Medical board appeals to public to combat prescription overdoses

In an appeal for the public's help in stemming the epidemic of prescription drug deaths, the Medical Board of California is asking people whose relatives died of overdoses to contact the board if they believe excessive prescribing or other physician misconduct contributed to the deaths.

Linda K. Whitney, the board's executive director, urged those with information about improper treatment to contact the board without delay. By law, the agency has seven years from the time of the alleged misconduct to take disciplinary action against a physician.

"The sooner we get the information, the sooner we can move forward," she said in an interview.

Whitney also said board investigators would review autopsies and other records on specific overdose deaths described in recent articles in the Los Angeles Times.

She said the board, which licenses and oversees California physicians, was acting in response to reports in The Times that documented the connection between doctors' prescribing practices and fatal overdoses involving OxyContin, Vicodin and other narcotic painkillers.

Whitney said members of the public can report concerns about excessive prescribing by calling 1-800-633-2322 or filling out and mailing a complaint form, which can be downloaded from the agency's website, http://www.mbc.ca.gov.

A revolution in treatment of chronic pain has caused a huge increase in prescriptions for pain and anxiety medications. There has been an accompanying sharp rise in prescription drug deaths over the last decade.

In response, authorities have focused on how addicts and drug dealers obtain such drugs illegally, such as by stealing from pharmacies or relatives' medicine cabinets. The Times articles reported that many fatal overdoses stem from drugs prescribed for the deceased by a doctor.

In nearly half of the prescription drug deaths in four Southern California counties from 2006 through 2011, medications prescribed by doctors caused or contributed to the death, according to an analysis of coroners' records.

Seventy-one doctors, a tiny fraction of all practicing physicians in the four counties, were associated with a disproportionate number of deaths, The Times found.

Sixteen patients of a Huntington Beach pain specialist died of overdoses from 2006 through 2011 after taking medications he prescribed. A San Diego County doctor lost 15 patients to overdoses, a Westminster physician 14, coroners' records show.

All three doctors have clean records with the medical board, and there is no evidence that board officials knew about the deaths.

That medical regulators could be unaware of clusters of fatal overdoses underscores gaps in the state's system of physician oversight.

Drugs fatalities are documented in great detail in county coroners' files, which in many cases list medications found at the scene of death, along with the name of the prescribing doctor. But medical board investigators do not review those files to look for patterns of reckless prescribing or other inappropriate treatment.

Whitney said the board would like to receive reports from county coroners on all prescription overdose deaths. State Sen. Curren Price, (D-Los Angeles), responding to the Times coverage, has promised to introduce a bill that would require such reports.

A fatal overdose does not necessarily mean a doctor did anything wrong, Whitney said. Board investigators must review patient records to determine whether physician misconduct contributed to a death, she said.

Public participation will aid such investigations, she said, because investigators can gain access to a physician's patient files more readily if a family member has granted consent.

In addition, family members may be able to contribute information about overdose deaths that is not in coroners' files. Tips from relatives could also be valuable in calling attention to previously overlooked cases, Whitney said.

Julianne D'Angelo Fellmeth, a public interest lawyer who has monitored the medical board for the state Legislature, called Whitney's announcement a "good first step," adding: "They need this information."

But Fellmeth said the board may be hindered in its investigative efforts by the effects of years of budget cuts.

The agency has fewer investigators than it did in 2001 and investigates about 40% fewer misconduct cases per year, according to board data. Over the same period, the number of licensed physicians in California has risen to more than 102,000.

"They should be actively seeking to restore the number of investigators' positions that they had before and increase those to keep up with the increase in the physician population," Fellmeth said. "It's not acceptable to have the ranks of medical investigators decrease in the face of this kind of misconduct and abuse."

From the time the board receives a complaint, it takes nearly a year on average for an investigation to be completed. In some cases, doctors under investigation for excessive prescribing have lost several patients to drug overdoses by the time the board took disciplinary action.

scott.glover@latimes.com

lisa.girion@latimes.com

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FBI removes many redactions in Marilyn Monroe file

LOS ANGELES (AP) — FBI files on Marilyn Monroe that could not be located earlier this year have been found and re-issued, revealing the names of some of the movie star's communist-leaning friends who drew concern from government officials and her own entourage.

But the records, which previously had been heavily redacted, do not contain any new information about Monroe's death 50 years ago. Letters and news clippings included in the files show the bureau was aware of theories the actress had been killed, but they do not show that any effort was undertaken to investigate the claims. Los Angeles authorities concluded Monroe's death was a probable suicide.

Recently obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act, the updated FBI files do show the extent the agency was monitoring Monroe for ties to communism in the years before her death in August 1962.

The records reveal that some in Monroe's inner circle were concerned about her association with Frederick Vanderbilt Field, who was disinherited from his wealthy family over his leftist views.

A trip to Mexico earlier that year to shop for furniture brought Monroe in contact with Field, who was living in the country with his wife in self-imposed exile. Informants reported to the FBI that a "mutual infatuation" had developed between Field and Monroe, which caused concern among some in her inner circle, including her therapist, the files state.

"This situation caused considerable dismay among Miss Monroe's entourage and also among the (American Communist Group in Mexico)," the file states. It includes references to an interior decorator who worked with Monroe's analyst reporting her connection to Field to the doctor.

Field's autobiography devotes an entire chapter to Monroe's Mexico trip, "An Indian Summer Interlude." He mentions that he and his wife accompanied Monroe on shopping trips and meals and he only mentions politics once in a passage on their dinnertime conversations.

"She talked mostly about herself and some of the people who had been or still were important to her," Field wrote in "From Right to Left." ''She told us about her strong feelings for civil rights, for black equality, as well as her admiration for what was being done in China, her anger at red-baiting and McCarthyism and her hatred of (FBI director) J. Edgar Hoover."

Under Hoover's watch, the FBI kept tabs on the political and social lives of many celebrities, including Frank Sinatra, Charlie Chaplin and Monroe's ex-husband Arthur Miller. The bureau has also been involved in numerous investigations about crimes against celebrities, including threats against Elizabeth Taylor, an extortion case involving Clark Gable and more recently, trying to solve who killed rapper Notorious B.I.G.

The AP had sought the removal of redactions from Monroe's FBI files earlier this year as part of a series of stories on the 50th anniversary of Monroe's death. The FBI had reported that it had transferred the files to a National Archives facility in Maryland, but archivists said the documents had not been received. A few months after requesting details on the transfer, the FBI released an updated version of the files that eliminate dozens of redactions.

For years, the files have intrigued investigators, biographers and those who don't believe Monroe's death at her Los Angeles area home was a suicide.

A 1982 investigation by the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office found no evidence of foul play after reviewing all available investigative records, but noted that the FBI files were "heavily censored."

That characterization intrigued the man who performed Monroe's autopsy, Dr. Thomas Noguchi. While the DA investigation concluded he conducted a thorough autopsy, Noguchi has conceded that no one will likely ever know all the details of Monroe's death. The FBI files and confidential interviews conducted with the actress' friends that have never been made public might help, he wrote in his 1983 memoir "Coroner."

"On the basis of my own involvement in the case, beginning with the autopsy, I would call Monroe's suicide 'very probable,'" Noguchi wrote. "But I also believe that until the complete FBI files are made public and the notes and interviews of the suicide panel released, controversy will continue to swirl around her death."

Monroe's file begins in 1955 and mostly focuses on her travels and associations, searching for signs of leftist views and possible ties to communism. One entry, which previously had been almost completely redacted, concerned intelligence that Monroe and other entertainers sought visas to visit Russia that year.

The file continues up until the months before her death, and also includes several news stories and references to Norman Mailer's biography of the actress, which focused on questions about whether Monroe was killed by the government.

For all the focus on Monroe's closeness to suspected communists, the bureau never found any proof she was a member of the party.

"Subject's views are very positively and concisely leftist; however, if she is being actively used by the Communist Party, it is not general knowledge among those working with the movement in Los Angeles," a July 1962 entry in Monroe's file states.

___

Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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Chinese tea farmers are switching to coffee

PU'ER, China — This remote southwestern city near the borders of Laos and Myanmar is named after one of China's most famous teas, grown on mountain terraces painstakingly carved out of the region's rich red soil.

