Slim majority supports L.A. sales tax increase

A Los Angeles sales tax hike being promoted as vital to preserving public safety and helping end years of budget deficits is...

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Listen to David Bowie's First Album in 10 Years for Free Online (Legally)

You don’t have to wait until March 12 to find out whether David Bowie’s first album in a decade is more Tin Machine than Low; the long-awaited The Next Day is already available, streaming in full on iTunes for a limited period pre-release.The stream continues Bowie’s current interest in previewing content from the album for free online before release; videos for both...

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Cellar victim Kampusch raped, starved in film of ordeal

VIENNA (Reuters) – A new film based on the story of Austrian kidnap victim Natascha Kampusch shows her being repeatedly raped by the captor who beat and starved her during the eight-and-a-half years that he kept her in a cellar beneath his house.Kampusch was snatched on her way to school at the age of 10 by Wolfgang Priklopil and held in a windowless cell under his garage near Vienna until she escaped...

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England Develops a Voracious Appetite for a New Diet

LONDON — Visitors to England right now, be warned. The big topic on people’s minds — from cabdrivers to corporate executives — is not Kate Middleton’s increasingly visible baby bump (though the craze does involve the size of one’s waistline), but rather a best-selling diet book that has sent the British into a fasting frenzy. “The Fast Diet,” published in mid-January in Britain, could do...

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Off the Shelf: Bretton Woods Monetary Agreement, Examined in a New Book

“DOWNTON ABBEY” has tapped our inner Anglophile on a wide front. But Americans were not so besotted with Britain in the first half of the 20th century, when it was a powerhouse of international trade. Until World War II, Britain ran international finance to its liking, and Americans were thirsting to chop it down to size. We need to understand that to grasp the importance of the Bretton Woods monetary...

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Watch Darpa's Robotic Dog Throw Cinder Blocks With Its <em>Head</em>

Flesh-and-blood dogs merely fetch. The robotic pooch that Darpa funds can throw.Boston Dynamics’ BigDog started life as a headless four-legged robot capable of hauling soldiers’ gear along rough and uneven terrain. The BigDog’s upgrades and follow-on robots are expanding the boundaries of robotic motion, courtesy of cash from Darpa’s Tactical Technology Office. Its...

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Cellar victim Kampusch raped, starved in film of ordeal

VIENNA (Reuters) – A new film based on the story of Austrian kidnap victim Natascha Kampusch shows her being repeatedly raped by the captor who beat and starved her during the eight-and-a-half years that he kept her in a cellar beneath his house.Kampusch was snatched on her way to school at the age of 10 by Wolfgang Priklopil and held in a windowless cell under his garage near Vienna until she escaped...

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Well: A Rainbow of Root Vegetables

This week’s Recipes for Health is as much a treat for the eyes as the palate. Colorful root vegetables from bright orange carrots and red scallions to purple and yellow potatoes and pale green leeks will add color and flavor to your table.Since root vegetables and tubers keep well and can be cooked up into something delicious even after they have begun to go limp in the refrigerator, this week’s Recipes...

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Ireland Seeks Easing of Its Debt Terms

DUBLIN — Ireland has been widely praised as the good pupil of the euro zone’s austerity school of thought. Now it wants to be rewarded. Ireland, whose banking crisis required it to receive a bailout of €85 billion, or $110 billion, by international lenders in 2010, is pressing for the right to ease the payback terms of billions of euros of debt it incurred in that process. It is also pushing...

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Jury in Bell corruption trial may be deadlocked

A court spokeswoman said Thursday the jury in the Bell corruption case appears to be deadlocked.“The jurors may be at an impasse,”...

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Bradley Manning Takes 'Full Responsibility' for Giving WikiLeaks Huge Government Data Trove

FORT MEADE, Md. — Wearing his Army dress uniform, a composed, intense and articulate Pfc. Bradley Manning took “full responsibility” Thursday for providing the anti-secrecy organization WikiLeaks with a trove of classified and sensitive military, diplomatic and intelligence cables, videos and documents.In the lengthiest statement to a military tribunal Manning has provided since his nearly...

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Cellar victim Kampusch raped, starved in film of ordeal

VIENNA (Reuters) – A new film based on the story of Austrian kidnap victim Natascha Kampusch shows her being repeatedly raped by the captor who beat and starved her during the eight-and-a-half years that he kept her in a cellar beneath his house.Kampusch was snatched on her way to school at the age of 10 by Wolfgang Priklopil and held in a windowless cell under his garage near Vienna until she escaped...

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First Lady Announces Public-Private Plan to Bolster Physical Education

CHICAGO — As part of her campaign to curb childhood obesity, Michelle Obama on Thursday announced an ambitious plan to increase physical education in the country’s public schools with the help of private companies. Jeff Haynes/ReutersMichelle Obama spoke in Chicago on Thursday about her plan to increase physical activity in schools. Under the $70 million...

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DealBook: Heinz Case May Involve a Side Bet in London

Regulators have escalated an investigation into suspicious trades placed ahead of the $23 billion takeover of H. J. Heinz, focusing on a complex derivative bet routed through London, according to two people briefed on the matter.The development builds on a recent regulatory action mounted against a Goldman Sachs account in Switzerland that bought Heinz options contracts. It also comes a week after...

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Race for L.A. city controller heats up

A previously low-profile race for Los Angeles city controller has begun to heat up as opponents of City Councilman Dennis Zine...

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Army's Demonic Numbers for Budget Cuts: 6, 6, and 6

The entire U.S. military is terrified of the impending budget cuts scheduled to hit Friday. But the Army thinks the cuts are demonic. “The fiscal crisis that we face today can be summed up by three numbers: six, six and six,” Maj. Gen. Karen E. Dyson, the director of the Army’s budget office, told reporters on Wednesday. Seriously.Dyson’s talking about three different figures that hit this...

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Cellar victim Kampusch raped, starved in film of ordeal

VIENNA (Reuters) – A new film based on the story of Austrian kidnap victim Natascha Kampusch shows her being repeatedly raped by the captor who beat and starved her during the eight-and-a-half years that he kept her in a cellar beneath his house.Kampusch was snatched on her way to school at the age of 10 by Wolfgang Priklopil and held in a windowless cell under his garage near Vienna until she escaped...

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Personal Health: Too Many Pills in Pregnancy

The thalidomide disaster of the early 1960s left thousands of babies with deformed limbs because their mothers innocently took a sleeping pill thought to be safe during pregnancy,In its well-publicized wake, countless pregnant women avoided all medications, fearing that any drug they took could jeopardize their babies’ development.I was terrified in December 1968 when, during the first weeks of my...

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Shell Suspends Drilling for Arctic Ocean in 2013

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Royal Dutch Shell PLC announced Wednesday it will not drill for petroleum in the Arctic Ocean in 2013. Shell Oil Co. President Marvin Odum said in an announcement that the company will "pause" its exploration drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas. The company made progress in Alaska, but Arctic offshore drilling is a long-term program that the company is...

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