France to lower GDP forecasts for 2012, 2013: finance minister

[ [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 2]], 'http://yhoo.it/KeQd0p', '[Slideshow: See photos taken on the way down]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 7]], ' http://yhoo.it/KpUoHO', '[Slideshow: Death-defying daredevils]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['know that we have confidence in', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/LqYjAX ', '[Related: The Secret Service guide to Cartagena]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['We picked up this other dog and', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JUSxvi', '[Related: 8 common dog fears, how to calm them]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 5]], 'http://bit.ly/JnoJYN', '[Related: Did WH share raid details with filmmakers?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 3]], 'http://bit.ly/KoKiqJ', '[Factbox: AQAP, al-Qaeda in Yemen]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have my contacts on or glasses', 3]], 'http://abcn.ws/KTE5AZ', '[Related: Should the murder charge be dropped?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JD7nlD', '[Related: Bristol Palin reality show debuts June 19]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 1]], 'http://bit.ly/JRPFRO', '[Related: McCain adviser who vetted Palin weighs in on VP race]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['A JetBlue flight from New York to Las Vegas', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/GV9zpj', '[Related: View photos of the JetBlue plane in Amarillo]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 15]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/white-house-stays-out-of-teen-s-killing-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120411/martinzimmermen.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['He was in shock and still strapped to his seat', 6]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/navy-jet-crashes-in-virginia-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120406/jet_ap.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['xxxxxxxxxxxx', 11]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/russian-grannies-win-bid-to-sing-at-eurovision-1331223625-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/1/56/156d92f2760dcd3e75bcd649a8b85fcf.jpeg', '500', ' ', 'AP', ] ]

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/france-lower-gdp-forecasts-2012-2013-finance-minister-181211394--business.html

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Michael Phelps Beats Ryan Lochte Again At U.S. Olympic Swim Trials In 200 IM

OMAHA, Neb. -- If this week in America's heartland is any indication, Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte are going to put on quite a show in London.

The world's greatest swimmers produced their most stirring duel yet at the U.S. Olympic trials Saturday night, going stroke for stroke in the 200-meter individual medley, never more than a few inches apart.

Their arms whirled in unison on the butterfly, then again when they flipped over for the backstroke. Their heads popped out of water as though this was synchronized swimming when they switched to the breaststroke. And, finally, they both gave it everything they had coming to the wall on the freestyle.

Phelps got there first, touching nine-hundredths of a second ahead of Lochte with the fastest time in the world this year.

The scoreboard from Omaha now reads: Phelps 2, Lochte 1.

"We were probably playing the cat-and-mouse game again," said Phelps, who won with a time of 1 minute, 54.84 seconds. "Then, of course, the last 50 we went crazy."

For Phelps, it was an emphatic message on his 27th birthday that he intends to turn his last Olympics into another major medal haul. For Lochte, it was a gutsy performance coming just a half-hour after he won the grueling 200 backstroke.

"The best thing about swimming is racing and stepping up against the world's best," Lochte said, sounding amazingly chipper before he returned for his third race of the night, the semifinals of the 100 butterfly.

Lochte finished third in his heat and set up one last race with Phelps on Sunday.

"Tonight was probably the most pain I've endured in a swimming competition," Lochte conceded.

Phelps, the two-time defending Olympic champion in the 100 fly, advanced to the final with another fastest time of 2012, powering away to win his heat in 51.35. Lochte tied for the sixth-fastest time in the semifinals (52.47), but this isn't one of his specialties. He'd need to pull a big upset to earn another Olympic event.

But, said his coach, Gregg Troy, "Ryan thrives on challenges."

Lochte seemed to have Phelps' number when he beat him twice at last year's world championships, then kept the dominance going with a convincing win on the first night of the trials in the 400 individual medley.

But Phelps edged Lochte in the 200 freestyle, and now he's got two wins in a row against the only swimmer who seems capable of preventing him from making another serious run at eight gold medals in London.

