Pope marks end of difficult year, notes God’s good

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI marked the end of a difficult year Monday by saying that despite all the death and injustice in the world, goodness prevails.Benedict celebrated New Year’s Eve with a vespers service in St. Peter’s Basilica to give thanks for 2012 and look ahead to 2013. He appeared tired during the service and used a cane afterward — an indication that the busy Christmas season...

Read More..

Ban on demanding Facebook passwords among new 2013 state laws

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Employers in California and Illinois will be prohibited from demanding access to workers’ password-protected social networking accounts and teachers in Oregon will be required to report suspected student bullies thanks to new laws taking effect in 2013.In all, more than 400 measures were enacted at the state level during 2012 and will become law in the new year, according to the...

Read More..

Kardashian, West feel ‘blessed’ over baby news

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Kim Kardashian and Kanye West are feeling lucky about their first child together.“It’s true,” the 32-year-old reality TV star said in a statement on her site Monday. “Kanye and I are expecting a baby. We feel so blessed and lucky and wish that in addition to both of our families, his mom and my dad could be here to celebrate this special time with us.”Kardashian’s father,...

Read More..

Are recession babies prone to be delinquent teens?

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – A new analysis of data on U.S. teens born during the early 1980s ties slightly higher rates of adolescent smoking, drinking, arrests and thefts to macroeconomic conditions during the first year of life.What was “striking for us was it basically went across all socioeconomic strata,” said Dr. Seethalakshmi Ramanathan, the lead author of the study. “From a national level,...

Read More..

Congress to miss midnight cliff deadline

America is going over the “fiscal cliff” – for a few minutes, or hours, at the very least. Don't panic. There's no need to move the family into the Doomsday bunker in the backyard. Yet.While President Barack Obama and Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have said they are close to a broad agreement that would prevent across-the-board income-tax hikes, lawmakers are unlikely to approve...

Read More..

Pakistan militants kill 41 in mass execution, attack on Shi’ites

PESHWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani militants, who have escalated attacks in recent weeks, killed at least 41 people in two separate incidents, officials said on Sunday, challenging assertions that military offensives have broken the back of hardline Islamist groups.The United States has long pressured nuclear-armed ally Pakistan to crack down harder on both homegrown militants groups such as...

Read More..

It’s a fight over fitness in Santa Monica’s parks

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (AP) — Physical fitness is a way of life on the beautiful beachfront oasis of Santa Monica. From sunrise to sunset, there’s huffing and puffing in the city’s parks as trainers put their students through the paces of every form of exercise imaginable.All along the 420 acres of greenery paralleling the Pacific Ocean are groups of a dozen or more people furiously pumping iron, doing...

Read More..

“The Hobbit” keeps box office crown for third week

(Reuters) – The dwarfs and elves of “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” prevailed at the North American box office again over the weekend, as its $ 32.9 million in ticket sales topped both the star-packed musical “Les Miserables” and the western “Django Unchained.”Despite surging past “The Hobbit” on Christmas day with an $ 18.1 million opening, “Les Miz” managed only third place in U.S. and Canadian...

Read More..

GOP Senate leader urges Biden to break ‘fiscal cliff’ impasse

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is shown in this C-Span video footage as he addresses the Senate …Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell urged Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday to jump into “fiscal cliff” talks in hopes of breaking an impasse that threatens Americans with sharply higher income taxes come January 1.In a brief speech on the Senate floor, McConnell complained...

Read More..

2 arrested after Guinea treasury chief killed

CONAKRY, Guinea (AP) — Officials in the West African nation of Guinea say they’ve arrested two suspects in the case of the killing of the country’s treasury chief, who was shot to death nearly two months ago.Authorities paraded the pair in front of journalists Friday. Aissatou Boiro was killed as she was driving home. She had launched an investigation into the loss of 13 million francs ($ 1.8 million)...

Read More..