Decreased Sexual Interest Most Common Complaint Among Women With Breast Cancer

FIRST PERSON | Research presented at the Oncology Nursing Society (ONS) Connections: Advancing Care Through Science conference discloses that decreased sexual interest is the most common complaint among women with breast cancer. 13.8 million women are breast cancer survivors in the United States. The research reported on results from 896 women.

The Oncology Nurse Advisor reports the research presented at the conference included information taken from the American Cancer Society Study of Cancer Survivors II. The study showed that among the 896 women included in the ONS research, 21.1 percent of them reported a decrease in sexual interest. This does not surprise me. As a one-year cancer survivor and someone still undergoing treatment, I can relate to the study.

Breast cancer is not sexy

Despite the media and marketing industry’s attempt to objectify breast cancer as something sexy, with stupid terms like “save second base” or “I love boobies,” those of us who are fighting cancer don’t see it as sexy.

I lost my left breast to breast cancer. Chemo put me into early menopause and made my hair fall out. My body image has changed forever — I will never look the same as I did before cancer. Scars tell the tale of my battle and most days I still feel like crap. Do I think about sex? Yes, but I miss the way it used to be. What I am dealing with now is something drug-induced and artificial.

Doctors don’t tell

My oncologist did not discuss all of the issues I would face with chemotherapy-induced menopause. I expected hot flashes and the end of my cycle. That was just the tip of the iceberg. There are many more symptoms that coincide with chemo-induced menopause — too many to discuss in this article and many are too personal for me to talk about in print.

Dealing with a radically different body image, scarring, feeling awful — both emotionally and physically — takes its toll on sex drive. Women like me do think about sex. We want to get back what chemo and surgery has taken away. I do believe that the research is correct on this. What surprises me is that only 21.1 percent of the women in the study said that they had a decrease in sexual interest. I thought the number would be much higher.

Lynda Altman was diagnosed with breast cancer in November 2011. She writes a series for Yahoo! Shine called “My Battle With Breast Cancer.”

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Housing recovery gains traction

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Home resales rose in October and a gauge of homebuilder sentiment climbed to a six-year high in November, signs of surprising vigor in the country’s still-struggling housing market.

The National Association of Realtors said on Monday that existing home sales climbed 2.1 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.79 million units, beating forecasts by Wall Street economists.

Separately, strengthening demand for new homes drove an increase in a monthly measure of home builder sentiment, which hit a more than six-year high in November, topping even the most optimistic forecast in a Reuters poll of analysts.

Rising home prices and a faster pace of sales have shown the housing market has finally turned the corner this year. The market collapsed when a mortgage debt bubble burst in 2006, helping trigger the 2007-09 recession.

The data on Monday suggested the recovery in housing is advancing even faster than many analysts had expected.

“The housing market is continuing to improve. It’s probably improving more than most economists were projecting earlier this year,” said Patrick Newport, an economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts.

The reports also support the view that the broader economic recovery is becoming increasingly self-sustaining, with job creation helping drive home sales, which in turn are supporting economic growth. Home building is expected to add to economic growth this year for the first time since 2005.

U.S. stock prices rose sharply, with investors heartened by the housing data and signs that lawmakers are making progress in talks aimed at avoiding sharp tax hikes and government spending cuts next year. Yields on U.S. government debt also rose.

The housing data also suggested that superstorm Sandy, a mammoth storm that slammed into the U.S. East Coast on October 29, continues to distort economic data in the United States.

The Northeast was the only region in the country where the pace of sales fell. NAR economist Lawrence Yun said Sandy would likely leave a bigger mark in November and December, although he expected the impact would only be temporary.

The storm, which killed more than 130 people in the United States and left millions of homes and businesses without electricity, led U.S. factories to cut production in October. It also weighed on auto sales as consumers stayed away from showrooms.

Economists, however, think Sandy’s impact on the economy will be temporary. Indeed, not all of the impact is negative. Home improvement retailer Lowes reported higher-than-expected profits on Monday as its sales got a lift from people buying items like generators, flashlights and batteries ahead of Sandy.

The housing data showed that home prices continue to rebound. In October, the median price for an existing home was $ 178,600, up 11.1 percent from a year earlier.

Supporting prices, fewer people sold their homes under distressed conditions, which include foreclosures, compared to the same period in 2011. Also, the nation’s inventory of existing homes for sale fell 1.4 percent during the month to 2.14 million, the lowest level since December 2002.

