Crucial debt talks resume in Athens

Communist party affiliated protesters block the entrance of the General Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen and Merchants building in Athens on Wednesday, Jan. 18 2012. Greece's unions and employers are to start talks on reducing labors costs, but the negotiations were disrupted when protesters from a Communist-backed labor union occupied the central building where the meetings were to take place. The banners read " Hands off Labor Contracts" "Increases in Salaries and Pensions". (AP Photo/Kostas Tsironis)

Communist party affiliated protesters block the entrance of the General Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen and Merchants building in Athens on Wednesday, Jan. 18 2012. Greece's unions and employers are to start talks on reducing labors costs, but the negotiations were disrupted when protesters from a Communist-backed labor union occupied the central building where the meetings were to take place. The banners read " Hands off Labor Contracts" "Increases in Salaries and Pensions". (AP Photo/Kostas Tsironis)

Communist party affiliated protesters block the entrance of the General Confederation of Professionals, Craftsmen and Merchants building in Athens on Wednesday, Jan. 18 2012. Greece's unions and employers are to start talks on reducing labors costs, but the negotiations were disrupted when protesters from a Communist-backed labor union occupied the central building where the meetings were to take place. (AP Photo/Kostas Tsironis)

Charles Dallara, the head of the Institute of International Finance, which represents Greece's private bondholders, leaves after his meeting with Prime Minister Lucas Papademos and finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos, in Athens, on Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2012. The Greek government resumed talks with its private creditors in Athens on Wednesday in the hope of sealing a debt relief deal needed to avoid a disastrous default this spring. (AP Photo/Kostas Tsironis)

(AP) ? The Greek government resumed stalled talks with its private creditors in Athens on Wednesday in the hope of sealing a euro100 billion ($128 billion) debt relief deal needed to avoid a disastrous default this spring.

Charles Dallara, a top official at the Institute of International Finance, a global banking association, returned to Greece after negotiations stalled last week, and held a nearly three-hour meeting with Prime Minister Lucas Papademos and Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos.

"A very crucial meeting, that lasted several hours, has just finished at the prime minister's office," Venizelos told Parliament shortly afterward. "The meetings between the Greek government and the IIF have resumed and they will continue (Thursday)."

Earlier, he said the talks "are without a doubt at a very sensitive stage."

The so-called private sector involvement, or PSI, deal is meant to write off half of the debt Greece owes private bondholders. Creditors would get most of the remaining debt in new bonds with extended repayment periods, as well as a cash payment.

"We want this (deal) to happen in a way that is safe for Greece ? with Greece in the eurozone ? and safe for the real economy and the financial system," Venizelos said.

Since May 2010, Greece has kept solvent with rescue loans from its European partners and the International Monetary Fund. In the event of bankruptcy, Greece would likely have to abandon the euro and revert to a devalued currency. Since the country imports more than it exports, the costs of fuel and basic consumer goods would skyrocket, further frustrating a population angered by two years of harsh austerity.

The PSI talks have mainly been held up by a disagreement on interest rates for the new bonds.

"The interest rate on the new loans is a key issue here," Dallara told CNN before Wednesday's meeting. "Some seem to have a view that we should actually extend the loans at interest rates even lower than what the IMF and (the Europeans) extend their loans at, and there's not much logic in that in our viewpoint."

Dallara urged the EU to make clear that a similar deal would not apply to other troubled eurozone countries. "Greece really is a unique situation," he said.

A Greek government official said Athens is still considering whether to impose so-called collective action clauses on its bonds. Such clauses could force private debt holders resisting a settlement to fall in line with the majority if an agreement is reached. The official asked not to be identified, citing the sensitive nature of the talks.

A second government official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said Athens estimates there could be an agreement by the end of the week.

Greece needs to clinch the deal quickly to qualify for more bailout loans before it faces a euro14.5 billion ($18.6 billion) bond repayment on March 20. The bond swap is a key part a new euro130 billion ($166 billion) bailout package in loans and bank support from international rescue creditors.

Recession-bound Greece needs to write off some of its borrowings, if it is to have a fighting chance of emerging from its debt hole.

It has so far relied on austerity measures, which were a condition for it to receive the emergency loans. The Greek government has cut pensions and salaries, raised taxes and sold some state property.

Yanis Varoufakis, a professor of economics at the University of Athens, argued that even with a debt deal Greece could do little to eventually avoid default.

"Let the truth be revealed. Let's have a default because Greece is insolvent and insolvent entities have to default. It's a law of nature and of society and of reason, and we should simply succumb to that," Varoufakis told AP Television.

"If European leaders are worried about the effect this will have on banks, they might as well recapitalize them, not continue to drip-feed the Greek state," he said.

