Alex Je Bailey

Summer Ski Camp

Snow skiing is a group of sports using skis as primary equipment. Skis are used in conjunction with boots that connect to the ski with use of a binding. Skiing can be grouped into two general categories. Nordic skiing is the oldest and includes sport that evolved from skiing as done in Scandinavia. Nordic style bindings attach at the toes of the skier's boots but not at the heels. Alpine skiing includes sports that evolved from skiing as done in the Alps.

Alpine bindings attach at both the toe and the heel of the skier's boots. As with many disciplines, such as Telemark skiing, there is some crossover. However, binding style and history tend to dictate whether a style is considered Nordic or Alpine. Therefore, in view of its lack of a locking heel, and its roots in Telemark, Norway, Telemark is generally considered a Nordic discipline. To use common known sports as examples, since examples make the concept, cross country skiing is Nordic whereas downhill skiing is Alpine.

FRANKFURT (AFP) –
Air Berlin, Germany's second biggest airline after Lufthansa, on Tuesday reported that its net profit more than doubled in the third quarter of this year on a 12-month comparison.

The company posted a net profit of 95.2 million euros (141.4 million dollars) compared to 45.1 million euros in the third quarter last year.

"Despite the remaining risks with respect to the economic environment and the development of the economy, Air Berlin confirms its previous forecast that it will achieve a better operating result than in 2008," a statement said.

But the company also said its sales fell 8.2 percent in the third quarter to 974 million euros because of reduced capacity due to cost-cutting.

Air Berlin is set to publish its full quarterly results on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) –
People who have had repeated flu infections -- or repeated flu vaccines -- may have some protection against the new pandemic swine influenza, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

They found evidence that the human immune system can recognize bits of the new H1N1 virus that are similar to older, distantly related H1N1 strains.

"What we have found is that the swine flu has similarities to the seasonal flu, which appear to provide some level of pre-existing immunity. This suggests that it could make the disease less severe in the general population than originally feared," said Alessandro Sette, director of the Center for Infectious Disease at California's La Jolla Institute.

The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may also help explain why many older people are less likely to have severe disease, said Allison Deckhut-Augustine of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

"Adults may have some pre-existing immunity for H1N1," Deckhut-Augustine said in a telephone interview.

That does not mean older people are protected from infection, and Deckhut-Augustine stressed that people should still be vaccinated against H1N1.

Swine flu has infected millions of people globally and killed an estimated 3,900 in the United States alone, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Drug makers are struggling to make vaccines and governments are working to vaccinate their populations.

Bjoern Peters and colleagues at the La Jolla Institute looked at flu epitopes -- molecular markers or structures that the immune system recognizes -- dating back 20 years.

"We found that the immune system's T-cells can recognize a significant percent of the markers in swine flu," Peters said in a statement.

DUAL PROTECTION

The human immune system has two kinds of protection. Antibody response can prevent infection, while T-cells fight infection once it has occurred.

Peters and colleagues found T-cell protection but not antibody response.

"This T-cell response decreases severity of disease but doesn't prevent infection," said Deckhut-Augustine, whose agency helped pay for the study and maintains the public database that Peters used.

The effect could be cumulative, Peters said, which could explain why people over 50 seem to be less likely to get noticeable H1N1 infections.

"This may also suggest why children are more susceptible to severe infection and why they might need two boosts," Deckhut-Augustine said. "They haven't been around as long and they haven't been exposed to different strains of H1N1 as long as adults."

Influenza is a very mutation-prone virus and from year to year the circulating strains drift, or change slightly. This is why new vaccines must be formulated each year and why people can catch flu again and again.

The new H1N1 was a never-before-seen combination of swine flu viruses, with a sprinkling of human and avian flu virus genetic sequences. But its long-ago ancestor was an H1N1 virus first seen in the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed upwards of 50 million people.

The researchers found that the new H1N1 swine flu shared 49 percent of its epitopes with older, seasonal H1N1 strains.

Using blood from healthy donors, they found that T-cells could recognize about 17 percent of these markers.

(Editing by Eric Beech)

Fences can be the source of bitter arguments between neighbours, and there are often special laws to deal with these problems. Common disagreements include what kind of fence is required, what kind of repairs are needed, and how to share the costs.

Ownership of the fence varies. In some parts of the country all boundaries are shared; in other parts of the country you may own the boundary on the left-hand or right-hand side, however, only the title deeds can be depended on to tell you which side is yours. (A 'T' symbol indicates who is the owner). It used to be normal for the cladding to be on the non-owners side (enabling access to the posts for the owner when repairs need doing), but increasingly this cannot be depended on.

Fence Fort Worth

WASHINGTON – Attorneys for sniper mastermind John Allen Muhammad plan to file an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court in an effort to stop next week's execution.
Muhammad is scheduled to die by lethal injection Nov. 10 at a Virginia prison.
Attorneys for the 48-year-old have said they planned to file the appeal Tuesday. They asked Gov. Timothy M. Kaine for clemency last month.
Muhammad is to be executed for the slaying of Dean Harold Meyers at a Manassas, Va., gas station during a three-week killing spree in October 2002 that left 10 dead in Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia.
Muhammad and his teenage accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, were also suspected of fatal shootings in other states, including Louisiana and Alabama. Malvo is serving a life sentence in prison.

CHARLOTTE , North Carolina (AFP) –
Chinese forward Yi Jianlian of the New Jersey Nets injured his right knee in a 79-68 National Basketball Association loss to Charlotte.

Yi was hurt when he collided with Charlotte's Gerald Wallace in the third quarter. Yi dropped to the floor and stayed there for several minutes before he had to be helped to the team's dressing room.

"I fell on my knee and kind of twisted it a little bit," Yi said.

Yi, who had four points and six rebounds before the injury, will undergo a scan on Tuesday to determine the extent of the injury, although Nets coach Lawrence Frank said Yi's knee was only sprained.

Wallace scored 24 points and recorded a personal best 20 rebounds for Charlotte, which dropped the injury-depleted Nets to 0-4.

http://www.wholesalebodyoils.com/

WASHINGTON -- Twenty years ago, early in October, I found myself in East Berlin observing one of modern history's most incredible events.

The rulers of East Germany had called one of their regular demonstrations in favor of their particularly grotesque Communist regimen. There they stood, the leaders of this Potemkin police state, awaiting the usual applause in a lineup before East Berlin's Rotes Rathaus or Red City Hall.

It was a lovely fall day, and I was standing protectively near the back of the crowd when "it" started. The crowd of East Germans began to hiss and boo at their "leaders," to shake their fists, and finally to laugh at them and mock them. The lineup of cold-blooded men physically cringed. This had never happened before.

I thought to myself that day, "It's over; it's finally all over." And it was. I went back to the Grand Hotel on Unter den Linden, the East's premiere luxury hotel, and had a glass of wine, which had the contradictory effect of only sobering me up.

Within a month -- on Nov. 9, 1989 -- the Berlin Wall came down in an outburst of both rage and hope, and Easterners from north to south poured into the West, as Soviet Communism began its final fall. The 20th anniversary of that extraordinary event will be celebrated in a Festival of Freedom at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin this Nov. 7-9, but while we know WHAT happened that night two decades ago, there is still a great discussion as to how and why.

