Most Americans don't think it's OK to cheat on taxes.
By Allison Linn, TODAY
Americans may make plenty of jokes about cheating on their taxes, but a new survey finds that in reality most don?t think it?s OK to rob the tax man. Or at least, that?s what they?re telling the IRS Oversight Board.
The?2012 Taxpayer Attitude Survey, released Tuesday by the independent oversight board, finds that 87 percent of Americans don?t think it?s OK to cheat on your taxes. That?s a 3 percentage point increase from last year.
Only 11 percent think it?s OK to cheat, either a little or as much as possible.
Perhaps more surprising, 95 percent of Americans said their personal integrity influences them to report their taxes honestly, an 8 percentage point increase from five years earlier.
About 63 percent said they are influenced by fear of an audit, while 70 percent are motivated by third-party information that could show them to be a tax cheat.
The IRS Oversight Board, an independent body created by Congress in 1998 to oversee the Internal Revenue Service?s actions, completed its annual survey of 1,500 Americans last August and September. The survey has a 3.1 percent margin of error.
If they?re going to pay their taxes honestly, most Americans seem to think everyone else should, too.
The survey found that more than 90 percent of Americans think it?s important that the IRS ensures that low- and high-income taxpayers, small businesses and corporations honestly pay their taxes, too.
Those results appear to show that Americans have come to feel more strongly in recent years that everyone should pay their fair share of taxes, and the IRS should vigorously enforce tax laws.
The results come as many Americans are either getting ready to file their 2012 income tax returns, or already have done so.
They also follow a bruising battle in Washington over the so-called fiscal cliff, a series of tax hikes and spending cuts that were scheduled to take effect until Congress reached a last-minute deal.
The fiscal cliff agreement raised taxes for wealthy Americans earning $400,000 or more and allowed taxes on capital gains and dividends to go up. It also ended a payroll tax holiday, meaning that most Americans are seeing more of their paycheck going to the tax man for Social Security and other entitlements this year.
ALMATY (Reuters) - Iran said nuclear talks with world powers were a "positive step", after two days of negotiations that ended in Almaty on Wednesday.
In a statement after the February 26-27 talks, Iran said expert level talks between the two sides would be held in Istanbul on March 18 and another round of political negotiations on April 5-6.
Iran's chief nuclear negotiator suggested Iran could discuss its production of nuclear fuel enriched to a fissile concentration of 20 percent - which greatly worries the West - but appeared to rule out closing the underground Fordow enrichment plant.
Saeed Jalili said the six powers - the United States, France, Germany, Britain, Russia and China - at Almaty had tried to "get closer to our viewpoint", which he said was positive.
The Iranian statement said: "We consider these talks a positive step which could be completed by taking a positive and constructive approach and taking reciprocal steps."
(Reporting by Justyna Pawlak, Fredrik Dahl, Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Alison Williams)
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Wal-Mart is putting special labels on some store-brand products to help shoppers quickly spot healthier items. Millions of schoolchildren are helping themselves to vegetables from salad bars in their lunchrooms, while kids' meals at Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants automatically come with a side of fruit or vegetables and a glass of low-fat milk.
The changes put in place by the food industry are in response to the campaign against childhood obesity that Michelle Obama began waging three years ago. More changes are in store.
Influencing policy posed more of a challenge for the first lady, and not everyone welcomed her effort, criticizing it as a case of unwanted government intrusion.
Still, nutrition advocates and others give her credit for using her clout to help bring a range of interests to the table. They hope the increased awareness she has generated through speeches, her garden and her physical exploits will translate into further reductions in childhood obesity rates long after she leaves the White House.
About one-third of U.S. children are overweight or obese, which puts them at increased risk for any number of life-threatening illnesses, including diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease.
While there is evidence of modest declines in childhood obesity rates in some parts of the country, the changes are due largely to steps taken before the first lady launched "Let's Move" in February 2010.
With the program entering its fourth year, Mrs. Obama heads out Wednesday on a two-day promotional tour with stops in Mississippi, Illinois and Missouri. She has been talking up the program on daytime and late-night TV shows, on the radio and in public service announcements with Big Bird. She also plans discussions next week on Google and Twitter.
"We're starting to see some shifts in the trend lines and the data where we're starting to show some improvement," the first lady told SiriusXM host B. Smith in an interview broadcast Tuesday. "We've been spending a lot of time educating and re-educating families and kids on how to eat, what to eat, how much exercise to get and how to do it in a way that doesn't completely disrupt someone's life."
Larry Soler, president and chief executive of the Partnership for a Healthier America, said Mrs. Obama has "been the leader in making the case for the time is now in childhood obesity and everyone has a role to play in overcoming the problem." The nonpartisan, nonprofit partnership was created as part of "Let's Move" to work with the private sector and to hold companies accountable for changes they promised to make.
Conservatives accused Mrs. Obama of going too far and dictating what people should ? and shouldn't ? eat after she played a major behind-the-scenes role in the passage in 2010 of a child nutrition law that required schools to make foods healthier. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican Party's vice presidential nominee in 2008, once brought cookies to a school and called the first lady's efforts a "nanny state run amok."
Other leaders in the effort, such as New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, have felt the backlash, too. Last fall, Bloomberg helped enact the nation's first rule barring restaurants, cafeterias and concession stands from selling soda and other high-calorie drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces.
Despite the criticism, broad public support exists for some of the changes the first lady and the mayor are advocating, according to a recent Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll.
More than eight in 10 of those surveyed, 84 percent, support requiring more physical activity in schools, and 83 percent favor government providing people with nutritional guidelines and information about diet and exercise. Seventy percent favor having restaurants put calorie counts on menus, and 75 percent consider overweightness and obesity a serious problem in this country, according to the Nov. 21-Dec. 14 survey by telephone of 1,011 adults.
Food industry representatives say Mrs. Obama has influenced their own efforts.
Mary Sophos of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which represents the country's largest food companies, including General Mills and Kellogg's, said an industry effort to label the fronts of food packages with nutritional content gained momentum after Mrs. Obama, a mother of two, attended one of their meetings in 2010 and encouraged them to do more.
"She's not trying to point fingers," Sophos said. "She's trying to get people to focus on solutions."
A move by the companies signaling willingness to work with Mrs. Obama appears to have paid off as the Obama administration eased off some of the fights it appeared ready to pick four years ago.
The Food and Drug Administration has stalled its push to mandate labeling on the front of food packages, saying it is monitoring the industry's own effort. A rule that would require calorie counts on menus has been delayed as the FDA tries to figure out whom to apply it to. Supermarkets, movie theaters and other retailers have been lobbying to be exempted.
The industry also appears to have successfully warded off a move by the Federal Trade Commission to put in place voluntary guidelines for advertising junk food to kids. Directed by Congress, the guidelines would have discouraged the marketing of certain foods that didn't meet government-devised nutritional requirements. The administration released draft guidelines in 2011 but didn't follow up after the industry said they went too far and angry House Republicans summoned an agency official to Capitol Hill to defend them.