Dallara, the Institute of International Finance official, said that if Greece is forced to default, it will be messy. "I personally believe that there is no such thing as an orderly default for Greece," he told CNN. "If there is a default, it is likely to be very disorderly."

As austerity measures have cut deeply into incomes and unemployment has risen, unions have held frequent strikes and protests over the past two years.

Unions and employers were to start talks on Wednesday on reducing labors costs, but the negotiations were disrupted when protesters from a Communist-backed labor union occupied the central building where the meetings were to take place.

EU-IMF debt inspectors are back in Athens this week to monitor progress of those reforms aimed at slashing the country's high budget deficits.

__

Derek Gatopoulos and Theodora Tongas in Athens contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-18-EU-Greece-Financial-Crisis/id-7992acd5b3ae4c79b2fb2636df48f9ec

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Pinkberry co-founder accused of homeless beating

By Robert Kovacik and Ashley Gordon , NBC Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES -- The co-founder of popular frozen yogurt chain Pinkberry was arrested Monday afternoon at Los Angeles International Airport on an outstanding warrant for assault with a deadly weapon, the Los Angeles Police Department told NBC4 News.

Young Lee, 47, was detained by a fugitive task force comprised of officers from the FBI and by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at Los Angeles International Airport, LAPD spokeswoman Karen Rayner said. Lee?s flight into LAX originated in Korea with one stop in London.

He was turned over to LAPD, who issued the warrant for his arrest. Lee is suspected of chasing down and beating a homeless man who approached him at a traffic light in June, according to the LA Times.

Authorities gave little detail on the assault that led to Lee?s arrest, only saying that it is possible the Korean-American executive has not been in LA since the alleged assault took place in the downtown Los Angeles area.

  • Read original story on NBC Los Angeles
  • In December, Lee?s 3,000-square-foot Malibu home went up for sale. Bought in 2008 for over $3.5 million, the property is now leased at under the purchase price.
    Phone calls to that home, owned by Lee and his personal and business partner Shelly Hwang, were not immediately returned.

    Lee and Hwang opened the first Pinkberry in 2005. Lee, a boxer turned architect, converted a West Hollywood garage into the original storefront now used as a Pinkberry office. The first shop offered just two flavors of the tart desserts: regular and green tea.

    Pinkberry?s popularity quickly soared and in 2007, a venture capital firm invested $27 million dollars into the chain.

    Source: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/17/10175726-pinkberry-yogurt-chain-co-founder-accused-of-beating-homeless-man

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    Fisher ready for challenge of rebuilding the Rams

    Jeff Fisher speaks during a news conference where he was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    Jeff Fisher speaks during a news conference where he was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    Jeff Fisher speaks during a news conference where he was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    Jeff Fisher, right, shares a laugh with team owner Stan Kroenke during a news conference where he was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke speaks during a news conference where Jeff Fisher was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    Jeff Fisher speaks during a news conference where he was officially introduced as the new head football coach of the St. Louis Rams NFL team, in St. Louis, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2012. At rear right is team owner Stan Kroenke, (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)

    (AP) ? After a year off, Jeff Fisher says he is refreshed and ready to take on the challenge in St. Louis.

    And this is some challenge: The Rams finished 2-14 this year, tied for the NFL's worst, and have won all of 15 games the last five seasons.

    Fisher was formally introduced as the new coach of the Rams on Tuesday after signing a five-year contract. He chose the Rams over the Dolphins.

    "My decision was very, very simple," he said. "It was based on a shared collective vision in restoring this franchise to a place of significance. It was that vision that made my decision very, very easy."

    Owner Stan Kroenke said the contract will keep Fisher in place "for a good while."

    "I think the more we talked the more comfortable we got," Kroenke said. "Jeff was absolutely what we were looking for. I told him that early on. He's a great coach, a great leader."

    Added chief operating officer Kevin Demoff: "The time was now for a bold statement about the future of this organization."

    Fisher reportedly will be paid $7 million per season but said his decision hinged on non-economic issues such as the franchise's plan moving forward, and the makeup of the coaching staff and front office.

    Fisher said reports the Dolphins were his first choice were not true. And despite the Rams' struggles in recent seasons, Fisher said he doesn't think they're that far off. He said the Rams have holes but didn't want to discuss specifics.

    Fisher said the possibility of the Rams relocating was not a major factor in his decision. Kroenke can move the franchise after the 2014 season if the Edward Jones Dome is not deemed among the top quarter of stadiums in the NFL.

    Kroenke was non-committal on the issue, noting that the city's Convention and Visitors Commission is due to make a proposal for potential upgrades on Feb. 1. He did make a reference to his investment in St. Louis.