Some say the East Germans simply opened their grim and grotesquely armed checkpoints between East and West. Many say that the events were due, of course, to new Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev's policies of "opening" to the world. Large sectors here in Washington persist in giving all the credit to Ronald Reagan for the fall of Communism -- he terrified the Russians with his rearming, this argument goes.

In fact, party officials both in Moscow and East Berlin were totally unprepared for their own collapse. Meeting that same Nov. 9 in Moscow, the Soviet Politburo did not even discuss Berlin, but received a panicky report about collapse in the Baltics. And party officials in East Germany explained patiently to me that October that they were working on a new "social concept" of a reformed socialist state to be put into effect in November -- but there was no longer any time for such belated "planning."

On the surface, the movements of people were all accidental. That day an East German official, holding a press conference to give out new government travel policies, inadvertently announced that crossings to the West would be opened "without delay." A respected TV anchorman in West Berlin picked up that promise on his show, and word was passed from house to house and from person to person. But accidental?

From what I saw in those days and years, all during the '80s, the fall of the Soviet state and the freeing of Eastern Europe had become unavoidable. As I wrote then: "What happened after the high drama of reunification ... can now be seen as less accidental than inevitable. The West Germans substantially underestimated, as did most of the West, the disastrous shape of the Eastern economy. It also did not expect that the Soviet market, upon which East Germany depended, would also collapse, leaving a void that could not quickly be filled."

Four years later, I would go to Siemensstadt or Siemens City, in what was a suburb of East Berlin. There, the gigantic West German electronics empire, Siemens, had taken over plant after plant successfully. But managers also told me that, even though they had gone for years to East Germany's annual Leipzig industrial fair and thought they had a pretty good idea of Eastern industry, in fact they knew nothing about its sobering reality. East Germany's was an "isolated system" that brought about its own doom, and it was more like a "developing country" than a developed one.

For the next few years after the Wall fell, you heard nothing but complaints from both Easterners (the "griping Easterners," the Westerners called them) and Westerners (the "know-it-all Westerners," as the East Germans called them). Eastern salaries remained low for years, and 40 percent of the vote continued to go to the Communists. Men and women who had struggled to open those jammed gates now complained that they had no "identity."

Later -- on the 10th anniversary of the fall of The Wall, and beyond -- Western politicians would understand better why the Eastern assimilation to the West took so long. The Easterners had been politically weaned on both Nazism and Communism, and both had failed them. It would take a generation.

Meanwhile, the American administration immediately responsible, that of President George H.W. Bush and Secretary of State James Baker III, consciously practiced the very best diplomacy -- on the surface, at least, they took no part in the drama of the Wall. "I won't dance on the wall," President Bush said famously, and Gorbachev appreciated this, never blaming Washington for what happened.

Today, on this 20th anniversary, there are still many complaints about reunification on both sides of the disappeared wall -- but they are increasingly unimportant in light of today's highly successful united Germany.

Today's Germany has no territorial claims on anyone and only friends as neighbors. Its democracy has strengthened since 1989. Germany, including its Eastern states, has been totally integrated into Western structures, with Germany at the center of a European Union that now includes almost all the formerly Soviet-dominated states of Eastern Europe. Almost alone among the aggressor states of the 20th century, Germany has paid enormous sums to the survivors of its terror, thus establishing new norms of international behavior.

Who would have dreamed it?

MOUNT AIRY, N.C. – A soured love affair may have led an ex-convict to gun down four men in the town that inspired the idyllic community of Mayberry on the 1960s TV series "The Andy Griffith Show," police said Monday.
Marcos Chavez Gonzalez, 29, was charged with four counts of murder in the slayings late Sunday outside a television store in Mount Airy, about 100 miles north of Charlotte.
The four were shot with a high-powered assault rifle outside Wood's TV, in the shadow of a water tower that says "Welcome to Mount Airy" and has a picture of Griffith and Opie, his son on the show.
Police do not believe the shootings were random. Mount Airy Police Chief Dale Watson said officers are investigating several leads, including whether it was a contract killing or repercussions from a love affair gone bad.
"This is Mayberry ... Andy Griffith's house is in spitting distance here," said Michael Wood, one of the owners of Wood's TV.
The town, population 8,700, has built a tourist trade on nostalgia for the show that continues to thrive in syndication.
Watson identified the victims — all residents of the town — as Victor Alfonso Martinez-Jimenez, 22; Javier Manuel Martinez, 21; Juan Manuel Martinez, 26; and Marcos Oviedo Aguliar, 21.
Michelle Oviedo, 21, said her boyfriend and brother were among the dead and the alleged shooter is her mother's boyfriend. She said she was sitting on her porch not far from Wood's TV when she heard the gunshots.
"When I got there, Javier and my brother were already gone," she said. "They were on top of each other."
Jose Armando Hernandez, 46, said through a translator that three of the victims were his nephews. He said his family is "destroyed" over the deaths, which he said stemmed from a problem with a woman.
Gonzalez was arrested without incident at a motel about 50 miles northeast of the town, Henry County, Va., Sheriff Lane Perry said. He was unarmed when he surrendered just before 4 a.m. to officers who had surrounded the motel.
He was extradited from Virginia and was being held in the Surry County jail. Jail workers said it was not clear whether he had an attorney.
Watson said 16 shots were fired but the assault rifle had not been found.
"It was quite a crime scene," he said.
State prison records show Gonzalez was released more than two years ago after serving more than two years on a 2002 conviction for kidnapping a minor and a probation violation.
State records show the felony kidnapping charge required Gonzalez to register as a sex offender. North Carolina's post-release supervision of Gonzalez ended in June 2006 when he returned to prison after failing to stay in contact with a probation officer, Correction Department spokesman Keith Acree said.
Nursing supervisor Sue Coe at Northern Hospital of Surry County confirmed that two people died at the store around 2:30 p.m. Sunday. She said two who were wounded died at the hospital, just across the street from the store.
By Monday, someone had set up a makeshift memorial with flowers. Mourners gathered there and some women lay on the ground crying. Someone christened the memorial with a bottle of Corona beer, which sat half empty next to brightly colored candles with photos of saints on them.

Gary Chilton, an owner of Chilton Insurance Group, which shares the building with Wood's TV, said the crime is an anomaly. Andy Griffith doesn't live there any more, but the town is still quiet.

"I'm not sure it's totally sunk in because it's so unusual. On any given Sunday there is nothing here in this parking lot. There's nothing here at all," he said. "My biggest question is why in this parking lot at all. Why Wood's TV parking lot?"

___

Associated Press writers Emery Dalesio in Raleigh and Mitch Weiss in Charlotte contributed to this report.

KABUL (Reuters) –
Afghanistan will hardly have enough time to provide full security during a presidential election run-off in November, a senior official said on Thursday as preparations for the second round entered full swing.

With violence in Afghanistan at its worst levels in eight years of war, the run-off poll comes as U.S. President Barack Obama weighs whether to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan to battle a resurgent Taliban.

