Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RightCelebrity/~3/_ukRfUZj0xk/
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Tuesday, January 31, 2012
The Kardashian Sisters Go Topless For Denim Line
The Kardashian girls know what sells, and they have it going on in the topless pic for their denim line. I know a lot of people will be checking out the ad, but will they buy the jeans? When getting a steady stream of negative press take your top off! Hey, it’s worked before! The Kardashian sisters already have their own clothing line for Sears and are now expanding with a denim line. I think this is a great idea. I love their clothes, and girls with curves need some good denim! Of course Celebuzz has all the deets, which you can see here, and they spoke with Kardashian Kollection co-creator Bruno Schiavi. He told them, ?We?re very excited about it. It launches in about four weeks. The girls love denim. And then we are really excited about home. Home looks incredible. There are three designs in home, everything from bed to cushions and pillows to bathroom accessories and shower curtains. Home is spectacular so we can?t wait for that. And swimwear of course is to die for. We are shooting our new swim campaign actually in January. We?re very excited about that.? The ads are cute, but I am [...]
Gavio TOAST! Docking Speaker for iPhone
This cute speaker from Gavio looks like a retro-styled toaster.? It would look really cute in my retro kitchen with my Formica dining table.? The TOAST dock has? 50mm speakers with 3W total RMS, and they reproduce 150-18,000Hz with an 80dB signal-to-noise ratio.? It’s powered with a 1000mAh lithium-ion battery.? No price has been released [...]
Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2012/01/29/gavio-toast-docking-speaker-for-iphone/
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Monday, January 30, 2012
Optimism builds in euro zone economy, picture still mixed (Reuters)
BRUSSELS (Reuters) ? Confidence in the euro zone's economy strengthened in January for the first time since early 2011, EU data showed on Monday, but a recovery in Germany masked a deterioration in France and Italy in a sign of the bloc's diverging fortunes.
The European Commission's economic sentiment indicator rose by 0.6 points in the euro zone to 93.4, the first improvement in sentiment since March last year as some confidence returned to services, consumers and construction.
The indicator was still slightly lower than forecast by economists polled by Reuters, underscoring the difficulty of measuring the rising optimism that is still tempered by EU leaders' inability to resolve the euro zone debt crisis.
The business climate indicator also rose for the second month in a row to -0.21, in line with economists' expectations.
The mixed picture was evident in the Commission's industrial confidence indicator, which remained unchanged in January, as factory managers said they saw a deterioration in their assessment of their order books, though this was offset by a positive assessment of their stocks.
Confidence in services, meanwhile, rebounded by 2 points in the euro zone and construction also rose 0.6.
Economists are divided over how deep the euro zone's economic contraction will be after the European Central Bank's decision in December to provide 3-year loans to banks averted a credit freeze.
But budget austerity and political divisions over how to solve the two-year debt crisis continue to depress business in the euro zone and the wider European Union, with non-euro zone country Britain heading for a recession in early 2011.
The European Commission forecasts 2012 economic growth of just 0.5 percent for the 17 nations in the euro zone, which generates 16 percent of global economic output. The International Monetary Fund is more pessimistic, forecasting a 0.5 percent contraction in 2012 that it says could drag the world into recession.
EU leaders hope to sketch a pathway out of the slump at a summit in Brussels on Monday, but a big divergence in the performance of the 27-nation bloc's economies makes that a tough task, while spending cuts are still the order of the day.
Recent data suggests Germany will avoid a recession, while non-euro zone member Britain, as well as euro states Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal, are likely to see their economies contract in 2012. Belgium and the Netherlands, also members of the single currency, will struggle to grow at all.
(Reporting By Robin Emmott; editing by Rex Merrifield)
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Sunday, January 29, 2012
Google, Facebook, Privacy ? And You
Editor?s note: Guest author Keith Teare is General Partner at his incubator Archimedes Labs and CEO of newly funded just.me. He was a co-founder of TechCrunch. Like millions of other people, I got an email from Google this morning. It was entitled ?Changes to Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service?. The first sentence describes the intent of the changes as shortening 60 policies into one, and improving their readability. Then there is a longer explanation captured in the graphic above. The email goes on to assert that Google has not changed its privacy policy and will not sell our personal information to third parties ? ?Our privacy policies remain unchanged?. So what is going on here? Facebook is the shiny object that Larry is focused on. This is a week where Sheryl Sandberg ? Chief Operating Officer at Facebook ? spoke at Hubert Burda?s DLD conference in Munich and stated that we were in the middle of 3 trends. First, a trend ?from anonymity to real identity?. Secondly, a trend from ?wisdom of crowds to wisdom of friends? and third, a trend ?from being receivers of information to broadcasters of information?. See the video below for the actual points she made. It was a thoughtful and at the same time a polemical speech, a speech with a strong point of view. In thinking about Google?s privacy policy changes it helps to listen to Sheryl?s remarks and reflect on the context. Facebook is saying that the Internet as a pure information retrieval mechanism is dead. That the ?readwrite? web that began as long ago as cheap web site hosting in 1998, has entirely replaced the read-only web. That the identifiable author has replaced the anonymous one. We are broadcasting and we are identifiable. That reading what friends say is now dominant in that world. Facebook envisages a future in which we all broadcast almost everything to almost everybody. Google?s problem. In that world, Google?s PageRank algorithm is seriously out of date. It promotes pages based on the number of links to it. Today, pages are no longer the unit of publishing. Far smaller items than a page dominate our senses. And those smaller messages are produced in huge quantity and in real time. So the signals that make something relevant have now changed. Facebook (and Twitter) have oodles of such signals. Google, until recently, had none. Google?s solution. The changesSource: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/JaxxfzBvTGI/
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Ideas: Genetic Testing and Insurance: One Datum
Reductions in the cost of genetic testing and improvements in what we know about what it tells us produce obvious benefits; if you know you are? likely to have some particular medical problem, you may be able to take precautions against it. But they also have at least one potential downside. The more is known about the chance of bad things happening to us, the less able we will be to insure against them.
A solution to this problem that is sometimes proposed is to permit individuals to have their genes tested but forbid insurance companies to require testing as a condition of insurance or to use the information it produces. The problem with that is adverse selection. If the customer knows his risk and the insurance company doesn't, high risk and low risk customers are charged the same price, making insurance a good deal for the former and a bad deal for the latter. Insurance companies, realizing that most of those who choose to buy their insurance are bad risks, will charge accordingly, driving more of the low or average risk customers out of the market. In the limiting case, insurance is bought only by high risk customers, at a high risk price. A famous description of the problem is Akerlof's article "The Market for Lemons."If we allow both insurance companies and their customers to make use of genetic information, then both high risk and low risk customers can buy insurance, but at different prices. The risk of having genetic variants that make you more likely to suffer some expensive medical problem is uninsurable, although you can still insure against the risk that, given those genes, the problem will actually appear.
