Saturday, May 26, 2012

Obama on the defensive on spending, debt

Obama on the defensive on spending, debt

Obama on the defensive on spending, debt

Posted: 26 May 2012 01:00 PM PDT

In this May 23, 2012, photo, President Barack Obama speaks to supporters during a campaign fundraiser in Denver. Government spending and debt are emerging as a campaign tug-of-war. Republican Mitt Romney blames President Barack Obama for a "prairie fire of debt." Obama calls the charge a "cowpie of distortion." Both candidates are reaching for unaligned, independent voters anxious about who's going to get stuck with the bill.(AP Photo/Ed Andrieski)Government spending and debt are emerging as a campaign tug-of-war, with Mitt Romney blaming President Barack Obama for a "prairie fire of debt" and Obama calling the charge a "cowpie of distortion." House Speaker John Boehner is talking about a debt ceiling that is still more than eight months away.

Killer or not? The dilemma over Etan Patz confessor

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:56 PM PDT

New York City Police Commissioner Ray KellyThe man who this week confessed to killing six-year-old Etan Patz, who disappeared in New York 33 years ago, has left US justice with a massive dilemma: is the suspect guilty, or is he a fantasist?

U.N. says over 92 killed, 32 of them children, in Syria attack

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:55 PM PDT

Demonstrators protest against Syria's President Bashar al-Assad after Friday prayer in BinshBEIRUT (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Saturday that more than 92 people were killed in what activists described as an artillery barrage by government forces in the worst violence since the start of a U.N. peace plan to slow the flow of blood in Syria's uprising. The bloodied bodies of children, some with their skulls split open, were shown in footage posted to YouTube purporting to show the victims of the shelling in the central town of Houla on Friday. The sound of wailing filled the room. ...

Oldies take on youth in controversial Eurovision

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:54 PM PDT

A choir of elderly Russian women from a single village are among the favourites to win in BakuContenders ranging from Russian grannies to a Swedish disco starlet clashed Saturday in the Eurovision Song Contest for a glitzy spectacle which host Azerbaijan hopes will banish qualms about its questionable rights record.

Shock over arrest in NYC boy's '79 disappearance

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:48 PM PDT

Supporters of the Patz family leave flowers on their doorstep in SoHo, Friday, May 25, 2012, in New York. New life has been breathed into the missing child case of Etan Patz after Pedro Hernandez implicated himself in the boy's death of the 6-year-old, whose disappearance 33 years ago on his way to school helped launch a missing children's movement that put kids' faces on milk cartons. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)When police dug up a Manhattan basement last month in a fruitless search for the remains of Etan Patz, a 6-year-old boy who disappeared in 1979, Lucy Suarez saw the news on TV and wished that the family of the missing child would finally get some peace.

SpaceX capsule has 'new car' smell, astronauts say

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:42 PM PDT

NASA astronaut Don Pettit (L) and Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko, International Space Station CommanderSpaceX's Dragon cargo vessel smells like a new car, said astronauts at the International Space Station after opening the hatches Saturday following the spacecraft's landmark mission to the orbiting lab.

Spain's support cast star, Germany flop

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:39 PM PDT

Spain's Alvaro Negredo (L) fights for the ball with Serbia's Ivan RadovanovicDefending European champions Spain showed off their impressive strength in depth when a second-string side defeated Serbia 2-0, but fellow Euro 2012 favourites Germany slumped to a shock 5-3 defeat to Switzerland.

Error-hit Germany slump to defeat against Swiss

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:38 PM PDT

Switzerland's Granit Xhaka (C) clashes with Germany's Per Mertesacker (L), Lars Bender (2nd L) and Mats HummelsGermany slumped to an error-plagued 5-3 friendly defeat to Switzerland on Saturday, a worrying setback just two weeks out from Euro 2012 where they will be amongst the favourites.

Patrick not looking back at what she left behind

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:32 PM PDT

Danica Patrick signs autographs before qualifying for the NASCAR History 300 Nationwide series auto race in Concord, N.C., Saturday, May 26, 2012. (AP Photo/Mike McCarn)With Danica Patrick in North Carolina racing stock cars, the Indianapolis 500 will go off on Sunday without an American woman in the field for the first time since 1999.

