Atra Mors On Its Way

Profound Lore Records finally confirmed: Evoken Breaks its 5 year silence with their new album "Atra Mors"(terrible death or dark death). There's no secret: i'm huge fan of Lyndhurst-based pioneers of funeral doom. Like many fans anticipating another spectacular album, i'm psyching about the content and style of Evoken in their latest work. Hopefully they won't back up and follow their solid trend. Evoken has been a permanent part of my life, i can remember each day of my internship listening to "Antithesis of Light" late at nights...

Seen as one of America’s forefathers of the death/funeral/doom metal movement and having forged in the early nineties where the New Jersey outfit, by incorporating such influences as old-school Paradise Lost, Disembowelment, Thergothon etc. would carve their own legacy in the annals of the doom metal movement as one of its pinnacle and essential bands.  With a career spanning almost 20 years and four unparalleled full-length albums, all essential and classic in their own right, that define EVOKEN’s repertoire, “Atra Mors” (the Latin translation for “Black Death”) signals a new chapter and turning point in the EVOKEN legacy.

Recorded and committed to tape over a six-month period at Sound Spa studios in Edison, New Jersey, “Atra Mors” sees EVOKEN comprise their most ambitious album to date.  While still upholding the utterly colossal, apocalyptic, and extraordinary heaviness the band have become synonymous for, “Atra Mors” sees EVOKEN embrace new ground by experimenting a bit more with the use of ambience and atmosphere, deploying a stronger sense of melody (and moments of tranquility) during some of the album’s discourse along with delivering moments that harken back to the ancient days of pure old-school death metal.

@Profound Lore Records

Haneke Presents: "Amour"

 By Sunday morning the 65th Cannes Film Festival had its first masterwork and an overwhelming critical favorite in Michael Haneke’s “Amour.” A tender, wrenching, impeccably directed story of love and death, the French-language film stars Emmanuelle Riva and Jean-Louis Trintignant as a Parisian couple in their 80s — named Georges and Anne, as are most of Mr. Haneke’s middle-class couples — struggling with an increasingly debilitating illness and the specter of what comes next. One day over breakfast she suffers a frightening episode that leaves her briefly locked in a mute, seemingly unaware blankness. She’s there, but not, and then just as suddenly she returns.

A hospital stay follows along with an operation, a grim prognosis, a slide into helplessness, the expected accumulation of humiliations, natural and not, and swells of emotion. Half-frozen by a stroke, Anne’s body has begun to betray her, but Georges holds her so very close: he brushes her hair, bathes and dresses her. Somewhat stooped, with a shaky, hitchy walk, he trembles when he lifts her from the bed or a chair, but he keeps holding on. The first time he has to help her move from her wheelchair, she tells him how to grasp her properly, as if in a hug, a gesture that’s poignant in its literalness — they press into each other — and reverberant of an erotic life shared and still remembered.

Mr. Haneke has often turned his cool gaze toward power and violence, and in some respects he has done so again in “Amour,” one difference being that he’s also made room here for tenderness. Part of the film’s emotional force is due to the actors, both superb, and to the poignancy of watching these two familiar, now frail bodies of cinema, as it were, performing in a pantomime of sickness and death. This very real fragility makes a sharp contrast with the bodies cinema immortalizes — eternally young — and it seems telling that Mr. Haneke, who likes to pick at screen illusion, cast actors who starred in two of the most famous French films of all time: Mr. Trintignant was the titular man from “A Man and a Woman” and Ms. Riva played the nameless woman in “Hiroshima Mon Amour.”

“Amour” sent a charge through the packed, rapt 2,300-seat theater, and immediately suggested that there was more to the official lineup than the first few days had suggested. The competition had gotten off toa terrific start with Wes Anderson’s “Moonrise Kingdom,” even if not everyone was equally convinced. A similar critical ambivalence greeted another strong competition entry, “Beyond the Hills,” from the Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, who won the Palme in 2007 for “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.” His new film centers on two young women who, after a reunion, are slowly and forcibly separated by different faiths: Alina (Cristina Flutur) believes in their friendship while Voichita (Cosmina Stratan) has turned to God and become a nun in a tiny Christian Orthodox sect.

Set largely in Voichita’s monastery, a windswept outcropping of buildings in the deep countryside, the story unfolds in atmospheric bits and narrative pieces. Alina and Voichita are lifelong friends, having grown up in the same orphanage. Alina, the stronger, more stubbornly independent of the two, has returned home after a stint working in Germany and thinking that she and Voichita will go off together. Mr. Mungiu, who prefers that viewers come to their own conclusions, never makes it clear if the women are lovers — “You will think whatever you will think,” he said during the party for his film Saturday — though a scene in which Voichita massages Alina’s back, then looks away when Alina turns over, baring her breasts, suggests private worlds of complication.

Shot on film and running two-and-a-half engrossing hours, “Beyond the Hills” explores the push and pull between the collective and the individual, between faith and free will. Voichita insists that she wants to stay at the monastery, where she and some dozen other nuns — along with chickens, boxes of bees and a kind of Greek chorus of incessantly barking dogs — live without electricity under the strict religious supervision of a priest. With mounting desperation and increasingly violent outbursts, Alina tries to change Voichita’s mind. Believing in a world of absolute good and evil, and confused by Alina’s passion, the nuns and priest respond by trying to ritualistically drive out the Devil, an ordeal that effectively pits one woman against a millennium of religious orthodoxy.