But in recent years, pu'er tea has surrendered prime real estate for a more lucrative brew: coffee. Chinese farmers have taken to the new crop, which thrives in high-altitude areas of Yunnan province and commands up to three times as much money as tea.

"My sole income depends on coffee now," said Ma Jiaying, a farmer from a dab-sized hamlet in Pu'er called Tea Tree Village.

Behind the change are major foreign producers, including Seattle's Starbucks Corp. and Switzerland's Nestle. Those multinationals are training farmers and buying beans from the region to meet the world's growing thirst for coffee.

More important, Yunnan has the potential to thrive as a production base in a country that is becoming increasingly hooked on the caffeine-loaded beverage. Long dismissed by many Chinese as being too bitter, coffee has enjoyed a surge in popularity among the country's young, urban elite.

Few pairings denote upward mobility more than an iPhone in one hand and a white-and-green Starbucks cup in the other. In central Beijing, the company's smallest cappuccino costs about $4.33, making a Chinese Starbucks habit one of the most expensive in the world.

"Starbucks in China for the young generation is almost like religion," said Liu Minghui, head of Pu'er-based Ai Ni Coffee, China's largest coffee production and exporting company. "They want to be seen drinking their coffee. A lot of these Chinese kids have come back from studying overseas where they've been introduced to this new lifestyle."

At 120,000 tons last year, China's coffee consumption was only 6% that of the U.S., the world's top consumer of hot joe. Meanwhile, about 1 million tons of tea was consumed in China last year.

Still, analysts for Barclays expect Chinese coffee demand to grow nearly 40% each year until about 2015.

More stores and shops are stocking instant coffee. Nestle's Nescafe brand has captured more than two-thirds of the Chinese market, thanks in part to blends mixed with powdered milk and sugar to make it more appealing to local palates.

Coffeehouses are percolating too; sales are projected to expand 23.5% annually on average to about $1.6 billion by 2016, according to Euromonitor, a global research group. Much of that growth is expected to come from Starbucks, which plans to more than double its Chinese stores to 1,500 by 2015. That would make China its second-biggest market, following the U.S.

"This is a long-term commitment," said John Culver, president of Starbucks Coffee China and Asia Pacific.

Part of that effort will be raising the profile of Yunnan coffee. Starbucks released a special blend in 2009 for Chinese consumers called South of the Clouds, which includes beans from Baoshan, a city northeast of Pu'er in Yunnan. A year later, the company partnered with Ai Ni Coffee to grow and test four coffee varietals on a plantation in Pu'er. Those beans could reach domestic and global markets in a few years.

Yunnan, considered one of the most bio-diverse regions in the world, is responsible for almost all of the roughly 60,000 tons of coffee grown in China. The provincial government has plans to increase coffee production to 200,000 tons by 2020.

But growers will have to invest heavily to guarantee consistent quality, experts said.

"It's still very messy," said Safi Malik, co-founder of Shangrila Farms, a boutique coffee brand that carries beans from Yunnan. "A lot of farmers don't have training. There's great coffee there, it just needs to be found and worked on."

A big test is whether Chinese farmers will remain committed to the crop through price fluctuations. This year, growers are being offered about $1.20 a pound, half of what they earned two years ago.

"The best I can do this year is break even," said Ma Xinwen, 40, who grows five acres of coffee on a hillside in Tea Tree Village about 4,000 feet above sea level.

Neighbor Ma Jiaying also worries about the lower prices, but he's confident they will bounce back.

The 48-year-old father of two has grown coffee beans for nine years, primarily for Nestle. Every Monday and Tuesday, the company sends Ma and other farmers a text message alerting them of prices. They are free to decide whether to sell their beans.

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Fiscal standoff leaves U.S. payrolls in doubt

WASHINGTON — If the nation goes over the "fiscal cliff," some Americans will wake up Tuesday with financial headaches to rival a New Year's Eve hangover.

More than 2 million long-term jobless would receive their final unemployment benefit check within days. Millions of taxpayers would be unable to file their returns early, resulting in delayed refunds. Taxes would rise immediately on workers across the board. And although some of those increases may eventually be reversed, the first paychecks of the year would be smaller until any legislative fixes kick in.

Even if the crisis is resolved quickly after the new year as pressure mounts on President Obama and lawmakers, it poses a short-term administrative nightmare for businesses. And it would be a financial blow to millions of people struggling to make ends meet in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

"As a working-class person, I would miss any money taken out of my paycheck," said Stephanie Smith, an office administrator in Sacramento. "I just feel that we're already paying high taxes, and it feels like we're still in a recession. Everybody wants to take money out of our paychecks, but nobody wants to put more in."

As the White House and Congress try to avoid the large tax increases and federal spending cuts coming next week, taxpayers, businesses and even the Internal Revenue Service are scrambling to figure out the effects if an agreement is not reached.

The fiscal pain could be averted by a last-minute deal. And even if there is none by Tuesday, Washington policymakers could retroactively reduce tax rates if they ultimately make a deal. But the uncertainty and short-term loss of income could damage an already fragile economy.

Some effects:

Income taxes: Rates would rise on everyone as the George W. Bush-era tax cuts expire. Middle-income households would get hit hard, paying about $1,500 more a year in taxes.

Payroll taxes: Rates would increase by 2 percentage points with the lapse of a temporary, two-year tax cut designed to boost the economy. Workers making $50,000 annually would take home about $40 less every two weeks.

Long-term unemployment benefits: Checks would abruptly end for people receiving extra federal aid — as much as 47 additional weeks of benefits in states such as California. State benefits of up to 26 weeks would still be available, but workers would be out of luck once those run out.

Alternative minimum tax: The number of people facing the provision would skyrocket to about 33 million next year from 4 million this year. The tax, enacted in 1969, was designed to make sure the very wealthy paid some income tax. But it was not indexed to inflation and needs to be fixed each year to avoid ensnaring middle-income households.

Although Congress at some point is expected to spare most of those people from that tax, delays in doing so mean that as many as 100 million people might not be able to file their returns until the end of March or later, according to the IRS. Delays would come as the IRS has to reprogram its system, as well as for taxpayers who would have to do special calculations to determine whether they owe money because of the tax.

Business already are struggling to adjust. They've got to figure out how much in federal taxes to withhold from employee paychecks starting next week. But as of Thursday, the IRS still had not told employers what the 2013 withholding levels would be.

That limbo is particularly vexing for small firms as Golden State Magnetic & Penetrant. The Los Angeles company inspects, cleans and paints aircraft and aerospace components. The firm's president, Joanne Weinoe, does the payroll for herself and her 12 employees. At present, she doesn't know what the withholding should be for the next set of checks she cuts.

"I'm going to tear my hair out of my head and shoot myself," Weinoe joked, adding she'll wait until the morning of Jan. 4, her next payday, before she makes any changes.

"If I have to adjust them, it'll be additional work for me," she said. "Every time they change something, it becomes more work for employers."

The IRS said it continued "to closely monitor the situation" and would "issue guidance by the end of the year."

Workers might not see the new income tax rates immediately reflected in their paychecks. The American Payroll Assn. is advising its members to continue to use 2012 withholding tables until they hear differently from the IRS.

The payroll service Payality Inc., with headquarters in Fresno County, is urging its 700 clients with 25,000 employees throughout the state to hold off on issuing paychecks and making direct deposits for January as long as they can in hopes that lawmakers and the Obama administration will strike a deal.

"We should have some direction by Dec. 31," company President Chet Reilly said. "Then we'll have to scramble as fast as we can."

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So You Just Got a Wii U. Now What?

Pair It With Your TV

One of the most useful features of the Wii U — and what could make it a staple of our connected living rooms — is its ability to hook in to the entertainment ecosystem seamlessly. When you start up your Wii U for the first time, you’ll be prompted to enter your television and cable box brands. In a surprisingly painless process (you only need the brand name of your TV, not the model number), your Wii U GamePad becomes a very useful remote control. It will be the only thing you have to touch when turning your system and television on in the future. When the Wii U’s television and video on demand aggregation dashboard comes fully online, that remote will be even more useful as you use it select shows on your DVR, video-on-demand services like Netflix, or live TV.

Click here to view this gallery.