UN observers warn of Syria civil war after massacre

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:29 PM PDT

The UN mission chief in Syria Major General Robert Mood addresses journalists in DamascusThe head of a UN mission warned on Saturday of "civil war" in Syria after his observers counted more than 92 bodies, 32 of them children, in the central town of Houla following reports of a massacre there.

Greek pro-bailout conservatives regain lead: polls

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:27 PM PDT

Conservative New Democracy party leader Samaras greets supporters during a pre-election rally in AthensATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's conservatives have regained an opinion poll lead that would allow the formation of a pro-bailout government committed to keeping the country in the euro zone, a batch of new surveys showed on Saturday. Greece was forced to call repeat elections for June 17 after a May 6 vote left parliament divided evenly between groups of parties that support and oppose the austerity conditions attached to a 130 billion euro bailout agreed with the European Union and International Monetary Fund in March. ...

Ex-Mubarak PM praises 'glorious' Egyptian uprising

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:26 PM PDT

COMBO - This combination of two photos shows Egyptian presidential candidates, from left, Ahmed Shafiq, and Mohammed Morsi. Shafiq and Morsi were the top vote-getters after a two-day election on Wednesday and Thursday which none of the 13 candidates could win outright. Now, both must appeal to the roughly 50 percent of voters who cast ballots for someone else. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra; Nasser Nasser)The two surviving candidates in Egypt's presidential election appealed Saturday for support from voters who rejected them as polarizing extremists in the first round even as they faced a new challenge from the third runner-up who contested the preliminary results.

Islamist and ex-PM vie for mantle of Egypt's revolt

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:26 PM PDT

Deputy head of the Muslim Brotherhood El-Erian talks during a news conference in CairoCAIRO (Reuters) - The Muslim Brotherhood and a military man close to ousted leader Hosni Mubarak courted defeated first-round candidates in Egypt's presidential election on Saturday, each trying to claim the mantle of the uprising before a run-off next month. State television said the Brotherhood's Mohamed Mursi led this week's vote with 26.4 percent, against 23 percent for ex-air force chief Ahmed Shafiq, according to preliminary results. Hamdeen Sabahy, a secular leftist came a close third with 21.5 percent, followed by independent Islamist Abdel Moneim Abol Fotouh. ...

In Cairo's City of the Dead, election brings hope

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:25 PM PDT

In this photo taken in Monday, May 21, 2012, a boy plays next to tombs in a room where his family lives in a necropolis called the City of the Dead, in Cairo, Egypt. The City of the Dead is a 4 mile (6.4 kilometer) long necropolis where thousands of Egyptians are forced to live and work alongside graves due to the scarcity of housing in the capital. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)As Egyptians took part in the country's first free presidential election, residents of one of Cairo's poorest quarters expressed hope that a new leader would help them with a simple request — finding a new home.

Dozens of children killed in new Syria attack

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:24 PM PDT

This image made from amateur video released by Shaam News Network and accessed Saturday, May 26, 2012 purports to show covered bodies after a government assault on Houla, Syria. Government troops shelled a string of villages in central Syria before pro-regime thugs swept through the area, shooting people in the streets and in their homes in attacks that killed more than 90 people, activists said Saturday. The assault on Houla, an area northwest of the central city of Homs, is one of the bloodiest single events in Syria's 15-month-old uprising. (AP Photo/Shaam News Network via AP video) TV OUT, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CANNOT INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE CONTENT, DATE, LOCATION OR AUTHENTICITY OF THIS MATERIALGruesome video Saturday showed rows of dead Syrian children lying in a mosque in bloody shorts and T-shirts with gaping head wounds, haunting images of what activists called one of the deadliest regime attacks yet in Syria's 14-month-old uprising.

Pakistan: US missile attack kills 4 in northwest

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:24 PM PDT

Oil tankers, which were used to transport NATO fuel supplies to Afghanistan, are parked in a compound in Karachi, Pakistan, Friday, May 25, 2012. Pakistan's parliament has unanimously approved new guidelines for the country in its troubled relationship with the United States, a decision that could pave the way for the reopening of supply lines to NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan. (AP Photo/Fareed Khan)An American drone fired two missiles at a bakery in northwest Pakistan Saturday, killing four suspected militants, officials said, as the U.S. pushed ahead with its drone campaign despite Pakistani demands to stop. This was the third such strike in the country in less than a week.

