If there was a list of people (and robots) that should avoid rapping?and maybe there ought to be?C-3P0 would be sitting pretty far up towards the top. Fluent in six million forms of communication and not an ounce of flow.
In 1986, to help promote the soon to be open Star Tours ride at Disneyland, ABC aired the TV special A Vacation In Space. The special gave viewers a look at some of the behind-the-scenes footage on the making of Star Tours, as well as the history of space travel and space-related films.
But somewhere?amid the references to the lack of gravity in space and the other references to lack of gravity in space?there's something inexplicably catchy in there. No one will blame you if you listen to just one more time. And one more time. And then just one more time after that. [Everything is Terrible via Laughing Squid via Buzzfeed]
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Apple has finally signed a deal with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co to make its guts for future iPhones and iPads. Specifically, TSMC will start mass-producing 20 nanometer chips for Apple in 2014, paving way for longer battery life in Samsung-less iPhones and iPads.
The Apple pact with TSMC has long been rumored. From Cupertino's point of view, it makes sense because Apple has been wanting to ditch anything and everything Samsung for a long time. It's always been hilarious that though Apple had a serious court war with Samsung, Samsung was making a bunch of chips (and screens and flash memory) that Apple needs. From TSMC's point of view, the chip maker is landing a whale of an order which means an ocean of money.
Supposedly, Samsung will continue to make guts for the next iPhones and iPads until at least 2014. Samsung supplies many of the internals of Apple's products, something that Apple has been looking to reduce in recent years (as their relationship has gone toxic). Apple has been looking to dance with TSMC since 2010 when it was looking to invest in the company and/or have TSMC dedicate a factory for Apple chips. It looks like Apple is finally closing. [WSJ]
Well, the hits just keep on coming. Grease being Paula Deen has not just been dropped from her ham company in the wake of her racist remark scandal. She's also been dumped by Walmart, and now Home Depot, and diabeetus drug company Novo Nordisk. All because she admitted to saying and doing some racist things years ago in a deposition. ...
Home ? News ? Olympus International Society for Computer Aided Surgery (ISCAS) Best Paper Award
Another interdisciplinary medicine and engineering collaboration receives award!
Ramya Balachandran research assistant professor and member of the Vanderbilt Initiative in Surgery and Engineering (ViSE), was awarded with the OLYMPUS ISCAS Best Paper Award at the 17th Annual Conference of the International Society for Computer Aided Surgery (ISCAS) held June 26-29 in Heidelberg Germany. Her co-authors are ?J.H. Noble, G. Blachon, J.E. Mitchell, F.A. Reda, B.M. Dawant, J.M. Fitzpatrick, and R.F. Labadie.
Her presentation, ?Clinical implementation of minimally-invasive, image-guided cochlear implantation surgery? was selected from over 80 presentations from very well established international groups spanning diverse topics ranging from endoscopic orthopedic surgery to image-guided liver resection to intraoperative planning for minimally-invasive neurosurgery.This award is a prime example of ViSE interdisciplinary collaboration and team science.
The International conference on Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery (CARS)? draws scientists, engineers, and physicians to present technological innovations.?? For further information about the CARS conference please consult the program announcement? http://www.cars-int.org/program/program.html and scroll to the 17th Annual Conference of the International Society for Computer Aided Surgery.
FILE - In this May 3, 2006 file photo, a student purchases a brown sugar Pop-Tart from a vending machine in the hallway outside the school cafeteria, in Wichita, Kan. High-calorie sports drinks and candy bars will be removed from school vending machines and cafeteria lines as soon as next year, replaced with diet drinks, granola bars and other healthier items the Agriculture Department said Thursday June 27, 2013.(AP Photo/The Wichita Eagle, Mike Hutmacher, File)
FILE - In this May 3, 2006 file photo, a student purchases a brown sugar Pop-Tart from a vending machine in the hallway outside the school cafeteria, in Wichita, Kan. High-calorie sports drinks and candy bars will be removed from school vending machines and cafeteria lines as soon as next year, replaced with diet drinks, granola bars and other healthier items the Agriculture Department said Thursday June 27, 2013.(AP Photo/The Wichita Eagle, Mike Hutmacher, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Kids, your days of blowing off those healthier school lunches and filling up on cookies from the vending machine are numbered. The government is onto you.
For the first time, the Agriculture Department is telling schools what sorts of snacks they can sell. The new restrictions announced Thursday fill a gap in nutrition rules that allowed many students to load up on fat, sugar and salt despite the existing guidelines for healthy meals.
"Parents will no longer have to worry that their kids are using their lunch money to buy junk food and junk drinks at school," said Margo Wootan, a nutrition lobbyist for the Center for Science in the Public Interest who pushed for the new rules.
That doesn't mean schools will be limited to doling out broccoli and brussels sprouts.
Snacks that still make the grade include granola bars, low-fat tortilla chips, fruit cups and 100 percent fruit juice. And high school students can buy diet versions of soda, sports drinks and iced tea.
But say goodbye to some beloved school standbys, such as doughy pretzels, chocolate chip cookies and those little ice cream cups with their own spoons. Some may survive in low-fat or whole wheat versions. The idea is to weed out junk food and replace it with something with nutritional merit.
The bottom line, says Wootan: "There has to be some food in the food."
Still, 17-year-old Vanessa Herrera is partial to the Cheez-It crackers and sugar-laden Vitaminwater in her high school's vending machine. Granola bars and bags of peanuts? Not so much.
"I don't think anyone would eat it," said Herrera of Rockaway, N.J.
There are no vending machines at Lauren Jones' middle school in Hoover, Ala., but she said there's an "a la carte" stand that sells chips, ice cream and other snacks.
"Having something sweet to go with your meal is good sometimes," the 13-year-old said, although she also thinks that encouraging kids to eat healthier is worthwhile.
The federal snack rules don't take effect until the 2014-15 school year, but there's nothing to stop schools from making changes earlier.
Some students won't notice much difference. Many schools already are working to improve their offerings. Thirty-nine states have some sort of snack food policy in place.
Rachel Snyder, 17, said earlier this year her school in Washington, Ill., stripped its vending machines of sweets. She misses the pretzel-filled M&M's.
"If I want a sugary snack every now and then," Snyder said, "I should be able to buy it."
The federal rules put calorie, fat, sugar and sodium limits on almost everything sold during the day at 100,000 schools ? expanding on the previous rules for meals. The Agriculture Department sets nutritional standards for schools that receive federal funds to help pay for lunches, and that covers nearly every public school and about half of private ones.