Besides labeling its store brands, Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, also pledged to cut sodium and added sugars by 25 percent and 10 percent, respectively, by 2015, and remove industrially produced trans fats.
Leslie Dach, an executive vice president, said sodium in packaged bread has been cut by 13 percent, and added sugar in refrigerated flavored milk, popular among kids, has been cut by more than 17 percent. He said Wal-Mart shoppers have told the company that eating healthier is important to them. Giving customers what they want is also good for business.
New York reported a 5.5 percent decline in obesity rates in kindergarteners through eighth-graders between the 2006-07 and 2010-11 school years, according a report last fall by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which studies health policy. In Philadelphia, the decline was 4.7 percent among students in grades K-12 between the 2006-07 and 2009-10 school years, the foundation said.
Declines also were reported in California and in Mississippi, where Mrs. Obama stops Wednesday.
In Philadelphia, an organization called the Food Trust has worked since 1992 to help corner stores offer fresh foods, connect schools with local farms, bring supermarkets to underserved areas and ensure that farmers' markets accept food stamps, according to Robert Wood Johnson.
New York City requires chain restaurants to post calorie information on menus. Licensed day care centers also must offer daily physical activity, limit the amount of time children spend in front of TV and computer screens, and set nutrition standards.
Both cities also made changes to improve the quality of foods and beverages available to students in public schools.
___
Online:
Let's Move: http://www.letsmove.gov
___
Follow Darlene Superville and Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap and http://www.twitter.com/mcjalonick
U-M study challenges notion of using Herceptin only for HER2-positive breast cancerPublic release date: 26-Feb-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nicole Fawcett nfawcett@umich.edu 734-764-2220 University of Michigan Health System
Breast cancer stem cells express HER2, even in 'negative' tumors, study finds
ANN ARBOR, Mich. New research from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center finds that the protein HER2 plays a role even in breast cancers that would traditionally be categorized as HER2-negative and that the drug Herceptin, which targets HER2, may have an even greater role for treating breast cancer and preventing its spread.
About 20 percent of women with breast cancer have tumors labeled HER2-positive. And since the drug Herceptin has come on the scene, it has had a tremendous impact on survival for these women, particularly when it is given in the adjuvant setting, after surgery to remove the primary cancer. The new findings have potential implications for an additional 65 percent of women with breast cancer.
A recent study based on new analyses of old data found some tumors were incorrectly categorized as HER2-positive and as a result those women received adjuvant Herceptin. It turns out, they benefited as much from the treatment as woman with actual HER2-positive cancer.
"We now provide a molecular explanation for the surprising finding that adjuvant Herceptin benefited some women with HER2-negative breast cancer. If this is confirmed in clinical trials, it could alter our approach to breast cancer treatment," says study author Max S. Wicha, M.D., distinguished professor of oncology and director of the U-M Comprehensive Cancer Center.
At this point, patients with HER2-negative breast cancer are not advised to take Herceptin.
The explanation is that HER2 is selectively expressed in the cancer stem cells of many HER2-negative breast tumors. Because the stem cells represent such a small number of cells in a tumor, the amount of HER2 is not high enough to meet the threshold for a HER2-positive cancer.
The researchers had previously shown HER2 plays an important role in cancer stem cells the small number of cells in a tumor that fuel its growth and spread. These cells represent 1 percent to 5 percent of all the cells in a tumor. They are resistant to current chemotherapy and radiation treatments but since they express HER2, they are effectively targeted by Herceptin.
Further, the researchers in this new study found that for tumors classified as HER2-negative, HER2 levels were higher in bone metastases compared to the primary breast tumor. Bone is the most frequent site to which breast cancer spreads.
The researchers administered Herceptin to mice with these bone lesions and found that it was most effective when given early, when tumors were small or mere "micrometastases." In these cases, Herceptin almost completely blocked the tumors from growing. When the drug was given later, after tumors were established, it had little effect.
"We have shown that the bone microenvironment induces HER2 expression in these tumors. If Herceptin can target bone micrometastases, then administering it to patients before metastases develop could help reduce tumor recurrence," says study author Hasan Korkaya, Ph.D., research assistant professor of internal medicine at the U-M Medical School.
The implications of this finding are that we need cancer treatments that target the small number of cancer stem cells in addition to traditional chemotherapies that eliminate the bulk tumor cells. This means that merely looking at whether a tumor shrinks is not good enough to determine whether the treatment will have long term benefit.
"This work has very significant implications for how we have developed adjuvant therapies. The idea of using drugs that cause tumors to shrink, which has been the accepted paradigm for developing therapies, is flawed. Our work suggests that adjuvant therapies will need to target the cancer stem cell population. Eliminating cancer stem cells by effective adjuvant therapies should prevent tumor recurrence, ultimately resulting in more cures," Wicha says.
###
A large randomized clinical trial sponsored by the National Institutes of Health is currently open at U-M and other sites across the country to address this question. Patients whose tumors are not considered HER2-positive by classic testing should not receive Herceptin outside of this trial. For information about the trial, call the U-M Cancer AnswerLine at 800-865-1125.
Additional authors: Suthinee Ithimakin, Kathleen C. Day, Fayaz Malik, Qin Zen, Scott J. Dawsey, Tom F. Bersano-Begey, Ahmed A. Quraishi, Kathleen Woods Ignatoski, Stephanie Daignault, April Davis, Christopher L. Hall, Nallasivam Palanisamy, Amber N. Heath, Nader Tawakkol, Tahra K. Luther, Shawn G. Clouthier, Whitney A. Chadwick, Mark L. Day, Celina G. Kleer, Dafydd G. Thomas, Daniel F. Hayes
Funding: National Cancer Institute grants CA129765 and CA101860; Breast Cancer Research Foundation; Komen for the Cure; Taubman Institute at the University of Michigan; Fashion Footwear Charitable Foundation of New York/QVC Presents Shoes-On-Sale; Stand Up to Cancer grant SU2C-AACR DT0409
Disclosure: Max Wicha has financial holdings in OncoMed Pharmaceuticals, receives support from Dompe and MedImmune and serves on the scientific advisory board of Veristem; Hasan Korkaya receives research support from MedImmune; Daniel Hayes has received research support from Pfizer, Novartis and Veridex and holds stock options for his role on the scientific advisory board for OncImmune.
Reference:Cancer Research, published online Feb. 26, 2013
Resources:
U-M Cancer AnswerLine, 800-865-1125
U-M Comprehensive Cancer Center, www.mcancer.org
Clinical trials at U-M, www.UMClinicalStudies.org/cancer
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
U-M study challenges notion of using Herceptin only for HER2-positive breast cancerPublic release date: 26-Feb-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nicole Fawcett nfawcett@umich.edu 734-764-2220 University of Michigan Health System
Breast cancer stem cells express HER2, even in 'negative' tumors, study finds
ANN ARBOR, Mich. New research from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center finds that the protein HER2 plays a role even in breast cancers that would traditionally be categorized as HER2-negative and that the drug Herceptin, which targets HER2, may have an even greater role for treating breast cancer and preventing its spread.
