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Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Can North Korea threaten U.S.? Not really

Despite North Korea's threats, its missiles can't reach American soil yet. But South Korea and Japan are in range, experts caution.

By Jack Kim,?Reuters / March 9, 2013

The guided missile destroyers USS Lassen and USS Fitzgerald are seen at a South Korean naval port in Donghae, about 120 miles east of Seoul, March 9. The destroyers arrived in South Korea on Saturday to take part in a naval drill, perhaps prompted by North Korea's recent threats against the United States.

South Korean Navy/Reuters

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North Korea's threat of a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the United States is a hollow one, but it has plenty of military firepower, experts warn. South Korea is most at risk from the isolated regime's artillery and rockets.

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Japan, separated by less than 1,000 km (625 miles) of water and a frequent target of North Korea's ire, is also in easy range of Pyongyang's short- and mid-range missiles.

In pure numbers, North Korea's military looks formidable, much larger than the more affluent South in both personnel and equipment. The North's 1.2 million soldiers face off against 640,000 South Korean troops who are backed up by 26,000 U.S. personnel stationed in the country. However, Pyongyang's capabilities are not what the figures would suggest. Impoverished North Korea has all but abandoned running a conventional military that can engage in sustained battle because of scarce resources and has instead focused on nuclear weapons and ballistic missile technology, experts said.

"A conventional military is very costly, and overwhelmingly so for North Korea. It quickly becomes a money fight and North Korea cannot win that," said Shin In-kyun, head of the Korea Defence Network, an alliance of defence experts based in Seoul.

Nevertheless, a defence policy statement from South Korea in December noted that North Korea's frontline artillery pieces could launch a "sudden and massive" barrage on the capital Seoul, a mere 50 km (31 miles) from the Demilitarised Zone border that separates the two Koreas.

North Korea has around 12,000 artillery guns, many arrayed near the border. It also has an arsenal of intermediate range missiles in operational deployment, some of which can travel more than 3,000 km (1,875 miles). That puts South Korea and Japan in range as well as the U.S. territory of Guam.

"They have the capability to strike anywhere in the South and Japan," said Shin.

North Korea has also shown it has submarine capabilities.

In 2010, a North Korean submarine was widely believed to have sunk a South Korean naval vessel, killing 46 sailors. Pyongyang has denied it was behind the attack. In the same year, North Korea shelled a South Korean island in a disputed area, killing civilians.

One military expert said the North might be careful before launching another blatant attack, given Seoul has vowed to respond vigorously next time.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/dkVWLllGmK0/Can-North-Korea-threaten-U.S.-Not-really

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Hand-picked Chavez successor registers in election

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) ? Thousands of cheering, crying admirers accompanied President Hugo Chavez's hand-picked successor Monday as he registered to be a candidate to replace the dead leader, while forcing the main opposition candidate to delay his entry into the race.

The massive crowd thronged acting President Nicolas Maduro and blocked opposition candidate Henrique Capriles from registering for the April 14 vote by the 2 p.m. deadline.

The Capriles campaign told The Associated Press that an aide registered for the candidate at the election commission later Monday afternoon.

Maduro also announced a change in Chavez's final resting place Monday, and the information ministry later said that officials had not decided what will happen to the late president's body.

Last week, Maduro had said the body would be embalmed and perpetually displayed in the country's military museum.

Thousands applauded from a plaza outside the National Election Commission, waving banners and holding up posters of Chavez as Maduro registered.

Many wore the red shirts and baseball caps of Chavez's ruling Socialist Party, letting out a loud cheer when acting President Nicolas Maduro arrived to sign his election papers.

Some cried as Maduro saluted them from the building's balcony, eulogizing Chavez once again as Venezuela's "father redeemer" and asking God to give him "the wisdom to allow me to carry out the orders he gave us."

Later, he launched into a speech of more than two hours in the plaza outside the building, introducing his longtime partner, Attorney General Cilia Flores, and their children and grandchildren to the crowd.

"I am not Chavez, but I am his son, and all of us together, the people, we are Chavez," he said.

Opposition supporters denounced the carefully stage-managed event as an affront to basic electoral fairness. The electoral commission is meant to play an impartial role ensuring the vote is fair and free.

Campaigning doesn't officially start until April 2, but already the two sides are at each other's throats.

