Lindsay Lohan was arrested this morning and charged with third-degree assault after a fight at a nightclub in the Chelsea section of New York City, police said.
The 26-year-old actress was arrested on the misdemeanor charge after she allegedly struck a woman at Club Avenue on 10th Avenue and 17th street at around 4 a.m. this morning. She was taken to New York's 10th precinct and received a desk appearance ticket, police told ABCNews.com. She was seen leaving the courtroom just after 7:30 a.m.
Lohan allegedly assaulted the woman during a dispute that escalated. The actress, a regular at the club, was banned from the establishment earlier this year following an incident in which she Tweeted that Justin Timberlake was seeing another woman at the club when he was dating Jessica Biel, WABC reported.
VIDEO: Lohan to Agents: 'Keep Me on Set, It's Safer That Way'
PHOTOS: Lindsay Lohan Through the Years
Thursday's arrest follows Lohan's previous arrest in September outside a nearby nightclub inside the Dream Hotel, when a pedestrian claimed the starlet hit him with her car and did not stop. The Manhattan District Attorney's Office declined to prosecute that case.
In late September Lohan was also involved in a hotel-room quarrel that began over a set of cell phone photos allegedly taken by a part time Congressional aide. After Lohan claimed the aide, Christian LaBella, had assaulted her, he was arrested, but the misdemeanor charges against him were later dropped.
On Sunday Lohan's Lifetime film "Liz & Dick," in which she portrays Elizabeth Taylor, premiered, and was watched by 3.5 million viewers, receiving scathing reviews. The film was positioned as the actress' comeback following years of trouble with the law.
While living in Los Angeles, the actress was incarcerated six times, but spent less than a total of two weeks behind bars. Last year she also spent 35 days under house arrest after pleading no contest to stealing a $2,500 necklace.
In March, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Stephanie Sautner took Lohan off probation from a 2007 DUI case. Over the past five years, the actress has been in and out of rehab five times as she has battled drug and alcohol problems.
Ed Rodriguez, the father of two school-aged kids in Otisville, N.Y., had high hopes of? winning the $580 million Powerball jackpot last night. Either way, he figured at least some of?the money went to a good cause.
"Some of it goes to education," he said after buying a ticket Wednesday at a Citgo station on the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey. With many school budgets in his area facing tight budgets, "it helps a lot."
He'd be disappointed on both counts. He didn't win the largest Powerball drawing in history, which went to ticket holders in Arizona and Missouri. And the money doesn't do as much good for education?as he thinks.
About 72 cents of every state lottery dollar goes somewhere else. About 60 cents goes to the winner. Some goes to run the lottery. A piece of it goes to a private, Italian-based conglomerate that operates lotteries and slot machines in 50 countries around the world.
Depending on what state you live in, that leaves as little as 11 cents left to pay for the government services these games were created to help.
Critics argue that, aside from being an inefficient way to raise money, paying for government services with lottery sales?also?shifts a larger portion of?the overall tax burden to those who can least afford it.
?It?s a very regressive tax," said Lucy Dadayan, a senior policy analyst at the Rockefeller Institute of Government. ?And any time a government relies on a regressive tax it's not the best policy option.?But it?s easier for state officials to promote gambling rather than to increase income taxes or sales taxes.?
State-run lotteries have been around since the U.S. was founded, but the modern era of government games dates to the 1960s. Since then, they?ve spread to 44 states, which took in nearly $69 billion in sales in the 2012 fiscal year.
After paying the winners and covering?operating expenses, the roughly $19 billion in remaining?proceeds went to fund a long list of state and local programs and services, from education to social services,?according to ?David Gale, ?Executive Director, North American Association of State and Provincial?Lotteries.
?If lotteries were not in existence those programs and services would be cut or they would have to be funded through another source,? he said.
The bulk of the money collected from tickets ? about 60 cents of every dollar on average - goes back to the winners, said Gale. After expenses ? everything from advertising, fees paid to vendors selling tickets and salaries for lottery commission staff - ?the amount left over varies widely from state to state.
In Rhode Island, just 11 cents in net profits was returned to the 2012 state budget to support a variety of programs, from education to social services. Oregon?s lottery, the most profitable in the country, generated 50 cents in profits for each?dollar of ticket sales last year to help pay for education, economic development and natural resource programs.
Profits can vary for a number of reasons, said Pierce. Some states use some of the revenues to pay for gambling addiction counseling programs. Some states have?laws governing how much money can be spent on advertising.
To try to boost the take, a handful of states are considering turning over their lottery operations to private companies, like GTECH, which already provides a variety of services ? from computer systems to retail terminals ? to about half the states. ?Illinois and Indiana have signed on and New Jersey officials are considering the move, according to Robert Vincent, a company spokesman
"They?re saying, 'We think we can make more money for good causes if we put this in the hands of a private manager,'" he said. ?We think we can drive more sales over the course of the contract.?
With revenues of more than $1 billion last year, GTECH is owned by Lottomatica Group, an Italian-based global gaming giant with 8,000 employees in more than 50 countries worldwide. Vincent said many state-run lotteries simply have don?t have the expertise to maximize their profits and boost tickets sales.
?You?re competing with Altoids,? he said. ?You?re on the counter of a convenience store and it's an impulse purchase whether you?re going to buy a lottery ticket or buy something else that?s there competing for your attention. That?s a very different environment than other government agencies that are there to protect, collect and manage infrastructure.?
States' hard-pressed tight budgets can use all the tickets sales they can get, which has increased pressure on lottery commissions to raise more money.?
But critics of the reliance on lotteries to fund government argue that it shifts the funding burden unfairly onto the poor and working class.
The link between lottery sales and low-income purchasers has been fairly well established. In 2004, three Cornell economists reviewed 10 years of data from 39 states and found a strong correlation between lottery sales and poverty rates.
