Cities join sewer and water line 'insurance' pitch - KansasCity.com

Prairie Village wants to sell you some insurance.

Roeland Park does, too.

The two Johnson County cities have joined a growing number of municipalities across the country in touting peace of mind for homeowners for just a small monthly fee.

It?s not a scam. In fact, it?s backed by the National League of Cities, and similar services are on the way to much of the rest of the Kansas City area.

But it?s also a marketing strategy by a private company that uses a city?s logo on a letter, above the mayor?s name, to get its pitch before potential customers.

It works. More than 12 percent of 7,800 households in Prairie Village that received that letter recently have signed up, according to Dennis Enslinger, assistant city administrator.

City Hall, in return, gets a 10 percent cut of the premiums.

Technically, it?s not insurance but a warranty to protect homeowners from the cost of repairing sewer or water lines that may break between their house and the connection to the sewer main or water meter. Many property owners may not realize they are responsible for those sections, which can cost thousands of dollars to repair in an emergency. Homeowners? insurance policies typically do not cover such repairs.

But Service Line Warranties of America does. In return for an introductory price of $5.50 a month or $59 a year, the company will dispatch a local plumber immediately and pay up to $4,000 to repair a broken line. It?ll pay another $4,000 if the job requires cutting up the street.

The plan?s 24-hour hotline offers simplicity to ?a busy homeowner who has better things to do than search for contractors and negotiate a fair price,? according to the company?s website.

Kathleen Whitworth of Roeland Park didn?t know such insurance existed when her sewer connection collapsed last March, sending an awful mess up into her basement in the 5200 bock of Catalina Street. Of course, she called her plumber.

?I assumed I was responsible to the curb,? Whitworth said. ?The biggest shock to me was that I was responsible to the main. I?m on the opposite side of the street to the main.?

Whitworth?s sewer pipe was made of ceramic and was installed more than 50 years ago. She figures it simply collapsed from age. But sewer and water lines can also get clogged with tree roots or break from settling ground.

Whitworth was lucky that her damage was only under her yard and not the street. Still, she was out several thousand dollars for the repairs. She said the $4,000 offered by Service Line Warranties would have covered her job.

Whitworth became one of the nearly 9 percent of Roeland Park property owners to sign up for a warranty after the first round of letters went out in that city.

Roeland Park City Administrator Aaron Otto said the city isn?t trying to twist any arms.

?It was made clear in the first sentence that this was a voluntary program,? Otto said.

Prairie Village and Roeland Park fielded calls from some residents who wanted to know whether the letters were legitimate.

Similar letters in Buckhannon, W.Va., last year had phones ringing off the hook at City Hall. Mayor Kenny Davidson acknowledged the city had entered a contract with Service Line Warranties of West Virginia, but he complained that the letters sent out by the company were ?misleading and confusing,? according to The Record Delta newspaper. The company agreed to revise the letters.

?People need to know that they?re dealing with a private company and not the city,? the mayor said.

Utility Service Partners, the parent company, calls its arrangements with municipalities ?co-branded marketing services agreements.?

According to a National League of Cities fact sheet, the use of a city?s return address on the outside of the envelope ?drives a very high ?open rate? and the city seal and signature lend credibility to the offer, thus driving a much higher enrollment rate.?

The insurance company also notes that the city?s image is enhanced because the public sees the warranty program as a service offered by the city.

Brad Carmichael, vice president for business development for Utility Service Partners, said other vendors offer similar products but his company pioneered the city partnership model that so far includes 81 municipalities in 23 states. Overland Park and Kansas City decided to pass. The company does not have any partnerships in Missouri and it does not sell warranties to individuals who are not in partnership cities.

But another company that offers sewer and water line warranties last week announced its entry into the Kansas City area market. Nicor Services will provide sewer line and water line warranties for anyone in the area.

In Johnson County, WaterOne has agreed to partner with a different vendor, HomeServe USA, to offer warranties for water service-line repairs beginning after the first of the year, said utility spokeswoman Eileen Koutelas.

As for sewer service, Johnson County Wastewater has considered partnering with a warranty provider, but no decision has been made, said General Manager John O?Neil.

Prairie Village and Roeland Park officials said they agreed to enter partnerships with Service Line Warranties because it sounded like a good option to offer their citizens. Neither city expects a windfall from the revenue-sharing arrangement. Enslinger estimates Prairie Village has racked up maybe $5,000 from the deal so far.

?We would have done it without the sharing agreement,? he said.

Source: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/11/13/3264453/cities-join-insurance-pitch.html

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Occupy Oakland: Protesters, Officials Take Stock Of Costs [LATEST UPDATES]

By TERRY COLLINS, The Associated Press

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) -- The tear gas clouds have cleared, graffiti has been scrubbed off buildings and shattered glass has been swept away.

(CLICK HERE OR SCROLL DOWN FOR LATEST UPDATES)

As downtown Oakland attempts to get back to normal ? which for now seems to include a massive Occupy Wall Street tent encampment in front of city hall ? the costs of the movement on the long-struggling city are just starting to come into focus.

And the divisions over the violent tactics that capped an otherwise peaceful day of protest may be taking a toll on the movement itself.

In contrast to New York's thriving island of affluence, Oakland has spent decades on the cusp, a tough, blue-collar town that struggles with poverty and crime.

The protests have been centered in a part of town that has been the target of economic revitalization efforts that recently have lent the area a more upscale vibe but where abandoned storefronts remain plentiful.

City politicians at a chaotic five-hour meeting Thursday night homed in on the price of business lost because of the protests.

Downtown retailers and business leaders say customers and businesses have been scared off. One high-profile real estate developer said he stood in the lobby of his historic office building next to the encampment early Thursday morning and sent vandals at the door scattering when he racked his loaded shotgun.

"We're losing 300 to 400 jobs on people who decided to not renew their leases or not to come here," said Mayor Jean Quan, who also complained about what she said was the protesters' lack of willingness to talk with city officials about seeking common ground.

The president of the Chamber of Commerce blames Quan for three deals falling through.

Two businesses planning to lease a total of 50,000 square feet of office space and another planning to bring 100 jobs into the city pulled out after Quan allowed protesters to return to their camp after a police raid had cleared them out, Joseph Haraburda said.

"We have economic development in reverse right now," he said.

Quan has paid a high political price over her handling of the Occupy encampment.

From an early morning police raid to clear the camp to a tear gas-filled clash with protesters that night to an about-face that has allowed the camp to grow bigger than ever, Quan has faced a barrage of criticism from all sides claiming she has failed to show leadership in the crisis.

The City Council did not vote Thursday on an expected resolution to pledge the city's support to the Occupy movement as several councilmembers expressed doubts, leaving the city's position unclear.

