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In honor of Fox's hit show "Empire," we are checking in on some of the sports empires. Many think the Red Sox are the favorites in the AL East, but can the Yankees win the division?
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A generation of children have been left behind in China's rural villages because their parents left to find employment.
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Jordan Spieth tied for second in his Masters debut last year and he recently talked about establishing a comfort level in a major. Is Spieth in for a big year in 2015?
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Virginia Tech standout freshman Jalen Hudson was at it again, this time against Miami in the second round of the 2015 New York Life ACC Tournament. Hudson drives the lane and throws down an emphatic one-handed jam in this ACC Must See Moment!
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An alligator has taken up residence on the 7th hole at the Myakka Pines Golf Course in Florida. Fair to avoid this hole?
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By Sam Galanis The New York Yankees are only nine games into their spring training schedule, but the Alex Rodriguez drama has already started. The controversial third baseman hit his first home run since 2013 off Boston Red Sox pitcher Brandon Workman on Wednesday, but apparently, the Yankees' official Twitter account forgot to mention it . They didn't tweet when the ball went out of the park, and their postgame recap only mentioned Jacoby Ellsbury and Carlos Beltran. According to the New York Daily News, the Yankees are one of the few teams that don't control their own social media. Their account is run by MLB Advanced Media, and a spokesperson told the Daily News that the "slight" was unintentional. "It was very much an unintended error," the spokesman said. "Alex is and will be treated like every other Yankees player." Rodriguez also headlined the game recap on the homepage of the Yankees' website Wednesday night. But that didn't stop Yankees fans from getting up in arms. It looks as though it only took one spring training home run for at least these Yankees fans to forgive A-Rod for his performance enhancing drug use, so we'll just have to wait and see if things change come April.
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Diego Forlan announced his retirement from international football on Thursday, ending his time with Uruguay's national team as the team's most-capped player. The 35-year-old forward played 112 matches for Uruguay and scored 36 goals, while he represented his country at three World Cups, winning the Golden Ball in 2010 as the best player of the tournament in South Africa. Forlan, who is on the books at Cerezo Osaka, revealed his international retirement at a press conference in Japan, which was simulcast on his official website. "It was a privilege to enjoy the national team and be part of a group that gave so much to our country, wear the shirt with great people," Forlan said. Forlan was part of Uruguay's Copa America-winning side - the country's first in 16 years - in 2011, while he finishes his career 13 games ahead of the South American nation's next most-capped player, Benfica defender Maxi Pereira. The former Manchester United, Villarreal and Atletico Madrid striker also retires as Uruguay's second most-prolific goalscorer behind Luis Suarez (43). Forlan's last international appearance was against Colombia at last year's World Cup in Brazil.
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Cliff Lee has a torn tendon in his elbow and he recently spoke about the emotional aspect of being hurt. Do you think Lee will pitch again?
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It's not often that we get to see celebrities without their hair and makeup perfectly done, but thanks to the latest selfie trend, your fave stars are rocking their barefaced beauty. 32 Naturally Beautiful Celebs Without Makeup Emma Stone Emma looked pretty and fresh sans makeup walking through the airport in LA. Love her geek-chic glasses! Jennifer Lawrence JLaw looked effortlessly gorge with blonde, beach-y waves and glow-y, makeup-free skin. Lorde Lorde looks absolutely stunning in this makeup-free selfie, showing off her bold brows and protect her flawless skin from the sun with an adorbs hat. Selena Gomez Sel hit the beach and took this gorge pic with the caption, "Hated bangs, but I have baby hairs #natural" Bella Throne Who needs makeup? Not Bella! She posted this gorge pic to Instagram, showing off her natural beauty. Demi Lovato Demi posted this beautiful no-makeup selfie for #NoMakeupMonday and proved that she's just as gorge without makeup! Selena Gomez Selena took a break from her super-glam looks to take this beautiful makeup-free selfie. Taylor Swift Taylor tweeted this adorable selfie with her cat, captioned "I woke up like this." Stunning! Kylie Jenner Kylie posted this stunning photo to Insta with the caption: "no makeup on screen coming soon." We're dying to know what her next big project is! Kendall Jenner Kendall showed off her naturally beautiful skin alongside big sis Khloe, who captioned the pic: "I love that Kendall is makeup-free and fabulous. And I apparently feel the need to be in faux fur, a hat and a cute amount of make up!" Demi Lovato Demi posting this stunning makeup-free pic to Instagram, urging others to do the same! She said: "Let's start a new Twitter/Instagram trend: #NoMakeupMonday... Why? Cause we deserve to show the world our beauty and our confidence!!! #NMM #NoMakeupMonday#DevonneByDemi"MORE: Demi Lovato Announces New Skincare Line, Continues Her Quest For World Domination Kylie Jenner We all know Kylie's makeup skills are sick, but she's just as gorge without makeup, too! Ashley Benson We're used to seeing the PLL star all dolled up as Hannah, but Ash looks so gorge in a tee and no makeup in this selfie she posted before heading to a photoshoot. Kylie Jenner Although Kylie and her sisters have all agreed that she is incredibly talented when it comes to doing her own makeup, we think she is absolutely stunning all-natural, too! Camilla Cabello The 5H singer jumped on the #unprettymonday trend, showing off her natural beauty on Twitter with this inspiring caption: "#unprettymonday but who cares about everyone's idea of pretty. I hate my crooked teeth but maybe it's time I embrace them. You should do the same. I'm saying we might as well embrace our physical imperfections, because what's inside is more important someday we'll all be wrinkly anyway." Cher Lloyd Even first thing in the morning, the singer looks amazing! Dinah Jane Hansen The 5H member shared how she finally overcame her insecurities about her looks, posting this caption with her totally natural pic: "Growing up I always had my my hair covering my face.. I would find every reason to cover the scars on my face becs of my insecurities of being unpretty and not accepted .. but today I have accepted the fact that I don't have perfect skin, that my polynesian hair will never be naturally tamed, that I might not be the prettiest girl but I realized that true beauty is whats inside and accepting myself for who I am.. and finding my inner strength to leave the house without make up and learning that nobody's perfect #unprettyMonday" Demi Lovato Demi embraced her freckles in this poolside selfie. Kylie Jenner Even Kylie has things about her looks that she doesn't love, captioning this fresh-faced Twit-pic, "All my freckles and my lil blood vessel... #fresh" Selena Gomez Selena looks just as pretty sans makeup, posting this beautiful car selfie. Lorde Lorde summed up the #struggle of having acne as a teen, with this amazing pic that she captioned, "In bed in paris with my acne cream on." Lauren Jauregui Lauren also jumped on the makeup-free Insta trend, getting totally real with this Insta post: "Sometimes my cheeks are too red and I get embarrassed. Sometimes I don't like my nose, or my hair, or my body, or anything for that matter. I used to be so insecure about every piece of myself and as I've grown up and gotten to experience the fact that I'm not the only girl in the world who feels that way, I've learned that loving yourself is worth your time. There are days that its hard and there are days you may feel awful because you will never look like that person, think like that person, be like that person, but always keep in mind that that person will never be you. #unprettymonday #youdontneedthemakeup #beconfident" Ally Brooke Hernandez Ally looks just as pretty sans makeup, but we love the inspiring caption she included with her #unprettymonday post: "#UnprettyMonday What makes YOU beautiful is not being afraid or ashamed of who you are and showing your personality!" Maia Mitchell The Fosters star (and her adorbs pug Sadie!) look amazing in this #nomakeup selfie! Miley Cyrus Whether she's rocking a bold makeup trend, or no makeup at all, Miley's never afraid to be her totally unique self. She let her cool, new accessory take center stage with this makeup-free snap that she captioned: "Rockin out to @skyferreira by myself in my favorite hat of all time BE VERY JELLY OF MY SUPER COOL SATURDAY!" Normani Kordei Joining her fellow 5H girls, Normani showed off her gorge fresh-faced look, admitting to the pressure to look perfect, writing, "#unprettymonday I always thought that I was okay & not the most beautiful girl there was. I use to get teased about my eyebrows and how thick they were. But this flaw has become my greatest asset and I take pride in them. You came into this world without makeup which is just the way God created you. As much make-up, extensions, plastic surgery you get it's irrelevant without believing that YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL. #beautystartsfromwithin" Perrie Edwards What does Perrie do when she can't sleep late at night? She takes midnight selfies! Rihanna Rihanna doesn't mind showing off her face in all it's natural glory. #SoInspiring Shay Mitchell Even a Thanksgiving food coma didn't stop the PLL star from sharing this adorable Insta: "Happy Thanksgiving!!! Still in bed! Haha #idontfeelguilty #moviedayinbed" Bella Thorne No makeup necessary! Bella was absolutely glowing after a day a filming. Zendaya Coleman This is just one of many fierce barefaced selfies from Zendaya. Keep them coming Z! Debby Ryan Debby put on a brave face with this totally selfie, captioning it: "In real life, I have freckles. Hiding is exhausting. What is your makeup hiding?"
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Madonna Madonna dated Tupac. The 56-year-old singer has revealed she enjoyed a short-lived relationship with the late 'Ghetto Gospel' rapper in 1994 - two years before he was shot and killed - who she claims got her "all riled up" and "feeling very gangsta". Referring to a specific interview she did with chat show host David Letterman, she told SiriusXM's Howard Stern: "I was mad at [David] when I said the F-word a lot. I was in a weird mood that day. I was dating Tupac Shakur at the time and the thing is he got me all riled up about life in general. "So when I went on the show I was feeling very gangsta." Speculation about a supposed relationship between the pair has been rife for years, although the 'Living For Love' hitmaker had not previously confirmed they dated. Meanwhile, Madonna, who is currently single but counts directors Sean Penn and Guy Ritchie as her ex-husbands, recently revealed she would "never say never" to getting married again, admitting she doesn't like to set boundaries for herself. She told The Sun newspaper: "Would I ever consider getting married again? Maybe. Never say never. "I don't have any limitations for myself in terms of relationships."
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WASHINGTON U.S. military and intelligence officials are increasingly pessimistic about the prospects for political reconciliation in Iraq, a key tenet of the Obama administration's strategy to dislodge the Islamic State group and stabilize the country. Senior officials say they are not seeing significant progress by the country's Shiite-led government on its efforts to strike a bargain with Iraq's deeply alienated Sunni population, from which the extremist force is drawing money and personnel. President Barack Obama expressed hope in September that a new Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Haider Abadi "understands that in order for Iraq to succeed it's not just a matter of a military campaign; it's also the need for political outreach to all factions within the country." That's a feat his predecessor, Nouri al-Maliki, didn't achieve. But in the months since, the Shiite-dominated government has taken few concrete steps to accommodate Sunnis, whose frustration helped fuel the Islamic State group's push into Iraq from Syria. Joint chiefs chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey, who returned from the region this week, told Congress Wednesday he was "concerned about what happens after the drums stop beating and ISIL is defeated, and whether the government of Iraq will remain on a path to provide an inclusive government for all of the various groups within it." Dempsey used an alternative acronym for the militant group. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said on March 2, "I really don't think there's any way of reversing or changing the picture fundamentally in Iraq unless the Sunnis are included ... and so far that's been a struggle." Instead of reaching out to Sunnis, the Iraqi government has bolstered its already close ties to Iran and to Iranian-backed Shiite militias that have been credibly accused of massacring Sunnis, U.S. officials acknowledge. The Iraqi military's reliance on Shiite militias this week to retake Tikrit, a Sunni stronghold, has complicated the prospects of political reconciliation, experts say. Although some Sunnis welcomed the liberation force, the well-publicized role of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in directing the assault on Tikrit has inflamed many Sunnis. Iran and Iraq fought a bloody seven-year war in the 1980s. "They see it as a Persian invasion of the Sunni heartland," said John Maguire, a former CIA case officer with long Middle East experience who travels frequently to Iraq. Human Rights Watch said in a March 4 report that it has documented "numerous" atrocities against Sunni civilians by the Shiite militias and security forces after they retook other towns. Similar to their rivals, the Shiite militias commonly post videos online documenting their atrocities and efforts to intimidate opponents. Sunnis are the dominant ethnic group in most of the areas of Iraq seized by Islamic State militants, who are also Sunnis. While many Iraqi Sunnis loathe the group's violent ideology, some see it as preferable to Shiite rule. In 2007, Sunni tribes revolted against the Islamic State's predecessor, al-Qaida in Iraq, after being promised a share of power. American officials believe U.S. bombing can help dislodge Islamic State militants from Iraqi territory in the short term, but they fear that group, or some other virulent Sunni insurgency, will simply re-emerge after the bombing stops in the absence of a political deal. "Ultimately this war against (the Islamic State group) is not really going to be successful, not really going to lead to something that's good and sustainable afterward, unless certain political accommodations are made," said Samir Sumaida'ie, a former Iraqi ambassador to the U.S. Dempsey said his trip to Iraq left him worried that the sectarian divide could cause Sunni Arab members of the coalition fighting the Islamic State like Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf countries to bolt. After meeting with Abadi, Dempsey told reporters Monday he was given firm assurances that the Shiite-led government is committed to reconciling with the Sunnis. Asked in an interview whether he considered those assurances credible, Dempsey said, "They seemed credible today." Dempsey noted that during his helicopter flight over Baghdad he saw worrisome signs of Iranian influence. He spotted "a plethora of flags" at checkpoints and elsewhere in the capital, "only one of which happens to be the Iraqi flag," he said, alluding to the banners of Iranian-backed Shiite militias. Signs of political reconciliation have been sparse. Last month, the Abadi government approved a draft law to set up a national guard that would include Sunnis, but that measure is languishing. A second draft measure designed to ease the purge directed at mainly Sunni members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party was greeted by protests from Sunni lawmakers. Alistair Baskey, a spokesman for the National Security Council, noted a series of hopeful steps by the Abadi government, including an effort to train and arm Sunni tribal fighters in Anbar province, and a partnership between Iraqi government forces and Sunni tribal units against Islamic State forces in key cities near Al Asad Airbase. But privately, American officials have expressed serious doubts about the prospects for a political settlement they acknowledge is crucial to their policy. Abadi is seen as well-intentioned but hemmed in by Iraq's Shiite-dominated, Iranian-influenced political system. Emma Sky, who advised senior U.S. commanders in Iraq through much of the eight-year war, says she sees Washington repeating its mistakes of the past by using military force in Iraq without crafting an overarching strategy. "Once again we're in a war with no vision of what the political outcome would be," she said in a telephone interview. At a news conference Tuesday, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the U.S. had been pressing the Iraqi government on political reconciliation. "At the end of the day this is going to depend upon the Iraqis," he said, "but there are ways we can work with them and are working with them. ... The sectarian danger in Iraq is the principal thing that can unravel the campaign against ISIS." ___ Associated Press writers Deb Riechmann and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington and Vivian Salama in Baghdad contributed to this report.
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Nick Gordon and Bobbi Kristina Brown Bobbi Kristina Brown and Nick Gordon argued hours before she was found unresponsive in the bath. The couple had been partying with a friend on 30 January and when they returned to their Georgia home in the early hours of the following day, they had a heated conversation before going their separate ways. Nick's mother Michelle said: "Nick walked away from the argument. "He went to another bedroom to fall asleep. [Bobbi Kristina] went up to her room and drew a bath." The couple's friend Max Lomas later found the 22-year-old aspiring singer unresponsive when a cable repair man arrived and needed access to her bedroom. Together, he and Nick administered CPR before paramedics arrived. Michelle recalled during an interview on 'Dr. Phil': "Nicholas was able to do the CPR on her for 15 minutes. "The police arrived, and they didn't help him. No one helped him until the EMTs got there." And Nick has turned to alcohol and drugs in a bid to cope with his guilt from the incident, and agony over not being able to visit Bobbi Kristina, who remains in a medically induced coma at the Emory University Hospital. Michelle said: "He has blamed himself for the condition she's in." During the interview, host Dr. Phil McGraw persuaded Nick to check into rehab after hearing he has tried twice to take his own life. Dr Phil said: "Nick, you're out of control. You've threatened suicide. You deserve to get some help because if you don't, you know you're going to wind up dead." Nick - who checked into rehab last week - vowed: "I'll be clean, I'll be sober, I'll be a good person."
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Five people have died and up to 25 people are feared trapped in rubble after a fire at a shopping centre in the Russian city of Kazan. The fire started in a first-floor cafe adjoining the Admiral centre on Wednesday and more than 600 people were cleared from the building. Part of the centre collapsed and emergency officials said that 16 people were being treated in hospital. Many more have been reported missing, Ria Novosti says. "There are about 25 people who we can't get in touch with. We've had many calls about it on our hot line," the head of the Volga regional emergency centre Igor Panshin was quoted as saying. A video posted on social media showed part of the roof collapsing near the entrance to the centre - one of the largest in Kazan. Footage from the scene showed a plume of black smoke over the city, the capital of the Tatarstan republic, some 800km (500 miles) east of Moscow. A security guard had initially tried to extinguish the fire himself and it took some time before the fire brigade was called, reports said. Although the fire has been put out, an area of 4,000 sq m (43,000 sq ft) was razed to the ground. Business owners who had broken through a police security cordon to save their goods from the fire were feared to be among those trapped in the rubble, Tass news agency reported. Five hundred riot police were sent to seal off the centre to stop people entering the building, it said.
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AirAsia boss Tony Fernandes said Thursday he had not given up on finding more bodies from one of the airline's jets that crashed in the Java Sea last year, but flagged the hunt will draw to a close within weeks. More than 100 bodies and the black box recorders have been recovered since Flight QZ8501 went down in stormy weather while flying from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore on December 28, killing all 162 people on board. "My message is we're not giving up. (The families) know that because I'm speaking to them every day," Fernandes told reporters in Sydney, adding that about 60 bodies had yet to be found, including the captain. "We have been successful from a sea operation like this. To get more than 50 percent is considered a huge success." But the Malaysian low-cost airline chief said the search could not "go on indefinitely". "There is a time period and we've agreed with the families that this is obviously not something that can go on indefinitely," he said. "But it's important for us that the families agreed on this and that's why I give them credit that they didn't keep insisting that we go on forever. "I'd say seven to 10 full operational days and then we'll probably have to close it down." Fernandes did not say when the last victims had been found, but Indonesian authorities have reported far fewer discoveries of bodies in recent weeks. The Indonesian National Transportation Safety Committee has so far shed little light on what caused QZ8501 to crash, or what occurred in the moments before the tragedy. It found the plane climbed from 32,000 feet to well above 37,000 feet in 30 seconds, likely in an attempt to avoid a menacing storm. It then quickly returned to 32,000 feet before "gradually" descending towards the sea. Indonesia will release the final report into the crash by August, the transport minister told AFP in February. Indonesia expansion plans Fernandes, in Australia to announce new flights from the country to Indonesia, said long-haul budget carrier Indonesia AirAsia X was reviewing safety procedures and operations although nothing had been changed as yet. "There's no guarantee that AirAsia is never going to have another incident again as I've always said from the beginning, but what we'll do is we'll mitigate as much as possible," he said. "We'll be transparent, we'll be open and we're working very hard on that... we owe it to those families that whatever we can possibly do to be the best, we will be the best, there's no doubt about it." Fernandes said AirAsia was still looking at expanding its operations in Indonesia, with a view to using Bali as a hub between flights from Australia to north Asia. An Initial Public Offering for the Indonesian unit of AirAsia was still on the cards, he added, saying that "in the light of (QZ8501), the IPO approach also appeals to us because it makes the airline more transparent". "We are keeping all options open." One year on from the disappearance of Malaysian Airlines MH370, which had 239 passengers and crew on board, the airline boss supported moves to enhance flight-tracking technology. "It's ridiculous that in this day and age we can't find (it). Even with (QZ8501)... it still took the best part of two weeks to locate it," Fernandes said. "I can't see why data can't be sent to the cloud every five minutes for instance."
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The BBC will be giving away mini-computers to 11-year-olds across the country as part of its push to make the UK more digital. One million Micro Bits - a stripped-down computer similar to a Raspberry Pi - will be given to all pupils starting secondary school in the autumn term. The BBC is also launching a season of coding-based programmes and activities. It will include a new drama based on Grand Theft Auto and a documentary on Bletchley Park. Digital visionaries The initiative is part of a wider push to increase digital skills among young people and help to fill the digital skills gap. The UK is facing a significant skills shortage, with 1.4 million "digital professionals" estimated to be needed over the next five years. The BBC is joining a range of organisations including Microsoft, BT, Google, Code Club, TeenTech and Young Rewired State to address the shortfall. At the launch of the Make it Digital initiative in London, director-general Tony Hall explained why the BBC was getting involved. "This is exactly what the BBC is all about - bringing the industry together on an unprecedented scale and making a difference to millions," he said. "Just as we did with the BBC Micro in the 1980s, we want to inspire the digital visionaries of the future. Only the BBC can bring partners together to attempt something this ambitious, this important to Britain's future on the world stage." It is hoped that the Micro Bit will encourage children to get involved in coding and programming. The BBC Micro, launched in the 1980s, played a big role in making computing mainstream but it was not without controversy. The broadcaster's decision to link up with Acorn Computers angered Sir Clive Sinclair as he prepared to launch a rival machine, the ZX Spectrum. Meet the Micro Bit The BBC does not see Micro Bit as a rival to similar computing devices such as Raspberry Pi, Arduino, Galileo and Kano, but rather hopes it will act as a "springboard" to these more complex machines. The tiny programmable machine is still a prototype and the BBC is working with several partners, including chip-designer Arm, Microsoft and Samsung, to get the end product right. When it launches in September it will be compatible with three coding languages - Touch Develop, Python and C++. The device is tiny - fitting easily into the palm of a hand. Children will be able to create text via a series of LED lights and they will also be able to use it to create basic games. The final version will have a Bluetooth link enabling it to be hooked up to other devices such as a Raspberry Pi. The Raspberry Pi Foundation is helping to develop learning resources for it and the BBC is being careful not to repeat the mistakes of the BBC Microcomputer launch, which angered rivals such as Sinclair. InsertBodyImagePlaceHolder_2 BBC Learning's Gareth Stockdale, who is developing the device, said: "The BBC's role is to bring focus to the issue, and then we will withdraw from the market." After the first million Micro Bits go out to schools, there will be no more. One day they might become a museum piece like the BBC Micro, which is now housed at the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley. 'Get creative' As part of its Make it Digital programme, the BBC has also launched an apprenticeship scheme for 5,000 young unemployed people to boost their digital skills. The scheme is the first of its kind to be developed in partnership with the Department for Work and Pensions. Radio 1, which is closely involved in the initiative, will offer top-performing trainees the opportunity to go on to an apprenticeship at the station. The nine-week traineeship, which will include training from the BBC Academy, aims to teach basic digital skills such as creating websites and short videos for the web. The BBC is also drawing on its vast vault of content to bring digital content into shows such as Doctor Who, EastEnders and the One Show. Radio 4 will have a series of programmes that look at the history of coding, digital content and future technologies. "With a dedicated season of programming on the BBC, 5,000 digital trainees, one million children who take their first steps with a Micro Bit, and a host of educational activity, we hope to inspire a new generation to get creative with digital," said Jessica Cecil, controller of Make it Digital.
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MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) On the eve of perhaps the most telling two days in the Formula One season, several drivers bravely talked up their chances of challenging Mercedes, while fearing that Friday's practice session at the Australian Grand Prix and Saturday's qualifying were likely to show the silver cars remain in a class of their own. Analysis of preseason lap times suggested Mercedes was around a second a lap faster than its nearest rivals - a giant margin by F1 standards - and driver Nico Rosberg did not bother trying to play down his team's advantage when asked Thursday about the preparations for the new season. ''I am confident of the job we have done, we believe in ourselves, we are the best in Formula One as a team and we are the ones to beat,'' Rosberg said. ''Some have been making some huge steps and we look forward to seeing where we are on Saturday, but certainly we are optimistic.'' Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo was the only driver to take race victories off Mercedes last year - winning three times - and he feels the team is better placed this season to challenge. ''The team definitely wants to get back on top,'' Ricciardo said. ''It was an off year from their standards last year and I don't think we're too keen to let Mercedes get any further away. ''It does look like the Mercs have a bit of pace again this year but for that last spot on the podium it looks pretty close between us, Ferrari and Williams and I'm sure there'll be a few other players coming into the mix.'' Australian-born Ricciardo, who was stripped of his podium finish in his home race last year due to a technical infringement, is now the lead driver at Red Bull after four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel switched to Ferrari. Vettel has a new team and a lucrative new contract, but- at least in the short term - it shapes as another season of fighting for second best. ''We've made a step. We're yet to find out how big the step is,'' Vettel said. ''We've seen last year that there are chances to win races, not just for Mercedes. So if you put yourself in a very strong position, probably at the beginning of the season right behind, then if something happens, you're there.'' Red Bull, Ferrari and Williams seem to be the best of the rest heading into the season ahead, with McLaren struggling in preseason testing as engine supplier Honda - returning to F1 after six years away - suffered predictable teething problems. Fernando Alonso, back at McLaren where he had one unhappy year in 2007, will sit out the season-opening race due to the lingering effects of a concussion suffered in preseason testing. His place will temporarily be taken by Kevin Magnussen, who finished on the podium on debut in Melbourne last year, but had since been relegated back to being the team's reserve driver due to Alonso's arrival. At least McLaren can be confident of being on the starting grid on Sunday, which is more than can be said for two other teams: Sauber and Manor. Sauber on Thursday failed in its appeal against a court judgment which ruled that the team was contractually obliged to use driver Giedo van der Garde for this race weekend, despite having pulled out of an earlier agreement with the Dutchman and having appointed drivers Marcus Ericsson and Felipe Nasr instead. There was no immediate comment from the team on how they would proceed in the wake of the court ruling, with some speculation the team may pull out of the race due to the contractual chaos. With Sauber struggling financially and coming off a dire 2014 season, Thursday's appeal verdict was a major setback. Manor arrived in Melbourne due to an 11th hour takeover by a new ownership group for the former Marussia team which failed to complete the 2014 season and went into financial receivership in the offseason. The team intends to use an iteration of its very uncompetitive 2014 car, and faces an uphill task to get within seven percent of the pole position time in Saturday's qualifying; the threshold for being eligible to race on Sunday.