?State o?cials laud the bene?ts of lottery proceeds and promote the fun and excitement of participation,? the researchers wrote. ?This entertainment value is one explanation for lottery demand by the poor: individuals with lower incomes substitute lottery play for other entertainment.?
By contrast, the researchers found little correlation between poverty rates and sales of movie tickets.
In some cases, lottery revenues have been used to cut income and sales taxes, further shifiting the burden of paying for state services to the poor, according to Patrick?Pierce, a political scientist and author of "Gambling Politics: State Government and the Business of Betting."
Pierce found that in the early stages of initiating a lottery, spending on services like education went up for a few years, but then began to level off as the new lottery winnings eventually replaced taxes collected as general revenue.
?Governors could then take the political credit for no tax increases or tax cuts while they were governors,? he said. ?The only reason they were able to do it was because of the lottery. They didn?t make state government more efficient. They didn?t do anything other than benefit from this voluntary tax that state residents were paying.?
State officials have found another reason to rely more heavily on lottery revenues. While revenues from sales and income are slowly recovering from the 2007 recession and weak recovery, profits from state lotteries have bounced back sharply ? up 37 percent in the past two years.
Despite high unemployment and little or no wage growth, lottery ticket buyers are durable customers.
?When their situation becomes more desperate because of the economy, you get some folks playing the lottery precisely because their situation is more desperate,? said Pierce. ?And this is the only route they see to escaping the situation that they?re in.?
A new Google TV update makes being a couch potato even easier.
The update is rolling out this week - first to LG devices - and adds voice search, PrimeTime, and better YouTube integration, Google said in a blog post.
Now, users can instantly access TV shows and movies, play online videos, open applications, and search Google, by just asking.
The new feature provides quick access to any channel (just say "CNN" to change stations), live and streaming options, and instructional YouTube videos (ask "how to tie a bow tie"). Unsure of exactly what you're in the mood for? Simply say "search movies with Jeff Bridges" for a list of possibilities in the new, more visual search results page.
Additionally, Google TV's revamped guide, now called PrimeTime, makes it easier to find favorite content. Accessible anywhere in the Google TV app, users can quickly flip through live TV, access favorite channels, see recently watched TV shows, and find new suggestions.
LG device owners will receive the Google TV update in the next few weeks, according to product Managers Greg Funk and Eric Liu, while it rolls out to other second-generation hardware in the coming months. First-gen devices will see updates to PrimeTime and YouTube.
Google TV already received an update in October 2011, when the service integrated the Google Play store, customized the home screen, and improved content from Netflix, YouTube, HBO GO, and other streaming sites.
"The initial version of Google TV wasn't perfect," Google said last year, "but launching it gave us the opportunity to learn."
That learning process also led to a better YouTube viewing experience on Google TV, which the company announced Tuesday.
The updated app for Android smartphones/tablets and Google TV automatically pairs the devices over the same Wi-Fi connection, allowing big-screen playback of any YouTube video from an Android-based phone or tablet. Remote control-like options ? pause, scroll, skip ? are included, as well as the ability to search for videos or browse the Web on your gadget while video playback continues, uninterrupted, on the TV.
For more, see PCMag's Hands On With Google TV 3.1 and the slideshow above. Also, check out Google's video below for more details on its updated service.
For more from Stephanie, follow her on Twitter @smlotPCMag.
Even though wise mobile phones have conquered the entire world and are in nearly everybody?s hands currently even though around the move, normal fixed phones strongly stay element of everybody?s every day surroundings, at home, inside the workplace, in hotels, in conference zones and so on? The reason is merely the comfort these fixed devices give: substantial LCD displays, quality speakers, possibility to connect a good quality headset, massive buttons, complete ?qwerty? keyboards along with a bunch of workplace functionalities for instance display of caller ID, call waiting, get in touch with forwarding, call transfer, conference calls, turning these communication devices into a Switchboard PBX Resolution. Even though the connectivity of numerous desktop phones is still offered by normal landlines, a brand new notion has emerged using the improvement of the GSM mobile phone communication worldwide and has established itself as powerful challenger: the GSM Desktop Phone, which is a desktop telephone whose connectivity is supplied by way of a SIM card (the card you get from your GSM mobile operator to insert inside your GSM mobile phone) in place of a landline, offering quite a few positive aspects for customers: Saving time, complexity and income on wired infrastructure, which makes it an ideal resolution for areas with no fixed access, for example temporary offices on construction web-sites, countryside homes, boats, and so forth?Saving landline expenses, a single single GSM provider for all your phones (fixed desktop and mobile), permitting attractive tariffsComfort of a desktop phoneSmart workplace with calls, texting and information ? online in oneOffice communication doable ideal from the begin for internet sites below constructionMobile and often prepared to use, just unpack it wherever you are GSM Desktop Phones have increasingly develop into well-known due to the fact lots of international mobile operators began to offer you them as an option to regular mobile phones, specially to modest and medium corporations, for which it represents a perfect option to typical landline communication systems, supplying fixed and mobile communication to all staff, below 1 single and appealing subscription contract. A additional brilliant application of GSM Desktop Phones has emerged within the safety and remote control location, a radio module getting inserted within the device and turning it into a GSM Alarm and Control System, in a position to connect wirelessly with a quantity of detectors and remote handle devices inside a home or an workplace, and to send alarm messages to or acquire orders from any GSM mobile phone. In conclusion, the GSM Desktop Telephone is a good alternative to frequent landline desktop phones, offering a one of a kind mixture of the desktop phone?s attributes just like LCD displays, high quality speakers, massive buttons, full keyboards and so forth? with all the benefits provided by a mobile subscription, which makes it excellent for residence household, remote locations, boats, construction web-sites, compact to medium companies and so on?Moreover, it delivers a exclusive solution for your security and remote handle of houses and offices.