Capriles announced his candidacy Sunday, while blasting Chavez's top lieutenants for trying to use the president's death to stoke passions and tilt the election.

"You are playing politics with the president's body," he said, adding that he wasn't convinced the government had been honest about when Chavez died, and had lied to the people during his long illness by insisting he would get better. The government says Chavez succumbed to cancer on Tuesday after a nearly two-year battle. It has offered almost no clinical information.

Capriles previously called Maduro a shameless liar and referred to him condescendingly as "boy."

Maduro appeared right after Capriles on state TV on Sunday, accusing "the losing, miserable candidate" of defaming Chavez and his family. He called Capriles a "fascist" who was trying to provoke violence by insulting the "crystalline, pure image of Commander Chavez."

During his speech, Maduro said Chavez's body would remain until Thursday at the military academy where it has lain in state. On Friday, it will be moved to the military museum Chavez employed as his headquarters during the failed 1992 coup, Maduro said.

He said the National Assembly would approve a constitutional amendment later this week to allow Chavez to be moved permanently to the National Pantheon, where the remains of early 19th century liberator Simon Bolivar are held.

By law, such a change to the constitution would have to be approved by voters.

Asked if the government still plans to permanently preserve and display Chavez's body, the Information Ministry said officials had not yet decided.

Analysts have voiced increasing concern about the angry rhetoric in a country that has become deeply divided during Chavez's 14 years in office, though most Caracas residents say such exchanges have been common.

Meanwhile, the administration of President Barack Obama on Monday expelled two Venezuelan diplomats in retaliation for Venezuela's expulsion of two American military attaches after Chavez died last week. U.S. officials say junior diplomats Orlando Jose Montanez Olivares and Victor Camacaro Mata were told to return home over the weekend and left the U.S. on Sunday.

Officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

Washington wants to repair ties with Venezuela but has made little headway so far.

Beyond the diplomatic tit for tat, Venezuelan officials have accused the U.S. of being responsible for Chavez's cancer and sought to rally anti-U.S. sentiment ahead of an April election for a new leader.

And in Cuba, revolutionary icon Fidel Castro broke his silence over the death of his protege and uber-ally, saying in an editorial published by Communist Party newspaper Granma that the island had lost its "best friend."

Cuba receives billions of dollars in oil a year from Venezuela at cut-rate prices, a huge boost its flagging economy.

___

Associated press writers E. Eduardo Castillo in Caracas and Bradley Klapper in Washington contributed to this report.

___

Paul Haven on Twitter: www.twitter.com/paulhaven

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hand-picked-chavez-successor-registers-election-173013667.html

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Iran blocks use of tool to get around Internet filter

Yeganeh Torbati , Reuters ? ? ? 11 hrs.

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iranian authorities have blocked the use of most "virtual private networks", a tool that many Iranians use to get around an extensive government Internet filter, Iranian media quoted an official as saying on Sunday.

A widespread government Internet filter prevents Iranians from accessing many sites on the official grounds they are offensive or criminal.

Many Iranians evade the filter through use of VPN software, which provides encrypted links directly to private networks based abroad, and can allow a computer to behave as if it is based in another country.

But authorities have now blocked "illegal" VPN access, an Iranian legislator told the Mehr news agency on Sunday. Iranian web users confirmed that VPNs were blocked.

"Within the last few days illegal VPN ports in the country have been blocked," said Ramezanali Sobhani-Fard, the head of parliament's information and communications technology committee, according to Mehr. "Only legal and registered VPNs can from now on be used."

Iran is holding a presidential election in June, its first since 2009, when a disputed result led to the worst unrest since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Protesters used services like Facebook to communicate during those "Green Movement" demonstrations, and the government has taken steps to curb access to the Internet in the last few months, apparently determined to prevent a repeat this time.

An Internet user named Mohamad from the Iranian city of Isfahan confirmed that VPNs had been blocked.

"VPNs are cut off. They've shut all the ports," he said in a Facebook message, adding that he was using another form of software to access the service without a VPN. He said Skype and Viber, Internet services used to make telephone calls, had also been blocked.

In January, Mehdi Akhavan Behabadi, secretary of Iran's Supreme Cyberspace Council, told Mehr that Internet users would soon be able to purchase registered VPN connections and that other VPNs were illegal. Financial institutions and other organizations might need to use VPNs for security reasons, which would be a legal use, Behabadi said.