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TAMPA, Fla. Cabela, a 1-year-old mixed breed dog who was rescued after being shot and tied to railroad tracks in Tampa, has captured a nation's heart, while police have announced four arrests in connection with the dog's abuse. "Cabela was shot because she wouldn't fight," said Andrea Davis, a Tampa Police spokeswoman. A photo of the bloodied dog in a police officer's arms was widely circulated earlier this month. Police have received thousands of messages in the case, including adoption offers, via phone calls, emails and through social media. Cabela is being cared for at Tampa Bay Veterinary Emergency Service. Doctors initially thought Cabela's leg would have to be amputated, but they were able to save her leg. Cabela will make a full recovery, Davis said. The dog had been used for fighting and didn't do well, officials said, and that's why she was marked for death. On Thursday, police said 18-year-old Darnell Devlin and 21-year-old Kenny Bell each face two counts of possession of a dogfighting dog. The arrests came after a search warrant of a home where Cabela had lived. Detectives discovered two more dogs that were used for fighting. Also arrested were two 17-year-olds Natwan Callaway and Bobby Hollinger who were charged as adults. They were charged with aggravated animal cruelty and trespassing; Callaway was also charged with possession of a firearm. All four are being held at the Hillsborough County Jail without bond. It's unclear if they have retained attorneys. Police said surveillance video led to the arrests. It showed four people walking to the tracks with the dog on March 4. Two adults left, but the teens stayed, and shortly after, officers responded to the area for a shots fired call. That's when they found Cabela. Rich Mills, one of the officers who responded to the scene, told local media that Cabela was bleeding from the gunshot wounds and tied with her head pinned to the tracks when police found her. He said officers were surprised that she was not whimpering or crying. "It touched me," Mills said of the scene. "It was almost eerie - like that she was just letting us come to her aid." The owner of the veterinary office posted on Facebook that Cabela is doing well. A recent photo showed the brindle-and-white on her back in a dog bed, belly up, in a pink cast. ___ Follow Tamara Lush on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tamaralush
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A ruling that pop stars Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams stole from Marvin Gaye threatens to create - in the words of their smash hit - even more blurred lines for songwriters who could increasingly be hauled to court over their artistic inspirations. A jury in Los Angeles on Tuesday awarded more than $7 million to Gaye's family after finding similarities between the late Motown legend's 1977 hit "Got to Give It Up" and "Blurred Lines" by Thicke and veteran songwriter Williams, which was the top-selling song in the United States in 2013. Gaye's heirs hailed the verdict as justice. But many music professionals voiced dismay, saying that non-specialist jurors confused the influences that lie in all artists with outright theft. "It's just a huge nail in the coffin for an already six-foot-under music industry. Now none of us have any idea what's going to win a lawsuit," said songwriter Greg Wells, who has co-written with superstars Adele and Katy Perry. "It reaffirms to me that for most ordinary people, music sounds like Japanese to them if they're not Japanese. This just takes the fear knob and cranks it to 11 for people who do what I and Pharrell do for a living," he told AFP. E. Michael Harrington, a composer and expert on music law at SAE Institute, Nashville, said that the ruling, if it stands, would mean that "plenty of plaintiffs can go crazy and sue everyone." "I've never seen a decision that is this poor -- the melody wasn't taken, there were no lyrics taken, there was no chord progressions taken," he said. "If this is the standard, it's below floor level it's so low." 'Fine line' The case technically involved not the recording of "Got to Give It Up" but the sheet music, which Gaye's family owns. Recordings of the two songs have similar atmospherics, including background noise from a party. In evidence highlighted by Gaye's team, Thicke himself had said in media interviews that he wanted to write a song like Gaye's. He backtracked in court and said he was not sober when speaking to the press. Whatever the idiosyncracies of the case, many musicians openly cite their influences. Music industry promotional campaigns, although often not crafted by the artists themselves, routinely compare new bands to well-known stars. The songwriter busbee, who has worked with a diverse array of artists including Shakira and Garth Brooks, said that melody infringement was a real problem but that professionals were careful. "It's a fine line because you obviously have to be responsible as a creative person. I can't go repaint the Mona Lisa and say it's my inspiration. Equally, though, if you're second-guessing every creative move you make, that's a little bit tricky," he said. Many songwriters say that they are regularly barraged by claims that they copied other artists, often obscure works that they had never heard of. "No one knows every single song ever and you would basically have to submit every song to a musicologist, which wouldn't be very cost-effective," busbee said. One prominent case emerged this year over British soul singer Sam Smith's smash hit "Stay With Me." After growing chatter about similarities between the song and Tom Petty's 1989 hit "I Won't Back Down," Smith quietly added Petty and the US rocker's collaborator Jeff Lynne as co-writers. Smith, who was born in 1992, said he had never heard "I Won't Back Down" and Petty agreed that he believed the similarities were coincidental. Rising lawsuits A different legal framework is already in place for intentional sampling. A US federal appeals court in 2005 ruled that gangsta rappers N.W.A. violated copyright rules by sampling a two-second guitar riff from George Clinton's band Funkadelic. That case had an international impact because it was cited by Germany's top court, which supported electronic music pioneers Kraftwerk in a suit over a sample by a German hip-hop act. Artists now generally seek licensing for samples. The rise in complaints comes at a time that the fast-changing music industry's revenues are dwindling. The money earned by Williams and Thicke for a year's top-selling song is a fraction of what an actor would earn from a Hollywood blockbuster. Sandy Wilbur, a musicologist who testified on behalf of Thicke and Williams, said that she has seen a major increase in music copyright litigation in the past two years. "Songwriters and composers will think twice before mentioning any others who might have inspired them. Still, inspiration is not infringement," she said.
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entertainment
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Jenson Button has won three Australian Formula One Grands Prix but said Thursday he will not be adding a fourth title with McLaren in this weekend's season-opening race. The British 2009 world champion admitted his McLaren-Honda had not done enough testing in pre-season to challenge for the podium. McLaren completed substantially less mileage than their rivals in testing amid repeated problems with Honda's new engine. The British team's preparations were also disrupted by an accident that left Spaniard Fernando Alonso in hospital and unable to compete around Melbourne's Albert Park street circuit. "We all know it's not going to be the easiest weekend for us," Button told reporters. "Will we be challenging for a win? No, we won't be. "In winter testing we had our difficulties but in terms of the way that the car feels and the way that the engine feels it is a really good platform. "It's just going to take time ... this weekend for us is more about just getting the best out of everything that we have." McLaren finished behind the field in terms of kilometres and laps covered in pre-season testing following the team's switch to Honda power units for this season. Button, who joined McLaren in 2010, said they were a year behind in development of the complicated system compared to the Mercedes, Ferrari and Renault engines. But he felt it would not be long until the team was challenging. "If you look at the layout of the power unit and how tight everything is in the car, you would say it's very aggressive and you can see that Honda is here to win," said Button, who won in Melbourne in 2009, 2010 and 2012. "It's just a matter of time before we are fighting at the front." Button said he was not sure when Alonso would return to racing following his concussion from the heavy crash during testing, with Denmark's Kevin Magnussen standing in for the double world champion this weekend. Button added that he had studied the data from the crash and there was no technical issue with the car.
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sports
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Take us to the beach rn. Celebs Rock The Hottest Swimsuit Trends Demi Lovato's Neon Bikini We don't know what's cuter, Demi's sporty bikini or her adorable pup! Kylie Jenner's Black Strappy Two-Piece Kylie showed off her non-basic black bikini while spending the day at the pool with her sis Kourtney's BF Scott Disick. Selena Gomez's Floral Suit Sel posted this gorge photo to Instagram with the caption: "Remembering how precious every day is." Gigi Hadid's Bright Bikini Gigi hit the beach with BF Cody Simpson, looking adorbs in a color-blocked two-piece and cut-off shorts. Kylie Jenner's Black Monokini Kylie was spotted on a photo shoot in Cali wearing a black cut-out swimsuit. Gigi Hadid's Retro Bikini Gigi shows off her adorable swimsuit style in a high-waisted, striped bikini. GabiFresh's Sporty Bikini Style blogger GabiFresh shows off her adorbs bathing suit while on vacay in Puerto Vallarta. The sporty bikini is from her swimsuit line with Swimsuits For All. Bethany Mota's Black Bikini And Cute Cover-Up We're loving the way Bethany made a sheer dress totally poolside-chic! Janel Parrish's Cut-Out One-Piece Pretty Little Liars star Janel (aka Mona) posted a gorgeous balcony shot from her beach vacation in Turks and Caicos. One-piece on fleek! Vanessa Hudgens' Tan Bikini The actress posted this gorge bikini shot to Insta, capturing her New Zealand vacay. Gigi Hadid's Sporty Two-Piece As the new face of Australian swim brand, Seafolly, Gigi rocked a cool, sporty bikini in this smokin' hot new image from the campaign. Taylor Swift's Retro One-Piece After showing off her belly button in a two-piece, Tay went back to her vintage-y one-piece suits. She captioned her adorbs vaca pic: "'She's always wearing, like, a 1950s bathing suit.'" It's true, and we love her for it! Shay Mitchell's Neon Bikini Shay's bright bikini top looks amaze against her tan skin! Taylor Swift's Bright Bikini Tay showed off her belly button for the first time ever while hanging with the sisters from the band Haim. Lorde's Black One-Piece Spending time back home in New Zealand, Lorde shows off her ~beach body~ in a classic black one-piece. Maia Mitchell's Knit Bikini The Seventeen Prom cover girl looks like a total boho babe with her knit bikini and septum piercing. Jessie J's Strapless Two-Piece No white Christmas for Jessie J! The singer hit the beach in a bright bikini. Rihanna's Red Bikini Ri headed to the beach for the holidays, and took this selfie with her friend by the pool. Love the matching red suits! Zoë Kravitz's Black Bikini The Divergent actress looked stunning on the beach in a totally un-basic black two-piece. Katy Perry's Retro Bikini Katy looks totally sassy in her high-waisted two-piece. Love the matching bucket hat! Shay Mitchell's Blue Maillot Shay looked H-O-T soaking up the sun while shooting some photos for her website, Amore and Vita. Shay captioned the photo: "In·di·an sum·mer noun [a period of unusually dry, warm weather occurring in late autumn. a period of happiness or success occurring late in life.] + Fun collaboration with some amazing people and close friends... @hudsonhawaii @serenahawaii@carlenekmakeup" Lucy Hale's Sporty Suit Lucy's sporty bikini top is fun and perfect for a cool pic on the ocean docks. Kelly Osbourne's Scalloped Bikini Kelly updated a simple black bikini with a fierce leopard-print kimono and fun sailor's hat while sunbathing on a boat. Ashley Tisdale's White Two-Piece Posing on the beach in Bora Bora, Ashley Tisdale looks island chic in a white bikini. Hilary Duff's Printed Bikini Bring your bikini to the next level by accessorizing with a cute printed cover-up like Hilary! Iggy Azalea's Glam Maillot Who says gold is only meant for jewelry? Iggy Azalea looks fresh and fabulous posing in her gold-accented swimsuit. Shay Mitchell's Floral One-Piece The PLL star put a cool, retro spin on summer florals in a flirty one-piece and major pink shades. Selena Gomez's Mod Bikini Sel looks like she's having a blast hanging at the pool with her friends! Her black-and-white retro two-piece is seriously adorable. Beyonce's Retro Two-Piece Queen Bey showed off her acrobatic skills on Instagram, while thanking fans for all the sweet birthday wishes! Beyonce's mix-and-match bikini is seriously cute, and you can buy the top on sale now at Aerie! Kesha's Glam One-Piece Kesha looked ever the California blonde in a shiny red-and-gold one-piece and beach-y waves. Zendaya's Flirty Yellow Bikini Zendaya looked smokin' hot in a trendy, cut-out yellow bikini and cool body chain. Nina Dobrev's Sporty Bikini A navy blue bikini isn't at all boring with fun neon accents! Nina looks like she's having a blast in her sporty suit while on break from filming The Vampire Diaries. Kendall & Kylie's Printed Suits! The Jenners might be fans of wearing black from head to toe on the streets, but their beachwear is all about fun patterns! Lea Michele's Bright Rash Guard Wearing bright colors is a fun way to stand out at the beach. The Glee star looked super cute while staying safe in the sun in a bright pink rash guard and contrasting tie-dye bikini bottoms. Selena Gomez's Citrus-y Suit The summer-y color compliments Selena's complexion, while her hippie shades and braids add a funky twist to her simple bikini.MORE: Find The Perfect Sunglasses For You! Kat Graham's Neon Colorblocking We're not sure who's cuter: Kat or her puppy! The Vampire Diaries star's electric suit is the perfect way to stand out at the beach, and the bustier-style top is super flattering and gives you more support than a traditional bandeau. More: The Cutest Celeb Pets on Instagram Katy Perry's Retro Stripes Katy Perry channels a retro, '50s vibe in high-waisted shorts and a bright bandana, but her neon bikini top adds a trendy twist. Victoria Justice's Black Crochet One-Piece The singer-slash-actress looks totally festival-ready hangin' poolside at Coachella in a flirty black monokini! The crochet details give the black suit a boho vibe that proves rocking a bikini isn't the only way to look seriously hot! Ashley Benson's Funky Top This gorgeous PLL star traded her ususal black-and-white looks for a bright printed bikini in this adorable selfie. The split neckline adds a flirty touch to the bandeau top, while still keeping it classy and fun! Vanessa Hudgens's Sporty Bikini Vanessa showed off her sporty side in this chic wetsuit-inspired bikini. In classic Vanessa style, she accessorized with earthy jewelry and beachy waves for boho flair. Bella Thorne's Camo Bikini How cute is Bella's girly camo? We're loving the leopard print accents on the side not to mention her amazing beach 'do! Rita Ora's Luxe Chains Even at the beach, Rita shows off her rocker-meets-hip-hop style in a chain-link bikini top and cutoff shorts. The only thing cuter than her glam beach look is that adorable pooch! Jordan Sparks's Neon Striped Bikini Stripes don't always have to give off a super preppy vibe! Jordan's neon suit has a fun, festival-ready feel, especially with her cool body chain. Candice Accola's Neon Tribal Two-Piece Here's one vampire that's not afraid of a little color! The Vampire Diaries star showed off her rocking bod in this awesomely bright bikini. Bonus points for chic sun protection: cute oversized shades and a cool hat! Emma Roberts's Zebra Bikini Channeling the safari trend, Emma's bikini is a fresh twist on classic animal prints that's perf for summer. Shay Mitchell's Neon-Detailed Bikini The PLL star's navy blue bikini gets a sporty upgrade with neon piping! Shay's hologram shades bring her own girly vibe. Ashley Greene's Cheery Yellow One-Piece Retro one-pieces can be just as cute and fun as the high-waisted two pieces we're used to seeing! Ashley's vintage-inspired suit is super bright and fun. Cara Delevingne's Preppy Mix-'N-Match Bikini Cara's plaid bikini bottom and navy blue top have an edgy-preppy feel that matches her off-the-beach style. Plus, this triangle top has slightly more coverage than a string bikini. Lucy Hale's White Shorts For a chill, Cali-cool look, Lucy Hale paired fringed cutoffs with a magenta bikini top. Throwing on a cute pair of shorts definitely minimizes the risk of a wardrobe malfunction while riding the waves or playing beach volleyball. Miley Cyrus's Edgy Netted Bikini She may not be at the beach, but we don't blame Miley for showing off her cute, new bikini. The fishnet design gives a simple black suit a cool, edgy vibe. Rita Ora's Sporty Two-Piece Rita's sports bra-like top proves cute swimsuits aren't just for girly-girls! This two-piece has enough coverage and support to get you through even the most intense beach volleyball game, but still looks super hot. Cher Lloyd's Vintage Bikini Cher Lloyd's girly, '50s-inspired polka dots look especially sweet paired with her edgy tattoos! The ruffles are great for filling out ladies with smaller frames. Rihanna's High-Waisted Suit If you're not completely into the full-on retro look, pick a high-waisted bikini with a more modern, string top. We love Rihanna's denim-colored suit and matching chambray cover-up! Jennifer Lawrence's Blue Bikini For girls like Jennifer Lawrence who are curvier on the bottom, a bottom with thicker bands on the sides is super-flattering. Pick a bold color it's incredibly sleek and slimming! Selena Gomez's Neon Ensemble On the set of Spring Breakers, Selena Gomez and the rest of her costars rocked neon shorts with their string bikini tops for a cool color-block effect. Adding fun shorts in a similar color to your suit gives you a little extra coverage, but still makes you look totally confident! Julianne Hough's White String Suit Underwire suits are ideal for girls with C-cups or bigger to give you extra support. But they're really a great way to get a perfect bikini fit no matter your size, since they usually come in bra sizes, rather than S-M-L. If you're going to rock a white suit like Julianne Hough's halter version, make sure to pick one with double lining, so there's no chance it will go see-through after a dip in the water! Jennette McCurdy's Surfer-Cool Look If you prefer wakeboarding and waterskiing to reading and sipping lemonade on the beach, sporty board shorts like Jennette McCurdy's are just your style! They highlight toned legs, and the drawstring makes sure they stay put as you crash through the waves. Katy Perry Tie Dye Suit A full-coverage top and classic bikini bottom are perfect for girls like Katy Perry who are big-chested but have a tiny waist and booty. Thank goodness that bikinis are sold as separates! The tie-dye pattern paired with tons of metal jewelry are perfect if you're festival-bound this summer. Christina Milian's Monokini Christina Milian proves that a one-piece suit never has to feel frumpy or boring! Choose one in an unexpected print, like snakeskin, to really stand out. Kendall Jenner's Patriotic Two-Piece Kendall's red, white, and blue bikini is perfect for a July 4th celebration but looks just as cool for the rest of the summer as well. Ashley Tisdale's Tribal Two-Piece Girls with smaller, well, girls can still rock a bandeau! Just choose one with straps to make sure your top doesn't go for a swim in the ocean. The bright, tribal print on Ashley Tisdale's suit is a huge trend for summer! Angela Simmons's Glam Bandeau A bandeau top offers more coverage than a string top that's super-flattering for curvy girls! If you view the beach as a whole new opportunity to show off your glam style, pick a suit like Angela Simmons's embellished bikini.
| 4 | 11,719 |
lifestyle
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DECATUR, Ga. Residents in the Atlanta area are adding their voices to a nationwide chorus of calls for increased police accountability after an unarmed, naked man was fatally shot by an officer responding to a complaint of a suspicious person at an apartment complex. More than 100 protesters gathered in the city of Decatur on Wednesday night to protest the death of Anthony Hill, 27. Most said they hoped the latest shooting would become part of an ongoing national discussion on how police officers interact with citizens, especially minorities. The relationship between law enforcement and civilians particularly in poor, minority and high-crime neighborhoods has become a contentious issue in many states across the U.S. following the high-profile deaths of unarmed men and teens by police officers, some of whom have been exonerated of wrongdoing after saying they perceived the males they shot as threats. DeKalb County police officer Robert Olsen fatally shot Hill on Monday while responding to reports of a suspicious person knocking on doors and crawling on the ground naked at an apartment complex just outside Atlanta. Hill began running toward Olsen and didn't stop when ordered to, DeKalb County Chief of Police Cedric Alexander told reporters Monday. Hill is black and the officer who shot him is white. No weapon was found and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation is looking into the shooting. Alexander has acknowledged the national debate surrounding police shootings and said he wanted to make sure this investigation is transparent, open and fair. Hill had served more than four years in the U.S. Air Force when he was medically discharged a few years ago, his girlfriend, Bridget Anderson, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Wednesday. He was being treated by a VA doctor for bipolar disorder but stopped taking the medication a week or two ago because he didn't like the side effects, including stiffening in his jaw, she said. Anderson, 22, said she didn't notice any changes in Hill after he stopped taking his medication and she'd never known him to behave strangely. Anderson had been planning to go to Hill's place Monday evening to cook together and celebrate their three-year anniversary. Instead, she got a call that he had been shot dead by police. "My heart just tore out of my chest," she said. "I started screaming his name and saying it couldn't be true that he was gone." Demonstrators remembered Hill as a talented musician who loved the color purple and struggled with mental illness. They marched through the streets for about an hour chanting, singing and occasionally stopping at intersections to sit down and listen to a speaker while police cars blocked traffic. Hill's mother has hired lawyer Christopher Chestnut and asked for privacy. Chestnut said Wednesday that the police officer could have retreated, used his nonlethal weapons or fought with his hands. Chestnut said his law firm will conduct its own investigation, but argued that a naked and unarmed man posed no imminent threat to the officer or anyone else. Hill's death at the hands of a police officer is especially tragic, Anderson said, because he had great respect for law enforcement. When no indictment was issued for police officers in the apparent chokehold death of Eric Garner, an unarmed black Staten Island man who got into a videotaped confrontation with white police officers, Anderson said she expressed anger and frustration with police. But Hill told her to remember that most police are good people, she said. Kenneth White, 39, who attended the protest with his wife, Tasha, 40, and two of their young children, said the family wanted to be there to demand that law enforcement be held accountable. "Police officers have an extremely hard job," White said. "But they signed the dotted line for that job. If they make mistakes, just like I make mistakes, I have to pay the price for it. I think the same should be held to those who are supposed to enforce those laws." ___ Associated Press writer Ray Henry contributed to this report.
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news
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Automaker General Motors recently made a bit of splash by announcing a $5 billion stock-repurchase program. Investors initially seemed pleased, given the one-day pop that General Motors stock enjoyed on Monday. But should they be so optimistic? For starters, it's worth noting that the buyback plans were not made out of a sense of obligation; the threat of a proxy fight with activist investor Harry J. Wilson forced GM's hand, whether the board and other shareholders really liked the idea or not. But even if you want to say Wilson has the best interest of all GM stockholders at heart and not just his own pocketbook, the fact remains that buybacks are one of the most dubious tricks on Wall Street. Stock repurchases are a clever accounting trick. It is an open questions as to how much stock buybacks help publicly traded companies or if they even help at all. U.S. mega-cap stocks, however, don't seem to care much about whether repurchases work or not. All they seem to care about is that everyone else is doing them, so they should, too. According to Bloomberg, S&P 500 components were on track to spend a record $914 billion on buybacks last year roughly 95% of all corporate earnings! That leaves it up to investors to read between the lines and figure out whether companies are just blindly participating in the buyback frenzy, or actually being thoughtful about providing value to their shareholders. Sadly, it appears that in most cases, they are doing the former. The intentions of a share repurchase plan are simple: to "return capital to shareholders" by spending money in a way that makes the stock go up and shareholders wealthier as a result. The primary idea is that buying back existing shares decreases the supply of outstanding stock, and gives existing shareholders a bigger piece of the company. Furthermore, stock repurchases are a clever accounting trick to inflate the much-publicized earnings per share metric for a stock. One way to increase EPS is to see bigger profits that increase the numerator in this calculation, but shrinking the number of shares in the denominator can have the same effect. In this age of challenging corporate profits, a little bump to the bottom line can go a long way. And nowadays, when cash is cheap and rates are low, "investing" in yourself seems to make a lot of sense for corporations with money to burn, given the alternatives. Accordingly, many executives consider the buyback boom a no-brainer. Do buybacks actually work? Trouble is, stock buybacks are only a boon in theory. In practice, buybacks frequently don't do much at all for shareholders, and there is little corporate accountants can do to change the state of the underlying business. Here's a fun list of underperforming blue-chips that spent a bundle on buybacks in 2014, to no avail: Exxon Mobil reported stock buybacks of $13.2 billion in 2014. But that couldn't overcome weak energy prices, and shares tumbled 9% compared to an almost 12% gain for the S&P 500 . Tech titan International Business Machines boasted in a chairman's letter that it repurchased $13.7 billion in 2014.Too bad the stock dropped 12% on the year. Machinery mega-cap Caterpillar announced in its last 10-K filing that the company repurchased $4.2 billion worth of stock in 2014 all for the stock to basically tread water, with a measly 1% gain on the calendar year. Aviation giant Boeing spent $3.2 billion on buybacks in 2014, according to its latest 10-K filing, and still lost about 5% that year. Restaurant icon McDonald's reported $3.2 billion in share repurchases, but the stock slid 3% on the year. Telecom player AT&T spent $1.6 billion in calendar 2014 to buy back stock, according to its financials, but shares declined about 4%. Now, you can pooh-pooh these particular mega-caps as companies with their own specific problems. But that's the point massive buyback plans cannot change the fundamentals of a business, and turn a stock in a tough spot into a good investment. On the flip side, do you really think Apple has gone up so dramatically because of buybacks? Any investor knows it's about the prodcuts; the iPhone 6 launch and highly anticipated Apple Watch rollout are much bigger drivers of Apple stock. Perhaps repurchasing stock lessens the pain during a rough patch, or creates a modest tailwind when times are good. But isn't there anything better these companies could be doing with that cash, like R&D or acquisitions? Or why not issue a special shareholder dividend instead? The bottom line is that buybacks don't change anything substantive in a stock. It's important to be rational about how and why a company is buying back stock. Here are some questions to ask before you get giddy about a stock buyback: What's the alternative? Economists refer to the road not taken as the "opportunity cost" of a venture. If a company really has no other good options for its money, then a buyback may make sense. Except that raising a dividend would be a juicier alternative to many shareholders. Yes, acquisitions and R&D can be risky and amount to nothing. But the same is true for buybacks sometimes. Investors need to ask where else the money could be spent even if management isn't creative enough to ask it themselves. Is the buyback affordable? It's one thing for a cash-rich company with massive cash flows to earmark a few billion dollars for buybacks. But borrowing cash or bleeding the coffers just for repurchases can be a disturbing sign. In fact, GM's announcement of a $5 billion stock buyback will "delay any potential consideration for an upgrade" to its credit rating, according to Moody's. Hamstringing liquidity is not a wise way to run a business. Do repurchases fuel stock awards? Another clever trick among Wall Street sharks is to buy back stock to maximize the value of stock awards to top executives. As options are exercised and more shares are doled out to company insiders, buybacks are a way to ensure those execs aren't diluted by the issuance of extra shares. In fact, Apple CEO Tim Cook has been open about the company's repurchase plans as a way to reduce dilution of employees who get compensated in Apple stock. While keeping employees happy and productive can have its benefits, shareholders need to ask if what's good for staffers is necessarily good for them. Are companies buying high? It's worth noting that Apple initiated its buyback program at the end of 2012, with shares were trading for an adjusted price of $95 or so. The stock promptly dropped into the $50s over the next several months despite Apple buying billions worth of its own stock at elevated levels. All this is not to say that stock buybacks are useless. In some circumstances a repurchase of stock makes sense, both for the company and for individual shareholders. But it often appears that some S&P 500 corporations are committed to buying their own stock at elevated levels to enrich executives because they have no good ideas for growth. Why pay a bigger dividend or develop a new product when you can buy back shares, ride the bull market, and blame the strong dollar on lagging performance? Individual investors shouldn't be duped by these tactics. You need to think seriously about whether buybacks are actually in shareholders' best interest.
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finance
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Republican governors are scrambling to come up with a response if the Supreme Court cripples ObamaCare, leading to a tangle of divergent views that could make it tougher for the GOP to rally around a single solution. Political pressure on Republican governors to act will be intense if the high court invalidates subsidies that help millions of their states' citizens buy health insurance. "The Republicans potentially have a PR nightmare on their hands, because what's going to happen when 8 million people are going to be denied subsidies?" said Ford O'Connell, a Republican strategist and member of The Hill's Contributors Blog. The fight over King v. Burwell is further complicated by the fact that several GOP governors could be launching presidential campaigns near the time the court reveals its decision, expected in June. Responses from Republican governors are all over the map. In Louisiana, where around 160,000 people would lose subsidies, Gov. Bobby Jindal is rejecting any fix to the law, as he makes a play for conservative voters. Jindal wrote an op-ed in National Review this month arguing people would be better off with no subsidies because, without them, the mandate to buy insurance would no longer apply. "Some on the right want to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory," he wrote. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who has emerged in polls as a leading potential GOP White House contender, isn't completely ruling out a fix but says it should come from Congress. About 180,000 people in his state would lose subsidies. "While we continue to monitor the federal court case and the pending outcome later this year, ultimately, the responsibility rests with the federal government to fix this federal law," Walker spokeswoman Laurel Patrick said in a statement. "Following the issuance of a decision, we will continue to work with members of Wisconsin's federal delegation to enact a solution." In New Jersey, where 200,000 people could lose subsidies, Gov. Chris Christie has been silent on the issue. His office did not respond to a request for comment. "I wouldn't say I've seen a distinct pattern," said Stuart Butler, a conservative health policy expert at the Brookings Institution. "They go from outright rejectionist states like Bobby Jindal to those that are trying to figure out some way to say, 'Can we get that money and use it in a more conservative way?' " Because the case centers on the interpretation of a single phrase in the law "established by the state" Democrats will be able to pressure Republicans with a politically advantageous argument. The lawsuit argues the phrase makes it illegal to distribute subsidies through the federal insurance marketplace. And Democrats can say it only takes a one-sentence bill to fix the phrasing and restore subsidies for the roughly 8 million people. Perhaps the most straightforward solution would be for states to set up their own marketplaces, which would remove all doubt about the phrasing. But that option could invite attacks that Republicans are enabling ObamaCare. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, another possible White House contender who has cultivated a "compassionate conservative" profile, appears more open to a state-based solution and did not rule out a state-run marketplace. He told Bloomberg that he is leaving options open and has "good people working on this." "If the court makes a decision that these exchanges get shut down, then we're going to have to figure something out in Ohio," he said. Governors not mulling White House runs are also raising their voices. Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) has supported a state-run marketplace in the past, and his state is the furthest along toward using that option. He told Michigan Public Radio on Monday that he is waiting to see what the court and Congress do. However, he added that, if the subsidies are struck down, "that raises the question, 'should we be looking at a state exchange again?' and that's a dialogue I would have to have with the Legislature." In addition to governors' efforts, congressional Republicans are working on a range of solutions, though Democrats dismiss them as a charade intended to encourage the court to strike down subsidies. Three House committee chairmen have outlined a plan to allow states to opt out of ObamaCare's mandates and to provide tax credits to help people buy insurance. Three Senate chairmen, meanwhile, have outlined a plan to provide financial assistance to let people temporarily keep their health insurance plans. That idea was endorsed by Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin (R) this week. But it would also put pressure back on the states, calling for giving them "freedom and flexibility" to create their own solutions. Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), in a Wall Street Journal op-ed calling for the temporary assistance, raised fears of Democratic political advantage if Republicans are not ready. "When Team Obama then turns its guns on the holdout states and their 37 governors, the political pressure to adopt ObamaCare will be crippling," he wrote. "I fear that most governors will fold."