Scientist: Evolution debate will soon be history

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:18 PM PDT

In this 2008 photo provided by the Turkana Basin Institute, paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey discusses the evidence for human evolution over a collection of hominin fossil casts at the Turkana Basin Institute's Ileret research facility in northern Kenya. Leakey predicts skepticism over evolution will soon be history sometime in the next 15 to 30 years. "If you get to the stage where you can persuade people on the evidence, that it's solid, that we are all African, that color is superficial, that stages of development of culture are all interactive," Leakey says, "then I think we have a chance of a world that will respond better to global challenges." (AP Photo/Turkana Basin Institute, Bob Campbell)Richard Leakey predicts skepticism over evolution will soon be history.

Rocket kills two at Pakistan market: police

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:10 PM PDT

Pakistani policemen in plain clothes display seized rocket-propelled grenade roundsRockets fired by suspected insurgents Saturday killed two people and wounded 20 others in Pakistan's troubled southwestern city of Quetta, police and hospital officials said.

Pakistan PM will not appeal contempt conviction: lawyer

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:01 PM PDT

Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani (C)Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani will not appeal his conviction for contempt because the speaker of the national assembly has not disqualified him, his lawyer said on Saturday.

Cairo's poor hope new president will help them

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:59 AM PDT

In this photo taken in Monday, May 21, 2012, a boy plays next to tombs in a room where his family lives in a necropolis called the City of the Dead, in Cairo, Egypt. The City of the Dead is a 4 mile (6.4 kilometer) long necropolis where thousands of Egyptians are forced to live and work alongside graves due to the scarcity of housing in the capital. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)As Egyptians took part in the country's first free presidential election, residents of one of Cairo's poorest quarters expressed hope that a new leader would help them with a simple request — finding a new home.

Havana sees US invasion at key art festival

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:55 AM PDT

A visitor takes a picture of "My Ark" by Cuban artist Ruben Alpizar at the San Carlos de La Cabana fortress as part of the 11th Havana Biennial exhibition in Havana, Cuba, Friday, May 25, 2012. The piece was bought by an American art collector during the month long art event. An unusually large delegation of American artists, curators, collectors and fans were accredited to attend the Biennial, organizers say. Unlike with other island goods, it's perfectly legal for Americans to buy Cuban art, which is covered under an exemption to the 50-year-old U.S. embargo allowing the purchase of Ruben Alpizar never met the American collector who fell in love with his painting of a plummeting Icarus against a starry background, hanging on the wall of a Spanish colonial-era fortress across the bay from Havana. Nor did he get a name or a hometown, or even learn whether the buyer was a man or a woman.

Break in Patz brings hope, tears to other families

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:51 AM PDT

FILE - In this Oct. 26, 1989 file photo, Patty Wetterling rests on the shoulder of her husband, Jerry, five days after their 11-year-old son Jacob was abducted by a masked man with a gun near thier St. Joseph, Minn., home. After 33 years, someone has confessed to killing 6-year-old Etan Patz. And people immediately start speaking of "closure." Patty Wetterling hates the word. Since 1989, she and her husband have writhed in the same hell as Stan and Julie Patz. "Once you're a victim of a crime like this, your life takes a very different direction," she says. "It doesn't really close anything, because everything just became different from that point on. But it does provide answers." (AP Photo/Jim Mone, file)After 33 years, someone has confessed to killing 6-year-old Etan Patz. And people immediately start speaking of "closure."

Everest season ends with 150 reaching summit

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:43 AM PDT

British climber Kenton Cool's team at camp four in Mount Everest's "death zone"A near-record number of climbers reached the summit of Everest as the season ended Saturday without a repeat of last week's deadly accidents, which had raised fears of overcrowding on the world's highest peak.

