Adults in Washington state will be able to smoke marijuana legally when it is officially decriminalized Thursday, even though the Justice Department has offered no guidance on the conflict with federal drug laws.
Prosecutors throughout the state have begun dismissing hundreds of misdemeanor marijuana cases, according to authorities there, and state and local police are being retrained to arrest drivers who are high and allow adults to light up in their homes.
MADRID: Lionel Messi scored twice as Barcelona beat Athletic Bilbao 5-1 to set a new record start to a La Liga season and open a 14-point gap on bitter rivals Real Madrid who later face a crunch derby with in-form Atletico.
Gerard Pique put the Catalan side ahead after 22 minutes followed quickly by Messi's first, which came off defender Fernando Amorebieta on the line, before Adriano Correia hit the third on the point of half-time.
Cesc Fabregas then added to the deluge of goals and Ibai Gomez got a consolation before Messi struck again.
Barca have now put together 13 wins and a draw from their first 14 matches to beat the previous best start in the Spanish top flight by Real Madrid in the 1991-92 season.
Messi also is now just one goal off Gerd Mueller's record of 85 goals in a calendar year for Bayern Munich and Germany in 1972.
Barcelona's injury problems at the back have eased so that coach Tito Vilanova was able to rest Carles Puyol with Javier Mascherano playing alongside Pique, but Dani Alves was missing and so Adriano came in at right back.
The home side began at a high tempo but while they pushed Athletic back the visitors kept faith with the coach Marcelo Bielsa's attacking philosophy as they looked to bring the ball out from defence.
Barca had their first sight of goal with a low drive from Andres Iniesta after 12 minutes which keeper Gorka Iraizoz saved comfortably.
They got their breakthrough after a spell of pressure.
Athletic failed to clear their lines from a corner and although Iraizoz repelled Fabregas' shot, Pique pounced on the rebound to knock it home.
Minutes later and Barca doubled their lead due in part to slack defending which has plagued Athletic's season and one of the reasons why they appear far short of the team which reached last season's Europa League and King's Cup finals.
Fernando Amorebieta failed to keep tight to Messi who through on goal slipped the ball past the keeper and a despairing dive from the defender only served to help the ball over the line.
The Barca players were queuing up to score the third before the break with Fabregas having a shot saved and Messi hitting the post before Adriano burst in from the right and fired a Fabregas pass into the roof of the net.
There was no let up after the restart and Iraizoz did well to block Messi but could do nothing to stop Fabregas who fired home an Iniesta pass inside the area.
Barca were guilty of easing off as Gomez pulled a goal back but Messi had the final say with his second.
Meanwhile, Mauricio Pellegrino was sacked as manager of Valencia following his side's 5-2 defeat at home to Real Sociedad.
The game swung on the first half dismissal of Jonas Goncalves with Valencia ahead through Roberto Soldado.
Alberto De la Bella equalised before the break and further goals came from Mikel Gonzalez, Diego Ifran, Imanol Agirretxe and Carlos Vela from the penalty spot while Soldado also got a second.
Earlier, an Alberto Lopo header saw fourth-placed Malaga lose 1-0 away to Getafe.
- AFP/fa
BJP vice president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said on Saturday that voting inside the parliament would decide as to who is in favour of national interest and who is working for international interests.
"The government feels that their responsibility is to safeguard the interest of international market mafias instead of national interest and for saving the interest of international market mafias, the government is ready to compromise with national interests. Now, the parliament will decide as to who is in support of international market mafias and who are supporting national interests," said Naqvi.
The government's decision to allow foreign supermarket chains such as Wal-Mart had triggered protest not only from opposition parties but also from some of its allies.
BJP had sought debate on the issue of allowing Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the retail sector, under the rule that entails voting after discussions.
Meanwhile, Minister in the Prime Minister Office (PMO), V Narayanaswamy said the government would answer all the queries raised by the opposition parties in the parliament and will explain the benefits of allowing FDI in retail sector.
The lower house of parliament has set December 04 and 05 as the date to vote and debate on FDI. The dates for the upper house are yet to be decided.
Narayanaswamy said the government is confident of becoming victorious in the debate.
Photograph by Hugh Gentry, Reuters
A spectacular natural phenomenon was on display early this week as lava from a vent in Hawaii's Kilauea volcano flowed into the ocean, sending up plumes of steam as it made contact with the waves.
Though lava can still be viewed from Kalapana near the Big Island's Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park, ocean entry is no longer occurring, according to the National Park Service.
Published November 30, 2012
Photograph by Hugh Gentry, Reuters
The lava traveled 7 miles (11 kilometers) from Kilauea’s Pu'u O'o vent to the ocean. When lava reaches the water, it cools and hardens, forming a lava delta that can be dangerous to nearby onlookers, according to Reuters.
The news service reported that no communities on the Big Island were threatened by the lava flow.
Published November 30, 2012
Photograph by Hugh Gentry, Reuters
A burst of volcanic activity erupts from Kilauea’s crater in Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park on November 27.
The volcano has been erupting continuously for nearly 30 years. No major damage has been suffered by a town since 1986, according to Reuters.
Published November 30, 2012
Photograph by Hugh Gentry, Reuters
“Ocean entries are beautiful but dangerous,” said Janet Babb, spokeswoman for the U.S. Geological Survey's Hawaiian Volcano Observatory, in a statement reported by Reuters. She warned that the steam could be more hazardous than it appears.
Published November 30, 2012
Photograph by Matt Northam, My Shot
A plume of smoke billows where lava from Kilauea meets the sea in this aerial photo taken November 27.
Published November 30, 2012
Photograph by Peter Vancoillie, Your Shot
Published November 30, 2012
NEW YORK: Oil prices turned higher in late trade Friday to end with modest gains ahead of the weekend despite growing worries over deficit negotiations in Washington.
In New York, West Texas Intermediate crude for January delivery added 84 cents to $88.91 a barrel.
On the London market, the Brent North Sea contract for January gained 47 cents to $111.23 a barrel.
Traders said there was little news to explain the higher price; the rising euro, which topped $1.30, was one likely contributor to buying.
But the US fiscal cliff talks, which could see the world's largest economy forced into recession next year if Democrats and Republicans cannot agree on a deficit-cutting plan, continued to overshadow trade.
Politicians on both sides signalled Friday that things were not going very well in the talks, one month before the deadline.
"Crude oil prices consolidated within the recent range... due to the mixed signals from the US about the fiscal cliff program and the ongoing uncertainty about the eurozone's economic conditions," said Sucden Financial Research analyst Myrto Sokou.
In Europe, official data published Friday showed unemployment in the eurozone hit a record high in October, another drag on growth in the region.
In Lagos, ExxonMobil's Nigeria chief warned that Nigerian oil production will fall by 40 percent by 2020 if the country goes ahead with proposed increases in taxes and royalties.
The proposals are part of a planned sweeping overhaul of Nigeria's oil industry that has been delayed for years. It would also include a restructuring of state oil firm NNPC.
Mark Ward said the current legislation included fiscal terms that were too harsh and would block investment.
"It would be good to have a good (law) passed so there is clarity and there is certainty on the investment climate, the fiscal terms as well as the restructuring," Ward told a gathering of industry figures.
"However, if what we see today is passed without significant changes, it will cause just the opposite: investment will dry up."
