Watchdog group: Most lobbyists giving to Clinton don’t represent ‘real people’
The Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics, today investigates what it calls the “lobbyist lobs” among Democrats Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards. “Lobbyists do represent ordinary Americans, as Hillary Clinton claims, but those contributing to her campaign mostly represent big industries,” the nonpartisan center reports in its Capital Eye publication… How pure are Edwards and Obama?… Contributions from Washington lobbyists have still managed to seep into both Democrats’ coffers.”

Steve Bradenton Cartoons

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Bin Laden: Europeans should end US help
CAIRO, Egypt – Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden called on Europeans to stop helping the United States in the war in Afghanistan, according to a new tape released Thursday.

U.S. sponsorship of Sunni groups worries Iraq’s government
The American campaign to turn Sunni Muslims ‘against’ Islamic extremists is growing so quickly that Iraq’s Shiite Muslim leaders fear that it’s out of control and threatens to create a potent armed force that will turn against the government one day.

Return of Iraqi refugees concerns US
BAGHDAD – The U.S. military has expressed concern that Iraq’s government is unprepared to deal with a mass return of refugees to Baghdad, a flow that could foster housing and employment tensions in a city that remains insecure despite declining violence.

Israeli court halts Gaza electricity cut
JERUSALEM – The Israeli government can continue cutting fuel supplies to residents of the Gaza Strip but must postpone an electricity cut planned for this weekend, Israel’s Supreme Court ruled Friday.

EU-Iran start final nuclear talks
LONDON (AFP) – The EU foreign policy chief and Iran’s top nuclear negotiator held last-ditch talks on Tehran’s nuclear plans Friday, but hopes of a breakthrough appeared slim amid a growing threat of new sanctions.

Russia signs Europe arms pact suspension into law
MOSCOW (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin signed a law on Friday suspending Russia’s participation in a key post-Cold War arms treaty, a move which could allow it to deploy more forces close to western Europe.

China to eliminate WTO-banned subsidies: US
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States announced Thursday that China has agreed to eliminate a dozen WTO-banned subsidies that have given Chinese exports a broad, unfair trade advantage.

Japan ordered to pay in overwork death
TOKYO – A court in central Japan ordered the government Friday to pay compensation to a woman who argued that her husband died from overwork at Toyota Motor Corp., Japan’s largest automaker, officials said.
Only I think the COMPANY should have to pay, and I think we should do some of this kind of suing right here in the good old U.S.A.

Botched Manila coup a warning to would-be plotters
MANILA (Reuters) – The Philippine government prepared fresh charges on Friday against the leaders of yet another botched coup and hunted for others as public apathy and a show of force sent a strong message to serial seditionists.

Australia wants Iraq troops home by mid 2008
CANBERRA (Reuters) – About 550 Australian combat troops in Iraq should be withdrawn by about the middle of next year, Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd said on Friday, setting a broad timetable for the soldiers to return home. Australia has about 1,500 troops in and around Iraq, but Rudd won power at the Australia’s national election on November 24 with a promise to bring frontline forces home.

Venezuelan students rally against Chavez
CARACAS, Venezuela – As more than 100,000 people flooded the streets to protest constitutional changes that would boost President Hugo Chavez’s power, students again showed they are a key force behind the re-energized opposition.

Police probe unlawful donations to Labour party
LONDON (AFP) – Police were set to begin Friday an investigation into unlawful donations to Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s governing Labour Party, in the latest blow to his beleaguered administration.

Pope criticizes atheism in encyclical
VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI strongly criticized modern-day atheism in a major document released Friday, saying it had led to some of the “greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice” ever known.
And so has Christianity, Mr. Pope, sir.  And so have other religions.  See below.

Calls in Sudan for execution of Briton
KHARTOUM, Sudan – Thousands of Sudanese, many armed with clubs and knives, rallied Friday in a central square and demanded the execution of a British teacher convicted of insulting Islam for allowing her students to name a teddy bear “Muhammad.”

Chad rebels declare war on French, foreign forces
N’DJAMENA (Reuters) – Chadian anti-government rebels on Friday declared a “state of war” against French and foreign military forces in an apparent warning to a European Union peacekeeping force that plans to deploy there soon.

US not seeking permanent Iraq bases: White House
The White House denied Thursday that the United States seeks permanent military bases in Iraq, days after the US “war czar” said that would be part of talks next year on long-term security ties.

Bush pushes Democrats to OK war funding
WASHINGTON – President Bush sternly pressed Democrats to approve money to fund the Iraq war “without strings and without delay” before leaving town for the Christmas holidays, something congressional leaders have already indicated they will not do.

Pelosi: Bush and His Republican Allies Are Preventing Extra Funds from Reaching Our Troops (by Office of the Speaker )
Washington, D.C. — Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement today in response to President Bush’s remarks this afternoon at the Pentagon: “Earlier this month, Congress approved nearly a half trillion dollars for the Department of Defense. Just two weeks ago, House Democrats passed $50 billion in additional funding for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have provided every penny that is currently necessary to fund Defense Department operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world. It is President Bush and his Republican allies in the Senate who are preventing extra funds from reaching our troops.“

TSA plan to gather more data protested
WASHINGTON — A government proposal to start collecting birth dates and genders of people reserving airline flights is drawing protests from major airlines and travel agencies that say it would be invasive, confusing and “useless.”

Judge: Feds must release telecom records
SAN FRANCISCO – An electronic privacy group challenging President Bush’s domestic spying program scored a minor victory after a judge ordered the federal government to release information about lobbying efforts by telecommunications companies to protect them from prosecution.

Leahy Starts Formal Process that Could Lead to a Contempt Citation for Karl Rove and Others (by Jonathan Turley)
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy has formally determined that Karl Rove, John Bolten, former White House political director Sara Taylor and her deputy, J. Scott Jennings, are in violation of the Senate subpoenas and must comply “immediately” or face legal consequences… This ruling would allow the matter to go to the Senate.Notably, Leahy found that Bush was not involved in the firing of U.S. Attorneys. This helped undermine the claim of executive privilege.

A New Beginning for American Families: The Dodd Plan for Fair, Practical Bankruptcy Reform (thanks to Space Cowboy at Shakesville – click through for a wonderful picture of Banker Cat turning down ur loan)
In a Dodd Administration, hardworking people who have fallen on hard times will be afforded a new beginning that re-establishes a safety net and helps families get back on their feet. As President, he will:
- Modify the means test to ensure families have sufficient resources to live on
- Protect children, not creditors
- Ensure all medical debts are dischargeable
- Permit bankruptcy courts to restructure mortgages so families can stay in their homes
- Allow private student loans to be dischargeable
Too bad Dodd can’t get more traction.  I like his defense of the Constitution, too.

Giuliani Defends Spending on His Mayoral Security
Rudolph W. Giuliani [Thursday] night called a Web site’s account of his spending a “political hit job” as his campaign struggled to explain why hundreds of thousands of dollars in travel expenses for his mayoral security detail were billed to obscure city offices instead of the Police Department. [A] senior aide to Mr. Giuliani … contended that the billing followed longstanding procedures in which legitimate travel expenses for the police detectives were spread among the budgets of various mayoral offices.

Giuliani Denies Obscuring Mayoral Expenses
New York City Comptroller Bill Thompson told ABC News that Giuliani’s administration billed obscure city agencies for his security detail’s travel expenses during his visits to the Hamptons… Thompson said this about the Mayor’s explanation, “That’s not the way that we operate these days, and it would not be the preferred way of doing business,” Thompson said. “In the end, it’s a very convoluted way of getting things done.”

