In an interview with Kotaku’s Jason Schreier at the Spike TV Video Game Awards, Valve co-founder Gabe Newell confirmed that a “living-room-friendly PC package,” designed to “compete with next-gen consoles from companies like Microsoft and Sony,” will be available for purchase starting next year.
What makes a PC a PC
Most of the machines Newell described, which he expected “companies” would “start selling” next year, would be powered by Microsoft Windows like normal PCs. However, they would be more like home theater PCs than regular computers; they would be designed to fit in the living room and plug into an HDTV, and they would use a much-simplified interface which eschews pointing and clicking in favor of using a game controller.
Getting the (Big) Picture
That interface is Steam’s Big Picture mode, launched last week as a free upgrade to the Steam digital store. Gamers can click a button on the Steam window to be taken to a screen much like an Xbox 360′s dashboard or PlayStation 3′s XMB, where they can use a game controller to buy things from the store and play their installed games.
Games which can be played using only a controller get special branding and status in Big Picture mode. Steam held an enormous sale to promote such games when Big Picture mode launched, including titles like Sonic Generations which are also available on game consoles.
Steam-powered penguins?
Besides Big Picture mode, Valve’s other big project as of late has been porting Steam to Linux, starting with the popular Ubuntu version. The Linux version of Steam, currently in beta, also supports Big Picture mode. Newell said in the interview that a working Linux version would “give Valve more flexibility when developing their own hardware,” and dozens of games are already available for Linux gamers on Steam.
What will this hardware look like?
Newell’s talk of “companies” making computers like this suggests a Valve-created standard, like the Intel ultrabook or like Google’s requirements for Android devices, which PC manufacturers would have to adhere to. He also talked about Valve making its own hardware, which might be similar to Google’s Nexus lineup of tablets and smartphones.
Besides that, these game console style PCs won’t be as “malleable” as a normal computer, according to Newell. Like with today’s laptops, it may be difficult or impossible to get at the internals and upgrade parts, the way dedicated PC gamers like to do with their machines.
How much will these machines cost?
Newell’s statement that they will compete with “next-gen” consoles from Sony and Microsoft, which probably means the long-awaited new PlayStation and Xbox consoles expected next year, implies that they will be cost-competitive in some way. Gaming PCs typically have prices starting at $ 600 – $ 800 at the very lowest, while the PlayStation 3′s $ 599 USD launch price made it a pariah of the game console world for years. A Steam-powered game console may have to invent its own price bracket.
However, the original Xbox was basically an Intel Celeron PC with a custom-made case. So it’s possible that Steam has a similar plan in mind.
JaredSpurbeckis an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008. Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News
In a part of Aleppo controlled by the Free Syrian Army, a woman hurt by Syrian Army shelling was wheeled in front of a hospital.
INCIRLIK AIR BASE, Turkey — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta signed an official deployment order on Friday to send 400 American military personnel and two Patriot air defense batteries to Turkey as its tensions intensify with neighboring Syria, where government forces have increasingly resorted to aerial attacks, including the use of ballistic missiles, to fight a spreading insurgency.
The American batteries will be part of a broader push to strengthen Turkey’s defenses that will include the deployment of four other Patriot batteries — two from Germany and two from the Netherlands. Each battery contains multiple rounds of guided missiles that can intercept and destroy other missiles and hostile aircraft flying at high speeds.
Mr. Panetta’s deployment order, the result of NATO discussions last week, represents the most direct American military action so far to help contain the Syrian conflict and minimize its risk of spilling across the 550-mile border with Turkey, a NATO member that is housing more than 100,000 Syrian refugees and providing aid to the Syrian rebels trying to oust President Bashar al-Assad.
Tensions between Turkey and Syria have escalated in recent months as Syrian forces have bombed rebel positions along the border and occasionally lobbed artillery rounds into Turkish territory. The Turks have also grown increasingly alarmed that Mr. Assad’s forces could fire missiles into Turkey.
News of the Patriot deployment order came as antigovernment activists inside Syria reported new mayhem, including an unconfirmed rebel claim to have shot down a government warplane attacking insurgent positions near the international airport in Damascus, the capital.
In Moscow, meanwhile, the Russian Foreign Ministry sought to distance itself from comments a day earlier by its Middle East envoy that the Syrian rebels might defeat Mr. Assad, a longstanding Kremlin ally and arms client. A ministry spokesman, Aleksandr K. Lukashevich, said Russia remained committed to a political solution in Syria.
“We have never changed our position and will not change it,” Mr. Lukashevich said. He rejected a comment made by a State Department spokesman on Thursday that Moscow had “woken up” and changed its position as dynamics shifted on the battlefield, saying, “We have never been asleep.”
All six Patriot units deployed in Turkey will be under NATO’s command and are scheduled to be operational by the end of January, according to officials in Washington.
George Little, the Pentagon spokesman, said Mr. Panetta signed the order as he flew from Afghanistan to this air base in southern Turkey, close to the Syrian border.
“The United States has been supporting Turkey in its efforts to defend itself,” Mr. Little said.
The order “will deploy some 400 U.S. personnel to Turkey to support two Patriot missile batteries,” Mr. Little added, and the personnel and Patriot batteries will arrive in Turkey in the coming weeks. He did not specify their deployment locations.
After landing at Incirlik on Friday, Mr. Panetta told a gathering of American Air Force personnel of his decision to deploy the Patriots.
He said the United States was working with Turkey, Jordan and Israel to monitor Syria’s stockpiles of chemical weapons, and warned of “serious consequences” if Syria used them, but he did not offer any specifics.
“We have drawn up plans for presenting to the president,” Mr. Panetta said. “We have to be ready.”
Turkey’s worries about vulnerability to Syrian missiles, including Scuds that might be tipped with chemical weapons, were heightened recently by intelligence reports that Syrian troops had mixed small amounts of precursor chemicals for sarin, a deadly nerve gas, at one or two storage sites, and loaded them into artillery shells and airplane bombs. “Their arsenal of chemical weapons has been configured for use at a moment’s notice,” Representative Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican who heads the House Intelligence Committee, said in an interview on Friday. Mr. Panetta, however, said this week that intelligence about chemical weapons activity in Syria had “leveled off.”
Recent Scud missile attacks by Mr. Assad’s forces against rebels in northern Syria have only added to Turkey’s concerns. The Scud missiles were armed with conventional warheads, but the attacks showed that the Assad government was prepared to use missiles as it struggled to slow rebel gains.
With the nearly two-year-old Syrian conflict entering its second winter and many thousands of people struggling for food and warmth in cities ruined by protracted fighting, the humanitarian costs seemed to be mounting.
An activist in the central province Homs, who identified himself as Abu Ourouba, said the town of Houla — where, the United Nations confirmed in May, Syrian troops had killed more than 100 people, including 32 children — was facing catastrophe.
“Houla has been besieged from all directions for the past 10 days,” he said. “Until now, not even one loaf of bread has entered Houla. The food that was available is beginning to run out very quickly. Most children don’t have milk anymore. The kids are at risk of dying from hunger.”
Shelling along access routes means that no one can walk “unless they crawl” to avoid hundreds of strikes from tanks, warplanes and rocket launchers, the activist said.
Thom Shanker reported from Incirlik Air Base, Turkey, and Michael R. Gordon from Washington. Reporting was contributed by Eric Schmitt from Washington; Anne Barnard, Hania Mourtada and Hwaida Saad from Beirut, Lebanon; Alan Cowell from London; and Ellen Barry from Moscow.
ALAMO, Texas (AP) — For years, Sonia Limas would drag her daughters to the emergency room whenever they fell sick. As an illegal immigrant, she had no health insurance, and the only place she knew to seek treatment was the hospital — the most expensive setting for those covering the cost.
The family's options improved somewhat a decade ago with the expansion of community health clinics, which offered free or low-cost care with help from the federal government. But President Barack Obama's health care overhaul threatens to roll back some of those services if clinics and hospitals are overwhelmed with newly insured patients and can't afford to care for as many poor families.
To be clear, Obama's law was never intended to help Limas and an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants like her. Instead, it envisions that 32 million uninsured Americans will get access to coverage by 2019. Because that should mean fewer uninsured patients showing up at hospitals, the Obama program slashed the federal reimbursement for uncompensated care.