What is clear is that the cash-strapped city's response to the protests is incurring major costs, especially in the form of police overtime.

The Oakland Police Officer's Association, which represents the rank-and-file, estimates that the city will have spent about $2 million in the past two weeks on the police response to the protests, which at one point included help from more than a dozen outside police forces.

"Occupy Wall Street comes in, takes over the park, starts to bleed the resources of this city ? resources that this city does not have," said Sgt. Dom Arotzarena, the union's president, who added that officers support the message of the movement but not its tactics.

The high-crime city laid off 80 officers last year in its effort to close a recession-driven budget gap.

Those hardships have not earned the police much sympathy from protesters, who have implored officers to cross the riot lines, in a city that has a long history of tensions between residents and officers.

Before Wednesday's massive turnout, Occupy Oakland had adopted several official positions, but none stating that the leaderless group was committed to non-violence. Like anti-Wall Street encampments in other cities, the Oakland offshoot adopts stands at evening meetings known as a General Assembly that are held four times a week.

Among the stances taken by Occupy Oakland was one encouraging participants to use a "diversity of tactics" outside the main encampment to register dissatisfaction with the economic status quo.

As an example, it noted that during confrontations with police, some protesters might want to have calm conversations and urge officers to be non-violent, while others might choose to express their anger by yelling, trying to remove police barriers, or disrupting traffic.

Yet at a news conference Thursday, divisions among protesters surfaced as several spokespeople addressed the latest vandalism.

Shake Anderson, a member of Occupy Oakland's media committee, said participants in the encampment had called the mayor's office to disavow the people who were causing damage, an action Quan later praised as helping prevent a bigger blowup between protesters and police.

"We called the mayor's office the instant we understood what was taking place over there," Anderson said.

"That was an anonymous action. That was nothing to do with Occupy Oakland," Anderson said.

Another committee member, Varucha Peller, interrupted and pleaded with Anderson to stick with the group's approved message of focusing attention on the thousands of people who shut down the Port of Oakland on Wednesday night.

"Occupy Oakland did not call the mayor's office. Individuals called the mayor's office. Occupy Oakland has a policy that has been passed through the General Assembly that we do not negotiate with politicians and we do not involve political parties," Peller said.

An early Occupy supporter whose views appear to be diverging from the group is Councilwoman Desley Brooks, who camped out with protesters early on. At the council meeting, she expressed skepticism about the camp's sustainability.

"I believe and understand the lack of hope and the pain and the frustration that people are feeling," said Brooks as her colleagues nodded in agreement. "But I have been extremely troubled, troubled by how far do we allow your rights to go and infringe on other people's rights."

___

Associated Press writers Marcus Wohlsen in San Francisco and Lisa Leff in Oakland and video journalist Haven Daley in Oakland contributed to this report.


Latest Updates On HuffPost's Live Blog: The Washington Post Confirms Occupy DC Injuries

From The Washington Post:

Hundreds of Occupy D.C. protesters blocked streets Friday night around the Walter E. Washington Convention Center where a conservative group was holding a dinner.

Two people were injured after apparently being struck by cars, authorities said.

Full story here.

PHOTOS: Occupy DC Protesters March On Koch-Affiliated Event
WASHINGTON -- Protesters marched on the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on Friday evening where Americans for Prosperity, a conservative organization funded in part by the Koch brothers, was assembled for its Defending The American Dream Summit and Ronald Reagan tribute dinner.

Full story and photos here.

Occupy DC: Two People Reportedly Hit By Car At Different Intersections
@ timcraigpost : Two people hit by a car, at different intersections, when car allegedly rammed two human blockades. Numerous police responding. #occupydc
Second Iraq War Veteran Reportedly Injured In Occupy Oakland Protests

The Guardian reports:

A second Iraq war veteran has suffered serious injuries after clashes between police and Occupy movement protesters in Oakland.

Kayvan Sabehgi, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, is in intensive care with a lacerated spleen. He says he was beaten by police close to the Occupy Oakland camp, but despite suffering agonising pain, did not reach hospital until 18 hours later.

Sabehgi, 32, is the second Iraq war veteran to be hospitalised following involvement in Oakland protests. Another protester, Scott Olsen, suffered a fractured skull on 25 October.

Full story here.

'These People Don't Even Believe In God'
@ timcraigpost : "These people don't even believe in God," one conference attendee said as she walked past #Occupydc
Occupy Paris Reportedly Has Food Stolen By Police
@ OccupyParis : #occupydefense number one trending topic on twitter ! We are hungry, police stole our food supplies. Follow us on twitter
Did The New York Post Instigate An Attack In Zuccotti Park?

HuffPost's Saki Knafo:

Recai "Rocky" Iskender woke up in his Zuccotti Park tent yesterday morning to the unpleasant sensation of being kicked in the head. He scrambled out of the tent and onto the sidewalk, where he found a man with wild hair and a deranged look screaming at him. He knocked the man on his back with a left hook.

Standing there capturing the action on his camera was Kevin Fasick, a reporter for the New York Post. This was excellent timing for Fasick. The Post has covered the seedy and criminal element in Zuccotti Park almost to the exclusion of any other aspect of the Occupy Wall Street movement. The morning of the attack, an op-ed urging Mayor Bloomberg to banish the "bums" appeared on the cover of the paper under a headline that screamed "ENOUGH!" Now Fasick had found the perfect opportunity to lend some reportorial weight to the editorial board's assertion that the protests had largely been "hijacked by crazies and criminals." The attacker, Jeremy Clinch of Cleveland, played the part of violent lunatic to perfection. He seemed to be performing just for Fasick's benefit, turning and ranting directly to the camera.

Full story here.

OWS Spokes Council Orientation Is Tonight

From the New York City General Assembly:

The Structure Working Group will be holding a Spokes Council Orientation, including going through a mock proposal, Group check-ins and other procedural issues tonight at 7pm at the 60 Wall St atrium. We will have a better space for Monday night.

Full details here.

OWS Releases Statement On Sexual Assault

Zuccotti Park's Safer Spaces Committee put out a statement to clarify recent allegations concerning a sexual assault that took place within OWS encampment. The press release provides a detailed accounting of the organization's response to the incident:

On the morning of October 29, a woman participating in OWS was sexually assaulted at Liberty Plaza. The person who she identified as having assaulted her was arrested on November 1 for a previous assault. He has since been released on bail.

On the morning of the assault, the survivor was accompanied to the hospital by a group of women from OWS, including a social worker, to support her and act as advocates. From the moment the incident was discovered to the present time, the survivor has been surrounded by a network of allies and trained advocates offering resources to provide emotional, medical, and legal support. At every step of the process, and in line with the core principles of survivor support, her wishes as to how she wanted to proceed have been honored, and information from a range of sources has been provided to her about her options. The survivor knew immediately that she wanted to make sure that the person who assaulted her did not harm anyone else at OWS. Community members honored this demand by asking that this person stay off site, and, when he refused, monitored his activity, ejected him from the space and escorted him to police custody.