One oasis of sweetness and fat will remain: Anything students bring from home, from bagged lunches to birthday cupcakes, is exempt from the rules.
The Agriculture Department was required to draw up the rules under a law passed by Congress in 2010, championed by first lady Michelle Obama, as part of the government's effort to combat childhood obesity.
Nutritional guidelines for subsidized lunches were revised last year and put in place last fall.
Last year's rules making main lunch fare more nutritious faced criticism from some conservatives, including some Republicans in Congress, who said the government shouldn't be telling kids what to eat. Mindful of that backlash, the Agriculture Department left one of the more controversial parts of the rule, the regulation of in-school fundraisers like bake sales, up to the states.
The rules have the potential to transform what many children eat at school.
In addition to meals already subject to nutrition standards, most lunchrooms also have "a la carte" lines that sell other foods ? often greasy foods like mozzarella sticks and nachos. That gives students a way to circumvent the healthy lunches. Under the rules, those lines could offer healthier pizzas, low-fat hamburgers, fruit cups or yogurt and similar fare.
One of the biggest changes will be a near-ban on high-calorie sports drinks. Many beverage companies added sports drinks to school vending machines after sodas were pulled in response to criticism from the public health community.
The rule would only allow sales in high schools of sodas and sports drinks that contain 60 calories or less in a 12-ounce serving, banning the highest-calorie versions of those beverages.
Low-calorie sports drinks ? Gatorade's G2, for example ? and diet drinks will be allowed in high school.
Elementary and middle schools will be allowed to sell only water, carbonated water, 100 percent fruit or vegetable juice, and low fat and fat-free milk, including nonfat flavored milks.
Republicans have continued to scrutinize the efforts to make school foods healthier, and at a House subcommittee hearing Thursday, Rep. Todd Rokita, R-Ind., said the "stringent rules are creating serious headaches for schools and students."
One school nutritionist testified that her school has had difficulty adjusting to the 2012 changes, and the new "a la carte" standards could also be a hardship.
The healthier foods are expensive, said Sandra Ford, president of the School Nutrition Association and director of food and nutrition services for a school district in Bradenton, Fla. She also predicted that her school district could lose $975,000 a year under the new "a la carte" guidelines because they would have to eliminate many of the popular foods they sell.
In a report released at the hearing, the Government Accountability Office said that in some districts students were having trouble adjusting to the new foods, leading to increased waste and kids dropping out of the school lunch program.
The food industry has been onboard with many of the changes, and several companies worked with Congress on the child nutrition law three years ago.
Angela Chieco, a mother from Clifton Park, N.Y., sees the guidelines as a good start but says it will take a bigger campaign to wean kids off junk food.
"I try to do less sugar myself," Chieco said. "It's hard to do."
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Associated Press writer Stacy A. Anderson contributed to this report.
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Follow Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick
Follow Connie Cass on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ConnieCass
LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - "Sucker Punch" beauty Emily Browning is attached to star opposite Luke Grimes in "The Shangri-La Suite," an indie movie in the vein of "Bonnie & Clyde" and "Natural Born Killers," TheWrap has learned.
Eddie O'Keefe will be making his feature directorial debut, having written the script with Chris Hutton. Tariq Merhab is producing with the "Little Miss Sunshine" team of Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa of Bona Fide Productions.
Story follows two young lovers who break out of a mental hospital in 1974 and set out on a road trip to Los Angeles to fulfill the boy's lifelong dream of killing his idol Elvis Presley, who appears as a supporting character.
With Browning and Grimes onboard, the filmmakers have attached two rising young stars who could help them secure financing over other projects fighting for indie dollars.
O'Keefe and Hutton are best known for their highly-regarded screenplay "When the Street Lights Go On," which documentary filmmaker Brett Morgen is developing for Anonymous Content.
Browning, who's best known for playing Babydoll in Zack Snyder's "Sucker Punch," has done an impressive job of balancing studio movies with artful independent fare ever since starring in "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events." She starred in Julia Leigh's controversial sex drama "Sleeping Beauty" and had an important cameo in Andrew Niccol's adaptation of "The Host."
A quartet of upcoming films show off her range, including Catherine Hardwicke's thriller "Plush," Paul W.S. Anderson's action epic "Pompeii," Sebastian Silva's thriller "Magic Magic" and "God Help the Girl," a musical written and directed by Belle and Sebastian frontman Stuart Murdoch.
Browning is repped by UTA, manager Michael Aglion of Signpost, Australia-based Catherine Poulton Management and attorney Barry Tyerman.
Incubation: The virus has a degenerative incubation period, decreasing in time depending on the generation of the virus. The virus will lay dormant for 1-3 hours depending on the infected individual, after which the individual will enter a sleep state ranging from a few days to mere minutes. During the sleep state the body of the infected individual will undergo a mutation that is common in all forms of the virus. First, bleeding from the eyes, ears, and nose will occur. Following that will be the paling of the skin and darkening of the eyes. After this has occurred there isn't much time left before the individual awakes from the sleep state.
Infection: Infection occurs when the DNA of an infected enters the body of a healthy person, this can happen in various ways. First being exposure of an open wound to the saliva or blood of an infected. Next would be a scratch or bite from an infected. The most uncommon way, yet still very possible, is the airborne transmission of the virus. Exposure to the air around an infected for extended periods of time can also lead to infection.
Mutations
Roamers: Roamers are fast, agile, and resilient. They are the most commonly encounter type of the infected due to the fact that most people that become infected enter the incubation period in similar environments. Due to them being the most numerous of the infected, the virus they carry has also mutated the most. Incubation has a very short time frame ranging from a few hours to minutes, but due to the rapid rate of mutation the virus cannot live airborne for very long meaning airborne infection is next to impossible.
COLLEGE STATION, Texas (AP) ? Four workers were hurt, three critically, after a barn frame collapsed Saturday at an $80 million Texas A&M University equestrian complex that's under construction.
The collapse happened on university property about a mile from the main campus, Texas A&M spokesman Lane Stephenson said.
College Station and Bryan fire departments, campus police and Texas A&M emergency medical personnel all responded to the accident, which happened shortly before 11 a.m. Saturday.
The accident involved an approximately 300-foot barn, according to the College Station Fire Department. Twisted metal beams could be seen at the site, where ground was broken last fall.
