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(CNN) -- Heavy rain that began pounding California on Tuesday threatened to unleash dangerous floods and mudslides, especially in areas ravaged by wildfires.
Residents of La Canada Flintridge, California, fill sandbags to prepare heavy rains in the fire-affected area.
"Very heavy rain is likely over the Sierra Nevada and foothills from later today through Wednesday morning as a strong and very moist Pacific storm moves into the region," the National Weather Service said. Up to 8 inches of rain could fall in areas above 4,000 feet, it said.
Forecasters described it as the first major storm of the season.
The Santa Cruz County Office of Emergency Services issued a mandatory evacuation order for 60 homes in a section of Davenport, an unincorporated community north of Santa Cruz along the state's central coast. The San Lorenzo Valley high school, middle school, and elementary schools are closed, the county said.
Many roads were flooding in Santa Cruz County, emergency management officials said.
The area burned in the summer's Lockheed fire, increasing the chances of mudslides in the current storm.
Wind gusts above 50 mph were reported from automated observation sites at high elevations, and rainfall was heavy over the Santa Cruz Mountains, the weather service said.
Gusty winds were reported in the San Francisco Bay Area, but heavy rain there was expected to end by early evening.
"Although it has been very dry for a lengthy period of time, excessive amounts of rain of this magnitude may produce flooding in locations that normally do not flood during an early autumn rainfall," the weather service said.
California's Emergency Management Agency was conducting conference calls with the National Weather Service to stay abreast of the latest reports, spokesman Greg Renick said.
The agency had advised other agencies to make emergency preparations, he said. Sandbags have been positioned at vulnerable locations.
"We have activated the state Operations Center in Sacramento and also activated the centers in Los Alamitos and Oakland," Renick said.
One major area of concern is the land burned by the Station wildfire in August and September, forecasters said. That 160,000-acre fire destroyed about 80 homes in Los Angeles County.
"The heavy rain will create favorable conditions for mud and rock slides over burn scars," said the weather service, which issued numerous flood watches and warnings.
Forecasters said debris flows also were possible in or near areas burned by blazes such as the Big Meadows Fire in Yosemite National Park, the Power Fire in Tulare County and the fire in San Bernardino National Forest.
|
[
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"The closed school was near which city?",
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"The storm is expected to dump how much rain?"
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"Sierra Nevada and foothills",
"Sierra Nevada and foothills",
"heavy rain",
"Santa Cruz",
"California",
"a section of Davenport,",
"8 inches"
] |
question: What part of the USA could the storm hit?, answer: Sierra Nevada and foothills | question: where could storm hit, answer: Sierra Nevada and foothills | question: what is expected to dump, answer: heavy rain | question: The closed school was near which city?, answer: Santa Cruz | question: where is santa cruz, answer: California | question: where is the evacuation, answer: a section of Davenport, | question: The storm is expected to dump how much rain?, answer: 8 inches
|
(CNN) -- Heavy rain that has killed at least 60 people in Central America is not expected to let up soon, authorities said Monday.
El Salvador is the country hit hardest so far. The government has declared a state of emergency and ordered evacuations.
At least 32 people have died in El Salvador, including several children, according to the country's civil protection director. Some were swept away attempting to cross swollen rivers, while others were killed when the walls of their homes collapsed.
"The temporary evacuation of the population in some parts of the country is meant to avoid casualties caused by mudslides," said Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes, who also ordered the cancellation of school classes.
In Guatemala, the death toll stands at 28 and close to 110,000 people have been affected by the rain.
President Alvaro Colom said that 15,000 more people are at risk and roughly 12,000 are in shelters, according to a statement on his website.
"We're praying to God for help," said Celida Yesenia Lopez, a Guatemalan flood survivor who lost her home. "It's very sad."
Honduras was similarly struck. The majority of the country's 18 departments are under alert and some 13,000 people have been affected.
Central America has been hammered by torrential rain since last week. Jova struck Mexico as a Category 2 hurricane late Tuesday. It weakened into a tropical storm and then a tropical depression as it moved over western Mexico. At the same time, Tropical Depression 12-E, which never reached tropical storm strength, brought the heavy rain to El Salvador and its neighbors.
More rain is forecast in the region.
|
[
"where are evacuations in effect?",
"Where are evacuations in effect?",
"how many were killed in Guatemala?",
"How many people are killed in Guatemala?",
"how many people are dead in El Salvador?"
] |
[
"El Salvador",
"El Salvador",
"28",
"28",
"32"
] |
question: where are evacuations in effect?, answer: El Salvador | question: Where are evacuations in effect?, answer: El Salvador | question: how many were killed in Guatemala?, answer: 28 | question: How many people are killed in Guatemala?, answer: 28 | question: how many people are dead in El Salvador?, answer: 32
|
(CNN) -- Heavy snow in northern and central China has killed 21 people since Monday, the country's Ministry of Civil Affairs said Friday, according to state-run media.
Xinhua news agency said the ministry did not provide the causes of the deaths, except to note that two school canteens had collapsed in Hebei and Henan provinces since Wednesday, killing four children.
The snow began to fall Monday on northern and central Chinese provinces, including Hebei, Shanxi, Henan, Shandong, Hubei and Shaanxi, and Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Xinhua reported.
More than 9,000 buildings have collapsed since then, Xinhua said. Citing the ministry, it said the snow has caused an estimated 4.5 billion yuan (nearly $660 million) in damages.
The ministry said about 159,000 people have been evacuated from their homes or stranded vehicles, Xinhua reported.
Civil Affairs Minister Li Xueju has ordered local authorities to provide food, water and clothing to those who are still stranded, "and to make proper arrangements for people who lost their homes in the snow to get through the winter," Xinhua reported.
It said the Civil Affairs Ministry and the Ministry of Finance have allocated 20 million yuan (about $3 million) from their central budgets to Shanxi and Hebei provinces to help move those affected by the snow and to help them build houses.
Heavy snow has also fallen on Beijing, but no deaths have been reported there, Xinhua said.
|
[
"On which day does snow begin to fall?",
"How many people were evacuated?",
"When did the snow start to fall?",
"How many people have been evacuated?",
"How many buildings have collapsed?",
"what Civil Affairs ministry says 159,000 people evacuated from?"
] |
[
"Monday",
"159,000",
"Monday",
"159,000",
"More than 9,000",
"their homes or stranded vehicles,"
] |
question: On which day does snow begin to fall?, answer: Monday | question: How many people were evacuated?, answer: 159,000 | question: When did the snow start to fall?, answer: Monday | question: How many people have been evacuated?, answer: 159,000 | question: How many buildings have collapsed?, answer: More than 9,000 | question: what Civil Affairs ministry says 159,000 people evacuated from?, answer: their homes or stranded vehicles,
|
(CNN) -- Heavy snow pummeled much of the East Coast on Wednesday, battering states for the second time in a week and forcing many people to stay home from school and jobs.
Several cities had record snowfalls.
The storm canceled or delayed flights in several cities, kept federal workers home for a third straight day in Washington, and taxed local government budgets as cities and counties scrambled to pay for snow removal, overtime, salt, supplies and equipment.
In Washington, the snow was falling at a rate of 2 inches per hour at one point in the afternoon, CNN meteorologist Jacqui Jeras said. Forecasters predicted that Washington winds would gust to 50 mph overnight.
A blizzard warning was to be in effect in the Washington area until 7 p.m., the National Weather Service said. Blowing snow caused such poor visibility at midday that snowplows temporarily parked by the side of the road, authorities said.
Forecasters predicted that the storm would dump a total of 8 to 10 inches inside the Capital Beltway (Interstate 495), with higher amounts to the north.
Watch the forecast on the storm's trek
"Even if you're in a SUV, it's difficult to get around," Washington Police Chief Cathy Lanier said. "You can't see the Capitol dome through the snow," even standing a few yards away.
Share your winter weather photos, videos
Government buildings were eerily quiet. The Department of Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service buildings were shut. No one answered the door at the Justice Department, though the attorney general's office said work was still being done at key counterterrorism offices.
The U.S. Postal Service said it was experiencing delays in processing mail.
Subway service was expected to be limited Thursday to underground stations, and bus service was expected to be suspended on Thursday.
Federal agencies were to be closed Thursday, too, and non-emergency employees were to be granted the day off.
This winter already has become the snowiest on record for Washington and its suburbs, as well as Baltimore, Maryland, and Wilmington, Delaware, the National Weather Service said. It's also on pace to become the snowiest season on record in other cities, including Atlantic City, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Blizzard warnings also were in effect Wednesday for Asheville, North Carolina; Newark and Atlantic City, New Jersey; Baltimore, Maryland; Dover, Delaware; New York and nearby Long Island; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Under a blizzard warning, the following conditions are expected to be seen for three hours or longer: wind speeds of 35 mph or more and considerable falling and/or blowing of snow with visibility near zero (less than one-fourth mile), the weather service said.
In Atlantic City, the landmark Boardwalk -- lined with shops, restaurants and casinos -- remained open despite the snow.
New York was to be under a blizzard warning until 6 a.m. Thursday, but the snow was expected to stop falling late Wednesday night. Forecasters predicted wind gusts up to 50 mph and predicted the city will have received 12 to 20 inches of snow by the time the storm ends.
In Pennsylvania, all of Interstates 76, 78, 83, 176, 476 and 676, as well as state road 581, were closed Wednesday because of blizzard conditions, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation said on its Web site. Part of I-81 was closed, it said.
Interstate 80 near Clearfield, Pennsylvania, was shut after two pileups -- one involving 17 cars and the other involving seven cars, said Rich Kirkpatrick from the state's Department of Transportation. One person died and another person was seriously injured, police said.
Philadelphia was under a blizzard warning until midnight, and could have as much as 20 inches of snow by the time it stops, forecasters said.
In Boston, Massachusetts, snowfall rates of 2 to 3 inches an hour were expected along the Interstate 95 corridor into the evening. A winter storm warning was in effect until 1 a.m. Thursday, with final snow totals of 5 to 10 inches, the weather service said.
Thousands of
|
[
"Which area is under a blizzard warning?",
"Many Interstate highways closed in which state ?",
"Who said this winter is snowiest on record for several cities?",
"Where are many Interstate highways closed?"
] |
[
"Asheville, North Carolina; Newark",
"Pennsylvania,",
"National Weather Service",
"Pennsylvania,"
] |
question: Which area is under a blizzard warning?, answer: Asheville, North Carolina; Newark | question: Many Interstate highways closed in which state ?, answer: Pennsylvania, | question: Who said this winter is snowiest on record for several cities?, answer: National Weather Service | question: Where are many Interstate highways closed?, answer: Pennsylvania,
|
(CNN) -- Heidi Klum knows that modeling is a young woman's game. In the latest issue of InStyle magazine, the supermodel claims that models, like food, spoil after a certain age.
"Models have a sell-by date," the 36-year old Klum said in the interview.
The mother of four -- who recently changed her last name to Samuel for her husband, the singer known as "Seal" -- also said that there are certain jobs she just doesn't do anymore.
"Like the young, sexy, cute things for teenagers, or even 25-year-old girls. I go in a different bracket now," Klum said.
(InStyle: See highlights of the Klum issue)
The German-born model entered a different bracket of current and former models in 2004 when she became an entrepreneur with the television series "Project Runway." Klum signed on as host, judge and executive producer of the reality show, in which up-and-coming fashion designers compete for the chance to receive money to launch their own fashion line.
In 2009 Forbes magazine estimated Klum's income at $16 million.
The new season of "Project Runway" kicks off Season 7 on Lifetime network on Thursday. In March Klum and fellow judge designer Michael Kors will be starring in their own "Project Runway" video game, in which players can design fashion lines, choose their models, strut down the catwalk, and strike a pose in a photo shoot.
InStyle's February issue hits newsstands on Friday, January 15.
|
[
"What show did Klum host?",
"Who sayes modeling is for young people?",
"When does the latest season of \"Project Runway\" begin?"
] |
[
"\"Project Runway.\"",
"Klum",
"Thursday."
] |
question: What show did Klum host?, answer: "Project Runway." | question: Who sayes modeling is for young people?, answer: Klum | question: When does the latest season of "Project Runway" begin?, answer: Thursday.
|
(CNN) -- Heightening its warnings as anticipated anti-government protests approach, Iran's government says it will arrest protesters and hold them until April if they disrupt state-sanctioned marches to commemorate the overthrow of the Shah of Iran.
Iran is this week celebrating the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, culminating on February 11 -- a day that marked the end of the country's Western-backed monarchy and the start of an Islamic republic. A coalition of Iranian reformist groups is urging opponents of the regime to stage non-violent protests on Thursday, on the official anniversary of the Shah's ouster.
The so-called Green Movement has been protesting for social justice, freedom and democracy in demonstrations throughout the country since the disputed June president election.
Those arrested for causing "instability," disrupting public order and carrying "extremist signs" linked to the Green Movement will be jailed until at least April 9, the end of the Persian holiday, of Norooz, according to government-run Fars news agency.
The holiday marks the start of spring.
"Given the security plans that the police have taken into consideration for tomorrow's glorious marches; these ceremonies will be held in complete security and calm," Fars quoted an unidentified, informed source as saying Wednesday. "But if some try to misuse the vast participation and presence of the people; the police will deal with them firmly and resolutely."
Anti-government demonstrations began after the disputed June 12 presidential vote, which re-elected hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad over main opposition candidate Mir Hossein Moussavi.
Police arrested 4,000 people in the post-election crackdown. At least seven people were killed and hundreds were arrested, witnesses said, as they took to the streets of December 27 during the Shiite Muslim holy period of Ashura.
The Iranian government has denied that its security forces killed anyone and has blamed reformists for the violence.
On Tuesday, an Iranian court sentenced one person to death and eight others to prison for their parts in anti-government demonstrations in December, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
The nine defendants were tried last week over their roles in protests during Ashura, Fars said, quoting the Tehran judiciary's public relations office.
There are now 10 people sentenced to death and awaiting appeal in connection with the protests.
Two men have been executed for participating in anti-government demonstrations, but a lawyer for one of them told CNN her client was already in jail when the protests broke out.
|
[
"who is celebrating the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution?",
"who has to be held until april?",
"Reformist groups are urging opponents of the regime to what?",
"what was the protest about",
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"who is urging opponents of the regime to stage non-violent protests?"
] |
[
"Iran",
"protesters",
"stage non-violent protests",
"anti-government",
"protests",
"the overthrow of the Shah of Iran.",
"A coalition of Iranian reformist groups"
] |
question: who is celebrating the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution?, answer: Iran | question: who has to be held until april?, answer: protesters | question: Reformist groups are urging opponents of the regime to what?, answer: stage non-violent protests | question: what was the protest about, answer: anti-government | question: what caused the arrests, answer: protests | question: What will the marches commemorate?, answer: the overthrow of the Shah of Iran. | question: who is urging opponents of the regime to stage non-violent protests?, answer: A coalition of Iranian reformist groups
|
(CNN) -- Hemant Karkare, Mumbai's slain terror chief, was a shrewd and unflappable investigator whose death is a blow to a police force that has difficult work ahead, his colleagues said this week.
Hemant Karkare, left, was killed by gunmen in Mumbai shortly after this video was taken Wednesday.
According to accounts in Indian newspapers, Karkare, 54, was credited with solving many crimes and did his job apolitically and with the utmost integrity.
"The state Anti-Terrorism Squad has lost a daredevil officer in Hemant Karkare," Peter Lobo, chief inspector of the Anti-Terror Squad in Pune, told The Times of India on Thursday.
Karkare, head of Maharashtra state's Anti-Terrorism Squad, was heading home Wednesday when he learned gunmen were attacking the Oberoi hotel in Mumbai, Maharashtra's Deputy Chief Minister R.R. Patil told The Hindu newspaper.
Karkare later got word the situation at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus was more serious. The terror chief and two other officers -- armed with automatic weapons -- jumped in a jeep and rushed to take on the terrorists, The Hindu reported. Watch how victims are coping with the attack »
Footage from CNN's sister network, CNN-IBN, showed Karkare donning a helmet and putting a bulletproof vest over his light blue shirt as uniformed police officers with firearms and walkie-talkies surrounded him. Watch Karkare's funeral »
It would be the last video taken of Karkare before terrorists shot him three times in the chest near Cama hospital, the site of another Wednesday attack in Mumbai.
"Though a workaholic, he was a soft-spoken officer. ATS has received a severe blow because of the untimely death of Karkare," Lobo told The Times of India before departing Pune to pay his respects to Karkare.
Karkare joined the Indian Police Services in 1982. He became head of Maharashtra's Anti-Terror Squad in January after he returned from Austria, where he served seven years in the Research and Analysis Wing, India's external intelligence agency.
The post in Austria was testament to his acumen as a police officer, a colleague told The Times of India.
"Due to his excellent ability to handle things, he was posted to the Research and Analysis Wing in Austria. He was like family to me,'' said Bipin Gopalakrishna, who joined the force with Karkare in 1982.
According to CNN-IBN, Karkare was credited with solving bombing cases in Thane, Vashi and Panvel and played a key role in cracking the case of the September 29 blast in Malegaon, which reportedly killed six people. He also uncovered several radical Hindu groups operating in Maharashtra, according to media reports.
Karkare came under intense political pressure while investigating the Malegaon bombing, and it was widely reported that he warned officers in his command against succumbing to pressure to doctor evidence.
"We should do our job and it is for the court to decide," Karkare was quoted in several media outlets as saying. Watch officials speculate on who may be responsible for this week's attacks »
"He was simply superb. He could handle any difficult situation boldly and with a cool mind," Aurangabad Police Commissioner Thakur Deepaksinh Gaur told The Times of India. Gaur told the paper he had worked with Karkare in Aurangabad and Nanded.
Added another Indian Police Services officer: "His death is a huge loss to our force and society."
When not on the clock, Karkare was known to enjoy sculpting and could often be found whittling driftwood, The Indian Express reported. He also enjoyed music and dabbled in palm reading, former diplomat T.P. Sreenivasan told The Hindu.
"We used to put him in one of the stalls as an Indian palmist during the annual charity fair organized by the Indian ambassador and he was big hit with the crowd," said Sreenivasan, who worked with Karkare in Vienna for five years.
Sreenivasan told The Hindu that Karkare -- who had strong credentials in fighting terrorism, corruption and money laundering -- could have earned a post at a U.N. agency in Vienna, but chose instead to return home to serve India.
|
[
"What was Karkare doing when he was shot?",
"What was Karkare doing when he heard of the attacks?",
"How did his colleagues describe him?",
"Who was shot while responding to the attacks?",
"Who heard of attacks while heading home?",
"How many times was he shot?",
"Where was Karkare going when he heard of the attacks?",
"Where was Hemant Karkare going when he heard about the attacks?"
] |
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"Karkare",
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"three",
"heading home",
"heading home"
] |
question: What was Karkare doing when he was shot?, answer: jumped in a jeep and rushed to take on the terrorists, | question: What was Karkare doing when he heard of the attacks?, answer: heading home | question: How did his colleagues describe him?, answer: shrewd and unflappable investigator | question: Who was shot while responding to the attacks?, answer: Karkare | question: Who heard of attacks while heading home?, answer: Karkare, head of Maharashtra state's Anti-Terrorism Squad, | question: How many times was he shot?, answer: three | question: Where was Karkare going when he heard of the attacks?, answer: heading home | question: Where was Hemant Karkare going when he heard about the attacks?, answer: heading home
|
(CNN) -- Henry Joseph Madden was a good student and track team member in high school, but he had a secret: He sometimes wore his mother's pantyhose and underwear under his clothes.
Dr. Jennifer Madden, a family physician, began her transition to being female at age 48.
"I really wanted to be a girl so bad, and that was one way for me to satisfy those feelings," Madden said. "I always felt like someone was looking over my shoulder."
The desire to be female never went away. At age 48, Madden confessed these feelings to a doctor, and started seeing a gender therapist who suggested Madden was transgendered.
Through reconstructive surgeries, electrolysis, laser procedures and voice lessons, Henry Joseph became Jennifer Elizabeth, known as Jenny. She is a practicing family physician in Nashua, New Hampshire. Watch Jenny's story »
Chastity Bono, child of performer Cher and the late entertainer and politician Sonny Bono, announced Thursday the beginning of a transition from female to a male.
While still relatively rare -- one advocate estimates that 0.25 to 0.5 percent of the American population is transgendered -- the idea of changing gender identity has become more widespread in recent years. The term "LGBT" (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) is more commonly recognized, and transgendered people have been portrayed in the 1999 film "Boys Don't Cry" as well as the 2002 book "Middlesex" by Jeffrey Eugenides.
Many people who have transitioned, including Madden, say they knew they had been born into the wrong gender from childhood. As early as age 3, Dr. Julie Praus, born male, didn't understand why her father wanted to play catch. As a boy, Praus learned how to fish and hunt, but enjoyed collecting Depression-era glassware vases. Praus, 48, a psychiatrist in Brattleboro, Vermont, started living as a woman in March 2008.
"I get up every morning and say, 'Wow, I can actually look at myself in the mirror,' because I've never been able to do that in my life, because what would stare back at me was not me," Praus said. iReport.com: Share your story of gender change
Doctors speculate that there is a biological foundation to gender identity, but no one has determined what in the biological makeup determines that gender. The interactions between personality and culture also contribute to identity, said Chris Kraft, clinical director at the Johns Hopkins Sexual Behaviors Consultation Unit.
The process of changing genders
For people who want a gender change on a biological level, the first step is therapy, experts say. Dr. Gary Alter, a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, California, said patients don't come to him until they've been in therapy, a process that can take as much as a year.
A therapist then gives a physician approval to start the patient on hormone treatment. At that point, the patient may or may not start living as the chosen sex, Alter said.
Females seeking to transition into males may elect to have their breasts removed via surgery. With testosterone, they will grow hair on their face and chest after about two years. Read one man's female-to-male advice to Chaz Bono
A higher percentage of males transitioning to females will go forward with genital surgery than females going to males, Alter said. Surgical methods for creating a penis -- which range from making one out of the clitoris to using the skin from the forearms -- are "not perfect," and many patients are happy with just chest surgery, he said.
Genital surgeries for creating female genitalia are better, he said. Alter's method is to make a clitoris out of the head of the penis, and make space for a vagina.
Facing the rest of the world
It is rare for people to undergo a gender transition and then want to reverse it, especially when surgery is involved, experts say.
Some say changing genders is one of the best things they've done, like Jamison Green, 60, author of "Becoming a
|
[
"What do doctors speculate?",
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"What is the estimated percentage of transgendered Americans?",
"What is the percentage of transgender Americans?",
"What do doctors speculate as the reason for gender identity?",
"What surgery do people undergo and then rarely want to reverse?",
"What proportion of the American population is transgendered?",
"Biological foundation is an influence to what?",
"what do people rarely do when they have the surgery?",
"Who speculates that there is a biological foundation to gender identity?",
"What do people undergo and want to reverse it?",
"What percent of the American population is transgendered?"
] |
[
"that there is a biological foundation to gender identity,",
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"0.25 to 0.5 percent",
"0.25 to 0.5 percent",
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"0.25 to 0.5 percent",
"gender identity,",
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question: What do doctors speculate?, answer: that there is a biological foundation to gender identity, | question: What do people rarely undergo?, answer: a gender transition and then want to reverse it, | question: What is the estimated percentage of transgendered Americans?, answer: 0.25 to 0.5 percent | question: What is the percentage of transgender Americans?, answer: 0.25 to 0.5 percent | question: What do doctors speculate as the reason for gender identity?, answer: biological foundation to | question: What surgery do people undergo and then rarely want to reverse?, answer: gender transition | question: What proportion of the American population is transgendered?, answer: 0.25 to 0.5 percent | question: Biological foundation is an influence to what?, answer: gender identity, | question: what do people rarely do when they have the surgery?, answer: to undergo a gender transition and then want to reverse it, | question: Who speculates that there is a biological foundation to gender identity?, answer: Doctors | question: What do people undergo and want to reverse it?, answer: gender transition | question: What percent of the American population is transgendered?, answer: 0.25 to 0.5
|
(CNN) -- Henry Olszewski was stoked in 2008 when he, along with millions of Americans, drafted New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady to his fantasy football team.
Tom Brady's season-ending knee injury last year sparked an idea at Intermarket Insurance.
About eight minutes into the season, a 220-pound safety was blocked into Brady's knee, tearing two of the quarterback's ligaments. Brady's season ended, as did Olszewski's.
"That Monday, [Olszewski] came in the office, and he was bummed out," said Anthony Giaccone, president of Intermarket Insurance. "He asked, 'Why can't we buy insurance for fantasy team players?' "
Thus spawned the brainchild for Fantasy Sports Insurance, which guarantees that NFL players won't miss a certain number of games. FSI will reimburse a fantasy player's entry fee if they do.
It's one of a blitz of bizarre businesses cropping up in the $800 million industry of turning quarterback stats to greenbacks, said Paul Charchian, president of the Fantasy Sports Trade Association. See fantasy football's top 10 prospects »
Charchian is familiar with the wellspring of offbeat companies fueled by the fantasy football craze; he owns LeagueSafe, which stores league entry fees in a bank until it issues a payout to the winner at season's end.
Other specialty businesses, he said, range from the obvious, such as trophy companies, to the esoteric, such as fantasy dispute resolution.
You read the last one correctly.
Web sites like fantasydispute.com and sportsjudge.com offer to mitigate fretful fantasy feuds. Think there was collusion in a trade or your league commissioner is playing favorites? Write up your dispute and send it to one of the sites. For $15, a lawyer will settle your quibble.
For the uninitiated: Fantasy football players generally "draft" NFL quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers, tight ends and team defenses and use their statistics each week to score points in head-to-head matchups.
Countless variations have proliferated, as have magazines and Web sites beholden only to fantasy players. Sort the top picks by position at SI.com
The NFL has introduced the RedZone Channel, which flips between games where a team is on the verge of scoring, CBSsports.com has launched a live Web show called "Fantasy Football Today," and cable's FX is scheduled to air a sitcom based on a fantasy football league this year.
The stakes have skyrocketed as well. The World Championship of Football offers a $300,000 top prize. The Fantasy Football Open Championship's is $1 million. The Wall Street Journal reported last year that a group of well-heeled financiers has a 10-team league with a $100,000 entry fee.
A June study by the research company Ipsos says three in 20 American men (and one in 20 women) play some fantasy sport.
"It takes the fans of one sports team and makes them interested in every game that's happening," said Jason Kint, senior vice president and general manager for CBSsports.com. "It's a welcome escape, as much of sports is right now."
Not all fans are enamored, however. ESPN's Colin Cowherd explained his aversion on his radio show last month, saying fantasy football was too time-consuming and, in his experience, for "total nerds and geeks."
"I'm a gambler, lived in Vegas. My friends are gamblers. We don't play fantasy football," he said. "We're busy. We have jobs. We have careers. We have lives. We don't have time for three-hour draft parties and an hour or two on the computer every week to update our fullback situation."
But more than 22 million Americans and Canadians do, Charchian said, and the economic downturn doesn't seem to be sacking the industry.
"It's hard to get out. It's enmeshed in your social circle," he explained.
Also, with most leagues costing less than $10 a week and with the average player spending nine hours weekly researching and tweaking his or her
|
[
"What was the spin off from magazines, web sites and TV shows?",
"What do 2 sites offer?",
"How many millions have been invested?",
"what sites offer lawyers",
"What prizes include?",
"what is the prize value"
] |
[
"Fantasy football",
"to mitigate fretful fantasy feuds.",
"$800",
"sportsjudge.com",
"$1 million.",
"$300,000"
] |
question: What was the spin off from magazines, web sites and TV shows?, answer: Fantasy football | question: What do 2 sites offer?, answer: to mitigate fretful fantasy feuds. | question: How many millions have been invested?, answer: $800 | question: what sites offer lawyers, answer: sportsjudge.com | question: What prizes include?, answer: $1 million. | question: what is the prize value, answer: $300,000
|
(CNN) -- Her powerful voice resonates through the music hall, delivering an unlikely message of hope.
All eight Liyana band members met at the King George VI school for disabled children in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.
The Afro-fusion melody comes from an unlikely source -- the small, wheelchair-ridden body of Prudence Mabhena, a woman from Zimbabwe who has overcome her physical disabilities and the hurdles of daily life in her home country.
"Some people don't even get you and take you as a person," Mabhena said. "And with us singing right now, we're not giving up -- we're pushing up."
Mabhena is the lead singer of Liyana, a group of eight musicians who are all physically disabled and from Zimbabwe. Their message of hope has been drowned out in their home country, which is suffering from an economic collapse, a cholera outbreak, and a political power struggle that has erupted into violence. Watch the band performing »
Mabhena was born with arthrogryphosis, a muscle and joint disorder, and had to have parts of her arms and legs amputated as a result. She said her mother was told to kill her rather than have her face life as a physically disabled woman in Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe was once a center for disability rights after it gained independence in 1980, according to recent report on Public Radio International. It was one of the first countries to recognize the rights of the disabled, who are sometimes shunned by communities in rural Africa who fear they are touched by witchcraft.
But the gains for the disabled in Zimbabwe have been erased by the country's current crisis, according to Dr. Raymond Lang of the London-based Cheshire Center for Conflict Recovery who spoke to PRI's Lonny Shavelson.
Mabhena said the group is apprehensive about returning to Zimbabwe after its U.S. tour, which wrapped up this month.
But none of the members of Liyana dwell on the despair.
"'Never give up' -- it's one of our biggest and strongest mottos," said singer Tapiwa Nyenger, explaining one of the band's song titles. "We have the capability to go on stage and at the end of the day make people smile. It's a good feeling."
All eight band members, who are between the ages of 17 and 23, met at the King George VI school for disabled children in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. The band describes their music as a fusion between "myriad geographic, cultural, and musical genres including gospel, reggae, and traditional Zimbabwean Shona music."
Liyana means "rain" -- a Shona term for good luck.
"Music makes you think of something positive," Nyenger said. "For me, music is rehabilitation."
Mabhena has said her voice is a gift from god.
They had long dreamed of performing in the United States, and their multi-city tour included more than 20 performances in California and the New York metro area, including the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark.
"We have been received in an overwhelming, heart-filling way," Nyenger said. "Everywhere we go, every place we go, we [see] new things, we meet new people, we learn new stuff."
The band's U.S. tour coincided with President Barack Obama's inauguration, which has also been a source of inspiration for a new song, "Obama."
"When we heard Obama was going to be the American president, the first black American president, we were so excited," Mabhena said. "Through that joy that we had, there came a song."
Liyana is also the subject of a new documentary, iTemba -- My Hope -- which is scheduled to be released worldwide later this year. The band's singers perform in seven languages -- Shona, Ndebele, English, Dutch, German, Hebrew, and Spanish -- allowing them to reach a wider audience.
"We want to leave a message to everyone in the world that no matter what circumstance you are in, you can make it," singer Marvelous Meulo said
|
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"How many performances on the US Tour?",
"Number of performances the tour consists of?",
"What is their message during the tour?",
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"How many performances have Liyana made in the US?",
"How many performances have they done in the U.S.?",
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"Where are Liyana from?",
"What is the message of their songs?"
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question: What has been drowned out?, answer: Their message of hope | question: What is Liyana's message?, answer: we're not giving up | question: How many performances on the US Tour?, answer: 20 | question: Number of performances the tour consists of?, answer: more than 20 | question: What is their message during the tour?, answer: of hope. | question: What is the group Liyanna comprised of?, answer: eight musicians who are all physically disabled and from Zimbabwe. | question: How many performances have Liyana made in the US?, answer: more than 20 | question: How many performances have they done in the U.S.?, answer: 20 | question: Where is Liyana from?, answer: Zimbabwe | question: Where are Liyana from?, answer: Zimbabwe. | question: What is the message of their songs?, answer: hope.
|
(CNN) -- Her school has become a symbol of the kind of crumbling infrastructure that President Obama hopes his stimulus bill will improve.
South Carolina student Ty'Sheoma Bethea was invited to the speech after she wrote a letter to lawmakers.
But on Tuesday, Ty'Sheoma Bethea became the face of the issue, when she joined first lady Michelle Obama as her guest for the president's first speech to a joint session of Congress.
The White House invited Bethea, a student at the J.V. Martin Junior High School in Dillon, South Carolina, after a letter she sent lawmakers appealing for help rebuilding her school made its way to the president.
The eighth-grader flew with her mother, Dina Leach, from South Carolina to Washington to attend Tuesday night's speech.
On Wednesday, back home in South Carolina, Bethea explained what she wanted the president to do.
"I just want for him to help my school out and to get us a bigger and better school and build us a new one, and I would thank him for that." she told CNN.
The eighth-grader was inspired to write the letter by Obama, who mentioned her school in his first presidential news conference on February 9. After visiting the school, he referenced J.V. Martin as evidence of educational institutions that would benefit from school construction funding in his $787 billion stimulus package. iReport.com: 'A very emotional moment'
In her letter, Bethea described the dilapidated condition of her school, which was built in 1896, and said the funds would improve the building and the quality of education.
"We are just students trying to become lawyers, doctors, congressmen like yourself, and one day president, so we can make a change to not just the state of South Carolina, but also the world. We are not quitters." Watch Obama quote Bethea in speech »
Obama repeated Bethea's statement about not quitting during his address.
"It was great to hear the president say my quote," Bethea said Wednesday. "We are not quitters because anything is possible, and I don't think we should give up so easily. We should work harder for it."
Poorly maintained and ill-equipped schools in South Carolina's "corridor of shame" were an issue during the Democratic primary as evidence that education reform had to be an imperative for the next president.
The schools became an issue again last week when South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, a Republican, said he might turn down some of the money in the stimulus. And South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn, the highest-ranking African-American in Congress, said turning down money was an "insult" to blacks.
"We have legislation here now with the money to do something about the schools, do something about water and sewage along that corridor in these 12 counties. And now the governor says, 'I don't want to accept the money.' That's why I called this an insult, that's why I said this is a slap in the face, because a majority of those counties are, in fact, inhabited by African-Americans," Clyburn said on CNN's Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.
In his speech Tuesday, Obama vowed that education is among the priorities of his administration. He urged Americans to take advantage of the promise of an education. Watch Obama discuss education »
"In a global economy, where the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge, a good education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity. It is a prerequisite," he said.
"It is our responsibility as lawmakers and as educators to make this system work, but it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it." Obama said. iReport.com: What would you fix first?
"So tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be a community college or a four-year school, vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get
|
[
"Who did Bethea wite a letter to?",
"Who joins Michelle Obama for the president's speech?",
"Who joined Michelle Obama for the speech?",
"What was the subject of Bethea's letter?",
"What did she write a letter about?"
] |
[
"lawmakers.",
"Ty'Sheoma Bethea",
"Ty'Sheoma Bethea",
"help rebuilding her school",
"appealing for help rebuilding her school"
] |
question: Who did Bethea wite a letter to?, answer: lawmakers. | question: Who joins Michelle Obama for the president's speech?, answer: Ty'Sheoma Bethea | question: Who joined Michelle Obama for the speech?, answer: Ty'Sheoma Bethea | question: What was the subject of Bethea's letter?, answer: help rebuilding her school | question: What did she write a letter about?, answer: appealing for help rebuilding her school
|
(CNN) -- Here are so-called "Oinkers" of the year, listed in the "2010 Congressional Pig Book Summary," which was released on Wednesday by the nonpartisan group Citizens Against Government Waste.
• The Dunder-head Mifflin Award (from the fictional paper company of the sitcom "The Office") -- Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pennsylvania, and Rep. Paul Kanjorski, D-Pennsylvania, for $200,000 for design and construction of a small business incubator and multipurpose center in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
• Thad the Impaler Award -- Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Mississippi, for $490 million in pork, including $200,000 for the Washington National Opera for set design, installation and performing arts at libraries and schools, and $500,000 for the University of Southern Mississippi for cannabis eradication.
Other awards:
• The Hal Bent on Earmarking Award -- Rep. Harold "Hal" Rogers, R-Kentucky, for $10 million for the National Institute for Hometown Security.
• The Little Engine That Couldn't Award -- $465 million for the Joint Strike Fighter alternate engine.
• The Narcissist Award -- Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, for $7.3 million to continue the Harkin Grant program and to Sen. Robert Byrd, D-West Virginia, for $7 million for the Robert C. Byrd Institute of Advanced Flexible Manufacturing Systems.
Watchdog group: Congressional pork getting leaner
• The Steak Through the Heart of Taxpayers Award -- Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, and Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-Texas, for $693,000 for beef improvement research.
• The Sapping the Taxpayers Award -- $4.8 million for wood utilization research in 11 states requested by 13 senators and 10 representatives.
• The Jekyll and Hyde Award -- Rep. Leonard Lance, R-New Jersey, for his ever-changing stance on earmarks. He first signed a no-earmark pledge, then received $21 million in earmarks, then supported the Republican earmark moratorium.
• The Kick in the Asp Award -- Delegate Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, for $500,000 for control and interdiction of brown tree snakes in Guam.
• The Plane Waste Award -- Sens. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, and Pat Roberts, R-Kansas, and Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Kansas, for $3.5 million for the National Institute for Aviation Research.
• The Do You Want Fries with That Award -- $2.6 million in potato research in four states requested by five senators and five representatives.
• The Putting on the Pork Award -- Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-New York, for $400,000 for restoration and renovation of the historic Ritz Theater in Newburgh, New York.
• The Lights! Camera! Earmark! Award -- Rep. Diane Watson, D-California, for $100,000 for career exploration and training for at-risk youths for jobs in filmmaking at the Duke Media Foundation in Hollywood.
• The An Earmark Grows in Brooklyn Award -- Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-New York, for $400,000 for construction and renovation for safety improvements at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
|
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"Who were winners of Narcissist Award?",
"What was requested by 10 lawmakers?",
"What went to wood utilization?",
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"Who won The Narcissist Award?"
] |
[
"Sen. Robert Byrd,",
"wood utilization research",
"Sen. Robert Byrd,",
"$2.6 million in potato research in four states",
"The Sapping the Taxpayers Award",
"potato research",
"Sen. Tom Harkin,"
] |
question: Who were co-winners of The Narcissist Award?, answer: Sen. Robert Byrd, | question: $4.8million went for what?, answer: wood utilization research | question: Who were winners of Narcissist Award?, answer: Sen. Robert Byrd, | question: What was requested by 10 lawmakers?, answer: $2.6 million in potato research in four states | question: What went to wood utilization?, answer: The Sapping the Taxpayers Award | question: What cost $2.6 million?, answer: potato research | question: Who won The Narcissist Award?, answer: Sen. Tom Harkin,
|
(CNN) -- Here's a 21st-century art object if ever there was one: a Japanese film by a French-Vietnamese writer-director based on a 1987 international best-seller named after a 1965 Beatles' song about Scandinavian pine.
Well, that's not all the song is about.
According to John Lennon, it was conceived as a deliberately opaque reference to an extramarital flirtation (he didn't want his wife to know about it) that went nowhere. The narrator sleeps in the bath, then torches the place in the morning.
Tran Anh Hung's lovely but overly languorous film of the acclaimed Haruki Murakami novel catches at the sexual longing and consternation that both the book and Lennon's song evoke: the tantalizing co-mingling of desire, mixed signals and cross purposes that can derail a tentative relationship.
Tran (who also wrote the screenplay) follows Murakami's slender plotline with respect bordering on devotion, but fails to find a correlative to the complex, overlapping perspectives that allow the novel to live in both the present and the past -- to enter into the mindset of adolescent angst, and to contemplate it from afar. Instead the film flails between too many lengthy, numb exchanges and a handful of spectacular but histrionic set pieces.
Toru Watanabe (Ken'ichi Matsuyama) is a freshman at Tokyo University in the late 1960s. He's largely impervious to the political upheaval going on around him, still struggling to come to terms with the sudden suicide of his best friend, Kizuki, on his 17th birthday. In their grief, Watanabe and Kizuki's girlfriend, Naoko (Rinko Kikuchi of "Babel"), spend many hours consoling each other, and on her 20th birthday they finally sleep together. The next day, Naoko quits school and retires to a sanatorium, leaving the confused Watanabe to muddle his way through classes.
While he and Naoko correspond in long, intimate letters, Watanabe takes up with another girl (or should I say, she takes up with him?). Midori (Kiko Mizuhara) is as self-confident and assertive as Naoko is vulnerable and timid. Watanabe, meanwhile, is a distinctly passive and bewildered protagonist, unsure of what he wants or what his obligations might be to the broken, suicidal Naoko.
The performances are credible enough, but neither the passive, vacillating Watanabe nor the neurotic, grief-stricken Naoko are easy figures to identify with, and it's hard to understand why so many women keep throwing themselves at Matsuyama's clay feet. Only Mizuhara's assertive Midori offers any energy, and she's sidelined for much of the movie.
