Pressure mounts on Italy's Berlusconi to quit (AP)

ROME ? Italy became the latest target in Europe's financial crisis Monday, as soaring borrowing rates intensified pressure on Premier Silvio Berlusconi to resign and let a new government reform the country's spendthrift ways.

Berlusconi batted away reports that he was considering stepping down in favor of early elections, saying they were "without foundation."

But the prospect of financial disaster was real because of Italy's huge debts and slow growth. Unlike Greece, Ireland and Portugal ? the three countries that Europe has already bailed out ? Italy's economy could be too large to rescue.

Investors want the government to quickly pass measures to boost growth and cut debt. But defections from Berlusconi's coalition government mean he no longer commands enough loyalty to pass the reforms.

Increasingly, Berlusconi is himself being seen as the problem.

If Berlusconi should resign or lose a confidence vote, President Giorgio Napolitano would decide whether to call early elections, or name a government of technocrats rather than politicians. The most widely discussed name to lead a technical government is Mario Monti, the former EU competition commissioner who once blocked General Electric's takeover of Honeywell.

The opposition center-left has long demanded the resignation of Berlusconi, citing sex scandals, criminal prosecutions and legislative priorities it says are aimed at protecting his own business interests rather than those of the country. However, it has failed to come up with a leader who can energize the base and create a credible program, leaving the opposition divided and rudderless.

The ultimate fear is that Italy cannot pay for its euro1.9 trillion ($2.6 trillion) debt and need international help. Europe would struggle with a bailout that large, meaning a default that could break up the 17-nation eurozone and drag down the global economy.

During a G-20 summit last week, Berlusconi had to ask the International Monetary Fund to monitor the country's reform efforts, a humiliating step for the eurozone's third-largest economy.

The yield on Italy's 10-year bonds jumped another 0.42 of a percentage point Monday to 6.67 percent, its highest level since the euro was established in 1999. That is drawing uncomfortably near the 7 percent threshold that forced both Ireland and Portugal to accept bailouts. As yields rise, governments must devote more of their national budgets simply to paying interest costs, creating a vicious circle of debt.

When traders thought early Monday that Berlusconi might resign, those borrowing rates eased. But later in the day, when it was clear the 75-year-old would not leave willingly, rates shot up again, reflecting market fears that he is not the leader who can turn Italy around.

"The leader and his country are in danger of taking the rest of Europe, if not the world, into economic hell," said Louise Cooper, markets analyst at BGC Partners.

Stocks worldwide recovered from big losses as investors responded to the latest twists in Europe's efforts to control its debt crisis, including speculation over Berlusconi's future. In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 85 points, or 0.7 percent, to close at 12,068.

The European Central Bank said Monday that it stepped up its program to buy government bonds last week, spending euro9.5 billion ($13 billion). It has been buying bonds for weeks to keep a lid on borrowing costs to help prevent Italy and Spain from succumbing to the debt crisis.

Berlusconi had lunch Monday with his children and friends at his villa near Milan, sparking Italian news media to speculate he was devising an exit strategy. But the lunch is a long family tradition and his Facebook page said "the reports of my resignation are without foundation."

Public administration minister Renato Brunetta, a Berlusconi loyalist, acknowledged Monday that the government has a "numbers problem" in parliament and if a majority is lacking then "everybody goes home." Interior Minister Roberto Maroni agreed, adding "it is useless to persist."

James Walston, professor of political science at the American University of Rome, said Berlusconi's time is quickly running out, even though elections are not due until 2013.

"He could go tomorrow. He could go next week. The sort of pressure that he is under, coming from his own people, will make it sooner than later," he said.

But Berlusconi has remained defiant, insisting he still commands enough support in Parliament.

"I don't understand how rumors of my resignation are circulating," Berlusconi was quoted as saying Monday by Libero newspaper.

Only the loss of a confidence vote can force a government to resign. Opposition leader Pierluigi Bersani said lawmakers are planning exactly that. Political analysts say a vote could come as early as Tuesday, when parliament is expected to approve the state's balance sheets ? a routine measure that failed by one vote last month.

