Napolitano says lone wolf terror threat growing (AP)

PARIS ? U.S. Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano said Friday that the risk of "lone wolf" attackers, with no ties to known extremist networks or grand conspiracies, is on the rise as the global terrorist threat has shifted.

Such risks, Napolitano said in an interview in Paris, heighten the need to keep dangerous travelers from reaching the United States, and she urged European partners to finalize a deal on sharing passenger data that has met resistance over privacy concerns.

Napolitano acknowledged shifts in the terror threat this year, but said the changes had little to do with the uprisings that have overturned the old order in countries around the Arab world and opened up new opportunities for extremist groups.

Asked about the greatest current threats to the United States, she said one from al-Qaida has morphed. "From a U.S. perspective, over the last several years we have had more attacks emanating from AQAP (al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula) than from core al-Qaida," she told The Associated Press.

"There's been a lot of evolution over the past three years," she said. "The thing that's most noticeable to me is the growth of the lone wolf," the single attacker who lives in the United States or elsewhere who is not part of a larger global conspiracy or network, she said.

She named no examples, but it's a phenomenon that is increasingly the focus of international anti-terror operations.

A former U.S. Army psychiatrist is the sole suspect in deadly shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, in 2009. In March, a Kosovo Albanian acting alone fatally shot two American airmen in Frankfurt, Germany. In April, a remote-control bomb exploded in a Marrakech cafe popular with tourists, killing 17 people, mostly foreigners ? an attack devised by a Moroccan who was inspired by al-Qaida and tried unsuccessfully for years to join the international terror network before returning to Morocco to devise an attack of his own.

One threat that has remained constant, Napolitano stressed, is that of terrorists reaching U.S. territory. She said the agreement with the EU on sharing data on air passengers for flights from Europe to America is needed to "make sure these global networks and global systems that we all rely on remain safe."

She stressed that such data aided high-profile U.S. terrorist investigations in recent years, including that into Najibullah Zazi, who admitted plotting to bomb New York subways, and David Headley, who was involved in the 2008 Mumbai, India, terrorist attack.

The United States and European Union initialed a new agreement on Nov. 17 after a previous accord from 2007 had to be renegotiated because of changes in EU legislation, and amid criticism that it allowed U.S. authorities too much insight into the private data of EU citizens.

The new deal sets clear limits to what data can be used by U.S. authorities and for how long, and allows passengers to obtain access to their records to correct and delete them.

The accord must still be endorsed by the EU Council ? the heads of state, expected to sign off easily later this month ? and the European Parliament, where a small group of legislators remains opposed.

The U.S. effort won support Friday from France's interior minister, who acknowledged that Europe gets spillover benefits from the tough U.S. line on terrorism. Claude Gueant said the U.S. made concessions to European concerns about privacy and agreed to share some data with Europe.

"I think this is accord is really a win-win," he told reporters after meeting with Napolitano and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

Napolitano and Holder were in Paris for a meeting with counterparts from the so-called G-6 countries: Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain.

___

Associated Press writer Jamey Keaten contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111202/ap_on_re_eu/eu_france_us_terrorism

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Friday Night Lights' Zach Gilford Engaged to Kiele Sanchez (omg!)

Saracen scores again!

Friday Night Lights star Zach Gilford recently became engaged to his girlfriend, actress Kiele Sanchez, Us Weekly reports. The couple first met when they were filming the pilot for Matadors in 2010.

Friday Night Lights comes to an end: The cast says good-bye with clear eyes, full hearts

Gilford, 29, is best known for playing Dillon High School Panthers quarterback Matt Saracen on NBC's beloved series Friday Night Lights. His film, Answers to Nothing, opens in theaters Friday.

Sanchez, 34, was previously married to filmmaker Zach Helm. She stars in A&E's The Glades and joined the third season of ABC's Lost, but her character, Nikki, was quickly written out of the show.

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Related Articles on TVGuide.com

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Railroad strike averted with agreements, extension

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The threat of a costly national railroad strike during the busy holiday season has been averted after the freight rail industry settled labor disputes with two of its unions and agreed to extend talks with a third.

Without the agreements, the railway unions could have begun striking as early as Tuesday, when a federal "cooling off" period was set to expire. Retailers warned that a rail strike would cost businesses and consumers $2 billion a day and prove especially damaging during the most important shipping season of the year.

The National Railway Labor Conference, which represents the railroads in bargaining talks, said its negotiators would try to reach an agreement with the final union before Feb. 8.

The agreements late Thursday with the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and the American Train Dispatchers Association came just hours after Republican House leaders said they would move to vote Friday on emergency legislation to prevent a work stoppage.

The group of more than 30 railroads ? including Union Pacific Corp., CSX Corp. and Burlington Northern Santa Fe ? has been trying for more than a year to reach collective bargaining agreements with 13 unions representing about 132,000 workers.

President Barack Obama appointed a five-member emergency board in October to mediate the dispute. The White House action averted a strike for at least 60 days, ending Tuesday at 12:01 a.m.

With the help of federal mediators, the railroads have now settled with 12 of the 13 unions in the current bargaining round. The only unsettled union is the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, which has about 25,000 workers.

"Everyone wins when we reach voluntary agreements," said Kenneth Gradia, chairman of the National Carriers' Conference Committee, which bargains on behalf of the railroads. "In a tough economy, these agreements offer a terrific deal for rail employees. They lock in well-above market wage increases of more than 20 percent over six years, far exceeding recent union settlements in other industries."

