Feb
02

"Great Rotation"- A Wall Street fairy tale?

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street's current jubilant narrative is that a rush into stocks by small investors has sparked a "great rotation" out of bonds and into equities that will power the bull market to new heights. That sounds good, but there's a snag: The evidence for this is a few weeks of bullish fund flows that are hardly unusual for January. Late-stage bull markets...
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Feb
01

Suicide Bomber Attacks Mosque in Pakistan

Abdul Basit/Associated PressPeople gathered at the scene of the explosion in a market in northwestern Pakistan on Friday. PESHAWAR, Pakistan — An explosion in a market in northwestern Pakistan on Friday killed at least 21 people and wounded 33 in what police described as a suicide bombing. The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in Hangu, about 70 miles west of Peshawar,...
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How I learned to stop worrying and love Twitter

Is anything more uniquely American than our free-wheeling, 140-character missives?Twitter is dead, you guys. Writers used to send pithy tweets across cyberspace, borne on the golden wings of Hermes. Now, as T.S. Eliot would say, “Our dried voices, when we whisper together are quiet and meaningless.” Twitter is so uncool, that even if we resurrected the spirits of Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix and...
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Woman Who Lost Her Legs in Tornado Starts Foundation Helps Others

Heroes Among Us By Janine Rayford 02/01/2013 at 10:15 AM EST Stephanie Decker with her kids, Dominic and Reese, and her husband Joe Courtesy Stephanie Decker When a storm of deadly twisters ravaged Indiana in March 2012, Stephanie Decker saved her two kids – but...
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Hedgehog Alert! Prickly pets can carry salmonella

NEW YORK (AP) — Add those cute little hedgehogs to the list of pets that can make you sick.In the last year, 20 people were infected by a rare but dangerous form of salmonella bacteria, and one person died in January. The illnesses were linked to contact with hedgehogs kept as pets, according to a report released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Health officials on Thursday...
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Dow hits 14,000 on strong data

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks extended gains on Friday, with the Dow industrials trading above 14,000 for the first time since October 2007, as jobs and manufacturing data pointed to a stronger U.S. economy. The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 133.89 points or 0.97 percent, to 13,994.47, the S&P 500 <.spx> gained 12.09 points or 0.81 percent, to 1,510.2 and the...
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Jan
31

Way of the World: A Symbol of Progress, or Villainy?

NEW YORK — Is oil like red meat or is it like tobacco? Your answer to that question determines how you feel about the North American boom in unconventional sources of fossil fuel, particularly the Canadian oil sands. If you think oil is like tobacco, it is a strictly noxious commodity, which seriously harms its users and those around them. We should stop consuming it at once and at all costs....
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Telecoms boom leaves rural Africa behind

JOHANNESBURG/FREETOWN (Reuters) – While mobile phone usage has exploded across Africa over the last decade, transforming daily life and commerce for millions, it’s a revolution that has left behind perhaps two thirds of its people.Poor or no reception outside the towns helps explain why the continent’s mobile penetration, in terms of the percentage of the population using the service, is far lower...
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Keri Russell's The Americans: Are You Hooked?

TV Watch By Tim Nudd 01/31/2013 at 10:25 AM EST Keri Russell in The Americans FX She's come a long way since Felicity. That much was clear in the very first scene of The Americans on Wednesday night, as Keri Russell was shown in an extremely compromising position...
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Sex to burn calories? Authors expose obesity myths

Fact or fiction? Sex burns a lot of calories. Snacking or skipping breakfast is bad. School gym classes make a big difference in kids' weight.All are myths or at least presumptions that may not be true, say researchers who reviewed the science behind some widely held obesity beliefs and found it lacking.Their report in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine says dogma and fallacies are detracting...
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