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Friday, October 25, 2013

World Headlines: A Chinese Trial, The Syrian War Spills Over

In this photo released by China's Xinhua News Agency, ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai, center, stands as the Shandong Provincial Higher People's Court announces the decision in his second trial in Jinan, Shandong Province. The court upheld Bo's conviction and life sentence for corruption and abuse of power.

Xie Huanchi/AP

China, Xinhua

We begin in China where a court rejected Friday an appeal by former politician Bo Xilai against his life sentence for bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power.

Bo, if you remember, was a rising star in China's political system before his career collapsed in early 2012 after his wife was linked to the murder of a British businessman. (She was handed a suspended death sentence in August). Bo himself was indicted in July and was convicted last month following a high-profile trial.

Here's how his sentence was broken down: He was found guilty of accepting bribes totaling about $3.3 million, embezzling about $820,000 and of abusing power. He was sentenced to life in prison for accepting bribes, his political rights were deprived for life, and his personal assets confiscated.

Also, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for embezzlement and had personal assets of about $165,000 confiscated. Bo was sentenced to seven years imprisonment for abuse of power.

Xinhua reported Friday on how Bo's appeals process worked:

"Bo submitted an appeal after the verdict was handed down. The Shandong Higher People's Court filed Bo's appeal and formed a collegial panel for the second trial.
"The collegial panel reviewed all the case files and video footage of the first trial, examined Bo's appeal documents and defence lawyers' opinions.
"The panel interrogated Bo several times and heard opinions of his lawyers, verified all evidence, comprehensively examined the facts confirmed during the first trial and legal applications to fully safeguard the litigation rights of Bo and the defence lawyers.
"After review by the collegial panel and deliberation of a judgment committee, Shandong Higher People's Court gave its decision."

Lebanon, Daily Star

Syria's civil war has sent refugees flooding into Lebanon. The war has also contributed to violence to the neighboring state.

At least seven people were killed in Lebanese city of Tripoli in overnight fighting between gunmen loyal to Syria's president and those opposed to Bashar Assad. Twelve people were also wounded, raising the number of people injured in the fifth consecutive day of fighting to more than 70.

Lebanese security sources told the newspaper the overnight battles were the fiercest since the fighting began Sunday.

"Tripoli, Lebanon's second largest city, has seen recurrent clashes linked to the crisis in neighboring Syria, namely between Jabal Mohsen, which backs Syrian President Bashar Assad, and Bab al-Tabbaneh, which supports his opponents," the newspaper reported.

Tripoli, the BBC reports, has a small Alawite community living amid a Sunni majority. Syria's Assad is Alawite; his opponents in the civil war are mainly Sunni.

Nigeria, Vanguard

More than half of all Nigerians live on $1 a day. That may be one reason why there's anger over a government minister's purchase of two bulletproof BMWs for $1.4 million for her ministry.

Nigeria's Civil Aviation Authority says it ordered the two BMW 760 Li cars at the request of Aviation Minister Stella Oduah. The revelations, which were first made in Sahara Reporters, a U.S.-based website that covers the region, sparked outrage in Nigeria.

The country's House of Representatives is holding an inquiry into the purchases. Oduah did not attend Thursday's hearing before the House Committee on Aviation, prompting members of the panel to demand that she appear at the next hearing Tuesday or face sanctions.

Australia, Sydney Morning Herald

Australia won't make fridges after 2016: Swedish manufacturer Electrolux announced that it would close its plant in Orange, New South Wales, by 2016.

Some 500 people will lose their jobs, severely affecting the economy of the city in a rural part of the state in eastern Australia. The plant has operated in Orange for more than 70 years.

Here's more from the newspaper:

"The refrigeration plant in Orange has been under the microscope since February, when Electrolux announced a six-month investment study to see if Orange is globally competitive enough to make a new range of refrigerators and freezers. Reconfiguring the factory to build the new range would have cost more than $45 million.

"John Brown, managing director of Electrolux Home Products Australia and New Zealand, said the company understood the sensitivity of its decision, but the company's investment study concluded it could manufacture refrigerators more cheaply in other factories in Asia and Eastern Europe. He said the company had spoken to all levels of government before reaching its decision."

Europe

We didn't mean to leave out the fallout in Europe over the U.S. National Security Agency's reported surveillance in France and Germany. The controversy has pushed Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Francois Hollande to call for talks with the U.S. (You can read those stories by clicking on the links – or you can find NPR's coverage here.)

