Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/287094616?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Monday, February 25, 2013
SKorea's new leader faces NKorea nuke crisis
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) ? Even before she takes office Monday as South Korea's first female president, Park Geun-hye's campaign vow to soften Seoul's current hard-line approach to rival North Korea is being tested by Pyongyang's recent underground nuclear detonation.
Pyongyang, Washington, Beijing and Tokyo are all watching to see if Park, the daughter of a staunchly anti-communist dictator, pursues an ambitious engagement policy meant to ease five years of animosity on the divided peninsula or if she sticks with the tough stance of her fellow conservative predecessor, Lee Myung-bak.
Park's decision is important because it will likely set the tone of the larger diplomatic approach that Washington and others take in stalled efforts to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions.
It will also be complicated by North Korea's warning of unspecified "second and third measures of greater intensity," a threat that comes as Washington and others push for tightened U.N. sanctions as punishment for the Feb. 12 atomic test, the North's third since 2006.
That test is seen as another step toward North Korea's goal of building a bomb small enough to be mounted on a missile that can hit the United States. The explosion, which Pyongyang called a response to U.S. hostility, triggered global outrage.
Park has said she won't yet change her policy, which was built with the high probability of provocations from Pyongyang in mind. But some aren't sure if engagement can work, given North Korea's choice of "bombs over electricity," as American scientist Siegfried Hecker puts it.
"Normalization of relations, a peace treaty, access to energy and economic opportunities ? those things that come from choosing electricity over bombs and have the potential of lifting the North Korean people out of poverty and hardship ? will be made much more difficult, if not impossible, for at least the next five years," Hecker, a regular visitor to North Korea, said in a posting on the website of Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation.
As she takes office, however, Park will be mindful that many South Koreans are frustrated at the state of inter-Korean relations after the Lee government's five-year rule, which saw two nuclear tests, three long-range rocket launches and attacks blamed on North Korea that killed 50 South Koreans in 2010.
Park's policy calls for strong defense but also for efforts to build trust through aid shipments, reconciliation talks and the resumption of some large-scale economic initiatives as progress occurs on the nuclear issue. Park has also held out the possibility of a summit with new North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Much is riding on Park's conclusion.
"The overall policy direction on North Korea among the U.S., Japan and South Korea will be hers to decide," said Victor Cha, a former senior Asia adviser to President George W. Bush. "If Park Geun-hye wants to contain, the U.S. will support that. But if Park Geun-hye, months down the road, wants to engage, then the U.S. will go along with that too. "
Engagement by Park would provide a sharp contrast with the rule of her father, Park Chung-hee, whose antipathy toward Pyongyang during his 18-year rule in the 1960s and '70s prompted a failed attack on the Blue House by 31 North Korean commandos in 1968. In 1974, Park's wife was shot and killed by a Japan-born Korean claiming he was acting on assassination orders by North Korea founder and then leader Kim Il Sung.
Critics say Park Geun-hye's North Korea policy lacks specifics. They also question how far she can go given her conservative base's strong anti-Pyongyang sentiments.
But Park has previously confounded ideological expectations. She travelled to Pyongyang in 2002 and held private talks with the late Kim Jong Il, the father of Kim Jong Un, and her gifts to Kim Jong Il are showcased in a museum of gifts to the North Korean leaders. During the often contentious presidential campaign, she responded to liberal criticism by reaching out to the families of victims of her father's dictatorship.
She said in her 2007 autobiography that she visited Pyongyang because she thought her painful experiences with the North made her "the one who could resolve South-North relations better than anyone else." She also wrote that Kim Jong Il apologized for the 1968 attack.
"I don't think this latest spike in the cycle of provocation and response undermines her whole platform of seeking to somehow re-engage the North," said John Delury, an analyst at Seoul's Yonsei University. North Korea wants a return of large-scale aid and investment from South Korea.
Before the election, Pyongyang's state media repeatedly questioned the sincerity of Park's engagement overture. Since the election, however, although regular criticism of Lee as "human scum" continues, the North's official Korean Central News Agency hasn't mentioned Park by name, though her political party is still condemned.
Pyongyang sees the nuclear crisis as a U.S.-North Korea issue, Delury said. "From a North Korean mindset, ramping up the tension and hostility with the U.S. does not equal jettisoning relations with the South."