Coroner: Gunman in Indiana standoff from Texas

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:40 AM PDT

Police escort two women away from the Prudential Executive Group Real Estate office in Valparaiso, Ind. after a standoff Friday, May 25, 2012, where a gunman was holding an unknown number of hostages before shooting himself twice in the head. Police say the gunman held employees hostage inside the building for several hours before releasing the last two unharmed. (AP Photo/The Times of Northwest Indiana, Jon L. Hendricks) CHICAGO OUT, GARY OUT, NO TVA Texas man who took hostages in a northwestern Indiana realty office and held police at bay for several hours suffered three gunshot wounds before dying, likely from two different weapons, a coroner said Saturday.

Biden says end to wars gives US new flexibility

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:40 AM PDT

Vice President Joe Biden presents a diploma to valedictorian Alexander George Pagoulatos during a graduation and commissioning ceremony at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., on Saturday, May 26, 2012. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday that the United States can now focus on new global challenges after a long decade of war in an election-year commencement address to jubilant graduates of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Rainy Memorial Day forecast for southeast coast

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:40 AM PDT

This NOAA satellite image taken Saturday, May 26, 2012 at 1:45 a.m. EDT shows shows clouds off the Carolina Coast associated with Subtropical Storm Beryl. The storm is expected to move slowly southwestward over the next few days, eventually making landfall as a tropical storm along the northeast coast of Florida. This region is currently in an exceptional drought, so the rain from Beryl may turn out to be partially a good thing. For more information, please see http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/. Clouds in the Plains are associated with a front that produced some severe thunderstorms and tornadoes in Kansas. (AP PHOTO/WEATHER UNDERGROUND)A cluster of thunderstorms stalled off the U.S. coast on Saturday is expected to make for a sloppy, rainy Memorial Day on beaches and in tourist towns from Florida to South Carolina.

Funeral held for Muslim Bosniaks killed long ago

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:33 AM PDT

Bosnian Muslims carry a coffin during a mass funeral in the eastern Bosnian town of Visegrad, 110 kms east of Sarajevo,on Saturday, May 26, 2012. Thousands have gathered in the eastern Bosnian town of Visegrad to bury the remains of 66 Muslim Bosniaks killed and thrown into the river by Bosnian Serb forces at the start of the country's 1992-95 war.The victims' remains were discovered two years ago, when a manmade lake that divides Bosnia and Serbia was partially drained for the maintenance of a dam. They were identified through DNA analysis and buried on Saturday at a cemetery in Visegrad. (AP Photo/Amel Emric)Several thousand people held a mass funeral on Saturday for 66 Muslim Bosnians who were killed by Bosnian Serb forces during the country's 1992-1995 war.

Serbian tells Putin he will not trade Kosovo for EU

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:27 AM PDT

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Serbia is on a "long and uncertain" road to joining the European Union but will not give up its claim to Kosovo for the sake of membership, President-elect Tomislav Nikolic told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday. It was Nikolic's first foreign trip since he was elected president on May 20. The election of the former leader of the ultranationalist Radical Party triggered speculation the country might abandon its pro-Western path steered since the overthrow of late Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. ...

Putin puts Medvedev in charge of Russia's ruling party

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:27 AM PDT

Russia's President Putin listens to Prime Minister Medvedev during a United Russia party congress in MoscowMOSCOW (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin steered Dmitry Medvedev into the chairmanship of Russia's ruling party on Saturday and demanded reforms to the flagging organization he will rely on to keep his grip on the country's far-flung regions. At Putin's behest, delegates at a United Russia congress elected Medvedev chairman with a unanimous show of hands, the final step in a choreographed role reversal the longtime leader hopes will preserve his rule against growing opposition. After four years of playing No. ...

Mexico's Michel Franco wins Cannes sidebar prize

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:25 AM PDT

"After Lucia" by Mexican director Michel Franco has won the top prize in the Cannes Film Festival's sidebar competition, Un Certain Regard.

CIA remembers those lost in covert operations

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:19 AM PDT

FILE - In this May 23, 2002, file photo, the American flag is reflected off of a marble slab of the CIA memorial wall containing stars in the lobby of the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Va. While the nation remembers its military war dead on Memorial Day 2012, the CIA marked the loss of colleagues in the hidden, often dangerous world of espionage, adding a new star to the CIA's memorial wall and more than a dozen names to the agency's Book of Honor. The new star carved into the agency's memorial wall was for Jeffrey Patneau, a young officer killed in a car crash in Yemen in September 2008. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool)The CIA is remembering those lost in the hidden, often dangerous world of espionage, adding a new star to the intelligence agency's memorial wall and more than a dozen names to its hallowed Book of Honor.

Spain's lender Bankia says it won't need more aid

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:18 AM PDT

Bankia's president, Jose Ignacio Goirigolzarri, speaks during a press conference at the bank's headquarters in Madrid, Saturday, May 26, 2012. Spain's troubled bank, Bankia, has asked the Spanish government for 19 billion euro ($23.8 billion) in financial support just as a leading credit rating agency downgraded it to junk status. The request came as Standard & Poor's downgraded Bankia and four other Spanish banks to junk status because of uncertainty over restructuring and recapitalization plans. (AP Photo/Antonio Heredia)The president of Bankia tried Saturday to calm fears about the future of the bank, saying Spain's second largest mortgage lender will emerge as a solid financial entity after it receives €23.5 billion ($29.5 billion) in state aid in the country's biggest-ever bank bailout.

Head of UN team in Syria says over 32 children, 60 adults killed in Friday artillery attack

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:07 AM PDT

GENEVA - The head of the U.N. observer team in Syria says at least 32 children under 10 years of age and more than 60 adults were killed in fighting in the centre of the country Friday.

Iran: Enriched uranium traces a 'technical issue'

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:05 AM PDT

World powers negotiators arrive at the Baghdad International Airport in Iraq, Wednesday, May 23, 2012. Negotiators from the U.S. and five other world powers sat down Wednesday with a team of Iranian diplomats to try to hammer out specific goals in the years-long impasse over Tehran's nuclear program.(AP Photo/Mohammed Ameen, Pool)A top Iranian nuclear official said that traces of enriched uranium discovered at an underground bunker came from a "routine technical issue," the country's official IRNA news agency reported Saturday.

UN: 32 children, 60 adults killed in Syria attack

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:02 AM PDT

The head of the U.N. observer team in Syria says at least 32 children under 10 years of age and more than 60 adults were killed in fighting in the center of the country Friday.

Young love on the run closes Cannes race with 'Mud'

Posted: 26 May 2012 10:59 AM PDT

(From L)US actors Tye Sheridan, Matthew McConaughey and Reese Witherspoon, director Jeff Nichols and actor Jacob LoflandCannes moored up on the Mississippi on Saturday with "Mud", a Huckleberry Finn-like tale about two boys, a fugitive, and the search for true love that wrapped up the race for the Palme d'Or.

NBA fines Spoelstra $25,000 for comments

Posted: 26 May 2012 10:48 AM PDT

Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra calls a play during the first half of Game 6 of their NBA basketball Eastern Conference semifinal playoff series against the Indiana Pacers, Thursday, May 24, 2012, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Darron Cummings)The NBA fined Miami coach Erik Spoelstra $25,000 on Friday for "critical public comments" about officiating in the Eastern Conference series with Indiana.

Egypt's Brotherhood would keep Israel treaty: Carter

Posted: 26 May 2012 10:44 AM PDT

CAIRO (Reuters) - The Muslim Brotherhood may seek to modify, but will not destroy, Egypt's 33-year-old peace treaty with Israel, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said on Saturday. Carter, 87, was speaking after initial vote tallies put the Brotherhood's candidate ahead in the first round of Egypt's presidential election, which his Carter Center helped monitor. The U.S. ...

India calls for US compassion in deportation case

Posted: 26 May 2012 10:38 AM PDT

India's Ambassador Ranjan MathaiIndia has appealed to Washington to show "utmost compassion" in the case of an Indian woman who was adopted and taken to the US in the 1980s but now faces deportation after being convicted of forgery.

Singapore's ruling party loses by-election

Posted: 26 May 2012 10:38 AM PDT

Voters dealt Singapore's ruling People's Action Party its third electoral setback in a year, allowing the opposition to hold onto a Parliament seat in a by-election Saturday.
Posted by Harshad at 1:16 PM

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