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Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Atletico beats Osasuna 1-0 for 3rd straight win
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Djokovic wins longest Slam final ever
Novak Djokovic wore down Rafael Nadal in the longest Grand Slam singles final ever, winning 5-7, 6-4, 6-2, 6-7 (5), 7-5 after 5 hours, 53 minutes to claim his third Australian Open title.
Rosenthal: 11 reasons Patriots can win Super Bowl XLVI
Rosenthal: This Super Bowl is an extremely even matchup. The Giants may be deeper, but this is a mentally tough Patriots team that is greater than the sum of its parts. Here are 11 reasons New England can win.
Trash Talk: This isn't all about Brady, Manning
Trash Talk: Just as quarterbacks get far too many laurel wreaths when they win, they get way too many thorns when they lose. In this Super Bowl, that dynamic is magnified to preposterous proportions.
Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/46195600/ns/sports-soccer/
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Monday, January 30, 2012
Kindle Fire No. 1 in Android tablet use: report
Amazon.com
By Athima Chansanchai
A new report analyzing app usage purports to show that, in just three months, Amazon's Kindle Fire has dethroned the Samsung Galaxy Tab as the top Android tablet ? at least when it comes to people actually spending time on their devices.
Flurry Analytics?compared application sessions among all Android tablets before and after the holiday season and found "that strong adoption of Kindle Fire, combined with significant downloads driven from the Amazon App Store, resulted in a massive surge in session usage that just edges out the Galaxy Tab. Unrounded, Kindle Fire represents 35.7 percent of sessions and Galaxy Tab represents 35.6 percent."
Flurry Analytics
The company estimates it tracks over 20 percent of all consumer sessions on more than 90 percent of all Android devices each day. That doesn't mean people are spending an exhaustive amount of time on apps, as "a session is defined as the launch and subsequent exit (or pause for more than 10 seconds) of an app." That could be one round of Angry Birds, for instance. ?
In terms of devices in users' hands, Flurry estimates "the active number of Galaxy Tabs in the market is at least twice that of the Kindle Fire," which would make sense since the former has been around in one version or another since November 2010. But the record-breaking outflow of 4 million Kindles in December?had something to do, no doubt, with the introduction of the Amazon tablet, though the company did not break out the models when it released those numbers.?
Practically ever since the Kindle Fire came out in November, research firms have been quick to predict its escalation in the non-iPad landscape, with one even going so far as to say it would be No. 2 after the iPad. Looks like those predictions are coming to pass.?
That has a lot to do, Flurry said, with Amazon's approach to the Kindle Fire, which isn't a straight-up Android tablet. Its apps come through the Amazon Appstore, it has its own browser (Silk) and it has a different configuration than other Android tablets (though users have decidedly different reactions to the home carousel, the tablet's home page format).
Amazon?s go-to-market strategy for the Kindle Fire is ground breaking among the Android guard. With its offering, Amazon takes the focus away from the device and operating system, emphasizing content, a differentiated consumer experience and commerce.?
Flurry's?analysis also revealed this: "the Kindle Fire drove over 2.5 times more paid downloads to consumers than the Samsung Galaxy Tab.? This shows that for tablets, the Amazon Appstore can already deliver more direct revenue to developers than the Android Market."
While the iPad is the undisputed tablet leader at 58 percent of the market share for the 27 million tablets shipped in 2011's fourth quarter, Android tabs made big gains to capture 39 percent, according to Strategy Analytics. In that report, tablets have made clear in-roads among the public, more than doubling from 10.7 million shipments by the end of 2010 to 26.8 million by the end of 2011.
Its research showed "global tablet shipments hit 66.9 million units in full-year 2011, surging 260 percent from 18.6 million in full-year 2010. Consumers are increasingly buying tablets in preference to netbooks and even entry-level notebooks or desktops."
More stories:
On Twitter, follow?Athima Chansanchai, who is also trying to keep her head above water in the?Google+?stream.
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School bans fuzzy boots used to hide cell phones (Reuters)
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) ? Singer Nancy Sinatra may have had boots made for walking, but she never attended Pottstown Middle School.
Starting Monday the Philadelphia suburban district is banning the wearing of fuzzy open-top boots, including the popular Ugg brand, to middle school classes because students have been stashing cell phones in the loose footwear, according to district director of community relations John Armato.
"Cell phones are a problem for obvious reasons," Armato said.
Superintendent Reed Lindley said the school principal asked for the boot ban "because of the classroom disruptions that are resulting from ringing cell phones."
Students at the school can avoid going toe-to-toe with school officials by wearing boots that lace up and usually have a snugger fit.
First time offenders will get detention, and subsequent violations include two detentions, followed by confiscation of the phone, Armato said.
Middle school parent Adrienne Beyer said she thinks the ban is extreme.
"I understand there may be a handful of kids that shove cell phones down their boots, but why does the handful have to ruin it for the other 600 students? But, I said to my daughter, 'It's a rule and we're going to follow it,'" Beyer said.
Ugg sheepskin boots originated in Australia and New Zealand and have become popular with pre-teens and teenagers in the United States in recent years.
(Editing By Barbara Goldberg and Greg McCune)
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Sunday, January 29, 2012
Gingrich???s Space Colony Proposition Unrealistic (ContributorNetwork)
COMMENTARY | Apparently the moon is the next prime real estate for U.S. citizens, or so former Speaker of the House and Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich seems to think.
In the Thursday Florida primary debate, Gingrich expanded on his previous claim that if elected president, he would make every effort to establish a space colony on the moon by 2020. What's more, it's estimated 13,000 inhabitants would be able to qualify for American citizenship.
This illustrious plan sounds a bit "spacey" to me. Just think: A presidential nominee who supposedly recognizes the economic woes that Americans have been facing and who bashes President Barack Obama for misallocation of national funds and ill-conceived solutions to bring the country back from its multitrillion-dollar deficit has the notion that American taxpayers have the means to support a colony in space.
I understand the argument that commercializing NASA and other space exploits is a compromising method to not let expensive equipment go to waste. I get that for Americans to remain a dominant world power, they must retain a presence in space.
But the convoluted part for me is how repurposing space equipment on Earth is going to ready average U.S. citizens for eventual long-term establishment in space. That begs the question of how Gingrich expects to pay for it, with so many other philanthropies vying for funding. I also wonder how Gingrich plans for Americans to remain the lone nationality represented on the moon.
The 1961 lunar landing guaranteed the U.S. a place in space race history. Chances are NASA wouldn't have made nearly the number of discoveries and strides in its 30 years if the U.S. hadn't laid the foundation early. But is a space colony the type of semi-permanent mark Americans want to make without funds to accommodate it?
