Obama urges Myanmar to stop violence against Muslims

By Paul Eckert

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama urged the president of Myanmar on Monday to halt violence against a Muslim minority but praised economic and political reforms in the formerly pariah nation that is emerging as a U.S. ally in China's backyard.

During the first visit to the White House in 47 years by a leader of the Southeast Asian nation, Obama called for an end to the killings of Rohingya Muslims in western Myanmar's Rakhine state.

Reformist Myanmar President Thein Sein vowed to resolve ethnic conflicts and bring perpetrators to justice.

"I also shared with President Sein our deep concern about communal violence that has been directed at Muslim communities inside Myanmar. The displacement of people, the violence directed towards them needs to stop," Obama said.

At least 192 people died last year in violence between Buddhists in Rakhine and Rohingya Muslims, who are denied citizenship by Myanmar. Most of the victims, and the 140,000 people made homeless in the attacks, were Muslims.

As the Myanmar government eases repression, long-simmering ethnic tensions are on the boil - a dynamic that resembles what happened when multi-ethnic Yugoslavia fractured in the 1990s after communism fell.

Thein Sein appealed for U.S. "assistance and understanding" as Myanmar attempts difficult reforms.

Obama said the Myanmar leader had assured him that he intends to release more political prisoners and institutionalize political reforms that have already begun transforming the country and ending its estrangement from the West.

Rights groups and some U.S. lawmakers fear Obama has moved too quickly since forging a dramatic breakthrough in relations in 2011 after a half century of military rule in Myanmar.

U.S. officials argue that reforms by Myanmar - freeing democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi and hundreds of political prisoners, scrapping censorship, legalizing trade unions and protests - are transformative and deserve support from Obama, who confirmed the end of Myanmar's pariah status with the West with a landmark visit last November.

"What has allowed this shift in relations is the leadership that President Sein has shown in moving Myanmar down a path of both political and economic reform," Obama said in the Oval Office.

Even critics in Congress of Obama's Myanmar policy support the U.S. strategic goal of bringing Myanmar, tucked between China and India, out of its isolation from the West.

The long U.S.-Myanmar estrangement was a drag on America's relations with ASEAN, the 10-nation Southeast Asian regional grouping that looks to Washington as a counterbalance to the more assertive China of recent years.

'MAXIMUM INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT'

In a speech after the White House meeting, Thein Sein described efforts to develop Southeast Asia's poorest economy, overhaul decrepit institutions, undo the habits of decades of authoritarian rule and build a new, inclusive national identity from dozens of ethnic groups, some of which have been at war for decades.

"To achieve all this we need maximum international support, including from the United States, to train and educate, share knowledge, trade and invest, and encourage others to do the same," he told an audience at a Washington university.

He referred to the Muslim killings and said his government "must ensure not only that inter-communal violence is brought to a halt, but that all the perpetrators are brought to justice."

Thein Sein, a retired general, was taken off the U.S. Treasury Department's Specially Designated Nationals visa blacklist last year to facilitate engagement.

The slight, soft-spoken leader was a close confidante of former military ruler Than Shwe, who ran Myanmar for 19 years, a period that saw mass jailing of opponents, the gunning down of pro-democracy protesters and widespread abuses in ethnic minority areas.

Successive U.S. governments have refused to acknowledge the country's change of name from Burma to Myanmar made in the late 1980s by the country's military rulers.

The United States for years deliberately referred to the nation of 60 million people as Burma, so as not to give legitimacy to military governments.

But in a nod to political reforms, the White House acknowledged it is now employing the name Myanmar more often than before.

"We have responded by expanding our engagement with the government, easing a number of sanctions, and as a courtesy in appropriate settings, more frequently using the name Myanmar," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

In a new U.S. measure to support reform, the United States and Myanmar on Tuesday will sign a Trade and Investment Framework Agreement on boosting trade, labor standards and investment, the United States trade representative said.

U.S. business leaders support lifting sanctions more quickly to facilitate access to an undeveloped consumer market in a country rich in oil, natural gas, minerals and timber. Europe, Japan and other parts of Asia have few or no Myanmar sanctions.

"The immediate tasks at hand ... are to remove the remaining U.S. economic sanctions on Myanmar, and to extend duty-free treatment in the United States for the imports of Myanmar," said Bart Fisher, chairman of the new Myanmar-U.S. Trade Council.