The last time a freight railroad strike occurred, in 1991, Congress quickly passed legislation that ended it within a day. A 1982 strike lasted four days.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2011-12-02-Railroad%20Strike/id-50fea2f0881249bfab945b8e4d672991

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Mike Ragogna: The Hit Men Hit Christmas (Exclusive Audio), Chatting With Ricky Scaggs and Kip Moore, Plus Billy Joel's Box

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A Conversation with Ricky Skaggs

Mike Ragogna: Why, it's Mr. Ricky Skaggs, and we ain't foolin'.

Ricky Skaggs: No we ain't! (laughs) I'm coming to you live from Medicine Hat, Alberta. I've been in up in Canada doing shows, and I appreciate you having me.

MR: My pleasure. Hey, are you on the Treasure Chest tour?

RS: No, actually the shows in Canada were all just bluegrass shows. The Treasure Chest tour kind of features the Country band as well as the bluegrass band. Right now, we're just doing all bluegrass dates.

MR: Great. Ricky, first, let's talk about your new album Country Hits Bluegrass Style. On it, you revisit a lot of your old hits. What inspired you to take on these songs with a bluegrass approach?

RS: Well, some of these songs like "I Wouldn't Change You If I Could," and "Crying My Heart Out Over You," and "Don't Cheat In Our Hometown" were all written and recorded as bluegrass songs by other artists, and I just happened to take those songs and make country hits out of them back in the early '80s. I thought that this was a good time to bring them back towards their originality, you know? Plus, it was fun to do an album picking on myself and do different arrangements of some of the hits that we had. It was fun to do. The fans have been kind of wanting me to do something like that for a while, especially since I've been going back to playing bluegrass again. We played primarily country music from about 1984 to 1995 or 1996, so around that time, I wanted to just come back to my roots and start playing bluegrass again, trying to simplify my music and my life. Then in 1997, I started Skaggs Family Records and it has been a wonderful thing to have my own record label and record the songs that I wanted to record when I wanted to record them. So, it really is a couture label--I can do whatever I want to do. If I want to do gospel or do something with Bruce Hornsby, I can do that. It's such a great thing to have.

MR: You're pretty good friends with Bruce.

RS: I am. We toured off and on for about a year and a half on that first record we did. We even recorded about 18 or 20 shows when we went out. We started listening to them again lately, and there is one from Omaha, Nebraska, that is just over the top good. We're seriously thinking about mixing that and putting it out on a CD at some point and maybe even doing some more touring in the next couple of years.

MR: Now that you are your own company, you kind of don't have to rely on the music industry.

RS: Nope. And, as you know, the music industry has really changed since 1996. I mean, the brick and mortar stores are becoming dinosaurs, you know? It's so sad seeing the bookstores that also sold music going out of business and record stores that sold all kinds of music over the last 25 years going out of business because of the Internet and the freedom to download music illegally. That sucks for people like me. I also don't feel like I'm owed music for free, you know? I don't feel like I'm supposed to get it for free, I believe I should have to pay for it. But hey, that's not the younger generation--kids think that they deserve it and that they should be able to get it for free and that's okay. But if they were songwriters and trying to make a living off of this, they might see it a little differently. It really is just a different time than 10 or 12 years ago when I first started my label.

MR: Very true. Is there any advice you would give to a new artist?

RS: Just try to be honest to yourself and to the music. Don't be a copy, try to be an original because there are a lot of copies out there. I believe that God is the giver of gifts and if he loves snowflakes enough to make every snowflake different, then he must love music enough to want the same diversity. We all have our own song to sing and our own songs that are born out of us, so try to be an original. I really try to encourage all young people to do that. Also, make sure you're getting into the industry for the right reasons. Don't do this just to win awards and get on TV. The love of the music is what brought me to Nashville originally and I've been playing since 1959. My dad bought me my first mandolin when I was five. I have loved music all my life and I grew up respecting it, loving it, and playing it not just to make money, though I did start to see that I was making money at an early age and maybe part of that is what kept me into it--thinking that I could potentially do it to make a living. Getting into it for the right thing is the main thing.

MR: Your reward came partly as 14 Grammys, 8 or so ACMs, and winning awards wasn't even the goal.

RS: That's right. I never set out to win awards and I'm always grateful when I get one. As a matter of fact, the Inspirational Country Music Association just awarded us with Entertainer of the Year and Musician of the Year not too long ago in Nashville. I told them that I knew that there were musicians that are musicians much better than me that deserve this much more than me. I just try to entertain folks with the music. I don't consider myself a big concert act, I'm really more of an artist that likes to play in front of people and hopefully they'll enjoy it.

MR: You also worked with some other incredible artists like Emmylou Harris as a part of the Hot Band, didn't you?

RS: I did, yeah. That was August 1979 through August of 1980 when I came to Nashville.

MR: What do you think when you look back on your career?