Simply how much does a exquisite watches price? How do you select a cellular phone within your price tag range? Properly, you will discover no easy answers to these queries, since you will discover dozens of aspects which may influence pricing, both of new phones and of utilized cell phones.
For anyone who is in will need of a mobile phone quickly, however, you may want to opt for a new red turtleneck sweater. Even though the cost will likely be probably be higher, you can expect to not have any worries about carrier compatibility, having a SIMS card for a applied cellular phone, or waiting for your phone to become shipped.
This is my ninth installment in a new series on leading a nonprofit (see my Guide to Effective Job Search and Career Development ? 2, postings 267-274 for Parts 1-8.) So far I have primarily focused on leading an established nonprofit with a history and structure, and an ongoing cash flow and an established supporting community. With this posting I turn to consider the challenges of starting a nonprofit, as its founding leader and visionary. And chances are that if you are looking to found and build a nonprofit, you do so driven by the imperative of a specific mission and vision and its societal significance.
I have been writing on an ongoing basis about startups in this blog, and in that more general context I cite my various postings and series as can be found at: Startups and Early Stage Businesses. My hope is that at least some of that material would be of value to the founder of a nonprofit startup, even as the same general principles would apply to the new for-profit business as well. And in that regard and with the stringent cash flow requirements needed to gain and maintain a tax exempt nonprofit status, I specifically cite my series: Understanding and Navigating Burn Rate: a startup primer, as included there as postings 67-78. But in keeping with the basic thrust of this series, I focus here on issues particular to nonprofits and their leadership. And I begin with some basic questions.
? What is the specific value defining core idea or issue that gives your proposed mission and vision statements meaning? ? Can you clearly and compellingly explain it and with the brevity of an elevator pitch that you would use if seeking a job? (See Structuring an Effective Elevator Pitch.)
Who is your natural audience for this message? Throw a wide net in answering that, as you want to include everyone who is or is likely to be directly impacted upon by the challenges you would address in your nonprofit, and you also want to include people and groups who would wish to support those so afflicted. Think in terms of potential donors here who have discretionary income to share with charitable organizations and nonprofits, but also think in terms of the people who would influence them to pick your mission and vision statements to support, and your nonprofit for seeking to actively, meaningfully address them.
So I write here about the dual and deeply interconnected tasks of crafting a message and knowing who that message could favorably reach as a call to action.
This is a short posting by word count but it covers a lot of ground in outlining steps that need taking, and that would come from the founder and people they can bring in early on. I am going to pick up on the second half of that last sentence in my next series installment, where I will look into some of the issues that nonprofit founders face in building a team. And I note in anticipation of that, that an effective founder of a nonprofit need not be an effective chief executive officer. But they do need to know if someone else should be found to actually manage the organization as a business, and they do need to be able to find and bring onboard such a person if needed, as well as help to find the rest of a starting team. Meanwhile, you can find this and related postings at my Guide to Effective Job Search and Career Development ? 2. I have also posted extensively on jobs and careers-related topics in my first Guide directory page on Job Search and Career Development. You can also find this and related postings at Nonprofits and Social Networking.
Report finds Big Pharma is doing more for access to medicine in developing countriesPublic release date: 28-Nov-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Suzanne Wolf swolf@atmindex.org 31-235-339-187 Access to Medicine Foundation
Amsterdam, the Netherlands: The latest Access to Medicine Index, which ranks the top 20 pharmaceutical companies on their efforts to improve access to medicine in developing countries, finds that the industry is doing more than it was two years ago, with GlaxoSmithKline still outperforming its peers, but an expanding group of leaders closing the gap.
The Index, published Wednesday, found that Johnson & Johnson was one of the most dramatic risers, climbing from the middle of the field in 9th position in the 2010 Index to 2nd this year, closely behind GlaxoSmithKline. It is one of two newcomers to the top three. Its rise is due largely to its consolidation of its access activities under one business unit, which has resulted in a more strategic and integrated approach, and to its acquisition of vaccine maker Crucell, which has increased the relevance of its research and development investments. It has also disclosed more overall about its access activities.
"This year's Index shows that companies are becoming more organised internally in their approach to access to medicine and that those who do this best tend to perform well across the other aspects we measure. The leaders are really raising the bar," said Wim Leereveld, founder and CEO of the Access to Medicine Index. "It's also clear that companies that do not continue to step up their efforts tend to be overtaken by their peers."
The Access to Medicine Index is an independent initiative that provides insight into what the world's leading pharmaceutical companies are doing for the millions of people in developing countries who do not have reliable access to safe, effective and affordable medicines, vaccines and other health-related technologies. It is published every two years.
It scores companies on their commitments, performance, innovation and level of transparency across seven areas of activity considered key to improving access to medicine. The companies are graded on more than 100 factors covering these areas, including whether they are developing new drugs for neglected diseases, to what extent they facilitate or resist efforts to create generic versions of their drugs, and how they approach pricing in developing countries. Lobbying activities, marketing ethics and product donations and other philanthropic activities are also tracked.
Ranking highlights: Who is doing the most?
GlaxoSmithKline remains at the top of the Index with a marginal improvement in performance since 2010, and this year, Johnson & Johnson and Sanofi, both new to the top three, follow closely in 2nd and 3rd positions respectively. The companies that rose in rank the most were Merck KGaA, followed by Johnson & Johnson, and then Bayer. AstraZeneca fell down the rankings most significantly, followed by Boehringer-Ingelheim, then Novartis and Roche. The bottom of the league is dominated by Japanese companies Takeda, Daiichi and Astellas.
