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Jack Lew's loopy signature may have to go

10 hrs.

This loopy mark is the signature of Jack Lew, the man who will reportedly be nominated as early as tomorrow to replace Tim Geithner as Treasury Secretary.

But don't expect to see those squiggles on your dollar bills.

Lew is very likely to change the way he signs his name if he is named as Treasury Secretary. At least, that's what Tim Geithner did.

Last year, Kai Ryssdal at Marketplace radio interviewed Geithner about the change in his signature.

"He had to change his autograph ? when his signature was added to the storied list of those featured on our nation's currency," Marketplace reports.

Ryssdal, who preferred the old signature, pressed Geithner on the decision.

"Well, I think on the dollar bill I had to write something where people could read my name. That's the rationale," Geithner said.

So, as disappointing as this news is, we probably won't get those awesome Lew loopty-loos on our dollars.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/jack-lews-loopy-signature-may-have-go-1B7899175

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New Illinois legislature has 3 charged lawmakers

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) ? As members of Illinois' newest General Assembly took the oath of office Wednesday, the state that's still struggling to rebuild its image after two consecutive governors went to prison set yet another precedent of sorts: three sitting lawmakers facing criminal charges.

Illinois is no stranger to dramatic headlines about the nexus of politics and crime in its highest offices ? most recently former Gov. Rod Blagojevich's conviction for attempting to sell Barack Obama's former U.S. Senate seat. But experts and capitol veterans can't recall a comparable circumstance for state legislators since the early 1970s, when several were rounded up in a bribery trial involving cement trucks.

The allegations against the three officials vary widely: bribery, bank fraud and trying to bring a gun onto a plane. But experts say that while the charges differ, the accumulation and timing is damaging to Illinois as it struggles to address some of the most serious financial problems in its history.

"All this does is confirm those negative, cynical opinions that are out there," said Kent Redfield, a University of Illinois at Springfield political scientist. "Part of that reputation is well deserved ... but if you're trying to get citizens of Illinois to accept the legitimacy of the process you need as much credibility and trust as you can muster. That's in pretty low supply in state government currently."

The three legislators, Rep. Derrick Smith, Rep. La Shawn Ford and Sen. Donne Trotter, are Chicago Democrats who were all sworn into office Wednesday in Springfield. But that's where the similarities end.

Unlike Blagojevich and former Gov. George Ryan, who were accused of abusing their powers, only one of the cases involves political corruption.

Smith, who was appointed, was arrested on bribery charges and expelled from office in August, the first such expulsion in more than a century. In November voters put Smith back in office. He pleaded not guilty to allegations he accepted a bribe in exchange for supporting what he thought was a day care center's grant application.

Smith hasn't appeared publicly much since and his attorney didn't return messages. By state law, Smith can't be expelled again for the same charges.

"I am going to let bygones be bygones," he said after the election, vowing to work for his district.

The other two cases don't involve public office.

Ford, re-elected in November, faces bank fraud charges. He allegedly made false statements to a bank to get an increase on a line of credit, saying he'd use the money to fix investment properties but using the funds for expenses like car loans and his 2006 campaign. He pleaded not guilty last month. Ford says the incident was a mistake.

Trotter, a veteran lawmaker, was arrested when airport security workers found a gun in his bag. Trotter, who works in security, contends he simply forgot it was in his bag. He pleaded not guilty. His attorney didn't return calls seeking comment.

Some of the increased legal action may stem from Illinois' intensified focus against official wrongdoing.

When he took office a decade ago, former U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's mission was to clean up the corruption-plagued Illinois. The investigations of Blagojevich, Ryan and Smith came under his watch. The state has also beefed up its ethics laws; last year officials abolished a program that allowed lawmakers to award college scholarships.

Authorities in Illinois' largest county say they've also focused efforts on lower level public officials, now that the focus is off governors. Gov. Pat Quinn vowed to keep the office scandal free after Blagojevich, and so far appears to have succeeded.

In 2010, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez launched a program to fight corruption involving publicly elected officials and public employees. The first sting netted six arrests including school officials. It was dubbed Operation Cookie Jar.

The approach of the program, which now counts 35 arrests, has been to work with police departments and seek out corruption instead of reacting to tips.

"In the past we were more reactive. The cases came in and we were notified," Alvarez said. "Our role is working from the bottom up."