While the movie has moments to savor and artistry to spare, these elements don't cohere into a satisfying whole. Tran doesn't speak Japanese, but in other respects he's well-suited to Murakami's world. A Vietnamese brought up and educated in France, best known for "The Scent of Green Papaya" and "The Vertical Ray of the Sun," Tran is a cinematic aesthete, very much attuned to melancholy and introspection. "Norwegian Wood" features a tumescent score by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood and stunning cinematography by the Taiwanese Mark Lee Ping-bin ("In the Mood for Love").
It's so gorgeous to look at that spectators are in danger of swooning in their seats. It's rather irritating that the characters prefer to wallow in misery than admire the natural beauty all around them -- including each other, of course. And that's the trouble. The film feels like a fetish object; almost a series of screen prints, it's a beautiful illustration of the text, but somehow the text itself is lost in translation.
|
[
"Who does the Director follow?",
"whose slender plot does this follow",
"What has moments to savor?",
"Who is Haruki Murakami?",
"the protagonist is described as passive and what?",
"What is passive and bewildered?"
] |
[
"Murakami's",
"Murakami's",
"the movie",
"writer-director",
"bewildered",
"Watanabe,"
] |
question: Who does the Director follow?, answer: Murakami's | question: whose slender plot does this follow, answer: Murakami's | question: What has moments to savor?, answer: the movie | question: Who is Haruki Murakami?, answer: writer-director | question: the protagonist is described as passive and what?, answer: bewildered | question: What is passive and bewildered?, answer: Watanabe,
|
(CNN) -- Herman Cain claims that brainwashing explains why so few blacks support conservative Republicans such as himself. He is wrong. The thinking, sentiments, and policy preferences he supports give good cause for rejecting him.
In his new campaign manifesto, "This is Herman Cain: My Journey to the White House," the candidate states repeatedly and without qualification that "Our Founding Fathers did their job ... a great job." He makes no mention of the blacks who fled George Washington, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson during the Revolutionary War in search of their freedom, or the Constitution's protection of slavery, or that the initial Constitution forbade Congress from prohibiting American participation in the international slave trade for 20 years and indeed made that provision unamendable.
Cain evinces no recognition of the Founding Fathers' role in erecting a cruel pigmentocracy that continues to poison virtually every aspect of American political, social and cultural life. This is not an abstruse or academic matter. The president nominates federal judges. An important theory of constitutional interpretation vying for ascendancy is originalism: the notion that the Constitution should be read as originally understood by its framers. Justice Clarence Thomas is the most militant originalist on the Supreme Court. A President Cain would seek to fill the federal judiciary with more Clarence Thomases -- a prospect that most blacks rightly view with dread.
Asked about his impressions of the Occupy Wall Street dissidents, Cain declared: "Don't blame the big banks. If you don't have a job and you're not rich, blame yourself " -- a statement that overlooks the desperation with which millions, a disproportionate number of whom are black, strive to stave off impoverishment and unemployment. Later, when Cain perceived the impolitic character of his comment, he tried to minimize it, asserting that he was only referring to the protesters and not to the impoverished or unemployed in general. That attempt at damage control rings false, however, especially in light of his further comment: "It is not a person's fault if they succeeded, it is a person's fault if they failed."
Largely located on the lower rungs of the American socioeconomic ladder, most black Americans appreciate sources of opportunity and power that Cain despises: unions, governmental support for the needy, a robust, government-supported full-employment policy, the public provision of health care. His worry, remarkably, is that America is too egalitarian. His signature policy -- the 9-9-9 tax reform proposal -- would institute a regressive consumption tax nationally and starve Social Security and Medicare. It would redistribute income upward. No wonder blacks overwhelmingly repudiate him and his tea party allies.
Cain also recently declared: "I don't believe racism in this country today holds anybody back in a big way." If there were any doubts before that he was bereft of the knowledge and sensibility required of a significant political figure, much less president, then this egregious statement should remove them.
A library full of careful, rigorous studies shows clearly that invidious racial discrimination and, perhaps even more consequentially, the perpetuation of disabilities inflicted by racial mistreatment in the past hurt blacks and other people of color in a broad array of domains: from commercial transactions like buying a car or purchasing a home, to dealing with police, to electoral politics, to wellness and life expectancy.
Race still matters. Not only are people of color discriminated against with frequency. Not only are the accumulated burdens of past discrimination permitted to prey upon new generations even in the absence of racial malevolence (complacency is deadly too). But studies also show that the darker you are, the more likely you are to face wrongful indifference or cruel mistreatment. (Take a peek at the illuminating article by Jennifer Hochschild and Vesla Weaver, "The Skin Color Paradox and the American Racial Order," in the December 2007 edition of Social Forces.)
Of course, there has been remarkable, positive change in American racial attitudes. But recall the miserable baseline against which we mark that progress. In 1958, the Gallup Organization asked whether Americans would be willing to vote for a qualified black presidential candidate nominated by their
|
[
"What does Cain do",
"What does cain say to blame yourself for",
"What are Cain's policies?"
] |
[
"claims that brainwashing explains why so few blacks support conservative Republicans",
"If you don't have a job and you're not rich,",
"the 9-9-9 tax reform proposal"
] |
question: What does Cain do, answer: claims that brainwashing explains why so few blacks support conservative Republicans | question: What does cain say to blame yourself for, answer: If you don't have a job and you're not rich, | question: What are Cain's policies?, answer: the 9-9-9 tax reform proposal
|
(CNN) -- Hey, big spender. New Year's Eve is coming up fast, but there's still time to think about an unforgettable getaway to usher in 2012.
Maybe this is the year for the trip of a lifetime or perhaps you're looking to be somewhere out of the ordinary when the clock strikes midnight.
If so, here are six luxurious itineraries that require deep pockets, but will set the tone for an amazing New Year.
Can't make it this time around? Use the list as inspiration for New Year's Eves to come.
Secluded Hawaii
Celebrate in your own (almost) private paradise, far away from any crowd. It takes a 45-minute ferry ride from Maui to get to tiny Lana'i, a former pineapple plantation that has earned the nickname "Hawaii's Most Enticing Island."
You might not be able to rent the whole place for yourself, like Microsoft founder Bill Gates did for his wedding, but you can sip champagne at midnight at the Four Seasons Lana'i at Manele Bay resort.
"It would be a very exclusive, quiet New Year's celebration," said Janice Hough, an agent with All Horizons Travel in Los Altos, California.
"The service is incredible. It's very much a get-away-from-it-all trip, although you're still in the U.S."
Rooms start at about $775 a night. The resort is offering a New Year's Eve prix fixe dinner for $125 per person and will treat guests to a special fireworks show over Hulopo`e Bay.
Luminous Santa Fe
This adobe wonderland at the foot of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in New Mexico draws art lovers, foodies and outdoor enthusiasts all year round.
But Hough noted the destination is especially beautiful during the holidays with "farolitos" -- or lanterns -- placed along the Santa Fe Plaza and the city's art gallery district.
"It's very pretty and very easy to get to. ... You're also not that far from skiing," she said.
There are plenty of posh accommodations to ring in the New Year in style. Hough recommended staying at the Encantado for a "resorty, out-of-town experience" or the Rosewood Inn of the Anasazi in the heart of the city near the Plaza.
Rates for both start at several hundred dollars a night around New Year's Eve.
Mega-yacht in St. Barts
Join celebrities and billionaires who spend New Year's Eve partying aboard yachts moored in St. Barts' famed Gustavia Harbor.
Stars like Demi Moore, Beyonce and Salma Hayek have been spotted celebrating on the Caribbean island in recent years, taking in the fireworks at midnight and staying to get a suntan on New Year's Day.
Don't have your own ship? No worries.
SeaDream, which offers cruises on luxury "mega-yachts" that carry up to 112 passengers, is sending both of its ships to the picturesque harbor on the big night as part of itineraries that also take you to other parts of the Caribbean.
"You feel like you're on a yacht yourself rather than a big cruise ship," said Sue Bryant, a contributing editor for CruiseCritic.com, who has sailed on the SeaDream II. She praised the ship's "foodie" cuisine and attentive service.
"The first day we were sunbathing on deck, somebody tapped me on the shoulder and said, 'Ms. Bryant, may I polish your sun glasses?' I've never had anyone say that before."
The voyages start at about $5,000 per person.
Romantic Vienna
There is something magical about Vienna during the holidays, but the city on the Danube really goes all out for New Year's, with elegant galas and an imperial ball to mark the occasion.
For a classic experience, stay at the famous Hotel Sacher, located next to the Vienna State Opera. You can start your night there with a 6-course New Year's Eve gala dinner, which features dishes such as beef consommé with truffle-celery ravioli and turbot with lobster jelly.
For 364
|
[
"Where is there a romantic New Year's Eve package?",
"Where is an imperial ball?"
] |
[
"Vienna",
"Vienna"
] |
question: Where is there a romantic New Year's Eve package?, answer: Vienna | question: Where is an imperial ball?, answer: Vienna
|
(CNN) -- Hidden under a quaint resort 60 miles northeast of Fairbanks, Alaska, lies a treasure trove of potential energy that's free and available 24/7.
"Imagineer" Bernie Karl and his wife, Connie, own Chena Hot Springs Resort near Fairbanks, Alaska.
Alaskan entrepreneur Bernie Karl has pioneered modern technology to tap into one of Earth's oldest energy resources: hot water.
Karl, 56, likes to call himself an "imagineer."
Using imagination to fuel his engineering ambitions, this tenacious thinker and self-starter has figured out a way to generate electricity using water that's the temperature of a cup of coffee -- about 165 degrees Fahrenheit.
"There's more opportunity now than there has ever been in the history of man, but we have to reinvent ourselves," Karl said.
Karl was determined to reinvent the way he consumed energy after he and his wife, Connie, purchased the Chena Hot Springs Resort from the state of Alaska in 1998.
"After we purchased the hot spring, I couldn't believe it, the swimming pool and the hot spring were being heated by diesel fuel, 1,000 gallons every month!" Karl said.
To slash costs and to use resources that were right under his nose, Karl invented a portable geothermal power plant.
In a little more than three years, Karl and his wife have severed the facility's dependence on diesel fuel and have saved $625,000, he said.
Karl's partnered with the Department of Energy to fund half of a $1.4 million exploration project to find and characterize the geothermal resources at Chena Hot Springs.
"It's a model for what you can do," said Karl.
Karl developed his tenacity from growing up as the sixth child of 16 siblings on a farm outside of Peoria, Illinois.
He said his parents taught him hard work, how to recycle his clothes and shoes, and how to compost food and farm wastes.
In the late 1970s, Karl was active in gold mining in Alaska's Central District, and he established the state's largest recycling facility in 1984, he said.
Many of his ideas stem from finding alternative ways to use and reuse resources he already has at his fingertips.
After acquiring the 400-acre resort, Karl began trapping water from the underground hot springs, which produce enough power to heat the facility's greenhouses year-round.
Most recently, Karl has turned his invention into a separate business by contracting with Peppermill hotel and casino in Reno, Nevada, to build a similar system there.
His portable geothermal generator units cost from $350,000 to $375,000, each with the potential to generate enough power for 250 average American homes per year.
'Hot taps'
His energy-generating machine lies on a flatbed truck and can be hooked up to oil and gas wells or other heat-emitting sources to generate electricity.
Karl adds a branch connection to an oil or gas pipeline, and the process begins when he "hot taps" into waste water coming through the pipes.
The hot water enters the tubes of an evaporator encased in a common refrigerant found in many air conditioning systems.
As the hot water passes through the evaporator, it begins to boil the refrigerant in the casing surrounding the tubes. The heat given off by the boiling refrigerant then causes an attached turbine to spin, which jump-starts a generator, producing electrical power.
Next, cooling water enters from another source, recondensing the vapor refrigerant into a liquid.
A pump pushes the liquid refrigerant back to the evaporator, so the cycle can start again.
The difference in temperatures drives the entire "binary system." This setup works exactly the opposite of a refrigerator.
"Chena Hot Springs is home to the lowest-temperature geothermal resource to be used for commercial power production in the world," Karl said.
"Oil companies don't drill wells for water, but they have some 5,000 kilowatts of geothermal power at their disposal in unused oil wells. Let's pick the low-hanging fruit and use the wells
|
[
"What did one resort owner do?",
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"Where is the entrepreneur from?"
] |
[
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"geothermal generator",
"portable geothermal power plant.",
"$625,000,",
"Bernie Karl",
"$625,000,",
"Peoria, Illinois."
] |
question: What did one resort owner do?, answer: has figured out a way to generate electricity using water that's the temperature of a cup of coffee | question: What makes the electricity?, answer: geothermal generator | question: What did the owner invent?, answer: portable geothermal power plant. | question: How much money has the owner saved?, answer: $625,000, | question: Who makes electricity with water the temperature of a cup of coffee?, answer: Bernie Karl | question: How much did Alaskan entrepreneur save?, answer: $625,000, | question: Where is the entrepreneur from?, answer: Peoria, Illinois.
|
(CNN) -- High school athletic director Brian Bordainick felt like he'd been shot when he learned the crushing news about his "9th Ward Field of Dreams" project.
Coach Shyrone Carey, left, and athletic director Brian Bordainick are rebuilding a once-dominant football team.
Architects who had agreed to help the Katrina battered Carver High School in New Orleans, Louisiana, win an NFL grant to build a $2 million stadium were pulling out -- the weekend before a Monday deadline.
The firm apologized, Bordainick said, but it would not be able to provide a design proposal for the facility, which was critical to winning the $200,000 grant.
"I've never been shot, but I imagine it felt something similar to that," said Bordainick, recalling that day in December 2008.
To make matters worse, swarms of news media were gathering at the school to interview the 23-year-old boy wonder -- the self-described "youngest high school athletic director in Louisiana" -- who was leading an effort to bring Carver's athletic program back from near death.
"I sucked it up, did the story ... and when they left, I picked up the phone book and started calling architects in the city." Watch update on New Orleans' schools after Katrina »
In an amazing moment of serendipity and opportunity, an entrepreneur friend of Bordainick's happened to be at a party and cornered a partner in one of the city's top architectural firms. The friend called Bordainick and -- before handing the architect the phone -- told Bordainick: "You've got 30 seconds to give your best elevator spiel you've ever given."
The architect was Steve Dumez, design director for Eskew+Dumez+Ripple, who agreed to help, despite Bordainick's preposterous plea. Watch Bordainick tell his story
"The one-day turnaround came as a bit of a shock," Dumez said. "What was crazy about it was trying to pull together an entire design proposal -- and that's just something that doesn't happen in 24 hours." Usually such design proposals require as long as a month to complete.
"How could you not get sucked into such an amazing story?" asked Dumez's partner, Mark Ripple, a 30-year veteran New Orleans architect. "There really isn't a good outlet in the area where kids can develop skills and self-esteem and all the things that come with a healthy recreation program."
The next day, the firm organized a small army of construction companies, civil engineers and architects who offered their support. "We got the satellite images and the renderings done in 8 hours," Bordainick said.
The proposal worked. In March the school learned it had won the NFL grant.
Nike also has backed the project -- donating $100,000 and joining thousands of individuals who have offered $1.5 million in pledges, cash and services so far.
All this during one of the nation's worst-ever economies. Bordainick credits much of the fundraising success to a network of e-mailers who started with a Web site created by a Web-developer-turned-Carver teacher.
He crafted an e-mail touting his "passion for building character through sports," and "creating something from nothing" while working with "people crazy enough to believe that they have the power to create change."
"I made it a goal to just e-mail a couple hundred people a day," he said. "I was teaching and calling people during my lunch break, and trying to get other people to make calls during their lunch break, and e-mailing people and doing all these things to get the word out about what we're doing and what we're trying to accomplish."
The proposed stadium -- which would host football, track, soccer and lacrosse -- is just one facet of Carver's struggle to regain its former self four years after the ravages of Katrina. A perennial football powerhouse, the team re-formed after Bordainick arrived at Carter in 2007, his first year in the Teach for America program.
|
[
"What high school was hit hard by Katrina?",
"Who leads fundraising campaign?"
] |
[
"Carver",
"Brian Bordainick"
] |
question: What high school was hit hard by Katrina?, answer: Carver | question: Who leads fundraising campaign?, answer: Brian Bordainick
|
(CNN) -- High winds and heavy seas capsized a boat filled with African migrants heading for Europe off the coast of Libya Monday -- with more than 200 feared dead, the International Organization for Migration in Geneva, Switzerland, said Tuesday.
A group of 227 migrants sits on a fishing vessel in Malta last month after arriving from Somalia.
Jemini Pandya, IOM spokeswoman, said a boat carrying 250 people capsized north of the Libyan coast, with at least 20 confirmed dead and 23 rescued. Another boat with around 350 migrants was rescued.
She said the rescued migrants were taken to two centers in the Libyan city of Tripoli. They included Egyptians, Somalis, Ghanians, Nigerians, Tunisians, Eritreans, Algerians, and Moroccans.
There were also passengers from Asia -- Bangladeshis, Syrians, Indians, and Pakistanis, she said. She said there may be two other vessels in the Mediterranean carrying migrants.
The initial reports that two vessels capsized proved to be incorrect, Pandya said. Watch as migrants are feared drowned »
The vessels departed Sunday and were heading to southern Europe, Egypt's Middle East News Agency reported Monday.
The migrants were believed to be headed for the Italian island of Lampedusa, where 37,000 landed last year, according to IOM spokesman Jean-Philippe Chauzy, who said many African migrants converge on Libya en route to Europe.
Italian coast guards said an Italian tugboat working for an offshore oil companies in the Libyan seas picked up 350 people on Sunday and carried them to Libya with the help of the Italian military.
The U.N. refugee agency, aware of the reports, said they came at the "beginning of the smuggling season in the Mediterranean."
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said details remain sketchy about what happened, but one boat among several vessels leaving Libya for Italy went down and hundreds are reported missing. It said the mishap occurred near the Libyan coast. It said some Egyptian nationals were rescued and bodies were recovered and that those aboard included Africans from the northern and the sub-Saharan regions.
High Commissioner Antonio Guterres on Tuesday said that the tragedy reflects the desperation of people to escape poverty and persecution.
"This tragic incident illustrates, once again, the dangers faced by people caught in mixed irregular movements of migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean and elsewhere which every year cost thousands of lives," the U.N. agency said.
|
[
"what capsized in Libya?",
"Where were the migrants believed to be heading?",
"How many people were dead when boat capsized in Libya?",
"How many were rescued?",
"who were heading for Italian island of Lampedusa?",
"What amount of migrants were among the boat?",
"Where did the boat capsize?"
] |
[
"boat carrying 250 people",
"Europe",
"20 confirmed",
"23",
"African migrants",
"350",
"the coast of Libya"
] |
question: what capsized in Libya?, answer: boat carrying 250 people | question: Where were the migrants believed to be heading?, answer: Europe | question: How many people were dead when boat capsized in Libya?, answer: 20 confirmed | question: How many were rescued?, answer: 23 | question: who were heading for Italian island of Lampedusa?, answer: African migrants | question: What amount of migrants were among the boat?, answer: 350 | question: Where did the boat capsize?, answer: the coast of Libya
|
(CNN) -- Higher temperatures are bringing some relief to the Southeast and should remain in place despite stormy weather expected for the coming weekend, weather forecasters said Tuesday.
After the stretch of unusually cold weather that gripped the region, severe storms will affect the Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and most of Florida on Friday evening and Saturday, the National Weather Service said. Cold Arctic air will remain to the north.
In Atlanta, Georgia -- where ice from a snowfall last week remains on the ground in some places and weekend temperatures didn't climb out of the 20s -- forecasters predicted a daytime high of 37 degrees Tuesday after a high of 44 on Monday. A gradual warming is predicted through Friday, when the high could reach 58. But overnight lows aren't expected to edge above freezing until Friday night.
Several Florida cities have had early morning record lows in the past two days, the weather service said.
"Temperatures over the weekend and early Monday morning plunged to levels not seen in 20 years over south Florida in the wake of the arctic cold front which blasted through the region early Saturday," it said.
"Temperatures remained at or below 50 degrees for more than 48 consecutive hours, finally rising above 50 during the late morning to midday hours Monday. Although no records are kept of consecutive number of hours at or below 50 degrees, it is likely that this streak is among the longest on record."
Key West, which has weather records dating to 1873, recorded its second-lowest temperature of 42 degrees Monday at 4:55 a.m. Its record low was 41 degrees, set January 13, 1981, and January 12, 1886.
In northern Florida, Tuesday's high was expected to reach 54 degrees in the state capital, Tallahassee, and temperatures were forecast to increase during the week. Early morning readings Wednesday will be in the high 20s, the weather service said. That is far better than the low of 16 degrees in the city early Monday.
The cold weather has damaged Florida's citrus crops, which can't tolerate prolonged temperatures of 28 degrees or below. Florida produces three-quarters of the United States' orange crop.
Some groves in the northern part of the growing area suffered substantial frost damage Saturday night and Sunday morning, Andrew Meadows, spokesman for Florida Citrus Mutual, said Monday. It will take about five weeks to quantify the losses, he said.
But the frigid air was welcome to peach growers in central Texas.
According to Jamey Vogel, who owns Vogel Orchard in Stonewall, Texas, just east of Fredericksburg, "Peach trees need chilling hours, which are hours below 45 degrees, and we have been getting a lot of those this year."
"We absolutely welcome it," he told CNN affiliate KXAN in Austin. He said he has 9,500 peach trees in his 90-acre family orchard. The trees, which are dormant this time of year, need cold, wet weather to produce a crop.
Share your cold weather stories, photos
On the West Coast, a storm was rolling into the area between Seattle and San Francisco, with the brunt heading into Northern California, according to CNN meteorologist Rob Marciano.
Two to 3 inches of snow was possible in the Sierras, forecasters said.
|
[
"Between what towns is a storm rolling ?",
"What part of the country will see a temperature rise and storms this week?",
"What city in Georgia is warming predicted through friday",
"What will be the weather according to the forecasters ?",
"What is the predicted high for Tallahassee?",
"what area will see higher temperatures"
] |
[
"Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and most of Florida",
"Southeast",
"Atlanta,",
"A gradual warming is predicted through Friday,",
"54 degrees",
"Southeast"
] |
question: Between what towns is a storm rolling ?, answer: Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and most of Florida | question: What part of the country will see a temperature rise and storms this week?, answer: Southeast | question: What city in Georgia is warming predicted through friday, answer: Atlanta, | question: What will be the weather according to the forecasters ?, answer: A gradual warming is predicted through Friday, | question: What is the predicted high for Tallahassee?, answer: 54 degrees | question: what area will see higher temperatures, answer: Southeast
|
(CNN) -- Hillary Clinton's campaign has apologized for "inappropriate" language used by her husband in response to what it called an "outrageously unfair" article about the former president.
Bill and Hillary Clinton campaign in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on Monday.
The article, by Vanity Fair magazine's national editor Todd Purdum, suggested that Bill Clinton's personality had changed since his 2004 heart bypass surgery and said that there were reports of Clinton "seeing a lot of women on the road."
Purdum quoted four anonymous former Clinton aides saying that another of his former assistants had conducted "what one of these aides called an intervention" about the reports of philandering.
A writer for the Huffington Post, Mayhill Fowler, asked Clinton on Monday what he thought "about that hatchet job somebody did on you in Vanity Fair," according to a recording of the exchange posted on the Huffington Post's Web site. Listen to Clinton call the reporter a "scumbag" »
"[He's] sleazy," Clinton responded. "He's a really dishonest reporter."
Clinton said he had not read the article but that he was told that "there's five or six just blatant lies in there. But he's a real slimy guy." Watch Larry King panel debate Bill Clinton's response »
Calling Purdum a "scumbag," Clinton said "he's one of the guys that propagated all those lies about Whitewater for Kenneth Starr. He's just a dishonest guy -- can't help it."
Purdum "didn't use a single name, he didn't cite a single source in all those things he said," said the former president, who added that the article was "part of the national media's attempt to nail Hillary for [Barack] Obama."
He said readers should be wary of news accounts that rely on unnamed sources.
"Anytime you read a story that slimes a public figure with anonymous quotes, it ought to make the bells go off in your head," he said.
Late Monday, Jay Carson, a spokesman for Hillary Clinton's campaign, said that "President Clinton was understandably upset about an outrageously unfair article, but the language today was inappropriate and he wishes he had not used it."
Purdum, a former New York Times reporter who covered the Clinton White House and is now married to former Clinton press secretary Dee Dee Myers, defended his article on CNN's "The Situation Room" Monday.
He told CNN's Wolf Blitzer he was "very careful to say there is no clear-cut evidence that President Clinton has done anything improper." Watch CNN's Wolf Blitzer interview Purdum »
"I reject the notion that I'm making an insinuation," Purdum said. "But I'm very comfortable quoting the people I quote because I know who they are, and I know that they are very senior people who have known President Clinton for a very long time and work for him at very high levels."
In his article, Purdum quotes a Johns Hopkins cardiologist -- who was not involved in Clinton's health care -- who says that the former president's bypass surgery could have affected his mood, perhaps even causing depression.
And on CNN, Purdum quoted "some people who work for him" saying that Clinton "seems to be angry all the time."
Purdum added he himself believes there's evidence the former president is acting in a different manner.
"I think there's a good deal of evidence that he is quite a bit angrier than he used to be," he said. "He's clearly very angry at the media, and he's very angry at the way he sees Sen. Clinton's campaign has been treated."
"I don't suggest that anyone can say -- except perhaps his own doctors over time -- with certainty that [the surgery] has affected President Clinton," he said. "But again, this article involves reporting with a whole bunch of people who have worked for Bill Clinton over many years. And this is
|
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"what did clinton say",
"who was quoted",
"What did author Todd Purdum say?",
"What is Vanity Fair?",
"what did the spokesman say",
"What were anonymous Bill Clinton aides discussing?",
"What did Bill Clinton call the author of Vanity Fair?"
] |
[
"sleazy,\"",
"four anonymous former Clinton aides",
"suggested that Bill Clinton's personality had changed since his 2004 heart bypass surgery and said that there were reports of Clinton \"seeing a lot of women on the road.\"",
"magazine's",
"\"President Clinton was understandably upset about an outrageously unfair article, but the language today was inappropriate and he wishes he had not used it.\"",
"an intervention\" about the reports of philandering.",
"\"scumbag,\""
] |
question: what did clinton say, answer: sleazy," | question: who was quoted, answer: four anonymous former Clinton aides | question: What did author Todd Purdum say?, answer: suggested that Bill Clinton's personality had changed since his 2004 heart bypass surgery and said that there were reports of Clinton "seeing a lot of women on the road." | question: What is Vanity Fair?, answer: magazine's | question: what did the spokesman say, answer: "President Clinton was understandably upset about an outrageously unfair article, but the language today was inappropriate and he wishes he had not used it." | question: What were anonymous Bill Clinton aides discussing?, answer: an intervention" about the reports of philandering. | question: What did Bill Clinton call the author of Vanity Fair?, answer: "scumbag,"
|
(CNN) -- Hindered by painful stings and strong currents, endurance swimmer Diana Nyad ended her latest attempt to swim from Cuba to Florida about two-thirds of the way through the crossing Sunday.
The 62-year-old Nyad suffered jellyfish and Portuguese man-of-war stings Saturday, while ocean cross-currents were pushing her off course, team captain Mark Sollinger said. She was pulled out of the water about 11 a.m. Sunday, about 67 nautical miles through the 103-nautical-mile passage.
Treading water before being helped out of the water, Nyad said the man-of-war stings had paralyzed some of the muscles in her back, given her chills and nausea. Doctors warned her she could suffer long-term health problems if she suffered another sting.
"I've never been in any pain, ever, like that in my whole life," she said, adding, "Now it's set me so far back, I just don't' have the lung capacity to swim the way I can."
It was her third attempt to make the swim from Cuba to Florida. Her first, in 1978, was brought to an end by strong currents and bad weather after almost 42 hours in the water.
She made a second try in August, before she was pulled from the water after 60 miles and almost 29 hours of swimming. She blamed a shoulder injury she suffered early in the journey, and an 11-hour-long asthma attack.
Her latest attempt, accompanied by shark divers, began just after 6 p.m. Friday from Havana's Hemingway Marina. The former world champion swimmer projected the swim would take close to 60 hours.
There was a bit of excitement early Saturday afternoon as an oceanic whitetip shark swam near Nyad, but a diver on her team faced it off and it meandered away.
The swimmer improved her performance late Saturday morning after struggling to maintain her usual stroke rate, her support team said. Fortified by chicken soup, Nyad was making good progress until the Saturday evening incident.
Nyad got back in the water at 12:20 a.m. Sunday and swam for nearly 11 hours before packing it in.
"But for each of us, isn't life about determining your own finish line?" she said in a statement on her website. "This journey has always been about reaching your own other shore no matter what it is, and that dream continues."
CNN's Matt Sloane and Shasta Darlington contributed to this report.
|
[
"How many attempts had the swimmer tried?",
"how many attempts have been made by Nyad",
"What stung the swimmer?",
"What attempt was this?",
"What did Nyad say?",
"what did Jellyfish stings cut short"
] |
[
"third",
"third",
"jellyfish and Portuguese man-of-war",
"swim from Cuba to Florida",
"\"I've never been in any pain, ever, like that in my whole life,\"",
"attempt to swim from Cuba to Florida"
] |
question: How many attempts had the swimmer tried?, answer: third | question: how many attempts have been made by Nyad, answer: third | question: What stung the swimmer?, answer: jellyfish and Portuguese man-of-war | question: What attempt was this?, answer: swim from Cuba to Florida | question: What did Nyad say?, answer: "I've never been in any pain, ever, like that in my whole life," | question: what did Jellyfish stings cut short, answer: attempt to swim from Cuba to Florida
|
(CNN) -- His father and uncle fall to the ground, crying uncontrollably. After 11 years of not knowing, relief of finding a child they thought had been lost forever pours out of them.
Christian Norris is reunited with his uncle and grandmother in Beijing.
That child is Christian Norris -- he's 17 now and he stood there unmoved as his father and uncle wept; perhaps because to him both men are distant memories.
"I don't really remember my dad that much," Christian said quietly "I just remember my uncle, who raised me much of the time."
His low-key, almost stone-faced demeanor was in stark contrast to his father Jin Gaoke. "There are no words to describe the joy I felt when I saw him. He is like a piece of flesh from my own body."
His uncle Jin Xiaowang chimes in. "The hair on his arms makes him look American, he has lots of hair on his arms."
Christian set this day in motion three years ago when he asked his adopted mother Julia Norris to find his Chinese family; a search from Maryland in the United States, to a remote village in central China, which would eventually involve hundreds of China's savvy Internet users.
Despite her background as a federal and private investigator and her work on the TV show "America's Most Wanted," Julia's search kept proving fruitless.
Police and orphanage records were incomplete and Christian's memories were vague.
"The first obstacle was that I was focusing on the wrong province. He remembered being from Shanxi province ... and he remembered the name of (his) village as Dongjiagou, and so I searched and searched."
Both the village name and the province were wrong -- Julia was looking in the wrong place hundreds of miles to the east. Watch the emotional reunion »
Everything changed in April this year when she contacted lawyer Zhang Zhiwei, who works with volunteers in China, reuniting lost children with the parents.
"Based on Jiacheng's (Christian's) memories we did some analysis, like his eating habits," Zhang said. "He likes vinegar, which should be in northern China and close to Shanxi. He also likes garlic ... and from his memory his family grew potato and corn, which gave us a hint of the region he used to live."
But the search really took off after Zhang posted a blog.
"When I posted the story many Chinese netizens were also moved by the selfless love and actively participated, providing as much detail as possible, all hoping to fulfill her dream of finding her son's hometown," he said.
Through their Internet searches the netizens discovered that Christian's birth parents were doctors and tracked them down to a city called Longde in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region through a medical essay they had written.
But Christian's birth parents weren't who he remembered; for the first six years of his life he had been raised by his uncle Jin Xiaowang -- always thinking he was his father.
"My older brother wanted to have two children, an older one and a younger one. They broke the one-child policy. They were afraid it might affect their jobs (and) they brought him (Christian) to me once he was born," Jin said.
So Christian grew up in a poor village called Donggou. When he was 6 years old his uncle says he was sent away to school in the city to live with his birth parents, but was told they were a foster family. After just a few months, Christian wanted to return to the village, so his father put him on a bus, and that was the last his family saw of him.
Details are vague and records incomplete, but it could have been up to a year later when police found him hundreds of miles away from his home, then took him to a nearby orphanage in Luoyang, Henan Province. The orphanage and the place they found him were in the same city.
That's where he was adopted by
|
[
"When did the search really take off?",
"When did the search for the family really take off?",
"How long ago did Christian ask his adopted mother?",
"What is Christian's biological family's nationality?",
"What family tree did Christian ask for?",
"Were the policeand orphanage records complete?"
] |
[
"after Zhang posted a blog.",
"after Zhang posted a blog.",
"three years",
"Chinese",
"Chinese",
"incomplete"
] |
question: When did the search really take off?, answer: after Zhang posted a blog. | question: When did the search for the family really take off?, answer: after Zhang posted a blog. | question: How long ago did Christian ask his adopted mother?, answer: three years | question: What is Christian's biological family's nationality?, answer: Chinese | question: What family tree did Christian ask for?, answer: Chinese | question: Were the policeand orphanage records complete?, answer: incomplete
|
(CNN) -- His golf career might be in a seemingly downward spiral, but Tiger Woods is still the world's most valuable sportsman according to a top business magazine.
The American, who this week dropped out of the world's top 50 golfers for the first time in 15 years, has retained his position as Forbes' top individual sports brand.
The 36-year-old has, according to Forbes' calculations, lost $17 million from his brand worth in the past year. But his $55 million value is still $29 million higher than the second-placed athlete, tennis star Roger Federer.
Despite the scandal that broke in late 2009 about the marital infidelities that led to his divorce from wife Elin Nordegren, Woods has begun to restore his portfolio of endorsements with June's agreement with Japan's Kowa Company, which deals in medical equipment and pharmaceuticals.
Fellow golfer Phil Mickelson is ranked third with $24 million, while basketball star LeBron James is catching fast with $20 million.
The Miami Heat player earned half that total from his deal with Nike -- again Forbes' most valuable overall brand, up 40% to $15 billion after spreading its swoosh into even more world markets.
English football club Manchester United lost top spot in the team brands to baseball's New York Yankees.
While United suffered due to the British pound weakening against the dollar, with a worth of $269 million, the Yankees' value -- now $340 million -- has boomed 57% since 2007 according to Forbes' Mike Ozanian.
"Had the exchange rate held fast since 2007 the Red Devils, who are looking to capitalize on their global fan base with an IPO (public share offering), would still be the most valuable team brand," Ozanian said.
The NFL's showpiece Super Bowl, with a brand value of $425 million, stayed well clear of the Summer Olympics ($230 million) and the FIFA World Cup ($147 million).
|
[
"How much does he earn?",
"which golfer is ahead of federer",
"Which team toppled Manchester United as the best team brand?",
"What happened to Nike?",
"Who tops Forbes' most valuable brand list?",
"Which brand moved further ahead as the most valuable overall brand?",
"what brand is repersented?",
"Who is tiger woods?"
] |
[
"$55 million",
"Tiger Woods",
"New York Yankees.",
"The Miami Heat player earned half that total from his deal with",
"Tiger Woods",
"Nike",
"Forbes' top individual sports",
"the world's"
] |
question: How much does he earn?, answer: $55 million | question: which golfer is ahead of federer, answer: Tiger Woods | question: Which team toppled Manchester United as the best team brand?, answer: New York Yankees. | question: What happened to Nike?, answer: The Miami Heat player earned half that total from his deal with | question: Who tops Forbes' most valuable brand list?, answer: Tiger Woods | question: Which brand moved further ahead as the most valuable overall brand?, answer: Nike | question: what brand is repersented?, answer: Forbes' top individual sports | question: Who is tiger woods?, answer: the world's
|
(CNN) -- His shooting spree left at least 10 dead and millions terrified of bullets coming from an unseen sniper.
But Mildred Muhammad believes she was the ultimate target of her ex-husband, John Allan Muhammad, the man dubbed the "D.C. Sniper."
And for some time, Muhammad said she felt extreme guilt for the victims that were gunned down in grocery store parking lots and gas stations. The youngest was a 13-year-old boy who was shot while walking to his Maryland school.
Muhammad spoke about the guilt she felt after the killing spree on CNN's "Larry King Live" on Monday night, the day before her ex-husband was scheduled to be executed.
Muhammad said she has gradually gotten over her guilty feelings and focused on her three children.
"I felt that way initially because I had done everything I knew how to do to bring attention to how dangerous he was to me," Muhammad said. "I had no idea his anger would extend beyond me, to include all people in his killings."
John Muhammad, the mastermind behind the Washington-area sniper attacks of 2002, is scheduled to die by lethal injection Tuesday evening at a state prison near Jarratt, Virginia.
During two lengthy trials -- including one featuring testimony from young accomplice Lee Boyd Malvo -- and in several years of legal appeals, John Muhammad has continued to profess his innocence.
Prosecutors say John Muhammad intended the killings to provide a smokescreen to cover up his real goal -- killing his ex-wife Mildred and gaining custody of his three children.
Muhammad said she divorced John Muhammad because of abuse and has not visited him since he was in prison.
"I feel that all of my efforts, all of my energy is to help my children through this emotional turmoil that they are going through," said Muhammad. "I don't have an emotional attachment to John."
John Muhammad's other ex-wife, Carol Williams, also talked to King Monday.
Williams, John Muhammad's first wife, said she plans to visit him in prison with their son Tuesday before the execution.
Williams also brought letters that John Muhammad wrote her from prison.
"Carol, I have missed my family for the past eight years. I don't want to be missed the day that these devils murder my innocent black (expletive)," John Muhammad wrote in one of the letters.
Williams said she was not surprised that John Muhammad still believed he was innocent.
"I'm praying for myself, for my son, and also for the families of the victims," Williams said.
|
[
"How many deaths in 2002?",
"Who believes she was ultimate target of sniper spree?",
"who felt guilt about victims that were gunned down?",
"who has maintained innocence in the deaths of at least 10 people in 2002?",
"Who felt extreme guilt for victims that were gunned down?",
"What does John Muhammad's second ex-wife believe?"
] |
[
"10 dead",
"Mildred Muhammad",
"Mildred Muhammad",
"John Muhammad",
"Mildred Muhammad",
"she was the ultimate target"
] |
question: How many deaths in 2002?, answer: 10 dead | question: Who believes she was ultimate target of sniper spree?, answer: Mildred Muhammad | question: who felt guilt about victims that were gunned down?, answer: Mildred Muhammad | question: who has maintained innocence in the deaths of at least 10 people in 2002?, answer: John Muhammad | question: Who felt extreme guilt for victims that were gunned down?, answer: Mildred Muhammad | question: What does John Muhammad's second ex-wife believe?, answer: she was the ultimate target
|
(CNN) -- Hispanics are described as the largest minority group in the United States, as a burgeoning force in the electorate and as an untapped frontier of the business market. Yet these descriptions belie the complexity of the 44 million people to whom they refer.
Susana Clar, with daughters Vanessa (left) and Virna (center), says the labels "Hispanic" and "Latino" are limiting.
Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions, some observers say.
"We are mixed and we are many things," said Phillip Rodriguez, a documentary filmmaker. Many of his films, such as "Los Angeles Now" and "Brown is the New Green: George Lopez and the American Dream," explore the experience and identity of Latinos in the United States.
Latinos "very often don't share language, don't share class circumstances, don't share education; it's very difficult to speak about them as one thing," he said.
From a census standpoint, being of Hispanic or Latino origin means a person identifies himself in one of four listed categories: Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban or "other Spanish, Hispanic or Latino" origin. In the latter more open-ended category, respondents can write in specific origins, such as Salvadoran, Argentinean or Dominican.
According to a Pew Hispanic Center/Kaiser Family Foundation survey in 2002, that is how most Latinos choose to identify themselves. When asked which terms they would use first to describe themselves, 54 percent said they primarily identify themselves in terms of their or their parents' country of origin. About one quarter choose "Latino" or "Hispanic," and 21 percent chose "American." But the broader terms -- Latino, Hispanic -- are the ones tossed about when the media want to discuss a "trend among Latinos," or when a politician appeals to the "Hispanic vote."
The U.S. government came up with the term "Hispanic" in the 1970s to generally refer to people who could trace their origin to Spanish-speaking countries. The term "Latino" refers to origins from Latin America, which includes non-Spanish speaking countries like Brazil. The terms are often used interchangeably, which is a point of some contention in the wider community.
But do the terms carry meaning among the people to whom they refer, or are they merely governmental designations?
