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LOS ANGELES – Brittany Murphy, the actress who got her start in the sleeper hit "Clueless" and rose to stardom in "8 Mile," has died in Los Angeles. She was 32.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Spokeswoman Sally Stewart said Murphy died at 10:04 a.m. Sunday. She would not provide a cause of death, or any other information.
The Los Angeles Fire Department responded to a call at 8 a.m. Sunday from a home that is listed as belonging to British screenwriter Simon Monjack, who is married to Murphy, spokesman Devon Gale said. Gale said one person was transported to a hospital.
Los Angeles police have opened an investigation into Murphy's death, Officer Norma Eisenman said Sunday afternoon. Investigators have been dispatched to Murphy's home in the hills of West Hollywood.
Messages left for Murphy's manager, agent and publicist by The Associated Press weren't immediately returned.
Born Nov. 10, 1977 in Atlanta, Murphy grew up in New Jersey and later moved with her mother to Los Angeles to pursue acting.
Her career started in the early 1990s with small roles in television series, commercials and movies. She is best known for parts in "Girl, Interrupted," "Clueless" and "8 Mile."
Her on-screen roles declined in recent years, but Murphy's voice gave life to numerous animated characters, including Luanne Platter on more than 200 episodes of Fox's "King of the Hill" and Gloria the penguin in the 2006 feature "Happy Feet."
She is due to appear in Sylvester Stallone's upcoming film, "The Expendables," set for release next year.
Her role in "8 Mile" led to more recognition, Murphy said told AP in 2003. "That changed a lot," she said. "That was the difference between people knowing my first and last name as opposed to not."
Murphy credited her mother, Sharon, with being a key to her success.
"When I asked my mom to move to California, she sold everything and moved out here for me," Murphy said. "I was really grateful to have grown up in an environment that was conducive to creating and didn't stifle any of that. She always believed in me."
She dated Ashton Kutcher, who costarred with Murphy in 2003's romantic comedy "Just Married."
Kutcher sent a message on Twitter Sunday morning about Murphy's death: "2day the world lost a little piece of sunshine," Kutcher wrote. "My deepest condolences go out 2 Brittany's family, her husband, & her amazing mother Sharon."
___
AP Entertainment Writer Anthony McCartney contributed to this report.

TAICHUNG, Taiwan – Tens of thousands of opposition demonstrators marched through the streets of the central Taiwanese city of Taichung on Sunday, ahead of the arrival of a senior Chinese envoy for trade talks that some on the island fear could eventually lead to unification.
Under a leaden gray sky, the demonstrators chanted pro-independence slogans and waved anti-China banners to protest the visit of China's top Taiwan negotiator, Chen Yunlin, whom they view as a stalking horse for Beijing's proclaimed policy of bringing Taiwan back into its fold. The sides split amid civil war in 1949.
Chen was scheduled to arrive in Taichung on Monday for five days of talks. He is set to sign four new commercial accords with Taiwanese officials, adding to the 10 already in the books.
Protester Hsu Wen, a 55-year-old businessman from the southern city of Kaohsiung, said Chen's visit would help pave the way for a loss of Taiwan's hard-won democratic freedoms and its de facto independence.
"It's all very clear (China) wants to use the economy as a means to force us to unification," Hsu said.
Buoyed by a strong showing in local elections earlier this month, the Democratic Progressive Party sponsored Sunday's demonstration to press home its message that President Ma Ying-jeou's signature policy of tightening economic links with Beijing is threatening the well-being of Taiwan's people and paving the way for a Chinese takeover.
Since assuming office in May 2008, Ma has eased cross-strait tensions to their lowest level in 60 years, turning his back on his predecessor Chen Shui-Bian's pro-independence policies amid a welter of business-boosting initiatives.
They include launching regular air and sea links between the sides and ending across-the-board restrictions on Chinese investment in Taiwan — precursors, Ma says, to a partial Taiwan-China trade agreement meant to be signed next year.
Police put Sunday's crowd in Taichung at 20,000-30,000. Some 500 officers were on hand to control the protesters, mindful that a visit by Chen late last year provoked repeated clashes between authorities and demonstrators.
This time there were no reports of trouble.
Taiwan's powerful business community strongly favors Ma's approach, seeing it as necessary to prevent the island's economic marginalization amid growing trade ties between Beijing and neighboring Asian countries.
Washington also supports it enthusiastically. Despite shifting its China recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979, the U.S. remains Taiwan's most important ally and fears being drawn into the armed conflict that Beijing threatens would follow any opposition move to formalize Taiwan's de facto independence. It sees Ma's policies as strongly reducing that possibility.
The DPP, however, believes the president's China-friendly push sets the stage for an eventual Chinese takeover of the island — a charge Ma vehemently denies.
The DPP says Ma's trade deal — formally known as the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, or ECFA — will flood the island with cheap Chinese products, prompting massive job losses.
"Our president has turned blind to the possibility that jobs will be lost" after signing the ECFA with China, DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen told protesters.
As recently as five months ago, most of the Taiwanese public accepted Ma's argument that closer economic ties with China would aid Taiwanese prosperity, even allowing for the global economic downturn.
But Ma's mishandling of the response to a devastating typhoon in August began to dent his popularity, as did a more recent miscue involving secret negotiations on the removal of a ban on some U.S. beef imports.
Earlier this month, Ma's Nationalist Party beat the DPP by only two percentage points in local elections — a far cry from the 17-point margin Ma enjoyed over his DPP rival in the March 2008 presidential poll.