It may do Gingrich well to recall another memorable point in the history of U.S. colonization, when the British colonies were established in North America but were expected to pay the same taxes as those residing in England.
Gingrich might soon realize his flat tax initiative is a bust with the anticipated tax inflation and strain a space colony would put on Americans in the U.S. The sheer amount of resources needed to sustain a colony on the moon would be astronomical. Not only would U.S. space residents lose their national identity and affiliation; I'm sure that terra firma-lovers would realize the wasted allocation of money resources to sustain their brothers in orbit. Sounds eerily similar to Gingrich's own sentiments about the current commander-in-chief.
An American-only space colony is an impressive campaign goal, but it may be a bit too lofty for Gingrich or others to achieve in the current economic climate. There's no doubt that it's a project that could take off in the distant future; after all, the U.S. did put a man on the moon. It has no chance, though, until financial feasibility catches up to American capability.
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Saturday, January 28, 2012
Obama to senators: Change the way you do business
President Barack Obama waves as he walks off of Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
President Barack Obama waves as he walks off of Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
President Barack Obama greets supporters after his speech at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Mich., Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama is pressing his case for changes in how the Senate does business, hoping to ease the partisan gridlock, and he wants to bar lawmakers from profiting from their service.
In his radio and Internet address Saturday, Obama said many people he met during his five-state tour after his State of the Union address were optimistic but remained unsure "that the right thing will get done in Washington this year, or next year, or the year after that."
"And frankly, when you look at some of the things that go on in this town, who could blame them for being a little cynical?" Obama said.
The president reiterated his calls for government reform made in Tuesday's address, saying he wants the Senate to pass a rule that requires a yes-or-no vote for judicial and public service nominations after 90 days. Many of the nominees, he said, carry bipartisan support but get held up in Congress for political reasons.
Obama noted that "a senator from Utah" said he would hold up nominations because he opposed the recess appointment of the head of the new consumer protection agency and three members of the National Labor Relations Board. Obama put the officials in their post during the Senate's holiday break; many Republicans have called that move unconstitutional. Obama said the American people deserve "better than gridlock and games."
"One senator gumming up the works for the whole country is certainly not what our founding fathers envisioned," the president said.
While Obama did not name the lawmaker, Utah GOP. Sen Mike Lee said Thursday that because of the president's "blatant and egregious disregard both for proper constitutional procedures and the Senate's unquestioned role in such appointments, I find myself duty-bound to resist the consideration and approval of additional nominations until the president takes steps to remedy the situation."
Obama said he also wants Congress to pass legislation to ban insider trading by lawmakers and prohibit lawmakers from owning securities in companies that have business before their committees.
In addition, the president is seeking to prohibit people who "bundle" campaign contributions from other donors for members of Congress from lobbying Congress. Obama urged the public to contact their member of Congress and tell them "that it's time to end the gridlock and start tackling the issues that really matter."
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., delivering the GOP address, said Obama's address to Congress lacked much discussion of the president's achievements "because there isn't much."
"This president didn't talk about his record for one simple reason," Rubio said. "He doesn't want you to know about it. But you do know about it, because you feel the failure of his leadership every single day of your life."
Rubio accused the president of driving up the national debt, failing to reduce high unemployment across the country and offering divisive economic policies.
The Florida senator said there is a growing gap between the rich and the poor but the best way to solve the problem is by embracing the American free enterprise system. Rubio said he hopes 2012 "will be the beginning of our work toward a new and prosperous American century."
___
Online:
Obama address: www.whitehouse.gov
GOP address: http://www.youtube.com/gopweeklyaddress
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AP Exclusive: New taste for Thai elephant meat (AP)
BANGKOK ? A new taste for eating elephant meat ? everything from trunks to sex organs ? has emerged in Thailand and could pose a new threat to the survival of the species.
Wildlife officials told The Associated Press that they were alerted to the practice after finding two elephants slaughtered last month in a national park in western Thailand.
"The poachers took away the elephants' sex organs and trunks ... for human consumption," Damrong Phidet, director-general of Thailand's wildlife agency, said in a telephone interview. Some meat was to be consumed without cooking, like "elephant sashimi," he said.
Poachers typically just remove tusks, which are most commonly found on Asian male elephants and fetch thousands of dollars on the black market. A market for elephant meat, however, could lead to killing of the wider elephant population, Damrong said.
"If you keep hunting elephants for this, then they'll become extinct," he said.
Consuming elephant meat is not common in Thailand, but some Asian cultures believe consuming animals' reproductive organs can boost sexual prowess.
Damrong said the elephant meat was ordered by restaurants in Phuket, a popular travel destination in the country's south. It wasn't clear if the diners were foreigners.
The accusation drew a quick rebuttal from Phuket Governor Tri Akradecha, who told Thai media that he had never heard of such restaurants but ordered officials to look into the matter.
Poaching elephants is banned, and trafficking or possessing poached animal parts also is illegal. Elephant tusks are sought in the illegal ivory trade, and baby wild elephants are sometimes poached to be trained for talent shows.
"The situation has come to a crisis point. The longer we allow these cruel acts to happen, the sooner they will become extinct," Damrong said.
The quest for ivory remains the top reason poachers kill elephants in Thailand, other environmentalists say.
Soraida Salwala, the founder of Friends of the Asian Elephant foundation, said a full grown pair of tusks could be sold from 1 million to 2 million baht ($31,600 to $63,300), while the estimated value of an elephant's penis is more than 30,000 baht ($950).
"There's only a handful of people who like to eat elephant meat, but once there's demand, poachers will find it hard to resist the big money," she cautioned.
Thailand has fewer than 3,000 wild elephants and about 4,000 domesticated elephants, according to the National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation Department.
The pachyderms were a mainstay of the logging industry in the northern and western parts of the country until logging contracts were revoked in the late 1980s.
Domesticated animals today are used mainly for heavy lifting and entertainment.
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Friday, January 27, 2012
Let's Play 'History As A List'
A bunch of you have sent me this list. It comes from Drew Breunig, a New Yorker who apparently works in the computer business, in advertising.
It's a short history of "Frontiers" ? territories that he says have challenged humans over the centuries, arranged in roughly chronological order. Drew calls it "Frontiers Through The Ages."
- Water, 1400
- Land, 1840
- Gold, 1850
- Wire, 1880
- Air, 1900
- Celluloid, 1920
- Plastic, 1950
- Space, 1960
- Silicon, 1980
- Networks, 1990
- Data, 2000
I know, I know, it's much too American and very arbitrary (Christopher Columbus didn't exactly "open" the oceans for exploration; Egyptian sailors, Minoans, Phoenicians did that, and much earlier), but still, Drew is playing a game here that's fun, if you keep at it.