At his party, a typical Cannes beach affair with pounding beats and revelers swarming the open bar, Mr. Mungiu talked about his film, the difficulties of shooting in winter and working with a young, untested cast. He based the screenplay (originally 245 pages!) on a pair of fact-based books by Tatiana Niculescu Bran about a real nun who died after being gagged and tied to a cross for days in a Romanian monastery during an exorcism. (Ms. Bran turned her first book into a play, “Deadly Confession,” which was staged at La MaMa in 2008.) It’s a shocker of a story, yet while Mr. Mungiu’s sympathies are transparently with Alina he neither sentimentalizes her — he keeps her at both an emotional and visual distance — nor does he demonize the priest or, especially, the nuns.

“The film should be watched and judged from each character’s perspective,” he explained, giving the larger, suggestively political view. “This is how you will discover that it is difficult to say who is guilty, because the people who are really guilty are not in the film. They are the people who created this kind of society, the people who created education that completely lacks the very important moral values that people should have.”


@NYTIMES

France Peresidential Elections 2012: TV Debate

The Socialist François Hollande has emerged with the upper hand from a bruising TV duel with the rightwing president Nicolas Sarkozy, as the two held their last rallies in the final 24 hours of campaigning before Sunday's presidential vote.

The first opinion poll for LH2 Yahoo showed French viewers of the live TV debate found Hollande to be the more serious candidate and also the nicest, most sincere and closest to their daily concerns. Sarkozy was seen to have been more dynamic and competent. Hollande was most convincing on the issues that worry voters the most: jobs, making ends meet as well as education, while Sarkozy was seen to be better on Europe, immigration and reducing France's debt.

Over 17 million French people watched the almost three-hour live TV presidential debate, more than watch an X Factor final in the UK, but fewer than tuned in to watch Sarkozy take on the Socialist Ségolène Royal in 2007.

Sarkozy is trailing Hollande by five to eight points in the polls and a classic televised battle of the personalities had been seen as his last chance to turn the election around and win over the large majority of France's 6.4m far-right voters he needs to have a chance at re-election.

Pollsters were sceptical that Sarkozy, who at times had seemed riled and on the defensive, would have done so. French presidential debates do not usually yield an outright winner, and some called this a draw.

But most commentators felt Hollande had won on points, delivering the most memorable lines, including repeating: "I, as president of the republic …" 16 times in a bid to gain in leadership stature. Newspaper columnists felt the debate would not produce an "earthquake" for the struggling Sarkozy, the most unpopular president to seek re-election in France. Hollande was seen to have cemented his advance.

He was given a further boost when the centrist François Bayrou, who took 9% of the vote in the first round, broke with his party's tradition and said he would vote for him. This was a blow to Sarkozy, who needs to secure as many Bayrou voters as possible.

If the TV slanging match was full of bile – Sarkozy called Hollande "a little slanderer" and Hollande told him "you'd be hard pressed to pass yourself off as a victim" – the political reaction afterwards was just as laden with invective.

Nadine Morano, a rightwing minister and Sarkozy ally, said the exchange with Hollande had been like "extracting pus". Sarkozy's special adviser called Hollande "grotesque". Jean-Marc Ayrault, tipped as a possible Socialist prime minister, said Sarkozy had been aggressive. Hollande said the nature of the debate had reflected the fracture, aggressiveness and tensions in society "after five years of Sarkozy".

But Sarkozy insisted that the election was on a knife-edge and all was to play for. "The opinion polls are lying. An election has never been this open … It's even more open after the debate," he told French radio.

He then gave a highly personal interview seemingly to show himself as more human and close to the people, saying he was so "rubbish" at technology that he didn't know how to work the three TV remote controls at home, and suggesting if his wife, Carla Bruni, wasn't with him he could barely operate the television.

At his final major rally in Toulon, he said the "left and its laxity" had "ruined" France.

Hollande, before giving his final open-air rally in Toulouse, was deliberately cautious about Sunday's vote, warning that nothing was won. Some observers have predicted the result could be closer than polls suggest.

Meanwhile, media fact-checkers were poring over the highly technical parts of the TV debate, when the candidates hurled statistics at each other. One French site calculated that Sarkozy mentioned a figure every 47 seconds and Hollande mentioned one every 1 minute, 36 seconds, although not all were accurate.

The final runoff vote takes place on Sunday.

@Guardian

by Angelique Chrisafis

Amy Winehouse's Death:Still Mystery

An autopsy on the body of Amy Winehouse revealed no cause of death Monday for the 27-year-old retro-soul singer, leaving fans and family to wait for the results of toxicology tests due in two to four weeks.

