Gary Sinise, Trombone Shorty to ride in Orpheus

NEW ORLEANS (AP) ? Actor Gary Sinise and New Orleans musicians Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews and Harry Connick Jr. will lead the parade of the Krewe of Orpheus on the evening of Lundi Gras, the day before Fat Tuesday. They also will perform at the glitzy ball that follows.

The celebrity riders were announced Thursday at Mardi Gras World, where many of the Carnival floats are built.

Orpheus marks its 20th anniversary when it parades Feb. 11.

The krewe was co-founded in 1993 by Connick and Sonny Borey, the krewe's captain. It has about 1,200 members and is known for attracting celebrities.

Connick will perform an original song he wrote for the anniversary, called "Smokey Mary Boogie Woogie Choo Choo." The song will be on Connick's upcoming album of Carnival music.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/gary-sinise-trombone-shorty-ride-orpheus-175504325.html

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Will Big Oil Keep Its Subsidies in a Fiscal Cliff Deal?

Democrats and Republicans are duking it out in Washington over a deal to avert the slew of spending cuts and tax increases?the so-called "fiscal cliff" you've heard so much about?that will take start to effect on January 1. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have argued that "everything should be on the table" in negotiations toward a deal that trims the nation's debt and avoids the "cliff." Yet notably absent from the debate over what to cut and what to spare in a deal are the tens of billions of dollars in subsidies, tax breaks, and other perks for the hugely profitable oil industry.

That silence begs the question: Will Big Oil's subsidies go untouched in the fight over a "fiscal cliff" deal?

In news stories and public remarks by leading Democrats and Republicans, there's been scant discussion of oil subsidies as a potential source of revenue. The proposals floated by the White House and by congressional Republicans have not delved into enough detail to know whether subsidies would be included in their proposed changes. And multiple aides to Senate Democrats say that, while they believe the subsidies are on the table, there hasn't been much of a push behind the scenes to include them in a fiscal cliff deal.

In case you didn't quite believe it, yes, the US government subsidizes Big Oil?shorthand for ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, Shell, and ConocoPhillips, five of the biggest oil companies. Many smaller drilling and refining companies up and down the supply chain receive subsidies, too. Some of these subsidies date back a hundred years, when the fledgling oil exploration business was risky, even deadly. Today, with a barrel of crude oil costing $90 to $100, Big Oil practically prints money. The big five corporations piled up profits of more than $1 trillion between 2001 and 2011. ExxonMobil alone raked in $16 billion in profits in April, May, and June of this year, the highest-ever quarterly profit for a US corporation.

Despite such staggering windfalls, the federal government continues to subsidize oil companies large and small. Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan government watchdog that wants to cut all energy subsidies, estimates that oil companies will receive $78 billion in industry-specific and broader business subsidies from 2012 to 2017. President Obama's budget plan for the 2012 fiscal year called for eliminating 13 subsidies or perks for oil companies, which will save taxpayers $4.6 billion a year over the next decade.

Experts of all stripes agree with Taxpayers for Common Sense's demand that Big Oil's "gravy train" come to an end. The libertarian Cato Institute, co-founded by Charles Koch, lauded Obama's plan to slash certain oil subsidies. A Sierra Club official compared subsidizing Big Oil to investing in the future of VCRs or typewriters: "It's a technology that is on its way out. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense." The lefty Center for American Progress think tank says it's time to "turn off the oil subsidy spigot."

In Congress, lawmakers ranging from hardline conservatives like Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) to dyed-in-the-wool liberals like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and plenty more in between, have called for eliminating oil subsidies. Even oil executives themselves have said in years past that they don't need the subsidies. ConocoPhillips CEO Jim Mulva told Congress in 2010 that, "with respect to oil and gas exploration and production, we do not need incentives." And former Shell CEO John Hofmeister once testified, "My point of view is that with high oil prices such subsidies are not necessary."