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/10/25/240707389/world-headlines-a-chinese-trial-the-syrian-war-spills-over?ft=1&f=1001
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BSkyB Cuts Streaming Service Price

LONDON -- U.K. satellite pay TV operator BSkyB, in which Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox owns 39 percent, has reduced the cost to subscribe to its Internet streaming service, NOW TV, to a price close to those charged by rival services Netflix and Amazon's LoveFilm.

With the cut, NOW TV costs $14.50 (£8.99) a month to subscribe, down from $24 (£15) a month, and includes access to the extensive Sky Movies library.

Titles currently available to watch on NOW TV include Les Miserables, Vamp U, Flight and Argo.

STORY: BSkyB Quarterly Earnings Drop, TV Subs Grow

Netflix is priced at $9.68 (£5.99) per month while LoveFilm's basic online package costs the same.

The move is a clear signal that Sky is taking its Internet streaming competition seriously and wants to ensure it is in the game.

Sky will keep a close eye on whether or not its freshly priced service cannibalizes its other offerings.

Sky this week launched its NOW TV box, which allows consumers to access the streaming service without having a satellite dish.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheHollywoodReporter-Technology/~3/H0ooi3LpYYw/story01.htm
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Pen Pal Of Young 'Jerry' Salinger May Have Been First To Meet Holden

J.D. Salinger wrote nine letters and postcards to aspiring Canadian writer Marjorie Sheard.

Graham Haber/The Morgan Library & Museum

J.D. Salinger wrote nine letters and postcards to aspiring Canadian writer Marjorie Sheard.

Graham Haber/The Morgan Library & Museum

Fans of the reclusive J.D. Salinger are in their element these days. The writer, who died in 2010, is the subject of a recent documentary and companion biography; there's word that five Salinger works will be published for the first time, starting in 2015; and now, the Morgan Library in New York is showing never-before displayed letters that a 20-something Salinger wrote, from 1941 to 1943, to a young admirer in Toronto.

For Salinger buffs, this is like a glimpse of the holy grail: seven letters and two postcards, mostly typed, two handwritten. Salinger's handwriting is slanted and spiky.

"He's writing quickly. He may have been writing this in a bar," says curator Declan Kiely. "The thing that jumps out at me is the way he forms 'I.' "

In a sea of cursives, Salinger prints his "I" — it looks like the Roman numeral one. He makes a strong vertical line and two horizontals.

Salinger, shown here in September 1961, comes off as both diffident and confident in his letters to Sheard.

"They're really emphatic," Kiely says.

And he underlines his name — sometimes with one line, sometimes two.

"You see Dickens doing this, you see Edgar Allen Poe doing this," observes Kiely, who is head of the Department of Literary and Historical Manuscripts at the Morgan Library. "A lot of male writers have what I would call a sort of architectural support."

Salinger Before Catcher in the Rye

Salinger's first letter to Marjorie Sheard is dated Sept. 4, 1941.

"Dear Miss Sheard," he writes. "Your warm, bright letter just reached me. Thanks very much. It's unfair to authors that you write only to Aldous Huxley and me."

Sheard had written to praise stories of Salinger's that she'd seen in Esquire and Collier's magazines. Like Salinger, she was in her early 20s and wanted to write fiction. He gives her advice: "Why don't you try writing something for Mademoiselle or one of the other feminine magazines? Seems to me you have the instincts to avoid the usual Vassar-girl tripe those mags publish."

He put his parents' address (1133 Park Ave., on 91st Street in Manhattan) in the upper right corner. He has typed the letter neatly — no cross-outs or erasures.

"He would have made a great secretary," Kiely says, smilingly.

Salinger, clearly thrilled to get a fan letter this early in his writing career, ends his note this way: "I hope you'll always read my work with pleasure. So glad you liked the Esquire piece. I write for Marjorie Sheard and a few others. The fact that Esquire's circulation is 600,000, and Collier's is in millions is purely coincidental."

Kiely thinks these letters reveal who Salinger was before Catcher in the Rye made him a literary star.

"He's a combination of diffidence and confidence," he says. "He is right at the very beginning, but he knows that he's onto something."

He's also witty. Later in their correspondence, after Salinger has been drafted and is waiting to be shipped overseas from Army basic training in Georgia, this Upper East Side prep school fellow writes, "Can't you just picture me leading me little platoon over the top? You boys go ahead. I'll meet you at the Biltmore under the clock."