Resources poured into fighting corruption on a federal level are more difficult to gauge. Randall Samborn, a spokesman for the Chicago U.S. attorney's office, declined comment.

The Chicago area already has the most public corruption convictions of any federal jurisdiction nationwide, according to a 2012 University of Illinois at Chicago report. Since 1976, that's meant more than 1,500 convictions in the Northern District of Illinois. That includes the 2011 conviction of Blagojevich, who's serving a prison sentence, and Ryan, who was convicted of corruption in 2006 and is due to be released from prison this year.

Overall, during that time, Illinois has logged more than 1,800 corruption convictions, placing it third behind the more populous California and New York.

Even now, it's far from the only state with current lawmakers in legal trouble.

Those in South Carolina include Democratic Rep. Harold Mitchell, who pleaded guilty in November to misdemeanor tax charges and will pay a fine to avoid jail. Also that month, a jury found South Carolina Republican Rep. Kris Crawford guilty of failing to file past years' tax returns on time and must pay a fine but doesn't face jail time. California's Democratic state Sen. Roderick Wright won re-election despite fighting felony counts of voter fraud and perjury.

Reformers say they can't jump to conclusions about the three in Illinois. The charges against Trotter could amount to him forgetting about the gun and those against Ford as an honest mistake, said David Morrison, deputy director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform. Smith's trial is in October.

"We need to watch the process play out," said Morrison.

___

Sophia Tareen can be reached at http://twitter.com/sophiatareen

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/illinois-legislature-3-charged-lawmakers-131102927.html

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Movie Reviews: 'Promised Land' Spotlights Social Issues - Oconee ...

A pair of corporate representatives, Steve Butler (Matt Damon) and Sue Thomason (Frances McDormand), arrive in a struggling farming community, intending to sell the locals on the idea of drilling for natural gas on their land. Initially, the local folks embrace the idea....all but a respected teacher, Frank Yates (Hal Holbrook). Others join in his objections, including environmental activist Dustin (John Krasinski) and local teacher Alice (Rosemarie DeWitt), who help rally the community against the drilling.?

Here's what the critics are saying:

Director Gus Van Sant has the challenging task of taking the divisive, high-tech practice of fracking and trying to make it not just human but cinematic. Working from a script by co-stars Matt Damon and John Krasinski, based on a story by Dave Eggers, he succeeds in fits and starts. The impoverished small town that's the tale's setting, a place in need of the kind of economic rejuvenation that extracting natural gas could provide, is full of folksy folks whose interactions with the main characters don't always ring true. ?Promised Land? has its heart on its sleeve and its pro-environment message is quite clear, but it's in the looser and more ambiguous places that the film actually works.--Christy Lemire, Associated Press

?

A social-issue drama handled in a very human way, ?Promised Land? presents its environmental concerns in a clear, upfront manner but hits some narrative and character bumps in the second half that weaken the impact of this fundamentally gentle, sympathetic work. Collaborating on a screenplay for director Gus Van Sant for the third time, after ?Good Will Hunting? and ?Gerry,? Matt Damon stars as a natural gas company rep who encounters more resistance than he bargained for when trying to buy up drilling rights on struggling farmers? land. This is something of a Frank Capra story preoccupied with the idea of what the United States used to be or is supposed to be, but the film isn?t quite rich or full-bodied enough to entirely pay off. Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter

?

Promised Land, which comes out nationwide January 4, follows Steve Butler and Sue Thomason (played by Damon and the always amazing Frances McDormand), two city slickers who come into the rural town of McKinley to buy up drilling rights for their company. At first, the locals seem to bite, but then at a town meeting a curmudgeonly schoolteacher confronts them over what he deems misleading practices.
All going as planned, right? Not exactly: Just as you think you know the way this movie is going to unfold, environmental activist and friendly bro Dustin Noble (played by our NYLON Guys cover star John Krasinski) shows up in town. And the thing is, though you're supposed to like this anti-fracking activist?you don't.
And that's just the beginning of the surprising twists and turns this film makes. Does it ever convince me that fracking is a necessary evil or the key to revitalizing rural America? No--but it also made me question my assumptions about who the good and bad guys are in this debate. And for the final 20 minutes alone, it's worth the price of admission. Rebecca Willa Davis, Nylon Magazine

?