The American Petroleum Institute, the oil industry's top trade group, has launched an advertising campaign pressuring seven senators in states with ties to oil and gas companies?Senate Democrats Tom Udall of New Mexico, Mark Udall of Colorado, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Kay Hagen of North Carolina, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Mark Warner of Virginia, and Mark Begich of Alaska?to not cut subsidies. In the three weeks after Election Day, API spent $3 million on TV ads, according to a ThinkProgress review of Kantar Media's CMAG data.

But in the recent years, Congress has failed to trim, let alone eliminate, the oil business' many perks. The closest Congress came to gutting these sweetheart deals were two votes this March on a measure offered by Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.). Menendez's Repeal Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act proposed cutting away a small slice of the big oil "gravy train"?namely, $2.4 billion a year in tax deductions enjoyed by the big five oil companies. The vote was 51 to 47, nine votes short of the 60 needed for passage.

Now, with a December 31 deadline looming, members of Congress are scrambling to find government programs to pare back or eliminate as part of a fiscal cliff compromise. For deficit hawks, experts point out, the $2.4 billion per year saved by cutting oil subsidies isn't earth-shaking, but it's low-hanging fruit, fiscally speaking. You would think oil subsidies would play a visible role in the discussions between Democratic and GOP lawmakers on what to cut.

But oil subsidies have gone unmentioned in all the breathless reporting on the thrust and parry over a fiscal cliff deal. Rory Cooper, a spokesman for House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), points out that congressional Republicans' offer to the White House was merely the framework of a deal, which didn't include details on how Congress would bring in the $800 billion in new revenues. Spokespeople for the White House and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) did not respond to requests for comment about whether oil subsidies are part of fiscal cliff deal discussions.

One senior Senate Democratic aide says it's more likely that oil subsidies will be trimmed if Democrats and Republicans agree to a sweeping deal?say one with spending cuts and new revenues totaling $1 trillion. That way cutting $24 billion in oil subsidies doesn't seem punitive and so is more politically palatable. "But if we do a short-term deal?so it's a hundred-billion-plus [toward reducing the deficit], then $24 billion is an awful big chunk of that, and politically it gets more difficult," the aide says.

Another senior Democratic aide says he thinks it's more likely that Congress will touch oil subsidies in 2013. "We're more likely to see the Senate take up this issue after the New Year, maybe as part of comprehensive tax reform," this aide says. "But even then I'm not optimistic."

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/big-oil-subsidies-fiscal-cliff-deal-obama-congress

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Gun Found in Frozen Meat Package At a New Mexico Supermarket

Travelers Today | By Katie McFadden

Updated: Dec 07, 2012 02:53 PM EST

A New Mexico supermarket worker was shocked when he found a loaded gun in a package of frozen meat.

A worker at Alberstons in Roswell, N.M. wasn't expecting anything out of the normal when he was unwrapping meat that was shipped in from a packing plant in Colorado. However upon doing the routine task, he found a gun with seven rounds of ammunition in a package of ribs on Wednesday, according to NBC.

"The big cases of meat come in a box," Sabrina Morales, Roswell Police Department public relations liaison, said, according to NBC. "When he opened it, he saw the firearm. It wasn't packaged inside with the meat, but it was in the same box." ?

Upon finding the Rock Island Armory .38 super semi auto handgun in the meat box, the worker brought it to the Roswell Police Department.

Police are not sure where the gun could have come from. They entered the weapon into the National Crime Information Center database but they couldn't find any information about it being stolen or missing.

Since the weapon was in a box of meat that may have been bloody or had an odor, the supermarket worker cleaned it before giving it to the police. Due to this, they weren't able to find fingerprints on the weapon.

The other bizarre aspect is that the meat that was sent from the Swift Packing Plant in Greeley, Colo., was more than a year old.

"The other part that's disturbing is the date on the package was 6.8.2011. I don't know how long meat stays well-frozen, but that was the date of the package he was opening," Morales told NBC.