Other analysts say should Berlusconi step down, he would seek to have his right-hand man, Gianni Letta, named to succeed him as premier until early elections can be organized. It is not known whether the Italian president, Napolitano, would agree to that.

If the opposition doesn't call a vote of confidence this week in an effort to unseat him, Berlusconi has pledged to call one himself to prove his majority stands, possibly next week, on reforms and other stopgap measures to lower Italy's debt ? now near 120 percent of GDP ? and revive the dormant economy.

The reform measures include a plan to sell government assets ? expected to raise euro5 billion ($6.9 billion) a year for three years ? and tax breaks to reduce youth unemployment of 29 percent and to get women back into the work force in a country where just 48 percent of women have jobs. The legislation would also allow stores to stay open on Sundays and open up closed professions.

Berlusconi has also pledged to raise the retirement age to 67 for all to match European trends, despite the fierce resistance of his allies in the Northern League, on whom Berlusconi relies to govern. They have proven at times difficult allies, exerting a strong independent streak and challenging Berlusconi on key policies. The leader, Umberto Bossi, also has on several occasions expressed doubts about Berlusconi's ability to complete the current mandate.

The leader of Italy's largest labor confederation, meanwhile, predicted 2012 will be a "terrifying" year for the economy even if Berlusconi leaves power. CGIL leader Susanna Camusso also slammed Berlusconi's anti-crisis plan as containing virtually nothing to spark economic growth.

"I hope there will be (early elections), and that they will be soon for the good of the country," she told The Associated Press on Monday.

Mario Draghi, an Italian who just took over as European Central Bank president, said last week that since joining the euro, Italy has enjoyed unnaturally low interest rates for years because its monetary policy has been linked to that of stronger economies like Germany.

"For a long time spreads between sovereign bonds in the euro area were very narrow," he said. "They did not reflect the different realities of different countries."

In contrast, German borrowing costs hit a record low Monday, as investors fled to their bonds as a safe haven in Europe.

___

Associated Press writer Colleen Barry in Milan contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/eurobiz/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111107/ap_on_bi_ge/eu_italy_financial_crisis

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Climate Change: The Kyoto Accords, and Hope, Are Expiring

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Four killed after bombs target Iraq Sunni militia (Reuters)

BAGHDAD (Reuters) ? Four bombs exploded near the home of a local leader of a government-supported Sunni militia north of Iraq's capital on Saturday, killing four people and wounding eight others, police and health sources said.

The attack follows a major assault on Thursday on the Sahwa militia, which helped turn the tide of the war by taking up arms against al Qaeda. Six people were killed and dozens wounded when bombs exploded near a group of fighters as they lined up to receive their pay in the city of Baquba.

Iraqi security forces and Sahwa members have been frequent targets in recent weeks as militants try to destabilize Iraq's fragile, cross-sectarian government while the United States withdraw its remaining 33,000 troops.

The four bombs exploded near a house in Taji, 20 km (12 miles) north of Baghdad, a mixed area of Shi'ites and Sunnis that was once a battlefield for al Qaeda and the Mehdi Army Shi'ite militia.

"Two bombs went off near the house of Isa Kadhim, a Sahwa leader in Taji town, killing his brother, his wife and two of his children," a police source said.

"A few minutes later, another two bombs went off close to the first explosions, wounding eight people in the area."

A source at Kadhimiya Hospital in northwestern Baghdad confirmed the death toll.

The sectarian slaughter of 2006-07 has ebbed but al Qaeda-linked Sunni insurgents and Shi'ite militias still carry out scores of bombings and other attacks each month, more than eight years after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

U.S. troops are scheduled to withdraw completely by the end of the year.

(Reporting by Kareem Raheem; Writing by Waleed Ibrahim; Editing by Jim Loney and Sophie Hares)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111105/wl_nm/us_iraq_violence_militia

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[OOC] capture.avi

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Cain accuser sticks to allegation; he presses on (AP)

WASHINGTON ? A lawyer for one of Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain's accusers declared Friday that she had alleged "several incidents of sexual harassment" in a complaint filed more than a decade ago.

