Bipartisan group sees change in politics on immigration reform

A bipartisan coalition of senators said Monday they have created a set of principles based upon which they hope lawmakers will pass immigration reform by summer.

WASHINGTON — Declaring that the politics of immigration  “have been turned upside down,” a bipartisan group of senators Monday outlined common principles for comprehensive immigration reform and expressed optimism that legislation granting legal status to most of the country's 11 million illegal immigrants could be realized by this summer.

One day before President Obama launches a campaign-style push for his vision of immigration reform, representatives of the so-called Group of Eight senators acknowledged previous false starts on the issue, and obstacles that probably lie ahead — particularly in determining how to increase the flow of legal immigration.

But, after an election in which the share of the nonwhite vote continued to grow and swung overwhelmingly toward Obama, the lawmakers said that the path forward was as clear as ever.

Arizona Sen. John McCain, the GOP’s 2008 presidential nominee and a past proponent of comprehensive reform, said the change in favor of taking action came down to one word: “Elections.”

PHOTOS: President Obama’s second inauguration

“The Republican Party is losing the support of our Hispanic citizens. And we realize that there are many issues in which we think we are in agreement with our Hispanic citizens, but this is a preeminent issue with those citizens,” he said at a Capitol Hill news conference. 

“For the first time ever, there's more political risk in opposing immigration reform than in supporting it,” added Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.).

The Senate blueprint, drafted during weeks of closed-door meetings by leading senators from each party, is more conservative than Obama's proposal, which the president plans to unveil Tuesday in a speech in Las Vegas. But its provisions for legalizing millions of undocumented immigrants go further than measures that failed to advance in Congress in previous years — a reminder of how swiftly the politics of immigration have shifted since the November election.

The Senate proposal would allow most of those in the country illegally to obtain probationary legal status immediately by paying a fine and back taxes and passing a background check. That would make them eligible to work and live in the U.S. They could earn a green card — permanent residency — after the government certifies that the U.S.-Mexican border has become secure, but might face a lengthy process before becoming citizens.

Obama is expected to push for a faster citizenship process that would not be conditional on border security standards being met first. The structure of the citizenship process will probably be among the most hotly debated parts of any immigration plan.

PHOTOS: A look ahead at 2013’s political battles

Less controversial provisions would tighten requirements on employers to check the immigration status of new workers; increase the number of visas for high-skill jobs; provide green cards automatically to people who earn master's degrees or PhDs in science, technology or math at U.S. universities; and create an agricultural guest-worker program.

Schumer said lawmakers are aiming for full legislative language to be put forward by March, which will then work its way through the committee process. A vote in the Senate could come by late spring or summer, he said.

“We still have a long way to go, but this bipartisan blueprint is a major breakthrough,” he said.

Though their effort was running parallel to the president’s, Democratic Sen. Richard J. Durbin of Illinois said he and Schumer spoke with Obama on Sunday and that the president “cheered us on.” McCain said Obama’s public campaign for it would be helpful to their cause.

Still, many conservatives on Capitol Hill remain skeptical about sweeping immigration legislation and could prove a major obstacle to any compromise.

“The last time we talked about this in 2007, it sounded very seductive. When we saw the details, it was clear it wouldn’t work,” Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said in an interview Monday. Sessions said he was particularly concerned that the Obama administration is not committed to securing the borders against future illegal immigration.

Similar criticism from Republican lawmakers doomed a 2007 immigration bill pushed by President George W. Bush and seniors Senate Democrats.

PHOTOS: President Obama’s past

Today, 22 GOP senators who opposed the 2007 plan remain in the Senate, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). By contrast, just two of the 12 Republicans who backed the compromise six years ago are still in Congress — McCain and South Carolina's Lindsey Graham.

Republican resistance to an immigration overhaul promises to be even more intense in the House, where many conservative lawmakers are leery of any proposal that would provide a mechanism for immigrants here illegally to gain citizenship, a key demand on the left.