    "I've been around here a long time," Kroenke said. "Contrary to a lot of reports, I haven't taken a lot of jack out of the market. I have put a lot of jack into the market. We'll see how that process works out."

    Fisher will have a role in the hiring of a general manager, and said several times that decision-making will be a collaborative effort. The Rams have targeted about a dozen candidates, a handful of whom they've already interviewed.

    The Rams did not confirm any assistant coaches, although it's been widely reported that Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams has agreed to join Fisher in that role. Fisher said only that he had some "very good options."

    Fisher inherits a franchise with a recent history of futility, averaging three wins per season under Scott Linehan, interim coach Jim Haslett and Steve Spagnuolo.

    The 53-year-old Fisher sat out the 2011 season after 17 years in Tennessee. His long stint with the Titans included a Super Bowl matchup against the Rams in 2000 in which Tennessee fell 1 yard shy of forcing overtime in a 23-16 loss. The Titans won three division titles and made six playoff appearances under Fisher, who stepped down a year ago as the league's longest-tenured coach, saying he needed a break.

    Yet after the Rams fired Spagnuolo, Fisher's name immediately jumped to the top of the search list.

    The Rams had an advantage in the bidding against the Dolphins since the new coach's agent is Marvin Demoff, Kevin's father. Former coach Dick Vermeil was a consultant in the process, with Kroenke playing an active role.

    Kevin Demoff said the relationship was beneficial as an ice-breaker, but afterward the Rams' offer stood on its own.

    Fisher was interviewed twice, once in Denver where Kroenke owns the Nuggets and Avalanche, and again in St. Louis where he toured facilities and met with quarterback Sam Bradford. Kroenke clearly wanted an experienced hand; Spagnuolo and Linehan both came to St. Louis untested beyond coordinator duties. Spagnuolo, fired along with general manager Billy Devaney, was just 10-38 in three seasons.

    St. Louis was considered a franchise on the rise after making a six-win improvement in 2010 and playing for the NFC West title in the finale, but was a total flop in 2011, playing a brutal schedule and decimated by injuries. The Rams haven't had a winning season since 2003, and they had the NFL's worst offense last season.

    For all his longevity in Tennessee, Fisher had only six winning seasons, and a succession of 8-8 finishes brought out the critics. His most recent playoff victory came in January 2004, and his most recent winning record was in 2008 when the Titans squandered the No. 1 seed in the AFC by losing in the divisional round.

    But Fisher led his team to at least 12 wins four times, and his career record is 142-120 (.542). He coached more games for one franchise than all but six coaches, all Hall of Famers.

    The Rams have the second pick in the April draft -- the fourth time in five seasons with either the first or second pick. Fisher also inherits a handful of franchise types including Bradford, running back Steven Jackson, defensive end Chris Long and linebacker James Laurinaitis.

    Bradford was the top overall pick in 2010 and was the NFL offensive rookie of the year, although last year he missed six games with a high left ankle sprain and threw only six touchdown passes. Bradford got punished more in Josh McDaniels' offense, which featured long-developing pass plays that stressed a line that ended the year with three players on injured reserve. McDaniels is also gone.

    Jackson shows no signs of slowing down with a franchise-record seven consecutive 1,000-yard rushing seasons. Long developed into one of the NFL's top pass rush threats and Laurinaitis has led the team in tackles all three of his seasons.

    Associated Press

    Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2012-01-17-FBN-Rams-Fisher/id-894c5d74ca9e42a485d12dfe3a265365

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    Video: Jimmy Carter wins 1976 Iowa caucus

    From the archives: In 1976, former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter made a name for himself by winning the Iowa caucus with 27 percent of the vote. Carter?s strong showing put him on the road to the Democratic nomination, and it put the Iowa Caucuses ? until then an election year footnote ? on the political map.

    Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/45848277/

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    Total in $2.3 billion U.S. shale gas deal (Reuters)

    PARIS (Reuters) ? French oil group Total SA (TOTF.PA) is ploughing $2.3 billion into the development of U.S. shale gas reserves in Ohio in the latest example of global energy companies piling into new energy sources made economic by the high price of crude.

    In a deal with Chesapeake Energy Corp (CHK.N), which the U.S. group announced in November without identifying its partners, Total will take a 25 percent stake in a joint venture covering the Utica Shale area of eastern Ohio.

    North America has seen a boom in investment in energy resources such as shale gas in recent years, raising the prospect of the United States reducing its dependence on imported energy.