A funeral for Winehouse, who was Jewish, was likely to be held Tuesday or Wednesday.
"I can't tell you what this means to us," father Mitch Winehouse told fans gathered Monday outside her home in London's Camden district. "We're devastated and I'm speechless, but thanks for coming."
The singer's mother, Janis Winehouse, was in tears as she examined the flowers, candles, vodka bottles, flags, drawings and handwritten cards left by neighbors, fans and well-wishers. Many of the offerings expressed the same sentiment: "What a waste."
Amy Winehouse, who had last spoken to members of her team around 10 a.m. Saturday, may have been dead for several hours before she was found by security guard Andrew Morris in her home that afternoon.
"She was in her bedroom after saying she wanted to sleep and when (Morris) went to wake her, he found she wasn't breathing," Chris Goodman, her representative in Britain, told the Sun. "He called the emergency services straight away. He was very shocked.
"At this stage, no one knows how she died. She died alone in bed."
The frail singer had been getting regular doctor checkups, the Sun said, most recently the night before her death. Her family said Monday that reports their daughter had bought cocaine, ketamine and ecstasy hours before she died were "nonsense."
Though only in her 20s, Winehouse reportedly suffered from emphysema as a result of smoking cigarettes and crack cocaine.
Winehouse's last public appearance came Wednesday when she briefly joined her goddaughter, singer Dionne Bromfield, on stage at the iTunes Festival near Camden. Winehouse didn't sing, but danced and clapped and encouraged the audience to buy Bromfield's album.
An inquest into the singer's death was opened and adjourned at London's St. Pancras Coroner's Court on Monday. During the two-minute hearing, an official read out the name, birth date and address of Winehouse, described as "a divorced lady living at Camden Square NW1."
Ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil, currently serving a 32-month jail sentence for burglary and gun possession, was "in total shock" and inconsolable upon hearing about the death, girlfriend Sarah Aspin told the Sun.
The scene at Winehouse's home had been investigated and "determined non-suspicious." In Britain, inquests are held to establish facts when a person dies violently or in unexplained circumstances. Winehouse's inquest will resume Oct. 26.
By Christie D'Zurilla, Los Angeles Times
@Edmonton Journal

Gutted by The Bitter News

Appeals Court Overturns Stem Cell Research Ban

Opponents of taxpayer-funded stem cell research lost a key round in a U.S. appeals court Friday.

In a 2-1 decision, a panel of the court of appeals in Washington overturned a judge's order that would have blocked taxpayer funding for stem cell research. The judges ruled that opponents of taxpayer-funded stem cell research are not likely to succeed in their lawsuit to stop it.
The panel reversed an opinion issued last August by U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, who said the research likely violates the law against federal funding of embryo destruction.
"We're thrilled with this decision and look forward to allowing federally funded scientists to continue with their work without political constraints," said Sean Tipton, a spokesman for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.
Researchers hope one day to use stem cells in ways that cure spinal cord injuries, Parkinson's disease and other ailments. Opponents say the research is a form of abortion because human embryos must be destroyed to obtain the stem cells.
The 1996 law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars in work that harms an embryo, so private money has been used to cull batches of the cells. Those batches can reproduce in lab dishes indefinitely, and the Obama administration issued rules permitting taxpayer dollars to be used in work on them
The lawsuit was filed by two scientists who argued that President Obama's expansion jeopardized their ability to win government funding for research using adult stem cells — ones that have already matured to create specific types of tissues — because it will mean extra competition.

Lamberth, the chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Washington, issued a preliminary injunction in August to block the research while the case continued.
The Obama administration immediately appealed and requested the order be stopped. The appeals court quickly ruled that the research could continue at the National Institutes of Health while the judges took up the case.
The opinion tossing out Lamberth's ruling was written by Judge Douglas Ginsburg, nominated to the court by President Ronald Reagan, and supported by Judge Thomas Griffith, a nominee of President George W. Bush. The dissent came from Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, a nominee of President George H.W. Bush; she agreed with the lower court judge that the lawsuit was likely to succeed.
As a result of the appellate ruling Friday, the original lawsuit can continue before Judge Lamberth, but the taxpayer-funded research also will go on. Lamberth hasn't thus far either held a trial or issued a final ruling, which he could do based on court filings without taking testimony.
Once the cells are culled, they can reproduce in lab dishes indefinitely. So government policies said using taxpayer dollars to work with the already-created batches of cells is allowed.
The Obama administration has expanded the number of stem cell lines created with private money that federally funded scientists could research, up from the 21 that President George W. Bush had allowed to at least 75 so far. To qualify, parents who donate the original embryo must be told of other options, such as donating to another infertile woman.
Congress twice passed legislation specifically calling for tax-funded stem cell research, which President Bush vetoed.

@AP

Pic : Judge Royce Lamberth

Syria Updates

The Syrian president President Bashar al-Assad has made a speech on the country's state TV denouncing "satellite television stations" as being part of a conspiracy against Syria which began weeks ago. Residents in Deraa told the Guardian that the speech was met with fury: "The speech was nonsense and has given security forces the green light to continue its oppression on our people," said one man speaking by telephone from the city.

Turkey-France Clash

Turkey has launched a bitter attack on French president Nicolas Sarkozy's and France's leadership of the military campaign against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, accusing the French of lacking a conscience in their conduct in the Libyan operations.

The vitriolic criticism, from both the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and the president, Abdullah Gül followed attacks from the Turkish government earlier this week and signalled an orchestrated attempt by Ankara to wreck Sarkozy's plans to lead the air campaign against Gaddafi.

With France insisting that Nato should not be put in political charge of the UN-mandated air campaign, Turkey has come out emphatically behind sole Nato control of the operations.

The row came as France confirmed that one of its fighter jets had destroyed a Libyan air force plane, the first to breach the no-fly zone since it was imposed on 19 March. The Libyan G2/Galeb trainer aircraft was destroyed by an air-to-ground missile just after it landed at an air base near the rebel-held town of Misrata, a French military spokesman said.

The clash between Turkey and France over Libya is underpinned by acute frictions between Erdogan and Sarkozy, both impetuous and mercurial leaders who revel in the limelight, by fundamental disputes over Ankara's EU ambitions, and by economic interests in north Africa.