The government's move to block VPN access may also have inadvertently cut off access to widely used sites such as Yahoo and Google, Sobhani-Fard told Mehr on Sunday, adding that parliament would study the issue more this week.

Amin Sabeti, a UK-based researcher on Iranian media and the web, said foreign companies such as airlines and banks had had problems using VPNs in Iran.

Through government-registered VPNs, Sabeti said, authorities could be able to monitor traffic more easily.

Deteriorate
Millions of Iranians experienced disruption to email and Internet access ahead of parliamentary elections last year.

"As the June election approaches ... Iran's Internet connectivity, and the accessibility of uncensored information, continues to deteriorate," said a report on Iran's Internet infrastructure published in March by the UK-based group Small Media, which researches Internet use in Iran.

"Prominent Persian-language websites and other online services have been filtered one by one, and communications with external platforms is becoming progressively more difficult."

Iranian authorities banned Google's email service for a week last year but reopened access after complaints from officials. They have also announced plans to switch citizens onto a domestic Internet network which would be largely isolated from the World Wide Web.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/iran-blocks-use-tool-get-around-internet-filter-1C8792930

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Sunday, March 10, 2013

Choosing The Right University for You | Grove Report

35-40 Whether you are getting a late start on your higher education or are fresh and right out of high school choosing a college or university is hard. There are so many things to worry about in addition to just the degree and price tag. For instance, when looking at a school like the University of Denver, you have to look at the student body demographic, extra curricular programs, and location of the school. Remember that for the next four years you will be living the college life and it is important to make sure that you are just as happy with your choice of institution in the classroom as you are out of it.

Demographic

The demographic of the student body will affect quite a few areas of your college experience. It will affect the types of activities that are planned by student organizations, how important the sport teams are, and overall will lean heavily on the things that you may have in common with your classmates. You may be a very religious individual and feel more comfortable in that environment. In that case a private religious institution such as Liberty University or Brigham Young University may be the route to go. However, if you are determined to rage against the machine and focus on social justice issues there are liberal schools that can cater to your interests.

Sports

Do you live to play sports? Or perhaps you just love to watch and appreciate those that do play sports? Well there are many schools that stress the pride that the student body should take in their sports teams. For many, the biggest events of the year are centered on football or basketball games. It?s not normally difficult to know which schools place high importance on their athletics. On the same track, if you could not feel any less excitement when you think about going to see a game you may want to look for a school that has few or no organized sports teams.

Student Life

The degree in which schools like Keene State College or the University of Denver stresses the need to have a well developed budget for Student Life can make or break your experience. While it is most important to make sure you are succeeding academically, you need to remember that you are only in class and doing homework for a portion of the week. What else you do with your free time is going to depend heavily of what kind of extra curricular programs are provided by your school. Groups like the college?s Student Government will help organize campus wide activities that help you meet new people and feel as though you are a part of your school. Having fun and learning is what college is all about. Make sure that the school you choose helps you do both.

Source: http://www.grovereport.org/index.php/choosing-the-right-university-for-you/

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Cornell University Athletics - Fencing To Send 10 To Compete At ...

Fencing To Send 10 To Compete At NCAA Northeast Regional

3/9/2013 9:00:00 AM

??Schedule of Events, List of Participants, and Live Stats
? Watch Live?on ESPN3

ITHACA, N.Y. ? The Cornell fencing team will send 10 individuals to compete at the NCAA Northeast Regional tournament, beginning Sunday, March 10. The NCAA Northeast Regional, the largest of the four regions, will be hosted by St. John's and the 259 participants will compete in Carnesecca Arena and Taffner Field House. ESPN3 coverage will begin at 3:30 p.m. with recaps of the early action, which includes the women's saber, women's epee, and men's foil events. Live coverage will follow and will include the women's foil, men's epee, and men's saber events.

The Big Red qualified 10 fencers for the event.
Saber
Beverly Yang (50-22)
Audrey Speer (53-21)
? Placed 13th at the 2012 NCAA Regional
Alaina Uhouse (22-26)

Epee
Olivia Weller (41-30)
Taylor Wong (36-30)
Jenny Zheng (13-23)
Ashley Muller (18-20)

Foil
Christine McIntosh (51-17)
? Took sixth at the 2012 NCAA Regional tournament and qualified for the NCAA Championships, where she took 18th overall
April Whitney (25-11)
? Took the bronze medal at the 2012 NCAA Regional tournament and then concluded the year with a 14th place finish at the NCAA championship tournament
Angelica Gangemi (55-11)

Source: http://www.cornellbigred.com/news/2013/3/8/FENC_0308131324.aspx

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Details of Hugo Chavez's final hours emerge

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's Hugo Chavez slid into a coma the day before he died of respiratory failure after cancer spread into his lungs, sources say.