-AFP/ac
The national flag will fly half mast on all buildings and there will be no official entertainment during the seven days of state mourning, starting Friday and will be on till December 6.
Gujral will be given state funeral. His body will be cremated near Smriti Sthal here on Saturday at 3pm.
All Central government offices and Delhi government offices here will close at 1:30pm on Saturday to enable people to attend the funeral ceremony.
There will be condolence references made to him in both the Houses of Parliament on Monday.
The Cabinet, which held special meeting to mourn the demise of the former PM, also passed a resolution placing on record "its deep sense of grief" and extended its "sincere condolences on behalf of the entire nation to the bereaved family".
The resolution says, "The Cabinet expresses profound sorrow at the sad demise of Inder Kumar Gujral, the former Prime Minister of India, on November 30. In his death, India has lost a great patriot, a visionary leader and a freedom fighter.
"Gujral actively participated in the freedom struggle and was imprisoned during the Quit India Movement. As a distinguished diplomat, he served as Ambassador of India to the erstwhile U S S R. and Special Envoy of India to a number of countries. Gujral was an esteemed Member of Parliament in both Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha.
"Before assuming the office of the Prime Minister of India on April 21, 1997, Gujral held various ministerial positions as Minister of External Affairs; Minister of Water Resources; Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs & Communications and Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting and Communications.
Born on December 4, 1919, at Jhelum in undivided Punjab into a family of freedom fighters, Gujral was an erudite scholar, an eminent intellectual and a well respected commentator on national and international affairs".
Photograph courtesy Héctor Montaño, INAH
Sporting an elaborate headdress and shield, the Palenque king named Kan Bahlam, or Snake Jaguar, is depicted on one of the tomb walls.
Eight other figures are depicted as well, "each probably a different royal ancestor of the tomb occupant," said Stuart.
"The imagery of nine ancestors seems to have been a theme repeated in other Palenque royal tombs, such as Pakal's own huge one in the Temple of the Inscriptions."
The region's most famous king, Pakal, came to power in A.D. 615 at age 12 and ruled until he was in his 80s. He turned Palenque into a thriving, world-class city. Because Pakal built over much of what existed before him, little is known about the time prior to his ascension to power.
If this tomb predates the famous king, as INAH and Stuart suspect, its contents could offer clues about life in pre-Pakal times.
It's unclear yet what might be found inside, but it's "cool enough," said Stuart, that there's now "firm archaeological evidence of a Palenque ruler from the years before Pakal's reign."
(Read about the rise and fall of the Maya in National Geographic magazine.)
Published November 30, 2012
DAMASCUS: Syrian troops mounted an assault on rebels near Damascus on Thursday, closing off the road to the airport before later securing it, authorities said, amid a widespread telecommunications outage.
Meanwhile, as UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi hinted President Bashar al-Assad would have to step down to allow for a new Syria, a monitoring group said a government air raid on the northern city of Aleppo killed at least 15 civilians.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the army attacked rebel bastions in a string of towns along the highway and near the international airport, with state media saying the road was eventually "secured."
The fighting around the capital, which came after Internet links went down across Syria, prompted EgyptAir and Emirates to announce the cancellation of flights to Damascus.
Official media said several members of an "armed terrorist group, Al-Nusra Front," had been killed in the town of Aqraba.
Two Austrian soldiers with a UN force on the Golan were injured after their convoy was shot at on the road to the airport, the foreign ministry in Vienna said.
A ministry spokesman said one soldier was shot in the arm, and the other in the shoulder, but both were quickly treated.
Austrian Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger instructed his country's embassy in Damascus to file a protest with the government and the Syrian ambassador in Vienna was to be summoned to the foreign ministry.
"Syria is responsible for the safety of our UNDOF soldiers and must ensure that they can fulfil their international mandate," Spindelegger said.
In Syria, state television, quoting a foreign ministry source, blamed the shootings on rebels.
"At around 12 noon (1000 GMT), and while a terrorist armed group was firing towards an army post in the area of Aqraba, the shots hit a vehicle of UNDOF, leading to the injury of two members of those forces," it said.
As activists warned that sudden communication cuts are often a signal of imminent military offensives, US technology companies Akamai and Renesys, which monitor web traffic, said the country was cut off from the Internet.
In Damascus, users said both Internet and mobile telephone communications were cut and land lines barely functioning, with the country's Internet provider citing technical problems.
The United States accused the beleaguered Syrian regime of deliberately severing telecommunications links in what it branded a sign of desperation.
"We condemn this latest assault on the Syrian people's ability to express themselves and communicate with each other and it just, again, speaks to the kind of desperation of the regime," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
She added, however, that some 2,000 communications sets supplied to opposition rebels over recent months as part of a US non-lethal assistance programme were not affected by the blackout.
Amnesty International warned that the cut in telecommunications "may herald the intention of the Syrian authorities to shield the truth of what is happening in the country from the outside world."
In northern Syria, five children and two women were among at least 15 people killed when a government warplane dropped two bombs on the rebel-held Ansari district of Aleppo, the Britain-based Observatory said.
The strike hit two buildings in Aleppo, the commercial capital, and videos posted online by activists showed the facades of several apartments blown away.
Rebels, who control vast swathes of territory in northern Syria, have made significant gains in past days, including shooting down regime attack aircraft with surface-to-air missiles for the first time.
The Washington Post reported on Thursday that Syrian rebels have obtained up to 40 shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles, some from Qatar, citing Western and Middle Eastern intelligence officials.
Analysts say the delivery marked a potential turning point in the prolonged war with Assad's forces, in which the Observatory says more than 40,000 people have perished since March 2011.
On Thursday, it said at least 59 people died nationwide -- 34 civilians, 19 soldiers and six rebels.
On the diplomatic front, international envoy Brahimi briefed the UN Security Council, which remains divided between Western nations and Assad allies Russia and China on the 20-month conflict.
"I think it's very, very, very clear that the people of Syria want change, and real change, not cosmetic changes," he later told reporters in New York. "The new Syria will not look like the Syria of today."
Brahimi also said that Syria "very, very urgently" needed a ceasefire and a large peacekeeping force. "A ceasefire will not hold unless it is very, very strongly observed. That, I believe, will require a peacekeeping mission."
-AFP/ac
Addressing a news conference on Thursday night, chief minister Prithviraj Chavan said the two-volume report, which was not discussed in the cabinet meeting — with observers saying it was part of a Congress strategy — will be uploaded on the state government's website by Friday. The first volume addresses issues pertaining to land brought under irrigation, while the second sheds light on big and medium projects executed by five state irrigation corporations.
NCP leader Ajit Pawar, who resigned as deputy chief minister last September following a series of exposes in TOI, is believed to be desperate to make a comeback in the government based on the findings of the white paper, which many in official circles described as a "whitewash". Pawar was the state's water resources minister between 1999 and 2010, when most of the dubious contracts were awarded to select contractors. Political sources said infighting between rival groups in the NCP may scuttle Pawar's re-entry plans.
According to an estimate, as much as Rs 35,000 crore may have been siphoned off by the politician-bureaucrat-contractor nexus in dud irrigation projects in the past ten years.
Government sources said only a criminal investigation will unravel the extent of the scam, described as the largest in Maharashtra's history.