“When you legalize those who are in the country illegally, it costs taxpayers millions of dollars, costs American workers thousands of jobs and encourages more illegal immigration,” said Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), the former chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. “By granting amnesty, the Senate proposal actually compounds the problem by encouraging more illegal immigration.”

Staff writers Brian Bennett and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

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Supernova Remnants: Dazzling Entrails of Violent Stellar Death

Even in death, there can be great beauty. Consider supernova remnants, the results of massive stars dying in great explosions, creating some of the most spectacular cosmic objects around.

Every 50 years or so, a star in our galaxy with more than 10 times the mass of our sun will expire. When such stars die, they go supernova, one of the most violent events in our universe. These explosions shoot off tons of material from the central star at up to 10 percent the speed of light.

Though the area surrounding stars seems empty, it is usually home to vast amounts of interstellar gas and dust. The supernova’s outburst runs into this surrounding material, creating a shockwave and heating it to temperatures greater than 10,000 Celsius. Over thousands of years, the local structure of the gas and dust shapes the stellar outpouring into shells, filaments, and other diffuse forms. Astronomers call these objects supernova remnants.

Supernova explosions and the remnants they leave behind have wide-ranging effects. They heat up the interstellar medium, creating complex chemistry out in space, and are responsible for accelerating protons and other atomic nuclei, which go zipping around the universe as cosmic rays. Perhaps most importantly, supernova explosions generate and liberate heavy elements, such as oxygen, carbon, and all metals, distributing them out into the wider cosmos. These elements eventually find their way into planetary systems, making life possible on at least one world that we know of.

Here, we take a look at some of the most famous and beautiful supernova remnants, giving you a chance to contemplate life, death, and cycles of renewal in the universe.

Above:

The supernova remnant N186 D appears as a bright pink spot at the top of this new image released by NASA on Jan. 28, spewing off tremendous amounts of X-rays. Located in the Large Magellanic Cloud about 160,000 light-years away, the remnant is blowing a huge bubble (the giant structure below the bright spot) as hot wind carves out a shock wave in the surrounding material.

Image: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ of Michigan/A.E.Jaskot, Optical: NOAO/CTIO/MCELS

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The CW orders “The Hundred” drama pilot, two others

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – The CW has gone post-apocalyptic with its pilot orders.

The network has placed an order for the drama pilot “The Hundred,” based on the upcoming book series by Kass Morgan (which has received an initial two-book order from Little, Brown).

The pilot will be set 97 years after a nuclear war has destroyed civilization, when a spaceship housing humanity’s lone survivors sends 100 juvenile delinquents back to Earth in hopes of possibly re-populating the planet.

Jason Rothenberg is writing as well as executive producing the project, which comes from Warner Bros. Television and Alloy Entertainment, with Alloy’s Leslie Morgenstein and Gina Girolamo also executive-producing.

The network has also ordered the sci-fi drama “Oxygen,” about a romance between a human girl and an alien boy.

“Passion and politics threaten the peace and an epic romance ignites between a human girl and an alien boy when he and eight others of his kind (The Orion 9) are integrated into a suburban high school ten years after they and hundreds of others landed on Earth and were immediately consigned to an internment camp where they’ve been imprisoned ever since,” a logline for the show explains.

Meredith Averill (“The Good Wife”) is writing and executive-producing “Oxygen,” which comes from CBS Television Studios, Ole Productions, Isla de Babel SL and 360 Powwow LLC.

Josh Appelbaum, Andre Nemec, Scott Rosenberg, Richard Shepard, Bryan Furst, Sean Furst and Daniel Gutman are also executive producing.

Finally, “Reign” promises to tell the “previously unknown and untold story of Mary Queen of Scots,” detailing the secret history of survival at French Court “amidst fierce foes, dark forces, and a world of sexual intrigue.” Stephanie Sengupta (“Hawaii Five-0″) and Laurie McCarthy (“Ghost Whisperer”) are writing and executive producing the pilot, which is being produced by CBS Television Studios.