The packing plant has not made any comments about the issue as of yet but the Greeley police are aware of it and have all of the information that is available at this time.

Roswell police are continuing to examine the NCIC database and will do a search through the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in hopes of finding out more information.

"If it was stolen, we would have thought that by now it would have been entered into the actual database, NCIC, as a stolen firearm," Sgt. Jim Preston said. "But we don't have any of that information, and it is something we're looking into."

This strange find is certainly a rare one for the Roswell police department.

"You hear of people finding frogs in their salad or weird stuff like that, but never heard of this one," Morales said.?

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Source: http://www.travelerstoday.com/articles/3855/20121207/gun-found-frozen-meat-package-new-mexico-supermarket-weird-news-weapon-greeley-colorado-roswell-weapons-firearms-grocery.htm

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Officials: Serbia's NATO ambassador leaps to death

BRUSSELS (AP) ? Serbia's ambassador to NATO was chatting and joking with colleagues in a multistory parking garage at Brussels Airport when he suddenly strolled to a barrier, climbed over and flung himself to the ground below, a diplomat said.

By the time his shocked colleagues reached him, Branislav Milinkovic was dead.

His motives are a mystery. Three diplomats who knew Milinkovic said he did not appear distraught in the hours leading up to his death Tuesday night. He seemed to be going about his regular business, they said, picking up an arriving delegation of six Serbian officials who were due to hold talks with NATO, the alliance that went to war with his country just 13 years ago.

A former author and activist opposed to the authoritarian regime of Serbia's former strongman Slobodan Milosevic, Milinkovic was outgoing, had a warm sense of humor and worked to keep good ties with ambassadors from other ex-Yugoslav countries, according to diplomats and acquaintances.

The diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release details, said they knew of no circumstances ? private or professional ? that would have prompted him to take his own life.

But Milinkovic, 52, had mentioned to colleagues at diplomatic functions that he was unhappy about living apart from his wife, a Serbian diplomat based in Vienna, and their 17-year-old son.

One of the diplomats described his death to The Associated Press, saying she had spoken to a member of the delegation who had witnessed the leap from the 8- to 10-meter-high (26- to 33-foot-high) platform.

The diplomats all spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not permitted by foreign service regulations to speak publicly to the press.

Speaking in Brussels, Serbia's Prime Minister Ivica Dacic said that "Belgian police are investigating, but it's obviously a suicide. It's hard to figure out the motives or causes."

The death cast a pall on the second day of a meeting of NATO foreign ministers. Officials said they were shocked by the news of the death of a very popular and well-liked man.

NATO's Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said he was "deeply saddened by the tragic death of the Serbian ambassador."

"As Serbian ambassador to NATO he earned the respect and admiration of his fellow ambassadors," he said.

When Yugoslavia was a united country, Milinkovic worked for a prominent Yugoslav foreign policy think-tank. But when Milosevic seized power in Serbia in late 1980s, Milinkovic joined other liberals who opposed the former strongman's regime and presented a rare voice of moderation during the era when much of Serbia was engulfed in nationalist fervor. He established close ties with international human rights and other groups and remained active in anti-war groups.

After Milosevic was ousted in 2000, Milinkovic was appointed Serbia's ambassador to the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe, or OSCE, in Vienna.

He was transferred to NATO as Serbia's special representative in 2004. Serbia is not a member of the military alliance, but Milinkovic was named ambassador after Belgrade joined NATO's Partnership for Peace program, which involves neutral states.

The move to join the NATO program had angered Serbian nationalists who are now in power. They have pledged that Serbia will never join NATO because of the alliance's 1999 bombing campaign that forced Milosevic's forces to withdraw from Serbia's southern province of Kosovo. In 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia, which has never accepted that loss.

Milosevic was widely blamed for instigating the '90s Balkan wars that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia, conflicts that claimed more than 100,000 lives and left millions homeless.