Park may take a wait-and-see stance in coming months.
A possible positive turning point could come if North Korea resists tests or launches during April, when it celebrates two state anniversaries ? Kim Il Sung's birthday and the army's founding anniversary ? according to analyst Hong Hyun-ik at the private Sejong Institute in South Korea. Pyongyang conducted a failed long-range rocket launch during last year's celebrations.
Hong predicts that the United States will seek nuclear talks with North Korea in a few months, something that could help Park's efforts to engage North Korea.
"The nuclear test sets back and complicates but does not necessarily doom her engagement efforts over the long term," said Ralph Cossa, president of Pacific Forum CSIS, a Hawaii-based think tank.
Park warned after the test that North Korea faces international isolation, economic difficulties and, eventually, a collapse if it continues to build its atomic program. She also pressed Pyongyang to respond to her overtures.
"We can't achieve trust with only one side's efforts. Isn't there a saying that 'We need both hands to make a clapping sound?'" she said.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/skoreas-leader-faces-nkorea-nuke-crisis-050243531.html
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Race, ethnic lines less visible as LA picks mayor
LOS ANGELES (AP) ? The election that made Antonio Villaraigosa the city's first Hispanic mayor since 1872 confirmed the clout of a fast-growing Latino population and turned the former barrio tough into one of the most visible Hispanic politicians in America.
Eight years later, with the historic barrier to the mayoralty erased, issues of race and ethnicity have been mostly muted in the contest to succeed him. The cries of "Si, se puede," Spanish for "Yes, we can," that followed Villaraigosa's 2005 campaign are long gone, and there is no Hispanic standard-bearer among the five candidates who want his job.
The city could elect its first woman mayor this year, its first Jewish one, or the first openly gay one. But more prosaic issues have dominated ? 10.2 percent unemployment, a proposed sales tax jump, the grip of municipal unions, troubled schools.
"These things become firsts, and then they become the standard and the norm," said former California Assembly speaker and one-time mayoral candidate Robert Hertzberg, who compared Villaraigosa's victory to the breakthrough election a generation earlier of Tom Bradley, the city's first and only black mayor. "The pendulum swings."
Retiree Tony Zapata, a longtime resident of the heavily Hispanic area where Villaraigosa went to high school, voted for the mayor and said the neighborhood took pride in the success of one of its own.
But the bond frayed. Zapata said his feelings soured after the mayor three times snubbed invitations from local veterans who wanted him to attend events.
This time he's backing City Councilman Eric Garcetti, because he's impressed with development in Garcetti's district, not his Hispanic family ties.
A candidate's race or ethnicity "is not a concern with me," said Zapata, 68, a tall, square-shouldered Vietnam veteran. After Villaraigosa became mayor "we never saw him again."
The nonpartisan primary March 5 takes place with the nation's second-largest city at a fitful juncture.
There are bright spots. Crime is low, new lofts and restaurants have lured young professionals to the long-neglected downtown, and a transit-building boomlet aims to one day get more drivers off the clotted freeways.
But a comeback from the recession has been slow, rising pension and health care costs for government retirees threatens money needed to plug potholes and trim trees, and school dropout rates and housing costs remain alarmingly high.
"The city's ability to provide services that improve the quality of life of city residents has diminished," Administrative Officer Miguel Santana wrote bluntly in a report this month.
Angelenos appear ready to turn to a workaday manager after years of Villaraigosa's high-energy if sometimes unsteady style, and distracting headlines about his romantic endeavors and celebrity pals. The Democrat and former legislator has kept a distance from the campaign to replace him.
After Villaraigosa's election "there were predictions that it would be a long time before we had another white mayor," said Franklin Gilliam, Jr., dean of the Luskin School of Public Affairs at the University of California, Los Angeles. But Villaraigosa "has not, or has not been able to, anoint an heir apparent" within the Hispanic community.
Scant turnout is expected. Most residents could probably name more Oscar nominees than candidates on the ballot.
The low-drama campaign involving several City Hall regulars and a longshot Republican will almost certainly end in a two-person runoff, since the divided vote makes it unlikely any candidate will gather the majority needed to win outright.
The runoff would take place May 21.