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Personal Health: Keeping Blood Pressure in Check

Since the start of the 21st century, Americans have made great progress in controlling high blood pressure, though it remains a leading cause of heart attacks, strokes, congestive heart failure and kidney disease.

Now 48 percent of the more than 76 million adults with hypertension have it under control, up from 29 percent in 2000.

But that means more than half, including many receiving treatment, have blood pressure that remains too high to be healthy. (A normal blood pressure is lower than 120 over 80.) With a plethora of drugs available to normalize blood pressure, why are so many people still at increased risk of disease, disability and premature death? Hypertension experts offer a few common, and correctable, reasons:

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Jane Brody speaks about hypertension.

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¶ About 20 percent of affected adults don’t know they have high blood pressure, perhaps because they never or rarely see a doctor who checks their pressure.

¶ Of the 80 percent who are aware of their condition, some don’t appreciate how serious it can be and fail to get treated, even when their doctors say they should.

¶ Some who have been treated develop bothersome side effects, causing them to abandon therapy or to use it haphazardly.

¶ Many others do little to change lifestyle factors, like obesity, lack of exercise and a high-salt diet, that can make hypertension harder to control.

Dr. Samuel J. Mann, a hypertension specialist and professor of clinical medicine at Weill-Cornell Medical College, adds another factor that may be the most important. Of the 71 percent of people with hypertension who are currently being treated, too many are taking the wrong drugs or the wrong dosages of the right ones.

Dr. Mann, author of “Hypertension and You: Old Drugs, New Drugs, and the Right Drugs for Your High Blood Pressure,” says that doctors should take into account the underlying causes of each patient’s blood pressure problem and the side effects that may prompt patients to abandon therapy. He has found that when treatment is tailored to the individual, nearly all cases of high blood pressure can be brought and kept under control with available drugs.

Plus, he said in an interview, it can be done with minimal, if any, side effects and at a reasonable cost.

“For most people, no new drugs need to be developed,” Dr. Mann said. “What we need, in terms of medication, is already out there. We just need to use it better.”

But many doctors who are generalists do not understand the “intricacies and nuances” of the dozens of available medications to determine which is appropriate to a certain patient.

“Prescribing the same medication to patient after patient just does not cut it,” Dr. Mann wrote in his book.

The trick to prescribing the best treatment for each patient is to first determine which of three mechanisms, or combination of mechanisms, is responsible for a patient’s hypertension, he said.

¶ Salt-sensitive hypertension, more common in older people and African-Americans, responds well to diuretics and calcium channel blockers.

¶ Hypertension driven by the kidney hormone renin responds best to ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers, as well as direct renin inhibitors and beta-blockers.

¶ Neurogenic hypertension is a product of the sympathetic nervous system and is best treated with beta-blockers, alpha-blockers and drugs like clonidine.

According to Dr. Mann, neurogenic hypertension results from repressed emotions. He has found that many patients with it suffered trauma early in life or abuse. They seem calm and content on the surface but continually suppress their distress, he said.

One of Dr. Mann’s patients had had high blood pressure since her late 20s that remained well-controlled by the three drugs her family doctor prescribed. Then in her 40s, periodic checks showed it was often too high. When taking more of the prescribed medication did not result in lasting control, she sought Dr. Mann’s help.

After a thorough work-up, he said she had a textbook case of neurogenic hypertension, was taking too much medication and needed different drugs. Her condition soon became far better managed, with side effects she could easily tolerate, and she no longer feared she would die young of a heart attack or stroke.

But most patients should not have to consult a specialist. They can be well-treated by an internist or family physician who approaches the condition systematically, Dr. Mann said. Patients should be started on low doses of one or more drugs, including a diuretic; the dosage or number of drugs can be slowly increased as needed to achieve a normal pressure.

Specialists, he said, are most useful for treating the 10 percent to 15 percent of patients with so-called resistant hypertension that remains uncontrolled despite treatment with three drugs, including a diuretic, and for those whose treatment is effective but causing distressing side effects.

