South Sudan rebels threaten Warrap state, call for evacuation (Reuters)

JUBA (Reuters) ? A rebel group in South Sudan threatened on Saturday to attack Warrap state to bring down the local government and called on the United Nations and residents to leave within three days.

The South Sudan Liberation Army, one of several rebel groups in South Sudan, said it would turn its attention to the state after earlier attacking Mayom town in neighboring oil-producing Unity state, also on the border on Sudan.

"Within few days, the people of Warrap will be liberated from abject poverty, corruption and abuse of human rights," it said in a statement.

"We would also advise the civilians to evacuate all towns and move to villages in order to be safe," it said.

The United Nations mainly runs humanitarian operations for food deliveries and aid to local people and Southern Sudanese coming from the north.

South Sudan became independent in July after a 2005 peace deal with Khartoum that ended decades of civil war, but the new nation has been struggling to end tribal and rebel violence that has killed around 3,000 people this year.

Rebel and tribal violence undermine stability in South Sudan struggling to build up state institutions. Several rebel militias are fighting government forces in remote parts of the country, which is roughly the size of France.

Officials in South Sudan said earlier on Saturday the SSLA had killed 15 people, including nine soldiers, and wounded 18 when attacking Mayom in the morning.

"We got attacked in Mayom town today by the militias from 6 to 7 a.m. The militia attacked the town, killed 15 and wounded 18," Unity state Information Minister Gideon Gatpan Thoar said. "More than 60 militiamen were killed."

Army spokesman Philip Aguer said: "It was indiscriminate, they didn't differentiate between civilians and the army. The killing included a doctor."

Aguer said Mayom was now under army control but the SSLA rejected that, adding in its statement: "Within four hours, SSLA forces also managed to capture Tomor town and they are now advancing toward Bentiu town."

(Reporting by Hereward Holland; Writing by Ulf Laessing; Editing by)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111029/wl_nm/us_sudan_south

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Stanford outlasts USC in triple-OT thriller (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? Stepfan Taylor ran for the tying touchdown with 38 seconds left in regulation and the go-ahead score in the third overtime, and Stanford's defense preserved its 16-game winning streak by forcing Curtis McNeal's fumble into the end zone to finish a 56-48 victory over No. 20 Southern California on Saturday night.

Andrew Luck burnished his Heisman Trophy credentials by engineering four late scoring drives for No. 4 Stanford (8-0, 6-0 Pac-12), though he nearly cost the Cardinal the game by throwing a crucial interception late in the fourth quarter.

"I was very disappointed in myself," Luck said. "For a couple of seconds, I wanted to go dig a hole and bury myself in it, but guys believed in me. I was so happy to still see time on the game clock. It was another chance to get out there."

Four years after Stanford stunned USC (6-2, 3-2) with a one-point victory as a 41-point underdog, the schools played another classic on a cool Coliseum night ? and once again, the Cardinal ruled.

Both teams scored in the first two overtimes. After Taylor's run in the third OT, Coby Fleener caught the 2-point conversion pass.

USC quickly got to first-and-goal at the 4, but Terrence Stephens forced the ball from McNeal. It squirted into the end zone and A.J. Tarpley jumped on it. After a lengthy Stanford celebration, Luck was among the last players to leave the Coliseum field, sprinting to the locker room while thrusting his arms triumphantly in the air.

Luck passed for 325 yards and three touchdowns and ran for a key score, but the Cardinal were in serious trouble after he made a rare mistake. Nickell Robey intercepted his pass and returned it 33 yards for a score to make it 34-27 with 3:08 left in regulation, but Luck calmly engineered a 76-yard drive capped by Taylor's short score.

Matt Barkley passed for 284 yards and three scores in his third straight loss to Luck. He got the Trojans into Stanford territory in the final seconds of regulation, but Robert Woods used up the final 9 seconds running to the sideline, preventing USC from trying a long field goal. USC coach Lane Kiffin said he was "very disappointed" the officials didn't allow him to call a timeout before it ended.

McNeal rushed for 146 yards and two long second-half touchdowns before committing the key mistake for the bowl-banned Trojans, whose three-game winning streak ended.

The Cardinal were truly tested for the first time since the middle of last season, which ended with an Orange Bowl victory. USC nearly pulled off another upset last season at Stanford Stadium, sticking with the Cardinal until Luck engineered a last-minute drive ending in a field goal for a two-point victory.

Although the bowl-banned Trojans fell agonizingly short of the biggest win in Kiffin's two seasons, USC chipped away much of Stanford's dominant aura accumulated during the nation's longest winning streak.

Stanford fell behind by 10 points in the third quarter, and the Cardinal won by fewer than 25 points for the first time in 11 games since last November. Stanford's defense had limited its last 13 opponents to 21 points or fewer, the school's longest stretch since 1939-41, before USC scored 34 points in regulation.

Stanford had gone three-and-out on offense just four times all season before USC forced three more three-and-outs. Luck had been sacked just twice all season before the Trojans put him down twice, including a huge third-down sack by Devon Kennard that knocked Stanford out of range for a potential tying field goal with less than 9 minutes to play.

The same Trojans defense that yielded 43 points at Arizona State and 41 by Arizona in consecutive games earlier this season played quite well against Luck and the Cardinal until the score ballooned late.

USC took a 20-10 lead shortly after halftime with McNeal's TD runs of 61 and 25 yards. Luck rushed for a go-ahead score in the third quarter, but the Trojans pushed back ahead on Marqise Lee's 28-yard TD catch with 13:04 to play.

Stanford's Eric Whitaker tied it at 27 on a 29-yard field goal with 5:10 left.

Luck rallied the Cardinal back, overcoming his fourth interception of the season to force the first overtime game at the sold-out Coliseum since 2003.

Jeremy Stewart scored on a dive over the line to cap Stanford's first possession of overtime, but Barkley hit Woods in the corner for a 15-yard score to even it. Freshman tight end Randall Telfer turned a short pass from Barkley into a TD to start the second OT, but Luck found Levine Toilolo with a cross-field TD pass moments later, and Whitaker knuckled home the extra point.

Woods had nine catches for 89 yards and a score.

