Schumer: Deficit panel unlikely to succeed

(AP) ? A top Senate Democrat says that a deficit "supercommittee" is unlikely to succeed because of a deadlock over taxes.

New York Democrat Charles Schumer told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that the congressional deficit panel probably won't agree on a plan to cut $1.2 trillion from the deficit over the coming decade "because our Republican colleagues have said no net revenues."

The bipartisan group has just over two weeks to report its recommendations. A recent exchange of offers revealed a deep rift on taxes, with Democrats recommending a $1.3 trillion increase in tax revenue as part of a $3 trillion plan that includes a sweeping overhaul of the tax code. Republicans rejected the idea.

Democrats insist they won't agree to cut popular benefit programs without Republican concessions on taxes.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2011-11-07-Debt%20Supercommittee/id-260ba4c5074d4df09acc39a47171ae40

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British Museum gets the manga treatment

Cian O?Luanaigh, contributor

(Image: copyright Hoshino Yukinobu and the British Museum)

Missing artefacts, a 200-year-old conspiracy, and a mysterious airship over London. Oh, and someone?s nicked Stonehenge...

Folklore and ethnology expert Professor Munakata Tadakusa certainly has his work cut out in Professor Munakata?s British Museum Adventure, the latest collection of comics from acclaimed manga artist Hoshino Yukinobu. Invited to give a talk at London's British Museum, he soon finds himself investigating a plot to steal museum artefacts and return them to their ?rightful? owners.

Hoshino?s cloaked detective has been solving crimes for over two decades in one of Japan?s leading manga magazines - the fortnightly Big Comic. Professor Munakata?s British Museum Adventure is the sleuth?s first visit to the UK, the result of a collaboration between Hoshino and the British Museum, which in 2009 invited the artist to create a manga based on its collections.

Professor-Munakatacover.jpg

(Image: copyright Hoshino Yukinobu and the British Museum)

At times simplistic, at times wonderfully melodramatic (a dying curator whispers ?Donate my collection?I will?become a part of the British Museum??), Hoshino?s action-driven plot explores relations between Japanese and British researchers, the question of who really ?owns? archaeological remains, and the debate about returning artefacts to their countries of origin.

In true manga style, Hoshino?s simplified character designs are set against hyper-realistic museum artefacts and intricately depicted landmarks, transporting me to London and allowing me to indulge my inner geek by mentally ticking off the artefacts I recognized from the Museum.

The original Japanese manga was published in 10 episodes over five months in Big Comic, allowing readers to digest clues, build tension in increments, and savor those well-placed cliffhangers at the end of each installment. Collecting these into one book warped the pace; story threads seemed hastily woven and the secondary characters lacked depth. Motives are secondary to action: a fatal sniper shot towards the end, for example, reeks of deus ex machina.

Professor-Munakata_colour.jpg

(Image: copyright Hoshino Yukinobu and the British Museum)

That said, the collection includes interesting extra content, including an interview with Hoshino on his research for the book - from visits to British archaeological sites to the minutiae of UK police uniforms. There is also an enlightening note on Japanese illustrative styles from graphic historian Timothy Clark.

Professor Munakata?s British Museum Adventure is no great detective story, but it is an entertaining mix of archaeology and adventure. And in one scene an airship tries to drop Stonehenge on St Paul?s cathedral, which is definitely worth a look.
?

Book information:
Professor Munakata?s British Museum Adventure
by Hoshino Yukinobu
British Museum Press
?14.99

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Cuba legalizes sale, purchase of private property

HAVANA (AP) ? Cuba announced Thursday it is allowing the purchase and sale of real estate for the first time since the early days of the revolution, the most important reform yet in a series of free-market changes ushered in by President Raul Castro.

The law, which takes effect Nov. 10, applies to citizens and permanent residents only, according to a red-letter headline on the front page of Thursday's Communist Party daily Granma.

The brief article said details of the new law would be published imminently in the government's Official Gazette, though the government has said previously sales will be subject to taxes and the rules will not allow anyone to accumulate great wealth.

The change follows the legalization in October of the purchase and sale of cars, though with restrictions that still make it hard for ordinary Cubans to buy new cars.

Castro has also allowed citizens to go into business for themselves in a number of approved jobs ? everything from party clowns to food vendors to accountants ? and has pledged to streamline the state-dominated economy by eliminating half a million government workers.

Cuba's employs over 80 percent of the workers in the island's command economy, paying wages of just $20 a month in return for free education and health care, and nearly free housing, transportation and basic foods. Castro has said repeatedly that the system is not working since taking over from his brother Fidel in 2008, but he has vowed that Cuba will remain a Socialist state.

Cubans have long bemoaned the ban on property sales, which took effect in stages over the first years after Fidel Castro came to power in 1959. In an effort to fight absentee ownership by wealthy landlords, Fidel enacted a reform that gave title to whomever lived in a home. Most who left the island forfeited their properties to the state.

Since no property market was allowed, the rules have meant that for decades Cubans could only exchange property through complicated barter arrangements, or through even murkier black-market deals.

Some Cubans entered into sham marriages to make deed transfers easier. Others made deals to move into homes ostensibly to care for an elderly person living there, only to inherit the property when the person dies.