"If there is an independent judicial inquiry, the Democratic Front government will collapse, considering the involvement of powerful politicians and officials," they said.
As reported by TOI on Thursday, the white paper has justified irrigation project cost escalations, blaming them on delays in relief and rehabilitation, land acquisition and environmental clearances. It says the escalations were commensurate with hikes approved for similar projects in other states.
Debunking the claim that Rs 70,000 crore was spent on irrigation projects in the past ten years, the document puts the figure at just Rs 42,000 crore. The paper, prepared by the state water resources department, claims that of this amount, Rs 30,000 crore was spent towards relief and rehabilitation; Rs 5,000 crore is shown under administrative expenses. The paper adds that over 30% of the relief and rehabilitation cost went towards projects that are yet to be completed. It is pertinent to note that departments controlled by the Congress are responsible for relief and rehabilitation and land acquisition.
The paper says 69 ongoing mega projects and 189 medium projects were taken up under the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme (AIBP) and bore approvals of the Central Water Commission and the Planning Commission. It says the central agencies ratified the cost escalations.
The paper says the scheduled rates for materials used by the department while awarding contracts (department scheduled rates) were lower than those used for similar projects in other states and also less than rates used by other agencies in Maharashtra like the public works department and the MMRDA.
The paper claims that the scope of project work was often increased on account of demand from local politicians. The document gives status reports for mega projects, including details like original cost, escalations and their reasons.
Of the state's 226 lakh hectares of cultivable land, the white paper says irrigated land stood at 48.5 lakh hectares in 2010, which it says is a 28% increase from 2001 when the area was 37 lakh hectares. The paper says the cropped irrigated area (the ratio of irrigation potential generation to land under irrigation) grew by 5.17% during the ten-year period.
According to the economic status report (ESR), the cropped irrigated area only rose by 0.1% during this period (from 17.8% in 2001 to 17.9% in 2010). The chief minister had cited ESR data while asking the department to prepare the white paper in May this year.
The paper also refuted allegations that the department had created liabilities worth Rs 70,000 crore. It said that while projects worth Rs 80,000 crore were in the pipeline, liabilities had been booked only for Rs 35,000 crore.
President Obama and Mitt Romney met face to face today for the first time since the election, breaking bread at the White House as talks over the looming "fiscal cliff" appeared to be faltering on Capitol Hill.
"I bet it was and is quite tasty," Obama spokesman Jay Carney said of the lunch as it was underway, "because [the chefs] know how to prepare very fine meals."
The menu included white turkey chili and Southwestern grilled chicken salad, the White House said in a written statement following the meal. The discussion was said to center on "America's leadership in the world and the importance of maintaining that leadership position in the future."
The former rivals concluded their 70-minute encounter with a visit to the Oval Office, the symbolic center of American power to which Romney has long tried to accede, shaking hands before the iconic "Resolute" presidential desk.
"Governor Romney congratulated the President for the success of his campaign and wished him well over the coming four years," the White House said. "They pledged to stay in touch, particularly if opportunities to work together on shared interests arise in the future."
The lunch took place in an elegant private dining room in the West Wing overlooking the manicured gardens of the White House South Lawn. Romney was seen coming and going from a side entrance in a black SUV. The former GOP nominee arrived without fanfare or entourage, opening his own car door both times.
President Obama said during a news conference earlier this month that he was interested in speaking with Romney about his ideas on jobs and economic growth, noting that his rival had "presented some ideas during the course of the campaign that I actually agree with."
Administration officials said there was no formal agenda for today's lunch or a "specific ask" or assignment for the governor.
Romney, who has kept a relatively low profile since losing the election on Nov. 6, has not publicly addressed Obama's post-election overtures or the prospect of working together. Both men have little personal history and had a chilly relationship during the campaign.
Senior Romney campaign strategist Eric Fehrnstrom called Obama's lunch invitation "gracious" and said that Romney was "glad to accept." The governor also met earlier Thursday in Washington with former running mate Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.
The Obama-Romney detente came as talks between the White House and congressional Republicans to prevent the economy from going over the "fiscal cliff" of mandatory spending cuts and tax increases set for Jan. 1 appeared to hit a snag.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the lead White House negotiator in the talks, and White House legislative chief Rob Nabors held a flurry of meetings today with congressional leaders of both parties in the House and Senate.
But following sessions, top Republicans poured cold water on what had been budding optimism of progress toward a deal.
"No substantive progress has been made over the last two weeks," said House Speaker John Boehner at a press conference.
"We know what the menu is. What we don't know is what the White House is willing to do to get serious about solving our debt crisis," he said, accusing the administration of failing to detail plans for significant spending cuts to correspond with desired tax revenue increases.
Obama and Boehner spoke by phone Wednesday night, sources told ABC News, their second conversation in four days. Boehner described it as "direct and straightforward," but suggested "disappointment" with Obama's reticence to waver on hiking tax rates on the wealthy.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., in advance of his meeting with Geithner, said everything the White House has put down on the table so far has been "counterproductive," and he hopes that the Treasury Secretary brings "a specific plan from the president" with him today.
The polar ice sheets are indeed shrinking—and fast, according to a comprehensive new study on climate change.
And the effects, according to an international team, are equally clear—sea levels are rising faster than predicted, which could bring about disastrous effects for people and wildlife.
Rising seas would increase the risk of catastrophic flooding like that caused by Hurricane Sandy last month in New York and New Jersey. Environmental damage may include widespread erosion, contamination of aquifers and crops, and harm to marine life. And in the long term, rising seas may force hundreds of millions of people who live along the coast to abandon their homes.
By reconciling nearly two decades of often conflicting satellite data into one format—in other words, comparing apples to apples—the new study, published in the journal Science, made a more confident estimate of what's called ice sheet mass balance.
That refers to how much snow is deposited on an ice sheet versus how much is lost, either due to surface melting or ice breaking off glaciers.
Between 1992—when polar satellite measurements began—and 2011, the results show that all of the polar regions except for East Antarctica are losing ice, said study leader Andrew Shepherd, a professor of earth observation at the University of Leeds in the U.K.
In that 20-year span, Greenland lost 152 billion tons a year of ice, West Antarctica lost 65 billion tons a year, the Antarctic Peninsula lost 20 billion tons a year, and East Antarctica gained 14 billion tons a year. (See an interactive map of Antarctica.)
"When we did the experiments properly using the same time periods and same maps, the riddles did all agree," Shepherd said.
According to glaciologist Alexander Robinson, "We've had a good idea of what the ice sheets are doing, but it seems this study really brings it all together in one data set that gives a much clearer picture.
"It's one more piece of supporting evidence that shows there are some dramatic changes happening, and we know that's being driven mainly by a warmer climate and warmer ocean—but there's still a lot we don't know about these regions and how they're changing," said Robinson, of the Complutense University of Madrid in Spain, who was not involved in the research.
(Read "The Big Thaw" in National Geographic magazine.)
Shrinking Ice Consistent With Warming
For the study, Shepherd and his team took data from three fields of satellite research: Altimetry, which measures the shapes of ice sheets and how they change over time; interferometry, which tracks the speed of ice sheets; and gravimetry, which calculates the weight of ice sheets by measuring Earth's gravitational field.