?Suppose I wanted to think about power, how sources of power have multiplied over time. I could write a list like this:
- gravity
- muscle
- horses
- wind
- steam
- internal combustion
- oil
- gas
- nuclear
With each new chapter, we get more power, plus more risk . Not a bad trade off, almost like a formula for what we call "progress." But not always. There are some lists I can imagine that don't flatter us at all. My friend the mathematician Steven Strogatz, a music lover, sent me this: it's a small idea, but faithfully chronological...
- vinyl
- 8-track
- cassette
- CD
- iTunes
"Pretty uneven progress there!" he says.
We could make lists that, viewed a certain way, would be very depressing. This "list," found all over the internet and attributed to "Anonymous," says a lot about our notion of "progress:"
But the more you do this exercise, the more you will find a consistent pattern that peeps through, says Kevin Kelly, first editor of Wired Magazine. Notice, he says, in many of these lists ? including Breunig's ? "there is decreasing mass in it. It gets lighter as it goes along, from Gold to Data."
Indeed.
Here's a similar list:
- stone
- bronze
- iron
- plastic
- bits
And another:
- blood
- chromosomes
- genes
- DNA
This, said Peter Drucker, the business guru from Claremont College, is the real story of human innovation, that over the eons we seem to move from heavy to light, from thick to fine, from muscle to thought.
The first chair, he once said, was probably a tree stump, created by a guy (or gal) who had to hack and hack or push a load of lumber to the ground. The work was, he imagined, sweaty and very physical.
A modern chair, on the other hand, comes from people who sit in studios with pencils or computers, fashioning in their heads while the muscle part, the manufacture, is probably done by cleverly designed robots, using materials created in laboratories. In other words, a modern chair is mostly thought, barely muscle.
I think there's a prediction, a foretelling, in all this. In his new book of essays, the science fiction writer William Gibson considers how our new communication networks look more and more like the superfine, delicate wirings of a mind...
"...the texture of these more recent technologies, the grain of them, becomes progressively finer, progressively more divorced from Newtonian mechanics. In terms of scale, they are more akin to the workings of the brain itself...the ongoing manifestation of some very ancient and extraordinary weirdness; our gradual spinning of a sort of extended prosthetic mass nervous-system..."
Wouldn't that be nice? If we big galumphing mammals drop our axes, trade our stones and heavy tools for highways made of dancing filaments of light that connect us, move us, do our bidding, making our cities, factories, vehicles lighter and lighter and lighter? We'd work in our heads, have the rest of the day for play, and live like lords and ladies. Sounds like a dream, at least till the newest edition of Stalin or Hitler figures out how to slip into that network and turn out all those lights.
And, by the way, those bad guys? They keep showing up.
- Cain
- Caligula
- Attila
- Ghenghiz Khan
- Vlad the Impaler
- Robespierre
- Stalin
- Hitler
- Pol Pot
Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/krulwich/2012/01/26/145854740/lets-play-history-as-a-list?ft=1&f=1007
California ? Annual Defender Office Management Seminar ? Apr. 19th ? Oxnard
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Thursday, April 19, 2012 Embassy Suites Mandalay Beach Resort, Oxnard, California Coordinator: Gary Windom, Riverside County Public Defender This seminar covers practical, policy and ethical issues in public defender and indigent criminal defense offices. It is also a ?
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California ? Annual Defender Office Management Seminar ? Apr. 19th ? Oxnard
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Thursday, January 26, 2012
Irishman makes "billion-euro home" of shredded notes (Reuters)
DUBLIN (Reuters) ? An unemployed Irish artist has built a home from the shredded remains of 1.4 billion euros ($1.82 billion), a monument to the "madness" he says has been wrought on Ireland by the single currency, from a spectacular construction boom to a wrenching bust.
Frank Buckley built the apartment in the lobby of a Dublin office building that has lain vacant since its completion four years ago at the peak of an ill-fated construction boom, using bricks of shredded euro notes he borrowed from Ireland's national mint.
"It's a reflection of the whole madness that gripped us," Buckley said of what he calls his "billion-euro home."
"People were pouring billions into buildings now worth nothing," he said. "I wanted to create something from nothing."
A wave of cheap credit flowed into Ireland in the early 2000s after Ireland joined the currency zone fuelling a huge property bubble that transformed the country.
The bubble's collapse since 2007 plunged Ireland into the deepest recession in the industrialized world, forcing the former "Celtic Tiger" to accept a humiliating bailout from the EU and the IMF.
Buckley was given a 100 percent mortgage at the peak of the boom to buy a 365,000 euro home on the far reaches of Dublin's commuter belt, despite the fact he had no steady income.
He has separated from his wife who lives in the home, which has since lost at least one-third of its value.
Living in his "billion euro home" since the start of December, Buckley is working on adding a kitchen to the living room and hall.
The walls and floor are covered in euro shreddings and the house is so warm Buckley sleeps without a blanket.
Pictures made from notes and coins decorate the walls, including one of a house, made from Irish 5 pence pieces.
"There are houses in Ireland worth less than that," Buckley quips.
Buckley said he wants Europe's politicians to solve the eurozone debt crisis without destroying its currency. But if the currency ultimately fails, he will happily use the euro zone's defunct notes as fodder for future projects.
"Whatever you say about the euro, it's a great insulator."
($1 = 0.7704 euros)
(Reporting by Conor Humphries; editing by Carmel Crimmins and Paul Casciato)
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House Democrats Seek To Subpoena Koch Industries Over Keystone XL
WASHINGTON -- House Democrats took the political offensive on Keystone Wednesday, seeking to probe connections between the multi-billion dollar project and Koch Industries, the Kansas-based energy conglomerate that has funded many a conservative cause.
At a hearing before a subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) called for subpoenaing representatives from Koch Industries over their alleged financial stakes in an approval of Keystone XL, arguing the committee has an "obligation" to understand who would benefit if the controversial oil pipeline was constructed.
The comments come just one week after Obama rejected a permit for the pipeline, which would stretch from tar sands in Canada to refineries in Texas, saying Republicans had jeopardized the review process by requiring the administration to render a decision by Feb. 21.
In a letter to subcommittee chairman Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) asking for the subpeonas, Waxman and eight other House Democrats called for a day of hearings featuring Koch Industry executives. They cited, as evidence for their suspicion, a Koch subsidiary's assertion during a Canadian proceeding that the company has a "direct and substantial interest" in the pipeline.