In some cases, words such as "extrême", "intense" or "concentrée" appended to fragrance names might indicate completely different fragrances that relates only because of a similar perfume accord. An example of this would be Chanel‘s Pour Monsieur and Pour Monsieur Concentrée.

Antique or badly preserved perfumes undergoing this analysis can also be difficult due to the numerous degradation by-products and impurities that may have resulted from breakdown of the odorous compounds. Ingredients and compounds can usually be ruled out or identified using gas chromatograph (GC) smellers, which allow individual chemical components to be identified both through their physical properties and their scent.

Solid Perfume

WASHINGTON – Senate health care legislation expected this week is likely to include a new long-term care insurance program to help the elderly and the disabled avoid going into nursing homes, Democratic officials say.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is expected to incorporate the voluntary program in legislation to be unveiled as early as Wednesday, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because a final decision has not been made.
Known as the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act, or CLASS Act, the program was a top priority for the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. It would begin to close a gap in the social safety net that's received little attention in the health care debate.
Fiscal conservatives and government economists have questioned whether the program would be financially sustainable over the long run, and insurance companies are lobbying to strip it from the health care bill.
Nonetheless, the House included the program in its health care legislation, with the approval of the Obama administration. In the Senate, the Health Committee bill had included it, but the Finance Committee omitted it. The approach Reid is considering in a combined bill would address the objections of fiscal conservatives by stipulating that premiums from the program could not be counted in offsetting the cost of the broader health care bill. Reid's office had no comment on Tuesday.
The cost of nursing homes averages $70,000 a year, and a home care attendant runs about $29 an hour. Medicare only covers temporary nursing home stays. Middle-class households have to exhaust their savings before an elder can qualify for nursing home coverage through Medicaid.
Under the proposed program, people would pay a modest monthly premium during their working years. If they become disabled, they would get a cash benefit of at least $50 a day that could be used to pay a home care attendant, buy supplies and equipment, make home improvements such as adding bathroom railings, or defray the costs of nursing home care.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the program would be fiscally solvent over a 75-year-period with the income from premiums, and no taxpayer financing. That assumes an initial monthly premium averaging $123, and a $75 daily benefit. People would sign up for the program at work through a payroll deduction. They would have to pay premiums for five years before they could qualify for benefits. Both the premiums and benefits would be adjusted annually.
"This is primarily a product for baby boomers, and people who are still working," said James Firman, president of the National Council on Aging, and a supporter of the program. "If we don't do this now, I don't think boomers are going to get another chance."
Supporters say the government benefit would provide a foundation upon which private insurance companies could build by selling supplemental long-term care coverage. But the industry says a new program would only create confusion for consumers.
Critics' concerns got validation recently from a report by Medicare economists who are expert in long-range cost estimates. In a report issued last weekend, they said a voluntary insurance program is likely to attract people who expect they'll need the coverage. Without taxpayer subsidies, premiums would keep going up, discouraging healthy people from signing up and triggering an "insurance death spiral."
"Individuals with health problems or who anticipate a greater risk of functional limitation would be more likely to participate than those in better-than-average health," the report said. "There is a significant risk that the problem ... would make the CLASS program unsustainable."

Creators Syndicate –
Former President Bill Clinton visited Capitol Hill recently to deliver a pep talk to Senate Democrats. "It's not important to be perfect here. It's important to act, to move, to start the ball rolling," he reportedly told senators. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel sounded a similar theme in an interview with the New York Times. "I'm sure there are a lot of people sitting in the shade at the Aspen Institute ... who will tell you what the ideal plan is. Great, fascinating. You have the art of the possible measured against the ideal."

So the strategy on crafting sweeping legislation that will profoundly alter one-sixth of the U.S. economy in the midst of the worst recession in 20 years is: Don't stress about the fine print. Just pass something!

This is the momentum theory of government. Governing is like campaigning: Keep the bandwagon rolling along and the voters will follow in the slipstream. Fail to do this, Bill Clinton warned, and Democrats may suffer the same fate in the 2010 elections that they did in 1994, after HillaryCare went down to defeat.

The former president is an acclaimed tactician and he may be right. But so many of his assumptions — and those of the Obama administration for whom he was speaking — are dubious.

In the first place, it isn't at all clear that Democrats lost in 1994 because they failed to pass health reform. A better explanation of the 1994 result was that voters were spooked by the attempted federalization of health care and expressed their displeasure by voting Republican. Certainly the subsequent retooling by the Clinton administration — agreeing that the "era of big government (was) over" and focusing on small matters like curfews and school uniforms — suggests that Clinton himself believed the health care reform was an overreach.

The Democrats also seem confident that — no matter how sloppy or unseemly the process of getting to passage may be — voters will be pleased with health care reform after it becomes law.

This, too, is a leap of faith. It requires a stubborn indifference to the steadily accumulating polling data showing that voters — particularly the all-important independents — are souring on health reform and are worried about overspending in Washington. An Ipsos/McClatchey poll in early November found that 49 percent of respondents oppose the health care reforms being considered in Congress while only 39 percent approve. In October, the numbers were 42 disapprove, 40 approve. Among independents, the number disapproving of health reform jumped from 38 percent to 53 percent. An October CNN poll found the approve/disapprove at 49/49. In November, disapproval took the lead with 53/45.

