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Showing posts with label cnn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cnn. Show all posts

Sunday, April 29, 2012

US: Deadly crash near New York's Bronx Zoo

deadly accident at New York, US
Police investigate the van that plunged over the Bronx River Parkway
Van plunges more than 50 feet from highway near Bronx Zoo, killing 7, police say

A van flew off an elevated portion of New York's Bronx River Parkway Sunday afternoon, falling more than 50 feet before landing in a horrific crash that left seven people dead, multiple news outlets reported.

The accident, near the Bronx Zoo, happened at about 12:30 p.m. local time, authorities said. It's not clear what caused the crash.

According to the Associated Press, the van was headed south when "it bounced off the median, crossed all southbound lanes over to the guardrail and fell." The vehicle "flipped off a ramp into a transit facility near the Bronx Zoo," CNN reported. According to NBC's New York affiliate, it was a rail yard.

It was not clear whether all seven of the victims were traveling in the van at the time of the crash. According to the news service, three of the victims were children.

According to NY1, at least one victim was pinned inside the vehicle.

According to the New York Post, all seven victims were traveling in the van when it crashed.

Fire Department spokesman Jim Long told the AP that the victims "were an 84-year-old man; three women, ages 80, 45 and 30; and three girls, ages 12, 10 and 7."


News by Yahoo

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Saturday, April 07, 2012

Isner powers to victory as U.S. draw level with France in Davis Cup

Tennis
John Isner (right) beat Gilles Simon in straight sets to tie the Davis Cup
(CNN) -- The United States are tied 1-1 with France after the first day of the Davis Cup World Group quarterfinal at the Monte Carlo Country Club in Roquebrune, France.

France's Jo-Wilfried Tsonga gave the hosts the initiative with a four-set 7-5 6-2 2-6 6-2 win over Ryan Harrison in the opening rubber.

But the United States hit back to level the tie as big-serving John Isner fired nine aces in a straight-set 6-3 6-2 7-5 win over Gilles Simon.

"I took the court very confident," Isner said, DavisCup.com reported.

"To me no matter who I was going to play today, I was going to feel confident no matter what. So that was the case today," he added.

"I went out there and I played very well, simple as that. I was very happy with how I played and I am happy that I was able to help the team out."

The U.S., who are without Andy Roddick or Mardy Fish, will look to the Bryan brothers (Bob and Mike) to edge them into the lead tomorrow as they face Michael Llodra and Julien Benneteau.

Meanwhile in Castellon, Spain took a firm hold on their tie against Austria as Nicolas Almagro and David Ferrer recorded straight set wins over Jurgen Melzer and Andreas Haider-Maurer respectively.

The five-time champions, who are without the services of an injured Rafael Nadal, can now clinch the tie on Saturday with victory in the doubles.

Almagro was on court for just under two hours in his 6-2 6-2 6-4 win over Melzer while world No.5 Ferrer demolished Haider-Maurer 6-1 6-3 6-1 to continue his unbeaten status in Davis Cup singles matches.

"I won relatively easily and am happy with my game. Maybe the opponent played a little bit bad and made many mistakes but I played very solid and consistent," Ferrer said, DavisCup.com reported.

Over In Prague, Serbia, who are without the services of World No.1Novak Djokovic, got off to a bad start against the Czech Republic as Tomas Berdych cruised to a straight-set win over Victor Troicki 6-2 6-1 6-2.

But Janko Tipsarevic overcame Radek Stepanek in a five-set thriller 5-7 6-4 6-4 4-6 9-7 to level the tie.

The winners will face either Argentina or Croatia who are battling it out in Buenos Aires.

That tie is nicely poised after Croatian No.1 Marin Cilic beat David Nalbandian 5-7 6-4 4-6 7-6 6-3 before Juan Martin del Potro hit back leveling the match with a straight sets victory over Ivo Karlovic 6-2 7-6 6-1.

News by CNN

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Tuesday, April 03, 2012

Tornadoes rip through Dallas-Fort Worth area

Tornado
Semi-tractor trailers lay in debris left by a tornado at southern area of Dallas
(Reuters) - At least two tornadoes tore through the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area in Texas on Tuesday, ripping apart buildings, tossing tractor trailer trucks into the air and grounding planes in the region.

There were no reports of deaths or serious injuries, according to police, although the storm was still active.

One tornado tossed around trucks like toys in the Flying J Truck Plaza in Dallas, said truck driver Michael Glennon, who caught the destruction on his video camera as debris swirled through the air.

"The second trailer is ripped to pieces and thrown 50 to 100 feet into the air," he told Reuters.

National Weather Service meteorologist Amber Elliott confirmed that two separate tornadoes had touched down, one in Arlington, Texas and another in Dallas. Nine separate tornado warnings have been issued by the weather service for the Dallas area so far on Tuesday, she said.

Hail ranging from pea-sized to as large as baseballs pounded Dallas and Fort Worth, the nation's fourth-most-populous metropolitan area with 6.3 million people.

"A house completely demolished. Gas leak in the area," said one comment broadcast on the suburban Arlington, Texas, police scanner, passed along by weather forecaster AccuWeather.