"That's the way you call our people," Susana Clar, 52, said of the terms. She and her family emigrated from Uruguay nearly two decades ago, and she works as a vice president in her daughter, Vanessa Di Palma's, Salt Lake City, Utah-based communications firm.
"Either you are Latino [or] Hispanic. I'm fine with that, but I think that we are so much more than that," Clar said.
Manuel Baez, 49, a native of the Dominican Republic who owns an insurance agency in Tampa, Florida, laughingly answered the question of how he identifies himself.
"Manuel or Manny," he said, adding, "We're being put together in this package and that's too hard," he said, stressing that he didn't like labels. He continued, "Dominican-American really represents who I am, instead of Dominican or Latino."
He never uses Hispanic to identify himself because "I am mixed," Baez said. "Hispanic doesn't go with me because I don't believe that Spain was the best thing for Latin America."
"For me...there is no such thing as a Latino identity," said Suzanne Oboler, professor of Puerto Rican and Latino studies at John Jay College at the City University of New York.
"There's certainly a cultural understanding... [And] a political identity," she said, noting that the many different groups will join on particular issues such as immigration and wages.
But she stressed that it was not a
|
[
"What do some observers say?",
"What are some of the national origins and languages?",
"what does the community include",
"what is the total of hispanics in the us",
"what is the population of hispanic origins un usa",
"what did the observes say",
"What number of people of Hispanic origin are there in the U.S.?",
"what community includes"
] |
[
"Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions,",
"Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban",
"Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed",
"44 million",
"44 million",
"Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions,",
"44 million",
"The term \"Latino\""
] |
question: What do some observers say?, answer: Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions, | question: What are some of the national origins and languages?, answer: Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban | question: what does the community include, answer: Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed | question: what is the total of hispanics in the us, answer: 44 million | question: what is the population of hispanic origins un usa, answer: 44 million | question: what did the observes say, answer: Even the terms used to name them -- Hispanics, Hispanic-Americans, Latinos, Latino-Americans, the Spanish-surnamed -- too tightly package the people categorized by those definitions, | question: What number of people of Hispanic origin are there in the U.S.?, answer: 44 million | question: what community includes, answer: The term "Latino"
|
(CNN) -- Historical tensions and overreaction on the part of both Russia and Georgia contributed to a five-day conflict between the two in 2008, a European Union fact-finding mission concluded in a report released Wednesday.
South Ossetian mourners at the grave of a relative killed in the conflict on the first anniversary in August 2009.
"The conflict is rooted in a profusion of causes comprising different layers in time and actions combined," said the report from the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Conflict in Georgia.
"While it is possible to identify the authorship of some important events and decisions marking its course, there is no way to assign overall responsibility for the conflict to one side alone. They have all failed, and it should be their responsibility to make good for it."
Georgia launched a campaign against South Ossetia, a Russian-backed separatist Georgian territory, on August 7, 2008. The following day, Russian tanks, troops and armored vehicles poured into South Ossetia and another Russian-backed breakaway Georgian territory, Abkhazia, advancing into Georgian cities outside the rebel regions.
A total of about 850 people were killed on all sides, the report said, and untold numbers of others were wounded or went missing. About 100,000 civilians fled their homes, and about 35,000 have been unable to return.
"The fighting did not end the political conflict, nor were any of the issues that lay beneath it resolved," the report said. "Tensions still continue. The political situation after the end of fighting turned out to be no easier and in some respects even more difficult than before."
Russia and Georgia each blamed the other for starting the conflict, and accused each other of a variety of offenses leading up to and during the fighting, including ethnic cleansing. Moscow has since recognized South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent regions. But relations between Georgia and Russia are at an "all-time low," the report notes.
After five days of fighting, a peace deal was brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, acting on behalf of the EU. An implementation effort followed on September 8. The report noted that the actions "stood in contrast to the failure of the international community, including the U.N. Security Council, to act swiftly and resolutely enough in order to control the ever-mounting tensions prior (to) the outbreak of armed conflict."
Georgian armed forces shelled the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali the night of August 7. While that action was seen as the start of the armed conflict, "it was only the culminating point of a long period of increasing tensions, provocations and incidents," the fact-finding report said. "Indeed, the conflict has deep roots in the history of the region, in peoples' national traditions and aspirations as well as in age-old perceptions or rather misperceptions of each other, which were never mended and sometimes exploited."
Any evaluation of the conflict should take that into account, along with mounting tensions in the months and weeks leading up to it, the report said, as well as "years of provocations, mutual accusations, military and political threats and acts of violence both inside and outside the conflict zone.
"It has to consider, too, the impact of a great power's coercive politics and diplomacy against a small and insubordinate neighbor, together with the small neighbour's penchant for overplaying its hand and acting in the heat of the moment without careful consideration of the final outcome, not to mention its fear that it might permanently lose important parts of its territory through creeping annexation," the report said.
The fact-finding mission was established in December by the EU to investigate the conflict. It was headed by Heidi Tagliavini, a former United Nations special representative for Georgia.
The EU said in a statement it welcomed the report and hopes its findings can contribute to future international efforts at "preventive diplomacy."
|
[
"Who is responsible for the conflict?",
"How many fled?",
"Who did Russia blame?",
"how many days for conflict",
"How many were killed?",
"How many were kiled in the five-day conflict?",
"How many civilians fled their homes?",
"how many civilians"
] |
[
"Russia",
"100,000",
"Georgia",
"five",
"about 850 people",
"850 people",
"100,000",
"100,000"
] |
question: Who is responsible for the conflict?, answer: Russia | question: How many fled?, answer: 100,000 | question: Who did Russia blame?, answer: Georgia | question: how many days for conflict, answer: five | question: How many were killed?, answer: about 850 people | question: How many were kiled in the five-day conflict?, answer: 850 people | question: How many civilians fled their homes?, answer: 100,000 | question: how many civilians, answer: 100,000
|
(CNN) -- Hoboken, New Jersey, Mayor Peter Cammarano III -- one of dozens of politicians and rabbis arrested last week in a corruption scandal -- has resigned, the city attorney said Friday.
Hoboken, New Jersey, Mayor Peter Cammarano III is accused of taking thousands of dollars in bribes.
Steve Kleinman said City Council President Dawn Zimmer will be sworn in immediately as acting mayor. He said Cammarano's letter of resignation, delivered to the city clerk at 9:15 a.m., said his resignation would be effective at noon Friday.
The Democratic Hoboken mayor was one of 44 people arrested in last week's federal corruption probe.
In his letter to the city clerk, Cammarano, 32, denied all criminal wrongdoing, but said the charges have disrupted the city government and his ability to perform mayoral duties.
"It had been my hope and expectation that I could remain in office and perform my official duties until I had the opportunity to resolve the legal charges against me in court," he wrote.
"Regrettably, it has turned out that the controversy surrounding the charges against me has become a distraction to me and an impediment to functioning of Hoboken government."
He apologized to Hoboken residents for the "disruption and disappointment" the case has caused, but said, "I am innocent of any criminal charges and I intend to fight the allegations against me."
Authorities said that 29 public officials and associates took hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes, and that 15 people -- including five rabbis -- engaged in money laundering. Read about some linked to investigation »
One of the federal complaints alleges that Cammarano took about $25,000 in bribes from a government witness posing as a real estate developer.
Dennis Elwell, 64, the Democratic mayor of Secaucus, in northern New Jersey, resigned Tuesday after being charged with accepting $10,000 from a confidential informant.
Elwell's attorney, Thomas Cammarata, said the mayor had decided that resigning was in the best interest of his family and the people of Secaucus, but was not an admission of guilt.
"Dennis pleaded not guilty to the charges, is presumed innocent and will vigorously defend the unproven allegations made against him," the attorney said.
Other city leaders arrested include Anthony Suarez, 42, the Democratic mayor of Ridgefield, New Jersey, and Leona Beldini, 74, the Democratic deputy mayor of Jersey City, prosecutors said.
Earlier this week, Democrats L. Harvey Smith and Daniel Van Pelt -- two members of the New Jersey State Assembly who were among the officials arrested in the probe -- were stripped of their legislative pay and benefits, Assembly Speaker Joseph J. Roberts Jr. announced.
When the arrests were announced July 23, prosecutors said investigators had searched about 20 locations in New Jersey and New York to recover "large sums of cash and other evidence of criminal conduct," and executed 28 seizure warrants against bank accounts that they believe were involved in laundering money.
|
[
"What was Peter Cammarano III arrested for?",
"What is Cammarano accused of?",
"Who's Mayor stepped down in the wake of a scandal?",
"How many were arrested?",
"What was Mayor Peter Cammarano accused of?",
"How many were arrested in the corruption probe?"
] |
[
"taking thousands of dollars in bribes.",
"taking thousands of dollars in bribes.",
"New Jersey,",
"44 people",
"taking thousands of dollars in bribes.",
"44 people"
] |
question: What was Peter Cammarano III arrested for?, answer: taking thousands of dollars in bribes. | question: What is Cammarano accused of?, answer: taking thousands of dollars in bribes. | question: Who's Mayor stepped down in the wake of a scandal?, answer: New Jersey, | question: How many were arrested?, answer: 44 people | question: What was Mayor Peter Cammarano accused of?, answer: taking thousands of dollars in bribes. | question: How many were arrested in the corruption probe?, answer: 44 people
|
(CNN) -- Hold on to the audacity of hope but shun the arrogance of over-promising.
A scholar says President Obama could learn from Lyndon Johnson's Great Society mistakes.
That's the message from a scholar who says President Obama can learn much from the success and mistakes of another ambitious attempt to remake America.
Robert Weisbrot, co-author of "The Liberal Hour: Washington and the Politics of Change in the 1960s,'' says the Great Society revolution was "tremendously liberating" for members of the most vulnerable groups in America.
The Great Society was President Lyndon Johnson's sprawling legislative attempts in the mid-1960s to lift Americans out of poverty, erase racial injustice and clean up the environment.
But historical circumstances won't permit Obama to push through his own Great Society, Weisbrot says.
"Obama is living in a different age," Weisbrot said. "The circumstances won't permit him to be another Lyndon Johnson."
Obama came to office with the nation's economic institutions verging on collapse. He also has to contend with bitter partisanship and a public that's suspicious of big government programs.
"Obama needs to not only learn lessons from the Great Society but keep in mind the limits of what he can draw from a fundamentally different age," Weisbrot said.
Americans were ready for the Great Society when Johnson became president, he says.
The country was enjoying a post-World War II economic boom. The Republican and Democratic parties worked together because both had a significant number of moderates. And people had more faith in the federal government, which had led the nation out of the Great Depression and World War II and helped rebuild the European economy, Weisbrot says.
"For many Americans, the federal government could achieve anything for which there was a national mandate," Weisbrot said.
Yet that same optimism helped stain the Great Society's legacy, Weisbrot says.
He says Johnson framed the Great Society as a war to defeat poverty and racial injustice. He over-promised, particularly when the Vietnam War began to drain away resources for the Great Society.
"Lyndon Johnson dealt in hyperbole," Weisbrot said. "It works well in getting legislation through Congress, but it sets the nation up for disillusionment when the promised Utopia didn't materialize."
|
[
"when was the great society",
"What did a scholar say circumstances would not allow?",
"What won't allow another Greaty Society?",
"Which president's mistakes does a scholar believe Obama could learn from?",
"Who over-promised?",
"what were johnsons mistakes",
"What could Obama learn from?"
] |
[
"mid-1960s",
"won't permit him to be another Lyndon Johnson.\"",
"historical circumstances",
"Lyndon Johnson's",
"\"Lyndon Johnson",
"Great Society",
"Lyndon Johnson's Great Society mistakes."
] |
question: when was the great society, answer: mid-1960s | question: What did a scholar say circumstances would not allow?, answer: won't permit him to be another Lyndon Johnson." | question: What won't allow another Greaty Society?, answer: historical circumstances | question: Which president's mistakes does a scholar believe Obama could learn from?, answer: Lyndon Johnson's | question: Who over-promised?, answer: "Lyndon Johnson | question: what were johnsons mistakes, answer: Great Society | question: What could Obama learn from?, answer: Lyndon Johnson's Great Society mistakes.
|
(CNN) -- Holders Barcelona made hard work of beating Czech minnows Viktoria Plzen 2-0 in their Champions League Group H clash Wednesday but need just one win to reach the knockout stages.
The Catalan giants were near their fluent best in the Nou Camp but wasted a string of chances after midfielder Andres Iniesta put them ahead early after being set up by Lionel Messi.
Argentine goal machine Messi hit the woodwork twice before David Villa made the game safe with a second eight minutes from time.
It left Barcelona unbeaten in the group, but they trail AC Milan on head-to-head record as the Italians beat BATE Borisov 2-0 in the San Siro.
Both the big guns have seven points with their return clash in the San Siro on November 23 set to decide who goes through as winners of the group.
Goals from Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Kevin Prince Boateng ensured an easy night's work for the Rossoneri, but their coach Massimiliano Allegri is already looking ahead to playing Barcelona again after holding them to a draw in the Nou Camp.
"It was an important win tonight to help with qualification, we still need points but our aim is to be playing Barcelona for first place, that would be an important result for the subsequent draw," he told SkySport of Italy.
In Group G, Cypriots APOEL Nicosia held Portugal giants Porto to a 1-1 draw and top a tight section with five points.
Brazilian star Hulk put the home side ahead as he lashed home an early free kick, but six minutes later the visitors were level.
Hulk's fellow Brazilian Ailton found space and produced a 25 meter shot that Helton in the Porto goal could not cover.
Zenit St Petersburg are second in the group, a point behind, after coming from behind twice to draw 2-2 at Ukraine's Shakhtar Donetsk.
Brazilians Willian and Luiz Adriano scored for Shakhtar, while Roman Shirokov and Viktor Faizulin leveled for the Russians.
|
[
"Who did Barcelona beat in the Nou Camp?",
"Who did Barcelona win against?",
"What score did AC Milan win with?",
"Who head Group H?",
"Who heads Group H?",
"Who did Nicosia hold?",
"Who won over Viktoria Pisen?"
] |
[
"Czech minnows Viktoria Plzen",
"Viktoria Plzen",
"2-0",
"Barcelona",
"Barcelona",
"Portugal giants Porto to a 1-1 draw and top a tight section with five points.",
"Barcelona"
] |
question: Who did Barcelona beat in the Nou Camp?, answer: Czech minnows Viktoria Plzen | question: Who did Barcelona win against?, answer: Viktoria Plzen | question: What score did AC Milan win with?, answer: 2-0 | question: Who head Group H?, answer: Barcelona | question: Who heads Group H?, answer: Barcelona | question: Who did Nicosia hold?, answer: Portugal giants Porto to a 1-1 draw and top a tight section with five points. | question: Who won over Viktoria Pisen?, answer: Barcelona
|
(CNN) -- Holly Hunter doesn't take roles based on what she thinks viewers want to see.
Holly Hunter plays a tough detective grappling with issues of faith in TNT's "Saving Grace."
"I have, frankly, very few expectations when it comes to audience," the acclaimed actress said. "I've done features, I've done stage and I've done television movies."
"I'm used to having the experience of perhaps missing an audience where your feature, for some reason or another, may not have a large audience, while some of my features have found large audiences, so I am used to both. My expectations are adaptable and they are low."
Hunter need not worry, because she has a hit on her hands with TNT's "Saving Grace," which is soon to debut its third season.
The television drama follows the decidedly messy life of Oklahoma City Police Detective Grace Hanadarko, who lives and works hard while being shadowed by a no-nonsense angel.
The premise may sound unusual, but it is just that originality that attracted Hunter, an Academy Award winner whose eclectic career has included projects as varied as the films "Raising Arizona," "Broadcast News" and the animated "The Incredibles." See the significant roles Hunter has played »
The actress said she continues to be attracted to playing Hanadarko because it allows her to explore emotions and attitudes that a lot of roles these days simply aren't offering.
"She wants to have conversations about sex, she wants to have conversations about faith," Hunter said. "She is very comfortable with the darkness in herself and with the darkness in others and I want to talk about that. There are not a lot of opportunities to have that conversation in features."
It isn't surprising that Hunter was able to find such a rich, creative playground at TNT.
The network (which is owned by the parent company of CNN) has carved a niche for itself as a destination for critically acclaimed and popular dramas.
That reputation has been strengthened by the popularity of shows like Hunter's as well as the program many credit with raising TNT's game, "The Closer."
That show's fifth season kick's off the network's summer schedule on June 8. Star Kyra Sedgwick said Deputy Police Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson is in for some changes now that she's married -- though she will maintain the edge that fans have come to love.
"I think the character continues to be great at her job and struggles in her personal life and issues surrounding the possibility of having children come up," said Sedgwick. "I think it's hard for someone who sees a lot of darkness in the world and deals with the darkest part of humanity to believe in the benevolence of the universe and the safety of a world to bring kids into."
Like Hunter, Sedgwick said she loves playing such a strong character.
That esteem, and flexibility of working on a cable series, which demands less of a time commitment than a network show, has made it easier to be on an opposite coast from her husband, Kevin Bacon, and their children, Sedgwick said.
"I was very clear on not wanting to give up any other part of my career," said Sedgwick, who this season also serves as the show's executive producer. "By doing the show, I think it has opened up more in the way of feature films for me."
Mark-Paul Gosselaar couldn't agree with Sedgwick more. His series, "Raising the Bar," will be back on TNT for a second season and the actor said he appreciates being part of a network that values drama.
His role as public defender Jerry Kellerman in the courtroom drama is a continuation of the actor's long-time collaborative relationship with Emmy-winning producer Steven Bochco.
"I've been fortunate enough, for close to the last decade, to work with one of the most prolific producers in this genre," said Gosselaar, who also had roles
|
[
"Who stars in the shows on TV this summer?",
"What show enters into the fifth season?",
"When do these shows air?",
"Who is teh actor fo Saving Grace?",
"What network broadcasts The Closer?",
"What show does Mark-Paul Gosselaar play in?",
"Who is the star of Saving Grace?"
] |
[
"Holly Hunter",
"\"The Closer.\"",
"June 8.",
"Holly Hunter",
"TNT's",
"\"Saving Grace.\"",
"Holly Hunter"
] |
question: Who stars in the shows on TV this summer?, answer: Holly Hunter | question: What show enters into the fifth season?, answer: "The Closer." | question: When do these shows air?, answer: June 8. | question: Who is teh actor fo Saving Grace?, answer: Holly Hunter | question: What network broadcasts The Closer?, answer: TNT's | question: What show does Mark-Paul Gosselaar play in?, answer: "Saving Grace." | question: Who is the star of Saving Grace?, answer: Holly Hunter
|
(CNN) -- Hollywood actor Johnny Depp is arguably best-known for his role as maverick captain Jack Sparrow in the wildly popular "Pirates of the Caribbean" franchise.
Now, he has taken things a step further with his own pirate-inspired ship in the Caribbean.
It may not be as creepy as the "Pirates of the Caribbean's" "Black Pearl," but Depp's ship "Vajoliroja" has more than a hint of the swashbuckler about it.
Depp has completely refitted the ship to his taste, with velvet wall hangings and furniture in rich burgundies and gold.
Wannabe pirates can test their sea legs on Depp's yacht, which is available for charter, although it's not cheap. One week aboard the ship, which hosts up to 11 guests and eight crew, costs a cool $130,000.
But help is on hand to distract visiting landlubbers from the dent in their booty: "Vajoliroja" boasts all the latest gadgets, including two speed boats, kayaks, wind surfs, water skis, wakeboards and more.
|
[
"What is Johnny Depp's yacht called?",
"What can wannabe swashbucklers do for $130,000 a week?",
"What is Vajoliroja?",
"For how much money a week can the boat be charted?",
"What did Depp do the ship in 2008?",
"With what did Depp completely refit the ship?",
"How much does the boat cost to charter?",
"What is Johnny Depp's pirate-themed yacht?"
] |
[
"\"Vajoliroja\"",
"test their sea legs",
"Depp's ship",
"$130,000.",
"completely refitted the",
"velvet wall hangings and furniture in rich burgundies and gold.",
"$130,000.",
"\"Vajoliroja\""
] |
question: What is Johnny Depp's yacht called?, answer: "Vajoliroja" | question: What can wannabe swashbucklers do for $130,000 a week?, answer: test their sea legs | question: What is Vajoliroja?, answer: Depp's ship | question: For how much money a week can the boat be charted?, answer: $130,000. | question: What did Depp do the ship in 2008?, answer: completely refitted the | question: With what did Depp completely refit the ship?, answer: velvet wall hangings and furniture in rich burgundies and gold. | question: How much does the boat cost to charter?, answer: $130,000. | question: What is Johnny Depp's pirate-themed yacht?, answer: "Vajoliroja"
|
(CNN) -- Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano unveiled a $700 million plan on Tuesday to help Mexico fight violent drug cartels, which includes a U.S. crackdown on the flow of weapons and money into Mexico.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says the DHS plan will address demand and border security.
The move sets the stage for visits to Mexico by three administration Cabinet members, starting tomorrow with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in an effort to stem drug-related violence and prevent it from spilling into the United States.
CNN's Kyra Phillips spoke with Napolitano on Tuesday about the United States' involvement in the Mexican government's war against drug cartels and the United States' stake in the conflict.
Kyra Phillips: Well, I want to get right to it because we'll never be able to defeat the drug lords until our own demand for drugs here in the U.S. is curbed. I mean, it is our consumption in the U.S. that fuels the drug lord production. So, what are you going to do to decrease that demand?
Janet Napolitano: Well, the whole package we announced today is not only about enforcement and stopping the flow of drugs into the United States and helping Mexico against these very brutal cartels, but it includes money for more drug courts and reduction in demand. So, we look forward to working on the demand side as well as the supply side, but I'll tell you, where the Department of Homeland Security is concerned, it's all about border safety and security and making sure that spillover violence does not erupt in our own country.
Phillips: We're talking about more than 200 cities, cities that we'd never think of, like Sheboygan, Wisconsin, and Sioux Falls [South Dakota]. I mean, what about the people right now that are dealing with sexual abuse, murder, house invasions, kidnapping?
Napolitano: That's right. What is happening, for those who don't live on the border, is that there are some large drug cartels. They're old. They've been in Mexico for a long time, but they've gotten larger and more powerful. The president of Mexico has said, enough. And he is really going after those cartels.
We've been clamping down on the land border, so the cartels simultaneously are fighting each other over ever-diminishing turf and they're fighting the federal government of Mexico. And that's what's caused 6,000 homicides in Mexico -- northern Mexico last year -- 550 of which were law enforcement or public officials who were assassinated by the cartels.
But the cartels got so big and powerful because they were bringing tonnage loads of cocaine and other illegal drugs into our country, and their organizations ultimately went to supply those who are using illegal drugs in places like Sheboygan and places -- other places where you wouldn't think of having any connection with these big cartels. Their fingers were everywhere. We want to shut those cartels down.
Phillips: Well, there are a lot of leaders here in the United States that say it's been -- we've helped those cartels. We've actually helped fuel the problem. And if you look at [Sen.] Dick Durbin [D-Illinois], chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs, he said the drugs are coming north, and we're sending money and guns south. And as a result, these cartels have gained extraordinary power. And he also added, about 90 percent of guns seized in Mexican raids are traced back to the United States, About 2,000 firearms cross the border into Mexico daily.
Napolitano: Well, it's a significant number of the guns used in this wave of violence in northern Mexico absolutely come from the United States. That's why part of our plan is increasing the number of agents who are going to inspect southbound vehicles. That's why we're sending technology to the border that will allow us to scan or do noninvasive X-rays to see whether cars are carrying assault weapons, other kinds of weapons that are now flowing into Mexico to fuel these drug cartels. And to find these huge truckloads,
|
[
"What are agents inspecting vehicles for?",
"What will the agents inspect southbound vehicles for?",
"Who said the plan includes money for programs?",
"What did the agents do?",
"What did the Homeland Security chief say?",
"What is the strategy aimed at preventing?"
] |
[
"assault weapons, other kinds of weapons",
"weapons and money",
"Janet Napolitano:",
"inspect southbound vehicles.",
"the DHS plan will address demand and border",
"the flow of weapons and money into Mexico."
] |
question: What are agents inspecting vehicles for?, answer: assault weapons, other kinds of weapons | question: What will the agents inspect southbound vehicles for?, answer: weapons and money | question: Who said the plan includes money for programs?, answer: Janet Napolitano: | question: What did the agents do?, answer: inspect southbound vehicles. | question: What did the Homeland Security chief say?, answer: the DHS plan will address demand and border | question: What is the strategy aimed at preventing?, answer: the flow of weapons and money into Mexico.
|
(CNN) -- Honda has expanded an airbag recall worldwide, covering 2001 and 2002 Accord, Civic, Odyssey, CR-V, and selected 2002 Acura TL vehicles, the automaker said.
The recall also includes the Honda Pilot and Acura CL in the United States, and the Honda Inspire, Saber and Lagreat in Japan for the same model years.
On its Web site late Tuesday, Honda said the driver's airbag inflators might expand with too much pressure, which can cause the inflator casing to break and could lead to injury or death.
There have been 12 incidents related to an airbag inflator problem, Honda said.
The original recall was issued in July 2009, and included 2001 and 2002 Accords and Civics, as well as some 2002 model year Acura TL vehicles.
The global recall now covers more than 950,000 vehicles.
Honda said it will notify affected customers by mail and phone with instructions on how to have their vehicles inspected and updated at an authorized dealer.
Last month, Honda announced a separate recall of 646,000 2007 and 2008 Fit, City and Jazz models worldwide, after a fire hazard involving a power window switch resulted in a death in South Africa.
|
[
"how many vehicles?",
"what recall is it?",
"what company called the recall?",
"what did honda do last month",
"Honda announced a separate recall of 646,000 for what?",
"How many vehicles recalled for power window problems?",
"Honda has expanded an airbag recall worldwide to more than how many vehicles?",
"how many vehicles does it cover"
] |
[
"950,000",
"airbag",
"Honda",
"expanded an airbag recall",
"2007 and 2008 Fit, City and Jazz models",
"950,000",
"950,000",
"950,000"
] |
question: how many vehicles?, answer: 950,000 | question: what recall is it?, answer: airbag | question: what company called the recall?, answer: Honda | question: what did honda do last month, answer: expanded an airbag recall | question: Honda announced a separate recall of 646,000 for what?, answer: 2007 and 2008 Fit, City and Jazz models | question: How many vehicles recalled for power window problems?, answer: 950,000 | question: Honda has expanded an airbag recall worldwide to more than how many vehicles?, answer: 950,000 | question: how many vehicles does it cover, answer: 950,000
|
(CNN) -- Hondurans divided over an ongoing political crisis agree on one thing -- they don't think very highly of their leaders, according to a new survey.
Almost half of Hondurans polled -- 48 percent -- said they disapproved of the job President Jose Manuel Zelaya was doing before he was ousted in a coup on June 28, said the 2009 Latinobarometro survey.
The man who assumed power after the coup, de facto President Roberto Micheletti, received a disapproval rating of 65 percent for how he has handled the crisis, according to the survey.
The annual Latinobarometro survey, named after the Chile-based non-profit company of the same name, is among the most highly regarded polls in the region. This year, the poll asked a number of questions that shed light on how Hondurans and other Latin Americans viewed the political crisis in Honduras.
A new Honduran president, Pepe Lobo Sosa, was elected last month, though the international community is split on whether to recognize him because the vote took place under the rule of the de facto government.
An agreement between negotiators for Zelaya and Micheletti had been reached earlier, but lost much credibility when its implementation didn't go as planned. Zelaya, who remains holed up inside the Brazilian embassy in the Honduran capital ever since covertly sneaking back into his country in September, has called the plan dead.
Several attempts to find a resolution failed, despite strong international criticism of the coup.
"It can be said that the force of rejection of all the international organizations, which were raised in a singular voice against the coup and in favor of the restitution of the constitutionally elected president, were ineffective against the local political forces that had expelled Zelaya in an ignominious manner," the survey said.
The political crisis stemmed from Zelaya's desire to hold a referendum that could have changed the constitution to allow longer terms for the president.
The country's congress had outlawed the vote, and the supreme court had ruled it illegal.
Micheletti and his supporters say Zelaya's removal was a constitutional transfer of power and not a coup.
According to Latinobarometro, 58 percent of Hondurans disapproved of the coup, while another 28 percent said they approved of Zelaya's ouster.
Those more heavily in favor of the coup included those with a higher education and the elderly, the survey found.
Of those with university degrees, 40 percent approved of the coup, compared with 27 percent approval among those with only a basic education, the survey said.
Zelaya faced long odds of returning to the presidency because the supreme court and congress, including lawmakers from his own party, were against his calls for the referendum that led to his ouster. These political power brokers, and in general, the Honduran elite that backed Micheletti, likely account for the discrepancy between education level and views of the coup. In Honduras, the elite are more likely to have completed university than others.
The low approval ratings for Zelaya point to his thin election victory in 2005, according to Latinobarometro.
The leftist Zelaya was elected with just under 50 percent of the vote. That margin hardly gave him a mandate to push the sweeping constitutional reforms he wanted, the survey said.
"Manuel Zelaya wanted to implement reforms that were beyond what the majority supported," the report said.
Outside of Honduras, 24 percent of respondents in the other Latin American countries approved of the coup, the Latinobarometro survey found. Asked to rate Honduran democracy on a scale of 1 to 10, those outside of the country said the Central American nation merited a 5.2, the survey said.
It was the first time that the firm asked for people to give their perception of democracy in a country that was not their own.
Latinobarometro also asked respondents in the region whether they believed a coup was possible in their own country.
The highest affirmative responses came from countries that have left-leaning presidents. Ecuadorians (36 percent), Brazilians (34 percent) and Venezuelans (30 percent) said a coup was possible in their country.
|
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] |
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"how Hondurans and other Latin Americans viewed the political crisis in Honduras.",
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question: what does the poll focus on?, answer: how Hondurans and other Latin Americans viewed the political crisis in Honduras. | question: what is the disapproval rating of zelaya?, answer: 65 percent | question: This year's poll focuses on what?, answer: how Hondurans and other Latin Americans viewed the political crisis in Honduras. | question: What does the year's poll focus on?, answer: how Hondurans and other Latin Americans viewed the political crisis in Honduras. | question: De facto president gets disapproval rating of what percent?, answer: 65 | question: What percent of respondents disapprove of Zelaya?, answer: 48 | question: what is the latinobarometro?, answer: survey. | question: What survey is a highly regarded poll?, answer: 2009 Latinobarometro | question: What percent disapprove of Zelaya?, answer: 48
|
(CNN) -- Honduras suspended diplomatic relations with Argentina on Tuesday in retaliation for having its ambassador expelled from Argentina last week.
Riot police stand in front of marchers supporting ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya on Tuesday.
The move stems from tensions between the two countries over a June 28 military-led coup in which Honduran President Jose Manuel Zelaya was replaced by congressional leader Roberto Micheletti. When Honduran Ambassador Carmen Eleonora Ortez Williams, who had been appointed by Zelaya, did not protest the coup, Argentina took exception.
Most countries in the world -- as well as the United Nations, the Organization of American States and the European Union -- have denounced the coup and demanded that Zelaya be restored to power. Those nations still consider Zelaya president and do not recognize any officials from Micheletti's government or any functionaries who support him.
Argentina asked Ortez to leave last week "for supporting the de facto government of Roberto Micheletti." On Tuesday, Honduras suspended relations with Argentina and asked the South American nation's diplomats to leave within 72 hours. Honduras' relations with Argentina will be "channeled" though the Argentine embassy in Israel, said a release issued in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital.
"With regards to Argentine personnel stationed in Tegucigalpa and who are finishing their functions in Honduras, they will be granted, based on the principle of strictest reciprocity, the same treatment, time and facilities that was conceded to Honduran functionaries accredited in Argentina," the Honduran release said.
The Honduran political crisis stems from Zelaya's desire to hold a referendum that could have led to extending term limits by changing the constitution, despite the country's congress having outlawed the vote and the supreme court having ruled it illegal.
Zelaya vowed to hold the vote anyway but was ousted before the voting started. The congress named Micheletti provisional president shortly after Zelaya was detained by the military and sent into exile.
Micheletti said Zelaya was not overthrown in a coup, but rather removed from power through constitutional means.
|
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question: Who is president of Hondoria?, answer: Manuel Zelaya | question: Who was expelled from Argentina?, answer: ambassador | question: What caused the ambassador to be expelled?, answer: tensions between the two countries over a June 28 military-led coup in which Honduran President Jose Manuel Zelaya was replaced by congressional leader Roberto Micheletti. | question: Who backed new Honduras government?, answer: Carmen Eleonora Ortez Williams, | question: Who was ousted?, answer: Honduran President Manuel Zelaya | question: When was military coup?, answer: June 28 | question: Who is Jose Manuel Zelaya?, answer: Honduran President | question: Where is ambassador expelled from?, answer: Argentina
|
(CNN) -- Honduras' de facto president said Thursday that he is willing to resign and let ousted President Jose Manuel Zelaya back into the country, as long as Zelaya gives up his quest for leadership.
Ousted Honduras leader Jose Manuel Zelaya may be allowed to return to his country under certain conditions.
The new proposal calls for the person next in line, as required by the constitution, to succeed de facto President Roberto Micheletti. Under terms of the proposal, Zelaya could return as a private citizen, but not be allowed to resume his post.
Presidential elections held after both resigned would be monitored by international observers such as the Organization of American States and the European Union, according to the proposal.
Zelaya did not immediately issue a response to the offer.
Until now, Micheletti has made clear that Zelaya would be arrested if he returned.
The offer comes two months after Zelaya was seized by the military in his pajamas and forced to leave the country.
Micheletti has insisted that Zelaya was not overthrown and was replaced through constitutional means.
The political crisis stemmed from Zelaya's plan to hold a referendum that could have changed the constitution and allowed longer term limits. The country's congress had outlawed the vote and the supreme court had ruled it illegal.
The Organization of American States sent a delegation to Honduras on Tuesday to promote the so-called San Jose Accord, which seeks an end to the political turmoil and the return of Zelaya to office. Micheletti's government declined to sign the agreement.
On Thursday, the United States said it was considering cutting off all aid to Honduras. Washington froze its assistance to Honduras after Zelaya was removed from office and stopped issuing visas in the Central American country earlier this week. Further steps could choke off as much $200 million in additional aid dispensed by the Millennium Challenge Corporation, funded by the U.S. government.
The United Nations and the European Union also have said that they do not recognize Micheletti's provisional government.
|
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"What did the Honduras interim leader agree to?"
] |
[
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"United States",
"de facto president",
"Honduras.",
"plan to hold a referendum that could have changed the constitution and allowed longer term limits.",
"resign"
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question: Who is considering cutting off aid to Central American country?, answer: the United States | question: Who was removed from office in June?, answer: Jose Manuel Zelaya | question: Who considers cutting off aid to central american country?, answer: United States | question: Who agrees to step down?, answer: de facto president | question: Who is the U.S considering cutting off aid to?, answer: Honduras. | question: Jose Manuel Zelaya was removed from office for what reason?, answer: plan to hold a referendum that could have changed the constitution and allowed longer term limits. | question: What did the Honduras interim leader agree to?, answer: resign
|
(CNN) -- Hong Kong is well suited to providing a quick hit of urban thrills and retail therapy, but time-pressed visitors can also get a glimpse of another side of the city away from the shopping malls and neon-lit streets.
It's not hard to find things to do or places to go at any time of day or night.
A trip to The Peak is a good point from which to begin the day. Home to some of Hong Kong's most expensive properties, it's also the place for an unbeatable view, smog and weather permitting.
Catch a tram there from next to the tranquil Hong Kong Park -- where early risers practice their tai chi -- or take a cheap taxi ride, which can whisk you there in a few minutes.
A clear morning will reveal the city's high-rise buildings and skyscrapers unfurled below, with Kowloon and the green and mountainous New Territories in the middle distance.
The pay-to-enter Peak Tower will also give you a view of the southern side of Hong Kong Island and the South China Sea, although a short walk round Lugard Road is a more rewarding way to take in the city below and work up an appetite.
Hong Kong is a restaurant city and dim sum, which refers to a variety of light dishes like dumplings, is a city staple that can be enjoyed at any time in this 24-hour city. It's most commonly taken as a mid-morning meal.
Image gallery: Hong Kong highlights »
Head back down towards Hong Kong's Central district, center of the city's finance and banking industry that funded the striking skyscrapers. The Luk Yu Tea House on Stanley Street is an oak-paneled gem that retains its charm despite its popularity: it's a fine spot for tea and dim sum.
For even more local flavor, pull up a plastic stool at a "dai pai dong," or street restaurant, situated further along Stanley Street, for cheap, quick, tasty eats.
If you're in the city on Sunday, Maxim's in Wan Chai is one of the few places where dim sum is still served by aging trolley dollies. Flag them down as they trundle past; point, eat and enjoy. You can't book a table but it's worth a visit for the atmosphere and harbor backdrop as much as the food.
Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated places on the planet, but its bustling streets are easy to navigate, helped by the affordable and plentiful taxis and an efficient public transport system. The city's skinny trams are a throwback to a different era and worth jumping on for a short journey just to watch the city go by: consider it a good chance to digest lunch.
While the city is generally unsentimental when it comes to preserving its old architecture, Sheung Wan, well within walking distance from Central, can give you a better feel of the city away from the shiny malls and new office buildings. From Queens Road, jump on the escalator (yes, escalator) all the way up to Caine Road and wind your way back down the hill.
The Dr Sun Yat Sen Museum and some incense-burning temples are nestled among the evocative streets, where you'll also find galleries and independent shops. The area is subject to increasing gentrification, so stroll down Gage Street while you still can: its market will soon disappear as part of the area's redevelopment.
Head towards the piers to catch the Star Ferry to Kowloon. Take one of the vintage green tugs -- as iconic as the city's skyscrapers -- from Central Pier to Tsim Sa Tsui (commonly referred to as TST) on the other side of the harbor.
As shopping is more of a way of life than a pastime for many Hong Kongers, you'll find you're never far from luxury brand outlets. TST offers just as many consumer delights as anywhere in the city.
Away from the air-conditioned glitz of TST's Harbour City shopping plaza, or the boutiques around Granville Terrace, the streets to the north of Yau Ma Tei have a
|
[
"What food can you sample?",
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"Where can you get world's best dim sum?"
] |
[
"dim sum,",
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"Hong Kong"
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question: What food can you sample?, answer: dim sum, | question: Where are there good views?, answer: The Peak | question: Where can you get world's best dim sum?, answer: Hong Kong
|
(CNN) -- Host Zain Verjee takes viewers through Oman's diverse terrain -- sailing the seas in a sleek racing boat and driving through oasis towns en route to the rugged mountains of Jabal Al-Akhdar. Plus:
The 'Jewel of Muscat' Omanis' relationship with the sea goes back generations and sailors have traveled and traded on the water for centuries. Inside the Middle East watches the launch of the "Jewel of Muscat," a reconstruction of a 9th century spice ship. The sewn-plank ship has been faithfully reconstructed from handmade coconut fiber ropes and wood -- and without a single nail. The "Jewel of Muscat" will follow old trading routes stopping in India, Sri Lanka and Malaysia before arriving in Singapore in July. Inside the Middle East goes on deck with the captain ahead of the ship's historic launch.
Your IME diary We bring you highlights from the Tour of Oman where cyclists rode for six days on a 700 km route in a race that is the first of this kind in Oman. At a Muscat art gallery we meet contemporary artist Hassan Meer and he describes his abstract paintings and photography. We also explore the exotic scents at the House of Amouage where CEO David Crickmore gives us a tour of the luxury perfumery. From the UAE we bring you the flavors of Gourmet Abu Dhabi as we report from the kitchen.
My Beirut with Zuhair Mourad Drawing inspiration from the blue of the Mediterranean and the green of Lebanon's valleys and mountains, fashion designer Zuhair Mourad has made his name internationally in couture. Mourad most recently made headlines at the Brit Awards red carpet with a gold corset mini-dress worn by singer Florence Welsh who went on to win Best Album. Mourad says he is inspired by the many civilizations that have left their mark on his country -- from Byzantine to Ottoman, from French to "modern Lebanese" -- he shows us around the city where he was raised, Beirut.
|
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question: What is inside the Middle East?, answer: "Jewel of Muscat," | question: What is the inspiration behind Zuhair Murad's designs?, answer: blue of the Mediterranean and the green of Lebanon's valleys and mountains, | question: Who explains how his home, Beirut, inspires his designs?, answer: Zain Verjee | question: What was recreated?, answer: "Jewel of Muscat," a reconstruction of a 9th century spice ship. | question: name this ship, answer: "Jewel of Muscat," | question: Who is Zuhair Murad ?, answer: fashion designer
|
(CNN) -- Hot dogs? Check. Fireworks? Check. Big Ben? Wait a minute...
