Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/180412325?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Saturday, December 31, 2011
Snow church opens in Bavaria
Snow church opens in Bavaria
A church built entirely of ice and snow has opened in Bavaria _ a century after villagers first built a snow church in an act of protest.
The church at Mitterfirmiansreut, near the Czech border, is more than 20 meters (65 feet) in length and boasts a tower. It's made up of some 1,400 cubic meters (49,000 cubic feet) of snow. The structure was bathed in blue light as it opened Wednesday evening with a blessing from Dean Kajetan Steinbeisser. But when the ancestors of today's villagers built the first snow church in 1911, they weren't thinking just of architectural achievement. Steinbeisser says: "It was meant as an act of provocation _ believers from the village got together and built a snow church because they didn't have a church here."
Source: http://www.onenewsnow.com/AP/Search/World/Default.aspx?id=1504850
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Friday, December 30, 2011
Cheryl Cole and Taio Cruz: New Couple Alert?
Cheryl Cole and Taio Cruz are making some beautiful music together ... sorta. Well, no, they definitely are, but only maybe in the way we're making it sound.
The pair, who have been collaborating on music together and are also rumored to be seeing each other, are attending a New Year's Eve party in L.A.
According to Perez Hilton, it's their "coming out" as a couple!
An insider explains: "Taio is starting to sort out his New Year's Eve and if he's performing, like he did last year, he wants to party with Cheryl Cole."
"In the run up to Christmas, he's had two shows in California, which I hear he invited Cheryl to attend. Taio is hoping to lay on a night to remember."
The insider continues: "He and Cheryl have both had a tough 2011. He'll want to have the best party night - they'll both be keen for 2012 to start."
Cole, who was ousted from The X Factor before its first season, has had a tough go of it in the love department. Hopefully Taio takes her "Higher." Sorry.
[Photos: WENN.com]
Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2011/12/cheryl-cole-and-taio-cruz-new-couple-alert/
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Thursday, December 29, 2011
N-Control dismisses marketing consultant, discounts PS3 Avenger pre-orders
Not the gossiping type? Here's a quick recap: When N-Control's latest Avenger add-on missed its November 8th street date, customers with pre-orders were left wanting. Some reached out for answers, hoping they could still get their PS3 Avenger before Christmas. All they got in reply, though, were some *ahem* choice words from N-Control's third party marketing contractor, Paul Christoforo -- a man who gained instant notoriety when his emails caught the attention of Penny-Arcade's Mike Krahulik. Krahulik took exception to Christoforo's insults, threatening tone and name-drop posturing (that's where we came in) and responded by publishing the marketing mishap on his comic's website.
Suffice to say, it hasn't ended well for Paul Christoforo -- N-Control has released a statement saying that he and his marketing operation have been "categorically dismissed," stressing that Christoforo owns no stake whatsoever N-Control. After ejecting the elephant from the room, N-Control went on to announce that all PS3 Avenger pre-orders would be given a $10 discount, and penned in a new ship date for January 15th. "I created the Avenger to make people happy," said inventor and company founder Dave Kotkin, who originally designed the controller for a student who had a physical disability, "I deeply regret that so many people have any negative feelings toward it as a result of what has happened." N-Control seems bent on moving on -- which is fine by us, so long as they keep their customers better informed. After all, it's not every day that such an awkward-looking gadget blows us out of the water. Read on for N-Control's full and apologetic press release.
Continue reading N-Control dismisses marketing consultant, discounts PS3 Avenger pre-orders
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Natural gas fueling plans may spur vehicle growth (AP)
NEW ORLEANS ? The United States has record supplies of natural gas and plenty of reasons to promote natural-gas powered cars, but so consumers, manufacturers and fuel suppliers haven't shown much interest.
Now, a major natural gas developer's plans to vastly increase the number of truck stops that offer liquid natural gas could help boost its use in the vehicles that burn the most fuel, while promoting its availability to a wider market.
Lots of natural gas is available, if U.S. drivers decide to use it. In just a few years, domestic natural gas supplies have increased by trillions of cubic feet through shale finds, boosting the supply to the point where plans are in place to export part of the overflow.
The growth of natural gas vehicles in the United States so far has been dominated by fleets of buses, taxis, and garbage haulers. Only one natural gas car is commercially produced in the country: the Honda Civic GX, recently renamed the NG. It has sold a grand total of about 13,000 in 13 years of production.
The reasons for the lackluster sales of natural gas cars are many: the fuel is only available at a handful of public stations, tethering the vehicles within a certain distance of a fuel source. And even though the pump price of natural gas can run $1 to $2 less per gallon equivalent than gasoline, natural gas vehicles carry a higher sticker price.
The focus for the natural gas vehicle industry in the United States has been the fuel-guzzlers: commercial vehicles, especially tractor-trailer rigs.
Rich Kolodziej, president of the trade association NGV America, says that makes sense in terms of overall fuel usage. He said a driver who puts 12,000 miles a year on a car at 25 miles to the gallon will use about 500 gallons of gasoline annually. But a diesel-driven 18-wheeler can easily go 120,000 miles a year. At six miles per gallon, that comes to 20,000 gallons.
"If you're trying to reduce foreign imports of oil, you're trying to reduce greenhouse gases and emissions in urban areas, where do you put your effort? You put it on the big vehicles," Kolodziej said.
For reasons of tank space, liquid natural gas is used by commercial trucks, while compressed natural gas is the fuel of choice for cars.
According to the international trade association NGV Global, there are 12.7 million natural gas vehicles in the world, including 6.8 million in the Asia-Pacific rim, 4.2 million in Latin America, 1.4 million in Europe, and 122,000 in Africa.
The U.S. has just 112,000 of them ? less than 1 percent of the global total, and less than a tenth of 1 percent of the 253.7 million vehicles in the U.S.
Most of them are in fleets.
"The big reason that they work well for fleets and not the average person on the street is that most fleet vehicles are used for relatively short trips," said John O'Dell, senior editor of Edmunds.com, which follows the vehicle industry. "They go back to the barn in the evening where they have a refueling station that can handle them.