"Motor home blown sideways blocking the street. There is a person stuck inside," another scanner broadcast said.

During the storm all planes were grounded at Dallas-Fort Worth International airport, the eighth busiest in the world, because of reports of storms and tornadoes, American Airlines spokesman Tim Smith said. The airport had reopened by late afternoon.

American canceled all 230 departures from its hub there on Tuesday, and a like number of inbound flights.

Dallas-Fort Worth airport spokesman David Magana said officials ordered passengers away from windows and directed them into stairwells and restrooms.

More than 110 aircraft sustained damage from hail, 400 departures were canceled and 40 incoming flights were diverted, the airport said in a statement.

HOMES DAMAGED, NO ONE HURT

Amethyst Cirmo, a spokeswoman for the city of Kennedale, west of Arlington, Texas said there was at least moderate damage to 40-50 homes there and some businesses were damaged as well. She said a tornado hit the city of 7,000 people, some power lines were down and a water main had broken, but was repaired.

"We have had some pretty severe damage, but we're doing OK," she said.

WFAA television in Dallas aired footage showing residents in one hard-hit neighborhood frantically directing a policeman, who appeared to be searching for people trapped by the storm.

The surrounding streets were littered with fallen trees and other storm-generated debris.

Video of a parking lot of a trucking company showed large trucks piled on top of one another, and some had their roofs ripped off.

Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez told CNN that there had been no serious injuries so far, but officers had not investigated all of the damaged neighborhoods. Officers also had been dispatched to damaged areas to prevent looting, she said.

The U.S. tornado season has started early this year. Tornadoes have been blamed for 57 deaths so far in 2012 in the Midwest and South, raising concerns that this year would be a repeat of 2011, the deadliest year in nearly a century for the unpredictable storms.

In 2011, there were 550 tornado deaths with 316 lives lost on April 27 in five southern states, and a massive tornado that killed 161 people in Joplin, Missouri on May 22.

Tuesday's tornadoes in Texas could prove more costly than a hailstorm nearly a year ago in the Dallas area that caused more than $100 million in insured losses. That April 15, 2011, storm was less damaging in terms of hail and winds.

Insurers have already lost as much as $2 billion during the 2012 tornado season, mostly from a record March 2 outbreak. That follows record-breaking losses of $26 billion during the 2011 tornado season.


News by Reuters

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Saturday, March 31, 2012

How the 'Crackberry' makers lost their way

mobile phones
BlackBerry
New York (CNN) – When I interviewed Research in Motion founder Mike Lazaridis two years ago at the launch of the Blackberry Torch, he was convinced the product would revive Blackberry’s fortunes because, “People don’t want to carry around two devices, they just want to carry one.”

He was right about that, but wrong about the device people wanted.

Thursday RIM announced a 23% drop in sales in the fourth quarter.  A recent Nielsen survey found only 5% of U.S. consumers buying a new smart phone chose a Blackberry.  It is a spectacular fall from grace for a company that pioneered push email and made their devices so indispensible they were nicknamed ‘Crackberrys.’

What happened?

For one thing, competition.  Workers who were issued Blackberry devices back in 2003-2005 didn’t just use them for work, they used them all the time and it didn’t take long for the likes of Apple and Google to catch on.  By 2007 both companies hit the market with phones that could not only deliver email and web access on the go, but had cool designs and access to app stores – something Blackberry did not.

But it wasn’t the competition that ultimately killed RIM’s edge.  The company suffered from “founder syndrome.” Mike Lazaridis and co-CEO Jim Balsillie created a brilliant product, but there were ultimately engineers that were blind to changes that were taking place.

In 2005, I went to Waterloo, Ontario to interview both men.  In lab coats and sanitized shoe booties, we toured the facilities and talked a lot about security and I.T. departments - not very much the user experience. It is something I have thought about often as I watched RIM’s stock and market share plummet.

It is often said that Steve Jobs was one of the few founders who was able to cannibalize his own products over and over.  Maybe it was Apple’s near death experience that enabled him to do that.  Is this finally RIM’s “a-ha” moment?  Maybe.

New CEO Thorsten Heins, who seemed in denial himself two months ago, has now announced a management shake-up, said he is open to selling or licensing part of the business. He vowed the company will turn its main focus back to the corporate market.  As one analyst told me, “it was the first RIM conference call in a long time where I didn’t roll my eyes.”

It may be too little, too late. Many of my friends and colleagues have gotten their I.T. departments to support their iPhones or Android phones. I can’t see them turning back.  And let’s not even mention tablets, which RIM has to practically give away to attract customers.

But RIM still had $4 billion in revenue. Their brand, though hurt, still carries weight – especially in developing countries.  And Matt Thornton, Avian Research in Boston says that if they do decide to license their operating system, and pare back from the hardware business, they have a shot.

“It will be a smaller company, but the gross margins on software companies can be 70-80% versus hardware companies which are closer to 40%,” he said.  Who might partner with Blackberry in a licensing deal?  Thornton thinks Samsung would make an interesting alliance.

Any Blackberry fans out there with advice for Thorsten Heins?  He’s gonna need it.