Light Amidst the Shag (by Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo)
I fear … that we are only rubbing the surface of the true Shag Fund in this incipient probe. Clearly there’s the travel money — billed to whatever NYC office — used for trips and security for Rudy out at the Hamptons shags. But we also know now that while Rudy was conducting an extramarital affair with Judi he gave her her own NYPD car and driver to be squired around the city with. Where’d the money for that come from?

Rudy’s Ties to a Terror Sheikh
Giuliani’s business contracts tie him to the man who let 9/11’s mastermind escape the FBI

White House lowers ‘08 economic forecast
WASHINGTON – The White House on Thursday lowered its forecast for economic growth for next year and said unemployment would rise as the housing slump and tight credit weigh on national economic activity.

Futures rise on Bernanke comments
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Stock index futures rose on Friday, indicating a higher market open, after comments by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke bolstered belief in the market that another interest-rate cut is on the horizon.

US economy surges on back of exports
The US economy grew at its fastest rate in four years in the third quarter as an export surge fuelled by a weaker dollar more than offset the impact of the deepening slump in housing.

US Foreclosure Filings Nearly Double
LOS ANGELES (AP) — More U.S. homeowners fell behind on mortgage payments or even lost their homes last month compared to a year ago, with Nevada, California, Florida and Ohio posting the highest foreclosure rates, a mortgage research company said Thursday.

Florida Halts Withdrawals From Local Investment Fund
Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) — Florida officials voted to suspend withdrawals from an investment fund for schools and local governments after redemptions sparked by downgrades of debt held in the portfolio reduced assets by 44 percent… Local governments including Orange County and Pompano Beach that use the pool like a money-market fund asked for their money back after the State Board of Administration disclosed in a report earlier this month that holdings in the fund were lowered to below investment grade.

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

FAIR Action Alert: Bill Clinton, Anti-War?
The New York Times and Washington Post (11/28/07) both failed to adequately challenge the dishonesty of former President Bill Clinton’s declaration that he had been opposed to the Iraq War “from the beginning.” Clinton, in fact, was a supporter of the war, both before the invasion and in the first year or so of the fighting.
What I recall is that the right wingers had a field day with Bill Clinton’s statements affirming the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

You Say That As If It’s a Bad Thing (by Chet Scoville at Shakesville)
The Weekly Standard on [Thursday] night’s Republican debate: “America got to see a vaguely threatening parade of gun fetishists, flat worlders, Mars Explorers, Confederate flag lovers and zombie-eyed-Bible-wavers as well as various one issue activists hammering their pet causes.” What’s wrong with a little truth in advertising?

Rove refuses to answer McClellan’s claims on Plame.
Following a speech in South Texas [Wednesday], Karl Rove responded to former White House press secretary Scott McClellan’s claim that Rove, along with “Libby, the vice President, the President’s chief of staff, and the president himself” were responsible for McClellan “unknowingly” passing “along false information” about the outing of Valerie Plame. Rove dodged the question, stating that McClellan said it “had all gotten carried out of proportion“.

Rep. Hoekstra Was Source Of Joe Klein’s FISA Lies, Decries ‘Paranoid,’ ‘Self-Absorbed’ ‘Far-Left Critics’ (Think Progress, Center for American Progress)
In Time Magazine last week, columnist Joe Klein baselessly claimed that Democrats’ proposal fix to FISA would require “every foreign-terrorist target’s calls to be approved by the FISA court.” [Thursday], House Intelligence Committee member and “Bush loyalist” Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) revealed that he was a “source” for Klein’s error-filled column… Klein ignorantly claimed the RESTORE Act “would give terrorists the same legal protections as Americans.” Hoekstra adds that Klein’s assertions are a “demonstratable fact.” Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ), a chief author of the RESTORE Act, countered that the legislation does exactly the opposite.

Republican operative’s wife attacks MoveOn.org. Oh, she’s also CNN’s new anchor Campbell Brown (by Joe Sudbay at AMERICAblog)
The wife of Dan Senor, who served as a spokesperson for Bush in Iraq, is now working for CNN… Last night, in her first week on the job, [Campbell Brown] attacked MoveOn: “… ‘General David Petraeus made his reputation taking on insurgents in Iraq. But when he came to Capitol Hill in September, he was confronted by American insurgents, a liberal anti-war group called MoveOn.org.’”… Actually, Campbell, if you want to know what real insurgents are, ask your husband and his colleagues who let the insurgency grow in Iraq under their watch. He even still has his White House web page touting that gig.

CNN’s Irresponsible Debate Coverage Undermines Its Claim As The ‘Most Trusted Name In News’
CNN bills itself as the “Most Trusted Name in News.” It has already hosted five presidential debates in the 2008 primary season, with another four scheduled. While many in the media credited the network with bringing “originality and spontaneity” to the debate process by partnering with YouTube, its debates have more often been characterized by sloppy preparation, a lack of transparency, and theatrics that undermine the intelligence of the American public.
Click through for some lowlights.

YouTube-CNN Republican Debate Reflects Poorly on New Media (by Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins at Mashable)
Wednesday night, CNN and YouTube played host to a Republican debate that, as it turns out, has stirred up a bit of controversy… Michelle Malkin has been the blogger most closely advancing the research on exactly who asked the questions at the debate, and at present count, nearly 30% of all questions asked were from planted questioners. That is to say, the various Democratic Presidential campaigns put out questions to the Republican candidates, and instead of picking questions from the constituency of the Republican base, CNN decided to wave through folks into the debate who would never vote for any of the candidates in an effort to shape their image in what they hoped would be an embarrassing way.
Well, if 30% of the questions were from the opposition, doesn’t that mean that 70% were not?  How does that constitute a liberal bias?

CNN ratings down in November
Despite scoring the highest-rated presidential primary debate in cable news history this month, CNN’s overall ratings fell in November, while Fox News Channel and MSNBC showed increases in primetime. CNN showed some improvement so far in this month’s move of “Lou Dobbs Tonight” to 7 p.m., but it has seen a sharp decline with its “American Morning.” Meanwhile, MSNBC beat CNN in November for second place in what the business calls “sales prime,” between 7 p.m.-2 a.m. ET — primetime on both coasts.
So, whatever your strategy is, CNN, it ain’t workin’.

WaPo Reporter Responds To All The Criticism Of Front-Page Obama Muslim Piece (by Greg Sargent at TPM Horse’s Mouth)
Okay, the Washington Post reporter who wrote [Thursday’s] front page article on the rumors that Obama is a Muslim has now responded to all the criticism of the piece… “I think the story makes clear, including in the candidate’s own words, he is a Christian.”… [T]he problem here is that WaPo, and not just Obama, should have “denied the accuracy” of the Obama-is-a-Muslim nonsense. The Obama Muslim smear is based on lies, not “rumors.”… That’s what everyone is yelling about.

Mandates and Mudslinging (by Paul Krugman)
[U]nder the [Barack] Obama [health care] plan, … people who did the right thing and bought insurance when they were healthy would end up subsidizing those who didn’t sign up for insurance until or unless they needed medical care… Mr. Obama, then, is wrong on policy. Worse yet, the words he uses to defend his position make him sound like Rudy Giuliani inveighing against “socialized medicine”: he doesn’t want the government to “force” people to have insurance, to “penalize” people who don’t participate. I recently castigated Mr. Obama for adopting right-wing talking points about a Social Security “crisis.” Now he’s echoing right-wing talking points on health care.
Here’s a lesson for you, mainstream media.  THIS is the kind of insight and coverage of political issues that we the public need, to be good citizens—no matter what you THINK we want.