The confrontation is shaping up to be decisive in determining the outcome of the bitter infighting over who should inherit command of the Libyan air campaign from the Americans and could come to a head at a major conference in London next week of the parties involved.

Using incendiary language directed at France in a speech in Istanbul, Erdogan said: "I wish that those who only see oil, gold mines and underground treasures when they look in [Libya's] direction, would see the region through glasses of conscience from now on."

President Gül reinforced the Turkish view that France and others were being driven primarily by economic interests. "The aim [of the air campaign] is not the liberation of the Libyan people," he said. "There are hidden agendas and different interests."

Earlier this week, Claude Guéant, the French interior minister who was previously Sarkozy's chief adviser, outraged the Muslim world by stating that the French president was "leading a crusade" to stop Gaddafi massacring Libyans.

Erdogan denounced the use of the word crusade yesterday, blaming those, France chief among them, who are opposed to Turkey joining the EU.

Senior Nato officials are meeting in Brussels for the fourth day in a row to try to hammer out an agreement on who should assume command of the no-fly zone over Libya from the Americans who are determined to relinquish command within days.

Sarkozy has agreed to give Nato military planners operational command of the campaign, but refused to grant the alliance political and strategic control, insisting this should be vested in the broader "coalition of the willing" taking part.

Turkey has responded by blocking Nato planning operations for Libya while stressing that Nato should be given "sole command", senior Nato diplomats said.

Turkey, Nato's second biggest army after the US and its only Muslim member, appears bent on winning the argument. It is already taking part in Nato patrols in the Mediterranean to police an arms embargo on Libya. It wants to limit and shorten the air campaign and proscribe ground attacks on Libya by Nato aircraft. If Nato is given political command of the air effort, Turkey would be able to exercise a veto in a system run on consensus.

The US's top military officer in Europe, Admiral James Stavridis, Nato's supreme commander Europe, has gone to Ankara to try to mediate a deal.

The Turks are incensed at repeated snubs by Sarkozy. The French failed to invite Turkey to last Saturday's summit in Paris which presaged the air strikes. French fighters taking off from Corsica struck the first blows. The Turkish government accused Sarkozy of launching not only the no-fly zone, but his presidential re-election campaign.

While the dispute over Libya is substantive and political, it also appears highly personal, revealing the bad blood simmering between the French president and the Turkish prime minister.

Sarkozy went to Turkey last month for the first time in four years as president. But the visit was repeatedly delayed and then downgraded from a state presidential event. He stayed in Turkey for five hours.

"Relations between Turkey and France deserve more than this," complained Erdogan. "I will speak with frankness. We wish to host him as president of France. But he is coming as president of the G20, not as that of France."

While the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, is also opposed to Turkey joining the EU, she has voiced her objections moderately. Sarkozy has declared loudly that culturally Turkey does not belong in Europe, but in the Middle East.

France has blocked tranches of Ankara's EU negotiations on the grounds that it should not be seen as ever-fit for membership.

Libya Updates

The Libyan announcement of a unilateral ceasefire made by foreign minister Moussa Koussa leaves several important questions unanswered. Is it simply a ploy to divide the UN after the approval of the security council resolution? And how will a ceasefire be monitored and verified? Will the UN be allowed in? Fighting was reported from the port of Misrata shortly before his press conference in Tripoli. His offer of dialogue has already been rejected by the Benghazi-based rebels. The Gaddafi regime is pretty low on credibility so there will be plenty of scepticism about this statement. And Koussa pointedly refused to answer any questions after dropping his bombshell.
Ian Black in Tripoli (Guardian)
pic : Another picture of Libyans celebrating in Benghazi after the UN vote. Photograph: Patrick Baz/AFP/Getty Images

Imaging's Torrid Growth Rate Is Slowing

 Is the era of rapid growth in medical imaging procedure volume over? The volume of advanced imaging services delivered to Medicare beneficiaries decreased in 2009 -- the first decrease in 11 years, according to a study released Wednesday.
Washington, DC-based research and consulting firm the Moran Company found that the volume of advanced imaging services billed within the Medicare system decreased by 0.1% in 2009 compared with 2008, while overall imaging services declined by 7.1% for the same year-to-year comparison.

"It's pretty clear the era of very rapid growth in advanced medical imaging seems to have come to an end at this point in time," said Don Moran, president of the Moran Company. "All the data point to a leveling. It's unclear whether we will see further declines, but the prior growth of these modalities and the advantages they offer to clinicians seems to be peaking."
The study, released today by the Access to Medical Imaging Coalition (AMIC), reviewed Medicare claims data from 1999 through 2009, examining both spending and volume of advanced imaging services, such as CT, MRI, nuclear medicine, and PET, as well as overall imaging services, including mammography.

Declining Volume

The analysis also found that the total volume of mammography screenings decreased by 0.3% in 2009, compared with a 2.8% compound annual growth rate in the past decade. In addition, the total volume of dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) exams fell by 2.2%, while spending on this technique decreased by 16% from 2008 to 2009.
The new findings are comparable to a 2008 analysis of Medicare claims data that showed a 19.2% reduction in Medicare spending on advanced imaging from 2006 to 2007. It also revealed a significantly reduced procedure volume growth rate of only 1.9%, which was less than the overall rate of physician-payment growth.
In addition, a study presented by David C. Levin, MD, and colleagues at the 2010 RSNA meeting found that imaging procedure volume grew at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 1.4% between 2005 and 2008, well down from the 4.1% CAGR experienced between 1998 and 2005.
Imaging industry observers have attributed the slowing growth rate to reimbursement cuts for medical imaging such as those enacted by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005. The healthcare reform legislation passed in 2010 includes additional reimbursement reductions.
The study shows that "medical imaging has been decimated by these cuts," said Tim Trysla, executive director of AMIC. "The impact of these cuts, even by the government's own estimates, has 'de facto' caused access problems for patients and providers. We are very concerned about choking off the access to these lifesaving technologies."
John Patti, MD, a radiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and chair of the American College of Radiology Board of Chancellors, said he and fellow radiologists are concerned with imaging's declining growth rate, because the Medicare population is increasing and the incidence and prevalence of disease remain the same.

