid to sustain herself, and every other year or so, find her way back to the tiny island and small patch of grass where a voraciously hungry chick waited for special delivery meals."

Indeed, Wisdom has logged an estimated two to three million miles since 1956—or four to six trips from Earth to the moon and back, according to the USGS. (Related: "Albatross's Effortless Flight Decoded—May Influence Future Planes.")

Bruce Peterjohn, chief of the North American Bird Banding Program, called Wisdom's story "simply incredible."

"If she were human, she would be eligible for Medicare in a couple years—yet she is still regularly raising young and annually circumnavigating the Pacific Ocean," he said in a statement.

Bird's-Eye View

As for Robbins, he said he'd "love to get out to Midway again." But in the meantime, he's busy going through thousands of bird records in an effort to trace their life histories.

There's much more to learn: For instance, no one has ever succeeded in putting a radio transmitter on an albatross to follow it throughout its entire life-span, Robbins noted.

"It would be [an] exciting project for someone to undertake, but I'm 94 years old," he said, chuckling. "It wouldn't do much for me to start a project at my age."

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Arias Challenged On Pedophilia Claim

Accused murderer Jodi Arias was challenged today by phone records, text message records, and her own diary entries that appeared to contradict her claim that she caught her ex-boyfriend, Travis Alexander, looking at pictures of naked boys.

Arias had said during her testimony that one afternoon in January 2008, she walked in on Alexander masturbating to pictures of naked boys. She said she fled from the home, threw up, drove around aimlessly, and ignored numerous phone calls from Alexander because she was so upset at what she had seen.

The claim was central to the defense's accusation that Alexander was a "sexual deviant" who grew angry and abusive toward Arias in the months after the incident, culminating in a violent confrontation in June that left Alexander dead.

Arias claimed she killed him in self-defense. She could face the death penalty if convicted of murder.

Catching Up on the Trial? Check Out ABC News' Jodi Arias Trial Coverage

Today, prosecutor Juan Martinez, who has been aggressive in questioning witnesses throughout the trial, volleyed questions at her about the claim of pedophilia, asking her to explain why her and Alexander's cell phone records showed five calls back and forth between the pair throughout the day she allegedly fled in horror. Some of the calls were often initiated Arias, according to phone records.

Jodi Arias Doesn't Remember Stabbing Ex-Boyfriend Watch Video

Jodi Arias Murder Trial: Testimony About Ex's Death Watch Video

Arias on Ex-Boyfriend's Death: 'I Don't Remember' Watch Video

She and Alexander also exchanged text messages throughout the afternoon and evening at a time when Arias claims the pedophilia incident occurred. In those messages they discuss logistics of exchanging one another's cars that night. Alexander sends her text messages about the car from a church social event he attended that night that she never mentioned during her testimony.

Arias stuck by her claim that she saw Alexander masturbating to the pictures, and her voice remained steady under increasingly-loud questioning by Martinez.

But Martinez also sparred with Arias on the stand over minor issues, such as when he asked Arias detailed questions about the timing and order of events from that day and Arias said she could not remember them.

"It seems you have problems with your memory. Is this a longstanding thing? Since you started testifying?" Martinez asked.

"No it goes back farther than that. I don't know even know if I'd call it a problem," Arias said.

"How far back does it go? You don't want to call them problems, are they issues? Can we call them issues? When did you start having them?" he asked in rapid succession. "You say you have memory problems, that it depends on the circumstance. Give me the factors that influence that."

"Usually when men like you or Travis are screaming at me," Arias shot back from the stand. "It affects my brain, it makes my brain scramble."

"You're saying it's Mr. Martinez's fault?" Martinez asked, referring to himself in the third person.

"Objection your honor," Arias' attorney finally shouted. "This is a stunt!"

Timeline of the Jodi Arias Trial

Martinez dwelled at one point about a journal entry where Arias wrote that she missed the Mormon baptism of her friend Lonnie because she was having kinky sex with Alexander. He drew attention to prior testimony that she and Alexander used Tootsie Pops and Pop Rocks candy as sexual props.