"There is not a really good fueling system in this country," O'Dell added. "You have to have the infrastructure out there to convince people to buy natural gas cars."
Kolodziej said that there are about 180,000 gasoline stations ? and only about 1,000 locations to fill up with natural gas.
But that may be changing.
The T. Boone Pickens-backed Clean Energy Fuels Corp. is embarking on a major expansion of natural gas fueling and plans to add liquefied natural gas pumps at 150 truck stops nationwide over the next 24 to 36 months.
"We've mapped out a strategy to cover every major interstate in the domestic United States," said Clean Energy Fuels chief marketing officer James Harger.
Clean Energy currently provides fueling services for over 500 fleets consisting of about 22,000 vehicles, such as transit buses, taxis, shuttle buses, school buses, municipal cars and garbage trucks, Harger said.
Still, Clean Energy has its eyes firmly focused on the long-haul trucking industry with its truck stop expansion plan.
Harger and other natural gas proponents are putting stock in pending congressional legislation that would provide tax credits to cover 80 percent of the cost difference between a liquid natural gas tractor-trailer and the diesel variety. Harger said the five-year bill probably would cost about $1 billion a year. The U.S. spends over $1 billion a day on foreign oil.
"This will help jump-start this industry," he said.
C.R. England, a major refrigerated carrier, recently started using five liquid natural gas-fired tractors for its rigs in southern California. The company has about 4,000 diesel tractors, said Tracy Brown, a company operating director. He said the region was chosen because of the ready availability of dedicated Clean Energy refueling depots. The rigs are being used in the Los Angeles region and on a route to and from Las Vegas, Brown said.
Although he would not reveal what Salt Lake City-based C.R. England paid for the liquid natural gas tractors, he said fuel cost savings could lead to overall savings within a year or two. Depending on diesel prices, the company saves $1.50 to $2 per gallon equivalent on liquid natural gas, he said. At the same time, fuel usage is about the same in equivalent diesel gallons.
"They are much cleaner, they are much quieter," Brown said of the new tractors. "We haven't noticed any power reduction from the diesel engines. We're very pleased with these."
As Clean Energy expands its network of public refueling, "it will be more advantageous to have natural gas vehicles on the road," Brown said.
Honda Motor Co. is expanding sales of its Civic NG. The NG carries a basic sticker price of $26,155, while its gasoline counterpart, the Civic LX, lists at $20,505.
Until this model year, the GX had only been offered as a private vehicle in dealerships in California, Oklahoma, Utah and New York. Sales will be expanded for the next model year to 37 states, mostly to dealers within 20 miles of a public fueling station, said Honda spokeswoman Jessica Fini. For the first time, the car will be advertised nationally and will offer a navigation system and an upgraded audio system.
"We think we are expanding the car at the right time with the expansion in public infrastructure," she said.
Honda's goal is to boost sales from about 1,000 cars annually to about 2,000, Fini added ? still a tiny fraction of the 259,000 gasoline-powered Civics that Honda sold in 2010.
Gene Paulsen, an aerospace engineer from Gilbert, Ariz., and his wife are on their second GX. They bought their first one in 2000 when the state offered tax credits for choosing the natural gas version of the Civic. They sold it earlier this year to a California woman.
He said his wife now commutes in a used GX he bought in 2009. They mostly refuel from a costly home refueling appliance, and have added a second fuel tank to drive longer distances.
"It works really well for us," he said. "But the fueling infrastructure isn't very good in Arizona. Until you add more fuel capacity to the thing, you're kind of stuck."
Paulsen said fuel for the GX costs about $1.50 per gallon equivalent, calculating the draw on his home's gas system, the cost of periodically maintaining his $10,000 refueling pump and the power cost for running the pressure pump to fuel the car.
"We wouldn't have done this if it was our only vehicle," Paulsen said.
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Wednesday, December 28, 2011
slashgear: Samsung buys out Sony S-LCD share in $940m TV deal http://t.co/UZnwFkl5 #tech #slashgear
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India tycoon's got tons of cash, nowhere to invest
In this Monday, Dec. 19, 2011 photo, billionaire Indian tycoon Ajay Piramal speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office in Mumbai, India. In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal was eager to set that cash pile to work and wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
In this Monday, Dec. 19, 2011 photo, billionaire Indian tycoon Ajay Piramal speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office in Mumbai, India. In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal was eager to set that cash pile to work and wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
In this Monday, Dec. 19, 2011 photo, billionaire Indian tycoon Ajay Piramal speaks during an interview with the Associated Press at his office in Mumbai, India. In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal was eager to set that cash pile to work and wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
MUMBAI, India (AP) ? Ajay Piramal is sitting on a mountain of cash. Yet the billionaire Indian tycoon, working in one of the world's fastest growing economies, is struggling to figure out what to do with the money.
The problem isn't opportunity, he said. It's India.
"Every large investment, there was no transparency," Piramal said.
His dilemma is a worrying sign for India. With the country mired in corruption, bureaucratic red tape and unclear and changing government policies, many of the men who made their billions here are saying maybe it's time to quit India. It's got to be easier to do business elsewhere.
In May last year, Piramal's healthcare business sold its generic drug operations to U.S. pharmaceutical giant Abbott Laboratories for $3.8 billion. Piramal, a tall big man in a country that still measures prosperity by girth, was eager to set that cash pile to work. He wanted to expand one of his chemical plants, but was told it would take five years.
"The same plant could be set up in China in two years," he said. "I love India, but my customer is not going to wait."
India, still a beacon of relatively fast growth despite a troubled world economy, should be a magnet for capital. Instead, since the beginning of 2010, the amount that Indians have invested in businesses overseas has exceeded the amount foreigners are investing in India, according to central bank figures.
In part this reflects the confidence and aptitude of India's maturing companies and the current malaise in the global economy and financial markets. But it also reflects deep problems at home. India's big coporations may be cash rich but the failure to invest that money domestically is bad news for a developing country that needs capital to build the roads, power plants and food warehouses that could help lift hundreds of millions out of dire poverty.
