Argentine court upholds freeze on Chevron assets

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) ? An attempt by Chevron Corp. to unfreeze its assets was dismissed Wednesday by an appeals court in Argentina, where the winners of a $19 billion environmental judgment in Ecuador are suing to force the oil company to pay.

Plaintiffs' attorney Pablo Fajardo told The Associated Press that the court refused to lift an embargo that a lower-court judge imposed in November in the case, which involves oil contamination left after Texaco Corp. pulled out of the Amazon decades ago. Chevron later bought Texaco and inherited the problem.

"Chevron respectfully disagrees with the court's decision" and will pursue all available legal remedies to reverse the interim measure, spokesman Kurt Glaubitz said.

Chevron has no assets in Ecuador, so the plaintiffs have filed suits in Canada, Brazil and Argentina.

Chevron has refused to pay, saying that if the accusations had been legitimate, the plaintiffs would be seeking relief in the United States, where the company is headquartered.

Each side has accused the other of committing fraud during the long judicial process, which began in the United States but moved to Ecuador with Chevron's consent at a time when the country was led by interests more sympathetic to foreign oil companies than its current president, leftist Rafael Correa.

___

Associated Press Writer Frank Bajak in Lima, Peru contributed to this story.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-01-30-Argentina-Chevron/id-4885a3a1f62d4f458d8ffbc007fb3e75

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Phoenix police: Body found that matches shooter

This image provided by the Phoenix Police Department shows an undated image of Arthur Douglas Harmon, 70 who authorities identified as the suspect, who they said opened fire at the end of a mediation session at a Phoenix office complex Wednesday Jan. 30, 2013. (AP Photo/Phoenix Police Department)

This image provided by the Phoenix Police Department shows an undated image of Arthur Douglas Harmon, 70 who authorities identified as the suspect, who they said opened fire at the end of a mediation session at a Phoenix office complex Wednesday Jan. 30, 2013. (AP Photo/Phoenix Police Department)

Members of the Phoenix Police Department SWAT team prepare to enter the home of a suspected gunman who opened fire at a Phoenix office building, wounding three people, one of them critically, and setting off a manhunt that led police to surround his house for several hours before they discovered he wasn't there, Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2013, in Phoenix. Authorities believe there was only one shooter, but have not identified him or a possible motive for the shooting. They don't believe the midmorning shooting at the complex was a random act.(AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Members of the Phoenix Police Department SWAT team exit the garage at the home of a suspected gunman who opened fire at a Phoenix office building, wounding three people, one of them critically, and setting off a manhunt that led police to surround his house for several hours before they discovered he wasn't there, Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2013, in Phoenix. Authorities believe there was only one shooter, but have not identified him or a possible motive for the shooting. They don't believe the midmorning shooting at the complex was a random act. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

A member of the Phoenix Police Department SWAT team leads a female neighbor away to safety, as the the SWAT team prepares to enter the home of a suspected gunman who opened fire at a Phoenix office building, wounding three people, one of them critically, and setting off a manhunt that led police to surround his house for several hours before they discovered he wasn't there, Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2013, in Phoenix. Authorities believe there was only one shooter, but have not identified him or a possible motive for the shooting. They don't believe the midmorning shooting at the complex was a random act. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Police officers leave an office building after a shooting at the building in Phoenix on Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2013. A gunman opened fire at the Phoenix office building, wounding three people, one of them critically, authorities said. Police were searching for the shooter. (AP Photo/Patrick Sison)

PHOENIX (AP) ? A landscaper in the Phoenix suburb of Mesa found a body in bushes early Thursday that matches the suspect in an office shooting that killed a man and critically wounded another, police said.

The rented Kia Optima sedan that Arthur Douglas Harmon, 70, was likely driving was also found nearby in a parking lot, authorities said at a news conference. The person who was found died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound and a handgun was also found, police said.

Harmon drew a gun and shot both men at the end of a mediation session Wednesday morning at an office building in north-central Phoenix, police said.

Steve Singer, 48, died hours later. Mark Hummels, 43, with the Phoenix law firm Osborn Maledon, was in critical condition. A 32-year-old woman was also shot but suffered non-life threatening injuries.

"We believe the two men were the targets. It was not a random shooting," said Sgt. Tommy Thompson, a Phoenix police spokesman.

Harmon also shot at someone who tried to follow him to get his license plate number, authorities said.

"As he left the scene, an individual witness got in his own car and actually followed Harmon in his Optima, and he drove into a neighborhood and Harmon actually got out of his car and shot at that witness," Thompson said.

Singer was the CEO of Scottsdale-based Fusion Contact Centers LLC, which had hired Harmon to refurbish office cubicles at two call centers in California.

According to court documents, Harmon was scheduled to go to a law office in the building where the shooting took place for a settlement conference in a lawsuit he filed last April against Fusion.

Fusion said Harmon was paid nearly $30,000 under the $47,000 contract. But the company asked him to repay much of the money when it discovered that the cubicles could not be refurbished, according to the documents.

Harmon argued Fusion hung him out to dry by telling him to remove and store 206 "worthless" work stations after the mix-up was discovered. Harmon said Fusion then told him that the company decided to use a competitor.

Harmon's lawsuit had sought payment for the remainder of the contract, $20,000 in damages and reimbursement for storage fees and legal costs.

Hummels represented Fusion in the lawsuit. Harmon represented himself.

The shooting took place in the building where Pro tempore Judge Ira Schwartz, who scheduled the mediation meeting, has an office.

The response to the shooting centered on the building ? home to insurance, medical and law offices ? but soon spread to a north-Phoenix home and a central-Phoenix high-rise office building where Hummels' office is located.

SWAT teams and two armored vehicles surrounded the house. Police served a search warrant to enter the house, which county property records show was sold by Harmon to his son last year for $26,000.

For a time, officers used a megaphone to ask Harmon to surrender, believing he might be inside the home.

Lois Allen, who has lived across the street from the Harmon home for about eight years, said she was startled to see all the police cars in the neighborhood.

She said she never met Harmon but had seen him walking a dog before.

The gunfire at the office complex prompted terrified workers to lock the doors to their offices and hide far from the windows. SWAT officers searched the building.

"Everyone was just scared, honestly, just scared," said Navika Sood, assistant director of nursing at First at Home Health Services who along with her co-workers locked the entrances to their office.

Sood said police evacuated the office about 30 minutes after she first heard the popping noises.

Becky Neher, who works for a title company in the building, said she heard two gunshots.

"Someone yelled, 'We have a shooter,'" Neher said. She looked out her second-story office and saw two people lying on the ground outside the back of the building.

The shooting took place on the same day that hearings on legislation to address gun violence were convened in Washington, with former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords testifying for stricter gun controls. A gunman shot Giffords in the head during a shooting rampage in Tucson in January 2011.

___

Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Paul Davenport, Felicia Fonseca, Terry Tang and Walter Berry in Phoenix, and AP researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-01-31-Arizona-Shooting/id-11cf11775f6e4ee59981bec3f0747369

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Construction fuel consumption index up 3.5 percent in December ...

WEX and IHS have released results of the WEX Construction Fuel Consumption Index (FCI), which indicated an increase of 3.5 percent in December over December 2011.

The WEX Construction FCI measures national fuel consumption statistics for the construction industry to provide an up-to-date indication of construction activity in the United States.

For December 2012, the WEX Construction FCI reported that fuel consumption by United States construction companies increased 3.5 percent over December 2011 and increased 0.04 percent versus the previous month.