The theoretical analysis of the problem is straightforward; interested readers can find one version in Chapter 6 of my Law's Order. But the theory does not tell us how large the problem is. That depends on empirical facts, in particular on how much the information provided by genetic testing affects the expected cost of insuring someone.As it happens, I recently came across a datum relevant to that question, as a result of having my own genes tested by 23andMe, a company that does mail order genetic testing. It turned out that I had a genetic variant that implied a moderately increased risk of meningioma, the second most common type of brain tumor.The information came a little late to be useful. Last summer, while I was part of a group on World of Warfare, one of the other players noticed that I had stopped responding. He called the house. My son took the call, came into my office, and found me half conscious on the floor. The diagnosis at the local hospital was meningioma, a benign (i.e. non-cancerous) tumor inside my skull but fortunately outside my brain. It was large enough to put pressure on my brain, so required surgery. I got surgery, all went well, and I am now fully recovered, aside from a visible scar and a tendency of my scalp to itch.
According to 23andMe, 35,000 Americans a year are diagnosed with meningioma, and in most cases the tumor is small enough not to require surgery. Assume that 10,000 of those, like my case, do, making the annual probability for a random American 1/30,000. Further assume that the average cost is $100,000. That's the right order of magnitude?I saw the figures for what it cost my insurance company, but don't have them ready to hand at the moment. The average cost to the insurance company of that particular risk is then about $3.
Finally, assume that my "moderately increased risk" means twice the average risk, which seems if anything a high guess. It follows that in a world where insurance companies had and used that data, my medical insurance would cost me, or my employer, three dollars a year more than in a world where the data was not available.
There are, of course, lots of other risks that my health insurance insures against. For some my genetics are presumably favorable, for some unfavorable. It would require much more information than I have to estimate how much the cost of insurance would vary from one person to another if all of that information was available and used. But at least the single datum I happen to have suggests that the effects might be small.
Labels: genetic testing, insurance, meningioma, tumor
Source: http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/2012/01/genetic-testing-and-insurance-one-datum.html
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Saturday, January 28, 2012
LMFAO Joining Madonna At Super Bowl?
Will.i.am claims party rockers LMFAO will perform with Madonna at Super Bowl.
By Gil Kaufman
LMFAO
Photo: Steven Lawton/ FilmMagic
It's a good thing the Super Bowl provides its halftime performer with the biggest platform in television, because according to the latest rumors Madonna is going to need a seriously massive stage to hold all her guests at the February 5 game.
Following reports that Nicki Minaj and M.I.A. as well as "The Voice" coach Cee Lo Green may make appearances comes news that LMFAO could be called off the bench also.
A year after his group, the on-hiatus Black Eyed Peas, played the big game, will.i.am told English radio station Capital FM that his party rocking homies will be in the mix. "I'm going to the Super Bowl this year to see my group LMFAO perform with Madonna," he said. "Check that out, Will.i.am Music Group is pretty freaking two for two! One year the Super Bowl, the next year another group part of the Super Bowl in collaboration with Madonna. That's still happening."
According to sources, the Madonna asked Green to perform with her at the showdown in Indianapolis between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots, which is traditionally the most-watched TV event of the year. "The Insider" reports that he's been flying to New York to rehearse with the pop icon. The sources add that he will contribute his signature flair to some of her classic tunes.
The pairing would make sense given that the new season of "The Voice" premieres right after the Super Bowl next month. MTV News caught up with the Queen of Pop at her "W.E." premiere earlier this week in New York, and the singer only had one tease about the Super Bowl gig. "I am not saying 'Yes,' and I am not saying 'No,' " she replied when asked whether Minaj and M.I.A. would take the stage with her. She added, "Pom poms. That's all I can tell you."
As if the pom poms and all the alleged guests aren't enough, the halftime show will be "imagined" by trippy Canadian circus troupe Cirque du Soleil and Madonna's longtime choreographer and creative director Jamie King. According to reports, the set list could include Madonna's new single, "Give Me All Your Luvin," as well as such classics as "Ray of Light," "Vogue" and "Music."
In addition to her Super Bowl performance, Madonna's fans are awaiting the release of her next studio album, M.D.N.A., out later this year.
Related ArtistsSource: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1678014/lmfao-madonna-super-bowl-halftime.jhtml
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Peter, Paul and Mary bassist Dick Kniss dies at 74
In this undated photo provided by Gloria Jean, Dick Kniss plays the acoustic bass. Kniss, who performed for five decades with Peter, Paul and Mary and co-wrote the John Denver hit "Sunshine on My Shoulders," died on Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2012 in Saugerties, N.Y. He was 74. (AP Photo/Gloria Jean) NO SALES
In this undated photo provided by Gloria Jean, Dick Kniss plays the acoustic bass. Kniss, who performed for five decades with Peter, Paul and Mary and co-wrote the John Denver hit "Sunshine on My Shoulders," died on Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2012 in Saugerties, N.Y. He was 74. (AP Photo/Gloria Jean) NO SALES
SAUGERTIES, New York (AP) ? Dick Kniss, a bassist who performed for five decades with the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary and co-wrote the John Denver hit "Sunshine on My Shoulders," has died. He was 74.
Kniss died Wednesday of pulmonary disease at a hospital near their home in the Hudson Valley town of Saugerties, said his wife, Diane Kniss.
Kniss was born in Portland, Oregon, and was an original member of Denver's 1970s band. He also played with jazz greats including Herbie Hancock and Woody Herman.
Active in the 1960s civil rights movement, Kniss performed at benefits for a range of causes and played during the first celebration of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday as a national holiday.
Peter, Paul and Mary's Peter Yarrow said in a statement that Kniss was "our intrepid bass player for almost as long as we performed together.
"He was a dear and beloved part of our closest family circle and his bass playing was always a great fourth voice in our music as well as, conceptually, an original and delightfully surprising new statement added to our vocal arrangements," Yarrow said.
Visiting hours are set for 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday at the Seamon-Wilsey Funeral Home in Saugerties.
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Friday, January 27, 2012
U.S. lawmaker may pursue limited China bill (Reuters)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? An influential Republican lawmaker said on Wednesday he may pursue "narrowly targeted" legislation to ensure the Commerce Department can impose countervailing duties on subsidized imports from China and other "non-market economies."