But in states with large illegal immigrant populations, the math may not work, especially if lawmakers don't expand Medicaid, the joint state-federal health program for the poor and disabled.
When the reform has been fully implemented, illegal immigrants will make up the nation's second-largest population of uninsured, or about 25 percent. The only larger group will be people who qualify for insurance but fail to enroll, according to a 2012 study by the Washington-based Urban Institute.
And since about two-thirds of illegal immigrants live in just eight states, those areas will have a disproportionate share of the uninsured to care for.
In communities "where the number of undocumented immigrants is greatest, the strain has reached the breaking point," Rich Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, wrote last year in a letter to Obama, asking him to keep in mind the uncompensated care hospitals gave to that group. "In response, many hospitals have had to curtail services, delay implementing services, or close beds."
The federal government has offered to expand Medicaid, but states must decide whether to take the deal. And in some of those eight states — including Texas, Florida and New Jersey — hospitals are scrambling to determine whether they will still have enough money to treat the remaining uninsured.
Without a Medicaid expansion, the influx of new patients and the looming cuts in federal funding could inflict "a double whammy" in Texas, said David Lopez, CEO of the Harris Health System in Houston, which spends 10 to 15 percent of its $1.2 billion annual budget to care for illegal immigrants.
Realistically, taxpayers are already paying for some of the treatment provided to illegal immigrants because hospitals are required by law to stabilize and treat any patients that arrive in an emergency room, regardless of their ability to pay. The money to cover the costs typically comes from federal, state and local taxes.
A solid accounting of money spent treating illegal immigrants is elusive because most hospitals do not ask for immigration status. But some states have tried.
California, which is home to the nation's largest population of illegal immigrants, spent an estimated $1.2 billion last year through Medicaid to care for 822,500 illegal immigrants.
The New Jersey Hospital Association in 2010 estimated that it cost between $600 million and $650 million annually to treat 550,000 illegal immigrants.
And in Texas, a 2010 analysis by the Health and Human Services Commission found that the agency had provided $96 million in benefits to illegal immigrants, up from $81 million two years earlier. The state's public hospital districts spent an additional $717 million in uncompensated care to treat that population.
If large states such as Florida and Texas make good on their intention to forgo federal money to expand Medicaid, the decision "basically eviscerates" the effects of the health care overhaul in those areas because of "who lives there and what they're eligible for," said Lisa Clemans-Cope, a senior researcher at the Urban Institute.
Seeking to curb expenses, hospitals might change what qualifies as an emergency or cap the number of uninsured patients they treat. And although it's believed states with the most illegal immigrants will face a smaller cut, they will still lose money.
The potential impacts of reform are a hot topic at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In addition to offering its own charity care, some MD Anderson oncologists volunteer at a county-funded clinic at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital that largely treats the uninsured.
"In a sense we've been in the worst-case scenario in Texas for a long time," said Lewis Foxhall, MD Anderson's vice president of health policy in Houston. "The large number of uninsured and the large low-income population creates a very difficult problem for us."
Community clinics are a key part of the reform plan and were supposed to take up some of the slack for hospitals. Clinics received $11 billion in new funding over five years so they could expand to help care for a swell of newly insured who might otherwise overwhelm doctors' offices. But in the first year, $600 million was cut from the centers' usual allocation, leaving many to use the money to fill gaps rather than expand.
There is concern that clinics could themselves be inundated with newly insured patients, forcing many illegal immigrants back to emergency rooms.
Limas, 44, moved to the border town of Alamo 13 years ago with her husband and three daughters. Now single, she supports the family by teaching a citizenship class in Spanish at the local community center and selling cookies and cakes she whips up in her trailer. Soon, she hopes to seek a work permit of her own.
For now, the clinic helps with basic health care needs. If necessary, Limas will return to the emergency room, where the attendants help her fill out paperwork to ensure the government covers the bills she cannot afford.
"They always attended to me," she said, "even though it's slow."
___
Sherman can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/chrisshermanAP .
Plushnick-Masti can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/RamitMastiAP .
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The last two weeks of December are traditionally quiet for stocks, but traders accustomed to a bit of time off are staying close to their mobile devices, thanks to the "fiscal cliff."
Last-minute negotiations in Washington on the so-called fiscal cliff - nearly $600 billion of tax increases and spending cuts set to take effect in January that could cause a sharp slowdown in growth or even a recession - are keeping some traders and analysts from taking Christmas holidays because any deal could have a big impact on markets.
"A lot of firms are saying to their trading desks, 'You can take days off for Christmas, but you are on standby to come in if anything happens.' This is certainly different from previous years, especially around this time of the year when things are supposed to be slowing down," said J.J. Kinahan, chief derivatives strategist at TD Ameritrade in Chicago.
"Next week is going to be a Capitol Hill-driven market."
With talks between President Barack Obama and House Speaker John Boehner at an apparent standstill, it was increasingly likely that Washington will not come up with a deal before January 1.
Gordon Charlop, managing director at Rosenblatt Securities in New York, will also be on standby for the holiday season.
"It's a 'Look guys, let's just rotate and be sensible" type of situation going on," Charlop said.
"We are hopeful there is some resolution down there, but it seems to me they continue to walk that political tightrope... rather than coming up with something."
Despite concerns that the deadline will pass without a deal, the S&P 500 has held its ground with a 12.4 percent gain for the year. For this week, though, the S&P 500 fell 0.3 percent.
BEWARE OF THE WITCH
This coming Friday will mark the last so-called "quadruple witching" day of the year, when contracts for stock options, single stock futures, stock index options and stock index futures all expire. This could make trading more volatile.
"We could see some heavy selling as there is going to be a lot of re-establishing of positions, reallocation of assets before the year-end," Kinahan said.
RETHINKING APPLE
Higher tax rates on capital gains and dividends are part of the automatic tax increases that will go into effect next year, if Congress and the White House don't come up with a solution to avert the fiscal cliff. That possibility could give investors an incentive to unload certain stocks in some tax-related selling by December 31.
Some market participants said tax-related selling may be behind the weaker trend in the stock price of market leader Apple . Apple's stock has lost a quarter of its value since it hit a lifetime high of $705.07 on September 21.
On Friday, the stock fell 3.8 percent to $509.79 after the iPhone 5 got a chilly reception at its debut in China and two analysts cut shipment forecasts. But the stock is still up nearly 26 percent for the year.
"If you owned Apple for a long time, you should be thinking about reallocation as there will be changes in taxes and other regulations next year, although we don't really know which rules to play by yet," Kinahan said.
But one indicator of the market's reduced concern about the fiscal cliff compared with a few weeks ago, is the defense sector, which will be hit hard if the spending cuts take effect. The PHLX Defense Sector Index <.dfx> is up nearly 13 percent for the year, and sits just a few points from its 2012 high.
(Reporting by Angela Moon; Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)
@RobLowe follows 135 people on Twitter. Among them is not @HilaryASwank, the Oscar-winning ex-wife of his brother, @ichadlowe.
@RobLowe does, however, follow @ikimlowe, the new wife of his brother, who helpfully identifies herself on the site as “wife of @ichadlowe.” Would @HilaryASwank, a formidable actor who does not use Twitter very often, have consented to live in her lesser-known husband’s Twitter shadow? Perhaps not. Perhaps that’s why they div—
But what am I doing? This is where Twitter can lead a person: to deranged, speculative pointless nosiness. To mindlessly customizing a version of Us Weekly magazine by reading between the Twitter lines of who follows whom, who tags whom, who seeks whose attention with tags and hashtags.
So forget that. I’m just going to keep following @RobLowe. His Twitter feed is one for the ages, and he’s on a tear, having just hit half a million followers. And I swear I follow Rob Lowe for the epigrams and jokes—why else?—though, yes, I once had a poster of the matinee idol from “St. Elmo’s Fire” on my wall. (But only because I learned that science had proven that he and Jaclyn Smith were the most perfectly symmetrical, beautiful humans ever to exist—and who ever would exist. It was a duty of citizenship in the human race to have a poster!)