"You're trying to get across (in the diary entry) that this involved a sexual liaison with Mr. Alexander right?" he asked. "And you're talking about Tootsie Pops and Pop Rocks?"

"That happened also that night," Arias said.

"You were there, enjoying it, the Tootsie Pops and Pop Rocks?" he asked again, prompting a smirk from Arias.

"I enjoyed his attention," Arias said.

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As sequester nears, Pentagon Comptroller Robert Hale at center of storm

Pentagon comptroller Robert F. Hale is overseeing the Defense Department’s plans to furlough most of its 800,000 civilian workers, but he insists that he still meets with friendly faces as he strides down the building’s corridors.

“I teasingly say, ‘When I walk down the hall, people still wave, but with fewer fingers,’ ” said Hale, who is balancing the tension and frustration of the times with a bit of wit.

As the Defense Department’s chief financial officer and principal adviser on all fiscal matters, including the Pentagon’s annual budget of more than $600 billion, the 66-year-old Hale and his office are at the focal point of a crisis.

“I think all of us realized a couple of months ago we were heading for the perfect storm, and we’re in the middle of it at the moment,” he said during an interview Wednesday, a particularly tumultuous day.

“This is furlough day,” Hale noted.

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta was giving Congress a formal 45-day notice required by law, as well as sending a message to the Defense Department workforce worldwide: In the event of sequestration, the Pentagon will move forward with furloughs.

Preparing for the furloughs, Hale said, is “frankly one of the most distasteful tasks I have faced in four years” as comptroller.

A square-jawed and amiable former Navy officer, Hale served as Air Force comptroller during the Clinton administration and before that for 12 years as head of the national security division at the Congressional Budget Office. But he considers the present situation “unparalleled” in his experience.

Hale had readied for the day’s tasks while riding in a Defense Department car from his home in Annandale to the Pentagon, dressed in a comptroller’s uniform: a dark business suit, white shirt and checked tie.

Arriving in his E-Ring office overlooking the Pentagon’s Mall entrance by 7 a.m., Hale prepared e-mails to the department’s senior leaders alerting them to Panetta’s pending actions. While Panetta’s message was being delivered in a letter to Capitol Hill and via e-mail to the workforce, Hale conferred with Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter in preparation for a Friday conference to coordinate sequestration with the senior Pentagon leadership.

“Not to say they aren’t frustrated, but they don’t blame it on me,” he said, conscious of the toll the turmoil is taking on officials and rank and file alike.

At 11 a.m. he was participating in a teleconference with worried defense agency heads from around the country. “They’ve got thousands of people affected by this,” Hale said.

At 1 p.m. he went before the Pentagon press corps to brief reporters about the budget developments, warning grimly that the cuts could leave the military unprepared to respond to contingencies but also joking that solving the sequestration issue would allow him to “spend more time with my wife.”

Hale rejected criticism voiced during Capitol Hill hearings last week that the Pentagon should have started making budget plans for sequestration much earlier.

“If we’d done this six months ago, we would have caused the degradation in productivity and morale that we’re seeing now among our civilians,” he said.

Hale does not have to travel far within the Pentagon to find disquiet about the situation. Many of the 160 employees of the comptroller’s office face furlough.

“They’re frustrated, angry, worried,” he said. “My own staff, several people are saying, ‘I’m just going to retire. I don’t want to do this anymore,’ and I can’t blame them. I mean, we’re talking about 20 percent pay cuts for five to six months. Some of these people aren’t going to be able to pay their rent.”

The irony of furloughing the budget staff in the midst of a budget crisis does not escape Hale. “It sure won’t help,” he said.

“You’re replanning your budget for one of the world’s largest organizations, something that we would normally do over six months, in a couple of weeks, so it’s a very compressed period,” he said.

Yet the comptroller said he is willing to stay on for a time if asked to remain when a replacement for Panetta is confirmed by the Senate.

“I’d like to help the department get through whatever’s coming in the next few months and then plot a course from there,” he said.

“It’s satisfying in the sense of helping a major organization and a very important one get through tough times,” Hale added.

Perspective makes a difference, too.

“Nobody’s shooting at me, as is happening to some of our folks in Afghanistan,” Hale said. “So I don’t believe by any means I have the toughest job in the Department of Defense, or even close.”