The frustration of India's business elite with corruption, political paralysis, log-jammed approvals, regulatory flip-flops, lack of access to natural resources and land acquisition battles ? to pick a few of the top complaints ? has reached a pitch perhaps not heard since India began liberalizing its economy in the early 1990s.
"If you are an honest businessman in India, it's very difficult to start up anything," said Jamshyd Godrej, chairman of manufacturing giant Godrej & Boyce. "Companies are going to operate where they see the best opportunities and efficiency for their capital."
Increasingly, that's outside India.
In 2008, foreigners poured roughly twice as much direct investment into India ? $33 billion ? as Indians plowed into businesses overseas. By 2010, that had reversed: Indians invested $40 billion abroad ? twice as much as foreigners invested in India ? a trend that's continued this year.
There is another, unspoken element to all the complaints. To the extent that business in India ran on corruption, some of the old, dirty ways of doing things are being disrupted, freezing India's already glacial bureaucracy, business leaders say.
Scandals in the staging of the Commonwealth Games, the pilfering of homes meant for war widows and the irregular auction of cellphone spectrum that cost the country billions has sent parliamentarians and even a Cabinet minister to prison.
With Indians tiring of the incessant graft, tens of thousands of middle-class protesters poured into the streets and pushed an anti-corruption bill onto the floor of Parliament.
Steelmakers can't get enough iron ore because a massive mining scandal in the southern state of Karnataka prompted a court to order the closure of illicit mines that account for a fifth of iron ore production in the country.
The bureaucrats ? even the honest ones ? are reportedly so scared of being punished they are refusing to make the decisions needed to make the country run.
Piramal is not unpatriotic. Each room in his executive suite is named after an Indian epic hero: Arjuna, the most pure; Dhananjay, acquirer and master of wealth. There's a quote from the Upanishads scriptures on the wall.
His office sits in a one million square foot office park in Mumbai his family built. The buildings around him ? white with blue glass that flashes back the unforgiving sun ? bear his own name in large black letters: Piramal Towers.
Piramal had the will and the means to build power plants and roads.
Instead, his Piramal Group's largest investment to date has been in one of the office park's tenants: the Indian subsidiary of the British telecom giant Vodafone Plc.
Last September, when he got the first payout, of $2.2 billion, from Abbott, the phone started ringing.
"Because people knew we had money, we had so many people approaching us for projects in the infrastructure sector," he said. "These people had no experience and no knowledge and no track record of having built a business in any area. And yet they were coming to us saying we have licenses and approvals. That just didn't sound right or smell right."
Each day, they paraded through his office: The investment banker who decided to build a 500 megawatt power plant, the coal trader assured of a government coal allocation, small-time miners with pretty presentations promising land, licenses and financing.
"They'd name politicians from the center and the state who had it all tied up for them," he said. "It didn't sound right. Obviously there were things going on in the system."
Road and port projects weren't much better, he said.
Piramal also looked at investing in engineering and infrastructure services companies, but couldn't make sense of their books.
"We couldn't find anything," he said. "People get greedy. In their desire to get good valuations they resort to, if I can say, creative accounting."
Today, India's infrastructure companies are known as great wealth destroyers.
"Infrastructure investment has become untouchable, a sure way of losing money," said Jagannadham Thunuguntla, head of research at SMC Global Securities. He calculates that four of India's top infrastructure companies ? GMR Infrastructure, GVK Power and Infrastructure, Lanco Infratech and Punj Lloyd ? have lost over 80 percent of their value since 2007. A fifth, Larson & Toubro is down 50 percent.
Piramal may have dodged a bullet, but shareholders in Piramal Healthcare aren't happy. Despite a $600 million special dividend and share buyback, the share price has sagged since the Abbott deal was announced on May 21 last year. They'd like to see the Abbott cash productively deployed. Instead, much of it is sitting in fixed deposit accounts.
Piramal said he really does want to run a pharmaceutical company and be the first Indian company to discover a world-class drug ? despite his dabbling in telecom, financial services and real estate financing. It's just that pharma can't absorb all his cash. He plans to sell the 5.5 percent stake he picked up in Vodafone Essar for $640 million in a few years, when Vodafone Essar issues shares in an initial public offering, he said.
He has also launched Piramal Capital, to make real estate and infrastructure loans, and spent about $50 million to acquire IndiaReit, a real estate investment company.
Meanwhile, his thoughts have turned to Boston, where he set up IndUS Growth Partners with a professor from Harvard Business School to look for buying opportunities in the U.S., in security, financial services and biotechnology. And he said he's still planning to spend over a billion dollars on biotechnology acquisitions in North America and Europe.
"India was going more towards capitalism than socialism," Piramal said. "I think we're going back. Capitalism went to too much excess. Corruption levels went to the extreme."
He said he'll announce his first overseas acquisition by March.
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Tuesday, December 27, 2011
In Japan, no dispute about No. 1 holiday song
(CBS News)?
We all have a favorite holiday song, and certainly no lack of choices. But in Japan, it seems, everyone has the same favorite holiday song. And this year, as Lucy Craft reports, it means more than ever.
In countries like Japan, where most people still identify with Buddhism and the native Shinto religion, the usual trappings of Christmas are a side note.
But there's nothing low-key about one Japanese holiday tradition. This time of year, Japan goes batty for Beethoven's masterpiece "Ode to Joy," the final movement of his famous Ninth Symphony.
December just wouldn't be the end of the year, without a stirring rendition of Beethoven's Ninth. The music is so beloved in Japan, it's known affectionately as "daiku" -- which literally means "number nine."
The Beethoven craze began, strangely enough, during World War I, when German soldiers being held as prisoners in Japan staged the very first performance of number nine here.
The Japanese liked what they heard, and by the mid-20th century, number nine had become a holiday hit.
Performed and sung all through the month, from concert halls to department stores, number nine is now a welcome, if predictable, gig for musicians, and conductors.
"I have done (this) more than 150 times," said conductor Yutaka Sado.
Some hard-core fans even try to sing it in German.
"I don't know all the words," said one 9-year-old. "I just fake it."
For sheer scale, nothing beats the 10,000-man "Number Nine Chorus," of Osaka. Talented and tone-deaf alike, all vie for the chance to stand on stage.