The American Society of Sydney, Australia, helps put together a July Fourth celebration on Sydney Harbour.
There may not be international landmarks at your neighbor's Fourth of July barbecue, but for Americans living abroad, they're the perfect backdrop when celebrating independence.
To global Yanks, it's just as important -- if not more so -- to throw an Independence Day party that feels just like home.
From Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Rome, Italy, Fourth of July soirees are happening on Saturday in nearly every corner of the world. So if your globetrotting lands you in one of these cities over the weekend, consider squeezing an Independence Day celebration into your itinerary.
July Fourth, eh?
Canada Day occurs a mere three days before the Fourth, and our neighbor to the north lights up the sky for both.
Held on the shores of Lake Ontario at the amusement park Ontario Place in Toronto, the Grand Finale for the Canada Dry Festival of Fire is an extensive fireworks display that draws between 15,000 and 20,000 people each year.
Choreographed to a surprise playlist, "the fireworks actually detonate to the beat of the songs, which are voted on by the listeners of [local radio station] CHFI," said Ontario Place spokesman Nick Kondrat.
Tickets include an all-day pass to the park, so be sure not to miss the eclectic entertainment, like "Salsa at Ontario Place," featuring live salsa music, dance competitions and lessons.
Fireworks begin at 10:30 p.m. Visit the park's Web site for tickets.
Americans in London Town
Time Out London lists this event as a "must-do" for Independence Day. Standing out from a slew of holiday gatherings, the 7th annual Fourth of July picnic, hosted by the American expatriate community, begins at 2 p.m. at London, England's, Battersea Park.
To keep the kids happy, there will be red, white and blue bouncy castles as well as balloons and face-painting, according to the group's Web site.
For the adults, plenty of barbecue will be available for purchase in addition to two fully stocked cash bars. Between softball games and paddleboat rentals at the nearby lake, there's plenty to do for the whole family. For a grand finale, a laser fireworks display starts at 9:45 p.m.
Even better: Admission is free all day.
When In Rome
A blowout event planned a year in advance, the American International Club of Rome's 20th celebration is a patriotic tribute: potato sack races for the kids, swing-dancing lessons with live music and all the s'mores, hot dogs and hamburgers you can stand, said the club manager and event coordinator, Nina Farrell.
"When you're away from home, it's really nice to get together and celebrate and be a little bit American," Farrell said.
The celebration will kick off at 5 p.m. with Americans and Italians alike at Marymount International School, ending at midnight with the crackling of sparklers. (Sorry, no fireworks allowed on the school grounds.)
For tickets, visit the AICR's Web site at http://www.aicrome.org/.
Red, white and blue down under
Mary Botto believes it's the little things that help a person become acclimated, and the Fourth of July celebration the American Society of Sydney, Australia, helps pull together is one of them.
Botto, the society's president, said this year's party will be held at the Hunters Hill Sailing Club, right on Sydney Harbour. The organization stays true to an American theme, from the food to the fireworks.
The one piece of American tradition Botto's group can't replicate is warm weather: July is winter in Australia, so most of the festivities are indoors, except the fireworks, which start around 6 p.m.
Everyone is welcome, and locals take part in the fun. "Australia Day here is huge and I think Australians really respect the fact that we still celebrate even though we're not in our home country,
|
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question: what other celebrations do they do this for, answer: Independence Day | question: Who organized for celebrations?, answer: The American Society of Sydney, | question: What are Americans abroad doing?, answer: July Fourth celebration | question: What is happening in London?, answer: the 7th annual Fourth of July picnic, | question: how many people show up, answer: 15,000 and 20,000 | question: What will happen in Buenos Aires?, answer: Fourth of July soirees | question: what are the number of people showing up, answer: between 15,000 and 20,000
|
(CNN) -- Hours after January 12's earthquake in Haiti, Drs. Claude and Yolene Surena were treating more than 100 wounded people -- not in a medical facility but outside their own Port-au-Prince home.
City medical facilities were decimated or overwhelmed, and makeshift triage areas like the one in the Surenas' yard tried to keep patients alive long enough to get the next available hospital bed. Yolene called her daughter in Maryland to assure her the couple was fine and to make a request.
"She was overwhelmed with patients," said Fabiola Surena, a 28-year-old U.S. Army staff sergeant studying to be a physician's assistant. "She needed me to come help."
Surena and eight U.S.-based relatives and friends -- all of whom were raised in or have relatives in Haiti -- went to the Surenas' Haiti home to assist the doctors, deliver food and first-aid supplies, and to see how their loved ones fared.
Surena, who was granted time off from the Army, and her cousin Anne-Rene Louis have been documenting their trip on CNN's iReport.com. They talked to CNN.com by phone on Thursday, their seventh day in Haiti; the group planned to return to the United States this weekend.
iReport.com: Fabiola and Anne-Rene's journey to Haiti
The nine, none of whom had any medical experience except for Surena, flew to the Dominican Republic and traveled by bus to Haiti's capital on January 15. At the Surenas' house, one of the few in the neighborhood that didn't collapse, patients were in bad shape.
"I've seen crushed bones, fractures, dislocations, a lot of lacerations. We've had kids who lost digits," Fabiola Surena said. "We've also had people just suffering from just diabetes or high blood pressure, whose medication was stuck in their [destroyed] house, so they're going into diabetic comas."
Many patients needed surgery, but the one surgeon assisting the couple had no post-school experience. The Surenas' home, stocked mostly with first aid and suture kits and over-the-counter medications, had "no surgical capabilities outside of sutures," Fabiola Surena said.
Because surgeries couldn't be done immediately and infection was setting in, many patients would need amputation later. A few people died before Surena's group arrived, and one has died since, after being moved to a hospital, she said.
iReport: List of missing, found | Are you there?
Fabiola Surena dressed bandages and took vital signs. The other eight from the U.S. made sure patients took medication, sterilized tools and did small dressing changes. The crew also tried to find hospitals that could take the critical patients, she said.
Patients rest on mattresses in the yard, covered by tents. Food, water and medical supplies, though bolstered by trips to the Dominican Republic and aid brought by others, are constantly low. The family eats whatever it serves to the patients -- perhaps rice, beans and tuna -- and sometimes it's just one meal, Surena said.
"We're basically out of painkillers. We receive a lot of medication for adults, but not for kids, so children are barely getting painkillers at all," she said.
Surena, who was born in New York but was raised in Haiti, says her feelings are difficult to put in words.
"It can be very depressing," she said in Port-au-Prince, in and around which tens of thousands were killed in the quake. "After a while, you're looking at the things you can't do. ... Some people beg for water, and we don't have water for us to drink."
"People look calm and try to go on with life and joke, but then a scared, panicked look comes over their faces when a helicopter flies overhead, because it sounds like an aftershock," she added.
Full coverage | Twitter updates
Haitians took the wounded to the Surenas' house after the quake because they knew they were doctors.
|
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] |
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"Drs. Claude and Yolene Surena",
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"Food, water"
] |
question: What remain constantly low?, answer: Food, water and medical supplies, | question: What do the doctors turn their home into?, answer: makeshift triage areas | question: Who turned their home into a makeshift clinic after quake?, answer: Drs. Claude and Yolene Surena | question: Who arrived to help?, answer: and eight U.S.-based relatives and friends | question: Who arrived to help the doctors?, answer: Surena and eight U.S.-based relatives and friends | question: What is constantly low?, answer: Food, water
|
(CNN) -- Hours after Libya's former interior minister said he resigned to support anti-government protesters, the Libyan government said he had been kidnapped.
Abdul Fattah Younis al Abidi told CNN Wednesday that he resigned Monday after hearing that 300 unarmed civilians had been killed in Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city. He accused Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi of planning to attack civilians on a wide scale.
But the same day, Libyan state media reported that "gangs" in Benghazi had kidnapped him. Witnesses have reported that Benghazi has essentially been taken over by the opposition. Witnesses also told CNN they saw Younis on Sunday and Monday in Benghazi, where he was siding with the protesters.
CNN could not immediately confirm reports for areas beyond Benghazi. The Libyan government maintains tight control on communications and has not responded to repeated requests from CNN for access to the country. CNN has interviewed numerous witnesses by phone.
Libyan state television added that Libyan forces have warned those responsible for the kidnapping that they "will be chased in their hiding places."
Earlier Wednesday, al Abidi said he had quit the government and is supporting the protesters, who he predicted will achieve victory in "days or hours."
"Gadhafi told me he was planning on using airplanes against the people in Benghazi, and I told him that he will have thousands of people killed if he does that," al Abidi said in an Arabic-language telephone interview Wednesday.
He called Gadhafi "a stubborn man" who will not give up. "He will either commit suicide or he will get killed," said al Abidi, who said he has known him since 1964.
Al Abidi called on Libyan security forces "to join the people in the intifada." Already, he said, "many members" of the security forces had defected, including those in the capital, Tripoli.
Since the recent protests in Libya started February 15, a growing number of Libyan officials have reportedly resigned.
Libya's ambassador to Bangladesh, A.H. Elimam, resigned to side with pro-democracy protesters, said BSS, the official news agency of Bangladesh, citing a Foreign Ministry official Tuesday.
iReport: Are you there? share photos, video
Justice Minister Mustafa Abdul Jalil also resigned, saying he was protesting the "bloody situation" and "use of excessive force" against unarmed protesters, according to the Libyan newspaper Quryna.
CNN's Waffa Munayyer contributed to this report.
|
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"Where was Abudl Fattah Younis al Abidi kidnapped from?",
"What did Al Abidi say?",
"Who was kidnapped in Benghazi?",
"When did al Abidi quit the government?",
"Who did the gangs kidnap?",
"When al Abidi said that he quit the government?",
"When will they acheive victory?",
"What did Libyan state tv report?",
"What is al Abidi prediction?"
] |
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question: Where was Abudl Fattah Younis al Abidi kidnapped from?, answer: Benghazi | question: What did Al Abidi say?, answer: that he resigned Monday after hearing that 300 unarmed civilians had been killed in Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city. | question: Who was kidnapped in Benghazi?, answer: Abdul Fattah Younis al Abidi | question: When did al Abidi quit the government?, answer: Monday | question: Who did the gangs kidnap?, answer: Abdul Fattah Younis al Abidi | question: When al Abidi said that he quit the government?, answer: Wednesday | question: When will they acheive victory?, answer: "days or hours." | question: What did Libyan state tv report?, answer: "gangs" in Benghazi had kidnapped him. | question: What is al Abidi prediction?, answer: will achieve victory in "days or hours."
|
(CNN) -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday called on President-elect Barack Obama to govern from the middle, as her party sat poised to gain its widest House majority in 15 years.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, celebrates election victories Tuesday night in Washington.
According to projections, Democrats in the House were on track Wednesday to increase their majority by at least 18 seats, a margin that would give Obama a formidable tool to push his legislative agenda after his January 20 inauguration.
Democrats took at least 22 seats from Republicans in Tuesday's election, with the GOP taking four seats from the Democrats, according to CNN projections.
With winners yet to be called for eight of the House's 435 seats, Democrats were projected to win 254 seats, with Republicans having 173.
"I don't know what the final number will be," Pelosi said during a Wednesday afternoon news conference on Capitol Hill. "But it will be well over 250. It's a signal of the change that the American people want."
Pelosi, D-California, said she hoped Obama would "bring people together to reach consensus" on issues that concern Americans. "A new president must govern from the middle," she said.
Topping her agenda, she said, would be "growing the economy, expanding health care, ending dependence on foreign oil and ending the war in Iraq."
When he woke up Wednesday morning, Republican National Committee Chairman Mike Duncan said, he felt like the boy who stubbed his toe, the character in a quote from President Lincoln, who said: "It hurts too bad to laugh, and I'm too big to cry."
Duncan also called on the president-elect to govern from the center and warned that if Democrats moved too far to the left, Republicans could take back seats in the 2010 midterm elections.
"The last two times Democrats controlled the House, Senate and the presidency, they choked on the bone of responsibility," he said. "They lurched far to the left and introduced the country to President Ronald Reagan and Speaker Newt Gingrich."
Among Tuesday's GOP casualties was longtime Rep. Chris Shays of Connecticut, whose reputation for occasionally bucking his party couldn't keep him from losing to Democrat Jim Himes.
Shays' defeat leaves New England without any Republicans in the House. Shays was seeking his 11th full term. Watch Pelosi say Americans voted for change »
Heading into Election Day, the Democrats had a 235-199 House majority. The Democrats' gains come two years after they took control of the House -- with a gain of 30 seats -- after 12 years in the minority.
Here are highlights of other races from Tuesday with projected winners:
Democrats gained at least two seats in Ohio, including that of Rep. Steve Chabot, who was seeking an eighth term in a Cincinnati-area district that normally votes about evenly for GOP and Democratic presidential candidates.
CNN projects that Chabot lost to Democrat Steve Driehaus. Just two years earlier, Chabot was re-elected with 52 percent of the vote despite an anti-Republican tide that helped Democrats capture Ohio's governorship and take a U.S. Senate seat.
Democrats also gained a seat left open by retiring Rep. Ralph Regula. Democrat John Boccieri defeated the GOP's Kirk Schuring in the northeastern Ohio contest.
• In New York, Democrats won three Republican seats, including two left open by incumbents not seeking re-election. In one of the open races, Democrat Mike McMahon won the last GOP-held seat in New York City, defeating the GOP's Robert Straniere. Democrat Dan Maffei defeated Republican Dale Sweetland, who was trying to win a seat vacated by 10-term GOP Rep. Jim Walsh.
In a rematch of a 2006 race, former naval officer Eric Massa beat GOP Rep. Randy Kuhl in a western New York district that generally votes Republican.
• Freshman Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minnesota, was projected to survive a race that tightened after she accused Obama of having "anti-American views." She was leading Democratic challenger
|
[
"Who is the RNC chairman?",
"What number of seats did house democrats take from the GOP?",
"What do democratic wins signal?",
"What did the RNC chairman warn Dems against?",
"What did Pelosi say about the Dem victories?",
"Who talked about what democratic victories signal?",
"What did the House Speaker say about a new leader?",
"What group chairman is warning democrats?"
] |
[
"Mike Duncan",
"four",
"change that the American people want.\"",
"if Democrats moved too far to the left, Republicans could take back seats in the 2010 midterm elections.",
"\"A new president must govern from the middle,\"",
"Nancy Pelosi",
"\"A",
"Republican National Committee"
] |
question: Who is the RNC chairman?, answer: Mike Duncan | question: What number of seats did house democrats take from the GOP?, answer: four | question: What do democratic wins signal?, answer: change that the American people want." | question: What did the RNC chairman warn Dems against?, answer: if Democrats moved too far to the left, Republicans could take back seats in the 2010 midterm elections. | question: What did Pelosi say about the Dem victories?, answer: "A new president must govern from the middle," | question: Who talked about what democratic victories signal?, answer: Nancy Pelosi | question: What did the House Speaker say about a new leader?, answer: "A | question: What group chairman is warning democrats?, answer: Republican National Committee
|
(CNN) -- Huddled on the top floor of her home after waist-deep water inundated the lower story, Doranne Lim is bothered by the debris -- and the smell.
Residents remove mud from a home Monday as waters recede in Marikina City, suburban Manila.
"My house is super, super messy," she said, speaking from her home in the eastern Manila suburb of Pasig City. The mud left behind by receding floodwaters -- caused when the nearby river flooded its banks -- is "really smelly."
Her car won't start, probably because the engine is flooded. Her microwave and refrigerator won't function. Most of her possessions have been moved upstairs.
Still, as one of the more than 1.8 million affected by recent floods, the 28-year-old Lim is counting her blessings. Her power is back on and she believes she can salvage most of her furniture. In addition, people she knows are still searching for missing friends and relatives in the flooding. Are you there? Share your story or pictures
"My office mate, she lives in a village with actually really nice houses," Lim said. "She was sitting on her roof for 15 hours. They didn't save anything, nothing."
The floodwaters were beginning to subside in some areas Monday after a weekend that saw Manila hit with torrential rainfall caused by Typhoon Ketsana, which has since strengthened into a typhoon. Officials said the Philippine capital saw its heaviest rain in more than four decades. The water swallowed whole houses and buses. At least 240 people are dead, officials say. See incredible images of the flooding »
Lim said she is cleaning up the smelly mess, but no one she knows has begun fixing the damage -- because another typhoon could be bearing down on the island nation in several days. Tracking maps show Tropical Storm Nineteen approaching the Philippines later this week.
Lim submitted a photo to CNN's iReport site of people traveling down a flooded road -- a main thoroughfare -- in Pasig City. Some are wading through thigh-deep water; others are being pulled on rafts. Some opportunists are charging others money to pull them on rafts, she said.
At the end of the road is a church and a market, she said. The market is not flooded, but is "really, really muddy," she said. "Most of the vendors in the market said they are going to sleep in the market tonight because they don't have any place to go."
Manila, on the island of Luzon, and the nearby province of Rizal bore the brunt of the storm. People like Lim's office mate huddled on rooftops Sunday waiting on army helicopters to pluck them to safety. Others used ropes to wade through waist-deep muddy waters. Watch how people of Manila are coping »
Power and water supply failed in some areas. Roads were rendered impassable, making rescue efforts challenging. Rescue crews were handing out food rations.
"Right now the challenge is to find out how many people have actually died and how many people we have to take care of in terms of people who've been displaced," said Richard Gordon, the chairman of the Philippines National Red Cross. He estimated up to 300,000 people have been displaced on the island of Luzon alone.
Another Pasig City resident, Arturo Fidelino, said 80 percent of his village was flooded. He counts himself lucky that his home was not inundated, but his family had to evacuate and move in with his in-laws because nearby streets were impassable. Fidelino said he and his wife have to get to work, and their 14-year-old daughter has to get to school.
Fidelino said his family was stuck in their home for two days, before a relative who owns heavy machinery was able to remove them.
"It's our first time to experience that kind of flood," he said, estimating it could take about a month for the waters to completely recede.
He said many of his neighbors remain stuck in their homes, as the homeowners' association organizes a removal effort
|
[
"How many people were killed?",
"How much water?",
"What are the survivors thankful for?",
"What do survivors face?",
"What percentage of the capital was under water?",
"What were the floods caused by?"
] |
[
"At least 240",
"waist-deep",
"power is back on",
"the smell.",
"80",
"Typhoon Ketsana,"
] |
question: How many people were killed?, answer: At least 240 | question: How much water?, answer: waist-deep | question: What are the survivors thankful for?, answer: power is back on | question: What do survivors face?, answer: the smell. | question: What percentage of the capital was under water?, answer: 80 | question: What were the floods caused by?, answer: Typhoon Ketsana,
|
(CNN) -- Huge crowds assembled in Pyongyang on Thursday at a national memorial service for the North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, the second day of state-orchestrated ceremonies to mourn the dictator who died earlier this month.
The authoritarian regime used a mixture of somber music, hyperbolic speeches, booming artillery fire and blaring horns to honor the man who oversaw 17 years of despotic rule in the secretive nation.
The ceremony took place a day after a funeral procession for Kim spent three hours winding through the snow-laden streets of Pyongyang lined with thousands of wailing mourners.
Once again, the regime placed Kim Jong Un, the son and chosen successor of Kim Jong Il, at the center of proceedings, proclaiming him the "supreme leader" of North Korea -- a fresh indication that the leadership transition is progressing smoothly.
The footage broadcast Thursday by North Korean state television showed thick rectangular blocks of people gathered in the snowy expanse of Kim Il Sung Square -- named after Kim Jong Il's father, the founder of North Korea.
Kim Jong Un and other senior members of the regime stood solemnly on a viewing platform overlooking the square.
During the ceremony, a string of top officials took to the microphone to praise Kim Jong Il's life and reinforce Kim Jong Un's leadership credentials.
"Kim Jong Un is the supreme leader who has inherited Kim Jong Il's beliefs, leadership, courage and guts," said Kim Yong Nam, the president of the North Korean parliament.
Read about the funeral for Kim Jong Il
"Kim Jong Il's great achievements will shine forever," said Kim Ki Nam, a senior official in the powerful Worker's Party. "Following our party's supreme leader, Kim Jong Un, we are converting our sadness to courage and we will achieve great things."
Under Kim Jong Il, the country suffered a devastating famine even as it built up its million-strong army, expanded its arsenal of ballistic missiles and became the world's eighth declared nuclear power.
He died on December 17, reportedly from a heart attack. News of his death, announced two days later, put the region on edge and set off speculation around the world about the country's stability and future direction.
For the time being, Kim Jong Un appears to be rallying support within the regime, despite his young age -- he is thought to be in his late 20s -- and relative inexperience.
After the speeches Thursday, a row of heavy guns fired off a salute. Then, a cacophony of horns and sirens went off, drawing the service -- and the last day of official mourning -- to a close.
CNN's Tim Schwartz contributed to this report.
|
[
"What has caused his death?",
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"When was the death?",
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"Who was proclaimed Supreme Leader?"
] |
[
"heart attack.",
"Kim Jong Un,",
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"December 17,",
"Kim Jong Il,",
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] |
question: What has caused his death?, answer: heart attack. | question: Who is the supreme leader?, answer: Kim Jong Un, | question: What was blaring?, answer: horns | question: When was the death?, answer: December 17, | question: What was commemorated?, answer: Kim Jong Il, | question: Who was proclaimed Supreme Leader?, answer: Kim Jong Un,
|
(CNN) -- Human remains found buried under recently added concrete at a home in Plant City, Florida, are likely those of missing lottery millionaire Abraham Shakespeare, police said Thursday.
Deputies made the discovery after a tip came in, suggesting investigators would find a body near a home in Plant City, according to CNN affiliate WFTV.
Hillsborough County Sheriff David Gee said the body was slowly being uncovered. They are awaiting positive identification.
However, Gee said their investigation and information specifically led them to the area after they began to believe he might be dead because of "sinister means and motives."
"Our indications were it would be there," Gee said during a news conference Thursday night.
Police on Wednesday had scanned the newly finished concrete slabs near the home on Wednesday and removed it. On Thursday, Gee said they discovered the remains buried five feet below the surface, and it appeared the remains had been there for awhile.
Shakespeare, a 43-year-old truck driver, won a $31 million Florida lottery prize in 2006. A year later, he won a court challenge from a fellow trucker who accused Shakespeare of snatching the winning ticket out of his wallet while the two were delivering meat to Miami restaurants.
Shakespeare's family reported him missing on November 9, telling the Polk County sheriff's office they hadn't seen him since April.
Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said when their investigation began, they had hoped to find Shakespeare alive "and he truly had just wanted to hide from those who were asking him for money."
"As our investigation continued, the information we developed led us to believe he may very well have ended up with an untimely death," Judd said.
Both Judd and Gee said they would not comment on whether anything else was found inside the manmade grave, or whether a previous person of interest was connected to the area. The home, according to WFTV, belongs to the boyfriend of a person of interest in the disappearance of Shakespeare.
While they await identification of the remains, police said they would begin to shift their focus to a murder investigation.
"It's painfully obvious he didn't get there by himself," Judd said.
Gee said police from Polk and Hillsborough counties were already working with prosecutors on the case and hope to bring to justice the person responsible for what they believe is clearly cold-blooded murder.
"Somebody put that body in that hole," Gee said. "This isn't by any means just where we find someone on the side of the road. Somebody has obviously put him there."
|
[
"What amount did he win?",
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] |
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"$31 million",
"buried under recently added concrete at a home in Plant City, Florida,",
"$31 million",
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"$31 million",
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"remains found buried under recently added concrete"
] |
question: What amount did he win?, answer: $31 million | question: Where were remains found?, answer: buried under recently added concrete at a home in Plant City, Florida, | question: How much did Shakespeare win?, answer: $31 million | question: Who found the remains?, answer: Deputies | question: How much money did he win before his disappearance and death?, answer: $31 million | question: What were found in Plant City Florida, answer: remains | question: What did the police say?, answer: remains found buried under recently added concrete
|
(CNN) -- Human rights groups in Bangladesh and abroad are calling for an investigation after 16 borders guards accused of participating in a bloody revolt in February died in custody in recent days.
A Bangladesh Rifles soldier is shown wearing a white cloth signifying surrender in late February.
The Bangladesh military acknowledged the deaths of the Bangladesh Rifles paramilitary troops, or jawans -- but insisted they were the result of illness and suicide.
"Given the history of abuses by security forces in Bangladesh, there is no reason to take at face value the claim that these detainees have committed suicide," said Brad Adams, Asia director or the New York-based Human Rights Watch, in a statement.
The 16 were among 1,100 jawans rounded up after a 35-hour mutiny that began on February 25 in the Rifles headquarters in the capital city, Dhaka. The jawans rebelled against their commanding officers, taking dozens of them hostage. When the standoff ended, more than 70 people were found dead -- the majority of them army officers.
Initially, Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina promised the jawans amnesty if they laid down their arms. But once the scope of the massacre came to light, Hasina withdrew her offer -- saying the government will not show mercy to those who killed, looted or committed arson.
The jawans were issued an ultimatum to turn themselves in, while the government created a committee to probe into the mutiny.
The result of the government inquiry is yet to be made public, after several delays.
On Thursday, the Rifles leadership issued a statement that said 16 detainees have died in custody since March 9: four from suicide, six from heart attacks and six from other diseases.
"We believe that perhaps they have failed to cope with the mental pressure associated with the guilt of committing the brutal attacks,"the statement said.
It then added: "Suicide is seen as a sin in religious terms and is also socially undesirable."
In response, the legal aid group, Ain o Salish Kendro (Law and Adjudication Center), and the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers' Association were among several organizations calling for an investigation.
During a hearing Wednesday, one of the suspects told a Dhaka court he had been administered electric shocks during a seven-day detention.
Family members of other detainees have made similar allegations.
Some of the suspects who died in custody had wounds on their bodies consisted with torture, Human Rights Watch said.
Bangladeshi authorities have said the wounds may have been inflicted when the suspects tried to escape from the Rifles headquarters after the rebellion.
"The explanations given by representatives of the security forces are simply not credible," Adams said. "Torture is a regular 'investigative technique' in Bangladesh and killing of detains in government custody is an endemic problem."
The country's elite anti-crime unit, Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), have often been accused of 'extra-judicial' killings. The battalion is involved in the interrogation of many of the Rifles suspects.
Since its inception in 2004, more than 550 alleged criminals died soon after they were captured by RAB forces. In each case, the battalion claimed the arrested men died from stray bullets as their units were engaged in gun battles with the suspects' comrades.
The 65,000-strong Bangladesh Rifles is responsible primarily for guarding the country's borders, but it also takes part in operations such as monitoring polls.
It is distinct from the army, but their commanders are career army officers.
The troops staged their rebellion on the second day of BDR Week, when officers and troops from various BDR outposts along the border were in the capital for celebrations.
Discontent had been bubbling for years in the ranks of the BDR, who complained their army superiors dismissed their appeals for more pay, subsidized food and their requests to participate in United Nations peacekeeping operations -- which pay far more than what they make at home.
Bangladesh and its South Asian neighbors are the largest troop contributors to U.N. peacekeeping operations.
During the stand-off, dozens of officers were killed. Some bodies were dumped in mass graves. Others were
|
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"16 borders",
"February"
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question: What is name of the country?, answer: Bangladesh | question: how many were involved, answer: 16 | question: what nationality were the soldiers, answer: Bangladesh | question: what was the groups?, answer: rights | question: who was accudes of participating in revolt?, answer: 16 borders | question: What month were the soldiers rounded up?, answer: February
|
(CNN) -- Humanitarian aid agencies scrambled Monday to offer help to the tens of thousands of people in need after Tamil separatists declared an end to their quarter-century struggle in Sri Lanka.
A Tamil refugee holds her child at a tented site in Vavuniya.
The United Nations said Monday that over the past few days some 65,000 people had fled what had been the fighting zone in northeast Sri Lanka, bringing to 265,000 the number of internally displaced people, which it refers to as IDPs.
"This latest massive influx of people, who have endured extreme conditions, will put an even greater strain on the transit and IDP sites that are already buckling under the pressure of the existing IDP population," the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said in a written statement.
The agency pledged to erect an additional 10,000 shelters to accommodate people streaming from the combat zone.
It reiterated its request for the Sri Lankan government to set aside land for the construction of emergency shelters, water and sanitation facilities and public buildings in Vavuniya, Jaffna, Mannar and Kilinochchi.
And it called on the government to improve conditions at 42 sites already hosting the displaced people, and to ensure adequate care and maintenance for them.
But the United Nations said its access to the sites in Vavuniya had been curtailed in recent days "and this affects our ability to monitor and distribute aid to the displaced. We hope this ends quickly."
Suresh Bartlett, aid agency World Vision's national director, said, "The conventional war may be over but the real challenge now is to foster an environment where fractured and displaced Tamil communities can heal and have a real chance at creating a future for themselves and their children."
Among the pressing issues, he said, is getting people back to their land and homes as quickly as possible, which in some cases will require that land be demined and buildings be repaired.
About 80,000 of the displaced -- a third of the people in camps -- are children, who need emotional, psychosocial and educational support in addition to physical aid.
"It is important to get people home as quickly as possible so they can feel a sense of ownership over their own lives, recover their dignity and livelihoods and create an environment where their children feel safe," he said.
In a telephone interview from Colombo, Sri Lanka's most populous city, Bartlett said that the displacement camps are overcrowded, with two and three families staying in shelters intended for a single family.
"A lot more needs to be done," he said. "More land needs to be cleared, more shelters set up" and safe drinking-water supplies assured. "It's not easy and it's not straightforward."
He said many of the people still streaming into the camps are malnourished.
Though the end of the conflict marks a great opportunity, "we can do with all the international support that we can get at this time," he said.
Estimates put the number of civilians killed in the conflict at 70,000 to 80,000, but Bartlett acknowledged that the true number may never be known.
Medecins Sans Frontieres, the aid group also known as Doctors Without Borders, was trying to scale up on Monday, a spokeswoman said.
The group's head of mission, Hugues Robert, said the 1999 Nobel Peace Prize-winning organization is staffing three hospitals in the region, where it was screening people seeking help to determine their needs, stabilize them, then treat them.
With fighting apparently ended, Robert predicted that the organization's team of 343 national staff and approximately 50 international staff will focus many of their efforts on providing post-operative care.
"We have a lot of wounded people," he said.
One area of need that remains largely unaddressed, he said, is mental health.
Amnesty International called for steps to be taken to ensure civilians and captured fighters are protected.
"The Sri Lankan government must ensure that its forces fully respect international law, including all provisions relating to protecting civilians from the effect of hostilities," said Amnesty International's Asia-
|
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"About what percentage of children are displaced in camps?",
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"What is total number of displaced people?",
"How many people in the displacements camps are children?"
] |
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"265,000",
"80,000"
] |
question: About what percentage of children are displaced in camps?, answer: a third of the people in | question: Where is the fighting zone taking place?, answer: northeast Sri Lanka, | question: What is the number of internally displaced people?, answer: 265,000 | question: What did U.N. pledge?, answer: The agency pledged to erect an additional 10,000 shelters to accommodate people streaming from the combat zone. | question: What does the UN pledge to erect?, answer: an additional 10,000 shelters | question: What proportion of them are children?, answer: a third | question: How many shelters did the UN pledge?, answer: an additional 10,000 | question: What is total number of displaced people?, answer: 265,000 | question: How many people in the displacements camps are children?, answer: 80,000
|
(CNN) -- Humiliation and comedy have always been natural bedfellows, but the one doesn't guarantee the other, as poor Katherine Heigl discovers in this crude, sub-par stab at a modern screwball comedy.
Katherine Heigl plays the sophisticated female boss of Gerard Butler in "The Ugly Truth."
The "Grey's Anatomy" and "Knocked Up" star plays Abby, a supposedly intelligent producer on a local Sacramento TV news show.
We're repeatedly assured that she's good at her job, though there's little or no evidence for that in what we see, and apparently the ratings are in the toilet.
That's why her boss drafts controversial cable clown Mike (Gerard Butler), whose bargain basement show "The Ugly Truth" gives viewers the real dope on the opposite sex.
Mike's straight talk isn't exactly edifying -- or original. It boils down to this: men are only interested in one thing, and it's not your IQ score.
His advice to women: swallow your pride -- and anything else that might come up.
Abby is understandably skeptical, both professionally and personally, but the sweeps prove her wrong. Mike may be outrageous, but Sacramento loves him for it.
A smarter comedy might make mischief from these base ingredients, the sophisticated female boss and her rude, reactionary star employee. But this movie, which is credited to three female screenwriters, bends over backward to accommodate Mike's tired old sexist world view and fails to be funny in the process.
Abby really is a neurotic control freak, living alone with her cat and a checklist about what constitutes the perfect guy. And when a close approximation of the type moves in right next door (Eric Winton as a handsome young doctor), she only lands him by putting herself in Mike's hands: accentuating her cleavage, losing the ponytail and trading in dinner and an art show for a hot dog and a baseball game.
Directed by Robert Luketic ("Monster in Law"), "The Ugly Truth" barely attempts to disguise its own lifts and tucks. The most craven of these gambits involves Abby going into multiple orgasm at a business dinner, a variation on Meg Ryan's famous scene in "When Harry Met Sally," except that in Ryan's case, she was in full control, demonstrating her mastery of the fake-out.
Abby, though, is sent into inadvertent paroxysms when the remote control of the vibrating panties she's wearing -- don't ask -- falls into the hands of a curious kid. Watch the stars describe the scene »
In other scenes, Heigl is caught hanging upside down from a tree in her nightgown, hiding in her office closet and furiously rubbing a stain out of the doctor's crotch in front of a stadium of ball fans. Presumably this is what picking up Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock's cast-offs entails these days. Katharine Hepburn would weep.
But what about Mike? Surely he has lessons to learn and comic indignities to endure? Not so much. In contrast to Abby's makeover, he's allowed to be comfortable in his own rather corpulent skin. Gerard Butler evidently hasn't worked out since Sparta; heck, he hasn't even bothered to shave.
You won't be surprised that the avowed bachelor boy falls in love with dear Abby. Of course he's a nice guy underneath. We know that from the way he looks out for his fatherless nephew. So what if he's a sexist pig? He's a sexy sexist pig, and obviously father material. What more could any woman want?
"The Ugly Truth" is rated R and runs 97 minutes. For Entertainment Weekly's review, click here.
|
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"What is a romantic comedy starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler?",
"What is the ugly truth?",
"Who stars in The Ugly Truth?",
"What kind of worldview does the movie accommodate?",
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"What is the name of the romantic comedy?",
"What bends over backwards to accommodate a sexist world view?"
] |
[
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"movie,",
"Katherine Heigl",
"men are only interested in one thing,",
"Mike's tired old sexist world view",
"\"The Ugly Truth.\"",
"\"The Ugly Truth\""
] |
question: What is a romantic comedy starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler?, answer: "The Ugly Truth." | question: What is the ugly truth?, answer: movie, | question: Who stars in The Ugly Truth?, answer: Katherine Heigl | question: What kind of worldview does the movie accommodate?, answer: men are only interested in one thing, | question: What fails to be funny?, answer: Mike's tired old sexist world view | question: What is the name of the romantic comedy?, answer: "The Ugly Truth." | question: What bends over backwards to accommodate a sexist world view?, answer: "The Ugly Truth"
|
(CNN) -- Hundred's of fans and former teammates of Robert Enke gathered to lay flowers and light candles outside of Hannover 96's Niedersachsen Stadion after the club's German goalkeeper was struck and killed by a train on Tuesday, in what police called an apparent suicide.
Enke, 32, died around 6:25 p.m. (12:25 p.m. ET), Hannover police press officer Stefan Wittke said in a statement.
"Preliminary police investigations indicate a suicide," Wittke said.
Police did not elaborate on what evidence they had that pointed to suicide, but Enke's close friend and advisor Jorg Neblung told the official Web site of football's world governing body FIFA: "I can confirm that it was suicide. Robert took his own life shortly before six o'clock."
The team's official Web site has been converted into a single-page memorial.
Enke captained Hannover 96, a team who currently lie tenth in Germany's Bundesliga top division, and had been capped by his national side eight times after making his debut aged 29.
The shot-stopper had also appeared for teams including Carl Zeiss Jena, Borussia Monchengladbach, Benfica, Barcelona, Fenerbahce and Tenerife in Spain.
His teammates were stunned by news of his death.
"We are in a state of shock," said team manager Oliver Bierhoff in a statement from the German Football Federation. "It is beyond words."
The German Football Federation (DFB) said Enke always said he wanted to play for the national team at the 2010 World Cup.
Soccer commentator and journalist Rafael Honigstein told CNN International that Enke was on course to be picked as the number-one choice for the team.
Enke had missed Germany's last four matches because of a bacterial infection, but had recently returned to action with Hannover.
"The leadership of the German national team never had any doubt that he was important for the team both as a goalkeeper and as a human being," the DFB statement said.
Enke is survived by his wife and eight-month-old daughter, who the couple adopted.
The couple's two-year-old daughter died in 2006 from a heart condition, and Honigstein said the loss of his child had taken a toll on Enke.
"It's been well documented that he had a tough time," Honigstein said. "People knew it was a terrible, terrible tragedy for him."
"I don't know why and how this happened," said Martin Kind, the chairman of Hannover 96. "It is a total catastrophe. I am finding it hard to understand. All I can say for sure is that it had nothing to do with football."
Fellow players said they believed that Enke had been suffering depression. "He was unstable," said Mr Kind. "But he kept it under wraps."
The coach of Germany's national team, Joachim Lowe, had been preparing his squad for their friendly game against Chile this weekend. The DFB have not yet confirmed whether the game would still be played.
A press conference is due to be held by the DFB at 1130 GMT, while Hannover 96 will speak to the media at 1200 GMT on Wednesday.
CNN's Frederik Pleitgen contributed to this report.
|
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question: where was the injury occured, answer: Hannover 96's Niedersachsen Stadion | question: who died at the age of 32, answer: Robert Enke | question: Who is Robert Enke, answer: German goalkeeper | question: How many caps has Robert Enke won, answer: eight | question: what did the police say, answer: investigations indicate a suicide," | question: what was the cause of death, answer: killed by a train
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of Cambodians packed a courtroom in Phnom Penh on Monday as three top Khmer Rouge leaders went on trial for their role during the bloody four-year regime in the mid-1970s.
The U.N.-backed Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia has scheduled four days of opening statements for the defendants, who are all in their 80s.
On trial are Ieng Sary, the former Khmer Rouge foreign minister; Khieu Samphon, the nominal head of state; and Nuon Chea, the prime minister, also known as Brother Number 2.
The head of the Khmer Rouge, Pol Pot, was known as Brother Number 1. He died in 1998, long before the U.N.-backed court came into existence.
A fourth defendant, Ieng Thirith, was ruled unfit to stand trial because she suffers from dementia and could be set free, prosecutor said. She is Sary's wife and served as the social affairs ministry during the regime.
Prosecutors have charged the defendants with crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture and religious persecution.
Under Pol Pot's leadership, the Khmer Rouge regime was responsible for the deaths of millions of ordinary Cambodians during a four-year reign of terror that was eventually halted in 1979 by invading Vietnamese forces.
In 1975, the Khmer Rouge ordered people out of Phnom Penh, the capital, and other cities in Cambodia to work in the countryside.
It is said to be responsible for about 1.7 million deaths, roughly a quarter of the population at the time. Its stated aim was to create a Communist utopia, but instead the regime forced Cambodians into what has been described as a living hell.
Soldiers marched city-dwellers into the countryside and forced them to work as farm laborers. Those already living in rural Cambodia were expected to produce enough food for the country while teaching farming to those who had never done it before.
The regime abolished currency, and considered anyone with an education a threat. It did not allow modern medicine, and it isolated Cambodia to make it completely self-sufficient.
The results were disastrous: People died of starvation and disease as soldiers tortured and killed anyone suspected of being disloyal.
In the end, virtually everyone, including the soldiers, became a target due to the leadership's paranoia.
|
[
"who they are accused of crimes against humanity?",
"how many people died during the red regime?",
"Which charges has been brought against defendants?",
"How many defendants are in their 80s?",
"What are they charged with",
"What number of people died during the rule",
"What caused the fourth defendant to be unfit for trial?",
"What was the fourth defendant ruled unfit to do"
] |
[
"three top Khmer Rouge",
"about 1.7 million",
"Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture",
"three",
"Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture and religious persecution.",
"1.7 million",
"dementia",
"to stand trial"
] |
question: who they are accused of crimes against humanity?, answer: three top Khmer Rouge | question: how many people died during the red regime?, answer: about 1.7 million | question: Which charges has been brought against defendants?, answer: Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture | question: How many defendants are in their 80s?, answer: three | question: What are they charged with, answer: Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture and religious persecution. | question: What number of people died during the rule, answer: 1.7 million | question: What caused the fourth defendant to be unfit for trial?, answer: dementia | question: What was the fourth defendant ruled unfit to do, answer: to stand trial
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of Egyptians took part Monday in the funeral of Marwa Sherbini, an Egyptian woman who was stabbed to death last week in the German city of Dresden in a crime believed to be racially motivated.