Luck threw early TD passes to Tyler Gaffney and Ryan Hewitt, but he was at his best on the Cardinal's final drive of regulation. He completed 10 straight passes down the stretch, yet still got help after throwing an incompletion on third down near midfield when USC safety T.J. McDonald needlessly leveled receiver Chris Owusu, keeping the drive alive.

After Robey's TD, the Coliseum announcer warned fans in the sold-out stadium against rushing the field after the final gun.

Turns out, that gun was still about an hour away.

Stanford is USC's oldest rival, and the schools have an eventful recent history during the Cardinal's improbable rise as a football power. Stanford posted one of the most shocking upsets in recent college football history here four years ago before a 55-21 rout of USC in 2009 that included the most points allowed in USC history ? until the latest unforgettable night at the Coliseum.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111030/ap_on_sp_co_ne/fbc_t25_stanford_usc

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Novel strategy stymies SARS et al.

Novel strategy stymies SARS et al.

Friday, October 28, 2011

Broad-spectrum antibiotics, which are active against a whole range of bacterial pathogens, have been on the market for a long time. Comparably versatile drugs to treat viral diseases, on the other hand, have remained elusive. Using a new approach, research teams led by Dr. Albrecht von Brunn of LMU Munich and Professor Christian Drosten from the University of Bonn have identified a compound that inhibits the replication of several different viruses, including the highly aggressive SARS virus that is responsible for severe acute respiratory syndrome.

The new method exploits the fact that interactions between certain host proteins and specific viral proteins are essential for viral replication. One of these host proteins is part of a signaling relay in the cell. The broad-spectrum antiviral compound used by the researchers blocks this signal pathway without having a deleterious effect on the host. "We have shown in this study that a broadly based search for new cellular targets can uncover new functional principles that have a demonstrable impact on virus replication," says von Brunn. "We have confirmed that the approach works in cell culture. We now hope that these laboratory results can be translated into clinically effective therapies. At the very least, our high-throughput procedure can be utilized to systematically screen various protein-virus interactions as potential targets for inhibitory compounds." The new study was carried out under the auspices of the SARS Research Network, which is supported by the Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF). (PloS Pathogens, 27. October 2011)

Broad-spectrum antibiotics that inhibit the growth of various species of bacterial pathogens are well known. Virologists, unfortunately, have no comparably versatile weapons in their armory. Individual drugs that are active against different types of viral pathogens are simply not available. "All of the antiviral agents we have are directed specifically at the virus itself," explains Professor Christian Drosten, Director of the Institute of Virology at Bonn University Hospital. "And since viral pathogens are highly diverse, each of these agents can attack only certain viruses." Moreover, viruses are also highly mutable, making the weaponry they can deploy against us even more powerful. What works against one viral strain may be essentially useless against another.

The SARS virus, a previously unknown pathogen which threatened to cause a worldwide pandemic in 2003, has spurred on the search for new antiviral substances. Only recently, it was shown that not only Chinese, but also European, bats carry the SARS virus. "But in contrast to the situation with bird influenza, one cannot simply kill these free-living animals in order to eradicate the pathogen," says Drosten. "That would have catastrophic ecological consequences and, apart from that, bats are retiring and secretive in their habits." If one wishes to develop drugs against viruses that can "hide" in animal species, one must explore other alternatives.

The research teams assembled by von Brunn and Drosten have now discovered a way to prevent the replication of a whole family of viruses by depriving them of an essential host factor. They first identified host proteins with which SARS viral proteins interact. This strategy led to the finding that a cellular signaling pathway is essential for the replication not only of the SARS virus, but also of a whole set of related viruses that are pathogenic to humans and animals.

"This signal pathway is normally involved in regulating the immune system," says Drosten. "We used a substance that inhibits the function of one of the proteins in the pathway, and found that it suppresses viral replication." In other words, drugs that block this pathway inhibit the replication of many different viruses, and therefore act as broad-spectrum antivirals. This opens a route to the treatment of conditions caused by the SARS virus, but also a whole variety of human coronaviruses, and pathogens that infect the internal organs of chickens, pigs and cats. Inhibition of this pathway does not damage the host, because parallel pathways can compensate for its normal role in the cell.

The successful inhibition of virus replication was not a result of serendipity. The researchers in Munich have developed a technique that allows them to systematically probe different proteins for the ability to interact with defined targets. "In order to replicate in the body of its host, a virus must first gain entry to a suitable cell type by binding to a specific receptor protein on its surface," says von Brunn, who works in the Max von Pettenkofer Institute at LMU Munich. "We have used an automated, high-throughput process to systematically test various protein-virus combinations as potential targets for possible inhibitors. The success of this strategy proves that a broadly based search for cellular targets can uncover new functional principles that have a demonstrable impact on virus replication," says von Brunn.

The investigators have shown in cell cultures that their approach actually works. "However, it will be years before we know whether or not these results can be translated into effective treatments," Drosten says. The study also underlines the importance of research collaborations. Drosten is convinced that "neither group could have done this on its own". The SARS Research Network, which is coordinated by Drosten, brings together virological expertise from six university institutes, two veterinary and four medical, located in Hannover, Gie?en, Marburg, Bonn, Munich and St. Gallen (Switzerland). (University of Bonn)

###

Ludwig-Maximilians-Universit?t M?nchen: http://www.uni-muenchen.de

Thanks to Ludwig-Maximilians-Universit?t M?nchen for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/114733/Novel_strategy_stymies_SARS_et_al_

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Google TV Software Update Offers Android Power (NewsFactor)

As the noise grows around an Apple television set, Google quietly rolled out a software update for Google TV on Friday. The update aims to simplify the user experience and Android app functions.

Google first launched Google TV in 2010 on Sony television and Logitech set-top boxes. Dubbed Revue, Logitech's sales didn't exactly take off. But Google isn't giving up on the project.

"The initial version of Google TV wasn't perfect, but launching it gave us the opportunity to learn," Mario Queiroz, vice president of product management, and Vincent Dureau, director of engineering at Google, wrote in a blog post. "These are still early days, and we're working hard to move forward with each update."

Android Power

Queiroz and Dureau say the Google TV interface is much simpler in version 2. A new, customizable home screen aims to help users find their favorite content quickly. Within the "all apps" area users can see shortcuts in much the same way they appear on Android phones and tablets.