Not long after “St. Elmo’s Fire,” @RobLowe, the record reflects, had a speedy fall after an early-adopter DIY sex tape (1988! Paris Hilton’s was not ’til 2003!). As Lowe’s first-rate autobiography reports, this was part of a bigger personal unraveling into promiscuity and dissipation on an NBA/Lohan scale. Eventually Lowe found deliverance in sobriety (which he names as one of his interests on Twitter) and the love of a good woman, @Sheryl_Lowe (business) or @Sheryllowe61 (personal).
Lowe also evidently found something in Twitter. As his career has done more than rebound—it has fully realized itself, with his comic-stilted-earnest-inimitable performances on “The West Wing,” “Brothers & Sisters” and, now, “Parks and Recreation”—he has built a sturdy and complementary Twitter feed.
Lowe’s Twitter presence seals his comeback. It is freewheeling, wide-ranging and among his best work. The onetime incorrigible gadfly, who might have died outside the Viper Room like River Phoenix or been left howling at the moon like Charlie Sheen, now knows who he is, has a gift for observational humor and lives his life with something that looks like joy.
Lowe recently retweeted this observation from the Telegraph’s Damian Thompson:
More:
Another Lowe tweet:
Which of us–especially those of us who were born in the 1960s–doesn’t feel like saying that aloud every year?
And speaking of Lowe’s vintage, it’s appealing that he’s not afraid to use our generation’s corny locutions on young-skewing Twitter. As he put it recently:
The merciless “pumped” kills me. Do people never leave the slang (or bands?) of their 20s? Lowe is big on “dude,” too.
At the same time, Lowe seems to enjoy aging:
He wrote this last month, referring to Chris Traeger, his character on “Parks and Recreation,” who exercises without cease, gunning for eternal life. In Traeger’s intense specificity—his needs in beverages, for example, are so idiosyncratic as to require paragraphs of instructions—he is a perfect new-sitcom archetype. One thing he is not is cool.
And neither is Lowe cool in his Twitter feed. Often he is sending out blessings to his followers or his family, or reveling in mere existence, with the hashtag #LoveLife. Lowe’s autobiography makes clear that the Handsome Man, a cultural slot in which he found himself early on, invites way too much resentment if he doesn’t start spoofing himself with gusto. It’s imperative he find the joke in life, and the dignity in himself, or he’ll yield to prettiness and silliness, as well as drugs and sex tapes.
Look on that @RobLowe Twitter feed, and learn from it, ye handsome millennials!
Less than a year after the Gagosian Gallery gave Damien Hirst all 11 of its spaces around the world to show his spot paintings, word comes that the bad-boy British artist will no longer be represented by Gagosian, where he has shown on and off for 17 years.
“We wish him continued success for the future,’’ a statement issued by the gallery, confirming his sudden departure, said.
On Thursday, Science Ltd., Mr. Hirst’s company, told the Financial Times that the gallery owner “Larry Gagosian and Damien have reached an amicable decision to part company,” adding that the artist would continue his relationship with the White Cube Gallery in London. But the question remains whether Mr. Hirst will look for another gallery to show his work in New York, where he has a large number of big collectors.
Mr. Hirst has never been known for being monogamous, at least not when it comes to gallery representation. White Cube in London has also handled his work for years. In 2008 he snubbed both galleries, when Sotheby’s in London sold 223 of his new artworks. The sale, which was held just as the financial markets were heading for disaster, included dead animals – sharks, zebras, piglets and even a calf – floating in giant glass tanks of formaldehyde; cabinets filled with diamonds; and cigarette butts. And paintings – spin paintings, dot paintings, paintings with butterflies pinned under glass. More than 21,000 visitors flocked to Sotheby’s on New Bond Street to see the work before the sale, which brought $200.7 million.
Ever the showman, he caused a sensation in 2007 at White Cube’s gallery in Mayfair when he showed a human skull cast in platinum and covered with 8,601 diamonds. At the time the gallery said the artwork cost $23.5 million to make. During the five weeks that summer when it was on display in a small, blackened room at White Cube’s Mason’s Yard Space, crowds lined up with free timed tickets in hand to ogle the piece. A nearby shop was doing a brisk business selling skull T-shirts and other Hirstian memorabilia. The skull was reportedly bought by a consortium of investors that included the artist himself. (It isn’t the first time he has invested in his own work. Mr. Hirst and Jay Jopling, the owner of White Cube, bought about 12 works from Charles Saatchi, former advertising magnate, in 2003 for around $15 million.)
Over the years Mr. Hirst has amassed a large fortune. The Sunday Times of London has called him the world’s richest artist, with a fortune estimated at about $346 million.
He is not the only artist to stray from Gagosian. Last week while the contemporary art world converged on Miami Beach for the giant art fair there, David Zwirner, the Chelsea dealer, confirmed that in May he is planning to do a show of new paintings and sculptures by Jeff Koons, another superstar artist represented by Mr. Gagosian. Like Mr. Hirst, Mr. Koons has never shown any gallery loyalty. For decades he has also exhibited his work at the Sonnabend Gallery in Chelsea. Last week Rebecca Sternthal, a director of Gagosian who works with Mr. Koons said that Gagosian “still represents Jeff Koons. He works closely with us and with Sonnabend. In the past he has had shows in different galleries but we are still actively working with him and with his studio.’’
Carly Rose Sonenclar, Emblem3, Tate Stevens and Fifth Harmony
Ray Mickshaw/FOX (4)
Sparks will fly at the finale!
On Thursday, The X Factor revealed its top three acts, who will perform next week in the final night of competition – in hopes of taking home the $5 million recording contract.
Simon Cowell said it would take a miracle to get his girl group, Fifth Harmony, to the finale after they performed Shontelle's "Impossible" and Ellie Goulding's "Anything Could Happen" on Wednesday. Keep reading to find out if their dream came true ...
Apparently, miracles do happen! Fifth Harmony was the first act to be sent through to the finale.
They will compete against departing judge L.A. Reid's country singer, Tate Stevens, and Britney Spears's only remaining contestant, Carly Rose Sonenclar.
That means Simon's promising boy band, Emblem3, are out of the running for the big prize.
"This is the way it goes on competitions," Simon said. "I'm gutted really for them ... But it happens."
ALAMO, Texas (AP) — For years, Sonia Limas would drag her daughters to the emergency room whenever they fell sick. As an illegal immigrant, she had no health insurance, and the only place she knew to seek treatment was the hospital — the most expensive setting for those covering the cost.
The family's options improved somewhat a decade ago with the expansion of community health clinics, which offered free or low-cost care with help from the federal government. But President Barack Obama's health care overhaul threatens to roll back some of those services if clinics and hospitals are overwhelmed with newly insured patients and can't afford to care for as many poor families.
To be clear, Obama's law was never intended to help Limas and an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants like her. Instead, it envisions that 32 million uninsured Americans will get access to coverage by 2019. Because that should mean fewer uninsured patients showing up at hospitals, the Obama program slashed the federal reimbursement for uncompensated care.
But in states with large illegal immigrant populations, the math may not work, especially if lawmakers don't expand Medicaid, the joint state-federal health program for the poor and disabled.
When the reform has been fully implemented, illegal immigrants will make up the nation's second-largest population of uninsured, or about 25 percent. The only larger group will be people who qualify for insurance but fail to enroll, according to a 2012 study by the Washington-based Urban Institute.
And since about two-thirds of illegal immigrants live in just eight states, those areas will have a disproportionate share of the uninsured to care for.
In communities "where the number of undocumented immigrants is greatest, the strain has reached the breaking point," Rich Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, wrote last year in a letter to Obama, asking him to keep in mind the uncompensated care hospitals gave to that group. "In response, many hospitals have had to curtail services, delay implementing services, or close beds."
The federal government has offered to expand Medicaid, but states must decide whether to take the deal. And in some of those eight states — including Texas, Florida and New Jersey — hospitals are scrambling to determine whether they will still have enough money to treat the remaining uninsured.
Without a Medicaid expansion, the influx of new patients and the looming cuts in federal funding could inflict "a double whammy" in Texas, said David Lopez, CEO of the Harris Health System in Houston, which spends 10 to 15 percent of its $1.2 billion annual budget to care for illegal immigrants.