RS: Well, I've been in a lot of good situations at the right time. There have been a lot of good things that have happened for me...doors were swung wide open. Getting to be a part of Emmylou's band and those records were a really good thing for me. She let me sing on some of her records and she had a lot of fans that heard me for the very first time through those. I will always be grateful to her for giving me the chance that she did. I've also had a chance to do a lot of production work. I produced Dolly Parton's White Limousine record and that was a blast. I've even hosted some TV shows. It's been a lot of fun and I've really had a wonderful life, especially getting to be on stage with Bill Monroe when I was six years old, with Flatt & Skruggs when I was seven, and The Stanley Brothers before I was ten. Those three bands were really the cornerstones of what I play today. I love gospel music and God has been so good to me that there's no way I wouldn't love music about him. I'm just really grateful for the life that I've had. It's been an absolutely wonderful life and I'm more excited about music at age 57 than I was at 27, I really am. I don't know what the future holds, but I know who holds it and I'm excited about it.

2011-11-30-61s8FCuz0BL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

MR: Beautiful. Okay, so the holidays are coming up, and I also wanted us to chat about your album A Skaggs Family Christmas, Vol. 2, that you did with The Whites. This is a follow up to your 2005 Christmas album, right?

RS: Yeah, it is. Our kids were pretty young in 2005--they were early to mid-teens. Now, Molly is 27 and Luke is 22 and they're both very much a part of Volume 2. They've grown and matured as singers and musicians. They're very strong on this record. And with this one, you also get a DVD that we shot live at the Ryman Auditorium two years ago. It's beautifully edited and shot in HD, and mixed at my studio. It's a great Christmas gift and you get both things with the purchase of the album. We're really excited about it and looking forward to touring with it. We're gonna be going through Clemson, South Carolina, Charlottesville, Virginia, Knoxville, Tennessee, Wabash, Indiana, Franklin, North Carolina, and some others. It'll be a really great time, and people can find out the rest of our tour times and locations on our website.

MR: One of the more interesting tracks is your live a cappella version of "The First Noel."

RS: Yeah, that's from the DVD. That is so pretty...it really came out great. I was in bad voice that night and somehow, I was still able to make it through that song. We shot that at the end of the tour and our last show was there in Nashville at the Ryman and I got a bad case of the sniffles and my throat was all sore. Thank goodness we were able to do a few overdubs and fix a few things.

MR: It really is beautiful. Ricky, thank you so much for spending time with us and Happy Holidays!

RS: Thank you so much, Mike! It was great talking to you, and I hope you have a great holiday season.

Country Hits Bluegrass Style Tracks:
Heartbroke
Honey (Open That Door)
You've Got A Lover
Cajun Moon
Crying My Heart Out Over You
He Was On To Something (So He Made You)
Highway 40 Blues
Uncle Pen
Lovin' Only Me
I Don't Care
Country Boy
I Wouldn't Change You If I Could
Don't Get Above Your Raising
Somebody's Prayin'

A Skaggs Family Christmas Volume Two Tracks:
Christmas Time's A Coming
Light of the Stable
The First Noel
What Songs Were Sung
Silent Night
Flight to Egypt
Reunion Song
Children Go
Joy to the World
Oh Come, Oh Come, Emmanuel

Transcribed by Evan Martin


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photo courtesy of The Hit Men

THE HIT MEN HIT CHRISTMAS

The Hit Men--the new SuperGroup made up of the original performing and recording members of mega-star acts including Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, Tommy James and the Shondells, The Critters, Carly Simon, Cat Stevens, Jim Croce and more--have debuted their yuletide track "A Four Seasons Christmas" exclusively here. This is a special medley created by The Hit Men featuring beloved holiday songs performed in the style of The Four Seasons. These six amazing performers, musicians, arrangers and composers--whose friendship dates back over 50 years--have reunited to go out on tour again, reliving the magic they created on stages around the world and in recording studios years ago. The Hit Men are currently on tour with a pit stop this weekend at The Tilles Center in Long Island, NY.

The Hit Men - A Four Seasons Christmas by The MuseBox

Hey, you can "Like" them at Facebook.com/thehitmenlive


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A Conversation with Kip Moore

Mike Ragogna: Kip, your new album is titled Drive Me Crazy and you're driving like crazy on your tour right now.

Kip Moore: Since March, and it's just now winding down. At one point in the last three months, I have seen my house only five or six days. It's pretty extensive and it's beating me up pretty bad, but it's what it takes trying to get as many people as we can. This is what it takes in these beginning stages trying to get as many people to hear what we're doing.

MR: Well, it seems that the press and gossip about Kip Moore is pretty good so far.

KM: I hope that's the case, Michael. It's feeling good, man. We're seeing more and more people coming from long hauls just to see the opening set. In some parts of the country, there is a cool, underground scene happening, and it's cool.

MR: You're from Georgia, right?

KM: Yeah. Tifton, Georgia.

MR: And you came into music not only through the country genre. Can we talk about some of your influences and also your talented family?

KM: My mom was an amazing piano player, she played organ in the church. Then she decided to quite and teach piano lessons at the house, so there were always people coming in and out. She was a dour Christian woman, at the same time she was a fanatic for Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings, these outlaw country guys; it was pretty crazy. She had a really cool side to her. When she would take us on these long trips to Mississippi to see my grandparents, she would wear out these Red Headed Stranger records. My dad was totally on the rock 'n' roll side. We would go fishing and drive to the gulf and he would play Springsteen, Jackson Browne and Bob Seeger. It was that stuff over and over. I had a love for both. I definitely felt like Springsteen and those guys had such a huge impact on my songwriting and the way I looked at things.

MR: Let's get into that because this mix of influences was pretty obvious on your single "Marry Was A Marrying Kind." Your style is a mix of country and genuine rock making you an anomaly in country music right now. And if you were paid by the word, you would be a millionaire.