Afghanistan also faces a logistical nightmare ahead of the November 7 vote that pits incumbent Hamid Karzai against Abdullah Abdullah, his main challenger and a former foreign minister, with the harsh winter closing in fast.

Karzai agreed to the run-off this week after a U.N.-led fraud inquiry invalidated enough of his votes from the August 20 first round to push him below 50 percent and trigger the second round under Afghan electoral law.

Concerns about security and a repeat of the fraud that tainted the first round have already cast a large shadow after weeks of political uncertainty.

Daoud Ali Najafi, chief electoral officer of the government-appointed Independent Election Commission (IEC), said he was worried security forces would have enough time to make the thousands of polling stations safe for voters.

"I don't think they are able to secure (polling centres) in time for the second round. Security is really a big concern for us," Najafi said.

A string of attacks around the country during the first round kept many people away from polling stations even though the Taliban, who had vowed to disrupt the election, were not able to derail the vote completely.

URGENT STEPS

The coming onset of winter, which makes large parts of the mountainous country inaccessible, is also a big worry.

The International Republican Institute, whose observers monitored the August vote, urged Afghanistan and its foreign backers to take urgent steps to resolve security and other concerns.

"Afghanistan faces a number of challenges in preparing for and holding a run-off election," it said in a statement.

Najafi said he had held meetings with NATO and Afghanistan's defense and interior ministries and had submitted a list of polling centres which needed to be secured before polling day.

The U.N. mission in Afghanistan, which provides assistance with elections, has started distributing ballot materials around the country. It has already said many district officials would be replaced as part of efforts to prevent fraud.

The IEC has also vowed to prosecute anyone suspected of having committed fraud.

For the West, the election is a key element in efforts to stabilize Afghanistan and deny sanctuary to militants believed to have used it as a base for the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

In Bratislava, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen urged member states to step up their efforts to train and equip Afghan forces, warning that inaction would have serious consequences.

NATO, like Washington, eventually wants Afghan security to take over defense tasks, a mission Rasmussen said was vital for the security of the region.

The poll also poses a logistical challenge in the mountainous nation where election officials have to rely on U.N. planes, trucks and donkeys to deliver ballots to far flung locations.

As preparations unfolded, a military helicopter crashed in northern Afghanistan, causing casualties, a senior intelligence official said.

It was not yet clear whether the aircraft was Afghan or foreign.

(Writing by Maria Golovnina, Editing by Ron Popeski)

(For more Reuters coverage of Afghanistan and Pakistan, see: http://www.reuters.com/news/globalcoverage/afghanistanpakistan)

MOSCOW – The European Union's parliament on Thursday awarded its annual Sakharov Prize for freedom of thought to three prominent Russian rights activists, in recognition of the difficult conditions they face in defending human rights in Russia today.
The prize was awarded to Lyudmila Alexeyeva, Sergei Kovalyov and Oleg Orlov on behalf of the human rights organization Memorial and "all other human rights defenders in Russia," parliament President Jerzy Buzek said in announcing the prize in Brussels. All three recipients are leading critics of the Kremlin.
The group was founded two decades ago to memorialize the victims of Stalinist oppression but quickly expanded to cover a broad array of civil-society development issues.
"This award gives me great joy, because it is a recognition of the great achievements we, the Russian rights movement as a whole, have made despite the hardships we have suffered," said Orlov, 56, who heads Memorial.
Human rights activists and journalists who work with them have been threatened, beaten and in some cases killed in recent years. Natalya Estemirova, a Memorial activist in Chechnya, was abducted and killed in July.
"In the last few years they have simply started killing us off," Orlov said.
Estemirova was nominated for the prize alongside Kovalyov in 2004.
"This is a prize for her," Orlov said.
Alexeyeva, 82, and Kovalyov, 79, were both leading Soviet dissidents and have continued to lead the fight for democracy and human rights in Russia.
"This is a very great honor," said Alexeyeva, who heads the Moscow Helsinki Group "It is from the European Union, which has exactly the kind of respect for human rights that we fight for every day in Russia."
"But it is sad, in a way, also," Alexeyeva said, recalling that the last time she shared an international award with Kovalyov — the Olof Palme Prize in 2004 — Anna Politkovskaya was a co-recipient. Politkovskaya, a journalist who exposed corruption and rights abuses in Chechnya, was shot dead in Moscow in 2006.
"Things are easier than they were in Soviet days. Though these days opponents are sometimes killed rather than imprisoned," Alexeyeva said.
Kovalyov, who spent seven years in the Gulag, has been unyielding in his criticism of the new Russia and Vladimir Putin, who rolled back many of the democratic achievements of the 1990s.
Kovalyov and Alexeyeva are contemporaries of the late Andrei Sakharov, the Soviet dissident for whom the prize is named.
The Sakharov Prize is considered the EU's top rights award and comes with a euro50,000 honorarium. It will be awarded Dec. 16 at the EU parliament in Strasbourg, France.
The prize has been awarded since 1988, and previous winners include former South African President Nelson Mandela, East Timorese leader Xanana Gusmao and Cuban dissident Oswaldo Paya.
Often the prize has chilled relations with the government of the recipient's country. Last year, China's government reacted angrily when the jailed dissident Hu Jia won. Beijing called him a criminal and said the Sakharov award amounted to political interference.
The major political groups in the European Parliament welcomed the announcement.

"Twenty years after the fall of the Iron Curtain, this historic moment sends a strong signal to EU leaders meeting in Brussels next week to also speak with one voice on the critical question of human rights in Russia," said Rebecca Harms, the co-president of the Greens/EFA group.

"I also hope that this year's Sakharov Prize will boost the EU's resolve to prioritize the human rights issue at next month's EU-Russia summit," she added. The leaders of both sides will meet in Stockholm on Nov. 18.