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news
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The International Monetary Fund (IMF) doesn't quite agree with the Narendra Modi government's growth forecast for Asia's third largest economy. In a report on March 11 , the IMF said that based on the revised GDP calculations, it estimates that the economy will grow by 7.5% in 2016. The revision earlier it had projected growth at 7.2% is driven by stronger investment following improvements to the business climate. The growth estimates are a bit off the mark from what India's finance ministry is projecting. In 2016, the economy will grow between 8.1% and 8.5%, the government said in February, after it rejigged how the country's GDP is calculated. In the past, the margin between the estimates made by agencies like the IMF and the government's projections have been typically very narrow . This time though the difference is that of 0.5 percentage points. The government's ambitious growth estimate has been debated and ridiculed lately. "Nobody really believes that the Indian economy grew at anywhere close to 7% last year, and shockingly no one is willing to put an end to this nonsense," Ruchir Sharma, head of emerging markets at Morgan Stanley Investment Management argued last month. Still, the IMF believes that India's economy is moving in the right direction. Paul Cashin, an assistant director at the find, said that the growth numbers are now higher and the current account deficit is comfortable, in part due to the fall in gold imports and lower oil prices."New investment project announcements have started to pick up, particularly in the power and transport sectors," he said. But risks persist. "Spillovers from weak global growth and potential global financial market volatility could be disruptive, including from any unexpected developments as the United States begins to raise its interest rates," Cashin added.
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finance
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You don't need to be very old to remember a time when politicians in Washington would practically elbow each other out of the way to get in front of cameras and rail against the federal debt and its effect on both the near-term federal budget and the long-term fiscal health of the nation. In his first term, President Obama asked former Republican Senator Alan Simpson and former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles to lead a commission that would craft a plan to fundamentally change the nation's fiscal path, in large part by attacking the national debt and deficit. Related: Key Economic Indicator Back to Pre-Recession Levels The Simpson-Bowles plan, which promised fiscal reform in exchange for pain for, well, pretty much everybody, never got the traction it needed to be enacted. And while it remained a touchstone for some fiscal conservatives, the problems it tried to solve lost their urgency. In part, that was an unintended side effect of the Federal Reserve's strategy to preserve the economy through the worst of the Great Recession. As it became clear that the Federal Open Market Committee, the central bank's interest rate-setting authority, intended to keep the effective interest rate on government debt at zero, arguments about the cost of federal borrowing faded. After all, in the short term the time frame in which most of our political decisions are made the borrowed money was essentially free. That is about to change, and it's probably a good idea for taxpayers to have a reasonable understanding of what a rising interest rate environment will mean for the federal budget. The FOMC is, pretty plainly, going to start increasing its target Federal Funds rate in the not-too-distant future. The likely result is that investors, who have become accustomed to an environment in which they can't buy risk-free assets unless they agree to earn virtually nothing on them, will start looking for a higher yield. That means that as the U.S. Treasury issues more debt and rolls over existing obligations, the price it has to pay will start to rise. Related: Home Buyers Borrowing More than Ever Before To be clear, absent a highly unlikely economic catastrophe, interest rates are expected to remain at historically low levels for a considerable time to come. That said, as they rise, the consequences for the federal budget are fairly dramatic. The Congressional Budget Office, for instance, predicts that over the coming decade, U.S. interest payments as a share of the country's gross domestic product will more than double , from 1.3 percent in 2015 to 3.0 percent in 2025. Federal borrowing costs are complex bonds are issued at varying maturities, and even if rates rise slightly in the near future, the effect on federal spending may not be obvious in the short term. Over time, though, a difference of less than a percentage point can add significantly to the debt. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a federal spending watchdog group, has noted that projecting the effects of interest rates on federal debt over 75 years can be very difficult but tweaking long-term assumptions about rates make a sizable difference. For example, lowering the projected average long-run interest rate used in budget calculations from 4.7 percent to 3.95 percent results in federal debt of 92 percent of GDP in the year 2039, instead of 111 percent of GDP. Interest spending that year would be 3.6 percent of GDP instead of 4.7 percent. On the other hand, an equal sized increase in the average long-run interest rate would result in federal debt at 130 percent of GDP, and an annual interest burden equal to 7.5 percent of GDP. Any analysis of federal fiscal policy involves many such moving parts and assumptions, including the benefits of economic growth and the professed willingness of members of Congress to overhaul a sclerotic tax code. But if nothing else, it's a virtual certainty that rising interest rates will, sooner or later, bring the federal deficit back into the spotlight. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: The Five Big Questions Hillary Clinton Left Unanswered U.S. Still Giving Corrupt Afghanistan a Blank Check The App-Selling Power of Kate Upton's Cleavage
| 3 | 11,724 |
finance
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Bad habits. They're pesky, aren't they? Every once in awhile I catch myself in a bad habit. They almost seem inevitable. But I'm always determined to squash them as soon as I recognize them. I'm sure you're in the same boat. When it comes to bad financial habits, there are some serious ones that can cost you thousands of dollars. Which of these habits are you guilty of committing? 1. Spending With Credit Cards When You Can't Afford It Credit card interest rates are regularly well above 10%. That translates into a lot of interest charges if you don't pay off your credit card every month. Worse yet, many people get stuck in a cycle of credit card debt a habit that seems to just not go away. Many people make what they consider to be "educated" guesses as to whether they can afford to put new clothes or high-tech gadgets on their credit cards. The problem is that those who do often don't really know their future expenses. If you're living paycheck to paycheck, even small emergency expenses can be enough to make you late on your credit card payments. And if you're late once, it's so easy to push off paying your credit card debt until you're really hurting. Furthermore, late payments can hurt your credit, and if your credit score drops low enough it can mean higher interest rates for you in the future. (You can see how your credit card debt is affecting your credit by getting your credit scores for free on Credit.com .) Unless you're entirely sure you can pay off your credit cards every month, you may want to seriously consider not using them. You may be asking, "Hey Jeff, I'm not sure how to stop using credit cards I can't afford to live without them!" That's a difficult situation, no doubt. In that case, you're going to have to look at both your income and expenses to determine where you can make improvements so you don't have to depend on credit to make ends meet. 2. Not Tracking Your Transactions With a Budget One of the best advantages of tracking your transactions is that you can see very clearly where you spent your money over time. Try tracking your spending for a month (there are free budgeting software programs that can help with that, too). If you haven't ever given a second thought to spending, this exercise will certainly help you do that. When the month is over, categorize and add up your expenses. Many people overspend on the following categories: Groceries Clothing Entertainment Eating Out These are categories you should monitor carefully. Once you know how much you're spending in your categories, make a few goals. Try lowering how much you're allowed to spend in your problem categories incrementally, month by month. Over time, because you've been tracking your categories and paying attention to your spending habits, you'll find you can lower your budget category allocations saving you thousands of dollars. 3. Waking Up Late I'm convinced that waking up late affects your finances . Allow me to explain. All of us are pressed for time. If you're like many out there, you dread the alarm clock and reach for the snooze button too many times (that is, more than zero times). But I bet there's something you'd love to do if only you had more hours in the day. Maybe you'd exercise, start a side business, or take some online classes. These are all activities that can either directly or indirectly result in more income. For example, if you take some online classes, you can learn a useful and marketable skill that can earn you a raise, promotion or a better job. Personally, I found that by waking up early I can have a few morning routines that get me pumped for my day ahead. The later I wake up, the less productive I feel, and the less productive I am. You can also fill those early morning hours with some of those activities you always wanted to get to but never could. You just might find that even if you don't consider yourself to be a morning person, you could become one. Instead of focusing on ways to improve your finances through just financial means, look at your entire life it's not as compartmentalized as it may seem and can have profound consequences on your money. 4. Consuming to Hopefully Find Contentment Something deep down in me cringes when I hear businesses call people "consumers." Sure, people consume, but that's not all they do. But maybe businesses sometimes refer to people as consumers because that's what so many do too often: they consume. Ask yourself if you consume more than you produce. Is your goal in the morning to wake up and say, "I wonder how I can please myself today?" Or, is your goal to serve others? Albert Einstein was quoted in the June 20, 1932 New York Times as saying: "Only a life lived for others is the life worth while." There's so much wisdom to that. But there are other benefits to serving others above ourselves, as well. Have you noticed that when you're busy serving others and making money, you spend less? Perhaps you've noticed the reverse. Don't consume to seek contentment. Contentment isn't found in consumption, it's found in servanthood. Follow this advice, and you'll likely keep more cash in your wallet, too. 5. Using Investment Accounts as Emergency Funds It happens from time to time. I've seen a few of my clients raid their investment accounts to pay for emergencies. Sometimes, it even becomes habitual. I understand why they do it, but the tax penalties can be high. Also, if you use your investment accounts as emergency funds, you'll lose all that potential earning power when you have to dip into it for emergencies. A better plan is to have a high-yield savings account nicknamed "emergency fund" and not touch it unless there's a true emergency. And don't fool yourself, you really do need an emergency fund. There are a whole host of emergencies that can crop up when you least expect it: lawsuits, medical bills , job loss, the list goes on and on. Here's one habit you should get into: taking extra money you've earned every month and pouring it into your emergency fund. You may even put monetary gifts you've received into your emergency fund until you've filled it up (I recommend three to eight months' worth of expenses). Say Hello to More Money Bad financial habits aren't always easy to correct. I'll be honest with you, it's often very difficult. It requires a shift in the way you think about money. You might have some bad financial habits right now you don't know about. Brainstorm! Find every last one if you can. You can break a bad habit in less than a month if you stay focused. Do it. It's worth it. This article originally appeared on Credit.com .
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finance
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McLaren boss Ron Dennis said he was wrong to deny Fernando Alonso was concussed when he crashed in testing, as the team prepared to start the Formula One season without the two-time world champion. Dennis said he could understand the criticism that came his way after he denied Alonso was concussed, only for him to be ruled out of the Australian Grand Prix on medical advice. "It was not the best performance by me," McLaren's chairman and CEO was quoted as saying by British newspapers. "I understand why the press beat me up for being inaccurate. I wanted to be open and honest. I failed. But it is my objective to try to be as honest as possible in future." McLaren head into the season-opener in downbeat mood with Alonso, returning from Ferrari, sidelined to avoid a second head impact and after their MP4-30 car struggled in testing. The nature of Alonso's crash in Barcelona, labelled "very strange" by his manager, prompted speculation and McLaren had to deny he suffered an electric shock in the cockpit. Dennis said no decision had been made about whether Alonso links up with Jenson Button for the second race in Malaysia, although the Spaniard seems determined to take part. "There is a very understandable concern about the complexities of a second concussion - okay, he had concussion - within 21 days of the first impact," Dennis said. "This is all something very difficult to quantify, and certainly not within my capability. We know we have a mountain to climb and we're in the process of climbing it. "It's massively complex. We're not where we want to be but we will get to where we want to be given time." Button, who has won the Australian Grand Prix three times, said McLaren would not be challenging for victory in Australia after repeated mechanical problems pre-season. "We all know it's not going to be the easiest weekend for us," Button told reporters. "Will we be challenging for a win? No, we won't be." Kevin Magnussen, who will stand in for Alonso this weekend, said expectations were "quite low" as McLaren renew their partnership with Japanese engine supplier Honda. "We're struggling with reliability to make the car run for a long time and also this is a new start for McLaren and in many ways," he said. "It's going to take time but I think it's the right direction that the team has chosen to go and I think it has a bright future. "It's going to take time but I think it will get there."
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sports
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BOISE, Idaho Idaho authorities say they're working around the clock to find those responsible for a "heinous" triple murder at a rural home in the Boise foothills. One man has been arrested on theft counts. "When I say this crime is heinous, that is probably an understatement," Ada County Sheriff Gary Raney told reporters Wednesday. "Somebody who violently, without cause, without any provocation that I know of, killed three innocent people. We are working 24 hours a day with everything we've got to put that person in jail." A 22-year-old Nampa man arrested Wednesday is accused of grand theft and forgery but not murder, the sheriff's office said in a statement. Adam M. Dees was arrested at a Boise electronics store. He is accused of three felony counts each of grand theft and forgery and a misdemeanor count of carrying a concealed weapon without a permit. Deputies also seized a 2003 black Subaru Legacy with a gold panel that Dees was driving. Two men and a woman were found dead Tuesday at the home. The victims' names were not immediately released. Raney declined to speculate on a motive or say if anything was missing from the home. He said the victims were related, and the killings occurred sometime between Sunday evening and Tuesday morning. He said police wanted to hear from anyone who saw the Subaru near the murder scene between Sunday and Tuesday night. "I want the community to help us put the right person in jail," the sheriff said. "It's hard for me to fathom even after 31 years of law enforcement what could possibly motivate somebody to do to these people what they did," he said. The killings took place in what records say is a three-bedroom, three-bathroom home on about 20 acres with a total value of about $800,000. Authorities say the property has horses and other buildings. He said police responded after a family member called Tuesday. "I've probably not seen a bloodier or more violent murder occur," Raney said. He said other law enforcement agencies were investigating, including the U.S. Marshals Service.
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Two years after Pope Francis swept into the Vatican vowing to shake up the Church, his opponents are playing a waiting game as they seek to put the brakes on his reform drive. The first leader of the world's Roman Catholics to come from Latin America has been credited with bringing a breath of fresh air to the way the Church relates to a billion followers and the rest of the world. His popular touch, leadership on issues such as paedophile priests and signals of a more compassionate and pragmatic approach to the vexed questions of homosexuality and divorce have removed the sense of crisis that had taken hold under his predecessor Benedict XVI. But as the erstwhile Jorge Bergoglio prepares to celebrate on Friday the second anniversary of his election, he will be keenly aware that a crunch is looming over the question of how to reconcile Catholic thinking on the family with the realities of how many believers live their lives in the early 21st century. The Argentine pontiff set the bar high on the issue by scheduling two major synods -- gatherings of bishops -- on the theme of the family early in his term. The risks involved were underlined when the first one, in October, saw riled conservative bishops mobilise to block the approval of language heralding an unprecedented opening to the gay community and greater flexibility on the treatment of divorced Catholics. The outcome was seen as a setback for Francis at the hands of a body in which conservatives continue to hold the whip hand ahead of the second synod this October. A worried pope "What the synod confirmed is that there is now an open conflict within the Vatican over very serious questions," said Marco Politi, a Vatican expert who has recently published an essay entitled "Francis among the wolves." "The pope himself is worried," Politi told AFP. "Before Christmas he told a Latin American friend 'the only thing I ask of the Lord is that the changes for which I am making so many personal sacrifices will not be like a light that goes out.'" Politi believes the historic decision of Benedict to retire rather than die in office -- and 78-year-old Francis's own hints he could do likewise -- have been game-changers inside the Holy See. "This is a pontificate with a limited timeframe," he said. "That means opponents can watch the clock and tell themselves, 'we only have to wait four, five years and it will be over.' "That's new and it strengthens them." Francis has also encountered subtle opposition to his bid to reform the Curia, the Vatican bureaucracy that runs the Church worldwide. Publicly, resistance has been muted, but with long-established ways of doing things under threat, "changing mentalities is not so easy," says an inside source. Francis's occasional characterisation of some Vatican officials as pampered and detached -- suffering from "spiritual Alzheimer's" as he put it in one cutting phrase -- has not won him friends inside the city state. Papal paradox A tendency to shoot from the hip has also caused concern, even irritation, that major theological questions are being reduced to soundbites. With his "Who I am to judge" comment about gays, Francis pulled the rug from under centuries of Church teaching that homosexual acts are sinful. Quips such as Catholics don't need to breed "like rabbits" and the suggestion that those who insult religion should expect "a punch on the nose," have also contributed to a papal paradox: the more popular Francis becomes in the wider world, the less sure is his support in the ranks of the Church. "Many practising Catholics are uneasy," said Vatican Radio's Romilda Ferrauto. "They understand the pope's wish to show mercy to those whom life has hurt but they also ask 'what about truth, what about God's law?'" And it is not just journalists who are prepared to express reservations. "No synod, no bishop, not even a pope can take away the treasure that is the Catholic faith," one bishop, Athanasius Schneider, recently observed. Such discordant voices matter, says Politi. "Criticism quickly translates into enormous inertia," he said. "When the pope suggests a change in the pastoral approach on questions of sexual morality, the response is a deafening silence. When he demands that servants of the Church live modestly, as he does, you do not see many bishops giving up their palaces."
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news
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Amateur video shows protests in Ferguson at the time of the shooting. You can hear the sounds of gunfire and see people running.
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news
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Upon returning from the 2015 Geneva Motor Show , I found myself with more questions than answers about the Ford Focus RS . When you see it in person, the car stands out for a multitude of reasons: its elegant exterior, its well-crafted interior, and its promise to out-perform much of the hot hatch competition. I heard from more than a few Mitsubishi Evo and Subaru WRX STI owners over Twitter who said they couldn't wait to blow all five doors off the Focus RS once it arrives in America early next year. Obviously, these owners have been breathing too much of their own Axe Body Spray if they really think their cars will have a chance against the Focus RS. They are going to get smoked like that first cigarette after a transcontinental flight. A head-to-head-to-head-to-head showdown will have to wait until early next year. But the Focus RS, at least on paper, is not merely going to be a formidable competitor. It's going to leave the likes of the VW Golf R, Evo, and STI in the parking lot. The first reason is power. Ford promises at least 320 horsepower out of the 2.3-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder engine. There's certainly less eco and more boost to this particular four-banger, which is fine. Let's all admit that fuel economy is not a top concern when considering any of these cars. Looking at the current Mustang with the same 2.3-liter engine, we can see hitting 320 hp won't be much of problem. The Mustang offers 310 hp and 320 lb-ft of torque. Even at those numbers, the RS would outmuscle the Golf R's 292 ponies and the STI's 305 horses. At 320 hp, it will have 10 percent more power than the Evo's 291 horses under its hood. Then again, that final power figure could rise even more, creating a bigger gap. Power, of course, is not everything, unless you make the most. The RS makes the most and also beats the competition in torque, crunching the competition's high mark of 300 lb-ft by at least 20 more lb-ft. Now, all of that power doesn't do that much good if the car is too heavy or cannot handle it. The proven Focus chassis should cope with the power quite well. Although Ford has not released the weight numbers on the RS, the Focus ST weights 3,215 pounds. Add another 150 pounds to account for the all-wheel-drive system, and you're looking at 3,365 pounds. That's still a touch lighter than the STI's 3,367 pounds and the Golf R's 3,384 pounds. It's 200 pounds lighter than the Evo MR, which tips the scales at 3,571 pounds. So it's at best a draw for the competition after tipping the scales. However, the Focus RS still offers more power per pound than any thing else in the field. In testing, the STI managed a 4.6-second 0-60 time, and the Golf R hit 4.5 seconds. The Focus should manage to beat both with around 4.4 seconds and a quarter-mile time less than 13 seconds. Mind you, those are guesses. The Focus RS also will allow true torque vectoring in the rear axle, something no one else provides, and Ford says the RS will be able to handle more than 1.00 g of lateral acceleration, whereas Motor Trend testing showed the STI and R offered .97 g and .94 g, respectively. Close again, but still inferior numbers. The one weak link might be the transmission. But even here, Ford has nothing to fear. The RS will only come with a six-speed manual transmission, and that has proven to be just fine. On the ST, the throws are quick and easy. That car's gearing is especially well-done. The lower gears allow you to pull power all the way to redline. It climbs hills just as well as it shoots down them. On the more subjective front, I think the RS just looks better than the current STI, Golf R, and Evo. Only the Golf R has as distinguished of an appearance. The Evo and STI lack aesthetic maturity. All have racing-like cockpits, but the newer Golf R and Focus RS have a much higher level of sophistication than the other two models. Add to the mix that the Focus RS will include the most recent technology and even come with a Drift mode, and you've got a winner again. Even with so much going for it, the Focus RS still has a lot to prove. The hot hatch market has been dominated by imports. (Technically, the Focus RS will be a European import, as well.) Its true performance remains unknown for the time being, but we'll find out soon enough. I just think it would be foolish to underestimate this RS.
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autos
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The Philippines has rescued two children who were sexually abused on camera for an overseas online audience and arrested four people in a crackdown on the country's booming cyber-sex trade, authorities said Thursday. Law enforcers acting on a tip-off from the US Department of Homeland Security raided several suburban Manila homes last weekend, the National Bureau of Investigation said. "We were able to rescue two girls who were not quite eight years old," Eric Nuqui, head of the bureau's anti-human trafficking division told AFP. "They were made to do sexual acts with minors as well as adults. These include intercourse as well as acts involving sex toys." Internet clients, based in the United States and unspecified European countries, would pay anywhere between $50 -- to watch naked children waving at the web camera -- to $200 to watch them engaging in sex acts, he said. Data from computer storage devices seized from the alleged Filipino operators, two men and two women, indicate at least six other children were victims of abuse, Nuqui said. The bureau is trying to find these children as well as possible accomplices of the suspects, now held without bail for qualified human trafficking and rape, he added. "These children are all from extremely poor families or broken families," Nuqui said, adding that parents will also be investigated to check if they were complicit in the crimes. Authorities have warned the Philippines is a major hub of a billion-dollar global child cybersex industry, with perpetrators aided by widespread poverty and legal loopholes that allow them to remain anonymous. Last year, online child abuse was the leading cyber-related crime in the Philippines, making up 46 percent of the more than 200 cases being handled by law-enforcement agencies, according to the justice department. Filipino police last month arrested an Australian man, Gerard Peter Scully, 51, after he allegedly sexually abused at least eight girls, including an infant in front of a video camera, for clients overseas. He is also accused of murdering one of the victims. Nuqui said he was unaware if the latest raids were related to a police operation in Denmark linked to children being sexually abused in the Philippines for overseas Internet clients. Danish police arrested 10 male suspects in Wednesday's raids, they said.
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news
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VAIO Corporation was formed when Sony sold its laptop business , but now the new company is entering a product category in which Sony still remains: smartphones. The VAIO phone was announced today through Japanese MNVO B-mobile, which is pricing it to move: you'll pay ¥3,980 (about $33) a month for the hardware plus voice service and data. The phone itself is a mid-range affair: there's a 1.2GHz quad-core processor, a 5-inch 720p display, and a 13-megapixel camera. It's 7.95mm thick and runs Android 5.0. The phone looks a lot like a Nexus 4 , with a glass back panel and staid black front, but Japanese site Blog of Mobile points out that it's near-identical to a Panasonic handset available in Taiwan called the Eluga U2. The VAIO phone will almost certainly never make it to the US, and even in Japan, there's little to set it apart unless you have nostalgia for the brand and want to save some money over offerings from the big three carriers. But it's intriguing to note VAIO's entry into the market nonetheless, as speculation rumbles over whether Sony's own smartphones have a future.
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news
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SAN FRANCISCO Get ready to see more red warning signs online as Google adds ammunition to its technological artillery for targeting devious schemes lurking on websites. The latest weapon is aimed at websites riddled with "unwanted software" a term that Google uses to describe secretly installed programs that can change a browser's settings without a user's permission. Those revisions can unleash a siege of aggravating ads or redirect a browser's users to search engines or other sites that they didn't intend to visit. Google had already deployed the warning system to alert users of its Chrome browser that they were about to enter a site distributing unwanted software. The Mountain View, California, company just recently began to feed the security information into a broader "safe browsing" application that also works in Apple's Safari and Mozilla's Firefox browsers. All told, the safe browsing application protects about 1.1 billion browser users, according to a Thursday blog post that Google Inc. timed to coincide with the 26th anniversary of the date when Tim Berners-Lee is widely credited for inventing the World Wide Web. Microsoft's Internet Explorer doesn't tap into Google's free safe browsing application. Instead, Explorer depends on a similar warning system, the SmartScreen Filter. Google's alerts about unwanted software build upon the warnings that the safe browsing system has already been delivering for years about sites infected with malware, programs carrying viruses and other sinister coding, and phishing sites that try to dupe people into sharing passwords or credit card information. Whenever a potential threat is detected by the safe browsing system, it displays a red warning sign advising a user to stay away. Google also is demoting the nettlesome sites in the rankings of its dominant Internet search engine so people are less likely to come across them in the first place. Google disclosed Thursday that the safe browsing application has been generating about 5 million warnings a day, a number likely to rise now that unwanted software is now part of the detection system. As it is, Google says it discovers more than 50,000 malware-infected sites and more than 90,000 phishing sites per month. The safe browsing application had gotten so effective at flagging malware and phishing that shysters are increasingly creating unwanted software in an attempt to hoodwink people, said Stephan Somogyi, Google's product manager of safe browsing. "The folks trying to make a buck off people are having to come up with new stuff and that puts us in a position where we have to innovate to keep pace with these guys," Somogyi said in an interview. "You are now going to see a crescendo in our enforcement on sites that meet our standard of having unwanted software."
