San Francisco nudity ban upheld in federal court

Source : TimesRepublican.com

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal judge cleared the way Tuesday for the city of San Francisco to ban most displays of public nudity, ruling that an ordinance set to take effect on Feb. 1 does not violate the free speech rights of residents and visitors who like going out in the buff.

U.S. District Court Judge Edward Chen refused to block the ban temporarily or to allow a lawsuit challenging it to proceed.

"In spite of what plaintiffs argue, nudity in and of itself is not inherently expressive," Chen wrote in an 18-page opinion.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 7-4 last month to prohibit residents and visitors over age 5 from exposing their genitals on public streets, in parks or plazas or while using public transit.

The measure was introduced in response to a group of nudists that regularly gathers in the city's predominantly gay Castro District. The threat of seeing outlawed a right that many people associate with free-spirited San Francisco prompted public protests and disrobing at supervisors meetings.

The activists who challenged the measure in court also had argued that the ordinance was unfair because it grants exceptions for public nudity at permitted public events such as the city's gay pride parade and the annual Bay-to-Breakers foot race.

Chen also rejected that argument.

"The plaintiffs took an unlikely position in their case that if they couldn't be naked everywhere, no one could be naked anywhere," City Attorney Dennis Herrera said. "We believed their legal challenge to be baseless, and we're grateful that the court agreed."

Christina DiEdoardo, a lawyer for nudity advocates who sued to overturn the ban, said her clients were considering whether to appeal. DiEdoardo noted that the judge indicated he would be open to considering a revised lawsuit if advocates could cite examples of their civil rights being trampled, which could be easier to do once the ban is enforced.

"We can still come back once the ordinance takes effect," she said.

Obama says struggling over whether to intervene in Syria

Source : Alarabiya

President Barack Obama said he has been wrestling with the question whether a U.S. military intervention in Syria’s 22-month-old civil war would help resolve the bloody conflict or make things worse.

In a pair of interviews, Obama responded to critics who say the United States has not been involved enough in Syria, where thousands of people have been killed and millions displaced according to U.N. officials. Transcripts of both interviews were released on Sunday.

The United States has called on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down, and has recognized an opposition coalition - but has stopped short of authorizing U.S. arming of rebels to overthrow Assad.

“In a situation like Syria, I have to ask, can we make a difference in that situation? Would a military intervention have an impact?” Obama told the New Republic Magazine.

Obama said he has to weigh the benefit of a military intervention with the ability of the Pentagon to support troops still in Afghanistan, where the United States is withdrawing combat forces after a dozen years of war.

“How would it affect our ability to support troops who are still in Afghanistan? What would be the aftermath of our involvement on the ground? Could it trigger even worse violence or the use of chemical weapons?” he asked.

“What offers the best prospect of a stable post-Assad regime? And how do I weigh tens of thousands who’ve been killed in Syria versus the tens of thousands who are currently being killed in the Congo?”

Obama said these questions are “not simple” and that any decision made should “balance all these equities.”

“At the end of your presidency, you can look back and say, I made more right calls than not and that I saved lives where I could, and that America, as best it could in a difficult, dangerous world, was, net, a force for good,” Obama added.

Obama’s comments come as world leaders gathered in Davos, Switzerland, said they wished the United States were more engaged in geopolitical issues such as the conflicts in Syria and Mali, where France is attacking al Qaeda-affiliated militants.

In an interview with CBS television program “60 Minutes,” Obama bristled when asked to respond to criticism that the United States has been reluctant to engage in foreign policy issues like the Syrian crisis.

Obama said his administration put U.S. warplanes into the international effort to oust Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, and led a push to force Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak from office.

But in Syria, his administration wants to make sure U.S. action would not backfire, he said.

“We do nobody a service when we leap before we look, where we ... take on things without having thought through all the consequences of it,” Obama told CBS.

“We are not going to be able to control every aspect of every transition and transformation” in conflicts around the world, he said. “Sometimes they’re going to go sideways.”

US could see piecemeal action on new gun laws: experts

Source : Globaltimes.cn

US  lawmakers are likely to take a piece-by-piece approach to legislation aimed at combating gun violence, as a comprehensive package of gun laws could be a tough sell to a bitterly divided Congress, experts said Thursday.

President Barack Obama unveiled a rash of new proposals Wednesday aimed at curbing gun violence after last month's horrific massacre in Newtown Connecticut that left 20 elementary school students dead and shocked nations worldwide. Measures included a ten-round limit on gun magazines, a ban on assault weapons, a clampdown on gun trafficking and better background checks.

Lanae Erickson Hatalsky, director of social policy and politics at Third Way, noted Obama did not make the package comprehensive, but instead said it could be done bit-by-bit.

That was a smart move for Democrats, she said, since proposals such as improving the background check system, for example, could find agreement on both sides of the political divide.