Overall trends
Seventeen out of the 20 companies perform better than they did at the time of the last Index report in 2010. At the top end, membership of the leading group has expanded from three to seven companies, and there is a smaller difference between the scores of the Index leaders than there was in 2010. Meanwhile, the gap has also narrowed between the bottom few companies and the top performers. This is notable given the fact that the Index set higher standards this year in many areas.
Companies are developing more products for more diseases that particularly affect the world's poor, and collaborating more in the process than they were two years ago. There is more target setting and some now devote as much as 20% of their pipeline to developing products that address the needs of the poor. For instance, Sanofi is adapting its leishmaniasis drug, which currently requires health workers to administer repeated injections, to develop a product that patients can apply to their skin at home. Meanwhile, Johnson & Johnson is collaborating to develop a simple portable rapid screening test for tuberculosis that doesn't need to be operated by a health professional, requires patients to simply cough into a breathalyser, and yields results within minutes.
In addition, more companies are using tiered pricing schemes to lower prices for certain countries or population groups within a country, and applying them to a broader range of products and in more countries.
However, there are still several areas where all companies could improve their approaches significantly. These include being more transparent about their lobbying practices, expanding their tiered pricing schemes, adapting packaging to local needs, making their drug donations more needs-based, and allowing their clinical trial data to be used to accelerate the approval of generic medicines in developing countries.
An area where current industry performance falls far short of Index expectations is transparency around the outsourcing of clinical trials to Contract Research Organisations (CROs). Companies often hire them to conduct clinical trials on their behalf in developing countries, but no company is publicly transparent about all the CROs they employ. Company accountability involves ensuring the wellbeing of trial participants through adequate due diligence in selecting these contractors, monitoring how they conduct the trials and willingness to enforce codes of conduct with disciplinary action. However, only four companies (Merck & Co., Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline and Eisai) provided evidence that they use disciplinary measures to enforce codes of conduct with their CROs to ensure that trials of their products are conducted safely and ethically.
"Access to medicine is a multi-faceted challenge and therefore responsibility for improving it lies with a number of different actors, but the pharmaceutical industry has a critical role to play. While the Index shows it has made strides in many areas, companies that have sector-leading practices also show us there is more the industry can contribute," Leereveld said.
###
Notes for reporters:
The Access to Medicine Index is published by the Access to Medicine Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in the Netherlands that aims to advance access to medicine in developing countries by encouraging the pharmaceutical industry to accept a greater role in improving access to medicine in less developed countries. The Index methodology was developed, and is continually refined, in consultation with multiple stakeholders including the World Health Organization, NGOs, governments and universities, as well as 30 institutional investors. The Index is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the UK Department for International Development and other charitable organisations.
The scoring and ranking of company performance for the 2012 Index was conducted by MSCI ESG Research, which provides environmental, social and governance ratings, screening, analysis, benchmarking and compliance tools to advisers, investment managers and asset owners worldwide.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Report finds Big Pharma is doing more for access to medicine in developing countriesPublic release date: 28-Nov-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Suzanne Wolf swolf@atmindex.org 31-235-339-187 Access to Medicine Foundation
Amsterdam, the Netherlands: The latest Access to Medicine Index, which ranks the top 20 pharmaceutical companies on their efforts to improve access to medicine in developing countries, finds that the industry is doing more than it was two years ago, with GlaxoSmithKline still outperforming its peers, but an expanding group of leaders closing the gap.
The Index, published Wednesday, found that Johnson & Johnson was one of the most dramatic risers, climbing from the middle of the field in 9th position in the 2010 Index to 2nd this year, closely behind GlaxoSmithKline. It is one of two newcomers to the top three. Its rise is due largely to its consolidation of its access activities under one business unit, which has resulted in a more strategic and integrated approach, and to its acquisition of vaccine maker Crucell, which has increased the relevance of its research and development investments. It has also disclosed more overall about its access activities.
"This year's Index shows that companies are becoming more organised internally in their approach to access to medicine and that those who do this best tend to perform well across the other aspects we measure. The leaders are really raising the bar," said Wim Leereveld, founder and CEO of the Access to Medicine Index. "It's also clear that companies that do not continue to step up their efforts tend to be overtaken by their peers."
The Access to Medicine Index is an independent initiative that provides insight into what the world's leading pharmaceutical companies are doing for the millions of people in developing countries who do not have reliable access to safe, effective and affordable medicines, vaccines and other health-related technologies. It is published every two years.
It scores companies on their commitments, performance, innovation and level of transparency across seven areas of activity considered key to improving access to medicine. The companies are graded on more than 100 factors covering these areas, including whether they are developing new drugs for neglected diseases, to what extent they facilitate or resist efforts to create generic versions of their drugs, and how they approach pricing in developing countries. Lobbying activities, marketing ethics and product donations and other philanthropic activities are also tracked.
Ranking highlights: Who is doing the most?
GlaxoSmithKline remains at the top of the Index with a marginal improvement in performance since 2010, and this year, Johnson & Johnson and Sanofi, both new to the top three, follow closely in 2nd and 3rd positions respectively. The companies that rose in rank the most were Merck KGaA, followed by Johnson & Johnson, and then Bayer. AstraZeneca fell down the rankings most significantly, followed by Boehringer-Ingelheim, then Novartis and Roche. The bottom of the league is dominated by Japanese companies Takeda, Daiichi and Astellas.
Overall trends
Seventeen out of the 20 companies perform better than they did at the time of the last Index report in 2010. At the top end, membership of the leading group has expanded from three to seven companies, and there is a smaller difference between the scores of the Index leaders than there was in 2010. Meanwhile, the gap has also narrowed between the bottom few companies and the top performers. This is notable given the fact that the Index set higher standards this year in many areas.