One of several ways this well-meaning picture falls short is in trying to sell a personal-salvation story as a salve to the conundrum it presents. As it unfolds on screen, it doesn't wash. When Damon's character jokes with DeWitt's Alice because despite the fact that she's got 80 acres of land, all she's growing is in a small garden in her yard, she tells him that the garden is for the benefit of her students. How so, Butler asks. "I'm teaching them how to take care of something," Alice replies, and as good and unaffected as Damon and DeWitt are in their roles, both of them might as well be wearing neon signs reading "FORESHADOWING" above their brows. And while the movie is potentially bracing in its assertion, in the tradition of such classic paranoid thrillers as "The Parallax View," that the lengths that a corporation will go to get its way can be sufficiently extreme to be almost beyond our ken, the demonstration of this assertion is more than a little on the pat side. Glenn Kenny, MSN Movies

"Promised Land" is rated R and runs 1 hour and 46 minutes. Check out show times at Beechwood Cinemas 11 and Carmike Cinema 12.

You might also be interested in reading:

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'Rise of the Guardians' Movie Reviews: Complex at Times for Younger Kids

Source: http://oconee.patch.com/articles/movie-reviews-promised-land-spotlights-social-issues

Savages

Palestinians celebrate U.N. victory

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Honda Motor Co introduced its redesigned Civic sedan only a year-and-a-half after a major model change of the best-selling compact car in the United States. Even Honda admits that the 2012 Civic, introduced in the spring of 2011, missed the mark. For a company that prides itself on rock-solid reliability, it was a shock last summer when influential Consumer Reports ranked the Civic dead last in a field of 12 compact sedans it tested. Sales of the new Civic, a 2013 model, will start this week and the refreshed car was shown off on Thursday at the LA Auto Show. ...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/photos/palestine-wins-status-as-state-slideshow/

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Syrian rebels take two military bases in heavy fighting

Interesting report from the Washington Post
Rebel fighters took over two military bases in Syria after heavy fighting Tuesday, an additional sign that the ragtag force may finally be breaking a weeks-long stalemate and making progress in its battle against the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
Making progress? Maybe, but keep reading.

In the past week alone, rebels have taken control of about a half-dozen military bases across the country as well as the Tishreen hydroelectric dam near the Turkish border.?
No doubt Turkey had a big role in the taking of the hydro electric dam

Both of the bases taken Tuesday were used by the Syrian air force, one of the deadliest threats to rebel fighters, according to opposition groups. The Syrian military has regularly blasted rebel positions, as well as residential neighborhoods, with jets and helicopters in recent months, killing thousands.

The deadliness of the Syrian military?s air power was on bloody display Tuesday after an air raid on an olive press in Idlib province killed at least 20 people and wounded dozens of others, according to the Local Coordination Committees, an activist network.

In a video posted online Tuesday, which reportedly showed one of the captured bases, fighters affiliated with the Free Syrian Army stomped on a bust of Assad?s father, Hafez, at the 666th air force battalion base south of Damascus.

?The second base, southeast of Aleppo, was overrun by fighters from Ahrar al-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Both are religious extremist groups suspected of having ties to al-Qaeda.?
?That the two air bases were taken over by such radically different groups among the opposition indicates that the recent rebel gains may not have been coordinated by any sort of unified leadership. It also hints at potential problems ahead if Islamist and secular groups begin to fight one another for control of territory.
Some observers note that while rebel fighters have been successful in taking over military bases, it is much less certain how long they will be able to hold them.
?Rebel groups have been losing territory to the Syrian military at the same time that they have been making gains.

?They?ve lost many areas in eastern Syria and near Aleppo recently,? said Rami Abdul Rahman, the director of the Syrian Observatory. ?It?s difficult to see a serious change.?

It's difficult to see a serious change. And still sounds like a stalemate
Stay tuned..

Source: http://pennyforyourthoughts2.blogspot.com/2012/11/syrian-rebels-take-two-military-bases.html

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Gone spear hunting: Ancestors used stone spear tips 500,000 years ago

Stone spear tips from South Africa date to 500,000 years ago, says new research. Human ancestors were hunting with stone spears about 200,000 years earlier than scientists previously thought.

By Malcom Ritter,?Associated Press / November 16, 2012

This stone spear tip (shown from different angles) from Kathu Pan, South Africa, may be 500,000 years old, according to a study published in the journal Science.