Early Diagnosis

"One of the tremendous benefits of advanced imaging over the years is that it has obviated the need for more costly and evasive diagnostic evaluation," Patti said. "This reversal of trend suggests that Medicare patients may not be receiving those appropriate exams and thus the benefit of early diagnosis."
In addition, he said the decrease may have "negative downstream effects on the health of our aging citizens and on the cost of providing the more complex care that may be necessary to treat disease if it is discovered in advanced stages."
One potential victim of the decline is outpatient imaging center owners and operators. Because of reimbursement cuts for outpatient imaging, some physicians have sold or given their imaging activities to hospitals, which are reimbursed at a higher rate under the Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (HOPPS). That scenario, in turn, could lead to less access to advanced imaging services.
In other study data, Medicare spending for advanced imaging services increased by less than half the spending growth for physician services overall. With a 1.2% increase in spending for advanced imaging, compared with 2.6% for services overall, imaging was one of the slowest-growing segments of the physician fee schedule in 2009.


Some Optimism
Despite the volume downturn in 2009, Trysla believes that advanced medical imaging will continue to contribute to patient care. "Medicine will not turn its back on advanced technology, especially with the benefits of early detection of disease, such as Parkinson's disease and cancer," he said. "I think you will see growth through new applications in technology, and medicine will continue to evolve from exploratory surgery toward early and more exact detection."
ACR's Patti also speculated that the dip in growth in 2009 would be temporary. "I don't think there are any physicians who are taking direct care of patients who don't understand the value of advanced imaging," he added. "And, I don't think there are any physicians who are willingly withholding [advanced imaging] from patients."


by : Wayne Forrest

Cairo's biggest protest yet demands Mubarak's immediate departure

The queue was a dozen wide and hundreds deep; it snaked past the pair of bronze lions at the mouth of Qasr El Nile bridge and fanned out across the river. Cairo has witnessed gunfire, molotov cocktails and backstreet anarchy over the past week, but today people flooded in to show the world something different.

"We are the heart of the Egyptian people, the ones who make this country work," said Samar Atallah, a 29-year-old anti-Mubarak protester. "We're here for peace. We are not hundreds, we are not thousands, we are millions."
Peace – alongside solid, stable community organisation – was the hallmark of Egypt's "day of departure", an event which produced the biggest turnout yet in Egypt's 11-day-old national uprising. The target of that uprising was yet to be toppled as night drew in, but at times, amid the impromptu tea stalls, the neat rows of first aid tents and the well-manned security cordons, that almost didn't seem to matter. At the centre of a city that is rife with chaos, Tahrir square had become an oasis of calm.

As a mark of how secure this anti-Mubarak stronghold has become after days of fierce fighting with armed supporters of the current regime, Egypt's defence minister walked among the hundreds of thousands who packed the square. Hussein Tantawi was welcomed by the crowds, who chanted 'Marshal, we are your sons of liberation'.
But after state TV accused those in Tahrir of fomenting unrest and being in the pay of unnamed foreign powers, Tantawi's message – that the government was responding to the people's demands and they could now go home – got a colder reception.
"The tragedy is in the lies told about us by the regime," said Amr, a 32-year-old protester who preferred not to supply his full name. "Do people really believe these lies? It's propaganda. This is our moment, our time, Mubarak has to go. He will never know how we feel. We want to live, not to struggle."

Tantawi wasn't the only diplomatic celebrity in the square. Amr Moussa, the secretary general of the Arab League, also joined the throng. Moussa is one of those in the frame to succeed Mubarak, who continues to cling on to power despite the rapid draining of international support away from his regime and the continuing paralysis of Egypt's economy. When asked about any potential campaign for the leadership, Moussa said he was "at the disposal" of his countrymen.
But high-level political manoeuvring was only a small part of Tahrir's story, as hundreds of thousands of people swept in to make a stand against a three-decade-old dictatorship that is still clinging on for dear life. After the "days of rage" this was something altogether different, a festival of singing, socialising and solidarity, as speakers addressed different corners of the crowd and food and drink was passed round freely amongst those present.
On the fringes of the square though, reminders of the violence that has wreaked havoc across downtown Cairo in recent days still lay scattered across the roadway. "At the height of it all we were dealing with 10 patients a minute," said Dr Samar Sewilam, one of the dozens of volunteer doctors who have set up field hospitals in the square to treat those injured in clashes with the beltagi – thugs who have stormed those inside the barricades day and night in attacks which appear to be orchestrated by the government.
"Those throwing missiles from the outside are using sharp rocks which split the face into two pieces," explained Sewilam. "99% of the patients I've treated go back to the front line to continue the fight. They ask me to stitch them up and then they instantly return. 'Just stitch me up and let me go back,' they always say."
Nearby, those not reassured by the regime's public proclamations of reconciliation worked on fortifying the security cordons around the square and constructing crude defensive shields. Some wore dustbin lids taped to their heads, preparations for what they fear could be a renewed night of violence.

