Thursday, February 28, 2013

Big Meteorite Discovered in Antarctica

Meteorite hunters at the bottom of the world bagged a rare find this southern summer: a 40-pound (18 kilogram) chunk of extraterrestrial rock.

A team from Belgium and Japan discovered the hefty meteorite as the members drove across the East Antarctic plateau on snowmobiles. Initial tests show it is an ordinary chondrite, the most common type of meteorite found on Earth, Vinciane Debaille, a geologist from Universit? Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium, said in a statement.

"This is the biggest meteorite found in East Antarctica for 25 years," Debaille said. "This is something very exceptional. When you find such a meteorite on Earth, it means that when it was in the sky, it was much larger." [Images of the Antarctic meteorite.]

The Russian meteor that burst into fragments above the Chelyabinsk region on Feb. 15 is also an ordinary chondrite, according to initial tests by Russian scientists.

Every year, scientists travel to Antarctica to search for meteorites. Their charred black crust stands out starkly in the white snow, and the cold, dry climate helps preserve any organic chemicals inside the rocks.

The expedition collected 425 meteorites in 40 days, with a total weight of 165 pounds (75 kg). Debaille said they may have found one Mars meteorite and one piece of the asteroid Vesta among the many discoveries.

The researchers canvassed the Nansen Ice Field, 86 miles (140 kilometers) south out of the International Polar Foundation's Princess Elisabeth station. The United States also sent scientists out on the polar ice to collect meteorites this season, from McMurdo Station on the opposite end of the continent.

Reach Becky Oskin at boskin@techmedianetwork.com. Follow her on Twitter @beckyoskin. Follow OurAmazingPlanet on Twitter?@OAPlanet. We're also on?Facebook?and Google+.

Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/big-meteorite-discovered-antarctica-202340161.html

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Talking About Teenage Love, part 3

Shaping expectations.? How you talk about love and relationships will have a significant influence on what your kid expects out of their beloved.? Young love-ers are romantic idealists.? Their model for love will be fairy tales, cartoons and a na?ve, superficial view of dating and dating partners.? (We won?t even get into what happens if they have already been watching R rated movies with the ubiquitous portrayals of? relationship-as-sex.)? They will need your help in learning how to think about infatuation, lust, love and romance.? They need to have some ideas about the ideal partner and, especially early on, the ideal date.? You will be fighting an uphill battle to counteract the media and popular culture who have been presenting an unrealistic view of the ideal human form and an exclusive focus on sex and sexuality.

Setting boundaries.? It is easy for experienced adults to lose themselves in the experience of love.? Young love-ers will need lots of help learning how to clarify their part in a relationship and their beloved?s part; what is their responsibility and what is their beloved?s responsibility; what is too much to ask and what is too much to be asked of.? Make sure your kid knows about the importance of having personal boundaries in love.? Help them make some decisions about what is too much and what is not enough before they are in the middle of it.? This would include both the physical and, more importantly, the emotional.? (It won?t save them from violating these boundaries but maybe it will reduce the number of times they try to merge their soul but lose themselves in the process.)

Maintaining respect, dignity & integrity.? There are so many sacrifices you are willing to make for a beloved.? Unfortunately for romantics (which are most teens), this can include sacrificing their dignity and their integrity.? Talk to your kid about how their beloved deserves to be treated.? What does it mean when they are treated badly, disrespected and required to compromise core values or beliefs.? And then turn it back around on them.? What do THEY deserve as someone?s beloved?? What are THEY going to require as someone?s beloved.? Talk about the importance and the problems with honesty (and dishonesty) and commitment (and infidelity).? Talk about the right way to be in a relationship and the right way to end a relationship.

Having fun.? Young love should be fun.? Not the carnal desire form of fun (though, of course, that IS fun).? Young love should be enlivening, exciting, invigorating, playful, energizing, positive, empowering, supportive, joyous, uplifting, encouraging and confidence building.? It should not be overly serious, depressing, conflictual, oppressive, undermining or demoralizing.? Adolescence is a time to practice the empowering and uplifting aspect of a loving relationship.? Once they have that down, then they can start in on the more complicated serious aspect of love in a stable, committed relationship.