Realistically, taxpayers are already paying for some of the treatment provided to illegal immigrants because hospitals are required by law to stabilize and treat any patients that arrive in an emergency room, regardless of their ability to pay. The money to cover the costs typically comes from federal, state and local taxes.
A solid accounting of money spent treating illegal immigrants is elusive because most hospitals do not ask for immigration status. But some states have tried.
California, which is home to the nation's largest population of illegal immigrants, spent an estimated $1.2 billion last year through Medicaid to care for 822,500 illegal immigrants.
The New Jersey Hospital Association in 2010 estimated that it cost between $600 million and $650 million annually to treat 550,000 illegal immigrants.
And in Texas, a 2010 analysis by the Health and Human Services Commission found that the agency had provided $96 million in benefits to illegal immigrants, up from $81 million two years earlier. The state's public hospital districts spent an additional $717 million in uncompensated care to treat that population.
If large states such as Florida and Texas make good on their intention to forgo federal money to expand Medicaid, the decision "basically eviscerates" the effects of the health care overhaul in those areas because of "who lives there and what they're eligible for," said Lisa Clemans-Cope, a senior researcher at the Urban Institute.
Seeking to curb expenses, hospitals might change what qualifies as an emergency or cap the number of uninsured patients they treat. And although it's believed states with the most illegal immigrants will face a smaller cut, they will still lose money.
The potential impacts of reform are a hot topic at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In addition to offering its own charity care, some MD Anderson oncologists volunteer at a county-funded clinic at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital that largely treats the uninsured.
"In a sense we've been in the worst-case scenario in Texas for a long time," said Lewis Foxhall, MD Anderson's vice president of health policy in Houston. "The large number of uninsured and the large low-income population creates a very difficult problem for us."
Community clinics are a key part of the reform plan and were supposed to take up some of the slack for hospitals. Clinics received $11 billion in new funding over five years so they could expand to help care for a swell of newly insured who might otherwise overwhelm doctors' offices. But in the first year, $600 million was cut from the centers' usual allocation, leaving many to use the money to fill gaps rather than expand.
There is concern that clinics could themselves be inundated with newly insured patients, forcing many illegal immigrants back to emergency rooms.
Limas, 44, moved to the border town of Alamo 13 years ago with her husband and three daughters. Now single, she supports the family by teaching a citizenship class in Spanish at the local community center and selling cookies and cakes she whips up in her trailer. Soon, she hopes to seek a work permit of her own.
For now, the clinic helps with basic health care needs. If necessary, Limas will return to the emergency room, where the attendants help her fill out paperwork to ensure the government covers the bills she cannot afford.
"They always attended to me," she said, "even though it's slow."
___
Sherman can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/chrisshermanAP .
Plushnick-Masti can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/RamitMastiAP .
PARIS (Reuters) - Stock futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street on Friday, with futures for the S&P 500 up 0.23 percent, Dow Jones futures 0.24 percent higher and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.12 percent at 5:44 a.m. ET.
* European stocks were steady on Friday morning, with the FTSEurofirst 300 <.fteu3> index sitting a few points below an 18-month high hit earlier this week, as lower-than-expected German manufacturing sector figures eclipsed strong Chinese economic data.
* Markit's index tracking German manufacturing activity slipped to 46.3 in December from 46.8 the previous month, remaining well below the 50 threshold that divides growth from contraction and missing the consensus forecast in a Reuters poll for 47.2.
* China's HSBC flash purchasing managers' index for December rose to 50.9, a 14-month high and the fifth straight monthly gain, underlining a brighter outlook for the world's second-biggest economy.
* Apple Inc releases the iPhone 5 in China on Friday, which should give it some respite after a recent slide in its share of what is already the world's biggest smartphone market. But the company's longer-term hopes may depend on new technology being tested by China's top telecoms carrier.
* Sprint Nextel Corp's $2.1 billion offer to buy out Clearwire Corp appeared to be running into trouble on Thursday, as some shareholders said they wanted more money while Softbank Corp set a cap on how much Sprint could pay.
* Pfizer Inc's planned U.S. initial public offering (IPO) of its animal health unit Zoetis Inc is likely by January or February and raise about $4 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the discussions.
* KKR & Co LP has jumped into the auction for the fiber-optics business being sold by Australian contractor Leighton Holdings Ltd , a source familiar with the process told Reuters, eyeing a business that analysts say could fetch as much as A$870 million ($918 million).
* Adobe Systems Inc , maker of Photoshop and Acrobat software, forecast full-year results below analysts' estimates but expects profit and earnings to grow from 2013 onwards. The company forecast adjusted earnings of about $1.40 a share on revenue of about $4.1 billion for 2013.
* Dutch chemicals group AkzoNobel is selling its struggling North American decorative paints arm to U.S. rival PPG Industries for $1.1 billion to focus on its larger European and faster-growing businesses.
* Bank of America Corp raised the stakes in its legal battle with bond insurer MBIA Inc on Thursday, saying MBIA was in default on some of its debt and filing a lawsuit related to changes in that debt.
* On the macro front, investors awaited a batch of U.S. indicators, including November industrial production, due at 9:15 a.m. ET, and Markit's flash manufacturing PMI for December, due at 8:58 a.m. ET.
* The S&P 500 ended a six-day winning streak on Thursday, retreating as worries intensified that Washington's "fiscal cliff" negotiations were dragging on with little progress.
* The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> tumbled 74.73 points, or 0.56 percent, to 13,170.72 at the close. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> fell 9.03 points, or 0.63 percent, to 1,419.45. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> slid 21.65 points, or 0.72 percent, to end at 2,992.16.
(Reporting by Blaise Robinson; Editing by Susan Fenton)
Apple has had quite a bumpy car ride so far with it’s mapping product. That all ends in just a couple hours, however, because late Wednesday evening Google is planning on bringing Maps back to iOS with the release of the company’s own software. AllThingsD is reporting that Google’s app will be available for download in the App Store shortly, and we’ll provide some initial thoughts on it soon after.
UPDATE: Google Maps is now available on Apple’s App Store for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.
Get more from BGR.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook
TOKYO — Japan scrambled fighter jets on Thursday after a Chinese surveillance plane entered what Japan considers its airspace above disputed islands that have become a source of heightened tension between the Asian powers.
Though Japan routinely sends jets to head off Chinese aircraft skirting its territory, the Japanese Defense Ministry said the incident was the first known violation of Japanese airspace by a Chinese plane in more than 50 years. Tokyo lodged a formal protest with Beijing, which swiftly retorted that it was the Japanese who had encroached.
The incident threatens to escalate a maritime standoff over the uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, which Japan controls and calls the Senkakus. China calls the same islands the Diaoyus. For months, patrol ships from the two countries have sporadically faced off in waters around the islets, exchanging protests over loudspeakers and, on some occasions, sparring with water cannons.
The incident also comes just days ahead of national elections in Japan on Sunday that are expected to result in a change in government.
In an embarrassment for the current administration, Japan’s radar systems failed to detect the Chinese surveillance plane Thursday morning, and Tokyo became aware of its presence only after a Japanese Coast Guard ship spotted it near the islands. By the time fighter jets were dispatched to the area from their base in Naha, on the island of Okinawa, the Chinese plane was nowhere to be seen, a Defense Ministry official said.
With the Japanese jets yet to arrive, the Coast Guard was left on its own to confront the Chinese plane. “Do not intrude into Japanese airspace,” the crew of one of its ships radioed the plane, according to the public broadcaster NHK.
“This is Chinese airspace,” the plane’s crew radioed back, according to NHK.
In Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura called the Chinese actions “extremely regrettable” and said that Japan had lodged an official complaint with Beijing.
Gen. Shigeru Iwasaki, chief of joint staff of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces, said it was regrettable that the plane had slipped into Japanese airspace unnoticed. “We are going to make sure this does not happen again,” General Iwasaki said.
In Beijing, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said:“I want to stress that these activities are completely normal.”
“China requires the Japanese side stop illegal activities in the waters and airspace of the Diaoyu islands,” the spokesman said.