News by CNN

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Friday, March 16, 2012

Afghan massacre suspect identified, arrives at Kansas base

U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales
(L) Robert Bales
(Reuters) - The U.S. Army identified the soldier implicated in the massacre of 16 villagers in Afghanistan this week as Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, and said he arrived on Friday at a Kansas base where he will be held in a solitary cell.

Bales, a four-tour veteran, is suspected of walking off his base in southern Afghanistan on Sunday and gunning down the 16 civilians, including nine children and three women, in a massacre that sent American-Afghan relations into a tailspin.

"The Army confirms that Staff Sergeant Robert Bales was transferred to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Bales is being held in pre-trial confinement," the Army said in a statement.

The 38-year-old soldier, whose military unit is based south of Tacoma, Washington, had been held in Kuwait after he was flown out of Afghanistan on Wednesday. Bales has not yet been charged.

"I would assume he'll be charged pretty fast," said Jeffrey Lustick, a defense attorney and former Air Force military prosecutor and defense attorney in Bellingham, Washington.

Bales is expected to face justice under U.S. military rules, but it is not clear where any trial would take place.

Photos of a soldier identified as Bales, wearing camouflage and battle gear, appeared in an article about training for soldiers headed for Afghanistan on a web publication linked to Fort Irwin, a California military base. According to the website, the photos were taken in August.

Bales' wife and two young children have been moved to Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Seattle for protection, said Bales' Seattle-based lawyer, John Henry Browne.

The Army said Bales will be held in "special housing in his own cell" in the Fort Leavenworth detention center, which it described as a "medium/minimum custody facility."

Bales, who completed a two-year associate college degree in 1992, joined the Army in 2001, the Army said. His home of record was listed as Jensen Beach, Florida.

His military training included education in sniper skills, military leadership and a course called "combat life savers."

The Baleses' off-white, spacious wood home sat dark on Friday night in a neighborhood now filled with news media in the town of Bonney Lake east of Tacoma. A children's playset was in the backyard, situated about a block from Lake Tapps.

Few neighbors were present. At one house backing on to Bales' property, a handwritten sign addressed to media was posted on the door, reading: "We don't know Bales, so don't ask."

Beau Britt, staying at his parents' house across the street, said he did not know Bales or his family. "It's not the sort of area where you just walk up to a house and start talking to them," Britt said.

SOLDIER WAS ON FOURTH TOUR
Browne told Reuters that post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, would likely be part of the defense.

"It is commonly used in military defense," he said, calling it a mitigating factor. Browne has said the soldier was unhappy about returning to combat after being wounded twice in Iraq.

The Army statement said Bales had spent a total of 37 months during three deployments in Iraq between 2003 and 2010.

Browne added on Friday that Bales had witnessed a serious injury to a comrade the day before the massacre in the southern province of Kandahar on Sunday.

"One leg was blown off," Browne said, and the sergeant was nearby. Browne or a colleague from the defense team plan to meet the sergeant next week, he said.

The shootings of the 16 villagers have harmed relations between Afghanistan and the United States. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has accused the Pentagon of failing to fully cooperate with an investigation into the killings.

Browne told CNN he had spoken with his client earlier in the morning, and in the short conversation the soldier "sounded distant and kind of like a deer in the headlights, but OK."

At a news conference on Thursday, Browne described his client as "an exemplary soldier" who was upset at having to do a fourth tour of duty in a war zone and was likely suffering from stress after seeing colleagues wounded.

An unnamed U.S. official had told The New York Times the killings were a result of "a combination of stress, alcohol and domestic issues — he just snapped."

But Browne said on CNN that marital problems were "totally bogus." He said his client had a "very strong marriage and, frankly, we're all taking offense at that."

Karzai met with village elders and families of victims of the shootings on Friday and appeared to back their belief that a single gunman could not have killed so many people and in different places some distance apart.

On Thursday, Karzai called for NATO troops to leave Afghan villages and confine themselves to major bases, underscoring fury over the massacre and clouding U.S. plans to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

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Friday, February 24, 2012

Floating house rises to flooding challenge

Floating house rises to flooding challenge
An "amphibious house" design was recently granted planning permission
London (CNN) -- Building a home with a floor beneath ground on a plot next to a flood-prone river might seem like a recipe for disaster. But not when it's designed to float.

The "amphibious house" was recently granted planning permission for construction on a island on the River Thames in Marlow -- a small town 35 miles west of London.

The upper part of the house is constructed from lightweight timber, according to its creators Baca Architects, while a concrete basement level sits inside a "wet dock" consisting of a base slab and four retaining walls.

Should the worst happen the house turns into a "free-floating pontoon" with vertical guideposts running up the building's exterior preventing it from drifting off downstream.

Sea level rise: Impacts and mitigation measures

A terraced garden will also surround the property encouraging incremental flooding while also helping manage run-off when water levels start to subside.

Richard Coutts, director of Baca Architects said in a statement: "From the outset, we sought the expert advice of the (UK) Environment Agency to determine the most appropriate construction model to mitigate flood risk on the site and provide a safe dwelling, sympathetic to its setting and fit for the challenges of the 21st century.