These efforts provided the survivor with the time and space to carefully review the options available to her. Following two days of discussion with family, friends, supporters, and anti-violence advocates, the survivor decided to make a report to the police and to push for a criminal investigation and prosecution. Supporters from OWS accompanied her to the police station, and will continue to support her throughout the legal process.

We have been saddened and angered to observe some members of the media and the public blame the survivor for the assault. A survivor is never at fault. It is unacceptable to criticize a survivor for the course of action they chose to take or their community for supporting them in that choice. Additionally, we were troubled at the time of her report that responding police officers appeared to be more concerned by her political involvement in OWS than her need for assistance after a traumatic incident of sexual violence. A survivor is not at fault for being assaulted while peacefully participating in a public protest to express their political opinions. We are aware that this is one of several known cases of sexual assault that have occurred at OWS. We are dismayed by these appalling acts and distressed by the fear among many Occupiers that they have caused, as well as their negative impact on our ability to safely participate in public protests. We have the right to participate in peaceful protests without fear of violence.

We are also concerned that segments of the media have attempted to use this incident as another way to disingenuously attack and discredit OWS. It is reprehensible to manipulate and capitalize on a tragedy like this to discredit a peaceful political movement. OWS exists within a broader culture where sexual assault is egregiously common: someone in the US is sexually assaulted every 2 minutes, most assaults are never reported, and most rapists are never held to account.[1] We live in a culture of violence in which sexual assault is often ignored, condoned, excused and even encouraged. We note that it is particularly difficult for survivors of assault at OWS to feel confident in reporting crimes to the NYPD ? the NYPD?s unjustifiably aggressive and abusive policing of OWS has undermined trust in the police force amongst protesters.

As individuals and as a community, we have the responsibility and the opportunity to create an alternative to this culture of violence. Advocates, some of whom are survivors themselves, have worked for decades to address sexual violence generally. We are working for an OWS and a world in which survivors are respected and supported unconditionally, where they are supported to come forward, and where every community member takes responsibility for preventing and responding to harm. We are redoubling our efforts to raise awareness about sexual violence. This includes taking preventative measures such as encouraging healthy relationship dynamics and consent practices that can help to limit harm.

We are creating and sharing strategies that educate and transform our community into a culture of consent, safety, and well-being. At OWS, these strategies currently include support circles, counseling, consent trainings, safer sleeping spaces, self-defense trainings, community watch, awareness campaigns, and other evolving community-based processes to address harm. We encourage survivors to connect with support and advocates, and to access medical, legal, and social services, as well as available community-based options, many of which are listed below. We stand together as a community to work towards the prevention of sexual violence and harassment, and to provide unwavering support for anyone who has been assaulted. We commit to creating a culture of visibility, support, and advocacy for survivors, and of accountability for people who have committed harm.

Occupy Philly Sets Up Pivotal General Assembly

Organizers have to decide whether or not to move to make way for city construction project. According to the Philly City Paper:

Mayor Michael Nutter has allowed the Occupy Philly encampment in front of City Hall to continue more or less unmolested. But he has made it clear that the protest tent city must move in the coming month when construction to rebuild Dilworth Plaza is slated to begin. But protesters have debated whether to comply and last night, a group called the ?radical caucus? put forward a proposal to vote on whether to stay put in Dilworth for good.

It?s possible, says organizer Chris Goldstein, that the proposal, like many others, will be tabled or amended. And he says that whether people stay or relocate will in the end be a personal choice since the General Assembly (GA) isn?t a governing body. It?s just a space to build consensus ? or something close to it (the rules call for an overwhelming super-majority).

For his part, Goldstein is more interested in discussing expanding the encampment than relocating.

?There?s a lot of autonomy in Occupy Philly. I?m not sure if a vote at the GA will make any difference. People can occupy wherever they want. My personal opinion is that we should occupy more places. I?m not sure if moving is as much an issue as expansion.?
Second Iraq War Vet Injured at Occupy Oakland

The Guardian reports:

A second Iraq war veteran has suffered serious injuries after clashes between police and Occupy movement protesters in Oakland.

Kayvan Sabehgi, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, is in intensive care with a lacerated spleen. He says he was beaten by police close to the Occupy Oakland camp, but despite suffering agonising pain, did not reach hospital until 18 hours later.

Read the whole thing here.

Oakland Sets Up First General Assembly Since General Strike
@ occupyoakland : GA tonight at 7. First GA since the #generalstrike, we have a lot to discuss and propose! Come get involved in the revolution #occupyoakland
Did The New York Post Instigate A Fight In Zucotti Park?

Recai "Rocky" Iskender awoke in his Zuccotti Park tent yesterday morning to the unpleasant sensation of being kicked in the head. He scrambled out of the tent and onto the sidewalk. A man with wild hair and a deranged look was screaming at him. He knocked the man on his back with a left hook.

Standing there, capturing the action on his camera, was Kevin Fasick, a reporter for the New York Post.

This was excellent timing for the Post reporter. In case you haven't been following, the Post has been covering the seedy and criminal element in Zuccotti Park almost to the exclusion of any other aspect of the movement. The morning of the attack, an op-ed urging Mayor Bloomberg to banish the protestors from the park appeared on the cover under the headline equivalent of a kick to the head: "ENOUGH!" Apparently Fasick had now found the perfect opportunity to lend some journalistic weight to this demand. Not only did the attacker, Jeremy Clinch of Cleveland, play the part of violent lunatic to perfection; he seemed to be performing just for Fasick's benefit, turning and ranting directly to the camera.

After the incident, Iskender angrily told Fasick that he suspected Clinch may have been put up to the job by someone employed by the "Bloomberg police machine," and he accused Fasick of somehow contributing to the incident. He says that Fasick managed to calm him down by repeatedly referring to Iskender as a "victim," but when the article and video came out this morning he found that the reporter had been less than honest with him. The article referred to Iskender as a wacko and jeered that he was "up to the bizarre standards set by Clinch." Iskender now suspects it was Fasick who coaxed Clinch into starting the fight. Fasick told this reporter he would not be giving any interviews.

--Saki Knafo

Send Us Your Images And Videos

People from across the U.S. have been sending their images and videos of Occupy Wall Street protests to OfftheBus, The Huffington Post's citizen journalism program. The best of these submissions are included in the gallery below. Recent additions include images from Oakland, Durham and Providence.

To add your own images from OWS events near you, email offthebus@huffingtonpost.com. See more citizen journalism from Occupy Wall Street events here.