Chavez's precise condition was one of the world's best-kept secrets since his cancer was announced in June 2011.

Since his death this week, however, details have emerged of the 58-year-old president's battle with cancer and the last moments in the hospital with close family and senior aides.

"They used iPads and other tools to give him policy presentations," one government source told Reuters, referring to ministers' visits to the Havana and Caracas hospitals where he spent his final weeks, unable to speak and breathing through a tube.

When appointing a new foreign minister, aides showed Chavez a list of several possible names, and he put a tick mark beside one - Elias Jaua - before signing the document, the source said.

After announcing in 2011 that cancer had been detected in his pelvic area, and a "baseball-sized" tumor removed, Chavez insisted on extreme privacy over the details of his health.

That was one of the reasons he chose to be treated in Cuba, where his friendship with past and present leaders Fidel and Raul Castro and the ruling Communist Party's firm grip on information guaranteed him discretion.

Chavez spent several months there on various visits, and underwent four operations, the last of which on December 11 was the most complicated.

His last words to aides before flying to Havana for that operation were: "I'll be back for sure."

METASTASIS IN LUNGS

Chavez did, indeed, fly home, but in such a bad state he could not be seen in public. He died of respiratory failure on Tuesday afternoon after the cancer had metastasized into his lungs, two sources said.

During two initial operations in mid-2011, Chavez had a tumor removed from his intestines, and was diagnosed with sarcoma in the psoas muscle that runs from the lower part of the vertebral column to the pelvis, a medical source said.

Though chemotherapy and radiotherapy kept the disease at bay and allowed him to run for re-election in October 2012, Chavez took heavy doses of medicines to enable him to make some heavily-staged campaign appearances - in a lot of pain.

On the last day of campaigning, standing for hours under a heavy rainfall, Chavez could bear it no longer, and a final rally was canceled. After the October 7 win, by an impressive 11 percentage points, an exhausted and suffering Chavez made few more public appearances before returning to Cuba weeks later.

The December 11 operation lasted six hours and left Chavez in a dire state, with hemorrhaging and a severe lung infection. He lost his pulse several times during the surgery and had to be resuscitated by doctors.

Cuban medics designed a special antibiotic to counter the infection, the medical source said, but even so Chavez had to undergo a tracheotomy to enable him to breathe through a tube in the windpipe.

In his last few days, a heavily-dosed Chavez met only with his closest family and aides despite a clamor from Venezuelan supporters - and opponents - to see him.

Even one of his closest friends and allies, Bolivia's leftist leader Evo Morales, was not allowed in to see him on visits to Caracas and Havana.

On Saturday, ministers were with him for about five hours, before a rapid deterioration began. He slipped into a coma on Monday and died at 4:25 p.m. local time (2055 GMT) on Tuesday.

(Writing by Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by Simon Gardner and Kieran Murray)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/agony-hugo-chavez-details-emerge-final-days-164052076.html

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Saturday, March 9, 2013

Bieber resumes tour after scuffle, health problems

FILE - In this Sept. 30, 2012 file photo, Justin Bieber performs at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. Bieber is recovering after fainting backstage at a concert in London on Thursday, March 7, 2013. A spokeswoman for Bieber said that the 19-year-old pop star was given oxygen and took a 20-minute reprieve after fainting backstage at his show at London's O2 Arena. (Photo by Isaac Brekken/Invision/AP, File)