[More from Mashable: 10 iPad Cases With Convenient Hand Grips]

Since the holiday gift-giving period is over, many of you might be fortunate enough to have received a brand new Wii U.

Nintendo’s latest console is quite different from other gaming consoles, and there are lots of great ways for you to take advantage of it. There are already a wide variety of games coming out for the Wii U, so you have a plethora of entertainment options as soon as you take it out of the box.

[More from Mashable: 8 Startups to Watch in 2013]

We’ve compiled a list of tips for first-time Wii U owners that should make your setup and first few days much easier. We’ve included a few games to try, as well.

Are you setting up a Wii U for the first time? Share any of your thoughts and tips in the comments.

Thumbnail image courtesy nubobo, Flickr.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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FBI removes many redactions in Marilyn Monroe file

LOS ANGELES (AP) — FBI files on Marilyn Monroe that could not be located earlier this year have been found and re-issued, revealing the names of some of the movie star's acquaintances who drew concern from government officials and her own entourage.

The files had previously been heavily redacted, but more details are now public in a version of the file recently obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act. The updated files reveal that some in Monroe's inner circle were concerned about her association with Frederick Vanderbilt Field, who was disinherited from his wealthy family over his leftist views.

The FBI's files on Monroe show the extent the agency was monitoring the actress for ties to communism in the years before her death in August 1962. A trip to Mexico earlier that year to shop for furniture brought her in contact with Field, who was living in the country with his wife in self-imposed exile. Informants reported to the FBI that a "mutual infatuation" had developed between Field and Monroe, which caused concern among some in her inner circle, including her therapist, the files state.

"This situation caused considerable dismay among Miss Monroe's entourage and also among the (American Communist Group in Mexico)," the file states. It includes references to an interior decorator who worked with Monroe's analyst reporting her connection to Field to the doctor.

Field's autobiography devotes an entire chapter to Monroe's Mexico trip, "An Indian Summer Interlude." He mentions that he and his wife accompanied Monroe on shopping trips and meals and he only mentions politics once in a passage on their dinnertime conversations.

"She talked mostly about herself and some of the people who had been or still were important to her," Field wrote in "From Right to Left." ''She told us about her strong feelings for civil rights, for black equality, as well as her admiration for what was being done in China, her anger at red-baiting and McCarthyism and her hatred of (FBI director) J. Edgar Hoover."

Under Hoover's watch, the FBI kept tabs on the political and social lives of many celebrities, including Frank Sinatra, Charlie Chaplin and Monroe's ex-husband Arthur Miller. The bureau has also been involved in numerous investigations about crimes against celebrities, including threats against Elizabeth Taylor, an extortion case involving Clark Gable and more recently, trying to solve who killed rapper Notorious B.I.G.

The AP had sought the removal of redactions from Monroe's FBI files earlier this year as part of a series of stories on the 50th anniversary of Monroe's death. The FBI had reported that it had transferred the files to a National Archives facility in Maryland, but archivists said the documents had not been received. A few months after requesting details on the transfer, the FBI released an updated version of the files that eliminate dozens of redactions.

For years, the files have intrigued investigators, biographers and those who don't believe Monroe's death at her Los Angeles area home was a suicide.

A 1982 investigation by the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office found no evidence of foul play after reviewing all available investigative records, but noted that the FBI files were "heavily censored."

That characterization intrigued the man who performed Monroe's autopsy, Dr. Thomas Noguchi. While the DA investigation concluded he conducted a thorough autopsy, Noguchi has conceded that no one will likely ever know all the details of Monroe's death. The FBI files and confidential interviews conducted with the actress' friends that have never been made public might help, he wrote in his 1983 memoir "Coroner."

"On the basis of my own involvement in the case, beginning with the autopsy, I would call Monroe's suicide 'very probable,'" Noguchi wrote. "But I also believe that until the complete FBI files are made public and the notes and interviews of the suicide panel released, controversy will continue to swirl around her death."

Monroe's file begins in 1955 and mostly focuses on her travels and associations, searching for signs of leftist views and possible ties to communism. One entry, which previously had been almost completely redacted, concerned intelligence that Monroe and other entertainers sought visas to visit Russia that year.

The file continues up until the months before her death, and also includes several news stories and references to Norman Mailer's biography of the actress, which focused on questions about whether Monroe was killed by the government.

For all the focus on Monroe's closeness to suspected communists, the bureau never found any proof she was a member of the party.

"Subject's views are very positively and concisely leftist; however, if she is being actively used by the Communist Party, it is not general knowledge among those working with the movement in Los Angeles," a July 1962 entry in Monroe's file states.

___

Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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The New Old Age Blog: United States Lags in Alzheimer's Support

This month, the United States Senate Special Committee on Aging released a report examining how five nations — the United States, Australia, France, Japan and Britain — are responding to growing numbers of older adults with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.

Every country has a strategy, but some are much further ahead than others. Notably, France began addressing Alzheimer’s disease and dementia in 2001 and is in the midst of carrying out its third national plan. (Scroll down at this link to find the English version of the 2008-2012 French plan.)

By contrast, the United States released its first national plan to address Alzheimer’s in May.

The Senate report highlights several trends under way in all five countries, including efforts to coordinate research more effectively, diagnose Alzheimer’s disease more reliably and improve training in dementia care by medical practitioners.

Most relevant to readers of this blog is another trend with increasing international scope: an accelerating effort to keep patients with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia at home and arrange for care and treatment there, rather than in institutions.

Anyone who’s followed reader response to Jane Brody’s column this week on aging in place knows the burden that this can place on families, especially if government support for home-based services (companions or home health aides who help with bathing, dressing, toileting and other tasks), adult day care or respite care is scarce or nonexistent, as is the case for most middle-class families in the United States.

Is care at home for patients with Alzheimer’s necessarily more humane? Only if caregivers have the resources — financial, physical and emotional — to handle this draining, exhausting, immeasurably difficult job. And only if the institutions that serve people with more advanced forms of Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia are so poorly financed, staffed and operated that we wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving loved ones in their care.

Three charts in the new Senate report underscore the extent to which the United States differs from other countries in what is expected of family caregivers. The first, on Page 60, shows countries’ support for paid long-term care services for residents age 65 and older. This includes all residents who need long-term care, including those with Alzheimer’s disease, other forms of dementia and other disabling chronic illnesses. Not included are services provided by unpaid family caregivers.

Look at where the United States ranks compared with Australia, Japan, France and the 30 other developed countries that belong to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Paid support for long-term care is much less in our country than in theirs.

The second chart, on Page 64, gives a sense of how much paid support for long-term care is provided in people’s homes. Again, the data is not specific to Alzheimer’s disease or dementia, although these are primary reasons older adults need long-term care.

And again, the United States falls short in terms of the amount of paid care it provides in home settings, even though older people tend to prefer these settings over institutions.

The third chart, on Page 75, brings results in the other two down to the level of families. When paid long-term care support is scarce or unavailable, you would expect a heavier load to fall on unpaid caregivers, and this is what the chart shows. Look at the number of caregivers in the United States who put in 10 to 19 hours a week (34.2 percent) or 20 hours or more a week (30.5 percent), and compare those with similar figures for France, Australia and Britain, all of which provide more paid long-term care than we do. Where are informal caregivers working the hardest? Right here at home in the United States.

For me, the take-away is clear. Other countries with which the United States is closely aligned have embraced long-term care as an essential social responsibility while we have not. Unless and until we do so, caregivers here will be among the most harried, stressed and burdened among wealthy, developed countries in the world.

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Fiscal standoff leaves U.S. payrolls in doubt

WASHINGTON — If the nation goes over the "fiscal cliff," some Americans will wake up Tuesday with financial headaches to rival a New Year's Eve hangover.

More than 2 million long-term jobless would receive their final unemployment benefit check within days. Millions of taxpayers would be unable to file their returns early, resulting in delayed refunds. Taxes would rise immediately on workers across the board. And although some of those increases may eventually be reversed, the first paychecks of the year would be smaller until any legislative fixes kick in.