In the immediate afterglow of President Obama's inauguration, a bare majority (51 percent) of Americans believed that "government should do more to solve problems and help meet the needs of people." That seems to have been the high water mark. By late October, only 46 percent agreed. More ominously for Democrats, the liberal Brookings Institution published a survey showing that 53 percent of Americans worry that if government gets more involved in health care delivery, it will make matters worse. A Bloomberg poll found that fully 62 percent would be willing to risk lengthening the recession rather than to further increase the national deficit.

As for whether the voters will thank the Democrats if they succeed in ramming through a bill (Harry Reid is reportedly considering the reconciliation strategy in the Senate that would require only 51 votes), recent history should give them pause.

In 1988, with the support of the AARP, the House passed the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act by a vote of 328 to 72. A year later, Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, had to literally flee an angry crowd of unhappy constituents wielding placards bearing slogans like "Don't Tax the Seniors." The law was repealed 16 months after passage by a vote of 360 to 66.

The House-approved bill contains, among other things, $170 billion in cuts to Medicare Advantage; $56.7 billion in cuts to home health care aids; $42.3 billion in cuts to the prescription drug program; and $5.3 billion in cuts to rehabilitation facilities. If these remain in the final bill, only two outcomes are possible. Either the cuts will not materialize, in which case Democrats will have to explain why they irresponsibly deepened an already punishing debt; or the cuts will bite, in which case the anger of older voters will make Rostenkowski's experience seem like a ticker tape parade.

To find out more about Mona Charen and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS.COM

INDUSTRY, Calif. – Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Thursday he has signed a bill allowing the construction of a 75,000-seat stadium that developers hope will lure an NFL team back to the Los Angeles area.
Schwarzenegger said he signed the environmental exemption bill last week but saved the announcement for a news conference in Industry, where the stadium would be built about 15 miles east of Los Angeles.
The bill nullifies a lawsuit filed by residents in nearby Walnut over the project's environmental impact.
Schwarzenegger called the lawsuit frivolous before a crowd of union members wearing hardhats. Across the street, a dozen protesters from Walnut and other nearby communities held signs saying "No Stadium."
"This is the best kind of action state government can create — action that cuts red tape, generates jobs, is environmentally friendly and brings a continued economic boost to California," Schwarzenegger said.
The governor spoke on the edge of the hilly 600-acre site where the stadium is planned by developer Majestic Realty Co., which helped develop Staples Center, the downtown Los Angeles home of the NBA's Lakers and Clippers and the NHL's Kings.
Renderings of the $800 million venue show sleek glass skyboxes cantilevered over regular seating. The stadium would be bordered by mid-rise buildings with an orthopedic hospital, movie theaters and shops to be built during a later phase of development.
Majestic chief executive Ed Roski, a billionaire, has vowed to build the stadium without any public support beyond the $150 million bond measure by Industry to pay for infrastructure improvements, which the developers plan to repay through ticket sales and parking fees.
Majestic has targeted seven teams it plans to approach after the Super Bowl in February about move to the Los Angeles area: the Buffalo Bills, Jacksonville Jaguars, Minnesota Vikings, St. Louis Rams, San Diego Chargers, Oakland Raiders and San Francisco 49ers.
The firm has said the teams are in stadiums that are either too small or can't be updated with luxury box seats or other revenue sources an NFL club needs to thrive.
Roski said he's prepared to break ground as soon as a team is locked in and that he's confident that he can raise the $800 million needed for the stadium despite tight credit markets.
"We don't feel at this time that it's going to be a challenge," he said.
Mark Ganis, president of Chicago-based consultancy SportsCorp, said it will be a struggle for a new team in the region to earn enough revenue to pay the high interest banks are demanding for construction loans.
The firm would also likely have to take on debt to buy and move a team to the region, said Ganis, whose firm helped develop the new Yankee Stadium and other sports venues.
"In order to privately finance and operate a new stadium, it would have to generate more in-stadium revenue than virtually any team currently existing in the NFL," Ganis said. "That is a monumental task."
Without guarantees that the team could bring in that revenue, the NFL would be unlikely to approve a move, Ganis said.
NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said the league wants to see a team back in the Los Angeles area under circumstances that make sense for the league and the community hosting a team, but declined to specify what those circumstances are.
He said the league was aware of the environmental exemption's passage, but wasn't actively supporting any specific proposals.

Majestic's proposal for a stadium in Industry, a 12-square-mile maze of warehouses, factories, strip malls and topless bars, has gone farther than any previous efforts to bring pro football back to the nation's second-biggest market since the Rams and Raiders left in 1994.

Roski was previously among the backers of a plan to renovate the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for an expansion team. But the new team went to a Houston after the Los Angeles interests were outbid by some $150 million.

Subsequent efforts to renovate the Coliseum and Rose Bowl, and build new stadiums in cities such as Carson and Anaheim were largely thwarted by community opposition and a reluctance to sweeten the deal for the NFL with public funding.

State legislators approved the current plan amid lobbying by Majestic and labor union officials, who argued that the venue's construction and operation would bring jobs to the region suffering from high unemployment.

Backers said the stadium would create over 18,000 jobs and generate over $320 million in salaries for residents of the region.

