Obama won't rush to act against Syria over chemical arms

By Steve Holland and Warren Strobel

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama signaled on Tuesday he is no rush to respond quickly to Syria's apparent use of chemical weapons, taking a cautious approach to the country's civil war, mirroring the views of the American public, most lawmakers and some U.S. allies.

Obama, who last year declared that the use or deployment of chemical weapons by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad would cross a "red line," told a White House news conference there was evidence those weapons were used, but there was still much that U.S. intelligence agencies did not know.

"We don't know how they were used, when they were used, who used them," he said, and, "We don't have a chain of custody that establishes what exactly happened."

Obama did not rule out action - military or otherwise - against Assad's government. But he repeatedly stressed he would not allow himself to be pressured prematurely into deeper intervention in Syria's two-year-long civil war.

The president's remarks raised the prospect that, despite declaring last week that there was evidence Assad's forces had used the nerve agent sarin "on a small scale," any U.S. government response will not be quick.

Obama's press secretary Jay Carney told reporters on Monday that there was no deadline for rendering a final judgment on whether chemical weapons were used, and by whom. "I would not give you a timetable," Carney said.

Privately, U.S. officials predict it will be weeks before any conclusion is reached.

Syria denies using chemical weapons.

BLOOD SAMPLES

Obama administration officials have not specified what "physiological" evidence they have that Syrian forces used sarin, but U.S. government sources said it included samples of blood from alleged victims, and of soil.

"My understanding of the situation is that the various intelligence agencies are quite confident that human beings were exposed to sarin, and that's based on physical samples and chemical analysis of blood from the victims," said Gary Samore, a former Obama nonproliferation adviser who is now at Harvard University.

Samore said there appeared to be "a question mark" about whether local military commanders used the weapons "or whether this came down from orders from Damascus to test how much they could get away with."

Since the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011 - it has killed 70,000 people and created more than 1.2 million refugees - Obama has repeatedly shied away from deep U.S. involvement.

That stance is shared by top Pentagon officials, who have spoken publicly and privately of their concerns about the limits and risks of employing U.S. military force in the shattered country.

Whether Obama is now slowly moving toward a more activist approach is unclear.

Obama, without being specific, said that if Syria's chemical weapons use was more firmly established "that means that there are some options that we might not otherwise exercise that we would strongly consider."

White House spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said "our assistance to the Syrian opposition has been on an upward trajectory, and (Obama) has directed his national security team to identify additional measures so that we can continue to increase our assistance."

Obama has approved nonlethal aid to the Syrian opposition, but has thus far stopped short of providing arms.

He now faces criticism for softening a "red line" that seemed crystal clear when he said in August that the use of chemical weapons by Assad, or transfer of stockpiles to extremist groups would be unacceptable.

White House officials said they do not think the U.S. public is eager to get involved militarily in Syria.

"Setting aside instances when America has been attacked - the Japanese and al Qaeda - military action should always be something any president considers very seriously and deliberately and that's especially the case when it's not an attack on the United States," a senior White House official said.

A New York Times/CBS News poll released on Tuesday found that 62 percent of Americans believe the United States has no responsibility to do something about the fighting between Assad's forces and anti-government rebels.

Only 39 percent of respondents said they were following the Syrian violence closely, indicating that it is not among U.S. citizens' top concerns.

"I think the American people are kind of where the president is. You've got to have some definitive evidence and you've got to very careful about what you do," said Democratic strategist Bob Shrum, who managed John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign.

"The politics of this is not hard for the president. It's the policy that's hard," Shrum said.

ROOM FOR MANEUVER

Obama also has room for maneuver on Syria because Republican are divided over what to do, and - unlike with Iran's nuclear program - close U.S. Middle East ally Israel is not urging American action.

Hawkish Republican senators John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said Obama's inaction was endangering U.S. national security interests and allies.

"There are many options at our disposal, including military options short of boots on the ground in Syria, that can make a positive impact on this crisis," they said in a statement responding to Obama's remarks.

But not all Republicans share that view. Departing from his party's frequent disparagement of the United Nations, Representative Harold Rogers of Kentucky replied when asked if Washington should arm the Syrian rebels: "It is such a muddled picture. I think probably we ought to be asking the U.N. to be involved."

The Republican divide "leads to an incoherent critique of the administration's policy," said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

There is also "the long hang-over from Iraq" and the U.S. war there, Alterman said. "I don't know when that goes away."

Michael Oren, Israel's ambassador to the United States, said his country is not calling on Obama to act against Syria.

"We're not making any policy recommendations," Oren said in a telephone interview. "We think the issue is very complex."

At his news conference, Obama stressed the need for international consensus. Secretary of State John Kerry travels to Russia, which has backed Assad, for talks on Syria and other issues next week.

"If we end up rushing to judgment without hard, effective evidence, then we can find ourselves in the position where we can't mobilize the international community to support what we do," Obama said.

Said Alterman: "Obama is looking for an opportunity to be decisive" in Syria. "You could either see it as reluctance, or patience."

(Additional reporting by Patricia Zengerle, Mark Hosenball and Tabassum Zakaria; Editing by Alistair Bell and David Brunnstrom)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-evidence-chemical-weapons-used-syria-questions-remain-151021291.html

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UMass Amherst biologists propose a new research roadmap for connecting genes to ecology

Public release date: 30-Apr-2013
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Contact: Janet Lathrop
jlathrop@admin.umass.edu
413-545-0444
University of Massachusetts at Amherst

A team of researchers at UMass Amherst proposes a new investigative roadmap for the field of evolutionary developmental biology, or 'evo devo,' to better understand how innovation at the genetic level can lead to ecological adaptations over time

AMHERST, Mass. A team of researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is proposing a new investigative roadmap for the field of evolutionary developmental biology, or "evo devo," to better understand how innovation at the genetic level can lead to ecological adaptations over time. Evo devo seeks to understand the specific genetic mechanisms underlying evolutionary change.

Seven UMass Amherst authors, all biologists but with diverse research programs including evolutionary genetics, developmental biology, biomechanics and behavioral ecology, describe the new framework they created to link genes to ecology in the May issue of Trends in Ecology and Evolution. They propose a set of hypotheses that can form the basis for further studies. "We advocate strengthened collaborations," they point out, among evo devo disciplines "to consider all links from genes to resource use."

In the past, evo-devo research has focused narrowly on connecting gene-level changes with evolution of different anatomical shapes, known as morphology, but it has been less successful in identifying mechanisms of more subtle, continuous changes that are important for how an organism performs in its particular environment. For example, how do genes and mechanisms evolve in relation to how fast an animal runs, how far it jumps or how hard it bites?

Lead co-authors of a new paper, Duncan Irschick and Craig Albertson, say that the field has to date been "hugely successful" in providing a mechanistic basis for the evolution of specific traits including bat wings and turtle shells, but they also point out that the old approach left a major gap in our understanding of what drives evolutionary change.