Even if the crisis is resolved quickly after the new year as pressure mounts on President Obama and lawmakers, it poses a short-term administrative nightmare for businesses. And it would be a financial blow to millions of people struggling to make ends meet in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

"As a working-class person, I would miss any money taken out of my paycheck," said Stephanie Smith, an office administrator in Sacramento. "I just feel that we're already paying high taxes, and it feels like we're still in a recession. Everybody wants to take money out of our paychecks, but nobody wants to put more in."

As the White House and Congress try to avoid the large tax increases and federal spending cuts coming next week, taxpayers, businesses and even the Internal Revenue Service are scrambling to figure out the effects if an agreement is not reached.

The fiscal pain could be averted by a last-minute deal. And even if there is none by Tuesday, Washington policymakers could retroactively reduce tax rates if they ultimately make a deal. But the uncertainty and short-term loss of income could damage an already fragile economy.

Some effects:

Income taxes: Rates would rise on everyone as the George W. Bush-era tax cuts expire. Middle-income households would get hit hard, paying about $1,500 more a year in taxes.

Payroll taxes: Rates would increase by 2 percentage points with the lapse of a temporary, two-year tax cut designed to boost the economy. Workers making $50,000 annually would take home about $40 less every two weeks.

Long-term unemployment benefits: Checks would abruptly end for people receiving extra federal aid — as much as 47 additional weeks of benefits in states such as California. State benefits of up to 26 weeks would still be available, but workers would be out of luck once those run out.

Alternative minimum tax: The number of people facing the provision would skyrocket to about 33 million next year from 4 million this year. The tax, enacted in 1969, was designed to make sure the very wealthy paid some income tax. But it was not indexed to inflation and needs to be fixed each year to avoid ensnaring middle-income households.

Although Congress at some point is expected to spare most of those people from that tax, delays in doing so mean that as many as 100 million people might not be able to file their returns until the end of March or later, according to the IRS. Delays would come as the IRS has to reprogram its system, as well as for taxpayers who would have to do special calculations to determine whether they owe money because of the tax.

Business already are struggling to adjust. They've got to figure out how much in federal taxes to withhold from employee paychecks starting next week. But as of Thursday, the IRS still had not told employers what the 2013 withholding levels would be.

That limbo is particularly vexing for small firms as Golden State Magnetic & Penetrant. The Los Angeles company inspects, cleans and paints aircraft and aerospace components. The firm's president, Joanne Weinoe, does the payroll for herself and her 12 employees. At present, she doesn't know what the withholding should be for the next set of checks she cuts.

"I'm going to tear my hair out of my head and shoot myself," Weinoe joked, adding she'll wait until the morning of Jan. 4, her next payday, before she makes any changes.

"If I have to adjust them, it'll be additional work for me," she said. "Every time they change something, it becomes more work for employers."

The IRS said it continued "to closely monitor the situation" and would "issue guidance by the end of the year."

Workers might not see the new income tax rates immediately reflected in their paychecks. The American Payroll Assn. is advising its members to continue to use 2012 withholding tables until they hear differently from the IRS.

The payroll service Payality Inc., with headquarters in Fresno County, is urging its 700 clients with 25,000 employees throughout the state to hold off on issuing paychecks and making direct deposits for January as long as they can in hopes that lawmakers and the Obama administration will strike a deal.

"We should have some direction by Dec. 31," company President Chet Reilly said. "Then we'll have to scramble as fast as we can."

Read More..

A risky return to the U.S.

The barrilero never stops moving.

All day he wheels cardboard barrels stuffed with used clothing through the narrow aisles of the warehouse. He dumps the apparel atop tables for sorters, who separate nylons from cottons, satins from silks, denims from plaids. If a sorter is standing around with no garments, it's the barrilero's fault. Supervisors hover nearby.

Tons of old clothing come in every week, and tons go back out, to India and Pakistan, where it's sold at outdoor markets.

The factory hired the barrilero in September, a few weeks after the now-21-year-old showed up at the manager's door looking for work. Right away, the manager had recognized him as Anthony, that cute kid who walked his factory floor selling Helen Grace chocolates to workers years ago.

Anthony didn't say much about where he'd been, or what he'd been doing since. He was polite, upbeat, and his knock on the door still had the soft touch of a child. But his hair was falling out, and there was something unfamiliar in his eyes.

"He seemed sadder," the manager said, "like he wanted to say something but didn't know how."

There were many things the barrilero would keep to himself. First among them: His name wasn't Anthony.

::

Luis Luna returned to his hometown of South Gate in May. His arms and legs were scraped raw from cactus needles and his eyes kept blinking, still starved of moisture from his eight-day journey through the Arizona desert the week before.

His friend, Julio Cortez, said it was hard to believe that this gaunt young man with patches of missing hair was the same person he knew at Southeast Middle School.

"I was in shock to see him back and see all he had gone through," Cortez said. "It made me sad and angry."

Cortez, a 22-year-old Cal State Long Beach student, took Luis to buy some clothes. Another former classmate gave Luis a cellphone. Luis slept on couches and in spare bedrooms and spent his days passing out resumes filled with the jobs of his teen years: flipping burgers, waiting tables at I-Hop. He fudged the dates to account for the 15 months he spent in Mexico after he was deported for being in the country illegally.

Luis had been pulled over three years ago for a broken headlight in Pasco, Wash., where he and his mother lived. He was cited for driving without a license, jailed and ordered out of the country in February 2011.

He had a wife back in Washington, but she had left him, in part because of the long separation. Luis decided to build a new life in Southern California, where he had grown up and where he still had friends

Weeks after arriving, he was still jobless and borrowing money to eat when he decided his future might lie in his past. He started retracing the route he took as a boy selling chocolates at warehouses and factories. The assembly line workers, truck drivers and managers knew him as Anthony, the name his mother told him to use to hide his identity.

They could vouch for his strong work ethic — that he'd been working for a living since he was 5 years old.

He eventually found the barrilero job, and a place to live. A swap meet vendor who picked through the bins of cast-offs looking for vintage garments told Luis he had extra space at his house.

Luis goes home to a converted two-car garage with no address in a middle-class neighborhood with trim lawns and streets lined with late-model cars. Much of his clothing is stuffed in a battered dark green suitcase that sits at the foot of his bed. The only other furniture is a mini refrigerator and two lawn chairs.

In some ways, he's a typical youngster with edgy tastes. He has a sleeve tattoo, wears skinny jeans and earrings, and is part of a deejay crew that plays at house parties. He cheers his beloved Los Angeles Lakers and hangs out in hookah bars, and is constantly texting flirty messages.

But his future is dimmer than most. Many of his friends are planning for life after college. Some are applying for work permits and temporary reprieves from deportation, taking advantage of an Obama administration program, announced in June, to help young people who were brought into the country as children.

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Temple Run was downloaded more than 2.5 million times on Christmas Day

Title Post: Temple Run was downloaded more than 2.5 million times on Christmas Day
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DC police investigating 'Meet the Press' incident

WASHINGTON (AP) — District of Columbia police say they are investigating an incident in which NBC News reporter David Gregory displayed what he described as a high-capacity ammunition magazine on "Meet the Press."

Police spokesman Tisha Gant said Wednesday the department is investigating whether Gregory may have violated D.C. firearms laws that ban the possession of high-capacity magazines. She declined to comment further.

While interviewing National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre on Sunday's program, Gregory held an object, apparently as a prop to make a point, and said it was a magazine that could hold 30 rounds.

High-capacity ammunition magazines are banned in the District of Columbia, regardless of whether they're attached to a firearm. "Meet the Press" is generally taped in Washington.

An email seeking comment from NBC was not immediately returned.

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Creating the Ultimate Housework Workout

Robert Wright for The New York Times

Chris Ely, an English butler, and Carol Johnson, a fitness instructor at Crunch NYC, perfecting a houseworkout.

CAN housework help you live longer? A New York Times blog post by Gretchen Reynolds last month cited research linking vigorous activity, including housework, and longevity. The study, which tracked the death rates of British civil servants, was the latest in a flurry of scientific reports crediting domestic chores with health benefits like a lowered risk for breast and colon cancers. In one piquant study published in 2009, researchers found that couples who spent more hours on housework had sex more frequently (with each other) though presumably not while vacuuming. (The report did not specify.)