"Last year news organizations reported that one company, Koch Industries, would be one of the big winners if this pipeline were constructed," Waxman said at the hearing. "We asked Koch whether this was true and were told they have no interest whatsoever in the pipeline. But then we learned that they told the Canadian government that they have a direct and substantial interest. Something does not add up."
A visibly ruffled Whitfield cut Waxman off, saying that while he would certainly accept the letter, he had no intention of subpoenaing the Koch brothers. "The brothers have nothing to do with this project," he said.
When Waxman pressed him on the issue, Whitfield pivoted to House Republican's favorite defensive talking point on the subject of clean energy.
"If you want to talk about that, let's talk about the millions of dollars the Obama administration gave companies like Solyndra and people like George Kaiser and other campaign bundlers," Whitfield said.
Solyndra, the California solar panel manufacturer and Department of Energy loan recipient that went belly-up last year, has nothing to do with the Keystone XL decision. And by that logic, Whitfield's comment would seem to acknowledge that he and Waxman were simply trading partisan barbs.
The bickering came during a hearing over a bill introduced by Rep. Lee Terry (R-Neb.) that would strip Obama's State Department of the power to approve the pipeline, passing it to the independent Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The bill would also require the FERC to issue approval of the project within 30 days.
Kerri-Ann Jones, the State Department's point person on Keystone, on Wednesday dismissed the proposed legislation, arguing it "imposes narrow time constraints and creates automatic mandates that prevent an informed decision." The panel is slated to meet again on Feb. 1.
Watch Mediaite's video of Waxman and Whitfield's heated exchange below:
"; var coords = [-5, -72]; // display fb-bubble FloatingPrompt.embed(this, html, undefined, 'top', {fp_intersects:1, timeout_remove:2000,ignore_arrow: true, width:236, add_xy:coords, class_name: 'clear-overlay'}); });Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/25/house-democrats-koch-industries-keystone-xl_n_1231783.html
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Marine faces 3 months in brig for Iraqi deaths (AP)
CAMP PENDLETON, California ? Military prosecutors worked for more than six years to bring Marine Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich to trial on manslaughter charges that could have sent him away to prison for life.
But only weeks after the long-awaited trial started, they offered Wuterich a deal that stopped the proceedings and could mean little to no jail time for the squad leader who ordered his men to "shoot first, ask questions later," resulting in one of the Iraq War's worst attacks on civilians by U.S. troops.
The 31-year-old Marine, who was originally accused of unpremeditated murder, pleaded guilty Monday to negligent dereliction of duty for leading the squad that killed 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians in the town of Haditha in 2005 during raids after a roadside bomb exploded, killing a fellow Marine and wounding two others.
Wuterich, who was indicted in 19 of the 24 deaths, now faces no more than three months in confinement.
It was a stunning outcome for the last defendant in the case once compared with the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. The seven other Marines initially charged were exonerated or had their cases dropped.
"I was expecting that the American judiciary would sentence this person to life in prison and that he would appear and confess in front of the whole world that he committed this crime, so that America could show itself as democratic and fair," one of the survivors, Awis Fahmi Hussein, told The Associated Press in Haditha.
Military judge Lt. Col. David Jones began hearing arguments from both sides Tuesday at Camp Pendleton, Calif., before making a sentencing recommendation to be considered by the commander of Marine Corps Forces Central Command.
Legal experts said the case was fraught with errors made by investigators and the prosecution that let it drag on for years. The prosecution was also hampered by squad mates who acknowledged they had lied to investigators initially and later testified in exchange for having their cases dropped, bringing into question their credibility.
In addition, Wuterich was seen as taking the fall for senior leaders and more seasoned combat veterans, analysts said. It was his first time in combat when he led the squad on Nov. 19, 2005.
Brian Rooney, an attorney for another former defendant, said cases like Haditha are difficult to prosecute because a military jury is unlikely to question decisions made in combat unless wrongdoing is clear-cut and egregious, like rape.
"If it's a gray area, fog-of-war, you can't put yourself in a Marine's situation where he's legitimately trying to do the best he can," said Rooney, who represented Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, the highest-ranking Marine charged in the case. "When you're in a town like Haditha or Fallujah, you've got bad guys trying to kill you and trying to do it in very surreptitious ways."
Marine Corps spokesman Lt. Col. Joseph Kloppel said the deal was not a reflection or in any way connected to how the prosecution felt its case was going in the trial.
The Haditha attack is considered among the war's defining moments, further tainting America's reputation when it was already at a low point after the release of photos of prisoner abuse by U.S. soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison.
It still fuels anger in Iraq today.
"We wonder about such a sentence issued against the defendant. We called upon US to be fair in passing sentences. Regrettably, we are disappointed about the issuance of such sentences," said Khalid Salman Rasif, a member of the Provincial Council in Haditha, adding he would contact the lawyer for victims' families for an explanation.
Kamil al-Dulaimi, a Sunni lawmaker from the Anbar provincial capital of Ramadi, called the plea agreement proof that "Americans still deal with Iraqis without any respect."
"It's just another barbaric act of Americans against Iraqis," al-Dulaimi told The Associated Press. "They spill the blood of Iraqis and get this worthless sentence for the savage crime against innocent civilians."
Wuterich, the father of three children, had faced the possibility of life behind bars when he was charged with nine counts of manslaughter, which will be dropped. Along with facing a maximum of three months in confinement, he could also lose two-thirds of his pay and see his rank demoted to private when he's sentenced.
.Wuterich, his family and his attorneys declined to comment Monday after he entered the plea. Prosecutors also declined to comment on the plea deal.
During the trial before a jury of combat Marines who served in Iraq, prosecutors argued he lost control after seeing the body of his friend blown apart by the bomb and led his men on a rampage in which they stormed two nearby homes, blasting their way in with gunfire and grenades. Among the dead was a man in a wheelchair.
In the deal, Wuterich acknowledged that his orders misled his men to believe they could shoot without hesitation and not follow the rules of engagement that required troops to positively identify their targets before they raided the homes.
He told the judge that caused "tragic events."
"I think we all understood what we were doing so I probably just should have said nothing," Wuterich told the judge.
He said his orders were based on the guidance of his platoon commander at the time, and that the squad did not take any gunfire during the 45-minute raid.
Many of his squad mates testified that they do not believe to this day that they did anything wrong because they feared insurgents were inside hiding.
Haditha prompted commanders to demand troops be more careful in distinguishing between civilians and combatants.
Former Navy officer David Glazier said the case shows such rules are essential to helping the United States prevail in an armed conflict.
"The reality is that this incident has had significant consequences for the U.S. in Iraq," said Glazier, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. "It probably fueled the resistance and so it probably ended up costing additional soldiers and Marines their lives later on."