"Amphibious design is one of a host of solutions that can enable residents to live safely and to adapt to the challenges of climate change," he added.

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Iranian company wants to send toy drone to Obama

Iranian company wants to send toy drone to Obama
Toy-Drone made by Iran
Tehran, Iran (CNN) -- An Iranian non-profit company says it will honor U.S. President Barack Obama's request that Iran return a drone that crashed there last year.

But instead of the actual drone, the company says it will send miniature toy versions. A lot of them.

"We plan to send a full squadron of 12 to the White House for President Obama as a present," said Reza Kioumarsi, a spokesman for the Aaye Art Group, a Tehran-based non-profit, non-governmental company that makes novelty items.

The company is trying to determine what Obama's favorite color is before sending the drones, which are 1/80th the size of the real drone, Kioumarsi said.

In December, Obama said the U.S. has asked Iran to return the highly classified RQ-170 Sentinel drone.

"We've asked for it back. We'll see how the Iranians respond," Obama said at the time.

This is probably not the response Obama was seeking.

Iran has said the country's armed forces had downed the drone near Kashmar, some 225 kilometers (140 miles) from the border with Afghanistan on December.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave a speech in December that seemed to suggest that Iran wouldn't return it.

"The North Americans at best have decided to give us this spy plane," Ahmadinejad said.

The RQ-170 Sentinel is one of the United States' most sophisticated drones and flies at up to 50,000 feet. It is designed to evade sophisticated air defenses.

One former intelligence official said it's "impossible to see" and discounted Iranian claims that it had been brought down by some form of electronic counter-measures. "It simply fell into their laps," he said -- after satellite communication was lost.

News by CNN


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Thursday, January 19, 2012

Gingrich angrily rejects marital question at debate

CNN
Newt Gingrich
(Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich angrily defended himself on Thursday against allegations that he had asked his ex-wife for an open marriage, lashing out in perhaps the most crucial debate yet in the 2012 campaign.

The CNN-sponsored debate got off to a raucous start when moderator John King asked Gingrich to respond to charges put forth by his ex-wife Marianne that he had sought an "open marriage" while having an affair.

The impropriety charges have dogged Gingrich for years and threaten to slow his momentum in South Carolina as he seeks to upset front-runner Mitt Romney in the first primary vote in the South on Saturday.

"I think the disruptive, vicious, negative nature of the news media makes it harder to govern this country," Gingrich fumed. "I am appalled that you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that."

The Republican crowd roared its approval of Gingrich.

The was the final chance for rivals to chip away at Romney's lead in South Carolina and Gingrich, the former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, had perhaps the best shot.

Romney came into the debate under strong pressure to turn back Gingrich, who received the endorsement of Texas Governor Rick Perry who dropped out of the race early Thursday.

Romney, a former private equity executive, insisted the company for whom he worked did in fact help create more than 100,000 jobs despite doubts about that expressed by experts.

Romney's experience at Bain Capital, which bought companies and restructured them sometimes resulting in job losses, has hurt him in South Carolina where unemployment remains around 10 percent. Gingrich lobs frequent attacks at him on this.

Romney said Bain helped nurture companies that created 120,000 jobs while business failures cost about 10,000 jobs for a net increase of 100,000.

"People have evaluated that since I ran four years ago," said Romney, who lost the Republican presidential race in 2008 to Senator John McCain.

Romney will take a huge step toward claiming the Republican nomination if he wins on Saturday.

Fighting for their political lives at the debate were former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum and libertarian Congressman Ron Paul of Texas.

GINGRICH GETS CLOSER

A strong performance in a debate in South Carolina on Monday helped him get within touching distance in the polls of Romney, who has struggled to explain why he has not released his tax forms.

But Gingrich has faced troubling questions that could halt his momentum. His second wife, Marianne, told ABC News that Gingrich had sought an open marriage while having an affair with current wife Callista. She said he should not be considered electable in the race to find a Republican challenger to Democratic President Barack Obama in next November's election.

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted of 656 likely South Carolina voters showed Romney with 35 percent support, Gingrich with 23 percent support, and former Senator Rick Santorum with 15 percent support.

Romney was looking for a rebound to boost his momentum after the surprise news from Iowa on Thursday that he did not receive the eight-vote victory that he had believed on January 3.

A formal count by Iowa election officials gave the nod to Santorum by a mere 34 votes, puncturing the aura of inevitability that Romney's campaign has sought to portray.

Santorum went on the attack on Thursday night against Romney and Gingrich over healthcare. He attacked Romney's healthcare plan in Massachusetts that Democrats say was a model for Obama's unpopular overhaul, and Gingrich for prior support for a provision that individuals be required to buy health insurance.



Friday, December 23, 2011

Congress punts hard payroll tax work to 2012

barack obama
Barack Obama
(Reuters) - President Barack Obama signed into law a two-month payroll tax cut extension on Friday, capping a year of fierce partisan combat over taxes and spending that will resume in January and play heavily in the 2012 elections.

The Senate and the House of Representatives, by voice votes in chambers nearly emptied for the holidays, passed a $33 billion (21 billion pounds) bill to keep the payroll tax rate at 4.2 percent through February. It had been scheduled to increase on January 1 to 6.2 percent. Obama swiftly signed the bill.