Companies are developing more products for more diseases that particularly affect the world's poor, and collaborating more in the process than they were two years ago. There is more target setting and some now devote as much as 20% of their pipeline to developing products that address the needs of the poor. For instance, Sanofi is adapting its leishmaniasis drug, which currently requires health workers to administer repeated injections, to develop a product that patients can apply to their skin at home. Meanwhile, Johnson & Johnson is collaborating to develop a simple portable rapid screening test for tuberculosis that doesn't need to be operated by a health professional, requires patients to simply cough into a breathalyser, and yields results within minutes.
In addition, more companies are using tiered pricing schemes to lower prices for certain countries or population groups within a country, and applying them to a broader range of products and in more countries.
However, there are still several areas where all companies could improve their approaches significantly. These include being more transparent about their lobbying practices, expanding their tiered pricing schemes, adapting packaging to local needs, making their drug donations more needs-based, and allowing their clinical trial data to be used to accelerate the approval of generic medicines in developing countries.
An area where current industry performance falls far short of Index expectations is transparency around the outsourcing of clinical trials to Contract Research Organisations (CROs). Companies often hire them to conduct clinical trials on their behalf in developing countries, but no company is publicly transparent about all the CROs they employ. Company accountability involves ensuring the wellbeing of trial participants through adequate due diligence in selecting these contractors, monitoring how they conduct the trials and willingness to enforce codes of conduct with disciplinary action. However, only four companies (Merck & Co., Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline and Eisai) provided evidence that they use disciplinary measures to enforce codes of conduct with their CROs to ensure that trials of their products are conducted safely and ethically.
"Access to medicine is a multi-faceted challenge and therefore responsibility for improving it lies with a number of different actors, but the pharmaceutical industry has a critical role to play. While the Index shows it has made strides in many areas, companies that have sector-leading practices also show us there is more the industry can contribute," Leereveld said.
###
Notes for reporters:
The Access to Medicine Index is published by the Access to Medicine Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in the Netherlands that aims to advance access to medicine in developing countries by encouraging the pharmaceutical industry to accept a greater role in improving access to medicine in less developed countries. The Index methodology was developed, and is continually refined, in consultation with multiple stakeholders including the World Health Organization, NGOs, governments and universities, as well as 30 institutional investors. The Index is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the UK Department for International Development and other charitable organisations.
The scoring and ranking of company performance for the 2012 Index was conducted by MSCI ESG Research, which provides environmental, social and governance ratings, screening, analysis, benchmarking and compliance tools to advisers, investment managers and asset owners worldwide.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
WASHINGTON (AP) ? With congressional opposition softening, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice could find her name in contention as early as this week to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. It's a step that may signal greater U.S. willingness to intervene in world crises during President Barack Obama's second term.
As Obama nears a decision on who should be the country's next top diplomat, Rice has emerged as the clear front-runner on a short list of candidates that many believe has been narrowed to just her and Sen. John Kerry, despite lingering questions over her comments about the deadly Sept. 11 attack on a U.S. Consulate in Libya.
According to congressional aides and administration officials, Rice will be making the rounds on Capitol Hill this week for closed door meetings with key lawmakers whose support she will need to be confirmed. Those appearances follow her first in-depth explanation of her Benghazi remarks that Republicans seized on as evidence of the administration's mishandling of the attack that took the lives of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans.
Acting CIA Director Michael Morell will join Rice in her meetings with lawmakers.
A senior Senate aide said the administration was trying to measure the strength of the Republican opposition to a Rice nomination, sounding out the more moderate members of the Foreign Relations Committee such as Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who is in line to become the panel's top Republican next year, and Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga.
Rice is scheduled to meet on Tuesday with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., her most vocal critic on Capitol Hill. She will also meet with Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H. McCain and Ayotte are members of the Armed Services Committee.
During an interview on Monday, McCain said he would ask Rice "the same questions I've been talking about on every talk show in America." Asked whether he thinks she's still unfit for secretary of state and what he was hoping for, McCain interrupted and said, "I'm not hoping for anything. She asked to see me and I agreed to see her."
Assessing the prospects for Rice before Obama makes any announcement would avoid the embarrassment of a protracted fight with the Senate early in the president's second term.
On talk shows the weekend following the attacks, Rice relied on talking points provided by the intelligence community that described the attack as a spontaneous assault growing out of a protest of an anti-Muslim film. GOP critics say her remarks downplayed evidence of an obvious terrorist attack just weeks before the Nov. 6 election.
Republicans called her nomination doomed, leading to a vigorous defense of her by Obama in his first post-election news conference. But since then, GOP lawmakers seemed to have softened their views. McCain, who said earlier this month that would he do everything in his power to scuttle a Rice nomination, said on Sunday that he was willing to hear her out before making a decision. McCain ally Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has also eased his opposition and said he is usually deferential to presidential Cabinet picks.
Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, had issued a statement highly critical of Rice on the day of Obama's news conference. He indicated Monday that perhaps she didn't know what had transpired in Benghazi on the day of the attack.
"I assumed she had full knowledge of everything that went on. I'm not at all convinced of that now. She very well could have been thrown under the bus," Inhofe said in an interview. He said she hadn't requested a meeting but he would be glad to meet with her.
White House spokesman Jay Carney said Monday that the administration appreciated McCain's latest comments about Rice, but wouldn't say whether the president saw them as an opening to make the nomination. "Ambassador Rice has done an excellent job at the United Nations and is highly qualified for any number of positions," Carney said.
Several diplomats currently serving with Rice said that what she lacked in Clinton's star power, she could make up with a blunter approach that demands attention and has marked her tenure thus far at the United Nations.
Rice, who at 48 is relatively young, has played the role of "conscience of the administration" on human rights and detainee issues and would bring "a certain edge" to the secretary of state job, according one colleague who has dealt with Rice on multiple issues over the past three years.