"I am willing to consider targeted legislation that ensures our countervailing duty laws can be used to protect U.S. employers and workers from unfairly subsidized imports from countries like China," House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp said in a statement.
A recent U.S. court ruling struck down the Commerce Department's ability to apply to countervailing duties to non-market economies, saying that Congress needed to change the law for the department to do that.
Camp emphasized that any legislation to address the ruling "would have to be narrowly targeted ... and be able to pass the House and Senate without complications."
However, the prospect of the Republicans moving any China bill is likely to invite attempts by Democrats to attach a measure to address China's currency practices.
Last year, the Democratic-controlled Senate passed a bill to pressure China on its currency, which many lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say is undervalued and gives Chinese manufacturers an unfair price advantage.
But House Republican leaders have sat on the bill, which they said could start a damaging trade war.
Former President George W. Bush's administration, responding to pleas of domestic producers, changed longstanding policy to allow countervailing, or anti-subsidy, duties to be applied to goods from non-market economies.
Previously, the Commerce Department had taken the position it was too difficult to calculate subsidy levels in economies where the state plays a dominant role in setting prices.
However, U.S. industry groups persuaded the Bush administration that was no longer the case with China.
(Reporting By Doug Palmer; editing by Christopher Wilson)
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Thursday, January 26, 2012
Chinese Researchers Lead in Howard Hughes Awards
[unable to retrieve full-text content]China?s government has spent billions in recent years into building a top-notch research establishment. Now comes a hint that the effort is beginning to pay off.
Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=8a82a6da071a97ad05dd0a1687663a5e
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Research: South Africans most active Tweeters (AP)
JOHANNESBURG ? New Research shows young people tweeting from Blackberries and iPhones are driving the growth of Twitter in Africa with South Africans by far the most vociferous.
Kenya-based Portland Communications and Tweetminster published the research Thursday indicating Twitter in Africa is widely used for social conversation and is fast becoming an important source of information.
The companies analyzed more than 11.5 million geographically pinpointed tweets originating on the continent during the last three months of 2011.
Research said that South Africans were the most prolific, followed by Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt and Morocco.
African Tweeters averaged 20 to 29 years, compared to 39 worldwide.
The companies said few African business and political leaders have joined the continent's Twittersphere.
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Wednesday, January 25, 2012
It Takes Balls Of Steel To Play This Sequencer [Video]
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Can Mitt Romney recover from his South Carolina 'disaster'?
Newt Gingrich defied conventional political wisdom in coming back to win solidly in South Carolina. Can he do the same in Florida, and what must Mitt Romney do to recover from Saturday's drubbing?
Was Newt Gingrich?s very solid victory in South Carolina Saturday night a fluke ? as the Republican establishment fervently hopes?
Skip to next paragraphOr was it a clear sign that all bets are off in the GOP nomination race ? a time when the mix of social, economic, and political forces in the United States have combined to create a new landscape for electoral politics?
Just three contests into the primary/caucus season, the question may be unanswerable, the kind of thing that keeps pundits and political scientists gainfully employed. But the results are stark.
RECOMMENDED: Newt Gingrich: 8 of the GOP idea man's more unusual ideas
?South Carolina has proven to be a disaster for Mitt Romney,? write Larry Sabato and Kyle Kondik of the University of Virginia Center for Politics in their morning-after analysis.
?The size of his defeat by Newt Gingrich ? a 12%+ landslide in a four-way race ? is virtually a repudiation of his candidacy in a state that has prided itself on picking the eventual nominee for 32 years,? they write. ?And we suspect Romney will have several more nights of heartburn, much like this one, as the nomination process unfolds.?
In the Palmetto State, Romney?s slide from presumptive front-runner was swift. Three days earlier, he?d had a clear lead in the polls. But back-to-back debates in South Carolina clearly showed Romney?s weakness and Gingrich?s strength in such crucial venues. Romney waffled on his wealth and income taxes; Gingrich dined on red meat when he took after the media over his marital infidelities.
Gingrich did well across the board in South Carolina, according to exit polls gathered by CNN: By gender (51 percent of men and 49 percent of women voted for him), age, education and income level, religion, ideology (Romney barely won among self-described moderates).
Most tea party supporters went for Gingrich. Importantly, so did most of those for whom the ability to defeat Barack Obama was the key to winning their vote ? ?electability,? which was supposed to be Romney?s strong point.
If Romney doesn?t want to be discouraged by the Sunday morning analysis of his defeat, he?d better stick to the funny papers.
Writing at Real Clear Politics, Sean Trende says there are three takeaways from South Carolina: ?There is no good news buried in here for Mitt Romney?. This is worse than George W. Bush?s loss to John McCain in New Hampshire?. Analysts are kidding themselves if they say Romney is the inevitable nominee.?
South Carolina was always going to be tough for Romney. In 2008, he came in just fourth there.
Now, Romney seems to be heading to ?more favorable ground,? as Sabato and Kondik put it.
According to 2008 exit polls from Florida, Nevada, Arizona, and Michigan ? important upcoming contests ? the number of evangelical Christians and those who describe themselves as ?very conservative? is smaller there than it was this year in Iowa and South Carolina.
Although Gingrich?s South Carolina win no doubt will generate more financial support for his campaign, Romney at this point has more resources to get his message across in Florida (including expected attacks on Gingrich), which is a much larger state than the candidates have fought in so far.
As of Sunday, Romney was leading Gingrich by 18.5 percentage points (40.5-22.0) in Florida, according to the Real Clear Politics average of polling data. In national tracking data, he?s ahead of Gingrich by 8.2 points. But as this past week's experience shows, that can swiftly change. The extent to which Gingrich's momentum continues will be key.
Though the South Carolina results for Rick Santorum and Ron Paul were less than spectacular (17 percent and 13 percent respectively), both vow to stay in the race for now. That works to Romney?s advantage, avoiding the two-man race that at this point would seem to benefit Gingrich.
Still, all eyes are focused on the two men at the head of a dwindling pack ? especially as they prepare to do rhetorical battle in critical debates in Florida this coming week.
RECOMMENDED: Newt Gingrich: 8 of the GOP idea man's more unusual ideas
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Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Tumblr boasts 120M users, and 15B page views monthly
By Helen A.S. Popkin
Tumblr
One of Tumblr's most beloved memes, reads from his own Ryan Gosling-dedicated Tumblr. That's just how huge Tumblr is now!