Mythbuster: Hispanics take up English the old-fashioned way
WASHINGTON — Just like previous immigrant groups, Hispanic immigrants in the United States speak little English in the first generation, but English dominates in the lives of the second generation and Spanish fades in the third, according to a study released Thursday. The classic pattern, reported by the Pew Hispanic Center, a Washington-based nonprofit research group, partially counters concerns raised in immigration debates that Hispanics in the United States will cluster in Spanish-speaking enclaves rather than assimilate and learn English, as previous immigrant groups have done.

If the media won’t do the mythbusting, turn to the courts: Rape case reform in the UK. (by Vanessa at Feministing)
Not one week after UK women Reclaimed the Night on Saturday, we find that juries will now be “briefed” before rape cases in order to dispel “rape myths” that studies have shown to contribute to a severe decrease in rape convictions in the UK…

Do Not Say That New Home Sales Increased! (by Dean Baker)
The Census Bureau reported that new homes sold at a 728,000 annual rate in October, up from a 716,000 annual rate reported for September. Bad things will happen to anyone who highlights this increase. The September sales data were revised down by 54,000 from a previously reported annual rate of 770,000. This means that the annual sales rate for October is 42,000, or 5.5 percent, lower than the previously reported September rate.

Media Matters for America headlines

Beck invoked purported “reconquista” movement in discussion of rioting in France

CNN’s Roberts equated “Christian conservatives” with “values voters”

Blitzer again ignored Bush’s inconsistent statements on Pakistani sovereignty

CNN expunged “don’t ask, don’t tell” question and answers in rebroadcasts of debate — without disclosure

Discussing McCain’s Hitler comment, CNN’s Brown baselessly asserted McCain was “making his case for a strong military”

Sun-Times omitted key information in suggesting Obama conflict of interest

Fox & Friends First claimed that Clinton “allegedly planted question” at GOP debate without noting denials

CNN’s Bohrman apologized to Republican candidates over question in YouTube debate, but has yet to apologize to Democrats

Resource: Vast Nazi archive opens to public
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands – After more than 60 years, Nazi documents stored in a vast warehouse in Germany were unsealed Wednesday, opening a rich resource for Holocaust historians and for survivors to delve into their own tormented past.

AP expands global coverage as papers close foreign bureaus
The AP family tree now branches out to 243 bureaus in 97 countries. “Keeping our people safe is a major part of the job,” says John Daniszewski, who oversees the AP’s international operations. “Ten to 20 years ago, journalists were widely respected as neutral. Unfortunately, now, in many places in the world, journalists are targets.”

“The biggest story of my entire life” never turns out that way
That’s what Time veteran Karen Tumulty tells Evan Smith. “I thought that about Iran-Contra, and a few years later I was covering Clinton’s impeachment. I thought that about impeachment, and a few years later I was covering the Florida recount. I thought that about the Florida recount, and a few years later I was covering 9/11.”

Hollywood studios send writers new offer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Film and TV writers who’ve been on strike for nearly a month are mulling a new contract offer from Hollywood studios. Producers said the offer they presented Thursday, dubbed the “New Economic Partnership,” would pay writers millions of dollars extra for work shown on the Internet, a central issue in negotiations.

Networks set for $120m from web ads
The four US television networks in a pay dispute with Hollywood television writers over online video advertising are in line to generate $120m of revenues in 2007 from free web streaming of their content, according to a leading media buyer.

Appeals Court Voids Agreement to Pay Freelancers for Work Published on the Web
A federal appeals court yesterday threw out a hard-fought agreement between publishers and freelance writers to pay the writers for electronic reproduction of their work. In a 2-to-1 decision, an appellate panel ruled that the courts had no jurisdiction over the copyright dispute and that a lower court erred in accepting the writers’ lawsuit and approving the settlement… “The decision is an outrage, and I hope it’s appealable to the Supreme Court,” said Gerard Colby, president of the National Writers Union, and a plaintiff.
This is the tactic that is being used by right-wing activist judges to negate agreements, legislation, and even court decisions they don’t like.  They just claim that they side they don’t want to win has no standing.  They don’t even have to rule on the questions of law.

ABC News, union reach contract agreement
ABC News said Thursday that it reached a tentative new contract with workers represented by the Writers Guild of America East that includes a 3.5% wage increase and a one-time signing bonus.
The union, comprising approximately 250 news writers, editors, artists and assistants in New York and Washington, D.C., has been working under an expired contract since Jan. 31, 2005.

Jesus loves ‘His Dark Materials’ (by Mark Morford)
Oh my God yes, they are protesting. They are pamphleting. The Catholic League and Focus on the Family and evangelical/fundamentalist Christian blogs from here to Colorado Springs, they are calling on their trembling armies to boycott [the first movie made from Philip Pullman's astonishing "His Dark Materials" trilogy, "The Golden Compass,"] because they believe that Pullman’s brilliant books … are not only aggressively anti-Christian, they ultimately describe, as their grand finale, nothing less than the death of God… [But] the nefarious thing the books aim to kill is, well, religious authority. It’s about the destruction of dogma. It’s about power, about who wants to control and manipulate life on Earth; it is about blind, ignorant, even violent adherence to insidiously narrow codes of thought and belief and behavior, sex and desire and love.
No wonder they’re protesting.  People can’t be allowed to decide for themselves when and how to have sex.  It would destroy the universe, everyone knows that!

Kids Create TV Shows on Qubo (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
Qubo, the bilingual children’s literacy website … is getting ready to roll out some new content on its channels, as well as some new interactive tools for children… Every week, viewers will be able to create their own animated episode of the “Zimmer Twins” using the interactive application, which will go live [Friday]. Additionally, those kids that make their own “Zimmer Twins” episode have the chance of getting their story featured on NBC, ION and Telmundo. I really like this level of interactivity for children, especially when it’s used in an educational way.
Start the exploitation early.  Grab them as kids, and they’ll never expect to be paid for their creativity.

Yahoo Hack Day “Mashup” Launched for Testing (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
Yahoo Local is further expanding its ongoing initiative by rolling out a new feature called Neighbors… Neighbors actually consists of tools from Yahoo Answers and functions from Yahoo’s suggestion boards, and it allows users to discuss and organize around local issues. The purpose is to enable users to make suggestions for the improvement and maintenance of their communities, and even offers the ability to vote on suggestions.

Google Reader Adds Drag and Drop (by Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins at Mashable)
Of all the Web 2.0 and social media tools I’ve adopted over the last year or so, the one that has changed the way I function on the internet most significantly would have to be Google Reader. I’ve always collected RSS feeds, and as a podcaster, they’re central to my bread and butter… Google Reader is getting a good upgrade today, in case you haven’t noticed: recommendations and drag and drop functionality.

Facebook revamps new advertising system
SAN FRANCISCO – Seeking to keep the peace in its popular online hangout, Facebook Inc. has overhauled a new advertising system that sparked privacy complaints by turning its users into marketing tools for other companies.