The shrinking supply of distressed and foreclosed inventory helped push U.S. homebuilder sentiment up for a seventh consecutive month in November.

The National Association of Home Builders said its sentiment index rose to 46 — the highest since May 2006 — from 41 the month before. Economists polled by Reuters had predicted the index would remain unchanged.

However, the gauge remained below 50, a reminder that the housing market was still some way off full recovery. Readings below 50 mean more builders view market conditions as poor than favorable. The index has not been above 50 since April 2006.

The measure has made strong progress over the last year, helping to cement optimism in the sector.

“Builders are reporting increasing demand for new homes as inventories of foreclosed and distressed properties begin to shrink in markets across the country,” said NAHB Chairman Barry Rutenberg.

(Additional reporting by Ed Krudy and Richard Leong in New York; Editing by Andrea Ricci and Tim Ahmann)

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Turbulence on Cuba-Italy flight leaves 30 bruised

ROME (AP) — An airliner flying from Havana to Milan abruptly plunged some 1,000 meters (3,300 feet) when it hit unusually strong turbulence over the Atlantic on Monday, terrifying passengers and leaving some 30 people aboard with bruises and scrapes, airline officials said.

The flight continued to Milan’s Malpensa airport after the plane’s captain determined that it suffered no structural damage and two passengers who are physicians found no serious injuries, Giulio Buzzi, head of the pilots division at Neos Air, told Sky TG24 TV.

The ANSA news agency quoted bruised passenger Edoardo De Lucchi as saying meals were being served when suddenly there was “10 seconds of terror.” He recounted how plates went flying and some passengers not wearing seatbelts bounced about.

Buzzi had said that the drop measured some 3,000 meters (10,000 feet) in a cloudless sky. But Milan daily’s Corriere della Sera’s web site, quoting Neos official Davide Martini, later reported that the plane first bounced up some 500 meters (1,650 feet), then dropped some 1,000 meters (3,300 feet) to some 500 meters (1,650 feet) below the original altitude.

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Wii U: New console launches in a sea of gadgets

NEW YORK (AP) — In the six years since the last major video game system launched, Apple unveiled the iPhone and the iPad, “Angry Birds” invaded smartphones and Facebook reached a billion users. In the process, scores of video game consoles were left to languish in living rooms alongside dusty VCRs and disc players.

On Sunday, Nintendo Co. is launching the Wii U, a game machine designed to appeal both to the original Wii’s casual audience and the hardcore gamers who skip work to be among the first to play the latest “Call of Duty” release. Just like the Wii U’s predecessor, the Wii, which has sold nearly 100 million units worldwide since 2006, the new console’s intended audience “truly is 5 to 95,” says Reggie Fils-Aime, the president of Nintendo of America, the Japanese company’s U.S. arm.

But the Wii U arrives in a new world. Video game console sales have been falling, largely because it’s been so long since a new system has launched. Most people who wanted an Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or a Wii already have one. Another reason: People in the broad 5-to-95 age range have shifted their attention to games on Facebook, tablet computers and mobile phones.

U.S. video game sales last month, including hardware, software and accessories, totaled $ 755.5 million, according to the research firm NPD Group. In October 2007, the figure stood at $ 1.1 billion.

The Wii U is likely to do well during the holiday shopping season, analysts believe —so well that shoppers may see shortages. But the surge could peter out in 2013. The Wii U is not expected to be the juggernaut that the Wii was in its heyday, according to research firm IHS iSuppli. The Wii outsold its competitors, the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3, in its first four years on sale, logging some 79 million units by the end of 2010. By comparison, IHS expects the Wii U to sell 56.7 million in its first four years.

In the age of a million gadgets and lean wallets, the storied game company faces a new challenge: convincing people that they need a new video game system rather than, say, a new iPad.

The Wii U, which starts at $ 300, isn’t lacking in appeal. It allows for “asymmetrical game play,” meaning two people playing the same game can have entirely different experiences depending on whether they use a new tablet-like controller called the GamePad or the traditional Wii remote. The GamePad can also be used to play games without using a TV set, as you would on a regular tablet. And it serves as a fancy remote controller to navigate a TV-watching feature called TVii, which will be available in December.