KM: Thank you man, I really appreciate that. We really worked hard on trying to create something really unique. I'm just so anxious for people to get into the depth of the rest of this album, like "Crazy One More Time" and "Hey Pretty Girl" and songs that I'm really proud of. I think it's going to make people feel something, and that's what listening to those old records did to me. They move me and they make me feel something, and I really want to bring that to people. So many times, we just hear songs and it's a formula and it's a song, but I really want to get to move people and it might be different for each person.

MR: And with a song like "Somethin' 'Bout A Truck," you do broaden your audience.

KM: I'm getting a lot of posts on my Facebook and Twitter saying, "I don't like country, but I'm loving this"...it's a neat thing to see. I wrote that song with Dan Couch, we wrote most of the record, and we've got five or six cuts on that record together. We had already gotten done writing a song and he was about to walk out the door. We had just got done talking about when my dad let me hold that truck, how I had this little beat up car and I was hanging out with girls who didn't seem too into me, then I picked her up in that truck and picked up a whole other woman. I threw the keys to my dad when I came home and said, "Damn dad, there's something about a truck." Right when I said that, he was walking out the door and said, "We've got to write that right now." It was about five o' clock and (Dan) had to be home, and he called his wife and told her we had to write something else. We sat there for another few hours and that's what came out.

MR: What's also great about "...Truck" are the different levels of meaning you can go to with that song.

KM: Yeah, that was a fun day in the room where we just kept playing with each verse and building it. The beauty of writing with someone like Dan is that there are great songwriters in this town, and I would never discredit any of them, but sometimes, the guys that are so used to getting cuts have this formula. They stick to this formula really tight, and if I had been in the studio with a big songwriter, they would have been scared about the way we did four verses before we hit the chorus. With a guy like Dan, he trusts me, and he was like, "Yeah man, lets do something different." So, we just kept playing off the words and it's the way we went with it.

MR: You also have to give MCA a pat on the back for allowing you to do a record like that.

KM: I can't stress that enough, what you just touched on. Luke Lewis, who's the president of the label, I've grown to love this dude. He's the coolest cat, and he's an old school guy. When we went to make this record, he sat me down and with his staff, he said, "Man, I love what you do. I love your demos and I love how you approach this whole thing. You go make the record you want to make. Cut the songs you want to cut, and hell, I'll let you pick the first single." I can't think of anybody else that would have done this with a brand new artist.

MR: Yeah, Luke is very intuitive about records, and Lost Highway has been built around some of his greatest risks. So, you also crossed paths with Scott Stepakoff, Westin Davis, and Keifer Thompson.

KM: Me and Keifer used to write constantly together. We wrote for three years before he got his record deal for Thompson Square. We would talk each other off the ledge, and we would constantly be saying, "Man, I don't know if this is going to happen for us." We kept each other's spirits up, and we both found it at about the same time, which was a neat thing.

MR: It's nice that you have both a crew and a support system.

KM: It's great and all of us came up together. I've got to give it to my boss Brett James, who's one of the biggest songwriters in the world. He's a star. He could see what we were doing was a unique thing, and he didn't try to put me in the room with big time songwriters. He said, "I love what you guys are doing, and I want you to keep doing that." When I said I didn't want to go write with these big writers, he understood, and we kept this little nucleus like that in the office.

MR: You've been songwriting for a while, yet this is your debut album.

KM: I'm new to the listener, lets put it that way. I've been in town for nine years, and even before that, I was playing the bar band scene in South Georgia for a long time.

MR: You also were playing as a Point Guard for Wallace State.

KM: Yeah, I love Basketball, it was my first love even before I started playing music. I did that until I was 20 years old. I still love to play. I love basketball.

MR: Do you find yourself doing a little one on one on the road?

KM: Yeah, I've been hearing about how good Tim McGraw is, I'm anxious to do a little trash talking to him one day on the road. We're going to have to wheel out the goals, and I'm going to have to put some tight lock defense on him. (laughs)

MR: Putting the tight lock defense on him for some charity game, right?

KM: (laughs) Exactly.

MR: Let's talk about the song "Mary Was The Marrying Kind." It's a lyrical gem, can you go into the story of that one?

KM: Yeah, Dan Couch and I were in the room with Scott Stepakoff one day, and we had been banging around on that rhythm. I had that opening riff the whole day, and we probably wrote five songs over that before it came out. Throughout the day, I had mentioned that I went home and ran into a girl I haven't seen in six or seven years, who I went to high school with. In High School, she was one of those girls that just slipped through the cracks. You would see her go through the hall and you never really noticed her. She always hid her head down and was mild-mannered and meek. Then, fast forward six years later to a party I was at when I was back home, she was amazing. Not only was she beautiful but she was smart, funny, charming, and witty. She had grown into her figure and she became confident, and had a great job. There was such a charisma about her, and I really wanted to kick myself in the ass for not noticing that at that age, along with all of my other friends. I think that's just part of growing up.

MR: Sometimes gratitude and things like that slip by.

KM: You look at different things when you're younger.

MR: And it seems Kip Moore played the Grand Ole Opry.

KM: I did and it was a pretty special experience.

MR: What was it like?