At NATO, Milinkovic worked to foster closer ties with the representatives of all five other nations that gained independence after the bloody 1991 breakup of the former Yugoslav federation into Bosnia, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Slovenia and Serbia.

Relations were still politically charged when Milinkovic first arrived in Brussels, but they have since improved drastically.

Two months ago, when Croatia's ambassador to NATO was being transferred to Moscow, Milinkovic organized a dinner for all five of his counterparts and a band played music from all parts of the former Yugoslav federation.

He is survived by his wife and son.

___

Stojanovic reported from Belgrade, Serbia.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/officials-serbias-nato-ambassador-leaps-death-093459101.html

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Solar-powered plane to circumnavigate globe. How will it fly at night?

The solar-powered plane, scheduled to fly around the world in 2015, travels only 30 miles per hour and will have to stay aloft 20 days, even at night. The solar-powered plane is the brainchild of Bertrand Piccard, the first person to circumnavigate the globe in a hot air balloon.

By David J. Unger,?Correspondent / December 4, 2012

The Solar Impulse airplane makes its historic 26-hour solar-powered flight in this July 2010 file photo. While it's not the first solar-powered plane, the Solar Impulse is unlike others in that its energy-efficient batteries allow the plane to stay aloft even at night.

Keystone/Fabrice Coffrini/Pool/AP

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The man who flew around the world in a hot air balloon now wants to make the same trip using only the power of the sun.

Bertrand Piccard ? not Icarus ? plans to make the trip in his Solar Impulse,?a fragile-looking plane that weighs less than an SUV and is powered by the 12,000 solar cells that make up its overlong wings.

While it's not the first sun-powered plane, the Solar Impulse is unlike others in that its energy-efficient batteries allow the plane to soar even through dark night skies.

"These cells capture the energy of the sun and transform it into electricity," Mr. Piccard explained in an interview with 60 Minutes. "This electricity goes simultaneously to the engine and to the batteries. Then we reach the next sunrise, and we capture the sun again, and we can continue, theoretically forever."?

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John McAfee Detained by Guatemala Police

John McAfee was taken into police custody in Guatemala on Wednesday for being in the country illegally, police there have confirmed. The McAfee Security founder had fled to Guatemala to avoid authorities in neighboring Belize, where he is wanted for ...

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GearFactor/~3/3GuaVjnpFTw/

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Latest news, rumors from 2012 Winter Meetings

Rich Dauer, Dexter Fowler, Pedro Alvarez

The Phillies, having already missed out on B.J. Upton, Angel Pagan and Denard Span as possibilities for center field, have talked to the Rockies about Dexter Fowler, FOXSports.com?s Ken Rosenthal reports. The Rockies don?t need to move Fowler, who is due about $5 million in arbitration next year, but they?re open to the possibility if?

Source: http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/

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UN calls on Israel to open nuclear facilities

UNITED NATIONS (AP) ? The U.N. General Assembly has overwhelmingly approved a resolution calling on Israel to quickly open its nuclear program for inspection and backing a high-level conference to ban nuclear weapons from the Middle East which was just canceled.

All the Arab nations and Iran had planned to attend the conference in mid-December in Helsinki, Finland, but the United States announced on Nov. 23 that it wouldn't take place, citing political turmoil in the region and Iran's defiant stance on nonproliferation. Iran and some Arab nations countered that the real reason for the cancellation was Israel's refusal to attend.

The resolution, approved Monday by a vote of 174-6 with 6 abstentions, calls on Israel to join the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty "without further delay" and open its nuclear facilities to inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Those voting "no" were Israel, the U.S., Canada, Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau.

Resolutions adopted by the 193-member General Assembly are not legally binding but they do reflect world opinion and carry moral and political weight.

Israel refuses to confirm or deny it has nuclear bombs though it is widely believed to have a nuclear arsenal. It has refused to join the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, or NPT, along with three nuclear weapon states ? India, Pakistan and North Korea.