In the wake of the disaster last March, the lyrics have taken on deeper meaning for Osaka residents who lived through the tsunami.
"The disaster showed us we need to help one another," said one chorus member. "That's what this song evokes, for me." A healing note, for a shattered nation.
Source: http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~r/CBSNewsGamecore/~3/T0huM5f3x98/
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Microsoft's quick start guide to Windows Phone at Christmas
Published by Ewan Spence at
Just in time for all the Windows Phone presents being opened for Christmas, Microsoft's Windows Phone YouTube channel has uploaded a bundle of getting started videos covering all the important areas of Windows Phone for the many new users around the world.
Here's the Live Tiles video, showing off one of the more popular elements in Metro that gives Windows Phone such a distinctive look and feel:
Also available on the channel are introductions for...
That should be more than enough to get all the new Windows Phone users up to speed - I wonder what they'll do next? That's the new users... and Microsoft!
Source / Credit: Microsoft's YouTube Channel
Filed: Home > Flow > Microsoft's quick start guide to Windows Phone at Christmas
Platforms: Windows Phone 7.5
Categories: Video
?
Source: http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/flow/item/13908_Microsofts_quick_start_guide_t.php
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Monday, December 26, 2011
JoeMyGod: RT @BorowitzReport: ROME: Thousands begin to gather for the midnight celebration of Tim Tebow's birthday. #nfl #broncos #denver #tebow
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RT @BorowitzReport: ROME: Thousands begin to gather for the midnight celebration of Tim Tebow's birthday. #nfl #broncos #denver #tebow 
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Sunday, December 25, 2011
Nicaragua vs Costa Rica at UN court on river works (AP)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands ? Nicaragua has filed a suit at the U.N.'s highest court seeking to stop Costa Rica from building a road along the banks of the San Juan river that it claims is destroying the environment.
The legal action filed late Thursday at the International Court of Justice is the latest in an ongoing dispute between the two countries over rights to the ecologically sensitive river that forms a common border.
Nicaragua claimed the construction had dumped uprooted vegetation, felled trees and tons of sediment that threatened endangered species, wetlands and the water quality of the river.
The Nicaraguans asked the court to order a return to the previous situation, and for Costa Rica to pay dredging costs to restore the river.
Earlier this week, the Central American Court of Justice also agreed to hear Nicaragua's complaint about Costa Rica's highway construction.
The two Central American countries came close to an armed standoff earlier this year over Costa Rica's complaint against Nicaraguan dredging it said was to improve navigation on the river.
The U.N. court, also known as the World Court, ordered both countries to withdraw armed forces from the area. But it declined to order Nicaragua to cease work, saying it was unclear that it was causing irreparable damage.
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Dunham?s Sports opens large Burlington store
BURLINGTON ? Dunham?s Sports, which calls itself the Midwest?s largest sporting goods chain, has come to Burlington in a big way.
Today the Waterford, Mich.-based retailer opens at Fox River Plaza in the former Pick ?n Save space. At 55,000 square feet, this store is about 25 percent larger than Dunham?s average, said Store Manager Todd Brunner.
Source: http://racine.fox6now.com/news/business/98881-dunhams-sports-opens-large-burlington-store
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Saturday, December 24, 2011
Heather Donahue of 'Blair Witch' Left Acting to Grow Pot
Anyone who saw the hit 1999 indie horror flick The Blair Witch Project will remember Heather Donahue as the terror-stricken star with the memorable knit cap. But if you haven't seen Donahue lately, that's because she's been busy with her new career: growing marijuana.
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Kenya HIV families torn between health or food (AP)
NAIROBI, Kenya ? Rosalia Adhiambo won't take the free anti-HIV drugs that would prolong her life. The spiraling price of food in Kenya means she can't afford to feed both her grandniece and herself.
So she feeds 5-year-old Emily and doesn't take her own medicine, fearing that the nausea she would get from taking the drugs without adequate food will make her too weak to look for work.
Prices for staple foods this year are almost twice as high as in 2009, the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization says. The rising prices and a dwindling of funds for HIV programs mean countless poor families must decide whether to focus on the health of an HIV-positive adult or on a child's hunger.
Valerian Kamito, a nurse at the clinic that gives Adhiambo her food, says some patients are refusing to start treatment for HIV and around a quarter of his 1,555 patients on anti-HIV drugs are now skipping their medication.
"They say they cannot take them on an empty stomach," Kamito said. Before prices rose, he said, "it was very rare."
HIV-positive adults need 10 percent more calories than other people just to maintain their body weight. Children with HIV need between 30 percent to 50 percent more calories than other children. They will lose weight and be vulnerable to infections without those calories, said nutritionist Kate Greenaway from the aid agency Catholic Relief Services.
Annual inflation in Kenya is around 20 percent, but wages haven't kept pace. Around half of Kenyans live on less than $2 a day, including 52-year-old Adhiambo, who makes $1 each day she does housework.
"When there is nothing to eat, we go to bed hungry. I tell Emily it is because God did not send us food today," said Adhiambo, motioning to a cardboard picture of Jesus on the wall of their corrugated iron shack.
"Emily stands before that picture and prays, 'God, please remember to send us food tomorrow,'" said Adhiambo.
She had work for two weeks last month, but the younger women get most of the jobs. Adhiambo relies on her daily free meal of rice, beans and vegetables from a clinic run by Catholic Relief Services in the Mathare slum, though she sometimes misses that if she is searching for work. The staff there are trying to persuade her to take her anti-HIV drugs.
But Adhiambo carries the food home and gives most of it to Emily, who isn't signed up for the CRS program, though workers there are trying to get her into it. The bright-eyed little girl in the torn blue dress is almost all that's left of Adhiambo's family. Adhiambo's brother, two sisters and husband are all dead. Emily's mother is alive, but ill. She refuses to be tested. Emily has been tested and is HIV positive.
Adhiambo needs to take drugs called anti-retrovirals, or ARVs, and so will Emily. Taken regularly, the medicine can prolong life by years, possibly decades. But if taken sporadically, the medicine will lose its effectiveness.