The lawyer, Joel Bennett, said his client accepted a financial settlement as part of an agreement to leave her job at the National Restaurant Association shortly after lodging the complaint. Bennett did not name the woman, who he said had decided not "to relive the specifics" of the incidents in a public forum.

Cain has denied ever sexually harassing anyone and is trying to overcome the controversy and resume normal campaign activities.

In a statement late in the day, the restaurant association said Cain had disputed the woman's allegations at the time she made them more than a decade ago. He was CEO of the organization at the time.

Bennett's comments to reporters outside his law office came at a time Cain was making a concerted effort to show he would no longer allow the controversy to dominate his unlikely challenge for the GOP presidential nomination.

Cain drew cheers of support Friday from conservative activists as he delivered a speech focused on the U.S. economy. He is trying to convert his meteoric rise in opinion polls into a campaign organization robust enough to compete with Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and other rivals in early primary and caucus states.

In an appearance before the Americans For Prosperity Foundation, the career businessman pitched his trademark 9-9-9 economic program and referred only elliptically to the controversy that has overshadowed his campaign in recent days. "I've been in Washington all week, and I've attracted a little bit of attention," he said to knowing laughter from his audience.

Not everyone sounded ready to let it fade, despite Cain's repeated denials.

In Georgia, the state party chairwoman, Sue Everhart, said, "I think he has to completely put it behind him or it will continue to be a problem. He's got to do the housekeeping duties and clean this up."

She suggested Cain should coax the restaurant trade group to permit one of his accusers to make a public statement. That was before the woman's lawyer read her statement, with the trade group's permission.

The accuser, whose identity has not been made public, signed a confidentiality agreement when she left the organization more than a decade ago after accusing Cain, then the trade group's head, of sexual harassment. At the time of her departure, she received a financial settlement. The lawyer declined to say how much it had been.

At least two other women have made similar allegations, and a former pollster for the restaurant association has said he witnessed yet another episode.

The controversy surfaced as Cain, a black man in a party that draws its support overwhelmingly from white voters, was rising to the top in public opinion polls. His campaign announced Friday that donations so far this week have totaled $1.6 million, described as a fourfold increase over the average take for an entire month.

Official figures won't be available for weeks, but to judge from Cain's existing campaign organization, it could hardly come at a better time for him.

In Iowa, where caucuses kick off the campaign year on Jan. 3, Cain has a modest presence at best.

He let more than two months lapse between visits on Aug. 13 and Oct. 22, and aides say they don't expect him to return to the state until Nov. 19.

He employs four full-time staff in the state, while Perry and Rep. Michel Bachmann of Minnesota each have 10 on their campaign payroll. Romney, who is still evaluating how strenuously to compete in the state, also has a bigger staff than Cain.

Cain also trails his rivals in the endorsement competition in Iowa, an important but hardly foolproof indication of a candidate's viability.

Lisa Lockwood, a spokesman for Cain's campaign in Iowa, said he has the support of Dean Kleckner, a former state Farm Bureau president and a party activist, and Pottawattamie County Chairman Jeff Jorgenson.

By contrast, Romney, Perry, Bachmann and former Sen. Rick Santorum have netted endorsements from state lawmakers and local party officials whose own networks could potentially prove beneficial.

So far, Cain has not run television commercials in the state, unlike Bachmann, Perry and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas.

In South Carolina, which hosts the first Southern state caucus, Cain has a staff of four and shows evidence of grassroots support. He won a straw poll of 110 women at a state Federation of Republican Woman meeting last weekend, followed closely by former Speaker Newt Gingrich, Bachmann and Romney.

Perry appears to have the largest organization in the state, and enjoys the support of roughly a dozen state lawmakers as well as one member of the state's congressional delegation, Rep. Mark Mulvaney.

Nationally, Cain also lags several of his rivals in fundraising, based on reports filed through the end of September, the most recent available.

