Jan
05

After Fiscal Deal, Tax Code May Be Most Progressive Since 1979

WASHINGTON — With 2013 bringing tax increases on the incomes of a small sliver of the richest Americans, the country’s top earners now face a heavier tax burden than at any time since Jimmy Carter was president. The last-minute deal struck by the departing 112th Congress raised taxes on a handful of the highest-earning Americans, with about 99.3 percent of households experiencing no change...
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Scare Amplifies Fears That Clinton’s Work Has Taken Heavy Toll

Pool photo by Brendan SmialowskiHillary Rodham Clinton with Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi in Cairo in July. WASHINGTON — When Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton fractured her right elbow after slipping in a State Department garage in June 2009, she returned to work in just a few days. Her arm in a sling, she juggled speeches and a trip to India and Thailand with physical therapy, rebuilding...
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Scare Amplifies Fears That Clinton’s Work Has Taken Heavy Toll

Pool photo by Brendan SmialowskiHillary Rodham Clinton with Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi in Cairo in July. WASHINGTON — When Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton fractured her right elbow after slipping in a State Department garage in June 2009, she returned to work in just a few days. Her arm in a sling, she juggled speeches and a trip to India and Thailand with physical therapy, rebuilding...
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Europe Likely to Be Harder on Google Over Search

PARIS — By some accounts, the United States let Google off the hook when it found that the technology giant had not abused its dominance in the Internet search market. Yves Logghe/Associated PressJoaquín Almunia has vowed to restore competition to the Internet search business in Europe. Few expect the European antitrust watchdog to be as lenient. The...
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Undecided Syrians Could Tip Balance of Rebellion

BEIRUT, Lebanon — At his government office in the Syrian capital, Damascus, the civil servant avoids discussing what Syrians call “the situation.” But he quietly ponders his own private endgame, toying with defecting to the rebels, yet clinging to his post, increasingly sure there are no fighters worth joining. A multilingual former military officer, he says he is among many friends and colleagues...
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Jan
04

DealBook: S.E.C. Ends Scrutiny of Former Top Aide to Buffett

The Securities and Exchange Commission has decided not to file insider trading charges against David L. Sokol, a onetime top lieutenant at Berkshire Hathaway, Mr. Sokol’s lawyer said Thursday.Mr. Sokol came under scrutiny in 2011 after abruptly resigning as chairman of Berkshire’s MidAmerican Energy Holdings, one of the many holdings of the investment conglomerate run by the billionaire Warren E....
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Scant Proof Is Found to Back Up Claims by Energy Drinks

Energy drinks are the fastest-growing part of the beverage industry, with sales in the United States reaching more than $10 billion in 2012 — more than Americans spent on iced tea or sports beverages like Gatorade. Their rising popularity represents a generational shift in what people drink, and reflects a successful campaign to convince consumers, particularly teenagers, that the drinks...
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Gadgetwise Blog: App Smart Extra: Keeping Fitness Resolutions

This week App Smart was full of apps that can help you, one way or another, to stick to any New Year’s resolutions you’ve made.Making a resolution to keep healthy is pretty common, and like me you may have resolved to improve your fitness by going for a regular jog. The iFit Running app ($2 on iOS) is great for this because it can track your runs using GPS, help you keep note of your timings and even...
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News Analysis: Debt Deal Fails to Allay Fears on U.S. Global Power

WASHINGTON — Two years ago the departing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, declared that “the most significant threat to our national security is our debt.” After a decade in which the nation had chased Al Qaeda and invaded Iraq, Admiral Mullen was saying, in essence, that the biggest enemy was us. Paula Bronstein/Getty ImagesSome analysts worry that the United...
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Jan
03

Your Money: Piecing Together a Tax Plan’s Effects

It is tempting for people who earn less than $400,000 to think that they got off easy this week under the tax deal to end the fiscal impasse, given that only those with incomes above that level will be in a higher income tax bracket in 2013. But the legislation that both houses of Congress have now approved could increase taxes on people with incomes that are not quite that high as well....
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The New Old Age Blog: On the Way to Hospice, Surprising Hurdles

I’ve often wondered why more families don’t call hospice when a loved one has a terminal disease — and why people who do call wait so long, often until death is just days away.Even though more than 40 percent of American deaths now involve hospice care, many families still are trying to shoulder the burden on their own rather than turning to a proven source of help and knowledge. I’ve surmised that...
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The New Old Age Blog: On the Way to Hospice, Surprising Hurdles

I’ve often wondered why more families don’t call hospice when a loved one has a terminal disease — and why people who do call wait so long, often until death is just days away.Even though more than 40 percent of American deaths now involve hospice care, many families still are trying to shoulder the burden on their own rather than turning to a proven source of help and knowledge. I’ve surmised that...
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Gadgetwise Blog: Tip of the Week: How to Control the Music in iTunes 11

Apple’s recent overhaul of its iTunes music-management program for Windows and Mac computers gave the software a new look. The ability to shrink the full iTunes window down to a “miniplayer” (a small streamlined bar that shows the name of the current track and playback controls) survived the redesign and can still be summoned by pressing Control-Shift-M in the Windows version or Command-Option-M on...
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Murder Charges Expected Against 5 Men in New Delhi Gang Rape

Correction: An earlier version of this story erroneously reported that the charges had already been filed. The story had been written in anticipation of the filing and was published mistakenly. As of now the charges have not been filed, and the story below has been edited to reflect that. Manish Swarup/Associated PressIndian police officers stood guard at the court where a group of men...
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Jan
02

Fiscal Deal’s Passage Ends Standoff

WASHINGTON — Ending a climactic fiscal showdown in the final hours of the 112th Congress, the House late Tuesday passed and sent to President Obama legislation to avert big income tax increases on most Americans and prevent large cuts in spending for the Pentagon and other government programs. The measure, brought to the House floor less than 24 hours after its passage in the Senate, was...
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Scant Proof Is Found to Back Up Claims by Energy Drinks

Energy drinks are the fastest-growing part of the beverage industry, with sales in the United States reaching more than $10 billion in 2012 — more than Americans spent on iced tea or sports beverages like Gatorade. Their rising popularity represents a generational shift in what people drink, and reflects a successful campaign to convince consumers, particularly teenagers, that the drinks...
Read More..

Scant Proof Is Found to Back Up Claims by Energy Drinks

Energy drinks are the fastest-growing part of the beverage industry, with sales in the United States reaching more than $10 billion in 2012 — more than Americans spent on iced tea or sports beverages like Gatorade. Their rising popularity represents a generational shift in what people drink, and reflects a successful campaign to convince consumers, particularly teenagers, that the drinks...
Read More..

Tech Giants, Learning the Ways of Washington, Brace for More Scrutiny

Mario Tama/Getty ImagesNadine Wolf demonstrated against online piracy legislation a year ago in New York. The measures were defeated. SAN FRANCISCO — Silicon Valley lobbied hard in Washington in 2012, and despite some friction with regulators, fared fairly well. In 2013, though, government scrutiny is likely to grow. And with this scrutiny will come even greater efforts by the tech industry to press...
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