"Connecting genes to a single discrete trait does not necessarily tell you how that animal performs in its environment, and it is the way an organism interacts with its environment that directly affects its survival," says Albertson. "Performance traits are often multi-dimensional. While gene for jaw width, for example, can tell you something about how an animal feeds in the wild, the full picture involves much more information, such as jaw length, skull depth, muscle size, the kinetics of jaw movement and a slew of other factors."

"We want to expand the research program beyond genes and discrete traits. We argue that if researchers focus on the phenotype and work back to the genes, we will gain a much more comprehensive understanding of how the genome affects an organism's survival in a particular environment. A key first step in this process should be to figure out how genes influence the way an animal negotiates its world."

Co-author Betsy Dumont point out that this work also has immediate practical implications. "We believe this approach has the potential to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how the genome influences an organism's ability to adapt to a changing environment."

Irschick adds, "As a group, we set out to create new intellectual ideas and to provide a platform for scientists to understand the world. I could not have been more pleased at how we all worked together towards that goal, and how we accomplished it."

Albertson says of the team's work, "Understanding how changes at the genomic level can influence an organism's survival in a changing environment is a long-standing question in biology, and one that no single research program can address in a comprehensive manner. It is a rare and special thing to be among colleagues who can pull together their collective expertise in order to begin to tackle this important question."

"By integrating ideas from the disparate fields of developmental biology, functional morphology and evolutionary ecology, we lay out a research program to examine how changes at the genomic level promote ecological success in a changing environment. Our long term goal is to turn these ideas into an integrative training experience for graduate students in the organismic and evolutionary biology program here at UMass Amherst," he adds.

###

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Public release date: 30-Apr-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Janet Lathrop
jlathrop@admin.umass.edu
413-545-0444
University of Massachusetts at Amherst

A team of researchers at UMass Amherst proposes a new investigative roadmap for the field of evolutionary developmental biology, or 'evo devo,' to better understand how innovation at the genetic level can lead to ecological adaptations over time

AMHERST, Mass. A team of researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is proposing a new investigative roadmap for the field of evolutionary developmental biology, or "evo devo," to better understand how innovation at the genetic level can lead to ecological adaptations over time. Evo devo seeks to understand the specific genetic mechanisms underlying evolutionary change.

Seven UMass Amherst authors, all biologists but with diverse research programs including evolutionary genetics, developmental biology, biomechanics and behavioral ecology, describe the new framework they created to link genes to ecology in the May issue of Trends in Ecology and Evolution. They propose a set of hypotheses that can form the basis for further studies. "We advocate strengthened collaborations," they point out, among evo devo disciplines "to consider all links from genes to resource use."

In the past, evo-devo research has focused narrowly on connecting gene-level changes with evolution of different anatomical shapes, known as morphology, but it has been less successful in identifying mechanisms of more subtle, continuous changes that are important for how an organism performs in its particular environment. For example, how do genes and mechanisms evolve in relation to how fast an animal runs, how far it jumps or how hard it bites?

Lead co-authors of a new paper, Duncan Irschick and Craig Albertson, say that the field has to date been "hugely successful" in providing a mechanistic basis for the evolution of specific traits including bat wings and turtle shells, but they also point out that the old approach left a major gap in our understanding of what drives evolutionary change.

"Connecting genes to a single discrete trait does not necessarily tell you how that animal performs in its environment, and it is the way an organism interacts with its environment that directly affects its survival," says Albertson. "Performance traits are often multi-dimensional. While gene for jaw width, for example, can tell you something about how an animal feeds in the wild, the full picture involves much more information, such as jaw length, skull depth, muscle size, the kinetics of jaw movement and a slew of other factors."

"We want to expand the research program beyond genes and discrete traits. We argue that if researchers focus on the phenotype and work back to the genes, we will gain a much more comprehensive understanding of how the genome affects an organism's survival in a particular environment. A key first step in this process should be to figure out how genes influence the way an animal negotiates its world."

Co-author Betsy Dumont point out that this work also has immediate practical implications. "We believe this approach has the potential to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how the genome influences an organism's ability to adapt to a changing environment."

Irschick adds, "As a group, we set out to create new intellectual ideas and to provide a platform for scientists to understand the world. I could not have been more pleased at how we all worked together towards that goal, and how we accomplished it."

Albertson says of the team's work, "Understanding how changes at the genomic level can influence an organism's survival in a changing environment is a long-standing question in biology, and one that no single research program can address in a comprehensive manner. It is a rare and special thing to be among colleagues who can pull together their collective expertise in order to begin to tackle this important question."

"By integrating ideas from the disparate fields of developmental biology, functional morphology and evolutionary ecology, we lay out a research program to examine how changes at the genomic level promote ecological success in a changing environment. Our long term goal is to turn these ideas into an integrative training experience for graduate students in the organismic and evolutionary biology program here at UMass Amherst," he adds.

###

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-04/uoma-uab043013.php

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Stocks up in midday trading as spending rises

NEW YORK (AP) ? Technology companies led the stock market higher Monday, pushing the Standard & Poor's 500 index back up to the record high it reached earlier this month.

A pair of strong economic reports also encouraged investors. Wages and spending rose in the U.S. last month, and pending home sales hit their highest level in three years.

Shortly after 12 p.m., the Dow Jones industrial average was up 85 points at 14,798, a gain of 0.6 percent. Microsoft and IBM were among the Dow's best performers, rising 2 percent each.

Big tech firms have slumped this month. Concerns about weak business spending and slower overseas sales have weighed on the industry, said Marty Leclerc, the managing partner of Barrack Yard Advisors, an investment firm in Bryn Mawr, Pa. Revenue misses from IBM and other big tech companies have highlighted the industry's vulnerability to the world economy.

"The areas of the stock market that haven't done as well rely on exports," Leclerc said. "Those stocks more dependent on the domestic economy have done the best."

Tech played catch-up on Monday. Information technology stocks rose the most of the 10 industry groups in the S&P, 1.5 percent. It's the only group that remains lower over the past year.

The S&P 500 index was up 11 points to 1,593, a gain of 0.7 percent. That matches its all-time closing high reached on April 11.

The Nasdaq composite rose 32 points at 3,311, a rise of 1 percent. Apple, the biggest stock in the index, rose 3.5 percent to $431.95.

The number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes reached the highest level since April 2010, according to the National Association of Realtors. Back then, a tax credit for buying houses had lifted sales. Separately, the government reported that Americans' spending and income both edged up last month.

Moody's and Standard & Poor's parent company McGraw-Hill surged following news that the ratings agencies settled lawsuits dating back to the financial crisis that accused them of concealing risky investments. McGraw-Hill gained 6 percent to $54.80, while Moody's jumped 10 percent to $61.02, the biggest gain in the S&P 500.

Eaton Corp. gained 5 percent to $61.31 after reporting that its quarterly net income jumped, beating Wall Street's estimates. The results were helped by its acquisition of Cooper Industries, an electrical equipment supplier.

In the market for government bonds, the yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped to 1.65 percent. That's down from 1.67 percent late Friday.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/stocks-midday-trading-spending-rises-162806957.html

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Army says no to more tanks, but Congress insists

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Built to dominate the enemy in combat, the Army's hulking Abrams tank is proving equally hard to beat in a budget battle.