The Arab proposal to create a weapons-of-mass-destruction-free zone in the Mideast, and to pressure Israel to give up its undeclared arsenal of perhaps 80 nuclear warheads, was endorsed at an NPT conference in 1995 but never acted on. In 2010, the 189 parties to the 1970 treaty called for convening a conference in 2012 on the establishment of a WMD-free zone in the Middle East.

The resolution, which was approved by the assembly's disarmament committee before the conference was cancelled, noted the decision to hold it "with satisfaction."

But Israel has long said there first must be a Mideast peace agreement before the establishment of a Mideast zone free of weapons of mass destruction. The region's Muslim nations argue that Israel's undeclared nuclear arsenal presents the greatest threat to peace in the region.

The Israeli government had no immediate comment on Monday's General Assembly vote.

Last week, the General Assembly upgraded the Palestinians to that of a nonmember observer state, endorsing an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank, east Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip.

Just before Monday's vote, Iranian diplomat Khodadad Seifi told the assembly "the truth is that the Israeli regime is the only party which rejected to conditions for a conference." He called for "strong pressure on that regime to participate in the conference without any preconditions."

Israeli diplomat Isi Yanouka said his country has continuously pointed to the danger of nuclear proliferation in the Mideast, singling out Iran and Syria by name.

"All these cases challenge Israel's security and cast a dark shadow at the prospect of embarking on a meaningful regional security process," he said.

"The fact that the sponsors include in this anti-Israeli resolution language referring to the 2012 conference proves above all the ill-intent of the Arab states with regard to this conference," Yanouka said.

Syrian diplomat Abdullah Hallak told the assembly his government was angry that the conference wasn't going to take place because of "the whim of just one party, a party with nuclear warheads."

"We call on the international community to put pressure on Israel to accept the NPT, get rid of its arsenal and delivery systems, in order to allow for peace and stability in our region," he said.

The conference's main sponsors are the U.S., Russia and Britain. British Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt has said it is being postponed, not cancelled.

While the United States voted against the resolution, it voted in favor of two paragraphs in it that were put to separate votes. Both support universal adherence to the NPT, and call on those countries that aren't parties to ratify it "at the earliest date." The only "no" votes on those paragraphs were Israel and India.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/un-calls-israel-open-nuclear-facilities-032837550.html

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Evernote Launches App for Small Businesses - Lauren Goode ...

Less than a week after closing $85 million in funding, Evernote is all business ? small business, that is.

Evernote Business for Mac

The company just announced that it will launch a premium, business-oriented version of its popular personal-productivity app, which claims more than 45 million worldwide users to date.

The new business app offers users the ability to create notes, spreadsheets, task lists, presentations and mock-ups, all of which can be shared with colleagues. Users can share Business Notebooks with colleagues, and can still maintain Personal Notebooks, which are private.

The service costs $10 per user per month, and includes two gigabytes per month of content storage in Personal Notebooks, while co-workers get the same amount of content storage in Business Notebooks.

Evernote Business apps for Android and Windows desktop went live this morning. The Mac desktop app is coming ?shortly,? and Evernote is still waiting on approval from Apple for the iOS app. A representative for the company says a Windows 8-compatible app is also forthcoming, but declined to say exactly when. (The original Evernote app for Metro launched with a pared-down features list, and for some users, syncing it with Windows 8 has proved challenging.)

Evernote Business for Windows

Given Evernote?s focus on organization and productivity, an official business app seems to be a natural offshoot of the free consumer app ? one that competes more and more with Microsoft?s OneNote app for Office users.

During the announcement made today at the LeWeb tech conference in Paris, Evernote CEO Phil Libin said that two-thirds of the app?s users already rely on Evernote for business. Fifteen percent of those users get it issued to them from work, while 85 percent bring it into a professional environment without it being official work software.

He also noted that a large number of users come from Japan, where 40 books have been written about the application.

Source: http://allthingsd.com/20121204/going-beyond-personal-productivity-evernote-launches-app-for-businesses/

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