____

Associated Press writer Raf Casert in Brussels contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON – Americans seem to be cooling toward global warming.
Just 57 percent think there is solid evidence the world is getting warmer, down 20 points in just three years, a new poll says. And the share of people who believe pollution caused by humans is causing temperatures to rise has also taken a dip, even as the U.S. and world forums gear up for possible action against climate change.
In a poll of 1,500 adults by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, released Thursday, the number of people saying there is strong scientific evidence that the Earth has gotten warmer over the past few decades is down from 71 percent in April of last year and from 77 percent when Pew started asking the question in 2006. The number of people who see the situation as a serious problem also has declined.
The steepest drop has occurred during the past year, as Congress and the Obama administration have taken steps to control heat-trapping emissions for the first time and international negotiations for a new treaty to slow global warming have been under way. At the same time, there has been mounting scientific evidence of climate change — from melting ice caps to the world's oceans hitting the highest monthly recorded temperatures this summer.
The poll was released a day after 18 scientific organizations wrote Congress to reaffirm the consensus behind global warming. A federal government report Thursday found that global warming is upsetting the Arctic's thermostat.
Only about a third, or 36 percent of the respondents, feel that human activities — such as pollution from power plants, factories and automobiles — are behind a temperature increase. That's down from 47 percent from 2006 through last year's poll.
"The priority that people give to pollution and environmental concerns and a whole host of other issues is down because of the economy and because of the focus on other things," suggested Andrew Kohut, the director of the research center, which conducted the poll from Sept. 30 to Oct. 4. "When the focus is on other things, people forget and see these issues as less grave."
Andrew Weaver, a professor of climate analysis at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, said politics could be drowning out scientific awareness.
"It's a combination of poor communication by scientists, a lousy summer in the Eastern United States, people mixing up weather and climate and a full-court press by public relations firms and lobby groups trying to instill a sense of uncertainty and confusion in the public," he said.
Political breakdowns in the survey underscore how tough it could be to enact a law limiting pollution emissions blamed for warming. While three-quarters of Democrats believe the evidence of a warming planet is solid, and nearly half believe the problem is serious, far fewer conservative and moderate Democrats see the problem as grave. Fifty-seven percent of Republicans say there is no solid evidence of global warming, up from 31 percent in early 2007.
Though there are exceptions, the vast majority of scientists agree that global warming is occurring and that the primary cause is a buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels, such as oil and coal.
Jane Lubchenco, head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told a business group meeting at the White House Thursday: "The science is pretty clear that the climate challenge before us is very real. We're already seeing impacts of climate change in our own backyards."
Despite misgivings about the science, half the respondents still say they support limits on greenhouse gases, even if they could lead to higher energy prices. And a majority — 56 percent — feel the United States should join other countries in setting standards to address global climate change.
But many of the supporters of reducing pollution have heard little to nothing about cap-and-trade, the main mechanism for reducing greenhouse gases favored by the White House and central to legislation passed by the House and a bill the Senate will take up next week.
Under cap-and-trade, a price is put on each ton of pollution, and businesses can buy and sell permits to meet emissions limits.
"Perhaps the most interesting finding in this poll ... is that the more Americans learn about cap-and-trade, the more they oppose cap-and-trade," said Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., who opposes the Senate bill and has questioned global warming science.
Regional as well as political differences were detected in the polling.
People living in the Midwest and mountainous areas of the West are far less likely to view global warming as a serious problem and to support limits on greenhouse gases than those in the Northeast and on the West Coast. Both the House and Senate bills have been drafted by Democratic lawmakers from Massachusetts and California.

One of those lawmakers, Sen. Barbara Boxer of California, told reporters Thursday that she was happy with the results, given the interests and industry groups fighting the bill.

"Today, to get 57 percent saying that the climate is warming is good, because today everybody is grumpy about everything," Boxer said. "Science will win the day in America. Science always wins the day."

Earlier polls, from different organizations, have not detected a growing skepticism about the science behind global warming.

Since 1997, the percentage of Americans that believe the Earth is heating up has remained constant — at around 80 percent — in polling done by Jon Krosnick of Stanford University. Krosnick, who has been conducting surveys on attitudes about global warming since 1993, was surprised by the Pew results.

He described the decline in the Pew results as "implausible," saying there is nothing that could have caused it.

The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 3 percentage points.

___

Associated Press writers Seth Borenstein and Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

___

On the Net:

The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press: http://www.people-press.org

(This version adds corrected graphic.)

Smelly Washers

Removal of soap and water from the clothing after washing was originally a separate process. The soaking wet clothing would be formed into a roll and twisted by hand to extract water. To help reduce this labour, the wringer/mangle was developed, which uses two rollers under spring tension to squeeze water out of the clothing. Each piece of clothing would be fed through the wringer separately. The first wringers were hand-operated, but were eventually included as a powered attachment above the washer tub. The wringer would be swung over the wash tub so that extracted wash water would fall back into the tub to be reused for the next wash load.

The modern process of water removal by spinning did not come into use until electric motors were developed. Spinning requires a constant high-speed power source, and was originally done in a separate device known as an extractor. A load of washed clothing would be transferred from the wash tub to the extractor basket, and the water spun out. These early extractors were often dangerous to use since unevenly distributed loads would cause the machine to shake violently. Many efforts have been made to counteract the shaking of unstable loads, first by mounting the spinning basket on a free-floating shock-absorbing frame to absorb minor imbalances, and a bump switch to detect severe movement and stop the machine so that the load can be manually redistributed. Many modern machines are equipped with a sealed ring of liquid that works to counteract any imbalances.

OWINGS MILLS, Md. – The NFL fined Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis $25,000 on Friday for two separate plays, including a helmet-to-helmet hit on Cincinnati Bengals receiver Chad Ochocinco.
The Ravens said Lewis will appeal the fine.
Both plays occurred in the fourth quarter of Baltimore's 17-14 loss on Sunday. The league deemed that Lewis "unnecessarily kicked the opponent" and later "unnecessarily struck a defenseless receiver."
During the latter play, Lewis hit Ochocinco after a pass from Carson Palmer sailed incomplete, and the 15-yard penalty for unnecessary roughness helped set up the winning touchdown with 22 seconds remaining.
Ochocinco lost his helmet during the collision, but immediately popped up from the turf. After the game, the boisterous receiver used his Twitter account to ask NFL commissioner Roger Goodell for leniency.
"Please don't fine Ray Lewis Mr. Roger Goodell, it was a clean hit, it's part of the game, save the fines for me," Ochocinco wrote.
Asked Wednesday if he expected to be fined, Lewis replied, "Probably."
But the standout middle linebacker said that's just how he plays the game.
"If I had to change anything, I would do it the same way I've done it," Lewis said. "I will never slow down my speed, the way I play this game. I've never played this game to hurt anybody.
"But the bottom line is, when I turn to go, I'm like a missile. When I'm locked in, I'm locked in. Whatever's there is there. Worrying about fines and all that, I'll let that take care of itself. The NFL does a great job with that. You call them and discuss it with them."
On Friday, Lewis said, "I'm not talking about no fine."
Coach John Harbaugh said, "I'm disappointed. You hate to see that."
Asked about the play in which Lewis allegedly kicked a player, Harbaugh said, "It was an inadvertent trip that happened."
Harbaugh added: "Ray Lewis is a tough, a physical guy. Ray Lewis is also as a great a sportsman as I've met. He plays good, clean football. I guarantee you the shot on Ochocinco was in the strike zone. I want to stand behind Ray in that sense."

ST. CLAIRSVILLE, Ohio – Trial dates have been set for two eastern Ohio police chiefs accused of snooping on a surrogate mother for actress Sarah Jessica Parker and actor Matthew Broderick.
Martins Ferry Chief Barry Carpenter and Police Chief Chad Dojack from neighboring Bridgeport are accused in an alleged scheme to take things from the Martins Ferry home of the woman who recently carried twins girls for Parker and Broderick.
On Friday, Carpenter's trial was set for Nov. 16 and Dojack's for Jan. 12 in Belmont County Common Pleas Court.
A special prosecutor said the chiefs, who are charged with several felonies, tried to sell items to celebrity photographers. Carpenter and Dojack have pleaded not guilty.
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Information from: WTOV-TV, http://www.wtov9.com

A chiptune, or chip music, is music written in sound formats where all the sounds are synthesized in realtime by a computer or video game console sound chip, instead of using sample-based synthesis. The "golden age" of chiptunes was the mid 1980s to early 1990s, when such sound chips were the most common method for creating music on computers. Chiptunes are closely related to video game music, which often featured chiptunes out of necessity. The term has also been recently applied to more recent compositions that attempt to recreate the chiptune sound for purely aesthetic reasons, albeit with more complex technology.