The injured workers were transported to hospitals. Their names and further details on their conditions were not immediately released. Nobody else was hurt.
For a time, emergency responders had to halt the search for the four because of concerns about another collapse.
"After that time search and rescue efforts were suspended until the remainder of the structure that was still standing could be stabilized," according to a statement from the College Station Fire Department. "After the structure was secured a secondary search of the area was conducted to ensure that all patients had been located."
Texas A&M police officials were trying to determine what caused the collapse. University police identified the contractor as Gamma Construction Company, with offices in Houston and San Antonio.
A Gamma Construction representative did not immediately return a phone call to The Associated Press for comment Saturday.
Gamma Construction, on its website, described the A&M work as one of its 2013 projects.
The website said the equestrian complex "will enhance Texas A&M University's equine program and will consolidate not only academic programs, but clubs and associations to one premier location in order to teach, train, conduct research, exhibit and showcase events."
Conditions at the time of the collapse were cloudy with temperatures in the mid-80s and winds gusting just above 10 mph, the National Weather Service said.
The first phase of the equestrian center was set for completion in 2014. The facility will include locker rooms, offices, a concessions building, a 50-stall barn, plus practice arenas and two covered competition arenas, according to the university.
CHICAGO (AP) ? It's all so very familiar. Big goals from Patrick Kane. Solid all-around play from Jonathan Toews. A goaltender stepping forward at the right time.
The Chicago Blackhawks have that look again, and another Stanley Cup is within reach.
Kane scored two goals, Corey Crawford made 24 saves and the Blackhawks beat the Boston Bruins 3-1 on Saturday night to move within one victory of their second championship in four years.
"This is what you work for all year, all summer, when you're training throughout the year, at training camp, whatever it may be," Kane said. "This is what you work for, this opportunity. We've got to seize the moment and take advantage of it."
Kane had a terrific postseason when Blackhawks won it all in 2010, including the winning score in a 4-3 overtime victory in Philadelphia that secured Chicago's first title in 49 years. Now he's picking up steam with the Blackhawks set to play for another Cup on Monday night in Boston, collecting seven goals in the last seven games.
Dave Bolland added an empty-net score, Toews had two assists and Bryan Bickell was credited with a team-high six hits and an assist. Toews also won nine of his 12 faceoffs before leaving with an upper-body injury.
"We're hopeful he'll be ready next game," said coach Joel Quenneville, providing the usual vague description of injuries that's so common in the NHL playoffs.
The Bruins also lost one of their key players when Patrice Bergeron was hurt in the second. It was unclear what happened to the star center, but the team said he was taken to a hospital for observation.
"Getting evaluated right now," coach Claude Julien said. "Not much I can say."
Zdeno Chara scored in the third period for the Bruins, who lost consecutive games for the first time since the first round against Toronto. Tuukka Rask made 29 saves, keeping the Bruins close while they scrambled to generate quality chances.
"We just ran out of time," Rask said.
Chara got a nice pass from David Krejci from behind the net and beat Crawford on the glove side to make it 2-1 at 3:40 in the third period. The whistling slap shot by the big defenseman came after he was on the ice for five of Chicago's goals in the Blackhawks' 6-5 overtime victory Wednesday night.
The location of Chara's third postseason goal brought to mind the glove-side difficulties for Crawford in Game 4. But he held up just fine coming off the worst postseason game of his career.
"I think it was a big effort by everyone to come back, play defensively, block shots, sacrifice our bodies to block those pucks and quickly get on to offense," he said.
Crawford gloved Daniel Paille's slap shot early in the third, and the Blackhawks helped their embattled goaltender by turning up the pressure on Rask after the Bruins cut it to one. Kane forced Rask to make a couple of nice stops, and Michael Frolik also made a run to the net.
The Blackhawks survived one last push by the Bruins after they pulled Rask, and the crowd of 22,274 roared when the overhead videoboard showed the No. 1 and the Stanley Cup on the screen, signifying the team is one victory away from its fifth title.
"We understand the situation and what's at stake, but our mindset is going in there and trying to have the best game possible," defenseman Duncan Keith said. "It's no different from tonight's game."
Not so for Boston.
"It's do or die," Julien said. "We've been there before, and we've done well in that situation."
Boston and Chicago returned to the ice three days after they played the highest-scoring game in this year's NHL playoffs. There were five goals in the second period alone, matching the total from the previous two games combined, and Brent Seabrook's overtime score lifted the Blackhawks to the series-tying victory.
It was a marked departure from the first three games of the finals, and raised questions about what the play would be like in the last part of the series. The answer, at least in Game 5, was a return to the strong team defense and disciplined play. It meant little room to maneuver in both offensive zones, especially for the series' biggest stars ? except Kane.
"Guys that have that kind of innate skill of scoring and being a top player, they anticipate like the rest of us would like to," Quenneville said.
With 2? minutes left in the first, Johnny Oduya's long slap shot broke the stick of Boston defenseman Dennis Seidenberg and trickled to the left side of the net where Kane poked it in for eighth playoff goal.
The line of Kane, Toews and Bryan Bickell, which Quenneville put back together before Game 4, struck again in the second. Bickell was stopped by Rask on a rush along the left side, but skated behind the net and threw it back in front.
The puck went off the right side of the goal as Rask got his blocker to the post. Kane then deftly backhanded the bouncing puck into the top of the net to make it 2-0 at 5:13.
"You're not going to get those chances often, so it was good to bury them," he said.
That proved to be enough for Crawford, who has allowed one goal or less in nine games this postseason. But this one had to be particularly satisfying after facing a barrage of questions about his glove over the past two days.
"I have a job to do," said Crawford, who watched from the stands when the Blackhawks won it all in 2010. "Whatever is being said doesn't really affect what I'm going to do on the ice."
Since the NHL went to a best-of-seven format for the Stanley Cup in 1939, the winner of Game 5 in a deadlocked series has gone on to win the title 15 times in 22 occasions.
Those numbers likely don't scare Boston very much. The Bruins faced the same situation against Vancouver in 2011 and came back to win the championship.
"We're going to fight," center David Krejci said. "We're going to fight with everything we have and force Game 7."
NOTES: Bruins rookie Carl Soderberg made his first career playoff appearance when Julien decided to scratch Kaspars Daugavins. The 27-year-old Soderberg played a little more than 14 minutes in his first game since April 28. ... Former Blackhawks G Ed Belfour received a loud ovation and chants of "Ed-die! Ed-die!" when he was shown on the videoboard in the second period. ... Actress Michelle Pfeiffer and her husband David Kelley, a TV writer and producer, attended the game.