Lawmakers from both parties have devoted nearly half a billion dollars in taxpayer money over the past two years to build improved versions of the 70-ton Abrams.

But senior Army officials have said repeatedly, "No thanks."

It's the inverse of the federal budget world these days, in which automatic spending cuts are leaving sought-after pet programs struggling or unpaid altogether. Republicans and Democrats for years have fought so bitterly that lawmaking in Washington ground to a near-halt.

Yet in the case of the Abrams tank, there's a bipartisan push to spend an extra $436 million on a weapon the experts explicitly say is not needed.

"If we had our choice, we would use that money in a different way," Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army's chief of staff, told The Associated Press this past week.

Why are the tank dollars still flowing? Politics.

Keeping the Abrams production line rolling protects businesses and good paying jobs in congressional districts where the tank's many suppliers are located.

If there's a home of the Abrams, it's politically important Ohio. The nation's only tank plant is in Lima. So it's no coincidence that the champions for more tanks are Rep. Jim Jordan and Sen. Rob Portman, two of Capitol's Hill most prominent deficit hawks, as well as Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown. They said their support is rooted in protecting national security, not in pork-barrel politics.

"The one area where we are supposed to spend taxpayer money is in defense of the country," said Jordan, whose district in the northwest part of the state includes the tank plant.

The Abrams dilemma underscores the challenge that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel faces as he seeks to purge programs that the military considers unnecessary or too expensive in order to ensure there's enough money for essential operations, training and equipment.

Hagel, a former Republican senator from Nebraska, faces a daunting task in persuading members of Congress to eliminate or scale back projects favored by constituents.

Federal budgets are always peppered with money for pet projects. What sets the Abrams example apart is the certainty of the Army's position.

Sean Kennedy, director of research for the nonpartisan Citizens Against Government Waste, said Congress should listen when one of the military services says no to more equipment.

"When an institution as risk averse as the Defense Department says they have enough tanks, we can probably believe them," Kennedy said.

Congressional backers of the Abrams upgrades view the vast network of companies, many of them small businesses, that manufacture the tanks' materials and parts as a critical asset that has to be preserved. The money, they say, is a modest investment that will keep important tooling and manufacturing skills from being lost if the Abrams line were to be shut down.

The Lima plant is a study in how federal dollars affect local communities, which in turn hold tight to the federal dollars. The facility is owned by the federal government but operated by the land systems division of General Dynamics, a major defense contractor that spent close to $11 million last year on lobbying, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

The plant is Lima's fifth-largest employer with close to 700 employees, down from about 1,100 just a few years ago, according to Mayor David Berger. But the facility is still crucial to the local economy. "All of those jobs and their spending activity in the community and the company's spending probably have about a $100 million impact annually," Berger said.

Jordan, a House conservative leader who has pushed for deep reductions in federal spending, supported the automatic cuts known as the sequester that require $42 billion to be shaved from the Pentagon's budget by the end of September. The military also has to absorb a $487 billion reduction in defense spending over the next 10 years, as required by the Budget Control Act passed in 2011.

Still, said Jordan, it would be a big mistake to stop producing tanks.

"Look, (the plant) is in the 4th Congressional District and my job is to represent the 4th Congressional District, so I understand that," he said. "But the fact remains, if it was not in the best interests of the national defense for the United States of America, then you would not see me supporting it like we do."

The tanks that Congress is requiring the Army to buy aren't brand new. Earlier models are being outfitted with a sophisticated suite of electronics that gives the vehicles better microprocessors, color flat panel displays, a more capable communications system, and other improvements. The upgraded tanks cost about $7.5 million each, according to the Army.

Out of a fleet of nearly 2,400 tanks, roughly two-thirds are the improved versions, which the Army refers to with a moniker that befits their heft: the M1A2SEPv2, and service officials said they have plenty of them. "The Army is on record saying we do not require any additional M1A2s," Davis Welch, deputy director of the Army budget office, said this month.

The tank fleet, on average, is less than 3 years old. The Abrams is named after Gen. Creighton Abrams, one of the top tank commanders during World War II and a former Army chief of staff.

The Army's plan was to stop buying tanks until 2017, when production of a newly designed Abrams would begin. Orders for Abrams tanks from U.S. allies help fill the gap created by the loss of tanks for the Army, according to service officials, but congressional proponents of the program feared there would not be enough international business to keep the Abrams line going.

This pause in tank production for the U.S. would allow the Army to spend its money on research and development work for the new and improved model, said Ashley Givens, a spokeswoman for the Army's Ground Combat Systems office.

The first editions of the Abrams tank were fielded in the early 1980s. Over the decades, the Abrams supply chain has become embedded in communities across the country.

General Dynamics estimated in 2011 that there were more than 560 subcontractors throughout the country involved in the Abrams program and that they employed as many as 18,000 people. More than 40 of the companies are in Pennsylvania, according to Sen. Robert Casey, D-Pa., also a staunch backer of continued tank production.

A letter signed by 173 Democratic and Republican members of the House last year and sent to then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta demonstrated the depth of bipartisan support for the Abrams program on Capitol Hill. They chided the Obama administration for neglecting the industrial base and proposing to terminate tank production in the United States for the first time since World War II.

Portman, who served as President George W. Bush's budget director before being elected to the Senate, said allowing the line to wither and close would create a financial mess.

"People can't sit around for three years on unemployment insurance and wait for the government to come back," Portman said. "That supply chain is going to be much more costly and much more inefficient to create if you mothball the plant."

Pete Keating, a General Dynamics spokesman, said the money from Congress is allowing for a stable base of production for the Army, which receives about four tanks a month. With the line open, Lima also can fill international orders, bringing more work to Lima and preserving American jobs, he said.

Current foreign customers are Saudi Arabia, which is getting about five tanks a month, and Egypt, which is getting four. Each country pays all of their own costs. That's a "success story during a period of economic pain," Keating said.

Still, far fewer tanks are coming out of the Lima plant than in years past. The drop-off has affected companies such as Verhoff Machine and Welding in Continental, Ohio, which makes seats and other parts for the Abrams. Ed Verhoff, the company's president, said his sales have dropped from $20 million to $7 million over the past two years. He's also had to lay off about 25 skilled employees and he expects to be issuing more pink slips in the future.

"When we start to lose this base of people, what are we going to do? Buy our tanks from China?" Verhoff said.

Steven Grundman, a defense expert at the Atlantic Council in Washington, said the difficulty of reviving defense industrial capabilities tends to be overstated.

"From the fairly insular world in which the defense industry operates, these capabilities seem to be unique and in many cases extraordinarily high art," said Grundman, a former deputy undersecretary of defense for industrial affairs and installations during the Clinton administration. "But in the greater scope of the economy, they tend not to be."

___

Online:

Abrams tank: http://www.army.mil/factfiles/equipment/tracked/abrams.html

__

Follow Richard Lardner on Twitter: https://twitter.com/rplardner

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/army-says-no-more-tanks-congress-insists-115422396.html

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Officials: 2 dead in building collapse in France

PARIS (AP) ? An official says an explosion at a residential building and subsequent partial collapse of the edifice has left at least two people dead and injured nine others in France's Champagne country.