For the above reasons the classic chiptune 8-bit sound can be recognised from its synthesised square or pulse wave instruments, simple white noise percussion and heavy use of ultra-fast arpeggios to emulate chords of three or four notes on a single channel (due to hardware limitations, several notes must be placed on the same channel).

Voice Chips

A gift or present is the transfer of something, without the need for compensation that is involved in trade. A gift is a voluntary act which does not require anything in return. Even though it involves possibly a social expectation of reciprocity, or a return in the form of prestige or power, a gift is meant to be free.

In many human societies, the act of mutually exchanging money, goods, etc. may contribute to social cohesion. Economists have elaborated the economics of gift-giving into the notion of a gift economy.

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LAUSANNE, Switzerland – Three cities have formally applied to host the 2018 Winter Olympics.
The International Olympic Committee says Munich, the French city of Annecy and the South Korean resort of Pyeongchang submitted their bids by Friday's deadline.
After an initial evaluation process, the IOC executive board will decide next June which cities to accept as official candidates.
The full IOC will select the 2018 host city at its session in Durban, South Africa, on July 6, 2011.
Munich, which held the 1972 Summer Olympics, aims to become the first city to host both the summer and winter games. Pyeongchang is bidding for the third straight time after narrowly losing out for the 2010 and 2014 Winter Olympics.

(Reuters) –
U.S. stock index futures pointed to a higher open on Wall Street on Friday, as investors awaited key earnings reports from conglomerate General Electric (GE.N) and Bank of America (BAC.N).

At 3.56 a.m. EDT, futures for the S&P 500 were up 0.28 percent, Dow Jones futures were up 0.31 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures were up 0.4 percent.

The tech sector will be in focus after Google (GOOG.O) and IBM (IBM.N) reported robust results that beat expectations, soothing concerns over the health of the technology sector after Nokia, the world's top cellphone maker, reported its worst ever result.

Google stock traded in Frankfurt (GOOGa.F) was up 3.8 percent, while IBM stock traded in Frankfurt (IBM.F) was down 2.4 percent.

Also after the bell on Thursday, Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD.N) posted a narrower-than-expected loss and said it has turned its core chipmaking business profitable, but the results failed to excite investors, who sold off its shares in extended trade. AMD shares traded in Frankfurt (AMD.F) were down 2.7 percent.

Callaway Golf Co (ELY.N) forecast a weak third-quarter, weighed down by charges and a stronger U.S. dollar, sending its shares down 4 percent in after market trade.

U.S. trade regulators could require major concessions in exchange for approving a proposed merger between concert promoter Live Nation Inc (LYV.N) and ticketing giant Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc (TKTM.O), sources told the Wall Street Journal on Thursday.

Energy shares will be in the spotlight as crude oil futures rose up for a seventh session just below $78 a barrel on Friday, after touching a one-year high earlier on an unexpectedly steep drop in U.S. oil product stocks and weakness in the dollar.

Japan's Nikkei stock average clawed up 0.2 percent on Friday to a three-week closing high, while European stocks are up 0.7 percent in morning trade in a broad rally, led by energy shares such as BP (BP.L) and Total (TOTF.PA).

The first stage of the U.S. economic recovery is coming along better-than-expected but the rebound may be prolonged as consumers save more and businesses clean up their balance sheets, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Thursday.

The enormous amounts of liquidity pumped into the U.S. financial system by the Federal Reserve are not inflationary "at the moment" but will become so at some point, Paul Volcker, the former Fed chairman and a White House adviser, said on Thursday.

The day's economic agenda includes the Federal Reserve's industrial production and capacity utilization data for September, due at 1315 GMT, and the Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers' preliminary October consumer sentiment index, due at 1355 GMT.

The U.S. construction industry should see modest gains in 2010, with the building of single-family houses, apartment buildings, highways and bridges on the rise, offsetting drops in commercial and manufacturing property, the Wall Street Journal said, citing an industry report.

Late-day strength drove U.S. stocks to 2009 highs on Thursday as rising oil prices lifted energy shares, eclipsing the banking sector's retreat after investors panned earnings from Goldman Sachs and Citigroup. Indexes once again set highs for the year and the Dow held above the 10,000 mark after breaching it for the first time in a year on Wednesday.

The Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) added 47.08 points, or 0.47 percent, to end at 10,062.94. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) gained 4.54 points, or 0.42 percent, to 1,096.56. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) edged up 1.06 points, or 0.05 percent, to close at 2,173.29.

(Reporting by Blaise Robinson; editing by Simon Jessop)

Most of (but not all) chip sounds are synthesised by simply dividing a clock square wave to get a square wave of desired frequency, and sometimes using a sawtooth/triangle wave from volume LFO or an (ADSR) envelope to get some kind of ring modulation. LFOs are used to control or influence a sound parameter such as pitch or filters in a repeating cycle.

More recent "old school" or "demostyle" MOD music, although sample-based, continues the style of the chiptunes used in these intros; new compositions in this style can still be regularly found at www.chiptune.com or www.chip-on.com (new chiptunes from old computers/formats can be found here as well).

Visit Site

AMSTERDAM – It's not green cheese, but it might as well be.
The Dutch national museum said Thursday that one of its prized possessions, a rock supposedly brought back from the moon by U.S. astronauts, is just a piece of petrified wood.
Rijksmuseum spokeswoman Xandra van Gelder, who oversaw the investigation that proved the piece was a fake, said the museum will keep it anyway as a curiosity.
"It's a good story, with some questions that are still unanswered," she said. "We can laugh about it."
The museum acquired the rock after the death of former prime minister Willem Drees in 1988. Drees received it as a private gift on Oct. 9, 1969 from then-U.S. ambassador J. William Middendorf during a visit by the three Apollo 11 astronauts, part of their "Giant Leap" goodwill tour after the first moon landing.
Middendorf, who lives in Rhode Island, told Dutch NOS news that he had gotten it from the U.S. State Department, but couldn't recall the exact details.
The U.S. Embassy in the Hague said it was investigating the matter.
The museum had vetted the moon rock early on by checking with NASA, Van Gelder said.
She said the space agency told the museum then that it was possible the country had received a rock: NASA gave moon rocks to more than 100 countries in the early 1970s, but those were from later missions.
"Apparently no one thought to doubt it, since it came from the prime minister's collection," Van Gelder said.
The rock is not usually on display; the museum is primarily known for its paintings and other works of fine art by masters such as Rembrandt.
It was on show in 2006 and a space expert informed the museum it was unlikely NASA would have given away any moon rocks three months after Apollo returned to Earth.
Researchers from Amsterdam's Free University said they could see at a glance the rock was not from the moon.
"It's a nondescript, pretty-much-worthless stone," Geologist Frank Beunk said in an article published by the museum.
He said it was worth no more than euro50 ($70).

