Surprise: New insurance fee in health overhaul law

WASHINGTON (AP) — Your medical plan is facing an unexpected expense, so you probably are, too. It's a new, $63-per-head fee to cushion the cost of covering people with pre-existing conditions under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.The charge, buried in a recent regulation, works out to tens of millions of dollars for the largest companies, employers say. Most of that is likely to be passed...

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Video of Columbus Circle Killer Released

The hunt for New York's Columbus Circle killer took on a new impetus today as police released surveillance video showing the killer moments before he calmly walked up to Brandon Lincoln Woodard and put one bullet from a silver colored handgun into the back of the Los Angeles man's head in full view of holiday shoppers.The video confirms the details of the hit man's calculated...

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Egypt army seeks national unity as crisis mounts

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's army chief called for talks on national unity to end the country's mounting political crisis after a vital loan from the IMF was delayed and thousands of pro- and anti-government demonstrators took to the streets. The meeting scheduled for Wednesday afternoon was called in response to an increasingly destabilizing series of protests that has unfolded since President...

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Football: Anti-racism body slams "weak" FA, Premier League

LONDON: The chairman of an anti-racism group has accused England's Football Association and the top-flight Premier League of lacking morality and leadership over their handling of recent racism cases.Herman Ouseley, who heads the Kick It Out organisation, also rebuked Chelsea and Liverpool over the racism incidents involving their players John Terry and Luis Suarez, saying they failed...

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54 Indian soldiers may be in Pakistan jails: India

NEW DELHI: Fifty-four Indian military personnel missing since the 1965 and 1971 wars are believed to be in Pakistani custody, defence minister AK Antony said on Monday. These include a member of the Border Security Force (BSF), the minister told the Lok Sabha in a written statement. He said the government had repeatedly taken up the matter with the Pakistani government but "Pakistan does not acknowledge...

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Smokers celebrate as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — The crowds of happy people lighting joints under Seattle's Space Needle early Thursday morning with nary a police officer in sight bespoke the new reality: Marijuana is legal under Washington state law.Hundreds gathered at Seattle Center for a New Year's Eve-style countdown to 12 a.m., when the legalization measure passed by voters last month took effect. When the clock struck, they...

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Iran: We Stole All Secrets From US Drone

An Iranian military commander claimed Monday that the country has stolen all the secrets held by a high-tech American surveillance drone that crashed in Iran last year, according to Iranian news reports."All the intelligence in this drone has been completely decoded and extracted and we know each and every step it has taken," said Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, Commander of the...

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Egypt army given temporary power to arrest civilians

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's Islamist president has given the army temporary power to arrest civilians during a constitutional referendum he is determined to push through despite the risk of bloodshed between his supporters and opponents accusing him of a power grab. Seven people were killed and hundreds wounded last week in clashes between the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and their critics besieging...

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7.1 quake hits eastern Indonesia, no tsunami threat: USGS

JAKARTA: A major 7.1-magnitude earthquake shook eastern Indonesia's Maluku islands Tuesday but there was no tsunami alert, the US Geological Survey said.The quake hit at 1653 GMT some 365 kilometres (226 miles) south-southeast of Ambon in the Maluku islands at a relatively deep 157 kilometres, it said, revising its strength down slightly from an initial measurement of 7.2.Indonesian government...

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India misguided, paranoid over China: Guha

Shreya Roy Chowdhury, TNN Dec 8, 2012, 06.12AM ISTMUMBAI: A good half-hour into the discussion on 'India, China and the World', historian Ramachandra Guha issued a disclaimer—all the three members on the panel had been to China only once. "We should learn their language, promote quality research, and have a panel on China driven by Chinese scholars," he said. And that was the general tenor of the...

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