The Los Angeles mayor oversees a budget of over $7 billion, but it's a notoriously weak office hemmed by a powerful City Council. Unlike other big cities like New York, the Los Angeles mayor cannot directly appoint the head of schools, or police.
That helps explain why some leading Hispanic politicians are looking elsewhere for work, rather than City Hall. Former U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis is a likely candidate for Los Angeles County supervisor, and state Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Los Angeles, is considered a prospect for statewide office, for example.
Much of the high-profile Hispanic support that helped twice elevate the outgoing mayor to office has coalesced around a white woman with a Jewish husband from the city's suburban-ish San Fernando Valley, Controller Wendy Greuel, a 51-year-old Democrat.
She's been in a close race with Garcetti, another Democrat who is Jewish on his mother's side, with Italian and Mexican roots from his father, and often plays up his Latino heritage and ready command of Spanish.
But Garcetti, 42, has a far different profile than Villaraigosa, the product of a broken home who grew up on the rough streets east of downtown and once sported a "Born to Raise Hell" tattoo. Garcetti, the son of a former district attorney, is an Ivy Leaguer and Rhodes Scholar from the Valley's tony Encino enclave who enjoys playing jazz piano.
Villaraigosa's Hispanic identity was central to his 2005 victory over Mayor James Hahn, a scion of an Irish political clan. He won with record Hispanic turnout, but also claimed significant support across a wide range of demographic and geographic groups. He won an easy, but not impressive, re-election in 2009.
The city's diverse population ? 93 languages are spoken in the Los Angeles Unified School District ? is about half Hispanic. However, Hispanics are expected to make up only about one-in-four votes in the primary, since a chunk of that population is too young to vote, not U.S. citizens or not registered. Blacks and Asians each make up about 10 percent of the population, with most of the remainder white.
The expected low turnout makes surprises more likely, elevating the roles of Democratic Councilwoman Jan Perry, 57, who is black and Jewish, and former prosecutor Kevin James, 49, a Republican former prosecutor and radio talk show host who is openly gay. Former technology executive Emanuel Pleitez, 30, a Hispanic, is also on the ballot.
In the post-Villaraigosa era, Hispanic voters "have gotten beyond having a Latino candidate for mayor, or having to have one," said Jaime Regalado, former executive director of the Pat Brown Institute of Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles.
"It's a certain maturation of Los Angeles' Latino voter," Regalado said. "That threshold has been passed."
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Protest votes raise uncertainty in close Italy election
ROME (Reuters) - Polls in Italy opened for the second and final day of voting on Monday, with a surge in protest votes increasing fears of an unclear outcome that could hamper economic reforms.
"I'm sick of the scandals and the stealing," said Paolo Gentile, a 49-year-old lawyer from Rome who said he had voted for the 5-Star Movement, an anti-establishment group set to make a huge impact at this, its first general election.
"We need some young, new people in parliament, not the old parties that are totally discredited."
Opinion polls give the center-left coalition led by former Industry Minister Pier Luigi Bersani a narrow lead but the race has been thrown open by the prospect of a huge protest vote - most of it going to 5-Star - against austerity and a wave of corporate and political scandals.
A bitter campaign, fought largely over economic issues, has been closely watched by financial markets, still wary after the debt crisis that took the whole euro zone close to disaster and brought technocrat prime minister Mario Monti to office in 2011.
For the euro zone, the stakes are high. Italy is the third largest economy in the 17-member bloc and the prospect of political stalemate could reawaken the threat of dangerous market instability.
"There are similarities between the Italian elections and last year's ones in Greece, in that pro-euro parties are losing ground in favor of populist forces," said Mizuho chief economist Riccardo Barbieri.
"An angry and confused public opinion does not see the benefits of fiscal austerity and does not trust established political parties."
Voting ends at 3 p.m. (1400 GMT), with the first exit polls due shortly afterwards. Projections based on the vote count will be issued through the afternoon and the final result should be known late on Monday or early Tuesday.
Italian bond markets remained sanguine on Monday morning, quickly reversing modest early losses. Later on Monday Italy will offer 4.25 billion euros of bonds in a further test of market sentiment.
The result is likely to be the most fragmented in decades, with the old left-right division disrupted by the rise of 5-Star, led by comic Beppe Grillo, and by the decision by Monti to run at the head of a centrist bloc.