Hypertension sometimes fails to respond to routine care, he noted, because it results from an underlying medical problem that needs to be addressed.

“Some patients are on a lot of blood pressure drugs — four or five — who probably don’t need so many, and if they do, the question is why,” Dr. Mann said.

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How to Measure Your Blood Pressure

Mistaken readings, which can occur in doctors’ offices as well as at home, can result in misdiagnosis of hypertension and improper treatment. Dr. Samuel J. Mann, of Weill Cornell Medical College, suggests these guidelines to reduce the risk of errors:

¶ Use an automatic monitor rather than a manual one, and check the accuracy of your home monitor at the doctor’s office.

¶ Use a monitor with an arm cuff, not a wrist or finger cuff, and use a large cuff if you have a large arm.

¶ Sit quietly for a few minutes, without talking, after putting on the cuff and before checking your pressure.

¶ Check your pressure in one arm only, and take three readings (not more) one or two minutes apart.

¶ Measure your blood pressure no more than twice a week unless you have severe hypertension or are changing medications.

¶ Check your pressure at random, ordinary times of the day, not just when you think it is high.

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Advertising: Playing Whac-a-Mole With Piracy Sites

OVER the years, the fight against online piracy has led to countless lawsuits by media companies and to escalating levels of law enforcement, all with mixed results.

Lately, though, new attention has turned to an aspect of online commerce that critics say finances online piracy: advertising.

Prodding from the White House and a recent academic report have put pressure on the online advertising industry to prevent ads — for jeans, say, or car insurance — from appearing on a page offering a free download of Season 2 of “Game of Thrones.” Yet these efforts have also been slow to produce results, in part because of the complexity of the online ad system.

This month, the University of Southern California’s Annenberg Innovation Lab released a report that ranked 10 ad networks on the amount of business they do with sites suspected of engaging in piracy, with Google and Yahoo placing high on the list. Ad networks use advanced computer algorithms to place ads on Web sites. They can be run by agencies, publishers or others.

The implicit criticism of the report is that the operators of these networks know which sites traffic in copyright infringement and therefore could keep ads — and ad money — away from them if they wanted to.

“Brands make sure that their ads never show up on porn sites, so we’re basically saying, why not do the same with piracy sites?” said Jonathan Taplin, the director of the Innovation Lab, which is part of U.S.C.’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.

But some of the ad networks cited by the report have disputed its methodology and meaning. And even its supporters complain that the online ad system — a chain of Web sites, ad servers, digital publishers and agency trading desks that buy and sell ads at a rapid pace — operates in a way that makes it difficult to know where to point the finger.

The researchers studied the fragments of computer code that were appended to the ads they found on sites suspected of piracy over a year. The sites were drawn from a report by Google listing sites that had received the most complaints from copyright holders.

Representatives of Google and OpenX, two of the largest companies on U.S.C.’s list, did not deny the prevalence of their codes. But they disputed its meaning, saying that their technology is widely used by third parties — like ad agency trading desks and advertisers — so the presence of their code did not necessarily implicate them in a transaction.

“To grossly overcalculate our network, you’re also grossly overcalculating how many of these sites we are funding,” said Andrea Faville, a Google spokeswoman. Mitch Stoltz, a staff lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, was more aggressive, calling the U.S.C. report “a little bit of analysis resting on false premises.”

The report comes a year after the failure of the Stop Online Piracy Act, a Congressional bill that would have given additional powers to federal law enforcement to prosecute copyright infringement. The bill was supported by the media and entertainment world, but activists and technology companies said it would violate due process and privacy.

Since then, the government has tried to press industry to regulate itself.

“We believe that effective enforcement must involve private sector stakeholder efforts,” Victoria Espinel, the United States intellectual property enforcement coordinator, said in a statement. “Voluntary best practices must be practical and effective, must respect privacy, due process, competition, free speech, and must protect legitimate uses of the Internet.”