KM: It was me, Little Big Town, Keith Urban, it was an eclectic bunch. When I first moved to town, the Grand Ole Opry was one of the first places I went to within two weeks of being there. I moved to town by myself, I didn't know anybody. I was sitting in the back with an usher named Goldie, an older woman, and we got to cracking up, she was really funny. Towards the end of the night, I told Goldie that one day, I was going to play on this stage. She laughed and she said, "Sure you are." When I got to finally step on that stage--and they have that old piece of the original Opry where you stand--you could feel the presence which was eerie and it was intimidating, nerve wracking, and it was so many things all in one. When I walked out, people still didn't really know me yet, and it was kind of dead silence. You get such a humbling feeling from who's been there before you. I haven't been nervous playing a gig in a long time, and that got my blood pumping really hard.

MR: You've now become part of a great country tradition by playing there.

KM: They have all of the pictures on the wall of everybody who's been in the room you've been in. They have all of that kind of stuff. I'm a music buff, I grew up listening to all kinds of music, and I have such an appreciation for it. Just to get the chance to play there was an honor.

MR: Speaking about honor, you must feel honored that at some point, Robert Oermann said he'd been looking for the link between rock, singer-songwriter and country, and apparently, it's you.

KM: Man, I read that article and I had a great time hanging with Robert, but I had no idea he was going to say something like that about me after he got my record. I didn't even know what to say, I've seen him also say the opposite to people. (laughs) I've seen the other side of the articles where it's been pretty brutally honest. I didn't know what he was going to say, but it was flattering. I was completely humbled by what he said about my record.

MR: That's what you get with passionate people. They don't have filters so they just tell the truth.

KM: That's what I got from him. Even for how long he's been in this business, you get the sense the minute you sit with him how passionate he is about what he does, and how bad he wants to hear the music he wants to hear.

MR: Robert is awesome, absolutely. You also have the song "Drive Me Crazy," which kind of sets up the theme of the album.

KM: Yeah, "Drive Me Crazy" is about those teen years for me, and I'm sure so many others. You're so confused who you are and you're trying to figure yourself out. I just lost my dad recently, and looking back--I was talking to my brother last night--in my teen years, I can remember so many times where we would argue and I would butt heads with him, but all he was trying to do was talk to me. I was so stubborn and stuck in my own ways that I couldn't see that at the time. I wish I could go back and mend that whole thing. That's what that song means to me when I wrote it. It might come across as something different to somebody else, but for me, it's about two teens who find refuge in each other. That was what it was with me and this girl. She had to grow up fast and pay the bills and take care of her family at an early age. I was just always angry about certain stuff, trying to figure my own self out. When we got together it was one big fire, we released all of our frustration and we talked about life. That's what we had for each other, we were each other's refuge and release point.

MR: I want to ask you about a couple of these "intros" to your songs. They seem to be a part of the song and yet separate.

KM: We had that on almost all of them, but we had to cut some out because we thought we were getting a little too crazy on it. I felt when people used to buy records, it was an experience, it was an all day event, at least it was for me. I know that times have changed, but I wanted to try to make it possible as much as I could, at least the first time around when you heard this record. So, we made these long intros and these vibe setups to the songs.

MR: What songs are your favorite and what are the stories behind them?

KM: For me, "Hey Pretty Girl" was one of the most special tracks on the record. For me, I've been rambling now for a long time and I've moved a lot of different places by myself. I lived in Hawaii for a long time in this little hut, surfed all of the time, backpacked and worked little odd jobs, then I moved to Nashville. With me spending that much time by myself and coming from a big family, it made me that way. I desired to get my own time because there were so many people trying to get a word in, I kind of grew up that way. With the job I have now, I'm always on the go, always on the run, and settling down is not really in the cards right now. I do know myself enough though to know that I'm going to desire. I think that's how we're all made, and it's how we were all created. You want to go through life with somebody at some point and have somebody to lean on. That's what I was thinking the day I wrote "Hey Pretty Girl." It's one of those things for me that's more of an idealistic standpoint--that one day, this is how I hope to feel about somebody, and this is the way I like to go through life with somebody.

MR: And there's "Still Growing Up." Do you feel like you're still growing up at 31?

KM: Man, I might still be growing up by the time I'm 50. I'm still figuring it all out and having a good time.

MR: I think the concept of growing up and becoming an adult doesn't really exist anymore.

KM: I want to always have that youthful spirit about me, I think that's the only way to go through life. I hope I never have to lose that.

MR: We talked about your dad earlier, and as we've been talking, I've been reflecting about it. From his end, having loved you as he did, it was probably the same thing going on, maybe some frustration with the events not the son.

KM: I'm sure it was. We never really talked about it, I got along with him as a kid too. I just had a lot of moments where we really clashed. As I got older, I learned to accept how he was and I learned to just diffuse it if we began to clash. I would make a joke, we would laugh, and everything would be fine. We got super close as we got older, we all did. We learned to appreciate who he was so much. He was a rough and rugged and a very blunt man. He said what was on his mind; as a kid, sometimes that's hard to take. As I got older, I learned to appreciate that. There was also an understood thing. I knew that he cared about me and I knew he wanted the best for me.

MR: When you're a father, you feel like you have to be rough with your boys a little. Also kids idolize their parents so much, that when they start growing up, they realize that they have faults too, and it's sometimes hard to cope with.

KM: You're so right. I'm very fortunate to have a dad like him for as long as I did. He molded me to the man I am now, so I'm thankful for him.

MR: Can you go into "Still Growing Up" a little more?