Within two weeks of its 2007 launch, plucky microblogging platform Tumblr hit 750,000 users, becoming the?go-to point for single service blogs?(often with NSFW titles) such as "Look at this F---ing Hipster," "STFU, Parents," "Animals with Casts," countless "F--- Yeah"?Tumblogs,??and a collection of infinitely reblogged photo memes such as "Selleck Waterfall Sandwich" and "Jumping Rob Pattinson.
Five years later, the?New York City-based tech company has grown from a content-generating platform to curation central, serving?120 million users and getting 15 billion unique page views every month. These are the numbers CEO David Karp cited from Internet traffic-tracking outfit Quantcast, while discussing Tumblr's evolution Monday at the Digital Life Design Conference in Munich, Germany.
"The early growth that we saw was around creators," Karp told the audience. "Our first community was those creators. We didn?t set out to build a network ... all we wanted to do was make novel tools."
Those novel ? and easy-to-use ? tools took off quickly?however, even though Tumblr originally eschewed the standard social network tools common on similar sites?? such as commenting and tagging ? that more than a few people find annoying.
Nonetheless, Tumblr is now a major influencer in how the distribution of mainstream media is changing. For example, the average Tumblr post is re-blogged on the site nine times, and now features apps for direct posts to Facebook and Twitter.
The content "therefore reaches vastly more people than if it just sat on its original site waiting to be discovered by people visiting it directly," Felix Salmon writes on the Tumblr reblogging phenomenon in his Reuters post, "How sharing disrupts media." "In the future, the most viral stories are going to have a life of their own, being shared across many different platforms and being read by people who will never visit the original site on which they were published."
Probably not that far in the future, either. As Tumblr's "about" page notes, the site now hosts more than 16 billion posts and 42 million blogs. On Monday alone, Tumblr racked up up more than 61 million posts.
via Venturebeat
More on the annoying way we live now:
Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet ? at least until the Stop Online Piracy Act becomes a law, making snark a libelous felony. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.
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Monday, January 23, 2012
Pa. woman hosted 'kegger' before 3 teens crashed (AP)
GREENSBURG, Pa. ? A prosecutor will seek a prison term for a western Pennsylvania woman who has pleaded guilty to serving a half-keg of beer to teen guests at her son's graduation party, before three of them were killed in a crash about a mile away.
Susan Sanders-Watt, 60, of Greensburg, pleaded guilty Monday to four counts each of corruption of minors and reckless endangerment and 17 citations of serving alcohol to minors, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (http://bit.ly/A4aNSq) reported.
Sanders-Watt wasn't charged with involuntary manslaughter, because prosecutors couldn't prove the beer she served caused the crash on June 26, 2010. That's because the driver, 19-year-old Michael Simpson, had been drinking at another location before the defendant's party.
But Westmoreland County District Attorney John Peck said Sanders-Watt faces a maximum of 45 years in prison and, though she'll likely receive less under state sentencing guidelines, he will ask a judge to put her in jail or prison rather than letting her serve probation or house arrest. Her sentencing will be scheduled in about three months.
"We're recommending a period of incarceration because three people were killed as a result of consuming alcohol," Peck said. "I think adults have to realize there are going to be horrible consequences giving alcohol to minors."
"This is probably one of the worst cases," Peck said, referring to the crash that killed Simpson, who was legally drunk, along with two passengers, Carly Kudray, 18, and Jordan Cobb, 19. A third passenger was injured but has recovered.
All four were graduates of Greensburg-Salem High School, about 30 miles east of Pittsburgh.
Defense attorney Scott Bitar said Sanders-Watt gave letters of condolence to the victims' families and will make a public statement about the incident when she's sentenced.
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At 23, new treasurer works to save Harrisburg
HARRISBURG?? In the battle to repair the tattered finances of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, residents have turned to an unlikely city treasurer: a 23-year-old college student.
Whether John Campbell, who was installed as treasurer on January 3, is the right person to lead that charge for Harrisburg, the state's capital, remains to be seen. He is not without convictions of what is needed.
He supported the city's bankruptcy filing, which was later dismissed by a U.S. bankruptcy judge, and wants to sell the incinerator that is at the root of the city's crushing $317 million in debt.
But as a college student studying for dual bachelor's degrees in business administration and economics, Campbell will have to navigate a tough road.
The city council and mayor barely speak, little money is available for routine road and streetlight repairs, and high crime and poor schools have fueled suburban flight.
Not to mention that a receiver installed by Pennsylvania's governor -- David Unkovic, a long-time public finance expert -- has sole authority over how tax dollars are spent.
That does not seem to daunt Campbell, who faced little opposition in November's general election 3 after winning a primary election last spring.
As Harrisburg's part-time treasurer - a post that pays $20,000 a year - he is responsible for collecting taxes and other fees as well as investing what little money the city has.
"What the voters of Harrisburg are looking for right now is somebody who understands finance," said Campbell, whose term runs through 2016. "When we're talking about bonds and arbitrage, having someone who understands how campaigns work is not going to help."
Campbell, a former Democratic Party official who earned an associate's degree at a Harrisburg community college and hopes to complete his bachelor's degrees by 2013, is trying to use the power of his office, once considered a backwater of city government, to bridge the financial gap.
But with the state receiver in charge of the city's finances, Campbell's flexibility is limited.
Though he supported the city's bankruptcy filing, he opposes the sale of the city's parking garages, one of Harrisburg's most dependable revenue sources. He wants to sell the indebted incinerator and the city's large collection of Wild West and African-American artifacts, leftovers from a previous mayor's obsession with making Harrisburg a museum mecca.
City council members say that, so far, Campbell has proven himself a quick learner.
At a council meeting last week Mayor Linda Thompson's staff pushed to sell delinquent tax liens to raise cash that would help cull some debt, much of which is owed to Assured Guaranty
Campbell opposed the move, telling council members they could expect an immediate 20 percent loss if they sold the liens, while keeping them would pay off over time.
"It made no sense, logically, to sell them," Campbell said. "It would be like accepting one of those payday loans."
The information convinced the council to not sell the tax liens, helping it save more than $400,000 over time, said Wanda Williams, the city council's president.
"We were very surprised at how intense Campbell's report was," said Williams. "He was able to address all the questions council members had."
Some, however, are reserving praise.
Corky Goldstein, a Harrisburg attorney and resident for nearly 40 years, says Campbell's age - he turns 24 next month - may work against him as he moves through the community.
"I don't think he's the person in this particular case that will make a difference," said Goldstein, who sits on the board overseeing Harrisburg's parking garages. "But he's in a position to learn a lot of the players and learn how the decisions are made."