"I'm scared of what's going on, you can see we're standing here peacefully but look what the government has been doing to us," said Mohamed Abas, a 32-year-old engineer stationed near Talaat Harb street, where pro-Mubarak supporters congregated in the distance. "They've been coming here for us for days, so of course I'm scared."
Most around him eschewed talk of clashes though, preferring to dwell instead on the positive aspects of the remarkable scenes unfolding in a city where, only two weeks ago, protests of more than a few dozen were virtually non-existent. "You're witnessing the beginning of the first popular Egyptian revolution," beamed Mohsena Tawfik, a legendary Egyptian actress. "It's a symbol against corruption and repression not just for our country but for the whole Arab world."

The peaceful energy inside the square contrasted sharply with the neighbourhoods surrounding it, where the ongoing absence of police and the presence of pro-Mubarak gangs have left many streets highly volatile. For the second day running foreign journalists were targeted by both the army and vigilante mobs; many protesters reported being physically harassed by those supportive of the regime as they left nearby metro stations and attempted to approach Tahrir.
Inside, as midday struck, hundreds of thousands bent down to pray, a moment of silence to remember the scores of protesters who have lost their lives in the past fortnight. As they rose, the chants against their president that have filled this square for days rang out with renewed energy. "Mubarak leave now!" bellowed Tahrir. "The people want this regime to fall."
What shape that fall and its aftermath should take is the subject of increased focus amongst protesters, many of whom are aiming to give their demands a firmer shape without compromising the non-hierarchical nature of their uprising so far.

The Guardian has received a copy of four specific demands laid down by a loose coalition of 300 youth co-ordinators who helped plan the initial demonstrations last week against Mubarak and his regime. They include not just the removal of Mubarak but also the disassembling of the entire NDP elite around him, precluding a smooth transition should vice-president Omar Suleiman, a close Mubarak ally, take the helm once the president leaves.
The document also calls for the formation of a committee made up of judges, youth leaders and the military which will appoint a transitional government, plus a founding council of intellectuals and constitutional experts who will draw up a new constitution and put it to the Egyptian people in a referendum. Finally it demands free and fair elections at a local and national level once the new constitution has been implemented.
@Guardian

Royal Blues Recruit Karimi

Iran international Ali Karimi (112 appearances) has signed for Schalke. The 32-year-old (born 8 November 1978) has been given a contract to the end of the current campaign. Karimi will wear the number 10 shirt for the Royal Blues.

Karimi, who most recently played for Teheran-based club Steel Azin FC, is no stranger to the Bundesliga. Felix Magath took him to Bayern Munich ahead of the 2005/2006 season. The attacking midfielder made 33 Bundesliga appearances for Bayern in the following two seasons, scoring three goals, and won the Bundesliga title and the DFB Cup in 2006.

His professional career has seen Karimi play for Fath FC (Iran/1996-1998), Persepolis FC (Iran/1998-2001), Al-Ahli Club (United Arab Emirates/2001-2005), Bayern Munich (2005-2007), Qatar SC (Qatar/2007-2008), Persepolis FC (Iran/2008-2009) and Steel Azin FC (Iran/2009-2010).

In addition to his success at Bayern Munich, Karimi won the Iranian league title in 1999 and 2000, the Iranian Cup in 1999, the United Arab Emirates Cup in 2002 and 2004, and was voted Asian Footballer of the Year in 2004. The 1.78 m midfield maestro also made two appearances for Iran at the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
@Schalke04.com

کریمی باز هم همه را غافلگیر کرد

خبر انتقال غیر قابل پیش بینی علی کریمی به شالکه ناکامی تیم ملی در جام ملتهای آسیا را تقریبا از یاد فوتبال دوستان برد.کریمی که در آستانه پیوستن به پرسپولیس بود و مذاکراتش را با علی دایی انجام داده بود ناگهان از بوندس لیگا سر در آورد.

در روزهایی که تعداد بازیکنان ایرانی شاغل در اروپا به تعداد انگشتان یک دست هم نمی رسد و لژیونرهایمان به مسعود شجاعی و جواد نکونام محدود شده اند علی کریمی که حتی دربین 18 بازیکن حاضر در جام ملتهای آسیا هم نبود و به تیم ملی دعوت نشد در سن 32 سالگی برای دومین بار راهی فوتبال آلمان می شود.

ستاره فوتبال کشورمان که پیش از این بین سال های 2005 تا 2007 با پیراهن بایرن مونیخ در بوندس لیگا بازی می کرد باردیگر نظر فلیکس ماگات را جلب کرد تا این بار این مربی آلمانی او را به شالکه دعوت کند.

کریمی بعد از اینکه در سال 2004 به عنوان مرد سال فوتبال آسیا انتخاب شد به عنوان بازیکن آزاد از باشگاه الاهلی امارات جدا شد و به بایرن مونیخ پیوست. در آن زمان ماگات هدایت باواریایی ها را به عهده داشت، بعد از جدایی ماگات از بایرن و آمدن هیتسفیلد کریمی هم کمتر فرصت بازی پیدا کرد و بیشتر به یک بازیکن نیمکت نشین تبدیل شده بود تا اینکه در پایان فصل 2007-2006 از اف سی هالیوود جدا شد و با وجود اینکه از تیم های ولفسبورگ، موناکو و سالزبورگ اتریش پیشنهاد داشت قید فوتبال در اروپا را زد و با رقم جالب 3.2 میلیون پوند به باشگاه قطر اسپورت پیوست.