Differentiating love from sex.? One of the most confusing aspects of love is its close association with sex and sexual desire.? You need to help your kid be able to tell the difference (and understand why it is important to tell the difference).? This means they need to be sexually educated beginning with a clear understanding of how sexual equipment operates, how the parts go together and what happens at all levels (physically and emotionally) when they do go together.? But, most importantly, they need to know about sexual relationships.? They need to be able to differentiate love from lust and make some decisions about the conditions under which they will (and won?t) have sex.

Establishing family dating rules.? The most direct influence you can have on how your teenager approaches loving relationships will be the rules you establish for dating and intimate time together.? When can they hang out with potential dating partners?? How old do they have to be for actual one-on-one dating (hint:? not until 16 years old).? Get these rules in place early on so there is no confusion (and less arguing) when they actually find someone worthy of dating.

Educate about manners.? There is still a place for manners and considerate behavior in loving relationships.? Sure, some people are offended by you opening a door for them (because it suggests a power differential in which the door opener is asserting their superiority and social dominance over the door openee).? Whatever.? Manners goes in both directions (since either person can open the door for the other).? The point is that there are social graces and polite considerations of others that familiarity can start to erode.? Help your kid remember to retain well-mannered behavior regardless of how long they have been in a loving relationship (or whether love has begun to fade).

Provide perspective.? Love is not enough.? It feels like it is enough.? It seems like it is enough.? But, love is not enough.? It is not enough to keep a relationship alive.? (That requires commitment and trust and communication.)? It is not enough to survive stress and trauma.? (That requires compassion and fortitude.).? It is not enough to keep the passion alive.? (That requires openness and sharing and playfulness.)? They will experience some of these (mostly the importance of commitment, trust and communication).? It will be important for you to throw in that love is great and all that but there is more they need to learn if love is going to last.? ?Love is so wonderful.? It is what really gets the relationship started so you can build in the other things that keep it going.?? ?Love is so pure that you have to be careful about putting other pressures on it unless you are really ready to assume all the responsibilities that come from committing yourself to each other.?

Love evolves across adolescence (and young adulthood).? Unfortunately, our culture does not provide any consistent or clear information about the evolution of love.? And, the information that is provided focuses almost exclusively on the infatuation and romantic aspects not on the committed partnership that marks a lasting relationship.? Your kid needs your help in learning about what love really means.

Source: http://drjameswellborn.com/talking-about-teenage-love-part-3/

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Beware of Google Glass re-sellers, especially those asking for $15K on eBay

Google Glass, the wearable camera/display combo that has everyone excited, isn't available for sale just yet ? but that's not stopping at least one eBay user from auctioning off a device he or she can't even hand over to you.

"I've been selected as an early adapter [sic] for Google's upcoming release," an auction listing read on Wednesday, "you are buying a brand new unopened pair of Google's Project Glass glasses." The seller references Google's #ifihadglass application process, the only way for folks to enter the company's Google Glass Explorer program if they hadn't pre-ordered a device during the Google I/O 2012 conference last June, and explains that he'll be able to pick up the shiny new gadget thanks to his application being among the 8,000 chosen ones.

And that's where one of the many issues with the auction listing begin.

You see, Google won't be notifying the individuals selected as part of the #ifihadglass application process until mid- to late March, meaning that the seller couldn't possibly know that he or she will be eligible to purchase one of the very first publicly available Glass units for $1,500. Additionally, the #ifihadglass terms strictly forbid those who are invited to purchase Glass from transferring their invitations. You can bet that the terms of purchase will include similar stipulations.

"So what if it's against Google's rules? Like anyone will ever find out," you might say. But the reality is that Google Glass will, like most mobile Android devices, be associated with a Google account. Meaning that it shouldn't be difficult for the company to catch on if a member of the Glass Explorer program decides to hand his or her gadget to someone else.