___
Associated Press writers Barbara Surk and Mazin Yahya in Baghdad, Elliot Spagat in San Diego and Raquel Dillon in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
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Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Uzbeki refugee arrested on terror charges in Chicago (Reuters)
DENVER (Reuters) ? An accused member of an Islamic group that is suspected of plotting attacks in Germany, Turkey, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan has been arrested and charged with providing support to foreign terrorists.
Jamshid Muhtorov, 35, an Uzbekistani refugee who resides in suburban Denver, was taken into custody on Saturday at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago by FBI agents, federal authorities said on Monday.
A criminal complaint charging him with providing and attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization was unsealed in Denver on Monday shortly after Muhtorov made his initial court appearance in Chicago.
Court documents filed in the case said Muhtorov was heading overseas to fight on behalf of the Islamic Jihad Union, a Pakistan-based extremist group that opposes secular rule in the U.S.-backed former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan and seeks to replace the current regime there with a government based on Islamic law.
The public defender assigned to Muhtorov at his court appearance could not immediately be reached for comment.
An FBI affidavit for Muhtorov's arrest said German authorities in 2007 disrupted an IJU plot and arrested three operatives of the group targeting unidentified facilities with explosives. It said Turkish authorities separately seized weapons and detained "extremists with ties to the IJU."
The court affidavit also said the organization claimed responsibility for attacks in 2008 that targeted coalition forces in Afghanistan, including a suicide attack against an unidentified U.S. military post.
In addition, the group conducted simultaneous suicide bombings in 2004 of U.S. and Israeli embassies, as well as of a Uzbekistani government office, all in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, FBI agent Donald Hale wrote in the FBI affidavit.
Federal prosecutors said Muhtorov's arrest, capping a "long-term investigation," highlights "the continued interest of extremists residing in the United States to join and support overseas terrorists."
If convicted of the charge against him, Muhtorov faces up to 15 years in prison.
The FBI began monitoring his telephone calls and email messages last March, including a conversation in July in which he told his daughter he would never see her again "but if she was a good Muslim girl he will see her in heaven," Hale's affidavit said.
(Editing by Steve Gorman and Paul Thomasch)
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Annie Leibovitz opens new art show at Smithsonian (AP)
WASHINGTON ? Photographer Annie Leibovitz says she has come back from some dark days and revived her creativity with a new project now on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum that marks a departure from her popular celebrity portraits.
Two years ago, Leibovitz was facing millions in debt and a mismanaged fortune that nearly cost her the legal rights to her own work, which includes some of pop culture's most memorable images. The ordeal was a good lesson in managing her business, Leibovitz said, but left her "emotionally and mentally depleted."
On Tuesday, she led a tour through the photographs she says renewed her inspiration with a few road trips through U.S. history. The idea grew out of a book she had wanted to make with her partner, Susan Sontag, with a list of destinations and an excuse to visit them. After Sontag died, she eventually revived the idea with her young children.
It began with a six-hour drive to Niagara Falls during the period of her financial troubles only to find out her credit card had been rejected at a hotel and their rooms had been given away. While they found another place to stay, Leibovitz was upset wanted to go home. But she agreed to go to a lookout point at the waterfalls with her kids.
"I was sitting off to the side, feeling a little down, and I saw my children mesmerized, studying the falls," she said. "And I walked over, stood behind them ... and I took this picture."
It's a snapshot anyone could have taken, she said: an image that captures the blue-green water before it plunges over the falls. Soon she began thinking of other places to visit.
The images that would become "Annie Leibovitz: Pilgrimage" include depictions of landscapes and people, but no faces. Instead, Leibovitz photographed historic objects and scenes, including the homes of "Little Women" author Louisa May Alcott, essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson, entertainer Elvis Presley and others.
"I was swept away when I walked into these places," she said. "I found myself taking pictures and not thinking about any consequences. I was seduced."
There were obstacles, though. One was coming to terms with photographing objects, she said, and finding a way to give them some emotion. She began creating close-up images, as with a nightdress worn by Emily Dickinson. Leibovitz zoomed in on the intricate detail.
"That is not my kind of picture. I mean, I don't ever come in tight like that," Leibovitz said. "It's not me."
It's also her first all-digital photography show. Leibovitz said she is still learning about new technology and about herself.
"This is an amazing time to be a photographer," she said. "I discovered things about myself which were really comforting ? that the work had a deep well, that it wasn't going to go away."
She also learned it was a mistake to let others manage her business affairs.
"I mean, I had a great ride," she said. "I was like a girl who went out and took pictures, and everyone else took care of everything else. Now I really do need to take care of everything."
Leibovitz didn't discuss the status of her debt but said she has good business advisers. "I'm back, for all intents and purposes," she said.
Her travels for "Pilgrimage" produced images of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud's couch, sharpshooter Annie Oakley's heart-shaped shooting target, Presley's Harley-Davidson and a TV he once shot with a gun at Graceland.
As a nod to Sontag, Leibovitz visited the home of Virginia Woolf, one of her partner's favorite writers, where she was happy to learn such a brilliant person could have such a messy studio, she said.
Andy Grundberg, guest curator for the show and a dean at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, said Leibovitz is presenting cultural history in a new way.
"She's trying to convey a sense of people without the people actually being there in front of the camera," he said of Leibovitz' travels. "She was kind of bushwhacking through our cultural legacy and figuring it out as she went along."
In some cases, one destination would lead to several others. Leibovitz was fascinated with the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, which led her to find Lincoln's top hat at the Smithsonian, models for Lincoln's statue in the studio of sculptor Daniel Chester French and a concert gown of Marian Anderson, who sang at the memorial when she was shut out of a segregated concert hall.
Leibovitz eventually compiled the project into a book that evolved into the new exhibit. The show is on view in Washington through May 20 and then will travel to U.S. museums through 2014. The photographs on display will be donated to the Smithsonian American Art Museum for its permanent collection.
Leibovitz said she pursued her new project to protect and nurture her lucrative portrait work by going back to it revived with new energy.
"It's a project I did for myself. I wanted to be seduced into a photograph and not make it up," she said. "And I wanted to take my time."
___
Smithsonian American Art Museum: http://americanart.si.edu
___
Brett Zongker can be reached at https://twitter.com/DCArtBeat
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Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Steven Tyler criticized for football anthem
Matt Slocum / AP
Steven Tyler's version of the national anthem might not have qualified him for his own show, "American Idol."
By Gael Fashingbauer Cooper
"American Idol" judge Steven Tyler found his own musical talents being judged Sunday after the Aerosmith frontman?sang the national anthem at Sunday's AFC Championship football game in Foxborough, Mass.