She "will not be going into the job as a star," said Karl Inderfurth, a former U.S. ambassador and senior State Department official who worked closely with Rice in President Bill Clinton's administration when she worked as a staff aide to the National Security Council and then as assistant secretary of state for African affairs. "She will be a rising star, though."
"Hillary Clinton understood the politics of diplomacy: what the person across the table needs in order to sell something," said Inderfurth, now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington. "Susan Rice's background is different. What she'll bring is her experience in multilateral engagement and the limitations thereof."
"But the most important thing she brings to the table is her relationship with the president," Inderfurth said.
Rice, like many other foreign policy experts of her generation, was shaped by the Clinton administration's inability to prevent the genocide of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus in Rwanda 1994. Years later, she told a journalist: "I swore to myself that if I ever faced such a crisis again, I would come down on the side of dramatic action, going down in flames if that was required."
That doesn't mean the U.S. will change its policy of only providing humanitarian support to Syrian rebels fighting to overthrow the regime anytime soon. But Rice's confirmation as the next secretary of state could alter the balance in an administration that has viewed humanitarian interventions with significant skepticism, given its rejection of the Bush administration's war in Iraq.
An early supporter of Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, Rice fell out with some of her Clinton administration-era NSC and State Department colleagues who urged her to support Hillary Clinton's competing candidacy, including her own mentor, Madeleine Albright, and some of her top aides.
With the Clinton-Obama primary battle in full gear in April 2008, tension between the two camps was on public display at a ceremony and reception to unveil Albright's official portrait in the State Department's ornate 8th floor Benjamin Franklin room, according to several people present. At those events, Rice firmly brushed aside appeals that she switch allegiance, those present said.
Obama's 2008 election brought with it the prospect that Rice, one of his campaign's top foreign policy advisers, might be in line for the Cabinet job she is known to covet. Instead, however, Obama went with the surprise choice of Clinton and gave Rice the U.N. portfolio, although he attempted to deflect her disappointment by restoring the job to a Cabinet-level position.
But her sights remained set on the top job, according to people who know her.
Since arriving in New York, Rice can point to a series of diplomatic achievements ? most notably the NATO-led air campaign that toppled Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and tougher sanctions against Iran and North Korea over their nuclear programs.
But Rice has also been criticized ? along with other Security Council leaders ? for the failure of the U.N.'s most powerful body to take action to end the 19-month civil war in Syria.
She has also been criticized, especially by human rights groups, for being too protective of U.S. allies, namely Sri Lanka where the U.N. says up to 40,000 ethnic Tamil civilians may have been killed in the final months of the country's civil war that ended in May 2009, and Rwanda, which has been accused of backing the M23 rebel group that last week took control of the eastern Congo city of Goma.
As U.N. ambassador, she has gained a reputation for a sharp intellect and sharp elbows. She is not known for diplomatic finesse, rather for being aggressive ? sometimes too aggressive ? and using salty language on occasion. In private, she has a good sense of humor.
In a legendary exchange last December, Rice dismissed an appeal by Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, who also isn't afraid to speak out, for a Security Council investigation of civilian deaths in Libya from NATO's bombing campaign as "a cheap stunt" to distract attention from the Syrian conflict.
"Oh, the bombast and bogus claims," she told reporters.
Churkin responded by mocking Rice's Stanford University degree, saying: "We hear that the Obama administration wants to establish a dialogue with the international community in the United Nations... If this is the intention, really this Stanford dictionary of expletives must be replaced by something more Victorian."
___
Associated Press Writers Donna Cassata in Washington and Edith Lederer in New York contributed to this report.
Re ?Holding Back Floodwaters With a Balloon? (Nov. 20): Reading the article, I recognized an idea I?d seen before. United States Patent 940,323, ?Bulkhead for Tunnels and the Like,? was granted to George W. Jackson on Nov. 16, 1909. Mr. Jackson built Chicago?s freight subway and needed a way to protect it from flooding. His patent covers a portable bulkhead with ?a hollow flexible rim which is adapted to be expanded against the inner walls of the tunnel to form a watertight joint.?
Sadly, both the tunnels and Mr. Jackson?s concern with flooding were forgotten by the time of the Chicago flood of 1992. His idea can certainly be applied to modern subway tunnels as well.
My company is offering a lump sum payout of my pension. The payout is $261,000 and can be rolled over to a traditional or Roth IRA. Will I have to pay taxes on a Roth rollover? If I don't take the payout, one option is to receive $1,577 monthly in a single-life annuity starting at age 60. I will turn 60 in December and my wife is one year younger. We will continue working until at least age 62. My wife and I currently have $700,000 in retirement savings (mostly traditional IRAs) and plan on working at least another two years. We are debt free except for our home mortgage of $215,000. Should I take the payout or stay with the monthly payment? ? Carl
The advantage of taking a lump-sum payout is that you retain full control over those assets. And unlike an annuity, you can pass any leftover money to your heirs when you die. But taking the pension in a lump sum also means that you'll be responsible for managing those assets. "You have to ask yourself whether you want the responsibility and risk of handling this money, or whether you want the certainty that comes with a guaranteed monthly pension," says Lyle Benson, a CPA and president of Baltimore-based tax and financial planning firm L.K. Benson & Co.
One other factor to consider is your life expectancy. If you're in a great health and feel confident that you'll outlast the life expectancy used by your pension administrator to calculate your pension, then the annuity might be a better option. However, single-life annuities come with a drawback: that money ceases to be paid out when you die. For that reason, Benson recommends trying to switch to a joint-and-survivor annuity if you opt not to cash out. Although your monthly payment would be smaller, those payments would continue to your spouse if you die before her.