As far as the auction initially mentioned goes, there are plenty of other things that make it scream "Scam!" and make me worry for the person who bid $15,900 on it. Like the fact that the seller's previous auctions include a "mason jar with trapped human soul."

Unsurprisingly, the auction disappeared from eBay before it ran its course.

Want more tech news or interesting links? You'll get plenty of both if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on Twitter, subscribing to her Facebook posts, or circling her on Google+.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/beware-google-glass-re-sellers-especially-those-asking-15-000-1C8594690

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Fermi's motion produces a study in spirograph

Feb. 27, 2013 ? NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope orbits our planet every 95 minutes, building up increasingly deeper views of the universe with every circuit. Its wide-eyed Large Area Telescope (LAT) sweeps across the entire sky every three hours, capturing the highest-energy form of light -- gamma rays -- from sources across the universe. These range from supermassive black holes billions of light-years away to intriguing objects in our own galaxy, such as X-ray binaries, supernova remnants and pulsars.

Now a Fermi scientist has transformed LAT data of a famous pulsar into a mesmerizing movie that visually encapsulates the spacecraft's complex motion.

Pulsars are neutron stars, the crushed cores of massive suns that destroyed themselves when they ran out of fuel, collapsed and exploded. The blast simultaneously shattered the star and compressed its core into a body as small as a city yet more massive than the sun. The result is an object of incredible density, where a spoonful of matter weighs as much as a mountain on Earth. Equally incredible is a pulsar's rapid spin, with typical rotation periods ranging from once every few seconds up to hundreds of times a second. Fermi sees gamma rays from more than a hundred pulsars scattered across the sky.

One pulsar shines especially bright for Fermi. Called Vela, it spins 11 times a second and is the brightest persistent source of gamma rays the LAT sees. Although gamma-ray bursts and flares from distant black holes occasionally outshine the pulsar, they don't have Vela's staying power. Because pulsars emit beams of energy, scientists often compare them to lighthouses, a connection that in a broader sense works especially well for Vela, which is both a brilliant beacon and a familiar landmark in the gamma-ray sky.

Most telescopes focus on a very small region of the sky, but the LAT is a wide-field instrument that can detect gamma rays across a large portion of the sky at once. The LAT is, however, much more sensitive to gamma rays near the center of its field of view than at the edges. Scientists can use observations of a bright source like Vela to track how this sensitivity varies across the instrument's field of view.

With this in mind, LAT team member Eric Charles, a physicist at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology and the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University in California, used the famous pulsar to produce a novel movie. He tracked both Vela's position relative to the center of the LAT's field of view and the instrument's exposure of the pulsar during the first 51 months of Fermi's mission, from Aug. 4, 2008, to Nov. 15, 2012.

The movie renders Vela's position in a fisheye perspective, where the middle of the pattern corresponds to the central and most sensitive portion of the LAT's field of view. The edge of the pattern is 90 degrees away from the center and well beyond what scientists regard as the effective limit of the LAT's vision.

The pulsar traces out a loopy, hypnotic pattern reminiscent of art produced by the colored pens and spinning gears of a Spirograph, a children's toy that produces geometric patterns.

The pattern created in the Vela movie reflects numerous motions of the spacecraft. The first is Fermi's 95-minute orbit around Earth, but there's another, subtler motion related to it. The orbit itself also rotates, a phenomenon called precession. Similar to the wobble of an unsteady top, Fermi's orbital plane makes a slow circuit around Earth every 54 days.

In order to capture the entire sky every two orbits, scientists deliberately nod the LAT in a repeating pattern from one orbit to the next. It first looks north on one orbit, south on the next, and then north again. Every few weeks, the LAT deviates from this pattern to concentrate on particularly interesting targets, such as eruptions on the sun, brief but brilliant gamma-ray bursts associated with the birth of stellar-mass black holes, and outbursts from supermassive black holes in distant galaxies.