The two slapped hands while hanging on the lane ropes, then headed for the edge of the pool, fully aware the races that really matter are still to come.

"It feels good to be back on that side, but I'm sure that's not going to be the end of us going back and forth," Phelps said. "I'm sure there's going to be some more races like that over the next few weeks."

After he received his medals, the sellout crowd of more than 13,000 serenaded Phelps with a rendition of "Happy Birthday." Then he trotted around the deck to hug his mom and sister.

In other events on the sixth night of the trials, Jessica Hardy made up for the disappointment of missing out on the Beijing Games because of a failed drug test, winning the 100 freestyle. Seventeen-year-old Missy Franklin moved a step closer to having a seven-event program in London, finishing second behind Hardy in 54.15, while 11-time Olympic medalist Natalie Coughlin missed out on her last realistic chance at an individual Olympic race.

"That was all my heart in that race right there," said Hardy, who won with a time of 53.96.

Coughlin finished sixth, the last spot that can earn a possible berth on the 400 freestyle relay. But, at best, she would probably only get a morning swim at these games, a far cry from the six medals she won in China.

"It's a relief to make my third Olympic team," Coughlin said. "I'll be there to support my teammates and the rest of Team USA. I think that will be my bigger role this Olympics."

The torch has been passed to a new generation. Franklin also led the semifinals of the women's 200 backstroke, posting a time of 2:07.91. If she can finish strong Sunday ? and there's no indication the bubbly teenager is tiring in the least ? she'll have four individual events and all three relays on her Olympic agenda.

"The goal coming in was to make the team," Franklin said. "I could have never dreamed of doing seven events and the fact it's a possibility is unbelievable. But I've made the team, that's all that matters. Tomorrow is my favorite event and I can't wait to get out there and have fun with it."

Rebecca Soni locked up a second individual race in London, cruising to an easy win in the 200 breaststroke. She was slow off the blocks and made the first turn in fourth, but there was never any real doubt about this one. Soni surged to the lead on the second lap and steadily pulled away, winning with the fastest time in the world this year, 2: 21.13.

"I'm always a little nervous to push it too soon. I felt great the first 100, nice and long," Soni, who'll be looking to defend her 200 Olympic title. "I know I've trained the hardest I can so if I can hopefully bring home a gold, that would be amazing. If I can get back to my best time, that would also be great. I'm just going to have fun with it."

Micah Lawrence is heading to the Olympics for the first time, taking second place in 2:23.03. But 30-year-old Amanda Beard missed out on making a fifth Olympic team, fading to sixth (2:26.42).

"I can't be disappointed in myself," said Beard, who first came to prominence as a 14-year-old medalist at the Atlanta Olympics. "I'm very proud that I pushed myself. I'm 30 years old, so things aren't as easy as they were when I was younger. I still enjoy it. I'm still having fun. I'm not heartbroken."

Lochte got started on his busy night by winning the 200 back. The 27-year-old Floridian was sixth at the first turn, but he quickly moved toward the front and took the lead for good with a brilliant flip turn off the final wall. Pulling away, he won with a time of 1:54.54, second-fastest in the world this year behind Japan's Ryosuke Irie.

Tyler Clary took the second spot in 1:54.88, giving him two individual races at the Olympics. He has bounced back just fine from the disappointment of finishing third behind Lochte and Phelps in the 400 IM.

Phelps and Lochte are both assured of at least four individual events in London, and it would take a major upset for Phelps to miss out on a spot in the 100 fly.

At the start of the evening, Anthony Ervin was the top qualifier in the 50 freestyle semifinals with a time of 21.74. Nathan Adrian and Cullen Jones, who went 1-2 in the 100 free the previous night, also advanced to the Sunday final.

After going fastest in the morning prelims, the 31-year-old Ervin turned in another blistering performance from the middle lane. Never lifting his head, he went from one end of the pool to the other in 21.74 seconds, tied for the third-quickest time in the world this year.