Benson also notes that rolling over a lump-sum pension payout to a Roth IRA would trigger taxes on the full amount. Because your tax bracket is probably higher now than it will be when you're retired, you're likely to be better off deferring that tax bill for now and rolling your pension assets into a traditional IRA.
? Marc Mewshaw
Got a question for the Help Desk? Send it to?helpdesk@cnnmoney.com.
The holiday season is upon us and that means lots of rich foods that can be both healthy and hazardous for our health. But which of the rumors and myths are true and which are just old wives tales. We separate the fact from fiction.
Tryptophan in turkey makes you sleepy
Fiction! The thought behind this statement has been that the presence of tryptophan--which is indeed involved in sleep and mood control--in turkey makes all of us sleepy. In actuality, turkey does not contain a significant amount of tryptophan, and when eaten with other foods, the absorption is reduced.?
Drowsiness during the holidays is likely from any one of the following or a combination: large meals can divert blood flow and oxygenation away from the brain during digestion; foods high in protein or carbohydrates can create sleepiness; and alcohol consumption may also play a role.?
If you're trying to prevent holiday drowsiness, don't over indulge- eat smaller portions, and watch your alcohol intake.
Cranberries have beneficial antioxidant properties
Fact! Antioxidant compounds in cranberries protect against urinary tract infections; reduce/control oxidative stress and inflammation in the cardiovascular system and the digestive tract (including the mouth, stomach, and intestines); and prevent the incidence of cancer.
However, the most commonly consumed form of cranberries is a processed version where most of the skin and flesh are removed and replaced with large amounts of added sugar. In this form, health benefits are significantly reduced. To get all of the antioxidant power from cranberries, eat them as whole berries versus juice, molds, or supplements.
White potatoes have little nutrition, sweet potatoes are healthier
Fiction and Fact! This one is a little trickier to answer. White potatoes are indeed nutritious, but sweet potatoes pack a more powerful punch.?
White potatoes have earned a bad reputation, especially with those who are trying to lose weight. However, potatoes only become an unhealthy food when fried, or loaded with high fat foods like butter, sour cream, bacon, and cheese. When eaten without all of the extra fat, these vegetables are low in calories and provide a variety of antioxidants; good sources of vitamins and minerals; and fiber. Additionally, potatoes provide protection against cardiovascular disease and cancer.
Sweet potatoes provide a great source of beta-carotene which raises blood levels of vitamin A. One cup of sweet potato contains 438 percent of the daily value! Similar to white potatoes, sweet potatoes also contain many protective antioxidants that are responsible for reducing inflammation and possibly helping modify insulin metabolism thereby improving blood sugar regulation-even in those with type-2 diabetes.
There are many varieties of potatoes, all with different health benefits. Try different varieties, and remember eat the skin-that's where a good portion of the fiber and nutrition reside.
Cooking stuffing in a turkey is perfectly safe
Fiction! While you may not always get sick from preparing stuffing this way, you are increasing your (and your family's) risk for food poisoning. For optimum safety and even cooking, cook your stuffing outside of the bird.?
If you do decide to stuff your turkey, keep the wet ingredients (onions, broth, celery, butter) chilled before preparing. Mix all of the ingredients just before filling the turkey. Fill the turkey loosely and cook it immediately after filling it. Use a food thermometer to make sure the center of the stuffing reaches a safe temperature of 165 ?F.
Mandy Seay is a bilingual registered and licensed dietitian who holds both a bachelor's degree in nutrition and in journalism. After gaining 30 pounds while living abroad, Mandy worked to lose the weight and regain her health. It was here that she discovered her passion for nutrition and went on to pursue a career as a dietitian. Mandy currently works as a nutrition consultant and freelance writer in Austin, Texas, where she specializes in diabetes, weight management and general and preventive nutrition. She recently published her first book, Your Best Health, a personalized program to losing weight and gaining a healthy lifestyle. Please visit Mandy's website at Nutritionistics.com.
In a few more weeks, it will be the Thanksgiving holiday and I am sure many people are already starting to make plans on how to celebrate. You might be trying to select a restaurant, deciding not to cook this year. You might be dining at home and trying to plan a menu of food and drinks for all your guests. You might be dining at the home of family or friends, and have been asked to bring a dish or a bottle of wine. So many decisions so I am here to offer some helpful suggestions that might ease your tension and worries.
Let me begin with some general advice, a sentiment which you should embrace. Stop?worrying that everything needs to be perfect because it will never be perfect and it doesn't have to be perfect. This is a holiday where family and friends gather, to share everything they are thankful for and not to complain and nitpick about silly and irrelevant issues. It is a time for fun and enjoyment, to relax and chat, to eat and drink, to savor the day together. As long as people enjoy themselves, as long as the food and wine is good, no one will complain or even care about whether it was "perfect" or not, whatever that term might mean. Just everyone being together is perfect enough.
Now, I'll provide some more specific advice:
Sometimes you just want to avoid all the time and effort of cooking a big Thanksgiving dinner, as well as cleaning up the mess afterwards. You might decide to dine out instead and you will find plenty of others opt for that same decision. Plenty of?restaurants are offering Thanksgiving specials and you can check out my short list of?over?7 Restaurants?in the Boston area, including Post 390, Aura, Avila, BOKX 109, Pantry at the Verve, Towne Stove & Spirits, and the various Legal Seafood restaurants. Keep an eye on my upcoming Thursday Sips & Nibbles columns?as I may have more restaurant suggestions as well.