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news
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Despite Western and Arab hopes he would be consigned to the dustbin of history, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad enters his fifth year of war with an increasingly tight hold on power. Alarm over the sweeping expansion of the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group in Syria and Iraq means that international priorities have shifted away from Assad's removal. "Assad has improved his position internationally. The US, EU states and others are no longer demanding his immediate departure," said Volker Perthes, director of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. In the four years since the conflict erupted in March 2011, leaving more than 210,000 people dead, Assad's forces have succeeded in halting gains by Western-backed rebels and jihadists seeking his overthrow. While rights groups still regularly accuse Assad of indiscriminately killing his own people, sending helicopters to drop crude barrel bombs, even the Syrian opposition no longer demands his resignation as a precondition for peace talks. "Statements from the US and from EU capitals indicate a de facto direct or indirect acceptance of Assad's holding on to the presidency, and a search for some form of national unity coalition that would include Assad as well as the non-jihadist opposition," Perthes said. 'Untenable position' A European diplomat who often travels to Damascus said EU states are divided on how to deal with the man described by French Prime Minister Manuel Valls just last month as a "butcher". "Outside of France, Britain and Denmark, who reject any role for Assad in Syria's future, many European countries think that after four years, this position is untenable," the diplomat said. He said countries including Sweden, Austria, Spain, the Czech Republic and Poland see no benefit to isolating Assad and want a softer European stance. "But they are too weak to have their voices heard," he said. US Secretary of State John Kerry recently laid bare the shifting Western stance towards the Syrian leader. Assad "has lost any semblance of legitimacy," Kerry said. "But we have no higher priority than disrupting and defeating Daesh," he added, using an Arabic acronym for IS. Assad, seen briefly as a reformer at the onset of his rule nearly 15 years ago, was ostracised for his bloody repression of anti-regime protests that began in 2011. But in remarks that enraged the rebels, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura recently described the president as "part of the solution" in Syria. "The Syrian regime, and especially its head, is the interlocutor for the international community -- even if officially, the West, Arab states, and Turkey don't talk to him," said Souhail Belhadj, researcher at the Geneva Graduate Institute and author of "Bashar's Syria: Anatomy of an Authoritarian Regime". Diplomatic window After suffering initial losses to rebels, Assad has managed to stabilise the military balance and even make gains in some areas, thanks to significant support from the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Air strikes by the US-led coalition have piled further pressure on jihadists who have flocked to the war-wracked country. Today, the regime controls 40 percent of Syrian territory home to 60 percent of the population. Almost all of Syria's major cities -- except IS's self-proclaimed capital Raqa and half of the second city of Aleppo -- are under government control. But the battle is far from over. "The Syrian regime certainly feels it is in an advantageous position with regard to the military situation," said David Lesch, professor of Middle East history at Trinity University in Texas and author of "Syria: The Fall of the House of Assad". "On the other hand, I think elements within the regime recognise that there may be an economic horizon sooner rather than later in terms of its dwindling manpower, finances and resources, especially when its two strongest allies, Iran and Russia, are suffering economically," he said. Assad has a "window of opportunity" to negotiate in the coming months before the looming 2016 US presidential election starts to restrict Washington's flexibility on Syria, said Lesch.
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FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) Protesters called for calm but vowed to keep pushing for change in Ferguson a day after the shooting of two officers in front of the city's police department heightened tensions in the St. Louis suburb. Dozens gathered for a candlelight vigil Thursday night, where they expressed sympathy for the wounded officers. They also prayed for peace as Ferguson moves forward in the wake of a scathing Justice Department report on racial bias in its law-enforcement practices. A larger crowd of about 200 protesters gathered later outside the police department, but the scene was a marked contrast to the previous night, when fights broke out before the shootings. Some called for specific changes: the resignation of Ferguson's mayor or the disbanding of the police department. Others were there to remember 18-year-old Michael Brown, whose shooting death by a Ferguson police officer in August made the city a national focal point. "We'll not be derailed in the pursuit of justice by anybody or anything that wants to get in our way," said the Rev. Traci Blackmon, a member of the state's Ferguson Commission who led the prayer vigil at a public plaza in downtown Ferguson near the police department. "We refuse to stop." Officers from the St. Louis County Police Department and the Missouri Highway Patrol were summoned to bolster security but largely stood idle in the distance. The protesters had largely disbanded by 11:30 p.m. No arrests were made. The shootings just after midnight on Thursday came as protesters had gathered after the resignation of the city's embattled police chief. They marked the first time in more than seven months of tension in Ferguson that officers were shot at a protest, and the bloodshed threatened to inflame the already fraught relationship between police and demonstrators. Both wounded officers were released from the hospital Thursday, but St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar who called the attack an ambush said they could have been killed. One was shot in the right shoulder, the bullet exiting through his back. The other in the right cheek, just below the eye. The bullet lodged behind his ear. Several people were taken in for questioning but were later released, and no arrests were made by late Thursday. The shots were believed to come from a handgun across the street from the police department. The gunman may have fired from up to 120 yards away, a distance longer than a football field. But with a line of roughly 20 officers standing in front of the building, the shooter did not have to be particularly accurate to hit two of them, Belmar said. In Washington, President Barack Obama took to Twitter to relay his prayers to the officers and to denounce violence against police. "Path to justice is one all of us must travel together," Obama wrote, signing the tweet with his initials to indicate the president personally composed it. Attorney General Eric Holder said the gunman was "a damn punk" who was "trying to sow discord in an area that was trying to get its act together, trying to bring together a community that had been fractured for too long." In a statement, Ferguson Mayor James Knowles III and the city council said that although they respect the right to protest peacefully, "we cannot continue to move forward under threats of violence and destruction to our community. We ask our residents and clergy in this area to partner with us as we make our way through this process." The calls for healing and reconciliation weren't received favorably by all. As participants gathered before the prayer vigil Thursday night, shouts of "white power" came from a passing pickup truck. Brown's August shooting by former Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson prompted protests locally and across the nation, and tensions escalated in November after a county grand jury declined to prosecute Wilson. Justice Department investigators concurred with that finding in a report released March 4. The Justice Department also released a separate report that day that found racial profiling in the city police force, and a municipal court system driven by profit, largely on the backs of black and low-income residents. Police Chief Tom Jackson's resignation on Wednesday marked the sixth departure or firing in the week since the release of that report. Ferguson's court clerk was fired and the municipal judge, two police officers and the city manager voluntarily stepped aside. Wilson resigned in November. ___ Associated Press videographer Jill Craig, photographer Jeff Roberson and writer Jim Suhr in Ferguson, Missouri; writer Jim Salter in St. Louis; and writers Eric Tucker and Josh Lederman in Washington contributed to this report. ___ Follow Alan Scher Zagier on Twitter at http://twitter.com/azagier
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Reima Kuisla, a Finnish businessman, was recently caught going 65 miles per hour in a 50 zone in his home country an offense that would typically come with a fine of a couple hundred dollars, at most, in the U.S. But after Finnish police pulled Kuisla over , they pinged a federal taxpayer database to determine his income, consulted their handbook, and arrived at the amount that he was required to pay: €54,000. The fine was so extreme because in Finland, some traffic fines, as well as fines for shoplifting and violating securities-exchange laws, are assessed based on earnings and Kuisla's declared income was €6.5 million per year. Exorbitant fines like this are infrequent, but not unheard of: In 2002, a Nokia executive was fined the equivalent of $103,000 for going 45 in a 30 zone on his motorcycle, and the NHL player Teemu Selanne incurred a $39,000 fine two years earlier. "This is no constitutionally governed state," one Finn who was fined nearly $50,000 moaned to The Wall Street Journal , "This is a land of rhinos!" Outrage among the rich especially nonsensical, safari-invoking outrage might be a sign that something fair is at work. Finland's system for calculating fines is relatively simple: It starts with an estimate of the amount of spending money a Finn has for one day, and then divides that by two the resulting number is considered a reasonable amount of spending money to deprive the offender of. Then, based on the severity of the crime, the system has rules for how many days the offender must go without that money. Going about 15 mph over the speed limit gets you a multiplier of 12 days, and going 25 mph over carries a 22-day multiplier. Most reckless drivers pay between €30 and €50 per day, for a total of about €400 or €500. Finland's maximum multiplier is 120 days, but there's no ceiling on the fines themselves the fine is taken as a constant proportion of income whether you make €80,000 a year or €800,000. Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Austria, France, and Switzerland also have some sliding-scale fines, or "day-fines," in place, but in America, flat-rate fines are the norm. Since the late 80s, when day-fines were first seriously tested in the U.S., they have remained unusual and even exotic . But to advocate for the American adoption of day-fines isn't to engage in the standard grass-is-greener worship of Scandinavia that's in style right now. It's logical. Yes, day-fines might dissuade the rich from breaking the law; after all, wealthier people have been shown to drive more recklessly than those who make less money , and Steve Jobs was known to park in handicapped spots and drive around without license plates. But more importantly, day-fines could introduce some fairness to a legal system that many have convincingly shown to be biased against the poor. Last week, the Department of Justice released a comprehensive report on how fines have been doled out in Ferguson, Missouri. " Ferguson's law enforcement practices are shaped by the City's focus on revenue rather than by public safety needs," it concluded. "There's a renewed interest in this because of the outrageous kind of fining and gouging that has become well-known out of Ferguson," says Judith Greene, who founded Justice Strategies, a nonprofit research organization. "But of course that kind of stuff goes on everywhere." Greene says that day-fines won't curb the troubling practice of aggressive, means-to-an-end fining, but it would be effective to introduce them anyway. " Then the criminal fines should come into the picture as they were originally intended, which is a criminal sanction a penalty for crime and then scaled appropriately," she says. Greene has seen America's experience with day-fines firsthand. Nearly 30 years ago,she helped launch a pilot program in Staten Island. The first day-fine ever in the U.S. was given in 1988, and about 70 percent of Staten Island's fines in the following year were day-fines . A similar program was started in Milwaukee, and Greene went on to work with a few other cities in implementing the day-fine idea. All of these initiatives, she says, were effective in making the justice system fairer for poor people. So why did it fail to catch on? "The fine as a sanction back then was not seen as tough enough, the focus back then being 'lock 'em up,'" Greene says. "There wasn't a lot of room for an intermediate sanction," she says. But now that concerns about over-incarceration are much more salient, things might be different. "We have a new climate, in terms of public attitudes about criminal justice, about sentencing," she says. "Why not now?" Finland was the first country to introduce day-fines, having established them in 1921, but the roots of the idea run deeper. Fines were first set up as a punishment in Europe in the 1100s , and well into the Middle Ages remained a second-best alternative to simply punishing offenders by seeking personal vengeance. Montesquieu was among the first to recognize the importance of implementing them on a sliding scale. "Cannot pecuniary penalties be proportionate to fortunes?" he wondered in 1748's The Spirit of the Laws . The Finnish public is with Montesquieu. Four out of five Finns said that they supported day-fines over flat-rate fines in a survey from more than a decade ago , the last time the day-fine system underwent reform. (Before 1999, it was up to the offender to tell the truth to the police about his or her own income. When the police started consulting a database, day-fine revenues increased 30 percent.) Tapio Lappi-Seppälä, who is the director of the University of Helsinki's Institute of Criminology and Legal Policy, says that an overwhelming majority of Finns still support them. "It is a matter of social justice and equal impact of punishment," he says. Citizens in other countries aren't always so supportive, though. In 1991, the governments of England and Wales tried out day-fines, only to abandon them after criticism from the media. "[This failure] can be attributed mainly to the U.K. government's inability to defend a sound system against ill-founded public pressure and misplaced criticism," Lappi-Seppälä wrote in the Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice . To be sure, not all of the criticism of day-fines is misplaced. Casey Mulligan, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago, has valid concerns about them. "An income-based system might appear to 'help the poor,' but that's forgetting the victims of those crimes," he says. He notes that income imbalances between neighborhoods could create disparities in the incidence of reckless driving. "Do we want more speeding past schools in poor neighborhoods than in rich neighborhoods?" he asks. Day-fines might make more sense in a place like Finland, where income inequality isn't as pressing of a problem (by one measurement , at least). Mulligan also points out that because some penalties involve time in custody, in court, or in jail, the system does, to an extent, mete out justice equally. "The value of the time component of a penalty is proportional to the penalized person's value of time," he says. In terms of earnings potential, an hour of a CEO's time is worth a lot more than an hour of a janitor's. But at least when it comes to discouraging the wealthy from breaking the law, day-fines could be effective, says Marc Bellemare, a professor of economics at the University of Minnesota. "When considering a proportion of their income…people are at least constantly risk-averse. This means that the worst that would happen is that the deterrent effect of fines would be the same across wealth or income levels," he says. He doesn't think the American system should be revamped overnight, but thinks that day-fines could hold promise. "We should start small say, only speeding tickets and see what happens," he says. Now that America is no longer of the "lock 'em up" mentality, day-fines should get another shot.
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A photographer teaches his daughter about black history using dress-up, resulting in some amazing photographs. Jen Markham (@jenmarkham) explains.
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In the NBA , a league obsessed with size and potential, it seems impossible for a true seven footer with a 7'7" wingspan to sneak up on anyone. These are the players that are nurtured since adolescence, drafted first, paid the most, and given every chance to succeed. However, since Hassan Whiteside joined the Heat this season, his meteoric rise from obscurity has been the most ridiculous story in NBA. He's got the athleticism of a modern-day center, with throwback '90s-center size. (Unlike these fake seven footers of today such as Dwight Howard and Joakim Noah, Whiteside is the real deal.) For weeks, the biggest question in the NBA has been: How did nobody see this coming? In just 22 minutes per game, Whiteside is putting up 11 points, 10 boards and 2.5 blocks per game. His PER of 27.15 is the fifth-best in the league behind only Anthony Davis, Russell Westbrook, Steph Curry, and Kevin Durant. Whiteside's rebound rate (the percentage of possible rebounds a player grabs) is 27.2 percent. That is the second-best single-season mark in NBA history behind only Dennis Rodman's 29.7 percent in 1994-95. Whiteside's block rate (percentage of shots a player blocks) is 9.2 percent, the 15th-best single-season mark in NBA history (Manute Bol's 10.8 in 1986-87 is best). Per 36 minutes, he is averaging 16 rebounds (best in the league), 3.9 blocks (best in the league) and 17.9 points. He has put together some of the most eye-popping box scores of the season. He's had four 20-plus rebound games, six 5-plus block games and a triple-double with 14 points, 13 rebounds and 12 blocks. The 12 blocks is a new Heat franchise record. The catch? Through 35 games Whiteside has two ejections, seven technical fouls and $40,000 worth of fines. Over his last four games he's tackled Alex Len, swatted Marcin Gortat and cross-checked Kelly Olynyk. His latest flare up earned him a one game suspension. Before this year, Whiteside was virtually unknown. Not just to fans or the media. Some people in the NBA barely knew who this guy was. When asked what he knew about Hassan Whiteside prior to this year, Wizards head coach Randy Wittman responded: "Not a whole lot, I know he's kind of bounced around, I think he was in Sacramento or Golden State or somewhere out West." While he was never in Golden State, he was drafted by Sacramento in 2010. A projected lottery pick by some, Whiteside ended up sliding into the second round. He was the 33rd pick. Whiteside's tenure in Sacramento didn't last long. A torn tendon in his left knee derailed his rookie season and he played just 110 minutes in his sophomore campaign. Playing behind Demarcus Cousins and Samuel Dalembert, there were concerns that Whiteside just wasn't ready to contribute. I didn't really care about going to a big school like UConn, Kentucky or Memphis. I just wanted to play for coaches that believed. "I feel like I could've played," says Whiteside. "I don't know if I would've played this well, but I would've played well. I just need the opportunity. Injuries and a lot of other things prevented that." The Kings waived Whiteside one year later. It was a setback, but not a death sentence. "I knew I could never doubt myself," he says. "I just looked at it day by day. When you look at it in the short term it doesn't seem as far away." While Whiteside didn't doubt himself, there never has been a shortage of doubt surrounding him. Even coming out of high school Whiteside felt overlooked. Despite his NBA frame and athletic freakishness, Whiteside was ranked outside of the top-10 centers in his class, and barely cracked the top-100 players overall. Whiteside got looks from major basketball powerhouses but never felt those coaches were really believers. Instead, Whiteside opted to attend Marshall, a small West Virginian Conference USA school. "I really felt like the coaches believed. When you got coaches who believe in you that's where it all starts at," says Whiteside. "I didn't really care about going to a big school like UConn, Kentucky or Memphis. I just wanted to play for coaches that believed." Whiteside shined at Marshall. He finished his freshman year averaging 13.6 points, 9.2 rebounds and a nation-leading 5.4 blocked shots in just 26 minutes per game. Despite his success, questions began swirling about his character. During Marshall's CollegeInsider.com Tournament opener, Whiteside was 20 minutes late, got kicked out of practice, and was held out of the starting lineup. During the game, Whiteside was benched for the final 14 minutes of Marshall's comeback win because he was "lackadaisical and disinterested." Whiteside entered the NBA Draft after his freshmen season and despite having "lottery" talent and potential, he fell to the second round because of concerns about his maturity. Whiteside's draft day slide was just more fuel to add to the fire. "I came out and was projected lottery, and ended up going in the second round," he recalls. "Wound up going 33 in the draft and, I mean, I never really felt like I got a chance to really showcase what I can do." It doesn't take much to see that Whiteside is fueled by this anger and unwillingness to be ignored. "When he gets mad enough, he'll dunk it over everybody," Dwyane Wade told ESPN's Israel Gutierrez . "But with that, he's got to understand what's gonna come." Like every dominant big man before him, Whiteside is now experiencing increased attention and harder fouls. The passion that has fueled him in success is now proving to be a double-edged sword. His recent instability is causing his once awestruck teammates to pause. Dwyane Wade with strong words about Hassan Whiteside. Transcribed from his postgame interview. pic.twitter.com/5Cv0888CFt Chris Wittyngham (@1043Chris) March 10, 2015 To Whiteside, not much has changed from his college and early NBA days to his success in Miami today: "I just got older, man. Not too much changed. I learned a lot. I traveled the world. I've just seen different things in my life." Whiteside's travels started after being dropped by Sacramento. The NBA well had dried-up and Whiteside had to go abroad to keep his hopes of a professional basketball career alive. One of Whiteside's ventures took him to China, where he joined the Sichuan Blue Whales. With Sichuan, Whiteside won a championship, a Finals MVP, and a Defensive Player of the Year award. But Whiteside has mixed feelings about his time away from the States. "There were fun times and there were tough times," he says. "It was fun winning a championship, winning MVP awards, and just setting a lot of records over there. But there were also tough times over there too." The toughest times came during his time in the Middle East. Whiteside, who spent time in Lebanon with the Amchit Club and Al Mouttahed Tripoli, recalls witnessing car bombs , team officials with AK-47s, and brawls taking place in the arena. I feel like I've been underrated all my life. Whiteside was eventually cut from Al Mouttahed Tripoli because he "did not perform as expected in the playoff games against Byblos." After his release, Whiteside returned to China for 17 more games before coming home and making another run at the NBA. After a look from the Grizzlies and successful D-League stints with teams in Iowa and Sioux Falls, Whiteside has seemingly found a home in Miami. But even the organization that finally gave Whiteside his greatest chance had their doubts at first. While speaking with Grantland's Kirk Goldsberry , head coach Erik Spolestra recalled his first meeting with Whiteside: "Man to man, eyeball to eyeball, after his first workout in November, my first words were, 'If you're really serious about it, we can be the spot for you. But, this might not be for you. Our culture, our program, our commitment to player development, and getting you in the best shape you've ever been in in your whole life…there's going to be times when you want to throw stuff at us and quit. And this might not be for you. But, if you want to commit to this, we think this is the right place for you.'" Image via USA TODAY Sports / Gary A. Vasquez For the most part, Whiteside has bought into the program that has represented the Eastern Conference in the previous four NBA Finals. It's paying off. He is putting up historically good numbers and has given life to a Heat franchise that is coping with losing this generation's greatest player. His staggering numbers indicate that he could be one of the best bigs in the game someday. The ever-confident Whiteside believes he's already there. "I always feel like I'm one of the better centers out there," he says. The way he has played in games against the leagues top front-courts shows that he may be right. But with Whiteside, Newton's third law holds true. For every point/rebound/block triple-double game there is an equal and opposite tackle-a-goofy-white-center game. Those that are still wary have reason. There is a precedent for Whiteside meltdowns. But the doubt surrounding him won't shock the well-traveled big man. He's gotten used to it. "I feel like I've been underrated all my life," says Whiteside. "It's always been, 'Where did this guy come from?' Even back in high school and when I put up the triple-doubles in college, it's been, 'Where did this guy come from?' And now it's just the same story. It's nothing new to me. Guys just need to look harder I guess."
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A Canadian woman died after a grey whale crashed into the tourist boat she was on off Mexico's Pacific coast. The woman had been snorkelling off the north-western resort of Cabo San Lucas. The exact circumstances of the incident are unclear. Firefighters say the whale jumped up and landed on the boat, throwing the victim into the water. But the tour company said the woman was injured when the captain had to make a sudden turn to avoid the surfacing whale, which hit one side of the boat. She later died in hospital. Two other people were also injured. Local media said the unnamed woman, believed to be 35 years old, was on a boat with 23 other people when the accident happened. The vessel was returning from taking tourists on a snorkelling trip. Boating accidents involving whales are relatively rare - although two years ago a US sail boat sank off western Mexico after a breaching whale fell onto it. In July a sightseeing boat was overturned by a whale off the coast of California. On Wednesday, Mexican authorities said more than 2,500 grey whales had gathered in the area, one of the highest numbers in the past two decades. The lagoons and bays off Baja California Sur are popular with pregnant females who bear their calves here. Grey whales can reach a length of almost 15m (50ft) and a weight of 36 tonnes.
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A Canadian woman was killed and two others were injured after a whale emerged from the water and slammed into the tourist boat they were traveling in off the coast of Mexico, Agence France-Presse reported Thursday. The boat's captain and another tourist jumped into the water after 35-year-old Jennifer Carren was thrown into the bay of Cabo San Lucas in Baja California, Mexico, but the Canadian tourist later died Wednesday at a hospital, according to the news wire service. Two other tourists were hurt during the incident, Sky News reported , but the extent of their injuries were unclear. The whale, believed to have been a gray whale, jumped out of the water in front of the tourist boat and hit the side of the vessel, according to owner Cabo Aventura. Gray whales must come up to the surface to breathe, according to National Geographic , and that is likely what the whale was doing when it smashed into the tourist boat and killed Carren and hurt two others. Gray whales, a type of baleen whale that are considered an endangered species, migrate in the winter along the west coast of the United States and Mexico "to breed and have their calves," according to the World Wildlife Fund . The whales can swim up to 12,000 miles between feeding and breeding. Their migratory patterns take them from the waters off the coast of Alaska to Mexico, according to National Geographic. The mammals range in size from 40 to 50 feet and weigh between 30 to 40 tons. Gray whales stay close to shore, which makes them a target for hunters, which led to a hunting ban in 1947, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council . Since then, the gray whale population in the eastern Pacific Ocean "has rebounded dramatically" to some 20,000 whales in the 1990s, according to the NRDC. There are fewer than 100 adult gray whales in the western Pacific Ocean, however.
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Some people in the professional sports world think they are on the top of the totem pole and have complete impunity to say what they want, when they want. Sometimes they should just shut up. Athletes aren't always known to be the most... intelligent individuals you might run into. Some of them have interesting imaginations, others have trouble with the English language and some just love to put their feet in their mouths. Here are 15 times it would have been far more prudent to be silent rather than speak up. 15. Terrell Owens The media has always been pretty hard on T.O., but usually for good reason. The guy has a chip on his shoulder and a bad attitude. He's known for being brash and tough to get along with. He refuses to admit it, though. Or at least he tries to. "Don't say I don't get along with my teammates. I just don't get along some of the guys on the team." To be fair, he must assume that the media is referencing his entire team. He loves being literal. 14. Mike Cameron In response to a reporter asking about Carlos Beltran losing a fly ball in the sun: "The sun has been there for 500, 600 years." Former outfielder Mike Cameron may have just misspoke. Or he wasn't thinking at all. Or he just doesn't know. Could be any, probably not all. Plus, what's his point? Is he defending the sun? Did somebody insult the sun for interfering with a live ball? The sun is the new Steve Bartman! 13. Bill Cowher "We're not attempting to circumcise rules." Now look, maybe he was saying that the Steelers weren't trying to cut off the small flap on the back cover of the rule book. 12. Floyd Mayweather Mayweather compares himself to a pair of iconic black leaders who went to jail for fighting for civil rights, not spousal abuse. "I took the plea. Sometimes they put us in a no-win situation. I had no choice, but I don't worry about going to jail. Better men than me have been there. I'm pretty sure Martin Luther King's been there, and Malcolm X. I have taken the good with the good so I'll accept the bad with the bad." 11. Fuzzy Zoeller Somehow it always comes back to race. It's a shame, really. Remember back when Tiger Woods first started out and received this warm welcome? "You pat him on the back and say congratulations and enjoy it and tell him not to serve fried chicken next year. Got it? Or collard greens or whatever the [heck] they serve." Good old Fuzzy. 10. Harry Caray The beloved Chicago Cubs announcer was well-known for being a bit out of his mind, calling baseball with a flair that few were able to match. He would let it get out of hand sometimes, however, like when he decried opposing outfielder Jorge Orta for missing a fly ball. "Aw, how could he lose the ball in the sun? He's from Mexico." Caray didn't get in any hot water due to the statement, but it's still very much remembered. 9. Cardale Jones THE Ohio State backup quarterback Cardale Jones obviously didn't get recruited because he was a scholar, but who knew he was dumb enough to point that out on one of the most public forums that exists worldwide? He wrote on Twitter: "Why should we have to go to class if we came here to play FOOTBALL, we ain't come to play SCHOOL, classes are POINTLESS." It'll be fun to see what he does when he doesn't play pro ball. Sportswriter isn't likely. 8. Stevie Johnson Stevie Johnson dropped what would have been a game-winning catch. After the game he took to Twitter, where everybody goes to talk to God, and went all Jesus on Mount Gethsemane on us: "I PRAISE YOU 24/7!!!!!! AND THIS HOW YOU DO ME!!!!! YOU EXPECT ME TO LEARN FROM THIS??? HOW???!!! ILL NEVER FORGET THIS!! EVER!!! THX THO..." Maybe we shouldn't allow athletes on the Twitter machine. 7. Carl Everett "The Bible never says anything about dinosaurs. You can't say there were dinosaurs when you never saw them. Someone actually saw Adam and Eve. No one ever saw a Tyrannosaurus Rex." Too bad he doesn't use Twitter. 6. Floyd Mayweather After being offered, and refusing, a contract for $ 12.5 million over a total of seven fights, Floyd Mayweather decided that it made sense to liken his plight to those of his ancestors. He said about the deal: "That's a slave contract." Dang, if that's the case, why are people so upset about slavery? That's a heck of a lot of money. 5. Ozzie Guillen Ozzie Guillen has no filter. Everybody is aware of that and people expect a level of stupidity and insanity when it comes to the former White Sox manager. He went above and beyond after becoming manager of the Miami Marlins, however. "I respect Fidel Castro. You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last 60 years, but that m*****f****r is still here." I'm not sure how that applies to anything whatsoever. 4. Bob Griese Bob Griese is the quarterback who led the 1972 Dolphins to the only undefeated season in NFL history. He's also the dope who made a Mexican food joke in reference to the whereabouts of a Colombian NASCAR driver. "He's out having a taco." Really, Bob? Really? What made that seem like a good idea? 3. Manti Te'o Remember that time when the Heisman Trophy candidate randomly decided that he would try to get attention by faking the death of a girlfriend who never existed? Me neither. This statement's irony appears to have been lost on Mr. Te'o. "For me, the greatest fault would be to tell somebody something I'm not." Oh. Okay then. That clears things up. 2. Floyd Mayweather You knew he would be here a bunch of times. "We're going to cook that little yellow chump…Once I kick the midget ***, I don't want you all to jump on my d***. So you all better get on the bandwagon now...Once I stomp the midget, I'll make that m****rf****r make me a sushi roll and cook me some rice…We're going to cook him with some cats and dogs." I don't think this rant from 201 directed toward Manny Pacquiao needs any further comment. 1. John Rocker - The Tame Beginning John Rocker doesn't like New York. When asked what he would do if he played in NYC he responded with an outburst that led to batteries being hurled at his head among other objects intended to cause bodily harm. Let's allow the quote to speak for itself: "I'd retire first. It's the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the 7 Train to the ballpark looking like you're riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair..." 1. John Rocker - But Wait, There's More! That was just John getting warmed up. Let's move to the beginning of him putting his foot in his mouth: "...next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It's depressing..." 1. John Rocker - The Grand Finale And finally, he bites down on his foot: "The biggest thing I don't like about New York are the foreigners. You can walk an entire block in Times Square and not hear anybody speaking English. Asians and Koreans and Vietnamese and Indians and Russians and Spanish people and everything up there. How the [heck] did they get in this country?" The best part is that he knew that the rant was going to be printed in Sports Illustrated!