Adrian tied with Josh Schneider for the second spot (21.81). Jones was next in 22.08.

Ervin was co-gold medalist in the 50 free at the 2000 Sydney Olympics but retired from swimming before he got a chance to defend his title. He returned to the pool last year.

"That was a best time," Ervin said. "That's what it's always about in swimming: chasing that best time."

___

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/01/michael-phelps-ryan-lochte-200-im-us-swim-trials_n_1640986.html

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David J. Olson: In Management of G8, G20 Summits, Mexican Performance Was Vastly Superior to U.S.

This year's G8 Summit took place at the secluded Camp David presidential retreat in the mountains of northern Maryland. The G20 Summit took place in Los Cabos, Mexico, the beach resort area at the southern tip of Baja California, where American tourists partied in clubs and frolicked on the beaches while 26 heads of state grappled with the world's most pressing problems.

Apart from the striking difference in venues, there was another huge contrast in the American and Mexican summits -- the level of transparency and the manner in which the two governments managed the process of consulting outside groups, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), otherwise known as civil society. Guess which country had a very transparent and inclusive process, with multiple opportunities for civil society engagement, and which made used a dedicated website and a suite of social media tools, including Twitter, Facebook, You Tube and others, to share information.

If you guessed the United States, you'd be wrong. As a member of the G8/G20 Global Task Force, a group of international NGOs advocating for their issues in the two summits, I saw firsthand that the Obama Administration's management of the G8 process was none of that:

• The U.S. process was secretive, and ignored civil society for months leading up to the summit, then held a series of meetings in the late spring after all the decisions had been made.
• The G8 Summit, originally planned for Chicago, was moved to Camp David at the last minute. The Administration said the move to Camp David was to allow the heads of state to have quality time together, but it also prevented civil society from having any kind of role, making it the first summit in memory closed to civil society.
• For the first time at a G8 or G20 summit, there was no media center, no dedicated G8 website and no social media even though Undersecretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment Robert Hormats told us, in a meeting at the State Department in early April, that there would be a media center and a website.
• The Obama Administration did not even release the G8 Accountability Report until after the summit was over, denying NGOs the opportunity for dialogue on the actual progress and weaknesses around the G8 commitments. The two previous G8 accountability reports were released before the summit.

The Mexican presidency of the G20, in contrast, did almost everything right in terms of transparency and engagement with civil society:

• They had a website and suite of social media tools up and running in late 2011.
• At the NGO planning meeting for the two summits in Mexico City in February, the foreign minister and deputy foreign minister (also the Mexican Sherpa), with a dozen senior officials, came to where civil society was meeting and spent two hours with us, hearing our concerns and sharing their thoughts.
• At that meeting, they suggested posting all of our policy papers on their G20 website. And they actually did it...
• There were a variety of other interactions between the G20 and NGOs throughout the process.
• Two days before the summit began, the government hosted a meeting between NGOs and the ministers of foreign affairs, agriculture and economy.

And we had three daily briefings by senior officials of the Mexican government during the summit itself, two of them by the chair of the Development Working Group.

Why was Mexico so good and the U.S. so bad at managing the processes of engaging key stakeholders?

Both countries are having presidential elections this year (Mexico's occurred yesterday and the U.S. will hold theirs in November). The difference is that Mexican President Felipe Calder?n has served one six-year term and is prohibited by law from running again and thus has little fear of the political consequences of engaging with NGOs and caring about issues like food security and climate change.

Carlos Zarco, director of Oxfam Mexico, told me that a contributing factor is that some elements of Mexican civil society, tired of feuding with its government, decided to engage this time. Both sides decided it was in their interest to talk.

Barack Obama, on the other hand, is in a very competitive election year and may have decided there is little political benefit in engaging with civil society and showing that he cares about development issues, even though he does.