Egyptians take part in the funeral of Marwa Sherbini, who was murdered in Germany last week.
Sherbini, 33, was stabbed to death Wednesday in a courtroom as she prepared to give testimony against a German man of Russian descent whom she had sued for insult and abuse.
The man, identified in German media as Alex A., 28, was convicted of calling Sherbini, who wore a headscarf, "terrorist," "bitch" and "Islamist" when she asked him him to leave a swing for her 3-year-old son Mustafa during an August 2008 visit to a children's park.
He was fined and appealed the ruling. The two were in court Wednesday for that appeal when Alex A. attacked, pulling out a knife and stabbing Sherbini 18 times. He also stabbed her husband three times and attacked another person.
According to Arab media, police officers tried to intervene to end the fight, and a number of shots were fired. One hit the husband, who fell unconscious and is currently in intensive care in the hospital of Dresden University.
Sherbini was three months pregnant at the time of her death.
Hundreds attended Sherbini's funeral in Alexandria, Egypt, her hometown, among them government officials, including Egyptian Manpower Minister Aisha Abdel Hadi and Telecommunications Minister Tariq Kamel, Egyptian media reported.
Many shouted hostile slogans against Germany and called for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to take a firm stand on the incident. Egypt's grand mufti, Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi, demanded the severest punishment to be issued against Alex A.
Berlin witnessed angry protests on Saturday, when hundreds of Arabs and Muslims demonstrated after a funeral prayer that called her killing an outrageous racist murder against Muslims.
In a phone call with Al Arabiya, Marwa's brother, Tariq Sherbini, said, "Extremism has no religion. My sister was killed simply because she wore the veil. This incident clearly shows that extremism is not limited to one religion or another and it is not exclusively carried out by Muslims."
"We are only asking for a fair punishment," he said, adding that his sister was not a radical. "She was a religious woman who prayed and wore her headscarf, but she was killed because of her belief."
Anger about Sherbini's death smoldered online, as Twitterers and bloggers pushed the cause.
"She is a victim of hatred and racism," tweeted Ghada Essawy, among many other Arab twitters and bloggers. Essawy called Sherbini "the martyr of the veil."
Various videos circulated on YouTube calling on Egypt to take action and urging Germany to address what their makers saw as a new wave of hatred against Arabs and Muslims in its community.
One video showed various pictures of a young happy Marwa saying that "The woman stood up for her rights and she was killed. May God bless her." The English font in the video presentation asked "when will Egypt cares for its citizens' rights inside Egypt and abroad."
Sherbini and her husband moved to Dresden in 2003, after the husband received a grant to study genetic engineering in the renowned Max Planck Institute. He was scheduled to present his Ph.D. thesis in the coming days.
CNN's Saad Abedine contributed to this report.
|
[
"Who was killed in the courtroom?",
"What did the Egyptians do during the funeral?",
"Who was killed in the courtroom as she prepared to give testimony?",
"What did the convicted man call Sherbini?",
"What was Sherbini called?",
"Who shouted hostile slogans against Germany?",
"What was the man convicted of calling Sherbini?"
] |
[
"Marwa Sherbini,",
"shouted hostile slogans against Germany",
"Marwa Sherbini,",
"\"terrorist,\" \"bitch\" and \"Islamist\"",
"\"terrorist,\" \"bitch\" and \"Islamist\"",
"Many",
"\"terrorist,\" \"bitch\""
] |
question: Who was killed in the courtroom?, answer: Marwa Sherbini, | question: What did the Egyptians do during the funeral?, answer: shouted hostile slogans against Germany | question: Who was killed in the courtroom as she prepared to give testimony?, answer: Marwa Sherbini, | question: What did the convicted man call Sherbini?, answer: "terrorist," "bitch" and "Islamist" | question: What was Sherbini called?, answer: "terrorist," "bitch" and "Islamist" | question: Who shouted hostile slogans against Germany?, answer: Many | question: What was the man convicted of calling Sherbini?, answer: "terrorist," "bitch"
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of South Koreas were left in limbo after North Korea shut its borders Monday at the start of joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea.
U.S. troops have started joint military exercises with their South Korean counterparts.
When Pyongyang took the action, 573 South Koreans were staying at the Kaesong industrial complex, north of the demilitarized zone, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.
Many of the stranded South Koreans work at the complex, which is a joint project between the Koreas.
"The South Korean government is closely monitoring the situation and preparing for all contingencies," said Kim Ho-nyun, a South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman. "We emphasize that currently the first priority is the safety of our citizens."
Eighty South Koreans had applied to cross the border into South Korea on Monday, Kim said, but had not been cleared to do so.
"We are also not certain what will happen to the South Koreans that want to cross tomorrow as well," he said.
The cross-border developments came as North Korea said it would retaliate if a "satellite" launch from its northeastern coast were intercepted, with the communist nation saying interference would "mean a war."
"Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war," a spokesman for the North Korean army said in a statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
U.S. and South Korean officials have said that North Korea appears to be preparing to test-fire its long-range missile, the Taepodong-2, under the guise of launching a satellite into space. The missile is thought to have an intended range of about 6,700 kilometers (4,200 miles), which -- if true -- could give it the capability of striking Alaska or Hawaii.
North Korea's bellicose announcement came on the first day of annual joint military drills between South Korea and the United States.
"We have said several times that the U.S.-South Korean military exercises are annual defensive exercises," Kim said.
"We again urge North Korea to maintain the agreed stance of mutual respect and to stop its verbal attacks and actions that are raising tensions on the Korean peninsula," he said.
The North said it has shut its borders to "any enemies" and has cut off "the North-South military communications in order to guarantee the security."
North Korea said the military phone lines with the South, the last remaining communications channel, will remain closed until the 12-day military exercises end on March 20, according to Yonhap.
Kim said his government is urging North Korea "to immediately retract this measure and to allow the smooth flow of personnel and communication."
On Saturday, U.S. envoy Stephen Bosworth said he wants dialogue with North Korea, but he also spoke against North Korea's move to go forward with a launch, saying it would be "ill-advised."
|
[
"When were the South Koreans not cleared to cross the border?",
"What country is doing annual joint military drills with the US?",
"Who started annual joint military drills?",
"Who is staying at Kaesong industrial complex?",
"Number of people staying at Kaesong industrial complex?",
"What is Kaesong north of?",
"Where are 573 people staying?",
"What were 80 South Koreans not cleared for?"
] |
[
"Monday",
"South Korea",
"U.S. troops",
"573 South Koreans",
"573 South Koreans",
"the demilitarized zone,",
"at the Kaesong industrial complex,",
"Korea"
] |
question: When were the South Koreans not cleared to cross the border?, answer: Monday | question: What country is doing annual joint military drills with the US?, answer: South Korea | question: Who started annual joint military drills?, answer: U.S. troops | question: Who is staying at Kaesong industrial complex?, answer: 573 South Koreans | question: Number of people staying at Kaesong industrial complex?, answer: 573 South Koreans | question: What is Kaesong north of?, answer: the demilitarized zone, | question: Where are 573 people staying?, answer: at the Kaesong industrial complex, | question: What were 80 South Koreans not cleared for?, answer: Korea
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of inmates using pipes and shanks as weapons trashed a California prison, burning a courtyard, ripping beds to shreds and tearing bathroom sinks from walls, a new video of the weekend riot's aftermath shows.
A dormitory is trashed after a riot at the California Institution for men, in Chino.
Video shot by CNN affiliate KABC-TV gave the first glimpse of the damage to the California Institution for Men in Chino from a riot that authorities said was ignited by racial tensions.
"This certainly is probably the worst that we've seen, especially adding the extensive damage to the unit that has been burned," prison spokesman Lt. Mark Hargrove told reporters outside the prison Tuesday. "That has never happened at this facility before."
The riot erupted Saturday night and raged until Sunday morning, injuring 250 inmates. Fifty-five inmates were taken to hospitals with serious injuries, including stab wounds and head trauma. Watch the aftermath of the violence »
"The prison is still under a state of emergency," George Kostyrko, a spokesman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation told CNN, which means no visitors were allowed and the prison could not take any new inmates.
Corrections officials said they transferred about 1,150 inmates to other facilities. "The ones that are there are likely in a lockdown mode until an investigation can determine whether or not they were directly responsible for the riot," Kostyrko said.
The decision to lock down the Chino prison and nine others in southern California was still in effect Tuesday.
"The lockdowns will remain in effect until all the staff that we deployed to Chino from other areas go back home," Kostyrko said.
The measure was taken to prevent copy-cat violence.
Though other races were involved, the altercations at Chino mostly involved Hispanics and African-Americans, Kostyrko said.
About 80 officers responded to the scene, but none of the staff was injured.
A housing unit was heavily damaged by fire. Prisoners broke windows and pulled down pipes to use as weapons, Kostyrko said.
The facility has seven units, each of which houses about 200 inmates.
In one of the torched dormitories, burned red prison uniforms were strewn everywhere, the floor was covered with ankle-high ashes, windows were shattered and there was a large hole in the roof.
In the mounds of trash that littered the floor of the dorm, a rusty foot-long pipe could be seen.
Most of the residential areas were badly damaged and some inmates were being temporarily housed in tents, the spokesman said.
Chino is about 35 miles east of Los Angeles.
|
[
"What is the video about?",
"What remain in lockdown?",
"What gives a glimpse of damage to the California Institution for Men in Chino?",
"How many people remain in lockdown?",
"What sparked the riot?",
"The video gives glimpse of damage to what?",
"What was the riot was sparked by?"
] |
[
"the weekend riot's aftermath",
"1,150 inmates",
"Video shot by CNN affiliate KABC-TV",
"1,150",
"racial tensions.",
"California Institution for Men in Chino",
"racial tensions."
] |
question: What is the video about?, answer: the weekend riot's aftermath | question: What remain in lockdown?, answer: 1,150 inmates | question: What gives a glimpse of damage to the California Institution for Men in Chino?, answer: Video shot by CNN affiliate KABC-TV | question: How many people remain in lockdown?, answer: 1,150 | question: What sparked the riot?, answer: racial tensions. | question: The video gives glimpse of damage to what?, answer: California Institution for Men in Chino | question: What was the riot was sparked by?, answer: racial tensions.
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of law-enforcement officers were making arrests and executing search warrants Thursday in Arizona as part of an investigation into human smuggling, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency said.
Authorities made at least 40 arrests in an investigation into the suspected smuggling of illegal immigrants in vans that took them from the border to Tucson and Phoenix, two officials with Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.
Federal authorities scheduled a news conference for Thursday afternoon to discuss what they called "a massive, yearlong investigation targeting the infrastructure of several major Arizona-based human smuggling networks."
|
[
"When did authorities make arrests?",
"What way were the immigrants transported to the border?",
"What is being investigated?",
"What is currently being smuggled?",
"Whats the number of arrests?",
"Where were the immigrants shuttled into?",
"Roughly how many arrests were made on Thursday?",
"Where were immigrants taken?"
] |
[
"Thursday",
"in vans",
"human smuggling,",
"illegal immigrants",
"40",
"vans",
"at least 40",
"Tucson and Phoenix,"
] |
question: When did authorities make arrests?, answer: Thursday | question: What way were the immigrants transported to the border?, answer: in vans | question: What is being investigated?, answer: human smuggling, | question: What is currently being smuggled?, answer: illegal immigrants | question: Whats the number of arrests?, answer: 40 | question: Where were the immigrants shuttled into?, answer: vans | question: Roughly how many arrests were made on Thursday?, answer: at least 40 | question: Where were immigrants taken?, answer: Tucson and Phoenix,
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people attending Comic-Con in San Diego, California, will transform into zombies on Thursday.
A "zombie walk" at Comic-Con will promote the upcoming "Zombieland" movie.
They'll converge in a "zombie walk" through the San Diego Convention Center to promote Woody Harrelson's upcoming post-apocalyptic comedy, "Zombieland."
Comic-Con is an annual gathering of 125,000 people whose interests include comic book and science fiction film and TV, anime, toys and video games. Major movie studios and TV networks use the convention to launch their latest productions.
Zombie movies have been on the rise in recent years, and the type of zombies on the big screen has been evolving with the times.
George Romero's 1968 film "Night of the Living Dead" -- followed by "Dawn of the Dead" -- popularized zombies "based on the original Haitian voodoo kind of zombie, the supernatural being, the walking dead or the undead," said "Zombieland" director Ruben Fleischer.
Zombie films made "a seismic shift in zombies with Danny Boyle's film '28 Days Later,' where it became a more viral-based thing, a diseased population, as opposed to from the grave," Fleischer said.
In "Zombieland," living people are infected by a fast-spreading virus that turns them into "this other being" that is fast, ferocious and flesh-eating, he said.
"These modern zombies are reflective of some of the perils of what can happen with overpopulation and disease control and how quickly things can spread and become a problem." iReport.com: Going to Comic-Con?
Fleischer, along with screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, consulted a disease expert "to get to the bottom of what the modern pandemic would be," he said.
"When swine flu happened, it was after we finished shooting, but it just really reminded me of how these things can spread so quickly and a whole population can be devastated," he said.
While about 500 extras were hired to be zombies in Fleischer's movie, even more Comic-Con participants could take part in Thursday's zombie walk. Sony has hired professional makeup artists to get them ready.
Fleischer said those portraying a modern zombie should think like "a rabid dog."
Don't lumber along like Frankenstein's monster, but move with "a real furious anger and intensity" and "a lot of grunting and snarling and growling," he said. "Zombies don't talk."
Hunger is a modern zombie's chief motivation, he said: "I think that they're definitely cannibalistic. They want to eat people."
What does a modern zombie wear?
Fleischer's zombies come as they are, whether in a work uniform or dressed for the mall.
"It's as if you were at the mall and some zombies attacked and everyone there got turned into a zombie," he said. "They'd be wearing the same clothes that they had before. They'd be dressed in the same way."
Fleischer developed a list of 150 types of zombies for his film, including construction workers, moms, a punk rocker and preppie zombies.
"They're just people who got infected, like a modern pandemic," he said.
"Zombieland" -- which hits theaters October 9 -- brings out the humor in killing zombies, which is Harrelson's specialty.
"They're not easy to kill, so sometimes you've got to get them more than once," Fleischer said. "You've got to make sure you get them because they'll keep coming if you don't."
Harrelson blamed post-traumatic stress from filming for his scuffle with a TMZ photographer at an airport the day after shooting wrapped in Georgia in April.
"With my daughter at the airport I was startled by a paparazzo who I quite understandably mistook for a zombie," Harrelson said.
While Harrelson will be at Comic-Con to promote the movie, it was
|
[
"Which new film features zombies?",
"How many people will attend Comic-con this year?",
"Who stars in Zombieland?",
"How many fans does comic con draw",
"How many does Comic-Con draw in?",
"What is the film called",
"Who will become zombies",
"What will Comic-Con visitors dress as to celebrate?",
"What is Comic-Con?",
"When is Zombieland set to debut?",
"what will become some Comic-Con attendees to celebrate new film?",
"how many fans the Comic-Con draws annually?",
"What film has some Comic-Con goers dressing as zombies?",
"Who attends Comic-Con?",
"what's the name of the new film?",
"When is \"Zombieland\" debuting?",
"How many people attend Comic-Con each year?"
] |
[
"\"Zombieland\"",
"125,000",
"Woody Harrelson's",
"125,000",
"125,000 people",
"\"Zombieland\"",
"Hundreds",
"zombies",
"is an annual gathering of 125,000 people whose interests include comic book and science fiction film and TV, anime, toys and video games.",
"October 9",
"transform into zombies",
"125,000 people",
"\"Zombieland\"",
"Hundreds",
"\"Zombieland\"",
"October 9",
"125,000"
] |
question: Which new film features zombies?, answer: "Zombieland" | question: How many people will attend Comic-con this year?, answer: 125,000 | question: Who stars in Zombieland?, answer: Woody Harrelson's | question: How many fans does comic con draw, answer: 125,000 | question: How many does Comic-Con draw in?, answer: 125,000 people | question: What is the film called, answer: "Zombieland" | question: Who will become zombies, answer: Hundreds | question: What will Comic-Con visitors dress as to celebrate?, answer: zombies | question: What is Comic-Con?, answer: is an annual gathering of 125,000 people whose interests include comic book and science fiction film and TV, anime, toys and video games. | question: When is Zombieland set to debut?, answer: October 9 | question: what will become some Comic-Con attendees to celebrate new film?, answer: transform into zombies | question: how many fans the Comic-Con draws annually?, answer: 125,000 people | question: What film has some Comic-Con goers dressing as zombies?, answer: "Zombieland" | question: Who attends Comic-Con?, answer: Hundreds | question: what's the name of the new film?, answer: "Zombieland" | question: When is "Zombieland" debuting?, answer: October 9 | question: How many people attend Comic-Con each year?, answer: 125,000
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people filled a college auditorium Wednesday to pay their last respects to an El Reno, Oklahoma, woman slain along with her four children last week.
Summer Rust's children -- clockwise from top, Autumn, Kirsten, Evynn and Teagin -- carve pumpkins.
About 300 people attended the service at Redlands Community College for Summer Rust, 25; her son, Teagin, 4; and daughters Evynn, 3, and Autumn and Kirsten, both 7, CNN affiliate KOCO reported.
Rust's white coffin was placed in front of the podium, flanked by the smaller caskets carrying her children.
Each casket had a picture of the victim, surrounded by flowers. A slide show of the family played on an overhead screen throughout the service.
"I've preached a lot of funerals, but none like this one," said the Rev. Gerald Van Horn.
"This has been on my heart ever since I heard about it. I first learned of it from the news, and I said, 'In El Reno? No way.' ... We don't have to deal with tragedy very often, but it has come, and the reality of it has sunk in. Searching my heart on what to say, I have found it difficult."
He told mourners that God is near and feels their pain but acknowledged that Rust and her children "will be greatly missed."
The bodies were found January 12 in Rust's apartment in El Reno, about 30 miles west of Oklahoma City.
According to the document, each of the victims was suffocated and strangled. Crime scene investigators said each body had ligature marks around the neck.
Rust's boyfriend, Joshua Steven Durcho, 25, admitted choking her to death but said the children were not there at the time, according to an affidavit filed last week.
He was arrested in Hamilton County, Texas, officials said. A spokeswoman at the Canadian County, Oklahoma, Sheriff's Office said Durcho was being held in the county jail after waiving extradition.
Durcho's cousin found Rust's body and called officers, who found the children's bodies in the apartment, says an affidavit written by a special agent with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
An apparent acquaintance of Durcho's told police he came to her apartment Monday afternoon and told her he had "choked" Summer Rust to death and he was leaving Oklahoma, according to the affidavit.
The affidavit says Durcho told the woman "that the children were at their grandmother's residence ... while he and Summer worked out their relationship problems."
Rust's mother, Susan Rust of Carson City, Nevada, said Durcho was unemployed and had been living with Rust and her children.
Authorities in Texas said Durcho was arrested after a state trooper attempted to stop his car because the trooper suspected that the driver was drunk. When the trooper ran the license plate on the car, it matched the tag number of a vehicle sought by Oklahoma police.
|
[
"What date were the bodies found?",
"Who admitted to choking a women in an affidavit?",
"What was the suspect's name?",
"What state is El Reno in?",
"What did 300 mourners attend?",
"How many mourners came to the funeral at Redlands Community College?",
"Number of kids the preacher found a funderal for?",
"What colleg was the service held at?",
"Number of mourners?",
"Who admitted to choking the woman?"
] |
[
"January 12",
"Rust's boyfriend, Joshua Steven Durcho,",
"Joshua Steven Durcho,",
"Oklahoma,",
"the service at Redlands Community College",
"300 people",
"four",
"Redlands Community College",
"About 300 people",
"Joshua Steven Durcho,"
] |
question: What date were the bodies found?, answer: January 12 | question: Who admitted to choking a women in an affidavit?, answer: Rust's boyfriend, Joshua Steven Durcho, | question: What was the suspect's name?, answer: Joshua Steven Durcho, | question: What state is El Reno in?, answer: Oklahoma, | question: What did 300 mourners attend?, answer: the service at Redlands Community College | question: How many mourners came to the funeral at Redlands Community College?, answer: 300 people | question: Number of kids the preacher found a funderal for?, answer: four | question: What colleg was the service held at?, answer: Redlands Community College | question: Number of mourners?, answer: About 300 people | question: Who admitted to choking the woman?, answer: Joshua Steven Durcho,
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people filled a college auditorium Wednesday to pay their last respects to an El Reno, Oklahoma, woman slain along with her four children last week.
Summer Rust's children -- clockwise from top, Autumn, Kirsten, Evynn and Teagin -- carve pumpkins.
About 300 people attended the service at Redlands Community College for Summer Rust, 25; her son, Teagin, 4; and daughters Evynn, 3, and Autumn and Kirsten, both 7, CNN affiliate KOCO reported.
Rust's white coffin was placed in front of the podium, flanked by the smaller caskets carrying her children.
Each casket had a picture of the victim, surrounded by flowers. A slide show of the family played on an overhead screen throughout the service.
"I've preached a lot of funerals, but none like this one," said the Rev. Gerald Van Horn.
"This has been on my heart ever since I heard about it. I first learned of it from the news, and I said, 'In El Reno? No way.' ... We don't have to deal with tragedy very often, but it has come, and the reality of it has sunk in. Searching my heart on what to say, I have found it difficult."
He told mourners that God is near and feels their pain but acknowledged that Rust and her children "will be greatly missed."
The bodies were found January 12 in Rust's apartment in El Reno, about 30 miles west of Oklahoma City.
According to the document, each of the victims was suffocated and strangled. Crime scene investigators said each body had ligature marks around the neck.
Rust's boyfriend, Joshua Steven Durcho, 25, admitted choking her to death but said the children were not there at the time, according to an affidavit filed last week.
He was arrested in Hamilton County, Texas, officials said. A spokeswoman at the Canadian County, Oklahoma, Sheriff's Office said Durcho was being held in the county jail after waiving extradition.
Durcho's cousin found Rust's body and called officers, who found the children's bodies in the apartment, says an affidavit written by a special agent with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
An apparent acquaintance of Durcho's told police he came to her apartment Monday afternoon and told her he had "choked" Summer Rust to death and he was leaving Oklahoma, according to the affidavit.
The affidavit says Durcho told the woman "that the children were at their grandmother's residence ... while he and Summer worked out their relationship problems."
Rust's mother, Susan Rust of Carson City, Nevada, said Durcho was unemployed and had been living with Rust and her children.
Authorities in Texas said Durcho was arrested after a state trooper attempted to stop his car because the trooper suspected that the driver was drunk. When the trooper ran the license plate on the car, it matched the tag number of a vehicle sought by Oklahoma police.
|
[
"Who killed these people?",
"Where were the bodies found?",
"How many attended service at RCC?",
"Where was the funeral held?",
"What about the funeral did the preacher find difficult?",
"How many bodies was found in apartment in El Reno?",
"How many mourners attended the service at Redlands Community College?",
"When were the bodies found the apartment in El Reno, California?"
] |
[
"Joshua Steven Durcho,",
"in Rust's apartment in El Reno,",
"About 300 people",
"Redlands Community College",
"to say,",
"four children",
"About 300",
"January 12"
] |
question: Who killed these people?, answer: Joshua Steven Durcho, | question: Where were the bodies found?, answer: in Rust's apartment in El Reno, | question: How many attended service at RCC?, answer: About 300 people | question: Where was the funeral held?, answer: Redlands Community College | question: What about the funeral did the preacher find difficult?, answer: to say, | question: How many bodies was found in apartment in El Reno?, answer: four children | question: How many mourners attended the service at Redlands Community College?, answer: About 300 | question: When were the bodies found the apartment in El Reno, California?, answer: January 12
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people gathered Tuesday night for a candlelight vigil outside a San Diego, California, church in honor of a teenage girl missing since Thursday.
The vigil was held just hours after authorities said they found human remains in an area where they had been searching for 17-year-old Chelsea King.
"There is strong likelihood that we have found Chelsea," San Diego County Sheriff William Gore said at a news conference.
The remains were found in a shallow grave along the shoreline of a tributary south of a lake in Rancho Bernardo Community Park, authorities said.
Searchers have been combing the edge of Lake Hodges for any clue into the disappearance of King, a cross-country runner who often ran along the park's trails.
The last reported sighting of the high school senior was at school Thursday, according to sheriff's department spokeswoman Susan Plese. Her car, with her cell phone inside, was found at the park, Plese said.
Police arrested 30-year-old John Albert Gardner III on Sunday in connection with the disappearance.
Gardner is being held in the San Diego Central Jail on rape and first-degree murder charges, according to jail records available online Tuesday night.
Gardner is due to appear in court later Wednesday.
Follow local coverage on KGTV
Gore said the body was found in a heavily wooded area not visible from nearby homes. A shoe had been found earlier in the same area.
He said King's parents have been informed of the discovery.
"They were holding out hope as we all were that we would find Chelsea alive," he said. "This is our worst fears that we would find her as we did today."
At Tuesday night's vigil, friends and family were expected to speak about King and play some of her favorite songs.
Gore said he expected to have positive identification of the body by Wednesday.
Gardner, a registered sex offender, is scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday, according to San Diego County district attorney's spokesman Steve Walker.
|
[
"What is John Albert Gardner III being help for?",
"When did the teen girl go missing?",
"What did hundreds do on Thursday?",
"What was the vigil for?",
"What was found in the park?",
"What were the hundreds gathering for?",
"What is John Albert Gardener III being held on?"
] |
[
"on rape and first-degree murder charges,",
"Thursday.",
"candlelight vigil",
"in honor of a teenage girl missing since Thursday.",
"human remains",
"candlelight vigil",
"rape and first-degree murder charges,"
] |
question: What is John Albert Gardner III being help for?, answer: on rape and first-degree murder charges, | question: When did the teen girl go missing?, answer: Thursday. | question: What did hundreds do on Thursday?, answer: candlelight vigil | question: What was the vigil for?, answer: in honor of a teenage girl missing since Thursday. | question: What was found in the park?, answer: human remains | question: What were the hundreds gathering for?, answer: candlelight vigil | question: What is John Albert Gardener III being held on?, answer: rape and first-degree murder charges,
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people were evacuated Sunday amid flood concerns after a long-dormant volcano erupted beneath a glacier in south Iceland.
It was the first time since 1821 that the volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier has erupted.
More than 600 people were evacuated as scientists monitored a fissure in the volcano from which lava was erupting. The fissure measured about 1,640 to 3,281 feet (500 to 1,000 meters).
Despite the remote location of the eruption, if the fissure "develops further towards the glacier, the melting floodwater ... will create dangerous floods in a populated area in south Iceland," said Gudrun Johannesdottir, a project manager for Iceland's Joint Rescue and Coordination Center.
The country's civil protection agency did not immediately record any injuries or damage.
Eyjafjallajokull is about 100 miles (160 kilometers) east of the capital, Reykjavik.
|
[
"When was the last eruption?",
"when was the first time that the volcano erupted?",
"What could the eruption do?",
"how many miles is the volcano from east of Reykjavik?",
"Where is the volcano?",
"what could melt part of glacier?"
] |
[
"1821",
"1821",
"will create dangerous floods in a populated area in south Iceland,\"",
"100",
"south Iceland.",
"a fissure in the volcano from which lava was erupting."
] |
question: When was the last eruption?, answer: 1821 | question: when was the first time that the volcano erupted?, answer: 1821 | question: What could the eruption do?, answer: will create dangerous floods in a populated area in south Iceland," | question: how many miles is the volcano from east of Reykjavik?, answer: 100 | question: Where is the volcano?, answer: south Iceland. | question: what could melt part of glacier?, answer: a fissure in the volcano from which lava was erupting.
|
(CNN) -- Hundreds of people were injured in Bahrain Friday, when rival groups clashed over an attempted march in the town of Riffa, a residential area where the ruling Al-Khalifa family lives.
The national health ministry said 774 people were injured and 107 were hospitalized in the wake of the fighting.
Anti-government demonstrators in Riffa had planned a march. A crowd numbering roughly 8,000 set off on the march, according to Bahrain's ambassador to the United States.
But they were met by hundreds of people carrying swords, hatchets, metal pieces, cricket instruments and pieces of wood with nails hammered into them. The opposing group had already taken up positions in an effort to stop the planned march.
Bahrain's ambassador to the United States took the unusual step of commenting on the clashes in Riffa, which he called a "sectarian conflict" between Shia and Sunni Muslim factions. Law enforcement officers had erected barbed wire fences in an attempt to ward off any fighting, Houda Ezra Nonoo said in a statement.
The conflict began when small groups from opposing sides met at the security fence, she said.
Accounts that claimed live ammunition was used by government forces were "rumors," Nonoo added. She also denied allegations that people inhaled tear gas to the point of suffocation.
Only eight tear gas canisters were used to disperse the crowd, according to Nonoo's statement. Video footage would support his version of the operation, she said.
The attempted march in Riffa was organized by some of the more hard-line Shia groups among the government opposition. However, there are also moderate Shia groups and Sunni groups in the anti-government coalition.
Sunni Muslims -- a minority in the kingdom -- dominate the government of Bahrain.
The Shiite Muslim majority has staged protests in recent years to complain about discrimination, unemployment and corruption.
Riffa is just over 12 miles (20 kilometers) southwest of the capital, Manama, where demonstrators have been protesting in Pearl Roundabout for a month. Seven people died there when security personnel tried to clear the area in mid-February.
Protesters initially took to the streets of Manama to demand reform and the introduction of a constitutional monarchy. More than 500 people have been injured in Bahrain since the protest began, which human rights activists say is part of a wave of popular unrest crashing through the Arab world
The Bahrain Center for Human Rights said authorities launched a clampdown on dissent in 2010. It accused the government of torturing some human rights activists.
CNN's Tim Lister and journalist Mansoor Al-Jamri contributed to this report.
|
[
"What was carried by the opposing crowds?",
"What is the name of the ruling family?",
"What family rules in the area where clashes occurred?",
"Who denied the allegations of police force?",
"How many people were injured?",
"where the confrontation took place"
] |
[
"swords, hatchets, metal pieces, cricket instruments and pieces of wood with nails hammered into them.",
"Al-Khalifa",
"Al-Khalifa",
"Houda Ezra Nonoo",
"774",
"town of Riffa,"
] |
question: What was carried by the opposing crowds?, answer: swords, hatchets, metal pieces, cricket instruments and pieces of wood with nails hammered into them. | question: What is the name of the ruling family?, answer: Al-Khalifa | question: What family rules in the area where clashes occurred?, answer: Al-Khalifa | question: Who denied the allegations of police force?, answer: Houda Ezra Nonoo | question: How many people were injured?, answer: 774 | question: where the confrontation took place, answer: town of Riffa,
|
(CNN) -- Hungary awoke Monday to a new political landscape after the center-right opposition Fidesz party took decisive election victory, ending eight years of Socialist rule.
Fidesz won two-thirds of the votes in Sunday's second round of parliamentary elections, gaining 263 of the 386 seats -- enough to allow it to govern without forming alliances.
Fidesz leader Viktor Orban characterized the vote -- which also saw gains by the far-right -- as a "revolution" in the Eastern European country that was under Soviet control from 1945 to 1991.
"Today there was revolution in the polling booths," Fidesz leader Viktor Orban told a crowd of supporters, according to Hungary's MTI news agency.
"Hungarians have overthrown the system and created a new one. The old system of leaders misusing their power was replaced by one of national unity."
While the Socialist party took second place with 59 seats, it was closely followed by the far-right Jobbik party, making its parliamentary debut.
Jobbik has come under international criticism for what many perceive as anti-Semitic statements and for its verbal attacks on the country's gypsy, or Roma, minority.
Ahead of the vote, the Socialists has seen their support dwindle as they struggled to push through a broad reform program, tackling the country's education and health care systems.
Their problems were compounded when the global recession hit Hungary hard. In late 2008, it had to borrow $27 billion from the International Monetary Fund as unemployment climbed into the double digits and the economy shrunk.
The party was also derailed by scandals and accusations of corruption.
In 2006, Hungarian radio played a leaked tape where former Prime Minister and Socialist Party member Ferenc Gyurcsany admitted that his party lied to the public to win that year's general election.
Journalist Fanny Facsar contributed to this report.
|
[
"who won 263 of the 386 seats in parliament?",
"what does the win mean",
"What did Fidesz win?",
"who was forced to take $27 billion loan in 2008?",
"how many seats Socialists won?"
] |
[
"Fidesz",
"ending eight years of Socialist rule.",
"two-thirds of the votes",
"Hungary",
"59"
] |
question: who won 263 of the 386 seats in parliament?, answer: Fidesz | question: what does the win mean, answer: ending eight years of Socialist rule. | question: What did Fidesz win?, answer: two-thirds of the votes | question: who was forced to take $27 billion loan in 2008?, answer: Hungary | question: how many seats Socialists won?, answer: 59
|
(CNN) -- Hunger is stunting hundreds of millions of children in the developing world, and more than 90 percent of them live in Africa and Asia, UNICEF says.
Poor nutrition is one of the main killers of young children, the U.N. Children's Fund says in the new report "Tracking Progress on Child and Maternal Nutrition."
"The report we have launched draws attention to the fact that 200 million children under the age of 5 in the developing world suffer from chronic undernutrition," said Werner Schultink, UNICEF's associate director of nutrition.
A lack of food can impair physical, mental and social abilities, the report says, adding that proper nutrition is important for mother and child. The 1,000 days from conception until a child's second birthday are the most critical for development, according to UNICEF.
Undernourished children "will perform less well in school, they will be able to do less well as an adult and, even worse, their health situation in adult life may be negatively affected," Schultink said. "They are more likely to suffer from chronic diseases, such as heart disease or diabetes."
UNICEF says nutrition supplement programs have helped deliver vitamin A and iodized salt to vulnerable children in developing countries, boosting childhood mortality.
Mothers also are being urged to breast-feed their children for at least the first six months to provide key antibodies and nutrients.
Reducing and eliminating malnutrition is feasible, according to the report, which calls on the international community to provide urgent help or face the consequences.
"Global commitments on food security, nutrition and sustainable agriculture are part of a wider agenda that will help address the critical issues raised in this report," said Ann Veneman, UNICEF's executive director. "Unless attention is paid to addressing the causes of child and maternal undernutrition today, the costs will be considerably higher tomorrow."
|
[
"what countries is this happening in",
"How many children younger than 5 suffer from chronic undernutrition?",
"How many under 5s suffer?",
"What us the result of poor nutrition?",
"What are undernourished kids more likely to suffer from?",
"What is one of the main killers of young children?"
] |
[
"Africa and Asia,",
"200 million",
"200 million children",
"the main killers of young children,",
"chronic diseases,",
"Poor nutrition"
] |
question: what countries is this happening in, answer: Africa and Asia, | question: How many children younger than 5 suffer from chronic undernutrition?, answer: 200 million | question: How many under 5s suffer?, answer: 200 million children | question: What us the result of poor nutrition?, answer: the main killers of young children, | question: What are undernourished kids more likely to suffer from?, answer: chronic diseases, | question: What is one of the main killers of young children?, answer: Poor nutrition
|
(CNN) -- Hunter S. Thompson's slim early novel -- written in 1959, when he was 22, but only published 40 years later -- gets a dream screen treatment courtesy of producer-star Johnny Depp and "Withnail and I" writer-director Bruce Robinson.
By rights Depp -- who already played Thompson's alter-ego Raoul Duke in Terry Gilliam's grandly grotesque "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" -- should be too old to play the latest recruit on a failing American newspaper in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
But even when he's hung over and wretched (which is often) he easily passes for 30, the age of the book's "Paul Kemp." Of course the fact that this engagingly left field movie has spent three years on the shelf helps.
When Kemp washes up in San Juan, his greatest literary achievement is his resume. He's promptly put on the astrology desk. But he's hungry to make a name for himself, which gives him an edge over his pickled colleagues. It's enough to attract the patronage of local wheeler-dealer Sanderson (Aaron Eckhart), a property developer who has big plans for the island -- and his eye-catching girlfriend, Chenault (Amber Heard).
It would be an exaggeration to call "The Rum Diary" a dry run for "Fear and Loathing" (and "dry" wasn't really in Thompson's vocabulary, though Kemp does make vain promises to cut back on the hard stuff from time to time). Still, in Depp and Robinson's hands you can't miss the roots of Gonzo. This is more than ever the portrait of the artist as a young man -- fermented, refined and distilled from the book.
Compared to his cartoonish Raoul Duke (or his Jack Sparrow) Depp's agreeably deadpan performance is scaled back several notches, though it's hard to think of another movie heartthrob who uses his body to such clownish effect when the occasion arises. Frequently shuttered behind a slick pair of shades, Kemp is a stranger in paradise and not quite sure of his bearings yet. He's an avid observer trying to figure out where a real writer might fit between the stinking shantytowns and the shiny luxury beach houses.
Robinson has no doubts about which side he's on in that fight, and smuggles in pertinent asides on the parlous state of today's heavily mortgaged newspaper business. Vibrantly photographed by Dariusz Wolski, the movie lays on the local color with gusto -- we get fighting cocks, voodoo and carnival - but we also see broken down plumbing, simmering racial tension, permanent flop sweat and killer lines like Sanderson's, after Kemp marvels at the beauty of the place: "It's God's idea of money."
Admittedly Kemp's picaresque misadventures don't add up to much of a plot -- the wheels come off in a climax that slouches off miserably in search of some future happy ending -- but there's so much to enjoy along the way, the movie's delayed release is hard to fathom.
Depp's easy rapport with Michael Rispoli, as photographer/sidekick Sala, is a low-key delight. I loved the way Aaron Eckhart's imperious uber-confidence slips where Chenault is concerned; and even anomalies like a jewel-encrusted tortoise... "I got the idea from a book," Sanderson explains -- as if it did.
Bruce Robinson has never topped the riotous comic miserabilism of his first film, the cult classic "Withnail and I" -- he's never even come close -- but "The Rum Diary" might be considered hair of the dog after a 24-year-long career hangover. He's back in his debauched and debunking element, which is reason enough to celebrate.
|
[
"Who's performance was agreeably deadpan?",
"Who did Depp rapport with?",
"What does the movie do with gusto?"
] |
[
"Johnny Depp",
"Michael Rispoli,",
"lays on the local color"
] |
question: Who's performance was agreeably deadpan?, answer: Johnny Depp | question: Who did Depp rapport with?, answer: Michael Rispoli, | question: What does the movie do with gusto?, answer: lays on the local color
|
(CNN) -- Hurricane Felicia had maximum sustained winds of 140 mph Thursday, but forecasters predicted the storm, which is heading toward Hawaii, would weaken in the Pacific later in the day.
Forecasters predict Hurricane Felicia will weaken as it moves over colder water.
The Category 4 storm's reduction in intensity was expected to come as it moved over cooler waters, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida.
Felicia could reach Hawaii on Tuesday morning, according to forecast tracks, but by that time the storm will have weakened to a tropical depression with winds of about 35 mph, the center said.
As of 8 a.m. local time, Felicia's center was about 1,510 miles west-southwest of the southern tip of Mexico's Baja California and 1,545 miles east of Hilo, Hawaii. Hurricanes 101: How hurricanes are classified »
The storm was moving northwest near 10 mph, and a gradual turn to the west-northwest was expected over the next 48 hours.
"If anything, it will be a rain-making system over the (Hawaiian) islands," said Richard Knabb, deputy director of the Central Pacific Hurricane Center.
Knabb said there are no real storm preparations under way in Hawaii, but officials are keeping an eye on the storm "just in case."
|
[
"When did Hurricane Felicia reach category 4?",
"what is the name of the storm?",
"What day did this happen",
"When is the storm expected to weaken?",
"What category hurricane is it",
"What is the Hurricane named"
] |
[
"Thursday,",
"Felicia",
"Thursday,",
"later in the day.",
"4",
"Felicia"
] |
question: When did Hurricane Felicia reach category 4?, answer: Thursday, | question: what is the name of the storm?, answer: Felicia | question: What day did this happen, answer: Thursday, | question: When is the storm expected to weaken?, answer: later in the day. | question: What category hurricane is it, answer: 4 | question: What is the Hurricane named, answer: Felicia
|
(CNN) -- Hurricane Ida moved into the southern Gulf of Mexico Sunday, prompting a declaration of emergency in Louisiana and concern along the U.S. Gulf Coast.
The storm regained hurricane intensity overnight Saturday, becoming a Category 2 hurricane, but forecasters said it is expected to weaken as it moves north. Ida drenched Nicaragua after making landfall last week as a Category 1 hurricane, then weakened to a tropical storm before resuming strength.