An Early Hint At Holden

And who was she, Miss Marjorie Sheard of Toronto? Only one of her letters to him survives. In a P.P.S. she provides some "vital statistics" — a list of her likes: "Drinking beer, also rum; Sunday afternoon cocktail parties; flirting; dancing in a too-high, too-crowded place; white evening gowns; men who are tall, dark and dangerous; writing letters to Jerry Salinger. My father's a lawyer who plays the cello and writes musical criticisms. My mother is extremely beautiful. My brother is crotchety and practical, but I like him."

Marjorie Sheard was only slightly older than Salinger. Only one of her letters to him survives.

The Morgan Library & Museum, Gift of Marjorie Sheard Carter

Marjorie Sheard was only slightly older than Salinger. Only one of her letters to him survives.

The Morgan Library & Museum, Gift of Marjorie Sheard Carter

Sheard was slightly older than Salinger. (His correspondence with teenage girls would come later). Her niece, Sarah Sheard, says Marjorie was quiet and shy. But she had a real writer's voice in that flirtatious P.P.S. A month after his first letter, Salinger is getting curious.

"Dear Marjorie," he writes. "Excuse the delay but I've been up to here and still am. Thanks for writing. What do you look like? Send a huge photo."

She does. In profile, the photograph reveals a nice straight nose and wavy dark hair that flows down her back.

On Nov. 18, 1941, Salinger writes, "Sneaky girl. You're pretty." That same letter also has news: After many rejections, The New Yorker magazine has accepted one of his stories. He tells her it's about a prep school kid on Christmas vacation.

"Let me know what you think of the first Holden story, called 'Slight Rebellion Off Madison,' " he writes. "Best, Jerry S."

Curator Declan Kiely says that November 1941 letter may be the most valuable in this collection.

"It could well be that Marjorie Sheard was one of the first people who learned of the creation of the character Holden Caulfield," he says.

The story was scheduled to run Christmas week, 1941. But it would be another five years before readers actually met Holden, the character who became the hero of Catcher in the Rye and one of the most beloved figures in fiction. The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor a month after Jerry wrote Marjorie about the New Yorker acceptance. Editors decided, given the circumstances, that the "Holden story" was "unpublishable."

A Coquettish Correspondent

Sarah Sheard says her aunt Marjorie never talked about her pen pal and mentor.

"She was a little coquettish about it," Sheard says. "She would sort of bat her eyes and say, 'Well, you know, I did have this brief, you know, exchange with J.D. Salinger.' Jerry Salinger, she called him."

She saved all the letters, and agreed the family could sell them to pay for the Toronto nursing home where she died last May, just before her 95th birthday.

Marjorie Sheard never published any fiction, but she did have a 30-year career writing advertising. Her young 1940s correspondent became one of the world's best-known authors.

Source: http://www.npr.org/2013/10/24/239864193/pen-pal-of-young-jerry-salinger-may-have-been-first-to-meet-holden?ft=1&f=1032
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2 shot at Nat'l Guard armory; gunman in custody

A patient believed to be one of the National Guardsmen injured near the naval base in Millington, Tenn., was taken to The Med in Memphis, Tenn., early Thursday afternoon, Oct. 24, 2013. Two ambulances arrived carrying two injured men shortly after the shooting ocurred. (AP Photo/The Commercial Appeal, Karen Pulfer Focht)

Police Chief Rita Stanback and Fire Chief Gary Graves, second from left, of Millington, Tenn., brief reporters about a shooting near a U.S. Naval Support Activity Mid-South on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2013, in Millington, Tenn. The Navy said two soldiers were wounded, though neither had life-threatening injuries. (AP Photo/Adrian Sainz)

Locates site of U.S. Navy base shooting; 2c x 3 inches; 96.3 mm x 76 mm;

MILLINGTON, Tenn. (AP) — A member of the National Guard opened fire at an armory outside a U.S. Navy base in Tennessee, wounding two soldiers before being subdued and disarmed by other soldiers, officials said Thursday.

Millington Police Chief Rita Stanback said the shooter was apprehended Thursday by other National Guard members, and that he did not have the small handgun used in the shooting in his possession by the time officers arrived. Stanback said two National Guard members were shot, one in the foot and one in the leg.

"I'm sure there could have been more injury if they hadn't taken him into custody," Stanback said.

Maj. Gen. Max Haston, Tennessee's adjutant general, said at a news conference that the victims were being treated at a local hospital and he expected them to be released.