Nintendo, known for iconic game characters such as Mario, Donkey Kong and Zelda, is expected to sell the consoles quickly in the weeks leading up to the holidays. After all, it’s been six long years and sons, daughters, brothers and sisters are demanding presents. GameStop Corp., the world’s No. 1 video game retailer, said last week that advance orders sold out and it has nearly 500,000 people on its Wii U waitlist.

Even so, it’s a “very, very crowded space in consumer electronics” this holiday season, notes Ben Bajarin, a principal analyst at Creative Strategies who covers gaming.

Apple‘s duo of iPads, the full-size model and a smaller version called the Mini, will be competing for shoppers’ attention. Not to be outdone, Amazon.com Inc. has launched a trove of Kindle tablets and e-readers in time for the holidays. These range from the Paperwhite, a touch-screen e-reader, to the Kindle Fire HD, which features a color screen and can work with a cellular data plan. Then there are the new laptops and cheaper, thinner “ultrabooks” featuring Microsoft’s new Windows 8 operating system —not to mention smartphones from Apple Inc., Samsung and other manufacturers.

“Nintendo has to be a cut above the noise here,” Bajarin says.

The Wii U is the first major game console to launch in years, but in some ways Nintendo is merely catching up with the HD trend. Sony Corp. and Microsoft Corp. began selling their own powerful, high-definition consoles six and seven years ago, respectively. Both Sony and Microsoft are expected to unveil new game consoles in 2013.

Baird analyst Colin Sebastian thinks the question is not how well the Wii U will do during the holidays, but how it will fare three and six months later.

Gaming has changed significantly in the past six years, especially when it comes to the type of mass-audience experiences that serve as Nintendo‘s bread and butter. Zynga Inc., the online game company behind Facebook games such as “FarmVille” and “Texas HoldEm Poker,” was founded in 2007. The first “Angry Birds” game, that addictive, quirky distraction that has players flinging cartoon birds at structures hiding smug green pigs launched in late 2009. The first iPad, of course, came out in 2010 —three years after the first iPhone.

Fils-Aime acknowledges that Nintendo competes in the broad entertainment landscape, “minute-by-minute,” for consumers’ time.

“That’s true today and that was true 20 years ago,” he says, adding that Nintendo‘s challenge is communicating to people “what is so fun and appealing about the new system.”

Analysts expect Wii U sales to be brisk over the holidays. Nintendo‘s loyal —some would say, fanatical— fan base has been placing advance orders and will likely keep the systems flying off store shelves well into next year. The classic Mario and Zelda games are a huge part of the appeal, since they can’t be played on any gaming system but Nintendo‘s.

Research firm IHS iSuppli estimates that by the end of the year, people will have snapped up 3.5 million Wii U consoles worldwide, compared with 3.1 million Wii units in the same period through the end of 2006.

After the Wii went on sale, shortages persisted for months. Stores were met with long lines of shoppers trying to get their hands on a Wii as late as July 2007, more than seven months after the system’s launch.

Though supply constraints are expected this time around, Fils-Aime says Nintendo will have more hardware available in the Americas than it had for the Wii’s initial months on the market. The company says it will also replenish retailers more frequently than it did six years ago.

An initial sell-out doesn’t mean the Wii U will be successful over the long term, IHS notes, citing its estimate that the Wii U won’t match the Wii’s sales over time.

Bajarin believes it’s going to take “a little bit of time” for the Wii U’s dual-screen gaming concept to sink in with people. If it proves popular, Nintendo could see even more competition at its hands.

“Technologically, it’s not a leap of the imagination to see Apple, Google, Microsoft do something like this,” he says.

____

Follow Barbara Ortutay on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BarbaraOrtutay

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Questions of Blame Linger 34 Years After Jonestown

From the age of 13, Leslie Wagner Wilson had been indoctrinated in the California-based Peoples Temple, led by the charismatic Jim Jones, whose mission was to foster racial harmony and help the poor.

But on Nov. 18, 1978, she and a handful of church members fought their way through thick jungle in the South American country of Guyana, escaping a utopian society gone wrong where followers were starved, beaten and held prisoner in the Jonestown compound.

She walked 30 miles to safety with her 3-year-old son, Jakari, strapped to her back and a smaller group of defectors. But just hours later, the mother, sister and brother and husband she left behind were dead.

“I was so scared,” said Wagner, now 55. “We exchanged phone numbers in case we died. I was prepared to die. I never thought I would see my 21st birthday.”