"We've improved search across the board for content from Live TV, Netflix, YouTube, HBO GO, and more," Queiroz and Dureau wrote. "But what if you don't know what to search for? There's now an app called 'TV & Movies' that let's you easily browse through 80,000 movies and TV episodes across cable or satellite, Netflix, Amazon, YouTube and many other sites. If you've opted in to recommendations, we can better predict what you want to watch next."

Google also launched a new YouTube experience specifically built for Google TV. YouTube is also more closely integrated with Google TV search so that consumers can turn virtually any topic into a channel.

"Android developers can now bring existing mobile apps or entirely new ones to TV. Initially, the number of apps won't be large -- apps requiring a touchscreen, GPS, or telephony won't show up -- but 50 developers have seeded the Market with cool and useful apps for the TV," Queiroz and Dureau said.

Will Samsung Buy In?

Colin Dixon, a senior IP analyst at The Diffusion Group, said people will look at round two of Google TV with a more critical eye than the first version. Much like Apple's rumored foray into television sets, Dixon said Google is trying to do something vastly different with Google TV than it has done with handsets.

"The challenge will be to partner with manufacturers to put Google in their box," Dixon said. "I like Google's model, which is free. They don't charge the manufacturers to integrate the platform into the box -- but they do expect to be running the commerce that's going on through that."

Google said an update would be available for Sony, but didn't mention any new partnerships with other TV manufacturers. Dixon doesn't expect Samsung, the leading television manufacturer, to embrace Google TV at this point.

"Google will be scrambling to find a partner who will work with them out of the gate. I suspect they may be able to get one of the second tier manufacturers, such as a Hitachi or a Sharp or somebody of that ilk that wants to roll the dice and see if they could make a splash," Dixon said. "But I would be very surprised if any other of the top five television manufacturers went with Google TV."

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/personaltech/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nf/20111028/bs_nf/80798

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South Korea toughens laws against sex crimes (AP)

SEOUL, South Korea ? In a near unanimous vote, South Korea's parliament approved a tougher law against sex crimes Friday, inspired in part by a recent movie based on a real-life case of sexually abused deaf children.

"The Crucible," a box-office hit since its release last month, fueled long-running criticism that the legal system is too soft on sex offenders. The legislation is South Korea's latest attempt to address that.

The bill eliminates the statute of limitations for sex crimes against children under 13 and disabled women and increases the maximum penalty to life in prison. Current law says the term must be less than life.

President Lee Myung-bak is expected to sign the bill into effect within a couple of weeks.

Endorsed by both the ruling and opposition parties, the legislation passed by a 207-0 vote. One lawmaker abstained.

Rep. Park Jun-sun, from the ruling Grand National Party, said that the bill sends a message to sex offenders that they will be tracked down "to the very end."

The broad support shows how angry people have become toward child sex offenders, especially after the release of "The Crucible," said Rep. Lee Choon-suak from the opposition Democratic Party.

The movie has drawn 4.5 million viewers, almost one-tenth of South Korea's population, according to the state-funded Korean Film Council. The viewers included President Lee and high-ranking judges and prosecutors, many of whom have vowed tough preventive measures.

A series of widely publicized sex crimes against children in recent years ? including the rape of an 8-year-old girl on her way to school in 2008 ? has sparked criticism of the country's laws.

Last year, South Korea scrapped a law that barred the prosecution of a child sex offender unless the victim made the complaint himself or herself. The country has also legalized chemical castration and the collection of DNA samples from sex criminals.

"Children live their whole life in fear if offenders are not tracked down and locked away," the father of the 8-year-old victim said in an interview. His name is being withheld to protect her identity.

Earlier this year, he teamed up with a children's foundation on an online petition aimed at scrapping the statute of limitations for child sex crimes.

The release of the movie gave a huge boost to the movement and the legislation, which appeared to be in danger of dying without a vote. More than 300,000 people had signed the petition as of Friday, up from about 70,000 a week ago, and the number was rising every minute.

The movie, directed by Hwang Dong-hyeok, is based on a novel, which in turn was based on a court case in the southwestern city of Gwangju.

Two teachers were convicted for sexually harassing two students at Gwangju Inhwa School. One was sentenced to two years, and the other to six months. The principal was convicted of raping a third student, but the court gave him a suspended 2 1/2-year term, citing a compensation deal he had reached with the victim.

In the movie, all three faculty members get away with suspended terms even though two are convicted of rape and one of molestation.

Many viewers have mistaken the plot for the true story and slammed the court for letting all three off. The court has tried to clarify the difference, only to draw criticism that its actual verdict was still too soft.

Pyo Chang-won, an assistant professor at the Korea National Police University, said time limits on criminal investigations help prevent frivolous claims and guard against prosecutions when memories may have grown cloudy. But he said advances in DNA technology have enabled investigators to prove a case even after many years. Pyo also said children know little about how to report sexual abuse and often don't have the courage to do so.

Lee Eun-sang of the Korea Sexual Violence Relief Center said that, between 2004 and 2006, her counseling center received more than 650 complaints from sex abuse victims that had exceeded the statute of limitations. She could not provide more recent figures.

Elsewhere, Britain has no statute of limitations on child sex crimes and a number of U.S. states have done away with statutes of limitations for rape cases regardless of the age of the victim, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

___

Follow Sam Kim on Twitter at http://twitter.com/samkim_ap

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111028/ap_on_re_as/as_skorea_sex_crimes

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In Soviet Illinois, company tax you (Balloon Juice)

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Robert Scheer: Thirty Years of Unleashed Greed

It is class warfare. But it was begun not by the tear-gassed, rain-soaked protesters asserting their constitutionally guaranteed right of peaceful assembly but rather the financial overlords who control all of the major levers of power in what passes for our democracy. It is they who subverted the American ideal of a nation of stakeholders in control of their economic and political destiny.

Between 1979 and 2007, as the Congressional Budget Office reported this week, the average real income of the top 1 percent grew by an astounding 275 percent. And that is after payment of the taxes that the superrich and their Republican apologists find so onerous.

Those three decades of rampant upper-crust greed unleashed by the Reagan Revolution of the 1980s will be well marked by future historians recording the death of the American dream. In that decisive historical period the middle class began to evaporate and the nation's income gap increased to alarming proportions. "As a result of that uneven growth," the CBO explained, "the distribution of after-tax household income in the United States was substantially more unequal in 2007 than in 1979: The share of income accruing to higher-income households increased, whereas the share accruing to other households declined. ... The share of after-tax household income for the 1 percent of the population with the highest income more than doubled. ..."