"Up until now there have been more than 30 studies that have each produced their own estimates of changes in ice sheets," Shepherd said.
"What we did was try to take the strengths of each approach and combined all the satellite technology together to get a better estimate of how ice sheets are changing," he said.
The results are also consistent with observations of climate change at the poles, Shepherd noted.
For instance, Greenland is shedding five times as much ice as 20 years ago, which fits with a trend of rising air temperatures in the Arctic.
(Pictures: "Changing Greenland" in National Geographic magazine.)
In West Antarctica, glacier loss is accelerating in an area where the ocean is getting warmer. East Antarctica is experiencing a slight increase in the amount of ice stored there, but that dovetails with higher rates of snowfall expected with climate change.
However, the growth isn't enough to compensate for the larger losses in the rest of Antarctica, the researchers say. (Related: "Why Antarctic Sea Ice Is Growing in a Warmer World.")
"The fact that Antarctica is definitely losing ice is a novel conclusion when we compare it to the last IPCC report in 2007, when scientists weren't sure if Antarctica was growing or shrinking," Shepherd said.
"Our data are now two to three times as accurate as those that were available at the time of the last IPCC report." The IPCC, or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is the leading international body for the study of climate change.
Rising Seas
Kevin Trenberth, a senior scientist at the Boulder, Colorado-based National Center for Atmospheric Research, who was not involved in the study, said the new study's "evidence is very compelling that global warming is playing a role in massive ice losses on land that contribute to sea level rise."
(Also see "Sea Levels Rising Fast on U.S. East Coast.")
Overall, polar ice loss has contributed about 11.1 millimeters to global sea level since 1992—roughly 20 percent of the total global sea level rise during that period, according to the study.
What's more, a study published earlier this week in Environmental Research Letters shows that sea levels are rising at a rate of 3.2 millimeters a year. That's 60 percent faster than the latest estimate of 2 millimeters a year projected by the IPCC. (See sea level rise pictures.)
"These results should be a major concern for politicians and climate talks in Doha, as they show that global warming is real and having major consequences that will only get bigger over time," Trenberth said by email.
As the World Meteorological Organization put it in a report released Wednesday during this week's UN climate change talks in Doha, Qatar, "climate change is taking place before our eyes." (See a map of global warming impacts worldwide.)
In addition to displacing millions, sea level rise may also supercharge large storms. For example, when a storm like Hurricane Sandy makes landfall, higher seas may boost storm surges that can strip away everything in their path and create damaging floods.
Sandy left at least 157 people dead and caused up to $80 billion in damage in hard-hit New York and New Jersey alone.
Predicting Future Climate Change
Study leader Shepherd hopes that climate modelers will be able to use this new data to better predict these consequences.
Until now, a modeler had to "choose an estimate of sea level rise from a pot of 40 ones with some uncertainty," he said.
Such a reconciled data set has been sorely needed, agreed Walt Meier, of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.
"You have this huge range of estimates of ice mass loss from Antarctica and Greenland—they're such a large range that you get to the point of you don't know what to trust," said Meier, who was not involved in the new study. (See pictures of shrinking ice sheets.)
The new study is in "a much more manageable range, and provides much better guidance in terms of future projections."
What's more, the study may even usher in a stronger model of another kind—scientific cooperation, Meier noted.
Instead of myriad groups working quasi-independently, the new study's co-authors "came together and sat down—at least figuratively—and came to a consensus for the best estimate that they can," he said.
"It's a great example," he said, "that in climate science and science in general, you can't do these kind of big things on your own anymore."
UNITED NATIONS: The United States on Wednesday pressed Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas not to seek elevated UN status, but Abbas remained on course to win a new show of international support.
Abbas will make the Palestinian case for "non-member observer state" status and indicate his conditions for talks with Israel in a speech to the UN General Assembly on Thursday, officials said.
He is guaranteed an overwhelming victory in the 193-nation assembly even though the United States and Israel fiercely oppose the move and other major powers have their doubts.
US Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Middle East envoy David Hale met with Abbas at his hotel on Wednesday but failed to get the Palestinian leader to withdraw his resolution or make amendments, officials said.
"It would be like changing my name," Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki told reporters when asked if the Palestinians were ready to change their request to the United Nations.
"We went up to make one more try to make our views known to President Abbas and to urge him to reconsider," US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in Washington.
A host of ministers and top diplomats followed the US officials in meetings ahead of the landmark vote. Abbas had lunch with Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who pledged his country's support.
Success will give the Palestinians access to UN agencies and treaties and allow them to apply to join the International Criminal Court (ICC) -- a prospect which worries Israel.
Palestinian officials say they are confident of getting two-thirds of the UN membership to back them. After France announced it would vote in favor, Spain, Norway, Denmark and Switzerland also said they would follow.
Britain announced however that it would abstain unless the Palestinians committed not to seek an ICC case against Israel and pledged an immediate return to negotiations with Israel. Germany said it would not support the resolution, but left open whether it would abstain or oppose the bid.
Diplomats from several European countries, including some backing the bid, have said they believe the Palestinians should have waited until US President Barack Obama had installed his new administration and the Israeli election had been completed.
Senior Palestine Liberation Organization official Hanan Ashrawi said Abbas has resisted "intensive pressure" to make concessions on the ICC. Palestinian envoys have said Abbas will not rush to join the ICC but could use the court if Israel does not change its attitude.
The United States has led opposition to the resolution as it has blocked the application for full membership of the United Nations that Abbas made to a fanfare welcome at the UN General Assembly in September 2011.
The United States and Israel say a Palestinian state can only emerge from bilateral negotiations which have been frozen since September 2010.
State Department spokeswoman Nuland warned "that no one should be under any illusion that this resolution is going to produce the results that the Palestinians claim to seek, namely to have their own state, living in peace next to Israel."
UN agencies that admit the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority could lose hundreds of millions of dollars in financing because of the vote. US law prohibits funding for any international body that recognizes a Palestinian state.
Washington has warned Abbas he risks losing around $200 million in development aid which is currently blocked in the US Congress.
Israel has been weighing countermeasures such as potentially freezing the transfer of tax and tariff funds it collects on their behalf, while some ministers have raised the idea of cancelling the 1993 Oslo peace accords.
And a foreign ministry policy paper even suggested "toppling" the Palestinian Authority.
But a ministry spokeswoman said Israel would most likely not take any punitive measures -- unless the Palestinians used the upgrade "as a platform for confrontation".
"Israel's reaction to the Palestinian move depends on what they choose to do. If they use this resolution as a platform for confrontation, we will have to act accordingly," said Ilana Stein in reference to any move at the ICC.
-AFP/ac
In a blog posting, party MP Derek O'Brien said, "The Trinamool Congress and its leader Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal, have been the original and unstinting crusaders in the matter of FDI in multi-brand retail. Other parties have periodically jumped on and off the issue. Some of them are seeking deals with the government, others are seeking publicity. Only Trinamool Congress has a consistent and principled opposition to FDI in multi-brand retail at this stage of India's development."
O'Brien said the government did not have an option but to come to Parliament on the issue, as changes in the FEMA regulations made by RBI to implement FDI in retail had to be put to vote. BJP and the Left parties have also talked about this provision which can be blocked by Parliament to turn the policy redundant.