FILe - In this Monday, March 4, 2013 file photo, Canadian singer Justin Bieber performs at the O2 Arena in east London. Bieber is recovering after fainting backstage at a concert in London. A spokeswoman for Bieber said Thursday, March 7, 2013, that the 19-year-old pop star was given oxygen and took a 20-minute reprieve after fainting backstage at London's O2 Arena. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - In this March 4, 2013 file photo, Canadian singer Justin Bieber performs at the O2 Arena in east London. Bieber is recovering after fainting backstage at a concert in London on Thursday, March 7, 2013. A spokeswoman for Bieber said that the 19-year-old pop star was given oxygen and took a 20-minute reprieve after fainting backstage at his show at London's O2 Arena. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - In this Monday, March 4, 2013 file photo, Canadian singer Justin Bieber performs at the O2 Arena in east London. Bieber is recovering after fainting backstage at a concert in London. A spokeswoman for Bieber said Thursday, March 7, 2013, that the 19-year-old pop star was given oxygen and took a 20-minute reprieve after fainting backstage at London's O2 Arena. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP, File)

LONDON (AP) ? It's been a rough week for Justin Bieber: Getting booed for being late, struggling to breathe mid-performance and fainting backstage, then caught on camera clashing with paparazzi.

But the 19-year-old pop sensation appeared to have recovered Friday for his final concert in London, singing and dancing to thousands of adoring fans at the O2 Arena.

Earlier Friday, the star made headlines when he got into an altercation with insult-hurling paparazzi, lashing out at a photographer with a stream of expletives as he was restrained by minders.

"Ahhhhh! Rough morning. Trying to feel better for this show tonight but let the paps get the best of me," the singer posted on Twitter soon after the altercation with the photographer, which took place as he got into a car earlier Friday. The scuffle was captured on video by Channel 5 News and widely broadcast by Britain's media.

"Sometimes when people r shoving cameras in your face all day and yelling the worst thing possible at u...well I'm human. Rough week," he wrote on the social networking site.

The clash came just hours after Bieber said he was "getting better" following breathing problems he suffered during the previous night's concert. The star took a short break to go backstage, where he was given oxygen, and had to be briefly hospitalized for a check-up.

A spokesman for the O2 Arena said Bieber was treated backstage during Thursday's concert after becoming short of breath, but recovered and finished his set.

"He was treated by our team of medics and after further examination they didn't find anything more serious or worrying."

A spokeswoman for Bieber said he was feeling "a little under the weather." She demanded anonymity to discuss the star's condition.

Bieber later posted a shirtless photo of himself in a hospital bed, saying he was getting better and listening to Janis Joplin. Before that on Twitter he thanked "everyone pulling me thru tonight."

"Best fans in the world," he wrote. "Figuring out what happened. Thanks for the love."

Video footage from the concert shows Bieber appearing to fade during a performance of his up-tempo hit, "Beauty and a Beat." He slows down, puts a hand to his head then bends over, resting his hands on knees before walking slowly to the back of the stage.

The AP spoke to 18-year-old journalism student Prithvi Pandya, who shot the footage, to confirm its authenticity.

"When he started 'Beauty and a Beat' you could see he was struggling," said Pandya, who was near the front of the crowd. "He took lots of drinks of water, that seemed unusual, and he was really sweaty, sweating a helluva lot.

"Toward the end of it, he went backstage. We didn't see him fainting. They brought on dancers to entertain, and I knew something was wrong at that point."

Bieber's manager, Scooter Braun, appeared onstage and told the crowd that the singer was feeling "very low of breath" but would come back to finish the show.

Jazz Chappell, a 20-year-old concertgoer who brought her younger sister and her friend to the show, said that In the nearly 30 minutes he was offstage, some fans started to leave. Once his manager announced what had happened, Chappell said many fans in the audience were gasping and crying, while others kept cheering for him to return.

"I thought, 'Give the guy a break. He just fainted. He's not a performing horse. Let him rest a second,'" said Chappell.

Chappell said Bieber, who is in London to perform four concerts at the O2, later returned and performed low-energy renditions of his hits "Boyfriend" and "Baby."

The incident caps a difficult week for Bieber. He was forced to apologize to outraged fans who accused him of taking the stage almost two hours late for his first concert at the O2 on Monday. He insisted he was only 40 minutes late and blamed "technical issues." He took to Twitter to vent his frustrations with the media's portrayal of the incident.

The star's Believe world tour is due to move on to Portugal on Monday, then continue across Europe, the Middle East, South Africa and North America until August.

___

AP writers Gregory Katz in London and Derrik J. Lang in Los Angeles and AP Music Writer Mesfin Fekadu contributed to this report.

___

Online:

http://www.justinbiebermusic.com/

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-03-08-People-Justin%20Bieber/id-664a9c0c1011456aa713b709933c3d4b

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