Discuss this topic and other political issues in the Post’s Politics Discussion Forums.

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Oscar hopeful Haneke fears failure with Mozart

MADRID: Although he is nursing hopes of an Oscar, Austrian film-maker Michael Haneke says he feels doomed to failure with his latest project -- a staging of a Mozart opera in Spain.

"Amour", Haneke's film about an ageing couple that won the Palme d'Or at Cannes last year, is up for five Oscars on Sunday, including for best film and best director.

First, however, the 69-year-old faces another big night -- Saturday's premier of "Cosi Fan Tutte", by his fellow Austrian at Madrid's Teatro Real.

"With Mozart you are condemned to fail. The question is on what level," Haneke, considered one of the greatest and most uncompromising living film-makers, told reporters in Madrid on Wednesday.

"I don't much like talking about opera. I prefer to talk about my films. I see myself more as a film director."

The Madrid show is his second opera project after "Don Giovanni" in Paris in 2007, and "probably my last" before returning to film-making, he added.

"After 'Don Giovanni' I received about 15 offers to direct operas but I rejected them all because I didn't think I was the right person to do them," he said.

Haneke's films such as "The White Ribbon" -- a macabre tale of pre-war Germany for which he won the first of his two Palmes D'Or -- have earned him a reputation for painful subjects.

"Cosi Fan Tutte" is ostensibly a romantic comedy -- the tale of two women who are tricked and tested by their suitors -- but the theatre says its meditation on love and loyalty has its hard side too.

Written by a depressed Mozart when he was having love pains of his own, "Cosi Fan Tutte" is one of the composer's most challenging operas to stage, said the theatre's Belgian director Gerard Mortier.

"It is the most profound and difficult Mozart, with some extraordinarily difficult arias," he said.

Haneke has stage-directed the opera in Madrid under the musical baton of French conductor Sylvain Cambreling.

"Amour" meanwhile examines the intimate life of an elderly man and his dying wife.

"It touches people because it could happen to any family," Haneke said.

"If you are young it could happen to your grandparents. If you're less young, to your parents. And if you're even less young, it could happen to you."

The film is nominated for Oscars in the best film, director, actress, script and foreign film categories.

"I would like to win them all. I would hope to win at least one -- any of them," he said. "I am crossing my fingers."

- AFP/sf

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Day 2 of nationwide strike: Cops on alert in Noida; UP govt forms panel to probe violence

NEW DELHI: Normal life in several parts of the country continued to remain affected on Day 2 of the nationwide strike called by the trade unions.

Cops in Noida are on high alert, after widespread violence on the first day of the strike. According to TV reports, several schools and offices in Noida have been closed.

The UP government has formed a two-member panel to probe the violence in Noida on the first day of the two-day nationwide shutdown.

The state government late on Wednesday named additional director general of police (Law and Order) Arun Kumar and home secretary Rakesh as members of the probe committee and asked them to submit a fact finding report within three days.

Principal secretary (Home) RM Srivastava told IANS that "toughest action" would be taken against those found guilty of violence.

The committee has been asked to look into the state of preparedness of the Noida police to handle the shutdown and identify district officials guilty of dereliction of duty.

"The government has taken a serious note of the whole episode, wherein properties were gutted, people were beaten up and several vehicles were set on fire. There should be no doubt that the government would crack down on all found guilty," Srivastava said.

Violence erupted on Wednesday in Noida and Greater Noida where factories were targeted and set on fire. Violent clashes took place and several vehicles were set afire.

Officials have started screening the video footage of the violence in order to identify and book the perpetrators.

"We are also exploring possibilities of slapping the National Security Act (NSA) on the rioters," a senior official said.

State government sources said chief minister Akhilesh Yadav was particularly miffed at the Noida violence as he views it as a big blow to his efforts to create a pro-investment climate in Uttar Pradesh.

"The chief minister has taken a serious note of the clashes as it could send a wrong signal that industries are not safe in UP," an official said.

In Kerala, workers from most sectors ranging from transport to banking keeping away from work.