At the time, Perry, the Texas governor, reported cash on hand of $15 million. Romney, the former Massachusetts governor making his second presidential run, reported $14.6 million in the bank.

Cain's cash on hand was $1.3 million, and his filing indicated he was more reliant on small donors ? those giving $200 or less ? than either Romney or Perry.

While polls are notoriously fickle, particularly before the first ballots are cast in a presidential race, Cain shot up rapidly in recent weeks, largely at Perry's expense, and his aides were eager to circulate the results of a Washington Post survey taken as the sexual harassment controversy was unfolding.

It showed him in a statistical tie for first with Romney, who had 24 percent support to 23 for Cain. Perry had 13, followed by Gingrich with 12.

Seven in 10 Republicans polled said reports of the allegations don't matter when it comes to picking a candidate.

But in a sign of possible danger ahead, the poll found that Cain slipped to third place among those who see the accusations as serious, and Republican women were significantly more likely than men to say the allegations make them less apt to support the businessman. The survey found that support for Cain was basically steady over the four nights of interviewing, though new accusations were surfacing.

In South Carolina, LaDonna Riggs, chairwoman of the Spartanburg County Republican Party, said she had seen nothing so far that would cause party activists to abandon Cain. "You give me some substance to the questions and then we can talk," she said.

"If there's truth to it, then it could hurt him. But right now, it's just allegations," said Cyrus Hill, a 67-year-old retiree from Granger, Iowa. "Allegations aren't going to end him.

Dave Roszak, 51 and a resident of Clive, Iowa, said, "If it turns out he isn't being honest, it will take him down."

_____

Associated Press writers Tom Beaumont and Phil Elliott in Iowa, Steve Peoples in New Hampshire and Jim Davenport in South Carolina contributed to this story.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/politics/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111104/ap_on_el_pr/us_cain

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Andy Rooney, wry '60 Minutes' commentator, dies

FILE - This Sept. 20, 2005 file photo shows "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney in New York. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died Saturday Nov. 5, 2011 at age 92. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)

FILE - This Sept. 20, 2005 file photo shows "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney in New York. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died Saturday Nov. 5, 2011 at age 92. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 9, 2009 file photo, 60 Minutes' Andy Rooney, center leaves the Celebration of Life Memorial ceremony for Walter Cronkite at Avery Fisher Hall in New York. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died Saturday Nov. 5, 2011 at age 92. (AP Photo/Stephen Chernin, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 9, 2009 file photo, 60 Minutes' Andy Rooney, center leaves the Celebration of Life Memorial ceremony for Walter Cronkite at Avery Fisher Hall in New York. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died at age 92. (AP Photo/Stephen Chernin, File)

FILE - In this August 1978 file photo, CBS News producer and correspondent Andrew Rooney poses for photos in his New York office. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died at age 92. (AP Photo/Carlos Rene Perez, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 2, 1978 file photo, CBS News producer and correspondent Andrew Rooney poses for photos in his New York office. CBS says former "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney died at age 92. (AP Photo/Carlos Rene Perez, File)

(AP) ? Andy Rooney so dreaded the day he had to end his signature "60 Minutes" commentaries about life's large and small absurdities that he kept going until he was 92 years old.

Even then, he said he wasn't retiring. Writers never retire. But his life after the end of "A Few Minutes With Andy Rooney" was short: He died Friday night, according to CBS, only a month after delivering his 1,097th and final televised commentary.

Rooney had gone to the hospital for an undisclosed surgery, but major complications developed and he never recovered.

"Andy always said he wanted to work until the day he died, and he managed to do it, save the last few weeks in the hospital," said his "60 Minutes" colleague, correspondent Steve Kroft.

Rooney talked on "60 Minutes" about what was in the news, and his opinions occasionally got him in trouble. But he was just as likely to discuss the old clothes in his closet, why air travel had become unpleasant and why banks needed to have important-sounding names.

Rooney won one of his four Emmy Awards for a piece on whether there was a real Mrs. Smith who made Mrs. Smith's Pies. As it turned out, there was no Mrs. Smith.