Last month?s WEX Construction FCI was consistent with the stalled growth indicated by most of the government?s subsequent construction data releases. Construction spending excluding improvements decreased by 0.2 percent in November, and private residential construction showed growth of 1.2 percent?the weakest gain in eight months.

Total housing permits in November increased by 3.6 percent. Housing starts decreased by 3.0 percent in November to an annual rate of 861,000.

In December, weak growth coincided with a gain of 30,000 jobs construction jobs following November?s 10,000 job losses. Total construction put-in-place decreased by 0.3 percent in November.

Despite month-to-month stalled growth in December, the United States housing market is improving, with new home sales in November rising 4.4 percent to a 377,000-unit annual rate. However, new home sales are not expected to reach normal levels above 800,000 until 2015.

Existing home sales increased by 5.9 percent in November, while inventories decreased to 2.03 million units?the lowest since December 2001. The low inventories are expected to spur
builders to put up new homes to avoid losing sales and facing higher prices.

Home prices are on the rise nationally in at least three of the four regions, while home prices in the Northeast continue to fall because many housing markets in this region remain depressed.

Source: http://www.equipmentworld.com/construction-fuel-consumption-index-up-3-5-percent-in-december/

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SPC Tornado Watch 21 Status Reports

Watch 21 Status Reports

STATUS REPORT #3 ON WW 21 VALID 302130Z - 302240Z SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES RIGHT OF A LINE FROM 20 NE CEW TO 20 SSE ATL TO 30 SSE TRI. FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION SEE MESOSCALE DISCUSSION 102 ..COHEN..01/30/13 ATTN...WFO...BMX...MOB...TAE...FFC...GSP... && STATUS REPORT FOR WT 21 SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES FOR THE FOLLOWING AREAS ALC005-031-045-061-067-069-113-302240- AL . ALABAMA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BARBOUR COFFEE DALE GENEVA HENRY HOUSTON RUSSELL $$ GAC007-009-011-013-021-023-035-037-053-059-061-071-079-087-093- 095-099-105-119-131-133-141-145-147-151-153-157-159-169-171-177- 193-195-197-199-201-205-207-211-215-217-219-221-225-231-235-237- 239-243-247-249-253-255-257-259-261-263-265-269-273-275-277-287- 289-293-297-307-317-319-321-302240- GA . GEORGIA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BAKER BALDWIN BANKS BARROW BIBB BLECKLEY BUTTS CALHOUN CHATTAHOOCHEE CLARKE CLAY COLQUITT CRAWFORD DECATUR DOOLY DOUGHERTY EARLY ELBERT FRANKLIN GRADY GREENE HANCOCK HARRIS HART HENRY HOUSTON JACKSON JASPER JONES LAMAR LEE MACON MADISON MARION MERIWETHER MILLER MITCHELL MONROE MORGAN MUSCOGEE NEWTON OCONEE OGLETHORPE PEACH PIKE PULASKI PUTNAM QUITMAN RANDOLPH ROCKDALE SCHLEY SEMINOLE SPALDING STEPHENS STEWART SUMTER TALBOT TALIAFERRO TAYLOR TERRELL THOMAS TIFT TURNER TWIGGS UPSON WALTON WEBSTER WILKES WILKINSON WORTH $$ NCC003-011-021-023-025-027-035-045-059-071-089-097-109-111-119- 121-149-159-161-175-179-302240- NC . NORTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ALEXANDER AVERY BUNCOMBE BURKE CABARRUS CALDWELL CATAWBA CLEVELAND DAVIE GASTON HENDERSON IREDELL LINCOLN MCDOWELL MECKLENBURG MITCHELL POLK ROWAN RUTHERFORD TRANSYLVANIA UNION $$ SCC001-007-021-023-045-047-059-073-077-083-087-091-302240- SC . SOUTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ABBEVILLE ANDERSON CHEROKEE CHESTER GREENVILLE GREENWOOD LAURENS OCONEE PICKENS SPARTANBURG UNION YORK $$ THE WATCH STATUS MESSAGE IS FOR GUIDANCE PURPOSES ONLY. PLEASE REFER TO WATCH COUNTY NOTIFICATION STATEMENTS FOR OFFICIAL INFORMATION ON COUNTIES...INDEPENDENT CITIES AND MARINE ZONES CLEARED FROM SEVERE THUNDERSTORM AND TORNADO WATCHES. $$ STATUS REPORT #2 ON WW 21 VALID 302030Z - 302140Z SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES RIGHT OF A LINE FROM 25 NW CEW TO 30 ENE HSS. ..COHEN..01/30/13 ATTN...WFO...BMX...MOB...TAE...FFC...GSP... && STATUS REPORT FOR WT 21 SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES FOR THE FOLLOWING AREAS ALC005-011-031-039-041-045-061-067-069-081-087-109-113-302140- AL . ALABAMA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BARBOUR BULLOCK COFFEE COVINGTON CRENSHAW DALE GENEVA HENRY HOUSTON LEE MACON PIKE RUSSELL $$ GAC009-011-013-021-023-035-037-053-059-061-063-077-079-089-093- 097-099-105-113-117-119-121-133-135-137-139-141-145-147-151-153- 157-159-169-171-193-195-197-199-207-211-215-217-219-221-225-231- 235-237-239-241-243-247-249-255-257-259-261-263-265-269-273-285- 289-293-297-307-311-317-319-302140- GA . GEORGIA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BALDWIN BANKS BARROW BIBB BLECKLEY BUTTS CALHOUN CHATTAHOOCHEE CLARKE CLAY CLAYTON COWETA CRAWFORD DEKALB DOOLY DOUGLAS EARLY ELBERT FAYETTE FORSYTH FRANKLIN FULTON GREENE GWINNETT HABERSHAM HALL HANCOCK HARRIS HART HENRY HOUSTON JACKSON JASPER JONES LAMAR MACON MADISON MARION MERIWETHER MONROE MORGAN MUSCOGEE NEWTON OCONEE OGLETHORPE PEACH PIKE PULASKI PUTNAM QUITMAN RABUN RANDOLPH ROCKDALE SCHLEY SPALDING STEPHENS STEWART SUMTER TALBOT TALIAFERRO TAYLOR TERRELL TROUP TWIGGS UPSON WALTON WEBSTER WHITE WILKES WILKINSON $$ NCC003-011-021-023-025-027-035-045-059-071-089-097-099-109-111- 119-121-149-159-161-175-179-199-302140- NC . NORTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ALEXANDER AVERY BUNCOMBE BURKE CABARRUS CALDWELL CATAWBA CLEVELAND DAVIE GASTON HENDERSON IREDELL JACKSON LINCOLN MCDOWELL MECKLENBURG MITCHELL POLK ROWAN RUTHERFORD TRANSYLVANIA UNION YANCEY $$ SCC001-007-021-023-045-047-059-073-077-083-087-091-302140- SC . SOUTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ABBEVILLE ANDERSON CHEROKEE CHESTER GREENVILLE GREENWOOD LAURENS OCONEE PICKENS SPARTANBURG UNION YORK $$ TNC171-302140- TN . TENNESSEE COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE UNICOI $$ THE WATCH STATUS MESSAGE IS FOR GUIDANCE PURPOSES ONLY. PLEASE REFER TO WATCH COUNTY NOTIFICATION STATEMENTS FOR OFFICIAL INFORMATION ON COUNTIES...INDEPENDENT CITIES AND MARINE ZONES CLEARED FROM SEVERE THUNDERSTORM AND TORNADO WATCHES. $$ STATUS REPORT #1 ON WW 21 VALID 301925Z - 302040Z THE SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES ACROSS THE ENTIRE WATCH AREA. ..COHEN..01/30/13 ATTN...WFO...BMX...MOB...TAE...FFC...GSP... && STATUS REPORT FOR WT 21 SEVERE WEATHER THREAT CONTINUES FOR THE FOLLOWING AREAS ALC005-011-013-017-031-035-039-041-045-051-053-061-067-069-081- 085-087-101-109-111-113-123-302040- AL . ALABAMA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BARBOUR BULLOCK BUTLER CHAMBERS COFFEE CONECUH COVINGTON CRENSHAW DALE ELMORE ESCAMBIA GENEVA HENRY HOUSTON LEE LOWNDES MACON MONTGOMERY PIKE RANDOLPH RUSSELL TALLAPOOSA $$ GAC009-011-013-015-021-023-035-037-045-053-057-059-061-063-067- 077-079-085-089-093-097-099-105-113-117-119-121-133-135-137-139- 141-143-145-147-149-151-153-157-159-169-171-187-193-195-197-199- 207-211-215-217-219-221-223-225-227-231-235-237-239-241-243-247- 249-255-257-259-261-263-265-269-273-281-285-289-291-293-297-307- 311-317-319-302040- GA . GEORGIA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE BALDWIN BANKS BARROW BARTOW BIBB BLECKLEY BUTTS CALHOUN CARROLL CHATTAHOOCHEE CHEROKEE CLARKE CLAY CLAYTON COBB COWETA CRAWFORD DAWSON DEKALB DOOLY DOUGLAS EARLY ELBERT FAYETTE FORSYTH FRANKLIN FULTON GREENE GWINNETT HABERSHAM HALL HANCOCK HARALSON HARRIS HART HEARD HENRY HOUSTON JACKSON JASPER JONES LAMAR LUMPKIN MACON MADISON MARION MERIWETHER MONROE MORGAN MUSCOGEE NEWTON OCONEE OGLETHORPE PAULDING PEACH PICKENS PIKE PULASKI PUTNAM QUITMAN RABUN RANDOLPH ROCKDALE SCHLEY SPALDING STEPHENS STEWART SUMTER TALBOT TALIAFERRO TAYLOR TERRELL TOWNS TROUP TWIGGS UNION UPSON WALTON WEBSTER WHITE WILKES WILKINSON $$ NCC003-011-021-023-025-027-035-045-059-071-075-087-089-097-099- 109-111-113-115-119-121-149-159-161-173-175-179-199-302040- NC . NORTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ALEXANDER AVERY BUNCOMBE BURKE CABARRUS CALDWELL CATAWBA CLEVELAND DAVIE GASTON GRAHAM HAYWOOD HENDERSON IREDELL JACKSON LINCOLN MCDOWELL MACON MADISON MECKLENBURG MITCHELL POLK ROWAN RUTHERFORD SWAIN TRANSYLVANIA UNION YANCEY $$ SCC001-007-021-023-045-047-059-073-077-083-087-091-302040- SC . SOUTH CAROLINA COUNTIES INCLUDED ARE ABBEVILLE ANDERSON CHEROKEE CHESTER GREENVILLE GREENWOOD LAURENS OCONEE PICKENS SPARTANBURG UNION YORK $$ THE WATCH STATUS MESSAGE IS FOR GUIDANCE PURPOSES ONLY. PLEASE REFER TO WATCH COUNTY NOTIFICATION STATEMENTS FOR OFFICIAL INFORMATION ON COUNTIES...INDEPENDENT CITIES AND MARINE ZONES CLEARED FROM SEVERE THUNDERSTORM AND TORNADO WATCHES. $$