Reports from across the state said buses and taxis were off the roads and markets remained shut. Train and air services were not affected.

Attendance in government offices was thin and educational institutions remained closed as pro-Left service and teachers unions joined the strike. Universities have cancelled examinations scheduled for the last two days.

Barring stray incidents of minor violence, the state has remained peaceful since Wednesday.

Police in their vehicles facilitated the short-distance travels of train and air passengers, who arrived in the state unaware of the hartal atmosphere.

Emergency services like healthcare, milk supply and media have been exempted from the strike.

In Mangalore, however, there has been no effect of strike on Day 2. The buses are plying normally and the schools are functioning as usual.

(With inputs from PTI, IANS)

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NASA's Mars Rover Makes Successful First Drill

For the first time ever, people have drilled into a rock on Mars, collecting the powdered remains from the hole for analysis.

Images sent back from NASA's Mars rover Curiosity on Wednesday confirmed that the precious sample is being held by the rover's scoop, and will soon be delivered to two miniature chemical labs to undergo an unprecedented analysis. (Related: "Mars Rover Curiosity Completes First Full Drill.")

To the delight of the scientists, the rock powder has come up gray and not the ubiquitous red of the dust that covers the planet. The gray rock, they believe, holds a lot of potential to glean information about conditions on an early Mars. (See more Mars pictures.)

"We're drilling into rock that's a time capsule, rocks that are potentially ancient," said sampling-system scientist Joel Hurowitz during a teleconference from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

A Place to Drill

The site features flat bedrock, often segmented into squares, with soil between the sections and many round gray nodules and white mineral veins.

Hurowitz said that the team did not attempt to drill into the minerals or the gray balls, but the nodules are so common that they likely hit some as they drilled down 2.5 inches (6.3 centimeters).

In keeping with the hypothesis that the area was once under water, Hurowitz said the sample "has the potential of telling us about multiple interactions of water and rock."

The drill, located at the end of a seven-foot (two-meter) arm, requires precision maneuvering in its placement and movement, and so its successful initial use was an exciting and welcome relief. The rover has been on Mars since August, and it took six months to find the right spot for that first drill. (Watch video of the Mars rover Curiosity.)

The flat drilling area is in the lower section of Yellowknife Bay, which Curiosity has been exploring for more than a month. What was previously identified by Curiosity scientists as the dry bed of a once-flowing river or stream appears to fan out into the Yellowknife area.

The bedrock of the site—named after deceased Curiosity deputy project manager John Klein—is believed to be siltstone or mudstone. Scientists said the veins of white minerals are probably calcium sulfate or gypsum, but the grey nodules remain something of a mystery.

Triumph

To the team that designed and operates the drill, the results were a triumph, as great as the much-heralded landing of Curiosity on the red planet. With more than a hundred maneuvers in its repertoire, the drill is unique in its capabilities and complexities. (Watch video of Curiosity's "Seven Minutes of Terror.")

Sample system chief engineer Louise Jandura, who has worked on the drill for eight years, said the Curosity team had made eight different drills before settling on the one now on the rover. The team tested each drill by boring 1,200 holes on 20 types of rock on Earth.

She called the successful drilling "historic" because it gives scientists unprecedented access to material that has not been exposed to the intense weathering and radiation processes that affect the Martian surface.

Mini-laboratories

The gray powder will be routed to the two most sophisticated instruments on Curiosity—the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) and Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin).

SAM, the largest and most complex instrument onboard, operates with two ovens that can heat the sample up to 1,800°F (982°C), turning the elements and compounds in the rock into gases that can then be identified. SAM can also determine whether any carbon-based organic material is present.

Organics are the chemical building blocks of life on Earth. They are known to regularly land on Mars via meteorites and finer material that rains down on all planets.

But researchers suspect the intense radiation on the Martian surface destroys any organics on the surface. Scientists hope that organics within Martian rocks are protected from that radiation.

CheMin shoots an X-ray beam at its sample and can analyze the mineral content of the rock. Minerals provide a durable record of environmental conditions over the eons, including information about possible ingredients and energy sources for life.