The Vela movie captures one other Fermi motion. The spacecraft rolls to keep the sun from shining on and warming up the LAT's radiators, which regulate its temperature by bleeding excess heat into space.

The braided loops and convoluted curves drawn by Vela hint at the complexity of removing these effects from the torrent of data Fermi returns, but that's a challenge LAT scientists long ago proved they could meet. Still going strong after more than four years on the job, Fermi continues its mission to map the high-energy sky, which is now something everyone can envision as a celestial Spriograph traced by a pulsar pen.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/astronomy/~3/Kd6-_fYbEqw/130227183532.htm

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Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Businesses signal a rise in investment plans

A gauge of planned U.S. business spending increased by the most in just over a year in January and new orders for long-lasting manufactured goods excluding transportation rose solidly, pointing to underlying strength in factory activity.

The Commerce Department said on Wednesday non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, a closely watched proxy for business spending plans, jumped 6.3 percent, the biggest gain since December 2011, after slipping 0.3 percent in December.

Economists had expected this category to only rise 0.2 percent.

Durable goods orders excluding transportation increased 1.9 percent, the largest gain since December 2011, after increasing 1 percent in December. That was well above economists' expectations for a 0.2 percent gain.

However, overall orders for durable goods - items from toasters to aircraft that are meant to last at least three years - tumbled 5.2 percent as demand for civilian and defense aircraft fell sharply. Last month's drop was the first since August.

The strong rise in so-called core capital goods should bolster expectations for business spending on equipment and software to remain on an upward trend this quarter.

Still, the report is unlikely to change the Federal Reserve's very easy monetary policy stance.

Factory activity has cooled in recent months after helping to lift the economy from the 2007-09 recession. Sluggish domestic demand, tighter fiscal policy and slowing global growth are holding back manufacturing.

Last month, shipments of non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, used to calculate equipment and software spending in the gross domestic product report, fell 1 percent after being flat the prior month.

Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/economywatch/businesses-signal-rise-investment-plans-1C8585250

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Light particles illuminate the vacuum

Light particles illuminate the vacuum [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 26-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Pasi Lhteenmki
pasi.lahteenmaki@aalto.fi
358-050-344-2306
Aalto University

The researchers conducted a mirror experiment to show that by changing the position of the mirror in a vacuum, virtual particles can be transformed into real photons that can be experimentally observed. In a vacuum, there is energy and noise, the existence of which follows the uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics.

If we act fast enough, we can prevent the particles from recombining they will then be transformed into real particles that can be detected', says Dr. Sorin Paraoanu from Aalto University.

For the experiment, the researchers used an array of superconducting quantum-interference devices (SQUID). These parts resemble devices used in imaging small magnetic fields in the brain. By changing the magnetic field, the speed of light in the device can be changed. From the standpoint of the electromagnetic field of the vacuum radiation reflecting from this kind of device experiences it as a moving mirror.

By quickly varying the speed of light in the array, we can extract microwave photons out of the vacuum's quantum noise', explains doctoral student Pasi Lhteenmki from Aalto University.

Future research directions for these kinds of devices include the creation of an artificial event horizon and observation or Hawking radiation emanating from it. The present observation will help cosmologists to get closer to the riddle of the birth of the universe and advance the development of extremely powerful quantum computers.

###

A link to the research article published in the PNAS journal: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/02/11/1212705110.abstract

A link to the news in the Nature journal: http://www.nature.com/news/a-vacuum-can-yield-flashes-of-light-1.12430

Additional information:

Pasi Lhteenmki, doctoral student, Aalto University


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Light particles illuminate the vacuum [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 26-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Pasi Lhteenmki
pasi.lahteenmaki@aalto.fi
358-050-344-2306
Aalto University

The researchers conducted a mirror experiment to show that by changing the position of the mirror in a vacuum, virtual particles can be transformed into real photons that can be experimentally observed. In a vacuum, there is energy and noise, the existence of which follows the uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics.