That was before the 2008 meltdown that ushered in the massive increase in unemployment and housing foreclosures that further eroded the standard of living of the vast majority of Americans while the superrich rewarded themselves with immense bonuses. To stress the role of the financial industry in this march to greater income inequality as the Occupy Wall Street movement has done is not a matter of ideology or rhetoric, but, as the CBO report details, a matter of discernible fact.

The CBO noted that in comparing top earners, "The [income] share of financial professionals almost doubled from 1979 to 2005" and that "employees in the financial and legal professions made up a larger share of the highest earners than people in those other groups."

No wonder, since it was the bankers and the lawyers serving them who managed to end the sensible government regulations that contained their greed. The undermining of those regulations began during the Reagan presidency, and so it is not surprising that, as the CBO reports, "the compensation differential between the financial sector and the rest of the economy appears inexplicably large from 1990 onward." Citing a major study on the subject, the CBO added, "The authors believe that deregulation and corporate finance activities linked to initial public offerings and credit risks are the primary causes of the higher compensation differential."

So much for the claim that excessive government regulation has discouraged business activity. The CBO report also denies the charge that taxes on the wealthy have placed an undue burden on the economy, documenting that federal revenue sources have become more regressive and that the tax burden on the wealthy has declined since 1979.

In the face of the evidence that class inequality had been rising sharply in the United States even before the banking-induced recession, it would seem that the Occupy Wall Street protests are a quite measured and even timid response to the crisis.

Actually, the rallying cry of that movement was originally enunciated not by the protesters in the streets, but by one of the nation's most respected economists. Last April, Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz wrote an article in Vanity Fair titled "Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%" that should be required reading for those well-paid pundits who question the logic and motives of the Wall Street protesters. "Americans have been watching protests [abroad] against repressive regimes that concentrate massive wealth in the hands of an elite few," Stiglitz wrote. "Yet, in our democracy, 1% of the people take nearly a quarter of the nation's income--an inequality even the wealthy will come to regret."

Maybe justice will prevail despite the suffering that the 1 percent has inflicted on the foreclosed and the jobless. But to date those who have seized 40 percent of the nation's wealth still control the big guns in this war of classes.

?

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-scheer/thirty-years-of-unleashed_b_1034363.html

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Raghida Dergham: Is the West Hijacking Arab Revolutions to the Benefit of Islamists?

Dubai -- While the West speaks of the necessity of accepting the results of the democratic process, in terms of Islamists coming to power in the Arab region, there are increased suspicions regarding the goals pursued by the West in its new policy of rapprochement with the Islamist movement, in what is a striking effort at undermining modern, secular and liberal movements. The three North African countries in which revolutions of change have taken place are witnessing a transitional process that is noteworthy, not just in domestic and local terms, but also in terms of the roles played by foreign forces, both regional and international. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is trying to hijack the youth's revolution with the help of the West. This is while bearing in mind that Egypt is considered to be the "command center" for the Muslim Brotherhood's network in different Arab countries.

The followers of the An-Nahda in Tunisia are wrapping their message with moderation as they prepare to hijack the democracy that Tunisia's youth dream of, while being met by applause and encouragement from the West in the name of the "fairness" of the electoral process. Libya, where the North Atlantic Alliance (NATO) is in a "marriage of convenience" with Islamist rebels, has become a hub of extremism and lawlessness, with a plethora of military aid being collected by an assortment of armed Islamists who aim to exclude others from power. In Yemen, where a struggle for power rages on, a war is taking place between extremism and a harsher and more violent brand of extremism, with so-called "moderate Islam" in the middle as a means of salvation, even as the latter's ideology remains neither modern nor liberal, and is rather lacking when it comes to the fundamentals of democracy and equality.

In Syria, where the battle for freedom is at its most difficult phase, the youths of the revolution fear what could very much be under discussion behind the scenes between the West and the Islamist movements, in terms of collaboration and of strengthening the Islamists' hold on power, in a clear bid to hijack the revolution of a youth that aspires to freedom in its every sense, not to yet another brand of tyranny and authoritarianism. Yet despite increasing talk and concern over the unnatural relationship between the West and Islamist movements in the Arab region, there is growing insistence among the region's enlightened and modern youths that they will not allow this relationship to direct their lives and dictate their course. It would thus be more logical for the West to listen carefully to what is happening at the youths' scene, as well as on the traditional secularist and modernist scenes, and to realize the danger of what it is doing for these elements and the road to change brought about by the Arab Spring.

The obsession of some Westerners with the so-called "Turkish model" of "moderate Islam," able to rule with discipline and democracy, seems na?ve, essentially because of its assumption that such a model can automatically be applied on the Arab scene, without carefully considering the different background and conditions that exist in Turkey and the Arab countries. There is also some naivety in assuming that the "Iranian model" of religious autocratic rule that oppresses people, forbids pluralism and turns power into tyranny, can be excluded as a possibility. What the movements of modernity, freedom and democracy in the Arab region fear is the replication of the Iranian experience and its revival on the Arab scene. What took place in 1979 after the Iranian Revolution is that the Mullahs hijacked it, excluded the youths from it and monopolized power in the "Islamic Republic" of Iran for more than 30 years.

Perhaps the West purposely encouraged what happened to Iran and its exceptional civilization by taking it back to the Dark Ages, to live in seclusion and isolation as a result of the tyranny of the Mullahs. Perhaps taking Iran more than 50 years back in time was a Western goal, which would explain their encouragement for the peaceful nature of this revolution to be hijacked. It should be stressed here that it was Iran's 1979 revolution that sparked, throughout the Arab region, the movement of reverting to social rigidity instead of modernity and advancement. The environment created by the rule of the Mullahs in Iran led to restricting efforts in neighboring Arab Gulf region, which became unable to embrace modernity for fear of its repercussions and consequences. In fact, hawkishness gained more ground in the Arab Gulf as a means of containing religious extremism. Thus, sectarianism increased hand in hand with extremism, and the whole region became thoroughly consumed by the struggle of religions, away from the social development necessary to accompany the structural development represented by buildings, installations and other basic infrastructure.

The countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) play numerous roles, sometimes in concordance, and sometimes in contradiction and mutual opposition. The common denominator among them is preserving the monarchy and keeping the Arab Spring far from the Gulf region with a certain extent of reform, which could either be costly for the regimes or for their relationship with Islamists -- be they moderates or extremists. What is even more noteworthy is what is being said about the Islamic Republic of Iran, in terms of its occasional support of groups allied with the Muslim Brotherhood, which it sees as a means to weaken the influence of Saudi Arabia in the region.

Also noteworthy is the fact that the United Arab Emirates is supporting the movement closest to modernism in Libya by providing support in the form of training the police force and strengthening it with equipment. This is while Qatar supports Islamist movements with training and weapons, which undermines the ability of "non-Islamists" to compete for power, and in fact leads to excluding them from power. Regarding Syria, on the other hand, the UAE is worried about what regional interference could lead to, and fears what reaches the extent of preparing for after the revolution. This is why it hesitates to support the Syrian opposition despite its desire -- which it has, in fact, sometimes acted on -- to provide some support to non-Islamist forces.

GCC countries always have Iran on their mind, as it does them, especially through the relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and the many dimensions of the relationship between Sunnis and Shiites. Examining how the West's policies have evolved regarding this aspect in particular, would require greater space and a more in-depth study. Yet it is noteworthy that former U.S. President George W. Bush strengthened the standing of the Islamic Republic of Iran, its influence and its regional ambitions of hegemony, through his war in Iraq. As for the current President, Barack Obama, he seems to be in the process of strengthening "moderate Islam," specifically among Sunnis, for it to be the means to confront both Sunni and Shiite extremism, in a policy of attracting "moderate Islam" even at the cost of undermining the forces of modernity, advancement and secularism, and pulling the rug from under their feet. This policy of Obama's is no less dangerous than that of Bush. They both played the sectarian card at the expense of secularism, and they both adopted policies that lead to weakening the forces of moderation and strengthening the forces of extremism, regardless of whether it is "moderate extremism," as it at the end of the day is based on the ideology of monopolizing power and not separating religion and state.

Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian judge, human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, addressed the women of the Arab awakening at the Women's Forum in Deauville, France, and said: Do not repeat our mistake. She said that the separation of religion and state is the only guarantee of democracy, not because the flaw lies in the Sharia itself, but because it can be interpreted by men who want more domination, and who view democracy as an enemy of their monopoly, one that takes away powers they have hijacked and purposely kept women away from.

At the same conference, the Yemeni participant, a friend of Tawakel Karman, the first Arab woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, said that Tawakel is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, and that, compared to the "Salafists," this group represents moderation itself, as well as salvation. This is an opinion which seems to have been embraced by the West, strengthened and driven forward amid the applause of Islamist movements that present themselves as the alternative moderation, blocking the way for movements of modernity by mounting the steed of democracy, most likely on a single path from which there is no return.

They are inflating themselves and their size, and entering into a temporary marriage with the West -- which in their opinion is na?ve -- a marriage of convenience that is to their benefit as long as it breaks the back of secularists and modernists. In truth, the democratic U.S. administration is not the only one encouraging Islamist movements to take such a course, as there are also some republicans like Senator John McCain. McCain made sure to address Islamists from the rostrum of the World Economic Forum at the Dead Sea during a seminar on the American-Arab relationship, calling for respecting their rights to power, and thereby sending two messages: one to Islamists under the headline "we are with you," and the other to the modernists under the headline "we do not care about you".

There are two schools of thought that do not agree with the opinion that there is no escape from accepting the movements of "moderate Islam" because they have been victorious in the revolutions and base themselves on the change brought by the Arab Spring. Those two schools do not agree that the Arab Spring is the spring of Islamists, and they do not agree to the claim that they are the makers of the Arab awakening or spring. These two schools want to stop the Islamists from hijacking the Arab Awakening and climbing to power with the help of the West, whether the latter is na?ve or ill-intentioned.

One school says: let the Islamists rule the Arab region, as this is an opportunity to prove their failure at controlling a people that does not want them. Those affiliated with this school point to Hamas and the Palestinian people's reactions to it, in not accepting it and Islamist rule. They believe that the Arab people will defeat Islamist movements, and that they will fail. Then the modernists will return nearly victorious and welcomed by the people, and things will move forward. This, then, is an opportunity to prove the sure failure of Islamists, so let them fail.

The other school says: the greatest mistake is for the modernists to dwindle and withdraw from the battle now, because the Islamists reaching power will consolidate their rule for decades, not years. We must therefore immediately demand a transitional phase that would give these movements the opportunity to organize into political parties and enter the elections. This is while bearing in mind that the only organized party is that of the Islamists, having been the only opposition movement under the former rulers. Those who are of this opinion insist on yielding neither to the cunning of the Islamists nor to the naivety of the West, and on launching an awareness campaign for world public opinion about Islamists and Western governments hijacking the Arab Spring in order to exclude the modernists, young and old equally.

It would be more logical for Western capitals to hear and to listen closely, because their partnership in hijacking the Arab youth's ambitions of freedom, pluralism, democracy and modernity will come at high cost for them -- not just for the path of change that has emerged from the soul of the youths of the Arab Spring.

RaghidaDergham.com

?

Follow Raghida Dergham on Twitter: www.twitter.com/raghidadergham

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/raghida-dergham/the-west-is-hijacking-ara_b_1064180.html

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China's mobile subscribers rise 1.3 percent in Sept (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? China, the world's largest mobile phone market, saw a 1.32 percent monthly increase in total number of mobile subscribers to 939.5 million in September, data from the country's three telecom operators showed.

China Mobile, the country's largest mobile carrier, said its mobile subscribers in September increased to 633.5 million, including 43.2 million 3G subscribers.

China Unicom, the No. 2 carrier, said mobile subscribers rose to 189.03 million, including 30.23 million 3G subscribers.

Mobile subscribers at China Telecom, the smallest of the three operators, increased to 116.95 million, including 28.43 million for 3G subscribers.

(Reporting by Christina Lo in Hong Kong; Editing by Vinu Pilakkott)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111028/wr_nm/us_china_mobile

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PFT: Bush: 'We stink.' Teammate: 'He stinks.'