Top/Watch Issuance Text for Watch 21/All Current Watches/Forecast Products/Home

Source: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/watch/ws0021.html

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Timeline of Germany's Greens

(Reuters) - Formed in 1980 as a loose coalition of pacifists, socialists environmentalists and feminists, the Greens may become kingmakers after Germany's September 2013 federal election.

Here is a look at significant Greens moments in Germany:

October 1992 - Germany's Greens co-founder Petra Kelly is found dead. Kelly was one of its first members of parliament. She was shot dead by her partner, former general and Green politician Gert Bastian, who then killed himself.

Sept/Oct 1998 - Social Democrats under Gerhard Schroeder win the federal election. Schroeder seals a coalition with the Greens and names Greens leader, Joschka Fischer, as foreign minister and deputy chancellor. The Greens join the federal government for first time.

May 1999 - The Greens emerge strengthened from a turbulent party congress where pacifists' anti-NATO demands are defeated. Party leaders and analysts say the Greens had come of age by beating back left-wing demands for an immediate halt to NATO's Yugoslav bombing campaign.

November 2001 - The Greens vote by a large majority to back the deployment of troops in Afghanistan, averting the collapse of the coalition government. Parliament approves the motion the next month.

September 2002 - Fischer confirms his status as Germany's most popular politician as he leads his Greens to their best election result.

March 2003 - Fischer, addressing the U.N. Security Council, says it is still possible to disarm Iraq peacefully and that Berlin therefore rejects war on Baghdad.

November 2005 - Angela Merkel's new coalition government of conservatives and Social Democrats (SPD) takes office after defeating Schroeder's SPD-Greens alliance in elections.

June/July 2011 - Lawmakers in the lower house of parliament - with opposition members from the Greens and SPD joining Merkel's center-right coalition - approve an end to nuclear energy by 2022 following Japan's Fukushima disaster. The upper house votes for it a week later.

March 2012 - Following elections in the German state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, the Green Party heads its first-ever state government, ending 58 years of rule by the conservative CDU. Later in the year Greens candidate Fritz Kuhn becomes mayor of Stuttgart, the first German state capital to elect a Green mayor.

January 2013 - The Social Democrats (SPD) and Greens edge Merkel's conservatives from power in Lower Saxony by one seat, reviving its hopes of defeating her in the September 2013 election.

(Reporting by David Cutler, London Editorial Reference Unit)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/timeline-germanys-greens-161628903.html

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1 in, 2 out: Simulating more efficient solar cells

Public release date: 28-Jan-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Andy Fell
ahfell@ucdavis.edu
530-752-4533
University of California - Davis

Using an exotic form of silicon could substantially improve the efficiency of solar cells, according to computer simulations by researchers at the University of California, Davis, and in Hungary. The work was published Jan. 25 in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Solar cells are based on the photoelectric effect: a photon, or particle of light, hits a silicon crystal and generates a negatively charged electron and a positively charged hole. Collecting those electron-hole pairs generates electric current.

Conventional solar cells generate one electron-hole pair per incoming photon, and have a theoretical maximum efficiency of 33 percent. One exciting new route to improved efficiency is to generate more than one electron-hole pair per photon, said Giulia Galli, professor of chemistry at UC Davis and co-author of the paper.

"This approach is capable of increasing the maximum efficiency to 42 percent, beyond any solar cell available today, which would be a pretty big deal," said lead author Stefan Wippermann, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis.

"In fact, there is reason to believe that if parabolic mirrors are used to focus the sunlight on such a new-paradigm solar cell, its efficiency could reach as high as 70 percent," Wippermann said.

Galli said that nanoparticles have a size of nanometers, typically just a few atoms across. Because of their small size, many of their properties are different from bulk materials. In particular, the probability of generating more than one electron-hole pair is much enhanced, driven by an effect called "quantum confinement." Experiments to explore this paradigm are being pursued by researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colo., as well as at UC Davis.