Both SAM and CheMin received samples of sandy soil scooped from the nearby Rocknest outcrop in October. SAM identified organic material, but scientists are still trying to determine whether any of it is Martian or the byproduct of organics inadvertently brought to Mars by the rover. (See "Mars Rover Detects Simple Organic Compounds.")

In the next few days, CheMin will be the first to receive samples of the powdered rock, and then SAM. Given the complexity of the analysis, and the track record seen with other samples, it will likely be weeks before results are announced.

The process of drilling and collecting the results was delayed by several glitches that required study and work-arounds. One involved drill software and the other involved a test-bed problem with a sieve that is part of the process of delivering samples to the instruments.

Lead systems engineer Daniel Limonadi said that while there was no indication the sieve on Mars was malfunctioning, they had become more conservative in its use because of the test bed results. (Related: "A 2020 Rover Return to Mars?")

Author of the National Geographic e-book Mars Landing 2012, Marc Kaufman has been a journalist for more than 35 years, including the past 12 as a science and space writer, foreign correspondent, and editor for the Washington Post. He is also author of First Contact: Scientific Breakthroughs in the Hunt for Life Beyond Earth, published in 2011, and has spoken extensively to crowds across the United States and abroad about astrobiology. He lives outside Washington, D.C., with his wife, Lynn Litterine.

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Arias Leaves Stand After Describing Killing, Her Lies

Jodi Arias stepped down from the witness stand today after mounting an emotional effort to save herself from death row, insisting to the Arizona jury that an explosive fight with ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander led to his death, and that her lies about killing him masked deep regret and plans to commit suicide.

Arias, 32, will now face what is expected to be a withering cross-examination beginning Thursday from prosecutor Juan Martinez, who has been aggressive to many witnesses throughout the trial and who is expected to go after Arias' claim that she was forced to kill Alexander or be killed herself.

She is charged with murder for her ex-boyfriend's death and could face the death penalty if convicted.

Catching Up on the Trial? Check Out ABC News' Jodi Arias Trial Coverage

The day's dramatic testimony started with Arias describing the beginning of the fight on June 4, 2008 when she and Alexander were taking nude photos in his shower and she claims she accidentally dropped his new camera, causing Alexander to lose his temper. Enraged, he picked her up and body slammed her onto the tile floor, screaming at her, she told the jury.

Arias said she ran to his closet to get away from him, but could hear Alexander's footsteps coming after her down the hall. She grabbed a gun from his shelf and tried to keep running, but Alexander came after her, she said.

"I pointed it at him with both of my hands. I thought that would stop him, but he just kept running. He got like a linebacker. He got low and grabbed my waist, and as he was lunging at me the gun went off. I didn't mean to shoot. I didn't even think I was holding the trigger," she said.

"But he lunged at me and we fell really hard toward the tile wall, so at this point I didn't even know if he had been shot. I didn't see anything different. We were struggling, wrestling, he's a wrestler.

"So he's grabbing at my clothes and I got up, and he's screaming angry, and after I broke away from him. He said 'f***ing kill you bitch,'" she testified.

Asked by her lawyer whether she was convinced Alexander intended to kill her, Arias answered, "For sure. He'd almost killed me once before and now he's saying he was going to." Arias had earlier testified that Alexander had once choked her.

Timeline of the Jodi Arias Trial

Jodi Arias Describes Violent Sex Before Shooting Watch Video

Jodi Arias Testifies Ex Assaulted Her, Broke Her Fingers Watch Video

Jodi Arias Gives Explicit Details About Doomed Relationship Watch Video

But Arias' story of the death struggle ended there as she told the court that she has no memory of stabbing or slashing Alexander whose body was later found with 27 stab wounds, a slit throat and two bullets in his head. She said she only remembered standing in the bathroom, dropping the knife on the tile floor, realizing the "horror" of what had happened, and screaming.

"I have no memory of stabbing him," she said. "There's a huge gap. I don't know if I blacked out or what, but there's a huge gap. The most clear memory I have after that point is driving in the desert."

Arias said that she decided in the desert not to admit to killing Alexander, a decision that would last for two years as Arias lied to friends, family, investigators and reporters about what really happened in Alexander's bathroom.

