Egyptians hand Islamists narrow win in constitution vote

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egyptians voted in favor of a constitution shaped by Islamists but opposed by other groups who fear it will divide the Arab world’s biggest nation, officials in rival camps said on Sunday after the first round of a two-stage referendum.

Next week’s second round is likely to give another “yes” vote as it includes districts seen as more sympathetic towards Islamists, analysts say, meaning the constitution would be approved.

But the narrow win so far gives Islamist President Mohamed Mursi only limited grounds for celebration by showing the wide rifts in a country where he needs to build a consensus for tough economic reforms.

The Muslim Brotherhood‘s party, which propelled Mursi to office in a June election, said 56.5 percent backed the text. Official results are not expected until after the next round.

While an opposition official conceded the “yes” camp appeared to have won the first round, the opposition National Salvation Front said in a statement that voting abuses meant a rerun was needed – although it did not explicitly challenge the Brotherhood‘s vote tally.

Rights groups reported abuses such as polling stations opening late, officials telling people how to vote and bribery. They also criticized widespread religious campaigning which portrayed “no” voters as heretics.

A joint statement by seven human rights groups urged the referendum’s organizers “to avoid these mistakes in the second stage of the referendum and to restage the first phase again”.

Mursi and his backers say the constitution is vital to move Egypt’s democratic transition forward. Opponents say the basic law is too Islamist and tramples on minority rights, including those of Christians who make up 10 percent of the population.

The build-up to Saturday’s vote was marred by deadly protests. Demonstrations erupted when Mursi awarded himself extra powers on November 22 and then fast-tracked the constitution through an assembly dominated by his Islamist allies.

However, the vote passed off calmly with long queues in Cairo and several other places, though unofficial tallies indicated turnout was around a third of the 26 million people eligible to vote this time. The vote was staggered because many judges needed to oversee polling staged a boycott in protest.

The opposition had said the vote should not have been held given the violent protests. Foreign governments are watching closely how the Islamists, long viewed warily in the West, handle themselves in power.

“It’s wrong to have a vote or referendum with the country in the state it is – blood and killings, and no security,” said Emad Sobhy, a voter who lives in Cairo. “Holding a referendum with the country as it is cannot give you a proper result.”

INCREASINGLY DIVIDED

As polls closed, Islamists attacked the offices of the newspaper of the liberal Wafd party, part of the opposition National Salvation Front coalition that pushed for a “no” vote.

“The referendum was 56.5 percent for the ‘yes’ vote,” a senior official in the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party operations room set up to monitor voting told Reuters.

The Brotherhood and its party had representatives at polling stations across the 10 areas, including Cairo, in this round. The official, who asked not to be identified, said the tally was based on counts from more than 99 percent of polling stations.

“The nation is increasingly divided and the pillars of state are swaying,” opposition politician Mohamed ElBaradei wrote on Twitter. “Poverty and illiteracy are fertile grounds for trading with religion. The level of awareness is rising fast.”

One opposition official also told Reuters the vote appeared to have gone in favor of Islamists who backed the constitution.

The opposition initially said its exit polls indicated the “no” camp would win comfortably, but officials changed tack during the night. One opposition official said in the early hours of Sunday that it would be “very close”.

A narrow loss could still hearten leftists, socialists, Christians and more liberal-minded Muslims who make up the disparate opposition, which has been beaten in two elections since Hosni Mubarak was overthrown last year.

They were drawn together to oppose what they saw as a power grab by Mursi as he pushed through the constitution. The National Salvation Front includes prominent figures such as ElBaradei, former Arab League chief Amr Moussa and firebrand leftist Hamdeen Sabahy.

If the constitution is approved, a parliamentary election will follow early next year.

DEADLY VIOLENCE

Analysts question whether the opposition group will keep together until the parliamentary election. The Islamist-dominated lower house of parliament elected earlier this year was dissolved based on a court order in June.

Violence in Cairo and other cities has plagued the run-up to the referendum. At least eight people were killed when rival camps clashed during demonstrations outside the presidential palace earlier this month.

In order to pass, the constitution must be approved by more than 50 percent of those casting ballots. There are 51 million eligible voters in the nation of 83 million.