Mark Cuban’s Radical Idea: Facebook Classifieds that Pay You to Sell (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
Mark Cuban’s latest radical idea: classifieds. His latest Facebook application, Radical Buy, lets you buy and sell items through the popular social network. It doesn’t sound all that radical, but it has an interesting twist. Borrowing from the affiliate advertising model, sellers can offer a commission for users that help their items get sold. That means you can post Jimmy’s “Wild Animal Trofees” listing on your profile, and if a sale is completed through you, then you earn the commission.
It’s kind of derivative, actually.  Amway has gone before.

Wi-Fi reaches out to gadgets
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Suited executives, grungy teens and even some savvy grannies are already using Wi-Fi to wirelessly link their laptops to the Internet. It may not be long before the short-range high-speed technology is just as popular for those looking to connect music players, phones, cameras, game consoles and more.

Google To Bid For Wireless Spectrum (by Stan Schroeder at Mashable)
According to [the Wall Street Journal], Google will apply to bid for the 700 MHz spectrum in a January Federal Communications Commission auction. This confirms frequent speculations that Google is interested in the wireless spectrum.

EU nations endorse standard system for mobile TV
BRUSSELS (AFP) – The rapid roll-out of television on mobile phones across Europe took a key step forward on Thursday with EU member states supporting an industry standard for the bloc.

Testers see Windows XP passing Vista
SEATTLE – Microsoft Corp.’s Windows XP operating system is about to get faster and Windows Vista isn’t, according to a report that caused a stir online this week as industry watchers speculated that a zippier XP could keep customers from upgrading to Vista.

Tech giants target older buyers and their cash
“Today’s older generation is primed to buy and consume new technologies like no previous group of seniors,” says David Kelly, president of technology research company Upside Research.

Duke scientists map ’silenced genes’
WASHINGTON – Remember biology class where you learned that children inherit one copy of a gene from mom and a second from dad? There’s a twist: Some of those genes arrive switched off, so there is no backup if the other copy goes bad, making you more vulnerable to disorders from obesity to cancer.

Sticky molecule may hold key to nerve disorders
LONDON (Reuters) – A sticky molecule previously linked to inflammation also helps seal vital insulation around peripheral nerves, making it a potential target for new drugs against nerve disorders, scientists said on Thursday.

More Young Americans Are Contracting HIV
On eve of World AIDS Day, U.S. experts wonder what has gone wrong

We Can! Program Takes Aim at Childhood Obesity
The national partnership wants to create a healthier America.

Cancer Patients Gain From Reporting Symptoms Online
It’s an effective way of connecting with doctors in real time, speeding care, study finds

New strain of Ebola kills 16
KAMPALA (Reuters) – A new strain of the deadly Ebola virus has infected 51 people and killed 16 in an area of Uganda near the border with Democratic Republic of Congo, U.S. and Ugandan health officials said on Thursday. 

Gene Tweak Reverses Aging in Mouse Skin Cells
It’s a long way from this to a human ‘fountain of youth,’ however

Male ancestor was slow to grow up
LONDON (Reuters) – One of our closest ancestors had more in common with gorillas than previously thought, with males of the species taking far longer to reach maturity than females, scientists said on Thursday. 

Biblical wall finally found, scholar says
After years of searching, a famous wall mentioned in the Bible’s Book of Nehemiah has finally been found in Jerusalem, according to an Israeli scholar.

Pre-human dating scene was a real jungle
Humans basically court each other one-on-one today, but 2 million-year-old skulls found in South African caves suggest that our ancient male relatives dated troops of females.

Dinosaur tracks discovered in Utah
KANAB, Utah – Tracks from half a dozen species of dinosaurs turned up in a southern Utah area popular with ATV riders. An area the size of a football field was closed to protect thousands of three-toed and other tracks.

Climate Change, ethics and the economics of the global deal (by Sir Nicholas Stern, IG Patel Professor of Economics and Government, London School of Economics – thanks to Economist’s View)
The problem of climate change involves a fundamental failure of markets: those who damage others by emitting greenhouse gases generally do not pay. Climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen.

Study Details How U.S. Could Cut 28% of Greenhouse Gases
A new report says the country is brimming with opportunities to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, while saving money at the same time.

Congress Called Near Compromise on Fuel Economy Bill
A deal in Congress to set significantly higher fuel economy standards for cars and light trucks could come this week, say those following the negotiations.

Competition Will Net $200K for Clean Energy Entrepreneurs
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 30, 2007 — The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy and utility company NSTAR, unveiled a new competition aimed at encouraging innovative new clean energy technologies.

Retailers keep “green” behind the scenes
COLUMBIA, Maryland (Reuters) – Retailers may be touting their environmental-friendliness this year, but just about the only “green” in evidence for the holidays is in the usual Christmas decorations. Thick catalogs continue to clog mailboxes, store personnel keep handing out free gift boxes, and plastic bags are everywhere.

WWF-UK Gives Luxury Companies Poor Grades
UNITED KINGDOM, Nov. 30, 2007 — In a new report, the WWF-UK takes a close look at the environmental and social records of luxury brands, finding little good to write about.

Energy-hungry India eyes role as “wind superpower”
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India might be painted as a pollution-spewing, global-warming economy of 1 billion people but it is also one of the world’s biggest wind power users, part of a focus on renewable energy mostly unnoticed in the West.

Musharraf sworn in as Pakistan president
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Pervez Musharraf embarked on a new five-year term as Pakistan’s civilian president Thursday, but gave no indication of when emergency rule will be lifted — a key demand of both his domestic rivals and the United States.

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Seeds of Doubt

US deaths in Iraq remain low in November
BAGHDAD – The number of U.S. troops killed in November remained at a low not seen since March 2006 on Thursday, a respite from years of bloodshed that forced some 2 million Iraqis to flee and prompted the buildup of nearly 30,000 more American forces.
That’s very good news.  Now, let’s take the troops out of harm’s way altogether.  Bring them home.

Olmert says Palestinian state vital
JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an interview published Thursday that creation of a Palestinian state is a vital Israeli interest, and that failure to reach a peace agreement could plunge Israel into a South African-style apartheid struggle.

Campaigner: Viagra used to bribe voters
BANGKOK, Thailand – Vote-buying is an old practice in Thai politics, but one candidate for December’s Thai election has reportedly come up with a new tactic — handing out Viagra instead of cash.

NKorea to come clean on secret nuclear programme: US envoy
SEOUL (AFP) – Work on shutting down North Korea’s declared nuclear plants is going well, with the communist state expected to come clean soon about a suspected secret programme, the chief US nuclear envoy said Thursday.

Koreas agree on arrangements for trains
SEOUL, South Korea – The top defense officials from North and South Korea agreed Thursday on security arrangements for the first-ever regular train service across their heavily fortified border.

Rudd names new Australian Cabinet
CANBERRA, Australia – Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd named his Cabinet on Thursday, choosing a woman as deputy leader for the first time, a former rock singer as environment minister and a lawyer from the Outback as foreign minister.

Australia’s Howard replaced as party leader
CANBERRA (AFP) – Australia’s former defence minister Brendan Nelson was Thursday elected as the new leader of the Liberal Party to replace outgoing prime minister John Howard, the party said.

Botched coup bid in Philippines ends without casualties
MANILA (Reuters) – Elite military and police units stormed the Manila Peninsula Hotel on Thursday, ending a short-lived coup attempt by a small group of soldiers and others who had called on the army to mutiny.