Aerosmith is a Boston-based band, so choosing Tyler to sing at the New England Patriots-Baltimore Ravens?contest seemed like a perfect choice. Tyler even showed his hometown team pride,?clad in a sequined Patriots scarf. But some are still complaining about his rendition, which featured his trademark raspy scream.
Sports blog Deadspin.com was blunt about its verdict, headlning a post "Steven Tyler's 'Star-Spangled Banner' was terrible, but was it the worst ever?"
The?Huffington Post complained that?Tyler "had trouble hitting the signature high note."
ESPN commentator Skip Bayless had even more criticism for Tyler, saying in a tweet: "How could Patriots be inspired by that awful anthem sung by Steven Tyler? At least give him some screaming guitars to camouflage voice."
FOX News panelist Greg Gutfeld wasn't a fan, either, tweeting: "I went outside to put a raccoon out of its misery - then?I realized my neighbor was watching Steven Tyler sing the Star-Spangled Banner."
Some complained that Tyler tweaked the lyrics in several places, including singing "as bomb bursting in air" instead of "the bombs bursting in air" and appearing to sing "oh the land of the free" instead of "o'er the land of the free."
But others appreciated Tyler's rendition. Country singer Jason Michael Carroll tweeted?that he felt Tyler rocked the anthem, adding "I knew 'the scream' was coming! (Tyler) is always amazing!"
What did you think? Watch Tyler's rendition for yourself, and tell us on Facebook.
?
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Monday, January 23, 2012
Summary Box: Lagarde urges Europe to boost growth (AP)
EASE UP ON AUSTERITY: The head of the International Monetary Fund said that some of the stronger eurozone countries could deal with their debts in a less aggressive way to shore up economic growth.
FIREPOWER: Christine Lagarde, also a former French finance minister, added that the European bailout fund should be increased.
CONTEXT: Germany, Europe's biggest economy, has paid for a large chunk of Europe's bailouts. It has put austerity at the heart of the eurozone rescue effort and is reluctant to put more money into rescue funds.
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?Scare Tactic? Anti-Gaming Ads Popping Up On Florida Televisions ...
MIAMI (CBS4) ? With an ominous voice over a bed of scary music, the announcer says, ?Big gambling?they say Florida?s the next Vegas??
It?s part of a new TV ad that?s hitting the airwaves? Friday.? It?s aimed at convincing you that putting mega casinos in South Florida, like the proposed Genting project in downtown Miami,? is a bad, dangerous idea.
?It?s very slick,? said Nova Southeastern University Professor and gambling law expert Bob Jarvis.? ?But it?s not accurate, not truthful.?
Javis calls the ad a scare tactic ? with no facts to back it up.
?The ad wants you to believe that here will be crime on every street corner if you allow casinos,? he said. ?And that?s simply has never happened anywhere. ?
Tell that to Luke Ythasunshorn.? In January of 2009,he was held up in his drive way after leaving a casino.
?He looked at me, held his gun and said give me your watch,? he recalled.? That was a $30,000 Rolex.? But Jarvis believes crimes like that can happen anywhere.
?There have been crimes when people leave casinos, but you know what, there have been crimes when people leave shopping malls and nobody is advocating we close down shopping malls,? said Jarvis
Former state lawmaker Dan Gelber is with NoCasinos.org.? He says crime, bankruptcy and social woes are all part of the package.
?The mega casinos they?re talking about bringing in to our community are the largest casinos in the history of the world,? said Gelber.? ?One of them alone would be equivalent of 7 of the largest casinos in Las Vegas.?
Gelber said we have nothing to compare the proposed resort casinos to ? that even though there is plenty of gambling here now ? this would be like nothing we?ve seen before .
?That?s like saying you have a? 7-11 on the corner so why not just have a Sawgrass Mills.? There?s a huge differencing proportion in what we?re talking about,? said Gelber.
The television spot ends with the announcing saying,?? ?What happens in Vegas should stay in Vegas! Tell our elected officials, keep big gambling out of Florida.?
The ad begins airing in South Florida today, it?s also running in Tallahassee where lawmakers are debating it.
Source: http://miami.cbslocal.com/2012/01/21/scare-tactic-anti-gaming-ads-popping-up-on-florida-televisions/
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Sunday, January 22, 2012
Recovering Robin Gibb makes classical debut
LONDON?? Bee Gees star Robin Gibb has recorded his first classical work with son Robin-John, a process he said helped him recover from serious illness.
The 62-year-old's "The Titanic Requiem," described as a "symphonic concept album," will be released by Warner Music Group's Rhino Entertainment on March 19, the label announced on Friday.
The concert performance premiere will take place in London on April 10, 100 years to the day after the ill-fated passenger liner set sail. It sank after striking an iceberg five days later in one of the most famous maritime disasters in history.
Story: Bee Gee Robin Gibb says he's improving-
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The album was recorded over the last year at Air Studios in London and performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Included on the album is "Don't Cry Alone," featuring lead vocals from Robin Gibb in what has been billed as "the welcome return of one of music's truly unforgettable and distinctive voices."
Gibb said in November that he was recovering after being "very unwell." His representatives have declined to comment on British media reports that the singer was battling liver cancer.
Story: Report: Bee Gees' Robin Gibb fighting liver cancer"It has been an incredible experience working with my son RJ," Gibb said in a statement to announce the new album.
"There is a creative freedom and uninhibited state that comes from working with a family member. Working on this album and with RJ has been a driving force, and one that has helped me on the road to recovery."
In October, Gibb was hospitalized for abdominal pain and treated for colon inflammation. After being released by doctors, he issued a statement saying he planned to return to work, according to media reports at the time.
Gibb is one of the two surviving members of the Bee Gees, a band he formed with his twin brother Maurice and older brother Barry. Maurice died in 2003.
They achieved international success with disco hits such as "Stayin' Alive" and "Night Fever."
Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/46069605/ns/today-entertainment/
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RedPad: Android tablet for Chinese politicians that costs twice as much as the iPad (Yahoo! News)
An Android tablet designed for Chinese officials without special features inexplicably costs $1,600
Would you buy a $1,600?Android tablet that doesn't have any special features compared to other slates half its price? A relatively unknown Chinese manufacturer seems to think people would, and released a tablet called the RedPad ? a?Honeycomb device specifically meant for?China's government officials, that costs almost two grand.
