BURBANK, Calif. (AP) — Los Angeles police say they've recovered a stolen 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air Convertible that belongs to talk-show host Phil McGraw.
Detective Jess Corral said Tuesday that investigators recovered McGraw's classic car, along with 13 others, after law enforcement began targeting auto theft rings.
McGraw is known as television's "Dr. Phil. His car was stolen from the RODZ shop in Burbank in August, and was found with minor damage.
The car is worth at least $80,000.
Posted by kelilipans at 7:06 PM
WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study says basic prescription drug coverage could vary dramatically from state to state under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.
That's because states get to set benefits for private health plans that will be offered starting in 2014 through new insurance exchanges.
The study out Tuesday from the market analysis firm Avalere Health found that some states will require coverage of virtually all FDA-approved drugs, while others will only require coverage of about half of medications.
Consumers will still have access to essential medications, but some may not have as much choice.
Connecticut, Virginia and Arizona will be among the states with the most generous coverage, while California, Minnesota and North Carolina will be among states with the most limited.
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Online:
Avalere Health: http://tinyurl.com/d3b3hfv
Posted by kelilipans at 7:04 PM
CAIRO (AP) — More than 100,000 Egyptians protested outside the presidential palace in Cairo on Tuesday, fueling tensions over Islamist leader Mohammed Morsi's seizure of nearly unrestricted powers and the adoption by his allies of a controversial draft constitution.
The outpouring of anger across the Egyptian capital, the Mediterranean port of Alexandria and a string of other cities pointed to a prolonged standoff between the president and a newly united opposition.
Morsi's opponents, long fractured by bickering and competing egos, have been re-energized since he announced decrees last month that place him above oversight of any kind, including by the courts, and provide immunity to two key bodies dominated by his allies: The 100-member panel drafting the constitution and parliament's upper chamber.
The decrees have led to charges that Morsi's powers turned him into a "new pharaoh."
The large turnout in Tuesday's protests — dubbed "The Last Warning" by organizers — signaled sustained momentum for the opposition, which brought out at least 200,000 protesters to Cairo's Tahrir Square a week ago and a comparable number on Friday to demand that Morsi rescind the decrees.
The huge scale of the protests have dealt a blow to the legitimacy of the new constitution, which Morsi's opponents contend allows religious authorities too much influence over legislation, threatens to restrict freedom of expression and opens the door to Islamist control over day-to-day life.
What the revived opposition has yet to make clear is what it will do next: campaign for a "no" vote on the draft constitution in a nationwide referendum set for Dec. 15, or call on Egyptians to boycott the vote.
Already, the country's powerful judges have said they will not take on their customary role of overseeing the vote, thus robbing it of much of its legitimacy.
Morsi was in the presidential palace conducting business as usual as the protesters gathered outside. He left for home through a back door as the crowds continued to swell, according to a presidential official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The official said Morsi left on the advice of security officials to head off "possible dangers" and to calm the protesters. Morsi's spokesman, however, said the president left the palace at the end of his normal work day, through the door he routinely uses.
The protest was peaceful except for a brief outburst when police used tear gas to prevent demonstrators from removing a barricade topped with barbed wire and converging on the palace.
Soon after, with the president gone, the police abandoned their lines and the protesters surged ahead to reach the palace walls. But there were no attempts to storm the palace, guarded inside by the army's Republican Guard.
Protesters also commandeered two police vans, climbing atop the armored vehicles to jubilantly wave Egypt's red, white and black flag and chant against Morsi. The protesters later mingled freely with the black-clad riot police, as more and more people flocked to the area to join the demonstration.
The protesters covered most of the palace walls with anti-Morsi graffiti and waved giant banners carrying images of revolutionaries killed in earlier protests. "Down with the regime" and "No to Morsi," they wrote on the walls.
"He isn't the president of all Egyptians, only of the Muslim Brotherhood," said protester Mariam Metwally, a postgraduate student of international law. "We don't feel like he is our president."
A giant poster emblazoned with an image of Morsi wearing a Pharaonic crown was hoisted between two street light posts outside the presidential palace. "Down with the president. No to the constitution," it declared.
"The scene at Itihadiya palace is a stab at the president's legitimacy and his constitutional declaration," opposition leader Hamdeen Sabahi told a private TV network. "The scene sends a message to the president that he is running out of time."
The massive gathering was reminiscent of the one outside the palace on Feb. 11, 2011 — the day authoritarian president Hosni Mubarak stepped down in the face of an 18-day uprising that ended his 29-year regime.
Shouts of "Erhal! Erhal!" — Arabic for "Leave! Leave!" — and "The people want to topple the regime!" rose up from the crowd, the same chants used against Mubarak. This time, though, they were directed at his successor, Egypt's first democratically elected president.