"But with nanoparticles of conventional silicon, the paradigm works only in ultraviolet light," Wippermann said. "This new approach will become useful only when it is demonstrated to work in visible sunlight."

The researchers simulated the behavior of a structure of silicon called silicon BC8, which is formed under high pressure but is stable at normal pressures, much as diamond is a form of carbon formed under high pressure but stable at normal pressures.

The computer simulations were run through the National Energy Research Scientific Supercomputing Center at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, which granted the project 10 million hours of supercomputer time.

The simulations demonstrated that nanoparticles of silicon BC8 indeed generate multiple electron-hole pairs per photon even when exposed to visible light.

"This is more than an academic exercise. A Harvard-MIT paper showed that when normal silicon solar cells are irradiated with laser light, the energy the laser emits may create a local pressure high enough to form BC8 nanocrystals. Thus, laser or chemical pressure treatment of existing solar cells may turn them into these higher-efficiency cells," said co-author Gergely Zimanyi, professor of physics at UC Davis.

###

Other authors of the paper are Marton Voros and Adam Gali at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary.

The work was funded by a National Science Foundation Solar Collaborative grant awarded to Zimanyi, Galli and colleagues at UC Davis and UC Santa Cruz in 2011. The project brings together experts in material science, chemistry, computer simulations and statistics to develop new approaches to solar power.

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Public release date: 28-Jan-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Andy Fell
ahfell@ucdavis.edu
530-752-4533
University of California - Davis

Using an exotic form of silicon could substantially improve the efficiency of solar cells, according to computer simulations by researchers at the University of California, Davis, and in Hungary. The work was published Jan. 25 in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Solar cells are based on the photoelectric effect: a photon, or particle of light, hits a silicon crystal and generates a negatively charged electron and a positively charged hole. Collecting those electron-hole pairs generates electric current.

Conventional solar cells generate one electron-hole pair per incoming photon, and have a theoretical maximum efficiency of 33 percent. One exciting new route to improved efficiency is to generate more than one electron-hole pair per photon, said Giulia Galli, professor of chemistry at UC Davis and co-author of the paper.

"This approach is capable of increasing the maximum efficiency to 42 percent, beyond any solar cell available today, which would be a pretty big deal," said lead author Stefan Wippermann, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis.

"In fact, there is reason to believe that if parabolic mirrors are used to focus the sunlight on such a new-paradigm solar cell, its efficiency could reach as high as 70 percent," Wippermann said.

Galli said that nanoparticles have a size of nanometers, typically just a few atoms across. Because of their small size, many of their properties are different from bulk materials. In particular, the probability of generating more than one electron-hole pair is much enhanced, driven by an effect called "quantum confinement." Experiments to explore this paradigm are being pursued by researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colo., as well as at UC Davis.

"But with nanoparticles of conventional silicon, the paradigm works only in ultraviolet light," Wippermann said. "This new approach will become useful only when it is demonstrated to work in visible sunlight."

The researchers simulated the behavior of a structure of silicon called silicon BC8, which is formed under high pressure but is stable at normal pressures, much as diamond is a form of carbon formed under high pressure but stable at normal pressures.

The computer simulations were run through the National Energy Research Scientific Supercomputing Center at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, which granted the project 10 million hours of supercomputer time.

The simulations demonstrated that nanoparticles of silicon BC8 indeed generate multiple electron-hole pairs per photon even when exposed to visible light.

"This is more than an academic exercise. A Harvard-MIT paper showed that when normal silicon solar cells are irradiated with laser light, the energy the laser emits may create a local pressure high enough to form BC8 nanocrystals. Thus, laser or chemical pressure treatment of existing solar cells may turn them into these higher-efficiency cells," said co-author Gergely Zimanyi, professor of physics at UC Davis.

###

Other authors of the paper are Marton Voros and Adam Gali at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary.

The work was funded by a National Science Foundation Solar Collaborative grant awarded to Zimanyi, Galli and colleagues at UC Davis and UC Santa Cruz in 2011. The project brings together experts in material science, chemistry, computer simulations and statistics to develop new approaches to solar power.

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-01/uoc--oit012813.php

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S&P 500 eases, ends longest winning run in 8 years

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The S&P 500 eased slightly on Monday after an eight-day run of gains, while the Nasdaq edged higher as Apple shares rebounded.

The index remained above 1,500, however, after closing above that level on Friday for the first time in more than five years. The S&P 500's eight sessions of gains was its longest winning streak in eight years.

Caterpillar shares helped limit losses on the Dow industrials even as the company posted a 55 percent drop in quarterly profit due to a charge connected with accounting fraud at a Chinese subsidiary and weak demand among its dealers. Caterpillar's shares, down 2.2 percent in the past three sessions, rose 2 percent Monday to $97.45.

"I think this multi-year high is really something that's in play both for shorter-term traders and with folks with money on the sidelines," said Bucky Hellwig, senior vice president at BB&T Wealth Management in Birmingham, Alabama.

Bargain hunters lifted Apple after the tech giant's stock dropped 14.4 percent in the previous two sessions. With Apple's stock up 2.3 percent at $449.83, the iPad and iPhone maker regained the title as the largest U.S. company by market capitalization as Exxon Mobil fell 0.7 percent to $91.11 and slipped back to second place.

On the down side, Boeing fell 1.4 percent to $74 on worries about the potential hit from delays in its 787 Dreamliner program.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 14.05 points, or 0.10 percent, at 13,881.93. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was down 2.78 points, or 0.18 percent, at 1,500.18. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 4.59 points, or 0.15 percent, at 3,154.30.

Investors poured $55 billion in new cash into stock mutual funds and exchange-traded funds in January, the biggest monthly inflow on record, research provider TrimTabs Investment Research said.

"What we have seen this year is, it appears the individual investor is allocating some 401(k) money to equities. Hopefully that's a decision that will be with us for a while," Hellwig said.

Data on Monday pointed to growing economic momentum as companies sensed improved consumer demand.

U.S. durable goods orders jumped 4.6 percent in December, a pace that far outstripped expectations for a rise of 1.8 percent. Pending home sales, however, unexpectedly dropped 4.3 percent. Analysts were looking for an increase of 0.3 percent.

Corporate earnings so far have mostly been stronger than expected. Thomson Reuters data showed that of the 150 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings so far, 67.3 percent have beaten analysts' expectations, which is a higher proportion than over the past four quarters and above the average since 1994.

After the bell, shares of Yahoo rose 4.4 percent to $21.21 following the release of its results.

During the regular session, Hess Corp shares shot up 6.1 percent to $62.48 after the company said it would exit its refining business, freeing up to $1 billion of capital. Separately, hedge fund Elliott Associates is looking for approval to buy about $800 million more in Hess stock.

Stocks have also gained support from a recent agreement in Washington to extend the government's borrowing power. On Monday, Fitch Ratings said that agreement removed the near-term risk to the country's 'AAA' rating.

Volume was roughly 6.1 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.

Decliners outpaced advancers on the NYSE by nearly 4 to 3, while advancers beat decliners on the Nasdaq by about 7 to 5.

(Additional reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Jan Paschal and Nick Zieminski)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/dow-p-500-near-flat-rally-apple-boosts-200448350--finance.html

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These Tips Are Way Better Than Googling - The Official Site Of ...

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Internet marketing can be a personal business strategy for your business. It involves particular needs of your business, along with online promotion. This vast world has so many strategies, tools, and techniques, that it can seem a bit confusing as to where you need to begin. These tips can help you make sense of the confusion.