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Tour New York's beautiful landmark interiors in a new exhibition at the New York School of Interior Design. The exhibition "Rescued, Restored, Reimagined: New York's Landmark Interiors" at the New York School of Interior Design features photographs of some of the city's most beautiful interiors, such as this second branch of the Willamsburgh Savings Bank, built at 1 Hanson Place in 1929. The tower housing this cathedral-like space was once the tallest building in Brooklyn. The Della Robbia Bar at 4 Park Avenue was designed by Warren & Wetmore in 1913. It is one of two intact interiors that have terra-cotta tiles by the Rookwood Pottery Company. The home of the world-famous Rockettes, Radio City Music Hall is an Art Deco masterpiece. The beautiful Baroque-style Mark Hellinger Theater, built in 1929, is now home to the Times Square Church. Built in 1907, the Surrogate's Court (Hall of Records) was designed by John R. Thomas in a Beaux Arts style. The former ticket office of the Cunard Steamship Co. now houses a special-events space for the restaurant Cipriani. Featuring a combination of Greek, Roman Renaissance, and rococo architecture, the Beacon Theater was built in 1929 and designed by Walter W. Ahlschlager. Architect Philip Johnson and William Pahlmann devised the Four Seasons restaurant, located in the Seagram Building, in 1959. Using bold colors, architect Ely Jacques Kahn added an Art Deco flair to the lobby of the Film Center Building. Designed in a Classic Revival style, the grand Dime Savings Bank was the busiest bank in Brooklyn in the 20th century. The elaborate Loew's Paradise Theater in the Bronx has a stunning blue ceiling with stars illuminated by tiny lightbulbs. The Willamsburgh Savings Bank at 175 Broadway in Brooklyn was designed by George B. Post in 1875. Manhattan's City Hall, located at Broadway and City Hall Park.
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Located on the isolated west coast of Vancouver Island, Tofino is one of those places that's never going to leave me. There's just something special about it - it may be that it makes me think of Peter Pan's Neverland or that it's a surf town. Despite the icy temperatures during our off-season November visit - the sun was shining and the sunsets were epic. We got in our share of hikes, golden hour photo shoots, and even a short surf lesson.
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Genetic testing company 23andMe wants to use the vast amounts of genetic data it has gathered over the last few years to start making drugs, according to Bloomberg . Instead of focusing on screening people for various diseases, the company plans to make therapeutic agents that will target these diseases and possibly cure them. It's a pretty big departure for the company that failed to get FDA approval for its DNA testing kit and that only just received FDA clearance to sell a test that looks for markers of Bloom Syndrome, a rare genetic condition that's associated with sun sensitivity and increased cancer risk. 23andMe has yet to pick the diseases or drug targets that it would like to work on. In fact, it's still deciding if it wants to strike out on its own or partner with pharmaceutical companies to run its trials. "Pharma companies don't have a direct relationship with consumers." The genetic testing company already has partnerships with pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer Inc. and Genentech. They use the company's genetic databases to conduct research for their medicines. Thus, if 23andMe dives into the drug-making business, it will find itself competing with its partners. The company's relationships with Big Pharma won't be affected by the change, according to 23andMe President Andy Page, who spoke with Bloomberg. But CEO Anne Wojcicki says the company could make drug development more efficient. "Pharma companies don't have a direct relationship with consumers, so they're always subjects," she said. "By engaging them and giving it to them as a prize, saying, 'You've powered this study, and you've made this happen,' we can do things in a different way." The former head of research and early development at Genentech, Richard Scheller, will lead 23andMe's therapeutics group. This spring, the company will try to raise money to fund the new enterprise. Since 2006, 23andMe has raised $126 million in funding. "With an FDA-cleared product, we need to continue to accelerate growth," Wojcicki said. "I want to push the limits."
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Whether you call Edward Snowden a traitor or a whistle-blower, he earned one label about which there's no debate: insider threat. Guarding against such risks is an expanding niche in the security industry, with at least 20 companies marketing software tools for tracking and analyzing employee behavior. "The bad guys helped us," says Idan Tendler, the founder and chief executive officer of Fortscale Security in San Francisco. "It started with Snowden, and people said, 'Wow, if that happened in the NSA, it could happen to us.' " The problem predates the Internet: the salesman who takes the entire customer list with him when he quits, or the engineer who makes off with key product designs. But technology has only made it easier; now the salesman e-mails the data to his Gmail account, and the engineer can put product designs on a USB drive. In an embarrassing episode for Morgan Stanley, the bank dismissed an employee earlier this year for taking information about an estimated 350,000 clients of its wealth-management division. Companies are also realizing that tracking insiders may improve their odds of catching outside hackers. While investigations into the breaches at Sony and Anthem are ongoing, it's likely that attackers hijacked employee passwords and logins, then used them to navigate the companies' computer systems to find and steal data. These methods are the reason it takes a business more than 200 days, on average, to detect breaches, according to FireEye, a cybersecurity company. "Hackers become employees when they get inside," says Avivah Litan, an analyst at research firm Gartner. "So the name of the game is constant surveillance." Fortscale and competitors such as Securonix, based in Los Angeles, sell software that pulls data from a company's computer systems and feeds it through algorithms to create a profile of each employee. The software constructs a base line showing what's normal behavior for that user: where and when he logs in, which programs he uses, which company databases he accesses regularly, and which external websites he browses. It also generates a risk score for users based on what danger they may pose to the organization. With "normal" established, it becomes much easier to spot suspicious activity for example, a worker downloading thousands of documents from a database she has permission to use but never has before. "What we're trying to do is get this situational awareness," says Igor Baikalov, a former security executive at Bank of America and chief scientist at Securonix. "The next step is predictive analytics: How can we detect the small changes and stop the bad thing from happening?" Dtex Systems, a security company based in San Jose, monitors insider threats by placing software on desktops as well as company-issued laptops. CEO Mohan Koo says that in the first 30 days of surveillance at a financial exchange, the system identified six people who were getting ready to leave with highly sensitive data. Employees heading for the exit start doing things they hadn't before, such as changing their e-mail habits, Koo explains. Other approaches delve more deeply into psychology. Stroz Friedberg, a New York-based consulting firm that specializes in digital forensics, is rolling out software called Scout, which evaluates users through the content of their e-mails and other communications using linguistic and behavioral analysis techniques developed by the FBI. The software establishes a base line and then scans for variations that may signal that an employee presents a growing risk to the company. Red flags could include a spike in references to financial stresses such as "late rent" and "medical bills." Edward Stroz, the firm's founder and a former FBI agent, says that while companies may have found this idea too intrusive in the past, he's seen a change in perception in the past year. He's still careful when discussing the software, describing it as a way to help employers build a "caring workplace." He offers the scenario of a star trader at a bank who's disappointed with the size of her annual bonus. Instead of being blindsided when she defects to a rival, a bank using Scout could identify her discontent early and make sure she doesn't take sensitive data or other team members with her. Looming in the background is the question of how to balance employees' privacy with more intensive monitoring. Dtex says it makes user data anonymous, replacing names with codes and matching names to activity only when necessary for an investigation. That helps companies monitor effectively and comply with privacy laws in countries such as Germany and Switzerland, Koo says. Randy Trzeciak, a cybersecurity specialist at Carnegie Mellon, says it's important for companies to keep their lawyers in the loop and to outline a clear, well- communicated, and consistently enforced policy, so there's no perception of selective monitoring. Some of the methods at companies that hire Securonix make even Baikalov wonder how much is too much. He cites the practice of matching information on user behavior online with feeds from video cameras and other systems that monitor physical locations. Some companies, he says, have created ticket systems so employees can report suspicious behavior by colleagues. "Is it too much, or is it actually the right amount of diligence?" he says. "I'm really curious how much we will get out of it. It's really the extreme in kind of Orwell-like monitoring." The bottom line: About 20 companies sell tools to monitor employee behavior from e-mail habits to database access and flag risks.
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Jonathan Hunt reports
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Several middle school basketball players in Wisconsin defend their friend with Down syndrome and stand against bullying.
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When I learned that I could grow a vegetable in my dimly lit, teensy New York City apartment with just a Solo cup and a few seeds, I felt overwhelmed. I love vegetables. I eat them for breakfast . My friends once gave me a crudité platter for my birthday instead of a cake. The website StartAGarden let me take my love for vegetables to a new level. Catering to my specific living situation, the site graphed out the kind of produce I could grow based on my location, space and the type of materials I had on hand. I, for example, don't really have gardening tools. But this posed no problem. All I had to do was buy the seeds. I started this experiment by using a Solo cup leftover from a '90s-themed party my roommates and I threw last week. Then I turned to the website. I entered my zip code and chose "indoors," because my apartment doesn't even have a fire escape on which I could secretly grow a vegetable. Next, the website prompted me to choose one type of produce to plant, based on my previous container selection. As shown below, I had three plants to choose from: Brussels sprouts, turnips and lettuce. To turnip town I went. Upon arrival, the site asked me when I wanted to start growing my turnip. I selected March 12, and the site then generated two dates: an end date and a through date. Since the turnip would take anywhere from 6.5 weeks to 13 weeks to grow, these dates informed me that I should expect the plant to turn up (see what I did there?) around April, and it should definitely finish growing by July. Finally, the site produced an incredibly comprehensive "how to" page, complete with directions on how to plant and when to water (the below is just a sample of the detailed instructions). It even warned about common mistakes. I am confident my turnip will be perfect. Find out how to grow your own plants by going to StartAGarden.org . Want to read more from HuffPost Taste? Follow us on Twitter , Facebook , Pinterest and Tumblr .
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Where is President Vladimir Putin? The Kremlin was forced Thursday to insist the Russian leader was in good health as rumours swirled online over his week-long absence from the public eye. Putin was last seen in public on March 5 when he met with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and, ever since he postponed a trip to Kazakhstan this week, Russians have grown increasingly curious about what their usually omnipresent leader is up to. The 62-year-old nurtures a fit, tough-guy image and rarely takes time off. "There's no need to worry, he's absolutely healthy," Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Echo of Moscow radio station on Thursday. Putin also postponed a meeting to sign an alliance agreement with the leader of the Georgian breakaway region of South Ossetia, and did not show up at a meeting of the FSB security agency. Peskov said the agreement with the rebel region may be signed next week and that Putin's attendance at the FSB meeting was not planned. He said Putin was busy with Russia's economic crisis and has "meetings constantly, but not all meetings are public." Asked if Putin's handshake remains firm, Peskov laughed and said: "It breaks your hand." However he evaded a question on when Putin would next be seen on television. "As soon as the sun comes out... and it starts smelling of spring, people start getting delusions," Peskov told TASS agency. Adding grist to the rumour mill, the RBK news website claimed that Kremlin footage purporting to show Putin meeting regional governors and women on International Women's Day last week had in fact been filmed earlier. Peskov denied this. The last time the popular Russian strongman's health prompted such speculation at home was when he cancelled a number of foreign trips in 2012 after appearing to have developed a limp, which the Kremlin said was due to a sports injury. Whispers in Moscow about a leader's health are nothing new, with Putin's ailing predecessor Boris Yeltsin and former Soviet supremo Leonid Brezhnev the constant targets of rumours over their health. "Has Putin died?" asks one website where the question is the only thing appearing on a blank page above a button which users can click to check, yielding responses such as "No" and "Still No".
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A new island has been formed in the South Pacific after the eruption of an underwater volcano in Tonga. Images have emerged of the island's surface, 45km (28 miles) north-west of Tonga's capital, Nuku'alofa. The island - which is 500m (547yds) long - was formed after an eruption at the Hunga Tonga volcano that started in December. One scientist said the island was likely to be highly unstable, and dangerous to visitors. The volcano - the full name of which is Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai - erupted for the second time in five years in December. Video captured on a boat hundreds of metres from the volcano showed fast-rising plumes of gas emerging from the sea. Satellite images taken within days of the eruption showed new rock formations, and more sediment in the sea. And next to one of the two islands that previously made up Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai was a large circular crater. A resident of Tonga's main island captured striking images of the new island from its surface. Gianpiero Orbassano, who owns a hotel in Tonga, travelled to the island with two friends and said he was likely to make another trip soon. "It's really quite solid once you are on it and it's quite high," he said. "It felt quite safe - the only difficult thing was getting out of the boat on to the island. The surface was hot, you could feel it. And climbing it was hard in the bright sun." Mr Orbassano, 63, had previously travelled to another new volcanic island in the Pacific, where friends took golf clubs to play on the new landscape. "I don't feel risk," he said. "When I am doing this kind of thing, I'm focusing on my photographs. I don't feel danger." 'Fascinating to see' Mary Lyn Fonua, editor of the Matangi Tonga news website, travelled by boat to view the eruption in January. She said: "We got to within 700m of the volcano and when you're that close in a small boat, it can be quite risky. "An underwater volcano behaves quite differently - all the gas can shoot out to the side. But it was a fascinating thing to see, just to watch a whole new island being constructed." Mrs Fonua said she was unlikely to get closer to the new island: "Its quite fragile really, I don't really think you should go on it. And we don't really know if the eruption has finished either." 'Better keep clear' Matt Watson, a reader in natural hazards at the University of Bristol, said the surface of the island was likely to be "highly unstable". "It will be very loose and unconsolidated material," he said. "It's formed by fragmentation of magma, so it's basically small pieces of rock on top of each other that have formed an island. "That's also going to make it more vulnerable to the waves. It's going to be battered by some of the waves and currents, particularly in Tonga." Dr Watson said he would be staying far from the volcano if he was in Tonga. "You would really have to strongly convince me, with strong scientific reasons, to go on it," he added.
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U.S. stocks traded higher on Thursday as mixed economic data indicated to some investors that the Federal Reserve will not raise interest rates as early as anticipated. The market rebound is "probably in response to a lot of folks (who) think the Fed will not be raising rates. The U.S. economy seems to be cooling," said Bruce Bittles, chief investment strategist at RW Baird, citing weak retail sales that offset an encouraging decline in jobless claims. Bittles added that at the beginning of the year his firm had expected the Fed not to raise rates because of strength in the dollar and instability in the global economy, two ongoing conditions. The Dow and S&P gained more than 1 percent to trade moderately higher for the year. The Nasdaq extended gains for the year. "I think it was just a reversal of yesterday," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at BMO Private Bank. "I understand the concern (about the rapid dollar rally) but perhaps investors are overly concerned about the Fed and the dollar." The U.S. dollar fell about half a percent, pausing its recent rally. The euro edged higher to $1.06, up from 12-year lows hit on Wednesday. "At least on a one-day basis we have a reprieve from the (strong dollar) very much analogous to the decline we saw in oil prices," said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at Wunderlich Securities. The Federal Reserve said on Thursday that household net worth rose by $1.5 trillion in the fourth quarter of 2014 to a record $83 trillion, with gains driven by real estate. "I think (the market rally) has something to do with yesterday's Federal Reserve findings on the stress tests," said Robert Pavlik, chief market strategist at Boston Private Wealth. "I think that's helping lift the overall market (along with) initial unemployment claims. With the most recent pullback some people are looking at this as a buying opportunity." The Dow Jones industrial average rose more than 250 points, with Goldman Sachs (GS) among the top three blue chip leaders. After passing its stress test on Wednesday, Goldman announced it will increase its quarterly dividend by 5 cents to 65 cents a share. While 29 banks passed, Deutsche Bank (DBK-DE) and Santander failed the stress tests, with the Fed objecting to the capital distribution plans proposed by their U.S. units. These banks will be barred from issuing dividends or buybacks until a new plan is approved. Bank of America (BAC) 's approval was contingent on submission of a revised capital strategy to the Fed by the end of September. The S&P 500 surged 1 percent and attempted to hold above its 50-day moving average, after falling below it on Tuesday. "I think this is just a bit of a temporary rally and we'll see resumption of that decline. This rally is not going to be long lasting," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital. Intel (INTC) fell on the firm's lowering of its first quarter revenue outlook, noting weaker demand for business desktop PCs and that inventory levels are lower than expected. Microsoft (MSFT) also declined, as the second greatest laggard in the Dow. U.S. business inventories were unchanged in January and further declines in sales pushed the number of months it would take to clear shelves to the highest since July 2009, which suggests a stock draw down in the months ahead. Retail sales for February fell 0.6 percent, missing expectations of a slight gain. "For the last 3 to 4 years, that first-quarter performance has been choppy in general," said Calvin Silva, senior retail specialist with Nasdaq's Advisory Services unit. "Online stores saw an increase. Not a silver lining but an example of how consumers will shift their preference based on their situation." Retail sales excluding automobiles, gasoline, building materials and food services were unchanged after a 0.1 percent decline in January. The ex-auto figure is "still on the weak side, but not as weak as the headline numbers suggest," Cardillo said. The "drop in jobless claims basically is a return to normalcy after the winter months. Weekly jobless claims fell more than expected to 289,000, below the prior week's 320,000. "The employment picture is kind of setting up for some more optimism come summer time," Silva said, citing that winter weather might create pent-up demand for increased spending during the warmer months. Import prices for February rose 0.4 percent, versus a revised decline of 3.1 percent in January. Export prices declined 0.1 percent, less than January's decline of 1.9 percent. "I think the market is looking at the numbers and saying the economy is in good shape," said Scott Clemons, chief investment strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman. "We're in the sixth to seventh year in the bull market. Earnings growth has begun to wear thin, so we'll need a boost besides (earnings). Consumer spending is the key." Dollar General (DG) matched estimates with quarterly profit of $1.17 per share, though revenue was slightly below estimates.The discount retailer also initiated a quarterly dividend of 22 cents per share. However, the discount retailer forecast profit below estimates . The retailer announced on Saturday plans to expand into Oregon, Maine and Rhode Island, taking its presence to 43 states. Shake Shack (SHAK) , which recently went public, reported a fourth-quarter loss and said same-restaurant sales growth would slow this year. Lumber Liquidators (LL) surged more than 10 percent after the company defended its products in a conference call on Thursday. Alibaba (BABA) will invest $200 million in Snapchat, as the mobile messaging company engages in another funding round. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) traded slightly lower after Barclays downgraded the firm to "equal weight" from "overweight," saying it may be hit harder by the slide in the euro than previously thought. "I do think this is a stock pickers' market because there are some parts that do better than others," said Scott Clemons, chief investment strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman. We're going to "end the year higher with lots of volatility along the way." About three shares advanced for every decliner on the New York Stock Exchange, with an exchange volume of nearly 500 million and a composite volume of about 2.8 billion as of 3:40 p.m. Crude oil futures settled down 2.3 percent at $47.05 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold futures settled up $1.30 to $1,151.90 an ounce. The U.S. 10-year Treasury note (US10Y) yield fell to trade near 2.08 percent. The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) (.VIX) , widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, traded near 16. U.S. stocks closed mildly lower on Wednesday as equities failed to recover from Tuesday's selloff, amid continued concern over dollar gains and the timing of a Fed interest rate hike. As of Wednesday's close: The Dow Jones industrial average was within one standard deviation below its 50-day moving average. Since 1981 the index has been in this position 4.38 percent of all trading days, according to quantitative analytics tool Kensho. The probability of the index moving lower is 43.3 percent and the probability of it moving higher in the days following is 56.7 percent. The S&P 500 was within one standard deviation below its 50-day moving average. Since 1980 the index has been in this position 4.00 percent of all trading days, according to Kensho. The probability of the index moving higher in the days following is 58.5 percent and the probability of it moving lower is 41.5 percent. The Nasdaq composite was within half a standard deviation above its 50-day moving average. Since 1980 the index has been in this position 4.69 percent of all trading days, according to Kensho. The probability of the index moving lower is 43.2 percent and the probability of it moving higher is 56.8 percent. Reuters and CNBC.com contributed to this report. More From CNBC.com: These oil driller stocks could be winners: Analyst Tax planning as your golden years approach Why I'm not interested in US stocks: Gartman
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CNBC's Scott Cohn reports Lumber Liquidators CEO Tom Sullivan goes on the offense today following the withering "60 Minutes" report about the safety of its hardwood flooring.
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VATICAN CITY Pope Francis marks his second anniversary Friday riding a wave of popularity that has reinvigorated the Catholic Church in ways not seen since the days of St. John Paul II. He's also entering a challenging third year, facing dissent from within on everything from financial reform to family issues. Is the honeymoon over? According to the Pew Research Center, not by a long shot, at least as far as ordinary faithful are concerned: Nine out of 10 U.S. Catholics have a favorable view of Francis, including six in 10 who have a "very favorable" view. Those are rankings not seen since John Paul's rock star days. And they trump the favorability ratings for Pope Benedict XVI even among more orthodox, church-going Catholics. "Two years after his election, Francis has made the face of the papacy irreversible," Italian Vatican analyst Marco Politi wrote recently. "Returning to a doctrinaire, absolute monarch, icon-pope will never be possible, without a dramatic loss in contact with contemporary society, believers and nonbelievers alike." Yet opposition abounds, most vocally among commentators but also some cardinals and bishops: Traditionalist Catholics have been joined by more mainstream conservatives who cringe at his mercy-over-morals priorities and apparent willingness to entertain pastoral approaches that might not follow Rome's rulebook. And two years on, he's still an impossible-to-label pontiff, a social justice-minded Jesuit who firmly upholds church doctrine on abortion, but willingly counsels transgender couples. He calls himself a faithful son of the church but dismisses theologians as obstacles to evangelization. Here are five things to look for in Francis' third year, one that will take him to Ecuador, Paraguay and Bolivia in July, the United States in September, and a planned visit to the Central African Republic and Uganda at the end of the year. ___ VATICAN REFORM Francis was elected on a mandate to bring order and financial transparency to the Vatican administration after years of mismanagement and scandal. Tangible results have been achieved and more are on the horizon. Francis gave Australian Cardinal George Pell, head of the new Secretariat for the Economy, broad powers to exercise "economic control and vigilance" over all Vatican departments, which have long operated as individual fiefdoms in both operations and budget. Pell took that mandate and ran with it, reportedly seeking to bring management of some Vatican assets including its vast real estate holdings under his belt. That dismayed the Vatican old guard and legal office, which expressed concern about checks and balances. By all indications, Francis has clipped his wings somewhat: The statutes of the Secretariat which Francis approved last month make clear that it oversees, but does not manage, Vatican assets. As with any reform plan, there has been opposition from prelates resisting full disclosure and fearful of losing power. Francis didn't engender much good will (or holiday cheer) with his Christmas dressing down of the Vatican Curia, when he ticked off 15 ailments they suffered, including "spiritual Alzheimer's." While no heads are expected to roll, there will be some reshuffling once Francis' first administrative reforms take shape, with the creation of two new congregations one for laity, another for justice and charity that will absorb a half-dozen smaller pontifical councils. ___ ENVIRONMENT Perhaps no unpublished papal document in recent history has generated more controversy, anticipation and anxiety than Francis' upcoming encyclical on the environment. The first Latin American pope has said global warming is "mostly" man-made, and that he hopes his document will encourage climate change negotiators meeting in Paris later this year to take "courageous" decisions. That has thrilled environmentalists but alarmed religious conservatives, some of whom are global warming deniers and are cringing at the idea that the pope is taking a theological approach to climate change. The Vatican official who helped draft the encyclical, Cardinal Peter Turkson, recently offered what was widely seen as a preview of the encyclical in a speech in Ireland. Turkson acknowledged disagreement over the causes of global warming but said "what is not contested is that our planet is getting warmer" and that Christians have a duty rooted in "ancient biblical teaching" to address the problem. The document is expected in June or July. ___ SEX ABUSE Francis' much-discussed sex abuse advisory commission got off to a slow start and still doesn't have any statutes to guide its work. But commission members are drafting proposals to protect children from predator priests, educate church personnel about the problem, and hold accountable bishops who cover up for pedophiles. On that last point, Francis has something of a hot potato on his hands: In January, he appointed Bishop Juan Barros Madrid to take over the diocese of Osorno, Chile. In the ensuing weeks, something unprecedented happened: Some 1,300 Osorno faithful, 51 national lawmakers and many of the 35 priests from the diocese urged Francis to rescind the appointment, accusing Barros of having covered up for Chile's most notorious pedophile, the Rev. Fernando Karadima. Barros has not responded to the accusations but the issue is likely to come to a head before his planned installation March 21. Francis also has to decide whether to sanction Kansas City Bishop Robert Finn, who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of failing to report a priest who had child pornography on his computer. Francis sent a Vatican investigator to the diocese, but has taken no public action. ___ THE OPPOSITION Traditional Catholics attached to the old Latin Mass have been wary of Francis ever since he emerged from the loggia of St. Peter's Basilica March 13, 2013 without the formal red cape his predecessors wore. They have been joined in opposition by conservative prelates intent on preventing any change in church practice regarding whether divorced and civilly remarried Catholics can receive Communion. They have been emboldened by the confusion that reigned during a meeting on family issues that Francis called last year, during which gays, civil unions and a host of hot-button issues were up for debate. Cardinal Raymond Burke, removed by Francis as the Vatican's chief justice, has become their figurehead, saying hypothetically that he would "resist" the pope if he were to try to change church doctrine. Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, head of the Vatican's liturgy office, said the pope deserves not only respect but trust. "Reading certain documents or statements, one might get the impression that he does not respect the doctrine," Sarah told the Catholic online network Aleteia. "Personally, I fully trust him and I encourage all Christians to do the same." A concerted effort to prevent any change on current teaching and practice is expected when Round 2 of the debate gets under way at a synod on the family in October. ___ FOREIGN POLICY Francis' crucial role in helping push along the U.S.-Cuba rapprochement was the clearest sign yet that that the Holy See aims to be a much bigger international player than under Benedict. But there have been some hiccups: Francis irked Ukraine by calling the current conflict a "fratricide," without mentioning Russia's role in it. He caused a minor diplomatic incident with Mexico by warning about the "Mexicanization" of Argentina's drug problem. In both cases, the Secretariat of State intervened to douse the flames. The big question that looms is China, where half of the estimated 8 million to 12 million Catholics worship in underground congregations, and where worship is officially allowed only in state-authorized churches outside the pope's authority. The Vatican's top diplomat, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, recently sounded an optimistic note, telling the magazine of the Franciscan religious order that things were "in a positive phase" with both sides willing to talk and that prospects were "promising." In the Mideast, Francis has sent envoys, money and prayers to Christians besieged by the Islamic State and demanded that Muslim leaders take the lead in condemning violence committed in God's name. His activism has found a fan in a frequent Vatican critic, the Catholic commentator Garry Wills, who said Vatican reform and pastoral ministry were "too narrow an assignment" for Francis. "His real task, for which he is ideally situated, is to prevent the world's descent into religious war," Wills wrote in The Washington Post. ___ Follow Nicole Winfield at wwwt.twitter.com/nwinfield
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By Thomas Emerick The NFL's new league year kicked off with a bang on Tuesday. In an attempt to make sense of all the big moves that took place, we took a look back at the biggest surprises from a long two-day period which was filled with trades, roster cuts and signings. Sam Bradford and Nick Foles swapped teams Sam Bradford wasn't known to have been on the trade block, but out of nowhere on Tuesday, the Rams traded him to the Eagles for Nick Foles (as well as some draft picks). This move shocked many fans who suddenly were left questioning Chip Kelly's master plan. Bradford has missed 23 straight games in a two-year span, but he did put up better stats when he last played. He tossed seven touchdowns, one interception and had 594 yards passing in his last five starts (2013). Foles managed just five touchdowns, five interceptions and had 787 yards in the last five games he was involved in. There's also a distinct difference from playing Brian Schottenheimer's offense versus Chip Kelly's system. Foles was in a position where many could produce. It was hard to see this deal coming. But it makes sense on paper given that Bradford has excelled more in making quick decisions and accuracy in short to intermediate passes. And in the past, he ran an uptempo scheme at Oklahoma and won the Heisman Trophy. For the Rams, it's a shocker that they could trade Bradford along with his $16.9 million cap hit and still obtain a cheap quarterback with starting experience along. This trade came just months after Bradford's future with the Rams and trade value were severely threatened by a knee injury. Frank Gore bails on Eagles for Colts Kelly has ruffled feathers this offseason, but it's hard to pin Gore's change of heart on the Eagles coach. Gore reportedly backed out of the deal, and soon after signed with a team that made sense as a landing spot on so many levels. Colts head coach Chuck Pagano once recruited for the University of Miami and Rob Chudzinski served as Miami's offensive coordinator while Gore was there. In the context of this crazy offseason, it's not entirely shocking. But when the Jets traded Revis to Tampa Bay for a first-rounder two years ago, it seemed like the end of an era and the start of another under John Idzik. Yet Idzik is gone. And Revis Island, once again, will be shutting down opposing receivers while one of the best cornerbacks in the league dons a green and white uniform. Catching passes from Andrew Luck and playing alongside former Miami Hurricanes star Andre Johnson certainly helped Gore make up his mind. This move shows Colts general manager Ryan Grigson is spending ostensibly in a push for a title before Luck's rookie contract runs out. A quiet Day 2 NFL fans went on a news consumption binge on Tuesday, but quickly came down to earth and were lulled to sleep on Wednesday. Tuesday featured a plethora of signings, with a few shocking trades mixed in as well. But Day 2 of free agency featured the Texans snagging veteran wideout Andre Johnson, the Jets trading for Ryan Fitzpatrick and the Bears signing Antrel Rolle. The Dolphins did announce Ndamukong Suh's record-setting deal for non-quarterbacks on Wednesday. Maybe the team waited for a reason, as it was among several agreements that had already been leaked to the public days ahead of the official start to the signing and trading period. Even though there are tampering rules in place to prevent this very thing from happening during the three-day negotiating period, it apparently did not matter. Seahawks trade for Jimmy Graham This move dramatically alters what we should expect from the offensive philosophy of both the Seahawks and Saints. New Orleans' defense has finished bottom-two in the NFL in two of the past three years. And their offense hasn't finished higher than 27th in run-play percentage since 2009, the year they finished ninth en route a victory in Super Bowl XLIV. The Saints re-signed Mark Ingram and acquired Seahawks center Max Unger. He ranked in the top five in Pro Football Focus' run-block grading each of the past three years, and this move likely signals a desire to protect their defense with a heavier dose of ground game and clock management much like the Cowboys in 2014. Meanwhile, Seattle should focus on upgrading the passing game now that Russell Wilson finally has an elite receiving target. And as we saw in the Super Bowl and NFC Championship Game, a team equipped with good cornerbacks could basically shut down Seattle's passing targets across the board. Due to his combination of size, speed, leaping ability and strength at catch point, Graham is a nightmare matchup for any opposing defensive back or linebacker. The reigning NFC Champions will be more dynamic on offense with him on the field. Patrick Willis, Jake Locker and Jason Worilds announced their retirement NFL fans have to be bummed that a linebacker with such incredible range and instincts in Willis is calling it quits. While we have to give him props for retiring on his own terms, it sure would have been great to see him out there blowing up plays for at least another few seasons. Still, it makes Niners GM Trent Baalke's recent linebacker selections in the draft now look more savvy. Jason Worilds and Jake Locker also called it quits. They were two of the more highly sought-after players at their respective positions in free agency. Locker was a former first-round pick. And Worilds, a second-rounder, was coming off a productive season and is only 27 years old. Could these players be more interested in life after football? It certainly seems as if they're not willing to jeopardize their health and put their bodies on the line anymore. No hard feelings: Darrelle Revis returns to New York Many felt Revis might still harbor a bit of ill will toward Jets management, making the Bills a trendy landing spot outside of the star cornerback re-signing with the Patriots. But it's now an afterthought after Revis agreed to return to the team that drafted him in 2007. In the context of this crazy offseason, it's not entirely shocking. But when the Jets traded Revis to Tampa Bay for a first-rounder two years ago, it seemed like the end of an era and the start of another under John Idzik. Yet Idzik is gone. And Revis Island, once again, will be shutting down opposing receivers while one of the best cornerbacks in the league dons a green and white uniform.