HARARE (AFP) –
South African President Jacob Zuma travels to Zimbabwe on Thursday in a bid to ease tensions within the strained unity government, though analysts held out little hope for a breakthrough.

During his two-day visit, Zuma will meet with long-ruling President Robert Mugabe and his partner in government, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.

The political rivals formed a unity government in February but remain deadlocked noteably over the appointment of the Central Bank chief and the attorney general.

Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) also says the party's supporters are still harassed by police, despite guarantees of political freedoms in the unity accord.

"We hope that his visit will unlock and unblock the political logjam in our country," said MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa.

Mugabe's party, however, blames western sanctions for undermining the government and sees the MDC concerns as a distraction, said Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa.

"Our position is very clear. We hope our principal, President Robert Mugabe, tells President Zuma that the outstanding issues are that of sanctions and external interference," Chinamasa told AFP.

"The so-called outstanding issues, which are the issues of the (Central Bank) governor and the attorney general, are nowhere in the Global Political Agreement," said Chinamasa, who was Mugabe's lead negotiator in the unity talks.

"This is meant to distract attention from the inclusive government," Chinamasa added.

Ahead of his trip, the secretary general of Zuma's African National Congress (ANC) told reporters that the president plans to be vocal about Zimbabwe's problems, in contrast to the "quiet diplomacy" of his predecessor Thabo Mbeki.

"President Zuma will be more vocal in terms of what we see as deviant behaviour," Gwede Mantashe told reporters. "If there is deviant behaviour, we will be more vocal... but we will still engage."

While Mantashe avoided criticising Mugabe directly, he rattled off a list of problems that could be laid at the ageing leader's feet, including the harassment of MDC lawmakers and the violence in last year's presidential elections.

South Africa, Zimbabwe's biggest trading partner, is a key backer of the unity deal. Zuma's findings will likely inform discussions at the next summit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) next month.

"President Zuma will be determined to use the visit to solve the outstanding issues" in the unity government, political analyst Okay Machisa said.

"He has a road map on the issues of Zimbabwe and he would want the local politicians to address the welfare of the people and not address their selfish needs."

Tsvangirai met Zuma in Johannesburg three weeks ago to brief him on the troubles within the unity government.

On Mugabe's side, the 85-year-old leader faces pressure within his own ZANU-PF to avoid any further compromises that would further erode the party's power.

The party's politburo earlier this month publicly called on Mugabe "to resist any pressures intended to prejudice the party."

The feuding has hindered Zimbabwe's drive to win 8.3 billion US dollars in aid to revive the civil service and jump start the shattered economy.

To date the inclusive government has raised just over two billion dollars, mostly coming from continental organisations and China.

One South African government official, in Harare ahead of the trip, insisted Zuma was coming to seek compromise.

"There are issues which have to be addressed, but as South Africa we believe that every problem presents a new opportunity," the official told AFP.

"Zimbabwe is far much better today than what it was last year, so we believe a compromise will eventually be found."

HYANNIS PORT, Mass. – The greatest heights eluded Ted Kennedy over a lifetime of achievement and pain. No presidency. No universal health care, chief among his causes.
Instead, Kennedy built his Washington monument stone by stone, his imprint distinct on the Senate's most important works over nearly half a century. He toiled across the Potomac River from the graveyard of his fallen brothers.
The last of the Kennedys who fascinated the nation with their ambition, style, idealism, tragedies — and sometimes sheer recklessness — Edward Moore Kennedy died late Tuesday night at 77. A black shroud and vase of white roses sat Wednesday on his Senate desk, which John Kennedy had used before him.
So dropped the final curtain on "Camelot," the already distant era of the Kennedy dynasty.
The Massachusetts senator's extended political family of fellow Democrats and rival Republicans, steeled for his death since his brain-tumor diagnosis a year ago yet still jarred by it, joined in mourning. Kennedy was the Senate's dominant liberal and one of its legendary dealmakers.
Just last year he jumped into a fractious Democratic presidential nomination fight to side with Barack Obama, giving the Illinois senator a boost that had the air of a family anointment.
"For his family, he was a guardian," Obama said Wednesday. "For America, he was a defender of a dream."
The president, vacationing in Martha's Vineyard, was awakened after 2 a.m. and told of Kennedy's death. He spoke soon after with the senator's widow, Victoria, and ordered flags flown at half-staff on all federal buildings.
Kennedy will be buried Saturday at Arlington National Cemetery after a funeral Mass in Boston, where Obama is to deliver a eulogy.
Kennedy will lie in repose at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston before that.
Also buried at Arlington, the military cemetery overlooking the capital city, are John and Robert Kennedy; John Kennedy's wife, Jacqueline; their baby son, Patrick, who died after two days, and their stillborn child.
To Americans and much of the world, Kennedy was best known as the last surviving son of the nation's most glamorous political family. Of nine children born to Joseph and Rose Kennedy, Jean Kennedy Smith is the only one alive.
To senators of both parties, he was one of their own.
"Even when you expect it, even when you know it's coming, in this case it hurts a great deal," said Democrat Patrick Leahy of Vermont.
Politicians also calculated the consequences for Obama's push for expanded health coverage. For several months, at least, Kennedy's death will deprive the Democrats of a vote that could prove crucial for his signature cause of health reform.
His illness had sidelined him from an intense debate that would have found him at the core any other time. Conservative Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, his improbable Republican partner on children's health insurance, volunteerism, student aid and more, said the Senate probably would have had a health care deal by now if Kennedy had been healthy enough to work with him.
"Iconic, larger than life," Hatch said of his friend. "We were like fighting brothers."
He was the last of the famous Kennedy brothers: John the assassinated president, Robert the assassinated senator and presidential candidate, Joseph the aviator killed in action in World War II when Ted was 12.

He lost his sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, less than two weeks ago, saw the bright promise of nephew John F. Kennedy Jr. end in a plane crash in 1999 and struggled with excesses of his own until he became a settled elder statesman.

Like Obama, Kennedy was a master orator. But the words that live for the ages seem to be those he uttered in tragedy or defeat.

Older Americans remember his eulogy of Robert Kennedy, when he asked history not to idealize his brother but remember him "simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it."

Remembered, too, is his speech conceding the 1980 Democratic presidential nomination to the incumbent Jimmy Carter. "For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives and the dream shall never die," he said.

By then, his hopes of reaching the White House had been damaged by his behavior a decade earlier in the scandal known as Chappaquiddick.

On the night of July 18, 1969, Kennedy drove his car off a bridge and into a pond on Chappaquiddick Island, on Martha's Vineyard, and swam to safety while companion Mary Jo Kopechne drowned in the car. He pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident; a judge said his actions probably contributed to the young woman's death. He received a suspended sentence and probation.

Kennedy's legislative legacy includes health insurance for children of the working poor, the landmark 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act, family leave and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. He was also key to passage of the No Child Left Behind Education law and a Medicare drug benefit for the elderly, both championed by Republican President George W. Bush.