Many more were forced to live in overcrowded apartments with many generations crammed into a few rooms. Even divorce hasn't necessarily meant separation in Cuba, where estranged couples are often forced to live together for years while they work out alternative housing.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2011-11-03-CB-Cuba-Private-Property/id-c0a2ba5975e443db9a28c97e685760b4

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Egyptians protest, anger mounts over blogger arrest (Reuters)

CAIRO (Reuters) ? Thousands of Egyptians protested on Monday in Tahrir Square, the epicenter of an uprising that toppled President Hosni Mubarak this year, after a prominent activist was detained by military prosecutors.

The military detained Alaa Abd El Fattah on Sunday, a high-profile blogger whose arrest by Mubarak's security forces in 2006 led one of the biggest campaign to release him in Mubarak's era.

Abd El Fattah refused to be questioned by military prosecutors over "inciting violence and sabotage" in connection with deadly clashes between the army and protesters on October9, when more than 25 people were killed.

The blogger said the army had no legitimacy to even interrogate him and said he would only speak to a civilian official, prompting his detention pending investigations.

"Field Marshal, the revolution is coming," one protester cried over loudspeakers, referring to Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the head of the army council now ruling Egypt.

About 3,000 protesters marched in solidarity with the blogger, calling on the military council to step down.

More than 25 people were killed in clashes that erupted during a demonstration by Christians on October 9, an incident now commonly known as the "Maspero" events.

Protesters said military police used excessive force, firing live ammunition and driving armed vehicles into the crowds. The army defended their actions during the protest and blamed "foreign elements" and other agitators for the violence.

A military prosecution source said they had received footage of Abd El Fattah in possession of weapons they say he confiscated from officers at the scene. Supporters of the blogger doubt the credibility of any such evidence.

'SHIFTING BLAME'

Abd El Fattah and another activist Bahaa Saber were questioned for "incitement."

Critics say the army is shifting blame onto activists, instead of conducting an impartial investigation. Seventeen human rights groups said in a joint statement that Abd El Fattah's detention was reminiscent of Mubarak's crackdowns.

"The activist exercised his right to not stand before military prosecution because he is a civilian," the group said.

"We see that the Maspero massacre and its repercussions, which ended yesterday with the detention of Alaa Abd El Fattah are a flagrant challenge to achieving the aspirations of the Egyptian people," the statement added, describing the arrest as an attempt to "distort" the image of activists.

A twitter hash tag used to campaign to free Abd El Fattah, who along with his wife Manal started one of the first blogs in the Arab region, in 2006 was revived by activists on Sunday and has since gone viral. Activists said they will continue their march onto the prison headquarters where he is held.

"We say to the military council, our numbers will grow and you cannot plan to quell the power of the people," activist Mohammed Fahmy said at the march.

Authorities have detained 28 others on suspicion of attacking soldiers. Any trial will be before a military court, a move that has drawn broad criticism from politicians who want the army to use civilian courts and say the military cannot be the arbitrator when it is accused of having a role.

Rights groups say at least 12,000 civilians have been brought before military courts since the uprising that toppled Mubarak in February, calling into question the willingness of the army to transform Egypt into a democracy.

"Military courts should never be used to investigate or try civilians," said Philip Luther, Amnesty's Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa, adding that the army has not held its officers to account for using too much force.

"Instead, they have continued to insist that the demonstrators were responsible for inciting the violence and have cracked down on those criticizing the way they handled the demonstrations," the London-based rights group added.

(Writing by Dina Zayed; Editing by Jon Hemming)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111031/wl_nm/us_egypt_activist_protest

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Scientific American-Then and Now

Excerpt from the first issue of Scientific American

"Scientific America" is the oldest continuously published magazine in the United States

Thoughts on the first issue of Scientific American, from 1845, now available online.

Nature Publishing Group (which publishes Scientific American) announced today that it has now digitized all of Scientific American?s archive, going back to Volume 1, Issue 1 from 1845.

I decided to take a look at the first issue, which was targeted to Americans of a mechanical bent, and started to reflect on how much (or how little) has changed in the intervening 166 years:

?

Then:

In 1845, the editor wrote ?we shall endeavour to avoid all expressions of sentiment, on any sectional, sectarian, or political party subject.?

Now:

In the words of Shawn Lawrence Otto, we at Scientific American understand that ?Science is never partisan, but science is always political.? Stating that evidence shows that something is true independent of what others?no matter their wealth or rank?think of it can be very subversive. (I?m reading Otto?s new book, ?Fool Me Twice: Fighting the Assault on Science in America.? Highly recommended.)

?

Then:

?[We] shall exercise a full share of independence, in the occasional exposure of ignorance and knavery, especially when we find them sheltered by arrogance and aristocracy.?

Now:

See ?Flu Factories? (2011), ?Drowning New Orleans? (four years BEFORE Katrina), anything by Michael Shermer.

?

Then:

?We shall advocate the pure Christian religion, without favouring any particular sect; and shall make it a point to adhere to reason and common sense, independently of the opinions of those, whose interests and popularity depend on their rigid adherence to traditional doctrines, and church creeds.?

Now:

Okay. So some things change. We do not advocate for religion, but we still feel free to ignore (and when necessary make fun of) creeds that demand belief in a 6,000-year-old earth or intelligent design, deny the evidence of anthropogenic climate change or posit ?personhood? in an unimplanted fertilized egg.

For more ?Anecdotes from the Archive,? check out Mary Karmelek?s blog.

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=6aa480c9c9949c4bd4243b08735814bb

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