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The leader of Tibet's exiled government on Thursday compared China to the regimes of North Korea and apartheid South Africa when it came to Beijing's iron-fisted control over Tibetans. Speaking on a trip to Paris aimed at putting the spotlight back onto the Tibetan cause, Lobsang Sangay told AFP in an interview that the arrival of Xi Jinping as China's president had done nothing to ease the situation in the Himalayan region. The Communist regime is accused of widespread repression of Tibetans' religion, culture and language that has sparked an unprecedented wave of self-immolations, but Beijing categorically denies this, saying it has brought prosperity and better living conditions to an impoverished region. "Inside Tibet, nothing has changed, in fact it has gotten worse," Sangay said, ahead of a meeting with French parliamentarians. He said surveillance cameras had been installed all over major urban centres in Tibetan areas, and that Tibetans had been issued with "identity cards with second-generation high-tech chips." "That means if you show it to any hotel or any check point, they will know exactly where you are from because all your biometrics are in that second-generation ID card. "It's almost like a reminder of North Korea or East Germany or the apartheid regime -- the control over Tibetan people, (their) every movement." - 'Shooters on roof tops' - Sangay, who took over as political leader of the Tibetan cause in 2011 when the Dalai Lama pared back his role, is in Paris until Saturday when he will attend a European rally marking a failed 1959 uprising against China. That uprising forced the Dalai Lama to flee, and the Tibetan spiritual leader has been living in exile in India ever since. Both the Dalai Lama and Sangay advocate greater autonomy for the Tibetan region within China, but Beijing accuses them of being separatists and wanting flat-out independence. As such, Beijing is resisting calls to resume talks with Tibetan officials that broke down in 2010 on securing political and cultural freedoms for Tibetans, and Sangay said Thursday there was still no progress on that front. In the meantime, more than 130 ethnic Tibetans have set themselves on fire since 2009 in protest at Beijing's rule. Most of them have died. Sangay said that on certain sensitive dates -- such as the March 10 anniversary of the start of the 1959 uprising -- "you will see shooters on roof tops (of the Tibetan capital Lhasa) looking at Tibetans with their binoculars and guns." "If you go to any of the major monasteries, just outside the gates there is a military camp." The Tibetan cause, once hugely popular worldwide thanks to the celebrity status of Nobel Peace Prize winner the Dalai Lama, has lost its momentum in recent years as countries grow increasingly reluctant to go against economic powerhouse China. Sangay acknowledged this, but said Western countries did not need to make a choice between doing business with China and supporting greater Tibetan autonomy. He pointed out that business between the United States and China appeared to go on as usual despite US President Barack Obama's public encounter last month with the Dalai Lama in Washington, which was slammed by Beijing. "Money is important, so you must have business engagement with China. At the same time, you should stand up for your moral values," he said. "Otherwise you come to France... the country of liberty, and you find that the very word French people take pride in is not supported when it's actually needed." Sangay also reiterated his belief that the non-violent model of resistance in Tibet was preferable. "It's a bit frightening. Marginalised groups around the world will notice that the headlines, the front page news is all about conflicts, and violence and beheadings and burning of people. That's what gets more attention and the discourse at the international level is about how many arms... and how many tanks to send," he said. "So people might think that's the option to pursue. But we believe that's the wrong option. Non-violence in the long-run is beneficial for all sides, hence Tibet as a non-violent model is very important."
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U.S. consumers unexpectedly spent less at retailers last month despite a steep drop in gasoline prices across America, marking the first time since 2012 that sales have dropped for three consecutive months. Retail sales is a key economic indicator, since consumer spending accounts for nearly two-thirds of U.S. economic activity. Retail sales dropped 0.6 percent in February after declining 0.8 percent in January, the Commerce Department said Thursday . Analysts had expected retail sales to rise 0.3 percent last month, according to analysts polled by Thomson Reuters. Sales also fell 0.3 percent in December. The unexpected drop in sales disappointed some market professionals, as the precipitous drop in gasoline prices over the past few months was expected to boost consumer spending at retailers. "There is no denying that the lack of evidence of a pickup in consumption growth is disappointing given the boost to purchasing power from lower energy prices," Paul Ashworth, chief economist at Capital Economists, said in a research note Thursday. But even though economists have yet to see low gas prices facilitate higher spending at retailers, they do expect to see an acceleration soon, as it seems severe winter weather appears to have hit retail sales for the second year in a row, Ashworth said. While falling crude oil prices serve as a headwind for the global economy in the long term, experts say they are a tailwind for the U.S. economy in the short term as gasoline prices continue to decline. Crude oil prices have lost nearly 60 percent from June to January, sending the average cost of gas in the U.S. to $2.44 per gallon, down $1.04 from a year ago, according to Gasbuddy.com .
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We keep waiting for the bust, the gigantic rollover of oil companies that just plain collapse under their own weight and the $50 price that you get for West Texas Intermediate. It hasn't happened. We keep waiting for the junk bond market that is riddled with $200 billion in oil and gas paper to be crushed by defaults and restructurings. It hasn't been. In fact, the iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bd , the high-yield exchange-traded fund that includes a lot of this suspect paper, is pretty much unchanged for the last three years and has enjoyed a sustained rally since the bottom back when most of the major oil stocks hit lows, rallying from $86 to $91 before falling back to $90 where it is now. Hardly catastrophic. We keep seeing stories that indicate that this quarter represents the peak of production and that it is all downhill from here. Nope. I think the first quarter's going to show extraordinary growth, despite the reduced drilling, with oil from the Permian, the Eagle Ford, the Bakken, the Gulf of Mexico, Mexico itself and Canada, where new pipe has brought tons of crude to market, all vying for precious refinery space because of the export ban for our own crude that the federal government isn't about to abandon. So why hasn't it happened? Why have we only seen Whiting Petroleum put itself up for sale, despite billions of dollars in loans and debt taken down by dozens of now stretched U.S. producers? And is Whiting only giving up, so to speak, because it made the last -- and dumbest -- buy, the purchase of Kodiak, a second rate Bakken producer, for $3.8 billion in stock plus an assumption of $2.2 billion in debt? I think I have the answer: the equity market. Since the collapse of the oil price, 25 companies that are regarded as either troubled or prudent, depending on your view, have come to the market with equity worth in aggregate $8.3 billion to help pay down debt, fund drilling or meet the tests of their revolvers. The record of the deals? Not bad: You are up on nine, some big; you are down on 11, none big; and you are flat on five. Given that oil is pretty much flat during this period, below or trending at $50, frankly, these have been pretty good deals. They could be terrific if we spike a bit, as we did last week when even more of the deal stock went positive. Plus, because of that record, the door isn't shut. There's another billion dollars in the queue, something that could be gobbled up rather quickly even at these oil prices. There are several amazing drivers of the lack of a collapse: First, it hasn't taken all that much equity to satisfy the borrowers, especially when drilling budgets have been ratcheted back. Second, the amount of money these companies are allocating to drilling might have shrunk dramatically, but so has the cost of drilling, namely from roughly $29,000 a day to about $20,000 a day, with the amount of time being cut in some cases to eight days from 25 days. Some of this drill time saving is because of high-grading -- the companies only going after their easiest properties in order to more easily satisfy cash flow -- but some of it is recent breakthroughs in technology that happen at a fortuitous moment for the group. Consequently, not only has the crash not occurred but those on the sidelines waiting -- such as Exxon Mobil , which talked glowingly of the opportunities to swoop in and buy cheap but solid properties, or the myriad private equity funds that stand at the ready -- have largely come up empty handed. Given the fairly strong nature of Whiting's Bakken properties, it is entirely possible that this company will entice multiple bidders simply because of the scarcity of merchandise for sale and the need for an outfit like Statoil , which has eyed Bakken properties and snapped some up before, to increase production given the steady drop in North Sea Crude. So given all the capital sloshing around, given how the break-evens have fallen so almost all of the major shales are producing positive cash flow, if things stay right here, this is the crash that hasn't occurred. I am sure that at a certain point later this year we will see the amount of oil being produced in this country declining at a faster rate, but that sure hasn't happened now. If anything, it's wildly overflowing, insuring that a steady glut is in the cards. In other words, we are at a level where we can't expect many belly-ups, because of the billions of dollars that want in and the lack of need for them, given how the banks and the debtors didn't require nearly as much equity raised as we thought, and the drilling techniques are so good that the old "$80 and below we are broke" theory is just so full of holes that you can drive a truck through them. This set of circumstances is by no means a cause to rejoice: There will be more oil coming to market than expected, with every dollar price increase and more equity raised with every stock price jump. But as for a catastrophe? Keep waiting. It doesn't look like it will happen.
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By Larry Brown When Jake Locker announced his surprising retirement from football on Tuesday, many instantly wondered whether he would pursue a career in professional baseball. Locker was a standout baseball player in high school and was twice drafted by the Angels (once 40th overall), who hold his rights through August. The Angels have said they have no interest in Locker as a player, which is just as well because it appears Locker is not interested in playing baseball anyway. Locker's father, Scott, spoke with The Seattle Times' Bob Condotta about his son's future . Scott says his son has simple plans for the time being: To spend time with his family and continue remodeling his home. Baseball does not appear to be in Jake's plans. "I don't think that's something he will entertain, because that would mean even more time away from his family,'' Scott Locker told Condotta. In addition to spending time with his family and renovating his home, Locker also will spend time with a gym for which he is a co-owner. Though Jake said his heart was not in football , leading him to retire, his dad is not ruling out a comeback at some point. "That is probably not something that he would even know how to answer now. He's just basing things off the way he's felt for the last little while and how he feels now and how he's wanting to move forward for the time being.'' Who knows? Maybe Jake will be like Urban Meyer, who took time off to be with his family and returned to football in time. I certainly wouldn't count it out.
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Washington may be one step closer to regaining its waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act. The state Senate passed a measure Wednesday that would require student scores on statewide standardized tests to play a role in teacher and principal evaluations. The legislation, Senate Bill 5748, would let local school districts and their teacher unions negotiate how the standardized test scores are used in evaluations and how much weight they would be given. The measure passed the Senate on a 26-23 vote. Last year, Washington became the first state in the nation to lose its exemption from the No Child Left Behind Act after the Legislature failed to approve a similar measure. Under current state law, districts in Washington must consider student growth in evaluating the performance of teachers and principals, but the districts can draw that growth data from local or district-based tests. The U.S. Department of Education said districts must use statewide standardized testing data when it is available. Without the federal waiver, school districts throughout the state lost control this year over about $40 million in federal Title I funds, which are designed to help low-income students. Schools had to redirect the money toward outside tutoring efforts, and districts also had to send parents letters telling them many of their schools were failing to meet federal standards. Sen. Steve Litzow, R-Mercer Island, said he is confident that Washington would regain its No Child Left Behind waiver if the full Legislature approves Senate Bill 5748 and it is signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee. He and other supporters of the measure said they have seen local school districts suffer since they were forced to set aside 20 percent of their Title I money due to loss of the state's waiver. "The loss of flexibility from this waiver money had a direct impact on our ability to help low-income students in the state of Washington," said Sen. Mark Mullet, D-Issaquah. The measure was criticized by many in the Senate, however, who said it would evaluate teachers based on standardized test scores that don't take into the account the challenges students and teachers face each day. The Washington Education Association, the state teachers union, opposes the proposal. Senate Minority Leader Sharon Nelson, D-Maury Island, said she doesn't think it's fair to judge teachers using new tests based on the Common Core standards, which school districts are administering for the first time this year. "At least in my district, there is much hesitation about that," Nelson said. The bill would delay the requirement that school districts use standardized testing data in evaluations until the 2017-18 school year. The measure now heads to the state House for consideration. Passed in 2002, No Child Left Behind set academic achievement standards that schools throughout the country have been unable to meet, including that 100 percent of students pass state-administered math and reading tests by 2014.
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Billionaire oilman Harold Hamm said Thursday that U.S. refineries can't handle all the oil that's being produced domestically. "Basically, there's 18 million barrels-a-day refinery space and $12 million barrels a day has been set-up for heavy sour crude," which contains a higher percentage of sulfur impurities than U.S.-produced light sweet crude, the founder and chief of Continental Resources (CLR) said in a CNBC " Squawk Box " interview. "That's doesn't do us any good. We're producing light sweet crude, the best in the world, and we need to get to the refineries in the world that can handle it." Hamm, a long-time opponent of the decades-old ban on U.S. crude exports, said there are refiners in South Korea, as well as U.S.-friendly countries in Europe and South America, that would be glad to process American crude, but the oil export ban prohibits that. "Americans consumers ... are paying for that. Right now, the refineries are getting Brent prices, world prices" for their product, he said. "We're out here trying to compete at a discounted price. West Texas Intermediate is right now about $9.50 a barrel less than Brent prices. So we're not on a level playing field at all." Oil prices, nearly cut in half over the past six months, were helped early Thursday by a slightly weaker dollar, making greenback-traded commodities such as crude more attractive to holders of other currencies. But the dollar index, a measure against a basket of currencies, has increased nearly 25 percent in the past year. Hamm said he's hopeful the Obama administration will lift the 40-year-old oil export ban, pointing to a meeting Oklahoma's Republican governor, Mary Fallin, had at the White House last month. She said at the time that President Barack Obama was willing to talk about whether to allow U.S. companies to export crude.
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Cinmeon Bowers had a rough game on Wednesday night. The 6-7 forward was 0-for-6 from the floor before head coach Pearl decided to delegate him to the bench during two stretches in the second half of the Tigers' SEC Tournament game against Mississippi State. Auburn was able to surge back into contention with Bowers on the bench, and went on to pull off a 74-68 win. MORE: Players stop game to defend cheerleader | Murray State coach pleads his case You'd think Bowers, a junior, may have felt slighted by the benching. Instead, he actually decided to thank Pearl for his decision to sit him by giving him a big kiss on the cheek after the game. "Cim will tell you he was as happy sitting on the bench watching Devin play as he was being out there," Pearl said after the game . "He didn't have it in the second half tonight. The good thing is he's fresh for tomorrow. But that's what a team is all about. He's not mad at me because I didn't play him late because he was like, hey, you should have played Devin (Waddell). Devin was playing well."
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It's available starting March 16. Disgraced foodperson Paula Deen is taking a chapter out of Kim Kardashian's book, and is releasing an animated mobile phone game. In the press release , Deen boldly proclaims that she is a "gamer at heart," so that's why she wanted to create Paula Deen's Recipe Quest. The free mobile game will apparently teach users "how to make Paula's favorite dishes" with a series of puzzles. The app takes players through Deen's career trajectory: They start as an "amateur chef in a home kitchen," work their way up to cooking in Paula's restaurant The Lady & Sons, and eventually own their very own "virtual restaurant." However, it doesn't look like the game includes a stop at Deen's fall from grace and firing from Food Network due to her use of racist language. Paula Deen's Recipe Quest includes 40 levels of puzzles where "players will mix and match ingredients to Paula's popular Southern dishes and collect downloadable recipe cards" as well as "real prizes" like a discount on a subscription to Deen's digital network . New puzzles will be added to the app each week. Hopefully this means that unlike the Kim Kardashian game, players will not end up forking over plenty of real dollars for in-game extras. Who knows, maybe Deen will discuss gaming strategies on her new upcoming podcast series . Paula Deen's Recipe Quest is available for iOS and Android starting March 16. Check out the kooky and over-the-top ad for the game below:
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A 2-year-old Alabama boy died after he drank his babysitter's methadone-laced grape soda, police said. Bessemer Police charged 31-year-old Cassie Townsend with chemical endangerment exposure to a child resulting in death after little Demonie Hendon died Saturday, WBRC reported. Townsend was watching Demonie Friday night when she noticed her soda bottle filled with methadone, a medication used to reduce heroin and narcotic addiction symptoms, wasn't where she left it, she told police. She found a sick-looking Demonie, and suspected the tot drank from the bottle, she said. The babysitter took the boy to a Birmingham hospital Friday night, but took him home shortly after, AL.com reported . She rushed him back to a children's hospital when he became unresponsive later, police said. Townsend was initially charged with child endangerment, but her charged were updated when Demonie died in the hospital Saturday. He would have turned three on Saturday. Police are waiting on toxicology test results to confirm that the grape soda had the drug in it. That report could take several weeks. Methadone is typically dispensed at a clinic, and is meant to be swallowed on-site, not taken away from the facility, police said.
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Runway, backstage, and front-row footage from the Paris show. Watch the Louis Vuitton Fall 2015 Ready-to-Wear fashion show from Style.com. Want more? Visit Style.com for more runway shows, fashion trends, shopping guides, and news about models and designers.
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The ripple effect of crude's crash is reaching ranches in Brazil as oil-producing countries from Russia to Venezuela buy less meat. Brazilian beef shipments abroad fell 31 percent in the first two months of the year, according to government data compiled by Bloomberg. Sales to Russia, Venezuela and Iran, which accounted for almost 50 percent of Brazilian beef exports a year ago, now represent one-fifth after posting the biggest decline. That's making Brazilian meatpackers Minerva SA and Marfrig Global Foods SA the worst performers among global peers. Brazil's best beef customers are buying less and demanding discounts after crude prices slumped the most since 2008 and emerging-market currencies weakened, Bradesco BBI SA said. Producers in Brazil don't have the health clearance to ship fresh meat to the U.S., Japan and South Korea, making them dependent on oil-producing countries. For Marfrig and Minerva, the deterioration in the overseas market follows a domestic decline last year in line with a slowdown in the economy. "It's very bad news for the industry," Gabriel Vaz de Lima, a Bradesco analyst who has the equivalent of hold recommendations on the two stocks, said by telephone from Sao Paulo. "Exports are no longer saving the day." Share Drop Minerva and Marfrig, which account for about 40 percent of Brazil's beef exports, lost 23 percent and 31 percent, respectively, this year. That's the worst performances among 15 global peers tracked by Bloomberg. Sao Paulo-based JBS SA rallied 17 percent. JBS, the world's biggest meat exporter, is less exposed to oil-driven economies because it gets most of its revenue from U.S. operations that have approval to ship to prime beef markets like Japan and South Korea. On Wednesday, JBS reported a 26 percent increase in fourth-quarter sales, beating the average estimate of analysts tracked by Bloomberg. Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to ban farm imports from the U.S. and Australia and approve 87 Brazilian meat plants for export last year spurred anticipation that Brazil would increase exports there. Instead, Brazilian shipments to Russia fell 56 percent to the lowest since 2005. A 50 percent plunge in oil prices and sanctions over the conflict in Ukraine have sparked Russia's worst currency crisis since a 1998 default and pushed the economy into recession. The ruble is the world's second-worst performing currency in the past year with a 34 percent decline 61.6656 per dollar. Declining Inventories "It's a moment for adjustment," Mauricio Nogueira, a beef analyst at Agroconsult, said by phone from Florianopolis, Brazil. "The market is adapting to an economy with lower oil prices" While Russia is expected to gradually resume purchases as inventories decline, sales probably won't return to last year's levels, Minerva Chief Executive Officer Fernando Galletti Queiroz said. "They are buying cheaper cuts now," Queiroz said in a conference call with reporters last week. Minerva is seeking to divert some beef that would have gone to Russia, its main purchaser, to countries including Chile and Egypt. Marfrig also sees Russian demand improving in coming months as the country rebuilds inventories. "Russia demand for beef still exists," Chief Executive Officer Martin Secco Arias told investors March 9 in London. Prospects are gloomier for Venezuela, where inflation reached 69 percent in December and the economy is set to contract 7 percent this year, Secco said. "It's more a question mark than Russia," he said. "The market has stopped." To contact the reporter on this story: Gerson Freitas Jr. in São Paulo at [email protected] To contact the editors responsible for this story: James Attwood at [email protected]; Jessica Brice at [email protected] Jessica Brice
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Two weeks after the Federal Communications Commission adopted controversial new net neutrality rules for Internet lines, the agency finally released the text to the public Thursday morning. The release promptly caused the FCC's famously delicate website to crash, as advocates, lawyers and opponents rushed to download the 400-pages of rules. It was soon back up, however, just in time for Republican FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai to post new summaries explaining why he hates the new rules and why they will be thrown out in an inevitable legal challenge.
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Lets face it, Jerian Grant is a stud. Totally deserving to be All-ACC. Heck, Irish fans have an argument he should be conference player of the year. Don't believe us... watch the video.
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In an ideal world, all of your bills would be paid on time, you'd never have to take out loans and money would always be available when you need it. Some people reach that economic utopia. But for most, juggling financial needs and obligations bills, loans, retirement, family and so on and still having a little fun can be a difficult balancing act. Almost everyone carries a credit card balance at one point or another, or has missed an occasional bill payment. But how can you tell if you're past that stage and wandering onto financial thin ice? The situation is different for everyone, but here are some circumstances that should set off alarm bells. The 4 Danger Signs Any of these four situations mean it's time to examine your finances and see what you need to do to get back in control. Don't wait until the problems stack up to get moving. 1. You have no emergency savings. If you have little to no money stashed away for a rainy day, your personal finance game could use some improvement. Having no financial cushion for sudden surprises, like medical emergencies or automobile accidents, may force you to take out a loan to cover your financial obligations, adding interest and fees to an expense you already can't afford. You're not alone: Studies from financial site Bankrate show that 24% of Americans have more credit card debt than emergency savings, while 28% of Americans have no savings at all. Here's a tip: Have at least six months' worth of living expenses socked away in the event you lose your job or have an unexpected expense in the future. For more, see Building An Emergency Fund . 2. You took out a payday loan. If you don't have enough money to pay your bills coming up, what should you do? If you said "take out a payday loan," you're setting yourself up for a financial nightmare. Payday loans are predatory by design. Lasting a very short time and backed by your paycheck, many people think the quick cash is their only option. But if you annualize the interest and fees that come with a payday loan, you'll have an annual interest rate ranging from nearly 400% to more than 500%. Personal loans from banks and even credit cards are a much better option when you need extra cash, since their interest rates at worst rarely exceed 30%. On the bright side, if you ever default on a payday loan, it will likely have a relatively minimal effect on your credit score. That, however, doesn't make one of these loans a good choice. For more on how these loans work, see Beware Of Payday Loans . 3. You're only making the minimum monthly payments on your debts. The minimum monthly payments on credit cards and loans aren't designed to help you quickly pay off your debts. Rather, lenders keep them low in hopes that your balance will last longer and accumulate more interest for them. Let's do a little math: Say you have $1,000 on a credit card with an 18% annual interest rate, and your minimum payment each month is the interest plus 1% of your balance (which would mean $25 for the first payment). If you only make the minimum monthly payments it will take you 113 months (almost 10 years!) to pay off that $1,000 debt. By the time you're done, you'll have paid just over $923 in interest, making the total cost almost double the original debt. If you can't pay off your balance in full each month, at least put more than just the minimum monthly payment towards it. And whatever you do, make sure you don't outright miss a payment. To learn about the debt snowball, debt avalanche and other ways to reduce credit card debt, see Alternatives to Balance Transfers . 4. You stopped saving for retirement. There will come a time when you will be ready to stop working and, one hopes, enjoy yourself on the savings you've accumulated over the years, plus Social Security and other retirement plans, if any. Or it could come sooner due to injury, illness or no one in your field being willing to hire someone your age. Most people call that time retirement. You won't be able to take advantage of that time in your life if you haven't been able to save at least some of your income in a 401(k), IRA or other nest egg. Once you've met your present-day obligations, contribute as much as you can toward your retirement savings. What you save now will be waiting for you to enjoy in the future plus interest. For more, check out Build Your Own Retirement Plan . The Bottom Line These are only some signs you need to work on your personal finances. The most global one is feeling uncomfortable about the future and whether your finances leave you up to handling it. Don't wait until anxiety starts eating away at your mental and physical well-being or putting a strain on the relationships in your life. Or until you start getting calls from debt collectors or have trouble getting your next car loan. If you've never done a formal budget before, that's one way to start. For details, see our tutorial Budgeting Basics. You might also think about whether it's time to see a debt counselor. To learn more, read How To Find A Credit Counselor or visit the website of the National Foundation For Credit Counseling. The sooner you start taking control, the sooner you'll be on your way to a better financial future. Preferably, long before it's time to retire!