InterAction, the coalition of U.S. NGOs, put out an analysis of the G8 Accountability Report in which it lauded the G8 for "a substantial improvement from the weak 2011 Deaville Accountability Report."(Download file.) But it also chastised the G8 for its lack of openness and inclusion: "Maintaining domestic support for overseas development assistance during these economically challenging times might be easier if the G8 reports were better informed by outside input and gained greater attention."

?

Follow David J. Olson on Twitter: www.twitter.com/davidjolson

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-j-olson/post_3583_b_1640066.html

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BET Awards 2012: Winners List

The Throne, Chris Brown and Beyoncé emerge the night's big winners.
By Kelley L. Carter

Kanye West and Jay-Z at the 2012 BET Awards
Photo: Michael Buckner/ Getty Images

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1688880/bet-awards-winners.jhtml

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PDN Pulse ? Blog Archive ? Your Cellphone Is Not Your Friend, and ...

The surveillance of journalists covering Syria has heightened concern about the risks journalists face in relying on mobile communications and cellphones. In February, journalists Remi Ochlick and Marie Colvin were killed when shells struck the press center that they and other journalists were using to transmit their stories; the Syrian army may have used satellite signals from the center to target it.

More recently the Committee to Protect Journalists reported that? Syrian security agents in October arrested a British journalist, seizing his laptop, cellphone, camera and video he had shot while interviewing anti-government Syrian activists; several of these dissidents have been arrested, one has fled the country and another has disappeared.

In the wake of these incidents, as well as attacks on journalists and their sources elsewhere, several journalism organizations have been hammering on the need for journalists to take precautions when using cellphones and laptops in certain areas, to protect the contact information they store electronically, and to make sure their communications are secure.

Several guides to protecting and encrypting your data are available online for free:

- The 2012 edition of CPJ?s Journalist Security Guide from CPJ has added chapters on how to protect your communications from surveillance and secure your data. You can download the guide here.

- SaferMobile.org, a non-profit helping journalists, has a new Mobile Security Survival Guide. It covers topics such as how to disable the GPS in your phone, set up secure communications and protect sensitive information. It also has links to best practices for using satellite phones.

- The web site Media Helping Media recently posted ?Tips for Staying Safe on Mobile,? which includes information on staying anonymous while using social media, uploading photos and stories safely, and browsing the internet securely.

- If you want a condensed summary of these and other security tips,? Lauren Wolfe, a former editor at CPJ and director of Women Under Siege, Tweeted tips from two seminars on journalism security held on World Press Freedom Day. You can find a Storify of the information she gleaned here.

Here are a few precautions suggested in all these guides:
-Take the battery out of your phone (don?t simply turn it off) to make sure it?s not transmitting its location to the cellphone network. (Don?t take an iPhone to meet sources who may be targeted.)

-If you connect to social media or other major web sites from the field, install HTTPS Everywhere browser extension, which makes your web browsing more secure. Make sure your smartphone supports sites with the https:// prefix.

-Download contacts, captions and story notes to a secure computer when possible, then wipe your phone, including the log of calls and SMS messages.

-Text messaging is one of the least secure ways to communication. Encryption software is available to encode your messages. But note: CPJ?s Security Guide and other resources point out that using encryption may call attention to your communications.

Paranoid? Sure. But it?s not only your own safety you have to be concerned about.

Related articles
Were Journalists in Homs Targeted for Bombing?

Survival Training for Conflict Zones

?

Tags: cellphone photography, Committee to Protect Journalists, Committee to Protect Journalists Security Guide, Media Helping Media, Safer Mobile, social media, Women Under Siege

This entry was posted on Monday, July 2nd, 2012 at 5:21 pm ET by Holly Hughes and is filed under Community, Photojournalism, Web/Tech.

Source: http://pdnpulse.com/2012/07/your-cellphone-is-not-your-friend-and-other-security-tips-for-conflict-zones.html

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Former astronaut Poindexter dies in watercraft accident

By Irene Klotz

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida | Mon Jul 2, 2012 1:18pm EDT

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - Alan Poindexter, a two-time shuttle astronaut, has died after a jet ski accident in Pensacola, Florida, NASA said on Monday.