BARE-BONES
A self-described workaholic, Campbell also has a full-time job at a Harrisburg historical society.
He attends his boyfriend's synagogue on Fridays and the pair go to his Presbyterian church on Sunday. He owns two dogs, and like many his age is addicted to his iPhone.
As Harrisburg grapples with its debt, Campbell and other officials are awaiting next month's report from Unkovic, the receiver, that will outline how the city can spend and collect money.
Because Unkovic technically has complete control over the city's finances, that has s led to some confusion over whether Campbell can hire a full-time deputy, a position he says is critical. He's asked Unkovic how to proceed, but says he has yet to hear back.
"Our office is running at bare-bone levels, and it's evident by the amount we need to get done here," Campbell said. "It's a little confusing, because I'd like to hire someone right away. We're in a limbo at this point."
A spokesman for Unkovic did not respond to a request for comment.
In the interim, Campbell wants to update the city's technology to let residents pay bills online, something he aggressively promoted during his campaign.
He also wants to tax those who commute into Harrisburg and use its roads and other services for free.
"It doesn't help our tax base that half our population is below the poverty line and half of the land in the city is not taxable because it is state or federally owned," he said.
State officials have so far resisted a commuter tax for the capital city.
"This could be a great revenue stream, and we could then negotiate with our bondholders and try to level out our debt payments and pay it off in a reasonable amount of time," Campbell said. "This is a plan that you could do, if there's just courage in the political system, but that clearly is lacking at the state level."
Despite the somewhat bellicose talk, Campbell says he does not currently envision a role for himself in state politics, though he is quick to add that might change.
"If there's something that I think I can do better than the current person, or there's an opening and I think that my expertise can be applied and I can better serve my constituents," he said, "I'm completely open to that."
Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46092885/ns/business-stocks_and_economy/
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Sunday, January 22, 2012
Weaver revisits paranormal with 'Red Lights' (AP)
PARK CITY, Utah ? Sigourney Weaver may not believe in ghosts, but the paranormal world of her latest film is not alien territory for her.
Weaver's Sundance Film Festival premiere, "Red Lights," is a dark exploration of the supernatural realm she previously took on in comic mode with "Ghostbusters" and its sequel.
"I probably don't believe in fairies and ghosts, but I certainly believe that people have souls," Weaver, 62, said in an interview. "I think that, and that's there's more going on around us than we can explain in a rational way."
What did surprise Weaver in preparing for her role is "what a huge business psychic entertainment was," she said.
"Red Lights" features Weaver as a skeptic whose life's work is debunking phony claims of the paranormal. The film from writer-director Rodrigo Cortes co-stars Robert De Niro as a superstar of the psychic realm, Cillian Murphy as Weaver's assistant and Elizabeth Olsen as one of their students.
There has been talk of a third "Ghostbusters" movie that would reunite Weaver with Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and other co-stars. Weaver likes the idea but has doubts it will happen.
"I'd love to work with everybody again," Weaver said. "I think, mmm, at this point, I think it's probably less than 50-50. That's what I think."
Another sequel to one of Weaver's blockbusters definitely is on. But Weaver cannot say much about "Avatar 2," James Cameron's next chapter in his science-fiction franchise. The first "Avatar" film was the biggest commercial smash of modern times, making $2.8 billion worldwide.
Weaver's character died and underwent a cosmic transformation in "Avatar." But Weaver has been bumped off before in her "Alien" sci-fi franchise and came back to battle on in another sequel.
"As Jim would say, there's no death in science fiction," Weaver said. "But no, I can't really talk about it. But I am looking forward to it."
Weaver is more talkative about a film that's an offshoot of the franchise that made her a star. In Ridley Scott's 1979 hit "Alien," Weaver played Ellen Ripley, the lone survivor of a spaceship crew terrorized by an unstoppable creature.
She earned a best-actress Academy Award nomination as Ripley in Cameron's 1986 follow-up "Aliens," and she reprised the role in two more sequels.
Scott makes his return to science fiction with this summer's "Prometheus," a cousin to "Alien" that stars Charlize Theron, Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender. The director and his actors have been coy about whether "Prometheus" is an outright prequel to "Alien," though they have said there are connections between the films, and the trailer for the new one has images resembling the design and features of the 1979 tale.
"Whatever they call it, I think everyone's very excited to see what Ridley does with some of these wonderful elements, and I think I'll be just as excited as everybody," Weaver said. "I don't really want to know anything about it. I have great confidence in him, and I'm sure they'll make a wonderful movie."
Could Weaver ever imagine resurrecting Ripley for another film?
"No. Let the poor woman rest," Weaver said. "No one ever believed her, anyway. They gave her such a hard time."
___
Online:
http://www.sundance.org
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Analyst: All These Concerns Over EA And Star Wars Are ?Overdone?
So, there's been some hubbub around Electronic Arts over the last few days, as the company ramps up for the release of its third quarter earnings on February 1st. Yesterday, EA's stock closed at $17.54 per share, which, in context, meant that the gaming goliath's stock was down 30 percent since hitting its 52-week high in early November. This drop was mostly due to the collective shock relating to the news concerning its recently released title, Star Wars: The Old Republic, which now has a ridiculous price tag attached to it -- as Wall Street is estimating the cost to be between $150 and $200 million.Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/CqW0_qzA8_M/
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Saturday, January 21, 2012
Recovering Robin Gibb makes classical debut
LONDON?? Bee Gees star Robin Gibb has recorded his first classical work with son Robin-John, a process he said helped him recover from serious illness.
The 62-year-old's "The Titanic Requiem," described as a "symphonic concept album," will be released by Warner Music Group's Rhino Entertainment on March 19, the label announced on Friday.
The concert performance premiere will take place in London on April 10, 100 years to the day after the ill-fated passenger liner set sail. It sank after striking an iceberg five days later in one of the most famous maritime disasters in history.
Story: Bee Gee Robin Gibb says he's improving-
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The album was recorded over the last year at Air Studios in London and performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Included on the album is "Don't Cry Alone," featuring lead vocals from Robin Gibb in what has been billed as "the welcome return of one of music's truly unforgettable and distinctive voices."
Gibb said in November that he was recovering after being "very unwell." His representatives have declined to comment on British media reports that the singer was battling liver cancer.
Story: Report: Bee Gees' Robin Gibb fighting liver cancer"It has been an incredible experience working with my son RJ," Gibb said in a statement to announce the new album.
"There is a creative freedom and uninhibited state that comes from working with a family member. Working on this album and with RJ has been a driving force, and one that has helped me on the road to recovery."