"I obviously have a knack for getting on paper what a lot of people have thought and didn't realize they thought," Rooney once said. "And they say, 'Hey, yeah!' And they like that."

Looking for something new to punctuate its weekly broadcast, "60 Minutes" aired its first Rooney commentary on July 2, 1978. He complained about people who keep track of how many people die in car accidents on holiday weekends. In fact, he said, the Fourth of July is "one of the safest weekends of the year to be going someplace."

More than three decades later, he was railing about how unpleasant air travel had become. "Let's make a statement to the airlines just to get their attention," he said. "We'll pick a week next year and we'll all agree not to go anywhere for seven days."

In early 2009, as he was about to turn 90, Rooney looked ahead to President Barack Obama's upcoming inauguration with a look at past inaugurations. He told viewers that Calvin Coolidge's 1925 swearing-in was the first to be broadcast on radio, adding, "That may have been the most interesting thing Coolidge ever did."

"Words cannot adequately express Andy's contribution to the world of journalism and the impact he made ? as a colleague and a friend ? upon everybody at CBS," said Leslie Moonves, CBS Corp. president and CEO.

Jeff Fager, CBS News chairman and "60 Minutes" executive producer, said "it's hard to imagine not having Andy around. He loved his life and he lived it on his own terms. We will miss him very much."

"60 Minutes" will end its broadcast Sunday with a tribute to Rooney by veteran correspondent Morley Safer.

For his final essay, Rooney said that he'd live a life luckier than most.

"I wish I could do this forever. I can't, though," he said.

He said he probably hadn't said anything on "60 Minutes" that most of his viewers didn't already know or hadn't thought. "That's what a writer does," he said. "A writer's job is to tell the truth."

True to his occasional crotchety nature, though, he complained about being famous or bothered by fans. His last wish from fans: If you see him in a restaurant, just let him eat his dinner.

Rooney was a freelance writer in 1949 when he encountered CBS radio star Arthur Godfrey in an elevator and ? with the bluntness millions of people learned about later ? told him his show could use better writing. Godfrey hired him and by 1953, when he moved to TV, Rooney was his only writer.

He wrote for CBS' Garry Moore during the early 1960s before settling into a partnership with Harry Reasoner at CBS News. Given a challenge to write on any topic, he wrote "An Essay on Doors" in 1964, and continued with contemplations on bridges, chairs and women.

"The best work I ever did," Rooney said. "But nobody knows I can do it or ever did it. Nobody knows that I'm a writer and producer. They think I'm this guy on television."

He became such a part of the culture that comic Joe Piscopo satirized Rooney's squeaky voice with the refrain, "Did you ever ..." Rooney never started any of his essays that way. For many years, "60 Minutes" improbably was the most popular program on television and a dose of Rooney was what people came to expect for a knowing smile on the night before they had to go back to work.

Rooney left CBS in 1970 when it refused to air his angry essay about the Vietnam War. He went on TV for the first time, reading the essay on PBS and winning a Writers Guild of America award for it.

He returned to CBS three years later as a writer and producer of specials. Notable among them was the 1975 "Mr. Rooney Goes to Washington," whose lighthearted but serious look at government won him a Peabody Award for excellence in broadcasting.

His words sometimes landed Rooney in hot water. CBS suspended him for three months in 1990 for making racist remarks in an interview, which he denied. Rooney, who was arrested in Florida while in the Army in the 1940s for refusing to leave a seat among blacks on a bus, was hurt deeply by the charge of racism.

Gay rights groups were mad, during the AIDS epidemic, when Rooney mentioned homosexual unions in saying "many of the ills which kill us are self-induced." Indians protested when Rooney suggested Native Americans who made money from casinos weren't doing enough to help their own people.

The Associated Press learned the danger of getting on Rooney's cranky side. In 1996, AP Television Writer Frazier Moore wrote a column suggesting it was time for Rooney to leave the broadcast. On Rooney's next "60 Minutes" appearance, he invited those who disagreed to make their opinions known. The AP switchboard was flooded by some 7,000 phone calls and countless postcards were sent to the AP mail room.