Iowa Credit Unions Gain $49 Million In Deposits Ahead Of Bank Transfer Day

The Iowa Independent reports:

Olivia Maiers, spokeswoman for the Iowa Credit Union League, reports that members have gain 7,000 new members and $49 million in new deposits since the beginning of September. Nationally, credit unions have gain 650,000 customers and added $4.5 billion in new accounts during that same time, according to the Credit Union National Association.

The national organization adds that four out of every five of their affiliated credit unions have reported the increase is due to attempts by larger banks to raise customer fees, the Bank Transfer Day movement or a combination of both.
WATCH: Anonymous Poet's Passionate Performance At Occupy Denver

Michael Moore may have drawn the crowd Thursday at Occupy Denver, but the day's most memorable moment may be attributed to an anonymous poet who stepped forward to recite Livin' In The Land Where The Whip Still Cracks.

Traders Dump McDonald's Job Applications On Occupy Chicago

Mediaite reports:

In the middle of an Occupy Chicago teach-in this week, traders at the Chicago Board of Trade dumped several sheets of paper on top of the heads of protesters below. Demonstrators were angered to find out they were showered with employment applications for McDonald?s.

Read the full story here.

Anonymous throws support behind Occupy the Caucuses in Iowa

An Occupy Des Moines protester tells HuffPost in an email "Occupy Des Moines has no intention of disrupting or interfering with caucus voting on January 3. We are targeting the presidential candidates and the big-moneyed corporations pulling their strings behind the scenes, not everyday voters."

Bloomberg's Patience Wears Thin As Eviction Rumors Swirl

The Village Voice reports:

Mike Bloomberg has started to publicly lose patience with the Occupy Wall Street encampment in Zuccotti Park. Yesterday, he told the Observer that recent reports of crime and sexual assault in the park were "a very high priority" for the administration and that any withholding of information from the police by protesters "is despicable, and I think it is outrageous and it really allows the criminal to strike again making all of us less safe."

Today during his weekly appearance on John Gambling's radio show, Bloomberg said that "we're not going to tolerate" some of the behavior at Zuccotti. "If you see what happened like in Oakland, we are not gonna have that here," he said. "That's not gonna happen here."

Read the full story here.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/04/occupy-oakland-costs_n_1077443.html

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Apple's Gestapo Chief "Steps Down" [Apple]

John Theriault—vicepresident of Apple's Gestapoarian Global Security services—has "stepped down." Theriault was under the command of Bruce Sewell, who is Apple's General Counsel Senior Vicepresident. Sewell used to report directly to Steve Jobs. More »


Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/YkO3vGMzUlw/apples-gestapo-chief-steps-down

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Repurpose a Towel Rack into a Pot Lid Rack [Kitchen Hacks]

Repurpose a Towel Rack into a Pot Lid RackMartha Stewart's homepage gives a great suggestion for organizing pot lids?attach one or two towel racks to the inside of the doors for the cabinet that holds your cookware. Look for towel racks that stand out around 2 inches - less space means you won't have enough clearance to fit most lids and more space means you'll intrude into your cabinet storage.

Lid Racks | Martha Stewart via Re-Nest

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/V526OqUnFqk/repurpose-a-towel-rack-into-a-pot-lid-rack

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Euro zone inflation stays at 3 percent, could delay ECB (Reuters)

BRUSSELS (Reuters) ? Euro zone inflation was surprisingly high at 3.0 percent for a second straight month in October, the EU announced on Monday, prompting economists to postpone their bets for a central bank rate cut until December.

With Europe's economy cooling, economists had forecast consumer price inflation would fall after reaching a three-year high in September. But high food and oil prices and tax hikes in Italy kept it at the same level.

"It looks a bit like stagflation with negative growth and high inflation," said Peter Vanden Houte, an economist at ING. "That's not positive news."

In a first reading of inflation for the month, the European Union's statistics agency Eurostat said inflation was 3.0 percent in October, compared to a 2.9 percent forecast by a Reuters poll of economists.

Economists had expected the European Central Bank to raise rates as soon as this week to support Europe's economy, as evidence mounts that the region's debt crisis is sapping business confidence and raising the specter of recession.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development slashed its 2012 growth forecast for the euro area to 0.3 percent from 2.0 percent in May.

Underscoring that, Eurostat said the jobless rate in the euro zone rose slightly to 10.2 percent in September from a revised 10.1 percent in August, nudged up by Spain, where unemployment reached 22.6 percent.

But stubbornly high inflation, above the Frankfurt-based central bank's target of close to, but under, 2 percent, is making a rate cut call much more difficult.

"We think interest rates will be on hold this week but we're expecting a rate reduction in December," said Nick Kounis, an economist at ABN AMRO.

Crude oil prices in euro terms were still around a third higher than in the same month last year. ING forecasts that if they continue at current levels, their impact on inflation will not dissipate until March.

MARIO'S MOMENT?

Adding to the cloudy outlook, Mario Draghi takes over as ECB president on Tuesday and may not feel comfortable lowering rates at his first meeting on Thursday, particularly with inflation more than a percentage point above target.

As an Italian at the helm of the ECB, Draghi will arguably be under more scrutiny from skeptical investors worried that a southern European might be less disciplined.

Last week Draghi warned of "a further weakening in growth prospects" but German members of the ECB's Governing Council remain focused on fighting inflation, partly driven by German folk memories of the hyperinflation the 1920s.

German council member Juergen Stark said on October 26 that interest rates at their current level were "adequate."

"The latest euro zone inflation and unemployment data might leave the hawks at the ECB concerned about underlying price pressures," said Jennifer McKeown, an economist at Capital Economics. "The rate has now been above the ECB's 2 percent price stability ceiling for 11 months running, perhaps suggesting that high inflation is becoming entrenched."