In October, Gibb was hospitalized for abdominal pain and treated for colon inflammation. After being released by doctors, he issued a statement saying he planned to return to work, according to media reports at the time.
Gibb is one of the two surviving members of the Bee Gees, a band he formed with his twin brother Maurice and older brother Barry. Maurice died in 2003.
They achieved international success with disco hits such as "Stayin' Alive" and "Night Fever."
Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/46069605/ns/today-entertainment/
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House Republican budget to seek Medicare reforms (Reuters)
BALTIMORE (Reuters) ? Republicans in the House of Representatives will put forward a budget plan this year that will seek substantial reforms to health benefits for the elderly and make aggressive strides toward reducing deficits, a senior lawmaker said on Friday.
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan said he wanted his budget plan to offer voters an alternative vision to the "cradle-to-grave welfare state" that he says Democratic President Barack Obama is promoting.
The House Republican budget resolution will contain reforms to Medicare, the healthcare program for Americans 62 and over, such as providing subsidies to help recipients pay for private insurance, based on their wealth and medical needs.
"We haven't written it yet, but we're not backing off on the kinds of reforms we've advocated," Ryan told reporters at a retreat for House Republicans in Baltimore.
Ryan said there was emerging bipartisan support for such "premium support" plans as the best way to save Medicare, which he said was going broke.
The Wisconsin congressman caused an uproar last year by proposing a plan effectively to privatize Medicare by turning the popular $525 billion fee-for-service program into a system of vouchers to be used by recipients to buy private insurance.
The plan was enough to rattle elderly voters and was cited as a key factor in the defeat of a Republican candidate in a normally conservative New York state congressional district last year.
In December, Ryan and Democratic Senator Ron Wyden unveiled a new approach to cut Medicare costs through a "premium support" model that allowed seniors to buy insurance through a regulated exchange while retaining Medicare's traditional fee-for-service model. The plan was viewed by critics as a ploy to soften opposition to future reforms.
The Obama administration has steadfastly opposed reforms that would end Medicare for seniors or amount to what it calls "radical privatization" of the program
Representative Tom Price, who heads the House Republican Policy Committee, said there was a lot of enthusiasm at the Baltimore retreat to tackle fundamental reform of "automatic spending programs" such as Medicare and Social Security.
BUDGET RERFORM PLANS
Ryan said his budget plan would aggressively shrink deficits
to put U.S. debt on a downward path, adding the United States would be in a situation similar to some debt-stricken European countries in a few years if no action was taken. He did not specify an amount for planned cuts.
"We feel we have an obligation to show the country our plan to pre-empt a debt crisis in this country. What matters most as is that we get the trajectory right," he said.
Despite the controversy raised about the House's last budget plan, Ryan insisted that Americans be offered an alternative as a vision of what the Republicans would accomplish if elected.
"People want to be bolder on the budget. People feel good about our budget experience and the budget we passed, even the Northeasterners, the people from the tough seats, they feel we did the right thing on the budget and they want to keep doing it."
Ryan also said he hoped to reform the budgetary process, which he said was outdated and broken, noting the Senate had not passed a budget resolution in nearly three years.
The House Budget Committee is working on 10 bills to reform the annual budget process, including a provision that would force the two houses of Congress, along with the White House, to work on a joint budget resolution early in the year, for votes later in the year.
In the process in place since 1974, the House and Senate work on separate budget bills and then work out the differences later.
Ryan said the panel would begin to refine some of the proposals in coming weeks, but the process would be halted for the committee's work on the fiscal 2013 budget plan, which will be unveiled in March. The reforms will resume later in the year once the budget plan is passed, he said.
(Additional reporting by Richard Cowan; Editing by Peter Cooney)
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Friday, January 20, 2012
Video: Stocks Rally Ahead of Bank Earnings
Peter Boockvar, Miller Tabak, and CNBC's Mary Thompson drill down on Tuesday's market rally and a look ahead to bank earnings.
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Business & financial news headlines from msnbc.com
Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/cnbc/46028643/
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Thursday, January 19, 2012
Water rights shift in Florida could foreshadow debates to come
Is reclaimed water a basic public resource or a privately manufactured product? That?s the question before the Florida legislature this session, as it decides how to classify the state?s large supply of wastewater that?s treated and used again, often for lawn irrigation or recharging aquifers. Environmentalists are nervous as lawmakers prepare to enact the largest overhaul to state water law in 40 years, changing the state?s very definition of water.?
Current Florida law subjects all state waters to permitting based upon ?beneficial use? in the public interest. But the bill up for debate would exclude reclaimed water from ?waters of the state,? granting sole ownership of the resources to the utilities that produce it. Many of these utilities are public entities, but some are privately owned.
Under the bill, state water management districts could not dictate how reclaimed water is used, even during an emergency shortage. Backed by several powerful interest groups, the bill appears destined to become law.
Supporters say the overhaul would protect Florida?s dwindling water supply by incentivizing production and use of reclaimed water through eased restrictions.?Local governments need the certainty,? says state Representative Dana Young, a Tampa Republican who teamed up with city representatives to write the bill. ?If they build the system, they need guarantees that they can use the water as they see fit.?
But environmentalists describe the shift as a business-friendly legislature?s attempt to erode state water protections, placing much of the resource in the hands of private interests. ?It has the potential to be the first step toward eventual privatization,? says Bob Graham, the former Democratic governor and longtime U.S. senator. Graham and other environmentalists say they too favor the reuse of water as a means of conservation, but not through redefining its ownership.
Reclaimed water accounts for less than one percent of water use across the United States. But it?s becoming more viable for dangerously dry communities, thanks to technological advances that have lowered treatment costs and improved its quality, according to a study released last week by the National Research Council.
Leader in reuse
Water questions loom large in Florida, where climate change and decades of residential development have eroded the coastline, enabling saltwater to seep into aquifers and contaminate the basic water supply. Those conditions, along with recent drought, have stirred fears the state may one day struggle to slake the thirst of the nation?s fourth most-populous state.
Reclaimed water is a key to dealing with this problem in Florida; the state leads the nation in its use. Each day, Florida reuses over 660 million gallons ? about 10 percent of the state?s total demand for water. No longer a commodity to be disposed of, used water is increasingly seen as a moneymaker, sometimes netting as much as $3.50 per thousand gallons.
But those who want to cede reclaimed water rights to utilities say that too much state authority has retarded investment in the technology. Though the state?s five water management districts rarely assert their power over reclaimed water, they have tried to do so on recent occasions, critics say, causing uncertainty for utilities that treat wastewater.