Los Angeles County Federation of Labor head Maria Elena Durazo said Majestic has guaranteed that the parking lot attendants, concession stand workers and other stadium employees would be paid middle-class wages.

"This is true economic development," Durazo said. "It's going to benefit everyone in our community."

But Rod Faccio, a protester from Walnut, said he didn't see the benefit to his community, which he feared would now be besieged by drunk drivers on game days and other hazards.

He condemned legislators for letting the project go forward without the environmental study that some stadium critics were demanding.

"That's the principal focus: what is the impact going to be?" said Faccio, 46. "Now we're never going to know."

FRIDAY, Oct. 16 (HealthDay News) -- Current state taxes and levies on
soft drinks are slowing consumption, but not enough to curb the obesity
epidemic in the United States, researchers say.

In an analysis of 16 years of data (1990 to 2006) on how various forms
of soft drink taxation affected body mass index, researchers found that
taxation has only a minor effect on BMI, which is a measurement based on
weight and height. For example, a 1 percent tax increase causes a BMI
decrease of 0.003 points -- less than a tenth of a pound for a man of
average height.

Soft drink taxation had the most BMI impact among people with lower
incomes, females, and middle-aged and older people. But even in these
groups, the effects on obesity were very small, according to the study
findings released online Oct. 15 in advance of publication in an upcoming
print issue of the journal Contemporary Economic Policy.

"Our results suggest that the current low, hidden rates of soft drink
taxation in most states are not effective in substantially changing adult
consumption," study author Jason M. Fletcher, an assistant professor at
the Yale School of Public Health in New Haven, Conn., said in a university
news release. "Our results leave open the possibility that large taxes
that are communicated to consumers are still worthwhile to consider as
policy options, but small tax changes will not work."

Currently, the average tax rate on soft drinks is about 3 percent, but
a number of states are considering increasing that rate.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about the
causes and consequences of obesity.

At a meeting last April with corporate lobbyists, aides to President Barack Obama and Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) helped set in motion a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign, primarily financed by industry groups, that has played a key role in bolstering public support for health care reform.
The role Baucus’s chief of staff, Jon Selib, and deputy White House chief of staff Jim Messina played in launching the groups was part of a successful effort by Democrats to enlist traditional enemies of health care reform to their side. No quid pro quo was involved, they insist, as do the lobbyists themselves.
The result has been a somewhat unlikely alliance between an administration that came into power criticizing George W. Bush for his closeness to Big Business and groups such as the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America and the American Medical Association.
The previously undisclosed meeting April 15 at the offices of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee led to the creation of two groups — Americans for Stable Quality Care and a now-defunct predecessor group called Healthy Economy Now — that have spent tens of millions of dollars on TV advertising supporting health reform efforts.
In the most recent ad sponsored by Americans for Stable Quality Care, Obama speaks directly into the camera for 60 seconds, extolling the virtues of health care reform, while text at the bottom of the screen encourages viewers to visit the websites of the White House and the Finance Committee, which this week approved a 10-year, $829 billion health overhaul.
Both coalitions operate independently of the administration and Senate Democrats, and spokesmen for both the White House and Baucus said that no pressure — implicit or otherwise — to join the pro-health-care reform groups was applied to industry representatives at the meeting.
After arriving late, Messina delivered a presentation to what was one of many such “outreach” meetings he has attended, and he left before the other participants began talking strategy. Selib, who had convened the gathering, “didn’t ask anyone for money,” said a Baucus aide.
Indeed, attendees describe a more subtle dynamic: The Democratic officials made no overt demands. Rather, they brought together the players and laid the groundwork for the creation of the coalition, and that was followed by more direct solicitations from an outside Democratic consultant, Nick Baldick, retained by Healthy Economy Now, asking attendees at the meeting to join the coalition and contribute to its ad campaigns.
One ethics expert, however, said the meeting still raises issues. No matter how careful Messina and Selib were to avoid conversation about Healthy Economy Now, their mere presence at what proved to be the coalition’s creation raises questions, said Bill Allison, a senior fellow at the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group that advocates for greater transparency and ethics in government.
“There’s no problem with sitting down at the table and talking,” said Allison. “But if they are signaling that they would really like these groups to support health care reform and trying to tell the groups how they’ll benefit from the plan, they’re laying a ‘quid’ on the table, and — even if they don’t discuss dollar amounts or advertising strategies — they’re suggesting what the ‘quo’ is, which is the groups’ support for the plan.”
The White House and committee officials said the meeting and the months of talks that followed it — between officials putting together the health care proposals and the stakeholders who would be affected by them — prove a willingness by the Obama administration and Baucus to engage groups traditionally considered adversaries of health care reform.
Ken Johnson, a senior vice president at PhRMA, called the April meeting “one of the key points where there was a coming together and a discussion of ideas and shared goals.”
Johnson said PhRMA, which ultimately provided the lion’s share of the $24 million to the two coalitions, “could have walked away at any time.”
Days after the meeting, Healthy Economy Now’s website address was registered, and meeting attendees began receiving unsolicited calls asking for cash for the coalition from Baldick, whose firm — Hilltop Public Solutions — had been hired to run Healthy Economy Now.
In addition to PhRMA and the American Medical Association, the strange-bedfellows coalition included AARP, the American Cancer Society, the Business Roundtable, the advocacy group Families USA and the Service Employees International Union, as well as trade groups for biotech and medical device firms.
Other attendees opted out. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and America’s Health Insurance Plans refused to participate in a group backing a plan that they would ultimately oppose — and the insurance group this week emerged as the most aggressive opponent to the bill Baucus shepherded through his committee.
Many participants in the meeting had a great deal at stake in health care legislation. At the time Healthy Economy Now launched the first of its ads May 12, PhRMA was negotiating with Baucus and the White House a complex deal in which drug makers would contribute $80 billion to lower costs in exchange for avoiding downward pressure on drug prices.
The Associated Press later revealed that PhRMA had agreed to spend a whopping $150 million pushing the health overhaul — a sum that included its contributions to Healthy Economy Now and Americans for Stable Quality Care.