"Your piece made me mad," Rooney told Moore two years later. "One of my major shortcomings ? I'm vindictive. I don't know why that is. Even in petty things in my life I tend to strike back. It's a lot more pleasurable a sensation than feeling threatened.

"He was one of television's few voices to strongly oppose the war in Iraq after the George W. Bush administration launched it in 2002. After the fall of Baghdad in April 2003, he said he was chastened by its quick fall but didn't regret his "60 Minutes" commentaries.

"I'm in a position of feeling secure enough so that I can say what I think is right and if so many people think it's wrong that I get fired, well, I've got enough to eat," Rooney said at the time.

Andrew Aitken Rooney was born on Jan. 14, 1919, in Albany, N.Y., and worked as a copy boy on the Albany Knickerbocker News while in high school. College at Colgate University was cut short by World War II, when Rooney worked for Stars and Stripes.

With another former Stars and Stripes staffer, Oram C. Hutton, Rooney wrote four books about the war. They included the 1947 book, "Their Conqueror's Peace: A Report to the American Stockholders," documenting offenses against the Germans by occupying forces.

Rooney and his wife, Marguerite, were married for 62 years before she died of heart failure in 2004. They had four children and lived in New York, with homes in Norwalk, Conn., and upstate New York. Daughter Emily Rooney is a former executive producer of ABC's "World News Tonight." Brian was a longtime ABC News correspondent, Ellen a photographer and Martha Fishel is chief of the public service division of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

Services will be private, and it's anticipated CBS News will hold a public memorial later, Brian Rooney said Saturday.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2011-11-05-Obit-Rooney/id-375cea72391642c39fa40e797d20cd94

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Republican candidates court Iowa insiders (Reuters)

DES MOINES, Iowa (Reuters) ? Five Republican presidential hopefuls auditioned for Iowa's party insiders at a fund-raising dinner on Friday, sparing each other from criticism but dishing up plenty of red-meat attacks on Washington and President Barack Obama.

Two months before Iowa kicks off the battle for the Republican presidential nomination, the two candidates who led a recent state poll -- Herman Cain and Mitt Romney -- skipped the chance to address about 1,000 party activists.

The contenders who did appear -- Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Rick Santorum and Michele Bachmann -- promised a quick end to Washington's big-spending, big-government ways if they occupied the White House.

"Some want to reform Washington with a pair of tweezers. I'm for bringing a wrecking ball to Washington," said Perry, the Texas governor, joking the candidates were on "Operation Occupy the White House."

"What's lacking in Washington D.C. isn't ideas, what's lacking up there is courage," he said.

Bachmann, a U.S. representative from Minnesota, likened the federal government and its rate of spending to a canoe heading over Niagara Falls.

"What we need in our nominee for the Republican Party is someone who will stand up and say 'stop, no more,'" she said.

The five candidates are battling along with Cain for the allegiance of Iowa's big bloc of social conservatives, hoping a win here will position them as the conservative alternative to Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts.

Cain's table in the lobby of the dinner hall stayed busy, and his supporters said they were not deterred by his absence or by the sexual harassment allegations from the 1990s lodged against him. Cain has denied the charges.

"If there was any substance to these charges, where were they when he was polling at 5 percent?" asked Bonita Davis, a Cain supporter who is technical writer from Des Moines.

'NOT JUST TAXES AND SPENDING'

Santorum, a former U.S. senator, reminded the crowd he just completed visits to each of Iowa's 99 counties -- the first Republican candidate in this cycle to manage that. He emphasized his commitment to a conservative social agenda and promised to lead with a focus on faith and family.

"America is not just about taxes and spending, it's not just about the size of government," he said. "We can't have a strong economy without strong values."

Paul, a libertarian U.S. representative from Texas, stressed his commitment to bringing U.S. troops back from Afghanistan and other war zones.