The Japanese Defense Ministry said it was only the third time foreign aircraft were known to have violated Japanese airspace since 1958, when Tokyo started keeping records of intrusions. A Soviet military jet entered Japanese territory in 1979 and a Taiwanese private plane in 1994, though neither incident led to confrontation.
With the Japanese elections just days away, public unease over China’s growing military shadow could provide a further boost for the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, which has promised to strengthen Japan’s military and is leading the governing Democratic Party in the polls. Public jitters here have also been enhanced by the fact that a rocket launched by North Korea on Wednesday traveled over Japanese territory.
Shinzo Abe, the Liberal Democrats’ conservative leader, supports an amendment to Japan’s pacifist Constitution that would allow it to establish a military beyond the self-defense forces that it currently maintains. Also running is a fringe party led by the nationalist politician Shintaro Ishihara, whose bid to purchase the disputed islands earlier this year triggered the current flare-up.
Hisako Ueno contributed reporting from Tokyo, and Bree Feng from Beijing.
Zac Efron was in a New York state of mind when he dined at BLT Prime recently.
The Paperboy actor and six friends enjoyed dinner together, with Efron eating a rib eye steak and drinking Johnnie Walker Blue.
Dressed casually in a black T-shirt and jeans, Efron and his friends were at the restaurant for two hours, just "catching up," an onlooker tells PEOPLE.
Efron's next film, Are We Officially Dating?, follows three New York bachelors who make a pact to have as much fun as possible.
LONDON (Reuters) - Stock futures pointed to a flat-to-lower open on Wall Street on Thursday, with futures for the S&P 500 down 0.1 percent at 0950 GMT (4.50 a.m. ET).
Contracts on the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq 100 were flat in percentage terms.
Japan's Nikkei <.n225> average surged above 9,700 for the first time in eight months, led by exporters, as the yen fell to a multi-month low on mounting expectations of aggressive monetary easing by the Bank of Japan after a general election at the weekend.
European shares slipped on Thursday after persistent concern about U.S. austerity measures that could hit growth in the world's largest economy overshadowed fresh stimulus steps from the Federal Reserve.
Google's navigation tool has returned to the iPhone, months after Apple's home-grown mapping service flopped, prompting user complaints, the firing of an executive and a public apology from Apple's CEO. [ID:nL1E8ND0P2]
Adobe Systems , the maker of Photoshop software, reports results, expected to show earnings per share fell to $0.57 in its fourth quarter, from $0.67 one year earlier.
GrainCorp Ltd on Thursday rejected a sweetened $2.9 billion bid from Archer Daniels Midland , putting pressure on the U.S. agribusiness giant to boost its offer for Australia's last major independent grains handler.
Knight Capital Group Inc expects to make a decision on its future ownership by early next week, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The U.S. unit of Britain's BAE Systems Plc said it has won a contract valued at up to $400 million to maintain and service more than 300 U.S. Navy trainer aircraft, beating out incumbent Sikorsky Aircraft, a unit of United Technologies, and L-3 Communications.
The Pentagon will pay about 4 percent less for each new Lockheed Martin Corp F-35A fighter jet when it signs a deal worth $3.8 billion with the No. 1 U.S. defense contractor on Friday, according to sources familiar with the deal.
American Airlines creditors want a potential merger with US Airways Group Inc to be an all-stock deal rather than one that pays some claims in cash, three people familiar with the matter said, in a move that underscores confidence in a merged airline.
Solar installer SolarCity is set to begin trading on the Nasdaq after halving the value of its initial public offering. The deal has been highly anticipated in clean tech and venture capital circles as alternative energy startups have had a difficult time attracting investor interest.
The U.S. Labor Dept releases first-time claims for jobless benefits for the week ended December 8 at 1330 GMT (8.30 a.m. ET). They were expected to show 370,000 new filings, a repeat of the previous weeks figure.
The U.S. Commerce Dept's November retail sales, also due out 1330 GMT (8.30 a.m. ET), were forecast to show a 0.5 percent rise, compared with a 0.3 percent decrease in October. Excluding automobiles, sales are expected to be unchanged, a repeat of the October level.
Producer prices were forecast to show a 0.5 percent decrease compared with a 0.2 percent drop in October. Excluding volatile food and energy items, PPI is expected to rise 0.2 percent versus with a 0.2 percent decrease in October.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> slipped 2.99 points, or 0.02 percent, to 13,245.45 on Wednesday. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> inched up just 0.64 of a point, or 0.04 percent, to 1,428.48. But the Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> shed 8.49 points, or 0.28 percent, to end at 3,013.81.
(Reporting By Francesco Canepa. Editing by Jeremy Gaunt.)
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – After weeks of anticipation, Pope Benedict sent his first tweet on Wednesday.
“Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart.”
The tweet was sent when the 85-year-old pope tapped on a touch screen at the end of his weekly general audience in the Vatican before thousands of people.
(Reporting By Philip Pullella, editing by Paul Casciato)
The wedding's back on – though it may be a good idea to save that gift receipt.
Hugh Hefner, 86, officially confirms that he is once again engaged to Crystal Harris, 26, telling his Twitter followers, "I've given Crystal Harris a ring. I love the girl."
And to prove it, Harris posted photos of the big diamond sparkler, calling it "my beautiful ring."
Neither announced a wedding date, though sources tell PEOPLE they're planning to tie the knot at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles on New Year's Eve.
Whether that still happens remains to be seen.
This is the plan they had in 2011 – a wedding at the mansion – except that Harris called it off just days before the nuptials were scheduled to happen in front of 300 invited guests.
Hugh Hefner and Crystal Harris
David Livingston / Getty
The onetime Playmate of the Month then ripped Hef's bedroom skills, calling him a two-second man, to which Hefner replied, "I missed a bullet" by not marrying her.
A year later, Hefner's "runaway bunny" bounded back to him.
LONDON (Reuters) - Stock futures pointed to a fractionally higher open on Wall Street on Wednesday, with futures for the S&P 500, the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq 100 rising by 0.1 to 0.2 percent.
* The U.S. Federal Reserve is expected to announce a fresh round of bond buying on Wednesday as part of its efforts to support a fragile economic recovery threatened by political wrangling over the government's budget.
* Negotiations to avert the "fiscal cliff" ahead of a year-end deadline intensified as President Barack Obama and U.S. House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner spoke by phone on Tuesday after exchanging new proposals.
* India's government announced an inquiry into lobbying practices by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. on Wednesday after a report that the giant retailer had pressed U.S. lawmakers to help gain access to foreign markets.
* Costco Wholesale Corp posted a 30 percent rise in quarterly profit, beating expectations, as the largest U.S. warehouse club chain saw sales rise and got a lift from higher membership fees.
* Chesapeake Energy Corp on Tuesday agreed to sell most of its remaining natural gas processing and gathering assets for $2.16 billion as it continues to sell assets to pay down its heavy debt load.
* Sprint Nextel Corp is in talks with Intel Corp and Comcast Corp to buy out their stakes in the U.S. wireless provider Clearwire Corp, two people familiar with the matter said on Tuesday.
* European shares steadied in early trade on Wednesday, keeping alive their sharp three-week rally as investors bet the Fed would deliver on stimulus.
* The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> closed up 78.56 points, or 0.60 percent, at 13,248.44 on Tuesday. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 9.29 points, or 0.65 percent, at 1,427.84 - its highest since November elections. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 35.34 points, or 1.18 percent, at 3,022.30.
(Reporting by Atul Prakash; editing by Patrick Graham)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A recently announced hacking of the U.N. nuclear agency’s computer servers was not the first time an attempt had been made to break into the organization’s computer system, the head of the agency said on Thursday.
Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said that a few months ago a group broke into the agency’s computer system and stole personal information of scientists working on peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
In response to questions at a Council on Foreign Relations event in Washington, Amano repeated what he said last week after the hacking was revealed: no sensitive information about the IAEA‘s nuclear inspections had been stolen.
The IAEA has shut down the server that had been hacked and is continuing an investigation, Amano said. But he also said it wasn’t the first attempt to break into the system.
“If you ask if this is the only case? I would say there have been some other tries but we are doing our best to protect our system,” Amano said.