Also attending was a group representing device makers — which has been battling plans to fund reform by taxing medical devices — and groups representing employers and workers, which also have major interests in the outcome of the health fight.

Some participants said they felt distinct pressure to sign on to the coalitions. “What were we supposed to say? No?” asked a participant who represented a group that joined the coalition but who did not want to be identified discussing the meeting for fear of jeopardizing the group’s position in ongoing talks.

But others said the meeting only formalized what had already functioned as an informal alliance.

“This is a natural outgrowth of groups that have worked together previously on health reform issues,” said Richard Deem, the senior vice president for advocacy at the American Medical Association.

The groups' backers “had a record of pooling their resources long before the coalition,” said Baldick aide Rebecca Kirszner Katz, adding that “a core group of these stakeholders approached Hilltop and others about formalizing a coalition.”

“The idea that this group of stakeholders — who deal with the problems in health care every day — needed to be told that it was important to communicate about health care, or how to do it, is absurd,” he said.

Allison said that it is not only the April meeting that troubles him but also the whole approach Baucus and the White House have taken in attempting to negotiate with potential adversaries.

“What you’ve had was the Senate and the White House sitting down and cutting deals with special interests,” he said. “I don’t think that’s quite what the American people signed up for when the Obama campaign said that they were going to limit the influence of special interests in this White House.”

Criticism — from the left and the right — of the PhRMA deal and the coalitions became more pointed after it was revealed in August that the coalitions were paying two firms with close ties to the White House to cut ads: AKPD Message and Media, which was founded by White House senior adviser David Axelrod, still owes him $2 million and employs one of his sons — and GMMB.

Liberals contended drug companies were being let off the hook. And congressional Republicans distributed talking points asserting the PhRMA deal raised “serious questions as to whether the drug lobby is helping to bankroll a multimillion-dollar severance package for one of the president’s senior advisers.”

The coalition spawned from the April meeting has evolved since its formation. AARP, a member of Healthy Economy Now, did not join Americans for Stable Quality Care, which welcomed a range of smaller medical groups left out of Healthy Economy Now. The SEIU — dissenting from the implicit endorsement of Baucus’s more conservative legislation in the group’s most recent ad — recently left the group.

But participants say the coalition will continue its large-scale efforts on behalf of the legislation.

“In the not-too-distant future, you’ll see a new set of ads” from Americans for Stable Quality Care, said Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA, a coalition member that also belonged to Healthy Economy Now.

CORRECTION: A quote now attributed to Rebecca Kirszner Katz was incorrectly attributed to a Democratic consultant.

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The Nation -- I woke up, read the New York Times website and thought I had come to the Onion instead. I hit refresh. Still there: "Obama Wins Nobel for Diplomacy." Maybe this is one of my weird work-related dreams, I thought. Maybe I am still drunk from last night's party. Better close my eyes and wake up again in the real world. Five minutes later...and still no dice.

Yes, Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize. My first reaction is that this is going to be a test of how much crazier Orly Taitz and the Republican Anti-Christers can get. Not only does this prove that Obama is a socialist svengali--because he got the Norwegians to vote for him, probably as part of some UN-takeover of America--it also proves that Obama is piggy. Anti-Christs are so like that; they want everything right now (and losing the 2016 Olympics was just a red herring).

But back in reality, I'm still a little perplexed. The Nobel Committee insists this is not an aspirational prize, no carrot to make the United States and its president better neighbors. Thobjorn Jagland, the former prime minister of Norway who chaired this year's committee, insists that it's for work the president has already accomplished, for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

"We are not awarding the prize for what may happen in the future, but for what he has done in the previous year," Jagland said. The announcement, which takes special note of Obama's anti-nukes position, says that Obama has "created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play...thanks to Obama's initiative, the United States is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting. Democracy and human rights are to be strengthened."

These Nobel sentiments, however, are aspirational in my view. Obama doesn't deserve the prize, yet.

Yes, the president has said he wants a world free of nuclear weapons, but as Jonathan Schell wrote in our pages, he has a long way to go before that vision becomes reality. That path must include the US Senate ratifying the comprehensive test ban treaty, and even a full court press from the White House can't guarantee that will happen this fall.

Then there's the matter of Obama's multilateralism and partnering with the UN. As Naomi Klein pointed out, the Obama administration, like its predecessor, boycotted the UN Durban anti-racism conference, using the flap over language on Israel-Palestine as an excuse to duck the actual issues about racial justice the conference cautiously raised. As for climate change, Obama has yet to commit to attending the December climate change conference in Copenhagen, and if that jaunt to Denmark is going to succeed in reducing carbon emissions, the US will have to bring a lot more to the table than it is currently offering.