If we act fast enough, we can prevent the particles from recombining they will then be transformed into real particles that can be detected', says Dr. Sorin Paraoanu from Aalto University.

For the experiment, the researchers used an array of superconducting quantum-interference devices (SQUID). These parts resemble devices used in imaging small magnetic fields in the brain. By changing the magnetic field, the speed of light in the device can be changed. From the standpoint of the electromagnetic field of the vacuum radiation reflecting from this kind of device experiences it as a moving mirror.

By quickly varying the speed of light in the array, we can extract microwave photons out of the vacuum's quantum noise', explains doctoral student Pasi Lhteenmki from Aalto University.

Future research directions for these kinds of devices include the creation of an artificial event horizon and observation or Hawking radiation emanating from it. The present observation will help cosmologists to get closer to the riddle of the birth of the universe and advance the development of extremely powerful quantum computers.

###

A link to the research article published in the PNAS journal: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/02/11/1212705110.abstract

A link to the news in the Nature journal: http://www.nature.com/news/a-vacuum-can-yield-flashes-of-light-1.12430

Additional information:

Pasi Lhteenmki, doctoral student, Aalto University


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-02/au-lpi022613.php

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Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Bradley, Clark the face of the debate

MARANA, Ariz. (AP) ? Bruce Lietzke would have noticed a banana inside the cover of his long putter.

One of the famous stories about Lietzke, a 13-time winner on the PGA Tour, is that he never touched a club when he wasn't on tour. His caddie didn't believe him, so at the end of the 1984 season, he put a banana inside the head cover of Lietzke's driver before zipping up the travel bag. Some 15 weeks later at the Bob Hope Classic, the caddie excitedly unzipped the travel bag.

The stench should have been the first clue.

"Sure enough, he pulled off that head cover and the banana ... it was not yellow," Lietzke said Monday. "It was black, nasty, fungus. He said he'd never doubt me again."

Lietzke confessed to breaking his own rules when it came to the broom-handled putter that he picked up at the Phoenix Open in 1991 and used the rest of his career. Even in his down time, he would tinker with the length of the putter and practice with it. And he wonders what the conversation would have been like today if that 1991 PGA Championship had turned out differently.

Lietzke was the runner-up at Crooked Stick behind a big-hitting rookie named John Daly. Imagine if Lietzke had won that major.

Would the USGA have banned the putter he anchored against his chest?

"I think so," Lietzke said. "Judging by their reaction to major successes, I guess they were just waiting for this to happen. The USGA should have made a statement then. If I had won the PGA Championship, they might have tried to outlaw it. And if you look back on it, most people would have gone along with it."

That was one of the arguments PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem put forth Sunday when he said the tour was against the proposed rule that would ban the anchored stroke primarily used for long putters and belly putters.

Without any empirical evidence that an anchored stroke is easier, why ban it?

And after all these years, why now?

The faces in this discussion ? and that's all it is right now ? are Keegan Bradley and Tim Clark, for vastly different reasons.

It was Bradley's win at the PGA Championship that prompted serious talk about the future of anchored strokes. Bradley now is lumped in with three of the last five major champions using a belly putter, but he was the catalyst.

European Tour chief executive George O'Grady said the conversations between golf's administrators and the governing bodies about the future of the long putters began last year at the Masters.

That was before Webb Simpson won the U.S. Open and Ernie Els won the British Open, which ramped up the attention.

As for Clark?

It was his dignified speech at Torrey Pines that led even the staunch opponents of long putters to look at them differently. More than one person in the room that night has described his presentation as a game-changer.

That much was reflected in the overwhelming support from the Player Advisory Council and player-directors on the tour's policy board that the PGA Tour should oppose the USGA on this rule.

The tricky part is figuring out where this will lead.

The PGA Tour sent the USGA a letter last week spelling out its opposition to Rule 14-1(b), and the PGA of America and its 27,000 club pros are also against the ban.