Chavez seeks expanded power in charter
CARACAS, Venezuela – Hugo Chavez could have a shot at becoming president for life if voters approve a sweeping overhaul of the constitution Sunday that would give him unchecked power to reshape Venezuela’s government, economy and society.
NOBODY should EVER be president for life of ANYTHING.  And I’m beginning to wonder about Supreme Court justices, too.

Sarkozy says “thugocracy” behind French riots
PARIS (Reuters) – Riots which hit a Paris suburb this week were the work of a “thugocracy” of criminals and not the result of social deprivation, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Thursday.

UN: World economic growth rate slowing
UNITED NATIONS – The world economy has been growing more slowly after global unemployment jumped to 6.3 percent last year, the highest in a decade, the United Nations reported Wednesday.

Ignoring Generals’ Words Of Caution, McCain And Lieberman Rush To Declare Success In Iraq
This month, as violence has dropped a bit in Iraq, military commanders and other Iraq experts have been hesitant to begin declaring victory, saying instead that the “positive” momentum is “not yet irreversible” and Iraq is “going nowhere” in “political terms.” But Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT), who traveled to Iraq for the Thanksgiving holiday, have been much less cautious in their public statements and have all but declared victory.

Bush shrinks federal pay raises
WASHINGTON – Federal workers living in more expensive regions of the country will get much smaller pay raises than scheduled under an order from President Bush, who said Wednesday that the proposed raises were unacceptably high.

VA’s performance on benefits slips or is unchanged
WASHINGTON — The Department of Veterans Affairs fell farther behind this year in its attempts to give veterans timely decisions on their disability claims, new records show… Overall, the agency either has fallen behind or has made no progress in improving its performance in more than half of what it lists as its key goals.

Intel centers losing anti-terror focus
WASHINGTON – Local intelligence-sharing centers set up after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks have had their anti-terrorism mission diluted by a focus on run-of-the-mill street crime and hazards such as hurricanes, a government report concludes.

Head of Rove Inquiry in Hot Seat Himself
WASHINGTON — The head of the federal agency investigating Karl Rove’s White House political operation is facing allegations that he improperly deleted computer files during another probe… Mr. Bloch said no documents relevant to any investigation were affected. He also says the employee claims against him are unwarranted. Mr. Bloch believes the White House may have a conflict of interest in pressing the inquiry into his conduct while his office investigates the White House political operation.

Livin’ Large (by Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo)
You probably know DOJ voting section chief John Tanner for doing his level best to crack down on minority voting and telling an audience that voter ID laws aren’t a problem since blacks and hispanics don’t live that long anyway. Now it seems he’s gotten in a bit of hot water for using his job to take a bunch of snazzy vacations on the taxpayer dime.

Rulings on Endangered Species Are Reversed
The Fish and Wildlife Service reversed seven rulings that denied increased protection for endangered species, after an inquiry found that the actions had been tainted by political pressure.

Probes find interference, bias by former Interior official
As deputy assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks, [Julie A.] MacDonald had a heavy hand in how 607 animal species and 744 plant species were protected under federal law… [An] investigation, finished this week, concluded that MacDonald had a potential conflict of interest when she oversaw an endangered species decision that could affect her Yolo County property in California.

“Guantanamo is Here: The Military Commission Act and Noncitizen Vulnerability”
Professor [Muneer I.] Ahmad examines how the Military Commissions Act of 2006 allocates rights premised on a distinction between citizens and noncitizens, which, he argues, creates a rights differential supported by neither law nor reason.

Scientists to Congress: stop funding abstinence-only ed.
From their letter: “By design, abstinence programs restrict information about condoms and contraception – information that may be critical to protecting the health of young people and to preventing unplanned pregnancy, HIV infection, and infection with other sexually transmitted organisms.”

Despite high energy prices, Democrats find energy legislation vexing
WASHINGTON — Oil prices flirt with $100 a barrel, gasoline costs more than $3 a gallon and home heating bills are soaring. Yet the Democrats who control Congress are struggling to pass energy legislation that the public considers a no-brainer. What’s the problem? Complex energy issues cut across party, regional and leadership lines. But for Democrats, there’s an added difficulty because the energy debate pits some of their key constituency groups against each other.

Court skeptical of Maine tobacco law
WASHINGTON – Cast in the good-guy role of stopping Internet cigarette sales to children, Maine’s deputy attorney general got roughed up Wednesday by several Supreme Court justices who suggested the law is not on his side.

Lott’s brother-in-law, nephew indicted for bribery.
A federal grand jury indicted outgoing GOP Sen. Trent Lott’s brother-in-law, Richard “Dickie” Scruggs, today “on charges that he and four other men tried to bribe a Mississippi state court judge.” Scruggs and his associates allegedly conspired to “bribe Mississippi Third Circuit Court Judge Henry L. Lackey with at least $40,000 in cash” after “Scruggs’ firm was named as a defendant in a dispute involving $26.5 million in attorneys’ fees.” The group of Mississippi attorneys in the indictment also include a former state auditor and Lott’s nephew Zach.

Is Lott Negotiating A Future Lobbying Position In Violation Of Senate Ethics Rules?
One of the “opportunities” that [resigning Senate Minority Whip Trent] Lott is considering, according to his son, Chester Lott — who is also a lobbyist — is “a partnership” with former Sen. John Breaux (D-LA), who until today, was the senior counsel at a powerhouse lobbying firm. But [Wednesday] afternoon, Breaux announced that he was leaving Patton Boggs in order “to form his own firm with his son, John Jr.”… If Lott is indeed considering “a partnership” with Breaux — speculation of which Breaux’s move fuels — then their plans may have been another factor in the timing of his resignation. The new ethics rules that take effect at the end of the current session have much more stringent regulations about negotiating future employment with lobbyists:

Democrats’ health plans echo Nixon’s failed GOP proposal
WASHINGTON — Even before Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton unveiled her new health-care plan, Republicans attacked it as socialized medicine. They neglected to mention, however, that her plan bears a striking resemblance to changes that were proposed in 1974 — by the late President Richard M. Nixon.

Giuliani billed city agencies for personal trips.
As New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani “billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during the time when he was beginning an extramarital relationship with future wife Judith Nathan in the Hamptons.”

Romney Refuses To Call Waterboarding Torture, Says He’ll Consult With Blackwater’s Cofer Black
During tonight’s CNN/YouTube debate, a YouTube questioner asked the candidates why they refuse to condemn waterboarding as torture. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney said that before making such a determination, he would need to get “counsel on a matter of this nature” from “a lot” of people. One of the people with whom Romney said he would specifically like to speak is Blackwater vice chairman Cofer Black.

$250,000:
Amount it has cost the RNC to recover missing e-mails sent by Karl Rove and other White House aides on political e-mail accounts. House investigators have charged the RNC with overseeing the “extensive destruction” of these e-mails, which may have violated the Presidential Records Act. The $250,000 has gone to former FBI agents hired to retrieve the lost e-mails and to lawyers hired to defend the RNC.

Virginia Republicans Will Demand Oath of Loyalty From Primary Voters
The [Virginia] State Board of Elections on Monday approved a state Republican Party request to require all who apply for a GOP primary ballot first vow in writing that they’ll vote for the party’s presidential nominee next fall. There’s no practical way to enforce the oath.
Like most Republican initiatives—coercive, mean spirited, and unenforceable.

