As the second part of Lance Armstrong’s televised confession that he doped and lied his way to seven Tour de France titles is broadcast on the Oprah Winfrey Network Friday night, The Lede will have real-time fact-checking and analysis from New York Times reporters, including Juliet Macur and Naila-Jean Meyers. We will also round up reactions from fans, bloggers, journalists and fellow riders once the broadcast and live stream gets underway, at 9 p.m. Eastern Time.
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Video game puts players in shoes of Syrian rebels
Label: TechnologyBEIRUT (AP) — A new video game based on Syria‘s civil war challenges players to make the hard choices facing the country’s rebels. Is it better to negotiate peace with the regime of President Bashar Assad, for example, or dispatch jihadist fighters to kill pro-government thugs?
The British designer of “Endgame: Syria” says he hopes the game will inform people who might otherwise remain ignorant about the conflict.
Views differ, however, on the appropriateness of using a video game to discuss a complex crisis that has killed more than 60,000 people since March 2011. Computer giant Apple has refused to distribute the game and some consider the mere idea insulting. Others love it, and one fan from inside Syria has suggested changes to make the game better mirror the actual war.
The dispute comes amid wider arguments about violent video games since last month’s shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that left 20 children and six adults dead. This week, the National Rifle Association revised the recommended age for a new shooting game after criticisms by liberal groups.
Tomas Rawlings, who designed the Syria game, said he got the idea while watching TV pundits debate the possible consequences of directly arming Syria’s rebels, which Western nations have declined to do. He said he thought a game could explore such questions by allowing players to make choices and see their consequences.
“For those who don’t want to read a newspaper but still care about the world, this is a way for them to find out about things,” said Rawlings, the design and production director of U.K.-based Auroch Digital.
In the simple game, which took about two weeks to build, the player assumes the role of the rebels seeking to topple Assad’s regime. The play alternates between political and military stages. In each stage, the player sees cards representing regime actions and must choose the rebel response.
The choices seek to mirror the real conflict. The regime may get declarations of support from Russia, China or Iran to boost its popularity while the rebels receive support from the United States, Turkey or Saudi Arabia – reflecting the foreign powers backing the two sides.
In battle, the regime may deploy conventional military forces like infantry, tanks and artillery as well as pro-government thugs known as shabiha. The rebels’ choices include sympathetic Palestinian or Kurdish militias, assassins or jihadist fighters known as muhajideen.
Some of the rebels’ strongest attacks also kill civilians, reducing rebel popularity and seeking to reflect the war’s complexity.
All along, the player is given basic information about the conflict, learning that Islamists once persecuted by the regime now consider the fight a holy war and that the shabiha are accused of massacring civilians.
The game ends when one side loses its support or the sides agree to a peace deal. The player is then told what follows. The longer the fighting lasts, the worse the aftermath, as chaos, sectarian conflict and Islamic militancy spread.
The lasting impression is that no matter which side wins, Syria loses.
Rawlings said that’s the game’s point.
“You can win the battle militarily but still lose the peace because the cost of winning militarily has fractured the country so much that the war keeps going,” he said. “You can also end the war so that there is less of that.”
The game was released on the company’s website and as a free download from Google for Android devices on December 12. Rawlings submitted the game to Apple to distribute via its App Store but the company rejected it.
Apple declined to comment, but Rawlings’s rejection referred to a company guideline for mobile apps: ” ‘Enemies’ within the context of a game cannot solely target a specific race, culture, a real government or corporation, or any other real entity.”
Rawlings is modifying the game, though he worries it will weaken it.
“It will still be the same overall experience, but it will reduce the value of the game to inform people,” he said.
News of the game was greeted with a mix of interest and outrage online. Some complained that players can’t take the regime side, while others found it wrong to make a game about a brutal war.
“Rawlings has mistakenly understood the Syrian war as a nonchalant ‘experience’ that people can play while waiting for the train to work,” said Samar Aburahma, a university student of Palestinian descent in San Francisco who refused to try the game. “It is beyond insulting to Syrians, especially given the fact that war is ongoing.”
Others find it a valuable, if limited, approach to the conflict.