Today, on the 34th anniversary, Wilson said it’s important to remember the California-based Peoples Temple Jonestown massacre, especially the survivors who have wrestled with their consciences for decades.

PHOTOS: Jonestown Massacre Anniversary

Nine members of her family were among the 918 Americans who died that day, 909 of them ordered by Jones to drink cyanide-laced Kool-Aid in the largest ritual suicide in history.

Her husband, Joe Wilson, was one of Jones’ top lieutenants who helped assassinate congressman Leo Ryan and his press crew when they tried to free church members who were being held against their will.

After arriving back in the United States, Wilson said she “went through hell” — three failed marriages, drug use and suicidal thoughts she describes in her 2009 book, “Slavery of Faith.”

“I was like Humpty Dumpty, but you couldn’t put me back together again,” she said.

Survivors, many of them African-American like Wilson, say they felt guilt and shame and faced the most agonizing question surrounding the nation’s single largest loss of life until 9/11: Was it suicide or murder?

Full Coverage: Jonestown Massacre

In the now-famous “death tape,” supporters clapped and babies cried as Jones instructed families to kill the elderly first, then the youngest in protest against capitalism and racism. Mothers poisoned 246 children before taking their own lives.

“We really can’t understand the Peoples Temple without looking at the historical time period when it arose,” said Rebecca Moore, a professor of religious studies at San Diego State University.

“With the liberation movements of the ’60s and ’70s, the collapse of the black-power movement, the Peoples Temple was the main institution in the San Francisco Bay area that promoted a message of integration and racial equality.”

Moore lost her two sisters and her nephew, the son of Jim Jones. “They were hardcore believers,” she said of her siblings.

Jim Jones, who was white, came from a “wrong side of the tracks,” poor background in Indiana where in the 1950s he became known as a charismatic preacher with an affinity for African-Americans.

“A number of survivors, including those who defected, believe to this day he had paranormal abilities,” said Moore, who met him years later. “He could heal them and read their minds.”

In the 1960s, Jones moved to San Francisco, where at the height of the Peoples Temple there were about 5,000 members.

WATCH: A Look Back at Jonestown Massacre

“They wanted my parents to join,” she said. “Like most outsiders, we didn’t have any idea what was happening outside closed doors.”

Jones ingratiated himself with celebrities and politicians, mobilizing voters to help elect Mayor George Moscone in 1975 and becoming chairman of the city’s housing authority.

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U.S. lawmakers say they’re confident they can avoid “fiscal cliff”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Leading U.S. lawmakers expressed confidence on Sunday that they could reach a deal to avert the “fiscal cliff” even as they laid down markers on taxes and spending that may make any agreement more difficult.

Republicans and Democratic leaders have agreed on a framework to reform the tax code and government benefit programs next year, but first need to prevent across-the-board tax increases and spending cuts due to begin in January that could push the economy back into recession.

That toxic $ 600 billion combination, known as the fiscal cliff, is the legacy of earlier failed budget deals. Both sides say they see greater willingness to compromise this time.

“What I hear is a perceptible change in rhetoric from the other side,” Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program. “And what it is is an invitation for our side to basically sit down and say, ‘What can we do for this country?’”

Taxes are the biggest hurdle.

President Barack Obama campaigned on a promise to raise tax rates on the wealthiest 2 percent of households, who have benefited more than the rest of the population over the past several decades as globalization and technology have transformed the U.S. economy. He wants to extend low tax rates for the bottom 98 percent of the population, but said he will not sign a budget deal that keeps low rates for the wealthiest in place.

Nancy Pelosi, the top Democrat in the House of Representatives, echoed this view. Though Republicans control the House, they will probably need Democratic votes to get any deal passed.

“If it’s going to bring in revenue, the president has been very clear that the higher-income people have to pay their fair share,” she said on ABC’s “This Week.”

A top Republican, Representative Tom Price, said his colleagues recognize the need to generate more tax revenue even as he said any tax-rate increase on the wealthy would lead to job losses.

Most Republican lawmakers have signed a pledge promising they will not tax rates. Instead, they want to generate more revenue through a rewrite of the code that would eliminate exemptions, lower rates and presumably spur the economy.

They also say tax changes must be paired with spending cuts.

“The two sides have identified the tax revenue that we’re willing to discuss, and now it’s time to talk about spending reductions,” Price, a member of the leadership team who has close ties to rank-and-file conservatives, said on CNN.