"Change in FDI regulations can be made only by the RBI, in turn, changing regulations in the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) of 1999. From time to time, the RBI issues notifications making such changes or amending the regulations. Section 48 of FEMA mandates that all such changes be laid on the floor of the House; such changes are called subordinate legislations as per the Constitution of India," O'Brien said.
The Powerball jackpot, now a record $550 million, has led to "lotto fever" as millions rush to buy tickets ahead of the 11 p.m. ET drawing, but mathematicians and experts warn that strategies will do little to enhance your chance of winning.
Even Richard Lustig, seven-time lottery winner who has written the book, "Learn How to Increase Your Chances of Winning the Lottery," says there is no sure-fire way to win.
"I don't guarantee or make promises to anybody that by following my method you're going to win the lottery," he previously told ABC News.
Read more: How One Man Became a Serial Lottery Winner
Lustig advises lottery ticket buyers to set a budget and not to overspend, thinking it will increase your chances of winning.
Read more: $100 Million Winners Share Lottery Success Stories
While the odds of winning the jackpot are one in over 175.2 million, the odds of winning any of the smaller prizes from $4 to $1 million are one in 31.85.
The $550 million prize has a cash option of $360.2 million, the estimated jackpot based on national sales up to the time of the drawing, according to the official Powerball website.
Kent Sievers/The Omaha World-Herald/AP Photo
Matthew Vea, an army reservist and programmer, created a website four years ago that has tracked some of the Mega Millions and Powerball numbers that have and have not been drawn.
With the bulging jackpot, Vea said he couldn't resist buying some tickets Tuesday night.
"I did a few quick picks, used some fortune cookies but also grabbed some numbers based on my site's number profiling," Vea said.
However, even Vea is realistic about his chances of winning.
"With true random odds at 1 in 175 million though, even having a 'strategy' isn't likely to make a difference," he said. "But it can sure make you more hopeful than just sticking your finger in the wind with a quick pick."
Lustig advises against using the "quick picks" or numbers picked by the lottery's computer, while Michael Shackleford, gaming mathematician and actuary who specializes in studying casino games, prefers it.
Still Shackleford, admits he has not purchased a lotto ticket in 25 years, "because it's a sucker's bet."
If you want to have a slightly smaller chance of sharing your winnings with others who chose the same numbers as you, he offers a few observations.
People often choose familiar numbers, including birthdays, which, if chosen, means you could share your winnings.
"Everyone was born in a month from one to 12 and days are one and 31, ignoring the late 30s and 40s. If someone were picking birthdays, they have a greater chance to split it with other birthday pickers," he said.
Shackleford has also said many people choose geometric progressions.
The most popular selection for a Quebec lottery drawing in January 2010 were numbers in multiples of seven.
In particular, 824 wagers chose 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, and 42. The second most popular selection, chosen by 424 wagers, was the consecutive numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. The third most popular selection was the mysterious set of numbers in the television series, "Lost." According to the Quebec lottery, 377 wagers chose: 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 and 42.
Another consideration, Shackleford has said, is when to play the game.
"It's good for you when the jackpot increases but it also induces more people to play, increasing your chance of sharing it," he said.
But at an estimated $550 million, sharing might not be such a bad thing.
Astronomers have witnessed a record-breaking blast of gas and dust flowing out of a monster black hole more than 11.5 billion light-years away.
The supermassive gravity well, with a mass of one to three billion suns, lurks at the core of a quasar—a class of extremely bright and energetic galaxies—dubbed SDSS J1106 1939. (See "Black Hole Blasts Superheated Early Universe.")
"We discovered the most energetic quasar outflow ever seen, at least five times more powerful than any that have been observed to date," said Nahum Arav, an astronomer at Virginia Tech and co-author of the study to be published in The Astrophysical Journal.
Using the powerful telescopes of the European Southern Observatory in Chile, Arav and his team were able to clock the speed and other properties of the outflow.
Belching out material as much as 400 times the weight of our sun every year, the blast is located nearly a thousand light-years from the quasar and has a velocity of roughly 18 million miles (29 million kilometers) per hour.
"We were hoping to see something like this, but the sheer power of this outflow still took us by surprise," said Arav.
The central black hole in this quasar is true giant dynamo. It's estimated to be upward of a thousand times more massive than the one in the Milky Way, producing energy at rates about a hundred times higher than the total power output of our galaxy. (See black hole pictures.)
Clues to Galaxy Evolution
Supermassive black holes are large enough to swallow our entire solar system and are notorious for ripping apart and swallowing stars. But they also power distant quasars and spew out material at high speeds.
(See "Monster Black Holes Gobble Binary Stars to Grow?")
The outflows have been suspected to play a key role in the evolution of galaxies, explained Arav, but questions have persisted for years in the astronomical community as to whether they were powerful enough.
This newly discovered super outflow could solve major cosmic mysteries, including how the mass of a galaxy is linked to its central black hole mass and why there is a relative scarcity of large galaxies across the universe.
"I believe this is the smoking gun for several theoretical ideas that use the mechanical energy output of quasars to solve several important problems in the formation of galaxies and cluster of galaxies," said Arav.
While Kirk Korista, an astronomer not connected to the study, believes these claims may be a bit premature, the research is expected to shed new light on the most powerful and least understood portions of typical quasar outflows.
"The superb spectroscopic data of this quasar have allowed for a breakthrough in quantifying the energetics of what is probably a typical quasar outflow," said Korista, an astronomy professor at Western Michigan University.
"This definitely is an important step in piecing together the story of galaxy evolution, and in elucidating the role of quasars in that story."
When members of Congress need factual information and insights into the effectiveness of the financial laws put in place after the 2008 economic crisis, they regularly turn to the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and Orice Williams Brown.
Initially as director and now as managing director of the GAO’s financial markets and community investment section, Brown and her staff have issued dozens of reports examining the flaws and offering recommendations to improve the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) bailout fund, the Wall Street regulatory reform law and the initiatives to prevent housing foreclosures.
HONG KONG: Birmingham City owner Carson Yeung will go on trial in Hong Kong on Wednesday on charges of money laundering after the troubled tycoon failed in a bid to have the case postponed.
The former hairdresser was arrested and charged in June last year with five counts of "dealing with property known or believed to represent proceeds of an indictable offence".
The exact nature of the allegations are unknown, but are expected to become clearer when the 15-day trial begins at 09:30am (0130 GMT) at a district court in the southern Chinese city.
Prosecutors have said investigations revealed around HK$720 million ($92 million) passed through accounts connected to the 52-year-old businessman, who had been on bail pending the trial since he was charged.
Yeung has yet to enter a plea but his lawyers have previously said that he intends to fight the charges.
A district court last week rejected his bid to delay the hearing by six months on grounds that most of his assets have been frozen, which prevented him from hiring a legal team.
The case also stopped him from travelling to Britain last year to attend his duties at the debt-ridden English football club.
The district court granted him permission, only for the High Court to overturn the ruling and allow an appeal from prosecutors, who argued there was a risk he might not return to Hong Kong.
Yeung, who was little known prior to his emergence in English football, took control of the club in October 2009 in an £81 million ($130 million) takeover from David Sullivan and David Gold, now the co-owners of West Ham.