"There are a lot of pieces that (Obama) suggested that would go a long way toward reducing gun crime," said Hatalsky.

Those include stricter penalties for gun traffickers. Currently, there are no federal laws against gun trafficking, only state laws, which ties the hands of law enforcement. And while there is a law against selling a firearm to a known felon, it is difficult for prosecutors to use it in court.

"That means you can drive a truck full of weapons into a city and sell them in an alleyway to a stranger and fear no prosecution from the federal government," she said, although state laws could come into play under such a scenario.

So far, the weeks following the shooting have seen a firestorm of debate between leading Democrats calling for a ban on assault weapons and gun proponents who maintain that such a ban would infringe on Americans' constitutional right to bear arms.

Indeed, Obama's proposed ban on assault weapons is likely to face an uphill climb in the GOP- controlled House and strong opposition from the National Rifle Association, whose president, David Keene, told ABC News Wednesday that the gun lobby is preparing for "battle" with the White House and Congress.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said Wednesday that Obama's proposals would fail to stop another Newtown-style killing spree, and some conservative pundits argue the White House proposals failed to address holes in the mental health system, as well as violence in the US film and video game industries.

Questions of constitutionality will play a pivotal role.

The office of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday the first test of any new legislation the majority leader decides to bring before the Senate "will be on whether or not it infringes on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms."

For now, it remains unclear what the Senate Judiciary Committee will consider, sources familiar with the matter said.

No "credible evidence" shows Syria's use of chemical weapons: U.S.

Source : Xinhua | English.news.cn

WASHINGTON, Jan. 16 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. government said Wednesday that there was no "credible evidence" so far that showed the Syrian government forces had used chemical weapons.

"At the time we looked into the allegations that were made and the information that we had received, and we found no credible evidence to corroborate or to confirm that chemical weapons were used," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said at a daily briefing.

Nuland's statement came after the Foreign Policy magazine reported on its website Tuesday that a secret diplomatic cable from the U.S. consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, had concluded that the Syrian government had probably used chemical weapons.

While admitting the existence of such message from the Istanbul consulate, Nuland told reporters that the State Department had concluded that the report cannot be corroborated.

However, the spokeswoman reiterated the Obama administration's harsh warning against the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

"We have been absolutely consistent and clear, from the president on down, that our red line is: we have a red line with regard to use of chemical weapons or their proliferation," Nuland said.

"If the Assad regime makes the tragic mistake of using chemical weapons or fails to meet its obligations to secure them, there will be consequences, and the regime will be held accountable," she added.

On Dec. 3, in a speech at the National Defense University in Washington, D. C., U.S. President Barack Obama warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad of "consequences" in using chemical weapons in the Arab country's lengthy conflict.

"The use of chemical weapons is and would be totally unacceptable, and if you make the tragic mistake of using these weapons there will be consequences and you will be held accountable," he said at the time.

Washington Dismisses Report on Chemical Attack in Syria

Source : RIA Novosti

WASHINGTON, January 15 (RIA Novosti) – The White House downplayed on Tuesday media speculations that chemical weapons had been used by President Bashar al-Assad’s regime against the Syrian rebels.

According to a recent report in the Foreign Policy magazine, a secret American investigation revealed that Assad forces used a poisonous gas against the rebels in Homs on December 23, 2012.

"The reporting we have seen from media sources regarding alleged chemical weapons incidents in Syria has not been consistent with what we believe to be true about the Syrian chemical weapons program," White House National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said in a statement.

The official reiterated, though, that Assad’s government would be still held responsible for any potential chemical attack against the Syrian opposition forces or failure to ensure security of its stockpile of chemical weapons.

"If the Assad regime makes the tragic mistake of using chemical weapons, or fails to meet its obligation to secure them, the regime will be held accountable," Vietor said.

The Syrian stockpiles of chemical weapons are believed to consist mostly of large amounts of Sarin, in addition to tabun (nerve agents) and mustard gas, and the country is reportedly producing and preparing VX for weapons.

The CIA says Syria has had a chemical weapons program "for years” and that the weapons can be “delivered by aircraft, ballistic missile, and artillery rockets." But Syria has never deployed the weapons, although it warned last summer that they could be used against “foreign invaders.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in December last year that the Syrian government is in control of chemical weapons and had placed its chemical arsenals in one or two depots in an effort to make them more secure.

At least 60,000 people have been killed in Syria’s conflict since March 2011, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has said, citing new analysis released by the United Nations in early January.

Obama under fire for white male Cabinet

Source : www.hurriyetdailynews.com

U.S. President Barack Obama has come under fire from some of his own Democratic Party for naming a stream of white men to key Cabinet and leadership posts in his second administration.