"The NASA family was sad to learn of the passing of our former friend and colleague Alan Poindexter," NASA wrote in a Facebook post. ?"Our thought and hearts are with his family."

Poindexter, 50, was riding jet skis with his two sons in Little Sabine Bay at Pensacola Beach on Sunday when the accident occurred, officials from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission told the Pensacola News Journal.

Poindexter's older son, who is 26, crashed into the jet ski that Poindexter shared with his 22-year-old son, the newspaper reported.

The impact knocked Poindexter off the jet ski. He was pulled from the water and taken to the beach where friends attempted to revive him.

Poindexter was then flown by helicopter to Baptist Hospital where he later died from his injuries, the newspaper reported.

Poindexter's sons were not injured in the accident, which is under investigation.

Poindexter, who went by the nickname "Dex," made two space flights during his career with NASA. In February 2008, he was the pilot aboard the shuttle Atlantis on a mission to deliver the European Space Agency's Columbus laboratory module to the International Space Station.

Poindexter returned to space in April 2010 as commander of the shuttle Discovery on one of the final cargo runs to the station before the shuttles were retired.

?"He was a talented, courageous Navy veteran with gifts," astronaut Greg Johnson wrote on Twitter. "?Dex was a lovable guy with a strong work ethic."

A captain in the U.S. Navy, Poindexter left NASA in December 2010 to become dean of students at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He earned a master of science degree in aeronautical engineering from the school in 1995.

He is the son of former National Security Adviser John Poindexter, who served in the Reagan administration.

Alan Poindexter was born in 1961 in Pasadena, California, but considered Rockville, Maryland, to be his hometown. He earned a bachelor of aerospace engineering degree from the Georgia Institute of Technology, then was commissioned in the Navy.

Poindexter flew combat missions in Iraq during Operation Desert Storm and Operation Southern Watch, then became a test pilot. He logged more than 4,000 hours flying time in more than 30 types of aircraft.

He was selected to join NASA's astronaut corps in June 1998.

(Editing by Jane Sutton and Eric Beech)

Source: http://feeds.reuters.com/~r/reuters/scienceNews/~3/I-gSP1ndXEE/us-usa-astronaut-poindexter-idUSBRE8610W220120702

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Rusty memories rejuvenated in elderly mice

Forgetfulness that accompanies the march of time may be reversible ? in mice at least. Elderly mice have had their faltering memories restored after receiving extra amounts of an enzyme that switches genes on or off in the brain.

"We found they performed just like young animals," says Hilmar Bading of the University of Heidelberg in Germany.

He and his colleagues injected a virus directly into the brain's hippocampus ? an area responsible for memory. The virus contained extra copies of a gene that makes an enzyme called DNA methyltransferase (Dnmt3a2). This enzyme alters gene activity through methylation, the addition of chemical methyl groups to DNA.

The team then gave the mice a series of memory tasks. They were presented with a pair of objects, then a day later they were presented with the same set-up but with one object moved to a new position. Because young mice remember the original positions of the objects, they spent more time investigating the one that had been moved. Elderly mice generally spent the same amount of time on each.

When elderly mice were given the virus, they matched the young mice in the task, spending 70 per cent of their time investigating the moved object.

When the researchers used similar techniques to halve the amount of Dnmt3a2 that young mice produce, their performance deteriorated to that of non-treated elderly mice. "Clearly, if you have too little of the enzyme, your memory works less well," says Bading.

As yet, there is no drug that could boost levels of Dnmt3a2 in the human brain, but Bading says that more of it gets made naturally when the brain is active.

So while his team intend to investigate possible memory-enhancing treatments, his advice to people as they age is to keep their brains and bodies as active as possible.

Journal reference: Nature Neuroscience, DOI: 10.1038/nn.3151

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Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/20e621f9/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Carticle0Cdn219980Erusty0Ememories0Erejuvenated0Ein0Eelderly0Emice0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

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