(AP Photo/Jayne Wilkins)

Enlarge

Scientists say they've found evidence that stone tips for spears were made much earlier than thought, maybe even created by an earlier ancestor than has been believed.

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Both Neanderthals and members of our own species, Homo sapiens, used stone tips ? a significant development that made spears more effective, lethal hunting weapons. The new findings from South Africa suggest that maybe they didn't invent that technology, but inherited it from their last shared ancestor, Homo heidelbergensis.

The researchers put the date of the South African stone tips at about half-a-million years ago ? 200,000 years earlier than other research has suggested.

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The new study involved analyzing stone points, a bit less than 3 inches (8 centimeters) long on average, that had been excavated about 30 years ago. Scientists had previously estimated they were about 500,000 years old, but it wasn't clear whether they were used as spear tips or some other kind of tool, said Jayne Wilkins, a researcher at the University of Toronto and lead author of the new report.

So she and her co-authors looked for evidence that the artifacts were spear tips, focusing on the way they were shaped and fractured. The pattern of damage along their edges fit in with what researchers found when they made copies of the artifacts and thrust them into the carcasses of antelopes.

From the age of the stone tips, the researchers suggest the technology may have been used by Homo heidelbergensis.

Sally McBrearty, an anthropology professor at the University of Connecticut who was not involved in the study, said it's clear that the South African artifacts are spear points. She said she sees no logical reason to doubt the trove is 500,000 years old, but she said she'd like to see some firmer proof.

"I would be happy to say that this is really half-a-million years old, I just want to be sure that it is," she said.

There's some room for doubt because of assumptions required in the dating technique and the geology of the South African site where the points were found, she said. Further sampling and analysis could firm up the evidence for the age, she said.

RECOMMENDED: Are you scientifically literate? Take the quiz

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/ENUmcDPdHas/Gone-spear-hunting-Ancestors-used-stone-spear-tips-500-000-years-ago

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Laid-off workers more likely to get cut again

14 hrs.

For Kathy English, it was bad enough to get laid off the first time. Then, it happened again.

The two layoffs in the past?six years have set English on a veritable employment roller?coaster: Between?bouts of unemployment, she's?worked several different short-term?jobs and taken steep pay cuts. When she is working, she often worries about whether she will end up unemployed again.

??I think you have to be extremely strong-minded to endure these circumstances,? English said.

The good news for the approximately 12 million jobseekers out there is that the employment market is slowly improving.

The unemployment rate remains relatively high, however,?meaning jobs are hard to come by. That?s left many of the millions of people who were already laid off and then found a job?worried they could be unemployed?again.

Their feelings are justified: Experts say that if you are laid off once, a combination of factors makes it more likely that you will be cut again.

?Once you?ve lost one job, even when you?re re-employed, you?re kind of set up to lose (a job) again,? said Ann Huff Stevens, an economist at UC Davis who has researched the issue.

Stevens used data from the major recession in the 1980s to evaluate why people who are laid off are likely to still be earning less money than before they were laid off, even years later and after they have found other work.

A major problem she found?was that the workers who had been laid off once were more likely to have lost a job again.

Stevens said workers who lose a job will have lower tenure in their new job, making them more susceptible to layoffs. Another issue is that they tend to have been re-employed when the economy was still weak, meaning the new employer also may encounter problems and need to cut costs.

A person who is unemployed also?is likely to take the first ? or only ? job they get offered. That means they may give less thought than they normally would to whether the job is a good fit for them.

?You may get a new job, but it just may not be a good match for your skills and your personality,? she said.

Those and other factors mean that even people who do find a new job after a layoff also are likely to be earning less for years to come.

?It takes a very long time to recover your earnings level,? Stevens said.

Angela Kelley lost a job she?d held for eight years in January of 2008. It took her six months to find a new position as a purchasing agent, and she ended up taking a pay cut.

Then just six months later, in January 2009, she was laid off again.

By then, the job market seemed even tougher. She and her husband, who have a young son, ended up moving from Austin, Texas, to East Texas. He took a new teaching job and she took a position as a teachers' aide?in the school suspension room.

It was a severe pay cut, but she stayed in the job until December of 2011, when they moved back to the Austin area for her husband?s job. That left her again searching for work.

?I can?t tell you how many resumes I sent out between January and June,? she said.

Kelley finally landed another position?as a purchasing agent. She?s very happy in her new job, but she?s still making less than she was earning in 2008.