Deceased still lining political coffers, to tune of half-million
[A] former piano salesman and musician is among more than 160 dead people who have given more than $540,000 to political committees and candidates for the White House and Congress over the past eight years, an analysis of political donations shows… Federal rules allow such donations as long as contributions don’t exceed legal limits and the intentions of the deceased were known, said Federal Election Commission spokesman Bob Biersack. Such gifts are fairly rare, he said.

John Ashcroft: I’m Willing To Be Waterboarded
[Tuesday] night, former Attorney General John Ashcroft delivered an address on national security at the University of Colorado… During the speech, Ashcroft caused an uproar when he declared Guantanamo Bay was a “good place” for detainees. In addition, he defended the torture tactic of waterboarding: “‘The things that I can survive, if it were necessary to do them to me, I would do,’ he said.” Ashcroft apparently believes that torture should be allowed as long as it doesn’t kill him.

Stocks jump as rate cut hopes increase
NEW YORK – Wall Street barreled higher Wednesday, driving the Dow Jones industrials up more than 300 points after a Federal Reserve official hinted that the central bank may lower interest rates again.

European, Asian stocks mostly higher after Wall Street bounce
LONDON (AFP) – European stocks mostly rose Thursday, though winnings were less strong than in Asia and overnight on Wall Street, where gains were extended on hopes of another US interest rate cut to bolster the economy.

Deadbeat Developers Signaled by Property Derivatives
Sales of debt secured by commercial mortgages tumbled 80 percent to $3.9 billion in October from a year earlier, data compiled by Bloomberg show. New securities backed by loans on buildings will fall 50 percent in 2008 from $220 billion this year, Moody’s said Nov. 2. Real estate deals are coming apart at the fastest pace since September 2001.

Offshoring, not enough to beat Italy’s productivity slowdown
The public debate on offshoring has created more heat than light to date, but researchers are beginning to get a picture of its real economic impact. New evidence from Italy, based on firm-level data and a direct measure of offshoring, shows that offshoring of parts and components boosts domestic productivity while offshoring of services does not.

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

CondeNet Pushing Content (And Ads) Through YouTube (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
CondéNet, one of the old media members that has been a bit more fearless in its online efforts, has signed an advertising and distribution deal with YouTube. CondéNet gets to sell the advertising, and it’s then split with Google… Now that enough of its online properties have achieved a certain amount of growth and have been rather established for some time, the larger push for traditional media to give out more free content puts pressure on the entire industry to better monetize online products.
Better monetizing, of course, means more support from advertising.  It’s the same in progressive media.  We complain about the control corporations have over our lives, but we push content providers into supporting themselves by depending on advertising money from those same corporations.

When Media Content is Free, It’s Worth Every Cent  (by Ted Rall)
Print media is dragging content providers into the abyss. First comes downsizing. Writers, cartoonists, and photographers are losing their jobs to peers willing to do the work for less or, in the case of readers invited to submit their comments and images for the thrill of appearing in the local rag, nothing. Then they squeeze those who remain for pay cuts.
Gee, it’s just like what happened to me in computer work.  With all the in-sourcing and out-sourcing over the last 15 years, salaries and job opportunities in IT have been devastated.  And the Democratic Party is doing it, too.  See below.  When does allowing participation become exploitation?

Via email from Mike Gehrke, Research Director of the DNC:
For a few months, we’ve had Democratic Party “trackers” recording hundreds of hours of Republican candidates in the field… [W]ith the Internet giving ordinary Americans like you access to the tools you need to change an election with the click of a mouse, we need to make sure you have everything you need to do just that.  The video is yours — you can just let us know what you find, or you can take it, re-mix it, add music, and make your very own ad out of it.  It’s up to you… Take a look at the video, forward your favorite clips to your friends, and make a contribution of $20 to keep this and other programs going strong through the 2008 election.
My response: You want ME to PAY YOU to DO YOUR WORK FOR YOU?  Please tell me that I’m misunderstanding this message.

Study: More Than 60% Don’t Trust Campaign Coverage
The Harvard University survey also revealed four out of five people believe coverage focuses too much on the trivial and more than 60% believe coverage is politically biased. “Americans believe the media focuses too much on the polls and candidates’ personal lives,” the report said.

THE USES OF TRIVIA: (by Bob Somerby at the Daily Howler)
Kevin [Drum] is right … [that by] the official rules of the game, modern reporters are not allowed to come out and say who would make the best president. But that doesn’t mean that they’re driven to trivia because they aren’t allowed to [state] their view and have nothing else to discuss. Do you mind if we state the obvious facts concerning what actually happens on earth? Here’s what happens: Forbidden to tell you directly who’s best, reporters use elements of trivia and personality to convince you, indirectly, about who would make the best president. Surely, everyone knows that they do this by now—unless they believe the earth is flat.

WaPo Edit Page Says White House Outreach To Syria Might Work — After Blasting Pelosi For Same Thing (by Greg Sargent at TPM Horse’s Mouth)
As you may recall, when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad last spring, The Washington Post editorial page was the leading institutional editorial voice against it. The paper published a widely discussed editorial, called “Pratfall in Damascus,” that helped set the tone for much mainstream criticism… Now, however, the Bush administration has decided to engage Syria as part of its current Mideast initiative. And right on cue, WaPo has published a new editorial which, while pessimistic about the initiative in general, nonetheless offers modest praise of the Bush administration’s invitation of that country.

Expert: Both parties cooperate to keep administration crimes secret (by  David Edwards and Muriel Kane at the Raw Story)
[Jonathan Turley, on Keith Olbermann’s Countdown,] “Today, the [so-called national security] privilege is used primarily not to keep something secret, but to keep something from being used against the government”… [According to Turley,] members of both parties are happy to see these cases dismissed because they are determined to keep impeachment off the table. “There’s a lot of people, both Democrats and Republicans, that … don’t want a court to say that the president did something that is a federal crime.”
Click through to watch the video.

CNN Rejects 5,000 YouTube Questions Submitted By The Public To Give Airtime To Grover Norquist
CNN and YouTube billed tonight’s Republican debate as one in which “YOU ask the questions of the candidates through videos you submit on YouTube.”… Out of almost 5,000 video submissions, CNN chose to pose 34 to the candidates [Thursday night]. Instead of alloting all slots to ordinary citizens — who don’t normally have access to politicians — CNN gave airtime to a question from Americans for Tax Reform president Grover Norquist.
Click through to watch the video of that segment of the debate.

Democrats Cancel Debate At Picketed CBS
So much for anchor Katie Couric’s moment in the presidential political spotlight. That televised debate set for next month among the Democratic presidential candidates has been canceled to avoid a potential conflict with striking WGA writers.

Tough times for local TV reporters who play it straight
They’re being shunted aside for those with flash and panache and who entertain more than inform, writes Sam McManis. Former Sacramento TV reporter Naj Alikhan recalls being encouraged to slap his neck while doing a report on West Nile virus spraying. He refused to do it and eventually left the station, deciding he’d had enough.

BREAKING: State Department official Iraq update is really compilation of plagiarized major media articles (by John Aravosis) at AMERICAblog)
Kind of pathetic when the official report from the US State Department on what’s “really” happening in Iraq is actually just a bunch of plagiarized paragraphs from the major media in the US… State outright plagiarized much of the major media in making its “report.” And what’s really funny, they even stole a number of paragraphs from a New York Times article when, as I recall, the NYT is the newspaper that George Bush refuses to read because it supposedly has such a “liberal bias.”