Islamists have been counting on their disciplined ranks of supporters and on Egyptians desperate for an end to turmoil that has hammered the economy and sent Egypt’s pound to eight-year lows against the dollar.

The army deployed about 120,000 troops and 6,000 tanks and armored vehicles to protect polling stations and other government buildings. While the military backed Mubarak and his predecessors, it has not intervened in the present crisis.

(Additional reporting Yasmin Saleh and Marwa Awad; Writing by Edmund Blair and Giles Elgood; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

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Actor Depardieu puts Paris house up for sale

PARIS (Reuters) – French actor Gerard Depardieu, accused of trying to escape the taxman by buying a house just over the border in Belgium, has put his sumptuous Parisian home up for sale.

Depardieu, the latest wealthy Frenchman to seek shelter from government tax hikes, is selling a vast early 19th-century manor house in the Saint Germain district of the capital, playground of writers, jazz musicians and art dealers over the decades.

His real estate agent declined to say how much he was asking for a property that is on a list of protected national monuments and, as well as the main house, has a swimming pool, landscaped gardens and an ultramodern annex that once served as a theatre.

News of the Parisian sale plan came a day after French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault described Depardieu’s behavior as “pathetic” and unpatriotic at a time when the French are being asked to pay higher taxes to reduce a bloated national debt.

An angry member of parliament has proposed that France adopt a U.S.-inspired law that would force Depardieu or anyone trying to escape full tax dues to forego their nationality.

The 63-year-old “Cyrano de Bergerac” star recently bought a house in Nechin, a Belgian village a short walk from the border with France, where 27 percent of residents are French nationals, local mayor Daniel Senesael told French media on Sunday.

Depardieu also enquired about procedures for acquiring Belgian residency, he said.

The move comes three months after Bernard Arnault, chief executive of luxury giant LVMH and France’s richest man, caused an uproar by seeking to establish residency in Belgium – a move he said was not for tax reasons.

Belgian residents do not pay wealth tax, which in France is now levied on those with assets over 1.3 million euros ($ 1.7 million). Nor do they pay capital gains tax on share sales.

Socialist President Francois Hollande is pressing ahead too with plans to impose a 75-percent supertax on income over 1 million euros.

While Depardieu’s real estate agents did not comment on the price being sought for the Paris property, a local newspaper suggested it could be in the region of 50 million euros.

At average prices quoted on the Internet, a property of that size would command upwards of 20 million, without the additional status of a national monument, celebrity appeal or the artwork renovation commissioned by Depardieu when he bought it in 2003.

Depardieu’s agents declined to comment.

(Reporting by Brian Love and Gerard Bon; editing by Andrew Roche)

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Gunman’s computers may be key in Connecticut school shooting investigation

NEWTOWN, Conn. — Alleged school shooter Adam Lanza reportedly occupied two bedrooms in his family's sprawling suburban home, one where he slept and another to stash his computer equipment.

For a young man who has been described as withdrawn from the outside world, Lanza's computer room is likely a gold mine for detectives, a veteran law enforcement source familiar with the investigation told Yahoo News.

"If he visited certain websites, they are going to glean whatever information they can from that and see what it means," said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly. "Does he have friends he communicates with online? Was there a fight with somebody?"

Police have already hinted that evidence inside the 4,000-square-foot home has been helpful in determining a possible motive for the rampage that claimed the lives of 20 children and six adult staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary.

Lanza shot and killed his mother, Nancy Lanza, at their home before driving to the school and commencing his deadly rampage, police say. Adam Lanza's body was later found inside the building, where police believe he took his own life. Results from the autopsies on the alleged gunman and his mother are still pending.

Lt. J. Paul Vance with the Connecticut State Police told reporters Sunday morning that investigators are scrutinizing the guns Lanza took to the school, including the semiautomatic military-style rifle the state's medical examiner said was used in the school killings.

"The weaponry involved, we are tracing historically all the way back to when they were on the workbench being assembled," Lt. Vance said.

However, he declined to discuss what else has been recovered from the Lanza home.

"Simply stated, we have a great deal of evidence that we're analyzing," Lt. Vance said. "The forensic part is an important part. That's not done yet."

While the gunman is thought to have acted alone, the law enforcement source said a deep dive into Lanza's computers could provide more clues.