"The same way we brought down Mubarak in 18 days, we can bring down Morsi in less," Ziad Oleimi, a prominent rights activist, told the crowds using a loudspeaker.
In Alexandria, some 10,000 opponents of Morsi gathered in the center of the country's second-largest metropolis, chanting slogans against the leader and his Islamic fundamentalist group, the Muslim Brotherhood.
The protests fueled Egypt's worst political crisis since Mubarak's ouster, with the country clearly divided into two camps: Morsi, his Muslim Brotherhood and their ultraconservative Islamist allies, versus an opposition made up of youth groups, liberal parties and large sectors of the public.
Tens of thousands also gathered in Cairo's downtown Tahrir Square, miles away from the palace, to join several hundred who have been camping out there for nearly two weeks. There were other large protests around the city.
Smaller protests by Morsi opponents were staged in the Islamist stronghold of Assiut, as well as in Suez, Luxor, Aswan, Damanhour and the industrial city of Mahallah, north of Cairo.
"Freedom or we die," chanted a crowd of several hundred outside a mosque in Cairo's Abbasiyah district. "Mohammed Morsi, illegitimate! Brotherhood, illegitimate!" they yelled.
Earlier Tuesday, several hundred protesters also gathered outside Morsi's residence in an upscale suburb. "Down with the sons of dogs. We are the power and we are the people," they chanted.
Morsi, who narrowly won the presidency in a June election, appeared to be in no mood for compromise.
A statement by his office said he met Tuesday with his deputy, his prime minister and several top Cabinet members to discuss preparations for the referendum. The statement suggested business as usual at the palace, despite the mass rally outside its doors.
Asked why Morsi did not address the crowds, Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Mahmoud Ghozlan said the protesters were "rude" and included "thugs and drug addicts."
The Islamists responded to the mass opposition protests last week by sending hundreds of thousands of supporters into Cairo's twin city of Giza on Saturday and across much of the country. Thousands also besieged Egypt's highest court, the Supreme Constitutional Court.
The court had been widely expected to declare the constitutional assembly that passed the draft charter illegitimate and to disband parliament's upper house, the Shura Council. Instead, the judges went on strike after they found their building under siege by protesters.
Morsi's Nov. 22 decrees were followed last week by the constitutional panel rushing through the draft constitution in a marathon, all-night session without the participation of liberal and Christian members. Only four women, all Islamists, attended the session.
The charter has been criticized for not protecting the rights of women and minority groups, and many journalists see it as restricting freedom of expression. Critics also say it empowers Islamic religious clerics by giving them a say over legislation, while some articles were seen as tailored to get rid of the Islamists' enemies.
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Associated Press writer Maggie Michael contributed to this report.
Posted by kelilipans at 7:02 PM
TOKYO (AP) — Leaders for Japan's biggest political parties are kicking off the campaign for parliamentary elections to be held in less than two weeks with visits to nuclear crisis-hit Fukushima prefecture.
Nuclear energy and the economy are key issues in the Dec. 16 election, which is widely expected to send Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's unpopular Democratic Party of Japan to defeat after three years in power.
The opposition Liberal Democratic Party is leading in the polls, but is unlikely to win a majority of seats in the lower house of parliament.
The most likely outcome of the election is a coalition government whose makeup is far from clear.
Polls show more than 40 percent of voters don't know which party they'll support in the election.
Posted by kelilipans at 7:10 PM
News Corp’s iPad newspaper “The Daily” is officially dead. Launched in February 2011, The Daily was a “ bold experiment in digital publishing and an amazing vehicle for innovation,” but like so many pioneering ideas, it “could not find a large enough audience quickly enough” to keep the publication going, according to Rupert Murdoch, the Chairman of News Corporation and Chairman and CEO of Fox Group. The Daily will officially cease publishing on December 15th and will see Jesse Angelo, its Editor-in-Chief and Executive Editor of The New York Post move into the role of Publisher for the latter. The Daily was supposed to signal a new era of app-based interactive newspapers, but alas, in a world of Flipboard, Instapaper and social media, finding a new channel to distribute and aggregate news has proven to be challenging, even for corporations with plenty of resources.
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Posted by kelilipans at 7:08 PM
LOS ANGELES (AP) — "Lincoln" is marching to more movie theaters.
Disney, which distributed the DreamWorks film, is making additional prints of director Steven Spielberg's historical saga starring Daniel Day-Lewis to meet an unexpected demand that has left some moviegoers in Alaska out in the cold.
"To say that we're encouraged by the results to date or that they've exceeded our expectations is an understatement," said Dave Hollis, head of distribution at the Walt Disney Co. "We're in the midst of making additional prints to accommodate demand and will have them available to our partners in exhibition by mid-December for what we hope will be a great run through the holiday and awards corridor."