Andrea Stanton, a religious studies professor at the University of Denver who studies Syria, said she responded emotionally to the game.
“It isn’t really a fun game to play,” she said, noting that she was angry when she lost and felt dread when the frequency of deadly regime airstrikes went up as the game progressed – as it has in the real conflict.
“This a very sobering game in that you sense how quickly the military stakes escalate and how little the political phase has to do with actual Syrians,” she said.
She is organizing a campus activity for students to play and discuss the game.
“I think it is very valuable for teaching and getting people to experience a sense of the limited options the rebels face,” she said.
It is unclear how many people have played the game. Google says it has been downloaded as many as 5,000 times from its site, and Rawlings says more have played online. He guesses more than 10,000 people have tried it.
Few in Syria are likely to have played it, since fighting has made the Internet and even electricity rare in some parts of the country.
One 18-year-old Syrian gamer liked the game so much, however, that he sent Rawlings a list of suggestions for improvement.
Reached via Skype, he said the jihadist fighters should be called Jabhat al-Nusra, after an extremist rebel group that the U.S. has designated as a terrorist organization.
He also pointed out that few rebel groups have tanks, as they do in the game, and suggested new rebel tactics.
“Car bombs are used lots in Syria, so that would make the game more realistic,” he said.
He said he hoped the game would help people understand the situation.
“I wish there were a 3D strategy game about Syria so you could feel the destruction on the ground,” he said.
The player, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said his feelings playing the game often mirror his feelings about the war. He wants peace but can’t imagine the rebels accepting a negotiated solution given how many people have died.
“Right this second, I want the war in Syria to stop, but when you see what is happening on the ground there is no way to make peace,” he said. “When I play the game like a rebel, I have to reject the peace.”
___
Associated Press writer Michael Liedtke contributed reporting.
Online: http://gamethenews.net/index.php/endgame-syria/
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See Personal Pics of Rosie O'Donnell's Daughter Dakota
Label: LifestyleAfter welcoming her fifth child, the comedian gives fans an intimate glimpse into her mommy joy in a series of personal photos
Credit: Courtesy of Rosie O'Donnell
Updated: Thursday Jan 17, 2013 | 12:00 PM EST
By: Shanelle Rein-Olowokere
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Will Obama's order lead to surge in gun research?
Label: HealthMILWAUKEE (AP) — Nearly as many Americans die from guns as from car crashes each year. We know plenty about the second problem and far less about the first. A scarcity of research on how to prevent gun violence has left policymakers shooting in the dark as they craft gun control measures without much evidence of what works.
That could change with President Barack Obama's order Wednesday to ease research restrictions pushed through long ago by the gun lobby. The White House declared that a 1996 law banning use of money to "advocate or promote gun control" should not keep the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal agencies from doing any work on the topic.
Obama can only do so much, though. Several experts say Congress will have to be on board before anything much changes, especially when it comes to spending money.
How severely have the restrictions affected the CDC?
Its website's A-to-Z list of health topics, which includes such obscure ones as Rift Valley fever, does not include guns or firearms. Searching the site for "guns" brings up dozens of reports on nail gun and BB gun injuries.
The restrictions have done damage "without a doubt" and the CDC has been "overly cautious" about interpreting them, said Daniel Webster, director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
"The law is so vague it puts a virtual freeze on gun violence research," said a statement from Michael Halpern of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "It's like censorship: When people don't know what's prohibited, they assume everything is prohibited."
Many have called for a public health approach to gun violence like the highway safety measures, product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car crashes decades ago even as the number of vehicles on the road rose.
"The answer wasn't taking away cars," said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.
However, while much is known about vehicles and victims in crashes, similar details are lacking about gun violence.
Some unknowns:
—How many people own firearms in various cities and what types.
—What states have the highest proportion of gun ownership.
—Whether gun ownership correlates with homicide rates in a city.
—How many guns used in homicides were bought legally.
—Where juveniles involved in gun fatalities got their weapons.
—What factors contribute to mass shootings like the Newtown, Conn., one that killed 26 people at a school.