About 20 percent of women with breast cancer have tumors labeled HER2-positive. And since the drug Herceptin has come on the scene, it has had a tremendous impact on survival for these women, particularly when it is given in the adjuvant setting, after surgery to remove the primary cancer. The new findings have potential implications for an additional 65 percent of women with breast cancer.
A recent study based on new analyses of old data found some tumors were incorrectly categorized as HER2-positive and as a result those women received adjuvant Herceptin. It turns out, they benefited as much from the treatment as woman with actual HER2-positive cancer.
"We now provide a molecular explanation for the surprising finding that adjuvant Herceptin benefited some women with HER2-negative breast cancer. If this is confirmed in clinical trials, it could alter our approach to breast cancer treatment," says study author Max S. Wicha, M.D., distinguished professor of oncology and director of the U-M Comprehensive Cancer Center.
At this point, patients with HER2-negative breast cancer are not advised to take Herceptin.
The explanation is that HER2 is selectively expressed in the cancer stem cells of many HER2-negative breast tumors. Because the stem cells represent such a small number of cells in a tumor, the amount of HER2 is not high enough to meet the threshold for a HER2-positive cancer.
The researchers had previously shown HER2 plays an important role in cancer stem cells the small number of cells in a tumor that fuel its growth and spread. These cells represent 1 percent to 5 percent of all the cells in a tumor. They are resistant to current chemotherapy and radiation treatments but since they express HER2, they are effectively targeted by Herceptin.
Further, the researchers in this new study found that for tumors classified as HER2-negative, HER2 levels were higher in bone metastases compared to the primary breast tumor. Bone is the most frequent site to which breast cancer spreads.
The researchers administered Herceptin to mice with these bone lesions and found that it was most effective when given early, when tumors were small or mere "micrometastases." In these cases, Herceptin almost completely blocked the tumors from growing. When the drug was given later, after tumors were established, it had little effect.
"We have shown that the bone microenvironment induces HER2 expression in these tumors. If Herceptin can target bone micrometastases, then administering it to patients before metastases develop could help reduce tumor recurrence," says study author Hasan Korkaya, Ph.D., research assistant professor of internal medicine at the U-M Medical School.
The implications of this finding are that we need cancer treatments that target the small number of cancer stem cells in addition to traditional chemotherapies that eliminate the bulk tumor cells. This means that merely looking at whether a tumor shrinks is not good enough to determine whether the treatment will have long term benefit.
"This work has very significant implications for how we have developed adjuvant therapies. The idea of using drugs that cause tumors to shrink, which has been the accepted paradigm for developing therapies, is flawed. Our work suggests that adjuvant therapies will need to target the cancer stem cell population. Eliminating cancer stem cells by effective adjuvant therapies should prevent tumor recurrence, ultimately resulting in more cures," Wicha says.
###
A large randomized clinical trial sponsored by the National Institutes of Health is currently open at U-M and other sites across the country to address this question. Patients whose tumors are not considered HER2-positive by classic testing should not receive Herceptin outside of this trial. For information about the trial, call the U-M Cancer AnswerLine at 800-865-1125.
Additional authors: Suthinee Ithimakin, Kathleen C. Day, Fayaz Malik, Qin Zen, Scott J. Dawsey, Tom F. Bersano-Begey, Ahmed A. Quraishi, Kathleen Woods Ignatoski, Stephanie Daignault, April Davis, Christopher L. Hall, Nallasivam Palanisamy, Amber N. Heath, Nader Tawakkol, Tahra K. Luther, Shawn G. Clouthier, Whitney A. Chadwick, Mark L. Day, Celina G. Kleer, Dafydd G. Thomas, Daniel F. Hayes
Funding: National Cancer Institute grants CA129765 and CA101860; Breast Cancer Research Foundation; Komen for the Cure; Taubman Institute at the University of Michigan; Fashion Footwear Charitable Foundation of New York/QVC Presents Shoes-On-Sale; Stand Up to Cancer grant SU2C-AACR DT0409
Disclosure: Max Wicha has financial holdings in OncoMed Pharmaceuticals, receives support from Dompe and MedImmune and serves on the scientific advisory board of Veristem; Hasan Korkaya receives research support from MedImmune; Daniel Hayes has received research support from Pfizer, Novartis and Veridex and holds stock options for his role on the scientific advisory board for OncImmune.
Reference:Cancer Research, published online Feb. 26, 2013
Resources:
U-M Cancer AnswerLine, 800-865-1125
U-M Comprehensive Cancer Center, www.mcancer.org
Clinical trials at U-M, www.UMClinicalStudies.org/cancer
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
In May of 2006, Apple released the first ad in its "Get a Mac" campaign.
Over the next three years, it would put out 66 installments of "Get a Mac," featuring Justin Long as a hipster Mac and John Hodgman as a stodgy Windows-based PC. It propelled Apple's Mac sales, and launched the careers of Hodgman and Long.
They were clever, and at times unfair, attacks on Microsoft and its users. They worked for Apple.
Since retiring the ad series, Apple hasn't come up with anything nearly as clever.
Instead, ads focus on Apple's products. This is a decent strategy since it makes great products like the iPhone and iPad.
The iPad in particular was a totally new product so Apple had to explain it to people in a simple way. Until Apple explained why we needed iPads, we didn't know why we needed iPads. You can see Microsoft not explaining why anyone needs a Surface and you can see how that's working out.
However, while Apple does product-focused advertising, its biggest hardware rival ? Samsung ? has stolen another page from Apple's playbook creating clever ads featuring people teasing Apple.
In November 2011, Samsung started running ads mocking Apple's users. This was a high risk maneuver. Lots of companies have tried to make fun of Apple users. None had succeeded.
But Samsung's ads were funny and well done. They also benefitted from good timing. Apple was moving from righteous underdog to the world's most valuable company. It's hard to be hip and cool when you're the biggest company in the world.
"Samsung has been scoring points with its people-based ads ? most of which play off some growing negative perceptions about Apple," wrote Ken Segall, a former ad man who developed Apple's "Think Different" campaign with Steve Jobs.
Where Apple's lines to buy iPhones were once seen as the sign of a company with a loyal following, Samsung turned it into the sign that you're a sucker lining up for years-old features.
There's truth to the idea that Apple doesn't roll out the newest features on its phones. Despite its reputation for innovation, it can be a slow adopter. This is because it doesn't want to add features for the sake of adding features, it wants to only add features that work and improve the product from its perspective.