A local rescue official says more than 100 rescue workers, firefighters, and bomb and gas experts were deployed to the building in the subsidized housing complex that collapsed Sunday morning in the city of Reims, east of Paris.

Reims mayor Adeline Hazan told France's BFM television that "a very powerful explosion" had taken place but the cause was unclear. She said the bodies of the two people killed remained under the rubble.

The rescue official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter, said he couldn't immediately confirm whether an explosion had taken place.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-04-28-EU-France-Building-Collapse/id-a59fa22a72d246938281085b0dfc58ce

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Lawmakers: Syria chemical weapons could menace US

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., walks to a meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, April 26, 2013, with Secretary of State John Kerry as he and national intelligence advisers came to the Capitol to update members of the House on Syria's alleged use of poisonous gas in its ongoing civil war. U.S. intelligence has concluded with "varying degrees of confidence," that the Syrian government has twice used chemical weapons in its fierce civil war, the White House and other top administration officials said Thursday. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., walks to a meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, April 26, 2013, with Secretary of State John Kerry as he and national intelligence advisers came to the Capitol to update members of the House on Syria's alleged use of poisonous gas in its ongoing civil war. U.S. intelligence has concluded with "varying degrees of confidence," that the Syrian government has twice used chemical weapons in its fierce civil war, the White House and other top administration officials said Thursday. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Syria's stockpile of chemical weapons could be a greater threat after that nation's president leaves power and could end up targeting Americans at home, lawmakers warned Sunday as they considered a U.S. response that stops short of sending military forces there.

U.S. officials last week declared that the Syrian government probably had used chemical weapons twice in March, newly provocative acts in the 2-year civil war that has killed more than 70,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands more. The U.S. assessment followed similar conclusions from Britain, France, Israel and Qatar ? key allies eager for a more aggressive response to the Syrian conflict.

President Barack Obama has said Syria's likely action ? or the transfer of President Bashar Assad's stockpiles to terrorists ? would cross a "red line" that would compel the United States to act.

Lawmakers sought to remind viewers on Sunday news programs of Obama's declaration while discouraging a U.S. foothold on the ground there.

"The president has laid down the line, and it can't be a dotted line. It can't be anything other than a red line," said House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich. "And more than just Syria, Iran is paying attention to this. North Korea is paying attention to this."

Added Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.: "For America to sit on the sidelines and do nothing is a huge mistake."

Obama has insisted that any use of chemical weapons would change his thinking about the United States' role in Syria but said he didn't have enough information to order aggressive action.

"For the Syrian government to utilize chemical weapons on its people crosses a line that will change my calculus and how the United States approaches these issues," Obama said Friday.

But Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Democrat, said Sunday the United States needs to consider those weapons. She said that when Assad leaves power, his opponents could have access to those weapons or they could fall into the hands of U.S. enemies.

"The day after Assad is the day that these chemical weapons could be at risk ... (and) we could be in bigger, even bigger trouble," she said.

Both sides of the civil war already accuse each other of using the chemical weapons.

The deadliest such alleged attack was in the Khan al-Assal village in the Aleppo province in March. The Syrian government called for the United Nations to investigate alleged chemical weapons use by rebels in the attack that killed 31 people.

Syria, however, has not allowed a team of experts into the country because it wants the investigation limited to the single Khan al-Assal incident, while U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has urged "immediate and unfettered access" for an expanded investigation.

One of Obama's chief antagonists on Syria, Sen. John McCain, R- Ariz., said the United States should go to Syria as part of an international force to safeguard the chemical weapons. But McCain added that he is not advocating sending ground troops to the nation.

"The worst thing we could do is put boots on the ground," McCain said.

His friend, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., also said the United States could safeguard the weapons without a ground force. But he cautioned the weapons must be protected for fear that Americans could be targeted. Raising the specter of the lethal bomb at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, Graham said the next attack on U.S. soil could employ weapons that were once part of Assad's arsenal.

"The next bomb that goes off in America may not have nails and glass," he said.

Rogers and Schakowsky spoke to ABC's "This Week." Chambliss and Graham were interviewed on CBS's "Face the Nation." McCain appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press."

___

Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Philip_Elliott

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-04-28-US-Syria/id-282719b58ce349b481c3d3ac90c87902

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3 Taliban bombs target Pakistani politicians

PARACHINAR, Pakistan (AP) ? Taliban bombs targeting politicians in northwestern Pakistan on Sunday killed 11 people, the latest in a series of attacks meant to disrupt next month's parliamentary election, police said.

The wave of political violence has killed at least 60 people in recent weeks, and many of the attacks have been directed at candidates from secular parties opposed to the Taliban. That has raised concern the violence could benefit hard-line Islamic candidates and others who are more sympathetic to the Taliban because they are able to campaign more freely without fear of being of being attacked.

Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ahsanullah Ahsan claimed responsibility for the three attacks, plus two others against secular parties in the southern port city of Karachi on Saturday that killed four people and wounded over 40.

"We are against all politicians who are going to become part of any secular, democratic government," Ahsan told The Associated Press by telephone from an undisclosed location.

The first bomb on Sunday ripped through the campaign office of Syed Noor Akbar on the outskirts of Kohat city, killing six people and wounding 10, police officer Mujtaba Hussain said.

A second bomb targeted the office of another candidate, Nasir Khan Afridi, in the suburbs of Peshawar city. That attack killed three people and wounded 12, police officer Saifur Rehman said.

The politicians were not in their offices at the time of the blasts. They are both running as independent candidates for parliament to represent constituencies in Pakistan's rugged tribal region along the Afghan border, the main sanctuary for Taliban and al-Qaida militants in the country.

Many politicians running in the May 11 election from the tribal region have their offices located elsewhere and find it hard to campaign in their constituencies because of the danger. The two who were attacked Sunday are considered to hold relatively progressive views compared to the deeply conservative Islamic beliefs of many in the tribal region.

The third attack occurred in the town of Swabi, where a bomb went off during a small rally held by the Awami National Party, which has been repeatedly targeted by the Taliban. The blast killed two people and wounded five, said police officer Farooq Khan. The two candidates targeted in the attack, Ameer Rehman and Haji Rehman, were not hurt.

The Pakistani Taliban have been waging a bloody insurgency against the government for years that has killed thousands of civilians and security personnel. The group's goal is to oust Pakistan's democratic government and implement a system based on Islamic law.

In mid-March, the Taliban threatened attacks against three secular parties that have earned the militants' ire by supporting military operations against them in the northwest: the Awami National Party, the Muttahida Quami Movement and the Pakistan People's Party. The Taliban have carried out at least 20 attacks against politicians and campaign workers since then, mostly from these three parties.

The violence has forced the parties to close dozens of campaign offices and has prevented them from holding large political rallies that are normally the hallmark of Pakistani elections. Many of the candidates have had to find ways to campaign from a distance, relying more on social media, advertisements and even short documentaries to rally support.

That has put these candidates at a disadvantage, and many have complained the militant violence amounts to vote rigging.