Getty Images

We?re checking in with teams as they hit their bye week. ?Or at least we are trying to.

Next up: The Chicago Bears.

Familiar position

Lovie Smith told everyone to calm down after the team?s loss to the Lions on Monday Night Football in Week 5. ?He pointed out that if the team could beat the Vikings and Bucs, they would be 4-3 just like last year at the bye.

Give Smith credit: That?s exactly what happened. ?After a?tumultuous?training camp and start to the season, the Bears are in decent enough shape.

The Bears season has a different feel to it after two strong efforts. They completely destroyed Minnesota, and controlled the action against the Bucs in London.

The Bears have proven capable of beating mediocre competition. They can?t beat the best NFC teams: The Packers, Saints, and Lions all have wins over Chicago.

Forte leads the way

Adrian Peterson is the best running back in the NFL. ?Matt Forte may be the most important to his team. ?Forte leads all players by a wide margin in yards from scrimmage with 1,091. ?He is just off Chris Johnson?s all time yards from scrimmage record pace.

It?s hard to overstate how good Forte is as a receiver. He has a shot to be the first running back since Marshall Faulk to put up over 1,000 rushing yards and 1,000 receiving yards in the same season. It?s no coincidence Mike Martz was involved in both seasons.

Improving passing game

Jay Cutler may have enjoyed the best two game stretch of his Bears career in the loss to the Lions and the win over the Vikings. He is looking more comfortable. His pass protection has improved from absymal to simply lame.

The offense still has to be more consistent after some early ugly outings, but it?s headed in the right direction. It?s 12th in scoring despite the 21 sacks Cutler has taken. The team has a +4 turover margin.

Safety dance

Chris Harris started the season at strong safety; he was released Thursday. Brandon Meriweather was signed for $3.25 million and now sits on the bench. The team is going young with Major Wright and Chris Conte at the position. ?This is a shaky secondary overall.

Average defense

Lovie Smith teams are supposed to be built on defense. At this stage, the Bears have been ordinary stopping opponents. Lance Briggs and Brian Urlacher are still playing at a high level, but they don?t get a lot of help. The defensive line has been decent. Julius Peppers has played at less than 100%.

Chicago?s only chance to make a postseason push is for the defense to improve dramatically.

Angling for a wild card

The Bears are three games back in the NFC North, so their only hope for a playoff spot is a wild card. They are in decent shape with wins over NFC contenders like Atlanta and Tampa Bay.

The next two weeks after the bye are huge. ?The Bears travel to Philadelphia before hosting Detroit. Sweeping those two games would put Chicago in terrific position before an oddly timed four-game tour through the AFC West.

After seven weeks, the Bears are in the mix. Their recent play indicates we?ll probably be talking about Bears tiebreakers come late December.

Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/10/27/reggie-bush-we-stink-teammate-he-stinks-bush-i-do-stink/related/

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[OOC] Ephron : Torn World

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Self-Proclaimed Artist
Writer of Fan-Fiction and Short Stories
Avid Reader of Fantasy and Fairy Tales
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Neverland Believer - (I don't want to grow up)
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XMatthewxHitomiX

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Hey, I would love to join the roleplay as Kurenai Hitsuya :) I can begin a character sheet right away.

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Submitted :) I did just edit a few things after I'd submitted xD

KrazyTigger

Member for 2 years

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Please allow me to Reserve Sesaro. If so that'd be great, Char. sheet up in a bit

If you need me: I'll be watching My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic!!!
:DDDDD

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Americans stay put amid economic downturn

WASHINGTON?? Yet another symptom of the economic downturn: Americans aren't moving.

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Young adults are staying put, often with their parents. Older people aren't able to retire to beachfront or lakeside homes.

U.S. mobility is at its lowest point since World War II.

New information from the Census Bureau highlights the continuing impact of the housing bust and unemployment on U.S. migration, after earlier signs that mobility was back on the upswing. It's a shift from America's long-standing cultural image of ever-changing frontiers, dating to the westward migration of the 1800s and more recently in the spreading out of whites, blacks and Hispanics in the Sun Belt's housing boom.

Rather than housing magnets such as Arizona, Florida and Nevada, it is now more traditional, densely populated states ? California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey ? that are showing some of the biggest population gains in the recent economic slump, according to the data released Thursday.

Residents have been largely locked in place. Families are stuck in devalued homes and young adults are living with parents or staying put in the towns where they went to college.

"The fact that mobility is crashing is something that I think is quite devastating," said Richard Florida, an American urban theorist and professor at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. He described America's residential movement as an important element of its economic resilience and history, from development of the nation's farmland in the Midwest to its coastal ports and homesteading in the West.

"The latest decline shows we are in a long-run economic reset and that we never really recovered ? we've just been stagnating along," Florida said.

About 11.6 percent of the nation's population, or 35.1 million, moved to a new home in the past year, down from 12.5 percent in the previous year. The current level of low mobility comes after the recession technically ended in mid-2009, beating a previous low of 11.9 percent in 2008.

It is the lowest in the 60-plus years that the Census Bureau has tracked information on moves, dating to 1948.

The share of people moving has been declining for decades, due in part to increases in two-income families that are more tied down by jobs and to an aging population that is less mobile. The peak for U.S. mobility came in 1951, when it hit 21.2 percent. The rate had leveled off at around 13 percent before falling off notably in 2008 during the recession.

Among young adults 25 to 29, the most mobile age group, moves fell to 24.1 percent from 25.9 percent in the previous year.

Longer-distance moves, typically for those seeking new careers in other regions of the country, remained largely flat at 3.4 percent.

The biggest drop-off occurred in local moves, down to 15.4 percent from 17.7 percent in 2010. It's a sign that young adults in the prolonged slump weren't even willing to venture outside their counties, continuing instead to live with relatives or on college campuses.

People most often cite a desire to live in a new home as the main reason for moving, as well as reasons of family or economy such as marriage or a new job. But analysts say with many young adults delaying marriage while struggling to find employment and aging baby boomers expressing financial worries about retirement, the current mobility freeze could continue for several more years.

An Associated Press-LifeGoesStrong.com poll this month found that more than half of baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964 say they are unlikely to move somewhere new in retirement; about 4 in 10 say they are very likely to stay in their current home throughout all of their retirement.