During that time she initially claimed she got lost that night while driving to a friend's house and never went to Alexander's home in Mesa,Ariz. She later changed her story and said two masked people, a man and a woman, burst into the home and killed Alexander and threatened to kill her family if she told anyone what happened.

She eventually confessed to killing her ex-boyfriend, but insisted it was self defense.

"The main reason (for lying) is because I was very ashamed of what happened. It's not something I ever imagined doing. It's not the kind of person I was. It was just shameful," she said. "I was also very scared of what might happen. I didn't want my family to know that I had done that, and I just couldn't bring myself to say that I did that."

"From day one there was a part of me that always wanted to (tell the truth) but didn't dare do that. I would rather have gone to my grave than admit I had done something like that," she said.

Arias said that she continued to lie because she figured she would never get caught; she was planning to kill herself before trial.

"I was concerned with how it would affect my family. I wanted to die. I was going to definitely kill myself," she said. "That was my plan. You can purchase different things in jail and I bought a bunch of Advil... and took it all in the next few days so it was in my system. They have razors for shaving, so I got one and took it apart one night with intentions to slit my wrists."

Arias said she balked at slitting her wrists after accidentally cutting herself, but that she still planned to commit suicide sometime in the future. When she told news reporters that "no jury would convict her," she claims she said it believing that she would be dead before they'd have a chance to put her on trial, Arias testified.

Arias said support from the public and her family eventually led her to change her mind.

"My family remained very supportive, and told me 'it doesn't matter what happens, we love you anyway.' I realized even if I told the truth they would still be there and wouldn't walk away," she testified.

"By the time spring, 2010, rolled around, I confessed. I basically told everyone what I could remember of the day and that the intruder story was all BS pretty much."

She said that her testimony today, a third version of events, was the truth.

Arias was arrested a month after Alexander's death, and prosecutors have argued that her behavior during those weeks showed a lack of remorse for the killing and an attempt to get away with murder.

Arias said today that after she killed Alexander and drove away from his Mesa, Ariz., home in a panic, it dawned on her that police would soon be looking for Alexander's killer, and she decided that she would pretend the bloody confrontation had never happened.

"I knew that it was really bad, that my life was probably done now. I wished it was just a nightmare I could wake up from, but I knew I had messed up pretty badly and the inevitable was going to be something I could not really run from," she testified.

"I didn't want anyone to know that that had happened or that I did it, so I started taking steps in the aftermath to cover it up. I did a whole bunch of things to try to make it seem like I was never there," she said.

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Pro-family and women-friendly workplaces called for by PAP Women's Wing

Singapore: The Women's Wing of the People' Action Party wants to see bolder government intervention in the drive for pro-family and women-friendly workplaces.

In a position paper submitted to the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) on Wednesday, it called for legislation to allow employees with children below the age of 12-years to request for flexible work arrangements.

Such requests, it said, should be seriously considered by employers.

It's also proposing legislation to allow employees to take no-pay leave for up to one year to take care of their children, and have their positions guaranteed when they return to work.

To champion and implement the necessary Human Resource policy changes, the paper suggested that the government set up a one-stop centre that can also provide training and handle complains.

The Women's Wing also wants to see better protection for freelance and contract workers - to include CPF contributions, medical benefits and injury compensation.

It also suggested a Back to Work Employment credit scheme - similar to the special employment credit scheme for older workers - to offset employers' costs for on-the-job training for women and job redesign.

People's Action Party (PAP) Member of Parliament for West Coast GRC, Ms Foo Mee Har says the government needs to take bold legislative action to ensure a shift towards a pro-family work culture.

- CNA/sf

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Florida Python Hunt Captures 68 Invasive Snakes

It's a wrap—the 2013 Python Challenge has nabbed 68 invasive Burmese pythons in Florida, organizers say. And experts are surprised so many of the elusive giants were caught.

Nearly 1,600 people from 38 states—most of them inexperienced hunters—registered for the chance to track down one of the animals, many of which descend from snakes that either escaped or were dumped into the wild.

Since being introduced, these Asian behemoths have flourished in Florida's swamps while also squeezing out local populations of the state's native mammals, especially in the Everglades. (See Everglades pictures.)