The 9.7" RedPad?is a pretty standard Android?tablet fare, with 1GB of RAM, and 16GB of storage, which is usually the lowest capacity found in mid-range slates. For $2,000, you'd think buyers will get a top-of-the-line device or at least a few extras. But the only bonus they will get is a rather shoddy looking leather case, and an inscription of China's "Serve the People" slogan at the back of the tablet. The total cost for manufacturing each device is $480, so why it's priced at $1,600 is beyond us. An?interview with the company spokesperson, Xianri Liu, reveals RedPad's somewhat twisted reasoning for that price point: the company believes people think expensive things are good. Therefore, RedPad must be good.
He also argues that RedPad comes with a bunch of apps including tablet versions of periodicals, and a state-sanctioned Chinese version of?Twitter. Installing those kinds of apps on the?iPad, he says, will cost as much as $1,600 in a year. A device of that price point targeted toward?politicians will almost certainly cause a stir not only within China, but all over the internet.
Liu says the company plans to release RedPad to market, and compete with?Apple's iPad?? a feat that will be extremely hard to accomplish when the tablet costs that much.
[via?Penn Olson,?The Verge]
(Source)
This article was written by Mariella Moon and originally appeared on Tecca
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Saturday, January 21, 2012
Italy: Divers find woman's body in stricken ship (AP)
ROME ? Italian Coast Guard divers have found a woman's body in a corridor of a submerged section of the capsized Costa Concordia, raising to at least 12 the number of dead in the cruise liner accident.
Coast Guard Cmdr. Cosimo Nicastro told The Associated Press that the body, wearing a life jacket, was found in a narrow corridor near an evacuation staging point at the ship's rear Saturday.
The body was brought to Giglio, the Tuscan island where the cruise liner hit a reef and ran aground on Jan. 14. Twenty people are missing.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
ROME (AP) ? Italian Coast Guard divers have found a woman's body in a corridor of a submerged section of the capsized Costa Concordia, raising to at least 12 the number of dead in the cruise liner accident.
Coast Guard Cmdr. Cosimo Nicastro told The Associated Press that the body, wearing a life jacket, was found in a narrow corridor near an evacuation staging point at the ship's rear.
The body was brought to Giglio, the Tuscan island where the cruise liner hit a reef and ran aground on Jan. 14. Twenty persons are missing.
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Britney Spears, Jason Trawick Wedding: Details Revealed!
Jason Trawick popped the question to Britney Spears just before Christmas, kicking off that whole slew of celebrity holiday engagements. And now, we have some details on the impending wedding.
"It's going to be a very intimate wedding with only immediate family and very, very close friends," a source told RadarOnline.com. "It will probably be a destination wedding in a very warm, tropical location."
And apparently, Britney wants everything to be as simple as possible. The source continued:
"There is absolutely no drama with the planning of the wedding and Britney will probably wear an off-white dress that will show off her killer bod."
When I hear quotes like this, mentally I squint and think, "okay, who is this?"
"Britney's sons are absolutely going to be a part of the ceremony as ring bearers, and Jason has something very special planned for the boys that will take place during the wedding," the source said.
Meanwhile, one of Spears' ex-handlers wants to write a tell-all book about the singer, namely it's about "orgies and hot tub sessions." Fernando Flores, the same dude who filed a lawsuit against Spears for sexual harassment, is now saying:
"Her tours were an anything goes environment. I heard stories of threesomes, orgies, girls making out - things that would make your hair stand on end."
Dude, we've all seen Jersey Shore. I'm pretty sure were completely desensitized to any kind of wild sex acts that could've gone on during a Britney Spears concert.
"I was in her bathroom and saw this picture of her in a tub with some girls. It was very sexual. She told me, 'That was on tour and s**t got crazy.' I asked what she meant and she said they all got it on. Her and the girls."
Big deal. Deena went down on Snooki after making out in front of everyone. Try again, buddy.
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Friday, January 20, 2012
Bank of New York Mellon 4Q profit falls 26 pct (AP)
NEW YORK ? Bank of New York Mellon Corp.'s fourth-quarter net income fell 26 percent, hurt by restructuring charges and a decline revenue stemming from less client activity and a seasonal slowdown in one of its businesses.
The results missed Wall Street expectations, and its shares fell almost 4 percent in midday trading.
The nation's sixth-largest bank reported on Wednesday that its net income fell to $505 million, or 42 cents per share, for the period ended Dec. 31. That's down from $679 million, or 54 cents per share, a year earlier.
Restructuring charges totaled 6 cents per share in the quarter. Taking out those charges, earnings were 48 cents per share.
Analysts expected earnings of 54 cents per share, according to a FactSet survey.
Revenue fell 6 percent to $3.54 billion from $3.75 billion, missing Wall Street's estimate of $3.75 billion.
Bank of New York Mellon's stock dropped 83 cents, or 3.9 percent, to $20.44 in midday trading.
Chairman, President and CEO Gerald Hassell said in a statement that the revenue decline was due to lower-than-normal levels of client activity caused by uncertain market conditions and the seasonality of its depositary receipts business.
Bank of New York Mellon earns fees from services such as banking, stock lending and investment record-keeping for institutions such as pension funds, as well as corporations and wealthy individuals.
Fee revenue fell to $2.77 billion from $2.97 billion, while investment services fees dropped 8 percent to $1.6 billion because of lower volumes, higher money market fee waivers and seasonally lower depositary receipts revenue.
Foreign exchange and trading revenue slipped in the quarter, as did investment management and performance fees.
Net interest revenue rose to $780 million from $775 million in the third quarter due to growth in client deposits placed with central banks.
Provision for credit losses was $23 million mostly because of a broker-dealer customer that filed for bankruptcy.
Assets under custody and administration rose 3 percent to $25.8 trillion thanks to new business. Assets that the Bank of New York Mellon manages, excluding securities lending assets, climbed 8 percent to $1.26 trillion.
For the full year, the New York trust bank's net income was basically flat at $2.52 billion. Per share earnings were down slightly to $2.03 per share from $2.05 per share in the previous year.
Annual revenue increased 6.1 percent to $14.73 billion from $13.88 billion.
Bank of New York Mellon also declared a quarterly dividend of 13 cents per share. The dividend will be paid on Feb. 7 to shareholders of record on Jan. 30.
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PFT: Roger Craig sees a Harbaugh-49ers dynasty
Getty ImagesExactly 30 years ago, coach Bill Walsh transformed a perennially mediocre-at-best 49ers franchise into a juggernaut that would capture five Super Bowl titles in 14 seasons.
After 17 years without a return to the NFL title game, one of the key members of Walsh?s 49ers predicts a return to glory under coach Jim Harbaugh.
?I see these guys doing some wonderful things this decade ? I think Jim will do great job of creating another dynasty and winning some Super Bowls,? Craig recently told the San Francisco Chronicle, via NFL.com.? ?I foresee us winning some Super Bowls in the next decade, if not this year then in the years ahead.? Wherever he goes, he wins.? He has the secret sauce, and I?m loving his flavor.?