One reason Finchem decided to speak about the letter ? a small distraction during the final of the Match Play Championship ? was his concern that the discussion was being portray as a showdown. Right now, it's a matter of opinion.

If it becomes a showdown, high noon is not until the USGA and R&A decide whether to go ahead with the rule. And that decision won't come until the spring.

It's a polarizing topic. If not, the governing bodies would not have offered a 90-day comment period that ends on Thursday. They simply would have announced a new rule and been done with it.

For now, the tour has not said it will go against the USGA. It has only said it disagrees with the USGA.

Finchem chose not to show his hand when he brushed off questions about whether the tour would ever allow an anchored stroke even if the governing bodies adopt a rule that bans it starting in 2016.

But he has made clear on at least three occasions that while slightly different rules could work for the PGA Tour, this rule would not be one of them.

This is not where golf needs to go. The buzz word coming out of the USGA annual meeting earlier this month was not "bifurcation" but "unification."

Go anywhere in the world and golf effectively is played by the same set of rules. This is something that should never change.

The USGA and R&A know they don't have evidence to show that using an anchored stroke is easier. Frankly, they don't need any evidence. This is not about equipment, rather a new rule that attempts to define the golf stroke as the club swinging freely.

The mistake by the USGA was waiting until someone won a major before acting ? or believing that winning a major should even make a difference.

The majors are the biggest events to win. They define careers. But if the belly putter was an issue when Simpson won the U.S. Open, why wasn't it an issue when he won the Deutsche Bank Championship? Did the putter work differently at Olympic?

Lietzke can think of several occasions when nerves made him miss with his long putter. And if the belly putter is the cure, don't just look at Ernie Els kissing that claret jug last summer at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. Look at those two putts Els badly missed on the last few holes of the Match Play Championship to lose in the opening round.

If the USGA decides that a ban on anchored strokes is best for the game, the PGA Tour should go along with it.

And if the USGA was serious about that 90-day comment period, the hope is that it was serious about listening.

Why?

And why now?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bradley-clark-face-debate-230137553--golf.html

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Should IRS report tax deadbeats to credit bureaus?

By Herb Weisbaum, TODAY contributor

Here?s a scary thought, especially if you owe back taxes: What if the Internal Revenue Service reported your payment history to the big national credit bureaus?

Unlike many other debts owed to the federal government, unpaid taxes are not reported to credit bureaus. The IRS is not allowed to directly share this information because of federal privacy laws.

Of course, Congress could always change the law to allow the IRS to directly report all delinquencies to the credit bureaus. No one has proposed making this change, but last year the Senate Finance Committee did ask the General Accounting Office to look at the issue.

The GAO did not make any recommendations in its report released in October, but it did list arguments for and against the idea. It also provided some hard numbers about the staggering amount of money owed to the federal treasury in unpaid taxes.

As of October 2011, about $343 billion was owed in unpaid federal tax debts. That?s more than the federal deficit of $207 billion for the 2012 budget year. Most of the outstanding debts are relatively small ?less than $5,000.

Some tax information does make it to the credit bureaus. When the IRS files a tax lien to collect back taxes, that information is public record and can be picked up by credit reporting agencies. The GAO found that liens have been filed for more than half of all the dollars owed in tax debts.

Why change the current system?

Simply put: the possibility of more revenue.

If this information were reported to the credit bureaus it would have an effect on credit scores and that might change behavior. Some people might be encouraged to pay their taxes on time or pay off existing debts to improve their credit scores.

It might also provide another way to enforce the tax code. Anyone who owed more than a certain amount of back taxes could be barred from receiving certain benefits, such as government contracts, grants or loans.

Would this really make a difference? According to the GAO report there?s no way to be sure.

?Some taxpayers have agreed to installment agreements, so reporting their debts many not influence their willingness to pay because they are already making payments. IRS classifies other debts as uncollectible, and reporting those debts many not make the debts any more collectible.?