"You don't know if this kid was put up to this by somebody else," the source said. "You don't know if there was a conspiracy of sorts. You don't know if there wasn't somebody who wasn't goading this kid on."

Family and friends say Lanza suffered from a personality disorder and that his mother, whom he killed just prior to the school shootings, struggled with her troubled son.

"Has he been seeing a child psychologist throughout his lifetime? Was he on medication?" the law enforcement source said. "These are a zillion logical who, what, whey, why, where questions that need to be answered. They need to be asked without any fear of any stigmatism … and you can't be politically correct in asking those questions."

Nor should the public be shy about discussing whatever is learned about Lanza's life and what prompted him to act, forensic psychologist Kris Mohandie told CNN.

"The opportunity is nearly always there to discover and disrupt," he said.

Dr. Mohandie said warning signs can include self destructiveness, hopelessness, desperation, interest in other mass shooters and a dysfunctional interest in weaponry.

Police say the guns used in the rampage were apparently owned and registered to Lanza's mother.

Without know specifics about the Lanza household, Dr. Mohandie pleaded for greater care with firearms.

"If you've got individuals who are unstable and you know it, it's probably a good idea restrict their access to firearms within their own home," he said.

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Analysis: Boehner opens door to tax hikes, shifts U.S. fiscal cliff talks

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner’s offer to accept a tax rate increase for the wealthiest Americans knocks down a key Republican road block to a deal resolving the year-end “fiscal cliff.”

The question now boils down to price – which income levels, what rates and what’s offered in return. Such major questions, still unanswered so close to the end of the year suggest, however, that no surge toward an agreement is immminent.

With just over two weeks before the fiscal cliff’s $ 600 billion in automatic tax hikes and spending cuts are triggered, threatening a new recession, there is little time to craft a comprehensive deal that will satisfy both Democrats and Republicans.

Until the latest offer, made on Friday, Boehner had insisted on extending all of the Bush era tax rates, resisting President Obama’s demand to let the marginal rates rise on income above $ 250,000. A rising chorus of business executives also had urged Republicans to agree to this.

Although the White House has not accepted Boehner’s gambit, which media reports have said includes a $ 1 million tax-hike threshold, it could push negotiations away from entrenched, ideological positions.

“Boehner has now accepted the premise of higher rates. So now we’re just arguing over details. I think it’s a significant step,” said Greg Valliere, chief political strategist at Potomac Research Group.

A framework deal spelling out tax revenue and spending cut targets to be finalized in the new year could be possible, Valliere said.

“Boehner’s offer to allow tax rates to go up for taxpayers earning over $ 1 million fundamentally transforms fiscal cliff negotiations,” added Sean West, U.S. policy analyst at Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy.

In a note to clients, West wrote that it signals, significantly, that Boehner ultimately believes a deal to avoid the cliff is still possible.

“The political burden is now shifted back to the president, who must be willing to take on his party in order to get a deal Boehner can ultimately pass. We do not think the president will overreach: Obama will work with Boehner to get to a deal.”

There are still several critical elements to a deal besides a tax rate increase on the wealthy, including Republican demands to cut spending on entitlements.

Changes to the expensive Medicare and Medicaid health care programs for the elderly and the poor could be central to any deal, which must also include an increase in the federal debt limit needed by the end of February.

DEMANDS ENTITLEMENT CUTS

Boehner conditioned his tax rate increase offer on Obama agreeing to cuts in entitlement spending.

Many Republican lawmakers want to raise the eligibility age on Medicare from 65 to 67. They also want to add more means testing to Medicare, making wealthier retirees pay more for their care.

Currently, Medicare does have some means testing, charging higher premiums for coverage of doctors visits and prescription drugs to individuals earning more than $ 85,000 and married couples earning more than $ 170,000. Only about 5 percent of recipients pay these higher premiums.

Thus far, Obama has offered only about $ 400 billion in 10-year entitlement savings, mostly through small adjustments in reining in health care costs – not fundamental changes such as raising eligibility ages.

And just as Boehner faces opposition in his own party to raising any tax rates, Obama faces opposition to cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security from Democrats, who pledged in election campaigns they would protect these programs.

A major bloc of congressional Democrats has already signaled they will not accept major cutbacks in Medicare as part of any fiscal cliff deal.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Maryland Representative Chris Van Hollen are among the high ranking Democrats in the House who in recent days have come out forcefully defending against raising the age for eligibility for Medicare from the current 65 to 67 years of age.