KM: Earlier, we were talking about how I don't want to lose that youthful spirit. This also being my debut record, I need to let some people in to me growing up, also letting people in on my life a little bit. I wanted to make it pretty true to me growing up as a kid, not being scared to even be a little offensive to people. I get so tired about how now, people get so politically correct that they say, 'He can't say that in a song." Even if you mention you had a couple of beers in a field somewhere, they say you can't say that in a song. I think, "Why," because that's the way teenagers grow up. You sneak a couple of beers or whatever, that's part of the growing up process, we do dumb things as kids.

MR: That gets folks in trouble sometimes, telling the truth like you did.

KM: Yeah, I'm going to be hurting some people's ears with that song. They're going to try and cover their kid's ears up. I just wanted to write a record that was true to me and I didn't really factor in if it was going to bother somebody. I wanted to say this is the music I want to do, and hoping that there is a crowd that will like it.

MR: Can we talk about one last song, "Faith When I Fall"?

KM: It was one of the songs where I had been in town eight and a half years before I was offered a record deal, I was a songwriter before I got the record deal. You're used to getting your teeth kicked in around town forever, it's a hard road. I lived in a lot of dumps. It's been a hard road to get to this point, and I'm still climbing, but I wrote this song the day after I got offered this record deal by MCA and it was an emotional day for me. Knowing my personality, I got to that point, and I was wanting to get to the next point. That's what the song is about, it's about having faith in whatever you're doing in life, just having faith and believing you're going to get to the next place.

MR: What advice do you have for new artists?

KM: Don't let anybody tell you "no." That's my advice, and stick to your guns, and hold yourself to the highest standard you can possibly hold yourself and people will take notice.

MR: Is there one thing we need to know about Kip Moore?

KM: I'm a huge advocate for wine. I love wine. Lets go with that.

MR: (laughs) Okay, and thanks so much, Kip. All the best.

KM: Thank you, Michael.

Tracks:
1 Drive Me Crazy
2 Mary Was the Marrying Kind
3 Somethin' 'Bout A Truck
4 Up All Night
5 Crazy One More Time
6 Everything But You (Intro)
7 Everything But You
8 Still Growin' Up
9 Hey Pretty Girl
10 Motorcycle
11 Where You Are Tonight
12 Faith When I Fall (Intro)
13 Faith When I Fall

Transcribed by Theo Shier

STOCKING STUFFERS

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Billy Joel - The Complete Albums Collection

This is a beautiful box, a staple even for a casual Billy Joel fan. It contains every studio album from Cold Spring Harbor through Fantasies & Delusions (including Songs In The Attic), all beautifully remastered as mini-albums with original artwork used for the jackets. Two elegant booklets feature the lyrics, rare pictures, and a pretty revealing Q&A by Steve Morris (I'm jealous). It also sports a rarities CD that is a gem, culling all of the stray cats Billy's released over the years as b-sides, etc. If there was one quibble, it's that the live albums were left out, but who knows, maybe The Complete Live Box is in the works, which would also make a nice future stocking stuffer (hear that Sony?). Considering this is all material that's been previously released, The Complete Albums Collection is the perfect overview of an important pop singer-songwriter who very rarely gets his due.

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Follow Mike Ragogna on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ragz2008

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mike-ragogna/the-hit-men-hit-christmas_b_1119659.html

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Atlas V Seeks NASA Man Rating Certification to Launch Commercial Spacecraft (ContributorNetwork)

The Atlas V has racked up another launch success with its lofting of the Curiosity Mars rover toward the Red Planet. Shortly, though, the launch vehicle may be tasked with a new mission, to launch manned space craft.

What is the Atlas V?

The Atlas V, along with the Delta IV, was developed under the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle program by Lockheed Martin to be a launch vehicle for commercial, NASA, and defense department payloads. Its first launch was on Aug. 21, 2002. Except for an anomaly that occurred on June 15, 2007, in which an engine shut down early, the Atlas V has had a complete success record in almost 30 launches.

The Atlas V comes in a variety of versions, depending on the size of the payload fairing (4 or 5 meters), the number of solid rocket boosters attached, and the type of upper stage Centaur rocket is used. The first two stages are powered by an RD-180 engine. The Centaur upper stage is powered by a RL10A engine.

The Atlas V has lofted a number of notable payloads, including the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Juno Jupiter orbiter, the New Horizons Pluto flyby probe, and the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbit, as well as a number of military and commercial satellites.

Why man rate the Atlas V?

Under the commercial crew program designed to create private space craft, only SpaceX, with its Falcon 9, has its own launch vehicles. The other participants, Boeing, SpaceDev, and Blue Origin, are looking at commercially available launch vehicles to loft their proposed spacecraft to low Earth orbit. The Atlas V is one of the launch vehicles being looked at for that purpose.

What does it mean to man rate a launch vehicle?

What makes a launch vehicle "man rated" is a subject of great argument in aerospace circles. It is generally defined as making a launch vehicle safe for human use. NASA's requirements for man rating a launch vehicle are quite stringent, requiring a reduction in the possibility of catastrophic failure, an elimination of the possibility of human error, and a reduction of crew workload (i.e. events during launch that would contribute to the fatigue of the astronauts) to what it regards as an acceptable level.

How would an Atlas V be certified as man rated?