"We have a lot more work to do," the president said at the White House. "This continues to be a make-or-break moment for the middle class ... There are going to be some important debates next year."

Obama heads to vacation in Hawaii with an important political win in his portfolio after he and fellow Democrats prevailed in the message war by backing lower taxes for middle-class Americans in the midst of a fragile economic recovery.

The battle took a toll on House Republicans led by Speaker John Boehner, who were forced to make an embarrassing retreat and agree to a short-term deal Thursday after getting hit by critics on all sides, include their colleagues in the Senate.

The temporary fix lets lawmakers lower the curtain, for now, on a year of political deadlock that in the end produced only a series of inconclusive truces. The fiscal policy debate is set to rage straight through the 2012 election season and beyond.

While Congress is on a long winter break now and does not return to full swing until late January, newly appointed negotiators are expected to begin work soon on figuring out how to pay for extending the payroll tax cut through 2012.

Republicans have sought a continued freeze on federal worker pay and cuts in Medicare benefits for the wealthy. Democrats have rejected both ideas while proposing a surtax on the wealthy to cover the extension's cost. Republicans reject this.

Both sides have been open to cutting federal workers' pension benefits. There also were last-minute Senate negotiations last week on possibly ending some tax breaks for the wealthy, such as a small one involving corporate jets.

Minutes after the bipartisan deal was passed by Congress, the bickering that has come to dominate Capitol Hill resumed.

Republican Representative Tom Price, a leader of House conservatives, immediately criticized the short-term extension, calling it a "two-month punt" and saying it would not have been needed if Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, and Obama had "been willing to do their job today."

'NOTHING OFF THE TABLE'

In a sign that the battle is far from over, Reid signaled that Democrats could renew their push for a surtax on wealthier Americans. Democrats had dropped that demand during the year-end negotiations that produced the two-month deal.

"There is nothing off the table," he said.

Obama scored a victory in the payroll tax struggle over Tea Party conservatives in the House who tried to block the two-month extension. They backed down on Thursday in the face of bipartisan criticism, but they are not going away.

Representative Tim Huelskamp, a first-term Republican, said on CNN that he was disappointed with Republican leadership caving in to pressure and accepting the two-month deal.

Next year could be a rough one for Boehner, the top House Republican, said Norm Ornstein, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

Boehner spent 2011 having to negotiate with many of his own party members on just about every major piece of legislation.

Now that House Republicans have had to go along with Democrats in the payroll tax debate, "the idea that this group of angry Tea Party Republicans, who feel betrayed, now will go along or that Boehner will be more capable of defying them is a little bit wrong-headed," Ornstein said.

Meanwhile, Democrats might be emboldened, believing "they've learned to play poker," he added.

Patrick Griffin, associate director Of American University's Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies, said House Republicans "overplayed their hand. How they interpret that lesson will be very interesting."

Any edge conferred on Democrats might be short-lived, however. The 2012 election cycle is just set to kick off with the Iowa Republican presidential caucus on January 3 and a long road lies ahead until voters go to the polls in November.

The payroll tax funds the Social Security retirement pension system. If it had been allowed to rise, the increase would have hit the wallets of 160 million working Americans.

The $33 billion needed to pay for the two-month extension will be raised by increasing fees charged by housing finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for guaranteeing mortgages.

Analysts said the fee hike, which investors will likely pass along to borrowers, could raise financing costs for mortgages, but probably not enough to slow a housing market recovery.

Unemployment benefits set to expire soon were extended as well, while cuts in payments to doctors who treat patients in the government-backed Medicare health insurance program for the elderly were postponed, under the bill signed by Obama.

Also included in it was a Republican initiative aiming to force the administration into fast approval of an oil pipeline opposed by environmentalists and many Democrats. The provision gives Obama 60 days to either approve TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline from Canada to Gulf of Mexico facilities in Texas, or declare it not in the national interest.

Obama wants more time to evaluate the environmental impact of routing the pipeline through sensitive areas of Nebraska. The White House has said that if pushed for a decision within 60 days, the administration would be forced to reject the project.

Not extending the payroll tax cut, analysts warned, could have jeopardized the recovery, even risking another recession.

The modest two-month fix drew fire from some businesses that said it will complicate payroll processing and tax planning.

The payroll situation "could get more confusing," said Robert Gard, an accountant with Gard and LaFreniere LLC in Alpharetta, Georgia. If the tax is not extended at the end of February, businesses will need to reprogram software, he said.



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Thursday, December 22, 2011

Wave of attacks kills dozens amid Iraq's upheaval

bomb attack in baghdad
Bomb Attack in Baghdad
Baghdad (CNN) -- A wave of explosions in Baghdad Thursday killed at least 63 people and wounded 185, authorities say, raising fears about the stability of the country amid political upheaval that threatens to undo Iraq's government just days after U.S. troops withdrew from the country.

Nine car bombs and six roadside bombs went off and a mortar round was fired in a two-hour period, targeting residential, commercial and government districts in the Iraqi capital, two police officials told CNN.