“Given the level of savings that is being talked about from Medicare, you can’t get it all from providers and drug makers,” said Paul Heldman, an analyst at Potomac Research, which tracks Washington policy for investors.

“So Opponents of raising the eligibility age have reason to believe beneficiaries will take some sort of hit if a mega-deal is cut,” he said.

If Republicans are not successful in securing entitlement program cuts in exchange for a tax-rate increase on the wealthy, they are adamant about using a debt-limit increase as leverage to overhaul Social Security and Medicare.

The U.S. Treasury expects to reach its $ 16.4 trillion statutory debt cap by year-end, and will exhaust its remaining borrowing capacity around mid-February, risking a potential default.

Louisiana Republican Representative John Fleming, a member of the conservative Tea Party caucus who has never voted to increase the debt ceiling, said he would support a debt limit hike if it were part of a deal to make Medicare and Social Security sustainable.

The pace of activity could pick up the coming week.

House Republicans were told to prepare for a possible weekend session next week, potentially interrupting travel plans for the long Christmas holiday weekend.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor scheduled “possible legislation related to expiring provisions of law,” a reference to the expiring tax cuts, for the end of the week, portending a weekend session. Cantor has said the House would meet through the Christmas holidays and beyond.

(Additional reporting by Thomas Ferraro, Richard Cowan and Kim Dixon; editing by Fred Barbash and Todd Eastham)

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Chicano rock pioneers Los Lobos marking 40 years

LOS ANGELES (AP) — They are seen as the progenitors of Chicano rock ‘n’ roll, the first band that had the boldness, and some might even say the naiveté, to fuse punk rock with Mexican folk tunes.

It was a group called Los Lobos that had the unusual idea of putting an accordion, a saxophone and something called a bajo sexto alongside drums and Fender Stratocaster guitars and then blasting a ranchera-flavored folk tune or a Conjunto inspired melody through double reverb amps at about twice the volume you’d normally expect to hear.

“They were Latinos who weren’t afraid to break the mold of what’s expected and what’s traditionally played. That made them legendary, even to people who at first weren’t that familiar with their catalog,” said Greg Gonzalez of the young, Grammy-winning Latino-funk fusion band Grupo Fantasma.

To the guys in Los Lobos, however, the band that began to take shape some 40-odd years ago in the hallways of a barrio high school is still “just another band from East LA,” the words the group has used in the title of not one but two of its more than two dozen albums.

As a yearlong celebration of Los Lobos‘ 40th anniversary gets under way, having officially begun on Thanksgiving, much is likely to be made of how the band began as a humble mariachi group, toiling anonymously for nearly a decade at East LA weddings and backyard parties before the unlikely arrival of rock stardom.

That’s, well, sort of true.

For long before there was mariachi in Los Lobos‘ life, there was power-chord rock ‘n’ roll. Before the Latin trio Las Panchos had an impact, there was Jimi Hendrix.

“I actually went to go see him when I was 14 or 15,” says drummer-guitarist and principal lyricist Louie Perez, recalling how he had badgered his widowed mother to spend some of the hard-earned money she made sewing clothes in a sweatshop on a ticket to a Hendrix show.

“I sat right down front,” he recalls, his voice rising in excitement. “That experience just sort of rearranged my brain cells.”

About the same time, he had met a guitarist named David Hidalgo in an art class at James A. Garfield High, the school made famous in the 1988 film “Stand and Deliver” that profiled Jaime Escalante’s success in teaching college-level calculus to poor barrio kids. Soon the two had recruited fellow students Conrad Lozano and Cesar Rosas, both experienced musicians.

“Cesar had played in a power trio,” Perez recalls, while Lozano had been playing electric bass guitar for years.

It was sometime in November 1973 (no one remembers the exact day so they picked Thanksgiving) when the band is believed to have been born.

And the group might have stayed just another garage band from East LA, had it not been for a Mexican tradition called Las Mananitas.

“It’s a serenade to someone on their birthday,” Perez explains, and the group members’ mothers had birthdays coming up.

“So we learned about four or five Mexican songs and we went to our parents’ homes and did a little serenade,” Hidalgo recalled separately.