بعد از حضور در فوتبال قطر کریمی بعد از 7 سال بار دیگر به پرسپولیس بازگشت و اولین گلش بعد از بازگشت به جمع سرخپوشان را در دربی پایتخت مقابل استقلال زد تا تیمش را از شکست نجات دهد.در پایان فصل اختلاف با عباس انصاریفرد مدیر عامل وقت پرسپولیس باعث شد جادوگر این تیم را ترک کند و به باشگاه استیل آذین بپیوندد.حضور 1.5 ساله کریمی در استیل آذین نیز با حاشیه های زیادی همراه بود که آخرین آن اخراج موقت به دلیل حضور در دیدار دوستانه الاهلی با میلان بدون اجازه مسئولین استیل آذین بود. کریمی بعد از این اتفاق با توافق حسین هدایتی رئیس استیل آذین از این باشگاه جدا شد. همه تصور می کردند جادوگر در سال های واپسین فوتبال خود بار دیگر به پرسپولیس باز می گردد اما بمب خبری امروز وقتی منفجر شد که سایت معروف کیکر خبر انتقال کریمی به شالکه را تایید کرد.

کریمی که هم در مستطیل سبز و هم خارج از زمین های ورزشی همه را غافلگیر می کند این بار پرسپولیس را دریبل می زند و به بوندس لیگا می رود تا پیراهن تیم شالکه یکی از پرمهره ترین تیم های این فصل بوندس لیگا را بر تن کندمنبع : سایت گل

شروین گیلانیl

Facebook reverses on sharing user addresses, phone numbers

On Tuesday, Facebook reversed a change announced on Friday to a permissions dialog box that users see when downloading third-party Facebook apps--a change that potentially makes users' addresses and phone numbers available to app developers.

The tweak was made known to developers of third-party apps Friday night, by way of a post on the Facebook Developer Blog. Basically, when a person starts downloading a third-party Facebook app, a Request for Permission dialog box appears that asks for access to basic information including the downloader's name, profile picture, gender, user ID, list of friends, and more. What's new as of Friday is an additional section that asks for access to the downloader's current address and mobile phone number.

At 2:25 a.m. Tuesday morning, a blog was posted on Facebook's Developer Blog which said:

"Over the weekend, we got some useful feedback that we could make people more clearly aware of when they are granting access to this data. We agree, and we are making changes to help ensure you only share this information when you intend to do so. We’ll be working to launch these updates as soon as possible, and will be temporarily disabling this feature until those changes are ready."

Cheney Considers Heart Transplant

Ex-US vice-president says his battery-powered heart pump is a 'wondrous device', and claims he didn't mind Darth Vader jibes.Dick Cheney, the former US vice-president whose tough approach to fighting terrorism earned him the nickname Darth Vader, is facing a decision on whether to undergo a heart transplant. Cheney uses a battery-powered heart pump, controlled by a box he wears on his waistcoat, to help circulate blood around his body. He told NBC's Today Show he would have to decide at some point on a possible transplant:"I'd reached the point, after 30 years and five heart attacks, where I really needed to do something," he said of the heart pump. "It's a wondrous device; it's really a miracle of modern technology." Cheney, who was George Bush's deputy throughout his eight years in office, has a history of heart problems, suffering his first heart attack aged 37 and his most recent last year. Cheney, who turned 70 this month, has had a pacemaker implanted and has suffered irregular heartbeats. Since last year he has been keeping a relatively low profile, writing up his memoirs with the help of his daughter, Liz, at his home in Maryland. Before that he had assigned himself the role of Barack Obama's irritant-in-chief, relentlessly sniping at him over his domestic and anti-terror policies. He remains critical, albeit more mutedly so. He told NBC he still expected Obama to be a one-term president.  "He embarked on a course of action when he became president that did not have as much support as he thought it did. When he got into healthcare reform, expanding the size of government, expanding the deficit – those are all weaknesses as I look at Barack Obama," Cheney said. ~ He softened his previous caustic claims that Obama was putting the nation in danger by sweeping aside the anti-terror laws put in place by the Bush-Cheney administration after 9/11. Those included what Cheney referred to as "enhanced interrogation techniques" 


Source : Guardian

Condition Upgraded To Serious

In yet another sign of significant recovery during a remarkable week, the condition of gravely wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was upgraded from critical to serious Sunday after a procedure to remove her from a ventilator was successful.

Giffords has responded from the moment she arrived at the emergency room Jan. 8, at first just squeezing a doctor’s hand. Then she raised two fingers. She opened her unbandaged eye shortly after President Obama’s bedside visit Wednesday. Then, more milestones – which doctors said were all indicative of higher cognitive function – were achieved, all with her husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, at her side.

Kelly asked her to give him a thumbs-up if she could hear him. She did more than that. She slowly raised her left arm. By the end of the week, she had moved her legs and arms.

At the hospital, more than 100 people were gathered amid a sea of get-well balloons and cards when the University of Arizona put out a statement upgrading her condition.

“Oh, that’s great news,” said Jean Emrick, a 50-year resident of Tucson, as a violinist played in the background. “Tucson is such a special place, and she represents what’s the best of southern Arizona.”

Doctors decided to upgrade her condition because a tracheotomy done a day earlier was uneventful, hospital spokeswoman Katie Riley said. A feeding tube was also put in Saturday.