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Jay Cohen can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/jcohenap
LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - NBC announced its fall premiere dates for new and returning series, including "Blacklist" on September 23, and the "Michael J. Fox Show" and a one-hour return for "Parks and Recreation" on September 26.
Additionally, "The Blacklist" and "Chicago Fire" (which returns on September 24) get the coveted "post-Voice" slot on Mondays and Tuesdays, respectively.
Here's an overview:
"The Voice," Monday, September 23 at 8 p.m.: Season 5 reunites all four original coaches during its two-hour premiere.
"The Blacklist," Monday, September 23 at 10 p.m.: New series starring "The Office" alum and "Boston Legal" star James Spader as an international criminal who works with a rookie FBI agent in order to bring down some of the world's most wanted.
"Chicago Fire," Tuesday, September 24 at 10 p.m.: Season 2 gets the coveted slot after "The Voice's" Tuesday episode.
"Revolution," Wednesday, September 25 at 8 p.m.: Season 2 will begin the night in a new time slot.
"Law & Order: SVU," Wednesday, September 25 at 9 p.m.: Season 15 features Det. Benson (Mariska Hargitay) fighting for her life against a madman.
"Parks and Recreation," Thursday, September 26 at 8 p.m.: Season 6 launches with an hourlong episode set in London.
"The Michael J. Fox," Thursday, September 26 at 9 p.m.: The new comedy starring the "Spin City" and "Family Ties" star will premiere with back-to-back episodes. He plays a father and husband returning to work as a news reporter in New York after a brief leave of absence to get his Parkinson's under control.
"Parenthood," Thursday, September 26 at 10 p.m.: Ray Romano returns for Season 5.
"Dateline NBC," Friday, September 27 at 9 p.m.: The news magazine show returns with a two-hour episode. It will later shift to its regular timeslot at 8 p.m. starting October 25.
"Ironside," Wednesday, October 2 at 10 p.m.: Blair Underwood stars in the action drama based on 60s-70s TV show starring Raymond Burr as wheelchair-bound chief of detectives.
"Welcome to the Family," Thursday, October 3 at 8:30 p.m.: The new comedy about the clash between two families forced to deal with the surprise pregnancy and marriage of their teenage kids.
"Sean Saves the World" Thursday, October 3 at 9 p.m.: "Will & Grace" star Sean Hayes returns to NBC as a single dad balancing his teenage daughter, opinionated mother and overbearing boss.
"Grimm," Friday, October 25. at 9 p.m.: Third season returns to Fridays.
"Dracula," Friday, October 26 at 10 p.m.: "The Tudors" star Jonathan Rhys Meyers plasy the iconic character returning to Victorian England to seek revenge on those who doomed him to immortal hell.
CAIRO - Jon Stewart took his politically engaged American satire to Cairo on Friday, appearing on a show hosted by the man known as "Egypt's Jon Stewart," who has faced investigation for insulting the president and Islam.
Among barbs aimed at Egypt's ruling Islamists and others, Stewart praised host Bassem Youssef for taking risks to poke fun. "If your regime is not strong enough to handle a joke," he said, "then you don't have a regime."
Youssef is a cardiologist whose online comedy clips inspired by Stewart's "Daily Show" won him wild popularity and a prime-time TV show after the 2011 revolution that ended military rule. He paid tribute to his guest as a personal inspiration as the pair traded gags over Stewart's impressions of a visit to Cairo.
Stewart in turn played down any difficulties his wit created for him in the United States, telling Youssef: "I tell you this, it doesn't get me into the kind of trouble it gets you into. I get in trouble, but nowhere near what happens to you."
With Egypt still in ferment and elected Islamist President Mohamed Mursi facing off against liberals who fear he plans to smother personal freedoms, Youssef was released on bail after being questioned in March over alleged insults to Mursi and the channel he appears on was threatened with losing its licence.
Criticising such moves, which have also drawn reproaches for Egypt from the U.S. government, Stewart said: "A joke has never shot tear gas at a group of people in a park. It's just talk.
"What Bassem is doing ... is showing that satire can still be relevant, that it can carve out space in a country for people to express themselves. Because that's all democracy is."
He took aim at Mursi's controversial decision this week to name a member of a hardline Islamist movement blamed for a massacre of tourists at Luxor in the 1990s as governor of that city. Having been brought into the studio hooded and presented as a "spy," he spoke a few words in Arabic before saying Egypt's president had honoured him: "I am now the mayor of Luxor."
Stewart also appeared to take a gentle dig at the opposition, who hope demonstrations planned for June 30 can force Mursi from power after just a year in office. It took Americans 100 years before a president was impeached for the first time, Stewart said: "For you guys to do it in one year, it's very impressive."
Perhaps the biggest laugh in the studio, though, was for a simple crack at Egypt's perennial traffic chaos: "I know this is an ancient civilisation," he said. "Have you thought about traffic lights?"
Traders sold off bonds and stocks after the Fed expressed optimism about the future of the US economy, but Karlsson says he doubts the Fed will decrease its bond purchases anytime soon.
By Stefan Karlsson,?Guest blogger / June 21, 2013
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke speaks during a news conference in Washington earlier this month. Some investors have expressed concern that the Fed will decrease its support of the economy, but Karlsson argues that the Fed is unlikely to do so anytime soon.
Susan Walsh/AP/File
Enlarge
Both bonds and stocks, not just in the U.S. but interestingly in most other countries as well, have sold off heavily after the Fed expressed optimism about how the U.S. economy would develop, something that was interpreted as a signal that it might reduce its bond purchases.
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I however doubt that they will actually do that anytime soon. The U.S. economy is expanding, but very slowly, so slowly that the employment to population ratio was no higher in May 2013 than in May 2012.
And though Bernanke may have hinted that the criteria for drawing down QE is a 7% unemployment rate, the official statement keeps mentioning the 6.5% rate, along with expected inflation of 2.5%
Furthermore, the negative market reaction to the possibility of reduced QE may prove to be a case of "self-preventing prophecy". The large sell-off to the hint of such policy change could deter the Fed from actually going through with it.
The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To contact us about a blogger, click here. This post originally ran on stefanmikarlsson.blogspot.com.
