New lingo for consumers: health overhaul glossary
President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law has spawned its own jargon. With the law finally about to take full effect, consumers might want to get familiar with some of the terms:
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Consumer alert: new health care markets on the way
WASHINGTON (AP) — Buying your own health insurance will never be the same.
Purported death threat throws Nevada assembly into uncertainty
LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - Just weeks before Nevada's Legislature is set to convene, an only-in-Las-Vegas series of events, including a lawmaker's alleged death threat against the speaker of the state Assembly, is offering a distracting sideshow. The chaos began when Democratic Assemblyman Steven Brooks was arrested this month on accusations of threatening incoming Speaker Marilyn Kirkpatrick, also a Democrat. ...
Syrian rebels, army clash in Damascus during U.N. visit
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian rebels clashed with forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad in southwest Damascus on Sunday, forcing the closure of the main highway to the southern town of Deraa, activists said. The fighting came as United Nations humanitarian chief Valerie Amos visited Syria ahead of a U.N. aid conference which aims to raise $1.5 billion for millions of people made homeless, hungry and vulnerable by the 22-month-old conflict. ...
Al Qaeda targets Germans, Britons in Libya: Spiegel
BERLIN (Reuters) - Al Qaeda is plotting to kidnap German and British citizens in Libya, the Spiegel weekly magazine quoted German intelligence sources as saying. Germany and Britain were among several Western countries to urge their nationals to leave the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi on Thursday, days after a deadly attack by Islamist militants in neighboring Algeria. Britain cited a "specific and imminent" threat to Westerners in Libya's second largest city, but officials declined to give any details. ...
Outgoing AU chief condemns Africa's response to Mali crisis
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - The outgoing head of the African Union, Benin's President Boni Yayi, on Sunday criticized Africa's slow response to the Islamist insurgency in Mali. France responded to a call for military help from Mali as rebels advanced towards the capital Bamako more than two weeks ago, reversing gains made by the militants linked to al Qaeda. French and Malian troops reached Timbuktu on Saturday. ...
Scandal-hit Monte Paschi seeks new investor to revive bank
MILAN (Reuters) - Italian bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena is seeking a financial investor to help revive the ailing lender and will remove a current cap on voting rights to help raise 1 billion euros ($1.3 billion), its chairman said. "I would like to have a long-term financial investor," Alessandro Profumo told Italian business daily Il Sole 24 Ore in an interview published on Sunday. "Nationality is not a problem. The important thing is that it believes in our project". Late on Saturday the Bank of Italy gave its approval to Monte Paschi's request for 3.9 billion euros ($5. ...
Mark Boal: Government Inquiry Into 'Zero Dark Thirty' 'Crosses a Line'
During an interview for “This Week,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” screenwriter and producer Mark Boal told Martha Raddatz that the current Senate inquiry into the Oscar-nominated movie could discourage the making of similar films in the future. “I think that it could discourage other screenwriters or…writers of...
Iranian workers demand South Korea 'return' funds
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — About 1,000 Iranian workers have staged a protest rally in front of the South Korean Embassy in Tehran demanding the return of $70 million allegedly held by Seoul after a collapsed business deal.
France favors Lauvergeon as EADS board chief: paper
PARIS (Reuters) - French President Francois Hollande wants Anne Lauvergeon, former chief executive of French nuclear reactor maker Areva, to chair the board of European planemaker EADS , French Sunday paper Le Journal du Dimanche reported. The paper quotes a source close to the government as saying that Lauvergeon is "the choice of Francois Hollande for the presidency of the group". It added that Hollande had discussed the nomination with German chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday and that "Germany agrees with the French choice". ...
Japan to boost military headcount amid china island row
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan is set to boost the number of military personnel, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said on Sunday, as the new government led by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) tackles a territorial spat with China over East China Sea islets. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe led the LDP to a landslide election victory last month, promising to beef up the military and stand tough in the dispute over tiny, uninhabited islands, called Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China. ...
'Zero Dark Thirty' Debate: Torture Has No Place in a Civilized Society
Election loss forces Singapore into delicate balancing act
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - It was just one seat in parliament but the loss of a by-election this weekend will force Singapore's long-ruling People's Action Party (PAP) to take a hard look at how it balances investor and voter needs in one of the world's biggest financial centers. With anger rising in the wealthy Asian city-state over soaring living costs, reliance on foreign workers and a widening income gap, the opposition Workers' Party took the PAP-held seat in the Punggol East ward by a convincing margin of nearly 11 percent in Saturday's poll. ...
Italy central bank approves Monte Paschi bailout request
ROME/MILAN (Reuters) - Italy's central bank on Saturday gave its approval to a request by scandal hit bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena for 3.9 billion euros ($5.3 billion) of state loans, the latest step in the battle to revive the ailing bank. The Bank of Italy's backing was the final stage required to free up the financial help for Italy's third biggest lender, which this week revealed loss-making derivatives trades that could cost it about 720 million euros. ...
Support for Japan's Abe government rises to two-thirds: poll
TOKYO (Reuters) - Support for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government rose by 4.7 percentage points to two-thirds of voters in the month since his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) returned to power, a poll by the Kyodo news agency showed on Sunday. The poll, conducted on Saturday and Sunday, showed that support for the government rose to 66.7 percent, an apparent sign of approval for his efforts to boost the economy with a mix of easy monetary policy and fiscal spending. ...
China keeps mum on Bo trial despite talk it could start on Monday
BEIJING (Reuters) - China's government is giving no details on the trial of shamed senior leader Bo Xilai, the final chapter in its worst political scandal in decades, as speculation mounted the case could be heard as early as Monday. A Beijing-backed Hong Kong newspaper, the Ta Kung Pao, reported on Friday that Bo's trial would begin on Monday in the southern Chinese city of Guiyang. But the government has not confirmed or denied this, belying recent efforts to promote transparency and openness, and at least two well-informed sources said on Sunday the reports were not true. ...
'No budget, no pay' advances despite reservations
WASHINGTON (AP) — In an earlier era, a move like the one engineered by House GOP leaders to pass a "no budget, no pay" measure probably would have been stopped in its tracks.
Obama says football needs to become less violent - report
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama said he loves football but thinks the sport should "probably change gradually" so that there are fewer concussions, particularly at the college level. "I'm a big football fan, but I have to tell you if I had a son, I'd have to think long and hard before I let him play football," Obama said in a wide-ranging interview with The New Republic magazine published early on Sunday on its website. Football is America's most popular televised sport, an industry worth $9 billion a year. ...
Israel vows Syria strike at any sign of chemical arms transfer
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Any sign of Syria's grip on its suspected chemical weapons slipping as it battles an armed uprising could trigger Israeli military strikes, Israel's vice premier said on Sunday. Silvan Shalom confirmed a media report that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had last week convened security chiefs to discuss the civil war in nearby Syria and the state of the country's chemical arsenal. ...