Patients say the medicine can cause nausea, fatigue, and diarrhea at first, especially if there is no food to go with it, said Greenaway. The drugs also cause a ravenous hunger as the body starts to recover. Adhiambo, afraid that the side effects will prevent her from working, refuses to take the pills.
The clinic gives 400 of its patients, Adhiambo among them, "prescribed food" to eat with their medicines so they'll continue the treatment. But most take the meals home to share with their families, said Kamito. The program has a long waiting list. The financial crisis means there is no money to expand it.
Globally, there has been around a 10 percent decline in HIV/AIDS funding, said Michel Sidibe, the UNAIDS executive director. The world's top funder of public health programs ? the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria ? has disbursed $15 billion since 2002, but it cannot afford to pay for any new or expanded programs until 2014.
Poverty, meanwhile, continues to eat at the gains made by modern medicine in fighting HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
Twenty to 30 percent of HIV-positive patients in the developing world drop out in the first two years of treatment, said Nils Grede, the deputy chief of the World Food Program's nutrition and HIV/AIDS unit.
"Barriers to continue the treatment ... are often related to poverty. You don't have the money to pay for the bus, you don't have enough food, so you spend your time on trying to make sure that your family eats," Grede told The Associated Press in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
"People adhere much better to drug regimens when there is food," said Greenaway. "But in poor families, that might mean mothers who want to stay strong have to decide whether to take something from their children's plates."
Adhiambo's neighbor Ishmael Abongo, a 35-year-old father of four, must do just that. He and his wife Mary are both HIV positive, as is one of their sons. The whole family shares the clinic's food. When he has found work, Abongo takes a bit of porridge from dinner and saves it for the morning so he isn't too dizzy for a two-hour bus journey.
"I know it is important to take the drugs," he said.
He recounted knowing four people who did not take the pills because they had no food. They are now all dead, Abongo said.
A clinic social worker visited Adhiambo in her tiny shack in December, trying to persuade her to take her medication or risk dying, and leaving Emily with no family to care for her. But Adhiambo was more worried about their present situation.
"What will happen to her if I take these drugs and I get sick?" Adhiambo asked, adding that if she can't work or even walk because of side effects from the medicine they won't have any food.
Eventually, Adhiambo stood up. She needed to find some clothes or a floor that needed washing. She was two months behind with the rent ? $15 a month ? and could be evicted.
The white-winged Jesus that Emily prays to was shown in the picture walking through a garden, nothing like the smelly alley outside the shack.
Words below picture said: "May my prayers come before you, that you heal me according to your will."
___
Associated Press writer Luc van Kemenade in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia contributed to this report.
___
Follow Katharine Houreld at http://twitter.com/khoureld
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Friday, December 23, 2011
Nebraska coach clears starting center for bowl game
LINCOLN, Neb. ? Nebraska coach Bo Pelini says center Mike Caputo will play in the Capital One Bowl against South Carolina despite his arrest on suspicion of drunken driving.
The senior from Omaha pleaded guilty on Thursday to reckless driving in Lancaster County Court and was fined $100.
Caputo was arrested on Dec. 11 in Lincoln after police found him slumped behind the wheel of a running vehicle in a parking lot. Chief assistant city attorney John McQuinn said Caputo would be charged with reckless driving instead of DUI.
Pelini said Caputo will play when Nebraska faces No. 10 South Carolina on Jan. 2. He says Caputo has been disciplined internally over the past couple weeks following the incident and will face "additional" measures during the bowl trip.
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40 Years On, the Triumphs and Challenges of America's 'War on Cancer' (HealthDay)
WEDNESDAY, Dec. 21 (HealthDay News) -- Jack Whelan first knew something was wrong when it got harder and harder to walk from the train station in Boston to the financial district where he worked.
He knew something was terribly wrong when he started getting nose bleeds.
A consultation with an oncologist confirmed Whelan's fears: He had advanced Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia, a rare form of blood cancer that affects only about 1,500 people in the United States each year.
Forty years ago, Whelan would have had five years to live -- at the outside -- and who knows what his quality of life would have looked like.
But today, five years after his diagnosis and almost 40 years to the day that President Richard Nixon signed the National Cancer Act declaring "war" on cancer, Whelan, 63, is power-walking, raking leaves, shoveling snow and back at work as a marketing executive.
Whelan is just one of the millions of Americans who have benefited from continued advances in cancer research. He has participated in four different clinical trials and is currently taking an experimental drug called LBH589 which, Whelan said, makes him "feel like Popeye the sailor after having spinach."
Just this month, scientists at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, where Whelan is being treated, discovered a single gene mutation present in 90 percent of patients who have this rare type of cancer, raising the hope that an even more targeted treatment will soon be able to attack the disease.
Since Dec. 23, 1971, and the passage in Congress of the National Cancer Act, research has made tremendous progress against what is still one of the world's foremost killers, experts say.
"Back at that time point, cancer essentially was a death sentence," said Dr. Raymond N. DuBois Jr., provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.
That's no longer the case, however, thanks to advances in early detection, improved therapies and a better understanding of the genetics driving different forms of cancer, he said.
"Forty years ago, fewer than one-third of patients with a diagnosis of cancer lived five years. Almost no children with a diagnosis of the most common form of childhood cancer, acute leukemia, lived [that long]," said Dana-Farber president Dr. Edward Benz Jr. "In 2011, nearly 90 percent of children diagnosed with acute leukemia will be cured and nearly two-thirds of all people diagnosed with cancer will live at least five years."
Since 1991 alone, there's been more than an 18 percent reduction in deaths from cancer, added Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society.
An ounce of prevention
Much of this progress may have started with prevention.
Declines in smoking rates, helped by the landmark U.S. Surgeon General's Report in 1964 linking smoking to cancer, have continued over the decades, preventing countless cases of lung malignancies and other forms of cancer.
Colonoscopies to detect pre-cancerous polyps have not only reduced mortality but prevented many cases of colorectal cancer outright.
The adoption of regular mammography screening for breast cancer is another success story in its own right, as is screening for cervical cancer.