Intrigued by science that merged the efforts of a Martha with the results of an Arnold (a buffer buffer?), this reporter challenged a household expert and a fitness authority to create the ultimate housework workout — a houseworkout — in her East Village apartment. Perhaps she could add a few years to her own life while learning some fancy new moves for her Swiffer. Christopher Ely, once a footman at Buckingham Palace, and Brooke Astor’s longtime butler, was appointed cleaner-in-chief. Mr. Ely is a man who approaches what the professionals call household management with the range and depth of an Oxford don. Although he is working on his memoirs (he described his book as a room-by-room primer with anecdotes from his years in service), he was happy enough to put his writing aside for an afternoon. His collaborator was Carol Johnson, a dancer and fitness instructor who develops classes at Crunch NYC, including those based on Broadway musicals like “Legally Blonde” and “Rock of Ages.”

Mr. Ely arrived first, beautifully dressed in dark gray wool pants, a black suit coat and a crisp white shirt with silver cuff links. He cleans house in a white shirt? “I know how to clean it,” he countered, meaning the shirt. When Ms. Johnson appeared (in black spandex and a ruffly white chiffon blouse, which she switched out for a Crunch T-shirt), theory, method and materials were discussed.

“If you’re dreading the laundry,” Ms. Johnson said, “why not create a space where it’s actually fun to do by putting on some music?” If fitness is defined by cardio health, she added, it will be a challenge to create housework that leaves you slightly out of breath. “I’m thinking interval training,” she said. As it happens, one trend in exercise has been workouts that are inspired by real-world chores, or what Rob Morea, a high-end Manhattan trainer, described the other day as “mimicking hard labor activities.” In his NoHo studio, Mr. Morea has clients simulate the actions of construction workers hefting cement bags over their shoulders (Mr. Morea uses sand bags) or pushing a wheelbarrow or chopping wood.

Mr. Ely averred that service — extreme housekeeping — is physically demanding, with sore feet and bad knees the least of its debilitating byproducts. Mr. Ely still suffers from an injury he incurred while carrying a poodle to its mistress over icy front steps in Washington When the inevitable occurred, and Mr. Ely wiped out, he threw the dog to his employer before falling hard on his backside. And the right equipment matters: After two weeks’ employ in an Upper East Side penthouse, he was handed a pair of Reeboks by his new boss, the better to withstand the apartment’s wall-to-wall granite floors. (For cleaning, Mr. Ely wears slippers, deck shoes or socks.)

Mr. Ely, whose talents and expertise are wide-ranging (he can stock a wine cellar, do the flowers, set a silver service, iron like a maestro and clean gutters, as he did once or twice at Holly Hill, Mrs. Astor’s Westchester estate), is a minimalist when it comes to materials. He favors any simple dish detergent as a multipurpose cleaner, along with a little vinegar, for glass, and not much else. “Dish detergent is designed for cutting grease; there’s nothing better,” he said. He’s anti-ammonia, anti-bleach. He said bleach destroys fabric, particularly anything with elastic in it. “Knickers and bleach are a terrible combination,” he said. “I had a boss who thought he had skin cancer. His entire trunk had turned red and itchy.” It seems his underpants were being washed in bleach. (Collective wince.) “It’s horrible stuff.”

As for tools, he likes a cobweb cleaner — this reporter had bought Oxo’s extendable duster, which has a fluffy orange cotton duster that snaps onto a sort of wand, but Mr. Ely prefers the kind that looks like a round chimney brush. (If you live in a house, he also suggests leaving the cobwebs by the front and back doors, so the spiders can eat any mosquitoes coming or going.) Choose a mop with microfiber fronds (he suggested the O Cedar brand) because it dries quickly and doesn’t smell. And a sturdy vacuum. Also, stacks of microfiber cloths or a terry cloth towel ripped up.

But first, to stretch. Ms. Johnson took hold of this reporter’s Bona floor mop (it’s like a Swiffer, but with a reusable washcloth) and Mr. Ely followed along with an old-fashioned string mop. Though Mr. Ely has a kind of loose-limbed elegance, he is not exactly limber. He grimaced as he parroted Ms. Johnson, who used her mop as Gene Kelly did his umbrella, stretching her arms overhead, one by one, twisting from side to side, sucking in her stomach, rising up on tip toes. (Mr. Ely said his old poodle-hurling injury was kicking in.) Ms. Johnson adjusted his chin — “You’re going to hurt yourself if you keep sticking your neck out,” she warned — and Mr. Ely raised a black-socked foot napped with cat hair and chastised this reporter: “Would you look at that?” (The cat had vanished early on, but his “debris,” as Mr. Ely put it, was still very much in evidence. The reporter hung her head. Did she know that cat spit is toxic? Mr. Ely wondered.)

“We’re warming up the spine,” said Ms. Johnson. “Squeeze your abdominals.”

Mr. Ely looked worried: “I don’t think I have abdominals!”

MR. ELY’S technique is to clean a room from top to bottom. That means he begins with the cobweb cleaner, wafting it along ceiling corners, moldings, soffits and, uh, the top of the fridge (major dust harvest there). His form was pretty, like a serve by Roger Federer, if not exactly aerobic. For Mr. Ely kept stopping to lecture this reporter — on condensation; on the basic principles of heat transfer and why one needs to vacuum the refrigerator coils; on the movement of moist air in a kitchen; on floor care, which involved a long story about a Belgian monastery whose inhabitants never washed the kitchen floor; on how to dust the halogen spot lights (use a cotton cloth, not a microfiber one, and make sure the lights are off, and cool).  “I do rabbit on, don’t I?” he said. Ms. Johnson gamely hustled him along, noting that anytime you raise your arms over your head you can raise your heart rate. “What about a balance exercise?” she cajoled, executing a neat series of leg lifts. “That’s good for the butler’s booty!”

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2012: A good year for investors

There's still time for Washington to blow it all up. But barring a "fiscal cliff"-induced calamity, many investors are on track for their best year in stock and bond markets since 2009.

That may come as a shock to Americans who have sworn off risk-taking with their nest eggs. Whether this year's gains are enough to tempt them back remains to be seen.

Here's a tally of investment winners and losers for 2012 as year-end nears:

WINNER: U.S. stocks. The public's continuing distrust of the market was a good contrarian indicator in 2012. Investors who stayed aboard for the ride are looking at double-digit returns on U.S. equities for the year — the third calendar-year gain in the last four, as stocks have rebounded from the 2008 crash.

The blue-chip Standard & Poor's 500 index was up 12.9% year-to-date through Wednesday. Add in dividend income and the return totals 15.4%. If it holds, that would be the best annual return since the index surged 26.5% in 2009.

The S&P this year is beating most types of bonds and has trounced the near-zero yields on most cash accounts such as short-term bank CDs.

Most other broad U.S. market indexes also are in double-digit-return territory for the year, including the tech-dominated Nasdaq composite, up 16.6%, and the Russell 2,000 small-stock index, up 14.8%. That's despite the looming "fiscal cliff," as the White House and Congress remain deadlocked over tax rates for 2013 and beyond.

"Considering the roller-coaster ride for investor emotions throughout 2012, the year has proven remarkably stable for the stock market," said James Stack, editor of the InvesTech market newsletter in Whitefish, Mont.

What drove share prices? The U.S. economy continued to grow (albeit slowly); ditto for corporate profits; and the Federal Reserve kept credit dirt cheap.

And maybe, in classic Wall Street style, the market just wanted to further confound the skeptical majority: Just 17% of Americans now have faith in stocks, according to the latest Chicago Booth/Kellogg School financial trust index, which polls 1,000 Americans quarterly.

Or to put it another way, 83% of people are distrustful of equities. That's an invitation for the market to taunt the masses.

WINNER: Bonds. 2012 began with many Wall Street pros again warning about the risk of a calamity in bonds, if market interest rates were to rise. Instead, U.S. rates mostly continued to fall for the year, pushed lower by the Federal Reserve and by global investors' ravenous appetite for income and perceived safety.

The result: healthy positive returns on most types of bonds for a fourth straight year, as older securities rose in value.

The average mutual fund that owns long-term government bonds was up 5.1% year-to-date through Monday, counting interest income and price appreciation, according to Morningstar Inc. Junk bond funds were up 14.6% and long-term California tax-free municipal bond funds were up 10.3%, on average.