The New York-New York hotel-casino, left, is seen from the Monte Carlo parking garage west of The Strip Tuesday, June 18, 2013, in Las Vegas. Casino giant MGM Resorts International and entertainment company AEG announced Tuesday, June 18, 2013 that they've inked a deal to build a 20,000-seat Las Vegas Strip arena. Groundbreaking for the $350 million arena, in an area from Las Vegas Boulevard to Frank Sinatra Drive between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo resorts, is expected next summer, with completion by spring 2016. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)
The New York-New York hotel-casino, left, is seen from the Monte Carlo parking garage west of The Strip Tuesday, June 18, 2013, in Las Vegas. Casino giant MGM Resorts International and entertainment company AEG announced Tuesday, June 18, 2013 that they've inked a deal to build a 20,000-seat Las Vegas Strip arena. Groundbreaking for the $350 million arena, in an area from Las Vegas Boulevard to Frank Sinatra Drive between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo resorts, is expected next summer, with completion by spring 2016. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)
The New York-New York hotel-casino is seen from the Monte Carlo parking garage west of The Strip Tuesday, June 18, 2013, in Las Vegas. Casino giant MGM Resorts International and entertainment company AEG announced Tuesday, June 18, 2013 that they've inked a deal to build a 20,000-seat Las Vegas Strip arena. Groundbreaking for the $350 million arena, in an area from Las Vegas Boulevard to Frank Sinatra Drive between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo resorts, is expected next summer, with completion by spring 2016. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)
The New York-New York hotel-casino, left, is seen from the Monte Carlo parking garage west of The Strip Tuesday, June 18, 2013, in Las Vegas. Casino giant MGM Resorts International and entertainment company AEG announced Tuesday, June 18, 2013 that they've inked a deal to build a 20,000-seat Las Vegas Strip arena. Groundbreaking for the $350 million arena, in an area from Las Vegas Boulevard to Frank Sinatra Drive between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo resorts, is expected next summer, with completion by spring 2016. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)
LAS VEGAS (AP) ? Years of talk about building an arena capable of hosting professional sports and big-name concerts yielded an announcement Tuesday that casino giant MGM Resorts International and entertainment company AEG will build a privately financed 20,000-seat indoor venue on the Las Vegas Strip.
Construction on the $350 million arena should start next summer on land that MGM Resorts owns between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo resorts, the two companies said in a joint announcement. Completion is expected by spring 2016.
The international design firm Populous will draw up plans for premium seating and hospitality areas for entertainment and sports events, the statement said. Populous designed London's O2 arena, Berlin's O2 World arena and Kansas City's Sprint Center, among other projects.
"Finalizing our agreement with AEG and selecting Populous ... are both important milestones in this process," said Jim Murren, MGM Resorts International chairman and chief financial officer.
Las Vegas-based MGM Resorts and Los Angeles-based AEG expect their equity contributions will be augmented by private third-party financing from as-yet unnamed sources. Naming rights are on the table. No professional sports teams have committed to the deal.
The arena is expected to be a centerpiece of an outdoor pedestrian mall featuring restaurants and retail shops stretching from Las Vegas Boulevard to Frank Sinatra Drive, visible from Interstate 15.
Dan Beckerman, AEG president and chief executive, noted that his company spent years talking with potential arena developers in Las Vegas before signing with MGM Resorts.
"Bringing together the knowledge, experience and assets of our respective organizations, we will create an arena that offers fans the best live entertainment experience," he said.
Tuesday's announcement signaled an end to an arena proposal by casino company Caesars Entertainment Corp. for a similarly-sized arena on land it owns on the other side of Las Vegas Boulevard.
"Once you've got spectators going through the turnstiles the race will be over," said David Schwartz, director of the Center for Gaming Research at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. "But this definitely looks promising. Not only is MGM buying into it, but an outside company that knows arena management."
AEG had been in talks with Caesars about building a $500 million arena funded by a 1 percent sales tax on purchases within a 3-mile radius. A ballot measure failed to make it to a statewide vote last November.
AEG also produces shows at the 4,300-seat Colosseum at Caesars Palace, home venue for singer Celine Dion.
Ted Fikre, AEG vice chairman, said Tuesday that the arena on MGM Resorts property proved the most attractive of several his company explored over the years in Las Vegas ? without the "risks and challenges that have doomed prior projects relying on public funding."
Former Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman tried for years to entice a developer to build an arena downtown that would be newer and larger than the Thomas & Mack center at UNLV. Goodman often said he wanted to attract a pro hockey or basketball franchise.
The Thomas & Mack opened in 1983 and hosts events such as the NCAA Mountain West Conference men's basketball tournament and National Finals Rodeo. It has a capacity of about 19,500 spectators for boxing events, and under 19,000 for basketball.
Three casinos have other large arenas around town, including MGM Resorts' Mandalay Bay Events Center. It can seat 12,000.
The parent company's MGM Grand Garden Arena opened in 1993 with a capacity of just under 17,000 spectators. It hosted the Pac 12 men's basketball tournament last March.
The Orleans Arena opened in 2003 adjacent to Boyd Gaming Corp.'s Orleans casino-hotel. It can seat about 9,500 for boxing, and just under 8,000 for hockey and basketball. It plays home to the professional minor-league Las Vegas Wranglers hockey team, and hosted Western Athletic Conference and West Coast Conference basketball tournaments.
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Find Ken Ritter on Twitter: http://twitter.com/krttr
Last week we brought you inside the Common Press, a letterpress studio where printing methods of yore are reinvigorated in the name of art. As much as the Press is engaged in making new things, the technological history being preserved there is vast.
Because MMA was once outlawed in several states, a patchwork of laws govern the sport across the country. This week has been a big one for the UFC to wade through legal red tape as it works on Boston and New York.
-- In Boston, there is an issue with the documentation foreign-born fighters must have to work in Massachusetts for the first UFC on Fox Sports 1 show. Basically, the law won't necessarily keep fighters off the card, but it will create a whole lot more work for the UFC. The UFC is expecting a "positive outcome" with this issue.
-- MMA won't have such a positive outcome in a state a short drive from Boston. The UFC has been lobbying to legalize MMA in New York for years, and for a while, it seemed like this year could be the year MMA would finally break through. Unfortunately, the New York legislature failed to bring the MMA bill to a vote, meaning the sport has to wait until next year.
Understandably, the UFC is disappointed. Here's what UFC chairman Lorenzo Fertitta had to say about it.