The annual growth of retirement-destination counties, typically in Sun Belt states such as Florida, Arizona and New Mexico, has fallen sharply since the recession that began in late 2007. It's down nearly half compared with the period 2000-2007, according to recent census data.

In all, the mid-decade housing boom and subsequent bust took a toll on virtually all age and race groups.

Homeownership declined in 47 states and the District of Columbia while the national ownership rate fell by its largest amount since the 1930s. Hispanics who moved and purchased homes in new destinations in the Southeast were hit especially hard, with bigger drops in average income and increases in poverty after low-wage construction jobs dried up in states such as South Carolina, North Carolina, Alabama, Kentucky and Tennessee.

In contrast, middle-class blacks from the North who migrated to Southern states such as Georgia, Florida and Texas fared better, maintaining higher incomes than African-Americans who remained in declining industrial centers such as Michigan and Ohio.

Other bright spots in the housing bust included urban, high-tech college meccas that are proving to be a draw for young, college-educated adults of all races and ethnicities.

The data covering 2008-2010 show that Raleigh, N.C.; the Texas cities of Austin, San Antonio and Houston; Denver; Pittsburgh; and Baltimore and Washington, D.C., had some of the biggest gains in residents. All of them tend to promise specialized tech jobs and hip lifestyles.

William H. Frey, a Brookings Institution demographer who reviewed the education and race data, said many of these cities will continue to attract new residents after the economy fully recovers. He said other cities must seek ways to diversify their industries, draw new investment and build partnerships with local universities to attract young talent, much like Pittsburgh has been striving to do after the collapse of its steel industry.

"Right now, the 'cool' cities are serving as way stations for the small number of adventurous young people who are willing to move in a down economy. But when the broader economy picks up, a much larger group of people will move to wherever the jobs spring up," Frey said, noting that people are staying put for now because they have to, not because they want to.

"We are now just in a lull, albeit a hyperextended one," he said.

Other findings:

?Texas posted increases in average income across all race groups even after the housing bust. The District of Columbia had the biggest overall gain in average income between 2005-2007 and 2008-2010 time periods, increasing 9 percent to nearly $60,000. Thirty-six states had declines.

?The district, New York, Connecticut, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, Alabama and California have levels of income inequality that rise above the national average. Broken down by large metropolitan areas, New York City, Miami, Los Angeles, Houston, Memphis, Tenn., New Orleans, San Francisco, and Birmingham, Ala., each had wider-than-average gaps between rich and poor.

?Across smaller areas of geography, Fountainhead-Orchard Hills, Md., just north of Hagerstown, had the greatest measured income inequality. Country Knolls, N.Y., near Albany, registered the least.

?Suburban and rural homeowners were more likely to stay put than others. Some 93.5 percent of the suburban and 93.7 percent of the rural population in owner-occupied units are residing in the same house as one year ago, up from the 2005-2007 time period, according to Kenneth Johnson, senior demographer at the University of New Hampshire.

?Renters were more mobile: Overall, 68.8 percent lived in the same rental unit one year ago.

John R. Logan, a sociology professor at Brown University, described consequences for mostly minorities should U.S. mobility stay frozen for extended periods. His research on neighborhood segregation has found that the average black or Hispanic household earning over $75,000 lives in a poorer neighborhood than the average white resident earning under $40,000.

"Being locked into place has its most severe effects on blacks and Hispanics, who are often segregated into disadvantaged neighborhoods regardless of their own incomes," he said. "Many middle-class homeowners in these neighborhoods have lost home equity, making it harder to move to communities with better schools and safer streets. Even the slow decline in black-white segregation that we've seen in the last 20 years will be hard to maintain under these conditions."

The census findings were based on the Current Population Survey as of March 2011, as well as comparisons of the 2005-2007 and the 2008-2010 American Community Survey to provide a snapshot of every U.S. community with at least 20,000 residents. Figures on income inequality come from a census analysis of survey data from 2005-2009.

___

Online:

www.census.gov

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45064895/ns/us_news-life/

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Injured soldier spurs veteran support for "Occupy" (Reuters)

OAKLAND, California (Reuters) ? A former soldier wounded in a protest on the streets of Oakland after surviving two tours in Iraq has put a new face on the 'Occupy' movement by galvanizing veteran backing for the push against economic inequality in the United States.

Former Marine Scott Olsen, 24, was sent to the hospital in critical condition after a clash on Tuesday night with police, which authorities blamed on provocation by protesters. Demonstrators have rejected blame.

A video of the bloodied young man being carried to safety by other protesters has eclipsed images of dirty tent camps and people dressed in costume that have dominated national coverage of the occupy demonstrations.

"A lot of people are now doing this for Scott," said Claire Chadwick, who works in nearby Berkeley. She was at the Tuesday demonstration and said she was the first to aid Olsen after a projectile hit him.

"I moved here a month and a half ago from Dayton, Ohio. I'm only 20 years old! And I've never been so disappointed in my government," she said on Thursday outside the Oakland hospital where Olsen is receiving treatment.

He was upgraded to fair condition by Thursday morning.

Occupy Wall Street, which has spread to cities across the United States, protests high unemployment and an economic system demonstrators see favoring the rich. They often call themselves the "99 percent" -- a reference to the wealth enjoyed by the top 1 percent of the economic pyramid.

Veterans have not been high-profile members of the movement in New York, California, and many U.S. cities.

But many veterans returning from Iraq are scrambling for jobs and sympathetic to, or outright supporters of the Occupy movement, said Vincent Emanuele, an Indiana-based veteran and organizer of Iraq Veterans Against the War.

Olsen's wounding "went viral" in the veteran community, energizing many to join the 'Occupy' groups, he said. The irony of a soldier who served two tours in Iraq being wounded while protesting at home was a shocking message that was affecting people of all backgrounds, he said.

"Right off the bat, on the surface, folks can see there is something wrong with that situation," he said.

Veterans are holding vigils across the nation at 7 p.m. local time in honor of Olsen, he said.

Jackie Smith, a professor of sociology at the University of Pittsburgh who is studying the protests, said the response by authorities in Oakland had the opposite of the intended effect.

"It sounds like it has somewhat backfired in Oakland and generated support for more protests there," Smith said.