In Internet Marketing is it important to find a way to get your visitors to leave their email addresses and build a mailing list. Add a box to your page for people to sign up, or leave a sign up page at your physical address. Use the mailing list wisely though and avoid sending out too much mail or people will stop reading it. Make sure to include a way for people to unsubscribe as well.

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Internet Marketing Involves Many Methods

To help you with internet marketing methods, keep a pen and paper handy. While it may sound counterintuitive when discussing internet marketing, keeping something nearby to jot down ideas helps. If your site focuses on unique content such as a blog, writing down those spur of the moment ideas may trigger a great post later that really drives visits to your site.

One of the best things that you can do for your site is to market your product in forums. This can increase the visibility that you have and will not cost any money towards your budget. Also, you can use forums to gauge the customer?s likes and dislikes for your services and what you need to improve.

A well-optimized website is one with flawless CSS language. This is due to search engines becoming more and more discriminating in their indexing procedures. Today search engines examine the style sheets along with all the rest of a website?s content and machinery. Up-to-date website owners will use free tools to check the validity of their CSS pages. A broken CSS page can cost a website valuable search engine ranking.

In Internet Marketing You Need a Positive Attitude

Stay positive. Things will go wrong. The search engines will change their algorithms, one of your joint venture partners will go bankrupt or any one of a long list of problems. But you?ve got to stay positive and have a good mental attitude that believes you can handle whatever is coming your way.

Be sure to keep yourself well informed before you decide to start an internet marketing plan. When you know information before starting the project it will help you to avoid many of the common problems that people fall into. This will lead to a higher chance of success and profit.

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Content is King in Internet Marketing

Get good content for your internet marketing website. Content is what people come to your site for in the first place. Offer them something relevant to their wants and needs that benefits them. Before trying to sell your product or service, give your site visitors something that will make them want to stay around.

While internet marketing can be a personal business strategy, it does have the main goal of successfully marketing your business products and services. As you have seen in these tips, there are various approaches, but they are all created around the idea of making your business much more successful online.

Start your Internet Marketing Career Here!

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Source: http://bruno-buergi.com/internet-marketing/

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Researchers break million-core supercomputer barrier

Jan. 28, 2013 ? Stanford Engineering's Center for Turbulence Research (CTR) has set a new record in computational science by successfully using a supercomputer with more than one million computing cores to solve a complex fluid dynamics problem -- the prediction of noise generated by a supersonic jet engine.

Joseph Nichols, a research associate in the center, worked on the newly installed Sequoia IBM Bluegene/Q system at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories (LLNL) funded by the Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) Program of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). Sequoia once topped list of the world's most powerful supercomputers, boasting 1,572,864 compute cores (processors) and 1.6 petabytes of memory connected by a high-speed five-dimensional torus interconnect.

Because of Sequoia's impressive numbers of cores, Nichols was able to show for the first time that million-core fluid dynamics simulations are possible -- and also to contribute to research aimed at designing quieter aircraft engines.

The physics of noise

The exhausts of high-performance aircraft at takeoff and landing are among the most powerful human-made sources of noise. For ground crews, even for those wearing the most advanced hearing protection available, this creates an acoustically hazardous environment. To the communities surrounding airports, such noise is a major annoyance and a drag on property values.

Understandably, engineers are keen to design new and better aircraft engines that are quieter than their predecessors. New nozzle shapes, for instance, can reduce jet noise at its source, resulting in quieter aircraft.

Predictive simulations -- advanced computer models -- aid in such designs. These complex simulations allow scientists to peer inside and measure processes occurring within the harsh exhaust environment that is otherwise inaccessible to experimental equipment. The data gleaned from these simulations are driving computation-based scientific discovery as researchers uncover the physics of noise.

More cores, more challenges

"Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations, like the one Nichols solved, are incredibly complex. Only recently, with the advent of massive supercomputers boasting hundreds of thousands of computing cores, have engineers been able to model jet engines and the noise they produce with accuracy and speed," said Parviz Moin, the Franklin M. and Caroline P. Johnson Professor in the School of Engineering and Director of CTR.

CFD simulations test all aspects of a supercomputer. The waves propagating throughout the simulation require a carefully orchestrated balance between computation, memory and communication. Supercomputers like Sequoia divvy up the complex math into smaller parts so they can be computed simultaneously. The more cores you have, the faster and more complex the calculations can be.

And yet, despite the additional computing horsepower, the difficulty of the calculations only becomes more challenging with more cores. At the one-million-core level, previously innocuous parts of the computer code can suddenly become bottlenecks.

Ironing out the wrinkles

Over the past few weeks, Stanford researchers and LLNL computing staff have been working closely to iron out these last few wrinkles. This week, they were glued to their terminals during the first "full-system scaling" to see whether initial runs would achieve stable run-time performance. They watched eagerly as the first CFD simulation passed through initialization then thrilled as the code performance continued to scale up to and beyond the all-important one-million-core threshold, and as the time-to-solution declined dramatically.

"These runs represent at least an order-of-magnitude increase in computational power over the largest simulations performed at the Center for Turbulence Research previously," said Nichols "The implications for predictive science are mind-boggling."

A homecoming

The current simulations were a homecoming of sorts for Nichols. He was inspired to pursue a career in supercomputing as a high-school student when he attended a two-week summer program at Lawrence Livermore computing facility in 1994 sponsored by the Department of Energy. Back then he worked on the Cray Y-MP, one of the fastest supercomputers of its time.

"Sequoia is approximately 10 million times more powerful than that machine," Nichols noted.

The Stanford ties go deeper still. The computer code used in this study is named CharLES and was developed by former Stanford senior research associate, Frank Ham. This code utilizes unstructured meshes to simulate turbulent flow in the presence of complicated geometry.

In addition to jet noise simulations, Stanford researchers in the Predictive Science Academic Alliance Program (PSAAP), sponsored by the Department of Energy, are using the CharLES code to investigate advanced-concept scramjet propulsion systems used in hypersonic flight (with video) -- flight at many times the speed of sound -- and to simulate the turbulent flow over an entire airplane wing.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Stanford School of Engineering. The original article was written by Andrew Myers.

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

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

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/ms7cX5a1IAs/130128104628.htm

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'Hansel & Gretel' hunts down a box office win

By Reuters

A grown-up "Hansel & Gretel" grabbed the weekend box office title, pulling in $19 million in U.S. and Canadian ticket sales with its reinvention of the classic fairy tale characters as fierce bounty hunters.

"Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters" knocked last weekend's winner, low-budget horror flick "Mama," into second place. "Mama" earned $12.8 million from Friday through Sunday, according to studio estimates, followed by "Silver Linings Playbook" with $10 million.

CIA drama "Zero Dark Thirty" came in fourth with $9.8 million.

Jeremy Renner and Gemma Arterton star in "Hansel & Gretel" as crossbow-wielding adult siblings who travel the world to take out evil witches. MGM and Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures produced the action comedy for about $50 million. Paramount had predicted opening weekend sales in the high-teens or low $20 million range.

Don Harris, Paramount's president of distribution, said the film performed well despite the very cold temperatures and snow that hit the eastern United States.

"We are pleased that we were on our number on a worldwide basis. It looks like we are on or exceeding our numbers, but we did get dinged with the weather on Friday," he said in an interview.

"The impact of the weather was certainly more than I had predicted."

"Mama" features Jessica Chastain as a woman forced to take care of two orphaned nieces who have been living in the woods. The $15 million production has now earned $48.6 million at U.S. and Canadian theaters through two weekends.