(Additional reporting by Ben Deighton, Christopher Le Coq and Robert-Jan Bartunek. Editing by Sebastian Moffett)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111031/ts_nm/us_eurozone

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Various '7 billionth' babies celebrated worldwide

A newly born baby girl named Danica Camacho, the Philippines' symbolic seven billionth baby, as part of the United Nations' seven billion global population projection, lies on the chest of her mother Camille in government's Fabella Maternity hospital in Manila on Monday Oct. 31, 2011.(AP Photo/Erik De Castro, Pool)

A newly born baby girl named Danica Camacho, the Philippines' symbolic seven billionth baby, as part of the United Nations' seven billion global population projection, lies on the chest of her mother Camille in government's Fabella Maternity hospital in Manila on Monday Oct. 31, 2011.(AP Photo/Erik De Castro, Pool)

A newly born baby girl named Danica Camacho, the Philippines' symbolic seven billionth baby, as part of the United Nations' seven billion global population projection, is weighed in government's Fabella Maternity hospital in Manila on Monday Oct. 31, 2011. (AP Photo/Erik De Castro, Pool)

Danica Camacho is cuddled by her mother Camille as they are wheeled out of the delivery room of the Government's Fabella Hospital moments after she was born Monday Oct.31, 2011 in Manila, Philippines. The Philippines, ranked 12th as the most populated country in the world, joins the rest of the world as it welcomes its symbolic 7 billionth baby. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)

In this photo released by United Nations Population Fund, Gamze Ozkan, 18, holds her new born baby boy, Yusuf Efe, at the Zekai Tahir Burak maternity hospital in Ankara, Turkey, early Monday, Oct. 31, 2011. According to the U.N. Population Fund, Yufuf Efe, son of the unemployed mother and a worker husband, will be one of 7 billion people sharing Earth's land and resources by Monday. (AP Photo/Nezih Tavlas, UNPF) EDITORIAL USE ONLY

In this photo released by United Naitons Population Fund, newly born Turkish baby boy Yusuf Efe, reacts next to his mother Gamze Ozkan, unseen, at the Zekai Tahir Burak maternity hospital in Ankara, Turkey, early Monday, Oct. 31, 2011. According to the U.N. Population Fund, Yufuf Efe, son of an unemployed mother and a worker will be one of 7 billion people sharing Earth's land and resources by Monday.(AP Photo/Nezih Tavlas, UNPF) EDITORIAL USE ONLY

(AP) ? She came into the world at two minutes before midnight, a tiny, wrinkled girl born into a struggling Manila family. On Monday, she became a symbol of the world's population reaching 7 billion people and all the worries that entails for the planet's future.

Danica May Camacho, born in a crowded public hospital, was welcomed with a chocolate cake marked "7B Philippines" and a gift certificate for free shoes. There were bursts of photographers' flashes, and speeches by local officials.

The celebrations, though, reflected symbolism more than demography.

Amid the millions of births and deaths around the world each day, it is impossible to pinpoint the arrival of the globe's 7 billionth occupant. But the U.N. chose Monday to mark the day with a string of festivities worldwide, and a series of symbolic 7-billionth babies being born.

Danica was the first, arriving at Manila's Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital at two minutes before midnight Sunday ? but doctors say that was close enough to count for a Monday birthday.

"She looks so lovely," the mother, Camille Galura, whispered as she cradled the 2.5-kilo (5.5-pound) baby, who was born about a month premature.

The baby was the second for Galura and her partner, Florante Camacho, a driver who supports the family on a tiny salary driving a 'jeepney,' ubiquitous four-wheel drive vehicles used by many poor and working-class Filipinos.

Dr. Eric Tayag of the Philippines' Department of Health said later that the birth came with a warning.

"Seven billion is a number we should think about deeply," he said.

"We should really focus on the question of whether there will be food, clean water, shelter, education and a decent life for every child," he said. "If the answer is 'no,' it would be better for people to look at easing this population explosion."

In the Philippines, much of the population question revolves around birth control. The government backs a program that includes artificial birth control. The powerful Roman Catholic church, though, vehemently opposes contraception.

Camacho, a Catholic like her husband, said she was aware of the church's position but had decided to begin using a birth control device.

"The number of homeless children I see on the streets keeps multiplying," Camacho said. "When I see them, I'm bothered because I eat and maybe they don't."

Demographers say it took until 1804 for the world to reach its first billion people, and a century more until it hit 2 billion in 1927. The twentieth century, though, saw things begin to cascade: 3 billion in 1959; 4 billion in 1974; 5 billion in 1987; 6 billion in 1998.

The U.N. estimates the world's population will reach 8 billion by 2025 and 10 billion by 2083. But the numbers could vary widely, depending on everything from life expectancy to access to birth control to infant mortality rates.

In Uttar Pradesh, India ? the most populous state in the world's second-most populous country ? officials said Monday they would be appointing seven girls born Monday to symbolize the 7 billion.

India, which struggles with a deeply held preference for sons and a skewed sex ratio because of millions of aborted female fetuses, is using the day to highlight that issue.

"It would be a fitting moment if the 7 billionth baby is a girl born in rural India," said Dr Madhu Gupta, an Uttar Pradesh gynecologist. "It would help in bringing the global focus back on girls, who are subject to inequality and bias."

According to U.S. government estimates, India has 893 girls for every 1,000 boys at birth, compared with 955 girls per 1,000 boys in the United States.

On Monday, the chosen Indian babies were being born at the government-run Community Health Center in the town of Mall, on the outskirts of the Uttar Pradesh capital of Lucknow.

Six babies were born from midnight to 8 a.m. Monday. Four were boys.

Meanwhile China, which at 1.34 billion people is the world's most populous nation, said it would stand by its one-child policy, a set of restrictions launched three decades ago limiting most urban families to one child and most rural families to two.

"Overpopulation remains one of the major challenges to social and economic development," Li Bin, director of the State Population and Family Planning Commission, told the official Xinhua News Agency. He said the population of China would hit 1.45 billion in 2020.

While the Beijing government says its strict family planning policy has helped propel the country's rapidly growing economy, it has also brought many problems. Soon, demographers say, there won't be enough young Chinese to support its enormous elderly population. China, like India, also has a highly skewed sex ratio, with aid groups saying sex-selective abortions have resulted in an estimated 43 million fewer girls than there should be, given the overall population.

India, with 1.2 billion people, is expected to overtake China around 2030 when the Indian population reaches an estimated 1.6 billion.

___

Sullivan reported from New Delhi. Associated Press writer Biswajeet Banerjee in Lucknow, India, contributed to this report.

(This version Corrects the name of the Indian town to 'Mall' instead of 'Lall' in the 20th paragraph.)

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2011-10-31-AS-7-Billion-People/id-1a53f1aa5ea84bb5b24e6ab47231a420

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The real business lessons from 'Moneyball'

We are deep into October. The Yankees and Red Sox have been sent home, but the Oakland Athletics are still thrilling fans on a nightly basis. It?s the 2002 A?s, not 2011, and their exploits can be seen only on a dwindling number of movie screens. But we A?s fans (I?ve been one since the early 1970s) take what we can get.

What we get is a movie, ?Moneyball,? in which Brad Pitt, as A?s General Manager Billy Beane, throws a few chairs and craftily rebuilds his team into a 103-game winner after the departure of three stars Oakland can?t afford to keep. We also get a seemingly unending debate over what the A?s run of success-but-not-quite-triumph from 2000 through 2006, and the team?s subsequent failure to put together a winning season, really means. Is Beane an innovative genius? A fraud? Just lucky? Is scientific analysis the key to success in sports and in life? Is baseball fair? My A?s are no longer just a baseball team; they are a heavily freighted metaphor.