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Five people confirmed dead and 25 others missing after blaze causes centre's collapse in Kazan. Five people have been confirmed dead and 25 others are missing and presumed dead after a shopping centre in the Russian city of Kazan collapsed in a fire, emergency officials have said. About 40 people were injured after the blaze engulfed Admiral centre in the city of Kazan on Wednesday. Officials said on Thursday that the toll of missing is based on reports from relatives and workers in the shopping centre. Regional emergency services head Igor Panshin was quoted by the Tass news agency as saying "the hope of finding survivors under the shopping center debris has been abandoned." The cause of the fire has not been confirmed. But Al Jazeera's Rob Matheson cited witnesses as saying that the fire began in a cafe. He also noted that the blaze engulfed "4,000 square metres of the shopping centre - an area almost as big as a soccer pitch".
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Popular to-do list app Wunderlist is today launching redesigned apps for the iPhone, Android, and Mac. The new apps feature a cleaner interface, new buttons to quickly add tasks or lists, and support for folders, which the company says was one of its most requested features. The iPhone version of the app also gains a "Quick Add" function, which will automatically add due dates and reminders to tasks as they are entered using natural language processing. Wunderlist for Android, meanwhile, has been redesigned to work better with Google's Material design directives for Android 5.0 Lollipop and beyond. These initial updates are the first of many that the company has planned for this year. Last month, CEO Christian Reber told The Verge that Wunderlist's goal this year is to " make the product smarter ", essentially taking it from a simple to-do list app to more of a virtual assistant. The new Quick Add feature is the first attempt at making a smarter Wunderlist, though Reber says that future updates are going to take that idea even further. It's likely that the forthcoming third-party app integrations announced last month will also contribute to making a smarter Wunderlist. Wunderlist for Android Wunderlist is far from alone in the crowded to-do app space: a quick search in any mobile app store will bring up literally hundreds of options for users to choose from. That's likely a large part of the reason Wunderlist is attempting to move beyond a simple to-do list and into something more integrated with your digital life. The updates for iPhone, Android, and Mac will be available in their respective app stores today. Wunderlist says that all of its apps will support folders starting today, and the Quick Add functionality will be coming to other platforms in the near future.
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Fast casual is not the hot stuff it once was. It used to be the big growth category for restaurants. Led by Chipotle (CMG) 's hugely successful 2006 IPO, the category quickly exploded with competitors like Fiesta Restaurant (FRGI) , which went public in 2012, and Zoe's Restaurant (ZOES) , which debuted in the middle of last year. Burger joints Habit Restaurants (HABT) and Shake Shack (SHAK) joined the game at the end of last year and in February of this year, respectively. But while many are still posting respectable earnings, the guidance is getting more conservative. Specifically, the same-store sales growth isn't as strong as it once was. Just look at the same-store sales guidance for three of these companies, all of which reported this week: Zoe's Kitchen 2014: 6.7% 2015 guidance: 4%-6% Shake Shack 2014: 4.1% 2015 guidance: low single digits Habit Restaurants 2014: 10.7% 2015 guidance: 2.5%-3.5% By any definition, that is decelerating same-store sales growth. This category in general still has the enthusiastic backing of most analysts, but investors have already begun weeding out many of these companies. Potbelly (PBPB) , which went public at the end of 2013, El Pollo Loco (LOCO) , which went public in the middle of last year, and Noodles & Co (NDLS) , which went public in 2013, are all well below their IPO prices.
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finance
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That little voice in the back of your mind that says don't trust them , don't walk down that alley , don't go to that party tonight , and think twice before investing stock , isn't just a passing subconscious. We thrive in a culture that believes rationality and prevailing scientifically proven logic rules over the knee jerk reaction to pull out of the parking lot or investigate a partner's alibi. There are just certain feelings humans obligatorily follow without concrete reasoning. A 2011 study published in the journal Psychological Science revealed how the body is able to speak intuitively to the mind by dealing out a card game. Researchers designed a game based on no obvious strategy but forced participants to rely upon their hunches. Each participant was hooked up to a heart monitor and a finger sensor to measure sweat secretion. Most players figured out how to improve and eventually win the game, and researchers realized the winners were those who listened to their heart rate. It would speed up before they made a certain choice, but people mistook the subtle bodily changes for intuition. "We often talk about intuition coming from the body following our gut instincts and trusting our hearts," the study's coauthor Barnaby D. Dunn, of the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, UK, said in a press release. "What happens in our bodies really does appear to influence what goes in our minds. We should be careful about following these gut instincts, however, as sometimes they help and sometimes they hinder our decision making." Instincts vs. Intuition "Instincts" derives from the word "instinctus" or "impulse," indicating it's the body's biological tendency to make one choice over another. It is the innate inclination toward a particular behavior that typically relies on a pattern of behavior in response to certain stimuli. The key to understanding our brains is by remembering humans are animals, which are born with a certain toolbox full of strategies and social impetuses to help us survive. It is instinctually engraved in us to recognize when to run from a perceived danger, known as the "flight or fight" response secreted into our blood systems by adrenal glands. Babies are born knowing how to feed from their mothers, while mothers know when there is something amiss with their offspring. It is the proverbial sixth sense we have shadowed behind the five testable ones: see, taste, touch, smell, and hear. On the flipside, the word intuition is based off of the word "intuition" or "consideration," formed by a collection of beliefs, experiences, and memories. The intuitive system is more hardwired into the human species than commonly understood. It is the automatic, mindless thought process that doesn't require analysis or deep thinking. Science relies on heuristic techniques for problem solving, learning, or discovery that engages in a practical approach to action that gut reactions can't evidentially rival. Unfortunately, gut feelings can also be silenced. When humans are forced or denied certain feelings during their prime stages of mental, physical, and above all emotional growth, guts can be faulty. A childhood hijacked by abusive or neglectful parents or guardians can create excessive self-doubt, irrational fear, or a clouded thought process, making it difficult to filter traumatic past experiences from actual gut intuition. Overwhelming stimuli can also make it difficult for a person to see the decision in front of them with clarity. Women, on the other hand, may have a stronger ability to make a successful intuitive decision because of their exceptional skills in reading other humans. Female ancestors needed to evaluate a situation quickly in order to tune in to their infant and their environment for protection and survival. Their brains were trained with peak awareness because they were protecting a heart outside of their own bodies. Female brains therefore evolved to have a larger composition and ability to organize chunks of environmental information at a time, giving them an edge to read people. So ladies, trust your gut.
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health
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What is a fair price for a bottle of water? Question two: do only suckers shop at airports? The questions are intertwined, because there now is a loud - and ugly - lawsuit between the upscale retailer Kitson and the Hudson Group, an operator of some 700 stores around the U.S. including its Hudson News, the largest newsstand brand at airports. Ground zero for this slugfest is Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), where Hudson Group operates two stores under the Kitson name. The relationship blew up when Kitson took its Smartwater - typically priced around Los Angeles at $2.55 for a liter, according to Kitson - to Hudson and asked to see it on the shelves of its airport stores. Hudson declined. A brawl ensued, with Kitson alleging that Hudson just wants to rip off parched travelers with other more expensive water. Understand that the trigger for this fight are TSA rules that effectively prohibit carrying a full bottle of water through security. But many passengers get thirsty in the low humidity environment of a plane, so it sets up a captive market to come prepared with water, at essentially any price. There is a way to beat this system, told to Mainstreet by a frequent - and frugal - flyer. Read to the bottom to find out how cheapskates stay hydrated without breaking their budget. First, back to the Kitson - Hudson slugfest: Hudson naturally has a different take on the situation. Attorney Brian Timmons said, "Kitson has no real history of selling water in its stores. Kitson is known for selling pricey items in its high end boutiques. So anyone who thinks that Kitson is really motivated here by an altruistic concern over the price of water at LAX has either never shopped at a Kitson store or is really naïve." Timmons's claim - Kitson simply wants to break the deal with Hudson that lets Hudson operate the LAX stores with a license to use the Kitson name. Kitson spokesperson Brad Chase snorted at Hudson's claims, and he tossed out the zinger that at LAX a contract stipulates that merchandise cannot be marked more than 18% over typical street value and, by Kitson's math, Hudson is marking up water 100%, usually charging around $5 for a liter. Timmons disputed that, too, saying that at some LAX locations, Hudson charges as little as $2.69 for a bottle of water. That fight will have its day in court, but for now it has shined a glaring light at a tough question: do only suckers shop at airport stores? Note: some items are sold at the marked price such as newspapers and magazines. There is no reason not to buy them at LAX, EWR, wherever. There also is the matter of food, and if you have a long layover - or simply a long flight ahead of you - eat in the airport. It will cost more than you'd pay downtown, but it won't cost more than the airline will charge for inflight meals. Of course, almost always, airport food tastes better . As for the rest - everything from aspirin to a bag of nuts and maybe even a bottle of water - you have to know you are overpaying. And if you do and you buy it, don't whine. But still -- despite knowing the markups - we buy at airports. There may even be good reasons. Louis Altman, CEO of satellite phone company GlobaFone, related that he recently got off a plane at Heathrow, to pick up a flight to India. He realized he had left his Bose noise cancelling headphones on the London flight and, said Altman, "I am addicted to them." When they couldn't be found he marched into an airport shop and plunked down $40 more than they should have been but, said Altman, with a long flight looming it was money well spent on a new pair. Marketing strategist Rachel Weingarten even suggested that sometimes the smart thing just is to embrace the absurdity of airport prices. She said: "when stuck at the airport in Ireland some years ago I overspent considerably on a flat cap. Everyone compliments me when I wear that particular chapeau. Sure it cost a small fortune, but it allowed me to be free with money and silly and just enjoy an otherwise exceedingly unpleasant moment." So there is that: for some people airport shopping relieves stress and who can be against that? For others, it solves emergencies, and that too can't be argued with. Now you want to know how to beat the system when it comes to overpriced water and for that thank travel blogger Amber Hoffman who files at WithHusbandInTow. Her advice: bring an empty water bottle through TSA. Pack it in a carryon bag. Once you clear TSA, find a water fountain. Around the U.S., especially, public drinking water is safe and often tasty. Fill your bottle. Total cost: zero. As for why she does this, Hoffman explained: "The prices charged by airport retail outlets are outrageous. More than that, though, anytime we can prevent a plastic bottle from being purchased and then discarded should be encouraged." If you are embarrassed about being cheap, smugly play the environmental card, and you just won. And you saved $5. Written by Robert McGarvey for MainStreet
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finance
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General Motors Co (GM.N) said on Thursday it plans to cut its powertrain warranty on Chevrolet and GMC vehicles for the 2016 model year because the offer was not a strong enough selling point. The five-year, 100,000-mile powertrain coverage, in place for nearly a decade, will be reduced to five years and 60,000 miles for the 2016 models, GM said. "We talked to our customers and learned that free scheduled maintenance and warranty coverage do not rank high as a reason to purchase a vehicle among buyers of non-luxury brands," GM said in a statement. "We will reinvest the savings we will realize into other retail programs that our customers have told us they value more than these." A GM spokesman said the change will not result in a material financial impact. Under a powertrain warranty, a carmaker will make repairs to the engine and transmission at no cost to the consumer. The GM brands will continue to offer courtesy transportation and roadside assistance during the coverage period, the company said. The Detroit automaker said it also will scale back its offer of two years of free maintenance, including oil changes and tire rotations, on most new Chevy, GMC and Buick vehicles. The brands will reduce the number of free service visits to two, from four, starting with 2016 models. The change was initially reported by Automotive News.
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finance
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Intel slashed its revenue forecast for the first quarter, citing lower-than-expected demand for business PCs and lower inventory levels across the PC supply chain. The chipmaker's shares fell 4 percent in premarket trading. Intel said it expects first-quarter revenue of $12.8 billion, plus or minus $300 million. It had earlier forecast$13.7 billion, plus or minus $500 million.
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finance
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The tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, the lowest-ranked team in international football, enjoyed a dream debut in the World Cup qualifiers Thursday by recording a shock 1-0 away victory over Sri Lanka. Tshering Dorji scored the only goal in the 81st minute at Colombo's Sugathadasa stadium, stunning the vast majority of the 3,500-strong crowd who had been expecting the hosts to swat aside the visitors. The winner came as Bhutan launched a counter attack after a sustained period of Sri Lankan pressure, with the skipper Karma Shedrup Tshering passing to Dorji who slotted home calmly from inside the penalty box. Ahead of the match, Sri Lanka were ranked 174 in FIFA's world rankings while Bhutan had the dubious honour of propping up the 209 league of nations table after only ever winning three matches in their history. But Bhutan, who normally play against a backdrop of snowy Himalayan peaks, reaped the benefits of acclimatising in the build-up at a training camp in Thailand and coped well with the humid conditions. "We tried hard to acclimatise to the conditions here. We didn't allow humidity to become a problem," a delighted Bhutan coach Chokey Nima said after what was the country's first ever appearance in the World Cup. "We will celebrate today, but we are also preparing for the next challenge." The two teams meet again when Sri Lanka travel to Bhutan's capital Thimpu for a return match on March 17. Bhutan has been a member of FIFA only since 2000 and a lack of funding had prevented it from taking part in previous World Cup qualification tournaments. Thursday's match was one a group featuring the 12 lowest-ranked teams in the Asian confederation who were kicking off the marathon contest for the right to take part in the 2018 World Cup finals in Russia.
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sports
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Tech wiz and engineer Benjamin Roberts put together an awesome mashup of Earl Sinclair from the TV series 'Dinosaurs' performing Biggie's hit song, and it matches perfectly with his lip movements. Sean Dowling (@SeanDowlingTV) has the video you need to see!
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video
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Even in the digital age, television is a medium that's starved for real-time data. That's why video platforms like Twitch and YouTube are thriving and broadcast television will be doomed TV if executives don't wise up, according to one incredibly popular YouTube personality. Most TV viewer information comes from the Nielsen ratings, a sampling system that has been criticized for not keeping tabs on all the new ways people watch TV. Broadcasters also use Facebook and Twitter to measure reactions and "buzz" about TV shows. The two methods form an imperfect way to understand what audiences are trying to tell content creators. "It's embarrassing the data that television has to work with. What are the Nielsen ratings? What do they even mean? It's obfuscatory," YouTube and Twitch star Sean Plott told Business Insider. Plott has more tools at his disposal because he produces his hit daily gaming show on YouTube and Twitch , the video platform for gamers. He uses these real-time tools to respond to his audience and incorporate their feedback into his show. Here's how it works. Plott broadcasts the Day [9] Daily live on Twitch. On the show, Plott breaks down the complicated strategies behind his favorite games, such as StarCraft II, Hearthstone, and Counterstrike. While viewers come for the strategy, they stick around for Plott's enthusiastic, funny, and improvisational style. The show isn't scripted, but Plott keeps a general outline of the specific games and strategies he wants to talk about in each show. What differentiates his show from television or film, however, is that on Twitch, there is a chat component live at all times. While the show is happening, Plott monitors audience reactions, answers viewer questions, calls out particular members of his community, and adjusts the show to appeal to their interests. "If the discussion [in the chat] is about the game, then that means you are doing something right. If they are complaining and calling things stupid, it's an immediate signal that they aren't that interested in the content," Plott said. Even more important than the chat component is the abundance of data available after a show. Each day, Plott analyzes his performance and reviews data to check in with viewer numbers, engagement, and interaction. "When I broadcast my show on YouTube, I can get a graph of exactly when people are tuning into the video and when people are tuning out," Plott said. Plott then uses that information to make adjustments for the next show. For example, Plott used to start his shows with a relatively long story about his life before he got to the meat of his show discussion of different game strategies. Using analytics, Plott noticed viewers often skipped the intro to get to the game content, and that they usually did this when the intros ran longer than seven minutes. He listened to his viewers and started shortening his intros. "I can say definitively, with data, that if I have a three-minute intro, people will not skip ahead. If I have an introduction that is three to five minutes, it better be a damn good story," Plott explained. And I've learned that I can't do introductions that are seven to 10 minutes long. People will skip. You have none of that [data] in broadcast television. You have none of that data and I don't know why. It's archaic." You can watch episodes of the Day[9] Daily here . NOW WATCH: 14 things you didn't know your iPhone headphones could do
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entertainment
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European champion Spain has fallen out of the top 10 of the FIFA World Rankings for the first time since 2007. Vicente Del Bosque's side is going through a rebuilding process having meekly surrendered the World Cup title in Brazil last year after exiting at the group stage. Since then there have been signs of improvement with Spain winning three of their four Euro 2016 qualifying matches, but it has also suffered high-profile friendly defeats to France and Germany. Italy's improvement by two places subsequently sees Antonio Conte's men return to the top 10 for the first time since June 2014, bumping Spain down to 11th. The rest of the top 10 remain unchanged with world champion Germany leading the way ahead of Argentina and Colombia. Lower down the order, the United States drops a spot to 32. Mexico remains in 21st.
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sports
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Kevin and Grant weld an air cannon in Kevin's garage to break Don Meredith's football passing record of 83 yards. They bring the cannon to the field for a "slug" test. Is it record worthy?
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video
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Australian court rules in favour of Dutchman Giedo van der Garde driving for team in Melbourne Grand Prix. Formula One team Sauber have lost their appeal against a court verdict that ruled in favour of Dutchman Giedo van der Garde's bid to drive for them and come under fire from rival drivers. Sauber appealed after an Australian court upheld a Swiss tribunal's decision ordering the team to refrain from taking action to deprive Van der Garde from racing for them. A test driver for Sauber last year, Van der Garde had accused the Swiss team of reneging on a deal to give him a race seat after they signed Sweden's Marcus Ericsson and Brazilian Felipe Nasr as their two race-day drivers. The Court of Appeals in Melbourne dismissed Sauber's appeal on Thursday and ordered them to pay the driver's legal costs, throwing the team's preparations for Sunday's season-opening Australian Grand Prix into confusion. Van der Garde's legal representative promptly launched a contempt of court action against Sauber late on Thursday, saying the team had made no effort to bring in the driver. Despite that, and for the second time in two days, Van der Garde told reporters outside Melbourne's Supreme Court of Victoria state that he was looking forward to racing with the team. "I'm hopeful of racing, I'm fit, I'm ready," he said outside court. "Of course I want to race, it's my life, I've been racing from nine years old, I'm good at it, so you're passionate about it." Lawyers for Sauber had argued handing Van der Garde a seat so late before the race was an unacceptable safety risk and told the Court of Appeals that there was no car seat in Melbourne that could be adapted to suit the Dutchman. McLaren driver Jenson Button said Sauber were being unfair. "For me it is a shame that they have gone in that direction, because safety is always a concern in motorsport and we shouldn't be throwing it around lightly," the former world champion told Sky Sports. "Personally, him driving the car is not a safety issue. I think it is unfair to use that against Giedo." Sauber was unreachable for comment after losing the appeal and it was unclear whether they were considering steps to accommodate Van der Garde at Albert Park this week.
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sports
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After viewing typical science fair style homemade volcanoes, Kevin and Grant head into the field to build a giant version, complete with the three phases of volcanic explosion.
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video
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Volkswagen (VOW3-DE) Chairman and CEO Martin Winterkorn walked into the German automaker's annual meeting on Thursday and flashed a big smile. Who can blame him? Eight years after taking over the company, with the goal of making it the world's automaker No. 1, Winterkorn has just about accomplished that feat. In fact, while VW is careful not to declare it will pass Toyota (7203.T-JP) to become the world's biggest automaker by volume sales, most in the industry expect it to happen in 2015. "I don't know whether we'll surpass Toyota this year but [we'll] try to also achieve our other targets," Winterkorn told CNBC at the Berlin meeting. Those other targets, most notably growing profit margins, are part of the new push by Winterkorn and his team. Last year, Volkswagen posted an operating profit of 6.3 percent as its two largest brands, VW and Audi, saw margins drop slightly due to hefty investments for expansion. "We want to be the volume number one but also we want to have 8 percent in operating profit," Winterkorn said. China, where Volkswagen has long been the largest automaker, remains its biggest driver of growth. Already boasting annual production of 3.7 million vehicles there, the company plans to expand that figure by about a third, to 5 million vehicles by 2019. "China remains a big growth market also for us," Winterkorn said. Still, Winterkorn stressed that being the leader in China isn't enough. As part of his goal to make the company better balanced geographically, he's eyeing the U.S. where Volkswagen has struggled even as the market enjoys a boom in sales as a potential lever. Despite U.S. auto sales reaching 16.52 million last year, their highest since before the recession, Volkswagen's sales in North America declined 2.4 percent. The problem: VW has been slow to roll out SUVs in a market where big vehicles are red hot. It's working to fix that shortfall with a yet to be named new SUV targeted for American car buyers, coming to showrooms next year. Shortly after that, the company says there will be more SUVs and crossovers coming out its Tennessee plant. "We procrastinated in the U.S., it's true," Winterkorn said. "And we are changing that." The next five years will see a dramatic shift in the types of vehicles sold, what powers them and how connected they are, Winterkorn said. At the center of that change are Apple (AAPL) and Google (GOOGL) . VW is working with both tech firms, amid speculation that they may eventually build vehicles themselves. But Winterkorn played down how much the two companies could disrupt traditional automakers. "I believe that for city traffic with small cars and low speeds [Apple and Google] are well placed," he said. "But combustion engines not so much," he said. Questions? Comments? [email protected] .
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finance
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Fake IRS agents have targeted more than 366,000 people with harassing phone calls demanding payments and threatening jail in the largest scam of its kind in the history of the agency, a federal investigator said Thursday. More than 3,000 people have fallen for the ruse since 2013, said Timothy Camus, a Treasury deputy inspector general for tax administration. They were conned out of a total of $15.5 million. The scam has claimed victims in almost every state, Camus said. One unidentified ictim lost more than $500,000. "The criminals do not discriminate. They are calling people everywhere, of all income levels and backgrounds," Camus told the Senate Finance Committee at a hearing. "The callers often warned the victims that if they hung up, local police would come to their homes to arrest them." The scam is so widespread that investigators believe there is more than one group of perpetrators, including some overseas. Camus said even he received a call from one of the scammers at his home on a Saturday. He said he had a stern message for the caller: "Your day will come." Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., said he got a similar call, but realized it wasn't a real IRS agent. "It was a very convincing, convincing phone call," Isakson said. So far, two people in Florida have been arrested, Camus said. They were accused of being part of a scam that involved people in call centers in India contacting U.S. taxpayers and pretending to be IRS agents. "These criminal acts are perpetrated by thieves hiding behind telephone lines and computers, preying on honest taxpayers and robbing the Treasury of tens of billions of dollars every year," said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. "Taxpayers must be more aware of the risks and better protected from attack and these criminals must be found and brought to justice." The IRS and the inspector general's office started warning taxpayers about the scam a year ago, and it has since ballooned. This year, it tops the IRS list of "Dirty Dozen" tax scams. Tax scams often increase during tax filing season, and with millions of Americans preparing their returns ahead of the April 15 deadline, the IRS is seeing many cases of identity theft and refund fraud. In recent years the IRS has stepped up efforts to detect large numbers of tax refunds going to the same address or bank account. Using computer filters, the agency identified more than 517,000 suspicious returns and blocked $3.1 billion in fraudulent returns, as of October 2014, Camus said in his testimony. In 2012, the IRS started working more closely with U.S. attorneys' offices around the country to combat tax refund fraud by people using stole identities, said Caroline Ciraolo, acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's tax division. Since then, the tax division has opened nearly 1,000 investigations and brought prosecutions against more than 1,400 people, Ciraolo told the Senate Finance Committee hearing. "Given the sophistication of this criminal activity and the fact that a lot of it comes from overseas, this looks to me like an emerging type of organized crime," said Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Finance Committee. The inspector general's office started receiving complaints about the telephone scam in 2013. Immigrants were the primary target early on, the IG's office said. But the scam has since become more widespread. As part of the telephone scam, fake IRS agents call taxpayers, claim they owe taxes, and demand payment using a prepaid debit card or a wire transfer. Those who refuse are threatened with arrest, deportation or loss of a business or driver's license, Camus said. The callers can manipulate caller ID to make it look like they are calling from an IRS phone number. They might even know the last four digits of the taxpayer's Social Security number, Camus said. They request prepaid debit cards because they are harder to trace than bank cards. Prepaid debit cards are different from bank cards because they are not connected to a bank account. Instead, consumers buy the cards at stores, and use them just like a bank card, until the money runs out or they add more. Real IRS agents usually contact people first by mail, Camus said. And they never demand payment by debit card, credit card or wire transfer. "Our message is simple," Camus said. "If someone calls unexpectedly claiming to be from the IRS with aggressive threats if you do not pay immediately, it is a scam artist calling. The IRS does not initiate contact with taxpayers by telephone. If you do owe money to the IRS, chances are you have already received some form of a notice or correspondence from the IRS in your mailbox."