Slow economic growth persuaded many investors that the Fed would continue to hold interest rates down. They were right: This month the Fed in effect pledged to continue its rock-bottom-rate policy until the U.S. unemployment rate falls to 6.5% from the current 7.7%. The rate hasn't been 6.5% since October 2008.

Still, with every decline in interest rates, the bond market becomes more of a coiled spring: If market rates ever rebound substantially, existing bonds will fall in value and positive annual returns could quickly become negative returns.

But investors have to decide if that's a worry for 2013 — or some point much further down the road.

WINNER: European stocks. After relentlessly hammering the equity markets of Europe's weakest economies in 2010 and 2011, investors apparently decided enough was enough.

Most of the continent's major markets are on pace to have their best year since 2009, as fear of a Eurozone breakup has receded.

It helped, of course, that the European Central Bank vowed in midsummer to do whatever was necessary to support the euro currency, including potentially unlimited purchases of government bonds across Europe, if needed.

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Contested UTLA panel elections signal internal fissures

The young staff at the Alexander Science Center has been hard hit by seniority-based layoffs, the main factor behind a turnover of at least 28 teachers in the last five years — this in a school with a faculty of about 28.

Teachers say that the students at the USC-adjacent campus have suffered from the lack of stability and that the faculty has felt frustrated and voiceless.

But now, three instructors from the Alexander science school are among the freshman class of delegates to the House of Representatives for United Teachers Los Angeles, the teachers union in the L.A. Unified School District.

The House is the union's official decision-making body: It selects candidates to endorse in elections and has the final say on policy — taking precedence over the president and the board of directors.

The recent elections, concluded this month, were the most contested in years, by far.

Of 32 election districts, 22 featured contested bids for seats that typically could be had for the asking through a self-nomination process. In all, 396 candidates vied for 209 positions, with 100 won by teachers not in the current House.

The ideology of the new delegates is varied, and still evolving. They are concerned about job security, teacher turnover, performance evaluations and funding levels. But they are also worried about what some see as a combative but ineffectual and sometimes wrongheaded union and a demanding, ossified district bureaucracy.

The level of interest in the House elections surprised union leaders and veteran teachers alike — some of whom greeted the nouveau activism with concern. They note that outside groups encouraged teachers to run and worry that such groups will try to influence union policy.

Two outside groups are local arms of national organizations, Educators 4 Excellence and Teach Plus. A third group, Teachers for a New Unionism, is headed by Mike Stryer, a Fairfax High teacher on leave who lost a bid for the school board four years ago. His team reached teachers through home mailings, urging them to run.

All the groups are funded by major nonprofits, such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has huge investments in education research and sometimes controversial policy positions. And all assert their desire for a union that better serves the interests of teachers as well as students.

Some in UTLA perceive an unholy alliance among these groups, their sponsoring foundations and L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy, a former Gates official.

"Taking over our House of Reps is clearly their strategy to destroy us," wrote teacher Anne Zerrien-Lee in an email posted to an online teachers forum.

"We have enough enemies outside of UTLA that we shouldn't have to deal with school district and Gates puppets within," said regional union leader Scott Mandel in an interview.

Without question, the outside groups see things differently than the leadership of UTLA.

Notably, the union has wanted to limit, as much as possible, the effect of test scores on a teacher's performance evaluation. The outside groups or their funders have backed the use of standardized test scores — or formulas based on them — as one key measure of a teacher's effectiveness.

Secondly, the outside groups want layoffs based on teacher effectiveness rather than seniority; the unions defend the seniority system as the most equitable approach.

Still, Teach Plus wasn't trying to recruit candidates who passed a litmus test, said Executive Director John Lee.

"Our desire wasn't to have a Teach Plus caucus but to connect teachers with leadership opportunities," Lee said.

The new delegates emphasize their loyalty to their profession and to their mission.

"I love teaching," said 35-year-old Antoinette Pippin, a fourth-grade teacher at Alexander Science Center. "I love my students, but I'm seeing a lot of things right now that are bad for my students and bad for teachers."

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Apps to help achieve New Year’s resolutions

(Reuters) – Whether it is improving health or managing finances better, about 87 percent of Americans will make resolutions for 2013 and there are plenty of apps to help them achieve their goals.

Nearly half of New Year’s resolutions are about setting health-related goals, which is the most popular category, according to a recent survey by online broker TD Ameritrade.

Rather than jumping into a rigorous fitness routine, a new app called 5K Runner suggests it might be better to ease into things slowly and focus on building sustainable habits. The iPhone app helps couch potatoes ramp up their running distance to 5 km over the course of eight weeks.

“You’re slowly building this routine into your daily life with a lot of success and after eight weeks you’re literally running 5K, which is pretty big if (initially) you’re not running at all,” said David-Michel Davies, the executive director of The Webby Awards, an annual ceremony honoring Internet companies.

The app guides runners through each run, alternating periods of running and walking for 35 minutes.

Davies also recommends Nike+ Running and RunKeeper, two popular and free fitness apps, which use GPS to track distance traveled, speed and calories burned. Both apps are available for iOS and Android devices.

Diet is another component of good health and a focus of many apps. Fooducate is an iPhone and Android app that helps shoppers make healthier purchases at the supermarket by allowing them to scan the barcodes of products and get insight into how healthy the product is.

Their database, which contains over 200,000 products, displays a grade for the product and information on its contents. It can show whether there are hidden additives or the probability of containing genetically modified ingredients.

“There are a lot of healthy people out there who unknowingly buy products that have an inordinate amount of salt in them,” Davies said.

DietBet is an app for people with a competitive streak. Available for iPhone and on the Web, it allows its users to join in a four-week weight loss challenge to lose 4 percent of weight. Everyone bets money, which goes into a fund, and submits proof of weight lost. People who meet the challenge split the money.

“It comes back again to how people get motivated,” Davies said. “Gamification is something that technology has really enabled and for some people it really works.”

To stay on top of finances, Davies recommends Mint, which provides a visual view of all financial accounts and is available for iOS, Android and on the Web.

(Reporting by Natasha Baker in Toronto; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Eric Beech)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Ticket rush: Film fans hand Hollywood record cash

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The big deal for Hollywood is not the record $10.8 billion that studios took in domestically in 2012. It's the fact that the number of tickets sold went up for the first time in three years.

Thanks to inflation, revenue generally rises in Hollywood as admission prices climb each year. The real story is told in tickets, whose sales have been on a general decline for a decade, bottoming out in 2011 at 1.29 billion, their lowest level since 1995.

The industry rebounded this year, with ticket sales projected to rise 5.6 percent to 1.36 billion by Dec. 31, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com. That's still well below the modern peak of 1.6 billion tickets sold in 2002, but in an age of cozy home theater setups and endless entertainment gadgets, studio executives consider it a triumph that they were able to put more butts in cinema seats this year than last.

"It is a victory, ultimately," said Don Harris, head of distribution at Paramount Pictures. "If we deliver the product as an industry that people want, they will want to get out there. Even though you can sit at home and watch something on your large screen in high-def, people want to get out."

Domestic revenue should finish up nearly 6 percent from 2011's $10.2 billion and top Hollywood's previous high of $10.6 billion set in 2009.

The year was led by a pair of superhero sagas, Disney's "The Avengers" with $623 million domestically and $1.5 billion worldwide and the Warner Bros. Batman finale "The Dark Knight Rises" with $448 million domestically and $1.1 billion worldwide. Sony's James Bond adventure "Skyfall" is closing in on the $1 billion mark globally, and the list of action and family-film blockbusters includes "The Hunger Games," ''The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part Two," ''Ice Age: Continental Drift," ''Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted," ''The Amazing Spider-Man" and "Brave."

Before television, movies were the biggest thing going, with ticket sales estimated as high as 4 billion a year domestically in the 1930s and '40s.

Movie-going eroded steadily through the 1970s as people stayed home with their small screens. The rise of videotape in the 1980s further cut into business, followed by DVDs in the '90s and big, cheap flat-screen TVs in recent years. Today's video games, mobile phones and other portable devices also offer easy options to tramping out to a movie theater.