In 2009, a water shortage prompted the St. Johns River Water Management District to consider placing limits on the use of reclaimed water. Florida's other districts were set to follow, says Jan McLean, a Tampa attorney working on the issue. But the City of Tampa, along with several other utilities, objected and eventually put a stop to the plan. Under the restrictions, McLean says, millions of gallons of water fit for reuse would have been wasted.
Young?s bill would prevent this by letting utilities make their own choices about how to use the reclaimed water they generate. As McLean sees it, ?The city just wants to have some certainty over what we view as an asset.?
Fears of privatization
But environmentalists worry about the consequences of that assurance, saying the move would lead others in farming and industry to clamor for ownership of their wastewater.?Mary Jean Yon, who works with the Audubon Society in Florida, says the change would be part of the ?continual erosion of power? of state water managers.?
Indeed, Republican Governor Rick Scott slashed state funding for water management districts by more than $700 million for 2012, a decrease of 40 percent. And Florida?s Republican-dominated legislature will take up a separate bill this session that would extend the life of some water consumption permits to 30 years, up from 20. ?That?s an incremental privatization of water,? says Richard Hamann, a professor of water law at the University of Florida.
Representative Young, the bill?s author, says complete privatization is not the goal. ?This bill is narrowly tailored to deal with a narrow question,? she told Stateline.??
National concerns
Environmentalists also question whether the bill would protect the water supply as advertised. ?We need to encourage reuse, but not all reuse is equal,? says Hamann. The shift could give utilities more incentive, for instance, to sell reclaimed water to a golf course for irrigation than to use it to recharge an aquifer.
Robin Craig, a water law expert at Florida State University, says predicting the effect of the shift in water policy is difficult.?It?s going to depend on how much reclaimed water is flowing back into the system, compared to return flows now,? she says.?
Florida wouldn?t be the first state to privatize some of its waters. Utilities in most Western states ? with the exception of Utah ? retain absolute rights over reclaimed waters under the long-held doctrine of prior appropriation. But public officials in those states tend to monitor closely the way the recycled water is used. In Washington State, for instance, the Department of Ecology recently drew up new rules that would prohibit reclaimed water use from interfering with rights downstream.
Supporters of the Florida bill say the state would still oversee reclaimed water use through a detailed permitting process?in the lead-up to its?production. McLean, the Tampa attorney, says the change would require more foresight from water planners who issue the permits, prohibiting them from changing the rules for utilities after the fact. Additionally, the bill would allow water management districts, under some circumstances, to require utilities to use reclaimed water in lieu of making withdrawals from an aquifer.
Nevertheless, environmentalists in Florida tend to see the legislation in their state as creating more problems than it is likely to solve. ?[Reclaimed water] is the same as all other water,? says Hamann. ?We should use it wisely.?
? Contact Jim Malewitz at jmalewitz@pewtrusts.org?
?
Source: http://feeds.stateline.org/~r/StatelineorgRss-California/~3/ayllYZeIUzY/story
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Turk gets life term for role in journalist killing (AP)
ANKARA, Turkey ? A Turkish court on Tuesday sentenced a man to life in prison for masterminding the killing of an ethnic Armenian journalist hated by hardline nationalists, but acquitted all 19 suspects of charges of acting under a terrorist organization's orders.
The verdict deeply disappointed the lawyers and family of Hrant Dink, who was gunned down outside of his office five years ago. Fethiye Cetin, a lawyer for the Dink family, said the trial failed to shed light on "the darkness" ? alleged connections between the suspects and some state officials.
The case has been widely seen as a test of whether the judiciary can fully investigate possible negligence by authorities, who allegedly knew about plots to kill the journalist.
It also highlights Turkey's uneasy relationship with its ethnic and religious minorities, which include at least 60,000 Armenian Christians in a mostly Muslim nation of more than 70 million.
After the decision, hundreds of activists began marching toward the scene where Dink was gunned down outside his Agos newspaper and promised to gather again at the spot of his murder on Thursday, the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 19 killing.
"This case is not over ... for us this case is just starting," said Cetin, vowing to appeal the verdict and likening the trial process to a "comedy."
A panel of judges found Yasin Hayal guilty of instigating Dink's killing, and gave him the life term despite a plea by a prosecutor that the court should sentence seven of the suspects to life in prison, including Erhan Tuncel ? who until now has been portrayed as another key instigator.
The court, however, sentenced Tuncel to 10 1/2 years in prison for a separate crime, his role in a bombing a McDonald's restaurant in 2004 in Black Sea port city of Trabzon and ordered his release from prison since he already completed his term while awaiting a verdict.
Dink had angered nationalists and had been prosecuted under Turkish law for describing the mass killings of Armenians in the early 20th century as genocide. Turkey denies the deaths constituted genocide, insisting those killed were victims of civil war and unrest.
Gunman Ogun Samast was sentenced to nearly 23 years in prison in July for "premeditated murder" by a separate, juvenile court. Samast was allegedly connected to Hayal but the court decision suggested the suspects who know each other were not acting as a gang and that Samast carried out the assassination alone under orders from Hayal.
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Drop in Melanoma Deaths Limited to Educated Whites: Study (HealthDay)
MONDAY, Jan. 16 (HealthDay News) -- Recent declines in death rates due to the skin cancer melanoma among white Americans appear to be limited to those with higher levels of education, researchers have found.
The findings reveal a widening education-related disparity in melanoma death rates and highlight the need for early-detection strategies to effectively target high-risk, low-educated whites, the American Cancer Society researchers said.
The investigators noted that overall melanoma death rates among white men and women aged 25 to 64 in the United States have been declining since the early 1990s, but it hasn't been known if death rates among whites might vary depending on a person's socioeconomic status, a term used to describe their levels of income and education.
To examine the issue, the researchers reviewed death certificates from 26 states and found that melanoma deaths declined about 10 percent between 1993-1997 and 2003-2007 in both men and women.
However, reductions occurred only among whites with at least 13 years of education, and there were actually slight increases among those with the least education. As a result, the education-related gap in melanoma death rates rose by nearly 52 percent in men and by almost 36 percent in women between 1993-1997 and 2003-2007, the investigators found.
The study was published in the Jan. 16 online edition of the journal Archives of Dermatology.
"To our knowledge, this is the first study to document this education gap in melanoma mortality trends among non-Hispanic whites in the U.S.," study leader Vilma Cokkinides said in an American Cancer Society news release.