"We don't need more weapons, we need a wiser foreign policy," Paul said. "We need to mind our own business, end these wars and start bringing our troops home."

Gingrich, a former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, praised his competitors at the dinner one by one, calling their proposals on the economy, taxes and repealing healthcare "powerful ideas."

"There has been a real effort to think through on the Republican side what we need to do to be competitive and to be prosperous," he said.

He also repeated his pledge to challenge Obama to a series of open-ended, unmoderated debates similar to the legendary Abraham Lincoln-Stephen Douglas Senate debates in 1858.

He said if Obama did not accept, he would follow the president around on the campaign trail "and wherever the president appears I will appear four hours later."

(Editing by Vicki Allen and Todd Eastham)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111105/pl_nm/us_usa_campaign_republicans

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Mars 500: Dry run to the Red Planet

The Mars 500 mission simulates a round trip to the Red Planet, without stepping foot off Earth. Almost a year and a half ago, six men entered the windowless isolation chamber at the Russian Institute for Biomedical Problems in Moscow. Since then, they have mimicked various stages of a Mars mission. On 4 November, they are due to come out.

Read more about the challenges of the journey, the excitement of the simulated Mars landing and how the ground crew is helping the inmates survive the experience.

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In Gaddafi's town, grim mood is good for sheep (Reuters)

SIRTE, Libya (Reuters) ? In the shattered Libyan town of Sirte, the hometown where Muammar Gaddafi met his end last month, the mood was grim on the eve of one of Islam's great festivals - the only good news was for the sheep.

As fellow Libyans prepared on Saturday to celebrate Eid al-Adha, the feast of sacrifice, by giving thanks for liberation from Gaddafi's rule with the ritual slaughter of tens of thousands of the beasts, those waiting their fate at a roadside market in Sirte were finding few buyers.

Sirte, once Gaddafi's favored "capital of Africa," lies in ruins. His tribal kin and loyal supporters in what became the last bastion of his 42 years of personal power were in no mood to join festivities that many Libyans will see as recalling the sacrifices of a war that has won them freedom.

"Who can celebrate Eid at a time like this?" grumbled Ali al-Saadeq, 48, as he joined a group of men eyeing up small flocks corralled in makeshift wire pens or huddled on the backs of farmers' pickup trucks by a highway on the edge of town.

"A revolution is supposed to turn things from bad to good," he said as sellers manhandled their bleating livestock to show off their qualities and tempt reluctant buyers complaining of empty pockets. "But so far, we haven't seen anything good.

"People don't have money to buy sheep," said al-Saadeq, noting the going rate was still a hefty $200-$300 a head. "People don't even have money to buy bread for their kids. Who has money now? The banks were all destroyed in Sirte."

A few animals were changing hands - Sunday's dawn will see families across the Muslim world cutting sheep's throats for festive meals that recall the story of God's favor to Abraham in sparing his son. But as these were trussed by the legs and slung into the trunks of cars, many more remained unsold.

HARD TIMES

Standing at the improvised market - like much of downtown Sirte the regular trade ground was destroyed in fighting and, locals say, by vindictive rebel forces from other towns - Taher al-Mansuri, a 33-year-old engineer, said he would make a purchase, but this year only to share a sheep with a neighbor.

The dislocation of the civil war meant he, like many in Sirte, had not been paid for months and the festivities of former times, when the once modest fishing village enjoyed patronage and cash from the Gaddafi clan, could not be matched.

Due to the revolt that began in February, the men said, they knew of no one locally who had managed to make the annual Haj pilgrimage to Mecca, whose end is marked by Eid al-Adha.

"It's not the right time for someone whose house has been destroyed or has lost a relative, blown up or shot," said Mansuri. "I don't think that a family would want to celebrate Eid when they have a relative also who is missing."

Though few were prepared to venture avowed nostalgia for Gaddafi - barely a mile from where he was captured, tormented and killed by fighters for the National Transitional Council (NTC) - the anger against his enemies bubbled over.