"If an airplane crashed today with 20 children and 6 adults there would be a full-scale investigation of the causes and it would be linked to previous research," said Dr. Stephen Hargarten, director of the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin.
"There's no such system that's comparable to that" for gun violence, he said.
One reason is changes pushed by the National Rifle Association and its allies in 1996, a few years after a major study showed that people who lived in homes with firearms were more likely to be homicide or suicide victims. A rule tacked onto appropriations for the Department of Health and Human Services barred use of funds for "the advocacy or promotion of gun control."
Also, at the gun group's urging, U.S. Rep. Jay Dickey, a Republican from Arkansas, led an effort to remove $2.6 million from the CDC's injury prevention center, which had led most of the research on guns. The money was later restored but earmarked for brain injury research.
"What the NRA did was basically terrorize the research community and terrorize the CDC," said Dr. Mark Rosenberg, who headed the CDC's injury center at the time. "They went after the researchers, they went after institutions, they went after CDC in a very big way, and they went after me," he said. "They didn't want the data to be collected because they were threatened by what the data were showing."
Dickey, who is now retired, said Wednesday that his real concern was the researcher who led that gun ownership study, who Dickey described as being "in his own kingdom or fiefdom" and believing guns are bad.
He and Rosenberg said they have modified their views over time and now both agree that research is needed. They put out a joint statement Wednesday urging research that prevents firearm injuries while also protecting the rights "of legitimate gun owners."
"We ought to research the whole environment, both sides — what the benefits of having guns are and what are the benefits of not having guns," Dickey said. "We should study any part of this problem," including whether armed guards at schools would help, as the National Rifle Association has suggested.
Association officials did not respond to requests for comment. A statement Wednesday said the group "has led efforts to promote safety and responsible gun ownership" and that "attacking firearms" is not the answer. It said nothing about research.
The 1996 law "had a chilling effect. It basically brought the field of firearm-related research to a screeching halt," said Benjamin of the Public Health Association.
Webster said researchers like him had to "partition" themselves so whatever small money they received from the CDC was not used for anything that could be construed as gun policy. One example was a grant he received to evaluate a community-based program to reduce street gun violence in Baltimore, modeled after a successful program in Chicago called CeaseFire. He had to make sure the work included nothing that could be interpreted as gun control research, even though other privately funded research might.
Private funds from foundations have come nowhere near to filling the gap from lack of federal funding, Hargarten said. He and more than 100 other doctors and scientists recently sent Vice President Joe Biden a letter urging more research, saying the lack of it was compounding "the tragedy of gun violence."
Since 1973, the government has awarded 89 grants to study rabies, of which there were 65 cases; 212 grants for cholera, with 400 cases, yet only three grants for firearm injuries that topped 3 million, they wrote. The CDC spends just about $100,000 a year out of its multibillion-dollar budget on firearm-related research, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has said.
"It's so out of proportion to the burden, however you measure it," said Dr. Matthew Miller, associate professor of health policy at the Harvard School of Public Health. As a result, "we don't know really simple things," such as whether tighter gun rules in New York will curb gun trafficking "or is some other pipeline going to open up" in another state, he said.
What now?
CDC officials refused to discuss the topic on the record — a possible sign of how gun shy of the issue the agency has been even after the president's order.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement that her agency is "committed to re-engaging gun violence research."
Others are more cautious. The Union of Concerned Scientists said the White House's view that the law does not ban gun research is helpful, but not enough to clarify the situation for scientists, and that congressional action is needed.
Dickey, the former congressman, agreed.
"Congress is supposed to do that. He's not supposed to do that," Dickey said of Obama's order. "The restrictions were placed there by Congress.
"What I was hoping for ... is 'let's do this together,'" Dickey said.
___
Follow Marilynn Marchione's coverage at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP
Housing, job data push S&P to five-year high; Intel down late
Label: BusinessNEW YORK (Reuters) - Stronger-than-expected data on housing starts and jobless claims lit a fire under stocks on Thursday, pushing the S&P 500 to a five-year high and its third day of gains.
A pair of economic reports lifted investors' sentiment. The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell to a five-year low last week and housing starts jumped last month to the highest since June 2008.