As recounted in the 2003 Michael Lewis book upon which the movie ?Moneyball? was based, Beane was among the first high-level baseball executives (the first was his predecessor and mentor, Sandy Alderson) to openly embrace what baseball geeks call sabermetrics, commonly known in the business world as data analytics. Through the unsentimental use of statistics, Beane was able, in Lewis?s telling, to exploit inefficiencies in the market for baseball talent and build a low-budget team that triumphed over lavishly funded foes.

?Moneyball? quickly became a business classic, and deservedly so. It?s a lot more fun to read than your average business book, making brainy iconoclasm seem heroic. Plus, baseball possesses two characteristics that in business exist only in the abstract: a level playing field (except for the pitcher?s mound) and truly reliable performance metrics. As a result, cause and effect are clearer. You can isolate successful behaviors and counterproductive ones. All this makes baseball a great demonstration ground for concepts with application elsewhere. But the most useful lessons to be drawn from the recent history of the Oakland A?s ? and, for that matter, from sports in general ? may not be the ones celebrated in ?Moneyball?.

The concept at the heart of ?Moneyball? is the efficient market hypothesis. As originally formulated in the 1960s, this theory held that on a big, transparent market such as the New York Stock Exchange, hard-nosed speculators will quickly sniff out discrepancies between asset prices and fundamental value. Through what?s called arbitrage ? buying underpriced assets and short-selling overpriced ones ? these geniuses get rich and the discrepancies disappear. Meanwhile, the goofballs who peruse market charts in search of secret meanings, or buy a stock because they just read about it in the Wall Street Journal, lose their money. The result: an efficient market.

In recent years, scholars have poked lots of holes in the belief that real-world financial markets approach this ideal. Emotion and shortsightedness can prevail for long periods. Arbitrageurs who are correct in their assessment of fundamental values can still lose all their money if they get the timing wrong. Goofballs sometimes get rich.

In sports, unlike finance, the fundamentals are there for everyone to see. Earnings per share can be manipulated; earned run average cannot. So you might think it would be harder for inefficiencies to persist. Yet they do.

The inefficiency at the heart of ?Moneyball? had to do with on-base percentage. It?s a better metric of offensive value than batting average, but in the early 2000s a team could hire a player with a high on-base percentage but a middling batting average (that is, somebody who walks a lot) at a discount. When Clemson University economists Jahn K. Hakes and Raymond D. Sauer set out to test what they called "the Moneyball hypothesis? a few years ago, they found that on-base percentage was deeply undervalued through the 2002 season. The price began to go up in 2003, as other teams ? notably the Boston Red Sox?began to emulate Beane?s approach. By 2004, after Lewis?s book had topped the best-seller lists, players with high on-base percentage were no longer a bargain.

So that particular inefficiency disappeared. But many sports inefficiencies remain. In 2002, University of California at Berkeley economist David Romer found that National Football League coaches kick on fourth down more often than statistics indicate they should. In several cases, including fourth-and-goal situations early in games, their timid choices ?represent clear-cut and large departures from win-maximization.? Romer?s paper got some attention in the NFL, but it has had almost no discernible impact on behavior. Going for it on fourth down is still seen as a daredevil move.

In another football study, B. Cade Massey of Yale School of Management and Richard H. Thaler of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business looked at how top picks in the NFL draft performed in comparison with those chosen later. Their finding: Players drafted high in the first round were persistently overvalued both in terms of the salaries they received and the picks they could be traded for. I asked Thaler, a prominent critic of the efficient market hypothesis in finance, whether he thought the market for stocks or the market for sports talent was more efficient. ?The NFL draft is certainly less efficient,? he e-mailed back. ?The bad teams get the early, over-valued picks. The smart teams like the New England Patriots do not.? And there is no way to arbitrage away this inefficiency. The smart teams ?cannot sell the top pick short, nor can you sell a bad team short. About the best you can do is try to buy up a bad team, but even this strategy will not necessarily work since someone dumb may outbid you for the team.?

The key here is the owners. ?If you have a crappy owner who consistently makes bad decisions, it is difficult to wrestle the team away from him,? says Thaler?s Chicago colleague Tobias J. Moskowitz. In his book Scorecasting, co-authored with Sports Illustrated writer L. Jon Wertheim, Moskowitz offers a related explanation for the perennial miserableness of the Chicago Cubs. The correlation between on-field performance and game attendance is lower for the Cubs than any other baseball team. Wrigley Field is usually packed no matter what, so the team?s owners have no economic reason to field a winner.

That?s not true for every sad sack franchise, of course. And yet sports ? at least, team sports on the American model ? lack many of the usual market mechanisms for rooting out inefficiency. Poor on-field performance doesn?t necessarily drive owners out of business. And there are, varying by sport, all sorts of mechanisms to protect the weak, from salary caps and revenue sharing to a draft system that gives the best picks to the worst teams. The losers may fail to take proper advantage of the gifts the draft doles out. But they?re still getting a gift.

Baseball has no salary cap, allowing the richest teams to outspend the poorest by as much as 5 to 1. That?s why the book ?Moneyball? is subtitled The Art of Winning an Unfair Game. Yet the team with the second-lowest payroll, Tampa Bay, was in the playoffs this year; none of the four teams that made it to the League Championship Series was in the payroll Top 10. The secret of sabermetrics is out, but baseball remains a deeply and gratifyingly inefficient market.

So why can?t Billy Beane keep building winners? You wouldn?t know it from the movie ?Moneyball,? which focuses on a few veterans acquired over the off-season, but the 2002 A?s team was actually built around a crop of young stars drafted in the 1990s and brought up through the organization?s farm system. Shortstop Miguel Tejada was the American League?s Most Valuable Player that year. Pitcher Barry Zito won the Cy Young Award; fellow starters Tim Hudson and Mark Mulder had been runners-up for the award in 2000 and 2001.

There is simply too much uncertainty in player development to allow a team to field a crop of brilliant homegrown performers like that on a regular basis. And once the team?s young stars had played long enough to be eligible for free agency, the A?s usually could no longer afford them. During the A?s run of success, Beane repeatedly could jury-rig replacements as his stars left. But keeping that up is hard.

It didn?t help that the one time Beane bet big to keep a player from leaving, it failed to pay off. In 2004, the general manager looked at third baseman Eric Chavez and saw a future Hall of Famer. So he signed him to a six-year, $66 million contract. A year later, Chavez began struggling with a debilitating series of back, neck, and shoulder injuries. Now that?s unfair. It?s also an indication that maybe the world shouldn?t be reading quite so much into the ups and downs of the Oakland A?s. Sometimes, in sports and in life, stuff just happens.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45032371/ns/business-us_business/

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Know Everything About Baby Automotive Safety. | usdems.org

Please read this to know extra about child car seats and retaining your child secure whereas within the car.