Many of Price’s fellow Republicans voted against an August 2011 budget deal that included $ 1 trillion in spending cuts on the grounds that it did not go far enough. That deal narrowly averted a U.S. default, but it rattled consumers and investors and led to a first-ever downgrade of the country’s debt.

Opinion polls show that Republicans would shoulder more of the blame if the country goes over the fiscal cliff in January. Price said his side is eager to avert disaster this time.

“Every member of our caucus appreciates that this fiscal crisis, this challenge that we have, is ever closer,” he said.

Durbin said he sees an increased willingness on the part of Republicans to reach a deal compared with prior budget standoffs. “You have to be careful. If you talk about taxes they run for the hills, but if you talk about revenue and tax reform they’ll sit still for that conversation,” Durbin said.

(Editing by Will Dunham)

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Rebels in Congo reach door of Goma

GOMA, Congo (AP) — A Rwandan-backed rebel group advanced to within 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) of Goma, a crucial provincial capital in eastern Congo, marking the first time that rebels have come this close since 2008.

Congolese army spokesman Col. Olivier Hamuli said the fighting has been going on since 6 a.m. Sunday and the front line has moved to just a few kilometers (miles) outside the city. After more than nine hours of violent clashes the two sides took a break, with M23 rebels establishing a checkpoint just 100 meters (yards) away from one held by the military in the village of Munigi, exactly 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) outside the Goma city line.

Contacted by telephone on the front line, M23 rebel spokesman Col. Vianney Kazarama said the group will spend the night in Goma.

“We are about to take the town. We will spend the night in Goma tonight,” said Kazarama. “We are confident that we can take Goma and then our next step will be to take Bukavu,” he said mentioning the capital of the next province to the south.

The M23 rebel group is made up of soldiers from a now-defunct rebel army, the National Congress for the Defense of the People, or CNDP, a group made-up primarily of fighters from the Tutsi ethnic group, the ethnicity that was targeted in Rwanda‘s 1994 genocide. In 2008, the CNDP led by Rwandan commando Gen. Laurent Nkunda marched his soldiers to the doorstep of Goma, abruptly stopping just before taking the city.

In the negotiations that followed and which culminated in a March 23, 2009 peace deal, the CNDP agreed to disband and their fighters joined the national army of Congo. They did not pick up their arms again until this spring, when hundreds of ex-CNDP fighters defected from the army in April, claiming that the Congolese government had failed to uphold their end of the 2009 agreement.

Reports, including one by the United Nations Group of Experts, have shown that M23 is actively being backed by Rwanda and the new rebellion is likely linked to the fight to control Congo’s rich mineral wealth.

The latest fighting broke out Thursday and led to the deaths of 151 rebels and two soldiers. On Saturday U.N. attack helicopters targeted M23 positions in eastern Congo.

Also on Saturday, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon had called Rwandan President Paul Kagame “to request that he use his influence on the M23 to help calm the situation and restrain M23 from continuing their attack,” according to peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous who spoke at the U.N. headquarters in New York on Saturday.

North Kivu governor Julien Paluku said Saturday that the Congolese army had earlier retreated from Kibumba, which is 30 kilometers (19 miles) north of Goma, after thousands of Rwandans, who he says were backing the rebels, attacked early Saturday.

“Rwandan forces bombarded our positions in Kibumba since early this morning and an estimated 3,500 crossed the border to attack us,” he said Saturday.

In downtown Goma, panicked residents had come out to try to get more information on what was happening. A 45-year-old mother of five said that she has nowhere to go.

“I don’t really know what is happening, I’ve seen soldiers and tanks in the streets and that scares me,” said Imaculee Kahindo. Asked if she planned to leave the city, she said: “What can we do? I will probably hide in my house with my children.”

Hamuli, the spokesman for the Congolese army, denied reports that soldiers were fleeing.

In 2008 as Nkunda’s CNDP rebels amassed at the gates of Goma, reporters inside the city were able to see Congolese soldiers running in the opposite direction, after having abandoned their posts. The Congolese army is notoriously dysfunctional with soldiers paid only small amounts, making it difficult to secure their loyalties during heavy fighting.

“We are fighting 3 kilometers from Goma, just past the airport. And our troops are strong enough to resist the rebels,” said Hamuli. “We won’t let the M23 march into our town,” he said. Asked if his troops were fleeing, he added: “These are false rumors. We are not going anywhere.”

U.N. peacekeeping chief Ladsous said that the rebels were very well-equipped, including with night vision equipment allowing them to fight at night.

Reports by United Nations experts have accused Rwanda, as well as Uganda, of supporting the rebels. Both countries strongly deny any involvement and Uganda said if the charges continue it will pull its peacekeeping troops out of Somalia, where they are playing an important role in pushing out the Islamist extremist rebels.

The U.N. Security Council called for an immediate stop to the violence following a two-hour, closed-door emergency meeting. The council said it would add sanctions against M23 rebels and demanded that rebels immediately stop their advance toward the provincial capital of Goma.

“We must stop the M23″ because Goma’s fall “would, inevitably, turn into a humanitarian crisis,” said France‘s U.N. Ambassador, Gerard Araud. He added that U.N. officials would decide in the coming days which M23 leaders to target for additional sanctions.

___

Associated Press writer Maria Sanminiatelli at the United Nations and Rukmini Callimachi in Dakar, Senegal, contributed to this report.

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How new Kindle Fire compares with rivals

Amazon.com Inc. started shipping a larger version of its Kindle Fire HD tablet computer on Thursday. Here’s a look at how it compares with the iPad and other tablets with similar screens.

Amazon.com Inc.‘s Kindle Fire HD 8.9″:

— Price: $ 299 for 16 gigabytes of storage, $ 369 for 32 GB.

— Screen size: 8.9 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 1920 by 1200 pixels, at 254 pixels per inch.

— Weight: 1.25 pounds.

— Cameras: Front-facing camera.

— Battery life: 10 hours.

— Operating system: Modified version of Google‘s Android

Pros: Cheap and portable. Convenient access to Amazon store. Dolby audio. Available with access to fast 4G wireless broadband networks, for $ 499 (starts shipping next Tuesday).

Cons: Small selection of third-party applications available from Amazon. No rear camera for taking video and photos.

Apple Inc.‘s iPad:

— Price: Starts at $ 499 for 16 gigabytes of storage, goes up to $ 699 for 64 gigabytes, more for versions with cellular data access. (Apple still sells the older, iPad 2 for $ 399.)

— Screen size: 9.7 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 2048 by 1536 pixels, at 264 pixels per inch.

— Weight: 1.44 pounds

— Cameras: 5-megapixel camera on back and a low-resolution camera on front, for videoconferencing

— Battery life: 10 hours.

— Operating system: Apple’s iOS

Pros: Unmatched access to third-party applications, high-quality Apple software and the iTunes store. Widest range of cases and accessories available. Available with access to fast 4G wireless broadband networks, starting at $ 629.

Cons: Data storage cannot be expanded with memory cards.

Google Inc.’s Nexus 10

— Price: $ 399 for 16 gigabytes of storage, $ 499 for 32 GB

— Screen size: 10.1 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 2560 by 1600 pixels, at 300 pixels per inch.

— Weight: 1.33 pounds.

— Cameras: 5-megapixel camera on back and a low-resolution camera on front, for videoconferencing

— Battery life: 9 hours for video playback, 7 hours for Web browsing.

— Operating system: Google‘s Android

Pros: Access to a variety of games, utilities and other software for Android devices, though not as extensive as apps available for iPad. Longer, narrower screen better suited to movies. Cheaper than newest full-size iPad.

Cons: Integrates with Google Play store, which is still new and isn’t as robust as Apple or Amazon’s stores. Data storage cannot be expanded with memory cards. No option for cellular wireless broadband.

Samsung Electronic Co.’s Galaxy Tab 2 10.1:

— Price: $ 399 for 16 gigabytes of storage

— Screen size: 10.1 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 1280 by 800 pixels, 149 pixels per inch

— Weight: 1.24 pounds

— Cameras: low-resolution front camera, 3-megapixel back.

— Battery life: 11 hours.

— Operating system: Google‘s Android

Pros: Storage is expandable with microSD memory cards. Can act as a universal remote control for an entertainment center. Option for wireless broadband starting in November.

Cons: Selection of third-party applications not as good as iPad’s, but wider than Kindle. Screen resolution lower than iPad’s.

Samsung Electronic Co.’s Galaxy Note 10.1:

— Price: $ 499 for 16 gigabytes of storage, $ 549 for 32 GB

— Screen size: 10.1 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 1280 by 800 pixels, 149 pixels per inch

— Weight: 1.3 pounds

— Cameras: low-resolution front camera, 5-megapixel back.

— Battery life: 9 hours.

— Operating system: Google‘s Android

Pros: Comes with a pen, for jotting notes and drawing on the screen. Slightly thinner and lighter than an iPad. Longer, narrower screen better suited to movies. Storage is expandable with microSD memory cards. Can act as a universal remote control for an entertainment center.

Cons: Selection of third-party applications not as good as iPad’s, but wider than Kindle. Screen resolution lower than iPad’s. No option for wireless broadband. Pen sensor slightly shortens battery life.

Barnes & Noble Inc.’s Nook HD+

— Price: $ 269 for 16 gigabytes of storage; $ 299 for 32 GB

— Screen size: 9 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 1920 x 1280 pixels, 256 pixels per inch

— Weight: 1.14 pounds

— Cameras: None.

— Battery life: 10 hours of reading, 9 hours of video

— Operating system: Modified version of Google‘s Android

Pros: Cheap and portable. Storage is expandable with microSD memory cards. Easy access to Barnes & Noble book store.

Cons: Selection of third-party applications is small. Barnes & Noble lacks wide range of content. Lacks cameras and option for wireless broadband.

Microsoft Corp.’s Surface:

— Price: $ 499 for 32 gigabytes of storage, $ 100 extra for keyboard cover. $ 699 for 64 GB version, includes keyboard cover.

— Screen size: 10.6 inches diagonally

— Screen resolution: 1366 by 768 pixels, 148 pixels per inch

— Weight: 1.5 pounds.

— Cameras: Front and back cameras

— Battery life: 8 hours.

— Operating system: Microsoft’s Windows RT.

Pros: Storage can be expanded with microSD memory cards. Comes with free Microsoft Office software. Models running full version of Windows 8 coming soon, offering compatibility with programs available for traditional Windows computers.

Cons: Operating system lacks good track record on tablets. Selection of tablet-adapted third-party applications small. No option for wireless broadband.

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Tulsa Town Hall: Nutrition a valuable tool in health care

Weil spoke as part of the Tulsa Town Hall series of speakers.

The United States has an expensive health-care system that doesn’t produce good results, he said.

“Something is very wrong with this picture,” he said. “We’re spending more and more and we have less and less to show for it.”

Changes in diet can be an effective treatment for many conditions, but American physicians are functionally illiterate in nutrition, he said.

“The whole subject of nutrition is omitted in medical education,” he said.

There are many ways of managing diseases other than drugs, he said. Integrative medicine, which can include dietary supplements and practices like meditation, is the future of health care, he said.

The health system is resistant to change because of entrenched vested interests. That includes pharmaceutical companies that do direct-to-consumer advertising, which should be stopped, he said.

“As dysfunctional as our health-care system is at the moment – and it is very dysfunctional – it is generating rivers of money,” he said. “That money is going into very few pockets.”

Weil has developed an anti-inflammatory diet based on the Mediterranean diet but with Asian influences.

Inflammation is associated with some heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease and some cancers, he said. And as a result, people should be eating real, unprocessed foods and whole grains. They should stay away from sugar-sweetened beverages, including fruit juice, he said.

“The new research that’s being done on sugar is not very comforting,” he said.

The aging process can’t be avoided, but age-related diseases can be avoided by proper care, he said.

“The goal should be to live long and well with a big drop off at the end,” he said.

Weil is the director of the University of Arizona’s Center for Integrative Medicine.

Tickets to the Tulsa Town Hall series are sold as a $ 75 subscription and cover five lectures. Tickets for individual lectures are not available.

To subscribe, visit tulsaworld.com/tulsatownhall, call 918-749-5965 or write to: Tulsa Town Hall, Box 52266, Tulsa, OK 74152.

Future speakers include journalist Ann Compton on Feb. 8; author James B. Stewart on April 5; historian and cinematographer Rex Ziak on May 10.

Original Print Headline: Speaker highlights nutrition

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Shannon Muchmore 918-581-8378
shannon.muchmore@tulsaworld.com
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Congressional leaders optimistic after meeting Obama

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican and Democratic congressional leaders emerged from a meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday pledging to find common ground on taxes and spending that would allow them to avert an upcoming “fiscal cliff” that could send the economy back into recession.

The top lawmakers spoke to reporters as a group for the first time in more than a year in what aides said was a joint decision to project a message of unity.

Each side at least signaled a willingness to put “on the table” issues dear to the two parties for decades, agreeing on a framework to discuss both tax and entitlement reform next year.

The two Democrats, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, the minority leader in the House of Representatives, said they recognized the need to curb spending.

John Boehner, the Republican speaker of the House, and Mitch McConnell, who leads the party in the Senate, said they had agreed to put “revenue on the table” as the two sides enter what are likely to be weeks of tense negotiations before a December 31 deadline.

Starting on January 2, about $ 600 billion worth of tax increases and spending reductions, including $ 109 billion in cuts to domestic and defense programs, will begin to kick in if Congress cannot decide how to replace them with less extreme deficit-reduction measures.

Nonpartisan budget forecasters say failure to reach a deal could push the U.S. economy back into recession and drive up the unemployment rate.

Both sides are eager to reassure the public that Washington will not see a repeat of the white-knuckle budget standoffs that spooked consumers and investors last year.

“We have the cornerstones of being able to work something out,” Reid said, standing outside the White House after a meeting with Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and other top officials that lasted more than an hour.

The S&P 500 stock index has dropped 4.7 percent since the November 6 election as investors have turned their attention to the uncertainty surrounding the fiscal cliff.

But stocks closed up on Friday on hopes that politicians would find common ground to steer clear of the danger.

The meeting marked the first time Obama, a Democrat, sat down with his Republican opposition since he won re-election last week.

“I think we’re all aware that we have some urgent business to do,” Obama told reporters at the beginning of the meeting.

ROOM FOR COMPROMISE?

Obama says tax rates on the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans must rise, while Republicans say they will not agree to any rate increase.

Republicans are also eager to rein in government health costs, which are projected to explode over the coming decade.

“We’re prepared to put revenue on the table provided we fix the real problem,” McConnell said, referring to Medicare and other government benefit programs.

There could be room for compromise.

Obama could agree to allow the top tax rate to rise to something less than the 39.6 percent he wants. Policymakers, for example, could also agree to limit the tax increase to households making more than $ 500,000 annually, rather than the $ 250,000 cap Obama is demanding.

Republicans have suggested generating more revenue by limiting tax breaks for the wealthiest, rather than raising their rates. Obama has said that would not raise enough money.

While the government may have a little flexibility in softening the full impact of the budget cuts, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Bloomberg TV on Friday the Treasury Department did not have the authority to delay the tax increases that would take effect at the start of next year if the White House and Congress fail to reach a deal.

Business leaders say the uncertainty is already weighing on the economy as employers postpone hiring and capital expenditures until they get a better sense of the tax and spending environment.

Pelosi suggested two sides might forge a temporary deal that would get them past the fiscal cliff and give them more time to work out a more lasting solution. Lawmakers will almost certainly not have time to retool Medicare and overhaul the outdated tax code before the end of the year, but a preliminary agreement could provide a framework for doing so later.

Following the hour-long White House meeting, Boehner said he had “outlined a framework that deals with reforming our tax code and reforming our spending.”

A Boehner aide, who asked not to be identified, said later the spending cuts would cover “entitlements” – the large federal benefit programs that include Medicare healthcare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor.

“The speaker spoke about a framework going into next year,” Pelosi said. “I was focusing on how we send a message of competence to consumers, to the markets, in the short run, too.”

Leaders of civic groups who met with Obama at the White House later on Friday, said the president assured them he would use his leverage to cut the best deal possible.

“He campaigned around tax fairness and the fact that everyone would do their part, and in particular the most wealthy would find a way to make their fair contribution,” said Janet Murguia, president of the National Council of La Raza, a Latino advocacy group.

Boehner faces a delicate balancing act as he will have to sell any deal to rank-and-file conservatives, many of whom believe they owe it to their constituents to hold the line on taxes.

But after Obama won re-election and fellow Democrats picked up seats in the House and Senate last week, Republicans may be more willing to show that they can balance their ideals with the demands of the country as a whole.

“Going over the fiscal cliff, in my view, is a bucket of crazy,” Republican Representative Peter Roskam, one of Boehner’s deputies, said at a budget conference.

(Additional reporting by Thomas Ferraro, Richard Cowan, Mark Felsenthal and Patrick Temple-West in Washington; Writing by Andy Sullivan and Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Fred Barbash and Peter Cooney)

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