A study conducted by NASA rejected a modified version of the Atlas V to launch the Orion space craft into low Earth orbit due to the existence of "black zones" or periods in which an abort would be impossible during a launch. Subsequent studies by Lockheed Martin suggested that a lighter space craft, on the order of those planned by the participants in the commercial crew program, would eliminate those black zones entirely.

The Atlas V's near perfect launch record gives it an inside track to gaining the coveted man rating certification. The adding of an emergency detection system as well as proven escape systems for the space craft payloads is the major milestone to getting that certification.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times and The Weekly Standard.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/space/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111127/us_ac/10535113_atlas_v_seeks_nasa_man_rating_certification_to_launch_commercial_spacecraft

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MOTOACTV review

MOTOACTV

Oh, hello, Moto.

When Motorola announced the MOTOACTV, I really didn't know that to think. An Android-based fitness tracker? Aren't there much cheaper apps for that sort of thing? Then the specs came out and it sounded kind of cool. Still, a phone can do everything the MOTOACTV can.

So what makes the MOTOACTV special? Is it as useful as Motorola purports it to be, or is it another passing fad in the Android world, destined to be dead on arrival, another product to waste away at the bottom of the bargain bin?

I've got an idea, so saddle up, partner, cause you're about to find out.

The Good

It's small, light, and built like a tank. There's no doubts Motorola built the MOTOACTV to be just that, and it'll hang with you no matter the terrain, every step of the way. The web portal is well thought out, too, and really adds something to the experience.

The Bad

In typical Motorola fashion, the MOTOACTV really wants to play nice with Motorola equipment, nothing else. The pedometer adds steps when you swing your arm (even if you're not walking), and the numbers it gives you are inconsistent with apps that track the same activity. Setup is clunky.

Conclusion

Motorola went out on a limb with the MOTOACTV, so it deserves credit for that. The so-so battery life, fairly locked-down environment, and questionable results all make me wonder if the MOTOACTV is as good as Moto hoped it would be.

Inside this review

More info

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/jcD0v9ZgWhw/story01.htm

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Students say they were questioned before NC flight

Students from the United Arab Emirates were taken off a Thanksgiving Day flight from Charlotte to Washington and rescreened by security, causing the flight to be delayed for more than four hours.

Three of the students told WJLA-TV in Washington (http://wj.la/vWN9fl ) they were pulled from the US Airways plane and questioned about the purpose of their trip and whether they had military training. They now want an apology.

A spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration said the US Airways pilot requested Charlotte airport police assist in removing individuals from the plane because of a perceived security concern. TSA and airport police responded and later determined the individuals did not pose any security threat.

A spokeswoman for US Airways declined to comment about the nature or origin of the security concern.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45437355/ns/us_news/

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95% Moneyball

Billy Beane: There are rich teams, there are poor teams, then there's fifty feet of crap, and then there's us.Moneyball is a solid triple base hit. It isn't quite a home run, but has the right players and the right manager to get the job done. Lets start with the best player, Brad Pitt, who gives a terrific performance here, and is what makes the film so effective. I feel that I must batter-up Jonah Hill, who I thought did a super job transferring from Comedy to Drama and plays his role subtly and professionally. This had such a Social Network feel to it (especially since Fincher's Dragon Tattoo trailer was before it), since it was written by Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zaillian. Learning about Billy Beane has never been more exciting, and director Bennett Miller makes the experience of Moneyball quite exhilarating.Moneyball is a true story, based on a novel with the same name by Michael Lewis, chronicling the life of Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics. At this point in Billy's life, his team is handicapped with the lowest salary in baseball. To get his team back on top and to the world series, he must find a competitive advantage for his team to win games. So instead of physically training and working with the players, Beane, along with his new assistant Peter Brand (Jonah Hill), they use statistical data to manage the players' value to guarantee wins, and change the game forever.First things first; Moneyball is not meant to be for fans of baseball, it may be a tad more beneficial to them, but this is a film for anyone who is at all interested in an inspirational sports film, with Brad Pitt. Moneyball looks fantastic. The cinematography is handled very diligently by Wally Pfister; who does quite a decent job putting the audience in the world of baseball, and all of the game scenes are lighted perfectly and with high intelligence. You can tell a lot of input was put into this, considering this film has been in post-production for quite awhile until it was finally released.In a film like this, it's important to keep your audience interested and eager for a second viewing; while it doesn't quite play well on that second reason, this is a very interesting story. Prior to going into this, I had no knowledge of who Billy Beane was or what he did for the game of baseball (which is generally the tactic I use when going into a film I'm excited about), and judging from the trailers, I thought he was an antagonist. Boy, was I incorrect to make that assumption. Beane is surprisingly a good guy, and it's time to bring up the man who was Beane, Brad Pitt.In my opinion, this is probably Pitt's most contained performance yet. It's not his best (see Fight Club or Benjamin Button), but it is quite impressive. What makes the atmosphere of his performance unique from all of his other roles is how low-key he played it. I don't know much about Billy Beane, but it seemed only fitting that Pitt would take on another tough role. Regardless, I still found it low-key and different from his usual bad-ass type roles, which was nice for a change, and I think might be in the running for [another] Academy Award. Aside from Pitt, I enjoyed the performances from Jonah Hill and Philip Seymour Hoffman, who were both very effective in their roles.I wouldn't classify myself as an avid baseball lover or watcher (I'm a pretty big fan of the Chicago Cubs), but I am known from time to time to tune in to a game. For me, baseball is a bit uninteresting to watch all the way through (one of the many reasons why I was skeptical about seeing this), but I found myself fascinated all the way through Moneyball. It put a "twist" on the game, adding a little Social Network-statistic-type mumbo jumbo in. You also have to admire the chutzpah that screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network) holds to keep tackling such complex subjects, and succeeding each time.The film was directed by Brett Ratner, who has directed some pretty big blockbuster hits such as the Rush Hour trilogy and X-Men: The Last Stand as well as the upcoming Tower Heist. Looking at those titles, it seems that Ratner can direct anything. He goes from buddy-cop to superheroes to baseball. Now do I think he is a good director? Yes, I do. Regardless of his few failed attempts of what's considered a "good" movie, I've always enjoyed his work, and Moneyball is definitely his most effective film in terms of drama and how it is shot.There was but one fatal flaw that kept me from giving this flick a perfect rating, and that is the replay value. I can't imagine myself viewing this multiple times, which is odd, because I've seen Fincher's The Social Network 20-30 times tops. Nevertheless, even for an individual viewing, Moneyball is worth seeing due to it's stellar performances, interesting plot, solid direction, and a magnificent script from Aaron Sorkin. Moneyball is not a home run, but it sure does swing for the fences.