The Tennessee National Guard late Thursday identified those shot as Maj. William J. Crawford and Sgt. Maj. Ricky R. McKenzie. The shooter's name has not been released.

In a news release, Guard spokesman Randy Harris said the two were shot while disarming the gunman.

Haston said all three of the men were recruiters. He said the shooter was a sergeant first class who had been in the Guard about six or seven years and that the victims were his superiors. He said the recruiters who were shot were based in Jackson, Tenn.

Haston characterized Thursday's activity as disheartening.

"You never think something like this is going to happen on your watch or in good old Tennessee here," he said.

Stanback said at an earlier news conference that the soldiers' conditions were not immediately known, though the Navy said on its official Twitter account that neither had life-threatening injuries.

The shooter was a recruiter who had been relieved of duty, said a law enforcement official briefed on the developments. The official was not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Asked about this at the news conference, Haston would only say that there were "administrative policies and procedures that we were going through with him." He did not elaborate.

Stanback said the shooting happened inside an armory building just outside Naval Support Activity Mid-South. There are more than 7,500 military, civilian and contract personnel working on the base, according to the facility's official website. The facility is home to human resources operations and serves as headquarters to the Navy Personnel Command, Navy Recruiting Command, the Navy Manpower Analysis Center and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Finance Center.

The Navy said the base was briefly placed on lockdown as a precaution, though the lockdown was lifted in the afternoon.

On Thursday afternoon, yellow crime scene tape remained around the front of the building where the shooting happened. Law enforcement had blocked off streets with access to the armory, which is across the street from the army base.

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-10-24-Navy%20Base%20Shooting/id-2cdbd4a46e9b4cbebf6b74d52c1a71fb
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Texas Vs. Utah: A Tale Of Two Government Shutdowners

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah (left), and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, walk to the Senate floor on Oct. 16 to vote on a bill to raise the debt ceiling and fund the government.

Evan Vucci/AP

Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah (left), and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, walk to the Senate floor on Oct. 16 to vote on a bill to raise the debt ceiling and fund the government.

Evan Vucci/AP

Two Tea Party-backed, defund-Obamacare-or-we'll-shut-down-the-government Senate leaders. Two very different outcomes.

Ted Cruz, who became the public face of the shutdown strategy with his 21-hour talkfest on the Senate floor, has gone back to Texas a conquering hero. He even got an eight-minute standing ovation at a San Antonio event over the weekend, and his not-quite-acknowledged 2016 presidential bid has only gathered momentum.

But Mike Lee, who actually circulated the letter demanding that the president's health care law be left out of any new government spending bill? Well, he's decided to avoid a lot of public events back in Utah for the time being.

It turns out there are many Republicans in Utah who think the shutdown was a bad idea, in part because the resulting closure of national parks cost the state's tourism industry money. Others are uncomfortable with the sharp and uncompromising ideological edge. The ill feelings could add steam to efforts to change the nominating process there to eliminate the party convention that currently has so much sway. It was the convention in 2010 where Lee and another challenger ousted incumbent Republican Robert Bennett. Lee then went on to win the subsequent primary.

If that convention is eliminated in favor of a stand-alone primary, it would diminish the influence of a small group of the most conservative activists and empower the broader, and more mainstream, conservative GOP electorate.

There's one bit of good news in this for Lee: His re-election cycle is still three years off.

And Cruz? He will be headlining the Iowa Republican Party's Reagan dinner Friday night.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2013/10/24/240542891/texas-vs-utah-a-tale-of-two-government-shutdowners?ft=1&f=1014
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Mouse To Scorpion: "Is That All Ya Got?"

Click here to listen to this podcast

Rodents called grasshopper mice have an unusual favorite food. Not grasshoppers. No, they really like scorpions. You can see the problem. But the mice shrug off any scorpion stings. And a new study shows how.

Researchers injected common house mice with scorpion venom. The mice nursed the injection site for several minutes. But grasshopper mice injected with venom fussed for only a few seconds. In fact, they were more bothered by saline solution.

So what’s going on? In the house mouse, a specific type of nerve-cell signaling-channel got activated by the venom. But this same channel in grasshopper mice stayed inactive in the presence of venom—meaning the mice remained blissfully ignorant.

In addition, a separate pathway did react to the scorpion venom—and it actually temporarily blocked pain signals. Meaning that for grasshopper mice, scorpion venom is actually an analgesic. The work is in the journal Science. [Ashlee H. Row et al, Voltage-Gated Sodium Channel in Grasshopper Mice Defends Against Bark Scorpion Toxin]

Understanding details of this system could lead to new approaches in the treatment of pain in people. So that someday we might ask, “Scorpion, where is thy sting?”