The deadliest attack was a suicide car bombing outside the offices of the Integrity Commission, the country's main anti-corruption body. At least 23 people were killed and 43 others were wounded in the explosion, which also damaged part of the building, police officials said.

The attacks targeted civilians across all walks of life. One took place at a market. Another, at a school as children were arriving.

CNN's Arwa Damon in Baghdad described it as a "nightmare scenario," eerily reminiscent of earlier days of the Iraq war.

The violence comes as Iraq's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish political leaders square off over a warrant issued for the arrest of Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, who is accused of organizing his security detail into a death squad that targeted government and military officials.

Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has demanded that Kurdish lawmakers hand over the Sunni vice president, who has denied the charges and refuses to return to Baghdad from northern Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region.

Finance Minister Rafie al-Issawi told CNN he does not believe the violence is directly connected to the latest political developments, "but there is a good environment for terrorists to be active in these bad circumstances."

Terrorists "will justify their criminal activities" and argue that the solution to Iraq's woes "isn't in the political process," said al-Issawi, a member of the Sunni-backed Iraqiya minority political bloc.

The seemingly coordinated explosions Thursday struck during the height of morning rush hour, hitting a number of Baghdad's primarily mixed Sunni-Shiite neighborhoods.

There have been no immediate claims of responsibility, though the attacks resemble previous bombings that have been claimed by both Sunni and Shiite insurgents as well as al Qaeda in Iraq.

At the Medical City hospital in central Baghdad, doctors treated the wounded whose bodies were peppered with what appeared to be shrapnel from explosions.

Images of bloodied, battered bodies and destroyed storefronts and homes were broadcast on Iraqi television stations.

While violence in Iraq has fallen off in recent years, the latest spate of attacks are among the worst since August when a series of coordinated bombings killed at least 75 people in 17 Iraqi cities.

The attacks come amid heightened sectarian tensions, raising fears that the political turmoil in Iraq could spark a return of sectarian bloodshed that nearly ripped the country apart during the height of the war.

Al-Hashimi has denied the charges against him, saying the accusations are politically motivated amid the rivalry between his Sunni-backed Iraqiya minority political bloc and al-Maliki's Shiite majority bloc.

The warrant for al-Hashimi's arrest was issued just days after Iraqiya suspended its participation in Parliament, claiming it was being cut out of the political process by al-Maliki.

The prime minister has said failing to hand over al-Hashimi or allowing him to flee to another country "could cause problems."

Al-Issawi, the finance minister, told CNN that before U.S. troops left, Iraqi officials made clear their fears of what could happen.

"So many times we warned the Americans, both the political and security situation (are) very fragile. Unfortunately, no one listened."

In a speech this month about bringing the U.S. troops home, President Barack Obama said, "Iraq is not a perfect place. It has many challenges ahead. But we're leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq, with a representative government that was elected by its people. "

"There can be no fuller expression of America's support for self-determination than our leaving Iraq to its people. That says something about who we are," Obama added.

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Sunday, December 11, 2011

Opposition says: Anti-regime Syrian doctor killed

Ibrahim Othman
Dr. Ibrahim Othman
(CNN) -- A Syrian doctor who became one of the country's most wanted men has been killed trying to flee to Turkey, opposition sources said.

Dr. Ibrahim Othman, 26, was a founder of the Damascus Doctors, a network of doctors that secretly treats wounded protesters who are afraid to go to government-run hospitals.

A video purporting to show him dead, and including shots of what appear to be his passport, was posted on YouTube on Saturday. CNN cannot independently confirm the authenticity of the video.

Friends and colleagues described him on a Facebook memorial page as "strong and fearless, with a pure heart."

Well known for his love of pranks, Othman said he was born to help people -- a desire that may have ultimately cost him his life.

In July, he showed CNN a secret treatment center where he works, a tiny room with basic equipment and supplies.

"It's illegal, but this is the only way to treat injured demonstrators," he said.

He knew he was putting his life on the line.

"Yeah, I know that, but the demonstrators, they are risking their life too, so we have to help them," he said.

There was little the Damascus Doctors could do for many of the wounded, he conceded.

"We spend all of our life to help people, and it's so hurtful to see people dying. And we cannot do anything," he said.

Some wounded protesters could be saved if they went to hospitals, Othman said. But there were risks involved.

"They refuse to go the government hospitals because they will be arrested," he said.

The director general of Damascus Hospital rejected that claim.

"We accept all cases without regard as to how the injuries were sustained or where It happened," Dr. Adib Mahmoud said.

But many do not believe it.

"They would detain me if I went to the hospital," said a teenaged patient of Othman's who said his back was cut when Syrian security forces dragged him over broken glass.

In the end, Syrian security caught up with Othman too, his friends and colleagues said -- as he feared they would.

"Every time when I leave home, I say goodbye to my mother," he told CNN when asked in July about the hardest part of his life. "Sometimes I feel I won't be able to come back and see her again."

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Monday, December 05, 2011

Why Muslims more devout than others?

muslims at pray
Muslims at Pray in Mosques
Conflict, theology and history make Muslims more religious than others, experts say

(CNN) – Every religion has its true believers and its doubters, its pious and its pragmatists, but new evidence suggests that Muslims tend to be more committed to their faith than other believers.