In El Salvador, at least 91 people died in flooding and mudslides, according to the government, but a low-pressure system out of the Pacific -- not Hurricane Ida -- triggered the disaster, forecaster Robby Berg of the National Hurricane Center said Sunday.
A hurricane warning, meaning hurricane conditions are possible within 24 hours, extends from Pascagoula, Mississippi to Indian Pass, Florida, forecasters said.
From Grande Isle, Louisiana, to west of Pascagoula, Mississippi, a tropical storm warning and a hurricane watch are in effect. This area includes New Orleans, which the center earlier excluded from the watch, and Lake Pontchartrain, the hurricane center said.
In anticipation of the storm's arrival, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency Sunday afternoon.
Hurricane Ida "threatens the safety and security of those citizens" along the state's southeast coastline, he wrote in the declaration. The declaration gives the director of the governor's office of emergency preparedness authority "to undertake any activity authorized by law which he deems necessary and appropriate" to prepare for the possibility of a hurricane.
Track Ida's progress, potential path
Alabama's Baldwin County commission urged that residents living in mobile homes, coastal communities or low-lying, flood-prone areas voluntarily evacuate. The county is under a local state of emergency and opened a shelter, according to a Sunday night statement from the county commission.
As of 10 p.m. ET Sunday, Ida had maximum sustained winds near 105 mph (165 km/hr) with higher gusts. But the storm was expected to weaken on Monday and possibly begin losing tropical characteristics on Tuesday, the hurricane center said.
The center of Ida was located about 400 miles (645 km) south-southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River, forecasters said. It was moving north-northwest at nearly 14 mph (22 km/hr) and was expected to increase in speed. The storm was expected to be near coastal areas of the northern Gulf by Monday night or early Tuesday, the hurricane center said.
As Ida moves in the Gulf of Mexico, conditions are expected to be unfavorable for any additional development, said CNN meteorologist Dave Hennen. Ida is expected to weaken because of a combination of wind shear, cooler water temperatures and the storm's interaction with a strong frontal system pushing off the Gulf Coast, he said.
But Ida is forecast to remain a hurricane as it moves in the northern Gulf toward the U.S. coast, the center said.
Florida's Division of Emergency Management asked residents to have disaster plans in place.
"Whether Ida maintains a storm or loses tropical characteristics, the Florida Gulf Coast region has the potential to see several inches of rain, strong winds, isolated tornadoes and dangerous surf and coastal flooding beginning Monday evening and continuing into Wednesday," the office said in a statement.
The area stretching from Indian Pass, Florida, to Aucilla River, Florida, is also under a tropical storm warning. Tropical storm conditions are possible within 24 hours, the center said.
Ida could drop between 1 and 3 inches of rain on portions of western Cuba, with isolated amounts of 8 inches possible in some spots, forecasters said. The central and eastern areas of the Gulf Coast northward to eastern Tennessee Valley and southern Appalachian Mountains could see 3 to 5 inches of rain with some areas getting as much as 8 inches, the center said.
Ida is the Atlantic region's ninth named storm. The Atlantic hurricane season ends November 30.
CNN meteorologist Jacqui Jeras and journalist Merlin Delcid in El Salvador contributed to this report.
|
[
"what has the governor declared",
"Who declares Emergency?",
"How many deaths were in El Salvador?",
"When did the govenor declare emergency?",
"What is Ida expected to do?",
"What expected weaken?",
"how many deaths have occured so far"
] |
[
"state of emergency Sunday afternoon.",
"Louisiana",
"at least 91",
"Sunday afternoon.",
"weaken as it moves north.",
"Hurricane",
"91"
] |
question: what has the governor declared, answer: state of emergency Sunday afternoon. | question: Who declares Emergency?, answer: Louisiana | question: How many deaths were in El Salvador?, answer: at least 91 | question: When did the govenor declare emergency?, answer: Sunday afternoon. | question: What is Ida expected to do?, answer: weaken as it moves north. | question: What expected weaken?, answer: Hurricane | question: how many deaths have occured so far, answer: 91
|
(CNN) -- Hurricane Ophelia got even more powerful Friday night as it churned across the Atlantic toward Bermuda, the National Hurricane Center reported.
A tropical storm watch was in effect for that mid-Atlantic island, but Ophelia's increasingly northerly path suggests it won't directly threaten the coastal United States.
The system was disorganized and seemed to be weakening last week. But it has gained steam in recent days and earlier Friday was upgraded to a Category 3 hurricane.
According to the center's 8 p.m. update, Ophelia had maximum sustained winds of 120 mph, which is 5 mph stronger than those recorded three hours earlier. Its center was located 480 miles south-southeast of Bermuda.
Ophelia has also gotten faster, increasing in speed 4 mph as it heads north at around 16 mph. With an expected turn more to the north-northeast, the storm is expected to strike the eastern part of Bermuda late Saturday, reports the hurricane center.
The Miami-based forecasters said that there could be fluctuations in Ophelia's intensity over the next 12 to 24 hours, followed by a gradual weakening.
Hurricane-force winds extended about 30 miles from the storm's eye, center said. Tropical storm-force winds, which are winds between 39 mph and 73 mph, have been recorded 175 miles away.
Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Philippe has strengthened somewhat as it spins farther east in the Atlantic, with its eye some 1,100 miles east-northeast of the Leeward Islands as of 5 p.m. Friday.
As of that update, its sustained winds were 50 mph, which is slightly stronger than the previous update.
The hurricane center predicted "some weakening" over the next 48 hours, during which it was set to turn more toward the west-northwest.
|
[
"what is happening with tropical storm philippe",
"What are the wind speeds?",
"what is the maximum sustained winds of ophelia",
"who will the hurricane hit next",
"What is the name of the tropical storm?",
"What speed of winds have been sustained",
"Which Island is to be hit",
"What is the name of the hurricane?"
] |
[
"has strengthened somewhat as it spins farther east in the Atlantic,",
"120 mph,",
"120 mph,",
"eastern part of Bermuda",
"Philippe",
"120 mph,",
"Bermuda,",
"Ophelia"
] |
question: what is happening with tropical storm philippe, answer: has strengthened somewhat as it spins farther east in the Atlantic, | question: What are the wind speeds?, answer: 120 mph, | question: what is the maximum sustained winds of ophelia, answer: 120 mph, | question: who will the hurricane hit next, answer: eastern part of Bermuda | question: What is the name of the tropical storm?, answer: Philippe | question: What speed of winds have been sustained, answer: 120 mph, | question: Which Island is to be hit, answer: Bermuda, | question: What is the name of the hurricane?, answer: Ophelia
|
(CNN) -- I asked a knowledgeable environmentalist earlier this week: "How big a story is the CRU scandal in your community?"
"The what?"
"The e-mails hacked at the Climate Research Unit at [the British] East Anglia University?"
"Ah." He smiled. "It says something that I didn't immediately recognize what you were talking about. I suppose on my side we'd take the same view that the Pentagon took of Abu Ghraib: a few bad apples on the night shift."
Meanwhile, on the right, the story is the biggest scandal since the leak of the Pentagon Papers.
Seemingly unperturbed by the CRU embarrassment, President Obama will shortly jet to Copenhagen to pledge reductions in U.S. carbon emissions. The Democratic majority in Congress continues to work on a cap-and-trade bill.
At the same time, Gallup has recorded an amazing 20 point drop since summer 2008 in the number of Republicans who believe that global warming is occurring. Among Republican conservatives, the drop is slightly smaller -- 13 points -- but that's because so few of them believed in the reality of global warming in the first place.
It used to be said that we were all entitled to our own opinions, but not entitled to our own facts. No more. In modern America, we choose our facts to fit our opinions. Michael Barone drove this point home in a 2008 column for the magazine of the American Enterprise Institute:
Americans' views of the economy are increasingly a function of voting behavior or party loyalty, rather than the other way around. In early 2006, a time of vibrant economic growth, 56 percent of Republicans said the economy was excellent or good, while only 28 percent of independents and 23 percent of Democrats agreed.
Maybe Republicans were just doing better than Democrats? No -- the partisan divergence held true among Republicans and Democrats even of the same income level. The same effect showed up in reverse in the 1990s. Under President Clinton, Democrats were more likely to assess the economy positively than were Republicans of the same income level.
Media critics often blame cable, talk radio and blogs for isolating the public into self-satisfied information communities. And for sure, Fox News, MSNBC, Rush Limbaugh and the Daily Show have done good business serving niche markets. But it's a real question: What is cause and what is effect?
Maybe customers always wanted to have their pre-existing opinions confirmed. Notice how often 19th century newspapers had names like the "Clay County Whig" or the "Jacksonville Democrat." What were these old county papers if not the Fox News and MSNBC of their day?
The whole global warming debate has been distorted from the start by intellectual self-ghettoization. Suffused by self-righteousness, the East Anglian scientists felt entitled to twist the evidence and delete the counter-evidence. iReport: Share your thoughts on climate change
But it also helped that they felt sure they would not be caught. They had defined their community in a way that excluded skepticism, that defined skeptics as the enemy, as liars, as Holocaust deniers.
Private e-mails and documents allegedly from the servers at the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit, a world-renowned center on the study of climate change, are thought to have been leaked by hackers.
Everything important about global warming remains disputed:
How fast is it happening? How much of it is attributable to human activity? How dangerous is it? How much should we pay to avert or mitigate it? Who should do the paying?
How are to begin to reach conclusions if we cannot even agree on the rules of discussion? The most famous public document on global warming calls itself "An Inconvenient Truth" -- and yet that document itself is filled with untruths, on every subject from sea levels to polar bears. (The bears are doing fine, populations at record levels in the Canadian Arctic.)
In his first book, "Earth in the Balance," former Vice President Al Gore wrote
|
[
"what has the global warming debate has been distorted by?",
"We choose our facts to fit our opinions in which country?",
"The debate has been distorted by what?",
"what do we choose our facts to fit?",
"what is the debate about"
] |
[
"intellectual self-ghettoization.",
"America,",
"intellectual self-ghettoization.",
"opinions.",
"global warming"
] |
question: what has the global warming debate has been distorted by?, answer: intellectual self-ghettoization. | question: We choose our facts to fit our opinions in which country?, answer: America, | question: The debate has been distorted by what?, answer: intellectual self-ghettoization. | question: what do we choose our facts to fit?, answer: opinions. | question: what is the debate about, answer: global warming
|
(CNN) -- I finally said goodbye to some old buddies.
Omar (played by Michael K. Williams), "The Wire's" legendary stickup artist, hunts for a rival with his shotgun.
One of them shot a woman at point-blank range after complimenting her on her hair. Another person maimed a rival with his shotgun. A third stole from his sister to finance his drug habit.
Their names are as twisted as their deeds: Snot-Boogie, Bubbles, Dukie. And if I ever introduced you to them, you probably wouldn't be able to understand them. Their talk is filled with a bruising street poetry that's hard to decipher unless you've lived in their West Baltimore neighborhood -- as I once did.
My "friends" are some of my favorite characters on the HBO series, "The Wire." HBO (which, like CNN, is a Time Warner division) released the complete, five-season box set two weeks ago. The show focuses on a detective unit's quest to take down a ruthless drug crew, but it grapples with bigger themes: the collapse of public schools, the disintegration of working-class America and political corruption.
Critics say "The Wire" offers the most realistic depiction of America's inner-city subculture ever seen. I decided to test that claim because I grew up in the West Baltimore community where "The Wire" is set. After watching all five seasons, my take on the show is ambivalent.
Some of "The Wire" is real, but not in the ways you might expect.
'How do I get from here to the rest of the world?'
"The Wire's" most unsettling scene for me took place in season four. It involved a murder -- of a gentle teenager's spirit. The character's name is Dukie, and he brought back memories of some people I knew.
Dukie is lost. He has no family, his public school is paralyzed by violence and he's not tough enough to make it on the streets. He has a gift for computers but doesn't know what to do with his ability.
Dukie looks one day for help from "Cutty," an ex-con who runs a boxing gym in their neighborhood. Cutty tells Dukie that "the world is bigger" than the violent neighborhood both live in.
"How do I get from here to the rest of the world?" Dukie asks Cutty.
"I wish I knew," Cutty sighs, and walks away.
Why did Cutty give Dukie such a hopeless answer? Maybe it's because some people who never lived in a neighborhood like "The Wire" confuse hopelessness for authenticity. Yeah, I could shock you with stories of violence, but it's so easy to slip from revelation to titillation. I start off telling you a story about how tough my school was, and soon I'm shooting it out with five drug dealers who want to steal my homework.
But I never remember West Baltimore being so hopeless. A man like Cutty wouldn't tell a young man that he had no way out -- adults rallied around kids with potential.
I even checked with some childhood friends -- one who is now an undercover police officer who literally works a "wire" for the Baltimore Police Department -- and we all agreed that "The Wire's" bleakness was exaggerated.
"They made it seem like we grew up in Bosnia," my friend, another "Wire" fan, told me.
Perhaps I had the luck of timing, or, to paraphrase one "Wire" character, I left just before "the game got more fierce."
I'm 44. I grew up on a street connecting two notorious Baltimore landmarks -- North Avenue and Frederick Douglass High School. Douglass is a school so bleak that PBS recently aired a documentary on its dismal state. North Avenue is known for its liquor stories and shootings. I left my neighborhood for good in the 1980s before crack cocaine really hit.
Still, I shared
|
[
"What is praised for realism?",
"Where is \"The Wire\" set?",
"What did the CNN.com writer have to say about the show's realism?"
] |
[
"\"The Wire\"",
"West Baltimore community",
"Some of \"The Wire\" is real, but not in the ways you might expect."
] |
question: What is praised for realism?, answer: "The Wire" | question: Where is "The Wire" set?, answer: West Baltimore community | question: What did the CNN.com writer have to say about the show's realism?, answer: Some of "The Wire" is real, but not in the ways you might expect.
|
(CNN) -- I have never been whacked out on LSD.
However, if I had ever had the chance to meet Hunter S. Thompson, a real acid pro, my fantasy is that during a brief conversation in which he got to know me a little bit I'd feel comfortable asking him at the end of our talk: Do you think I could handle acid?
Even after I regaled him with the story of when friends of mine tried it in college, then wandered around the New York Botanical Gardens and invented the rock n' roll backpack -- which is a standard backpack with a radio boombox in it -- he would say no, you personally shouldn't take LSD, you suppressed malcontent. Hopefully, this would all just sound like a sort of guttural gesture, because that would be subtle enough.
There's a definite chance that not only would HST think I couldn't handle the drugs, but he might hate me entirely. I can't imagine someone who covered the Hells Angels, shark fishing competitions, got to threaten the life of the man he hated more than anyone else on Earth (Richard Nixon) and helped get Jimmy Carter elected president enjoying the company of me, a person who basically gets paid to tweet for a living?
I am not alone in my enduring fascination with Thompson. Today the movie about the novel Thompson started writing in 1959 at the age of 22-years-old, "The Rum Diary" starring Johnny Depp, will be released. The film offers plenty of opportunities to remember the renegade journalist, such as Jann Wenner's recent piece titled "Hunter S Thompson Was My Brother in Arms."
I get the continued curiosity. And while it's fine that I can't write or take drugs like Thompson, I actually did try to be like him once.
In 2008, after reading "The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved," the piece in which he invented Gonzo journalism, I wrote a three-part series for Yahoo! Sports called "The Odyssey To The Infield" in which I attended all three legs of the Triple Crown Of Thoroughbred Racing in person. My experience was maniacal enough, but I wrote in a style that was caught up in the decadence and truly ignoring of the depraved.
I too overindulged in gambling, alcohol, and some frat boy misogyny, took a full can of beer projectile to the collar bone and hung around women in fancy dress that were too blind drunk to know that they were knee deep in mud. Yet with all that I still couldn't capture his frenetic style.
I was impressed by my own momentum but could never let it come unhinged, and if HST himself read this report he would probably be nauseous at how upbeat it was.
It's cool that I failed, because everyone who tries to emulate his Gonzo genius falls short to a certain extent.
Recently, when she thrust herself into the annals of The Gathering Of The Juggalos, Emma Carmichael from Deadspin wrote an excellent analysis on the currency of women's breasts at the debauched music and arts festival held in some back corner of southern Illinois (see: "Dropping In On The Demented Utopia Of The Gathering Of The Juggalos").
It was fine Gonzo reporting; she had the Juggalo clown make-up and everything, but ended up with the determination that she couldn't be one of these people. I can't help but wonder if Thompson fraternized with the crazies on the aptly named "drug bridge" at The Gathering if we would have ended up making them his people -- and then they probably would have set off many, many explosives together.
I suspect "The Rum Diary" will be released to mixed reviews. I wager most of the criticism will be directed at the fact that 48-year-old Depp is attempting to play a 23-year-old. And the Thompson fans who see the film will get the subtext that this book is supposed to be Thompson on the brink of finding his path to self-destruction.
A time in his life when fear and loathing was just the fear. It was a time, pre-
|
[
"Who composed The Rum Diary?"
] |
[
"Hunter"
] |
question: Who composed The Rum Diary?, answer: Hunter
|
(CNN) -- I have vivid memories of childhood. The 5-year-old girl with endless questions; she wanted to discover the secrets of the entire world within minutes. She dreamed of being a doctor once, an engineer another time, and a mother of lovely kids. A dreamer, this is how I would describe the little girl Reem.
Reem is a 22-year-old student living in Gaza City.
Days passed fast. Reem couldn't remember a lot of them, but she had some moments left in her memory -- usually the happy moments of her life -- and those memories were the basis for today's Reem, the 22-year-old girl who is ME.
I remember how happy I was when my teacher announced to the school that I was first in my class. I remember my mother's voice singing to me before I fell asleep; I remember my father running behind my kite when I lost it in the air, and I remember me asking my parents for a real monkey as a pet.
I can't forget the day I finished high school; I felt so grown up. I remember the day when the school announced the exam results and the tears of happiness my mother shed when I received a grade of excellent, and then I decided to enroll in the college of Business Administration.
I can call Gaza City the city of qualifications, where a lot of youth are qualified for good jobs. I am one of those youth who is volunteering in organizations, participating in community service activities, getting trained in various skills and getting more qualified day by day. But many young people like me cannot find jobs. See perspectives from Palestinian youth »
Sometimes, I feel disconnected from Gaza, but whenever I see the photos of Jaffa, I realize that it's where I and a thousand refugees belong. I find myself crying, missing a place I have never been to, but it's where my parents and my grandparents lived. I remember all those bedtime stories my grandmother used to tell me about the land, the fence of roses they had, and her climbing trees and cutting fruits. How I miss that place.
But life must go on. My day starts with the smile of optimism and the plan of my day. Waking up early to go to my university; I have to attend all of my lectures even though some are boring. My friends are a big part of my day. We start with our updates and then go to courses where we can develop our skills. When I arrive home, I feel so exhausted, but still I continue working and studying hard. I am always looking for chances for personal development, whether through volunteer work or at school.
I was offered a great opportunity to volunteer with the aid organization Mercy Corps as a founding member of the Why Not? youth program, and then I had the pleasure of seeing this program blossom into the Global Citizen Corps, or GCC, a cultural exchange between Palestinian and American students. I believe this program is deeply important because it changes the negative impression of Palestinian youth that is too often spread by media.
All my friends and 1,000 others are engaged in this program, which develops our personalities, our skills and serves the community. We use digital media as a tool to express what we feel and what we do. We make changes in ourselves, in our community, and we pave the way for global change. We are thinking globally and acting locally.
My ambition is to be a researcher in business studies all over the world. I finished my B.A. and a diploma of business studies, and I hope to obtain a scholarship to do graduate work in media and development. I am also interested in the field of project management and human interaction management. I know it is a good ambition to be Ph.D. holder and a worldwide researcher, but as Palestinian girl, I have fewer opportunities, not because I am not qualified or hard-working enough but because I am Palestinian.
Usually Palestinian students have fewer opportunities than others to get scholarships, because it's hard for them to
|
[
"Even though there aren't any jobs, what does Reem call Gaza City?",
"What types of things does she do during the day?",
"what describes reem?"
] |
[
"of qualifications,",
"Waking up early to go to my university; I have to attend all of my lectures",
"dreamer,"
] |
question: Even though there aren't any jobs, what does Reem call Gaza City?, answer: of qualifications, | question: What types of things does she do during the day?, answer: Waking up early to go to my university; I have to attend all of my lectures | question: what describes reem?, answer: dreamer,
|
(CNN) -- I think it's fair to say that most of us have been absolutely horrified by the plight of tens of thousands of Haitians this month.
A massive earthquake is always devastating, but for such carnage and misery to be wrought upon a people who already had nothing seems especially cruel.
It was 0100 GMT when I went on air, the aftershocks were both frequent and significant, and from the Tweets I read there was a sense of utter panic and fear on the streets.
The pictures have been absolutely heartbreaking, and the stories our crews have reported from all over the country have been terribly moving.
I wanted to do something to help. For some reason I was especially moved when Anderson Cooper dragged that bleeding boy out of the street - a young boy who was stunned and panicked and terribly vulnerable - and I realized that I had something I could contribute.
Click here to place a bid on the Open flag
(Item number: 250569560734)
Years ago, when I was the Living Golf anchor, I was looking to collect something unusual for a charity auction. As it happens, the auction was cancelled and since then I had largely forgotten that I had something of value and unique at the back of my wardrobe.
The British Open, one of golf's most illustrious competitions, is never more special than when held at St Andrews, the so-called "home of golf." Every professional wants to be "Open Champion" and of the last seven tournaments to be played up there, many of the champions have been legends of the sport. Jack Nicklaus won it twice, as did Tiger Woods.
Seve Ballesteros and Nick Faldo complete the roll-call of champions who have already made it into the pantheon of greats.
It struck me that to get all four to autograph a replica flag from the 2005 Open would be pretty special. Seve (1984 winner) obliged me in Tenerife later that year, with a signature as flamboyant as many of his shots.
Tiger (2000 and 2005 winner) added his name when we met in Dubai the next year. Faldo (1990 winner) and I live in the same town but our paths never seemed to cross when they needed to and so I posted the flag to his management company and from somewhere on his global travels he obliged.
My colleague Justin Armsden interviewed Nicklaus (1970 and 1978 winner) at The Old Course and, though Jack hadn't bargained on signing any autographs that day, Justin's producer Andrea Mortensen bagged the all important tag.
So, just to recap, some of the greatest names in golf have signed this unique memento. Also up for auction are the Xeroxed scorecards of all four players when they last all played the St Andrews Open in 2000.
They are perfectly reproduced. You'll see Tiger's winning round, counter-signed by another Open Champion David Duval and another card is counter-signed by a man who wasn't yet a major winner, Angel Cabrera.
You'll note the meticulous nature of Faldo's game, every hole is neatly ticked off and appropriately, there's even a squiggle and a correction on the card of American John Daly, the only Open champion at St Andrews since 1970 that I was unable to persuade to sign the flag.
But maybe his autograph absence and messy scorecard are in keeping with the erratic character we have come to know and love!
This year just so happens to be the 150th anniversary of The Open at St Andrews and so it's appropriate to auction the flag and the cards in 2010.
But Haiti is the true motivation for the sale. It is right because they desperately need help. All proceeds of the sale will go to a charity called Plan International, who have been working in Haiti for over thirty years.
The donation will support their emergency relief and recovery work there with children and their communities; helping the most vulnerable and the very people who are the country's future.
I hope you will bid on the flag, and if not please help spread the word of the sale so
|
[
"Who is the flag signed by?",
"What are they trying to raise money for?",
"What will the money raised be going towards?"
] |
[
"some of the greatest names in golf",
"charity called Plan International,",
"a charity called Plan International,"
] |
question: Who is the flag signed by?, answer: some of the greatest names in golf | question: What are they trying to raise money for?, answer: charity called Plan International, | question: What will the money raised be going towards?, answer: a charity called Plan International,
|
(CNN) -- I wanted to believe the man in front of me wasn't a rapist. I knew he was a former Sudanese soldier, I knew he wanted to talk about rape in Darfur. A humanitarian group working on Darfur issues had introduced him to us. They told us his testimony was important to hear.
A woman left homeless by conflict in Darfur walks along railway tracks.
Last year in Darfur aid workers told me children as young as five were being raped in the huge displacement camps that are home to several million Darfuris. In some camps, they told me, rape had become so common that as many as 20 babies a month born from rape were being abandoned.
As I sat inches from Adam --not his real name -- I feared the revulsion I knew I would feel at my own questions as I asked about rape and his involvement. I have interviewed rape survivors in Darfur. I have two daughters. I am a human being with a conscience. It would be hard to listen to his replies.
He told me he was conscripted by force in to the Sudanese army in the summer of 2002. He thought he was being taken for six months' national service and then would be released.
The conversation was slow going at first. We were both holding off from delving into the sordid details he'd come to discuss. His answers were short, he told me he got no pay from the army, only food and drink.
He said he was rounded up in an army truck from a market in Darfur and trained to kill. He said he was armed with Kalashnikovs and told to "shoot targets." Watch ex-soldier describe brutal attacks on children to Nic Robertson »
Then, he says, his officers told him "we will be taken to a patrol and then soon after that we were asked to join other people to go and burn and kill people".
That's when he says he realized he wasn't getting national service training, that in fact, he was being forced into war against his will, with his own people. "They are black," he told me, noting the difference between the lighter skinned rulers of Sudan and the darker farmers of Darfur. "I am black," he said, "this shouldn't be happening."
But, he said, worse than being told to kill his own people, was that if he tried to resist, he himself would be killed. "The order is that the soldiers at the front, and there are some people who are watching you from behind, if you try to escape or do anything you will get shot. The order is that we go to the village, burn it and kill the people."
It felt as Adam was beginning to open up a little -- not easy, given the topic, and the lights and cameras all around us. He was beginning to talk a bit more, answer questions with more than one or two words. But it was following a pattern: I'd have to lead the way. We were both waiting for the inevitable. How he came to know of rape in Darfur.
And that's when he said it. Watch warrant being issued for president »
He brought up the rape by himself. He was talking through a translator but his voice was quiet. I thought I heard anger, heard him slow and his voice drop: "I had no choice," he said "but I will say that I didn't kill anybody but the raping of the small children, it was bad" I knew this was going to be difficult and now it had begun.
What happens with the children, I asked. "They cry out," he answered. "And what happens when they cry out?" "Two persons will capture her while she is crying and another raping her, then they leave her there," came his reply.
Silence. "What do I ask now?" I thought. Be forensic. Get the story. This is important testimony, I reminded myself
|
[
"What was Adam told to do?",
"What was the former soldier told to do?",
"Who was armed?",
"Where did the attacks take place?",
"who was armed with Kalashnikov?"
] |
[
"\"shoot targets.\"",
"\"shoot targets.\"",
"Adam",
"Darfur",
"Adam"
] |
question: What was Adam told to do?, answer: "shoot targets." | question: What was the former soldier told to do?, answer: "shoot targets." | question: Who was armed?, answer: Adam | question: Where did the attacks take place?, answer: Darfur | question: who was armed with Kalashnikov?, answer: Adam
|
(CNN) -- I wanted to believe the man in front of me wasn't a rapist. I knew he was a former Sudanese soldier, I knew he wanted to talk about rape in Darfur. A humanitarian group working on Darfur issues had introduced him to us. They told us his testimony was important to hear.
A woman left homeless by conflict in Darfur walks along railway tracks.
Last year in Darfur aid workers told me children as young as five were being raped in the huge displacement camps that are home to several million Darfuris. In some camps, they told me, rape had become so common that as many as 20 babies a month born from rape were being abandoned.
As I sat inches from Adam --not his real name -- I feared the revulsion I knew I would feel at my own questions as I asked about rape and his involvement. I have interviewed rape survivors in Darfur. I have two daughters. I am a human being with a conscience. It would be hard to listen to his replies.
He told me he was conscripted by force in to the Sudanese army in the summer of 2002. He thought he was being taken for six months' national service and then would be released.
The conversation was slow going at first. We were both holding off from delving into the sordid details he'd come to discuss. His answers were short, he told me he got no pay from the army, only food and drink.
He said he was rounded up in an army truck from a market in Darfur and trained to kill. He said he was armed with Kalashnikovs and told to "shoot targets." Watch ex-soldier describe brutal attacks on children to Nic Robertson »
Then, he says, his officers told him "we will be taken to a patrol and then soon after that we were asked to join other people to go and burn and kill people".
That's when he says he realized he wasn't getting national service training, that in fact, he was being forced into war against his will, with his own people. "They are black," he told me, noting the difference between the lighter skinned rulers of Sudan and the darker farmers of Darfur. "I am black," he said, "this shouldn't be happening."
But, he said, worse than being told to kill his own people, was that if he tried to resist, he himself would be killed. "The order is that the soldiers at the front, and there are some people who are watching you from behind, if you try to escape or do anything you will get shot. The order is that we go to the village, burn it and kill the people."
It felt as Adam was beginning to open up a little -- not easy, given the topic, and the lights and cameras all around us. He was beginning to talk a bit more, answer questions with more than one or two words. But it was following a pattern: I'd have to lead the way. We were both waiting for the inevitable. How he came to know of rape in Darfur.
And that's when he said it. Watch warrant being issued for president »
He brought up the rape by himself. He was talking through a translator but his voice was quiet. I thought I heard anger, heard him slow and his voice drop: "I had no choice," he said "but I will say that I didn't kill anybody but the raping of the small children, it was bad" I knew this was going to be difficult and now it had begun.
What happens with the children, I asked. "They cry out," he answered. "And what happens when they cry out?" "Two persons will capture her while she is crying and another raping her, then they leave her there," came his reply.
Silence. "What do I ask now?" I thought. Be forensic. Get the story. This is important testimony, I reminded myself
|
[
"What did he say about his victims?",
"What age were the raped girls?",
"What did the soldier say?",
"What name did the attacker assume?",
"Where did Adam rape children?",
"Where did Adam say the rape attacks took place?",
"What were the soldiers armed with?"
] |
[
"\"They cry out,\"",
"as young as five",
"He told me he was conscripted by force in to the Sudanese army",
"Adam",
"in Darfur.",
"Darfur.",
"Kalashnikovs"
] |
question: What did he say about his victims?, answer: "They cry out," | question: What age were the raped girls?, answer: as young as five | question: What did the soldier say?, answer: He told me he was conscripted by force in to the Sudanese army | question: What name did the attacker assume?, answer: Adam | question: Where did Adam rape children?, answer: in Darfur. | question: Where did Adam say the rape attacks took place?, answer: Darfur. | question: What were the soldiers armed with?, answer: Kalashnikovs
|
(CNN) -- I was a high school student in 1983, when the video for "Thriller" was released, getting plenty of air time on MTV. By then, the network's "M" could just as easily have stood for Michael. It was an event.
At a time when MTV was criticizing for not featuring black artists, Michael Jackson's success changed all that.
I can remember getting together with a group of friends to watch the premiere like it was a new movie release. The video did not disappoint. Once again Michael disregarded all conventions of the genre and not just redefined, but completely re-imagined, what a music video could be.
But most people don't know that the album broke new ground in a non-musical way, too. Viewers today of MTV, with its steady stream of reality shows like "Real World 22 - Cancun" and "16 and Pregnant," might forget that, when it started nearly three decades ago, MTV was all music, all day.
Actually, it wasn't really all music. It was just what MTV considered rock music. By the late 1970s, radio formats had essentially resegregated the music world. When MTV launched in 1981, it modeled its playlist on the popular album-oriented rock radio format of the day, which meant that music by black artists was effectively excluded from the network. You might see the occasional Jimi Hendrix clip, but there was no room for funk, disco, R&B or that new emerging form -- rap.
It wasn't long before the public took note of the glaring absence of African-American artists. MTV was called to task on the air in 1983 for its lack of black artists by none other than David Bowie. At about the same time, MTV famously refused to air Rick James' "Superfreak" video. It defended itself by claiming it wasn't a rock song.
Michael Jackson changed all that.
Jackson opened the door with the video for "Billie Jean," which was simply too good for its time to be overlooked. He blew that door wide open with "Beat It," which featured a guitar solo by the reigning rock god of the day, Eddie Van Halen. Jackson succeeded in this not just because he was a great singer, but because of his musical daring.
"Beat It" was a song that was incapable of being slotted among the genres of the day. Yes, it had all the signatures of a rock song -- overdriven guitars, a driving tempo and a searing solo. But it had more. It had a backbeat. You could dance to it. You wanted to dance to it. And the viewers loved it, regardless of their race or ethnicity. iReport.com: Share stories of Jackson's success, legacy
Jackson's effect on MTV was both immediate and permanent. His videos became cultural events and his success laid waste to the notion that white rock audiences wouldn't tune in for "black" music. In the aftermath of Jackson's breakthrough success, MTV helped usher rap into the mainstream with shows like "Yo! MTV Raps," and black artists like Prince and Chaka Khan became mainstays of the network.
It wasn't long before young people schooled on a diet that ranged from Public Enemy to AC/DC began to experiment with what those genres would sound like if they were combined -- just as Jackson had done with "Beat It." The outcome was some of the most interesting music of the next decade. Artists like Linkin Park, Rage Against the Machine, P.O.D. and Beck all owe a debt of gratitude to Jackson for creating a welcoming environment.
And we as fans all owe him the acknowledgment reserved for those individuals whose achievements transcend their chosen field and reshape the world around us. Watch fans in Los Angeles react to Jackson's death »
I was always mournful about the sad spectacle his life became in recent years. But that should not detract from the meteor-like impact he had on popular culture at his peak. Michael Jackson was the Jackie Robinson of MTV. He disregarded the
|
[
"who's success forced them to change",
"What had MTV been criticized for?",
"What forced MTV to rethink itself?",
"Who loved the videos?",
"what did viewers think of jacksons videos",
"Wha are they criticised for?",
"what did viewers complain about"
] |
[
"Michael Jackson's",
"lack of black artists",
"Michael Jackson",
"the viewers",
"loved it,",
"not featuring black artists,",
"not featuring black artists,"
] |
question: who's success forced them to change, answer: Michael Jackson's | question: What had MTV been criticized for?, answer: lack of black artists | question: What forced MTV to rethink itself?, answer: Michael Jackson | question: Who loved the videos?, answer: the viewers | question: what did viewers think of jacksons videos, answer: loved it, | question: Wha are they criticised for?, answer: not featuring black artists, | question: what did viewers complain about, answer: not featuring black artists,
|
(CNN) -- I was in Atlanta when I first learned of a controversy over an inscription marking the new Martin Luther King Jr. National Memorial in Washington. The quote on one side of the granite "Stone of Hope" reads, "I was a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness."
In an interview with The Washington Post, poet Maya Angelou argued that these were not King's exact words and that, out of context, they made a humble preacher look like "an arrogant twit."
Angelou expressed no concern with 14 other quotations from King that appear on a 450-foot-long memorial behind his statue.
By coincidence, this news found me as I began research for a book on the power of short writing. I've learned that we often use the shortest texts to express the most important messages, especially to honor and enshrine. Twitter did not invent short writing. From tattoos to gravestones to the base of monuments, we choose words with special care because we want them to last forever. In a short text, every word counts.
But with concision can come the loss of context.
The overwhelming impression of the new memorial derives, not from language, but from sculpture. Even small photos of the new statue make King look monumental. He stands 30 feet tall, strong and determined, arms folded, looking as if he just marched out of the huge block of stone behind him.
Memorial to be dedicated Sunday
In the presence of such powerful imagery, why the argument over a single sentence?
Angelou's concerns were echoed by other African-American scholars and leaders, who argued the 10 words on the monument base have been ripped from their original context and meaning.
In a sermon at Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church, just months before his death in 1968, King preached, "Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all the other shallow things will not matter."
In context, the word "if" makes all the difference. Without that opening conditional clause, it does seem that King is embracing the role of drum major rather than acquiescing to it.
I did not understand, until I visited Florida A&M University and other historically black colleges and universities, the importance of the drum major in African-American culture.
The drum major is a white American icon, too, of course, flamboyant even by the strait-laced Midwestern standards of Meredith Wilson's "The Music Man." Translated by famous black college marching bands, as pictured in the 2002 film "Drumline," flamboyance transforms itself into soulful spectacle.
To get a feel for the presence and status of drum majors, check out YouTube videos of auditions for that honored position. In addition to musical and leadership skills, the drum major must be able to strut, dance, spin, prance and perform backbreaking bends and splits -- without missing a beat.
At the Poynter Institute where I work, marble plaques in a central garden offer students inspirational sayings. Famous writing teacher Donald Murray quotes the Roman poet Horace: "Nulla Dies Sine Linea," Latin for "Never a Day Without a Line" of writing.
The engraver, not schooled in Latin, left out the word "Sine" (without), leaving us with dead-language gibberish that could be taken to mean the opposite of the original.
"Oh well," I said when I saw the mistake, "at least it's not carved in stone."
When we use the phrase "carved in stone," we denote something permanent, irreversible, unchangeable. But it ain't necessarily so. Ignoring my suggestion that we copy-edit the marble text with a magic marker, my boss ordered a corrected version of Murray's quote.
Everything I've learned about the language of enshrinement suggests that the inscription on the King monument should be revised. It need not be changed right away or in
|
[
"What was taken out of context?",
"when will King memorial be dedicated?",
"When will the King memorial be dedicated?",
"Who has reportedly objected to a quote on the King monument?",
"what city will King memorial be dedicated in?",
"What quote was taken out of context",
"What did maya angelou object to",
"When is the king memorial dedicated"
] |
[
"King's exact words",
"Sunday",
"Sunday",
"Maya Angelou",
"Washington.",
"a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness.\"",
"inscription marking the new",
"Sunday"
] |
question: What was taken out of context?, answer: King's exact words | question: when will King memorial be dedicated?, answer: Sunday | question: When will the King memorial be dedicated?, answer: Sunday | question: Who has reportedly objected to a quote on the King monument?, answer: Maya Angelou | question: what city will King memorial be dedicated in?, answer: Washington. | question: What quote was taken out of context, answer: a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness." | question: What did maya angelou object to, answer: inscription marking the new | question: When is the king memorial dedicated, answer: Sunday
|
(CNN) -- I wish the titans of Wall Street could meet Mark Dalton.
Not that it would be likely to change anything. But I wish the leaders of Goldman Sachs and of the other big banking firms could talk to Mark Dalton for just a few minutes.
They might learn a few things about how to better connect with the American people.
I didn't know Dalton's last name until a few days ago. For almost two years, I've held onto something he mailed to me. There was no reason not to throw it out, yet I had a feeling that someday I'd want to refer to it.
That day is now. With the public's wariness of Wall Street growing, with Goldman Sachs being accused of fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission (even as Goldman was announcing first-quarter profits of $3.46 billion, nearly twice as much as in the first quarter a year ago), with investors wondering if they're being given a fair shake by the firms to which they have entrusted their money, Mark Dalton's way of doing business might be worthy of at least a moment's attention.
I came across him quite by chance. I occasionally purchase used books -- titles that have gone out of print. Sometimes I will place my orders through Amazon.com, which offers an online marketplace for local used-book merchants around the country.
In 2008, I found a book I was looking for on that Amazon marketplace, and submitted an order. The price was more than reasonable: $6.95 for the used hardcover. Used books are not shipped by Amazon itself, but by the local booksellers.
A week or so after I placed the order, the package arrived, from High View Books in Smithfield, Rhode Island. The book seemed to be in good shape. I was pleased.
But with it was a personal letter to me. It said:
"Thank your for your recent book order. I have enclosed a check to you for $2.95. The reason for this is that this book is only in 'Very Good' condition, while I mistakenly described it as being in 'Near Fine' condition in my listing. Please accept my apologies for the error. (Also, please note, the soiling that you see on the dust jacket is actually on the Mylar and not the dust jacket itself.)"
He wrote that he hoped his apology and the refund were satisfactory. Sure enough, tucked into the book was a check made out to me, for $2.95.
I was surprised by the gesture. Yes, in his online listing for the book he had said it was in "Near Fine" condition, but who really knows what those designations mean? You see them all the time describing used books: "Fair," "Good," "Very Good," "Near Fine," "Fine"-- they would seem to be approximations. I had no complaints about the condition of the book I had bought from him. If I had paid $6.95, and he had refunded $2.95, and Amazon had taken its commission, how was he supposed to make a living?
I mailed his check back to him, thanking him for it and telling him how impressed I was with the way he did business. I told him I could not accept the refund.
And for some reason, I couldn't toss the letter. It made me feel hopeful about certain things.
With Wall Street losing people's confidence in recent days over the way it is alleged to treat its customers' money, I got the letter out again. He had just signed it "Mark at High View Books"; I was able to find him in Smithfield, which is how I found out that he was Mark Dalton.