Strength in the housing and labor markets is key to sustained growth and higher corporate profits, helping to bring out buyers even on a day when earnings reports were mixed.
Gains were tempered by weakness in the financial sector, with Bank of America
In other negative earnings news, shares of chipmaker Intel
The S&P 500 ended at its highest since December 2007 and now sits just 5.6 percent from its all-time closing high of 1,565.15.
"Having consolidated really for the last two weeks, the fact that we broke out, I think that that is sucking in quite a bit of money," said James Dailey, portfolio manager of TEAM Asset Strategy Fund in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 84.79 points, or 0.63 percent, at 13,596.02. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 8.31 points, or 0.56 percent, at 1,480.94. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 18.46 points, or 0.59 percent, at 3,136.00.
Better-than-expected earnings and revenue reported by online marketplace eBay
In the housing sector, PulteGroup Inc
Semiconductor shares <.sox> rose 2 percent to the highest close in eight months.
Financials were the only S&P 500 sector to register a slight decline for the day.
Bank of America's fourth-quarter profit fell as it took more charges to clean up mortgage-related problems. Citigroup posted $2.32 billion of charges for layoffs and lawsuits.
Energy shares led gains on the Dow as U.S. crude oil prices jumped more than 1 percent. Shares of Exxon Mobil
S&P 500 earnings are expected to have risen 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, Thomson Reuters data showed. Expectations for the quarter have fallen considerably since October when a 9.9 percent gain was estimated.
Volume was roughly 6.5 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.
Advancers outpaced decliners on the NYSE by about 22 to 7 and on the Nasdaq by about 2 to 1.
(Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)
The Lede Blog: Live Updates on Armstrong's Oprah Interview
Label: WorldThe Lede is rounding up online reaction to Lance Armstrong’s interview with Oprah Winfrey on Thursday night in real-time, with additional fact-checking and context provided by Juliet Macur and Sarah Lyall. The broadcast begins at 9 p.m. Eastern Time and will be streamed live on the Oprah Winfrey Network’s Web site.
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BlackBerry maker plans local skate, publicity in Waterloo to celebrate new phone
Label: TechnologyWATERLOO, Ont. – Call it BlackBerry Town, even if the name isn’t official.
In the lead up to the BlackBerry smartphone unveiling later this month, creator Research In Motion is turning its Waterloo, Ont., home base into a celebration of the device.
The company plans to decorate light poles in areas of Waterloo and neighbouring Kitchener with banners that promote its latest smartphone and thank the community for its support.
City councillors in Kitchener voted earlier this week to make an exception to rules that prevent corporations from using public property to advertise.
RIM says it is making plans for other events as well.
The company will hold skating rink parties at Kitchener City Hall and in Waterloo Town Square on Jan. 30 to coincide with the unveiling of its new BlackBerry devices.
Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News
Baby Boy on the Way for Kara DioGuardi
Label: Lifestyle
Mom & Babies
Celebrity Baby Blog
01/16/2013 at 08:15 PM ET
Cindy Ord/Getty
Kara DioGuardi is going to be a mom!
The Grammy-nominated songwriter, who also served as a judge on American Idol‘s eighth and ninth seasons, confirms to PEOPLE exclusively that she and husband Mike McCuddy will welcome their first child via gestational surrogate in the coming weeks.
“We are eagerly awaiting the healthy and happy birth of our son Greyson James Carroll McCuddy,” DioGuardi, 42, tells PEOPLE.
After years of struggling with fertility issues and multiple failed IVF attempts, the couple, who wed in 2009, decided to explore other paths to parenthood — including adoption and surrogacy.
In the end, says DioGuardi, “We made a personal decision to try with a surrogate. I asked someone we knew, a friend. And on the first try, it worked.”
“We’re praying for our surrogate, that she gets through this and that it’s as easy on her as it can possibly be, because she’s been a gem throughout the whole process,” says the songwriter and music publisher.
“I’ve got two people on my mind: her and the baby. She’s given us this incredible gift.”
– Marisa Laudadio
Large study confirms flu vaccine safe in pregnancy
Label: HealthNEW YORK (AP) — A large study offers reassuring news for pregnant women: It's safe to get a flu shot.