Muslims are much more likely than Christians and Hindus to say that their own faith is the only true path to paradise, according to a recent global survey, and they are more inclined to say their religion is an important part of their daily lives.

Muslims also have a much greater tendency to say their religion motivates them to do good works, said the survey, released over the summer by Ipsos-Mori, a British research company that polls around the world.

Islam is the world's second-largest religion - behind Christianity and ahead of Hinduism, the third largest. With some 1.5 billion followers and rising, Islam's influence may be growing even faster than its numbers as the Arab Spring topples long-reigning secular rulers and opens the way to religiously inspired political parties.

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But while there's no doubt about the importance of Islam, experts have different theories about why Muslims appear to be more religious than members of other global faiths - and contrasting views on whether to fear the depth of Muslims' commitment to their faith.

One explanation lies in current affairs, says Azyumardi Azra, an expert on Islam in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim majority country.

Many Muslims increasingly define themselves in contrast with what they see as the Christian West, says Azra, the director of the graduate school at the State Islamic University in Jakarta.

"When they confront the West that they perceive or misperceive as morally in decline, many Muslims feel that Islam is the best way of life. Islam for them is the only salvation," he says.

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That feeling has become stronger since the September 11 attacks, as many Muslims believe there is a "growing conflict between Islam and the so-called West," he says.

"Unfortunately this growing attachment to Islam among Muslims in general has been used and abused by literal-minded Muslims and the jihadists for their own purposes," he says.

But other experts say that deep religious commitment doesn't necessarily lead to violence.

"Being more religious doesn't necessarily mean that they will become suicide bombers," says Ed Husain, a former radical Islamist who is now a Middle East expert at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

In fact, Husain argues that religious upbringing "could be an antidote" to radicalism.

American Muslim women who cover explain their choice

The people most likely to become Islamist radicals, he says, are those who were raised without a religious education and came to Islam later, as "born-agains."

Muslims raised with a grounding in their religion are better able to resist the distortions of Islam peddled by recruiters to radical causes, some experts like Husain argue, making them less likely to turn to violence.

But he agrees that Muslims are strongly attached to their faith, and says the reason lies in the religion itself.

"Muslims have this mindset that we alone possess the final truth," Husain says.

Muslims believe "Jews and Christians went before us and Mohammed was the last prophet," says Husain, whose book "The Islamist" chronicles his experiences with radicals. "Our prophet aimed to nullify the message of the previous prophets."

The depth of the Muslim commitment to Islam is not only a matter of theology and current events, but of education and history, as well, other experts say.

"Where religion is linked into the state institutions, where religion is deeply ingrained from childhood, you are getting this feeling that 'My way is the only way,'" says Fiyaz Mughal, the director of Faith Matters, a conflict-resolution organization in London.

The Ipsos-Mori survey results included two countries with a strong link between religion and the state: Legally Muslim Saudi Arabia, which calls itself the guardian of Islam's two holiest sites, Mecca and Medina; and Indonesia, home of the world's largest Muslim population.

The third majority Muslim country in the study is Turkey, which has a very different relationship with religion. It was founded after World War I as a legally secular country. But despite generations of trying to separate mosque and state, Turkey is now governed by an Islam-inspired party, the AKP.

Turkey's experience shows how difficult it can be to untangle government and religion in Muslim majority countries and helps explain the Muslim commitment to their religion, says Azyumardi Azra, the Indonesia expert.

He notes that there has been no "Enlightenment" in Islam as there was in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, weakening the link between church and state in many Christian countries.

"Muslim communities have never experienced intense secularization that took place in Europe and the West in general," says Azra. "So Islam is still adhered to very strongly."

But it's not only the link between mosque and state in many Muslim majority countries that ties followers to their faith, says professor Akbar Ahmed, a former Pakistani diplomat who has written a book about Islam around the world.

Like Christians who wear "What Would Jesus Do?" bracelets, many Muslims feel a deep personal connection to the founder of their faith, the prophet Muhammad, he says.

Muhammad isn't simply a historical figure to them, but rather a personal inspiration to hundreds of millions of people around the world today.

"When a Muslim is fasting or is asked to give charity or behave in a certain way, he is constantly reminded of the example set by the prophet many centuries ago," argues Ahmed, the author of "Journey Into Islam: The Crisis of Globalization."

His book is based on interviews with Muslims around the world, and one thing he found wherever he traveled was admiration for Muhammad.

"One of the questions was, 'Who is your role model?' From Morocco to Indonesia, it was the prophet, the prophet, the prophet," says Ahmed, the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University in Washington.

But while Ahmed sees similar patterns across the Islamic world, Ed Husain, the former radical, said it was important to understand its diversity, as well.

"There is no monolithic religiosity - Muslims in Indonesia and Saudi Arabia are following different versions of Islam," says Husain. "All we're seeing (in the survey) is an adherence to a faith."

Political scientist Farid Senzai, director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington, raised questions about the survey's findings.