I could go on: fully closing Gitmo and restoring civil liberties and compliance with the Geneva Conventions; negotiating with Iran in good faith; withdrawing from Iraq and, of course, withdrawal from Afghanistan. Escalation, or even maintaining the status quo there, would alone discredit this award in history's eyes.

Obama got a nice vote of confidence from the Norwegians for his promises. But now, he has to actually earn the Nobel with his deeds. That will be hard to do if his administration continues to send such mixed signals on international cooperation and diplomacy.

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BERLIN (Reuters) –
German President Horst Koehler paid tribute Friday to 70,000 East German citizens who braved a feared crackdown by communist security police and took to the streets of Leipzig in a historic demonstration 20 years ago.

The pro-democracy rallies in the city led directly to the breaching of the Berlin Wall less than a month later and German unification in October 1990.

"On October 9, 1989, 20 years ago, the people of Leipzig showed us what citizens can achieve when they believe in their own strength and take their destiny into their own hands," Koehler said at a ceremony in a concert hall in Leipzig, attended by Chancellor Angela Merkel and other high-ranking politicians.

"In those October days, everything was on a knife's edge ... people had to expect the worst because there were clear threats," Koehler said, recalling fears the crowds would be crushed with the same brutality as pro-democracy protestors around Tiananmen Square, Beijing four months earlier.

"But the revolution stayed peaceful," he said.

In the early autumn of 1989, Monday prayer meetings for democracy and justice filled a central Leipzig church with political dissidents, would-be emigrants and ordinary East Germans caught up in the growing wave of defiance.

"Monday demonstrations" followed in the town center, reaching a peak on October 9 when 70,000 people openly challenged the communist authorities by taking to the streets.

These demonstrations grew in size and spread throughout East Germany, eventually leading to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

"The citizens of East Germany knew they did not want to continue living without freedom, living narrow and dismal lives," said Koehler. "This is why it is important to keep the memory of the East German dictatorship and the resistance against it alive."

(Reporting by Sarah Marsh; editing by David Stamp)

MUMBAI, India – Hollywood is finally getting to know A.R. Rahman, the short, humble and deeply religious man who took two Oscars home to southern India for his work on "Slumdog Millionaire."
In the eight months since Slumdog's surprise Oscar sweep, Rahman has survived the rage of felicitation that hit him when he returned to India — even the prime minister offered his congratulations — and embarked on countless lunches with studio executives in L.A. eager to match him with that perfect new film.
In between, he's managed to score two movies, hatched plans with Dave Stewart of Eurythmics to start a band, and is putting together a new solo album.
The Oscars, Rahman said, "got me an identity in the West."
"There won't be any doubts looking at me: Who are you? What are you doing here?" he said by phone from Medina, Saudi Arabia. "I don't have to prove again I can do this and that, and rather can just be cool about my musical statement."
His latest composition is for "Couple's Retreat," a yoga-inflected romantic comedy written, produced by and starring Vince Vaughn, released Friday by Universal Studios.
He spent nearly three months working on "Couple's Retreat," first in London and then in L.A.
"L.A. helped me hide," Rahman said. "I can walk on the streets, which I can't do in India. I can go to a coffee shop and sit there. I have so much freedom, whereas in India I get mobbed."
In India, Rahman enjoys a fanatical pop-star fame that stretches from barefoot slum kids playing cricket to the richest matrons of Mumbai. He has won 18 Filmfare Awards, three MTV Awards, and six Tamil Nadu State Awards, among others. In 2000, he was conferred the highest civilian honor in India, the Padma Shri, for his contributions to the film industry.
But that somehow didn't translate. "Slumdog" did.
Now, Rahman said, he's not just getting work from Hollywood, he's getting good work — projects for which he can set his own artistic terms.
"Since the Oscars and all the appreciation, people come for what I am," he said.
The new album — for Interscope Records, which produced the blockbuster soundtrack to "Slumdog" — is still in its early stages, but Rahman said he hopes to bring together experienced artists like Lady GaGa and M.I.A. with "some really new talents."
"After 'Jai Ho' became number one in 17 countries, they were very excited and said, 'Why don't you do a whole album?'" Rahman said.
He keeps working on his pet project: A classical conservatory he opened two years ago in his hometown of Chennai, in southern India. About 130 students are learning the vanishing arts of the viola, violin and acoustic piano. Rahman said he's also teaching them Indian classical music and electronic composition — the same motley but fortuitous set of skills that holds together his own career.
The "Couple's Retreat" soundtrack veers from the South Indian Carnatic harmonies of "Undressing" to the hip-hop inflected "NaNa." Shyam Benegal, an award-winning Indian director — he also got the Padma Shri — who hired Rahman to make music for two of his films, says Rahman has created "a musical bridge."
"He has bridged the musical distance between the way the Western ear responds and the way the Indian ear responds," he said. "It's very difficult to say how."
The foundations of that bridge were laid when Rahman was a child. After his composer father died, Rahman took up playing the keyboard for movies in south India's burgeoning Tamil-language film industry. He was just 12.

"I had to work because we had the keyboards," he said. "My mother said, 'Why don't you learn them? It's such an advantage for you to have them.'"

"I was almost the breadwinner of the family," he added.

After studying under several masters of classical Indian music, he won a scholarship to the Trinity College of Music in London and took a degree in Western classical music. His break in India came when he was 23 and noted director Mani Ratnam asked him to score his film "Roja."