Obama named Jan. 10 Jack Lew as his treasury secretary, the fourth white male he has named to the most-prized Cabinet posts in recent weeks. Lew’s nomination follows Obama’s pick of Sen. John Kerry to replace Hillary Clinton as secretary of state. If confirmed by the Senate, Kerry will be the first white male to hold the top U.S. diplomatic post in more than a decade. Obama has also named former Sen. Chuck Hagel to be defense secretary and John Brennan to head the Central Intelligence Agency. Against this, he lost the first Hispanic woman in the Cabinet when Labor Secretary Hilda Solis announced her resignation on Jan. 9. Last month Lisa Jackson, who is black, announced she was stepping down as head of the Environmental Protection Agency.

“It’s embarrassing as hell,” New York Democrat Charles Rangel, one of the most senior black members of Congress, said. New Hampshire Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, whose state has the only all-female delegation in Congress, described the appointments as “disappointing.”

Testosterone in Cabinet

Republicans joined in the criticism with former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee accusing Obama of waging a “war on women,” using the same words Democrats coined to criticize Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney during the election campaign. “Now a lot of those females who supported Obama are saying, ‘How come there is so much testosterone in the Cabinet and so little estrogen?’” the former Arkansas governor said.

Obama beat Romney 55 percent to 43 percent among women, according to Reuters/Ipsos exit polling on Election Day. He also won large majorities of the African-American and Hispanic vote.

Diversity in the U.S. is usually defined as including women and racial minorities, especially Hispanics and African-Americans. U.S. political pundits parse polling data of women, Hispanics, African-Americans and other groups for signs of voting patterns. They track the “gender gap,” which is the percentage difference between Democratic and Republican support among women. Since Obama’s re-election in November, analysts have noted the rising percentage of ethnic minorities and described his victory as a reflection of changing demography.

The criticism of Obama is surprising because Republicans usually are the party accused of insensitivity to diversity. Former President George W. Bush deflected this by pointing to the two secretaries of state during his eight years in office, Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, both black. They were followed by Hillary Clinton. Almost overlooked in the criticism is that the White House announced this week that Attorney General Eric Holder, who is black, will stay on as the nation’s senior legal officer.

Obama also was widely reported to be considering an African-American woman, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice as secretary of state. She pulled her name from consideration because of Republican objections to her statements about the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. White House spokesman Jay Carney urged critics to make their judgments only after Obama had completed his team. “Women are well-represented in the president’s senior staff,” he said Jan. 9, noting that his team included Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

Obama, Karzai agree to accelerate military transition

Source : Voice of Russia

Afghan security forces will control 90 percent of the country’s territory from February just as US troops continue their pullout, according to a joint statement to this effect made by Afghan and U.S. Presidents on Friday.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Friday they have agreed to slightly speed up the schedule for moving Afghanistan's security forces into the lead across the country, with U.S. troops shifting fully to a support role. The leaders also said Obama agreed to place battlefield detainees under the control of the Afghan government.

The two leaders say the Afghan army is "exceeding initial expectations" and the Afghan forces will be put in the combat lead across Afghanistan this spring, rather than wait until summer as was initially planned.

Obama said it was not certain what it would mean for the pace of U.S. troop withdrawals this year. He said that was "something that isn't yet fully determined." He also cautioned that while U.S. troops will fall back into primarily a support, American forces will still likely see combat.

Afghans now lead about 80% of operations and by February are expected to have a lead in securing 90% of the Afghan population, according to a joint statement issued by Obama and Karzai.

The most important item on the two leaders' agenda were talks on whether the United States will have a residual presence in the country beyond 2014, when the U.S. and its allies are scheduled to end combat operations.

Some U.S. commanders have proposed fewer than 10,000 troops in Afghanistan after 2014, to keep battling terrorists and training Afghan forces.

Karzai declined to spell out the size of a contingency force he'd like to see left behind.

"Number are not going to make a difference to the situation in Afghanistan," Karzai said."It's the relationship that will make a difference in Afghanistan."

There are currently 66,000 troops in Afghanistan.

Eight flu deaths reported in Oklahoma, U.S.

Source: Xinhua | English.news.cn

HOUSTON, Jan. 10 (Xinhua) -- Eight people in the U.S. state of Oklahoma have died from flu complications this season, state health officials said Thursday.

The state Health Department's weekly flu report also shows a sharp increase in the number of flu deaths reported, with flu deaths jumping by six in one week to eight for the week ending Tuesday.

Ninety-two people in Oklahoma were hospitalized due to the flu in the past week, and 345 hospitalizations have been reported because of the flu so far this season, according to the report.

Oklahoma's flu season typically peaks in January or February, health officials said.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has warned that influenza activity would be increasing across most of the country.

More than 200,000 people are hospitalized due to influenza each year, according to the CDC.

According to the agency's most recent weekly influenza report, 29 states are reporting high levels of the flu, and 18 pediatric deaths have been attributed to the flu this season.