There?s also the belief that providing tax payment history to credit bureaus would give potential lenders a more complete ? and possibly more accurate ? picture of the person or business applying for credit.?

Under the current system, the credit reporting agencies know the dollar amount of a tax debt when a lien is filed. They don?t know if the debt grows because of penalties and interest. They don?t know when it?s reduced as the amount owed is paid down.

Direct reporting, supporters say, would provide more current information which would give the taxpayer an incentive to pay off the debt because the declining balance would improve their credit history.

The GAO did offer this caution: reporting tax payment information on an ongoing basis could increase the risk that negative information shows up in a person?s credit file twice.

Would it really make a difference?

The General Accounting Office did not come to a conclusion on that.

It noted that such a system could cost the IRS money because it would have to handle transmission of information to the credit bureaus and deal with taxpayer inquiries and disputes.

?Taxpayers would be forced to either dispute the inaccurate information to have it corrected or face possible serious consequences such as denial of credit, employment, or housing due to the inaccurate negative information on their credit histories. IRS would incur additional costs as it would have to respond to related inquiries and disputes.?

The GAO report also included a caution from the National Taxpayer Advocate that full reporting could result in some people choosing not to file tax returns ? or to file inaccurately ? if they know they owe money to the IRS.

The credit reporting industry hasn?t taken a position on this idea. And since nothing has been proposed, consumer groups haven?t really focused on the issue.

Chi Chi Wu, staff attorney for?the National Consumer Law Center said her main concern was the potential harm that could be caused by reporting errors.

?Would tax debts show up in the wrong credit reports?? she asked. ?I?d be concerned that adding a whole new batch of data would increase the number of errors credit bureaus make and how difficult it can be to get them fixed.?

Wu noted that American taxpayers share some very private and confidential information with the IRS and in return Congress prohibits the IRS from sharing that information.

?If that bargain is going to be changed,? Wu said, ?we want to think long and hard about why and how it would be changed.?

Herb Weisbaum is The ConsumerMan. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter or visit The ConsumerMan website.

Herb will be a guest on the Jim Bohannon Radio show Tuesday night (Feb. 26) talking about current consumer issues. Listen live at 11 pm Eastern. Here?s how to find a radio station in your area.

Source: http://lifeinc.today.com/_news/2013/02/26/17102095-should-irs-report-tax-deadbeats-to-credit-bureaus?lite

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Factbox - Speakers at Reuters Future of the Euro Zone summit

(Reuters) - Speakers at Reuters Future of the Euro Zone summit which will take place from Monday, February 25 to Thursday, February 28.

For news from the summit, click on: http://www.reuters.com/summit/Eurozone13

SPEAKER'S TITLE SPEAKER'S NAME

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barrosso

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble

French Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici

Spanish Finance Minister Luis De Guindos

European Economic & Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn

European Central Bank executive board member Joerg Asmussen

European Central Bank executive board member Benoit Coeure

European Commission Vice-President Joaquin Almunia

European Commissioner for Internal Market/Services Michel Barnier

EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht

UK government minister Ken Clarke

Former UK minister and EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson

Leader of centrist ALDE group in European Parliament Guy Verhofstadt

Oxford University economist Clemens Fuest

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/factbox-speakers-reuters-future-euro-zone-summit-140728633--sector.html

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Call For $30 Smartphones To Connect The Next Wave Of Mobile Users From Emerging Markets

IndiaSmartphones have been getting more affordable but to connect the ?next billions? of users they need to get more affordable still. Speaking at Mobile World Congress today Manoj Kohli, CEO of carrier Bharti Airtel ? which operates in India and Africa -- said the price of smartphones needs to come down to $30, and mobile data dongles to $10, to break down the affordability barrier.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/_uas6X22q1c/

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Ask Obama to Protect Wildlife with Improved Environmental Le ...


Gran Pat (322)
Sunday February 24, 2013, 7:09 am
TY, Cher. Done.

Why is this inappropriate?