Candidates from Islamic parties and others who have advocated negotiating peace with the militants rather than fighting them have been able to campaign with much less fear of being attacked.

Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, head of the Pakistan Muslim League-N party, held a rally with several thousand people in the northern town of Murree on Sunday without incident. Many analysts predict Sharif's party will come out on top in the parliamentary election.

The Taliban issued a statement earlier this year requesting that Sharif and the heads of the country's two largest Islamic parties mediate peace negotiations. Sharif declined but said he was a supporter of the talks.

The parties that have been targeted by the Taliban also support peace negotiations with the militants, but only if they lay down their weapons and accept the constitution first ? conditions the militant group has rejected.

____

Associated Press Writers Riaz Khan and Rasool Dawar in Peshawar contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/3-taliban-bombs-target-pakistani-politicians-172732748.html

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Lawmakers cancel FAA furloughs, flee Washington ? by air

Air travelers breathed a sigh of relief after Congress passed quick legislation allowing the FAA to cancel furloughs for air traffic controllers. But that's just increased partisan sniping over the sequester and its across-the-board budget cuts.

By Brad Knickerbocker,?Staff writer / April 27, 2013

A passenger waits for his flight at Hartsfield-Jackson airport in Atlanta Friday. Congress approved legislation ending furloughs of air traffic controllers that have delayed hundreds of flights daily, infuriating travelers and causing political headaches for lawmakers. The FAA says things should be back to normal by Sunday evening.

David Goldman/AP

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On behalf of steaming-mad air travelers ? some forced to wait hours or have their flights canceled ? Congress gave the Federal Aviation Administration special dispensation to call furloughed air traffic controllers back to work.

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Then most of them scooted out of town for a week?s vacation, heading for Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (known to Democrats as ?Washington National?) or to Dulles International.

On Saturday came good travel news for all air travelers, no matter their political affiliation, the FAA announcing simply:

?The FAA has suspended all employee furloughs. Air traffic facilities will begin to return to regular staffing levels over the next 24 hours and the system will resume normal operations by Sunday evening.?

(Which came as particularly good news to Decoder, who?s scheduled to fly cross-country and back ? six flights in all ? this coming week.)

But none of those now-absent members of House and Senate should expect to receive much constituent praise for having over-ruled themselves on behalf of the FAA. It took breaking part of the ?sequester? scheme for across-the-board budget cuts, designed to force themselves (and the Obama administration) to come to agreement on government spending and the deficit.

Who?s to blame? The other guy, of course.

In his radio address Saturday, President Obama had this to say:

?It was a bad idea then.?And as the country saw this week, it?s a bad idea now?.?

Republicans fired back.

"There are some in the Obama administration who thought inflicting pain on the public would give the president more leverage to avoid making necessary spending cuts, and to impose more tax hikes on the American people,'' said Rep. Bill Shuster of Pennsylvania, chairman of the House transportation committee, in the GOP address. ?This episode is yet another demonstration of why we need to replace the president?s sequester with smarter, more responsible cuts.?

?The president?s sequester? ? that was part of the budget deal agreed to by the Republican-controlled House, of which House Speaker John Boehner (R) said, ?I got 98 percent of what I wanted.?

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Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/twM5CV77iCU/Lawmakers-cancel-FAA-furloughs-flee-Washington-by-air

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PHOTOS: Politics, press and stars mix at dinner

AAA??Apr. 27, 2013?11:58 PM ET
PHOTOS: Politics, press and stars mix at dinner
By The Associated Press??By The Associated Press

First lady Michelle Obama and late-night television host and comedian Conan O'Brien gesture to his tie at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

First lady Michelle Obama and late-night television host and comedian Conan O'Brien gesture to his tie at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Late-night television host Conan O'Brien, from left, first lady Michelle Obama, Michael Clemente, Executive Vice President of Fox News, and President Barack Obama attend the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Director Steven Spielberg uses his smart phone during the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Christi Parsons, White House correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and Tribune newspaper chain, from left, Chief of Staff Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, Michael Scherer, White House correspondent for TIME, late-night television host Conan O'Brien and first lady Michelle Obama attend the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President Barack Obama speaks at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, Saturday, April 27, 2013, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

There were Republicans mixing with Democrats, journalists talking to Hollywood celebrities who play reporters or politicians and, of course, President Barack Obama. The president and headliner Conan O'Brien traded barbs about each other and many of those attending the annual star-studded White House Correspondents' Association dinner. Here are some images from the evening's festivities:

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-04-27-Obama-Correspondents-Photo%20Gallery/id-c8c9f944b67344da80bd735b300b242c

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Activision CEO Kotick among top-paid CEOs in U.S.

(Reuters) - Videogame publisher Activision Blizzard Inc's Chief Executive Robert Kotick received a total compensation of $64.9 million last year, making him one of the top paid CEOs in the United States.

Kotick's 2012 total compensation includes about $56 million in stock awards, while there were no stock awards for 2011. His base salary doubled to $2 million, according to regulatory filings on Friday. (http://r.reuters.com/bew67t)

Kotick, 50, also a board member of Coca-Cola Co, was paid $8.33 million in 2011 by Santa Monica-based Activision.

The company's revenues and net income, however, rose only in single digits for 2012, slower than the growth rate it saw in 2011.

Activision's Kotick makes over three times the $21 million pay package received by Goldman Sach Group Inc's CEO Lloyd Blankfein in 2012, and it is 50 percent higher than Walt Disney Co CEO Robert Iger's $40.2 million compensation in 2012.

Kotick has been a director and CEO of Activision Inc, since February 1991 until July 2008, when he became CEO of Activision Blizzard in connection with the combination of Activision and Vivendi Games.

(Reporting by Thyagaraju Adinarayan in Bangalore; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/activision-ceo-kotick-among-top-paid-ceos-u-234401896.html

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Self Defense ? Striking Points That Are Effective | Jackie's Women's ...

Related eBooks

There isn?t one person alive who shouldn?t be concerned about their own personal safety and personal security. We have always encouraged people to carry at least one self-defense product with them. Here are some striking points that can be used in any self-defense situation to disable an assailant rather quickly. Read on to learn more.

Source:Self Defense ? Striking Points That Are Effective

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Self Defense: The Psychology of Attack and Survival (How To Defend Yourself and Survive In Any Dangerous Situation) (Self Defense Psychology)Self defense isn?t about carrying around a gun or mace or weapons. It?s not about being bigger or stronger than others. It?s not about what you look like, whether you?re a man or a woman or how old you are.

At the end of the day, the you will survive because your mind and body are strong and united. We?ve all heard stories of super-human strength ? the grandma who lifted up with her bare hands to save her grandson and other such stories abound.

But the same thing can happen mentally ? at times of great stress, you can acquire super-human mental powers as well as physical. Like the lady who is mugged at gunpoint and says something that spooks the robber. He runs away, dropping her purse, and the woman picks it up and walks off like nothing happened.

How do we access our super-human potential when we need it most?

How can you fight off four assailants at once?

How can you talk your way out of being robbed?

How can you protect yourself and your family when something goes wrong?