Regardless of Apple's reasoning for doing what it does, Samsung is successfully landing blows on Apple. As Segall says, "While you can still argue that Macs and i-devices have a ton of appeal, you can?t argue that Apple is still untouchable when it comes to advertising. The fact is, it is being touched ? often and effectively ? by none other than Samsung."
Samsung has reinforced the clever ads with a monster marketing budget hammering away its message about its phones.
The irony here is that Samsung is doing to Apple what it did to Microsoft from 2006 to 2009. It's creating a humorous caricature of the type of person that uses Apple products, then bashing it over our heads on TV.?
Apple is still selling a lot of iPhones, so it's not like the ads are killing the company. But, Microsoft still sold a lot of Windows-based computers when Apple did its "Get a Mac" campaign.
The damage to Apple isn't easily quantified but there's no denying that Samsung's ads are working, and Apple's brand is nowhere near as strong as it was two years ago.
Part of it is self-inflicted with stuff like Apple Maps. But when Apple makes a mistake like that, Samsung is waiting with the biggest, most expensive megaphone in the world, just waiting to draw attention to it. Just like Apple once did to Microsoft.
The economy is slowly hobbling back to health, but for many Americans the rainy day fund is still looking a little dry and the credit card bill is still looking a little scary.
About 24 percent of Americans have more credit card debt than emergency savings, according to an annual survey released Monday by the personal finance website Bankrate.com.
The survey found that only about 55 percent of Americans have more emergency savings than credit card debt. About 16 percent had none of each, and the rest either didn?t know or wouldn?t answer.
The results are little changed from the same survey Bankrate.com did in 2011 and 2012. The results suggests that, in general, people?s ability to save up for a rainy day and keep a handle on credit card debt hasn?t gotten much worse in recent years - but it hasn?t improved, either.
Greg McBride, senior financial analyst with Bankrate.com, said a big problem is that people?s wages have been pretty stagnant in recent years, even as expenses for things like food and health care have edged up.
?It just leaves less money that can be put toward debt repayment or emergency savings,? McBride said.
Americans appeared to have been sobered by the Great Recession, and some people were able to get a better handle on their credit card debt in the years that followed.
The total amount of revolving debt, which is made up mostly of credit card debt, fell between 2008 and 2010, according to the Federal Reserve. Since then, it has held relatively steady at around $850 billion, the Federal Reserve data shows.
But those aggregate numbers don?t? tell the whole story, said Lucia Dunn, economics professor at The Ohio State University.
Her research has shown that some people were able to pay off their credit card debt around the time of the Great Recession. But those who weren?t able to get control of their debt during that period are likely still struggling with it, she said.
?For those who were not able to pay off (their credit cards) and were still carrying a balance, that balance is still growing,? said Dunn, who was not involved in the Bankrate.com survey.
Dunn said her data also has shown that people continue to have elevated levels of stress about their debt, even though the recession has officially been over since June of 2009.
??We may be out of the recession, but debt?s still a looming problem for people,? she said.
The Bankrate.com data also showed that saving up enough money for an unexpected emergency remains a thorny problem.
Nearly 4 in 10 people said they were feeling less comfortable about their savings levels than a year ago, while nearly half were feeling about the same. Only 14 percent said they were feeling better about their savings levels.
They Bankrate.com survey was of a representative sample of about 1,000 adults, and it was conducted in early February.
McBride, from Bankrate.com, said many Americans may have the goal of increasing their savings but find that they have little left over after the bills are paid.
?I think that people care about it. I think most of it is just sort of the inability to make substantive progress,? he said.
Still, McBride said he wasn?t sure that Americans will improve their financial habits once the economy improves For many Americans, he noted, thriftiness has been forced on them because their credit lines have been cut, they?ve suffered a job loss or they?ve hit another financial brick wall.
As the economy starts to strengthen further, he expects Americans will be more likely to spend their extra cash rather than save it.
?At the point where incomes do start to grow, I don?t think it means that the savings rate?s going to go up,? he said. ?I think it means that consumer spending is going to go up.?
Are you comfortable with the amount of money you have saved for an emergency?
Let?s hope the Titanic II ship doesn't end up like the original.
The Australian billionaire Clive Palmer, who is financing plans for the replica luxury liner, unveiled blueprints for the ship that will be built in China with its maiden voyage in 2016 to chart the original course from Southampton, England, to New York City ? minus the iceberg.
Palmer said, ?The area [for] passengers will be authentic with the same design and facilities. But there will be modern things such as air conditioning and other features we are debating - such as internet on the ship.? 1920s-inspired costumes will even be provided. And, yes, enough life boats for everyone.
For "Titanic" fans (looking at you, pre-teen girls), the ship will be designed to make passengers feel like they?re extras in the movie. Minus the last part. (The real-life Titanic , like the one in the James Cameron film, sank en route to New York after hitting an iceberg on April 15, 1912.)
Palmer wouldn?t jinx the project, saying at a press conference, ?I'm not too superstitious ... Anything will sink if you put a hole in it. I think it would be very cavalier to say it.?
And passengers can rest easy: the Finnish shipbuilder behind the reconstruction says it will be the "safest cruise ship in the world. " What could possibly go wrong?
Twitter had some ideas. News of the Titanic II plans quickly caught the attention of the social media site, making the ship a trending topic. Comments included, from
Martin ?@MartinComedyy posted, ?Titanic II...is there going to be an Iceberg II??
Andy Lassner ?@andylassner added, ?Just heard about the billionaire who's building Titanic II that'll be ready in 2016. I'll be rushing to get my Hindenburg II done by 2015.?
Jared ?@ghero46 wrote, ?I've got this weird, sinking feeling about the Titanic II being built.?
Of course, a ship doesn?t have to actually sink to be the vacation from hell.
The Carnival cruise ship Triumph, a 14-story luxury liner carrying 4,200 passengers and crew, in February lost power to propulsion, refrigeration, generators, and yes, toilets, after a fire in the engine room turned a pleasure cruise into a five-day nightmare of spoiled food and non-working toilets.
A lawsuit filed on behalf of passenger Cassie Terry was described as ?the voyage of the damned,? adding that Terry ?was forced to subsist for days in a floating toilet, a floating Petri dish, a floating hell.?
FILE - In this Sunday, Jan. 6, 2008, file photo, Republican presidential hopeful former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaks with Chris Wallace on FOX News Sunday in Manchester, N.H. Wallace said on Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013, that he has landed the first post-election interview with Romney and his wife, Ann. The interview will air on his show next week (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)
FILE - In this Sunday, Jan. 6, 2008, file photo, Republican presidential hopeful former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaks with Chris Wallace on FOX News Sunday in Manchester, N.H. Wallace said on Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013, that he has landed the first post-election interview with Romney and his wife, Ann. The interview will air on his show next week (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)
NEW YORK (AP) ? Fox's Chris Wallace has landed the first postelection interview with defeated Republican nominee Mitt Romney and his wife, Ann.