(Reporting by Paul Eckert; Additional reporting by Steve Holland and Jeff Mason; Editing by Alistair Bell and Eric Beech)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-urges-myanmar-stop-violence-against-muslims-002528038.html

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Forum Jump

Source: http://www.worldlawdirect.com/forum/real-estate-law-matters/71713-squatters-rites-texas-deceased-father-son-keeping-property.html

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The Koch Brothers' Foray into Media Has Already Been a Success

Billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch are quite?entrepreneurial?in their attempts to influence public policy in their favor. They don't just donate to a few like-minded politicians: They have long funded libertarian think tanks like the Cato Institute. They helped fund the Tea Party movement. In the 2012 election, they funded groups like Americans for Prosperity to air campaign ads attacking Barack Obama during the last presidential campaign. While their reported interest in buying the Tribune Company's eight newspapers, which includes the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times, has stirred up fears from journalists and activists in those cities that the Koch brothers would extend their influence into media,?their limited involvement with the media has already yielded success.

RELATED: PBS, Now With Commercial Breaks

David Koch is on the board of New York PBS station WNET -- and his status as a mega-donor -- led the station to air a rebuttal to a program that used his apartment building as a symbol for the gap between rich and poor, and to refuse to air a documentary about the Kochs' role in the 2010 governor's race in Wisconsin, The New Yorker's Jane Mayer reports. In the end, it didn't matter for WNET. Koch quit the board and decided against a major donation.

RELATED: Koch Brothers Want to Know Why Their Money Was Wasted

The government funds just 12 percent of PBS's budget, which means it and its member stations are dependent on charitable contributions for the rest. That?means that PBS programming that argues that the middle class ("Viewers Like You") should pay lower tax rates than the very rich (like David Koch and the rest of the donors who get thanked by name) is targeting the people who pay to keep that programming on the air. And that's kind of what happened when New York's WNET and Boston's WGBH, whose boards Koch sits on, decided to air a documentary called?Park Avenue: Money, Power and the American Dream on November 12. It used the residents of the New York City building at 740 Park Avenue to tell the story of income inequality. The Kochs are residents. As the content of the film became clear, the president of WNET, Neal Shapiro, became nervous. He phoned David Koch in advance. He invited Koch to sit on a panel to discuss the film after it aired. Koch doesn't make many public appearances, so he offered a written response. WNET aired a statement from Koch Industries after the film aired, which Mayer describes as an unprecedented move "like appending Letters to the Editor to a front-page article."

RELATED: Koch Brothers vs. Rupert Murdoch: The Fight for Tribune Newspapers Is On

The controversy pushed self-censorship downstream. WNET said it had been blindsided by Independent Television Service, which funded the Park Avenue film and many other documentaries aired by PBS stations. And so a few months after that documentary aired, ITVS decided not to fund?Citizen Koch, a documentary about politics after the Supreme Court's?Citizens United?decision that focused on the Kochs' funding of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

RELATED: The Koch Is Hitting the Fan at the L.A. Times

In the end, the self-censorship didn't save WNET's funding. David Koch quit the board, and decided against a big gift to the station.?"It was going to be a seven-figure donation?maybe more," a source told Mayer. How would editors at Tribune newspapers take in these considerations if the Kochs were directly responsible for their paychecks? It's a question the Koch brothers are probably asking, too. The Kochs are keenly aware of the efficacy of their public advocacy, conducting a review of what went wrong with their ads in the 2012 elections. While Koch might have quit the WNET board, just being a member had undeniable results. Being an owner of eight newspapers?could be?irresistible.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/koch-brothers-foray-media-already-success-184427075.html

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Making ice-cream more nutritious with meat left-overs

May 20, 2013 ? Most of the animal proteins found in the meat industry waste have, until now, been underutilised. The challenge is to transform such waste into food of higher functionality and added value. Thanks to the findings of the EU funded PROSPARE project, it is possible to reuse the protein and lipid fraction of disused food, according to project co-ordinator Arnaldo Dossena, who is the head of the food science department at theUniversity of Parma, in Italy.

Up to 50% of the animal weight processed in the meat industry is discarded as left-overs and ends up composted or incinerated, despite beingrich in proteins and lipids. Turning the lipid fraction of such waste into biodiesel has proven too expensive. So the focus is now on reusing proteins. Today, only 22% is converted by the food industry into feed and barely 3% is consumed as food. The problem is that recovery methods are energy intensive. They also convert the source proteins into meals with poorer digestibility and nutrient properties as well as a low commercial value.

Thanks to a process involving enzymes to digest food, poultry left-overs such as bone and meat trimmings can be converted into proteins dubbed functional animal proteins hydrolyzates. They differ from existing protein hydrolyzates, from eggs, buttermilk, or fish already on the market in that they have a higher content of nutritionally useful amino acids. They can be used as supplements for sports diet, to help build up muscle tissue, and as additives in processed food, for example. So far, some of their properties -- namely prebiotic, antimicrobiotic, antioxidant and hypotensive -- have been demonstrated in vitro.