They were such a hit that they began scouring pawn shops for genuine Mexican instruments and really learning to play them.

Because they were at heart a rock ‘n’ roll band, however, they always played the music a little too loud and a little too fast. That was acceptable at the Mexican restaurants that employed them, until they decided to break out the Stratocaster guitars they had so coveted as kids.

“They said, ‘Well, that’s not what we hired you for,’” Perez says, chuckling.

So they headed west down the freeway to Hollywood, where initially the reaction wasn’t much better.

Saxophonist Steve Berlin recalls seeing the hybrid group showered with garbage one night when they opened for Public Image Ltd. Two years later, however, when they opened for Berlin’s group the Blasters, the reaction was different.

“It was quite literally an overnight success kind of thing,” the saxophonist recalls. “By the next morning, everybody I knew in Hollywood, all they were talking about was this band Los Lobos.”

A few nights later, they asked Berlin if he might jam with them. They were working up some tunes melding punk rock with Norteno, a Latin music genre that uses an accordion and a saxophone, and they needed a sax player.

For his part, Berlin says, he had never heard of Norteno music.

Something clicked, however, and soon he was producing the group’s first true rock album, 1984′s “How Will the Wolf Survive?” At the end of the sessions he was in the band.

The next 28 years would be pretty much the same kind of up-and-down ride as the first 12 were.

The group became international rock stars in 1987 with their version of the Mexican folk tune “La Bamba” for the soundtrack of the film of the same name. They melded 1950s teen idol Ritchie Valens’ rock interpretation with the original Son Jarocho style and sent the song to No. 1.

A two-year tour and a couple albums that nobody bought followed, leaving the group broke and disillusioned.

So they poured their anger and disillusionment into the lyrics and power chords of “Kiko,” the 1992 album now hailed as their masterpiece. A new version, recorded live, was released earlier this year.

The influence of Los Lobos‘ cross-cultural work can be heard to this day in the music of such varied young Latino groups as the hip-hop rockers Ozomatli, the Son Jarocho-influenced alt-music band Las Cafeteras and the Latino pop-rock group La Santa Cecilia, says Josh Kun, an expert on cross-border music.

“All of these bands inherited, wittingly or not, the experimental and style crossing instincts that Los Lobos proved were possible while hanging onto and developing your roots as a Mexican-American group,” said Kun, who curated the Grammy Museum’s recent “Trouble in Paradise” exhibition that chronicled the modern history of LA music.

For Los Lobos, winner of three Grammys, that was just the natural way of doing things for guys, Perez says, who learned early on that they didn’t fit in completely on either side of the U.S.-Mexico border.

“As Mexican-Americans in the U.S. we’re not completely accepted on this side of the border. And then on the other side of the border it’s like, ‘Well, what are you?’” he mused.

“So if that’s the case,” he added brightly, “then, hey, we belong everywhere.”

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Police hope motive emerges from evidence in shooter's home

Conn. State police spokesman Lt. Paul Vance at Saturday morning's news conference. (Jason Sickles/Yahoo News)

NEWTOWN, CT - The Sandy Hook school principal and another staffer were killed after lunging at a gunman who forced his way inside to begin a deadly shooting spree, the regional school superintendent said Saturday.

The principal, Dawn Hochsprung, 47, and school psychologist Mary Sherlach, 56, died along with 4 other adults and 20 children in the second deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. The alleged shooter, 20-year old Adam Lanza, was found dead at the scene, and his mother, Nancy Lanza, was discovered dead at their home.

Newtown school superintendent Janet Robinson told reporters that the two educators and other staff members had put themselves in harms way to protect children once it became clear the school was under siege.

"The teachers were really, really focused on saving their students," Robinson said.

Police on Saturday said evidence recovered at gunman Lanza's home may provide a motive for the massacre.

State police spokesman Lt. Paul Vance declined to provide specifics about the evidence but said, "we're hopeful it will paint a complete picture."

Authorities say Lanza  killed his mother at their home Friday morning before driving to Sandy Hook.

[Related: Follow the latest updates from our reporters in Newtown]

Armed with two semi-automatic pistols, Lanza rapidly sprayed bullets in hallways and classrooms. Lanza killed himself before police officers could reach him.