Giffords and 18 others were shot when a gunman opened fire at an event she was hosting outside a supermarket in her hometown. Six people died.

A week after the shootings, more details emerged about a victim who police said became distraught and was arrested during a town hall meeting Saturday evening.

James Eric Fuller, a self-described liberal and military veteran, started ranting at the end of the program. He took a picture of a local Tea Party leader and yelled, “You’re dead,” before calling others in the church “whores,” police said.

Deputies called a doctor and decided he should be taken to a hospital for a mental evaluation, Pima County sheriff’s spokesman Jason Ogan said.

The man Fuller is accused of threatening, Tucson Tea Party co-founder Trent Humphries, said he was worried about the threat and the dozens of other angry e-mails he has received.

Source :AP

BP Wins Australian Exploration Permits

BP awarded four permits to drill off the South Australia coast ~ • Minister says BP must show it 'has learned the lessons from Deepwater Horizon'  BP has been given its first-ever oil exploration permits off the Australian coast, but the government warned on Monday that the London-based energy group will have to demonstrate higher safety standards than it had applied in the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster before it is allowed to drill. ~ BP holds stakes in the Northwest Shelf and Gorgon natural gas fields in Western Australia state but has never before applied for its own offshore exploration permits in Australia.  Resources and energy minister Martin Ferguson announced on Monday that BP has been awarded four of seven offshore exploration permits approved by the government as part of an annual tender process. BP will be allowed to explore to depths exceeding 15,000 feet (4,600 metres) off the coast of South Australia state. The other three permits awarded to Australian companies Woodside Energy, Riverina Energy and Finder No. 4 are off Western Australia. Oil companies are facing increased scrutiny in the United States after an explosion and spill at BP's Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers on 20 April last year and caused massive environmental damage to the US coast. "The permits awarded to BP follow an extensive assessment and due diligence process that examined the technical and financial competence of BP to undertake the proposed work programme in accordance with the stringent requirements of Australian legislation," Ferguson said in a statement. "Additional conditions have also been attached to these permits, emphasising the need for oil field best practice behaviour by the operator," he added. "This reinforces BP's undertaking, given as part of the assessment process, to fully integrate lessons learned from the Deepwater Horizon incident into its systems and processes."

Kiko To Sampdoria

Federico Macheda is on the verge of joining Sampdoria on loan for the remainder of the season, despite Manchester United making it clear they would prefer a Premier League move.Il Secolo XIX claims the striker has chosen to play for Samp just 24 hours after Sir Alex Ferguson said he "hopes Macheda will stay in the Premier League".

The 19-year-old Italian striker has started just two games for United this season, and Old Trafford chiefs believes a loan move would benefit him.

Reports in England though suggested a hoard of Premier League sides want him, but Sampdoria believe he is the one to fill the void left by Antonio Cassano following his move to Milan.

And, his agent Giovanni Bia has now confirmed the United youngster will be playing at Marassi with the move pending official status after agreeing terms with 'Doria."Macheda to Sampdoria? Lets say that just an official note is missing," Bia told Sky Sport Italia.

"We are just missing the traditional exchange of faxes, but we are almost there.

"We hope to close everything by tonight and Federico could be available by Sunday. The idea is a loan until June."


@Goal.com

Facebook raises new funding at $50B valuation

Facebook is now worth $50 billion,according to a report in The New York Times that says the company has raised $500 million in new funding from Goldman Sachs and Russian firm Digital Sky Technologies.

Goldman invested $450 million, while DST (which has already invested about $500 million into Facebook) provided the remaining $50 million. Goldman also plans to create a “special purpose vehicle” to pool its clients and invest another $1.5 billion in Facebook without triggering the Securities and Exchange Commission’s 500-shareholder threshold, The Times says. (Companies that break the threshold are required to disclose more information publicly.)

Facebook’s valuation has been climbing steadily on the secondary markets where shares are sold. (The SEC is now investigating those markets.) Early Facebook investor Accel Partners recently sold off some of its shares at a $34 billion valuation.

Facebook is expected to have its initial public offering as soon as 2012, although the company hasn’t said anything specific on the matter. It reportedly brought in $2 billion in revenue in 2010, and chief Mark Zuckerberg has said that the company is barely profitable, because it’s not focused on profits yet.

Last month, the second-hottest social networking company, Twitter, raised $200 million at a $3.7 billion valuation.

by : Anthony Ha

@VentureBeat

McKesson completes purchase of US Oncology

Healthcare information systems and pharmaceutical distribution corporation McKesson announced today that it has completed its acquisition of US Oncology.

US Oncology, headquartered in The Woodlands, TX, is the largest community-based cancer care and research network in the U.S., with more than 500 affiliated sites of care, including 100 radiation therapy treatment centers.

The acquisition, for $2.16 billion in cash, was announced by McKesson of San Francisco on November 1 and was approved by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice on December 20. However, the sale was halted on December 21 by an order from the Supreme Court of the State of New York, based on a complaint filed by Cancer Clinics of Excellence (CCE) of San Rafael, CA. An evidentiary hearing was scheduled for January 10, 2011.
J. Ike Nicoll, president and CEO of CCE, announced that a settlement agreeable to both CCE and McKesson had been reached, and that the complaint was withdrawn from the New York Supreme Court today. A spokesperson for McKesson Specialty Care Solutions concurred, stating that terms of the settlement had been successfully negotiated.