The film, which opened in wide release Nov. 9 and has earned $83.6 million in North America so far, has been unavailable at some smaller venues, such as the Gross Alaska theaters in Juneau.
But the extra prints are coming a little too late to fit the movie into the five-screen Glacier Cinemas theater during the holiday season, said Kenny Solomon-Gross, general manager of the Gross Alaska, which runs two theaters in Juneau and one in Ketchikan, Alaska.
"When we had the room for 'Lincoln,' Disney didn't have a copy for us," Solomon-Gross said Monday.
His film lineup is pretty booked through the end of the year, and he probably can't screen "Lincoln" until after the first of the new year. Yes, the excitement over the film will have dimmed, but then the Academy Awards season will be stirring up, he said. That should kick up the buzz.
In the meantime, Solomon-Gross plans to head to Las Vegas this week and catch the film there.
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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Derrik J. Lang on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/derrikjlang . Associated Press writer Rachel D'Oro in Anchorage, Alaska, contributed to this report.
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Online:
http://www.thelincolnmovie.com
Posted by kelilipans at 7:06 PM
DOHA, Qatar (AP) — Hassan al-Kubaisi considers it a gift from above that drivers in oil- and gas-rich Qatar only have to pay $1 per gallon at the pump.
"Thank God that our country is an oil producer and the price of gasoline is one of the lowest," al-Kubaisi said, filling up his Toyota Land Cruiser at a gas station in Doha. "God has given us a blessing."
To those looking for a global response to climate change, it's more like a curse.
Qatar — the host of U.N. climate talks that entered their final week Monday — is among dozens of countries that keep gas prices artificially low through subsidies that exceeded $500 billion globally last year. Renewable energy worldwide received six times less support — an imbalance that is just starting to earn attention in the divisive negotiations on curbing the carbon emissions blamed for heating the planet.
"We need to stop funding the problem, and start funding the solution," said Steve Kretzmann, of Oil Change International, an advocacy group for clean energy.
His group presented research Monday showing that in addition to the fuel subsidies in developing countries, rich nations in 2011 gave more than $58 billion in tax breaks and other production subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. The U.S. figure was $13 billion.
The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has calculated that removing fossil fuel subsidies could reduce carbon emissions by more than 10 percent by 2050.
Yet the argument is just recently gaining traction in climate negotiations, which in two decades have failed to halt the rising temperatures that are melting Arctic ice, raising sea levels and shifting weather patterns with impacts on droughts and floods.
In Doha, the talks have been slowed by wrangling over financial aid to help poor countries cope with global warming and how to divide carbon emissions rights until 2020 when a new planned climate treaty is supposed to enter force. Calls are now intensifying to include fossil fuel subsidies as a key part of the discussion.
"I think it is manifestly clear ... that this is a massive missing piece of the climate change jigsaw puzzle," said Tim Groser, New Zealand's minister for climate change.
He is spearheading an initiative backed by Scandinavian countries and some developing countries to put fuel subsidies on the agenda in various forums, citing the U.N. talks as a "natural home" for the debate.
The G-20 called for their elimination in 2009, and the issue also came up at the U.N. earth summit in Rio de Janeiro earlier this year. Frustrated that not much has happened since, European Union climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard said Monday she planned to raise the issue with environment ministers on the sidelines of the talks in Doha.
Many developing countries are positive toward phasing out fossil fuel subsidies, not just to protect the climate but to balance budgets. Subsidies introduced as a form of welfare benefit decades ago have become an increasing burden to many countries as oil prices soar.
"We are reviewing the subsidy periodically in the context of the total economy for Qatar," the tiny Persian gulf country's energy minister, Mohammed bin Saleh al-Sada, told reporters Monday.
Qatar's National Development Strategy 2011-2016 states it more bluntly, saying fuel subsides are "at odds with the aspirations" and sustainability objectives of the wealthy emirate.
The problem is that getting rid of them comes with a heavy political price.
When Jordan raised fuel prices last month, angry crowds poured into the streets, torching police cars, government offices and private banks in the most sustained protests to hit the country since the start of the Arab unrest. One person was killed and 75 others were injured in the violence.
Nigeria, Indonesia, India and Sudan have also seen violent protests this year as governments tried to bring fuel prices closer to market rates.
Iran has used a phased approach to lift fuel subsidies over the past several years, but its pump prices remain among the cheapest in the world.
"People perceive it as something that the government is taking away from them," said Kretzmann. "The trick is we need to do it in a way that doesn't harm the poor."
The International Energy Agency found in 2010 that fuel subsidies are not an effective measure against poverty because only 8 percent of such subsidies reached the bottom 20 percent of income earners.
The IEA, which only looked at consumption subsidies, this year said they "remain most prevalent in the Middle East and North Africa, where momentum toward their reform appears to have been lost."