To highlight the python problem, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and its partners launched the 2013 Python Challenge, which encouraged registered participants to catch as many pythons as they could between January 12 and February 10 in state wildlife-management areas within the Everglades.

The commission gave cash prizes to those who harvested the most and longest pythons.

Frank Mazzotti, a wildlife ecologist at the University of Florida and scientific leader for the challenge, said before the hunt that he would consider a harvest of 70 animals a success—and 68 is close enough to say the event met its goals.

It's unknown just how many Burmese pythons live in Florida, but catching 68 snakes is an "exceptional" number, added Kenneth Krysko, senior herpetologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville.

Snakes in the Grass

Finding 68 snakes is impressive, experts say, since it's so hard to find pythons. For one, it's been unusually warm lately in Florida, which means the reptiles—which normally sun themselves to regulate their body temperature—are staying in the brush, making them harder to detect, Krysko said.

On top of that, Burmese pythons are notoriously hard to locate, experts say.

The animals are so well camouflaged that people can stand right next to one and not notice it. "It's rare that you get to see them stretched out—most of the time they're blending in," said Cheryl Millett, a biologist at the Nature Conservancy, a Python Challenge partner.

What's more, the reptiles are ambush hunters, which means they spend much of their time lying in wait in dense vegetation, not moving, she said.

That's why Millett gave the hunters some tips, such as looking along the water's edge, where the snakes like to hang out, and also simply listening for "something big moving through the vegetation."

Even so, catching 68 snakes is "actually is a little more than I expected," said Millett.

No Walk in the Park

Ruben Ramirez, founder of the company Florida Python Hunters, won two prizes in the competition: First place for the most snakes captured—18—and second place for the largest python, which he said was close to 11 feet (3.4 meters) long. The biggest Burmese python caught in Florida, nabbed in 2012, measured 17.7 feet (5.4 meters).

"They're there, but they're not as easy to find as people think," said Ramirez. "You're not going to be stumbling over pythons in Miami." (Related blog post: "What It's Like to Be a Florida Python Hunter.")

All participants, some of whom had never hunted a python before, were trained to identify the difference between a Burmese python and Florida's native snakes, said Millett. No native snakes were accidentally killed, she said.

Hunters were also told to kill the snakes by either putting a bolt or a bullet through their heads, or decapitating them-all humane methods that result "in immediate loss of consciousness and destruction of the brain," according to the Python Challenge website.

Ramirez added that some of the first-time or amateur hunters had different expectations. "I think they were expecting to walk down a canal and see a 10-foot [3-meter], 15-foot [4.5-meter] Burmese python. They thought it'd be a walk in the park."

Stopping the Spread

Completely removing these snakes from the wild isn't easy, and some scientists see the Python Challenge as helping to achieve part of that goal. (Read an opposing view on the Python Challenge: "Opinion: Florida's Great Snake Hunt Is a Cheap Stunt.")

"You're talking about 68 more animals removed from the population that shouldn't be there—that's 68 more mouths that aren't being fed," said the Florida museum's Krysko. (Read about giant Burmese python meals that went bust.)

"I support any kind of event or program that not only informs the general public about introduced species, but also gets the public involved in removing these nonnative animals that don't belong there."

The Nature Conservancy's Millett said the challenge had two positive outcomes: boosting knowledge for both science and the public.

People who didn't want to hunt or touch the snakes could still help, she said, by reporting sightings of exotic species to 888-IVE-GOT-1, through free IveGot1 apps, or www.ivegot1.org.

Millett runs a public-private Nature Conservancy partnership called Python Patrol that the Florida wildlife commission will take on in the fall. The program focuses not only on eradicating invasive pythons but on preventing the snake from moving to ecologically sensitive areas, such as Key West.

Necropsies on the captured snakes will reveal what pythons are eating, and location data from the hunters will help scientists figure out where the snakes are living—valuable data for researchers working to stop their spread.

"This is the most [number of] pythons that have been caught in this short of a period of time in such an extensive area," said the University of Florida's Mazzotti.

"It's an unprecedented sample, and we're going to get a lot of information out of that."

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