The financial hit to the family has been substantial. Kelley said they?had to sell their house at a loss and are living with relatives in Austin while they try to find a rental home that will accept their dog.

In the meantime, they?ve cut back on everything from groceries to movie nights with their son. They have little extra to save for big expenses such as their son?s college fund.

?We?re struggling to pay the bills, so we really don?t have anything to put into savings,? she said.

English is finally earning close to what she made in 2009, after her second layoff from an administrative job. But the years of unemployment have taken a toll, and she expects it to have an effect on long-term financial goals like retirement.

She also is still haunted by the fear and frustration she felt during the months in which she was looking for work or working jobs that paid very little.

At one low point, she and her boyfriend moved from Pennsylvania to Florida, where they lived in a trailer while she spent months trying to find a job. They eventually returned to Pennsylvania, where she found clerical work that paid half of what she?d been making in 2009.

?It?s extremely frightening,? said English, 44. ?Not only do you wonder where you?re going to work, but you almost get to a point where you don?t know where you?re going to live.?

Now she is happy to have her current job, as an administrative manager with an environmental cleanup company.

The job losses also have made her more?aware of any possible concerns about her employer's financial condition. She said she?s more likely to ask if she should be worried about layoffs. She also said she?s grown much more concerned with job security than with job satisfaction.

The only upside she sees is that she has become very good at putting together resumes and explaining things like unemployment gaps. She?s thought about taking on a second job as a career coach, helping people put together resumes and cover letters.

?I?m looking at, maybe I should step out of my security zone and do this,? she said.

?

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/economywatch/laid-workers-more-likely-get-cut-second-time-1C7121572

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Best-selling Australian author Courtenay dies

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) ? Best-selling Australian author Bryce Courtenay, whose first and final books drew on his tough early-life experiences in Africa, has died of stomach cancer. He was 79.

He started writing in midlife and called his first novels "practice books," but his debut was a success. "The Power of One" was published in 1989, translated into 12 languages and became a hit movie.

His publisher Penguin Group said Friday that Courtenay died at his family home in the Australian capital Canberra late Thursday, surrounded by his family and pets.

His 21st novel, "Jack of Diamonds," was published Nov. 12 and included a moving epilogue to his readers.

"It's been a privilege to write for you and to have you accept me as a storyteller in your lives," he wrote. "Now, as my story draws to an end, may I say only, 'Thank you. You have been simply wonderful.'"

Courtenay was born the illegitimate son of a dressmaker on Aug. 14, 1933, in the mountain town of Barberton in what is now the Limpopo province of South Africa.

By the age of 17, he was working in the dangerous mines of what is now Zimbabwe. The work paid his way to Britain, where he studied at the London School of Journalism. He met an Australian, Benita Solomon, whom he followed to her hometown of Sydney in 1958 and married.

He fell into a career in advertising with U.S. agency McCann Erikson at the age of 26 and rose to creative director. He had an epiphany at the age of 50 when he decided to fulfill a lifelong ambition to be a novelist.

"The Power of One" was to be the first of three "practice books" Courtenay planned to write over three years before taking two years to write a fourth book which he hoped would find a publisher.

"I was absolutely staggered when somebody wanted to publish it in the first place," Courtenay said in his official biography released by Penguin.

"Now its worldwide success and the fact that it's available in 12 languages still amazes me," he said. It became a movie starring Morgan Freeman.

Courtenay dedicated its sequel, "Tandia," to his third son, Damon, who died of medically acquired AIDS at the age of 24 in 1991 ? two months before the book was published.

That tragedy inspired his third book, "April Fool's Day," that deals with the public fear of AIDS and was published in 1993.

In June, doctors told Courtenay that there was no hope of curing his stomach cancer.

Bob Sessions, Courtenay's longstanding publisher at Penguin, said the author would produce a 600-page book in six months, sometimes writing for more than 12 hours a day.

"He was a born storyteller and I would tell him he was a latter-day Charles Dickens with his strong and complex plots, larger-than-life characters and his ability to appeal to a large number of readers," Sessions said.

Courtenay divorced his first wife, Benita, in 2000. She died in 2007 aged 72.

He married his partner of seven years, Christine Gee, last year. He is also survived by his sons Brett and Adam.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/best-selling-australian-author-courtenay-dies-034830584.html

Kayla Harrison