The club's fortunes however have gone downhill. They were relegated from the Premiership three months after winning the League Cup amid financial troubles.
Yeung has assured Birmingham City he will continue to support the club financially despite his legal troubles.
-AFP/ac
Bio-toilets developed by the Indian Railways and Defence Research and Development Organization have earned praise from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, but IIT scientists say they are neither environment-friendly nor suitable for trains.
But Indian Railways, which has for several years been searching for a way to prevent spreading human excreta across the countryside and stop track corrosion, which costs it350 crore a year, is betting on the bio-toilets.
Officials say they tested the system extensively and, since January 2011, installed 436 bio-toilets on eight trains. The railways plans to install bio-toilets in all new coaches at a cost of 500 crore.
The bio-toilet uses 'cold-active' bacteria collected from Antarctica and other low temperature areas to treat waste, turning it into water and gas that are disinfected before being expelled from the train.
IIT-Kanpur studied the toilets when they were put on trial three years ago. "There is no magic bacteria that can treat waste fast enough for use in a train toilet," said Vinod Tare, professor, environmental engineering and management, IIT-Kanpur.
IIT-Kanpur and the Research Design and Standards Organisation developed a zero discharge toilet that the railways tried but rejected.
"Such toilets are suitable for houses not for trains because a large number of people will need to use them in a short span of time."
Tare said the whole project was based on misinformation. "With every flush untreated waste is expelled through different levels and finally on the tracks," he said.
But railways officials insist that they have fixed the problems with the system. "We have eliminated the drawbacks that IIT-Kanpur pointed out," Railway Board executive director (mechanical engineering) Shailendra Singh said. |
"We are using stronger bacteria and garbage tossed into the commode will not affect the functioning of the toilet."
A mild swipe of the bacteria on the sides of the toilet box is enough to clean the toilet once, but the railways will load several kilograms of the bacteria in each toilet box.
"The toilets will save a lot of money because they will reduce corrosion of railway tracks and the undercarriage of coaches need not need to be replaced often," said a senior official with Southern Railway, which operates the Chennai-Guwahati Express, which uses bio-toilets.
"We found more than 5 kg of gutka sachets when a box was opened during an overhaul," he said. "The garbage did not affect the bacteria and there was no odour."
The technology is effective, official said, but passengers will have to cooperate with the railways and display discipline akin to that expected of aircraft passengers. A page on bio-toilets posted on Indian Railways' website says passengers are expected not to use the toilet pan as a garbage bin.
Nov 27, 2012 1:33pm
Khalil Hamra/AP Photo
CAIRO – Waves of protesters poured into Cairo’s Tahrir Square today to protest the far-reaching constitutional declaration made by President Mohammed Morsi last week that has essentially granted him unchecked power.
Click here for images of the demonstrations in Tahrir Square.
The new declaration frees Morsi from judicial oversight and with no parliament currently in place, many said longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak had simply been substituted with another.
“This is the first step for tyranny, he’s trying to put all the power in his hands and this is against the constitution and the law,” said Hassan Gamal, a professor of orthopaedic surgery. “No exceptions for anybody. Mubarak was tyrant because of the exceptions. We’re not going to tolerate any exceptions anymore.”
Liberal groups had called for the mass protest against Morsi, many of which have long complained of Islamists’ strength in post-Mubarak Egypt, led by Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. Protesters today said they were afraid of the constitution being written by an Islamist-dominated constitutional assembly, which will be put to a referendum once finished.
“The Muslim Brotherhood, they say something and then do the opposite,” said English teacher Nadine Mustafa. “We are in the 21st century, we want democracy, we don’t want a pharaoh ruining the country. This is ridiculous.”
Morsi’s office published the seven-article declaration on Thursday, the second of which states that Morsi’s laws and decrees “are final and binding and cannot be appealed by any way or to any entity” until the constitution is approved and a parliament elected.
Violence immediately broke out with clashes between Morsi opponents, supporters and police leading to more than 500 injuries and at least three deaths. To prevent more violence, the Muslim Brotherhood on Monday night cancelled their own rallies planned for today, though supporters did turn out in Alexandria.
“He’s a president that was elected to office with no constitution, no parliament and no defined powers in the state. It’s an exceptional circumstance,” argued Muslim Brotherhood senior adviser Jihad Haddad, who accused Mubarak-appointed judges of blocking Morsi’s attempts to reform the country’s institutions.
Morsi’s office insisted that the powers are only temporary. Haddad said the declaration will only be valid until a draft of the constitution is submitted.
“[Morsi] tried to do this through the only available avenue and choice,” Haddad said. “It does terrify [Morsi opponents] because the only thing they can rely on is trust and that trust was given to us during the presidential elections.”
Sen. Jim DeMint is lifting his hold on an FAA nominee.
(Jonathan Ernst - Reuters)
After a deep freeze, it looks like things might be moving again in the Senate: Sen. Jim De Mint is no longer blocking the nomination of Michael Huerta to be Federal Aviation Administration administrator.
The South Carolina Republican had put a hold on Huerta last summer, reasoning that Republicans shouldn’t appoint anyone to the five-year position before the outcome of the presidential election was known. If GOP candidate Mitt Romney had won, Huerta could have served through his first term. But now that President Obama has been reelected, DeMint has withdrawn the nominee’s roadblock.
Huerta has served as the acting chief at FAA since the former agency head, Randy Babbitt, resigned following a drunken-driving arrest. The charges were later dropped against Babbitt.
Huerta’s nomination was approved by a Senate committee in July.
NEW YORK: Strong gains by Apple, Facebook and other key tech stocks sent the Nasdaq exchange higher Monday while the Dow and S&P 500 sagged.
The US markets were generally feeble on the first session after a slow Thanksgiving holiday week, with the jury still out over how strong the crucial Black Friday holiday sales went for retailers.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished down 42.31 points (0.33 per cent) at 12,967.37.
The broad-market S&P 500 lost 2.86 (0.20 per cent) at 1,406.29, while the Nasdaq Composite rose 9.93 (0.33 per cent) to 2,976.78.
A pumped-up Facebook soared 8.1 per cent to $25.94 after analysts at longtime skeptics Bernstein Research gave the company a "like," setting a $33 target for the price.
That, combined with Apple's 3.2 per cent surge to $589.53, drove the Nasdaq's gain.
Retailers dependent on physical stores were mostly lower, with Walmart losing 0.4 per cent, Costco 1.7 per cent, and Target 2.6 per cent.
The first weekend of the holiday sales period, kicked off with last week's Black Friday shopping bonanza, was strong, businesses said, but many were reported concerned that consumer spending might not be sustained over the next month.
But online retailers were higher, Amazon gaining 1.6 per cent and eBay adding 4.9 per cent, after Friday's online sales topped $1 billion for the first time.
Among the Dow blue chips, Coca-Cola topped losers with a 1.5 per cent fall while Hewlett-Packard led a handful of gainers, adding 2.4 per cent.
Bond prices rose. The 10-year US Treasury yield dropped to 1.66 per cent from 1.69 per cent Friday, and the 30-year fell to 2.80 per cent from 2.83 per cent.
- AFP/fa
The morning session started with chairman Hamid Ansari expressing the resolve of the House in fighting terrorism on the 4th anniversary of Mumbai attacks but had to be adjourned shortly as the BJP refused to relent.
The main Opposition accused the government of contempt of Parliament by deciding to introduce FDI in retail when it had given an assurance to the contrary in the House last year.
"The government had given an assurance on December 7, 2011, that it was going to suspend FDI in retail Now they are bringing it...this is contempt of Parliament,'' said senior leader Vankaiah Naidu amid slogan-shouting by other members.
Behind Valencia Street's widened sidewalks and bike lanes, San Francisco has another tool ready to cut traffic and transit crowding. Nestled in the neighborhoods surrounding this longtime transportation corridor are hundreds of parked cars—available for sharing.
Brian Scates, creative director at a Silicon Valley startup, rented out his 2000 Audi All-Road last year for $50 to $60 a day, rather than let it sit unused while he biked around town and commuted to work by train. Meanwhile, Sebastien Rouif throws his surfboard into the back of his neighbor's pickup truck on Saturdays to drive down the coast and catch some waves. The fee and gas total about $40, cheaper than other rental options—and it's a lot less expensive than owning a car. (Related Pictures: "Twelve Car-Free City Zones")
Scates has since cut back on sharing his car, but still believes in the idea: "I'm all about fewer cars on the road, and maximizing the value that we get out of those vehicles."
Scates and Rouif, who both rented through Getaround, a car-sharing network, are in the vanguard of San Francisco residents who have given peer-to-peer car sharing a whirl. P2P, as it's known, aims to help address transportation problems by mining a largely untapped resource: Most cars sit unused most of the time. At least 30 companies worldwide are offering P2P car sharing, which enables short-term access to personal vehicles in a way that is convenient, smartphone-friendly, and cheap.
The system is not without its problems. Sharers have to be willing to tolerate additional wear and tear on their vehicles; for some, that alone is a deal breaker. And though a few states have passed laws establishing rules on car-sharing insurance coverage, liability issues remain.
Still, cities like San Francisco—feeling the strain both of too many cars on the road and crowded public transit—are taking steps to encourage car sharing. Indeed, they echo the P2P startups in touting the business opportunity inherent in helping people to consume less through sharing. (Related: "The City Solution")
"If you ask how to transform a car from a product into a service, you get a whole new economy," said Shannon Spanhake, deputy innovation officer for the City of San Francisco. (Related Quiz: "What You Don't Know About Cities and Energy")
Community Cars
Car sharing isn't entirely new. One program begun in a Swiss housing cooperative in 1948 continued for 50 years; individuals who couldn't afford a car on their own instead gained mobility by sharing a few vehicles. A series of car-sharing experiments were launched in the 1970s in Europe, after the Arab oil embargo caused worldwide energy prices to skyrocket. But one of the earliest studies on the concept concluded in 1969 that "community garages" never would work in the United States because cities here had "numerous rivers" of highway and "oceans" of parking space to accommodate individual car ownership.
Four decades later, with jammed highways and astronomical parking prices a near-universal feature of life in U.S. cities, a few nonprofits and businesses have begun to see opportunity in offering car sharing as an alternative. (Related: "Five Signs California Is Ditching Its Car Habit")
A leader in the movement was Zipcar, the 12-year-old membership-based network with some 730,000 users in 20 cities and college campuses in North America, Spain, Austria, and the United Kingdom. Peer-to-peer car sharing embraces the Zipcar idea—short-term rentals and convenience enabled by mobile technology. But P2P takes the concept a crucial step further by cutting out the expense of keeping a fleet of cars as well as maintenance crews and dedicated parking spaces.
Network members list their own cars for rental. Carless city dwellers join to gain occasional access to a set of wheels. The car-sharing company typically screens renters and vehicles, offers a platform for matching up car owners and drivers, facilitates payments (while taking its cut), and provides insurance.
Car sharing can be relatively low tech. For many RelayRides and Getaround sharers, for example, the car owner meets the renter in person, checks the driver's license, offers a quick orientation on the car, and hands over the keys. But many companies use technology to allow the rentals to take place without such face-to-face meetings. RelayRides can enable keyless access if the car owner subscribes to General Motors' OnStar service. Wheelz has its own technology (and Getaround is deploying a similar device) to enable renters to unlock strangers' car with apps on their smartphones.
Wheelz, which started out on college campuses but rolled out to the general public in San Francisco last month, says it installs $100 to $200 worth of proprietary gear under the dash of each car in its network, not only for keyless entry, but for tracking vehicle location and calculating fuel use (the cost of which is then added to the driver's tab). Many of the car-share companies also plug into the power of social networks to enhance trust; they have online communities of users where car owners and renters rate each other publicly, following the eBay model. (Related: "California Tackles Climate Change, But Will Others Follow?")
Advocates of peer-to-peer car sharing see these services as part of a larger trend, known by turns as "collaborative consumption, the "sharing economy," or simply, the "mesh." The idea is to turn goods into services, through an economy built on "accessing" cars, bicycles, power tools, homes, workspaces, or garden plots. (Related: "Bike Share Schemes Shift Into High Gear") The epitome of the notion is the rapidly growing Airbnb marketplace for sharing apartments, houses, and other spaces, which has expanded in four years to 26,000 cities in 192 countries.
Peer-to-peer car sharing has caught fire around the globe, expanding to more than 30 companies worldwide, up from only a handful in 2010. Investors are betting that peer-to-peer car sharing is an idea whose time has come. RelayRides has a slew of venture capital backing, from Google Ventures to General Motors Ventures. In August, Getaround announced it had attracted $13.9 million in funding, including from Google co-founder Eric Schmidt's Innovation Endeavors, Yahoo chief executive Marissa Mayer, and actor Ashton Kutcher.
Among the backers of Wheelz is the car-sharing giant Zipcar. The companies portray the services as complementary rather than competitive. Wheelz chief executive and co-founder Jeff Miller says vehicles in the Wheelz network are priced, on average, about 10 to 15 percent lower than comparable Zipcar vehicles. That's not a huge discount; what distinguishes Wheelz cars is their convenience, he said. "The cars are where people live. They're in your neighborhood, they're across the block." Plus, he added, "It has sort of a feel-good ethos to it," because the cars—and much of the fee—stay within the community. (Wheelz takes 40 percent of the rental fee, while the owner keeps 60 percent.)
General Motors is not the only automaker that is taking the trend of access over ownership seriously. Car2go, a program from the German automaker Daimler, allows members in 15 cities and five countries to borrow pint-sized Smart Fortwo cars. Similar networks have been set up by BMW in San Francisco and four German cities, and by Renault in France. Sydney, Australia, is now home to more than 9,000 car-sharing members, and by 2016 the city aims to boost car sharing among its residents to 10 percent of all households. The city is supporting the trend by offering convenient curbside parking, particularly in urban renewal areas. (Related: "Coal-Fired Australia, Buffeted by Climate Change, Enacts Carbon Tax")
Evolving Rules of the Road
The rules of the road are still evolving.