The research found no evidence that the vaccine increases the risk of losing a fetus, and may prevent some deaths. Getting the flu while pregnant makes fetal death more likely, the Norwegian research showed.
The flu vaccine has long been considered safe for pregnant women and their fetus. U.S. health officials began recommending flu shots for them more than five decades ago, following a higher death rate in pregnant women during a flu pandemic in the late 1950s.
But the study is perhaps the largest look at the safety and value of flu vaccination during pregnancy, experts say.
"This is the kind of information we need to provide our patients when discussing that flu vaccine is important for everyone, particularly for pregnant women," said Dr. Geeta Swamy, a researcher who studies vaccines and pregnant women at Duke University Medical Center.
The study was released by the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday as the United States and Europe suffer through an early and intense flu season. A U.S. obstetricians group this week reminded members that it's not too late for their pregnant patients to get vaccinated.
The new study was led by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. It tracked pregnancies in Norway in 2009 and 2010 during an international epidemic of a new swine flu strain.
Before 2009, pregnant women in Norway were not routinely advised to get flu shots. But during the pandemic, vaccinations against the new strain were recommended for those in their second or third trimester.
The study focused on more than 113,000 pregnancies. Of those, 492 ended in the death of the fetus. The researchers calculated that the risk of fetal death was nearly twice as high for women who weren't vaccinated as it was in vaccinated mothers.
U.S. flu vaccination rates for pregnant women grew in the wake of the 2009 swine flu pandemic, from less than 15 percent to about 50 percent. But health officials say those rates need to be higher to protect newborns as well. Infants can't be vaccinated until 6 months, but studies have shown they pick up some protection if their mothers got the annual shot, experts say.
Because some drugs and vaccines can be harmful to a fetus, there is a long-standing concern about giving any medicine to a pregnant woman, experts acknowledged. But this study should ease any worries about the flu shot, said Dr. Denise Jamieson of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"The vaccine is safe," she said.
___
Online:
Medical journal: http://www.nejm.org
S&P 500 ends flat as bank profits temper growth concerns
Label: BusinessNEW YORK (Reuters) - The S&P 500 ended nearly flat on Wednesday as solid earnings from two major banks and a bounceback in Apple shares offset concerns about a lower forecast for global growth in 2013.
Shares of Goldman Sachs
JPMorgan shares rose 1 percent to $46.82, while Goldman climbed 4.1 percent to $141.09.
They were among the first big banks to report results and helped to lift estimates for S&P 500 corporate earnings slightly, to a 2.2 percent gain, Thomson Reuters data showed.
"Pretty solid numbers from both JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs are putting a lot of momentum behind the financials, with a lot more names to report this week. But I think that's helping to put a better bid to the market overall," said Michael James, senior trader at Wedbush Morgan in Los Angeles.
Apple rebounded after three days of losses, helping the Nasdaq outperform the S&P 500 and Dow. Apple rose 4.2 percent to $506.09. It closed below $500 on Tuesday for the first time since February.
"There could not have been more negativity around Apple going into today. So was it due for an oversold bounce on a trading basis? Absolutely," James said.
A slow economic recovery in developed nations is holding back the global economy, the World Bank said on Tuesday, as it sharply scaled back its forecast for world growth in 2013 to 2.4 percent from an earlier forecast of 3.0 percent.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 23.66 points, or 0.17 percent, at 13,511.23. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 0.29 points, or 0.02 percent, at 1,472.63. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 6.77 points, or 0.22 percent, at 3,117.54.
The biggest drag on the Dow was Boeing
After the bell, shares of eBay
Earlier in the day, U.S. economic data showed consumer prices were flat in December, pointing to muted inflation pressures that should give the Federal Reserve room to prop up the economy by staying on its ultra-easy monetary policy path.
Other data showed U.S. homebuilder confidence in the market for single family homes held steady near seven year highs in January, suggesting the outlook for the housing market remained upbeat.
Volume was roughly 5.6 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.
Decliners outpaced advancers on the NYSE by nearly 8 to 7 and on the Nasdaq by almost 7 to 5.
(Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Kenneth Barry)
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