Wallace said on "Fox News Sunday" that the interview will air on his show next week. Additional portions will be on Fox News Channel the next day. Wallace says he'll ask Romney how he has dealt with the defeat, what he plans to do and his thoughts about President Barack Obama's second-term agenda.
Fox News spokeswoman Ashley Nerz says the interview will be taped this week in southern California, where Romney has spent much of his time since the election.
Romney has also said he will speak March 15 to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, an annual event that draws leading Republican voices.
EUGENE, Ore. -- Johnathan Loyd's performance in a loss to California on Thursday was so dismal it spurred a late-night call of concern from his coach.
"I was worried about him," Oregon coach Dana Altman. "But he bounced back tough."
He certainly did.
Loyd had his best game of the season with 15 points and nine assists to lead No. 23 Oregon past Stanford 77-66 on Saturday, keeping the Ducks (22-6, 11-4 Pac-12) tied with No. 12 Arizona atop the league standings.
Carlos Emory led the Ducks with 19 points and Arsalan Kazemi had 15 as Altman got his 600th career win.
E.J. Singler added 12 points and Tony Woods had nine points and nine rebounds for Oregon.
"Lots of guys played well but Johnny was the guy who stirred the drink," Altman said.
Loyd, making his ninth start in place of injured point guard Dominic Artis, was 6 of 8 from the field for a season high in points and a career high in assists.
It was a much different performance than his 0-for-6, no-point effort in a 48-46 buzzer-beating loss to the Golden Bears.
"It felt great tonight," Loyd said. "I needed it. My teammates had faith in me. They kept telling me they believed in me so I just stepped up."
Dwight Powell led the Cardinal (16-12, 7-8) with 16 points and Josh Huestis had 12 points and 13 rebounds.
Oregon led 30-26 at halftime but outscored the Cardinal 11-4 early in the second half to go up 46-34 with 13:50 to play and Stanford never got closer than 10 points the rest of the way.
The Ducks shot a season-worst 27.6 percent against California on Thursday and it looked like things were on the same track when Damyean Dotson and Singler air-balled shot attempts in the opening minutes against the Cardinal.
But after falling behind 14-7, Oregon heated up.
The Ducks scored eight straight points, two on a short jumper from Loyd that put them up 15-14 with 11:01 to play in the half.
Stanford regained its lead 3:09 before halftime when Huestis capped a 6-0 run with a rebound dunk to make it 24-23.
Loyd followed with a 3-pointer, then dished to Kazemi for a dunk and made two free throws to help Oregon take a 30-26 halftime lead.
Powell was a force for the Cardinal in the first half, scoring 12 points on 4-of-6 shooting. But the junior forward picked up his third foul right before halftime and then added his fourth 2 minutes into the second half attempting to block Woods from stuffing back a miss by Singler.
That sent the Cardinal's leading scorer and second-leading rebounder to the bench for a 6-minute stretch and the Ducks took advantage, going on a 14-6 run to push their lead to 46-34.
"You want guys on your team to step up," Stanford coach Johnny Dawkins said. "We needed some guys at that point to really assert themselves and make some plays for us to kind of keep us in position to where we have a chance to get back in the game. Unfortunately,. they kept gaining ground."
Oregon led 48-36 when Dawkins was hit with a technical foul with 10:13 to play for arguing a foul called against Cardinal guard Gabriel Harris.
Singler made one of the two free throws for the technical, then both free throws for the original foul call to put the Ducks up 51-36.
Oregon's lead grew to 66-42 with 5:27 left to play.
The Ducks finished the game shooting 48.4 percent and made 25 points off Stanford's 17 turnovers. They outscored the Cardinal 42-18 inside.
The Cardinal, who handed Oregon its worst loss of the season three weeks ago at Maples Pavilion (76-52), shot 37.7 percent overall and made only 4 of 17 3-point attempts.
A winter storm moves across the center of the nation, bringing more snow to the Plains, Midwest, and Mid-Mississippi River Valley. The southern side of this system allows for showers and thunderstorms to persist for the Southeast.
A winter storm moves across the center of the nation, bringing more snow to the Plains, Midwest, and Mid-Mississippi River Valley. The southern side of this system allows for showers and thunderstorms to persist for the Southeast.
DODGE CITY, Kan. (AP) ? A second major winter storm was bearing down on the central Plains Sunday, forcing cancellations and sending public works crews scrambling for salt and sand supplies less than a week after another system dumped more than a foot of snow on parts of the region.
National Weather Service officials in Kansas issued blizzard warnings and watches through late Monday ahead of the strong storm system that's packing snow and high winds. The storm has been tracking across western Texas toward Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri.
"We're expecting more wind with this storm," said Jeff Johnson, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Dodge City, Kan. "Snow amounts are varying, but we could see upward of a foot across south-central Kansas with lesser amounts across west-central and central Kansas."
Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback amended the state of emergency declaration he signed last week to include the new storm.
"This storm has the potential to be more dangerous than last week's storm," said Brownback, who held a briefing Sunday night along with emergency officials in his state to warn residents about the weather.
He urged motorists to "stay off the road unless it's absolutely critical" but said drivers who must travel should pack their charged cellphones and emergency kits containing food, water, blankets, road flares and shovels.
The region was hit by a massive storm last week that dumped a foot of snow in some sections, closed airports and caused numerous accidents.
"It would have been nice if we'd had a few days to recover, to do some equipment rehab," Joe Pajor, deputy director of public works in Wichita, Kan., told The Wichita Eagle. The city saw its second-highest snowfall ever Thursday with 14.2 inches.
Other totals from the Thursday snowstorm included 18 inches in the southern Kansas town of Zenda, 17 inches in Hays, Kan., about 13 inches in northeast Missouri and 12 inches of snow in parts of Kansas City.
Steve Corfidi, meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said the storm also will affect southern states and could spawn tornadoes Tuesday in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, the Florida Panhandle and Georgia.
"It definitely will be one of the more significant events of the season, the winter season, absolutely," Corfidi told The Associated Press. "Both in winter weather and severe weather potential, and rain, down in the southeast United States."
More than a foot of snow is possible from the Texas Panhandle, across the Oklahoma Panhandle and into Kansas and possibly Missouri as the storm moves eastward from the southwestern United States.
While snowfall is expected to taper off by Monday afternoon, wind gusts of up to 35 mph will remain a hazard, said Sarah Johnson, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service's Amarillo, Texas, office.
Pajor told the Wichita newspaper the new storm "looks worse than the last one" and that sand and salt supplies are low because of last week's record storm, as are the number of locations where snow can be transported off city streets. He said the plowing strategy for the new blizzard may have to involve plowing snow into the center of arterial streets, and cutting traffic to one lane each direction.
He also said streets won't be treated with the city's limited sand and salt supplies until the snow ends and plowing is under way.