A lack of progress toward self-regulation has frustrated media companies. They say the opacity of the online ad system makes it nearly impossible to hold any party responsible for the ads.

“The ecosystem for online ads is incredibly complicated,” said Cary Sherman, chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America. “Everybody can point the finger at other people.”

One example is programmatic buying, a technique used by networks to place ads on sites based primarily on demographics. As a result, a brand may not know every site where its ad will appear.

One solution floated in the ad business is a blacklist of offending Web sites. Dick O’Brien, the executive vice president and director of government relations at the American Association of Advertising Agencies, a trade group, said this would be difficult. “If an organization like ours tries to create a list and organize a boycott, that opens us up to antitrust issues,” he said.

Advertising agencies, including OMD, a digital agency part of the Omnicom Media Group, one of the largest agencies in the world, said they were examining the report, but so far little significant action has been taken. Stephen Kline, the senior counsel for privacy and regulatory matters at the Omnicom Media Group, described the challenge for brands and agencies to identify piracy sites that appear as quickly as they disappear as “a little bit of Whac-a-Mole.”

As Mr. Taplin of the Innovation Lab sees it, Google has effectively provided a blacklist with its Transparency Report, which lists the sites that have received the most takedown requests from copyright owners. But these are only requests, not proof of illegal behavior.

The next edition of the U.S.C. report is due in mid-February. Mr. Taplin said it would name brands that advertise on pirate sites. In an interview, he said he was not ready to identify those brands, but he noted that insurance companies were among the biggest offenders.

Mr. Taplin said the report had not been done for any media company or organization, but, as a veteran of the music and film industries, he also made no secret of his sympathies with Big Content.

He told the story of his friend Levon Helm of the Band, who died last year. (Mr. Taplin was a producer of the band’s 1978 concert film, “The Last Waltz.”) Mr. Helm, he said, had to tour, despite having cancer, to make up for money he lost from royalties, in part because of piracy.

“That didn’t seem fair to me.”

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Live updates: SAG Awards 2013: Jennifer Lawrence wins; Danes, Moore and Costner score a threepeat

Are Daniel Day-Lewis and Jennifer Lawrence Oscar front-runners?

The pair took trophies at the 19th Screen Actors Guild award Sunday night, wins that could give them an edge heading into next month’s Academy Awards. 

Day-Lewis won the SAG — and a standing ovation from his peers — for playing the nation’s 16th president in “Lincoln.” Lawrence won her award for female actor in a feature film for the quirky romantic comedy “Silver Linings Playbook.”

PHOTOS: SAG Awards red carpet

Meanwhile, it was a threepeat night for Claire Danes, Julianne Moore and Kevin Costner.

The performers made it a clean sweep by winning the Emmy, the Golden Globe and now the SAG award for their television work.

Danes won for female actor in a drama series for the political thriller “Homeland.”

Moore’s uncanny performance as 2008 Republican vice presidential hopeful Sarah Palin in HBO’s “Game Change” earned her the trophy for female actor in a television movie or miniseries. And Costner nabbed male actor in a television movie or miniseries for History’s “Hatfields & McCoys” but was not present for the win.

In other TV awards, Bryan Cranston won for male actor in a drama series for “Breaking Bad.” “It is so good to be bad,” purred Cranston as he picked up the honor. And PBS' "Downton Abbey" won for ensemble in a drama series.

Earlier, a spry and chipper 87-year-old Dick Van Dyke was honored for a career that has spanned nearly seven decades and is going strong.

SAG 2013: Winners | Show highlights | Complete list | Red carpet

Van Dyke was met with a standing ovation and cheers from his peers. “That does an old man a lot of good,” he said, grinning from ear to ear. He was supposed to receive the life achievement honor from Carl Reiner, who created the seminal 1961-66 CBS series “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” the show that turned Van Dyke into a TV legend, and co-presenter Alec Baldwin from NBC’s “30 Rock.”