Thanks to, first, the Pap smear (which looks for abnormal cells on the cervix) and now the HPV test (which detects the human papillomavirus that can cause cervical cancer), death rates from cervical cancer in the United States plummeted more than 60 percent between 1955 and 1992, according to the U.S. National Cancer Institute.
No doubt, incidence and mortality from cervical cancer will continue to decline with the advent of another major weapon: newly approved vaccines that prevent infection with the strains of HPV that cause most cases of this type of cancer.
These vaccines (two have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration) have great potential to reduce head and neck cancers, as well as anal cancer deaths, which can also be caused by HPV, Brawley said.
But advances in detection have been complemented by improvements in treatment, the experts added. These include better surgical techniques. For example, studies suggest that women who have a lumpectomy to conserve their breast along with radiation typically have as good a prognosis as women who undergo a full mastectomy.
Targeted radiation has also made treatment much less onerous for prostate cancer patients, and new chemotherapies often arrive with drastically fewer side effects than in decades past.
The age of "targeted therapies" or "personalized medicine" -- an era ushered in by anti-estrogen breast cancer therapies such as tamoxifen (which debuted in the 1980s) -- is here, Brawley said. Those highly targeted medications were later joined by aromatase inhibitors as well as Herceptin (trastuzumab) to attack a specific form of Her2neu-positive breast cancer.
Scientists are also finding new targets for lung, colorectal and other cancers. For example, studies show that Tarceva (erlotinib) can improve the average survival of patients with non-small cell lung cancer by about two months. That may not sound like much but, in lung cancer, it represents a huge stride.
"Wonder drug" Gleevec, a medicine used to push certain blood cancers into remission, is another targeted-therapy success story. In fact, a colleague of Whelan's was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia while still in his 20s and subsequently died. Had he been diagnosed a few years later, after the discovery of Gleevec, he would have lived, Whelan believes.
Brawley agrees that "personalized medicine is the future," and he predicts many more advances in this area in the next five years.
Dubois added: "We are doing molecular fingerprinting of each individual tumor and, although we're not using that right now to direct cancer care, the idea is once we have that information we will be able to use it to figure out exactly which treatments a patient needs so they're not being given unnecessary treatment. And the treatment they do get is going to be much more effective on the first round of therapy when it really makes the biggest difference."
Doctors now also know that "multi-modality" therapy -- meaning the combined use of surgery, radiation and drug therapy -- "has given people the best chance for good outcomes for particular kinds of cancer," said Benz.
Progress lacking on some fronts
But while there's been undisputed progress, "it's very incomplete progress," Benz and others acknowledged.
"If you look over the past 40 years, on some fronts we've actually been winning and on some fronts we're losing terribly," said Brawley. "We are our own worst enemy in terms of battling cancer with tobacco control, diet and exercise and getting everybody adequate preventive screening and treatment.
"In excess of 200,000 of the 500,000 lives that will be lost from cancer this year could have been avoided if we simply adopted all the cancer-control technologies that we've learned over the last 40 years," he added.
Although the smoking rate has declined dramatically since publication of the U.S. Surgeon General's 1964 report, it's been stalled at about 20 percent for 10 years now, Brawley said.
There are also lingering disparities in both prevention and treatment by race, socioeconomic status and urban versus rural locations, said Brawley.
Cancer therapies are also becoming increasingly complicated and expensive "at a time when the trend in health care and in support for cancer research is going down," added Benz. "I worry that we're going to see increasing disparities as cancer and personalized medicine becomes more complicated and expensive. It will be harder and harder to offer it to everybody who needs it."
Clinical trials may also become more difficult and expensive to conduct, as scientists recognize more and more subtypes of cancer. That means fewer people fit each particular subtype, Benz said.
Nevertheless, the overall message is a positive one.
"It's been a huge evolution since 1971," said DuBois. "It's just incredible."
More information
There's more on the National Cancer Act at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.
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Thursday, December 22, 2011
Attacks hurt Gingrich in Iowa, no letup pre-caucus (AP)
DAVENPORT, Iowa ? More than $1 million in negative advertising ? much of it bankrolled by Mitt Romney's allies ? has eroded Newt Gingrich's standing in Iowa and thrown the Republican presidential race here wide open two weeks before the first votes.
The former House speaker's Iowa slide mirrors his newfound troubles nationally, and it has boosted Romney's confidence while fueling talk that libertarian-leaning Texas Rep. Ron Paul could pull off a win in the leadoff caucus state on Jan. 3.
"The only person who profits from Republican ads attacking other Republicans is Barack Obama and I think it is pretty reprehensible behavior on the part of some of the candidates," Gingrich said Monday as he arrived in Davenport, jabbing his opponents even as he insisted he was running an upbeat campaign.
Later, at an appearance in Hiawatha, Gingrich encouraged voters to demand that Romney and others take down the tough spots, saying that they "ought to be ashamed of themselves."
"If you see Romney, tell him to take them off the air,'" he told several hundred supporters.
Despite his chiding, attacks against him are all but certain to continue. For one, the Restore Our Future political action committee, made up of former Romney staffers from his failed 2008 bid, plans to spend $1.4 million more over the next two weeks, including on a new ad beginning Tuesday that's expected to be aimed at Gingrich. That would bring to roughly $3 million the amount spent by the group against Gingrich.
Aides for several campaigns competing against Gingrich as well as outside independent groups aligned with the candidates say their internal polls find that he has fallen over the last week from the top slot in Iowa. And a national Gallup poll released Monday found Gingrich's support plummeting: He had the backing of 26 percent of Republican voters nationally, down from 37 percent on Dec. 8. Romney's support was largely unchanged at 24 percent.
Gingrich's weakened position follows a barrage of advertising that cast him as a longtime Washington, D.C., power-broker. The ads, primarily financed by so-called super PACs, underscore the power of independent groups following a Supreme Court decision last year that allowed people, unions and corporations to donate unlimited amounts of money to outfits advocating the election or defeat of candidates. Since the ruling, groups have popped up to work on behalf of every serious Republican presidential candidate.
Gingrich said while campaigning in Iowa that any candidate faced with such a concentrated an attack will slip.