In the Senate, Republicans respected and often befriended him. But his essential liberalism marked him as a lightning rod, too. He proved a handy fundraising foil motivating Republicans to open their wallets to fight anything he stood for.

In 1980, Kennedy's task of dislodging a president of his own party was compounded by his fumbling answer to a question posed by CBS' Roger Mudd: Why do you want to be president?

"Well, I'm, uh, were I to, to make the, the announcement, to run, the reasons that I would run is because I have a great belief in this country," he began.

It's a question that all savvy politicians ever since make sure won't catch them unprepared.

In his later years, Kennedy cut a barrel-chested profile, with a swath of white hair, a booming voice and a thick, widely imitated Boston accent. He coupled fist-pumping floor speeches with charm and formidable negotiating skills.

"I think that once he realized he was never going to be president — that that was not the legacy he had to follow — he really worked at becoming the best senator he possibly could," Leahy said. "And he did."

He was first elected to the Senate in 1962, taking the seat that his brother John had occupied before winning the White House, and he served longer than all but two senators in history.

Kennedy was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor in May 2008 and underwent surgery and a grueling regimen of radiation and chemotherapy.

He made a surprise return to the Capitol last summer to cast a decisive vote for the Democrats on Medicare. He made sure he was there again in January to see his former Senate colleague sworn in as president but suffered a seizure at a celebratory luncheon afterward.

His survivors include a daughter, Kara Kennedy Allen; two sons, Edward Jr. and Patrick, a congressman from Rhode Island, and two stepchildren, Caroline and Curran Raclin.

Edward Jr. lost a leg to bone cancer in 1973 at age 12. Kara had a cancerous tumor removed from her lung in 2003. In 1988, Patrick had a non-cancerous tumor pressing on his spine removed. He also has struggled with depression and addiction and recently spent time at an addiction treatment center.

___

Woodward reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Laurie Kellman in Washington, Philip Elliott in Oak Bluffs, Mass., and Bob Salsberg contributed to this report.

___

On the Net:

Kennedy's office: http://kennedy.senate.gov

WASHINGTON, Aug 26, 2009 (AFP) –
US Senator Jim Webb, back from a rare trip to Myanmar, called sanctions against the military regime "overwhelmingly counterproductive" and asked the opposition to consider taking part in upcoming elections.

Webb, whose against-the-grain views on Myanmar have infuriated some activists, voiced concern that Western isolation of Myanmar pushed it into the arms of China, "furthering a dangerous strategic imbalance in the region."

The United States and European Union have imposed sanctions on Myanmar, earlier known as Burma, due to its refusal to recognize the last elections in 1990 and prolonged detention of the victor, democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

"While the political motivations behind this approach are laudable, the result has been overwhelmingly counterproductive," Webb wrote Wednesday in The New York Times.

"The ruling regime has become more entrenched and at the same time more isolated. The Burmese people have lost access to the outside world," said Webb, who on August 15 became the first US official to meet the junta's reclusive leader Than Shwe.

Webb said he opposed lifting sanctions due to US economic interests or "if such a decision were seen as a capitulation of our long-held position that Myanmar should abandon its repressive military system in favor of democratic rule.

"But it would be just as bad for us to fold our arms, turn our heads and pretend that by failing to do anything about the situation in Myanmar we are somehow helping to solve it," he said.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Webb's views are "something we're going to be looking at" in a review of Myanmar policy initiated after President Barack Obama took office.

The Obama team has been skeptical about sanctions as a diplomatic tool and supports engagement with US foes, although the State Department earlier assured Aung San Suu Kyi supporters in Congress it was not looking to open trade with Myanmar.

Webb, a gruff Vietnam veteran and author who belongs to Obama's Democratic Party, said the United States could offer to help Myanmar carry out elections next year.

Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy has denounced the vote -- the first since the 1990 polls -- as a sham, particularly as the Nobel laureate remains under house arrest.

But Webb said the opposition party "might consider the advantages of participation as part of a longer-term political strategy."

"There is room for engagement" between the United States and Myanmar, Webb wrote. "Many Asian countries -- China among them -- do not even allow opposition parties."

Webb, who heads the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on Asia, won the freedom of a troubled American who had been jailed in Myanmar for swimming to Aung San Suu Kyi's home.

But Myanmar democracy activists have been livid. Pyinya Zawta, a prominent monk who lives in exile in the United States after being jailed for leading pro-democracy protests, said Webb is "despised by the people of Burma."

"Webb claims that the Burmese people would benefit from interaction with the outside world, as if we need to be condescendingly 'taught' by Americans about our rights and responsibilities," Zawta wrote in The Irrawaddy, a newsmagazine set up by Myanmar exiles in Thailand.

"Had Webb spent some time with real Burmese people apart from the military regime and others who share his views, he would better understand the sacrifice we made for democracy," he said.

Walter Lohman, director of the Asian Studies Center at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think-tank, also faulted Webb on sanctions, saying that China and Southeast Asian nations provided a lifeline to Myanmar.

"It is demonstrably true that American sanctions have not brought about change in Burma," Lohman said.

"But the answer lies in building the necessary international consensus to pressure it, not abandoning the effort," he said.

Cap Cana is a tourism development with an investment of upwards of two billion dollars in the eastern lands of the Dominican Republic. This area renown for its great hotels and beaches, lacks exclusivity to the high upper class which Cap Cana hopes, in part, to offer. The area was conceived with the backing both financially and publicly of "elites" such as Donald Trump, Jack Nicklaus, and other holders.

Cap Cana's area includes more than one-hundred and twenty millon square meters of land, of which twenty-five million will be developed in its first phase. It also includes 8 kilometers of beach and coasts, 5 of which are considered to be among the most spectacular in the Caribbean, locally considered to be neck-in-neck to the beaches of Bahia de Las Aguilas (literally, Bay of the Eagles) located in the southwestern municipality of Perdernales- often referred by past visitors as some of the most beautiful in the world.

Dominican Republic Villa

WASHINGTON (Reuters) –
U.S. sales of existing homes likely rose to their highest level in 10 months in July, according to a Reuters poll, as buyers rushed to take advantage of a tax credit for first-time homeowners.

The survey of 61 economists predicted sales of previously owned homes climbed to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5 million in July, the briskest pace since 5.1 million units were sold in September, from 4.89 million units in June.

That would also mark the fourth straight monthly gain in home resales.

As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Obama administration has made up to $8,000 available to qualifying taxpayers who buy homes this year. The program, credited for the signs of a turn around in the three-year housing slump is scheduled to end in November.

Adding to the picture of a steadily improving resale housing market were still relatively low mortgage rates, an improving economic outlook, and the fifth straight monthly rise in pending home sales, analysts said.

The National Association of Realtors will release U.S. existing-home sales data on Friday at 10 a.m. EDT.

The following is a selection of comments from economists.:

BMO CAPITAL MARKETS

Forecast: 4.99 million units

"Affordability looks good, though it's off record highs because of firming mortgage rates and sagging incomes. Cheap, foreclosed properties still account for roughly one-third of sales, but overall demand is starting to revive."