The technology developed under the project is now being tested by a Belgian food company, called PROLIVER. It is hoping to enhance the nutritional quality of its protein hydrolysates, already sold in dietary, health and sports food supplements. One of the project partners, Mobitek-M, which is a Russian company specialised in production of protein-enriched food stuffs, is also planning on including these products into ice-cream, under the follow-up Rosano Project. They have built a plant in the Belgorod region of the Russian Federation, which is about to start of transforming functional animal protein at a capacity of one hundred tonnes per day.

Some see a real advantage in this approach. "I think in Europe the most important part of such an approach is to reduce the impact of the [food] production on the environment," explains Vegard Segtnan, senior researcher at the Norwegian Institute of Food, Fishery and Aquaculture Nofima, located in Troms?. He also believes that there is also a market for these specialised protein products that are easily assimilated by the body for sick people, the elderly and athletes. "The materials have a one up to two years shelf life," Dossena says, "[they] can be used to increase the protein count where there is a protein deficit since they contain many free amino acids [which are therefore easily absorbed]."

These products aim to complete the gamut of protein-based products present on the market. However, there is currently no EU-wide specific regulations for them. Instead, they are approved on a case-by-case basis in individual EU countries. Protein hydrolyzates approved in national EU markets need to qualify as a specific food product category, according to Karin Verzijden, a food regulatory expert at law firm Axon lawyers, in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. For example, these products might qualify as dietary supplements. "It really depends on the emphasis that is put on their ability to be digested much quicker than regular proteins for instance," Verzijden said.

In addition to qualifying as food dietary supplement, experts disagree as to whether they might either qualify as novel foods used as food ingredients, or as additives. It partly depends on whether they were not already used for human consumption within the EU market prior to 1997, when the EU novel food regulation entered into force. Until further clarity regarding the food category these applications would be considered under by the food regulator at EU-wide level, it may be a while before they reach their potential users.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/4YJ_YW2Ii4c/130520094846.htm

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Tea party looks to take advantage of moment

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ? Is the tea party getting its groove back? Shouts of vindication from around the country suggest the movement's leaders certainly think so.

They say the IRS acknowledgement that it had targeted their groups for extra scrutiny ? a claim that tea party activists had made for years ? is helping pump new energy into the coalition. And they are trying to use that development, along with the ongoing controversy over the Benghazi, Libya, terrorist attacks and the Justice Department's secret seizure of journalists' phone records, to recruit new activists incensed about government overreach.

"This is the defining moment to say 'I told you so,' " said Katrina Pierson, a Dallas-based tea party leader, who traveled to Washington last week as the three political headaches for President Barack Obama unfolded.

Luke Rogonjich, a tea party leader in Phoenix, called the trio of controversies a powerful confluence that bolsters the GOP's case against big government. "Suddenly, there are a lot of things pressing on the dam," said Rogonjich.

It's unclear whether a movement made up of disparate grassroots groups with no central body can take advantage of the moment and leverage it to grow stronger after a sub-par showing in last fall's election had called into question the movement's lasting impact. Republicans and Democrats alike say the tea party runs the risk of going too far in its criticism, which could once again open the door to Democratic efforts to paint it as an extreme arm of the GOP.

"Never underestimate the tea party's ability to overplay its hand," said Democratic strategist Mo Elleithee. "Just because there is universal agreement that the IRS went too far, that should not be misread as acceptance of the tea party's ideology of anger."

At the very least, furor over the IRS devoting special attention to tea party groups claiming tax-exempt status is giving the tea party more visibility than it has had in months, and it's providing a new rallying cry for tea party organizers starting to plot how to influence the 2014 congressional elections. The law allows tax-exempt organizations to lobby and dabble in politics as long as their primary purpose is social welfare.

The tax-agency scandal ? it has led to the acting IRS commissioner's ouster, a criminal investigation and Capitol Hill hearings ? seems to validate the tea party's long-held belief among supporters that government was trampling on them specifically, a claim dismissed by ousted commissioner Steven T. Miller. He has called the targeting "a mistake and not an act of partisanship."

Nevertheless, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., elected in 2010 with tea party backing, said the IRS scandal "confirms many of the feelings that led to the tea party movement in the first place."

"What's happened here is a reminder of, this is what happens when you expand government," he said in an interview with The Associated Press. "That and the disaster that is Obamacare is going to be a real catalyst in 2014 and beyond."