It's all been a continual drain on cinema business, and cynics repeatedly predict the eventual demise of movie theaters. Yet Hollywood fights back with new technology of its own, from digital 3-D to booming surround-sound to the clarity of images projected at high-frame rates, which is being tested now with "The Lord of the Rings" prelude "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," shown in select theaters at 48 frames a second, double the standard speed.

For all of the annoyances of theaters — parking, pricy concessions, sitting next to strangers texting on their iPhones — cinemas still offer the biggest and best way to see a movie.

"Every home has a kitchen, but you can't get into a good restaurant on Saturday night," said Dan Fellman, head of distribution for Warner Bros. "People want to escape. That's the nature of society. The adult population just is not going to sit home seven days a week, even though they have technology in their home that's certainly an improvement over what it was 10 years ago. People want to get out of the house, and no matter what they throw in the face of theatrical exhibition, it continues to perform at a strong level."

Even real-life violence at the movie theater didn't turn audiences away. Some moviegoers thought twice about heading to the cinema after a gunman killed 12 people and injured 58 at a screening of "The Dark Knight Rises" in Colorado last summer, but if there was any lull in attendance, it was slight and temporary. Ticket sales went on a tear for most of the fall.

While domestic revenues inch upward most years largely because of inflation, the real growth areas have been overseas, where more and more fans are eager for the next Hollywood blockbuster.

International business generally used to account for less than half of a studio film's overall receipts. Films now often do two or even three times as much business overseas as they do domestically. Some movies that were duds with U.S. audiences, such as "Battleship" and "John Carter," can wind up being $200 million hits with overseas crowds.

Whether finishing a good year or a bad one, Hollywood executives always look ahead to better days, insisting that the next crop of blockbusters will be bigger than ever. The same goes this time as studio bosses hype their 2013 lineup, which includes the latest "Iron Man," ''Star Trek," ''Hunger Games" and "Thor" installments, the Superman tale "Man of Steel" and the second chapter in "The Hobbit" trilogy.

Twelve months from now, they hope to be talking about another revenue record topping this year's $10.8 billion.

"I've been saying we're going to hit that $11 billion level for about three years now," said Paul Dergarabedian, a box-office analyst for Hollywood.com. "Next year I think is the year we actually do it."

___

Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

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Recipes for Health: Penne With Mushroom Ragout and Spinach

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Penne with mushroom ragout and spinach.

​​Mushrooms and spinach together is always a match made in heaven. I use a mix of wild and regular white or cremini mushrooms for this, but don’t hesitate to make it if regular mushrooms are all that is available.

 

1/2 ounce (about 1/2 cup) dried porcini mushrooms

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1/2 medium onion or 2 shallots, chopped

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 pound mixed regular and wild mushrooms or 1 pound regular white or cremini mushrooms, trimmed and cut in thick slices (or torn into smaller pieces, depending on the type of mushroom)

Salt and freshly ground pepper

1/4 cup fruity red wine, such as a Côtes du Rhone or Côtes du Luberon

2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme or a combination of thyme and rosemary

6 ounces baby spinach or 12 ounces bunch spinach (1 bunch), stemmed and thoroughly cleaned

3/4 pound penne

Freshly grated Parmesan to taste

 

1. Place the dried mushrooms in a Pyrex measuring cup and pour on 2 cups boiling water. Let soak 30 minutes, while you prepare the other ingredients. Place a strainer over a bowl, line it with cheesecloth or paper towels, and drain the mushrooms. Squeeze the mushrooms over the strainer to extract all the flavorful juices. Then rinse the mushrooms, away from the bowl with the soaking liquid, until they are free of sand. Squeeze dry and set aside. If very large, chop coarsely. Measure out 1 cup of the soaking liquid and set aside.

2. Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy, nonstick skillet over medium heat and add the onion or shallots. Cook, stirring often, until tender, about 5 minutes. Turn up the heat to medium-high and add the fresh mushrooms. Cook, stirring often, until they begin to soften and sweat, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and salt to taste, stir together for about 30 seconds, then add the reconstituted dried mushrooms and the wine and turn the heat to high. Cook, stirring, until the liquid boils down and glazes the mushrooms. Add the herbs and the mushroom soaking liquid. Bring to a simmer, add salt to taste, and cook over medium-high heat, stirring often, until the mushrooms are thoroughly tender and fragrant. Turn off the heat, stir in some freshly ground pepper, taste and adjust salt.

3. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt generously. Fill a bowl with ice water. Add the spinach to the boiling water and blanch for 20 seconds only. Remove with a skimmer and transfer to the ice water, then drain and squeeze out water. Chop coarsely and add to the mushrooms. Reheat gently over low heat.

4. Bring the water back to a boil and cook the pasta al dente following the timing suggestions on the package. If there is not much broth in the pan with the mushrooms and spinach, add a ladleful of pasta water. Drain the pasta, toss with the mushrooms and spinach, add Parmesan to taste, and serve at once.

Yield: Serves 4

Advance preparation: The mushroom ragout will keep for 3 or 4 days in the refrigerator and tastes even better the day after you make it.

Nutritional information per serving: 437 calories; 9 grams fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 2 grams polyunsaturated fat; 5 grams monounsaturated fat; 0 milligrams cholesterol; 73 grams carbohydrates; 5 grams dietary fiber; 48 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste or Parmesan); 17 grams protein

​

Up Next: Spinach Gnocchi

 

Martha Rose Shulman is the author of “The Very Best of Recipes for Health.”

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Retailers roll out after-Christmas sales

Armed with gift cards, outfits that don't fit and some unexpected Christmas cash, shoppers are heading back to the malls for yet another bout of holiday splurging.

LaTonya Reliford, 33, and her family will be out scavenging for bargains Wednesday. The elementary school teacher said she has started giving money and gift cards to her three children so they have more freedom to buy what they want.

"We give them part gifts and part cash, so on the day after Christmas we take our kids and go to the malls," the Beverly Hills resident said. "There are good deals, and they can find what they really like."

After weeks of anxiously wooing shoppers, the nation's retailers, hoping to get a last bite at the holiday season, are offering bargains, half-off deals and fresh promotions.

Target stores are opening earlier and closing later the day after Christmas. Toys R Us is rolling out new waves of deals including "buy one, get one half off" specials on books and board games. And Macy's has launched a "Week of Wonderful" to trot out new savings on apparel and home goods.

Retail experts predict the day after Christmas will be among the top five shopping days of the year. "Typically the 26th is an important day, and retailers count on it," said Bill Martin of retail technology firm ShopperTrak. "It will be a day when you will find bargains."

Still, Martin said, merchants' revenue may fall short of the $7.1 billion they raked in on that day last year. That was when Dec. 26 conveniently fell on a Monday and many people were still on vacation and ready to shop.

"At least some portion of the population is heading back to work on Wednesday," he said. "So it could have a little bit of a downward pressure on sales as a result."

Christmas capped more than a month of nonstop shopping online and in bricks-and-mortar stores. Thanksgiving weekend prompted a burst of early holiday spending. But soon, retailers reported something of a lull. In the last 10 days, however, people packed the malls once again.

Just what kind of holiday season it was financially won't be known for sure until after New Year's. The National Retail Federation estimated that holiday cash registers would ring up $586.1 billion, up 4.1% from a year earlier. But in recent weeks, merchants have expressed doubts about hitting that mark.

"There were a lot of major distractions this year for shoppers, including the political climate, the 'fiscal cliff' and no hot items this holiday," said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst at NPD Group. "There are more reasons why it's not going to be exceptional growth. It will be 3.5% to 3.8% growth at best."

Starting Wednesday morning, shoppers should expect to see after-Christmas sales, early hours and some Black Friday-type door-buster deals designed to draw people into stores, retail experts said.

But don't expect to see the steep across-the-board promotions that were common in the last few years, they said.

"The inventory was better controlled this year, so there won't be that last-minute deep discounting unless it is largely planned by the retailer," said Kamalesh Rao, director of economic research at MasterCard Advisors SpendingPulse.

At the Best Buy store in Westfield Culver City, a few items will be on sale Wednesday, "but before Christmas is definitely better for sales," general manager Margie Kenney said. "We do see a lot of shoppers looking for bargains right after the holidays."

Instead of merely trying to clear out old merchandise, Macy's is stocking shelves with new items, including the first peek at spring fashions, said Kim Freeburn, a vice president of stores at Macy's.