Rove, Newsweek join forces in mutual exploitation
Newsweek got plenty of attention earlier this month when it announced that Karl Rove, who masterminded George W. Bush’s two successful presidential campaigns, would be writing occasional columns. This arrangement — in which a publicity-hungry newsweekly joins forces with a publicity-hungry Washington insider — looks like a fascinating case of mutual exploitation.

Mythbuster: Zombie ideas about income mobility (by Paul Krugman)
Many politically charged topics are overrun with zombie ideas — false stories that refuse to die, and just keep coming back. Another one has just resurfaced — the idea that America’s rich are just kings for a day, and that pretty soon they’ll be replaced by another lucky group. Been there, dealt with that: “… much of the movement up and down represents fluctuations around a fairly fixed long-term distribution.”

More Social Securty UFOs at the Post (by Dean Baker)
Ruth Marcus is on the warpath again arguing that those who don’t want to jump in line on the SS crisis train are [being] irresponsible… Only the Post would argue that it’s better to raise taxes and/or cut benefits on much poorer workers today than to risk the possibility that we may have to raise taxes or cut benefits on the much wealthier workers of the future in order to cover the greater cost of their own retirement (they are projected to live longer also — that’s the real problem. We’re so cruel to our children.)

Media Matters for America headlines

Citing “Clintonian answer,” Carlson found another reason to call Obama “a wuss”

On Glenn Beck, Buchanan repeated his claim that allowing immigrants from “the whole world in” the U.S. will lead to “a tangle of squabbling nationalities”

NY Times’ Herbert claimed few congressional Dems opposed Iraq war resolution; in fact, most voted against it

Morning Joe failed to note Bill Clinton’s statement against March 2003 invasion of Iraq

Boortz: “[M]aybe the reason” Obama doesn’t wear flag pin is “the flag of this country irritates a lot of Democrat [sic] voters”

Matthews cited Zogby Interactive poll without noting criticism of methodology

NPR’s Liasson cropped quote to suggest Pres. Clinton accused Democrats of “Republican-style, Swift-boat attack” on Hillary

MSNBC’s O’Donnell aired Thompson ad without challenging its claim that Thompson helped “expose the truth during Watergate”

Reporters say Baghdad too dangerous despite surge
Nearly 90 percent of U.S. journalists in Iraq say much of Baghdad is still too dangerous to visit, despite a recent drop in violence attributed to the build-up of U.S. forces, a poll released on Wednesday said. The survey by the Washington-based Pew Research Center showed that many U.S. journalists believe coverage has painted too rosy a picture of the conflict.

Activists seek independent Cuba colleges
HAVANA – A group of Cuban students and young professionals said Tuesday it has collected 5,000 signatures petitioning the government to allow universities that would operate independently of the state while encouraging freedom of speech.

Court Awards Damages to Reporter Whose Home Was Raided
A European court has awarded damages to an investigative journalist whose home was raided and computers confiscated after he published articles alleging fraud within the E.U.

Turkish prosecutor probes atheist book
ANKARA, Turkey – A Turkish prosecutor has launched a probe into whether a book by best-selling atheist writer Richard Dawkins is an attack on religious values — a move that could lead to the prosecution of the book’s Turkish publisher.

US Senator Kennedy in eight-million-dollar memoir deal: reports
NEW YORK (AFP) – Senator Edward Kennedy, the elder statesman of the US political clan scarred so often by tragedy, is to publish his memoirs in a deal reportedly worth eight million dollars.

Wasserman: Papers shouldn’t pander to the bestseller list
News about bestsellers “is already pretty obvious and pretty widespread [so] we ought to focus on those kinds of books which, in the judgment of editors and reviewers, are neglected but are nonetheless worthy of people’s attention,” says former Los Angeles Times books editor Steve Wasserman.
But major publishers will only publish books they think will be bestsellers.  They, too, are neglecting books containing information worthy of people’s attention.  So there wouldn’t be any books to cover.

Sad newspapers (by Jeff Jarvis)
I was in Detroit on business Monday and thanks to many too many hours in the airport, I picked up the Free Press (where I once interned) and the Detroit News. I was shocked at how thin they were in every sense of the word: few pages and not much in them. We in New York don’t see just how desperate the situation is becoming for metro papers in much of the rest of the country because we have more than five of them in the area. Detroit should be luckier than most with two. But the two of them don’t add up to much.

New York Times in Peril Again: Hiring Freeze and Lost Jobs (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
The New York Times may be having more trouble with its publishing company. The company has frozen new hiring, and has also cut a “small amount” of newsroom jobs. No journalists have lost their jobs (yet), and it doesn’t seem to be as bad as the massive layoffs and buyouts the industry faced over the summer. Jobs will be filled internally, which means that more people will be taking on more work, likely without more pay. Clerical and secretarial jobs have been cut as well.

Analyst lowers rating of NYT Co. to “sell” from “neutral”
Banc of America’s Joe Arns says the Times Co. is his least favorite in the newspaper publishing sector. His price target on the stock, which traded at all-time lows in the last two months, went to $14 per share from $21. It closed Tuesday at $16.83.

Dow Jones signals local papers sell-off
Dow Jones, the US media group in the process of being sold to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, has said it may sell the Ottaway group of local papers. The company is considering a sale of some or all of Ottaway’s eight daily and 15 weekly community newspapers.

FCC chief favors waivers for Tribune
The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday said he has proposed that the agency clear the $8.2 billion buyout of Tribune Co. this week with temporary waivers of media cross-ownership rules.

News Web Sites Seek More Search Control
NEW YORK (AP) – The desire for greater control over how search engines index and display Web sites is driving an effort by leading news organizations and other publishers to revise a 13-year-old technology for restricting access.

Interview: Jason Tanz
[F]ocus your magazine on the things the Internet can’t do really great—write long stories, print it on nice paper, have beautiful layouts. I think that a lot of other magazines are trying to make stories shorter and become adaptable to the web, and essentially make the magazine product something that dovetails quite nicely immediately into the web format. So why buy the magazine? Even though we do put all the content of our magazine online for free, people still do find a different experience in coming home and opening it up and spending time with it.

MSNBC Closes the Gap on CNN in November
MSNBC will close out November within firing distance of CNN, averaging 230,000 viewers in the key adults 25-54 demo versus CNN’s 232,000.

MTV eyeing expanding myMTV beyond Japan
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Viacom Inc’s MTV Networks is eyeing an expansion of its myMTV mobile video social network to other countries beyond Japan, said MTV’s president for global digital media, Mika Salmi, on Wednesday. The service lets members use cell phones to share their favorite videos with others in the community.

CBS Signs Truveo to Add Video to Radio Websites (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
What goes well with music? Apparently video… CBS has teamed up with AOL’s video search service Truveo to extend its tools to nearly 3 dozen of CBS’s online radio websites. Not many details pertaining to the deal have been released, so it’s uncertain whether there will be any advertising revenue shared between the two companies, or in what capacity the videos will be integrated into the online radio stations.

Disney To Make Up To 20 Startup Acquisitions In Next 24 Months
A new group has been created within the corporate strategy group at Disney, we’ve heard, and they are gearing up to make a number of consumer Internet acquisitions over the next 24 months.

TV, film and game violence seen as a threat
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Violence depicted on television, in films and video games raises the risk of aggressive behavior in adults and young viewers and poses a serious threat to public health, according to a new study… The findings, which are reported in the Journal of Adolescent Health, support earlier research which showed that children who watch violent television shows and who identify with the characters and believe they are real are more likely to be aggressive as adults. The results were true for both men and women.