But Baldwin ended up doing the honors solo because Reiner was sick with the flu.

“I've knocked around this business for 70 years, but I still haven’t figured out what exactly I do,” Van Dyke cracked during his acceptance speech. He noted that it was great to pick a career “full of surprises and a lot of fun” and one that does “not require growing up.”

FULL COVERAGE: SAG Awards 2013 

Meanwhile, Baldwin and Tina Fey earned a great parting gift.

The pair took home back-to-back trophies Sunday night at the 19^th Screen Actors Guild Award for their lead roles in NBC's “30 Rock.”

Fey used the win to ask people to tune in at 8 Thursday night for the series’ one-hour finale, opposite the highly rated CBS sitcom “The Big Bang Theory.”

PHOTOS: SAG Award nominees & winners

“Just tape ‘The Big Bang Theory’ for once, for crying out loud!” Fey pleaded.

The critically acclaimed show had a shot at a hat trick because it was nominated for ensemble cast in a comedy series. But that honor went to ABC’s “Modern Family” for its third consecutive win.

On the movie front, another no-show, Tommy Lee Jones, won supporting actor in a feature film for “Lincoln.”  Fresh off her Golden Globes win two weeks ago, Anne Hathaway took the trophy for supporting female actor for playing the tragic Fantine in “Les Miserables,” a win that bolsters her chances of taking the Academy Award next month in the same category.

FULL COVERAGE: SAG Awards 2013 

Hathaway’s win offers a rare moment of clarity as the highly unpredictable awards season winds down.

“Argo” and “Les Misérables” are the front-runners, fresh off their Golden Globes victories two weeks ago, where they won trophies for dramatic film and comedy or musical. And Saturday night, "Argo" seemingly advanced its Academy Award best picture hopes by winning the Producers Guild Award, considered one of the leading indicators of Oscar gold.

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Lace 'Em Up: 4 Running Shoes Reviewed

Hitting the streets to get fit by spring? We review four new specialty sneakers for runners.

Adidas' Adizero Feather 2.0 runners are so light (barely 7 ounces) and so responsive, running in them feels more like bouncing on fluffy clouds than pounding on pavement. OK, I'm exaggerating, but I was really blown away by the light weight when I took them out on long-distance runs. So effective was the feather-weight design on a 5-mile outing, I could actually notice the reduced effort in my legs.

The shoe is topped with a barely-there breathable mesh that runs from the toes all the way back to the heel. Ventilation is therefore excellent, with a constant flow of cool air delivered directly to your piggies. And, unlike most shoes that make use of fancy, lightweight materials, they're actually quite sturdy.

These sneaks are compatible with Adidas' miCoach data reporting system and its companion apps. So if you already have a miCoach Speed_Cell sensor, just lift up the shoe's insert and pop it in (You can also attach the sensor to your laces). The sensor can be synced with your iPhone to track your speed, acceleration, distance, and pace during runs.

The only problem is that the miCoach system needs some work, including the inconsistent syncing and the iPhone app's interface. If you're used to the Nike+ app, you'll be struggling to work your way through using Adidas' lesser creation. That said, it's an add-on to the shoe and not a primary feature, so miCoach's shortcomings don't detract from the sneaker's quality.

WIRED Obscenely light at only 7 ounces. Flexible mesh upper keeps your tootsies cool and dry. Durable, despite the lightweight design. miCoach-compatible for tracking your runs. Great styling. Affordable at $115. Men's and women's versions.

TIRED If you're not into light shoes, these aren't for you. The miCoach system needs a lot of work -- it's adequate, but could be so much better.

Photos by Ariel Zambelich/Wired

Rating: 8 out of 10

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Witch-hunting “Hansel & Gretel” wins box office

(Reuters) – A grown-up “Hansel & Gretel” grabbed the weekend box office title, pulling in $ 19 million in U.S. and Canadian ticket sales with its reinvention of the fairy tale characters as fierce bounty hunters.

“Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters” knocked last weekend’s winner, low-budget horror flick “Mama,” into second place. “Mama” earned $ 12.8 million from Friday through Sunday, according to studio estimates, followed by “Silver Linings Playbook” with $ 10 million.

CIA drama “Zero Dark Thirty” came in fourth with $ 9.8 million.

Jeremy Renner and Gemma Arterton star in “Hansel & Gretel” as crossbow-wielding adult siblings who travel the world taking out evil witches. MGM and Viacom Inc’s Paramount Pictures produced the action comedy for about $ 50 million. Paramount had predicted opening weekend sales in the high-teens or low $ 20 million range.

Don Harris, Paramount’s president of distribution, said the film performed well despite the very cold temperatures and snow that hit the eastern United States.

“We are pleased that we were on our number on a worldwide basis. It looks like we are on or exceeding our numbers but we did get dinged with the weather on Friday,” he said in an interview.

“The impact of the weather was certainly more than I had predicted.”

“Mama” features Jessica Chastain as a woman forced to take care of two orphaned nieces who have been living in the woods. The $ 15 million production has now earned $ 48.6 million at U.S. and Canadian theaters through two weekends.

Chastain also stars in “Zero Dark Thirty” in an Oscar-nominated role as a dogged CIA agent searching for al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The best picture nominee, which has sparked debate over depictions of torture, has grossed $ 69.9 million since its release in late December.

“Silver Linings Playbook” stars Bradley Cooper as a former mental patient trying to rebuild his life with the help of a young widow played by Jennifer Lawrence. Total sales for “Silver Linings” reached $ 69.46 million. The movie, Cooper, Lawrence and co-star Robert De Niro are all nominated for Oscars.

New crime thriller “Parker” finished in fifth place, taking in $ 7 million at domestic theaters. The film is based on a series of novels by Donald E. Westlake and stars Jason Statham as a thief seeking revenge against a crew that double-crossed him. Jennifer Lopez plays a woman who helps with his mission.

“Movie 43,” a film with an ensemble of Hollywood directors and stars, was in seventh place, according to Hollywood.com, very close behind “Django Unchained.”

The film is a series of interconnected short movies following a washed-up producer as he pitches hilarious and insane story lines featuring some of the biggest stars in Hollywood, including Hugh Jackman, Seth MacFarlane, Kate Winslet and Dennis Quaid. Privately held Relativity Media produced the film for about $ 6 million.

“Mama” was distributed by Universal Studios, a division of Comcast Corp. Sony Corp’s movie studio released “Zero Dark Thirty.” “Parker” was released by independent studio FilmDistrict. The Weinstein Co distributed “Silver Linings Playbook.”

(Editing by Bill Trott)

Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Ariel Sharon Brain Scan Shows Response to Stimuli

JERUSALEM — A brain scan performed on Ariel Sharon, the former Israeli prime minister who had a devastating stroke seven years ago and is presumed to be in a vegetative state, revealed significant brain activity in response to external stimuli, raising the chances that he is able to hear and understand, a scientist involved in the test said Sunday.

Scientists showed Mr. Sharon, 84, pictures of his family, had him listen to a recording of the voice of one of his sons and used tactile stimulation to assess the extent of his brain’s response.

“We were surprised that there was activity in the proper parts of the brain,” said Prof. Alon Friedman, a neuroscientist at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and a member of the team that carried out the test. “It raises the chances that he hears and understands, but we cannot be sure. The test did not prove that.”

The activity in specific regions of the brain indicated appropriate processing of the stimulations, according to a statement from Ben-Gurion University, but additional tests to assess Mr. Sharon’s level of consciousness were less conclusive.

“While there were some encouraging signs, these were subtle and not as strong,” the statement added.

The test was carried out last week at the Soroka University Medical Center in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba using a state-of-the-art M.R.I. machine and methods recently developed by Prof. Martin M. Monti of the University of California, Los Angeles. Professor Monti took part in the test, which lasted approximately two hours.