Q. What?s the best child automotive seat?

The best automobile seat is the one which matches your baby?s dimension and weight. It additionally fits properly in your automobile and is well installed.

Q. What forms of baby automobile seats are available?

There are several sorts of baby automobile seats corresponding to toddler seats, front going through automobile seats, and convertible seats. There are additionally combination seats (can face entrance or rear), booster seats and integrated automobile seats. With each type of seat there are variations.

Q. Is a five-point harness or a protect safest for my baby?

A five point harness offers your small one the greatest protection as a result of it holds your baby tighter in the seat within the event of a crash. A T-Shield or over-the-head restraint permits an excessive amount of room or can get in the way in which of chubby tummies and legs. The stalk of the T-Shield could cause severe injury to your baby.

Q. How can I find out how to soundly set up my baby?s automobile seat?

All automobile seats (besides most second hand seats) come with printed directions. If after studying the directions you still are not certain tips on how to properly set up it. You can call or email the manufacturer. Some police stations and hospitals have help applications as well.

Q. Is there an accurate approach to secure my youngster in the child car seat?

Sure, there is a right way wherein to safe your child in his car seat. The way you secure your baby within the automotive seat will possible depend on the age and size of your baby. For youngsters underneath a 12 months of age they should be positioned in rear-dealing with seats within the center of the rear seat. Older youngsters can sit going through entrance and their seat are typically placed behind the driver or passenger to be able to utilize the shoulder/lap belts.

Q. What is LATCH?

LATCH refers to Lower Anchors and Tethers for Children. It?s a baby automotive seat installation system. The decrease hooks are attached between the bottom of the back of the seat and seat itself. The tether piece is a strap made of seat belt materials with a clip that secures forward going through baby automotive seats and prevents excessive motion of the child?s head in crashes.

Q. What is a Tether?

The tether is a strap manufactured from seat belt materials with a clip. It attaches to the clips on the seat and secures front facing baby automobile seats. In a crash it prevents excessive motion of the seat and the baby?s head, reducing the severity of injuries.

Q. How can I inform when my baby is able to use car seat belts with no booster seat?

Your baby shall be ready for utilizing the automotive security restraint system when s/he can sit all the way again within the seat and the knees can bend comfortably over the sting of the seat. The belt crosses the shoulder between the neck and the arm and the lap belt is low and touches the thighs. Your child must be capable of stay seated the entire trip.

Q. Can a baby car seat be used safely in an airplane?

Yes it can. Airways require kids age 2 and beneath, to be in authorised car seats. The seats should be sixteen inches or less to slot in the airplane seats. Name forward and learn out if your seat is an accredited seat. Once on the airplane, the hostess/es, will be able to help you.

Q. Is it protected for me to make use of second-hand child automotive seats?

Sure it is safe to make use of second-hand baby automotive seats supplied you do a safety check. Belts and harnesses shouldn?t be frayed or cracked. There needs to be no cracks or tears within the seat cover and the seat ought to recline easily and stay upright when the infant is seated. Look into the history of the seat, if it has been in a car crash don?t buy it, its potential to safely restrain your baby has been compromised. If the seat doesn?t come with a guide contact the manufacturer to make sure the seat can be properly installed. If the seat is greater than 5 years ancient don?t use it, it could have been in a crash and older baby automotive seats could not fit in new mannequin cars.

Q. What should I do if my child automotive seat is recalled?

In most cases, the manufacturer will give you instructions of what to do if baby car seat is recalled. In some cases they may change it without cost they are going to have you ever convey it someplace to get substitute parts additionally without charge to you.

Q. Are there child automobile seats accessible for kids with special wants?

Youngsters with special wants could require different restraint systems. Focus on your choices with your pediatrician.

Q. What is the finest kind of harness for my baby automotive seat?

There are 4 types of harnesses in baby automobile seats. The six-point harness has two straps at the shoulders, two at the hips and two on the crotch. The 5-point harness has two straps at the shoulders, two at the hips and one at the crotch. The t-shield is a padded triangle that latches at the crotch whereas the overhead shield comes down from over the head and latches at the crotch. The safest harnesses are the 5 ? 6-level harnesses. These prevent excessive motion of the baby in crash situations. The t defend and the over-head defend permit for too much room and will trigger your child to be ejected from the car in a crash.

In Conclusion

You possibly can by no means go incorrect when you err on the facet of warning when it comes to your baby. The scale and weight of your child in addition to your price range will resolve what sort of seat you will buy.

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Blood vessel mapping reveals four new 'ZIP codes'; Targeting specific addresses could help fight cancer, obesity and other diseases

ScienceDaily (Oct. 24, 2011) ? A research team led by scientists from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center has discovered four new "ZIP codes" in their quest to map the vast blood vessel network of the human body.

The study, published online the week of Oct. 24 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, brings science one step closer to the goal of using the vascular system to personalize cancer therapy, as well as fight obesity, heart disease and other disorders. Researchers also found that some addresses are shared in vasculature across the board instead of always being organ-specific.

The study is part of ongoing research to identify specific and unique addresses, or ZIP codes, within the body's vascular system and use them to develop diagnostic, imaging and therapeutic strategies. Husband-and-wife research team Wadih Arap, M.D., Ph.D., and Renata Pasqualini, Ph.D., professors at the David H. Koch Center for Applied Research of Genitourinary Cancers at MD Anderson, pioneered the concept and were senior authors of the paper.

"By identifying vascular ZIP codes, we bring medicine closer to the ultimate goal of targeted therapies," Pasqualini said.

Innovative methods help investigation

This study supports the Arap-Pasqualini lab's ongoing research to show blood vessels are more than a uniform and ubiquitous "pipeline" that serves the circulatory system.

More than a decade ago, the group pioneered a screening technique that employs billions of viral particles, called phage, to discover, validate and use blood vessel diversity. The particles are packaged with small fragments of proteins called peptides that act as ligands. When injected into the body, they bind to specific receptors in the blood vessels and organs.

"This process is like a 'molecular mass mailing' to all addresses in the body," Arap said. "The peptides travel until they find a target and bind to it, then with our novel technology we recover and identify them. Knowing the characteristics of the peptides and where they attach can help us understand the vascular system's molecular makeup and develop therapies focusing on disease sites."

This new study was the first in which researchers evaluated the molecular repertoire of protein diversity in several patients, targeting multiple organs at once.

In three cancer patients, serial rounds of peptide collection were followed by biopsies from various tissues to determine where and how the peptides homed, which enabled the enrichment of targeting peptides for identifying ligand-receptors. After systemic delivery of a peptide library to the first patient, phage were recovered from organs, pooled and serially screened in two subsequent patients. Large-scale sequencing was then performed.