This year?s new, absurd, offensive, and completely erroneous charge used to justify the defeat of MMA legislation was that MMA is anti-woman and leads to domestic violence. This is a deception fabricated by a Las Vegas union that is recklessly and callously trying to use an important societal issue to try and punish the UFC. It isn?t honest and doesn?t work.
Fertitta pointed out that one of the fighters the union in Las Vegas has been most upset about is Quinton "Rampage" Jackson. This union, which has a problem with Fertitta's Station Casinos non-union status, didn't protest when Jackson signed with Bellator. If they truly thought MMA -- and not the Fertitta-owned UFC -- was the problem, wouldn't they send press releases and fill up Twitter decrying Bellator and World Series of Fighting and every other promotion out there?
People attribute minds to robots, corpses that are targets of harmPublic release date: 17-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Anna Mikulak amikulak@psychologicalscience.org 202-293-9300 Association for Psychological Science
As Descartes famously noted, there's no way to really know that another person has a mind every mind we observe is, in a sense, a mind we create. Now, new research suggests that victimization may be one condition that leads us to perceive minds in others, even in entities we don't normally think of as having minds.
This research, published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, shows that people attribute minds to entities they perceive as being targets of harm, even when the entity in question is a robot or a corpse.
"People seem to believe that having a mind allows an entity to be part of a moral interaction to do good and bad things, or to have good and bad things done to them," says psychological scientist Adrian Ward, who conducted the research at Harvard University.
"This research suggests that the relationship may actually work the other way around: Minds don't create morality, morality creates minds."
Ward, together with Daniel Wegner of Harvard University and Andrew Olsen of the University of Pennsylvania, conducted five studies that investigated the relationship between morality and mind. The results consistently revealed that participants attributed 'more' mind to entities portrayed as targets of intentional harm.
For example, participants who read a story about a nurse who intentionally unplugged the food supply to a patient in a persistent vegetative state attributed more mind to the patient than those who read that the nurse performed her job satisfactorily. Participants also attributed more mind to a corpse when they read that it had been the target of harm.
Participants even attributed more mind to a George, a "highly complex social robot," when they read that George had been stabbed with a scalpel by a research scientist.
Surprisingly, people attributed "full" minds to entities when they were the targets of moral harm minds capable not just of experiencing harm, but also capable of experiencing emotions, feeling hunger, exerting self-control, and planning for the future.
Ward believes that the findings may help to explain how two people can look at the same entity for example, a fetus, a comatose patient, a gorilla, or a lab rat and see completely different capacities for thinking, feeling, and general consciousness:
"When these entities are thought of in moral terms, they're attributed more mind it seems that people have the sense that something wrong is happening, so someone must be there to receive that wrong."
Importantly, the results of the final study suggest that the effects of harm may depend on the preexisting mental status of the victim in question.
Participants who read that Sharon, a fully conscious adult human, was physically abused by her boss attributed less mind to Sharon than participants who read that her boss behaved normally. They attributed less ability to experience pain and less mind overall to Sharon, falling in line with previous research on dehumanization.
"Victimization may cause people to dehumanize other entities but only when these entities have a mind to begin with; entities with absent or liminal minds, in contrast, seem to gain minds as a result of victimization," the researchers write.
The research may have implications for hot-button issues centered on morality and mind, including issues surrounding animal rights, abortion, and end-of-life decisions. If moral intuitions lead to subjective perceptions of minds, investigating the objective realities of mental capacities is unlikely to resolve moral disagreements over what the 'right' course of action is.
Ward hopes to further explore how the so-called harm-made mind might influence actual decision making:
"Exploring this relationship will allow us to understand how different ways of presenting and discussing information about minds and morality may help people see eye-to-eye on contentious issues, and potentially come to a place of mutual understanding."
###
For more information about this study, please contact: Adrian F. Ward at award@fas.harvard.edu.
The APS journal Psychological Science is the highest ranked empirical journal in psychology. For a copy of the article "The Harm-Made Mind: Observing Victimization Augments Attribution of Minds to Vegetative Patients, Robots, and the Dead" and access to other Psychological Science research findings, please contact Anna Mikulak at 202-293-9300 or amikulak@psychologicalscience.org.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
People attribute minds to robots, corpses that are targets of harmPublic release date: 17-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Anna Mikulak amikulak@psychologicalscience.org 202-293-9300 Association for Psychological Science
As Descartes famously noted, there's no way to really know that another person has a mind every mind we observe is, in a sense, a mind we create. Now, new research suggests that victimization may be one condition that leads us to perceive minds in others, even in entities we don't normally think of as having minds.
This research, published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, shows that people attribute minds to entities they perceive as being targets of harm, even when the entity in question is a robot or a corpse.
"People seem to believe that having a mind allows an entity to be part of a moral interaction to do good and bad things, or to have good and bad things done to them," says psychological scientist Adrian Ward, who conducted the research at Harvard University.
"This research suggests that the relationship may actually work the other way around: Minds don't create morality, morality creates minds."
Ward, together with Daniel Wegner of Harvard University and Andrew Olsen of the University of Pennsylvania, conducted five studies that investigated the relationship between morality and mind. The results consistently revealed that participants attributed 'more' mind to entities portrayed as targets of intentional harm.
For example, participants who read a story about a nurse who intentionally unplugged the food supply to a patient in a persistent vegetative state attributed more mind to the patient than those who read that the nurse performed her job satisfactorily. Participants also attributed more mind to a corpse when they read that it had been the target of harm.
Participants even attributed more mind to a George, a "highly complex social robot," when they read that George had been stabbed with a scalpel by a research scientist.
Surprisingly, people attributed "full" minds to entities when they were the targets of moral harm minds capable not just of experiencing harm, but also capable of experiencing emotions, feeling hunger, exerting self-control, and planning for the future.
Ward believes that the findings may help to explain how two people can look at the same entity for example, a fetus, a comatose patient, a gorilla, or a lab rat and see completely different capacities for thinking, feeling, and general consciousness:
"When these entities are thought of in moral terms, they're attributed more mind it seems that people have the sense that something wrong is happening, so someone must be there to receive that wrong."
Importantly, the results of the final study suggest that the effects of harm may depend on the preexisting mental status of the victim in question.
Participants who read that Sharon, a fully conscious adult human, was physically abused by her boss attributed less mind to Sharon than participants who read that her boss behaved normally. They attributed less ability to experience pain and less mind overall to Sharon, falling in line with previous research on dehumanization.