"It will be a vote of protest, maybe of revolt," said Corriere della Sera, Italy's largest newspaper, on Monday.
It is unclear how Grillo's rise will influence the result, with some pollsters saying it increases the chances of a clear win for the center-left, led by Bersani's Democratic Party (PD), because 5-Star is taking votes mainly from Berlusconi.
After the first day of voting on Sunday about 54 percent of voters had cast their ballots, a sharp fall on the level of 62.5 percent seen at the same stage in the last election in 2008.
Bad weather hampered the turnout in Italy's first post-war election to be held in winter.
The 5-Star Movement, backed by a frustrated younger generation increasingly shut out of full-time jobs, could challenge former premier Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PDL) party as Italy's second largest political force.
"Come on, it isn't over yet," was Monday's front page headline in Il Giornale daily, owned by Berlusconi's brother, a call to arms to voters not to give up.
The 76 year-old Berlusconi has pledged sweeping tax cuts and echoed Grillo's attacks on Monti, Germany and the euro in a media blitz that has halved the lead of the center-left since the start of the year.
Support for Monti's centrist coalition meanwhile has faded and he appears set to trail well behind the main parties.
SENATE RACE
Monti helped save Italy from a mounting debt crisis when he replaced a discredited Berlusconi in November 2011, but with the economy in its longest recession for 20 years analysts fear an electoral stalemate could spark renewed market pressure.
"I voted for the PD because a PD win is the only way to have a stable government and we need stability or we will end up like Greece," said Viola Rossi, an 80 year-old pensioner from Rome.
Whatever government emerges will inherit an economy that has been largely stagnant for much of the past two decades and problems ranging from record youth unemployment to a dysfunctional justice system and a bloated public sector.
The credibility of the political system has been hit by corruption scandals and criminal investigations affecting state-controlled defence group Finmeccanica and Italy's third-largest bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena.
If Bersani wins, it is far from clear that he will be able to control both houses of parliament and form a stable government capable of lasting a full five-year term.
Italy's electoral laws guarantee a strong majority in the lower house to the party or coalition that wins the biggest share of the overall national vote.
However the Senate, elected on a region-by-region basis, is more complicated and the result could turn on a handful of regions where results are too close to call, including Lombardy in the rich industrial north and the southern island of Sicily.
Many politicians and analysts believe Bersani and Monti will end up in an alliance after the vote, despite a number of spiky exchanges during the campaign and Monti's insistence that he will not join forces with Bersani's leftist allies.
For his part, Bersani, who has pledged to maintain the broad reform course set by Monti while doing more to help growth, says he would seek support from other parties and would be ready to offer the former European commissioner a job in his government.
(Additional reporting by Stefano Bernabei and Gavin Jones; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/protest-votes-add-uncertainty-close-italy-election-070325879.html
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Sunday, February 24, 2013
Razorbacks set for rematch with No. 7 Florida
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Source: nutupgators.com --- Saturday, February 23, 2013
Most seem to assume the Florida Gators will exact payback tonight on the Arkansas Razorbacks. ...
Source: http://nutupgators.com/?p=34556
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Frank Ocean's ?Eyes Like Sky?: Listen To The Leaked Track
A previously unreleased Frank Ocean song has leaked, just as he preps the follow-up to his Grammy-winning debut channel ORANGE. As a straightforward, mostly-acoustic ballad, ?Eyes Like Sky? could have easily fit into Ocean?s 2011 mixtape nostalgia ULTRA. But as a tale of growing infatuation, it also sounds as if it describes the same love running through Ocean?s mind in ?Forrest Gump? and throughout channel ORANGE: ?And the same boy with sunken eyes saw me and described / yellow, so perfect.?
?Eyes Like Sky? is reportedly from Ocean?s channel ORANGE sessions, although the R&B auteur has not confirmed this. Check out the leaked track after the jump.
What do you think of ?Eyes Like Sky?? Let us know below, or by hitting us up on Facebook and Twitter.
Source: http://idolator.com/7443153/frank-ocean-eyes-like-sky
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Binghamton U. gives mall shoppers a college sampler
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Source: http://www.pressconnects.com/article/20130223/NEWS01/302230047/1112/
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