These questions haunted me for years. I would often lay awake at night or daydream about potential fights or conflicts. Some guy at the bar comes at me with a knife so I use a typical Aikido move to disarm him and throw him on the ground using his own force. I get jumped from behind in an alleyway and knocked on the ground... the scenarios played through my head over and over like a moviescreen. Only this wasn?t the movies. It wasn?t real either ? it was practice.

And that practice payed off ? in a big way.

I want this book to prepare you for what may lie ahead. No one knows what the future holds. But even if you never have to face an attack or serious bodily harm for the rest of your life, this book will prepare you mentally and physically for when times get tough.

Life isn?t about being bigger, stronger, fast or smarter than the competition. Life is about survival. It?s about freedom, confidence and success. This book will give you the tools and the confidence to know that you will survive no matter what happens.

Learn how to defend and protect yourself and your family today. Scroll up and grab your copy!

Self-Defense (Alex Delaware)Dr. Alex Delaware doesn t see many private patients anymore, but the young woman called Lucy is an exception. So is her dream. Lucy Lowell is referred to Alex by Los Angeles police detective Milo Sturgis. A juror at the agonizing trial of a serial killer, Lucy survived the trauma only to be tormented by a recurring nightmare: a young child in the forest at night, watching a strange and furtive act.

Now Lucy s dream is starting to disrupt her waking life, and Alex is concerned. The power of the dream, its grip on Lucy s emotions, suggests to him that it may be more than a nightmare. It may be the repressed childhood memory of something very real. Something like murder.

Vital Point Strikes: The Art and Science of Striking Vital Targets for Self-defense and Combat SportsVital Point Strikes is a guide to pressure point striking for the average martial artist. Sang H. Kim demystifies the lore of vital point striking and shows you realistic applications of vital point strikes for self-defense and combat sports. For those new to the concept of vital points, he begins by examining the Eastern theory of acupoints, meridians and ki (qi) and the Western scientific concepts of the nervous and circulatory systems, pain threshold and pain tolerance, and the relationship between pain and fear. This synthesis of accepted Eastern and Western theories helps the reader understand what makes vital point striking work and why it can be not only useful in fighting, but deadly. Based on this introduction, you ll learn about 202 vital points for use in fighting including the name, point number, location, involved nerves and blood vessels, applicable techniques, sample applications, and potential results for each point. The points are illustrated in detail on an anatomically correct human model, with English, Chinese, and Korean names as well as point numbers for easy reference. In addition to identifying the vital points, Sang H. Kim gives you detailed information about the type of techniques that work for vital point striking including a discussion of fighting zones and ranges, plexus strikes, stance and footwork, bodily weapons, striking directions and angles and dozens of applications for common empty hand, grappling, groundfighting, knife and gun attacks. Based on over thirty years experience in the martial arts and in-depth research, Sang H. Kim has created one of the most complete books available on the art and science of vital point striking. Complete Krav Maga: The Ultimate Guide to Over 230 Self-Defense and Combative TechniquesDeveloped for the Israel military forces and battle tested in real-life combat, Krav Maga has gained an international reputation as an easy-to-learn yet highly effective art of self-defense. Clearly written and extensively illustrated, Complete Krav Maga details every aspect of the system including dozens of hand-to-hand combat moves, over 20 weapons defense techniques and a complete physical conditioning workout program.

All the moves are described in depth from beginning Yellow Belt to advanced Black Belt, yet they are easy to learn because one of Krav Maga's strengths is its simplicity. Based on the principle that it is best to move from defense to attack as quickly as possible, Complete Krav Maga offers fast-escape maneuvers from attacks and holds. It then follows them up with specific counterattacks, including punches, kicks and throws.

The authors show how anyone (big or small, man or woman) can practice self defense by using Krav Maga to protect weak spots, exploit an assailant's vulnerabilities and turn the attacker s force against him. Complete Krav Maga teaches the reader how to get in shape, gain confidence and feel safer and more secure every day.

Tags: self defense

Source: http://www.jackiesbazaar.com/womensinterests/self-defense/self-defense-striking-points-that-are-effective

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Terrence Malick's moving Christian message ? and film critics' failure to engage with it

The divisive director's last two films were essentially ecstatic cinematic tributes to God. But you wouldn't know it from reading the reviews

Christianity gets a lot of bad press, much of it richly deserved. Evangelical Protestants have been making a decisive contribution to anti-intellectualism in American life for a long time now, and today they continue to produce more than their share of creationist claptrap and sentimentalist kitsch. Catholics, for their part, often do little better, with leading clerics and lay intellectuals fixated on policing sexual morals and seemingly eager to treat the church as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party.

Obviously, there is so much more to Christianity than this. And the recent work of filmmaker Terrence Malick shows us exactly what that is.

SEE MORE: Should Congress fix the sequester just to halt flight delays?

Both The Tree of Life (2011) and the just-released To the Wonder are deeply Christian in outlook and inspiration ? and both demonstrate the religion's continued power to serve as a vital cultural and intellectual force.

Mainstream critics hardly seem to have noticed. The problem isn't that reviews of the films have been negative. (Many critics praised The Tree of Life, while To the Wonder has been widely panned.) The problem is that, regardless of whether they've admired or ridiculed the films, the vast majority of mainstream critics have failed to treat them as the profoundly religious ? and specifically Christian ? works of art that they are. Whether or not the silence is a product of the theological illiteracy and scriptural ignorance that typically prevails among overwhelmingly secular journalists, something essential about these remarkable films has been missed.?

SEE MORE: 10 things you need to know today: April 26, 2013

(Beware: Spoilers lie ahead.)

Critics did a passable job with The Tree of Life. In part that was because its religious themes and cosmic ambitions were impossible to miss. Here was a movie that asked sweeping theological questions ? What is the meaning of suffering and loss? Why does God permit it? What kind of consolation can faith provide? ? and answered them on the broadest possible terms. The film begins with one man's anguished efforts to come to terms with the death of his brother. From there it returns to the creation of the universe, gives us a glimpse of the origins of divine grace among the dinosaurs, explores the man's boyhood struggles with his father, mother, and ill-fated brother, and finally portrays the end of life on earth and a reconciliation of loved ones in heaven. Many critics found it impossible not to be swept away by the audacity of Malick's cinematic vision and breathtaking ambition.

SEE MORE: Today in history: April 26

Yet even the most positive reviews of The Tree of Life skated over its numerous theological and scriptural allusions, and several critics who otherwise praised the film openly mocked the Fellini-esque vision of the afterlife with which it concludes. (One wonders if these critics also roll their eyes at the biblical verse in which we are promised that in heaven God will wipe away every tear from our eyes.)

To the Wonder has fared far worse. On the most obvious level, the movie tells a straightforwardly tragic love story: An American man (Neil, played by Ben Affleck) and French woman (Marina, played by Olga Kurylenko) fall for each other in Paris; they hit the skids after she returns with him to Oklahoma; Neil takes up with a second woman (Jane, played by Rachel McAdams); that relationship also fails; Neil and Marina give it another go; when things deteriorate further, they go their separate ways. The End. If that's all there were to it ? an unimaginative plot presented in Malick's sumptuous visual style and acted by largely mute characters who speak mainly in elliptical voiceovers ? To the Wonder would be the beautiful but boring failure so many critics are saying it is.