Emily Yates, 29, an Iraq veteran who recently became acquainted with Olsen, said the Tuesday incident had pushed her off the fence and into Occupy movement. The police action had stunned her, she said. "The friggin' police are the 99 percent, too," she added.

(Additional reporting by Ben Berkowitz in New York and Dan Levine in San Francisco; Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Eric Walsh)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111028/us_nm/us_usa_wallstreet_veterans

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U.S. seeks $71 million from Equatorial Guinea leader's son (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? The Obama administration is seeking to seize almost $71 million in allegedly corrupt assets from the son of the leader of Equatorial Guinea, including $1.8 million worth of pop star Michael Jackson memorabilia.

The U.S. Justice Department accused Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of longtime President Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mbasogo, of amassing over $100 million and using the proceeds to fund a lavish life in the United States and abroad, including luxury cars, boats and a Gulfstream jet.

In the impoverished West African country where 70 percent of the population falls below the poverty line, according to the World Bank, the son Nguema serves as a minister of forestry and agriculture, earning about $6,800 a month in salary.

The country has valuable natural resources, including oil, gas and timber, that are allegedly being used in a variety of schemes to line the pockets of the president, his son and their close confidants, according to the U.S. Justice Department.

The alleged corruption ran the gamut of bribery and money laundering schemes, including demanding fees before signing logging concessions to companies or paying a tax before getting timber exports approved, according to the complaint.

In another scheme, Nguema ran a program in which companies working in Equatorial Guinea made contributions to a program to provide metal roofs to homes for the poor, but instead Nguema and others took the money, the Justice Department said.

Companies that refused to donate faced retaliation, the U.S. authorities said.

When Nguema came to the United States in 1991 to attend Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, he lived in a hotel room at the posh Beverly Wilshire Hotel and a house he rented in the upscale town, the complaint said.

Nguema's expenses were paid for by a U.S. oil company operating in his country, according to the Justice Department.

JET, FERRARI, JACKSON MEMORABILIA SOUGHT

The Justice Department filed forfeiture complaints in Los Angeles and Washington for a $38.5 million Gulfstream V jet, a $30 million home in Malibu, a 2011 Ferrari worth more than $530,000 and the Jackson memorabilia worth almost $2 million.

"We are sending the message loud and clear: the United States will not be a hiding place for the ill-gotten riches of the world's corrupt leaders," said Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department's criminal division.

The jet is not currently in the United States. It is believed to be in Equatorial Guinea, but if forfeiture orders are approved, the Justice Department could work with foreign governments to grab it if it were to land in their countries.

A Washington, D.C.-based spokesman for Equatorial Guinea and Nguema said officials tried to offer U.S. officials evidence "that there has been no wrongdoing," but were rebuffed.

"We intend to carefully review the allegations of this complaint now that we finally have access to it," said Matt Lauer with Qorvis Communications. "We look forward to meeting with representatives of the Department of Justice to provide information that we hope will resolve the issues presented."

The Justice Department said that despite the government salary, Nguema spent tens of millions of dollars on luxury cars, yachts, a lavish estate in the posh seaside town of Malibu, and a huge collection of Jackson memorabilia.

The Malibu compound includes 12 acres that overlook the Pacific Ocean, a 15,000-square-foot (1,400-square-meter) main house, a 2,500-square-foot (230-square-meter) guest house, a tennis court and pool.

FRENCH SEIZE VEHICLES

Late last year, Nguema moved his luxury car and motorcycle collection from Los Angeles to France, worth an estimated $10 million combined. Authorities there last month seized some of his vehicles, according to one court filing.

He also moved his two yachts he kept in California back to Equatorial Guinea last year, the filing said.

Between June 2010 and June 2011, he acquired a treasure trove of Michael Jackson memorabilia, some without his name being used, the court papers said. The singer died from an overdose of a mix of propofol and sedatives in June 2009.

Nguema spent $275,000 for one of Jackson's white crystal-covered gloves used during the late singer's "Bad" tour, as well as $80,000 for a pair of crystal-covered socks, according to the forfeiture complaint.

He also bought other items including clothing, awards and autographed music sheets, according to the court papers.

A U.S. Senate panel investigating foreign corruption in 2004 found that Riggs Bank in the United States had been a conduit for Equatorial Guinea officials' money. The bank closed the accounts and the money was withdrawn, except for Nguema's.

(Editing by Paul Simao)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111025/pl_nm/us_usa_equatorialguinea

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Gary Hart for President in 2012? (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | The left's disappointment with President Barack Obama has been touched upon many times before. However the sticking point has always been finding someone with a high enough profile to challenge him in the Democratic primaries.

A group calling itself "Run Gary Hart" thinks it has found that man. His name is Gary Hart, the former senator from Colorado, campaign manager for George McGovern and twice candidate for president.

Leaving aside whether the former senator and star of the "monkey business" sex scandal is even willing to have another go at it, Hart makes for an interesting man of the white horse. He has intellectual pretensions going back to the 1984 campaign when he was called an "Atari Democrat" for his propensity to offer high tech babble as part of his campaign spiel. In 1987, during his second attempt, Hart was caught up in a what would now be considered a tame sex scandal involving an attractive young lady named Donna Rice and a yacht called "Monkey Business."

Since 1987, Hart has practiced law, written extensively, and has gotten a doctorate at Oxford. He was mentioned for a cabinet post in a potential John Kerry presidency. He currently has a professorship at the University of Colorado at Denver.

Hart had started his political career as a great young hope, brimming with a boatload of new but unspecified ideas. However, now in his 70s, Hart would have to approach a revival of his political career as a venerable sage.

While Hart's political approach is still decidedly left, combining a skepticism about the war on terror with a desire to have an energy policy to wean the United States off foreign oil, one wonders what he appeal would be for those disaffected liberals looking for an alternative to Obama.

It is possible that Hart has been out of the public eye for so long that he would qualify as a fresh face. An entire generation has grown up not knowing who Hart is. Were he to decide to challenge Obama, he might get a following, combining young people looking for a savior, to aging supporters from his previous campaigns who pine for what might have been.

Sources: Run Gary Hart

Gary Hart Biography, Answers.Com

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111025/pl_ac/10271331_gary_hart_for_president_in2012

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Bunmi Laditan: Open Letter to 'Occupiers' from Rational America (Huffington post)

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