"They've rounded up prisoners and killed them," fumed Mehdi Juma, 40, referring to at least one case where international human rights monitors have accused NTC forces of suspected atrocities against pro-Gaddafi fighters who held on in Sirte for two months after the capital Tripoli was overrun.

Deep tribal and regional rivalries, notably between the people of Sirte and those of Misrata, Zawiya or Benghazi whose triumphant slogans are spray-painted across the bullet- and shell-scarred walls of Gaddafi's hometown, underlie fears that Libya, for all the postwar euphoria elsewhere, faces trouble in the future, even the risk of an insurgency or more civil war.

Unconfirmed reports in the area on Saturday spoke of two people killed near Sirte by suspected Gaddafi sympathizers. The talk added to a climate of fear that ubiquitous checkpoints and patrols by the motley forces backing the NTC have done little to alleviate, at any rate in the area around Sirte.

DEVASTATION

Inside the town itself, few residents appeared to have returned to homes, many of which have been damaged by fires as well as by explosions and the effects of shrapnel.

One group of young men, who said they were mostly students and supporters of the anti-Gaddafi cause, worked with a bulldozer to clear a street of rubble, but there was little other sign of activity. Many residents appeared still to be sheltering with relatives in the arid countryside round about.

The odd car passed along Sirte's seafront promenade, once a showcase for Gaddafi when he hosted international summits and foreign dignitaries. They crunched, cautiously, over blasted concrete and countless cartridge and shell cases.

Surveying the ruin of what had been his minimarket, 22-year-old Mohammed Mahfouz was in despair: "How can I fix this? There's no electricity, no water. It's beyond repair.

"A revolution that comes like this, wrecks buildings, steals and loots and writes obscene things on the walls of people's homes and destroys everything in its path and sets fire to houses, is this a revolution?

"I don't feel like it's Eid. It's just a normal day, a depressing day."

Along the street, where streetlights stand crooked in the warm sea breeze, reduced to the punctured texture of cheese-graters in testimony to the hails of metal that flew along the beachfront last month, Zia Mohammed, 36, stood disconsolate in the wreckage of her home, her children bewildered around her.

Husband Mohammed Ramadan, standing in the charred and still reeking wreckage of his sitting room, said it had been deliberately torched by NTC fighters who suspected him - wrongly, he said - of being a supporter of Gaddafi, a common complaint across the seaside town that is home to 100,000.

"We have nothing to give to the kids, nothing to eat," his wife Zia said. "We have no gas to cook with. We have nothing.

"Here, there is no Eid."

(Editing by Matthew Jones)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111105/wl_nm/us_haj_libya_sirte

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Genoa battered by flash floods, 6 die (AP)

ROME ? Torrential rains lashed Genoa and Italy's western coastline again Friday, triggering flash floods that killed at least six people as raging water uprooted trees and swept cars and furniture through the streets.

Flights were canceled or delayed and Saturday's soccer match against Inter Milan was postponed as the Marassi neighborhood around Genoa's stadium has been among the hardest hit areas of the city.

Luca Cari, spokesman for Genoa's fire department, told Italy's Sky TG24 that six people were confirmed dead and one person was missing. Two of the dead were reported to be children.

As two rivers broke their banks, authorities urged residents to move to the upper floors of buildings and warned that the worst could still come with rains forecast at least through Saturday.

"Oh God, it's a disaster, it's a disaster!" wailed one woman whose video of recycling bins, motorcycles and cars being swept along city streets was shown on RAI state television. "Oh God, it's a person," she said, zeroing in on an apparent corpse floating in the cappuccino-colored rivers of mud.

At least 10 people died in floods that swept the sea coast near Genoa on Oct. 28. The Cinque Terre, a top tourist attraction, has been digging out the mud ever since.

Much of northern Italy was hit by heavy rains Friday, and flooding was also reported in Venice.

In a sign of the seriousness of the problem, Premier Silvio Berlusconi gave Italy's civil protection chief extra authority to take whatever measures were necessary to provide assistance to affected residents.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111104/ap_on_re_eu/eu_italy_floods

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