The threat of the pending storm forced cancellations Sunday and Monday in Kansas and Missouri, including the championship basketball tournament for the Kansas Collegiate Athletic Association, which rescheduled the tournament for Tuesday in Park City, Kan.
Matt Lehenbauer, emergency management director for Woodward County, Okla., said he expected rain or snow to begin there Sunday evening and forecast up to a foot of snow and wind gusts up to 50 miles per hour.
"We're expecting white-out conditions," he told the AP.
He said there is plenty of salt and sand on hand to help clear roads, but the conditions may cause delays.
"We may not get the roads cleared until midday Tuesday if we get the expected amount of snow and wind. As it's falling, in the blizzard-like conditions, we just won't be able to keep up," he said.
LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's finance minister insisted on Saturday he would not change course after the loss of the country's 'AAA' credit rating but George Osborne is facing pressure to do just that as his bet on austerity falters ahead of the 2015 election.
Moody's dealt Britain its first sovereign rating downgrade on Friday, saying the $2.5 trillion economy faced years more sluggish growth and debt would continue to rise until 2016.
Economically the one-notch cut will have limited importance -- most of Europe, Japan and the United States have already suffered the same fate and Britain continues to borrow at historically low rates.
But politically it is toxic for Osborne who has repeatedly vowed to protect the top credit rating since the 2010 election campaign. The downgrade exposes him to opponents who say his failure to deliver economic growth is driving Prime Minister David Cameron towards electoral defeat.
Osborne said on Saturday the move by Moody's showed he was right to focus on restoring Britain to fiscal health, arguing that only by doing that will the conditions for growth be restored.
"I am absolutely determined to make sure we deal with our problems, to make sure that Britain stays the course, to make sure that it doesn't take from this credit rating the wrong message which is we should go and borrow a lot more," the 41-year-old Chancellor of the Exchequer said.
"I'm absolutely clear we're not going to do that."
For investors, the downgrade underscores Britain's predicament: a debt-ridden, stagnating economy which has kept bond yields low in large part thanks to the Bank of England becoming the world's biggest investor in UK government debt by buying it with newly printed money.
"Osborne no longer has any place to hide or anyone to blame," said David Blanchflower, who served on the Bank of England's interest rate setting committee from 2006 to 2009.
He said the minister should "stand up, be a man and accept responsibility for the worst recovery in 100 years" and, in a message on Twitter, suggested a swift cut to value-added tax, a labor tax holiday for workers under 25 and incentives for investment and hiring to kick start growth.
Osborne can take comfort from Moody's confidence that his austerity plan would eventually "reverse the UK's debt trajectory".
A Treasury official noted Moody's had given the UK's credit rating a stable outlook, meaning little chance of a further downgrade in the next 12-18 months. When the United States and France were downgraded, their outlooks remained negative.
But whether growth will return forcefully long enough before the 2015 election to allow voters to appreciate it is now highly uncertain.
Sterling fell by almost a cent to around $1.5160 after the downgrade, just off Thursday's fresh 2-1/2-year low. Analysts said they expected it to fall further on Monday.
Some of the Conservatives' Liberal Democrat coalition partners questioned the political judgment of attaching so much importance to Britain's AAA rating.
"This is a self-inflicted injury for George Osborne," said Matthew Oakeshott, a former Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman. "To be fair, he was very green in 2009 ... He foolishly erected triple-A status as a virility symbol."
"BLEEDING THE PATIENT"
Cameron, who led his Conservative Party back to office as part of a coalition government after 13 years out of power, risks another year of stagnation and giving his opponents and open goal to aim at.
The Labor Party - which left the biggest peacetime deficit when it lost the 2010 election - called for Osborne's head.
"The medicine is not working so the Chancellor says increase the dose - that's crazy economics. It is like an 18th-century doctor bleeding a patient as they get sicker and sicker," said Ed Balls, the party's main spokesman on finance issues.
But people close to Britain's most powerful two politicians say they are completely aligned. Osborne led Cameron's bid for leadership of the Conservatives and ran the 2010 election campaign. There is little or no chance of him being sacrificed or being forced into a humiliating policy U-turn which would wreck his career.
"Osborne has lots of critics, both inside and outside the party, who are now going to be emboldened by this, but there is no coherent alternative," said Tim Montgomerie, editor of the influential ConservativeHome website.
Though Labor is about 10 percentage points ahead of Conservative Party in polls, surveys show voters trust Cameron and Osborne more than Labor's leader Ed Miliband.
TIME FOR A TWEAK?
Osborne originally gambled that by slashing spending, growth rates of between 2 and 3 percent would kick in from 2013.
But with Britain's banks still recovering from the financial crisis and many of its main trading partners in Europe stuck in recession, his debt targets will be missed. His room for more spending is limited as he tries to avoid pushing up yields on Britain's 1.29 trillion pounds ($1.97 trillion) of debt.
With government spending so restricted, many investors' hopes lie with the Bank of England. Its governor, Mervyn King, this month voted to restart government-bond buying. Although in the minority, his change of heart suggested the bank may be closer than expected to pursuing more stimulus.
If Osborne slows his debt reduction plans, he could upset bond investors and throw his deficit targets further off course.
"We should stick to the plan," said Kwasi Kwarteng, a Conservative lawmaker. "The prime minister would not want to be seen to be panicking, and he's committed to keeping George Osborne where he is."
"But we do also need to look at growth," said Kwarteng, who suggested cutting corporation tax and red tape.
Business lobby the Confederation of British Industry has called for more investment on infrastructure and housing to be funded by more cuts in day-to-day spending. It also expects the government to guarantee more private-sector projects.
Osborne has a chance in his annual budget next month to deliver such tweaks to policy. ($1 = 0.6551 British pounds)
(Additional reporting by Mohammed Abbas and William Schomberg. Editing by Mike Peacock)
With a number of other countries already in line to get their hands on Mozilla's Firefox OS, it's pretty clear that the company doesn't have the States at the top of its list of priorities. While attending its press conference at MWC today, however, we just had to ask: when will we be getting a turn at the mobile operating system? CEO Gary Kovacs assured us that the US is indeed on the list (albeit a bit further down), and his company has both plans and partners lined up for what looks to be a 2014 release time frame for the low cost operating system.
SEOUL, South Korea - Even before she takes office Monday as South Korea's first female president, Park Geun-hye's campaign vow to soften Seoul's current hard-line approach to rival North Korea is being tested by Pyongyang's recent underground nuclear detonation.
Pyongyang, Washington, Beijing and Tokyo are all watching to see if Park, the daughter of a staunchly anti-communist dictator, pursues an ambitious engagement policy meant to ease five years of animosity on the divided peninsula or if she sticks with the tough stance of her fellow conservative predecessor, Lee Myung-bak.
Park's decision is important because it will likely set the tone of the larger diplomatic approach that Washington and others take in stalled efforts to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions.