SEE MORE: The tanking economy: Is a spreadsheet error to blame?

But that's not all there is to it. On a deeper level, the film is Malick's meditation on the Christian vision of love ? and the obstacles that we perversely place in the way of satisfying our irrepressible longing for it. Anyone who's fallen in love is familiar with the feeling: The world appears transfigured. In the first words of the film, Marina describes it as being "newborn," called "out of the shadows." In a series of quick scenes filmed in Paris, the lovers touch and embrace each other bathed in radiant sunlight. In voiceover, Neil calls Marina "my sweet love... my hope." Marina says their love unites them, makes one person out of two.?

Ultimately, for Malick, the experience of falling in love grants us a glimpse of the divine ? of a "Love that loves us" (as Marina twice describes it in voiceover, once at the beginning and again at the end of film). Early in the movie, Neil and Marina feel their love intertwine with the sacred when they pay a visit to the stunning church on the island of Mont Saint-Michel off the northwest coast of France, where the lovers (in Marina's words) "climbed the steps to the wonder." (The island and church, nicknamed "the wonder" [le merveille], gives the film its title.)

SEE MORE: A short history of Shakespearean insults

But love is not only rapture. In Malick's Christian view, it also calls on us to sacrifice, to give ourselves over fully to the one we love. Once Marina moves to Oklahoma with Neil, a new character (a priest named Father Quintana, movingly played by Javier Bardem) expresses these sentiments in voiceovers and homilies from the pulpit of his church. Paraphrasing Ephesians 5:25, Father Quintana declares that "a husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the church and give his life for her." It is in undertaking this sacrifice that we participate in "the divine presence, which sleeps in each man, in each woman."

Marina is eager for such sacrifice, but Neil resists it, with Marina but also with Jane ? both of whom long to have children with him. (Children haunt the film, promising a happiness and fulfillment, and demanding a commitment, that is never chosen.) Glancing longingly at other women, Neil prefers to remain aloof, forever keeping his options open, turning love (in Jane's words) into "nothing: pleasure, lust," instead of treating it as the divine "command" that Father Quintana says it is: "Love is not only a feeling. Love is a duty. You shall love... You feel your love has died? It is perhaps waiting to be transformed into something higher."?

SEE MORE: Immigration reform: The Senate and the House are on a collision course

Not that Father Quintana is some kind of saint. On the contrary, like Neil, he struggles with love ? in his case, the priestly call to brotherly love or charity (agape). Lonely and lost, he says he "thirsts" for God but worries that the "stream is dried up." In voiceover, he confesses to God: "Everywhere you are present. And still I can't see you. You're within me. Around me. And I have no experience of you. Not as I once did. Why don't I hold onto what I've found? My heart is cold. Hard."

That so many reviewers have either ignored Father Quintana's role in the film, or seen his struggles as an uninteresting subplot unrelated to the movie's exploration of romantic and sexual love, is perhaps the most stunning critical oversight of all. Just as Neil holds himself back, refusing to give in to all that love demands, Father Quintana often fails to detect the presence of God all around him and sometimes withholds himself from the most troubled and troubling people to whom he's called to minister (including prisoners and drug addicts).

SEE MORE: WATCH: Jon Stewart dissects the Bush Presidential Library

Yet unlike Neil, who ends up alone, Father Quintana achieves a spiritual epiphany during a sequence toward the end of the movie that is unlike any I have ever encountered in film, and one I have not seen referenced in a single mainstream review. As the priest comforts a succession of suffering people ? the old, the anguished, the crippled, the sick, and the dying ? he recites a devotion of St. Patrick: "Christ be with me. Christ before me. Christ behind me. Christ in me. Christ beneath me. Christ above me. Christ on my right. Christ on my left. Christ in the heart." The sequence reaches its climax with the recitation of a prayer by Cardinal Newman (one that was also prayed daily by Mother Teresa's Sisters of the Missionaries of Charity): "Flood our souls with your spirit and life so completely that our lives may only be a reflection of yours. Shine through us. Show us how to seek you. We were made to see you."

Humanity was made for God. And he is present all around us ? in the transfiguring, wondrous joy of romantic love, in self-giving sacrifice, in our suffering and the suffering of others, in the charity we offer to those in pain, in the resplendent beauty of the natural world ? if only we open our eyes to see him. That, it seems, is Terrence Malick's scandalous message.

SEE MORE: Your annual investing checkup ? in 5 painless steps

Take it or leave it. Be moved by it or dismiss it as mystical nonsense. But please, recognize it for what it is: an ecstatic cinematic tribute to God.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/terrence-malicks-moving-christian-message-film-critics-failure-093500205.html

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Big List of Link Building No-Nos - 'Net Features - Website Magazine

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Link building is one of the most basic methods that Web professionals use to grow their businesses online. It?s a pretty great system because there are so many different ways to build links on the Internet, but it?s also really difficult because there are so many ways to build links, meaning there are a lot of ways to screw it up.

So, while getting links is an essential task for website owners, they should also make sure that they?re doing it the right way. Otherwise, their brand can be seriously (and in drastic cases, even irreparably) damaged. But with so many options for link building, how do you know what to do and what not to do? That?s easy! Just check out this Website Magazine guide to link building no-nos.

Irrelevant or Duplicate Content
If you?re trying to garner links from websites, the first thing you should do is make sure you?re worth linking to! That means producing original and valuable content that is going to have some relevance to the people visiting the pages you want links from. Also, avoid running duplicate content (either content previously published on your site, or that you?ve written and published elsewhere) and writing guest blog posts for irrelevant sites. This will make your site feel authoritative and be more attractive to high-quality links.

Don?t Spam or Leave Irrelevant Comments
Look, nobody on the Web likes a spammer, so don?t be that guy (or gal). It?s fair game for you to want to visit websites or forums that are relevant to your audience or niche and spread the word about your great site in hopes of building a few links, but that doesn?t mean you should just drop in context-less comments or replies that don?t really help progress any discussions or provide value to other readers, all in hopes that they?ll pay attention to you. Instead, take part in ongoing discussions to build your presence as an authority, and only add references or links to your site when it will add value to other visitors. And if you?re on a forum, you can even include a link to your site in your signature.

Be Social ? Not Pushy
Social media marketing is basically a necessity on the Web these days; you?re just not going to get anywhere without it. However, just having a profile on Facebook, Twitter, etc. is not enough ? you also have to be social and engage with your fans/followers and other big names in your niche. Be friendly and open, and under no circumstances should you simply and blatantly engage in self-promotion, or spam the walls (and news feeds) of your fans with promotional links.

Don?t Buy Crappy Links
The ultimate goal for people looking to build links is to find those that are high-quality and relevant to your site, so not only is it a waste for you to try to buy links from low-quality sources, it?ll also get you in trouble with Google, which keeps a cautious eye on low quality link sites that engage in a nefarious practice called ?link farming.? When it comes to getting quality links, your site and content should be all you need. And while you?re at it, don?t bother with ?trading? links with low quality sites just to have them. You?re better than that?