In the U.S., environmental groups say fossil fuel subsidies include tax breaks, the foreign tax credit and the credit for production of nonconventional fuels.
Industry groups, like the Independent Petroleum Association of America, are against removing such support, saying that would harm smaller companies, rather than the big oil giants.
In Doha, Mohammed Adow, a climate activist with Christian Aid, called all fuel subsidies "reckless and dangerous," but described removing subsidies on the production side as "low-hanging fruit" for governments if they are serious about dealing with climate change.
"It's going to oil and coal companies that don't need it in the first place," he said.
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Associated Press writers Abdullah Rebhy in Doha, Qatar, and Brian Murphy in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report
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Karl Ritter can be reached at www.twitter.com/karl_ritter
Posted by kelilipans at 7:04 PM
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. (AP) — Navy Secretary Ray Mabus on Monday honored four members of a Marine special operations team in a rare public ceremony for the covert forces.
In a ceremony at Camp Pendleton, Calif., Mabus awarded Marine Sgt. William Soutra Jr. the Navy Cross, the Navy's highest honor and the military's second highest honor, for tending to the wounded while guiding the platoon to safety during an attack in Afghanistan's Helmand Province in July 2010 that spanned over two days.
Three others on his team, including a Navy corpsman, were given Silver Stars.
Often the heroic actions of special operators are only known to each other and the leadership because of their covert work on classified missions.
"This is a chance to recognize people who don't get recognized much," Mabus said, adding that their actions show "just how incredibly capable" Marine special operators are.
Soutra was a canine handler with a Marine special operations team when they were ambushed. After the team's assistant leader was fatally wounded by an enemy explosive during the ambush, Soutra jumped into action, repeatedly running into the line of fire as he helped direct troops to defend themselves and fight off the enemy, Mabus said.
At one point, the 27-year-old Marine from Worchester, Mass., placed a tourniquet on a wounded commando, before dragging him to a ditch for cover. He worked tirelessly for more than an hour after the initial blast and helped carry casualties through the sporadic gunfire, officials said.
His military dog stayed attached to his side during the ordeal. The dog had to be put down more than a year ago because it had cancer.
Maj. James Rose, Staff Sgt. Frankie Shinost Jr. and Navy Corpsman Patrick Quill were given Silver Stars for their actions that day.
The four men called it a horrible day because they lost their element leader, Staff Sgt. Chris Antonik.
"Every day I think about Chris," said Soutra, calling him a close friend and great warrior.
Soutra vowed to try to carry on as the kind of warrior that would make Antonik proud.
Posted by kelilipans at 7:02 PM
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — A mortar shell left from the Vietnam War has exploded in a southern village, killing four children and seriously injuring five other people.
Hieu Nghia village official Le Van Giang says three children aged 4 to 11 died at the scene Sunday afternoon and a 6-year-old boy died at the hospital. The blast seriously injured two other children and three men.
Giang said the shell exploded when the children who found the shell from bamboo brush were playing with it. A villager found the shell five years ago when dredging a canal.
The village in Vinh Long province was a communist stronghold during the war.
Vietnamese government figures show unexploded ordnance have killed more than 42,000 people since the war ended in 1975.
Posted by kelilipans at 7:10 PM
LONDON (Reuters) – The euro zone crisis has left Western Europe the only world region to see a fall in advertising spending this year, market research group ZenithOptimedia said.
The forecasting group said advertising expenditure in Western Europe fell 2.2 percent to $ 106.8 billion this year compared with an average increase of 3.3 percent worldwide.
North American ad spending rose 4.1 percent to $ 171.9 billion and Asia’s expenditure was up 6.1 percent to $ 140.1 billion this year.
“Developing markets, social media and online video are all growing rapidly, supporting continued expansion in global ad expenditure despite stagnation in the eurozone,” said Steve King, global chief executive of ZenithOptimedia Group.
The company, part of advertising agency Publicis, also said European ad spending would be flat next year before growing by about 2 percent in 2014 and 2015.
This leaves Europe lagging faster-growing regions such North America, which will grow by 3.5 percent next year, as well as Asia (5.5 percent) and Latin America (10 percent).
“The euro zone crisis is dragging down economic growth at the moment,” ZenithOptimedia said on Monday.
“Because the eurozone is in recession, its imports from other countries are slowing down or shrinking, and the risk of eurozone collapse adds to global uncertainty, leading companies to hoard cash instead of investing in growth,” the firm said in an emailed statement.
Ad spending generally tracks economic growth, so recessions tend to hit the shares of advertising agencies, including market leaders WPP, Omnicom, Interpublic Group and Publicis.
ZenithOptimedia said global ad expenditure would rise 4.1 percent next year to reach $ 518 billion, driven largely by faster growth in the developing markets.
(Editing by Helen Massy-Beresford)
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Posted by kelilipans at 7:08 PM
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