Discovery to make nature-themed video games
Get ready for “Meerkat Manor: The Video Game.” Discovery Communications is partnering with Activision Inc to make video games based on “Meerkat Manor” and other popular nature television shows, Discovery Chief Executive David Zaslav told the Reuters Media Summit on Wednesday.

Size Limits for Cable Look Likely
WASHINGTON, Nov. 28 — Coming off a setback at the hands of the cable television industry, the head of the Federal Communications Commission moved to reassert himself on Wednesday by proposing that the commission quickly adopt a rule that would prevent Comcast, the nation’s biggest cable company, from becoming larger, commission officials said.

New Software Detects Web Interference
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) – Increasingly worried over Internet providers’ behavior, a nonprofit has released software that helps determine whether online glitches are innocent hiccups or evidence of deliberate traffic tampering.

Bollywood shorts on AIDS to get YouTube release
PANAJI, India (Reuters) – Four short films made by top Bollywood directors to spread awareness about HIV/AIDS in India are slated to be released on the video-sharing Web site YouTube in February after making their debut on local television.

US withdraws subpoena seeking identity of 24,000 Amazon customers
U.S. prosecutors have withdrawn a subpoena seeking the identities of thousands of people who bought used books through online retailer Amazon.com Inc., newly unsealed court records show. The withdrawal came after a judge ruled the customers have a right to keep their reading habits from the government.

Arbitron Delays New Radio Ratings System
NEW YORK (AP) – Arbitron Inc. is delaying the rollout of a new ratings system for radio stations in nine markets following complaints from broadcasters that the system’s samples were too small to provide reliable data.

TiVo’s Latest: Record Shows on Your PC (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
TiVo is teaming up with Germany-based Nero, a digital media technology company, to make the home more digital. This will be achieved namely with the ability to get TiVo service on your computer. TiVo’s looking to take advantage of the continued merging between the television and the PC, not to mention the growing number of PC television tuners that are expected to be purchased in the coming years (estimated at 50.8 million worldwide).

Canadian Bosses Think Facebook Is More Important than TV (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
Forty-six percent of those surveyed have said that … social media is even more important than television, radio, newspapers and magazines. This isn’t a surprising set of statistics, but it does highlight a turning of the tide, where the online sector is more important than every other aspect of traditional media. And if it’s more important than traditional media for marketing purposes, the implications are that social media has become far more important for a great many aspects of our lives. Marketing goes where the people are.

Once a Mainstay of Magazines, Cigarette Makers Are Dropping Print Ads
The R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company disclosed this week that it would run no ads in 2008 in consumer magazines and newspapers for cigarette brands like Camel, Winston, Pall Mall and American Spirit.

Viral is Fine, but It’s Not a Big Idea Unless You Have Scale
Media Mavens Discuss How to Make Integrated Campaigns Work

What Do Media Mavens Wish For?
How About a Restructuring of the Entire Advertising Industry

Google Knows Where You Are Too; Launches “My Location” for Mobile (by Adam Ostrow at Mashable)
Google has released a new version of Google Maps for mobile, which includes a new “My Location” feature that approximates your location by using information from cell phone towers. This means that instead of typing in your current location to get directions, Google knows already knows where you are, and can help steer you from there to your destination.

Google’s Storage Plans Raise Plenty of Concerns
In the wake of this week’s buzz about Google’s plans for a new online service for file storage, Internet privacy specialists are raising concerns about the potential vulnerability of such data to government investigations.

MTV says “Rock Band” is flying off shelves
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Viacom Inc’s (VIAb.N) MTV Networks said on Wednesday that copies of “Rock Band,” its new music-based video game, have been “flying off the shelves” in the first week of sales.

One Laptop Per Child Sued for Patent Infringement
The One Laptop Per Child Association has been sued for patent infringement, charging the project with stealing its designs for a multilingual keyboard.

Soup Up Your Cellphone
Widgets will not turn your vintage Motorola StarTAC into an iPhone, but they will add features and functions that you didn’t think were capable on your phone.

Humanoid robot teaches dentists to feel people’s pain
TOKYO (AFP) – Japan’s future dentists may soon be able to better appreciate patients’ pain by training on a humanoid robot that can mumble “ouch” when the drill hits a nerve.

Fashion Preview: Tomorrow’s High-Tech Clothing
Fashion always keeps at least one eye on the future. Now scientists are lending a hand, developing tomorrow’s super-powered clothing such as garments that can recharge your MP3 player and exoskeletons that enhance strength.

Stem cell pioneer says embryonic research still needed
TOKYO (AFP) – A Japanese scientist who helped produce stem cells from skin says controversial research on human embryos must continue for now, as it will take time to put the new breakthrough into practical use.

Genes May Explain Role of Race in Colon Cancer Risk
Differences in a key piece of DNA seem important, scientists say

Autistic Children Have More Gray Matter in Brains
This imbalance may make it tougher for them to function socially, study suggests

Drug May Help Reverse Clotting Deficiency
Eltrombopag might also aid patients with hepatitis liver disease, study finds.

Rise in CT Scans Poses Cancer Risk
One-third of the scans are unnecessary, Columbia researchers contend

Obesity Rates Leveling Off Among U.S. Adults
But more than a third of Americans still weigh much too much, study finds

3-D Breast Imaging May Improve Cancer Detection
Stereoscopic digital mammography cut rate of false-positive results, study found

Men Talk More Than Women
Women may have a reputation as the chattier gender, but research into the matter shows that men may actually be a little more talkative than women—though it all depends on the situation.

Dogs Do Well on Computers
They sport bejeweled chokers, lavish in bubble baths at spas and have their own leather-bag chauffeurs. And now our almost-like-human dogs might also try their paws at computers. In order to test whether dogs can visually categorize pictures, and transfer their knowledge to new situations, four dogs were shown landscape and dog photographs, and expected to make a selection on a computer touch-screen.

Roman artifacts found at London’s Olympic site
Roman pottery and a coin from the Iron Age have been found on the site of the aquatics center planned for the London 2012 Olympic Games.

New Findings Underscore an Earth-Venus Kinship
Other than the hellish heat, a crushing carbon dioxide atmosphere and corrosive clouds of sulfuric acid, Venus is a lot like Earth, scientists said yesterday. In a news conference at the Paris headquarters of the European Space Agency, the scientists, working on the agency’s Venus Express mission, played up the Venus-as-Earth’s-twin angle in presenting their newest findings, including signs of lightning, surprising swings of temperature and additional evidence that Venus could have once had oceans the size of Earth’s.

Speeding Star to Escape from Milky Way
One of the fastest moving stars ever seen is challenging theories to explain its blistering speed. The cosmic cannonball, a neutron star known as RX J0822-4300, was discovered with NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. Astronomers used five years of Chandra observations to show that the rogue star is careening away from the Puppis A supernova remnant, leftovers of a star that exploded about 3,700 years ago. The neutron star is racing of our Milky Way Galaxy at about 3 million mph (4.8 million kph).

Scientists Discover ‘Teenager Galaxies’
LONDON (AP) – Young galaxies, so faint that scientists struggled to prove they were there at all, have been discovered by aiming two of the world’s most powerful telescopes at a single patch of sky for nearly 100 hours. An international group of researchers has identified 27 pre-galactic fragments, dubbed “teenager galaxies,” which they hope will help astronomers understand how our own Milky Way reached adulthood.