US takes Indonesia to WTO over import restrictions

Source : BBC News

he US has filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization (WTO) against Indonesia's restrictions on imports of horticultural and animal products.

Indonesia had put in place strict licensing requirements for imports of plant-based products in 2011.

It also has a quota on imports of beef and other animal products, which the US said has seen "drastic reductions".

The US said the moves were designed to protect Indonesia's domestic industry and were a violation of WTO rules.

It added that the rules had hurt US exports to Indonesia.

"Indonesia's opaque and complex import licensing system affects a wide range of American agricultural exports," US Trade Representative Ron Kirk said in a statement.

"It has become a serious impediment to US agricultural exports entering Indonesia, reducing Indonesian consumers' access to high- quality US products."

The US said it has requested consultations with Indonesia under the dispute settlement provisions of the WTO.

Indiana boy abducted in 1994 found in Minnesota under different name

Source: Fox News

WOLCOTTVILLE, IND. – A boy abducted from northeastern Indiana by his paternal grandparents 19 years ago has been found in Minnesota.

Indiana State Police said Thursday that Richard Wayne Landers Jr. was abducted in July 1994 during court proceedings over his custody in Wolcottville.

Police say a 24-year-old man with the same Social Security number and birth date as Landers but living under a different name was located in October in Long Prairie, Minn.

His grandparents also were living under aliases nearby and confirmed his identity.

The grandparents were initially charged with custody interference, but charges were dropped in 2008 after the case went cold.

Police spokesman Sgt. Ron Galaviz says Landers' father was never in the picture.

Galaviz says an attorney is working with Landers' mother to reconnect her with her son.

Americans Less Healthy, Die Younger: Study

Source : RIA Novosti

January 10 (RIA Novosti) Americans under the age of 50 are less healthy and die sooner than their peers in other developed countries due in part to disease and the prevalence of car accidents, gun violence and drug overdoses, according to a new study by a panel of US experts released Thursday.

“Since 1980, the United States has had the first or second lowest probability of surviving to age 50 among the 17 peer countries,” said the authors of the 18-month study by two non-profit research groups, the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council and available here.

“Americans who do reach age 50 generally arrive at this age in poorer health than their counterparts in other high-income countries, and as older adults they face greater morbidity and mortality from chronic diseases that arise from risk factors (e.g., smoking, obesity, diabetes) that are often established earlier in life.”

The study, whose results were described as “stark” by The New York Times, was commissioned to examine the reasons for a slower climb in longevity rates in the US that began in the 1980s, compared to other countries including Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain, Norway and the United Kingdom.

In ranking life expectancy among the 17 nations, the group found that even though the United States spends more on money on healthcare than any other country American men were at the bottom of the list with the lowest life expectancy, and American women were second from the bottom.

“Something fundamental is going wrong,” said lead panelist Steven Woolf, chairman of the Department of Family Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University, quoted by The New York Times.

“This is not the product of a particular administration or political party. Something at the core is causing the US to slip behind these other high-income countries. And it’s getting worse.”

What the study authors called the “US health disadvantage” appears to impact all Americans including those who are higher income, who don’t smoke, and who are not overweight.

The study identified nine categories which appeared to negatively affect the mortality rates in the US, including high infant mortality rates, deaths from motor vehicle crashes and homicides, adolescent pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases, and high rates of HIV and AIDS, obesity, drug deaths and heart disease.

It also noted that killings with guns were 20 times higher in the United States than in other countries while the rate of suicides with firearms was six times higher.

“We expected to see some bad news and some good news,” Woolf told The New York Times. “But the US ranked near and at the bottom in almost every heath indicator. That stunned us.”

US Nuclear Systems, Infrastructure Under Cyber-Attack

Source : Islamic Invitation Turkey

America’s power, water, and nuclear systems are increasingly being targeted by cybercriminals seeking to gain access to some of the nation’s most critical infrastructure. The number of attacks reported to a US Department of Homeland Security cyber-security response team grew by 52% in 2012, according to a recent report from the team. There were 198 attacks brought to the agency’s attention last year, several of which resulted in successful break-ins. The energy sector was the most-targeted field, with 82 attacks, and the water industry reported 29 attacks last year. Chemical plants faced seven cyber-attacks, and nuclear companies reported six. According to the source, many companies choose not to report incidents, and the majority of cyber-attacks go undiscovered, according to industry researchers. DHS warned that the nation’s infrastructure is worryingly vulnerable. The Obama administration and many in Congress have been more vocal about how an “enemy nation” or a terrorist cell could target the country’s critical infrastructure in a cyber-attack. Legislation aimed at preventing such attacks stalled in Congress last year.

In its report, the Department of Homeland Security advised critical infrastructure companies to keep devices linked to their control systems offline, put stronger passwords in place and implement better security protocols.