Chastain also stars in "Zero Dark Thirty" in an Oscar-nominated role as a dogged CIA agent searching for al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The best picture nominee, which has sparked debate over depictions of torture, has grossed $69.9 million since its release in late December.

"Silver Linings Playbook," another Oscar contender, stars Bradley Cooper as a former mental patient trying to rebuild his life with the help of a young widow played by Jennifer Lawrence. Total sales for "Silver Linings" reached $69.46 million.

New crime thriller "Parker" finished in fifth place, taking in $7 million at domestic theaters. The film is based on a series of novels by Donald E. Westlake and stars Jason Statham as a thief seeking revenge against a crew that double-crossed him. Jennifer Lopez plays a woman who helps with his mission.

"Movie 43," a raunchy new comedy with an ensemble of Hollywood directors and stars, settled for seventh place. The film is a series of related short films about three kids scouring the Internet to find the world's most-banned movie. Stars making appearances include Huge Jackman, Seth MacFarlane, Kate Winslet and Dennis Quaid. Privately held Relativity Media produced the film for about $6 million.

"Mama" was distributed by Universal Studios, a division of Comcast Corp. Sony Corp's movie studio released "Zero Dark Thirty." "Parker" was released by independent studio FilmDistrict. The Weinstein Co distributed "Silver Linings Playbook."

Related content:

Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Source: http://entertainment.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/27/16724757-hansel-gretel-hunts-down-top-spot-at-box-office?lite

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Free Legal Question: Criminal Law | Florida | There is a type of ...

There is a type of hearing in criminal law (at least there was in WI where I worked) that was frequently ordered by a judge. The hearing is generally conducted after a case has been pending a while and a defendant has rejected a plea offer. The purpose of the hearing is for the plea offer to be read into the record, the judge will ask the defendant whether he/she understands the offer and is in fact rejecting that offer. If the offer is rejected on the record the offer is then withdrawn and the judge may state no further negotiations may be made and a trial date is set. What is the name for that type of proceeding? It has a specific name, a ___________ hearing.

Source: http://www.lawguru.com/legal-questions/-/type-hearing-criminal-law-wi-740956248/

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Well-To-Do Real Estate Broker Accused Of Raping Internet Date ...

Gavel (file/credit: CBS 2)

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) ? A well-to-do real estate broker at a high-end Manhattan firm has pleaded not guilty to a rape charge brought from a young woman he met on the Internet.

As WCBS 880?s Irene Cornell reported, Lakhinder Vohra, 47, met the woman through a Web site called SeekingArrangement.com. The woman claimed Vohra attacked her on her first visit to his Wall Street apartment.

• Well-To-Do Real Estate Broker Accused Of Raping Internet Date
• WCBS 880's Irene Cornell Reports

The Web site caters to men like Vohra, who works for the firm Nest Seekers described as ?sugar daddies with lots of cash.? Vohra used the handle ?Daddylovesarmcandy? on the Web site and claimed to be worth as much as $10 million, according to a New York Post report.

The 26-year-old victim claimed that he threw her face down on the bed, placed his hand on her back, and raped her, the newspaper reported.

Vohra?s attorney compared the situation to that of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the disgraced French politician and former head of the International Monetary Fund who was accused of rape by his maid in 2011. The criminal case against Strauss-Kahn was dismissed, and he has since filed a lawsuit against his accuser, Nafissatou Diallo.

In Vohra?s case, attorney Mike Saint-Pre told the court: ?What we have here is a case of extortion. Even as the woman was leaving the apartment, she was attempting to extort money from Vohra.?

Vohra was ordered held on $10,000 bail on Friday, the newspaper reported.

Please leave your comments below?

Source: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2013/01/26/well-to-do-real-estate-broker-accused-of-raping-internet-date/

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Baby Doe Tabor Bedroom Set | blog.antiques.com

January 25th, 2013 by Admin

Known as the ?Baby Doe Tabor suite?, this set was purchased by U. S. Senator Horace ?Silver Dollar? Tabor. Owning incredible silver mines in Colorado, he was also one of the wealthiest men in the world.? Known as the ?Silver King?, he created quite the scandal when, while still married, he fell in love with Elizabeth McCourt, also known as Baby Doe, a beautiful woman many years his junior.? As the story goes, the Senator bought the suite during their Honeymoon in Philadelphia for his bride. It was brought back to Colorado (where Tabor lived) and installed in their house where family history had it that President Ulysses S. Grant slept in it.

Tabor was heavily leveraged and in 1890 when the Sherman Silver purchase act was passed, silver prices dropped and Tabor unfortunately lost all of his money. There are actually stories of him becoming a miner in his own mine in order to survive. Despite being broke, Horace and Baby Doe stayed together and were still very much in love in 1899 when Horace died. Numerous books, an Opera, as well as a MGM movie were done on her life as she was one of the most fascinating personages of her day.

The suite?s exceptional history did not stop with the Tabors. After Horace?s death, Baby Doe sold the set to the famed William Randolph Hearst. He kept it until approximately 1930 when he gave it to his publisher Dr. Barham for his Santa Ynez, New Mexico ranch, which he shared with Hearst.

The suite is primarily made of finally carved and burled walnut and was almost certainly crafted by the great Philadelphia cabinetmaker Daniel Pabst. It is one of two great sets he made, the other exhibited at the 1876 Philadelphia ?World?s Fair? and now at Saganore Hill Museum, President Theodore Roosevelt?s Oyster Bay home. The bed, which will perfectly hold a modern queen size mattress, has upon its cornice nocturnal animals such as owls and bats. Its footboard holds hidden compartments and overall it is a stunning example of aesthetic art. It stands 104? high. The dresser, which is equally as impressive, displays hummingbirds and other daytime animals in its cornice. It also has drawers for jewelry as well as a unique pull out shelf to lay out the day?s accessories. It stands an impressive 115? high.

In all of our experience, we have never seen another suite equal to this one. It is not only extraordinary; but it also has one of the most interesting provenances of any object we have ever offered. I would love for you consider this masterpiece. Our toll free number is 1-800-544-9440. Can we tempt you?

Dresser: 62 3/4? wide x 27? deep x 107? high
Bed: 65 3/8? wide x 92 1/2? deep x 104? high

Sincerely,

Susan

Source: http://blog.antiques.com/2013/01/25/baby-doe-tabor-bedroom-set/

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Movie Review: &#39;Parker&#39; ? CBS Philly

(Jason Statham stars in ?Parker.?)

By Bill Wine
KYW Newsradio 1060

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) ? No one will ever accuse Jason Statham of having an acting range, but few are the movie stars whose name on the marquee so completely identifies the genre or the type of leading man he?ll be playing.

Take him or leave him, he sure is a known quantity: quiet, strong, inexpressive, resourceful, and deadly.

But Parker tweaks the Statham formula a tad by adding a female icon to the mix: Jennifer Lopez is the female lead.

(2 stars out of 4)

Yep, it?s J-Sta and J-Lo, together again for the first time!

The noir-like action thriller, set in the criminal underworld and brutally violent, offers tough-as-nails Statham as the anti-heroic title character, a professional thief who, sporting a moral code in the Robin Hood mode, steals from the wealthy and punishes the guilty.

During the bungled robbing of the Ohio State Fair that opens the film, Parker is doublecrossed by his crew -? played by Michael Chiklis, Wendell Pierce, Clifton Collins Jr., and Micah A. Hauptman ? who betray him, shoot him, take his share of the money, and leave him for dead.