"Victimization may cause people to dehumanize other entities but only when these entities have a mind to begin with; entities with absent or liminal minds, in contrast, seem to gain minds as a result of victimization," the researchers write.
The research may have implications for hot-button issues centered on morality and mind, including issues surrounding animal rights, abortion, and end-of-life decisions. If moral intuitions lead to subjective perceptions of minds, investigating the objective realities of mental capacities is unlikely to resolve moral disagreements over what the 'right' course of action is.
Ward hopes to further explore how the so-called harm-made mind might influence actual decision making:
"Exploring this relationship will allow us to understand how different ways of presenting and discussing information about minds and morality may help people see eye-to-eye on contentious issues, and potentially come to a place of mutual understanding."
###
For more information about this study, please contact: Adrian F. Ward at award@fas.harvard.edu.
The APS journal Psychological Science is the highest ranked empirical journal in psychology. For a copy of the article "The Harm-Made Mind: Observing Victimization Augments Attribution of Minds to Vegetative Patients, Robots, and the Dead" and access to other Psychological Science research findings, please contact Anna Mikulak at 202-293-9300 or amikulak@psychologicalscience.org.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
WEST ALLIS, Wis. (AP) ? When Ryan Hunter-Reay picked up his first win of the season in Alabama, he regretted that his wife and newborn son weren't on hand for Victory Lane photographs.
He made up for it Saturday with an early Father's Day celebration at his favorite track, no less.
Hunter-Reay continued Andretti Autosport's domination at the Milwaukee Mile, winning the IndyCar event for the second year in a row and third time in his career. He became the first driver to win back-to-back races at the Mile since Tony Kanaan in 2006 and 2007 when he was driving for ... you guessed it, Michael Andretti, himself a five-time winner at Milwaukee.
"At Barber, that was one of the races that Beccy and our son didn't come to and I felt bad because we didn't have the pictures of him in Victory Lane, so this is even better," Hunter-Reay said. "To do it on Father's Day, to do back-to-back at Milwaukee, I love this place. Every driver, you ask them, they respect this oval the most."
Andretti drivers have won five of the last nine races at the mile oval and nearly had a perfect day Saturday in a race that was promoted for the second year by Michael Andretti's marketing company. Hunter-Reay got the win, E.J. Viso finished fourth and James Hinchcliffe was fifth.
The only blemish was pole-sitter Marco Andretti, who led the first 62 laps before his day fell apart with an electrical issue.
"He let me down," joked father Michael Andretti. "I really feel bad for Marco. He was running really strong, really strong all weekend."
But it was still a huge success for Andretti, who is in negotiations with IndyCar to promote the race next year but makes winning at Milwaukee a priority for his organization.
"We come here with a philosophy of what I had back when I was driving, and we just carry that on, try to stress that to the engineering and the drivers on the way we used to do it then," Andretti said. "There's things we used to do that really used to work. Seem to still be working."
For Hunter-Reay, it was the second win of the season for the defending IndyCar Series champion. And it came at the site of the track he used to jump-start last year's title run ? Hunter-Reay reeled off three consecutive wins starting with Milwaukee last season to climb into the championship race.
He wasn't thinking championship in the closing laps, though. His focus was on Father's Day and son Ryden.
"Those last few laps I was thinking, 'Man, I've got to do this for him,'" Hunter-Reay said. "It's so special, he's 6 months old, getting to have my little guy here in Victory Lane is the best Father's Day gift."
IndyCar Series points leader Helio Castroneves was second and followed by Penske Racing teammate Will Power as Chevrolet swept the podium. It was the first podium finish this season for Power, who hasn't won a race since Brazil last year.
He made a bold attempt to pass Castroneves for second in the closing laps before cautiously backing off a touch. Power said after the race he had to consider the big picture and that his teammate is the current points leader while racing for position.
"That was close, I wanted to race him very cleanly because he's leading the championship," Power said. "I was like 'Man, I don't want to take you out.' Helio continues to get good points, and it's cool to get (my) car up on the podium. We've just got to keep chipping away and in the meantime, I'm going to help out Helio as much as I can. If I can beat him I will, and make some hay on the championship."
Scott Dixon was sixth in the highest finishing Honda and was followed by Takuma Sato, who dominated the middle section of the race but was shuffled out of contention when Ana Beatriz brought out the final caution and pit cycles dropped him deep into the field. Still, it was the best finish for an A.J. Foyt Racing entry at Milwaukee since Foyt himself was fifth in 1988.
"The yellow came out and that was very bad timing for us because it put us behind those who hadn't pitted yet," Sato said. "They were able to pit and get ahead of us which is why we lined up in seventh. Then they had fresher tires, too, so it was really tough to pass them back. It was still a great race, but it was so disappointing in the end. Really a shame."
Dario Franchitti, Justin Wilson and Kanaan rounded out the top 10.
Marco Andretti wound up 20th and was passed by teammate Hunter-Reay for second in the IndyCar standings.
"It's unfortunate, we came here for a win and had a car to do it," said Andretti, who was slowed before the electrical issue by a poor pit stop. "The voltage went straight down and I lost all kinds of power. I couldn't shift, the clutch didn't work. We came back for all the points we could."
A female supporter of Iranian presidential candidate Hasan Rowhani flashes a victory sign as she holds his poster during a celebration gathering in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 15, 2013. Moderate cleric Hasan Rowhani was declared the winner of Iran's presidential vote on Saturday after gaining support among many reform-minded Iranians looking to claw back a bit of ground after years of crackdowns. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A female supporter of Iranian presidential candidate Hasan Rowhani flashes a victory sign as she holds his poster during a celebration gathering in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 15, 2013. Moderate cleric Hasan Rowhani was declared the winner of Iran's presidential vote on Saturday after gaining support among many reform-minded Iranians looking to claw back a bit of ground after years of crackdowns. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Supporter of the Iranian presidential candidate Hasan Rowhani celebrate outside his campaign headquarters in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 15, 2013. Moderate cleric Hasan Rowhani was declared the winner of Iran's presidential vote on Saturday after gaining support among many reform-minded Iranians looking to claw back a bit of ground after years of crackdowns. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
FILE -- In front of a portrait of the late Iranian revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini, presidential candidate Hasan Rowhani, a former top nuclear negotiator, center, gestures to his supporters at a rally in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 1, 2013. Iran's reformist-backed presidential candidate surged to a wide lead in early vote counting Saturday, June 15, 2013, a top official said, suggesting a flurry of late support could have swayed a race that once appeared solidly in the hands of Tehran's ruling clerics. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)
A female supporter of Iranian presidential candidate Hasan Rowhani, flashes a victory sign as she holds his poster during a celebration gathering in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 15, 2013. Moderate cleric Hasan Rowhani was declared the winner of Iran's presidential vote on Saturday after gaining support among many reform-minded Iranians looking to claw back a bit of ground after years of crackdowns. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A man places his ballot in a box as Iranians outside their country of origin cast ballots in Iran's presidential election, in a hotel meeting room in Los Angeles Friday, June 14, 2013. Iranian-Americans and expatriates cast ballots Friday in polling places across the United States, joining their countrymen half a world away in selecting the next Iranian president (AP Photo/Reed Saxon)
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) ? Moderate cleric Hasan Rowhani was declared the winner of Iran's presidential vote on Saturday after gaining support among many reform-minded Iranians looking to claw back a bit of ground after years of crackdowns and now resets the country's political order.