"You get enough negative ads without answering them, your numbers go down for a while," said Gingrich, who has tried to refrain from attacking his fellow Republicans. "I think the average Republican's going to be very unhappy with Republicans whose entire campaign is negative."
With the caucuses looming in two weeks, the race in Iowa is arguably anyone's to win. And the results here will shape the rest of the state-by-state march to the GOP nomination.
Gingrich has acknowledged that the onslaught has tested his pledge to keep his criticism focused on Democratic President Barack Obama.
The Republican rushed back to Iowa on Monday after a three-day absence for three days of campaigning before voters tune out this weekend for the Christmas holiday.
He told about 200 people in the garage of a security company in Davenport that he would launch a 44-stop Jobs and Prosperity tour before the caucuses, and use those events to answer any charges put out there. Gingrich, whose campaign nearly collapsed last summer, also acknowledged his Iowa organization lags behind. "There's no question, some candidates have been running for five or six years and have raised millions of dollars and they're better organized than I am."
But Gingrich has also been trying to catch up, and got some good news upon his return to Iowa.
Gingrich planned to announce Wednesday during a campaign stop in Des Moines the endorsement of Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen and New Hampshire House Speaker Bill O'Brien.
Gingrich has also redoubled his appeals to conservatives, who make up the base of the GOP, with sharp criticism of the judiciary, saying he would have the Justice Department instruct the U.S. Marshal service to arrest judges who ignore subpoenas to testify in Congress about their decisions. And he tried anew to end accusations he lobbied on behalf of troubled Freddie Mac or other organizations.
"We should have had a much more coherent answer," he said about charges that he earned a windfall from the federally backed mortgage giant.
He then offered his latest explanation, saying that his consulting firm, the Gingrich Group, was hired over a period of six years for strategic advice and he earned about $35,000 a year ? "less than I got per speech." Gingrich said that when Freddie Mac was seeking a bailout in 2008, he told House Republicans "my position was to not give them money." Altogether, Gingrich's firm earned some $1.6 million from Freddie Mac.
As Gingrich tried to answer the criticism, Romney, his chief rival, was increasingly expressing optimism as he reveled in a series of endorsements from establishment GOP figures such as Bob Dole, the 1996 GOP nominee, early-state leaders like South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, and newspapers including The Des Moines Register.
Romney joined those criticizing Gingrich's comments on judges, telling Fox News in an interview Monday that Gingrich's idea of sending authorities after judges was neither constitutional nor practical.
"Let me tell you, there are a lot of decisions by judges I vehemently disagree with," Romney said. "The solution to judges out of control is not to tear up the Constitution and say that the Congress of the United States becomes the now ultimate power in this country. ... In the Constitution, there is a method for removing a justice. There's also a method for reversing their decisions."
Paul, who has built arguably the largest get-out-the-vote organization in Iowa and has steadily been inching up in Iowa polls, spent the day in New Hampshire before returning to Iowa for a packed schedule later in the week. He's been on the air here with ads assailing Gingrich.
Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum was among several conservatives canvassing Iowa in hopes of taking advantage of Gingrich's slide and mounting a late-game surge.
Another, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, was in the midst of a bus tour when he slapped at two strong-running candidates Monday over their past support of the $700 billion Wall Street bailout while visiting a pizza buffet in Manchester.
"This Wall Street bailout is the single biggest act of theft in American history," he said. "And, you know, Newt and Mitt, they both were for it. That's one of the reasons I say that if you really want an individual who is an outsider, someone who has not been engaged in part of that process, I hope you'll take a look at me."
Most of the money lent to the financial institutions has been repaid.
On her own bus tour of the state, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, looking to peel off Paul supporters, sought to sow doubt about Paul's opposition to pre-emptive military action in nations such as Iran and North Korea.
"Ron Paul would be a dangerous president," Bachmann said in Grundy Center. "He would have us ignore all of the warning signs of another brutal dictator who wants to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth. I won't...The death of Kim Jung Il reminds us that we live in a dangerous world."
Gingrich, indirectly but unmistakably, went after Paul, too, for wanting to close U.S. military bases abroad and bring all or nearly troops home. "I stand apart from some of our candidates in believing we need a strong defense," Gingrich asserted.
That criticism aside, the vast majority of attacks over the past week have been against Gingrich, and not limited to television advertising.
An anonymous independent group calling itself Iowans for Christian Leadership is urging conservatives not to back Gingrich, in light of his two divorces and past marital infidelity. The group has issued fliers and posted a scathing online video aimed at Gingrich, but has not begun showing TV ads.
The pro-Romney group, meantime, has spent $1.1 million on Iowa advertising over the past two weeks with a spot referring to Gingrich's "baggage," including ethics charges that led to his departure from Congress.
Paul's campaign has also run an ad pointedly attacking Gingrich's work for Freddie Mac and his former support for a health care mandate, a position unpopular with conservatives. And Perry also has started to run ads against Gingrich.
All have painted Gingrich as a Washington insider who profited from his stature after leaving Congress more than a decade ago.
Paul is scaling back his advertising to $55,000 or so over the next two weeks but the pro-Romney super PAC is filling the void with roughly $1.4 million in ad time reserved for the rest of the Iowa campaign.
The group also is advertising in Florida, spending a modest amount, roughly $143,000 over two weeks. But the ad buy is significant because Florida, which holds its primary Jan. 31, is seen as a potential showdown for Romney and Gingrich.
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Monday, December 19, 2011
Pats end Broncos' 6-game streak
New England's 41-23 win halts Denver's win streak at six games
updated 7:28 p.m. ET Dec. 18, 2011
DENVER - Not this time, Tim Tebow.
Tom Brady and the New England Patriots shut down Tebow's late-game heroics and clinched a playoff berth with a 41-23 victory over the Denver Broncos on Sunday.
The Patriots (11-3) won their sixth straight game and another AFC East title by bouncing back from an early 17-6 deficit and an awful first quarter in which they were outgained on the ground 167 yards to 4.
This time, there was no last-minute magic from Tebow, who had guided the Broncos (8-6) to four straight fourth-quarter comebacks and six straight wins.