JPMORGAN CHASE BANK

Forecast: 4.95 million units

"This would be the fourth consecutive rise and, if realized, sales would be roughly back in line with the level that prevailed from the fall of 2007 to October 2008. Gains in affordability over the last year, more foreclosure sales, and an improving economy could then lift sales further later in the year."

MOODY'S ECONOMY.COM

Forecast: 4.99 million units

"Existing home sales will probably continue to firm in coming months as the economy begins to rebound, more foreclosures come on to the market, and prospective buyers take advantage of increased affordability. One possible concern is an apparent increase in the share of contracts falling through and not being counted as home resales. The increase in the share of scuttled contacts is apparently being caused by new rules that produce more conservative valuations, and have prevented some potential home buyers from obtaining financing."

(Polling by Bangalore Polling Unit)

(Reporting by Nancy Waitz; Editing by Neil Stempleman)

ISLAMABAD – A missile fired from a suspected U.S. unmanned plane destroyed a suspected militant hide-out in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing at least nine people in a stronghold of a jihadi leader blamed for attacks in Afghanistan, intelligence officials said.
The United States has launched more than 40 missile strikes on al-Qaida and Taliban targets close to the Afghan border since last year, reportedly killing several top commanders, but also civilians. Earlier this month, one such strike is believed by U.S. and Pakistani officials to have killed the Pakistani Taliban chief, Baitullah Mehsud.
The attack Friday was on a housing compound in the village of Dande Darpa Khel, near Miran Shah in North Waziristan, three intelligence officers said condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media. They said several people were wounded.
Authorities stepped up security in the region following the attack and the officials said efforts were under way to get details about the victims.
Dande Darpa Khel and surrounding areas are strongholds of Afghan Taliban leader Siraj Haqqani whose network is powerful in eastern Afghanistan. He has a large Islamic school in the village that was hit by a U.S. missile in October 2008, killing about 20 people.
Siraj is the son of senior Taliban leader Jalaluddin Haqqani, a veteran of the fight against Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s, who American commanders now count as a dangerous foe. Haqqani is alleged to have close connections to al-Qaida and to have helped funnel foreign fighters into Afghanistan.
The Haqqanis have been linked to attacks in Afghanistan, including an attempt to kill President Hamid Karzai and a suicide attack on a hotel in Kabul, both last year. Haqqani network operatives also plague U.S. forces in Afghanistan's eastern Khost province with ambushes and roadside bombs.
Pakistan's border region is remote, mountainous and there is little government or military control there. Al-Qaida's top leadership, including Osama bin Laden, are believed to be hiding in the area.
The U.S. occasionally fired missiles into the region beginning in 2006, but dramatically stepped up the attacks last year.
The strikes have targeted militants behind surging attacks in Pakistan, those blamed for violence in Afghanistan, as well as al-Qaida and other foreign terrorists allegedly using the area to plot or train for terrorist attacks around the world.
The missiles are fired from CIA-operated drones believed to be launched from across the border in Afghanistan or from secret bases inside Pakistan. They are reported to be piloted by operatives inside the United States. U.S. officials rarely — if ever — acknowledge the airstrikes.
The Pakistani government publicly protests the attacks, which are unpopular among many in this Muslim country of 170 million people, many of whom see the United States and its allies as prosecuting an unjust war against co-religionists in Afghanistan.
Despite this, it is assumed to be cooperating with the strikes and providing intelligence on them.
The government says Washington should give the technology to Islamabad as its military is capable of using the drones.
___
Associated Press writer Hussain Afzal from Parachinar contributed to this report.

LOS ANGELES – An AIDS advocacy group filed complaints Thursday with state officials against 16 production companies that show unprotected sex in porn movies.
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation filed the action with the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, alleging the practice amounts to unsafe behavior in a California workplace.
"We will not stop until there is a policy of requiring condoms to be used in porn," foundation president Michael Weinstein said.
By law, U.S. adult film actors must prove they have tested negative for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases within 30 days of going to work on a film.
CalOSHA spokesman Dean Fryer said the regulatory agency requires workers in any industry where there is a "possibility of transmission of fluids," including health care and adult films, to reduce the risk of disease transmission.
"The employers of porn actors are required to provide a safe and healthy work environment," Fryer said.
Nearly 60 adult DVDs accompany the complaints against Hustler Video, Maverick Entertainment, Vivid and other porn production companies in Los Angeles. Many people in the multibillion-dollar industry oppose the use of condoms in the films.
Hustler publisher Larry Flynt told The Associated Press, "people who enjoy viewing adult films do not want to see people using condoms."
"While it might provide some additional protection, the sales are not going to be there to make the effort worthwhile for the actors and actresses," he said.
Flynt praised laws mandating monthly testing for adult film actors as a highly effective way to prevent the spread of AIDS.
Vivid Entertainment head Steven Hirsch agreed.
"If we didn't think the proper testing was in place, we would do something about it," he said.
A call to Maverick was not immediately returned.
Weinstein said AIDS could be spread through the on-camera behavior and noted that many people get their sex education from porn movies.
Watching unprotected sex could prompt them to be careless during sex acts, he said.
Former porn actress Jan Meza said she asked about the use of condoms when she first started appearing in adult films in 2006.
"I was told that I would never get work again," said Meza, who later contracted herpes.
Meza stopped appearing in films in 2007 and went to work for a charity group that provides safe haven to performers who want to leave the industry.

The labor complaints are part of the AIDS advocacy group's broader campaign to mandate the use of condoms in porn.

Last month, it filed a lawsuit against the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, calling on officials to enforce health and safety rules on adult film sets to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

In June, health inspectors paid a surprise visit to the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation in San Fernando Valley, a clinic where an adult film actress recently tested positive for HIV.

The inspection was part of a broader investigation into the clinic, which has reported 22 other HIV cases since 2004. At least five performers for Vivid Entertainment, tested positive for HIV that year, prompting a brief self-imposed moratorium on porn production.

Fryer said CalOSHA is awaiting a court ruling on an injunction sought by the American Civil Liberties Union to prevent the agency from accessing medical files at the clinic.

"Our elected officials and our government are treating the young people who are performing in these films as trash that don't deserve protection," Weinstein said.

Weinstein said no state legislators have agreed to sponsor the group's proposal to mandate condoms in porn movies.

Hirsch said the adult film industry would likely leave California if the use of condoms became mandatory.

Florida Home Insurance

Any risk that can be quantified can potentially be insured. Specific kinds of risk that may give rise to claims are known as "perils". An insurance policy will set out in detail which perils are covered by the policy and which are not.

Financial stability and strength of an insurance company should be a major consideration when purchasing an insurance contract. An insurance premium paid currently provides coverage for losses that might arise many years in the future. For that reason, the viability of the insurance carrier is very important. In recent years, a number of insurance companies have become insolvent, leaving their policyholders with no coverage (or coverage only from a government-backed insurance pool or other arrangement with less attractive payouts for losses). A number of independent rating agencies, such as Best's, Fitch, Standard & Poor's, and Moody's Investors Service, provide information and rate the financial viability of insurance companies.