Since then he's worked on over 100 movies in India.

"His fees have gone up a lot," said director Benegal. "He may be the most expensive composer in India today working on films. That he is. But what he gives to you, even in financial terms, the recovery is almost instantaneous."

Still, Hollywood's remunerative embrace could price India's favorite son out of his home market.

"If he charged me Hollywood rates," Benegal said, "I wouldn't be able to pay."

WASHINGTON (Reuters) –
The number of U.S. workers filing new jobless claims hit a 9-month low last week, and retailers posted their first monthly sales gain in over a year, easing fears recovery from recession would be unsustainable.

The Labor Department on Thursday said first-time applications for unemployment benefits dropped 33,000 to a seasonally adjusted 521,000 last week, the lowest level since early January. That was below market expectations for 540,000.

Separately, September sales at major domestic retailers showed the first monthly increase since August 2008. It was a sign consumer spending has started to recover and the economy was growing again after the worst recession in 70 years.

"The labor market is improving, but rather slowly," said Cary Leahey, economist at Decision Economics in New York. "Both the initial and continuing claims numbers suggest that October ought to be a better month for payrolls than September."

U.S. stocks ended higher on the claims data and a surprise quarterly profit from Alcoa Inc. Forecast-beating results from major U.S. retailers also buoyed sentiment.

Weak demand for a sale of $12 billion in reopened 30-year U.S. government bonds weighed on Treasury debt prices. The 30-year bond lost over a full point as investors feared appetite for U.S. debt was waning after huge supply.

ECONOMY GROWING AGAIN

The jobless claims report was a relief after data last week showed U.S. employers cut 263,000 jobs in September, far more than the market was expecting.

Data suggests the economy started growing in the third quarter after a recession that started in December 2007, but a persistently weak labor market is casting doubts over the strength and sustainability of recovery.

The unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent in September, a 26-year high. Economists reckon the Federal Reserve will probably refrain from raising interest rates, currently near zero, until the jobless rate peaks.

Fed officials on Thursday sounded cautiously optimistic notes on the recovery while agreeing it was too soon to withdraw support the U.S. central bank has provided the economy.

High unemployment is undercutting household incomes, and restraining consumer spending, which normally accounts for about 70 percent of U.S. economic activity. But there are signs households may be starting to loosen their purse strings.

U.S. retailers, including Macy's Inc and Abercrombie & Fitch, recorded better-than-expected sales in September, data showed on Thursday.

Based on 30 retailers, sales at stores open at least a year climbed 0.6 percent, versus expectations for a 1.1 percent decline, according to Thomson Reuters data. Nearly 80 percent of them beat expectations.

"I think the consumer is dipping their toe back into the discretionary waters right now, but just their toe," said Retail Metrics President Ken Perkins.

Analysts are hoping the gradual improvement of the labor market could encourage consumers to become less frugal.

In a sign the labor market was healing, the four-week moving average for new claims fell 9,000 to 539,750 last week, declining for a fifth straight week.

The average is considered a better gauge of underlying labor market trends as it irons out week-to-week volatility.

The number of people on long-term unemployment benefits fell 72,000 to 6.04 million in the week ended September 26.

It was the lowest since late March and below expectations. The measure has trended down for three consecutive weeks, but that could be because claimants are exhausting benefits.

The insured unemployment rate, the percentage of insured workers who are jobless, eased to 4.5 percent, the lowest since early April, from 4.6 percent in the week ended September 19.

"The fall in insured unemployment suggests that overall unemployment is approaching its peak," said Abiel Reinhart, an economist at JP Morgan in New York.

(Additional reporting by Lisa Lambert, Ellen Freilich and Jessica Wohl; Editing by Andrew Hay)

CAIRO (AFP) –
Egypt's Al-Azhar University, the most prestigious centre of religious learning in the Sunni Muslim world, said on Thursday it will ban the face veil from female-only classrooms and residences.

"The Supreme Council of Al-Azhar has decided to ban students and teachers from wearing the niqab inside female-only classrooms, that are taught by women only," a statement said.

The ban extends to women's dormitories and to schools affiliated with the university, it said.

The face-veil, or niqab, is worn by some devout Muslim women. Local press reported that Mohammed Tantawi, head of Al-Azhar, said last week that he intended to ban the practice in the university.

The supreme council's statement added that Al-Azhar does not oppose the niqab, which it said only a minority of Muslim scholars consider an obligation, but it opposes "imprinting it on the minds of girls."

The decision came after female students who wear the niqab were banned from the women's dormitory of the state-run Cairo University.

Most Muslim women in Egypt wear the hijab, which covers the hair, but the niqab is becoming more popular on the streets of Cairo.

The government has shown concern over the trend. The religious endowments ministry issued booklets against the practice, saying the niqab is not Islamic, and the health ministry wants to ban it among doctors and nurses.

In the Middle East, the niqab is associated with Salafism, an ultra-conservative school of thought practiced mostly in Saudi Arabia.

Most Salafis shun politics, but the creed has influenced Islamist militants such as Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

From the Palestinian territories, a small Salafi group known as Jund Ansar Allah has called on Egyptians to strike out in reaction, according to a statement reported by the SITE Intelligence Group.