He seemed as surprised to be hearing from me as I was when I had gotten his refund check. He's 42 years old; High View Drive is the street on which he lives, and his used books -- about 4,000 of them at last count -- are kept in his garage.
|
[
"What is being accused of shady practices?",
"Who is being accused of shady business practices?"
] |
[
"fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission",
"Goldman Sachs"
] |
question: What is being accused of shady practices?, answer: fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission | question: Who is being accused of shady business practices?, answer: Goldman Sachs
|
(CNN) -- I'm 45, and my son is 7.
Once in a while, I still get carded when I try to buy certain well-guarded cold medicines, so I was taken aback in recent months when two different strangers asked, "Is that your grandson?"
I was most surprised by the instant assumption, without an awkward pause or hesitation, as if grandmother was the only option. I was 38 when Jason was born -- not exactly a young mother, but nowhere near the age I imagine a grandmother to be.
Both incidents took place after I moved from California to Atlanta, a Southern city, and both times I was asked by fellow black women -- one about 21, and one who was my senior.
I thought about the incidents when I read a recent CNN.com essay by Rose Arce on being mistaken for her daughter's nanny. The essay inspired me to post my case of mistaken grandmother identity on Facebook, where I got lively responses ranging from "Are you kidding?" to makeover tips.
Had I let too many gray hairs escape my patrol?
Maybe the question shouldn't have surprised me, given the historically high teen birth rates and young grandmothers in the black community, especially in the South.
But I have since learned about a convergence of birth and child-rearing trends that make it harder to guess whether an over-40 caretaker is a grandparent or, like me, a more ... er ... "mature" mother.
First, experts say teenagers are having fewer babies.
"We believe evidence-based teen pregnancy programs work best," says Vikki Millender-Morrow, the CEO of the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention (G-CAPP), founded by Jane Fonda. "We also believe in giving the kids hope. Even with all the education in the world, if they don't believe their future circumstances are brighter than what they're seeing, what's the reason to delay?"
Georgia had the highest teen birth rate in the nation in 1995, but currently ranks No. 13, according to Millender-Morrow. And recent data shows that Georgia was one of 10 states -- including Mississippi, Florida and Arizona -- that had the most dramatic decreases in births to 15- to 17-year-olds between 2007 and 2009.
It's a national trend.
According to preliminary data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics published this year, the birth rate for teens ages 15 to 19 had reached its lowest point in the nearly 70 years since the data has been tracked. Black births to teens ages 15 to 17 have plummeted since the 86.1 rate in 1991, for example, when the Hispanic rate was 69.2 (per 1,000 women).
Still, black and Hispanic teenagers still have a much higher birth rate than non-Hispanic whites. The February report shows that the birth rate per 1,000 teens for black teenagers ages 15 to 17 was 32.1 in 2009, and even higher at 41 for Hispanic teens -- compared with just 11 for non-Hispanic whites.
If more young people are weighing their life options -- with fewer "babies having babies" -- fewer grandparents are raising their grandchildren, right?
Wrong. More children are being raised by their grandparents.
U.S Census Bureau data from 2009, published in July, reports that the percentage of white and Hispanic children being raised by one or both grandparents doubled between 1991 and 2009, from about 1% to 2%. About 5% of black children are raised by a grandparent, a figure the Census Bureau says has remained constant since 1991.
Citing the impact of harsh economic times, the Pew Research Center's latest data from 2008 indicates that 2.9 million children were being raised primarily by their grandparents -- up 8% from 2000, and 5% from 2007.
Pew reports that the number of black grandparents serving as primary caregivers fell 12% between 2000 and 2008, but the number of white grandparents spiked 19%. The number of Hispanic grandparents becoming caregivers rose 14% during that eight-year period. According to Pew
|
[
"What was Due asked?",
"What age is she?",
"What percentage of grandparents are raising children?",
"What has Tananarive Due been asked?",
"What age is Tananarive Due?",
"Who are now raising more children?",
"More children are being raised by who?"
] |
[
"\"Is that your grandson?\"",
"45,",
"latest data from 2008 indicates that 2.9 million",
"\"Is that your grandson?\"",
"45,",
"grandparents.",
"their grandparents."
] |
question: What was Due asked?, answer: "Is that your grandson?" | question: What age is she?, answer: 45, | question: What percentage of grandparents are raising children?, answer: latest data from 2008 indicates that 2.9 million | question: What has Tananarive Due been asked?, answer: "Is that your grandson?" | question: What age is Tananarive Due?, answer: 45, | question: Who are now raising more children?, answer: grandparents. | question: More children are being raised by who?, answer: their grandparents.
|
(CNN) -- I'm not an auto mechanic, I'm an Army wife, a mother and -- when time permits -- a journalist. So when my car needs work, I take it to someone with oil on his hands and years of experience looking under hoods. The same is true for plumbing problems, legal issues and medical care.
I don't assume that I know better than the experts. When necessary, I get a second opinion but, ultimately, I always yield to the advice of those who know more than me.
With that in mind, I am thrilled that President Obama has decided to listen to his experts -- the military commanders and strategists -- and is committing more troops to Afghanistan.
But as an Army wife at Fort Bragg whose husband has already done three tours of duty in Afghanistan, I can't help but close my eyes, grit my teeth and brace myself for the hard days ahead. As happy as I am that the president has finally made a move after months of deliberating, I know that this announcement is likely bad news for me.
Deployments are awful -- just awful. There is no bright side and no silver lining. For most of us in the military community the luster of sacrificing for our country wore off a deployment or two ago and we are now coasting on the fumes of commitment and shared sacrifice.
Many of us who are married to the military aren't even sure why we are willing to endure yet another deployment. We just are.
Our spouses see the fight firsthand and are reminded daily of why this battle must be won. They get pep talks at work and enjoy the camaraderie of their fellow soldiers. We at home just hear the gripes of war-weary Americans and see the news reports of waning support.
We don't experience the victories, we only see our children developing emotional problems, our marriages falling apart, our careers sidelined, our dependence on antidepressants climbing, even our houses crumbling from years of neglected repairs.
That's why a troop surge in Afghanistan brings mixed feelings. More troops there means more casualties -- a word I don't take lightly. Casualties are people, people with names and faces that I know. I see their wheelchairs at my kids' schools and I've dropped flowers on their freshly dug graves.
A troop surge may mean that even more of my friends will be widows and more of their children will be fatherless. It certainly means more Little League teams in my community will be missing a coach, more families here will know each other only on Skype and more pets will be abandoned. It may very well mean that I will spend more years being both mother and father, and that I'll have more conversations with my children about why their daddy is always gone when so many daddies never leave. These are not things to celebrate.
But right now, after just hearing our president give an inspiring speech, I'm going to consider that this plan may mean that my friends who are in Afghanistan now will finally have what they need to stay safe. Maybe it will mean that if and when my husband has to go back there, he will be in a better and safer situation.
And, more than anything else, maybe it will mean that our nation will succeed in Afghanistan and that all of these years that my husband and I have lost together, all of these friends we've buried, all of these injuries he and others have nursed -- will have been worth it.
I am not a strategist. I do not know what will take us to victory in Afghanistan. I cannot say if sending 30,000 more troops is the right or the wrong decision. All I know is that the president consulted the experts and then he sought second, third, fourth -- and who knows how many more -- opinions, and this is the solution he has reached.
I commend him for making a definitive plan. I will pray for his wisdom and for the strength and safety of the troops who will be going into harm's way, just as I pray for those who
|
[
"What is Sanderlin glad that Obama did?"
] |
[
"listen to his experts"
] |
question: What is Sanderlin glad that Obama did?, answer: listen to his experts
|
(CNN) -- I've never been one to attend the performances of symphony orchestras, but off and on, for more than 35 years, I gave myself the gift of something even better:
Paul Harvey received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush in 2005.
I would go and sit with Paul Harvey as he broadcast his radio show.
It was music; it was thrilling. I met him in the early 1970s, when I was a young newspaper reporter in Chicago, and that's when he allowed me, for the first time, to sit silently in his studio as he did his work. Over the years, whenever I felt a need for a Paul Harvey fix, he was always welcoming, and we came to know each other well. I would sit there wordlessly and observe absolute excellence.
He would invariably be wearing a smock when I arrived -- he had been working since well before the sun came up, and the smock would cover his shirt and tie. It was the kind of smock a jeweler might wear, or a watchmaker -- it was crisply pressed, the uniform of an expert craftsman. I never asked him why he wore it, but I suspect that was the reason -- pride in craftsmanship.
He would be at the typewriter, honing his script. He was famed for his voice, but the writing itself was so beautiful -- his respect for words, his understanding of the potency of economy, his instinct for removing the superfluous. The world heard him speak, but the world never saw him write, and I think he honored both aspects of his skill equally.
He would walk down the hallway to his studio just minutes before airtime. The studio itself -- when I first knew him it was on the west side of North Michigan Avenue, and in later years he moved it to the east side of the street -- was far from lavish. It was impossible to equate the spartan surroundings with the idea that his voice was leaving this little room and traveling around the world. Maybe that was the point: He worked for the illusion of unfussy intimacy.
He would make these warm-up noises -- voice exercises, silly-sounding tweets and yodels, strange little un-Paul-Harvey-like sounds -- and he showed no self-consciousness about doing it in front of someone else, because would a National Football League linebacker be self-conscious about someone seeing him stretch before a game, would a National Basketball Association forward be worried about someone seeing him leap up and down before tipoff? This was Paul Harvey's arena, and he would get the voice ready, loosening it, easing it up to the starting line.
And then the signal from the booth, and. . .
"Hello, Americans! This is Paul Harvey! Stand by. . . for news!"
And he would look down at those words that had come out of his typewriter minutes before -- some of them underlined to remind him to punch them hard -- and they became something grander than ink on paper, they became the song, the Paul Harvey symphony. He would allow me to sit right with him in the little room -- he never made me watch from behind the glass -- and there were moments, when his phrases, his word choices, were so perfect -- flawlessly written, flawlessly delivered -- that I just wanted to stand up and cheer.
But of course I never did any such thing -- in Paul Harvey's studio, if you felt a tickle in your throat you would begin to panic, because you knew that if you so much as coughed it would go out over the air into cities and towns all across the continent -- so there were never any cheers. The impulse was always there, though -- when he would drop one of those famous Paul Harvey pauses into the middle of a sentence, letting it linger, proving once again the power of pure silence, the tease of anticipation, you just wanted to applaud for his mastery of his life's work. iReport.com: Share your memories of radio legend Harvey
He probably wouldn't have
|
[
"What did Bob Greene say about Paul Harvey?",
"What is Harvey famous for?",
"Who wrote their own scripts?"
] |
[
"he was always welcoming,",
"his voice,",
"Paul Harvey"
] |
question: What did Bob Greene say about Paul Harvey?, answer: he was always welcoming, | question: What is Harvey famous for?, answer: his voice, | question: Who wrote their own scripts?, answer: Paul Harvey
|
(CNN) -- IBM's reported plans to lay off thousands of U.S. workers and outsource many of those jobs to India, even as the company angles for billions in stimulus money, doesn't sit well with employee rights advocates.
Business Week reports that IBM's workforce increased from 386,558 in 2007 to 398,000 at the end of 2008.
IBM employees are being dealt a double blow, said Lee Conrad, national coordinator for Alliance@IBM, a pro-union group that has been fighting IBM's outsourcing for years.
"We're outraged that jobs cuts are happening in the U.S. and the work is being shifted offshore," Conrad said. "This comes at the same time IBM has its hand out for stimulus money. This to us is totally unacceptable."
IBM wants a share of the money in President Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act for projects updating power grids, creating electronic health care records and furthering the use of broadband.
"In the research we've done working with the transition team, we know that $30 billion could create 1 million jobs in the next 12 months," IBM CEO Sam Palmisano said in January. Watch how IBM hopes to benefit from the stimulus »
The problem is where those jobs would be, said Ron Hira, a professor of public policy at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
"This is really a question of policy," Hira said. "IBM is doing what's in its best interest, and in this case it's not in the best interest of America. And that's why you need policymakers to step in to ensure that this money gets spent to create American jobs." Watch the outcry generated by IBM »
IBM has not responded to multiple requests for comment from CNN after the Wall Street Journal's report that the IT giant would be shipping 5,000 U.S. jobs overseas.
"We have no problem with job creation in other countries," Conrad said. "We have no problem with global expansion. We realize IBM is a global company and has been for many years. But this is different. This is cutting jobs in the U.S. and shifting the work offshore. This isn't job creation. It's job shifting."
According to Business Week, IBM has indeed been shifting jobs. The magazine reported that the company's workforce went up from 386,558 at the end of 2007 to 398,000 at the end of 2008. But U.S. employment fell from 121,000 to 115,000 during the same time.
Hira, author of the book "Outsourcing America," said it's not just IBM moving jobs out of the United States.
"The problem here, though, is that these companies have an inordinate influence over the political process," he said. "They have a huge, disproportionate amount of power, political power, and can influence the process."
For that reason, he said, "you really do need the American public to sort of stand up and say, 'Wait a second. This is just not right.' ... I certainly hope that there's a backlash, because there should be. This is bad for America."
CNN's Mary Snow, Jennifer Rizzo and Vivienne Foley contributed to this report.
|
[
"Who said $30 billion could create 1 million jobs in next 12 months?",
"What was IBM criticised for?",
"IBM criticized for plans to shift U.S. jobs to which country?",
"IBM CEO has said how much could create 1 million jobs in next 12 months?",
"What does public need to do?",
"How many jobs could be created?"
] |
[
"IBM CEO Sam Palmisano",
"reported plans to lay off thousands of U.S. workers",
"India,",
"$30 billion",
"stand up and say, 'Wait a second. This is just not right.'",
"1 million"
] |
question: Who said $30 billion could create 1 million jobs in next 12 months?, answer: IBM CEO Sam Palmisano | question: What was IBM criticised for?, answer: reported plans to lay off thousands of U.S. workers | question: IBM criticized for plans to shift U.S. jobs to which country?, answer: India, | question: IBM CEO has said how much could create 1 million jobs in next 12 months?, answer: $30 billion | question: What does public need to do?, answer: stand up and say, 'Wait a second. This is just not right.' | question: How many jobs could be created?, answer: 1 million
|
(CNN) -- IHOP has filed a lawsuit against a church group called the International House of Prayer claiming that the group is illegally using the pancake house's famous acronym.
The legal flap started earlier this month when the International House of Pancakes filed the lawsuit in a federal court in California.
The Kansas City, Missouri-based church group "selected and adopted the International House of Prayer name, knowing it would be abbreviated IHOP. IHOP-KC intended to misappropriate the fame and notoriety of the household name IHOP to help promote and make recognizable their religious organization," the lawsuit says.
Lawyers from the pancake restaurant say the odds are stacked against the church group and provided the court with pages and pages of documentation of websites, newsletters and signs on buildings where the prayer group allegedly used the IHOP acronym.
The use of the acronym infringes on the restaurant's trademark, the restaurant contends.
So, IHOP, the pancake house, is asking a judge to get IHOP, the church group, to stop using the letters IHOP.
The restaurant says it has used the acronym for more than 30 years.
As of Thursday, representatives from the International House of Prayer had not filed a response to the lawsuit, according to court documents.
The church group started in 1999 in Missouri and now bills itself as 24/7 place for people to come and pray, according to the group's website.
|
[
"When was international house of prayer formed?",
"where is this house",
"what trademark is being infringed?"
] |
[
"1999",
"Kansas City, Missouri-based",
"IHOP"
] |
question: When was international house of prayer formed?, answer: 1999 | question: where is this house, answer: Kansas City, Missouri-based | question: what trademark is being infringed?, answer: IHOP
|
(CNN) -- Iceland and Sweden plan to take in about 200 Palestinian refugees from Iraq who have been living in refugee camps along the Iraqi-Syrian border, the U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday.
More than two dozen refugees stranded at the Al Waleed refugee camp for the last two years will be headed to Iceland in the next few weeks, the agency said. In addition, 155 Palestinians in the Al Tanf refugee camp have been accepted for resettlement in Sweden, it said.
Many Palestinians living in Iraq have gotten caught up in the violence that has engulfed the country since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 and have had to flee their homes. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said that out of the estimated 34,000 Palestinians who lived in Iraq since 2003, about 10,000 to 15,000 remain.
The UNHCR says about 2,300 Palestinians "are living in desperate conditions along the Iraq-Syria border." They are, the UNHCR says, "unable to return to Iraq or to cross the borders to neighboring countries." It says the Al Waleed camp has 1,400 people and Al Tanf about 900.
"UNHCR has repeatedly called for international support for the Palestinians but with few results. Few Palestinians in the border camps have been accepted for resettlement or offered shelter in third countries; 223 Palestinians left to non-traditional resettlement countries such as Brazil and Chile.
"Some urgent medical cases were taken by a few European countries, but this is a very small number out of the 2,300 Palestinians stranded in the desert," the UNHCR said in a statement.
It noted that Sudan has made an offer to take in some of those Palestinians, and said "UNHCR and Palestinian representatives are finalizing an operations plan that will enable this to take place."
Refugees International recently asked the United States government to intervene and resettle the Palestinians in the United States instead of Sudan, which itself is engulfed in sectarian fighting and whose government has been condemned for atrocities.
"The Palestinians being resettled in Sudan is obviously not an ideal or preferred solution," State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper told CNN last month. "But we accept the judgment of the UNHCR that it is preferable to the Palestinians continuing to be stranded in the border area in extremely dire circumstances."
|
[
"What is under way?",
"What are 2,300 palestinians?",
"Who is living in desperate conditions along the Iraq-Syria border?",
"What number of Palestinian refugees will go to Iceland?"
] |
[
"200 Palestinian refugees from Iraq",
"The UNHCR says about",
"200 Palestinian refugees",
"More than two dozen"
] |
question: What is under way?, answer: 200 Palestinian refugees from Iraq | question: What are 2,300 palestinians?, answer: The UNHCR says about | question: Who is living in desperate conditions along the Iraq-Syria border?, answer: 200 Palestinian refugees | question: What number of Palestinian refugees will go to Iceland?, answer: More than two dozen
|
(CNN) -- Iceland is losing its only three McDonald's restaurants as a result of the poor economic situation in the country.
Businessman Magnus Ogmundsson, who owns the only McDonald's franchise in Iceland, said it had become too expensive to operate the restaurants after Iceland's currency, the krona, plunged in value.
"The krona is quite weak and we are buying everything in euros, and we have very high tariffs on imported agricultural products," he told CNN on Tuesday.
In January 2008, it cost more than 95 Icelandic krona to buy one euro, according to the Central Bank of Iceland. Tuesday, that price had shot up to more than 186 krona.
That means the currency is worth half as much today as it was in January 2008 -- and things priced in euros now cost twice as much to buy.
Ogmundsson said the McDonald's Corporation worked with him to find a solution, but in the end he had no choice but to close.
There was "good cooperation" with McDonald's, Ogmundsson told CNN. "No hard feelings."
McDonald's said it had become financially prohibitive to continue operating in Iceland because of "the unique operational complexity of doing business in Iceland combined with the very challenging economic climate in the country."
It said there are no plans to seek a new franchise partner in that country.
The three stores will close at midnight Saturday, but they will reopen as an independent chain called Metro, with more domestic ingredients and fewer imported products.
"We believe we can be more successful with our own brand," Ogmundsson said.
A McDonald's Big Mac hamburger currently sells for the equivalent of $5.29, making Iceland one of the most expensive places in the world to buy the sandwich. Only Norway and Switzerland charge more, according to the countries listed on the Economist magazine's Big Mac Index, published in February.
A Big Mac costs about $3.54 in the United States, $2.19 in Australia, $5.07 in Denmark, $1.66 in South Africa, and $1.52 in Malaysia.
|
[
"What was the name of the franchise?",
"What will Iceland do?",
"What are imports priced in?",
"How many restaurants will close?",
"What is Iceland losing?",
"What happened to the restaurants?",
"What country's currency plunged in value?",
"What country is losing restaurants in the article?"
] |
[
"McDonald's",
"losing its only three McDonald's restaurants",
"euros",
"three",
"its only three McDonald's restaurants",
"is losing its only three McDonald's",
"Iceland,",
"Iceland"
] |
question: What was the name of the franchise?, answer: McDonald's | question: What will Iceland do?, answer: losing its only three McDonald's restaurants | question: What are imports priced in?, answer: euros | question: How many restaurants will close?, answer: three | question: What is Iceland losing?, answer: its only three McDonald's restaurants | question: What happened to the restaurants?, answer: is losing its only three McDonald's | question: What country's currency plunged in value?, answer: Iceland, | question: What country is losing restaurants in the article?, answer: Iceland
|
(CNN) -- Icelandic Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir of the center-left Social Democratic Alliance has claimed victory in general elections triggered by the collapse of the Nordic nation's economy.
Sigurdardottir celebrates victory on Saturday night.
Sigurdardottir's party, which has headed an interim government since February 1, was on course to win around 30 percent of the vote or 20 parliamentary seats, according to state broadcaster RUV.
The Left-Green Movement, the Social Democratic Alliance's coalition ally, was expected to win 14 seats, giving the coalition a controlling 34-seat block in the 63-member Icelandic parliament, the Althing.
"I believe this will be our big victory," Sigurdardottir told supporters, according to Reuters.com. "I am touched, proud and humble at this moment when we are experiencing this great, historic victory of the social democratic movement."
Sigurdardottir's electoral success marks a change of direction for Iceland, a nation 300,000 people, which has traditionally leaned to the right on political matters.
Sigurdardottir, the world's first openly gay leader and Iceland's first female premier, has pledged to take the Atlantic island into the European Union and to join the euro common currency as a viable way to rescue Iceland's suffering economy.
But that ambition could bring Sigurdardottir into conflict with the Left-Green Movement which favors a currency union with Norway as an alternative to EU membership.
Iceland has been in political turmoil since October, when its currency, stock market and leading banks crashed amid the global financial crisis.
The country's Nordic neighbors sent billions of dollars to prop up the economy, as did the International Monetary Fund in its first intervention to support a Western European democracy in decades.
But weekly demonstrations -- some verging on riots -- finally forced Prime Minister Geir Haarde and his Independence Party-led center-right coalition to resign en masse on January 26. The Independence Party was projected to win 16 seats in Saturday's vote, according to RUV.
|
[
"When did the financial crisis occur?",
"What did the financial crisis trigger?",
"What crashed last year?",
"Who is the world's first openly gay premier?",
"What left Iceland in turmoil?",
"What was the Icelandic vote triggered by?",
"Who is Johanna Sigurdardottir?"
] |
[
"October,",
"victory in general elections",
"leading banks",
"Sigurdardottir,",
"currency, stock market and leading banks crashed",
"collapse of the Nordic nation's economy.",
"Icelandic"
] |
question: When did the financial crisis occur?, answer: October, | question: What did the financial crisis trigger?, answer: victory in general elections | question: What crashed last year?, answer: leading banks | question: Who is the world's first openly gay premier?, answer: Sigurdardottir, | question: What left Iceland in turmoil?, answer: currency, stock market and leading banks crashed | question: What was the Icelandic vote triggered by?, answer: collapse of the Nordic nation's economy. | question: Who is Johanna Sigurdardottir?, answer: Icelandic
|
(CNN) -- If Herman Cain committed sexual harassment and is now lying about it, his goose is cooked and it should be. But if he is telling the truth, there is something terribly disconcerting about the way the Washington "scandal industrial complex" -- full of reporters, former campaign workers and pundits -- has reacted to this sad story.
After the story broke in Politico, Cain the next day denied that he sexually harassed anyone, which after all, is the core issue. Since then, other anonymous sources claim they too were harassed, without anyone really knowing what the alleged harassment entailed. He has been consistent, unwavering and on the record in his denial.
But that's not good enough for the way things work in Washington, where the manner in which he reacted to the news is said to be a sign of whether he would make a good president. He is being assailed because he remembered more information and therefore "his story changed," an unforgivable development for those who cover scandal news.
Journalists trotted out their well-worn formula for keeping a scandal story alive by saying that his "answers led to more unanswered questions," even though he already answered the only question that matters -- did he harass anyone? Experts who know scandals decry his failure to have "gotten ahead of the story." He should have seen this coming, they say, and pre-empted it, the way all clever Washington politicians, skilled in the art of survival, would have done.
My problem with this line of attack is it's exactly what has made politicians, and often the reporters who cover them, so disconnected from the rest of the country. Cain's reaction has been human. It's been just the opposite of what a politician who prizes political survival above all would have done.
Imagine that you were accused of doing something you did not do 12 years ago. You have a staff and your staff figured out a way to make it go away. Good, you might say. I didn't do it and it deserves to go away. You then put the issue out of your mind. Then 12 years later, the allegations re-emerge. It's not unnatural that you start to remember more facts. Some details come back to you. Some don't. That's the way the human mind works. It's not the way political minds work.
In a year in which people of all parties are fed up with how Washington conducts its business, it's ironic that Cain is now being assailed by Washington insiders for his failure to act like a Washington insider.
I know all the tricks of the trade. If Cain spent 21 years in Washington like I did, he would have pre-empted the issue by giving a speech about what it takes to make it in business.
As he cited his successes, he could have addressed how hard it can sometimes be to make it in America today. How innocent statements he once made to his staff led to threatened lawsuits. How despite his knowing he did nothing wrong, he was advised to "settle" the matter so it didn't become a bigger distraction. What's $35,000 to a multimillion dollar industry? Trial lawyers, excess regulations, union demands all make it so hard to create jobs and achieve growth. He could have gotten the news out himself, framed in a way that minimized the "scandal" and maximized his themes about the economy. How very Washington, and clever, that would have been.
If Cain was the same type of skilled politician who has made Washington what it is has largely become -- an assemblage of smooth-talking, gifted experts in creating a massive debt that risks our future, while being seemingly incapable of doing anything about it other than blaming the other guy -- he might have acted differently.
But he's not an insider. He said what came naturally. He remembered more facts -- a very human development -- and said them. Scandal experts will tell you not to remember more information. Stick to your denial and say nothing else, they would advise
|
[
"Who has repeatedly denied",
"What individuals scandal industry kicked into full gear?",
"who is responsible for this",
"What story is disconcerting",
"What did cain repeatedly deny?"
] |
[
"Herman Cain",
"Herman Cain",
"Herman Cain",
"about the way the Washington \"scandal industrial complex\"",
"that he sexually harassed anyone,"
] |
question: Who has repeatedly denied, answer: Herman Cain | question: What individuals scandal industry kicked into full gear?, answer: Herman Cain | question: who is responsible for this, answer: Herman Cain | question: What story is disconcerting, answer: about the way the Washington "scandal industrial complex" | question: What did cain repeatedly deny?, answer: that he sexually harassed anyone,
|
(CNN) -- If Lagos were a person, he (or she) would be described as "mad, bad and dangerous to know."
Locals get about in traffic-heavy Lagos on motorcycles known as okadas.
But we all know that these types of people are usually the most exciting kind. They are a lot of fun and you just never know what's going to happen when they're around.
By the same token, any visitor to Lagos should prepare for the unexpected -- it can feel like a literal assault on the senses from the moment you step off the plane and feel the intensity of the dense tropical heat.
Lagos is big, brash and bold and creaks under the weight of the 17 million people who live there.
The former capital of Nigeria, Lagos remains its economic nerve center and teems constantly with the buzz of buying and selling (usually performed at the top of the vendors' voices.)
There's only one volume level in Lagos and that's loud. From the constant tooting of horns in the snail-paced traffic, known locally as go slows, to music blaring from homes round-the-clock, the city buzzes constantly with noise.
Getting around is not easy and you will be caught in the frequent go slows, where you will be confronted by vendors selling all manner of things, from English football team merchandise to dinner sets to plantain chips to frozen yogurts. Locals often joke they can kit out their entire home in a short car journey.
The city is divided into three islands adjacent to each other and the mainland. Most expatriates and employees of multinationals, that proliferate in Lagos, are based on two of the islands; Ikoyi and Victoria Island.
The vast majority of wealth in the city is concentrated on these upmarket islands, with their western-style shopping malls and entertainment complexes.
The best restaurants, bars, boutiques and galleries can also be found here and it's best to stick to these areas to make the most of your time in Lagos.
A stay in Lagos would be incomplete without visiting one of the lively and colorful markets like the Balogun market off Breadfruit St, Lagos Island. It is not for the meek or faint-hearted but you're guaranteed to get a bargain or two if you're prepared for a good haggle.
It's great for African prints and carvings but is a maze of a market, so best to hop on the back of popular motorcycles known locally as okadas to help you navigate it.
To relax from all that haggling, you can head down to one of the five beaches in the city -- the best of them is Tarkwa Bay -- a small beach at the entrance to the Lagos port. It is easily accessible by boat from Tarzan Jetty at Maroko (around $6 per person) or under Falomo bridge on Victoria Island.
At Tarkwa Bay you can browse through some local African arts, cloth or even locally produced honey brought round by the occasional hawker. For a spot of lunch, make like locals and indulge in some "pepper fish" or suya -- very spicy chunks of meat, similar to kebabs, cooked over a charcoal grill), washed down with ice cold beer.
For authentic Nigerian cuisine that won't give your stomach too much "wahalla" (trouble), the Yellow Chili restaurant on Oju Olubun Close, Victoria Island is recommended. Those with an adventurous palate can order the special delicacy of Isi-Ewu - goat's head, while others can tuck into jollof rice and chicken or spicy bean cakes (moi-moi) -- a favorite with most Nigerians.
For a spot of culture, a short taxi ride away is one of the city's main attractions, the National Museum on King George V Road, Onikan. It opened in 1957 and houses bronze sculptures and ivory carvings from Benin dating back 300 years.
Is Lagos the most exciting city in Africa? Use the Sound Off box below to have your say.
If you are in the market for some art, you can pick up some tasteful, but admittedly,
|
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"What should shoppers be prepared to do at local markets?",
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question: What should shoppers be prepared to do at local markets?, answer: prepare for the unexpected | question: Where is the city of Lagos located?, answer: Nigeria, | question: which is the city that never sleeps, answer: The former capital of Nigeria, Lagos
|
(CNN) -- If a bed and 14 other antiques up for sale in New York next week look familiar, it might be that you saw them in a movie.
An American Renaissance gilt, carved, inlaid and ebonized bed is expected to go for $500,000.
Pieces of furniture owned by two very rich 19th-century Americans were destined for a trash pile before they were rescued for the silver screen.
They will find new life on the auction block next week.
Made by the Herter Brothers in the 1870s, the furniture sat in Warner Brothers' Hollywood props department since 1942, when the studio bought it at an estate auction for a fraction of the original cost.
Warner Brothers, owned by CNN parent Time Warner Inc., could get $2 million from the auction, and it means valuable space will be cleared out in the props department storage.
One studio source said using such expensive -- although authentic -- props on movie sets doesn't make business sense.
Jon King, director of Bonham's, the New York auction house that will put the furniture on sale next Thursday, said he did not have the studio's permission to reveal in which movies the furniture might have been used.
You can watch post-1942 Warner Brothers period films to find them.
"You have to go slow-motion and stop and start an awful lot," King said.
"I would imagine that if any of these were in movies they might steal the scene away from the actors," said King, an expert in 19th-century furniture.
A New York Times article about the furniture, published in 1995, said it appeared in Warner Brother's "Saratoga Trunk," a 1945 movie starring Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman.
Few records were kept over the decades to track the pieces' appearances, a studio source said.
King said he saw Herter Brothers furniture from the same estate in Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho," filmed in 1960 on Universal's lots.
Universal bought its furniture at the same 1942 estate auction that Warner Brothers attended. The studio sold its collection years ago, King said.
The furniture -- in American Renaissance and American Aesthetic styles -- was made with "very exotic and very expensive materials" for two very rich California men -- Gov. Milton Slocum Latham and railroad magnate Mark Harper, King said.
The most dramatic piece is an ornate bed commissioned for the master bedroom at Latham's Menlo Park, California, home. It could sell for $500,000, King said.
"A lot of people in the field regard that as the finest bed ever made in the 19th century in America," King said. "Basically, the quality of carving and the number of things going on in there in the bed, it's just amazing."
Changing times and tastes made the furniture obsolete for anything but a period movie by 1942. Movie studios were scouring the country for cheap furniture for their props departments, King said.
But recent decades have see a steep rise in values for Herter Brothers craftwork, he said.
King said next week's sale is significant for collectors because "this is the last studio collection."
The Herter Brothers -- German immigrants who set up their furniture-making shop in New York City after the Civil War -- also made furniture for the White House, where some pieces remain.
|
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question: Who owned the furniture?, answer: Gov. Milton Slocum Latham and railroad magnate Mark Harper, | question: What are auction houses not allowed to reveal?, answer: in which movies the furniture might have been used. | question: What year was it bought in?, answer: 1942, | question: When did the studio buy it?, answer: 1942, | question: What was owned by two wealthy americans?, answer: Pieces of furniture | question: What period films can you watch?, answer: post-1942 Warner Brothers
|
(CNN) -- If all goes according to plan, cancer survivor Kyle Garlett will compete in October's Ford Ironman World Championship, a grueling triathlon made up of a 2.4-mile ocean swim, a 112-mile bicycle ride and a 26.2-mile run.
Heart transplant recipient and cancer survivor Kyle Garlett will compete in October's Ironman World Championship.
And he'll do it with another man's heart pumping in his chest.
"I don't think there's anybody who wouldn't consider me a success story and a survivor," Garlett said.
His medical issues began in 1989 when he received his first Hodgkin's disease diagnosis as a high school senior. In 1995, during his third battle with the cancer, doctors ceased his chemotherapy treatment when they discovered it had weakened his heart.
Two years later, Garlett learned he had secondary leukemia as a result of chemotherapy to treat the Hodgkin's, and three more years of chemotherapy ensued.
And after five years on the waiting list, he received a new heart in 2006.
Now, the 37-year-old savors his body's capabilities.
"It's kind of like the starving person who all of a sudden finds himself in front of a buffet. And now I've got the buffet. I've got my all-you-can-eat plate, and I'm just loading it up," Garlett said.
A heart transplant may seem extremely daunting, but Garlett saw it as a more hopeful operation than his years of cancer treatments.
"Going in for chemotherapy, as a patient you know what's happening. Your body is being poisoned and you know that when you come out on the other side of it, you're going to have given up something," said Garlett, a sportswriter and motivational speaker living in Marina del Rey, California.
"On the heart transplant, though, it was completely the opposite. I knew that from the day of the transplant on, every day I'd be getting stronger. And they were now doing something that was going to fix me, improve my life."
Garlett, who says he's "not a klutz" but "definitely not a natural athlete," trains about 15 hours a week for October's Ironman in Kona, Hawaii. Closer to race time, he expects to spend 20 to 25 hours a week in intense training to achieve his goal of finishing within the 17-hour time limit.
Garlett was invited to compete in the elite event because organizers believe he "demonstrates the Ironman mantra: Anything is possible," said Blair LaHaye, director of communications for Ironman.
LaHaye said a handful of athletes are invited to take part in the event each year, but their inclusion doesn't reduce the number of slots for those who get in by doing well in qualifying events, or by winning a spot through the Ironman lottery. Garlett will compete in a half-Ironman or other long-distance event before Kona to validate his selection.
The training and competition are demanding enough for competitors without health issues. But being a heart transplant patient comes with the extra challenge of getting the organ to beat at an acceptable rate.
"When the old heart comes out, all the nerves are severed. And when the donor heart comes in, the nerves are not connected," explained Dr. Jon Kobashigawa, medical director of the UCLA Heart Transplant Program, where Garlett is a patient.
In a person whose heart is intact, "the brain will tell the heart, 'Let's go, start exercising, let's start beating faster,' " Kobashigawa said. A donor heart, however, relies on circulating adrenaline in order to get it going. As a result, heart transplant recipients must warm up thoroughly to get their heart pumping properly.
The "denervated" heart works about 80 to 90 percent as well as a normal heart, Kobashigawa said, "but through exercise, these patients who do strenuous activities, I believe, do get their exercise capacity almost to the normal range, if not normal."
It's also possible, doctors say, for
|
[
"What will Garlett compete in?",
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"What poses an extra challenge for transplant patients?"
] |
[
"Ironman World Championship,",
"Kyle Garlett",
"of getting the organ to beat at an acceptable rate."
] |
question: What will Garlett compete in?, answer: Ironman World Championship, | question: Who will compete in the Kona triathlon?, answer: Kyle Garlett | question: What poses an extra challenge for transplant patients?, answer: of getting the organ to beat at an acceptable rate.
|
(CNN) -- If an e-mail popped up in your inbox promising a house for $100, you'd expect to see it sent from a guy in Nigeria asking you to wire him several thousand dollars first.
Zeb Smith lies on his front lawn and spends a quiet afternoon with his neighbors.
But this depressed housing market dream is real. And Detroit, Michigan, artist Jon Brumit and his wife, Sarah, are living it.
The couple never counted on owning a home.
"It's not that we have a little money," Jon Brumit said, laughing. "I'm saying we have no money."
But the couple began entertaining the idea of a permanent nest when their friends Mitch Cope and Gina Reichert, also artists, started taking advantage of foreclosures in the city, where the average home price dipped to $11,533 in April, according to the Detroit Association of Realtors.
Dragging down the average are homes that are long abandoned or foreclosed on that are selling for pennies on the dollar. Detroit already had the lowest market value houses in Michigan before the latest rounds of job losses at GM and other huge employers, market analysts say.
"Those artists are doing a good thing; they are at least helping to stabilize neighborhoods that would be all but lost," said Mike Shedlock, an investment adviser who blogs frequently about Detroit's economy.
For less than a few thousand dollars, Cope and Reichert snapped up a dilapidated bungalow in a north Detroit neighborhood called "BanglaTown," for its unexpected mix of Bangladeshis, African-Americans, Polish and Ukrainians and the occasional shady character.
Scrappers had cleaned the house to the bone. The copper had been stolen; the electrical wiring was stripped.
But no matter. Here was a chance for Cope and Reichert, who run a popular Detroit art store, to rehabilitate the 1920s brick house into a bastion of energy savings, with solar panels, LED lights, recycled wood and high-end insulated windows.
They're installing a security system that exemplifies elegant efficiency with hurricane-proof windows and steel doors replacing burglar bars. They are also experimenting with running their air-conditioning on a car battery.
The project became known as the Power House. Cope and Reichert wanted to create a central place to power homes nearby and, in turn, revive a neighborhood's sense of community.
The trick was getting their friends not only to cheer the concept but invest in it by moving next door.
"It was much easier than we thought it might be," Cope said. "We told everyone that Detroit is an interesting city to work in as an artist, and the neighborhood is diverse. But, really, it came down to money."
"I kept telling Mitch, 'Wow those are an awesome, ridiculously good deals but if you find anything that's less, let me know," Brumit said. "Like, if something comes along for next to nothing, cool."
A few weeks later, Cope e-mailed Brumit a photo of an abandoned home on his block. Its windows were boarded up and plywood was nailed across the front door. The huge hole in the roof was courtesy of the fire department. A neighbor said the house had been set on fire -- twice.
Pricetag: $100. Brumit called a real estate agent with the Department of Housing and Urban Development, who confirmed that bids on the foreclosed property started at $95 for the property, $5 for the house. There were no back taxes -- no one seemed to be sure who once owned the house, it had been empty for so long, Brumit said.
Cope, also a designer and builder, and an inspector did a walk-through.
"Inspection was fine and Mitch told me the foundation was good," Brumit said. "He just said, 'If you didn't mind scraping some peeling paint, doing some surface treatments, putting in new utilities, windows and repairing the roof ... this could be pretty interesting.'"
Now,
|
[
"How much did artists pay for a trashed house?",
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] |
[
"$100,",
"Jon Brumit and his wife, Sarah,",
"$100,",
"their friends Mitch Cope and Gina Reichert, also"
] |
question: How much did artists pay for a trashed house?, answer: $100, | question: who bought the house, answer: Jon Brumit and his wife, Sarah, | question: how much did the house cost, answer: $100, | question: Have other artists ever bought houses in the same neighborhood?, answer: their friends Mitch Cope and Gina Reichert, also
|
(CNN) -- If director Ron Howard hopes religious controversy will help sell tickets to "Angels & Demons" the way it boosted his "Da Vinci Code," the Catholic Church is not playing along with his script.
Tom Hanks reprises his role as professor Robert Langdon in "Angels & Demons."
Howard, who premiered the follow-up in Rome, Italy, this week, said there was "residual antagonism from 'The Da Vinci Code,' " but Vatican officials ignored the movie by not responding to suggestions that the church was offended.
The first movie based on Dan Brown's mega-selling novels earned $750 million worldwide in 2006.
"The Da Vinci Code" was intensely criticized by Catholics, especially those from the Opus Dei organization, a small but influential group within the Catholic Church whose members felt that they were vilified in the story.