The hackers – a group using an Iranian-sounding name – have posted scores of email addresses of experts who have been working with the U.N. agency on a website, and have urged the IAEA to investigate Israel’s nuclear activity.
Israel, which has an undeclared nuclear arsenal, and the United States accuse Iran of seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability. Tehran denies such ambitions.
Amano would not say if he believed Iran was behind the attacks on the IAEA, whose missions include preventing the spread of nuclear weapons and which is investigating Iran’s disputed nuclear activities.
“The group … they have what looks like an Iranian name. But that does not mean that the origin is Iran,” he said.
There has been an increase in suspected Iranian cyber attacks this year, coinciding with a deepening standoff with the West over Tehran’s nuclear program.
(Reporting by Deborah Charles. Editing by Warren Strobel and Doina Chiacu)
But visitors to this city, the capital of Mongolia, seldom find a blue sky today. It is smoggy, and soot rains down from the hills, as the poorest residents burn cheap brown coal to stay alive through the winter.
The investment prospects of Mongolia, a darling of the emerging markets, are similarly shifting.
In May, the Parliament passed a law that restricted foreign investment in the country’s most attractive asset, its mineral deposits. The government is also taking aim at a crucial deal with the multinational mining giant Rio Tinto, a pact that many see as the foundation of the country’s recent economic growth.
Now, the underlying fundamentals of the country look increasingly shaky. Mongolia faces a financing crunch, as investment dollars flowing from abroad have fallen. And revenue from coal, the country’s main export, has dropped along with Chinese demand.
“There are a series of elements that have built up less-than-welcoming attitudes to Mongolia at a time when the macroeconomic situation is deteriorating,” said John P. Finigan, the chief executive of Golomt Bank, the country’s second-biggest bank.
Mongolia’s star rose — and is now falling — with the fortunes of one company: Rio Tinto, the country’s largest investor.
In October 2009, Rio Tinto and Ivanhoe Mines, a Canadian exploration company, negotiated a deal with the Mongolian government about developing Oyu Tolgoi, the crown jewel of the country’s mining sector and the world’s biggest new source of copper. The copper and gold mine would cost more than $10 billion to build, and the potential investors wanted assurances. Under the so-called Oyu Tolgoi Investment Agreement, taxes and royalty payments to the government would be fixed for 30 years. At the time, it was considered “the initiation of a new stage in Mongolia’s history,” said Oliver Belfitt-Nash, an analyst at Monet Capital, a Mongolian investment bank.
The agreement set off a boom.
Rio Tinto spent billions of dollars to buy out Ivanhoe’s stake in the project and build the Oyu Tolgoi mine. Investors followed, encouraged by the cooperation between a multinational corporation and a coalition government. Some investors financed smaller mines. Others imported mining equipment or Hummers to sell to newly minted millionaires. Skyscrapers rose in central Ulan Bator.
The impact of this spending was significant in this country of only three million people. Last year — when capital expenditures on the Oyu Tolgoi mine peaked — Mongolia’s gross domestic product increased by 17.5 percent, according to the International Monetary Fund. It was the fastest-growing economy in the world.
But optimism has fizzled since May. That month, Mongolia passed the Strategic Foreign Investment Law, which states that Parliament must approve foreign takeovers of assets in strategic sectors like mining and banking.
In Ulan Bator, the law was widely seen as a torpedo aimed at one deal, Chalco’s takeover of SouthGobi Resources, a coal mining company. Chalco, China’s largest state-owned mining company, agreed in April to buy a controlling stake in SouthGobi Resources, a Rio Tinto subsidiary, for $926 million. In September, Chalco walked away, citing regulatory uncertainty.
Both foreign investors and local businessmen have complained about the law’s lack of clarity. The rules set up the potential for severe regulatory delays, as politicians from all parties intervene in the deal-making. The government has not yet specified how the law would work in practice, but it has already affected transactions beyond the SouthGobi acquisition.
“We haven’t made any new investments,” said an executive at an financial company with extensive holdings in Mongolia, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. It “is a horrible law. It is very menacing and unclear. At a time when investors are scared of allocating capital anyway, it’s definitely had a negative impact.”
In the months after the law’s passage, foreign direct investment plunged. In September, investment flows from abroad dropped 44 percent compared with the same month in 2011, according to data from the central bank.
The commodity markets are partly to blame for the financing crunch. Prices for coal and copper, the country’s main exports, are lower this year.
But government policies have only worsened the problem. Ovoot Tolgoi, a large coal mine owned by SouthGobi Resources, has suspended its operations for the last six months after the failed deal with Chalco.
Tavan Tolgoi, the state-owned coal mining company, did not export coal for three months this summer. In the run-up to elections in June, the government raided the company’s treasury to pay for cash handouts to the populace.
The ruling party eventually lost the elections. And the policy left Tavan Tolgoi so starved for money that it could not afford to transport its coal to Chinese markets, according to a company official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the political nature of the matter.
The combination — the weakness in the mining industry coupled with the government actions — has hurt the country’s finances. The International Monetary Fund expects that Mongolia will face a fiscal deficit of 900 billion tugrik, or $643 million, in 2012, and several policy makers in Ulan Bator expect it to widen next year.
The situation has left the government scrambling to make up the gap, putting the Rio Tinto deal directly in the cross hairs.
Last month, the Parliament approved a budget for 2013 that tries to renegotiate the Oyu Tolgoi Investment Agreement with Rio Tinto. The budget calls for 446 billion tugrik, or $319 million, of extra income from the Oyu Tolgoi mining project next year. This revenue would come from new royalty payments that are up to four times as high as in the original deal. The budget legislation refers to “when the amendment is made,” as if it were already a done deal.
“We believe the recent surge in government support to renegotiate” the deal with Rio Tinto “is to meet the proposed budget deficit,” Dale Choi, an analyst at Origo Partners, a private equity investor in Mongolia, said in a note last month. But revising the deal “would undoubtedly adversely impact both near- and longer-term economic growth and Mongolia’s sovereign risk profile in the global financial markets.”
The changes in the budget could threaten Rio Tinto’s returns. Significantly higher payments to the government could make the project uneconomical, prompting the company to freeze new investment and start international arbitration.
So far, Rio Tinto and its partners have spent more than $6 billion building Oyu Tolgoi, a vast complex that gleams with state-of-the-art equipment in the Gobi Desert. But the investors have not seen a dollar in profit because the mine will not start producing copper until next year. A spokesman for Rio Tinto declined to comment.
The two sides are in a standoff. The mining minister said at a news conference in October, “We have a strong need to renegotiate the investment agreement. If Oyu Tolgoi keep refusing, we will work until they understand and accept the changes.” But the company is unwilling to accept the tax and royalty amendments proposed in the budget, said a person with knowledge of the situation. Low-level discussions between the company and the government are under way, according to people on both sides, who declined to be identified.
Now, Mongolia faces a tough choice.
The country needs the money to plug the hole in the budget. The Rio Tinto deal has also become politically toxic, and the government needs to please many members of its coalition who campaigned and won seats by opposing the agreement.
But foreign investment — the lifeblood of the economy — could dry up if Rio Tinto pulls back.
Even as pessimism about the economy and investment policy deepens in Mongolia, outside investors continue to buy into the country’s “blue sky” future. Last week, Mongolia sold $1.5 billion of sovereign bonds amid strong demand.
In New York, Singapore and Hong Kong, a Mongolia delegation showed a PowerPoint presentation that featured photographs of the wide-open steppe. The first slide reads: “Mongolia: The Country with Unmatched Growth Potential.”
But within Mongolia, some are wondering whether such claims match the reality.
This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: December 11, 2012
A previous version of the article said that Chalco walked away from buying a controlling stake in SouthGobi Resources in May. The company walked away in September.
Nashville star Hayden Panettiere has broken up with her boyfriend of more than a year, New York Jets wide receiver Scotty McKnight, a source confirms to PEOPLE.
But the split doesn't appear to be the stuff of a sad country song. The actress, 23, is still friends with McKnight, 24, and one source tells TMZ that their pals wouldn't be surprised if they got back together.