Lt. Vance said all the bodies were removed from the school overnight. A medical examiner is expected to release the names of the victims later today.

Police have assigned a trooper to support each victim's family in the days ahead. Vance asked reporters to respect the families' grief and privacy.

"This is an extremely heartbreaking thing for them to endure," Lt. Vance said.

Police were expected to release the names of the victims Saturday afternoon. Some names were already being disclosed by family members, including teachers Lauren Rousseau, 30, and Vicki Soto, 27.

It will likely take investigators two more days to process the school crime scene where it is believed Lanza fired as many as 100 rounds from his guns.

"It's going to be a slow, painstaking process," Lt. Vance said.

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School murders silence “cliff” rhetoric as deadline nears

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mass murder in Connecticut silenced “fiscal cliff” talk on Saturday as the White House and Congress quietly got ready for a final scramble to avert the tax hikes and spending cuts set for the New Year, with sessions of the U.S. House of Representatives now scheduled just days before Christmas.

President Barack Obama canceled a trip he had planned to make next Wednesday to Portland, Maine to press his case for tax hikes for the wealthy. His weekly radio and Internet address on Saturday focused on Newtown, the site of Friday’s school shootings, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life.

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio canceled the standard Republican radio response to Obama “so that President Obama can speak for the entire nation at this time of mourning,” he said in a statement issued late Friday.

The moratorium on cliff pronouncements masked a growing recognition that the two sides could remain deadlocked at the end of the year on the key sticking point – whether to leave low tax rates in place except for high earners, as Obama wants, or extend them for all taxpayers, as Boehner wants.

With multiple polls showing that the public supports Obama’s position, Republicans in the U.S. Senate prodded their counterparts in the House to make a face-saving retreat, in a fashion that would allow Obama’s proposal to pass the Republican-controlled House while simultaneously letting Republicans cast a vote against it.

Republicans could then shift the debate onto territory they consider more favorable to them, cutting government spending to reduce the deficit.

“Just about everyone is throwing stuff on the wall to see if anything sticks,” one Republican aide said with reference to various proposals being discussed on how to proceed. Alluding to public opinion polls, the aide added: “We know if there is no deal, we will get blamed.”

“We could win the argument on spending cuts,” said a Republican senator who asked not to be identified. “We aren’t winning the argument on taxes.”

However, Republican leaders in both chambers are leery about seeming to cave on taxes. “There’s concern that if we did that, Obama would simply declare victory and walk away and not address spending,” said one aide. “We don’t trust these guys.”

Some of the prodding was coming from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Don Stewart, a McConnell spokesman, said the minority leader in the Democratic-controlled Senate hasn’t embraced any single plan, but has discussed and circulated measures offered by fellow Senate Republicans.

“Senator McConnell does not advocate raising taxes on anybody or anything,” Stewart said.

“We’re focused on getting a balanced plan from the White House that will begin to solve the problem of our debt and deficit to improve the economy and create American jobs,” said Boehner spokesman Michael Steel.

“Right now, all the president is offering is massive tax hikes with little or no spending cuts and reforms,” Steel said.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor scheduled “possible legislation related to expiring provisions of law,” a reference to the expiring tax cuts, for the end of the week, portending a weekend session.

Cantor has said the House would meet through the Christmas holidays and beyond.

Hopes expressed after the November6 general election of some “grand bargain” on deficit reduction have all but disappeared, at least for this year. This is partly because time is running out and partly result of growing warnings from Democrats in Congress that they would not support big changes in the Medicare program, the government-run health insurance program for seniors that is a major contributor to the government’s debt.

House Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California ruled out one frequently mentioned proposal – raising the age of eligibility for Medicare, in a December 12 CBS television interview.

Asked if she was drawing a “red line,” around that idea, Pelosi said her comments were “something that says, ‘don’t go there,’ because it doesn’t produce money.

(Reporting by Thomas Ferraro and Kim Dixon; Editing by Fred Barbash and David Brunnstrom)

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Sony’s PlayStation 4 could lose to the next Xbox before it’s even released

I love all game consoles equally. My Xbox 360 is used equally as much as my PlayStation 3. The Wii — oh, I’ll just leave it at that. The current generation of consoles is all but over — 10-year life cycle be damned — and new consoles are rumored to be coming next fall. If not next fall, then in 2014. Whatever is the case, Sony (SNE) can’t afford to lag in third place again. Sure, the Xbox 360 and PS3 are neck-in-neck in global lifetime sales, and the Xbox 360 did have a one year head start, but coming off the disappointing PS Vita, “confidence is less high” that Sony will deliver a console next year in time to compete with Microsoft (MSFT), according to Kotaku.