"We call upon our mujahedeen brothers to start crushing the fortifications of the government of the pharaoh of this age (President Hosni Mubarak) and to strike with an iron hand all the agents and traitors."

Al-Azhar has long enjoyed a reputation as Sunni Islam's eminent source of learning and edicts.

Salafists, who actively promote their creed, sometimes funded by wealthy patrons in Saudi Arabia, are opposed to Al-Azhar's theological teachings.

ANAHEIM, Calif. – With Torii Hunter hitting the rocks and John Lackey rolling through the Boston lineup, the Los Angeles Angels finally got on top of the Red Sox in the playoffs.
Lackey pitched into the eighth inning and Hunter hit a three-run homer off the rock pile in center field, leading the Angels to a 5-0 victory over their longtime playoff nemesis in their first-round opener Thursday night.
Hunter's shot broke open a scoreless game and appeared to topple any mental barriers Los Angeles might have faced against the Red Sox, who ended three of the Angels' past five seasons in the division series, winning nine of 10 games. Boston didn't manage an extra-base hit while getting shut out in the playoffs for the first time since Game 2 of the 1995 division series against Cleveland.
Game 2 is Friday night at Angel Stadium, with Boston's Josh Beckett facing Jered Weaver.
The AL West champion Angels snapped a six-game home playoff losing streak behind Lackey, who dominated his first playoff victory since 2002 with fine control and good defense behind him. After striking out four and allowing four singles over 7 1-3 innings, he doffed his cap to a standing ovation.
Jon Lester allowed four hits over six innings for the Red Sox, who had won five straight playoff series openers. Lester wasn't as sharp as Lackey during just his second loss since July 19, but he avoided trouble until the fifth.
Erick Aybar started the rally with a leadoff double down the left-field line. After Bobby Abreu walked, Hunter smashed Lester's second pitch off the Disneyland-esque artificial rock pile, with fireworks bursting from it at the moment of impact.
The homer was the fourth career playoff shot for Hunter, the Angels' unofficial team captain and clubhouse leader who just finished one of his best regular seasons.
Kendry Morales added a late run-scoring single and Abreu drew four walks for the Angels, who had lost six straight home playoff games. Although they've made six of the past eight postseasons, the Angels lost three of four last fall to the Red Sox, who won the World Series after bouncing Los Angeles from the division series in 2004 and 2007.
Boston took the first two games at Angel Stadium in last season's division series, including Lester's 4-1 win over Lackey in the opener. In fact, the Angels had lost 12 of their 13 playoff games against Boston since the infamous Game 5 of the 1986 AL championship series, won in extra innings by the Red Sox after an incredible ninth-inning rally capped by Dave Henderson's homer.
As a rookie, Lackey won Game 7 of the 2002 World Series to clinch the Angels' only championship — but the veteran ace hadn't won a playoff game since. He was winless in six division series appearances in his career, including his previous five starts against Boston.
Lackey had to escape just two jams in the first six innings, stranding two runners in the third on Dustin Pedroia's fly to right before getting Kevin Youkilis' grounder to third with two on in the sixth.
Los Angeles padded its lead in the seventh on Morales' run-scoring hit and a heads-up play by Juan Rivera, who advanced to third and then scampered home when Jason Bay's throw from left field got away. J.D. Drew threw out Morales at the plate moments later to end the inning.
Lackey slammed the ball into his glove with exaggeration when manager Mike Scioscia came out to remove him in the eighth, but acknowledged the crowd on the way out.
Despite the Angels' ominous playoff history against the Red Sox, the noisy Orange County crowd didn't seem to be anticipating disappointment while clacking its ThunderStix and easily drowning out the surprisingly small Boston fan contingent on a slightly chilly night.
Neither pitcher faced much trouble until the third, when Lester issued back-to-back walks to load the bases before striking out Vladimir Guerrero on three pitches.
The Red Sox couldn't get a break from first base umpire CB Bucknor, who twice called Howie Kendrick safe after Youkilis snagged wide throws. On both plays, in the fourth and sixth inning, replays appeared to contradict Bucknor's calls — but the Angels did nothing with either opportunity.
NOTES: Boston manager Terry Francona didn't appear in pregame introductions because he wasn't feeling well. He still managed the game. ... Abreu's four walks tied David Ortiz's division series record, set Oct. 5, 2007, against the Angels. ... Lackey thought he had ended the third inning with Jacoby Ellsbury's grounder back to the mound, but plate umpire Joe West made a very late call of catcher's interference, well after broadcaster TBS had already gone to commercials. Lackey still coolly retired Pedroia.

YANGON (AFP) –
Detained Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi is meeting with Western diplomats in Yangon, embassies told AFP Friday.

The military-ruled nation's foreign affairs ministry has granted permission for the US chief of mission and the heads of the UK and Australian embassies to meet with the democracy icon, US embassy spokesman Drake Weisert said.

"We look forward to hearing directly from Aung San Suu Kyi her views regarding the situation in Burma," he said, using the country's former name.

Another Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the meeting was taking place between 10am and 11am (0330-0430 GMT).

In a recent letter to military regime leader Than Shwe, in which Suu Kyi offered suggestions for having Western sanctions lifted, she requested a meeting with foreign diplomats in Yangon to discuss the issue.

In the past week the Nobel Laureate has had two meetings with Aung Kyi, the official liaison between herself and the junta -- the first time they have met for talks since January 2008.