This is Panettiere's second go at a relationship with an athlete. Before dating McKnight she was with Ukrainian boxer Wladimir Klitschko for about two years. – Julie Jordan
WASHINGTON (AP) — It's about to get faster and easier to diagnose food poisoning, but that progress for individual patients comes with a downside: It could hurt the nation's ability to spot and solve dangerous outbreaks.
Next-generation tests that promise to shave a few days off the time needed to tell whether E. coli, salmonella or other foodborne bacteria caused a patient's illness could reach medical laboratories as early as next year. That could allow doctors to treat sometimes deadly diseases much more quickly — an exciting development.
The problem: These new tests can't detect crucial differences between different subtypes of bacteria, as current tests can. And that fingerprint is what states and the federal government use to match sick people to a contaminated food. The older tests might be replaced by the new, more efficient ones.
"It's like a forensics lab. If somebody says a shot was fired, without the bullet you don't know where it came from," explained E. coli expert Dr. Phillip Tarr of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warns that losing the ability to literally take a germ's fingerprint could hamper efforts to keep food safe, and the agency is searching for solutions. According to CDC estimates, 1 in 6 Americans gets sick from foodborne illnesses each year, and 3,000 die.
"These improved tests for diagnosing patients could have the unintended consequence of reducing our ability to detect and investigate outbreaks, ultimately causing more people to become sick," said Dr. John Besser of the CDC.
That means outbreaks like the salmonella illnesses linked this fall to a variety of Trader Joe's peanut butter might not be identified that quickly — or at all.
It all comes down to what's called a bacterial culture — whether labs grow a sample of a patient's bacteria in an old-fashioned petri dish, or skip that step because the new tests don't require it.
Here's the way it works now: Someone with serious diarrhea visits the doctor, who gets a stool sample and sends it to a private testing laboratory. The lab cultures the sample, growing larger batches of any lurking bacteria to identify what's there. If disease-causing germs such as E. coli O157 or salmonella are found, they may be sent on to a public health laboratory for more sophisticated analysis to uncover their unique DNA patterns — their fingerprints.
Those fingerprints are posted to a national database, called PulseNet, that the CDC and state health officials use to look for food poisoning trends.
There are lots of garden-variety cases of salmonella every year, from runny eggs to a picnic lunch that sat out too long. But if a few people in, say, Baltimore have salmonella with the same molecular signature as some sick people in Cleveland, it's time to investigate, because scientists might be able narrow the outbreak to a particular food or company.
But culture-based testing takes time — as long as two to four days after the sample reaches the lab, which makes for a long wait if you're a sick patient.
What's in the pipeline? Tests that could detect many kinds of germs simultaneously instead of hunting one at a time — and within hours of reaching the lab — without first having to grow a culture. Those tests are expected to be approved as early as next year.
This isn't just a science debate, said Shari Shea, food safety director at the Association of Public Health Laboratories.
If you were the patient, "you'd want to know how you got sick," she said.
PulseNet has greatly improved the ability of regulators and the food industry to solve those mysteries since it was launched in the mid-1990s, helping to spot major outbreaks in ground beef, spinach, eggs and cantaloupe in recent years. Just this fall, PulseNet matched 42 different salmonella illnesses in 20 different states that were eventually traced to a variety of Trader Joe's peanut butter.
Food and Drug Administration officials who visited the plant where the peanut butter was made found salmonella contamination all over the facility, with several of the plant samples matching the fingerprint of the salmonella that made people sick. A New Mexico-based company, Sunland Inc., recalled hundreds of products that were shipped to large retailers all over the country, including Target, Safeway and other large grocery chains.
The source of those illnesses probably would have remained a mystery without the national database, since there weren't very many illnesses in any individual state.
To ensure that kind of crucial detective work isn't lost, the CDC is asking the medical community to send samples to labs to be cultured even when they perform a new, non-culture test.
But it's not clear who would pay for that extra step. Private labs only can perform the tests that a doctor orders, noted Dr. Jay M. Lieberman of Quest Diagnostics, one of the country's largest testing labs.
A few first-generation non-culture tests are already available. When private labs in Wisconsin use them, they frequently ship leftover samples to the state lab, which grows the bacteria itself. But as more private labs switch over after the next-generation rapid tests arrive, the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene will be hard-pressed to keep up with that extra work before it can do its main job — fingerprinting the bugs, said deputy director Dr. Dave Warshauer.
Stay tuned: Research is beginning to look for solutions that one day might allow rapid and in-depth looks at food poisoning causes in the same test.
"As molecular techniques evolve, you may be able to get the information you want from non-culture techniques," Lieberman said.
___
Follow Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick
PARIS (Reuters) - Stock futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street on Tuesday, with futures for the S&P 500 up 0.18 percent, Dow Jones futures up 0.18 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.23 percent at 5:25 a.m. EDT.
* European shares gained ground on Tuesday morning, helped by data showing German investor confidence unexpectedly rose in December after a sharp fall in the previous month, with Italian shares recovering from the previous day's selloff sparked by Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti's announcement that he plans to resign.
* Monti said on Tuesday he still wanted to influence political debate in whatever role he fills after elections next year, leaving his political future open following speculation he may remain in politics.
* Texas Instruments Inc will be in focus after slightly raising its profit target, excluding a massive restructuring charge, as the company is cutting costs due to macro-economic uncertainties.
* Intel presented new manufacturing technology that it said keeps it on track to launch a new generation of chips for smartphones and tablets as it rushes to catch up with Qualcomm and other rivals in the fast-growing mobile market.
* Industrial machinery maker SPX Corp is in exclusive talks to buy rival Gardner Denver Inc and hopes to finalize a deal by the end of the year, four people familiar with the matter said on Monday.
* Contract manufacturer Flextronics International Ltd said it agreed to take over Motorola Mobility's manufacturing operations in Tianjin, China and Jaguariuna, Brazil.
* Morgan Stanley might seek approval from the Federal Reserve to repurchase shares for the first time in four years, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the firm's thinking.
* A group of Chinese companies, including Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), is in talks to buy nearly all of American International Group Inc's aircraft leasing unit for about $5.5 billion, AIG said on Friday.
* On the macro front, investors awaited U.S. international trade for October, due at 8:30 a.m. EDT, the consumer confidence index, due at 10 a.m. EDT, as well as wholesale inventories, due at 10 a.m. EDT.
* U.S. stocks edged higher on Monday as technology shares bounced back after recent weakness and McDonald's posted strong monthly sales.
* The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 14.75 points, or 0.11 percent, to 13,169.88 at the close. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> inched up just 0.48 of a point, or 0.03 percent, to 1,418.55. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> advanced 8.92 points, or 0.30 percent, to close at 2,986.96.
As Syria‘s rebels work to overthrow the tank-equipped Assad regime, they’ve learned that it helps to have tanks of their own. They deserve bonus points for integrating video game technology. This is no exaggeration. Have a look at the opposition forces’ “100 percent made in Syria” armored vehicle, the Sham II.
RELATED: What Dennis Kucinich Really Said in Syria
Named for ancient Syria and assembled out of spare parts over the course of a month, the Sham II sort of rough around the edges, but it’s got impressive guts. It rides on the chassis of an old diesel car and is fully encased in light steel that’s rusted from the elements. Five cameras are mounted around the tanks outside, and there’s a machine gun mounted on a turning turret. Inside, it kind of looks like a man cave. A couple of flat screen TVs are mounted on opposite walls. The driver sits in front of one, controlling the vehicle with a steering wheel, and the gunner sits at the other, aiming the machine gun with a Playstation controller.
RELATED: It’s Never a Good Idea to Put Your Torture Victims on YouTube
Sham II is heading up to the devastated city of Aleppo to join the combat forces there. Meanwhile, rebel forces continue to close in on Damascus and Assad’s shrinking regime. Diplomats have already begun to speculate about what the Syrian president’s next move would be. We do know that Assad has been exploring the option of seeking political asylum in the Middle East or in Latin American. However, it looks more likely that Assad and his cronies will retreat to the Alawite-controlled mountains on Syria’s Mediterranean coast. The only other alternative — chemical weapons attack notwithstanding — would be for Assad to stay in the palace and fight to the end. And can you imagine standing helpless as a fierce machine like Sham II roared up the palace steps? Run, Bashar. Run.