[More from BGR: Has the iPhone peaked? Apple’s iPhone 4S seen outselling iPhone 5]

I want a new console just as much as any other gamer. There’s a reason people are still pouncing on those Wii U consoles and flipping them on eBay. Six years is unusually long for a console to still be kicking around.

[More from BGR: Apple execs said to be ‘seething’ over Google Maps praise]

According to the well-informed Stephen Totilo, Editor-in-Chief of Kotaku, the game blog that first broke news on the next-gen Xbox, Microsoft’s “Durango” is ”on the mark” and “Sony appears to inspire less confidence…due to the on-and-off troubles of the PlayStation 3 and the struggles of the Vita vs. how much lost confidence is due to any problems looming for PS4.“

Totilo says “confidence is high that the next Xbox will be out in time for next Christmas” and confidence is low that the PS4 will be right there on store shelves next to it.

The “on-and-off troubles of the PlayStation 3″ Totilo is referring to is the anchor that’s weighed the console down since launch: tougher development due to the Cell processor and less available RAM – 256MB vs. 512MB in the Xbox 360.

In the months before the PS3′s launch in 2006, Sony said the console would be the most powerful console ever created, and here we are six years later and multi-platform games on the console consistently end up being buggier and uglier than on the Xbox 360 in many cases. Cases in point: Skyrim, Mass Effect 3 and Call of Duty: Black Ops II.

Sony’s in a rut right now. It has the chops to build beautiful and powerful hardware that’s a developer’s dream (ex: PS Vita), but at the same time, it’s always launching after the competition nowadays.

If Sony’s learned any lessons in the last half a decade, it better apply them to the PS4. The console needs to offer next-level processing and graphics. It needs to be backward-compatible with PS3 games and play Blu-ray discs. It should be small and quiet. It should have a strong online platform, support a greater array of apps and most importantly be easy for developers to program for.

Game exclusives will always be important, but now that games are million-dollar productions, multi-platform will be where developers hope to reap back their costs.

With Microsoft said to be preparing an “Xbox 720″ and an “Xbox Lite,” Sony can’t make the mistake of launching late or pricing the console too high. A launch in spring of 2014 would mean Sony will miss Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the two biggest shopping days of the year that bring in massive sales.  Ceding sales and market share to Microsoft and Nintendo by launching late would be disastrous.

The PS3 screwed up too many times. At this point, the PS4 needs to be perfect out of the door.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Matt Damon fracking film in Berlin festival lineup

BERLIN (Reuters) – The Berlin film festival on Thursday announced the first movies of its 2013 lineup, and among the main competition entries will be U.S. director Gus Van Sant‘s drama starring Matt Damon and centering around the controversial shale gas industry.

“Promised Land” will have its international premiere at the annual cinema showcase, although it is scheduled to be launched first in the United States.

According to online reports, “The Bourne Identity” star Damon was originally down to direct the movie tackling the practice of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking” for shale gas, which has raised concerns over its environmental impact.

The film reunites the actor and film maker after Van Sant directed Damon in the acclaimed 1997 drama “Good Will Hunting”.

Damon was nominated for a best actor Academy Award for his performance and won a screenplay Oscar along with co-writer Ben Affleck for a movie that helped launch their Hollywood careers.

Also in the main competition in Berlin is “Gloria”, directed by Chilean film maker Sebastian Lelio, Korean entry “Nobody’s Daughter Haewon” directed by Hong Sangsoo and Romanian picture “Child’s Pose” by Calin Peter Netzer.

There will be a world premiere for “Paradise: Hope”, the final installment of Austrian director Ulrich Seidl’s Paradise trilogy, while out of competition in Berlin is 3D animation film “The Croods”, featuring the voice of Nicolas Cage.

And under the Berlinale Special heading comes documentary “Redemption Impossible”.

The 63rd Berlin film festival runs from February 7-17.

(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)

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