—Sophie Bushwick

[The above text is a transcript of this podcast]

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs.
Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.

© 2013 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/mouse-scorpion-ya-got-001408651.html
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U.S. Spying Takes Center Stage At EU Summit

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is furious about the U.S. eavesdropping on her calls. She is the latest to protest loudly to the U.S. as the EU gathers for a regular summit. The meeting should have focused on immigration and the economy, but will be sidetracked by the continued NSA spying anger.

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Audie Cornish.

MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

And I'm Melissa Block. We begin this hour with the latest news about the extent of the National Security Agency's spying activities. The Guardian newspaper came out with a report this afternoon saying that the U.S. has monitored the phone traffic of 35 world leaders. The paper cites a document from 2006. The news comes after revelations yesterday that the NSA tapped German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cell phone.

The news further damages U.S. relations with Western Europe. German officials reacted to the news with deep concern.

THOMAS DE MAIZIERE: (Speaking foreign language)

BLOCK: That's the German Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere speaking with German public broadcaster ARD. He called the allegations really bad. He also said that as long as America is Germany's best friend, it really can't work like this. Meanwhile, at the European Union summit in Brussels, many leaders are expressing indignation that the U.S., their strongest ally, is engaging in any spying on European officials and citizens.

For more, we're joined by NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson. She is in Berlin. And Soraya, this is the latest in a series of revelations about the NSA's activities, including earlier revelations this summer about spying on Germany, but reaction now seems to be much stronger.

SORAYA SARHADDI NELSON, BYLINE: Yeah, I mean, they've been pretty upset by this all along. I mean, you're looking at German history here where during the East German Communist times the Stasi did a lot of spying on people and certainly during the Cold War there was a lot of it and then go back to World War II.

But I think what's particularly outrageous to them now is the fact that this was done on the chancellor herself. This is arguably the strongest or most important leader in Europe and certainly in Germany and so there really is a feeling of betrayal.

BLOCK: This all led to Chancellor Merkel calling President Obama. He apparently assured her that her phone is not being listened to. So I'm a little confused. If the NSA was tapping Merkel's phone, what does that mean? They were tapping it, but just not listening to what she was saying?

NELSON: Well, I think what President Obama was trying to tell her was that it's not being listened to now and it's won't be listened to in the future, but he didn't address, in fact, what happened in the past. And this is the $64,000 question, if you will, and what people in Germany want to know is, you know, did this, in fact, happen and what happened before.

And it sort of leads to the whole issue of why Germans aren't placated by these assurances by the president. They don't feel he's taking these allegations seriously and they don't really like the, trust me, it's OK, don't worry about it approach that they're seeing.

BLOCK: And apart from Germany, Soraya, what other reaction has there been across Europe?

NELSON: Well, there's a lot of outrage being expressed by leaders. The French president, for example, who had also called the U.S. ambassador in Paris on the carpet to answer questions about spying allegations there, wants to see this on the EU summit agenda, that this whole matter be discussed.

And also, Annette Heuser who is the executive director of the Bertelsmann Foundation in Washington says some European leaders are calling for pulling the Transatlantic trade talks on hold.

ANNETTE HEUSER: Bottom line is, Europeans are not accepting this when it comes to the transatlantic relationship because you don't spy on your friends and I would say this NSA scandal is a political phenomena right now that is happening across the Atlantic.

NELSON: She adds that the proposed trade agreement is the only prestigious project that Europeans and Americans have in the pipeline so this is a real serious issue.

BLOCK: And Soraya, it got even more serious today with that report I mentioned from The Guardian newspaper which says the NSA was able to monitor the phones of 35 world leaders. What more can you tell us about that?

NELSON: The newspaper cites a memo from October 2006 that it said it got from Edward Snowden. Now, this NSA memo doesn't name the world's leaders who were spied and said that it didn't receive much in the way of useful intelligence. But what was interesting is that they were asking U.S. officials in other departments to handover - basically open up their Rolodexes and hand over foreign contacts, with the hopes that they would get more intelligence from those individuals.

BLOCK: From those phone numbers.

NELSON: From those phone numbers.

BLOCK: OK. NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson in Berlin. Soraya, thanks.

NELSON: You're welcome, Melissa.

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Source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=240559681&ft=1&f=1004
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