(Look, it would be way too easy to make a juvenile remark at this point, including but not limited to ?that?s what she said.?? Instead, I?ll just sit here and wonder how close Craig came to calling back Eric Branch of the Chronicle and begging him to pull that last sentence.)
?Jim Harbaugh is an amazing guy, an innovator, amazing coach, a leader,? Craig added.? ?When you get players to buy into your system the way he has, you?re going to have success.?
Amen to that.? We thought Harbaugh would make enough of a difference to win the NFC West, but we never dreamed he?d take the team to a 14-3 record and a berth in the NFC title game, especially since he had only seven weeks to get his team ready.
Some think that Jeff Fisher avoided the Dolphins for fear of competing directly with Bill Belichick and the Patriots.? In the end, Fisher may have wished he picked Belichick as his arch-rival instead of Harbaugh and the 49ers.
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Thursday, January 19, 2012
Report: UK soldiers accused of abusing Afghan youths
By msnbc.com
Two UK soldiers serving in Afghanistan have been arrested after they allegedly encouraged two children to touch them inappropriately through their clothes, a British newspaper reported on Wednesday.
The Sun reported that Prime Minister David Cameron was "deeply shocked" in the wake of claims that the pair, a sergeant and a private, filmed the separate incidents involving a boy and girl aged around 10.? The two then reportedly showed the footage to other servicemen, the newspaper reported.?
Defense officials who informed Cameron of the allegations told him that the pair had been arrested, The Sun reported.
The U.K.'s Ministry of Defense said it was taking the allegations "extremely seriously."
"We are aware that an allegation has been made concerning alleged inappropriate behaviour by two servicemen in Afghanistan. The Royal Military Police (Special Investigations Branch) has launched an investigation into this," it said in a statement to msnbc.com. "It would be inappropriate to comment further while an investigation is ongoing."
The allegations come just days after the American military was hit by video showing Marines urinating on Taliban corpses.?
F. Brinley Bruton, London-based senior writer and editor
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Ending Campaign, Huntsman Plans to Drop Out and Back Romney (Time.com)
Jon Huntsman signaled that he will bow out of the Republican presidential race Monday morning and endorse Mitt Romney, winnowing the GOP field and giving Romney a boost just five days before South Carolina's pivotal Jan. 21 primary.
Huntsman will announce his decision, revealed Sunday night by campaign officials, at a Monday morning speech in Myrtle Beach. The move comes less than a week after the former Utah governor battled to a third-place finish in New Hampshire, the state on which he staked his campaign. (VIDEO: 'Humble' Jon Huntsman Announces 2012 Run)
After failing to break through in the Granite State, Huntsman's days in the race were numbered. Though he treated the disappointing result as a triumph -- confetti showered the stage at his New Hampshire send-off Tuesday night -- and journeyed south vowing to fight on, Huntsman's campaign was running on fumes, bereft of the money and momentum required to run ads or contest a protracted primary fight. While his exit was anticipated, the timing was a surprise. Earlier Sunday, he earned the endorsement of South Carolina's The State newspaper.
Advisers cast Huntsman's decision as a way to help Romney to wrap up the nomination and turn his sights to Barack Obama. The former Massachusetts governor, fresh off wins in Iowa and New Hampshire, is scrambling to fend off attacks from a slew of conservative challengers who see this week's Palmetto State primary as their last, best hope to stall Romney's push for the nomination. Huntsman's slim support base -- after notching 17% in New Hampshire, he has polled in the low single-digits in South Carolina -- is most likely to throw its support to Romney. (MORE: The Huntsman Fallacy)
Whether Romney's camp will embrace the endorsement is another matter. After pledging to make comity a hallmark of his campaign, Huntsman sharpened his tone toward the Republican front-runner as his own fortunes sputtered. In recent weeks, he bitterly hammered Romney for being a political "chameleon" who lacked core convictions and "likes firing people." On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, Huntsman suggested Romney's remarks about sacking insurance companies, taken against the backdrop of his record at Bain Capital, rendered him "completely unelectable." Now Huntsman is calling Romney the GOP's best hope to oust Obama in the fall.
Huntsman's exit caps a campaign that sputtered badly after a splashy beginning. A popular governor with impeccable foreign-policy credentials, Huntsman's plunge into the presidential race last summer was met with media fanfare and whispers among Democrats that his moderate tone and knack for knitting together bipartisan coalitions could make him a tough general-election match-up. His campaign kickoff in June painted him as a conservative in the Reagan mold. But he struggled from the start to find a foothold in a crowded GOP field. (MORE: Jon Huntsman: The Potential Republican Presidential Candidate Democrats Most Fear)
As Utah governor, Huntsman compiled a conservative record on fiscal issues, abortion and gun rights while presiding over a surge in job growth. Instead of heralding these credentials, Huntsman often preferred the language of moderation. He decried partisan bickering, made a show of bucking GOP doctrine on issues like global warming and refused to criticize Obama, under whom he served as Ambassador to China. With primary voters hungry for red meat, he served up a steady diet of civility and compromise, and the recipe didn't take. At debates Huntsman was by turns wooden and jocular, muddying his strong grip of foreign policy and conservative tax plan with an off-kilter joke or a Mandarin phrase. Behind the scenes, his campaign was racked by infighting early on. In one of the race's richest ironies, Huntsman -- the wealthy son of a billionaire chemical manufacturer -- was hamstrung all along by a lack of money, struggling to dredge up enough cash to go up on the air until it was too late. (Though in the end, his super PAC spent some $2 million to run spots in New Hampshire, more than any other campaign.)
It wasn't enough. As a relative moderate running in a bull market for conservatives, Huntsman may have been doomed from the start, but he inflicted further damage by failing to zero in on a message. A few days before the New Hampshire primary, during a campaign stop in Concord, Huntsman was asked whether the experience of running had disabused him of the notion that there was still a place in politics for a centrist like himself. Huntsman, whose aides labored daily to cast him as a conservative alternative to Romney, didn't bother to dog whistle. "Some people like to call it centrist or something else. I do what I do based on a view of this country and its future," he said. "I'm a realist, at the end of the day. I don't like to spend a lot of time posturing...I'm just going to be who I am." Too many voters were left unsure what that was.
See TIME's 2011 Person of the Year: The Protester.
See TIME's Top 10 Everything of 2011.
View this article on Time.com
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Star Snapshots: Golden Globes Edition!
Time to celebrate! See how the stars (Charlize! Tina Fey!) let loose after the awards ceremony
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