An Opus Dei priest who teaches history and literature at Holy Cross University in Rome said that "Angels & Demons" has "simply not been an issue" among those in the Vatican and that any controversy is a product of the movie's marketing machine. Watch Howard make his statements »
"To be honest, I don't think that anyone at the Vatican is paying much attention to the premier of the 'Angels & Demons,' " Father John Wauck said. "I was just talking with some people yesterday, I know friends of mine working in the Vatican, and they were surprised to learn that the movie was premiering in Rome. They had no idea."
"I think the church's attitude has been, from the beginning, 'hands off,' " Wauck said. "Especially, I think, after what happened with 'The Da Vinci Code.' "
The new movie is not as offensive, Wauck said.
"In 'The Da Vinci Code,' there were serious issues, such as who Jesus Christ was or the nature of church in the course of history, but none of them is taken in 'Angels & Demons.' It's simply, you know, a thriller," he said.
The movie may even help Rome by promoting tourism there, which is "not a bad thing," Wauck said.
But Howard suggested to CNN's Neil Curry that controversy has carried over to the sequel.
"I think there's some residual antagonism from 'The Da Vinci Code,' " Howard said.
Stirring people up with controversy is "something that appeals to me," he said.
"Part of the entertainment value is that people are going to go in there and have something to talk about or think about afterward," he said.
Howard said he tried to reach out to the Catholic Church.
"We've even invited certain groups, members of the church, for example, to see early rough cuts, because I wanted to share it with them and know what they thought, and I felt they'd find it not as offensive as they'd imagine," he said. "Everyone's declined to do that."
Howard himself downplayed reports that Rome and Vatican officials hampered production by refusing permission to film in certain locations.
"Probably a little more has been made of that," he said.
"While I don't want to reveal how we took people on the 'Angels & Demons' tour and on the adventure, someday I might, maybe on the DVD or something, do a little better breakdown of how we got the shots we needed," he said.
Producers did resort to some "low-budget street photography where you just pull up in a car, getting out of a van, clearing a little space and shooting a shot," Howard said.
This controversy, Wauck said, was also cooked up by the film's marketing department.
"As a general rule, no commercial films are filmed in churches in Rome, and no exception was made for 'Angels & Demons,' " Wauck said.
The film, which like "The Da Vinci
|
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"what is angels and demons based on?"
] |
[
"'The Da Vinci Code,'",
"Dan Brown's",
"Dan Brown's",
"Ron Howard",
"\"The Da Vinci Code\"",
"Dan Brown's mega-selling novels"
] |
question: What was controversial book made into controversial film?, answer: 'The Da Vinci Code,' | question: who wrote the book angel and demons?, answer: Dan Brown's | question: Angels& Demons, a new Ron Howard film was based on whose novel?, answer: Dan Brown's | question: who is the film director of angel and demons?, answer: Ron Howard | question: What is based on Dan Brown novel?, answer: "The Da Vinci Code" | question: what is angels and demons based on?, answer: Dan Brown's mega-selling novels
|
(CNN) -- If one California lawmaker has his way, his cash-strapped state may have an arresting real estate listing on the market: San Quentin State Prison.
San Quentin prison houses more than 5,300 inmates, including Scott Peterson.
State Sen. Jeff Denham is proposing selling the 432-acre prison, which offers a breathtaking view of San Francisco Bay, to garner money for California.
"Our inmates just don't need an ocean view. Let's level it off," said Denham, a Republican.
"Let's rebuild something for the community there and reap the benefit for the state by having that money come in," he added.
Denham estimates that the property could sell for as much as $2 billion, even amid a down market.
On Tuesday, lawmakers put the proposal to sell the prison in a "holding pattern," said Jann Taber, a spokeswoman for Denham. Watch CNN's Dan Simon report from San Quentin »
State Sen. Mark Leno, who chairs the state's public safety committee, said the committee was holding the proposal under a policy that allowed lawmakers and residents to give further thought to legislation that could exacerbate overcrowding in California's prisons.
Taber said it could be brought up again this year or next.
The prison houses more than 5,300 inmates, including Scott Peterson, according to the department of corrections.
However, even with the waterfront property, putting the prison on the market may be a hard sell, especially if a new prison had to be built.
"This is a really good facility," Bob Sleppy of the California Department of Corrections said. "It's existing; it's operating; it's well-operated over the years by custody staff. It serves an immediate need."
He said that building another facility to house the inmates might be troublesome.
"Communities seldom welcome a new prison," he said, adding that constructing a prison to replace San Quentin could cost $2 billion, the very price tag Denham suggested.
The idea of selling San Quentin, which opened its doors in 1852, has been raised before, but it never received much support because of California's chronic problem of overcrowded prisons.
California is near 200 percent capacity in its prisons, and selling San Quentin could make the problem worse, said Leno, a Democrat.
He said there were no precise numbers available showing the value of San Quentin's property or what it would cost to build a prison to replace it.
"Again, we have no actual numbers right now," he said, adding, "I would guess, at best, it would come out a wash."
Real estate consultant Stephen Roulac said San Quentin's land could be used for condominiums, parks or community-type buildings.
"We would love to see a performing arts center prospectively here, possibly a museum, possibly a tie-in with a university," he said.
Lawmakers have approved $356 million to build a death row facility to replace the existing one at San Quentin, and some say that is another reason to consider selling the prison.
"Does it make sense anymore in the year 2009 to continue to invest in expanding this prison facility on the most prime piece of real estate in Northern California, or should we finally start to think about some non-correctional uses for this unique property?" asked state Assembly member Jared Huffman, a Democrat.
Denham has tried twice to pass legislation to sell San Quentin. His efforts in 2007 and in 2005 never made it out of committee, his office said.
|
[
"What is the prison capacity in California?",
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"What was Denham quoted as saying about the view?",
"What does Denham say?"
] |
[
"5,300",
"to house the inmates might be troublesome.",
"\"Our inmates just don't need an ocean",
"\"Our inmates just don't need an ocean view. Let's level it off,\""
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question: What is the prison capacity in California?, answer: 5,300 | question: What do critics claim about building a new facility?, answer: to house the inmates might be troublesome. | question: What was Denham quoted as saying about the view?, answer: "Our inmates just don't need an ocean | question: What does Denham say?, answer: "Our inmates just don't need an ocean view. Let's level it off,"
|
(CNN) -- If presidential hopeful Rick Perry should awaken one night in a cold sweat with the Ghost of Republican Past hovering by his bedside, the apparition will likely take the form of Sen. Charles Percy, who passed away on Saturday after a long struggle with Alzheimer's disease.
Percy's political career ended when he lost his Illinois Senate seat in 1984, the same year that future Texas Gov. Rick Perry won his first election to the Texas House of Representatives as a Democrat. Charles Percy's fall from GOP wunderkind to party outcast offers a vivid illustration of the Republican Party's mutation from a vibrant and diverse coalition to the dogmatic cult of conservative ideology that it has become today.
In 1968, political gossips buzzed about the possibility that the rich, handsome, "All-American" Charles Percy might run for president. The New York Times called him "the hottest political article in the Republican Party," and Richard Nixon worried that Percy would be his most formidable competitor in the primaries.
Percy was a moderate-to-liberal Republican from the Rockefeller wing of the party who had made his name promoting affordable housing and combating urban poverty. Such positions were seen as positive political attributes in 1968. Four years earlier, Barry Goldwater's libertarian presidential campaign had proved a disaster, and Republicans were not eager to repeat the experience.
But Percy chose not to run and instead endorsed his colleague Nelson Rockefeller, who lost to Richard Nixon. Over the next few years, Percy clashed frequently with Nixon over defense spending and Supreme Court appointments. During the Watergate scandal, he again defied Nixon by demanding an independent investigation.
With his popularity and national name-recognition peaking, Percy might have had another shot at the presidency in 1976, but he deferred to the incumbent, Gerald Ford. There would not be another chance, for the Republican Party was moving away from Charles Percy.
In the mid-1970s, a group of conservative insurgents known as the New Right began plotting to extinguish the party's liberal wing. They despised men such as Percy and embraced a fanatical brand of social conservatism. One of their leaders, Paul Weyrich, founded the Heritage Foundation and recruited Jerry Falwell to lead the Moral Majority.
One by one, the New Right knocked off the liberal Republicans, either by defeating them in primaries or fatally weakening them in general elections -- names now barely remembered such as Clifford Case of New Jersey or Edward Brooke of Massachusetts.
In 1984, New Right leaders backed a primary challenge against Percy. When that failed, they endorsed his Democratic challenger, the liberal, bow-tie wearing Paul Simon. One of the leaders, Richard Viguerie, explained that Percy's defeat was more important to conservatives than retaining Republican control of the Senate. When the voting was over, the Republicans kept the Senate, but they lost Charles Percy.
The drive for ideological purity has continued ever since, with tea party groups and fundraisers such as the Club for Growth targeting moderate conservatives after the liberals went extinct. In recent years, they helped force out Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island and Charlie Crist of Florida.
Perry, the front-runner of the Republican presidential field in polls, is a deep social and fiscal conservative who would never have had a shot at the presidential nomination in 1968. But in 2012, it's the liberal Charles Percy who wouldn't have stood a chance. Even Goldwater's refusal to embrace the religious right would doom his candidacy were he to run today.
Yet perhaps Perry would still be wise to pay attention to the Ghost of Republican Past.
He might get to see the old Democratic Party advertisement showing a disembodied pair of hands ripping apart a Social Security card. That advertisement helped turn the tide against Goldwater, who like Perry had challenged Social Security.
Conservative activists have succeeded in driving American politics far to the right, but there may still be limits.
The opinions in this commentary are solely those of Michael Wolraich.
|
[
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"What did Charles Percy fight?",
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"moderate-to-liberal Republican",
"Charles Percy.",
"Alzheimer's disease.",
"New Right"
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question: Who was charles percy in 1968., answer: moderate-to-liberal Republican | question: Who was a rising GOP star in 1968?, answer: Charles Percy. | question: What did Charles Percy fight?, answer: Alzheimer's disease. | question: What toppled Percy and other liberal Republicans?, answer: New Right
|
(CNN) -- If someone had asked Kelly Pless to describe herself three years ago, the word "fit" would have never crossed her mind.
Kelly Pless weighed 220 pounds at her heaviest. She lost 95 pounds through diet and exercise.
For most of her adult life, the 31-year-old graduate student from Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, has struggled with her weight. She started gaining as a teenager and by the time she graduated from high school, she was carrying 215 pounds on her 5' 2" frame.
Prom, she says, was a nightmare.
"I had to go to three different stores to buy a dress," Pless said. "I had to buy the biggest, also the ugliest, prom dress the store had because it was the only one that would fit."
After high school, she lost 50 pounds. But because she hadn't done it in a healthy way, her weight crept back up to 220 pounds.
At 28, she started having trouble breathing and doctors told her the weight was to blame. She reached her breaking point.
"I remember being heavy and feeling like being fit just wasn't something I could be," said Pless. "I remember feeling like even if I tried, it wasn't something my body was capable of."
Despite her doubts, Pless decided to do something. Fortunately she didn't have to look far for inspiration. See before and after weight loss photos from CNN.com I-Reporters »
"My manager at the Kennedy Space Center ran marathons, and he was the same age as my father," she said. Because her own father had diabetes and was in poor health, he seemed much older, she said.
Over the next three to four months, she began walking, without any real goal or expectation. Pless believed that if she just focused on eating less and moving more, everything would fall into place.
"At first, it was hard to start exercising because I was worried people would make fun of me," Pless said. "But then I just told myself, if that's the worst that could happen ... I just got out there and didn't care."
Eventually, she started to run or "shuffle" as she jokingly recalls. She also adopted an "eat to live" philosophy and satisfied her cravings for sweets by eating lots of fruit.
"I changed how I felt about food and what it meant to me," said Pless, who occasionally indulges in a bite of birthday cake or a piece of chocolate.
"One of the first things I cut out was cakes and cookies. That was my weak spot. After a few months of cutting those things out, I focused more on portion control," said Pless. "I pretty much eat when I'm hungry and don't eat when I'm not and really try to pay attention to when those times are. Make sure I'm not eating out of boredom or [at] social events, I try to make sure I'm not overeating, just because everyone else is." Kelly Pless shares her weight loss secrets »
Pless pays close attention to societal pressure, which she believes is the reason many people overeat. Restaurant servings are about three times bigger than a normal portion size, she says. She makes sure she doesn't overeat when dining out simply because the food is there.
"What's hard is to change how you feel about foods that you love or that aren't necessarily good for you, or actually change how you look at food. That was the hardest part for me."
Instead of giving in to the temptation or convenience of calorie-laden or fatty foods such as cheeseburgers from the drive-through, Pless asks herself, "What do I really want to eat? Or, what does my body really want right now?"
All of the hard work and determination paid off. Pless has lost 95 pounds and kept it off for 1½ years. As a result, she says,
|
[
"When did Kelly Pless start gaining weight?",
"Who started out walking?",
"At what weight did Kelly Pless have at her highest recorded weight?",
"What was Kelly Pless' highest weight?",
"What is Kelly Pless' philosophy about eating?",
"What did help her lose weight?",
"which was the initial weight of Kelly Pless?",
"When did Kelly Pless started gaining weight?",
"Pless weighed how much?",
"Approximately how much weight did Kelly lose?",
"What is her eating philosophy?",
"Who started gaining as a teen and weighed 220 pounds at her heaviest?",
"Who started out walking but now runs 40 miles a week?",
"What was her eating philosophy?"
] |
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"95 pounds",
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question: When did Kelly Pless start gaining weight?, answer: as a teenager | question: Who started out walking?, answer: Kelly Pless | question: At what weight did Kelly Pless have at her highest recorded weight?, answer: 220 pounds | question: What was Kelly Pless' highest weight?, answer: 220 pounds | question: What is Kelly Pless' philosophy about eating?, answer: "eat to live" | question: What did help her lose weight?, answer: diet and exercise. | question: which was the initial weight of Kelly Pless?, answer: 220 pounds | question: When did Kelly Pless started gaining weight?, answer: as a teenager | question: Pless weighed how much?, answer: 220 pounds at her heaviest. She lost 95 pounds through diet and exercise. | question: Approximately how much weight did Kelly lose?, answer: 95 pounds | question: What is her eating philosophy?, answer: "eat to live" | question: Who started gaining as a teen and weighed 220 pounds at her heaviest?, answer: Kelly Pless | question: Who started out walking but now runs 40 miles a week?, answer: Kelly Pless | question: What was her eating philosophy?, answer: less and moving more, everything would fall into place.
|
(CNN) -- If the congressional "super committee" does not reach a deficit reduction deal by Wednesday's legally mandated deadline, I propose we take a page from the NBA owners and lock Congress out.
I'm serious. We, the taxpayers, are the owners of Congress and if Congress won't make a deal that helps our nation, then let's put a big padlock on the doors of the House and Senate -- or at least change the locks and not give them the keys.
Polls show that me and apparently 91% of my fellow Americans have never been more frustrated with the dysfunctional nature of "our" Congress. Congress' approval rating has fallen to an abysmal 9% -- to put this in perspective, herpes is now slightly more popular than Congress. Bed bugs really can't be that far behind.
I'm not sure who the 9% of voters are who think Congress is doing a good job -- I can only assume it's Congress' friends and families as well as some of the well-connected lobbyists who have reaped benefits.
Maybe the 9% are those pleased when Congress made history in August after waiting until the last minute to compromise on a budget deal, which led to the first downgrade of the U.S. credit rating by Standard & Poor's.
Or possibly the 9% were impressed when House Democrats and Republicans joined together in a rare moment of bipartisanship a few weeks ago and voted in favor of a resolution by a whopping 396-9.
Was this vote to create jobs for the more than 25 million Americans who are unemployed or underemployed? Or maybe this vote was to help Americans on the brink of foreclosure?
Nope, this vote was to address an issue that Congress felt demanded immediate attention: Affirming that our national motto is: "In God We Trust."
Wow, that should really put some food on the table of a hungry family whose unemployment benefits are close to expiring. I hope you take the time to "thank" Rep. J. Randy Forbes, a Republican from Virginia, for leading the courageous charge on that issue.
Instead of a congressional lock out, perhaps Donald Trump could host a new TV show entitled: "Congressional Apprentice," where each week members of Congress are given a task to help our nation. Those who fail will be met by Trump gleefully declaring: "Congressman ... You're fired!"
I'm at the point that when I hear about a king in a foreign nation dissolving the legislature in his country, I almost wish our president could do the same.
Despite all its negatives, Congress can take credit for one positive achievement: Inspiring more Americans to become engaged in politics as witnessed by both the rise of the Occupy movement and the tea party movement. Congress' failures have awakened both the left and the right of the American electorate.
I hope that both the Occupy and tea party groups (and everyone else in the middle) can agree on a concrete change to our electoral system, namely: Term limits for Congress. Even though Congress' approval rating had fallen to 21% at the time of the November 2010 congressional mid-term elections, the inherent advantages of incumbency for members of Congress are so powerful that still 87% of incumbents in the House and 90% in the Senate won re-election.
Term limits would mandate a turnover in the composition of Congress so that federal elected officials no longer focus on political concerns and making a career out of serving in Congress but instead on enacting legislation that benefits all Americans in the short time they will serve.
Term limits are the only way to ensure meaningful change of our Congress. But that won't be easy. To impose congressional term limits, the U.S. Constitution must be amended -- just as it was with the 22nd amendment, which set a term limit for our president. The problem is that absent a constitutional convention, the only way to start the process for a Constitutional amendment is that Congress -- the people with a 9% approval rating -- have to pass it by a two-thirds vote in each chamber before it
|
[
"What do NBA owners do that Congress should do?",
"Who looks unlikely to reach an agreement by the deadline?",
"What is the only way to force dramatic change?",
"What is the way to force dramatic change"
] |
[
"lock",
"congressional \"super committee\"",
"Term limits",
"Term limits"
] |
question: What do NBA owners do that Congress should do?, answer: lock | question: Who looks unlikely to reach an agreement by the deadline?, answer: congressional "super committee" | question: What is the only way to force dramatic change?, answer: Term limits | question: What is the way to force dramatic change, answer: Term limits
|
(CNN) -- If there is one thing that Africa can learn from the global financial crisis it's that the West doesn't always get it right, Nobel Peace Laureate Wangari Maathai told CNN.
Two young boys plow their dry cornfield in Kwale, Kenya which has been blighted by drought.
"It sends a message that anyone can make a mistake. Nobody has a blueprint and nobody is a know-it-all," she said of the current turmoil engulfing the global banking system.
"I can tell you I never would have thought we could experience what we're experiencing in America now," she added.
"Because for one we never would have thought that the Americans could be caught 'asleep,' not monitoring their financial system and therefore waking up one day and finding out that their most respected institutions are collapsing right and left."
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned the global financial crisis will have a "major impact," on low-income countries.
In a recent report, "The Implications of the Global Financial Crisis for Low-Income Countries," the Fund singled out sub-Saharan Africa as particularly vulnerable to the crisis, as lower global growth reduces export demand and depresses commodity prices.
And last month, anti-poverty campaign group ActionAid forecast Africa's income would drop by $49 billion dollars between 2007 and the end of this year.
Most of that, it said, would be due to a fall in export earnings, aid and income from rich countries now in recession.
"Although developing countries didn't make this crisis, it has become all too clear that they are in the firing line when it comes to suffering its worst effects," Claire Melamed, Head of Policy at ActionAid said in a statement accompanying the report.
"There is a real risk that development will start to go backwards in many countries as the money dries up and that the recession will lead to worsening poverty and terrible consequences for the men, women and children caught in its grip," she added.
Wangari Maathai said many Africans had become so accustomed to their daily struggles that they assumed life could not get any worse.
"Some of the impact that the western banks or the Western people are experiencing we've been experiencing for decades," Maathai said.
"We've been raising and educating children who cannot get any employment. Long ago our hospitals collapsed, our infrastructure collapsed, our education system collapsed.
"That's why people are saying it can't get any worse, but you and I know it can get worse," she said.
Now 69, Wangari Maathai has long campaigned for human rights and the empowerment of Africa's most impoverished people. Watch Revealed: Wangari Maathai »
More than thirty years ago she founded the Green Belt Movement, a tree-planting campaign to simultaneously mitigate deforestation and to give locals, especially women and girls, new purpose. They have since planted more than 40 million trees.
In 2004, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to promote sustainable development, democracy and peace, and has recently repeated calls for Africans to 'rise up' and demand greater accountability from their governments. See photos of Maathai receiving the Nobel Peace Prize »
"What Africa needs to know is that now that the world has its own crisis in its own hand, if they don't take care of themselves and place themselves in a position where they can be assisted, they will suffer, the people will suffer," Maathai told CNN.
Earlier this month, the group of 20 industrialized nations agreed an unprecedented rescue package worth $1.1 trillion to tackle the global economic crisis.
It included $750 billion dollars for the International Monetary Fund (IMF), three times the Fund's previous lending capacity, as well "special drawing rights" to an additional $250 billion.
Of the commitment, Maathai said: "I'm glad that the G20 identified that they must help the poor people, but the biggest problem for the poor developing countries in Africa
|
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"who is nobel peace laureate?",
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"Who says West is fallible?"
] |
[
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"Africa",
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"Wangari Maathai",
"Nobel Peace Laureate Wangari Maathai"
] |
question: who is nobel peace laureate?, answer: Wangari Maathai | question: What has he said aobut the West?, answer: doesn't always get it right, | question: Who needs to take responsibility for the future?, answer: Africa | question: who need to take responsibility?, answer: governments. | question: Who said Africans need to take responsibility for the future?, answer: Wangari Maathai | question: What is the name of the laureate winner?, answer: Wangari Maathai | question: Who says West is fallible?, answer: Nobel Peace Laureate Wangari Maathai
|
(CNN) -- If there's a blessing in the current swine flu epidemic, it's how benign the illness seems to be outside the central disease cluster in Mexico. But history offers a dark warning to anyone ready to write off the 2009 H1N1 virus.
The Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 sickened an estimated third of the world's population.
In each of the four major pandemics since 1889, a spring wave of relatively mild illness was followed by a second wave, a few months later, of a much more virulent disease. This was true in 1889, 1957, 1968 and in the catastrophic flu outbreak of 1918, which sickened an estimated third of the world's population and killed, conservatively, 50 million people.
Lone Simonsen, an epidemiologist at George Washington University, who has studied the course of prior pandemics in both the United States and her native Denmark, says, "The good news from past pandemics, in several experiences, is that the majority of deaths have happened not in the first wave, but later." Based on this, Simonsen suggests there may be time to develop an effective vaccine before a second, more virulent strain, begins to circulate.
As swine flu -- also known as the 2009 version of the H1N1 flu strain -- spreads, Simonsen and other health experts are diving into the history books for clues about how the outbreak might unfold -- and, more importantly, how it might be contained. In fact, the official Pandemic Influenza Operation Plan, or O-Plan, of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is based in large part on a history lesson -- research organized by pediatrician and medical historian Dr. Howard Markel of the University of Michigan.
Markel was tapped by the CDC to study what worked and what didn't during the 1918 flu disaster. Markel and colleagues examined 43 cities and found that so-called nonpharmaceutical interventions -- steps such as isolating patients and school closings -- were remarkably successful in tamping down the outbreak. "They don't make the population immune, but they buy you time, either by preventing influenza from getting into the community or slowing down the spread," Markel said. Explainer: Flu facts »
Markel describes a dramatic example in the mining town of Gunnison, Colorado. In 1918, town leaders built a veritable barricade, closing down the railroad station and blocking all roads into town. Four thousand townspeople lived on stockpiled supplies and food from hunting or fishing. For 3½ months, while influenza raged in nearly every city in America, Gunnison saw not a single case of flu -- not until the spring, when roads were reopened and a handful of residents fell sick. Visit LIFE.com for photographs of the lethal flu pandemic of 1918
Nonpharmaceutical interventions, or NPIs, also proved effective in big cities such as New York, according to Markel. In fact, the sooner cities moved to limit public gatherings or isolate patients, the less severe their experience tended to be -- as much as an eight- or ninefold difference in case and death rates, he says. Based on this guidance, the CDC preparedness plan devotes dozens of pages to potential NPIs, from voluntary isolation to reorganizing company work schedules to reduce the density of people sitting next to each other in the office or while riding trains and buses.
If it seems odd to base medical strategy on 90-year-old newspapers, the approach is increasingly popular. "There's a big case for looking at history," says Simonsen. "We call it archaeo-epidemiology. You go to libraries and places like that, dig around, collaborate with people like John Barry and try to quantify what really worked." Map: where the flu is today »
Barry is the author of "The Great Influenza," perhaps the signature history of the devastating 1918 pandemic. He says the historical record shows that isolating patients worked to slow the spread of flu in 1918, but that attempted quarantines -- preventing movement in and out of cities -- was "worthless."
While Barry supports the CDC's general containment strategy, in the past he has publicly criticized Markel's work. After Markel's
|
[
"What season did the last 4 pandemics usually occur?",
"What did past epidemics teach the CDC?"
] |
[
"spring",
"the majority of deaths have happened not in the first wave, but later.\""
] |
question: What season did the last 4 pandemics usually occur?, answer: spring | question: What did past epidemics teach the CDC?, answer: the majority of deaths have happened not in the first wave, but later."
|
(CNN) -- If you didn't know that Perry Farrell, Dave Navarro and Stephen Perkins were members of Jane's Addiction, you might think they belonged to three different bands -- and Farrell is the first to admit it.
"One guy's just a ball of sunshine. That's Stephen," the singer said. "Then Dave is like a black hole sometimes, like places where he goes. And me? I'm just like a pingpong ball put in the cosmos, man."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, pretty much sums up the genius of Jane's Addiction -- the friction of three disparate parts rubbing together, until finally, it explodes into a glorious musical fireball. It's a chemical reaction that, throughout the band's 26-year-history, has all too often imploded as well.
"I'm not really sure how many times we've parted ways," said Navarro, the group's guitarist. "I wasn't really one of the people who thought we wouldn't be back together, primarily because we've gotten back together so many times over the years. We don't break up anymore. We just go on five-year hiatuses."
The alternative rock pioneers are prepping the October 18 release of "The Great Escape Artist," their first studio album in eight years.
"The sound is definitely updated on this album," Farrell said. "The differences are that we are now working with synthesizers and computer software that goes with guitars, so you'll hear a lot of very modern sounds mixed in with what people call the ageless, or timeless, sound of Jane's Addiction."
With original bassist Eric Avery, Jane's Addiction put a soundtrack to the gritty Southern California underground arts scene of the late 1980s. The group's first studio album, "Nothing's Shocking," was an examination of love, lust, violence and drugs. By 1990, the band was all over rock radio with "Stop!" and "Been Caught Stealing," a pair of hit singles off its sophomore disc, "Ritual de lo Habitual." The new CD is only the group's fourth studio album.
"We pull from the environment," said drummer Perkins. "Jane's Addiction wrote our (first) music in Hollywood in 1986. You hear Los Angeles. You hear that Mexico is only 100 miles away from us. You can hear the struggle, and also the glory, of being a musician in L.A. Our music was never negative, but it had that strong urge. You wanted to go f**k, not to go punch. And I think Jane's still has that."
CNN visited the band during a video shoot for the new single, "Irresistible Force," on a Hollywood soundstage. Farrell, the lyricist, said the song chronicles how the universe was created. "I say the big bang was actually a conscious act of cosmic lovemaking."
Perkins, the pragmatist, has a different interpretation. "To me, the 'Irresistible Force' is what pulls me, Dave and Perry together. Ever since I was 13, I've been playing with Navarro. I met Perry when I was 17. And no matter how much we stopped playing with each other, and tried to get away from each other, it's the magnet -- it pulls us closer."
The band members discussed their reunion and new album and how they've avoid fistfights for nearly two decades:
CNN: How does it feel to have Jane's Addiction back together again?
Perry Farrell: I love performing with Jane's Addiction. I hope I get to do it all my life. It's healthy for bands to take a break every now and then. People are really looking forward to this new record because they're a little starved. I'm pulling the old woman's trick of making them want, and want, and need and desire.
CNN: Who's the peacemaker who calls and says, "Let's try this again?"
Dave Navarro: I don't really know how
|
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"What is the name of the new release from the band?",
"CNN visits band during video shoot for new single called what?"
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] |
question: Who is the lead singer of the band?, answer: Perry Farrell, | question: What band is Perry Farrell in?, answer: Jane's | question: What genre is the album "The Great Escape Artist", answer: alternative rock | question: What is the new single from "The Great Escape Artist", answer: "Irresistible Force," | question: What is the name of the new single?, answer: "Irresistible Force," | question: Who visits the band during a video shoot?, answer: CNN | question: What is the name of the new release from the band?, answer: "The Great Escape Artist," | question: CNN visits band during video shoot for new single called what?, answer: "Irresistible Force,"
|
(CNN) -- If you happen to browse upon a news story that's too odd to be true Wednesday, hold your outrage and check the calendar.
A Lebanese newspaper ran a caricature last year of two opposition leaders hugging in light of April Fools' Day.
It's April Fools' Day -- when media outlets around the world take a break from the serious business of delivering news and play fast and furious with the facts.
No one quite knows when the practice began, but any journalist will point to what is undoubtedly the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled: A 1957 BBC report that said, thanks to a mild winter and the elimination of the spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop.
The segment was accompanied by pictures of farmers pulling strands of spaghetti from trees -- and prompted hundreds of viewers to call in, wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti trees.
While not as elaborate, the pranks that media outlets harvested this year have been quite rich:
The Guardian in London ran a story Wednesday announcing that, after 188 years as a print publication, it will become the first newspaper to deliver news exclusively via Twitter.
Twitter, a micro-blogging site, allows users to post updates that are 140 characters long. In keeping with the limitation, the newspaper said it had undertaken a mammoth project to retool the newspaper's entire archive.
For example, Charles Lindbergh's 1927 flight from New York to Paris, France, was condensed to: "OMG first successful transatlantic air flight wow, pretty cool! Boring day otherwise ... sigh."
The news isn't always black and white. The Taipei Times, one of three English-language dailies in Taiwan, fooled many readers with a report that two pandas donated by China to the Taipei Zoo were, in fact, brown forest bears dyed black and white.
To render a whiff of authenticity to the story, editors made a reference to China's tainted-milk scandal that sickened 300,000 people last year.
But the story contained enough outrageous lines to clue in readers.
Among them, a quote from a souvenir stand operator who worried the panda deception would affect sales of her "stuffed panda toys, panda T-shirts, panda pens and notepads, remote-controlled pandas on wheels, caps with panda ears on top, panda fans, panda flashlights, panda mugs, panda eyeglass cases, panda face masks, panda slippers, panda wallet and panda purses."
Sometimes, of course, the pranks backfire. In Australia, the Herald Sun newspaper drew hundreds of angry comments Wednesday after a story on its Web site said a Chinese construction firm wanted to buy naming rights to the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Many readers did not realize the story was a hoax -- despite a quote from a spokeswoman named April Fulton. iReport.com: Share your best April Fools' office pranks and jokes
Geoffrey Davies, the head of the journalism department at London's University of Westminster, said such pranks do not particularly affect the credibility of a news organization.
"They are done in a way that you know it's a joke," he said. "In the Guardian story, for example, the clue is in the name of the journalist [Rio Palof] -- which is an anagram for April Fool. People look out for them really, and therefore, you kind of open the paper trying to spot the spoof story."
Of course, news outlets aren't the only ones who hoodwink readers on April 1.
The town of Rotorua, a popular tourist stop in New Zealand, said a rotten egg smell that permeates the town is such an aphrodisiac that Playboy founder Hugh Hefner wants to build a mansion there.
Microsoft Corp. said it is releasing a new Xbox 360 video game, "Alpine Legend," which will do for fans of yodeling what "Guitar Hero" did for rock music. And car manufacturer BMW announced in ads in British newspapers that it had developed "Magnetic Tow Technology."
"BMW Magnetic Tow Technology is an ingenious new system that
|
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"What did The Guardian report?",
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"April Fools' Day.",
"Fools' Day.",
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"the story was",
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question: What format is the Guardian?, answer: print publication, | question: what is the reason for hoax?, answer: April Fools' Day. | question: What often occurs on April 1?, answer: Fools' Day. | question: What did The Guardian report?, answer: it will become the first newspaper to deliver news exclusively via Twitter. | question: What is a hoax?, answer: the story was | question: what is The Guardian?, answer: newspaper
|
(CNN) -- If you sell it, they will come.
Prices are expected to grow for Michael Jackson autographs like the one he gave this young fan in 2002.
That's the hope at least for many offering Michael Jackson related merchandise and memorabilia, including autographed items and domain names, in the wake of his surprising death.
Almost 20,000 items were up for sale after his death on the popular auction site eBay, where collectors could snap up everything from the rare to the ridiculous.
Among the many T-shirts, record albums, DVDs and posters, there were also magazines about Jackson, dolls and copies of newspapers announcing his death.
There were Michael Jackson gloves (sparkly, of course), masks, wigs, sunglasses and fedora hats. Anyone in the mood for some senior soda could try and win an auction for an unopened six-pack of Pepsi from the 1984 Jacksons world tour.
For those seeking to establish Web sites, domain names were available including "ILoveYouMichael.com," which was selling for the "buy it now" price of $5,000. Officials at eBay said that compared with the daily average of the week prior, Thursday's gross merchandise volume for Jackson memorabilia increased by 275 percent and sold items increased by 210 percent.
New listings were up 61 percent, while the average selling price of items had increased by 31 percent.
Online merchant CafePress also offered a variety of items, including mugs, "R.I.P. Michael Jackson" magnets and dozens of T-shirt designs, including one screened with a drawing of tennis legend Billie Jean King and the words "not my lover."
Some of the hottest items may turn out to be the ones bearing Jackson's signature.
On eBay, bids for what the buyer claimed was a signed Michael Jackson guitar had reached almost $1,300 by Friday afternoon.
Jerry Ohlinger, owner of Jerry Ohlinger's Movie Material Store in New York, predicted that although Jackson was generous in giving autographs, the price for a legitimate autograph probably will at least double from the $150 to $300 range it was prior to his death.
"He would sign autographs whenever he appeared in person," Ohlinger said. "For instance, he visited our store at least three times, and he signed autographs for all of the employees."
As a comparison, Ohlinger said, an autograph for the late actress Marilyn Monroe, who also was known to sign a great deal during her lifetime, sells for about $5,000 because of great demand.
As of Friday, items purported to be autographed photos of Jackson were ranging in price from just over $5 to several thousand dollars.
There is no way to predict whether there will be a sudden influx in demand for Michael Jackson memorabilia and merchandise, Ohlinger said.
All of the hoopla would probably tickle the pop icon, who Ohlinger said was himself a fan of star items.
Whenever Jackson would visit Ohlinger's Manhattan store, he would shop for vintage photos of some of the legendary ladies of cinema, including his very dear friend Elizabeth Taylor, Ohlinger recalled.
|
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"What percentage did sales increase?",
"What is percentage of sell raise of Jackson items from last week?",
"Whose memorabilia is being sold?",
"By what percent did sales of Jackson related items increase?",
"What is the name of the auction site?",
"What is on the sale after Jackson death?",
"What does the expert say about Jacksons autograph?",
"What online auction site boasted thousands of items?"
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question: What site boasts much memorabilia?, answer: eBay, | question: Do they have T-shirts?, answer: many | question: Who claims Jackson's autograph will double in price?, answer: Jerry Ohlinger, | question: Where are the items on sale at?, answer: eBay, | question: What percentage did sales increase?, answer: 210 percent. | question: What is percentage of sell raise of Jackson items from last week?, answer: 210 percent. | question: Whose memorabilia is being sold?, answer: Michael Jackson | question: By what percent did sales of Jackson related items increase?, answer: 275 | question: What is the name of the auction site?, answer: eBay, | question: What is on the sale after Jackson death?, answer: 20,000 items | question: What does the expert say about Jacksons autograph?, answer: Prices are expected to grow | question: What online auction site boasted thousands of items?, answer: eBay,
|
(CNN) -- If you thought it was difficult managing your own money in 2007, consider the pressure of the task when you're dealing with $1.8 trillion of client assets.
Sallie Krawcheck has made Fortune's list of the World's Most Powerful Women every year since 2002
That's what Sallie Krawcheck does as Chairman and Chief Executive of Citi Global Wealth Management.
She joined the banking industry as a research analyst, but quickly rose through the ranks, gaining a reputation for honesty and integrity along the way.
Dubbed the "Mrs Clean" of Wall Street, Ms Krawcheck was credited with restoring investors' faith in analyst reports while head of retail brokerage firm Smith Barney.
She joined Citigroup in 2002, and spent some time as Chief Financial Officer before taking up her current role in March 2007.
Sallie Krawcheck has been a regular entrant on Fortune's list of the World's Most Powerful Women in Business -- in 2007, she made number 12.
John Defterios caught up with Ms Krawcheck in Dubai. He asked her for her views on the movement of capital outside the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States).
Sallie Krawcheck (SK): I think what's happening right now, it's fascinating because in the United States and in developed Europe we're having a liquidity crunch -- someone might argue a liquidity crisis. And in fact, we are awash with liquidity in the Middle East and in Asia as well, so there's really a bifurcation that's occurring in the world.
And if you think about, oil doesn't even have to stay at the 90-plus dollar level it is; even at levels in the 70's, 60's, 50's, 40's, a tremendous amount of liquidity is being generated in these markets which is really being put back into the market. Yes, the investments are going up globally, but the governments here really are investing back in the infrastructure and the economies of this region. And so over time, you're really going to see... I think continue to see... a shift in economic activity on a relative basis from the more developed economies here to the Middle East as well as to Asia.
John Defterios (JD): It's coming almost as a perfect storm; we have a sub prime crisis, a 20 percent fall in the dollar in the last two years. In this window of time, is there a danger that the financial capitals build outside of Wall Street and it undermines its role?
(SK): I think there is no doubt that New York is losing its status as a financial capital of the world. If you think about some years ago, if you think about the internet bubble for example, where it was New York and California wasn't it? And you look at a whole range of reasons for it, and the sub prime crisis perhaps, the decline of the dollar perhaps. But you have overlapping regulators in the United States, you have very high taxes in the United States, you have a very litigious environment in the United States, and you have the emerging markets coming up, so capital is being raised outside of the United States. These things, some of which are negative for the United States, some of which are positive for the other regions, is accelerating a shift that was underway from New York, to London, to Hong Kong, to Singapore, and potentially to Dubai as well.
(JD): Some of the wealth funds are now on the radar of both Wall Street and Capitol Hill in Washington. You can't have your cake and eat it too. You can't say I want some of that liquidity but I only want part of that liquidity. What is the result of that do you think? Can you over-regulate the sovereign funds?
(SK): Oh, I think you can over-regulate the sovereign funds. I think the same question can be asked of the private equity funds and the hedge funds as well; where in a lot of countries
|
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"what are the client assets worth",
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"Who is MME speaking with?",
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"what year is mentioned",
"Who are the most powerful women in 2007 ?",
"Who is the boss at Citi Global Wealth Management?",
"Who did MME speak with?",
"Who is the boss of Citi Global Wealth Management?",
"Who is Sallie Krawcheck?"
] |
[
"$1.8 trillion",
"$1.8 trillion",
"Fortune's",
"happening right now, it's fascinating because in the United States and in developed Europe we're having a liquidity crunch -- someone might argue a liquidity crisis. And in fact, we are awash with liquidity in the Middle East and in Asia as well, so there's really a bifurcation that's occurring in the world.",
"John Defterios",
"12.",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"2007,",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"Sallie Krawcheck",
"Chairman and Chief Executive of Citi Global Wealth Management."
] |
question: what are the client assets worth, answer: $1.8 trillion | question: Amount of client's assets?, answer: $1.8 trillion | question: what magazine is mentioned, answer: Fortune's | question: What did Krawcheck say?, answer: happening right now, it's fascinating because in the United States and in developed Europe we're having a liquidity crunch -- someone might argue a liquidity crisis. And in fact, we are awash with liquidity in the Middle East and in Asia as well, so there's really a bifurcation that's occurring in the world. | question: Who wants to speak to Sallie Krawcheck ?, answer: John Defterios | question: Where is Sallie ranked by Fortune?, answer: 12. | question: Who is MME speaking with?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: Who is ranked the 12th Most Powerful Woman ?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: what year is mentioned, answer: 2007, | question: Who are the most powerful women in 2007 ?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: Who is the boss at Citi Global Wealth Management?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: Who did MME speak with?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: Who is the boss of Citi Global Wealth Management?, answer: Sallie Krawcheck | question: Who is Sallie Krawcheck?, answer: Chairman and Chief Executive of Citi Global Wealth Management.
|
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