But he survives and, seeking vengeance with a vengeance, follows them to Palm Beach, Fla. in disguise.

There, while the quartet of thieves plan an elaborate jewel heist, he enlists the help of struggling real estate agent Leslie Rogers, played by Lopez, who becomes his partner-in-crime in hope of financial reward.

Director Taylor Hackford (Ray, An Officer and a Gentleman, The Devil?s Advocate, Proof of Life), dipping into the action pool, works from a screenplay by John J. McLaughlin that?s based on the novel Flashfire by Donald E. Westlake, who featured the titular master criminal in twenty-some novels but insisted that the character?s name be changed in the several movie versions (Point Blank, The Outfit, Payback) that emerged from the series.

Veteran Hackford knows how to hold our attention during flashy set pieces, but there?s nothing in the narrative to get us rooting or even caring.

The simplistic script is so repetitious and bloated that it seems to struggle to conjure enough in the way of plot continuity to fill out to feature length.

And the lead character is a jumble of arbitrary traits and confused morality that doesn?t add up to a real person.? Even a skillfully nuanced actor would have trouble selling this synthetic construct, and Statham is nothing of the sort.

What this Jason Statham flick offers that distinguishes it from previous outings (The Transporter, Crank, The Mechanic, Death Race) are the two lazy disguises that he dons while half-heartedly impersonating a priest and a tycoon.

But let?s face it: while Statham has an unmistakable muscular charm, his persona, let alone his facial expression, doesn?t vary regardless of the surface accoutrement: he is action icon Jason Statham no matter how he?s dressed.

So much for the camouflage.? And wait?ll you hear his Texas drawl.

As for Lopez, she?s saddled with an extraneous, underdeveloped character -? she?s not even the romantic interest, not really -? and is obviously included as a demographic stretcher who, through no fault of her own, never becomes necessary or convincing.

Overall, there?s lots of stealing going on on-screen, but no one steals the movie while it?s busy stealing your time.

So we?ll disguise 2 stars out of 4 for a ho-hum, here-we-go-again action thriller.? As Statham vehicles go, Parker barely shifts out of park.

More Bill Wine Movie Reviews

Bill Wine?s Top 10 Movies of 2012

Bill?s Winter Movies Preview

More CBS Philly Entertainment News

Source: http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2013/01/25/movie-review-parker/

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History says Democrats have a tough climb in 2016

It?s not too soon to start talking about the next presidential inauguration in 2017, and why the historical re-election trends favor the Republicans.

Andrew Jackson.Maybe Hillary Clinton, the current very-early front-runner for the Democratic nomination, can break the struggles that Democrats have had trying to win a presidential election after its candidate (or his legal successor) won two prior elections.

That?s only happened twice since 1828 for the Democrats, when the modern two-party era started in earnest. In 1836, the Democratic Vice President Martin Van Buren succeeded Andrew Jackson by defeating four Whig candidates, while President Franklin D. Roosevelt succeeded himself in 1940 by running for an unprecedented third term.

The Democrats have failed in four of their last five attempts to win three consecutive terms in office after taking two elections with the same candidate (or his legal successor), with just President Roosevelt winning in 1940 under very unusual circumstances.

The failed Democratic candidates include James Cox (1920), Adlai Stevenson (1952), Hubert Humphrey (1968), and Al Gore (2000). That puts the batting average for the Democrats at .333.

The Republicans have fared better than their opponents when it comes to extending control over the presidency after the same president (or his legal successor) won two straight elections.

Among the GOP candidates who were able to win that vital third election in a row for their party were Ulysses S. Grant (1868), Rutherford B. Hayes (1876), Theodore Roosevelt (1904), and George H.W. Bush (1988).

Republican candidates who lost in similar circumstances were Richard Nixon (1960), Gerald Ford (1976), and John McCain (2008).

Even with four defeats, the Republicans were batting .571 when it came to winning a third election, after the same president (or his legal successor) won two elections in a row.

But the more immediate trend is that in seven of the last nine elections, voters have decided to switch the party controlling the White House when a candidate (or his successor) had won two prior elections.

Part of the trend could date back to the FDR era, when Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, both Democrats, held office for a combined 20 years.

The 22nd Amendment, which limits a president to two terms or 10 years in office, came as a direct consequence to that era.

The distrust of people in power also dates back to the age of the American Revolution and the mistrust of hereditary rulers with no curbs on their powers.

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The Republicans have controlled the White House for 20 consecutive years twice, but not since 1913, when President William Howard Taft left office.

If there was one period of pure political party domination, it was the first era of political parties before 1828. One party dominated the White House for 28 years, until President Jackson broke through with the newly created Democratic Party.

The Federalists and what historians now call the Democratic-Republican Party were rivals in 1796, when John Adams won the presidency over Thomas Jefferson. The Democratic-Republicans won the next five elections, and James Monroe ran mostly unopposed in 1820 for a sixth win. That led to a constitutional crisis in 1824, when four candidates from the same party ran against each other in a bitter race.

When Jackson lost the election in the House of Representatives to John Quincy Adams, our current two-party system was born as the future president broke away to form a new party. The Whig party appeared in the 1830s to battle the Democrats and was followed by the Republicans in the 1850s.

Candidate	Years	Party	Successor
Jackson	1828-1836	Democrat	Democrat
Lincoln/Johnson	1860-1868	Republican	Republican
Grant	1868-1876	Republican	Republican
McKinley/Roosevelt	1896-1904	Republican	Republican
Wilson	1912-1920	Democrat	Republican
Roosevelt	1932-1940	Democrat	Democrat
Roosevelt/Truman	1944-1952	Democrat	Republican
Eisenhower	1952-1960	Republican	Democrat
Kennedy/Johnson	1960-1968	Democrat	Republican
Nixon/Ford	1968-1976	Republican	Democrat
Reagan	1980-1988	Republican	Republican
Clinton	1992-2000	Democrat	Republican
G.W. Bush	2000-2008	Republican	Democrat

Also Read

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/historic-election-pattern-doesn-t-120408822.html

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'Not to be published' Diana photo sells for $18K

AMHERST, N.H. (AP) ? A photo marked "not to be published" that shows a teenage Diana Spencer before she became Princess of Wales has been sold by a New Hampshire auction house for more than $18,000.

The photograph shows a group of friends relaxing during a ski trip, with Diana reclining on a bed, with a young man seated behind her and a bottle of whiskey on the window sill. It was acquired by a British newspaper just after her engagement Prince Charles, but someone at the paper wrote "not to be published" across it, presumably because it would've embarrassed the royal family.

RR Auction in Amherst, N.H., says the photo sold in the online auction Thursday to a real estate investor from San Diego for $18,306, well above early estimates.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/not-published-diana-photo-sells-18k-162652913.html

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How Innovation is born. ? Spirit of Giving

his article was written by Ken Cashin for the inaugural issue of?Izaak Magazine?? an in-depth, behind the scenes, all-access publication highlighting the incredible, everyday happenings at the?IWK Health Centre. Researchers like Dr. Jason Berman are using some of the world?s most unlikely sources to find the most miraculous cures.

Zebra Fish

When it comes to medical research, inspiration can be a driving force. And, when that inspiration comes from a desire to make life better for young patients, ground breaking innovation can be born. Such is the case with Dr. Jason Berman. He is a world-leading pediatric haematologist- oncologist who runs a zebrafish research laboratory at the IWK Health Centre.