Instead of another slow start followed by a fantastic finish, the Broncos started out fast and then fizzled. They scored on their first three possessions and then were done in by a trio of second-quarter turnovers.
Champ Bailey had said the Broncos needed a big game against a big QB to prove to themselves and others that they were not just a curiosity but a contender.
They didn't get it on this day.
Denver has faced four quarterbacks currently ranked in the top-10 in yards passing ? Aaron Rodgers, Matthew Stafford, Philip Rivers (twice) and Brady. They're 1-4 in those games.
Brady, who was 23 of 34 for 320 yards with two TD passes and a touchdown run, made up for another bad day by the Patriots' defense to beat the Broncos for the second time in eight career starts ? the only team with a winning record against the three-time Super Bowl champion.
With its first loss since Oct. 30, the AFC West-leading Broncos face a tougher path to the playoffs, with a trip to Buffalo next week followed by a season finale against Kansas City, which ended Green Bay's 19-game winning streak Sunday behind Kyle Orton, the player Tebow replaced in Denver.
Tebow fell to 7-2 as Denver's starter.
The Broncos' 167 yards rushing in the first quarter ? 11 more than their league-leading per-game average ? represented the biggest output in any quarter of the Bill Belichick era in New England. They finished with 252.
Tebow slipped a tackle in the backfield by Rob Ninkovich and darted his way for a 9-yard TD on the game's opening drive. Lonnie Paxton's bad snap prevented Matt Prater from kicking the extra point.
Brady needed five snaps to put the Patriots ahead 7-6 with a 33-yard touchdown toss to Chad Ochocinco, his first score since Nov. 21, 2010, for Cincinnati at Buffalo.
The Broncos responded by going 80 yards in four plays and scoring again. Willis McGahee reeled off a 29-yard run and then retreated to the sideline with what appeared to be a left hamstring injury. Tebow hit Demaryius Thomas for 22 yards before tailback Lance Ball took it in from 32 yards out for his first TD run of his career to make it 13-7.
Denver's next drive stalled at the 8, and coach John Fox decided not to go for it and Prater's field goal made it 16-7.
That's when the Patriots went to the no-huddle and Brady capped an impressive drive with a 1-yard touchdown throw to Aaron Hernandez, who set career highs with nine catches for 129 yards. That made it 16-14.
The Broncos' ball-control offense stumbled after that.
Ball fumbled at his own 19 and Ninkovich recovered, leading to Stephen Gostkowski's 21-yard field goal put the Patriots up for good at 17-16.
Then, defensive end Mark Anderson, subbing for Andre Carter, who injured his left knee earlier in the game, forced and recovered a fumble by Tebow at the Broncos 40. Six plays later, Brady took it in himself from a yard out to make it 24-16.
Brady audibled at the line and just inched the nose of the football across the goal line with 1:08 left in the first half, then celebrated his eighth career TD with a masterful spike.
After some questionable play calling by Broncos offensive coordinator Mike McCoy, the Broncos punted the ball back to the Patriots with 40 seconds left. They held, but Broncos punt returner Quan Cosby tried to field a punt on the run and muffed it with three seconds left. Dane Fletcher recovered for New England and Gostkowski trotted out for a 34-yard field goal to make it 27-16 at halftime.
After Danny Woodhead's 10-yard TD run made it 34-16, Tebow's 2-yard keeper with 8:41 left pulled the Broncos to 34-23, but Brady responded in a big way, leading the Patriots on another 80-yard scoring drive, this one culminating in BenJarvus Green-Ellis' 1-yard TD run.
Tebow was 11 of 22 for 194 yards and added 93 more on 12 carries. Late in the fourth quarter, he was dropped for a 28-yard sack by Ninkovich, a bad ending to a big week for the second-year pro from Florida.
During the week, Tebow cemented his role as a cultural phenomenon as he was the subject of a skit on "Saturday Night Live," his name was brought up in the GOP debate in Sioux City, Iowa, and two high school students were suspended for organizing several "Tebowing" kneel-downs in tribute to the Broncos QB.
? 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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PFT: Packers not only lost their first game of the season, they suffered two more important injuries on Sunday. This is crucial for the playoffs.
Chiefs ends Packers' perfect dream ? |? ??Video
The Green Bay Packers' perfect season came to a crashing halt on Sunday against the beleaguered Kansas City Chiefs, who rallied behind interim coach Romeo Crennel and new quarterback Kyle Orton to a shocking 19-14 victory.
Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/45718058/ns/sports-nfl/
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Sunday, December 18, 2011
This week in The Slacktiverse, December 17/18 2011 (slacktivist)
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Obama nominates 2 for labor board (AP)
WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama on Wednesday announced plans to nominate two Democrats to the National Labor Relations Board, despite a Republican threat to block any appointments to the agency.
The president intends to nominate Sharon Block, deputy secretary for congressional affairs at the Labor Department, and Richard Griffin, currently the general counsel for the International Union of Operating Engineers, to fill two vacancies on the board.
The move comes just days after the board's top lawyer dropped a controversial lawsuit that charged Boeing with illegally retaliating against union members in Washington state by opening a new plant in South Carolina. That case ? along with other union-friendly decisions ? has made the board a target of Republicans who contend it has acted too favorably toward unions.
Obama's nominees would have to be confirmed by the Senate, but Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said last week he would block Obama from making any further appointments to the board. The agency usually has five members but has operated for months with three. It will lose another member by the end of the year, leaving it without enough members to conduct business.
Graham has said his goal is to keep the NLRB from making any more key decisions during the rest of Obama's time in office. He and other Senate Republicans have blocked other Obama appointees, most recently Ohio attorney general Richard Cordray, whom Obama nominated to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Last week, Obama held out the possibility of bypassing the Senate to install Cordray when Congress is in recess.
Obama's attempt to fill the NLRB posts is fueling speculation that the board members could be included with Cordray in a group of recess appointments. Union officials have been pushing the White House to keep at least three members on the board so it can function next year.
But it remains unclear whether Obama will have a chance to make any recess appointments. For months, House Republicans have convened brief, pro forma sessions whenever Congress is away to prevent the Senate from going into a full recess. GOP lawmakers have pledged to continue the tactic.
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