"The reasons for the widening of the educational gap in mortality rates are not yet understood, but we do know the cornerstone of melanoma control is recognizing the signs of melanoma early. Lower socioeconomic status is associated with suboptimal knowledge and awareness of melanoma, inadequate health insurance, and lower rates of skin self-examination or physician screening," she explained.
The researchers said there's a need for more vigilant primary and secondary melanoma-prevention education campaigns that target high-risk people with low socioeconomic status and the doctors who care for them.
More information
The U.S. National Cancer Institute has more about melanoma.
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Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Huntsman quits GOP race (AP)
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. ? Jon Huntsman abandoned his once-promising campaign for the Republican presidential nomination on Monday and endorsed Mitt Romney as the man "best equipped to defeat Barack Obama'" in the fall.
The former Utah governor coupled his announcement with an appeal to the remaining contenders to stop attacking one another in television commercials. "At its core, the Republican Party is a party of ideas, but the current toxic form of our political discourse does not help our cause," he said.
He noted that he and Romney have had their differences, and he did not respond to questions when asked if he still believes ? as he said while campaigning for last week's New Hampshire primary ? that the former Massachusetts governor is out of touch and unelectable.
Huntsman said he was suspending his candidacy, but his endorsement made it clear that was a euphemism. He dropped out less than a week after finishing third in New Hampshire, the state where he had staked his candidacy. While he has campaigned for nearly a week in South Carolina, he lacked the funds for television commercials or other essentials of a modern campaign.
Given Huntsman's decision to back Romney, his departure seemed unlikely to clarify the overriding question of the Republican campaign, whether conservative voters could or would unify behind either Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich or Rick Perry to create a strong conservative challenger to Romney.
Huntsman's resume had suggested he could be a major contender for the Republican presidential nomination: businessman, diplomat, governor, veteran of four presidential administrations, an expert on China and foreign trade. But the former ambassador to China in the Obama administration found a poor reception for his brand of moderate civility that he had hoped would draw support from independents, as well as party moderates.
Huntsman was almost invisible in a race often dominated by Romney, a fellow Mormon. One reason was timing. For months, Romney and other declared or expected-to-declare candidates drew media attention and wooed voters in early primary states.
Huntsman, however, was half a world away, serving as ambassador to China until he resigned in late April. Nearly two more months would pass before his kickoff speech on June 22 in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty. The former Utah governor had already acknowledged that expectations for him in South Carolina's primary this week will be "very low." Word of the Huntsman withdrawal came on the same day that The State, South Carolina's largest newspaper, endorsed him for president.
Although Huntsman was viewed as having little chance of finishing strong in South Carolina, his endorsement of Romney could give the former Massachusetts governor, who leads in state polls, even more of the look of inevitability.
The move comes as pressure has been increasing on Texas Gov. Rick Perry to leave the race to allow South Carolina's influential social conservatives to unify behind either former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum or former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Santorum worked over the weekend at consolidating conservatives, trying to parlay into support in South Carolina the decision Saturday by an influential group of national Christian conservatives to back him.
"I think it's important that we eventually consolidate this race," Santorum told reporters Monday at a news conference in Columbia. He stopped short of urging Perry, who has shown little traction in South Carolina, to quit the race.
"That's up to the candidates themselves to decide," Santorum said.
To stand out in a crowded field, Huntsman positioned himself as a tax-cutting, budget-balancing chief executive and former business executive who could rise above partisan politics. That would prove to be a hard sell to the conservatives dominating the early voting contests, especially in an election cycle marked by bitter divisions between Republicans and Democrats and a boiling antipathy for Obama.
Huntsman also tried to offer a different tenor, promising a campaign marked by civility.
"I don't think you need to run down somebody's reputation in order to run for the office of president," he said.
While Huntsman was often critical of his former boss ? he joined those saying Obama had failed as a leader ? and occasionally jabbed at Romney, he spent more of his time in debates pushing his own views for improving the economy rather than thumping the president or his opponents.
In light of his work in the Obama administration, Republicans seemed wary of Huntsman. While he cast his appointment in August 2009 as U.S. ambassador to China as answering the call to serve his country, his critics grumbled that he had in fact been working on behalf of the opposition.
Huntsman was conservative in matters of taxes and the reach of the federal government, but he was out of step with most conservatives in his support of civil unions for gay couples. On matters of science, he poked fun at his skeptical rivals in a pre-debate tweet: "To be clear. I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy."
In the end, Huntsman didn't seem to register, crazy or otherwise, with Republicans looking for an alternative to Romney or a winner against Obama. He was routinely at the bottom of national polls, barely registering at 1 or 2 percent, a reflection of the faint impression he made in the GOP debates.
His campaign put all its emphasis on the New Hampshire primary, hoping that face-to-face politicking in the first-in-the-nation primary would pay off with a strong second-place finish or a surprise victory in Romney's backyard. While other GOP candidates spent December in Iowa, the Huntsman campaign ignored its leadoff caucuses, where social conservatives were all but certain to give him short shrift.
Central to Huntsman's New Hampshire strategy was its open Republican primary, which allowed independents to vote along with declared party members. He gambled that he could attract moderate voters, Republicans and independents alike, by presenting himself as a successful conservative leader who wasn't interested in engaging in a culture war.
He called his third-place showing a "ticket to ride" to South Carolina, but his distant finish behind Romney and runner-up Ron Paul was widely regarded as lackluster.
Huntsman, 51, was born in Redwood City, Calif., and raised in Utah. His father, an industrialist and at one time a Nixon administration official, founded Huntsman Chemical Corp. in 1982. Now the Huntsman Corp., it reported revenues of more than $9 billion in 2010.
The younger Huntsman drifted a bit as a young man. He attended high school in Salt Lake City but dropped out to play keyboards in a band. He later attended the University of Utah, then dropped out to serve two years as a Mormon missionary in Taiwan, where he learned to speak Mandarin.
He returned to the University of Utah in 1981 and later worked as an intern for Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and as a staff assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He left college to join the Huntsman Corp. in 1983, the same year he married Mary Kaye Cooper. He studied international politics at the University of Pennsylvania, earning a bachelor's degree in 1987.
While he served in the administrations of both George H.W. Bush ? he was ambassador to Singapore in 1992 ? and George W. Bush, Huntsman first won elective office in 2004 as Utah's governor. He was re-elected by a 3-1 margin in 2008, then resigned the following year to be America's top diplomat in China.
Huntsman and his wife have seven children, including one adopted from India and one adopted from China.
___
Elliott reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Thomas Beaumont in Myrtle Beach, S.C., contributed to this report.
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