    Under the terms of the deal, Total paid $610 million to Chesapeake and $290 million to a U.S.-based group called EnerVest, the other partner in the venture. Chesapeake will receive another $1.42 billion contribution to drilling and well-completion costs, expected by the end of 2014, it said.

    "This is consistent with our strategy to develop positions in unconventional plays with large potential and, in this case, with value predominantly linked to (the) oil price," said Total exploration and production president Yves-Louis Darricarrere.

    Total, already in a joint venture with Chesapeake in the Barnett Shale area in Texas, has said it is looking to boost its position in U.S. shale basins that have crude oil or natural gas with a high liquids content, making them more valuable than dry gas.

    Contents of the latest joint venture were disclosed in November, but at the time Chesapeake, the second-biggest U.S. producer of natural gas, did not reveal the identity of its partners.

    Oil and natural gas can now be extracted from shale by drilling miles-deep wells and injecting thousands of gallons of water and using chemicals to flush out natural gas deposits trapped between layers of rock.

    Chesapeake is an aggressive buyer of land in the new U.S. shale formations, believed to hold massive reserves of natural gas and oil. But its appetite for new property has left the company too debt-laden to pay for drilling and forced it to attract joint venture partners to help fund development costs.

    PROMISING RESULTS

    The latest venture with Total covers about 619,000 net acres, of which 77,000 were contributed by Houston-based EnerVest, Chesapeake said.

    "We believe the Utica acreage is a good asset for Total," analysts at brokerage Bernstein wrote in a research note. "We continue to believe that long-term unconventional assets such as shale oil and gas acreage can deliver stable production and increasingly positive cashflows, given that we expect the oil price to remain high in the long term."

    At brokerage CA Cheuvreux, analyst Dominique Patry wrote: "There is no production to date but 13 wells have been drilled across the acreage with very promising results seen from each well in terms of productivity and liquid content."

    Thin profitability, due to low U.S. gas prices, has not diminished foreigners' enthusiasm for the controversial energy resource.

    Statoil (STL.OL) last October paid $4.4 billion for Brigham Exploration (BEXP.O) to boost its unconventional energy resources in the United States, one of its key growth areas, while India's Reliance (RELI.NS) is also looking to invest more in the U.S. shale gas sector.

    Concerns about water table pollution, tremors and gas leakage are slowing the expansion of shale gas, but with the biggest oil and gas reserve holders limiting foreign investment in their energy sectors, the big western oil and gas majors are increasingly focusing on OECD countries such as the United States and Australia.

    Yet the technique remains controversial.

    The French government in October cancelled three shale gas exploration permits, including one that was granted to Total, after it banned the use of the drilling technique, called hydraulic fracturing.

    Shares in Total, which also has shale gas exploration permits in Poland, Denmark and Argentina, were little changed, down 0.3 percent at 39.885 euros by 1331 GMT.

    Jefferies advised Chesapeake in the transaction. Total declined to disclose its advisors.

    (Additional reporting by Tom Bergin; Editing by Christian Plumb and David Holmes)

    Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120103/bs_nm/us_total_chesapeake

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    baptistpress: IMB 2011 Top 10: Amid African famine, life-and-death decisions grip Africa aid workers http://t.co/57syRW8z #fb

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    GOP Obama Strategy: Let Him Do the Talking

    A team of GOP researchers has been working tirelessly in a windowless room at the Republican National Committee headquarters compiling a kind of Obama-pedia, reports The Washington Post.? The searchable digital archive of text and videos of all of the public statements the president has made since the start of his 2008 campaign will be used as the playbook for the campaign to oust him in the general election.

    The plan is to let Obama do his own talking in the ads against him.

    Ads will feature promises he made as a candidate and in the early days of his presidency ? on things like job creation, homeowner assistance and poverty reduction ? contrasted against actual results.? A prominent clip will reportedly be from the 2009 ?Today? show interview, where Obama said that if he could not fix the economy in three years, ?then there?s going to be a one-term proposition.?

    GOP strategists said that an ?in his own words? approach was chosen rather than traditional attack ads because many voters ? even those who think the country is on the wrong track ? like Obama personally and respect the historic significance of his election. ?Afraid of turning voters off with negative ads, they apparently want to try Newt Gingrich?s Iowa approach in the general election.

    But it looks like Mitt Romney and not Newt would be able to slide most easily into the final strategy.? Conveniently, the RNC?s research director and author of the playbook, is Joe Pounder, a former Romney campaign aide.? Romney has already been using the tactic, quoting the president often in his campaign stops.

    Democrats reportedly also have prepared a similar playbook that paints Mitt Romney as a flip-flopper.

    Source: http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/01/gop-obama-strategy-let-him-do-the-talking.html

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