If you are cooking at home, or need to bring a dish to someone else's home, then let me suggest some relatively easy, but quite delicious, recipes. I have compiled for you a list of five such Easy Thanksgiving Recipes,?including Buffalo Chicken Dip, Sangria, Double Corn Pudding, Special Potato Casserole and Swedish Apple Pie. Just about anyone can make these easy recipes, and your family and friends should really enjoy the results. Plus, these recipes aren't just appropriate for Thanksgiving and you can enjoy them at any time. Buffalo Chicken Dip while tailgating? Sangria for your next wine party? Swedish apple pie for Sunday dessert?
Choosing wines for Thanksgiving can seem intimidating but it really is not. Please don't worry about what wines to choose. Start by reading some general advice I previously wrote,?Thanksgiving: I Want Wines To Make People Smile. I hope that will help decrease your worry over wine selections. There are so many good choices for Thanksgiving wines. If you do though want some more specific?wine recommendations, and are willing to think outside the box, then why not consider Sherry or Sake, both which are very food friendly and would pair well with your Thanksgiving feast.
Whatever you do for Thanksgiving, enjoy yourself and appreciate all that you have, rather than worry about what you do not.
Obama didn't really contest Indiana this year, and he's narrowly losing Vigo County, by less than 100 votes. That puts him ahead of the Kerry vote here in 2004. Also?I?m using exit polls, and I shouldn't?he's running 12 points behind Mitt Romney. Kerry ran 20 points behind George W. Bush. Obviously, falling back to the usual crushing defeat in Indiana is lousy for the president. But if he's running 8 points ahead of Kerry in a blank canvas state, we have our first hint that the polls were not skewed.
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel announced plans on Sunday to boost its Iron Dome missile interceptor system, citing successful tests of the largely U.S.-funded system conducted in light of what it called "a variety of unprecedented threats".
A Defence Ministry statement said a fifth battery of the rockets used so far to fend off salvoes fired by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, would be added to the system "within a short time" following successful tests of an upgrade.
Tests were carried out on the system "to improve its performance and capabilities of the system against a variety of unprecedented threats," the statement said.
It was not immediately clear exactly where the new unit would be deployed. A senior Israeli official suggested in a briefing to reporters in April there were thoughts of placing another battery in the greater Tel Aviv area.
Since early 2011, Israel has deployed several Iron Dome batteries in its southern region. The system uses small radar-guided missiles to blow up Katyusha-style rockets with ranges of between 5 km (3 miles) and 70 km (45 miles), and mortar bombs, in mid-air.
Israel has also developed a longer-range interceptor, called Arrow, to defend against possible missile strikes from Iran. Israel has not ruled out military action to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon. Tehran denies seeking such weaponry.
The U.S. Congress approved $205 million for Iron Dome in fiscal 2011. The units are estimated to cost about $50 million each.
(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan; Editing by Jon Hemming)
???? ??? ????? ???????? by Naharnet Newsdesk 05 November 2012, 10:56
Israeli forces have detained the wife of an Islamic Jihad leader who is being held in administrative detention, Israeli and Palestinian sources said on Monday.
Palestinian security sources in the northern city of Jenin said Nawal Saadi, 52, was arrested at her home in the city's refugee camp in the early hours of Monday morning.
An Israeli army spokeswoman confirmed the arrest.
"She was arrested this morning by border police and transferred to the custody of security forces, Israeli police, for questioning," she said.
There were no details on why Saadi was arrested. Her husband Bassam Saadi, a local Islamic Jihad leader, has been detained without charge by Israeli authorities for more than a year under an administrative detention order.
Israel regularly carries out arrest raids throughout the West Bank, including in areas under full Palestinian security control.
Last week, troops arrested five Palestinians, including two men with ties to the Islamic Jihad movement.
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JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) ? A smog-like haze that hung over part of Alaska's Kodiak Island this week was courtesy of a volcanic eruption ? 100 years ago.
The National Weather Service said strong winds and a lack of snow Tuesday helped stir up ash from the 1912 eruption of Novarupta, the largest volcanic blast of the 20th century.
The ash drifted up to about 4,000 feet and traveled over the Shelikof Strait and across Kodiak Island, prompting an aviation alert. The news was first reported by KMXT radio.
Weather service meteorologist Brian Hagenbuch said it isn't unheard of for ash from Novarupta to create a haze, but it isn't very common either. Winds in the area were blowing about 35 to 40 mph, with gusts of more than 52 mph.
Officials first picked up the haze on a weather camera Tuesday when the sun was rising. "It looked very foggy. ... It was kind of a curious thing," Hagenbuch said. "We didn't expect fog there."
As the day got lighter, the haze took on a "brownish, smog-type look," he said.
A satellite image showed a "milky white plume" spreading out from the northern Alaska peninsula, and authorities later confirmed the existence of ash particles, he said.
At Larsen Bay, a community of about 90 people on Kodiak Island's northwest coast, a thick haze lingered until late Tuesday afternoon, said Charlene Clampffer, the town's secretary.
"It was over everything," Clampffer said.
"It looked like it was going to rain or something when we first noticed it," she said. Then, people realized: "That's not clouds! That's ash from a volcano somewhere."
The ash wasn't alarming, as residents of Larsen Bay, about 280 miles southwest of Anchorage, have experienced haze from volcanoes before.
This time, ash dusted streets, boardwalks and cars.
"We had to wear masks and take care of ourselves," Clampffer said.
When Novarupta erupted in June 1912, it spit ash as high as 100,000 feet above the sparsely populated Katmai region, covering the remote area now known as the Valley of 10,000 Smokes to depths of up to 700 feet. The volcanic cloud spread across the U.S. and traveled as far as Algeria in northern Africa in what also was one of the five largest volcanic eruptions in recorded history ? 10 times more powerful than the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington.
Dave Schneider, a geophysicist with the Alaska Volcano Observatory, said it's no surprise a lot of ash remains at Novarupta. He said it will be that way for "many, many more years."
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Public release date: 28-Nov-2012
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