Slow Down on Submitting to Directories
Directories, either paid or free, are great because they can seem like they're these big fields where links grow just for you, but don?t be tempted to just submit your site to a bunch of directories the week it goes live. Remember, good links come naturally and are built up over time. Plus, search engines can totally tell when you?ve just acquired a lot of links by going directory crazy, and that?s going to do more harm than good for your site in the immediate future.

Don?t Over-Link to Your Own Site
If you?re a hard-working content marketer, chances are you?re producing articles and blog posts pretty regularly, including for other websites or blogs that you don?t run. Naturally, you may want to drop a link to your site once, maybe twice, in said article, if there?s a natural and not-totally-obvious way to do it (most authors save this for their bio section attached to the article). Be careful not to ?over-link? to your site in these articles, though. Remember, you?re supposed to be offering relevant and valuable information to your readers, not promoting your website, so never drop in more than one link to your site. Besides, Google is open about the fact that it only reads the first link anyway, so more than one link is not only annoying, but also useless.

Link to Various Pages on Your Site
One of the biggest mistakes that people make when linking to their websites is to link only to their home pages. This is a bad idea, because (A) it makes users have to dig to find certain information, so just link to the pages you want them to see, and (B) it gives your site a bad deep link ratio and negatively affects how well your deeper ?child? pages will rank on the search engines. But also, if your site has a canonical issue that gives you a ?/index.html? URL in addition to your domain URL, make sure that when you DO link to your home page, it doesn?t send users to this index page (or any other home page extensions).

Change Up the Anchor Text
When you?re targeting a specific term that you want associated with your website, you may think it?s a good idea to use the same anchor text in your links over and over again. It?s not. In fact, this kind of narrow targeting will actually hurt you on the search engines. Instead, try to vary the anchor text you use to include OTHER relevant or related terms, or terms specific to the page you?re linking to. This will help your site rank for more terms, obviously. Plus, it would be helpful to include your company or website name in a percentage of your links, as well.

Source: http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/archive/2013/04/26/big-list-of-link-building-no-nos.aspx

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Senate bill ends air traffic controller furloughs

WASHINGTON (AP) ? With flight delays mounting, the Senate approved hurry-up legislation Thursday night to end air traffic controller furloughs blamed for inconveniencing large numbers of travelers.

A House vote on the measure was expected as early as Friday, with lawmakers eager to embark on a weeklong vacation.

Under the legislation, which the Senate passed without even a roll call vote, the Federal Aviation Administration would gain authority to transfer up to $253 million from accounts that are flush into other programs, to "prevent reduced operations and staffing" through the Sept. 30 end of the fiscal year.

In addition to restoring full staffing by controllers, Senate officials said the available funds should be ample enough to prevent the closure of small airport towers around the country. The FAA has said it will shut the facilities as it makes its share of $85 billion in across-the-board spending cuts ? known as the sequester ? that took effect last month at numerous government agencies.

The Senate acted as the FAA said there had been at least 863 flights delayed on Wednesday "attributable to staffing reductions resulting from the furlough."

Administration officials participated in the negotiations that led to the deal and evidently registered no objections.

After the vote, White House press secretary Jay Carney said, "It will be good news for America's traveling public if Congress spares them these unnecessary delays. But ultimately, this is no more than a temporary Band-Aid that fails to address the overarching threat to our economy posed by the sequester's mindless, across-the-board cuts."

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, a key participant in the talks, said the legislation would "prevent what otherwise would have been intolerable delays in the air travel system, inconveniencing travelers and hurting the economy."

Senate approval followed several hours of pressure-filled, closed-door negotiations, and came after most senators had departed the Capitol on the assumption that the talks had fallen short.

Officials said a small group of senators insisted on a last-ditch effort at an agreement before Congress adjourned for a vacation that could have become politically problematic if the flight delays continued.

"I want to do it right now. There are other senators you'd have to ask what the hang-up is," Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., said at a point when it appeared no compromise would emerge.

For the White House and Senate Democrats, the discussions on legislation relating to one relatively small slice of the $85 billion in spending cuts marked a shift in position in a long-running struggle with Republicans over budget issues. Similarly, the turn of events marked at least modest vindication of a decision by the House GOP last winter to finesse some budget struggles in order to focus public attention on the across-the-board cuts in hopes they would gain leverage over President Barack Obama.

The Professional Aviation Safety Specialists, a union that represents FAA employees, reported a number of incidents it said were due to the furloughs.

In one case, it said several flights headed for Long Island MacArthur Airport in New York were diverted on Wednesday when a piece of equipment failed. "While the policy for this equipment is immediate restoral, due to sequestration and furloughs it was changed to next-day restoral," the union said.

It added it was "learning of additional impacts nationwide, including open watches, increased restoration times, delays resulting from insufficient funding for parts and equipment, modernization delays, missed or deferred preventative maintenance, and reduced redundancy."

The airlines, too, were pressing Congress to restore the FAA to full staffing.

In an interview Wednesday, Robert Isom, chief operations officer of US Airways, likened the furloughs to a "wildcat regulatory action."

He added, "In the airline business, you try to eliminate uncertainty. Some factors you can't control, like weather. It (the FAA issue) is worse than the weather."

In a shift, first the White House and then senior Democratic lawmakers have signaled a willingness in the past two days to support legislation that alleviates the budget crunch at the FAA, while leaving the balance of the $85 billion to remain in effect.

Obama favors a comprehensive agreement that replaces the entire $85 billion in across-the-board cuts as part of a broader deficit-reduction deal that includes higher taxes and spending cuts.

One Senate Democrat, Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, noted that without the type of comprehensive deficit deal that Obama favors, a bill that eases the spending crunch at the FAA would inevitably be followed by other single-issue measures. She listed funding at the National Institutes of Health as one example, and cuts that cause furloughs of civilians who work at military hospitals as a second.

At the same time, Democratic aides said resolve had crumbled under the weight of widespread delays for the traveling public and pressure from the airlines.

Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., involved in the discussions, said the issue was big enough so "most people want to find a solution as long as it doesn't spend any more money."

Officials estimate it would cost slightly more than $200 million to restore air traffic controllers to full staffing, and another $50 million to keep open smaller air traffic towers around the country that the FAA has proposed closing.

Across the Capitol, the chairman of the House Transportation Committee, Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., said, "We're willing to look at what the Senate's going to propose."

He said he believes the FAA has the authority it needs under existing law to shift funds and end the furloughs of air traffic controllers, and any legislation should be "very, very limited" and direct the agency to use the flexibility it already has.

In a reflection of the political undercurrents, another House Republican, Rep. James Lankford of Oklahoma, said FAA employees "are being used as pawns by this (Obama) administration to be able to implement the maximum amount of pain on the American people when it does not have to be this way."

The White House and congressional Democrats vociferously dispute such claims.

___

Associated Press writers Joan Lowy, Henry C. Jackson and Alan Fram in Washington and David Koenig in Dallas contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/senate-passes-bill-ease-faa-furloughs-005441034--politics.html

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