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finance
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WASHINGTON Average long-term U.S. mortgage rates rose this week yet remained near historic lows reached in May 2013. Long-term rates resumed their upward trend of recent weeks after declining last week. Mortgage giant Freddie Mac said Thursday the national average for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage increased to 3.86 percent from 3.75 percent last week. The average rate for a 15-year mortgage, popular with homeowners who refinance, rose to 3.10 percent from 3.03 percent last week. A year ago, the average 30-year mortgage stood at 4.37 percent and the 15-year mortgage at 3.38 percent. Mortgage rates have remained low even though the Federal Reserve in October ended its monthly bond purchases, which were meant to hold down long-term rates. The Fed continues to keep short-term rates near zero, while it considers a rate increase as early as June. Robust U.S. job gains in February, as shown by government data issued last Friday, appear to have convinced many investors that the Fed will soon raise the short-term interest rate it controls. The Labor Department reported that employers added a solid 295,000 jobs last month, and the unemployment rate dropped from 5.7 percent to a seven-year low of 5.5 percent. To calculate average mortgage rates, Freddie Mac surveys lenders across the country at the beginning of each week. The average doesn't include extra fees, known as points, which most borrowers must pay to get the lowest rates. One point equals 1 percent of the loan amount. The average fee for a 30-year mortgage was 0.6 point, unchanged from last week. The fee for a 15-year mortgage also remained at 0.6 point. The average rate on a five-year adjustable-rate mortgage rose to 3.01 percent from 2.96 percent. The fee was stable at 0.5 point. For a one-year ARM, the average rate increased to 2.46 percent from 2.44 percent. The fee remained at 0.4 point.
| 3 | 11,785 |
finance
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Yet again, Han Solo has been imprisoned inside a flattened rectangle. At least this time it's not carbonite the smuggler is joined by a raft of Star Wars characters old and new as trading cards in Topps' new iOS app, Star Wars Card Trader. The app allows users to collect, trade, and display official Star Wars trading cards, replicating every card released since Episode IV 's release in 1977, and adding eight new cards for characters who will appear in the upcoming Episode VII for the first time. Those new cards were first seen last December , and gave names to the characters set to be introduced in The Force Awakens . Thanks to the digital collectibles, we know the ball droid is called BB-8, Daisy Ridley's speeder-riding character is called Rey, and the guy with the contentious triple-pronged lightsaber is Kylo Ren. The rest of the app's card roster will be rounded out with classic characters, with some special edition cards given flashy effects pull a shiny Yoda out of your pack and you'll be treated to a visual flourish and the sound of a blaster bolt. Topps says new content related to Episode VII will be added in the future, but already, as the cards feature short biographies of the character they depict, the app might become one of the first places fans will find out official information about the movie's new faces. Note that you might need to spend to get your hands on information about the new characters. Card packs cost credits, the app's internal currency, which can either be earned by signing up, successively logging in, and by completing collections, or bought with real money. 20,000 credits cost $5, but pack prices vary some are given away for free, others sell for a few pennies, while some of the rarest premium collector packs can go for around $50. You can also trade for the cards you want, using an system built into the app that allows users to trade up to nine cards with a partner, and gives traders a user-generated trustworthiness rating. For now though, those traders will need an iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch Star Wars Card Trader is currently only available on iOS.
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news
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A Cincinnati Reds prospect arrested in connection with an assault on his girlfriend outside a Glendale, Ariz., restaurant will be on unpaid leave pending the result of a criminal investigation, according to a team statement. Tanner Jeremy Rahier, 21, a right-handed third baseman, is accused of hitting his girlfriend in the head with a rock and knocking her unconscious early Sunday morning, court records show. Rahier had been in the Valley with the Reds for Cactus League play. Director of media relations for the Reds, Rob Butcher, issued a statement on Wednesday saying the Commissioner's Office ordered Rahier's unpaid leave until the criminal investigation is complete, at which time he will be subject to "appropriate discipline." Butcher said Rahier has been directed to comply with treatment suggested by the Reds' Employee Assistance Program, but he provided no further details. Rahier was jailed early Sunday on suspicion of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and assault with intent to injure. He has since been released. Glendale police say Rahier had argued with a bartender at Pullano's Pizza, near 51st Avenue and Thunderbird Road, and refused to pay his tab. Rahier's girlfriend led him outside, where police say he began arguing with her. Police say that's when Rahier started throwing rocks at his girlfriend. One rock, about 8-inches in diameter, reportedly hit the woman on the left side of her head, causing a deep cut and knocking her unconscious, according to a probable-cause statement. Rahier ran from the scene but was apprehended near the restaurant, said Sgt. David Vidaure, a Glendale police spokesman. The probable-cause statement said Rahier was intoxicated at the time and had a previous arrest in Oklahoma for public intoxication. A California native, Rahier was chosen by the Cincinnati Reds in the second round of the 2012 draft, according to the Minor League Baseball website, MiLB.com. In 2014, Rahier played for the Dayton Dragons of the Midwest League and hit for a .238 average with 9 home runs and 54 runs batted in. The Reds' spring training facilities are located in Goodyear. MacDonald-Evoy writes for the Arizona Republic, a Gannett property
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sports
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Singapore Changi Airport has been named the world's best airport for the third year in a row. At the Skytrax 2015 World Airport Awards held in Paris Wednesday night, Changi pulled off a hat trick, maintaining its stronghold as the best airport in the world. This year's results differ little from last year, with Incheon International Airport in Seoul, Munich Airport, and Hong Kong International also rounding out the top four spots and holding onto their respective places from 2014. Of note, the list is divided between Asian and European airports, with not a single US hub managing to crack the top 10. Vancouver International Airport in Canada is the highest-ranked North American airport on the list, coming in at No. 11. Here are the world's best airports 2015 according to Skytrax: 1. Singapore Changi Airport 2. Incheon International Airport 3. Munich Airport 4. Hong Kong International Airport 5. Tokyo International Airport (Haneda) 6. Zurich Airport 7. Central Japan International Airport 8. London Heathrow Airport 9. Amsterdam Schiphol Airport 10. Beijing Capital International Airport Here are the world's cleanest airports: 1. Incheon International Airport 2. Tokyo International Airport (Haneda) 3. Centrair Nagoya 4. Kansai International Airport 5. Singapore Changi 6. Tokyo Narita 7. Hong Kong International Airport 8. Zurich Airport 9. Copenhagen Airport 10. Helsinki Airport World's Most Improved Airport: Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport World's Best Airport Hotel: Crowne Plaza Changi Airport World's Best Airport Dining: Hong Kong International Airport World's Best Airport Security: Tokyo Haneda Airport World's Best Airport Shopping: Heathrow Airport World's Best Airport for Leisure Amenities: Singapore Changi World's Best Airport Staff: Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport
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travel
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Over the last two years DJI has emerged as the world's most popular consumer drone maker, at least by revenue. And The Verge has learned that the company is currently in talks with Silicon Valley's top venture capital firms to potentially raise a new round of funding. Sources familiar with the negotiations say DJI reported around $500 million in revenue for 2014, roughly four times what it did in 2013 , and is on pace to do about $1 billion in sales this year. The potential valuation of the company would be a healthy multiple of that, several billion dollars, although no deal has yet been finalized. Forging a new category of consumer electronics The company helped bring small, powerful drones to the masses with its Phantom line of quadcopters, our favorite unit during last year's testing . In doing so, the Shenzen based firm became one of the first Chinese companies to help forge a new category of consumer electronics at global scale. The Phantom was simple enough for beginners, but powerful enough to interest serious hobbyists, professional photographers, and filmmakers. Last year we dubbed it " the kleenex of drones ," and that ubiquity has become a very big business. With over 2,800 employees, DJI now has offices in Shenzen, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Rotterdam, Tokyo, and Kobe. It sells several different variations of its Phantom drone, as well as its higher-end "prosumer" unit, the Inspire One , and its much larger S-class units. It also has a popular line of gimbals used for stabilizing cameras during flight, and has translated that technology into a handheld camera stabilizer, the Ronin, used by film and TV professionals. CBI Insights found drone funding was up 104 percent between 2013 and 2014. The company was founded in 2006 by Frank Wang, then a student at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Originally DJI was centered on building flight control systems for model helicopters, which Wang had loved since childhood. But as multi-rotor drones began to gain popularity, Wang deftly turned the company toward that market. The funding comes as competition heats up Before the Phantom, most highly capable consumer drones were sold to serious hobbyists and required a lot of assembly and know-how. The French company, Parrot, had a simple, popular unit with its A.R. Drone, but that was not a very powerful craft. The Phantom represented the first relatively cheap drone that came ready to fly out of the box, but boasted top of the line flight control systems. They also had a potent pitchman in Colin Guinn, who we met for the first time at SXSW in 2012 . North America represents DJI's biggest market. Mr. Guinn has since left for rival drone maker 3D Robotics, which two weeks ago announced a $50 million round of funding led by Qualcomm . And Parrot recently released its own more powerful quadcopter, the Bebop , taking direct aim at DJI's Phantom line. Up until now, DJI had taken on relatively little outside capital, preferring to bootstrap the business. But as competition heats up, it is considering taking on venture capital to help maintain its lead and potentially branch out into new sectors of the booming drone market.
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Little girls have always talked to their Barbies, but one coming this fall will actually listen and talk back.
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Spring practice is a time for all sorts of change position, depth chart changes and personnel. On Tuesday, Michigan is dealing with an unexpected one. Fifth-year starting senior center Jack Miller is not returning to the team, TheWolverine.com reported . MORE: Multi-position threats | SN Top 50 players | Best QBs | RBs Miller started all 12 games last season and owned 16 career starts. He was give the team's award for top offensive lineman last season. Miller participated in some spring practices in Jim Harbaugh's first season. According to Wolverine247.com , Miller a political science major is focusing on academics. Sophomore Patrick Kugler (6-6, 299) could be first in line to replace Miller, unless the Wolverines start shuffling players along the line. Kugler played in just one game last season.
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As many of us have no doubt recently been reminded, these post-winter weeks can wreak havoc on road surfaces. As the thaw comes, so too do the potholes. Often, drivers are left with the costs for repairs after running over particularly nasty potholes, while city authorities spend big money fixing them. But what if you could find potholes before they even form? Researchers at Nottingham Trent University in the U.K. are working to develop new technology that would do just that: monitor the surface of roads for underlying damage that may develop into a pothole if left unattended. Research fellow Dr. Senthan Mathavan and his colleagues have developed software for analyzing data collected by road surface scanners run by British engineering company Dynatest . The partnership, which includes academics from Brunel University and the National University of Sciences and Technology in Islamabad, Pakistan, aims to make better predictions from finer pieces of data relating to road quality. The scanners don't just detect cracks, but rather the symptoms of raveling , the term engineers use to describe the gradual breakdown of a road surface. "Raveling is slightly different to cracks and potholes. Raveling is sort of a precursor to these things," says Mathavan. "Once raveling happens it leads to serious defects like potholes and cracks and such." Dynatest's 2D and 3D scanners are simple enough in concept. They attach to the front of a vehicle, in this case a van, and scan the road surface for signs of raveling. The scanners then provide the researchers with two different views of the surface of the road. The 2D scanner is effectively a high-resolution camera, while the 3D scanner creates a three-dimensional map of the ground. "The lighting arrangements make sure that you get a good contrast between cracks and the regular road," explains Mathavan. "From contrast, you can distinguish cracks." The scanners also work equally as well at night as they do during the day. But detecting evidence of raveling is one thing, as Mathavan explains. Making sense of all the data collected is the key challenge of this project. "We are trying to maintain this road network as best as we can." In test runs, the researchers found that their software detected raveling correctly in 900 images that were collected. The idea is that if these sorts of defects can be caught much earlier than before, repairs and planning can in theory become more efficient or even cheaper. Municipal governments have tried all sorts of ways of staying on top of potholes. Pothole reporting apps and hotlines have proliferated, and larger cities now routinely mobilize blitz-style repair teams who work overtime to fix up springtime roads as quickly as possible. The technology these researchers are developing will eventually be open-source and could be adopted by governments and road authorities as part of their maintenance plans. "In our view all these road authorities and highway agencies and people like that are moving more towards maintenance-based data," adds Mathavan. "With funding cuts, they cannot reconstruct or overhaul these networks. So what we are trying to do is, we are trying to maintain this road network as best as we can." The next steps for the researchers include benchmarking the technology and comparing it against other technologies used by civil engineers, as well as traditional repair assessments carried out by humans, to gauge how their new algorithms can be improved. The initial research from this study was only recently published, but the project has already garnered interest from councils and authorities in the U.K., says Mathavan, with whom they will be talking more over the "coming months." Right now the hardware used on the survey vehicles by Dynatest is quite large and bulky and isn't yet practical for use on public roads on a regular basis. Advancements, however, could make the equipment smaller, more discreet, and easier to attach to existing municipal vehicles for frequent assessments of a city's road surfaces.
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If you hate your bank, switching to another doesn't have to be a hassle.
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In many industries, new competition is disrupting the way business is conducted. Think department stores and cable television. Now the $12 trillion mutual fund industry is threatened too. Since 2007, mutual fund assets have grown less than 50%, while the collective amount invested in exchange-traded funds baskets of securities that can be traded like individual stocks has more than tripled, to $2 trillion. Traditional mutual funds are suffering from the growing popularity of low-cost passive investing. Last year investors poured nearly 10 times as much money into index portfolios, which simply buy and hold all the securities in a sliver of the market, as they put into actively managed funds. And the vast majority of ETFs are index portfolios, many charging lower expenses than mutual funds. Meanwhile, ETF-like investments could gain traction in the realm of active management. So far, few actively managed ETFs have been launched because the Securities and Exchange Commission requires them to divulge their holdings in real time something stock pickers are wary of doing. However, the SEC recently greenlighted an ETF-like vehicle that solves the disclosure problem. Exchange-traded managed funds, or ETMFs, will be required to reveal their holdings only a few times a year, like traditional mutual funds. Eaton Vance, which won approval for its NextShares ETMF structure and is licensing it to other money managers, expects to launch its first ETMFs this year. Because ETFs and ETMFs are traded on an exchange and don't require back-office and marketing functions, they can charge less. Eaton Vance expects that on average a NextShares ETMF could cost about 0.63 percentage points less than a mutual fund version. So while the average actively managed mutual fund charges $133 a year for every $10,000 you invest, ETMFs may cost just $70 a year. Still, mutual funds have been around for 91 years and aren't going the way of the dinosaur tomorrow. A big reason is that 401(k) plans, which control more than $4.4 trillion in assets, have yet to embrace ETFs. Until that happens and until ETMFs arrive in full force here are ways you can still put traditional funds to good use. Satisfy Your Core Stocks When it comes to the bulk of your equity portfolio, it doesn't matter if you use index ETFs or index mutual funds as long as you pick a cheap option. "Low cost is low cost, period," says Dave Nadig, chief investment officer of ETF.com. Case in point: MONEY 50 pick Schwab S&P 500 Index mutual fund charges 0.09% annually, the same as SPDR S&P 500 ETF . As you can see from the chart below, though, not all index mutual funds charge rock-bottom prices. Fix the Bond Problem MONEY has warned of the risks of putting all your bond money into traditional index funds and ETFs. Those portfolios are obliged to load up on what are now the most expensive parts of the fixed-income market: U.S. Treasuries and agency-backed mortgage debt that the Federal Reserve bought in droves to stimulate the economy. Jeff Layman, chief investment officer at BKD Wealth Advisors, says his firm has switched from passive core bond funds to active managers, who have the leeway to diversify into less frothy parts of the market. With few exceptions, most actively managed high-grade bond portfolios are mutual funds. A good option is MONEY 50 pick Dodge & Cox Income DODGE & COX INCOME FUND DODIX 0.07% , which charges just 0.43% in annual fees. Fill a Niche For narrowly focused assets, Samuel Lee, editor of Morningstar ETFInvestor, says you can find traditional mutual funds with deft active managers who have the flexibility to "avoid horrendous transaction costs." Surprisingly, some of these funds charge lower expenses than ETFs. For example, he prefers Vanguard High Yield Corporate VANGUARD HIGH-YIELD CORPORATE INV VWEHX -0.33% , an actively managed fund that charges 0.23% a year, over SPDR Barclays High Yield ETF, which charges 0.40%. Commodities are another area where mutual funds may make more sense. ETFs that invest in physical commodities or futures contracts are less tax-efficient than a regular fund that owns commodity-related stocks. Collectively these investments represent just a minority of your overall portfolio. Still, it means the death of the fund may be exaggerated for now. Sign up for and more view example ]]>
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Secretary of State John Kerry mocked Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) and his deputies Thursday amid reports that the state's environmental agency banned employees from mentioning climate change. Though he did not mention Florida by name, the state's Department of Environmental Protection was at the center of a report this week saying that terms like climate change, global warming and sustainability were prohibited in official communications. "Literally a couple of days ago, I read about some state officials who are actually trying to ban the use of the term 'climate change' in public documents because they're not willing to face the facts," Kerry said in a speech at the Atlantic Council Thursday. Kerry brought up the topic as part of his argument that it is a waste of time to debate whether or not human-caused climate change is real. Instead, world leaders need to accept what Kerry says are scientific facts. "Now, folks, we literally do not have the time to waste debating whether we can say 'climate change,' " he said. "We have to talk about how we solve climate change." Kerry compared the climate change debate to the science behind gravity and the freezing point of water, both of which he said are settled. Scott, who has said he doubts about the scientific consensus that humans significantly contribute to climate change through greenhouse gas emissions, denied the report from the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting about climate change at the environmental agency. On Wednesday, the same organization reported that other Florida agencies have also been banned from mentioning climate change under Scott's leadership.
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Turkey on Thursday said it had detained an intelligence agent working for one of the nations in the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State (IS) for helping three British teenage girls cross into Syria to join the jihadists. The surprise revelation by Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu appeared aimed at deflecting sustained criticism from Western countries that Turkey is failing to halt the flow of jihadists across its borders. "Do you know who helped those girls? He was captured. He was someone working for the intelligence (service) of a country in the coalition," Cavusoglu told the A-Haber channel in an interview published by the official Anatolia news agency. A Turkish government official told AFP that the agent was arrested by Turkey's security forces 10 days ago, and added that the person was not a Turkish citizen. "We informed all the countries concerned," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "It's not an EU member, it's also not the United States. He is working for the intelligence of a country within the coalition," Cavusoglu added, without further specifying the nationality of the detained agent. Cavusoglu said he had informed his British counterpart Philip Hammond of the development. "He told me 'just as usual'," said Cavusoglu, without explaining further. Close friends Kadiza Sultana, 16, and 15-year-olds Shamima Begum and Amira Abase, crossed into Syria after boarding a flight from London to Istanbul on February 17. They took a bus from Istanbul to the southeastern Turkish city of Sanliurfa close to the Syrian border, from where they are believed to have crossed the frontier. The disappearance of the girls has alarmed Britain and raised questions about what motivates such young people to go to Syria. - 'Turkey always a scapegoat' - Turkey has long expressed irritation over the repeated criticism from the West that Ankara is not doing enough to stop jihadists and their sympathisers crossing into Syria. The government official said the case of the missing girls showed closer cooperation was needed. "Turkey is always blamed as a scapegoat but this case has shown that we need more cooperation in the fight against Daesh," the official said, using an alternative name for IS. "The region's security cannot be put on Turkey's shoulders alone," the government official added. Turkey accused Britain last month of a "reprehensible" delay in informing the Turkish authorities about the departure of the three teenage girls for its territory. Along with the US and EU states, Arabian peninsula nations including Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been involved in the coalition against IS. Canadian special forces and fighter jets are also deployed in the region, but a senior official in Ottawa told AFP the suspect "is not a Canadian citizen" and "was not employed by" its spy agency. Turkey has played a limited role in the US-led coalition against the IS group due to differences with Washington, which for the moment prefers to focus on battling the jihadists while putting off any potential confrontation with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime. One consequence of the discord with the United States is Ankara's refusal to open its Incirlik air base in southern Turkey for use by coalition combat aircraft fighting IS militants. Cavusoglu on Thursday said Turkey would evaluate all its options, including the use of Incirlik, based on a "comprehensive strategy." Ankara has repeatedly called for the creation of a safe zone inside Syria for refugees fleeing the government offensive. Last month, the United States and Turkey signed a deal to train and equip thousands of moderate Syrian rebel forces. US special envoy John Allen, who is coordinating international efforts against IS, is due to travel to Ankara this week to meet with Turkish officials after a visit to Italy, the US State Department said in a statement.
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SAN FRANCISCO The woman suing a prestigious Silicon Valley venture capital firm for alleged gender discrimination accepted a generous severance package that gave her a salary, access to her company email and kept her biography on the company website. Yet she immediately started telling people she was abruptly fired and contacting companies to let them know she would no longer be working with them. An attorney for the firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, questioned Ellen Pao on Thursday about her actions, as she tried to portray the former executive as someone who misrepresented and twisted facts. "It was the right thing for you," attorney Lynne Hermle said of Pao's decision to contact companies to let them know she had been let go. Pao responded that it was the right thing for the companies. She has said she was abruptly fired after filing her lawsuit alleging gender discrimination at the firm and told to pack her things by the end of the day. The case has drawn attention to the gender imbalance at venture capital and technology companies that attract high-powered talent from some of the best universities in the nation, but where women are grossly underrepresented. Pao's severance package included her salary $33,000 a month and set her actual separation date six months in the future. Hermle questioned why Pao almost immediately posted on an online message board and said on her Kleiner Perkins voicemail message that she had been terminated. Kleiner Perkins has also said Pao had a history of conflicts with her colleagues that contributed to the firm's decision to let her go. Earlier on Thursday, Hermle shared a chart Pao had created listing "resentments" she held against John Doerr, a prominent venture capitalist and senior partner at the firm, a male colleague with whom she had an affair and another male colleague. Doerr was Pao's mentor at the firm and has testified that he tried to increase the number of women at Kleiner Perkins. Among the resentments Pao accused Doerr of was "tolerating incompetence." Pao's attorneys have tried to paint Kleiner Perkins as an old-boys club where their client was subject to boorish behavior by men and denied a seat on a company board and a promotion because she was a woman. They are seeking $16 million in damages. The judge presiding over the case ruled late Wednesday that the defense cannot introduce evidence about the alleged financial difficulties of the plaintiff's husband, who ran a now-bankrupt hedge fund and has been accused of fraud. He has denied the allegations. The law firm was expected to argue that Alphonse "Buddy" Fletcher's problems gave Pao a financial motive to sue. Judge Harold Kahn said the information would create a "sideshow," wouldn't help the jury reach a verdict and would intrude on the privacy rights of Pao and Fletcher.
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If only more militant Irish nationalists had the decency to die. Get shot in the back by a Paddy more extreme, like Michael Collins did, and someday Liam Neeson could be playing you. Get executed by the Brits like James Connolly, and your aphorisms will be in Irish graffiti forever. Starve yourself to death like Bobby Sands did in the H-Block, and history will talk about how your vote totals for MP compare favorably to Thatcher's. Legends all. Gerry Adams still lives, and no one will forgive him for it. Adams commanded killers, like Collins. He invokes the stern, almost utopian principles of 1916, which Connelly helped invent. And like Sands, he was tortured for his political aspirations by Northern Irish authorities. We know what to do with killers who die: judge them on the merits of their cause. We know what to do with killers who win outright: celebrate them as national heroes. But people who put down the gun and muddle on in the ambiguous world of politics? We're not sure what to do with them. Even his enemies acknowledge how crucial Adams was to the peace process in Northern Ireland. Adams' leadership made the 1994 cease-fire and the 1998 Good Friday agreement possible. And today Adams' party, Sinn Fein (translated from Irish, "We, ourselves"), is on the rise in the Republic of Ireland, refashioned as an anti-austerity party that has tapped into dissatisfaction with the post-crisis financial deals Ireland made at home and abroad. At the same time, Adams has been subject to a barrage for a year. The leaking of the "Belfast Project," a work of historical research, led to his brief arrest in connection with the 1972 death of Jean McConville, a mother of 10 who was assassinated as a "tout" by IRA Provos then commanded by Adams. Ever since there have been stories about Sinn Fein's fundraising, about its mishandling of a child abuser, and about Sinead O'Connor's capricious wish to kick Adams out of the driver's seat of the electoral force he built. One can sense behind all of this the faint wish that, necessary as Adams was, he should have gone the way of the martyr after the peace accords. A dead Adams, as martyr for the peace process, would have simply made everyone's lives easier. It would have had a bit of the poetry of Irish history in it. Instead the Irish are stuck with the real Adams, a political firebrand whose charisma relies partly on the "whiff of cordite" and partly on his reputation for being a social-media weirdo. Here is a leader who talks about trampolining naked with your dogs and bubble baths. Some people want Adams to just finally admit to his role in the Belfast IRA and the violence, as Martin McGuinness has. Would it make them feel better? That Adams grates on people is easy to understand. He is a moralizer. His piety about the peace process only reminds everyone that he was a man of violence, or at least a man who oversaw it. He preaches about the rights of workers and of women, rights that the IRA abridged in their own way with bombs and bullets. He also grates on people because he is serious about the principles that liberated the Republic of Ireland from Great Britain's grasp a century ago. The deeds of the IRA in the 70s, 80s, and 90s confronted a generation of people in the Republic with the actual costs of a nationalism, costs that they otherwise honored from a safe distance in the history books. It was easy to hate Adams from within a free country but did they hate their grandfathers, too? Adams simply doesn't fit. And so we have the odd spectacle of The New Yorker reminding readers of the IRA's foul deeds under Adams, while also amplifying the criticism of disgruntled nationalists. Like Dolours Price, whose beef is that Adams stopped the killing before a 32-county socialist Ireland could emerge from the smoke and fire and justify her own conscience. Adams brings me up short, too, I must admit. I was raised on the periphery of American-Irish nationalism. For a time my mother set about learning the Irish language and took me to Gaeltacht weekends. She wore a bracelet for the hunger-strikers in the North. I happily bless the memories of Collins, Eamon De Valera, and Connolly. But like others, I tried to invent a standard that somehow lets those men remain heroes while delegating the Provos around Adams as turf-warring thugs. When Ryan Turbidy, the host of Ireland's premiere late night talk show, tried to gain the moral high ground on Adams in 2010, informing Adams that people think he's terrible and that the bloodshed was avoidable, something odd happened. Adams switched out of his careful, passive voice. Instead of referring broadly to what "the Republican movement" did, he adopted the personal pronoun: "I was born into a state that didn't want me." That state didn't allow his parents to vote. Their generation endured bombs thrown into their houses. Popular politicians, including men of the cloth, compared Adams and his kind to vermin, systematically denied them jobs, and let rioters burn down their houses without consequence. It was a state that arrested men and watched them starve themselves, for merely exercising what we would consider basic rights in America. When I think of that , the remarkable thing about Gerry Adams isn't that he did unjustifiable, evil things, or that he evades telling the truth about it now. It's that he ever stopped at all. Adams has to answer to God and to everyone for Jean McConville. But his partners in the peace process haven't disclosed everything either, while Adams stands in front of the cameras and take the abuse for his history and his evasions. Perhaps others should do the same. More on MSN: How Adams has dodged the real questions in his responses 'The New Yorker' magazine says Gerry Adams ordered London bombings More on MSN Top Stories
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World champion Lewis Hamilton on Thursday said he was already dreaming of emulating the late Formula One great Ayrton Senna by winning his third drivers' title this season. Hamilton, racing with dominant team Mercedes, is the pre-season favourite and he said it had been his ambition since childhood to match his "favourite driver". "I would say that I always wanted to do what Ayrton did," the 30-year-old Briton told reporters in Melbourne ahead of the year's first race, the Australian Grand Prix. "Ayrton was my favourite driver and I guess as a kid I always wanted to emulate him." Hamilton ended a six-year wait for his second world title last year and his biggest rival in this year's championship is expected to be his teammate, Nico Rosberg. Brazilian legend Senna won championships in 1988, 1990 and 1991 before his life was tragically cut short when he crashed at the San Marino Grand Prix in 1994. Speculation over Hamilton's future could be one distraction with his contract due to expire this year and reports of an approach by Ferrari. He said discussions over a new deal with Mercedes were going well, but that nothing had been signed. "I don't really know what to say," he said, when asked about the negotiations. "It's going good. It's not signed yet." Hamilton added that he didn't place any extra importance on a good start to the season this year, after he had to retire from the 2014 Australian race with mechanical problems. "I don't see a particular exaggerated importance (compared) to any other time," he said. "Of course you come here and you'd like to start on the right foot, as I did want to last year, but there is a long, long way to go so it's not the most important start of the year."
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