"Customers will not be looking at just leftover goods and markdowns," she said. "Our stores are well-positioned with new merchandise. New spring colors, maybe a little bit lighter-weight products and new fashions."

Stores are bracing for a swarm of shoppers coming in to redeem gift cards.

"Dec. 26 tends to have the highest redemption for gift cards," Target spokeswoman Donna Egan said. "Most gift cards are redeemed in electronics. We will also focus on apparel, toys and holiday decor."

The soaring popularity of gift cards has transformed the day after Christmas from an exchange- and return-heavy day into a day with many new sales, said Paul Kurzawa, chief operating officer of Caruso Affiliated, which owns the Grove and the Americana at Brand shopping centers.

"Now the day after Christmas is a lot more sales generated by people redeeming gift cards," he said. "We will see that trend for the rest of the year and the rest of January as people are still out on the holidays and kids are out of school."

Cecilia Aguilara, 18, of Hollywood probably will be part of the horde looking to score end-of-the-year deals. The college freshman said family members usually give her at least a couple of gift cards for Christmas, such as the Barnes & Noble and Old Navy ones she received last year.

"I think someone will give me a gift card," she said Monday. "Then I'll go to the mall to spend it on the day after or over the weekend when the sales are pretty good."

shan.li@latimes.com

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U.S. drone strategy in Yemen is fraught with peril

AL SARRAIN, Yemen — The U.S. drone flew over a cluster of mud houses on a ridge and, according to Yemeni officials, locked onto Adnan Qadhi, a mercurial man of many guises, including radical militant, peace mediator, preacher of violence and army general.

Villagers said Qadhi climbed out of his utility vehicle the night of Nov. 7 to make a cellphone call shortly before the missile struck. His photo — broad face peering from beneath a tilted red beret, stars on his epaulets — now hangs in a small grocery store in a land where farmers work narrow fields below the villas of politicians, tribal leaders and a former president that rise like fortresses on nearby hilltops.

Some here call him a martyr, others a fanatic. But the life and death of Qadhi, a senior officer in the 1st Armored Division who preached holy war in mosques and donned government-issued fatigues, epitomizes the political instability, tribal intrigue, crisscrossing allegiances and radical Islamist passions the United States must sort out when targeting militants in Yemen. At times, Washington risks being drawn into internal conflicts and becoming increasingly despised in the Arab world's poorest nation.

Extremists here have a history of shifting tactics and circumstances. They were pressed into service by the government of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh when needed, then arrested and jailed when the political winds changed. Later they vanished from prisons by the scores, set loose across tribal lands. Yemeni security officials say that era is ending, and they're stepping up military offensives to rout extremists — fighters from Libya, Somalia and other nations, and assassins on motorcycles intent on killing intelligence officials.

At the same time, the Obama administration has intensified airstrikes against the Yemeni group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which plotted in 2009 and 2010 to blow up American airliners. A 2011 drone attack killed Anwar Awlaki, an American-born Muslim preacher and militant recruiter. Weeks later, a U.S. airstrike killed Awlaki's 16-year-old son, who tribesmen and relatives say had no links to terrorism.

The Long War Journal, a website that tracks U.S. drone activity, reports that since 2002, America has launched 57 airstrikes in Yemen, killing 299 militants and 82 civilians. The number of strikes has risen dramatically from four in 2010 to 40 so far this year.

"Why do these Americans come and interfere in Yemen?" said Radhwan Dahrooj, the grocer in Al Sarrain. "Why do they kill our people? If they have charges against someone why do they not arrest him and bring him to justice?"

Qadhi was sentenced to prison four years ago for plotting an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Sana, the capital, that killed at least 16 people, no Americans among them. With the help of clansmen and army officials, he was released shortly afterward and resumed his old life: militant and officer in the 1st Armored Division, led by Maj. Gen. Ali Mohsin Saleh Ahmar, a commander described in a 2005 U.S. diplomatic cable as "dealing with terrorists and extremists."

When uprisings against President Saleh swept the country in 2011, the brigade mutinied and battled with competing tribes and security units for control of Sana.

What began as a peaceful revolution against Saleh tipped the nation — already fighting a rebellion in the north and a secessionist movement in the south — into deeper turmoil. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and its affiliate Ansar al Sharia exploited the unrest, taking over territory in the south. That gave Qadhi an opportunity to expand his militant ambitions even as he slipped into another of his guises, currying favor with the government by mediating a truce between Yemeni officials and an Al Qaeda faction.

The U.S., which this year has given Yemen $337 million in military and security aid, would not confirm that a drone targeted Qadhi. Yemeni officials and villagers, who heard a plane circling that night, said a U.S. airstrike killed him not far from his home in Beit al Ahmar. Though Qadhi was an active Al Qaeda recruiter and often accused Washington in his sermons of wanting to keep Yemen divided and in chaos, it is not clear what specific danger he was seen as presenting to the United States.

Washington has no precise rules on the criteria for targeting militants with drone strikes. But President Obama has said that an extremist must present an imminent threat to the U.S. or its allies, as Yemen's Al Qaeda branch is considered to do, and that arrest would be impossible.

A former senior U.S. intelligence official said Qadhi's arrest for the 2008 embassy attack would not have been enough to put him on an assassination list. White House counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan has said that militants battling solely to overthrow the government in Sana are not targeted. But Qadhi's 1st Armored Division was certainly a threat to the Yemeni government and the country's stability.

Yemeni officials said the nation's new president, Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi, approved the strike against Qadhi after determining that an attempt to arrest him in his neighborhood could have led to more deaths. The officials said they were unaware of intelligence linking Qadhi to any active plot.

The danger in the drone program is the potential for U.S. intelligence and airstrikes to be manipulated by Yemenis seeking to weaken the competing clans and political factions. For example, Obama and his top generals felt misled in 2010 when Obama signed off on an airstrike against a senior militant that killed six people, including the deputy governor of Mareb province. The strike was based entirely on intelligence provided by the Yemenis, who had not told the U.S. that the governor would be there, a former senior U.S. official said.

Since Hadi took office in February, the cooperation and trust between the Yemeni government and the U.S. has vastly improved, U.S. and Yemeni officials say.

There are many potential drone targets. For decades, young men have left Yemen to become foot soldiers and bomb makers among the militants in Afghanistan, Algeria, Pakistan, Iraq and Libya. Some of them have come home.

One was Rashad Mohammed Saeed, who left at 15 and became a confidant of Osama bin Laden, fighting beside him in Afghanistan. He returned to Yemen around 2000 and in an interview said he had put aside his weapons to start the Renaissance Union Party, made up of former militants who run for parliament seats.

Like militants in other countries, he is struggling to reconcile a decades-long philosophy of violence and the more peaceful, and successful, political approach — at least in Tunisia and Egypt — of the protest movements that ignited the so-called Arab Spring. He worries about what many here describe as an incessant invisible buzz in the sky.

"We have entered politics. Do you think the U.S. will leave us alone to choose our own leaders and way of life?" Saeed asked. "Our party is close to Al Qaeda. We're trying to get them to lay down their weapons. Yemen doesn't need this violence now. We just need protection from drones. I may be a target myself."

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Mundie, one of Gates’ successors, to retire from Microsoft

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Craig Mundie, one of two Microsoft Corp executives who took over Bill Gates‘ role at the company, has relinquished control of Microsoft’s large research organization and is to retire from the company in 2014.

Mundie is taking on a new role as a senior adviser to Chief Executive Steve Ballmer, according to a memo circulated internally earlier this month but only made public on Monday.

Eric Rudder, another Microsoft veteran, is taking on responsibility for Microsoft Research, Trustworthy Computing, and the Technology Policy Group, which were all run by Mundie.

A 20-year Microsoft veteran, Mundie was one of two men hand-picked by co-founder Gates to take over leadership of the technical side of Microsoft when he retired from day-to-day work at the company in 2008.

Mundie took over responsibility for the company’s long-term research activities, while Ray Ozzie became chief software architect. Ozzie left Microsoft in 2010. According to Ballmer’s memo, Mundie will retire from Microsoft in 2014, when he will be 65.

Mundie’s new role was first reported on Monday by the All Things D tech blog.

(Reporting By Bill Rigby; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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