Mr. Sharon’s son Gilad said in October 2011 that he believed that his father responded to some requests. “When he is awake, he looks at me and moves fingers when I ask him to,” he said at the time, adding, “I am sure he hears me.”

Professor Friedman said in a telephone interview that the test results “say nothing about the future” but may be of some help to the family and the regular medical staff caring for Mr. Sharon at a hospital outside Tel Aviv.

“There is a small chance that he is conscious but has no way of expressing it,” Professor Friedman said, but he added, “We do not know to what extent he is conscious.”

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Employers Increasingly Rely on Internal Referrals in Hiring

Sandy Huffaker for The New York Times

Danielle Cosgrove, left, referred Riju Parakh for a job at Ernst & Young. Ms. Parakh was hired within three weeks.

Riju Parakh wasn’t even looking for a new job.

But when a friend at Ernst & Young recommended her, Ms. Parakh’s résumé was quickly separated from the thousands the firm receives every week because she was referred by a current employee and within three weeks she was hired. “You know how long this usually takes,” she said. “It was miraculous.”

While whom you know has always counted in hiring, Ms. Parakh’s experience underscores a fundamental shift in the job market. Big companies like Ernst & Young are increasingly using their own workers to find new hires, saving time and money but lengthening the odds for job seekers without connections, especially among the long-term unemployed.

The trend, experts say, has been amplified since the end of the recession by a tight job market and by employee networks on LinkedIn and Facebook, which can help employers find candidates more quickly and bypass reams of applications from job search sites like Monster.com.

Some, like Ernst & Young, the accounting firm, have set ambitious internal goals to increase the proportion of hirings that come from internal referrals. As a result, employee recommendations now account for 45 percent of nonentry-level placements at the firm, up from 28 percent in 2010.

The company’s goal is 50 percent. Others, such as Deloitte and Enterprise Rent-A-Car, have begun offering prizes like iPads and large-screen TVs in addition to traditional cash incentives for employees who refer new hires.

Economists and other experts say the recession has severed networks for many workers, especially the long-term unemployed, whose ranks have remained high even as the economy recovers.

Nearly 4.8 million Americans have been out of work for 27 weeks or more, according to the Labor Department, three times as many as in late 2007. The typical unemployed worker has been jobless for 38 weeks, compared with 17 weeks before the recession.

While the overall unemployment rate has edged downward recently, little improvement is expected for the long-term jobless when data for December is released by the Labor Department on Friday.

“The long-term unemployed and other disadvantaged people don’t have access to the network,” said Mara Swan, executive vice president for global strategy and talent at Manpower Group, which provides temporary help and job placement services. “The more you’ve been out of the work force, the weaker your connections are.”

Although Ernst & Young looks at every résumé submitted, “a referral puts them in the express lane,” said Larry Nash, director of experienced and executive recruiting there. Indeed, as referred candidates get fast-tracked, applicants from other sources like corporate Web sites, Internet job boards and job fairs sink to the bottom of the pile.

“You’re submitting your résumé to a black hole,” said John Sullivan, a human resources consultant for large companies who teaches management at San Francisco State University. “You’re not going to find top performers at a job fair. Whether it’s fair or not, you need to have employees make referrals for you if you want to find a job.”

Among corporate recruiters, Mr. Sullivan said, random applicants from Internet job sites are sometimes referred to as “Homers,” after the lackadaisical, doughnut-eating Homer Simpson. The most desirable candidates, nicknamed “purple squirrels” because they are so elusive, usually come recommended.

“We call it Monster.ugly,” said Mr. Sullivan, referring to Monster.com. “In the H.R. world, applicants from Monster or other job boards carry a stigma.”

Monster.com did not respond to a request for comment.

Even getting in the door for an interview is becoming more difficult for those without connections. Referred candidates are twice as likely to land an interview as other applicants, according to a new study of one large company by three economists from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. For those who make it to the interview stage, the referred candidates had a 40 percent better chance of being hired than other applicants.

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