The stunning surge behind Rowhani, a former nuclear negotiator, was seen by his supports as a rebuke of uncompromising policies that have left Iran increasingly isolated and under biting sanctions from the West over Tehran's nuclear program. It also demonstrated the strength of opposition sentiment even in a system that is largely organized against it.
The ruling clerics barred from the race reform candidates seen as too prominent, allowing a list of hopefuls who were mainly staunch loyalists of the supreme leader and the Islamic establishment. But the opposition settled on the 64-year-old Rowhani as the least objectionable of the bunch, making him a de facto reform candidate with backers inspired by his message of outreach rather than confrontation.
Celebrations broke out across Tehran and other cities. Thousands of Rowhani supporters took to the streets leading to his campaign headquarters in Tehran before the final results were announced despite a statement from Rowhani urging his supporters to avoid street gatherings. There were no immediate reports of unrest or attempts by security forces to rein in the crowds ? another sign of the sweeping scope of Rowhani's victory with more than three times as many votes as his nearest rival.
But the numbers don't translate directly into power in Iran's Islamic system. The ruling clerics and their protectors, the Revolutionary Guard, maintain control over all key decisions such as nuclear efforts, the military and foreign affairs.
What Rowhani's victory means, however, is that reformists and liberals will likely regain a greater voice and clout to try to shape the views of the theocracy, which cannot easily ignore the decisive outcome of Friday's election to success the combative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He was barred from seeking a third consecutive run.
Ahmadinejad congratulated Rowhani, adding "I hope ... opportunity will be provided more than before to serve and work for the establishment of justice and development of the country."
Rowhani won with 50.7 percent of the more than 36 million votes cast, the Interior Ministry reported, well ahead of Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf with about 16.5 percent. Hard-line nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili ? who said he was "100 percent" against detente with Iran's foes ? came in third with 11.3 percent followed by conservative Mohsen Rezaei with 10.6 percent.
Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar said the turnout was 72.7 percent, suggesting that liberals and others abandoned a planned boycott as the election was transformed into a showdown across the Islamic Republic's political divide. Iran has more than 50 million eligible voters.
Rowhani just cleared the majority needed to seal victory and avoid a runoff. The Interior Ministry said Rowhani had 18,613,329 votes, followed by Qalibaf with 6,077,292, Jalili with 4,168,946 votes and Rezaei with 3,884,412. The other two candidates were far behind.
Rowhani, the only cleric in the race, led the influential Supreme National Security Council and was given the highly sensitive nuclear envoy role in 2003, a year after Iran's 20-year-old atomic program was revealed.
"Rowhani is not an outsider and any gains by him do not mean the system is weak or that there are serious cracks," said Rasool Nafisi, an Iranian affairs analyst at Strayer University in Virginia. "The ruling system has made sure that no one on the ballot is going to shake things up."
Yet the last campaign events for Rowhani carried chants that had been bottled up for years.
Some supporters called for the release of political prisoners including opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahdi Karroubi, both candidates in 2009 disputed election and now under house arrest. "Long live reforms," some cried at Rowhani's last rally. The rally was awash in purple banners and scarves ? the campaign's signature hue in a nod to the single-color identity of Mousavi's now-crushed Green Movement.
In the end, it appeared ideology overcame the economy as a deciding factor. Many voters had indicated they could favor Qalibaf because of his reputation as a competent fiscal steward who could help stabilize Iran's sanctions-battered economy.
Western sanctions over Iran's nuclear program have shrunk vital oil sales and are leaving the country isolated from international banking systems. New U.S. measures taking effect July 1 further target Iran's currency, the rial, which has lost half its foreign exchange value in the past year, driving prices of food and consumer goods sharply higher.
"I cordially congratulate your deserving election as the president of the Islamic Republic of Iran and demand the God almighty to bestow you and your future government success in serving the honorable Iranian people," Qalibaf said in a message addressed to Rowhani.
Just a week ago, Rowhani was seen as overshadowed by candidates with far deeper ties to the current power structure: Jalili and Qalibaf.
Then a moderate rival of Rowhani bowed out of the presidential race to consolidate the pro-reform camp. That opened the way for high-profile endorsements including his political mentor, former President Akbar Heshmi Rafsanjani, who won admiration from opposition forces for denouncing the postelection crackdowns in 2009. This, too, may have led to Rafsanjani's being blackballed from the ballot this year by Iran's election overseers, which allowed just eight candidates among more than 680 hopefuls.
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, did not publicly endorse a successor for Ahmadinejad following their falling out over the president's attempts to challenge Khamenei's near-absolute powers.
Khamenei praised Iranians for the high turnout, calling it an "epic and enthusiastic election" and a "dazzling test."
"After weeks of speaking and hearing, it's time to work. The president-elect, until formally taking office, has a precious opportunity ... to begin without hesitation the work that presidential responsibilities require," he said in his message broadcast on state TV.
Iran's stock exchange and currency markets reacted positively to early election results that showed Rowhani ahead.
The stock exchange index rose 2 percent while the rial strengthened by 9 percent against the U.S. dollar.
___
Murphy reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writer Nasser Karimi in Tehran contributed to this report.
Because MMA was once outlawed in several states, a patchwork of laws govern the sport across the country. This week has been a big one for the UFC to wade through legal red tape as it works on Boston and New York.![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](http://www.eurekalert.org/images/back2e.gif){kind=small}
Public release date: 17-Jun-2013
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