"Look at the countries that are surveyed - Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Turkey," he says. "There are about 300 million Muslims in those three countries, (who make up) about 20% of Muslims globally."

Islam is "incredibly important" in Saudi Arabia, he says.

"But in Tunisia or Morocco you could have had a different result. It would have been nice if they had picked a few more Arab countries and had a bit more diversity," says Senzai.

The pollster, Ipsos-Mori, does monthly surveys in 24 countries, three of which are majority Muslim – Turkey, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia. The other countries range from India to the United States, and Mexico to South Korea, and are the same each month, regardless of the subject the pollsters are investigating.

In the survey released in July, about six in 10 Muslims in the survey said their religion was the only way to salvation, while only a quarter of Hindus and two out of 10 Christians made that claim about their own faiths.

More than nine out of 10 Muslims said their faith was important in their lives, while the figure was 86% for Hindus and 66% for Christians.

Ipsos-Mori surveyed 18,473 adults via an online panel in April and released the findings in July. Results were weighted to make the results as representative as possible, but the pollster cautioned that because the survey was conducted online, it was harder to get representative results in poorer countries where internet access is not widespread.

CNN polling director Keating Holland also warns that in an "opt-in" survey, where respondents actively choose to participate, results tend to come from "people who are confident in their opinions and express them openly... not good for intensely private matters like faith or income or sex."

Online surveys in countries that are not entirely free are also open to the possibility that pollsters get "the approved response" in those nations, "where the people who are most likely to be willing to talk about such matters are the ones who hold, or at least verbalize, opinions that won't get them in trouble if they are expressed," Holland says.

That may have been an issue in Saudi Arabia, where respondents were given the choice of not answering questions on religion due to their potential sensitivity in the kingdom. The Saudi sample was the smallest, with 354 participants, meaning "findings for Saudi Arabia must be treated with caution," Ipsos-Mori said.

About 1,000 people participated in most countries, but sample sizes were smaller in the three majority Muslim countries and in eight other countries.

The survey participants did not reflect the true percentage of Christians and Muslims in the world. Christians were over-represented – as were people who said they had no religion – and Muslims were under-represented.

Nearly half the respondents identified themselves as Christian. Eleven percent were Muslim, 4% were Buddhist, 3% were Hindu and 3% were "other." A quarter said they had no religion and 6% refused to say.

Fiyaz Mughal, the interfaith expert, argues that even though the countries surveyed might not be representative of the entire Muslim world, the findings about Muslims rang broadly true. Muslims in different countries were committed to their faith for different reasons, he says.

"Saudi Arabia is an institutionally religious state. Indonesia has religion tied into its culture," says Mughal.

But Muslim immigrants to Europe also show strong ties to their religion, either as a defense mechanism in the face of a perceived threat, or because of an effort to cling to identity, he contends.

He detects a link between insular communities and commitment to faith regardless of what religion is involved. It is prevalent in Muslim Saudi Arabia, but he has seen it among Israeli Jews as well, he says.

"The Israeli Jewish perspective is that (the dispute with the Palestinians) is a conflict of land and religion which are integrally linked," Mughal says.

"What does play a role in that scenario is a sense of isolationism and seclusion in Israeli Jewish religious communities, a growing trend to say, 'Our way is the only way,'" he says.

Religious leaders of all faiths need to combat those kinds of attitudes because of the greater diversity people encounter in the world today, he argues.

They have a responsibility to teach their congregations "that if they are following a religion, it is not as brutal or exclusive as possible," Mughal says. "Things are changing. The world is a different place from what it was even 20 years ago."

Politicians, too, "need to take these issues quite seriously," he says.

"In the Middle East there are countries - the Saudi Arabias - where you need to be saying that diversity, while it may not be a part of the country, is something they have to deal with when moving in a globalized area," he says.

But Senzai, the political scientist, says that it's also important for the West to take the Muslim world on its own terms.

"Many Muslims want religion to play a role in politics," he says. "To assume that everyone around the world wants to be like the West - that they want liberal secular democracy - is an absurd idea."

– CNN's Nima Elbagir and Atika Shubert contributed to this report.



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Sunday, November 27, 2011

Prince William Rescues Two Sailors From Sinking Carrier Ship In Irish Sea

price william
Prince William
Prince William took part in a rescue mission after a cargo ship sank in the Irish Sea early Sunday morning, CNN reports.

Two of the crew were pulled to safety, however five still remain missing after one body was recovered, the British Coastguard confirmed to the BBC.

The two men were airlifted to safety by a four-man crew, which included the Duke of Cambridge -- second in line to the throne -- who is a Royal Air Force helicopter pilot, Fox News explains.

The coastguard received a mayday call at 2 a.m. local time from the Swanland cargo carrier ship located 20 miles northwest of the Llyn Peninsula, North Wales, after its hull cracked.

The ship, carrying eight people and 3,000 tons of limestone, capsized before rescue forces arrived, notes MSNBC.

"We know that at least some of them are wearing immersion suits and have strobe lighting with them, however sea conditions are challenging at best," Jim Green, a coastguard spokesman told News.com.au.

The British RAF, the Irish Coastguard and an Irish Naval ship are continuing to search for the missing five people.

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