"This uncovered a new twist for the vascular map," Pasqualini said. "To this point, we had seen mainly addresses that were organ and tissue specific. Because of this synchronized method, we discovered some markers are vascular-associated at multiple sites."

Shared addresses surprise researchers

Analysis revealed four native ligand-receptors, three of which were previously unrecognized.

Two are shared among multiple tissues (integrin a4/annexin A4 and cathepsin B/apolipoprotein E3) and the other two have a restricted and specific distribution in normal tissue (prohibitin/ annexin A2 in white fat tissue) or cancer (RAGE/leukocyte proteinase-3 in bone metastases).

The discovery of shared addresses especially intrigued researchers.

"No one knew about the novel aspect surrounding these particular proteins, and the fact that they can interact and come together to serve a common purpose," Pasqualini said. "There are likely to be many more."

A tissue-specific vascular-targeting system, comprising ANXA2 and prohibitin, was found as a ligand-receptor in human white adipose (fat) tissue vasculature. In earlier research, targeting of prohibitin with an apoptotic agent caused dramatic weight loss in obese rodents. The lab is applying to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to conduct a clinical trial for a new drug that will test this principle for weight loss in humans. Moving the impact forward This project establishes that large-scale study of the human vasculature can uncover many unidentified or unique molecular networks that can contribute to the treatment of many diseases.

"This endeavor and the applications of our findings are exciting," Arap said. "There are going to be many more receptors and many levels of diversity. We've just scratched the surface."

Translational applications, such as first-in-man clinical trials, have started within MD Anderson. The FDA has granted a safe-to-proceed status for the first vascular-targeted Investigational New Drug (IND). Three other drugs are in pre-IND stage, and several others are in pre-clinical laboratory phase.

"I believe these strategies to identify therapeutic targets on the vasculature are truly innovative both from a scientific and clinical perspective," said David Cheresh, Ph.D., associate director for Translational Research at the University of California, San Diego Cancer Center and noted authority on angiogenesis and cancer metastasis. "Identifying such targets will ultimately pave the way for the next generation of smart/targeted cancer therapies."

MD Anderson and some of its researchers, including Arap and Pasqualini, have equity positions in drug-development companies Alvos Therapeutics and Ablaris Therapeutics, which are subjected to certain restrictions under institutional policy. MD Anderson manages and monitors the terms of these arrangements in accordance with its conflict-of-interest policy.

Co-authors from MD Anderson's David H. Koch Center are first authors Fernanda Staquicini, Ph.D., Marina Card?-Vila, Ph.D., and Mikhail Kolonin, Ph.D. Additional authors include Julianna Edwards; Diana Nunes, Ph.D., and Emmanuel Dias-Neto, Ph.D., Eleni Efstathiou, M.D., Ph.D.; Jessica Sun, and Christopher Logothetis, M.D.

Other MD Anderson contributors include Anna Sergeeva, Ph.D., Department of Stem Cell Transplantation; Shi-Ming Tu, M.D., Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology; Jeffrey Gershenwald, M.D., Department of Surgical Oncology; Jeffrey Molldrem, M.D., Department of Stem Cell Transplantation; Anne Flamm, J.D., Department of Clinical Ethics ; Erkki Koivunen, Ph.D., Department of Leukemia; Rebecca Pentz, Ph.D., Department of Clinical Ethics; Patricia Troncoso, M.D., Department of Pathology; Kim-Ahn Do, Ph.D., Department of Biostatistics; Gregory Botz, M.D., Department of Critical Care; and Michael Wallace, M.D., Department of Diagnostic Radiology.

Additional contributors included Martin Trepel, M.D., University Medical Center of Hamburg; Nalvo Almeida, Ph.D., and Jo?o Setubal, Ph.D., Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and Department of Computer Science, Virginia Polytechnic University; Stan Krajewski, M.D., Ph.D., at The Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute; Richard Sidman, M.D., (corresponding author), Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School; Dolores Cahill, Ph.D., and David O'Connell, Ph.D., Conway Institute of Biomedical and Biomolecular Science, University College Dublin.

This work was funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, the U.S. Department of Defense, AngelWorks, the Gillson-Longenbaugh Foundation and the Marcus Foundation.

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Three Ways to Drive Away Annoying Trick-or-Treaters on Halloween [Evil Week]

Three Ways to Drive Away Annoying Trick-or-Treaters on HalloweenWhether you're an old grump with no Halloween spirit or you have a baby with an early bedtime, there are any number of reasons you could want to avoid greedy trick-or-treaters this Halloween. Here are a few ways to keep them at bay.

Method One: Leave the Candy on the Porch

Three Ways to Drive Away Annoying Trick-or-Treaters on HalloweenThe most obvious method is to just leave the kids some candy on the porch. Whether your lights are on or not, they probably won't bother you?they'll just take some candy and leave. Of course, this gives you the problem of mean kids that just take all the candy in the bowl, and if it's clear that you're still home, people will probably knock if there's an empty bowl. If you don't want to give up your God-given free right to keep your lights on in the evening, an automated candy dispenser could solve all your problems. Photo by Ginny.

Method Two: The Empty Bowl

Three Ways to Drive Away Annoying Trick-or-Treaters on HalloweenIf you're a Halloween hater and don't even want to give those little rugrats any candy, you'll have to be a bit more creative. You could always stick some caution tape or a "Beware of Dog" sign up on your fence, but the easiest method is probably to just stick an empty bowl on your front porch. Coupled with a sign that says "We are out for the night, take a few pieces of candy", it'll look just like you're gone and celebrating, but that some mean kid came and took all the candy. As long as your lights are off, no one should bother you. Photo by Jakub Hlavaty.

Method Three: The Automatic Light Switch

Three Ways to Drive Away Annoying Trick-or-Treaters on HalloweenIf you want to get a bit more creative, Instructables has a great guide to building an anti-Halloween light sensor. With just an Arduino and a few choice pieces of electronics, you can build a sensor on your front stoop that turns off the lights as soon as any festively clad children approach, as if to say "I'm going to bed, so please go away". It's a bit more time-consuming, but also hilariously evil if you want to really disappoint some of those poor kids.

There are likely a lot of other clever methods you could use to keep those kids away?if you've got a particularly tight-knit neighborhood, perhaps, just start giving away toothbrushes and wait for the kid network to start buzzing?but the above methods should get you by pretty easily. Got any of your own favorite Halloween avoidance techniques? Share them with us in the comments.


You can contact Whitson Gordon, the author of this post, at whitson@lifehacker.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.
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Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/ZDXQclGGeO0/three-ways-to-drive-away-annoying-trick+or+treaters-on-halloween

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