In November, Xi Jinping made his official debut as party chief at the 18th party congress, which military officers attended.
BEIJING — In a strong signal of support for greater market-oriented economic policies, Xi Jinping, the new head of the Communist Party, made a visit over the weekend to the special economic zone of Shenzhen in south China, which has stood as a symbol of the nation’s embrace of a state-led form of capitalism since its growth over the last three decades from a fishing enclave to an industrial metropolis.
The trip was Mr. Xi’s first outside Beijing since becoming party chief on Nov. 15. Mr. Xi visited a private Internet company on Friday and went to Lotus Hill Park on Saturday to lay a wreath at a bronze statue of Deng Xiaoping, the leader who opened the era of economic reforms in 1979, when Shenzhen was designated a special economic zone. Mr. Deng famously later visited the city in 1992 to encourage reviving those economic policies after they had stalled following the violent crackdown on pro-democracy protests in 1989.
“Reform and opening up is a guiding policy that the Communist Party must stick to,” Mr. Xi said, according to Phoenix Television, one of several Hong Kong news organizations that covered the trip. “We must keep to this correct path. We must stay unwavering on the road to a prosperous country and people, and there must be new pioneering.”
In the months before the transition, there were widespread calls, including from people close to Mr. Xi, to adopt more liberal economic policies and even to experiment with greater political openness as a way for the party to maintain its rule. Without much success so far, reformers have long been encouraging the leadership to move toward a more sustainable growth model for China, one that relies more on domestic consumption rather than infrastructure investment and exports, and where state enterprises play less of a role.
Mr. Xi, known as a skillful consensus builder, has kept his ideas carefully veiled throughout his career, but his trip to Shenzhen is the strongest sign yet that he may favor more open policies. In a speech in Beijing on Nov. 29, Mr. Xi spoke of the “Chinese dream” of realizing the nation’s “revival,” which, besides being a call for renewal, also signaled strong nationalist leanings.
Mr. Xi’s father, Xi Zhongxun, was a revered senior official handpicked by Mr. Deng to help shape the new economic policies and oversee the creation of the Shenzhen zone. Mr. Xi’s mother lives in Shenzhen, and he visited her on his trip, according to Hong Kong news reports.
“If he indeed went to Shenzhen, that means he intends to make reform a subject of priority,” said Li Weidong, a liberal political analyst. “That would really be a phenomenon.”
Mr. Li cautioned, though, that the so-called reform policies that followed Mr. Deng’s 1992 southern tour, in his view, “ended up being fake” because China’s boom resulted in widespread corruption and the expansion of state enterprises at the expense of private entrepreneurship.
When Mr. Xi’s predecessor, Hu Jintao, became party chief in 2002, he was seen by many as a potential reformer, but his tenure was marked by conservative policies. For his first trip outside Beijing as party chief, Mr. Hu went in December 2002 to Xibaipo, a hallowed site for the revolution, where he reiterated a speech given by Mao Zedong.
Over the weekend, video footage from Phoenix Television showed a line of minibuses and police cars winding its way through Shenzhen. Mr. Xi and other officials walked outdoors in dark suits. The party’s official news organizations did not immediately report on the trip, but some prominent mainland Chinese news Web sites cited the Hong Kong reports.
Mr. Xi’s early moves as party leader seem aimed at emphasizing national “revival,” a theme he highlighted when he appeared on Nov. 29 with the party’s new seven-man Politburo Standing Committee in a history museum at Tiananmen Square. According to People’s Daily, the party mouthpiece, Mr. Xi stood in front of an exhibition called “The Road to Rejuvenation” and said, “After the 170 or more years of constant struggle since the Opium Wars, the great revival of the Chinese nation enjoys glorious prospects.”
He added: “Now everyone is discussing the Chinese dream, and I believe that realizing the great revival of the Chinese nation is the greatest dream of the Chinese nation in modern times.”
The emphasis on a “Chinese dream” is particular to Mr. Xi, and could prove to be a recurring motif throughout his tenure. The notion of a grand revival — “fu xing” in Mandarin — has been popular with Chinese leaders for at least a century, but Mr. Xi appears to be tapping more deeply into that nationalist vein than his recent predecessors, perhaps recognizing that traditional Communist ideology no longer has popular appeal.
Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro were on hand to celebrate their film Silver Linings Playbook at the Weinstein Company's special event at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood on Friday.
At the candle-lit dinner party, De Niro enjoyed a Purity Vodka martini, while Cooper posed for photos with Zoe Saldana. De Niro spent part of the night talking with Mel Gibson and Jane Fonda, who were also in attendance.
Diane Keaton was also at the event, but upon arriving, entered the room "looking a bit puzzled," an onlooker tells PEOPLE.
When asked if she was looking for someone, she responded, "No, I'm looking for a drink," the source adds.
SEATTLE (AP) — The crowds of happy people lighting joints under Seattle's Space Needle early Thursday morning with nary a police officer in sight bespoke the new reality: Marijuana is legal under Washington state law.
Hundreds gathered at Seattle Center for a New Year's Eve-style countdown to 12 a.m., when the legalization measure passed by voters last month took effect. When the clock struck, they cheered and sparked up in unison.
A few dozen people gathered on a sidewalk outside the north Seattle headquarters of the annual Hempfest celebration and did the same, offering joints to reporters and blowing smoke into television news cameras.
"I feel like a kid in a candy store!" shouted Hempfest volunteer Darby Hageman. "It's all becoming real now!"
Washington and Colorado became the first states to vote to decriminalize and regulate the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana by adults over 21. Both measures call for setting up state licensing schemes for pot growers, processors and retail stores. Colorado's law is set to take effect by Jan. 5.
Technically, Washington's new marijuana law still forbids smoking pot in public, which remains punishable by a fine, like drinking in public. But pot fans wanted a party, and Seattle police weren't about to write them any tickets.
In another sweeping change for Washington, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Wednesday signed into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage. The state joins several others that allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.
The mood was festive in Seattle as dozens of gay and lesbian couples got in line to pick up marriage licenses at the King County auditor's office early Thursday.
King County and Thurston County announced they would open their auditors' offices shortly after midnight Wednesday to accommodate those who wanted to be among the first to get their licenses.
Kelly Middleton and her partner Amanda Dollente got in line at 4 p.m. Wednesday.
Hours later, as the line grew, volunteers distributed roses and a group of men and women serenaded the waiting line to the tune of "Chapel of Love."
Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.
In dealing with marijuana, the Seattle Police Department told its 1,300 officers on Wednesday, just before legalization took hold, that until further notice they shall not issue citations for public marijuana use.
Officers will be advising people not to smoke in public, police spokesman Jonah Spangenthal-Lee wrote on the SPD Blotter. "The police department believes that, under state law, you may responsibly get baked, order some pizzas and enjoy a 'Lord of the Rings' marathon in the privacy of your own home, if you want to."
He offered a catchy new directive referring to the film "The Big Lebowski," popular with many marijuana fans: "The Dude abides, and says 'take it inside!'"
"This is a big day because all our lives we've been living under the iron curtain of prohibition," said Hempfest director Vivian McPeak. "The whole world sees that prohibition just took a body blow."
Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce for those over 21, but for now selling marijuana remains illegal. I-502 gives the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage. Analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.
But marijuana remains illegal under federal law. That means federal agents can still arrest people for it, and it's banned from federal properties, including military bases and national parks.
The Justice Department has not said whether it will sue to try to block the regulatory schemes in Washington and Colorado from taking effect.
"The department's responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged," said a statement issued Wednesday by the Seattle U.S. attorney's office. "Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress."
The legal question is whether the establishment of a regulated marijuana market would "frustrate the purpose" of the federal pot prohibition, and many constitutional law scholars say it very likely would.
That leaves the political question of whether the administration wants to try to block the regulatory system, even though it would remain legal to possess up to an ounce of marijuana.
Alison Holcomb is the drug policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and served as the campaign manager for New Approach Washington, which led the legalization drive. She said the voters clearly showed they're done with marijuana prohibition.
"New Approach Washington sponsors and the ACLU look forward to working with state and federal officials and to ensure the law is fully and fairly implemented," she said.
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Johnson can be reached at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle
