N. Korea displays Kim Jong Il a year after death

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — North Korea unveiled the embalmed body of Kim Jong Il, still in his trademark khaki jumpsuit, on the anniversary of his death Monday as mourning mixed with pride over a recent satellite launch that was a long-held goal of the late authoritarian leader.

Kim lies in state a few floors below his father, national founder Kim Il Sung, in the Kumsusan mausoleum, the cavernous former presidential palace. Kim Jong Il is presented lying beneath a red blanket, a spotlight shining on his face in a room suffused in red.

Wails echoed through the chilly hall as a group of North Korean women sobbed into the sashes of their traditional Korean dresses as they bowed before his body. The hall bearing the glass coffin was opened to select visitors — including The Associated Press — for the first time since his death.

North Korea also unveiled Kim’s yacht and his armored train carriage, where he is said to have died. Among the personal belongings featured in the mausoleum are the parka, sunglasses and pointy platform shoes he famously wore in the last decades of his life. A MacBook Pro lay open on his desk.

North Koreans paid homage to Kim and basked in the success of last week’s launch of a long-range rocket that sent a satellite named after him to space.

The launch, condemned in many other capitals as a violation of bans against developing its missile technology, was portrayed not only as a gift to Kim Jong Il but also as proof that his young son, Kim Jong Un, has the strength and vision to lead the country.

The elder Kim died last Dec. 17 from a heart attack while traveling on his train. His death was followed by scenes of North Koreans dramatically wailing in the streets of Pyongyang, and of the 20-something son leading ranks of uniformed and gray-haired officials through funeral and mourning rites.

The mood in the capital was decidedly more upbeat a year later, with some of the euphoria carrying over from last Wednesday’s launch. The satellite bears one of Kim Jong Il’s nicknames, Kwangmyongsong, or “Lode Star,” a moniker given to him at birth according to the official lore.

Cameras were not allowed inside the mausoleum, and state media did not release any images of Kim Jong Il’s body.

With the death anniversary came a hint that Kim Jong Un himself might soon be a father.

His wife, Ri Sol Ju, was seen on state TV with what appeared to be a baby bump as she walked slowly next to her husband at the mausoleum, where they bowed to statues of Kim’s father and grandfather.

There is no official word from Pyongyang about a pregnancy. In addition, Ri is shown wearing a billowing traditional Korean dress in black that makes it difficult to know for sure.

North Koreans are reluctant to discuss details of the Kim family that have not been released by the state. Still there are rumors even in Pyongyang about whether the country’s first couple is expecting.

To honor Kim’s father, North Koreans stopped in their tracks at midday and bowed their heads as the national flag fluttered at half-staff along streets and from buildings.

Pyongyang construction workers took off their yellow hard hats and bowed at the waist as sirens wailed across the city for three minutes.

Tens of thousands of North Koreans gathered in the frigid plaza outside, newly transformed into a public park with lawns and pergolas. Geese flew past snow-tinged firs and swans dallied in the partly frozen moat that rings the vast complex in Pyongyang’s outskirts.

“Just when we were thinking how best to uphold our general, he passed away,” Kim Jong Ran said at the plaza. “But we upheld leader Kim Jong Un. … We regained our strength and we are filled with determination to work harder for our country.”

Speaking outside the mausoleum, renamed the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, the military’s top political officer, Choe Ryong Hae, said North Korea should be proud of the satellite, calling it “a political event with great significance in the history of Korea and humanity.”

Much of the rest of the world, however, was swift in condemning the launch, which was seen by the United States and other nations as a thinly disguised cover for testing missile technology that could someday be used for a nuclear warhead.

The test, which the U.N. Security Council said violated a ban on launches using ballistic missile technology, underlined Kim Jong Un’s determination to continue carrying out his father’s hardline policies even if they draw international condemnation.

Washington said Monday it has no option but to seek to isolate Pyongyang further.

“What’s left to us is to continue to increase pressure on the North Korean regime and we are looking at how to best to do that, both bilaterally and with our partners going forward until they (North Korea) get the message. We are going to further isolate this regime,” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

Some outside experts worry that Pyongyang’s next move will be to press ahead with a nuclear test in the coming weeks, a step toward building a warhead small enough to be carried by a long-range missile.

Despite inviting further isolation for his impoverished nation and the threat of stiffer sanctions, Kim Jong Un won national prestige and clout by going ahead with the rocket launch.

At a memorial service on Sunday, North Korea’s top leadership not only eulogized Kim Jong Il, but also praised his son. Kim Yong Nam, president of the Presidium of North Korea’s parliament, called the launch a “shining victory” and an emblem of the promise that lies ahead with Kim Jong Un in power.

The rocket’s success also fits neatly into the narrative of Kim Jong Il’s death. Even before he died, the father had laid the groundwork for his son to inherit a government focused on science, technology and improving the economy. And his pursuit of nuclear weapons and the policy of putting the military ahead of all other national concerns have also carried into Kim Jong Un’s reign.

In a sign of the rocket launch’s importance, Kim Jong Un invited the scientists in charge of it to attend the mourning rites in Pyongyang, according to state media.

The reopening of the mausoleum on the anniversary of the leader’s death follows tradition. Kumsusan, the palace where his father, Kim Il Sung, served as president, was reopened as a mausoleum on the anniversary of his death in 1994.

___

Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea, and Matthew Pennington in Washington contributed to this report. Follow Jean Lee, AP’s bureau chief for Pyongyang and Seoul, at www.twitter.com/newsjean.

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Viral Justice: Domestic Abuse Victim Calls Out Attacker on Facebook

Amber Taylor had been living in a Missouri motel with her boyfriend, Austin “Wildboi” McCauley, until this week, when he reportedly beat her unconscious with a baseball bat.

Two days later, the 23-year-old took a picture of herself recovering from her injuries and posted it to McCauley’s public Facebook page, calling him out for his abuse and prompting his arrest.

Since its posting online, the photo has accumulated almost 10,000 “Likes” and close to 1,000 comments. Its caption includes the sentence, “I’m not the only girl he’s done this to but I’m not scared anymore I’m going to speak up.”  

McCauley has since been arrested and charged with second-degree domestic assault.

MORE: Savannah Dietrich Calls Out Her Attackers, Sees Them Punished

In her interview with news station WDAF, Taylor explained she wanted to expose her boyfriend’s true nature to the people who thought they knew him best. “I just wanted his friends to actually see the true him,” she said.

The young mother reports that she’s not only received support from McCauley’s own friends, but also from people across the country. “I’m actually glad that I have people that are writing me and telling me they care. Because being with him, I didn’t get to have any friends.”

This isn’t the first time social media has provided an outlet for a victim in need of support. Earlier this year, 17-year-old Savannah Dietrich violated a court order when she announced the names of her two underage attackers on her public Twitter account. Though the maneuver had her facing contempt charges, Dietrich and her parents reported it was necessary to bring attention to what they characterized as the unfair nature of her trial.

Though public pressure on the court still didn’t result in the attackers receiving jail time, they were sentenced to harsher punishments than were originally conceived before Dietrich went public with their names. And in the melee, the teenager inadvertently rallied a nation’s support, serving as an example of how self-advocacy can facilitate healing.

That may be the take-away for Hillary Adams as well. The disabled daughter of Texas judge, William Adams, Hillary was the subject of her father’s relentless beatings and secretly videotaped one of those incidents. Seven years later, she posted the video online. Though Adams was already grown up and no longer living with her father, she claimed the posting had more to do with holding him personally accountable, even if the law wouldn’t.

Trauma sufferers often report that keeping abuse a secret is a move that backfires, creating a greater sense of personal shame, no matter how blameless they may be. But social media is an accessible avenue they can use to tell their stories, offering survivors the chance to shed their shame and reclaim their dignity.

Do you think social justice can really be achieved with social media? Would you use it to get justice? Let us know what you think in the Comments.

Related Stories on TakePart:

• Anna Breslaw’s 600-Word Sprint: The V-Word Dialogues

• Despite His ‘Legitimate Rape’ Fail, Todd Akin is Still a Senate Contender

• In U.S., a New Definition for Rape

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A Bay Area native, Andri Antoniades previously worked as a fashion industry journalist and medical writer.  In addition to reporting the weekend news on TakePart, she volunteers as a webeditor for locally-based nonprofits and works as a freelance feature writer for TimeOutLA.com. Email Andri | @andritweets | TakePart.com

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Pope speaks of his pain over “senseless violence” in Connecticut

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict expressed his pain over the killing in the United States of 26 people, including 20 schoolchildren, by a gunman and prayed for the consolation of the victims’ families at his weekly address on Sunday.

“I was deeply saddened by Friday’s senseless violence in Newtown, Connecticut,” the pontiff told crowds of pilgrims gathered in St Peter’s Square in Vatican City.

“I assure the families of the victims, especially those who lost a child, of my closeness in prayer. May the God of consolation touch their hearts and ease their pain.”

“Upon those affected by this tragedy, and upon each of you, I invoke God’s abundant blessings!”

On Friday a 20-year-old gunman identified as Adam Lanza forced his way into the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown where he shot dead six adult women, and 12 girls and eight boys aged six and seven years old, before killing himself.

Services to mourn the victims have been held at St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church in Newtown.

(Reporting by Naomi O’Leary; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Craft Brewers Threatened by Big Beer Brands

American craft brewers love to talk about how they’re stealing market share from the big beer companies, such as MillerCoors and Anheuser-Busch InBev (BUD). In the first half of the year, craft beer sales rose 14 percent, in dollar terms, according to the trade group Brewers Association. Their larger competitors can only dream of such gains in the U.S.

Craft brewers, however, are increasingly worried about how the world’s two largest beer companies are attempting to counter their growth by making beers that appear to be craft products—like MillerCoors’s Blue Moon and AB InBev’s Shock Top—with no indication on their labels that they’re produced by large multinational corporations.

Today the craft brewing industry called out the big guys in an op-ed piece in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the hometown newspaper of AB InBev’s North American division. It was written by Charlie Papazian and Bob Pease, the president and chief operating officer, respectively, of the Brewers Association, and Dan Kopman, co-founder of Schlafly Beer, a small independent brewer in St. Louis.

Here’s what they had to say:

Noting the expansion of the craft brewers’ niche and also that many beer drinkers are turning away from the mass-produced light lagers that they are historically known for, the large brewers started producing their own craft-like beers. However, they don’t label these faux-craft beers as products of AB InBev and MillerCoors. So if you are drinking a Blue Moon Belgian Wheat Beer, you are not told it is an SABMiller product. If you crack open a Shock Top, you are not told this brand is 100 percent owned by AB InBev. The large brewers also have bought or own 100 percent of smaller breweries like Goose Island, Leinenkugel and Henry Weinhard. They own significant equity stakes in Red Hook, Widmer and Kona breweries. They sell these beers through their strong distribution channels, but market these faux-craft beers as if they were from independent, locally owned craft breweries.

In an interview, Kopman told Bloomberg Businessweek that all brewers should label their products so consumers aren’t mislead about a beer’s origin. “We definitely need to discuss this as an industry,” he said. “We need to have an agreed-upon standard for transparency where you are a multinational or an independent.”

This craft industry’s increasing aggressiveness comes at a sensitive time for AB InBev. The Belgium-based company that bought Anheuser-Busch in 2008 is now seeking the approval of the U.S. Department of Justice to complete the purchase of Grupo Modelo (GMODELOC). The last thing it needs is the small American brewers complaining that it’s trying to undermine their growth. That doesn’t seem to have escaped the craft industry either.

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Egyptians hand Islamists narrow win in constitution vote

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egyptians voted in favor of a constitution shaped by Islamists but opposed by other groups who fear it will divide the Arab world’s biggest nation, officials in rival camps said on Sunday after the first round of a two-stage referendum.

Next week’s second round is likely to give another “yes” vote as it includes districts seen as more sympathetic towards Islamists, analysts say, meaning the constitution would be approved.

But the narrow win so far gives Islamist President Mohamed Mursi only limited grounds for celebration by showing the wide rifts in a country where he needs to build a consensus for tough economic reforms.

The Muslim Brotherhood‘s party, which propelled Mursi to office in a June election, said 56.5 percent backed the text. Official results are not expected until after the next round.

While an opposition official conceded the “yes” camp appeared to have won the first round, the opposition National Salvation Front said in a statement that voting abuses meant a rerun was needed – although it did not explicitly challenge the Brotherhood‘s vote tally.

Rights groups reported abuses such as polling stations opening late, officials telling people how to vote and bribery. They also criticized widespread religious campaigning which portrayed “no” voters as heretics.

A joint statement by seven human rights groups urged the referendum’s organizers “to avoid these mistakes in the second stage of the referendum and to restage the first phase again”.

Mursi and his backers say the constitution is vital to move Egypt’s democratic transition forward. Opponents say the basic law is too Islamist and tramples on minority rights, including those of Christians who make up 10 percent of the population.

The build-up to Saturday’s vote was marred by deadly protests. Demonstrations erupted when Mursi awarded himself extra powers on November 22 and then fast-tracked the constitution through an assembly dominated by his Islamist allies.

However, the vote passed off calmly with long queues in Cairo and several other places, though unofficial tallies indicated turnout was around a third of the 26 million people eligible to vote this time. The vote was staggered because many judges needed to oversee polling staged a boycott in protest.

The opposition had said the vote should not have been held given the violent protests. Foreign governments are watching closely how the Islamists, long viewed warily in the West, handle themselves in power.

“It’s wrong to have a vote or referendum with the country in the state it is – blood and killings, and no security,” said Emad Sobhy, a voter who lives in Cairo. “Holding a referendum with the country as it is cannot give you a proper result.”

INCREASINGLY DIVIDED

As polls closed, Islamists attacked the offices of the newspaper of the liberal Wafd party, part of the opposition National Salvation Front coalition that pushed for a “no” vote.

“The referendum was 56.5 percent for the ‘yes’ vote,” a senior official in the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party operations room set up to monitor voting told Reuters.

The Brotherhood and its party had representatives at polling stations across the 10 areas, including Cairo, in this round. The official, who asked not to be identified, said the tally was based on counts from more than 99 percent of polling stations.

“The nation is increasingly divided and the pillars of state are swaying,” opposition politician Mohamed ElBaradei wrote on Twitter. “Poverty and illiteracy are fertile grounds for trading with religion. The level of awareness is rising fast.”

One opposition official also told Reuters the vote appeared to have gone in favor of Islamists who backed the constitution.

The opposition initially said its exit polls indicated the “no” camp would win comfortably, but officials changed tack during the night. One opposition official said in the early hours of Sunday that it would be “very close”.

A narrow loss could still hearten leftists, socialists, Christians and more liberal-minded Muslims who make up the disparate opposition, which has been beaten in two elections since Hosni Mubarak was overthrown last year.

They were drawn together to oppose what they saw as a power grab by Mursi as he pushed through the constitution. The National Salvation Front includes prominent figures such as ElBaradei, former Arab League chief Amr Moussa and firebrand leftist Hamdeen Sabahy.

If the constitution is approved, a parliamentary election will follow early next year.

DEADLY VIOLENCE

Analysts question whether the opposition group will keep together until the parliamentary election. The Islamist-dominated lower house of parliament elected earlier this year was dissolved based on a court order in June.

Violence in Cairo and other cities has plagued the run-up to the referendum. At least eight people were killed when rival camps clashed during demonstrations outside the presidential palace earlier this month.

In order to pass, the constitution must be approved by more than 50 percent of those casting ballots. There are 51 million eligible voters in the nation of 83 million.

Islamists have been counting on their disciplined ranks of supporters and on Egyptians desperate for an end to turmoil that has hammered the economy and sent Egypt’s pound to eight-year lows against the dollar.

The army deployed about 120,000 troops and 6,000 tanks and armored vehicles to protect polling stations and other government buildings. While the military backed Mubarak and his predecessors, it has not intervened in the present crisis.

(Additional reporting Yasmin Saleh and Marwa Awad; Writing by Edmund Blair and Giles Elgood; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

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Manitoba Tories to oust youth president over social media comments

WINNIPEG – An official with Manitoba’s Progressive Conservative party is being ousted over social media comments about aboriginals.

Brayden Mazurkiewich, the president of the party’s youth wing, is being asked to resign over a post on his Facebook page today.

The post concerns a planned urban reserve on a former Winnipeg military base, and says the land was designed for — quote — “hard-working men and women of the military, not free-loading Indian.”

Party president Ryan Matthews says the comments are unacceptable.

Matthews says if Mazurkiewich doesn’t quit voluntarily, the party’s management committee will convene next week to deal with the matter.

Mazurkiewich was not immediately available for comment.

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As Conn. story unfolds, media struggle with facts

NEW YORK (AP) — The scope and senselessness of the Newtown, Conn., school shooting challenged television journalists’ ability to do much more than lend, or impose, their presence on the scene.

Pressed with the awful urgency of the story, TV, along with other media, fell prey to reporting “facts” that were often in conflict or wrong.

How many people were killed? Which Lanza brother was the shooter: Adam or Ryan? Was their mother, who was among the slain, a teacher at the school?

Like the rest of the news media, television outlets were faced with intense competitive pressures and an audience ravenous for details in an age when the best-available information was seldom as reliable as the networks’ high-tech delivery systems.

Here was the normal gestation of an unfolding story. But with wall-to-wall cable coverage and second-by-second Twitter postings, the process of updating and correcting it was visible to every onlooker. And as facts were gathered by authorities, then shared with reporters (often on background), a seemingly higher-than-usual number of points failed to pan out:

— The number of dead was initially reported as anywhere from the high teens to nearly 30. The final count was established Friday afternoon: 20 children and six adults, as well as Lanza’s mother and the shooter himself.

— For hours on Friday, the shooter was identified as Ryan Lanza, with his age alternatively reported as 24 or 20. The confusion seemed partly explainable when it was determined that 20-year-old Adam Lanza, the shooter who had then killed himself, was carrying identification belonging to his 24-year-old brother.

This case of mistaken identity was painfully reminiscent of the Atlanta Olympics bombing case in 1996, when authorities fingered an innocent man, and the news media ran with it, destroying his life. Such damage was averted in Ryan Lanza’s case largely by his public protestations on social media, repeatedly declaring “It wasn’t me.”

— Initial reports differed as to whether Lanza’s mother, Nancy, was shot at the school, where she was said to be a teacher, or at the home she shared with Adam Lanza. By Friday afternoon, it was determined that she had been shot at their home.

Then doubts arose about whether Nancy Lanza had any link to Sandy Hook Elementary. At least one parent said she was a substitute teacher, but by early Saturday, an official said investigators had been unable to establish any connection with the school.

That seemed to make the massacre even more confusing. Early on, the attack was said to have taken place in her own classroom and was interpreted by more than one on-air analyst as possibly a way for Adam Lanza to strike back at children with whom he felt rivalry for his mother’s affection.

— Lanza’s weapons were listed as two pistols (a Glock and a Sig Sauer) as well as a .223-caliber Bushmaster rifle, but whether that rifle was used in the school or left in the trunk of Lanza’s car remained unclear.

— There were numerous versions of what Lanza was wearing, including camouflage attire and black paramilitary garb.

With so many unanswered questions, TV correspondents were left to set the scene and to convey the impact in words that continually failed them.

However apt, the phrase “parents’ worst nightmare” became an instant cliche.

And the word “unimaginable” was used countless times. But “imagine” was exactly what the horrified audience was helpless not to do.

The screen was mostly occupied by grim or tearful faces, sparing everybody besides law enforcement officials the most chilling sight: the death scene in the school, where — as viewers were reminded over and over — the bodies remained while evidence was gathered. But who could keep from imagining it?

Ironically, perhaps the most powerful video came from 300 miles away, in Washington, where President Barack Obama delivered brief remarks about the tragedy. His somber face, the flat tone of his voice, the tears he daubed from his eyes, and his long, tormented pauses said as much as his heartfelt words. He seemed to speak for everyone who heard them.

But TV had hours to fill.

Children from the school were interviewed. It was a questionable decision for which the networks took heat from media critics and viewers alike. But the decision lay more in the hands of the willing parents (who were present), and there was value in hearing what these tiny witnesses had to say.

“We had to lock our doors so the animal couldn’t get in,” said one little boy, his words painting a haunting picture.

In the absence of much hard information, speculation was a regular fallback. Correspondents and other “experts” persisted in diagnosing the shooter, a man none of them had ever met or even heard of until hours earlier.

CNN’s “Piers Morgan Tonight” scored an interview with a former classmate of Lanza’s — with an emphasis on “former.”

“I really only knew him closely when we were very, very young, in elementary school together,” she said.

Determined to unlock Lanza’s personality, Morgan asked the woman if she “could have ever predicted that he would one day flip and do something as monstrous as this?”

“I don’t know if I could have predicted it,” she replied, struggling to give Morgan what he wanted. “I mean, there was something ‘off’ about him.”

The larger implications of the tragedy were broached throughout the coverage — not least by Obama.

“We’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics,” he said, which may have gladdened proponents of stricter gun laws.

But CBS correspondent Nancy Cordes noted, “There’s often an assumption that after a horrific event like this, it will spark a fierce debate on the issue. But in recent years, that hasn’t been the case.”

Appearing on “The O’Reilly Factor” Friday night, Fox News correspondent Geraldo Rivera voiced his own solution.

“I want an armed cop at every school,” he said.

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School murders silence “cliff” rhetoric as deadline nears

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mass murder in Connecticut silenced “fiscal cliff” talk on Saturday as the White House and Congress quietly got ready for a final scramble to avert the tax hikes and spending cuts set for the New Year, with sessions of the U.S. House of Representatives now scheduled just days before Christmas.

President Barack Obama canceled a trip he had planned to make next Wednesday to Portland, Maine to press his case for tax hikes for the wealthy. His weekly radio and Internet address on Saturday focused on Newtown, the site of Friday’s school shootings, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life.

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio canceled the standard Republican radio response to Obama “so that President Obama can speak for the entire nation at this time of mourning,” he said in a statement issued late Friday.

The moratorium on cliff pronouncements masked a growing recognition that the two sides could remain deadlocked at the end of the year on the key sticking point – whether to leave low tax rates in place except for high earners, as Obama wants, or extend them for all taxpayers, as Boehner wants.

With multiple polls showing that the public supports Obama’s position, Republicans in the U.S. Senate prodded their counterparts in the House to make a face-saving retreat, in a fashion that would allow Obama’s proposal to pass the Republican-controlled House while simultaneously letting Republicans cast a vote against it.

Republicans could then shift the debate onto territory they consider more favorable to them, cutting government spending to reduce the deficit.

“Just about everyone is throwing stuff on the wall to see if anything sticks,” one Republican aide said with reference to various proposals being discussed on how to proceed. Alluding to public opinion polls, the aide added: “We know if there is no deal, we will get blamed.”

“We could win the argument on spending cuts,” said a Republican senator who asked not to be identified. “We aren’t winning the argument on taxes.”

However, Republican leaders in both chambers are leery about seeming to cave on taxes. “There’s concern that if we did that, Obama would simply declare victory and walk away and not address spending,” said one aide. “We don’t trust these guys.”

Some of the prodding was coming from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Don Stewart, a McConnell spokesman, said the minority leader in the Democratic-controlled Senate hasn’t embraced any single plan, but has discussed and circulated measures offered by fellow Senate Republicans.

“Senator McConnell does not advocate raising taxes on anybody or anything,” Stewart said.

“We’re focused on getting a balanced plan from the White House that will begin to solve the problem of our debt and deficit to improve the economy and create American jobs,” said Boehner spokesman Michael Steel.

“Right now, all the president is offering is massive tax hikes with little or no spending cuts and reforms,” Steel said.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor scheduled “possible legislation related to expiring provisions of law,” a reference to the expiring tax cuts, for the end of the week, portending a weekend session.

Cantor has said the House would meet through the Christmas holidays and beyond.

Hopes expressed after the November6 general election of some “grand bargain” on deficit reduction have all but disappeared, at least for this year. This is partly because time is running out and partly result of growing warnings from Democrats in Congress that they would not support big changes in the Medicare program, the government-run health insurance program for seniors that is a major contributor to the government’s debt.

House Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California ruled out one frequently mentioned proposal – raising the age of eligibility for Medicare, in a December 12 CBS television interview.

Asked if she was drawing a “red line,” around that idea, Pelosi said her comments were “something that says, ‘don’t go there,’ because it doesn’t produce money.

(Reporting by Thomas Ferraro and Kim Dixon; Editing by Fred Barbash and David Brunnstrom)

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US prices fall on cheaper petrol

14 December 2012 Last updated at 10:02 ET

US consumers prices fell in November due to a sharp drop in petrol prices, according to official figures, as inflation in the economy remained weak.

The consumer price index fell 0.3% from October, the first decline since May, the US Labor Department said.

The gasoline index fell 7.4% in November, which more than offset gains in prices elsewhere.

Stripping out food and energy costs, “core” prices rose by 0.1% in November, the figures showed.

Over the past year, consumer prices have risen 1.8%, while core prices have increased by 1.9%.

The US economy remains fragile and, earlier this week, the US central bank pledged to continue buying bonds to keep actual borrowing rates low until the labour market outlook improves substantially.

Though the unemployment rate fell to a four-year low of 7.7% in November, statistics suggest that much of the decline in the jobless rate since 2008 has been due to people dropping out of the workforce, either due to retirement or because they have given up seeking work.

The Federal Reserve also cut its economic outlook. It now expects the economy to grow between 1.7-1.8% this year, down from 1.7-2.0% it previously expected.

The latest data came against the backdrop of the looming “fiscal cliff” – the tax increases and spending cuts due to be implemented in January if Congress and the White House do not strike a deal.

The Fed chief said last month that all of the changes would “pose a substantial threat to the recovery”.

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Nigeria governor, 5 others die in helicopter crash

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A navy helicopter crashed Saturday in the country’s oil-rich southern delta, killing a state governor and five other people, in the latest air disaster to hit Africa’s most populous nation, officials said.

Nigeria‘s ruling party said in a statement that the governor of the central Nigerian state of Kaduna, Patrick Yakowa, died in the helicopter crash in Bayelsa state in the Niger Delta. The People’s Democratic Party’s statement described Yakowa’s death as a “colossal loss.”

The statement said the former national security adviser, General Andrew Azazi, also died in the crash. Azazi was fired in June amid growing sectarian violence in Nigeria, but maintained close ties with the government.

Yushau Shuaib, a spokesman for Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency, said four other bodies had been found, but he could not immediately give their identities.

The crash occurred at about 3:30 p.m. after the navy helicopter took off from the village of Okoroba in Bayelsa state where officials had gathered to attend the burial of the father of a presidential aide, said Commodore Kabir Aliyu. He said that the helicopter was headed for Nigeria’s oil capital of Port Harcourt when it crashed in the Nembe area of Bayelsa state.

Aviation disasters remain common in Nigeria, despite efforts in recent years to improve air safety.

In October, a plane made a crash landing in central Nigeria. A state governor and five others sustained injuries but survived.

In June, a Dana Air MD-83 passenger plane crashed into a neighborhood in the commercial capital of Lagos, killing 153 people onboard and at least 10 people on the ground. It was Nigeria’s worst air crash in nearly two decades.

In March, a police helicopter carrying a high-ranking police official crashed in the central Nigerian city of Jos, killing four people.

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