Tea party activists hope they also can drive support ahead of the elections by stoking widespread suspicions that the Obama administration and State Department are hiding key details about the September 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya, that killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans. The seizure of Associated Press phone records also plays into their argument that government is too intrusive.

Tea party activists have tried to take advantage of the issues that have put some of their central tenets ? limited government and civil liberties ? in the spotlight.

From around the country last week, they headed Washington to hold a news conference on the Capitol steps and meet with members of Congress. Those who stayed home jammed House and Senate phone lines with calls urging congressional action as the IRS saga unfolded. An email from Teaparty.org that was sent to activists proclaimed: "We've worked so hard these past few years and it's paying off! We're witnessing the unraveling of a presidency at an unprecedented rate."

Freedomworks, a national tea party group, spent the week circulating petitions for congressional hearings and encouraging leaders of local groups who believe they have been targeted by the IRS to include their story on a national database to build the case against the agency.

"Perhaps all this attention will break something loose," said Jim Chiodo, an activist from Holland, Mich.

It wasn't long ago that the tea party was the hot new political kid on the block, bursting onto the national scene during the contentious summer debate over health care in 2009. Over the next few years, the loosely affiliated conservatives and civil libertarians would leave their mark on the 2010 elections by helping Republican candidates win Senate races in Florida, Kentucky, Utah and Wisconsin and scores of House races.

Those victories resulted in House and Senate Republican caucuses getting pushed to the right in legislative battles, making life difficult for Obama and his Democrats in an era of divided government.

But the movement's success was muted in 2012 when Republicans nominated the establishment-backed Mitt Romney for president, though he did little to inspire the tea party. He lost, and so did many tea party-backed House and Senate candidates.

Now, tea party activists say they are emboldened and won't be afraid to recruit candidates to run in Republican primaries against incumbents who appear to go easy on the Obama administration, particularly in light of the IRS scandal.

"It's one of those issues we should just raise hell about," said Nashville Tea Party leader Ben Cunningham.

Some say they're now even more suspicious of government than before.

"I personally feel so vindicated," said Mark Falzon, a New Jersey tea party leader. But he added: "What's scaring me now is what's going on below the water line that we're not seeing."

Republicans say that the tea party will have an opportunity come 2014 to make its mark again, particularly with Obama not at the top of the ticket. Also, they say that with Obama's health care law going into effect and with the slew of latest controversies, they now have concrete issues to point to when arguing against government overreach.

"Suddenly, this is a very real demonstration of too much power ceded to government bureaucrats," said Matt Kibbe, president of Freedomworks. "This is no longer theoretical."

___

Associated Press writers Steve Peoples in Boston and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Follow Thomas Beaumont on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Tom_Beaumont

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/tea-party-looks-advantage-moment-131128674.html

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Bill Hader steals the show in starry 'SNL' sendoff

TV

Aaron Couch The Hollywood Reporter

16 hours ago

Ben Affleck joined the five-timers club as host, but departing castmember Bill Hader stole the show on "Saturday Night Live?s" season 38 finale.

Hader gave a cinematic sendoff to Stefon, that perennially irritating scenester kid. During Weekend Update, he faced his usual dressing down from Seth Meyers. Stefon had finally had enough, and announced he?d met someone else and was leaving Meyers. Meyers -- who was joined at the Update desk by former co-anchor Amy Poehler -- ran after Stefon and found him in a church. What came next was a fantastic (and surprisingly emotional) Graduate-themed segment featuring surprise guest Anderson Cooper as Stefon?s fiancee.

VIDEO: "Saturday Night Live": Watch Bill Hader's finest sketches

In the show?s final sketch, Hader, Fred Armisen, Jason Sudeikis and Taran Killam played a British rock band saying goodbyes on the last night of a tour.

?It?s the last night here,? Armisen said.

?But we?re going to keep playing together,? Hader said.

The band began playing a song, and were eventually joined on stage by Armisen?s Portlandia costar Carrie Brownstein, Sonic Youth?s Kim Gordon, the Sex Pistols? Steve Jones, singer-songwriter Aimee Mann, and Dinosaur Jr.?s J Mascis.

Earlier in the week, a report emerged that Armisen and Sudeikis would be leaving the show, and while NBC has not commented on the report, it's worth nothing that Armisen played the leader of the band. The focus was actually more on Armisen than Hader. Based solely on the sketch, signs point to an Armisen exit in addition to Hader's.

But lest we forget the host, it's time to circle back to Affleck. During his opening monologue, the actor-director addressed his odd "Argo" Oscars speech, in which he thanked wife Jennifer Garner but went on to talk about how marriage takes a lot of work. On "SNL," Affleck brought Garner out to discuss what he really meant. What followed was a marital game of ping-pong, with Garner saying she would have described their marriage as ?a gift,? not work, and Affleck fumbling for a better explanation.