It will also be complicated by North Korea's warning of unspecified "second and third measures of greater intensity," a threat that comes as Washington and others push for tightened U.N. sanctions as punishment for the Feb. 12 atomic test, the North's third since 2006.
That test is seen as another step toward North Korea's goal of building a bomb small enough to be mounted on a missile that can hit the United States. The explosion, which Pyongyang called a response to U.S. hostility, triggered global outrage.
Park has said she won't yet change her policy, which was built with the high probability of provocations from Pyongyang in mind. But some aren't sure if engagement can work, given North Korea's choice of "bombs over electricity," as American scientist Siegfried Hecker puts it.
"Normalization of relations, a peace treaty, access to energy and economic opportunities ? those things that come from choosing electricity over bombs and have the potential of lifting the North Korean people out of poverty and hardship ? will be made much more difficult, if not impossible, for at least the next five years," Hecker, a regular visitor to North Korea, said in a posting on the website of Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation.
As she takes office, however, Park will be mindful that many South Koreans are frustrated at the state of inter-Korean relations after the Lee government's five-year rule, which saw two nuclear tests, three long-range rocket launches and attacks blamed on North Korea that killed 50 South Koreans in 2010.
Park's policy calls for strong defense but also for efforts to build trust through aid shipments, reconciliation talks and the resumption of some large-scale economic initiatives as progress occurs on the nuclear issue. Park has also held out the possibility of a summit with new North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Much is riding on Park's conclusion.
"The overall policy direction on North Korea among the U.S., Japan and South Korea will be hers to decide," said Victor Cha, a former senior Asia adviser to President George W. Bush. "If Park Geun-hye wants to contain, the U.S. will support that. But if Park Geun-hye, months down the road, wants to engage, then the U.S. will go along with that too. "
Engagement by Park would provide a sharp contrast with the rule of her father, Park Chung-hee, whose antipathy toward Pyongyang during his 18-year rule in the 1960s and `70s prompted a failed attack on the Blue House by 31 North Korean commandos in 1968. In 1974, Park's wife was shot and killed by a Japan-born Korean claiming he was acting on assassination orders by North Korea founder and then leader Kim Il Sung.
Critics say Park Geun-hye's North Korea policy lacks specifics. They also question how far she can go given her conservative base's strong anti-Pyongyang sentiments.
But Park has previously confounded ideological expectations. She travelled to Pyongyang in 2002 and held private talks with the late Kim Jong Il, the father of Kim Jong Un, and her gifts to Kim Jong Il are showcased in a museum of gifts to the North Korean leaders. During the often contentious presidential campaign, she responded to liberal criticism by reaching out to the families of victims of her father's dictatorship.
She said in her 2007 autobiography that she visited Pyongyang because she thought her painful experiences with the North made her "the one who could resolve South-North relations better than anyone else." She also wrote that Kim Jong Il apologized for the 1968 attack.
"I don't think this latest spike in the cycle of provocation and response undermines her whole platform of seeking to somehow re-engage the North," said John Delury, an analyst at Seoul's Yonsei University. North Korea wants a return of large-scale aid and investment from South Korea.
Before the election, Pyongyang's state media repeatedly questioned the sincerity of Park's engagement overture. Since the election, however, although regular criticism of Lee as "human scum" continues, the North's official Korean Central News Agency hasn't mentioned Park by name, though her political party is still condemned.
Pyongyang sees the nuclear crisis as a U.S.-North Korea issue, Delury said. "From a North Korean mindset, ramping up the tension and hostility with the U.S. does not equal jettisoning relations with the South."
Park may take a wait-and-see stance in coming months.
A possible positive turning point could come if North Korea resists tests or launches during April, when it celebrates two state anniversaries ? Kim Il Sung's birthday and the army's founding anniversary ? according to analyst Hong Hyun-ik at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea. Pyongyang conducted a failed long-range rocket launch during last year's celebrations.
Hong predicts that the United States will seek nuclear talks with North Korea in a few months, something that could help Park's efforts to engage North Korea.
"The nuclear test sets back and complicates but does not necessarily doom her engagement efforts over the long term," said Ralph Cossa, president of Pacific Forum CSIS, a Hawaii-based think tank.
Park warned after the test that North Korea faces international isolation, economic difficulties and, eventually, a collapse if it continues to build its atomic program. She also pressed Pyongyang to respond to her overtures.
"We can't achieve trust with only one side's efforts. Isn't there a saying that `We need both hands to make a clapping sound?'" she said.
Denver Broncos head coach John Fox answers a question during a news conference at the NFL football scouting combine in Indianapolis, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)
Denver Broncos head coach John Fox answers a question during a news conference at the NFL football scouting combine in Indianapolis, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) ? John Fox has some bad news for the other 31 NFL teams: Peyton Manning could be even better in 2013.
The Denver coach says Thursday at the league's annual scouting combine that with another offseason to heal and to fine-tune his comfort with Denver's offense, the four-time MVP and reigning Comeback Player of the Year could have a more impressive second season in the Mile High City.
Fox says a year ago the Broncos were doing homework on Manning. They saw a dramatic improvement in Manning's workouts last offseason at Duke, and then with the quarterback's passing in the second half of the 2012 season. Manning led Denver to the AFC's best record, 13-3.
The big story of the week, no, month, is Sony's next-generation console, the PlayStation 4. Well, the company didn't show us the physical box itself and instead chose to detail a new DualShock controller, some not-hugely-specific hardware outlines and titles we can expect to see (in some form) on the fourth generation PlayStation. As Pythagoras said: "Number rules the universe," and the After Math prefers it that way. Find some of those numbers after the break.
Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius stands during his bail hearing at the magistrate court in Pretoria, South Africa, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. The lead investigator in the murder case against Pistorius faces attempted murder charges himself over a 2011 shooting, police said Thursday in another potentially damaging blow to the prosecution. Prosecutors said they were unaware of the charges against veteran detective Hilton Botha when they put him on the stand in court to explain why Pistorius should not be given bail in the Valentine's Day shooting death of his girlfriend. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius stands during his bail hearing at the magistrate court in Pretoria, South Africa, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. The lead investigator in the murder case against Pistorius faces attempted murder charges himself over a 2011 shooting, police said Thursday in another potentially damaging blow to the prosecution. Prosecutors said they were unaware of the charges against veteran detective Hilton Botha when they put him on the stand in court to explain why Pistorius should not be given bail in the Valentine's Day shooting death of his girlfriend. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
Investigating officer Hilton Botha sits inside the witness box during the bail hearing for Oscar Pistorius at the magistrate court in Pretoria, South Africa, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. South Africa's National Prosecuting Authority acknowledged that the timing of attempted murder charges against a police detective leading the investigation into Oscar Pistorius is "totally weird" and that he should dropped from the case against the world-famous athlete. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius's father Henke Pistorius, right, with daughter Aimee, left, during his bail hearing at the magistrate court in Pretoria, South Africa, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. The lead investigator in the murder case against Pistorius faces attempted murder charges himself over a 2011 shooting, police said Thursday in another potentially damaging blow to the prosecution. Prosecutors said they were unaware of the charges against veteran detective Hilton Botha when they put him on the stand in court to explain why Pistorius should not be given bail in the Valentine's Day shooting death of his girlfriend. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
FILE- In this Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2013 file photo, Investigating officer Hilton Botha, sits inside the court witness box during the Oscar Pistorius bail hearing at the magistrate court in Pretoria, South Africa. The lead investigator in the murder case against Oscar Pistorius faces attempted murder charges himself over a 2011 shooting, police said Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013, in another potentially damaging blow to the prosecution. Prosecutors said they were unaware of the charges against veteran detective Hilton Botha when they put him on the stand in court to explain why Pistorius should not be given bail in the Valentine's Day shooting death of his girlfriend. Police Brig. Neville Malila told The Associated Press that Botha ? who gave testimony in the Pistorius bail hearing on Wednesday ? is scheduled to appear in court in May on seven counts of attempted murder related to an incident in October 2011 when Botha and two other police officers fired at a minibus they were trying to stop. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe, File)
Graphic shows the layout of Oscar Pistorius??? apartment
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) ? South African police appointed a new chief investigator Thursday in the Oscar Pistorius murder case, replacing a veteran detective after unsettling revelations that the officer was charged with seven counts of attempted murder.
The sensational twist in the state's troubled investigation fueled growing public fascination with the case against the double-amputee Olympian, who is charged with premeditated murder in the Valentine's Day slaying of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.
Pistorius, a sporting icon and source of inspiration to millions until the shooting last week, is backed by a high-powered team of lawyers and publicists. The abruptness of his fall, and its gruesome circumstances, have gripped a global audience and put South Africa's police and judicial system under the spotlight.
The man at the center of the storm sat in the dock during his bail hearing, mostly keeping his composure in contrast to slumped-over outbursts of weeping on previous days in court. In front of Pistorius, defense lawyer Barry Roux pounced on the apparent disarray in the state's case, laying out arguments that amounted to a test run for the full trial yet to come.
Roux pointed to what he called the "poor quality" of the state's investigation and raised the matter of intent, saying Pistorius and Steenkamp had a "loving relationship" and the athlete had no motive to plan her killing.
Pistorius, 26, says he mistook Steenkamp for an intruder when he shot her through a locked bathroom door in his home. Prosecutors believe the shooting happened after the couple got into an argument, and prosecutor Gerrie Nel painted a picture of a man he said was "willing and ready to fire and kill."
Much of the drama Thursday, however, happened outside the courtroom as South African police scrambled to get their investigation on track.
In a news conference at a training academy, National Police Commissioner Riah Phiyega said a senior detective would gather a team of "highly skilled and experienced" officers to investigate the killing of 29-year-old Steenkamp, a model and budding reality TV contestant.
The decision to put police Lt. Gen. Vinesh Moonoo in charge came soon after word emerged that the initial chief investigator, Hilton Botha, is facing attempted murder charges, and a day after he offered testimony damaging to the prosecution.
Botha acknowledged Wednesday in court that nothing in Pistorius' version of the fatal shooting contradicted what police had discovered, even though there have been some discrepancies. Botha also said that police left a 9 mm slug in the toilet and lost track of allegedly illegal ammunition found in Pistorius' home.
"This matter shall receive attention at the national level," Phiyega told reporters after testimony ended in the third day of Pistorius' bail hearing.
Bulewa Makeke, spokeswoman for South Africa's National Prosecuting Authority, said the attempted murder charges had been reinstated against Botha on Feb. 4. Police say they found out about it after Botha testified in Pistorius' bail hearing Wednesday.
Botha and two other police officers had seven counts of attempted murder reinstated against them in connection with a 2011 shooting incident in which they allegedly fired shots at a minibus they were trying to stop.
Makeke indicated the charges were reinstated because more evidence had been gathered. She said the charge against Botha was initially dropped "because there was not enough evidence at the time."
Pistorius' main sponsor, Nike, meanwhile, suspended its contract with the multiple Paralympic champion, following eyewear manufacturer Oakley's decision to suspend its sponsorship. Nike said in a statement on its website: "We believe Oscar Pistorius should be afforded due process and we will continue to monitor the situation closely."
On Thursday, Chief Magistrate Desmond Nair asked the defense regarding Pistorius' bail application: "Do you think there will be some level of shock if the accused is released?"
Defense lawyer Roux responded: "I think there will be a level of shock in this country if he is not released."
Prosecutor Nel suggested signs of remorse from Pistorius had nothing to do with whether he planned to kill his girlfriend.
"Even if you plan a murder, you plan a murder and shoot. If you fire the shot, you have remorse. Remorse might kick in immediately," Nel said.
As Nel summed up the prosecution's case opposing bail, Pistorius began to weep in the crowded courtroom, leading his brother, Carl Pistorius, to reach out and touch his back.
"He (Pistorius) wants to continue with his life like this never happened," Nel went on, prompting Pistorius, who was crying softly, to shake his head.
"The reason you fire four shots is to kill," Nel persisted.
Earlier Thursday, Nair questioned Botha over delays in processing records from phones found in Pistorius' house following the slaying.
"It seems to me like there was a lack of urgency," the magistrate said.
Botha is to appear in court in May to face seven counts of attempted murder in connection with the minibus shooting incident. He has been quoted in the South African media as denying allegations he was drunk at the time, saying he and the other officers were trying to stop the vehicle and didn't know there were people inside.
While Botha has been dropped from the Pistorius investigation, he has not been suspended from the police force, Phiyega said, and could still be called by defense lawyers at trial.
Pistorius, wearing the same gray suit, blue shirt and gray tie combination he has worn throughout the bail hearing, stood ramrod straight in the dock, then sat calmly looking at his hands.
Roux said an autopsy showed that Steenkamp's bladder was empty, suggesting she had gone to the bathroom to use the toilet, rather than fled there to escape an enraged Pistorius, as prosecutors contend.
"The known forensics is consistent" with Pistorius' statement, Roux said, asking that bail restrictions be eased for his client.
But the prosecutor said Pistorius hadn't given guarantees to the court that he wouldn't leave the country if he was facing a life sentence. Nel also stressed that Pistorius shouldn't be given special treatment.
"'I am Oscar Pistorius. I am a world-renowned athlete.' Is that a special circumstance? No," Nel said. "His version (of the killing) is improbable."
Nel said the court should focus on the "murder of the defenseless woman."
Botha testified Thursday that he investigated a 2009 complaint against Pistorius by a woman who said the athlete assaulted her. However, Pistorius did not hurt the woman, who in fact injured herself when she kicked a door at Pistorius' home, Botha said.
___
AP Sports Writer Gerald Imray contributed to this report from Johannesburg
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