"There are all these apps and other ways of accessing transportation within cities, which are all part of the solution, but it's getting ahead of policies," said Rick Hutchinson, chief executive of San Francisco Bay area's pioneering nonprofit car-share service City CarShare, at a recent panel discussion. For instance, regulators in California and New York City have recently clamped down on operations of several companies they said were acting essentially as unlicensed taxi services, enabling citizens to hail and pay for chauffeured rides by smartphone. (Related: "To Curb Driving, Cities Cut Down on Parking")
For peer-to-peer car sharing, one of the trickiest questions has been insurance coverage. California, Oregon, and Washington state all have passed laws within the past two years aimed at ensuring drivers are covered (generally by the car-sharing company and its insurance partners), while protecting the vehicle owner from the risk of losing his or her own insurance coverage.
In U.S. states without such explicit law, insurance companies that write personal auto insurance typically view car sharing as an invalidating commercial use of a vehicle. In Boston earlier this year, a RelayRides renter died and four riders in the other vehicle were severely injured in a crash where lawyers anticipated the claims would surpass the $1 million insurance provided by the car-sharing company. Who will ultimately pay the balance will depend on the outcome of wrangling among insurance companies and, possibly, the courts. But a New York Times report on the case in August noted that the owner, who received a check from the car-sharing service insurance to cover the cost of replacing her car, immediately listed her new vehicle on RelayRides.
But are there enough enthusiastic car sharers out there to for P2P to grow into the kind of business its investors envision? In San Francisco, a hotbed of P2P activity, only about 1,500 of the city's 400,000 registered cars are shared vehicles, said Timothy Papandreou, deputy director of sustainable streets planning and policy for the city transit agency. The city is actively crafting a strategy for supporting—and regulating—sharing of "anything that moves," he said, from cars to electric scooters, and a much-anticipated bicycle-sharing service rolling out in January. Papandreou says that if the number of shared vehicles in San Francisco increases fivefold, total car ownership could potentially drop by an estimated 25 percent. That would ease crowding on roadways, and hopefully, on the city's strained streetcar and rapid transit system. "Everything comes down to transit crowding," he said. "Our transit is at peak capacity."
Whether P2P can take a bite of city transit problems will depend on the experience of the sharers. Sebastien Rouif, the surfer, who works as a transportation analyst with the French consulate, has tried to persuade his roommates to list their cars on Getaround. In addition to helping the concept to spread, it would also enable him to borrow their vehicles and be covered by Getaround's insurance. So far, he said, they are not convinced.
Scates found that renting out his Audi through Getaround allowed him to bring in about $1,200 over the course of a year, offsetting a portion of the $300 per month he was paying for parking. "Everyone was nice and most of them brought the car back without issues, and had it clean and full of gas," he said. "Only one renter ever brought it back dirty and not full. I'd say it was 90 percent positive."
Still, there were downsides. "The individual renter is spending time handing off keys and coordinating rentals, keeping the car full of gas and clean, getting it serviced more often, and dealing with increased repairs," Scates said. "So even with the extra income, there are tradeoffs."
Once, his Audi came back with a broken cigarette lighter; another time there was a broken air spring in the suspension system. Because of the problems, and the fact that he no longer pays for parking (he now parks his car outside the city), Scates dropped out of active sharing. He doubled his rental rate, and has had no takers at the new price. Nonetheless, Scates says he'd still recommend the service to recoup some of the cost of keeping a car in a city like San Francisco, especially for "for folks who aren't emotionally invested in their cars."
The ranks of such drivers may well be growing, with statistics clearly showing that younger Americans are buying fewer cars and driving fewer miles than their peers in previous generations. Networks like Getaround, RelayRides, Wheelz, and others are betting that in the next chapter of the American love affair with the automobile, drivers will be less smitten with the vehicle, and more devoted to sharing the ride. (Related Pictures: "Cars That Fired Our Love-Hate Relationship With Fuel")
This story is part of a special series that explores energy issues. For more, visit The Great Energy Challenge.
SAO PAULO: Michael Schumacher bade an emotional farewell to Formula One on Sunday after finishing seventh in his final race, the tumultuous season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix.
After 21 years, seven drivers' championship triumphs and 91 victories, the 43-year-old recovered from an early puncture to score points in his final outing with the Mercedes team.
In an incident-packed race, Schumacher fell to the back of the field in the opening laps but climbed to sixth before being passed by title-bound fellow-German, and good friend, Sebastian Vettel.
"I think it's a nice ending," he said. "I'm finishing off and he's (Vettel) clinching his third title. I'm very proud of him and he's a good friend of mine and let's see what happens in his future.
"My emotions are under control at the moment, maybe later having a drink and hugging the mechanics it'll become more sentimental but I'm looking forward to life after Formula One now.
"It's been a pretty big challenge in this race because obviously I had the puncture and was at the back again... It took some memories back to 2006 when the same thing happened to me.
"Luckily I have the nature of not giving up and always trying to find a solution, and it worked out. In a way it does remind me of 2003 when I had a similar struggle and just managed by a point to win the championship."
He smiled as he looked back on his thrilling fight with 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen of Lotus during the race.
"People are here to see a show, so you might as well put one on," added Schumacher.
"Give it a go and give it the maximum. I was having a go, and at certain moments you need to accept that there isn't the space and admit defeat."
He added that he had enjoyed his "second career" with Mercedes.
"It's been a beautiful time. Lots of exciting moments we shared, and lots of tough moments. The most incredible thing in a way is that I felt a lot of support in these last three years and they have been the most difficult years for me. But the fans have always been behind me."
-AFP/ac
Addressing the gathering, former president A P J Abdul Kalam said people should embrace a combination that will unite economic prosperity and the spiritual way of life. He also emphasized the importance of imparting moral values during the early years of education.
Releasing a Centenary souvenir on the occasion, chief minister Oommen Chandy said the social responsibility of religious organizations gives stability to society.
Delivering the presidential speech, Baselios Mar Thoma Paulose II, Catholicos of the East and Malankara Metropolitan, said that they never wanted quarrels or undue privilege but only justice and the rule of law. "We are a peace loving community. We appeal to the government to act courageously and give justice as per the law of the land and resolve conflicts in the community," he said.
He added that the church would set apart Rs 100 crore for social welfare schemes, including lending a helping hand to heart and cancer patients, building home for the homeless and provide financial aid to poor students.
Union minister K V Thomas, Hibi Eden, Vellapally Natesan, Archbishop Dr Mar Aprem Metropolitan, Chaldean Syrian Church of the East in India, Rev Thomas K Ommen, Church of South India and mayor Tony Chammany were present at the venue.
Nov 25, 2012 10:37am
(Image Credit: Charlie Neibergall/AP Photo)
The Powerball jackpot has swelled to $425 million, the largest in the lottery’s history, after no tickets matched the winning numbers in a drawing Saturday night.
The Powerball numbers for Saturday were 22-32-37-44-50, and the Powerball was 34.
Iowa Lottery spokeswoman Mary Neubauer said the jackpot could get even bigger before Wednesday, because sales tend to increase in the run-up to a big drawing.
The previous top windfall was $365 million. The jackpot was claimed by eight co-workers in Lincoln, Neb., in 2006.
PHOTOS: Biggest Lotto Jackpot Winners
While millions of Americans can have fun dreaming about how they’d spend the jackpot, the odds of winning are 1 in 175,000,000, according to lottery officials.
To put that in perspective, a ticket holder is 25 times less likely to win the jackpot then they are to win an Academy Award.
Even still, the old saying holds true: “You’ve got to be in it to win it.”
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