PHOTOS: From live TV to the big screen: 12 "SNL" sketches made into movies

Affleck finally found his footing:

"I want to tell you how I wish I had ended that speech: I couldn?t do any of the things I do without you, without your support. You?re my angel, my wife, my world.?

The moment was shattered when Garner pointed out that he was reading the speech off of a cue card.

"SNL" moved on to imagine what would happen if Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Armisen) were to make a movie about Affleck directing "Argo." The result was spectacular. "Bengo F--- Yourself" saw Ahmadinejad wearing a Red Sox cap, doing a Boston accent and pitching his idea for a totally false CIA story. Affleck himself had a role in the movie as a sound technician.

?Why would I appear in this movie? Well, to be honest I?ve long been looking to appear in a movie worse than 'Gigli,'? Affleck said.

VIDEO: "SNL" recap: Zach Galifianakis plays "Game of Game of Thrones"

Affleck sported a mustache and a paunch to play a member of a family of emotionally repressed police officers attempting to toast the engagement of a young female relative. In a less-than-successful sketch, he portrayed a counselor at a camp designed to turn gay kids straight.

"SNL" was on a gay sketch kick, apparently, with a prerecorded segment advertising anti-anxiety medication for people feeling worried about attending perfect gay weddings over the summer. One man (Hader) feared that he was an inadequate dancer at gay weddings, where he said guests knew choreographed Beyonce dances. Another (Moynihan) never had clothes that were good enough, and a third noted that President Barack Obama had called to congratulate his gay friends at their wedding, while at his wedding, his grandmother had called Obama the N-word. Not quite as classy of an event.

Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/bill-hader-steals-show-star-packed-saturday-night-live-sendoff-1C9984549

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Wyo. student who threatened to rape self on Facebook was convicted of assault

The 28-year-old University of Wyoming student who allegedly threatened herself with rape in a Facebook hoax in April was convicted of aggravated assault in 2005 after she brandished a gun at an employer who fired her.

Meg Lanker-Simons, now a newly-minted UW graduate, was charged with interference with a police investigation after she allegedly posted on an anonymous Facebook forum that she wanted to engage in angry sexual intercourse ? with someone named ?Meg Lanker Simons.?

The posting on UW Crushes read:

?I want to hatefuck Meg Lanker Simons so hard. That chick runs her liberal mouth all the time and doesn?t care who knows it. I think its so hot and makes me angry. One night with me and shes gonna be a good Republican bitch.?

It turns out that the April 24 incident isn?t the strident leftist?s first rodeo in Wyoming?s criminal system. As the Laramie Boomerang reports, Lanker-Simons had an aggravated assault conviction in 2005 as the result of a bizarre gun-brandishing incident.

After Lanker-Simons was fired from a radio station in the fall of 2005, she returned and pulled a Glock 22 .40 caliber handgun from her purse. She waved the semi-automatic pistol around. She pointed it at the man who sacked her. He testified that he was ?in fear for his life,? notes the Boomerang.

The radio station was evacuated. Police caught Lanker-Simons as she tried to flee the scene in her vehicle. They held her at gunpoint.

In July 2006, Lanker-Simons ? then known as Meghan Michelena ? was sentenced to six years of probation. Her term of probation was subject to a number of conditions. She had to undergo counseling, complete community service, pay fines and apologize to her victims. She was also prevented from owning any guns.

The alleged Facebook hoax brought national attention to the Cowboy State?s flagship college. Initially, the administration stood firmly behind Lanker-Simons. ?No student should have to deal with such threatening language,? said one sternly-worded official statement. A school official also denounced ?rape culture,? according to KOWB.

Concerned fellow feminists also threw a rally for Lanker-Simons ? complete with all manner of signs condemning rape threats ? before police concluded that Lanker-Simons herself was behind the threats.

This month, Lanker-Simons participated in the University of Wyoming?s commencement ceremonies despite the charges against her. She graduated with a bachelor?s degree in psychology.

Lanker-Simons is also a blogger and a local radio host.

In 2010, Lanker-Simons and Bill Ayers sued the University of Wyoming after school officials decided to cancel a speech by Ayers, a former Weather Underground radical and mentor to President Obama. Also in 2010, her husband, Andrew Simons, ran a failed Democratic campaign for Wyoming secretary of state.

According to the Boomerang, the interference charge is a misdemeanor punishable by a prison sentence up to a year and a fine up to $1,000.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/wyo-student-threatened-rape-self-facebook-convicted-assault-174802295.html

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