His enthusiasm and energy is contagious as he discusses his first-of-a-kind research program in Halifax with the potential to provide unique cancer drug-testing services in zebrafish to pharmaceutical companies and cancer specialists across Canada and around the world. Dr. Berman looks for such answers in zebrafish ? small striped fish that are remarkably similar to humans in their genetics and cell biology. Zebrafish are gaining international recognition in their ability to help researchers better understand human diseases. By studying blood-cell development in zebrafish, Dr. Berman and his team are hoping to pinpoint the genetic changes that lead to leukemia.

Dr. Berman treats children with cancer, including leukemia, lymphoma and solid tumours, as well as blood disorders like haemophilia and anemia. While many of his patients have acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and can be cured with current multi-agent chemotherapy, some suffer from more aggressive subtypes of ALL, such as T-cell disease (T-ALL), while approximately 20 per cent suffer from acute myelogenous leukemia (AML). Dr. Berman?s unique research approach focuses on these more difficult-to-treat forms of leukemia, using the zebrafish model to identify and test new potential treatments. ?The zebrafish is a vertebrate and shares many of the same genes with humans,? explains Dr. Berman. ?Because they are fertilized externally, are transparent, and reproduce in large numbers, they are a very useful tool for studying how changes in genes affect both normal development and the abnormal development that can result in diseases like cancer.?

Dr. Berman and his team are currently testing different compounds in several cancers including: T-ALL, AML and sarcomas (common bone tumours in children) to identify new drugs or combinations that stop and reverse the abnormal cancer growth and kill the cells that start the cancer. ?In 2012, most children with cancer have a very good chance of cure, but often at the significant cost of toxic treatments with lots of complications,? says Dr. Berman. ?By better understanding the genetic and molecular factors underlying particular diseases using rapidly evolving technologies and innovative model systems like the zebrafish, we will be able to provide better, more personalized and targeted treatment that will result in improved outcomes and fewer side effects.?

Dr. Jason Berman

Reviewed by an international panel by the Beatrice Hunter Cancer Research Institute, Dr. Berman received Cancer Care Nova Scotia?s Peggy Davison Clinician Scientist Award in May 2011, which provides $100,000 per year for three years to build cancer research programs. Previously held by only one other individual, funding through this prestigious award is helping Dr. Berman use the zebrafish to study white blood cell development, mast cell biology, leukemia and solid tumours. The award, he says, is a great tribute to both pediatric oncology and the zebrafish model and demonstrates the support, faith and encouragement that Cancer Care Nova Scotia has in the potential of his research program to impact the future for cancer patients. ?This award enables us to attract the best and the brightest from across Canada and beyond to work with us and establish our laboratory as an international centre of research excellence, fostering the training of the next generation of leading cancer researchers right here in our province.?

He says it gives hope to children who have to endure the challenges of chemotherapy. One such child is Olivia Mason, daughter of Tammy and Barry Mason of Bedford, N.S., who has been a patient of Dr. Berman?s since being diagnosed with AML in February 2011. ?We know first-hand the struggles that children endure going through intensive chemotherapy to treat AML. The current treatment is very difficult and it is heartbreaking to watch your child endure this illness and treatment,? the Masons commented through Cancer Care Nova Scotia. ?Olivia is strong and determined. We know she will make it.

However, we anxiously await the day that Dr. Berman, and his team, announce that they have found an easier way to treat AML. With the Peggy Davison Award to Dr. Berman, we know that they are one step closer to that announcement.?

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Categories: IWK Foundation, IWK Health Centre, Oncology, research | Tags: Blood Disorders, Haematology, IWK, IWK Health Centre Foundation, IWK Helath Centre, Lab, leukemia, Lymphoma, Oncology, research, Zebra Fish | Permalink.

Source: http://iwkfoundation.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/how-innovation-is-born/

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As layoffs keep dropping, hopes rise for job gains

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Employers are laying off fewer workers, a trend that normally suggests hiring is picking up. The January jobs report next week will show whether employers have begun to hire more freely or are still waiting for the economy to strengthen.

The number of people seeking unemployment aid has reached a five-year low. Some employers, such as health care companies, restaurants and retailers, are hiring steadily. Yet overall job growth remains modest. And the unemployment rate is the same painful 7.8 percent it was when Barack Obama became president four years ago.

The economy isn't growing fast enough to accelerate hiring. Flat pay and high unemployment are holding back consumer spending, which rose at a meager annual rate of 1.6 percent in the July-September quarter.

The economy expanded at a 3.1 percent annual pace in the same period, partly because companies stockpiled more goods, which boosts production. Most economists think growth dipped below a 2 percent rate in the October-December quarter because consumer demand remains tepid.

Another factor has been uncertainty about federal spending and budget deficits. Most companies don't seem worried enough to cut jobs. But many may not boost hiring until further progress on the budget is achieved. This month, Congress avoided the "fiscal cliff" in part by postponing automatic spending cuts. And this week a deadline for raising the government's borrowing cap was put off for three months.

Significant hiring gains are "unlikely ... when there remains so much political uncertainty," said Paul Dales, an economist at Capital Economics.

First-time applications for unemployment benefits dropped 5,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 330,000, the government said Thursday. That's the fewest since January 2008. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, also fell to nearly a five-year low.

Applications are a proxy for layoffs. They fluctuated between 360,000 and 390,000 for most of last year. At the same time, employers have added an average of 153,000 jobs a month.

Weekly applications have now fallen below that level for two straight weeks. That suggests that job gains could accelerate.

Still, economists caution that the figures are particularly volatile in January. The government has difficulty adjusting its numbers to account for layoffs after the holiday shopping season. Layoffs typically spike in the second week of January as retailers and other employers cut staff. Then layoffs plummet in the following weeks. The government tries to adjust for those seasonal trends. But the figures can still be volatile.

Tom Gimbel, CEO of the LaSalle Network, a staffing and recruiting firm in Chicago, says he's seeing more demand for temporary and contract employees. Demand for temp employees is up 25 percent in the past three months.

"Companies are putting their foot in the water," Gimbel said.

But they're reluctant to make more permanent hires, partly because they don't want to have to lay off workers if the economy falters, he said. Many businesses still have painful memories of undergoing layoffs during the recession.

"Companies do not want to do that again," he said.

Some sectors are already picking up. Manufacturers added the most jobs in nine months in December. Retailers posted three months of big gains last fall. Restaurants and hotels have been hiring at a healthy pace since the summer.

Health care companies added nearly 30,000 jobs a month last year ? almost one-fifth the overall total.

Construction companies may step up hiring soon. They added 30,000 jobs in December, though some of the increase likely reflected temporary hiring for repairs and rebuilding after Superstorm Sandy.

But the once-battered housing sector is recovering, which bodes well for construction jobs. Home builders started work in 2012 on the most new homes in four years. And sales of previously occupied homes reached their highest level in five years last year.

Patrick Newport, an economist at IHS Global Insight, forecasts that construction companies will add 140,000 jobs this year, up from a meager 18,000 in 2012.

Other industries may also benefit. Home improvement retailer Lowe's said Tuesday that it will hire 45,000 temporary workers for the busy spring season. It also said it would add 9,000 permanent part-time employees.

State and local governments, though, are still shedding jobs. And job gains in the financial services and transportation and warehousing industries have been weak for months.

United Airlines said Thursday that it will eliminate 600 positions from its work force of 84,000 people worldwide. The company lost $723 million last year.

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Follow Chris Rugaber on Twitter at https://Twitter.com/ChrisRugaber

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/layoffs-keep-dropping-hopes-rise-job-gains-211717158--finance.html

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