July 3, 2011

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/moneyball/

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How much crazier can Black Friday get?

A Black Friday shopper takes a rest with purchases at Northpark Mall in Ridgeland, Miss., on Friday, Nov. 25, 2011. (AP Photo/The Clarion-Ledger, Vickie D. King) NO SALES

A Black Friday shopper takes a rest with purchases at Northpark Mall in Ridgeland, Miss., on Friday, Nov. 25, 2011. (AP Photo/The Clarion-Ledger, Vickie D. King) NO SALES

A consumer rests herself and her bags in Herald Square during the busiest shopping day of the year, Friday, Nov. 25, 2011, in New York. Some of the nation's major chain stores opened late Thursday, competing for holiday shoppers on the notoriously busy Black Friday to kick off a period that is crucial for the retail industry. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

Black Friday shoppers line up outside of a Kmart store in Salem, Ore., early Friday, Nov. 25, 2011. (AP Photo/Statesman-Journal, Timothy J. Gonzalez)

This photo provided by the Maricopa County Sheriff?s Office, shows Jerald Allen Newman, 54, after his arrest Thursday, Nov. 24, 2011, at a Walmart store in Buckeye, Ariz. Buckeye police are coming under fire for a video posted online Friday that shows Newman on the floor of the store with a bloody face after police took him to the ground. Police say he was resisting arrest but his wife and witnesses say he was just trying to protect his grandson during a chaotic rush for discounted video games. (AP Photo/Maricopa County Sheriff's Office)

Black Friday shoppers take a rest at Westfield Galleria at Roseville in Sacramento, Calif., on Friday, Nov. 25, 2011. (AP Photo/The Sacramento Bee, Hector Amezcua) MAGS OUT; TV OUT; MANDATORY CREDIT

(AP) ? Pepper-sprayed customers, smash-and-grab looters and bloody scenes in the shopping aisles. How did Black Friday devolve into this?

As reports of shopping-related violence rolled in this week from Los Angeles to New York, experts say a volatile mix of desperate retailers and cutthroat marketing has hyped the traditional post-Thanksgiving sales to increasingly frenzied levels. With stores opening earlier, bargain-obsessed shoppers often are sleep-deprived and short-tempered. Arriving in darkness, they also find themselves vulnerable to savvy parking-lot muggers.

Add in the online-coupon phenomenon, which feeds the psychological hunger for finding impossible bargains, and you've got a recipe for trouble, said Theresa Williams, a marketing professor at Indiana University.

"These are people who should know better and have enough stuff already," Williams said. "What's going to be next year, everybody getting Tasered?"

Across the country on Thursday and Friday, there were signs that tensions had ratcheted up a notch or two, with violence resulting in several instances.

A woman turned herself in to police after allegedly pepper-spraying 20 other customers at a Los Angeles-area Walmart on Thursday in what investigators said was an attempt to get at a crate of Xbox video game consoles. In Kinston, N.C., a security guard also pepper-sprayed customers seeking electronics before the start of a midnight sale.

In New York, crowds reportedly looted a clothing store in Soho. At a Walmart near Phoenix, a man was bloodied while being subdued by police officer on suspicion of shoplifting a video game. There was a shooting outside a store in San Leandro, Calif., shots fired at a mall in Fayetteville, N.C. and a stabbing outside a store in Sacramento, N.Y.

"The difference this year is that instead of a nice sweater you need a bullet proof vest and goggles," said Betty Thomas, 52, who was shopping Saturday with her sisters and a niece at Crabtree Valley Mall in Raleigh, N.C.

The wave of violence revived memories of the 2008 Black Friday stampede that killed an employee and put a pregnant woman in the hospital at a Walmart on New York's Long Island. Walmart spokesman Greg Rossiter said Black Friday 2011 was safe at most of its nearly 4,000 U.S. stores despite "a few unfortunate incidents."

Black Friday ? named that because it puts retailers "in the black" ? has become more intense as companies compete for customers in a weak economy, said Jacob Jacoby, an expert on consumer behavior at New York University.

The idea of luring in customers with a few "doorbuster" deals has long been a staple of the post-Thanksgiving sales. But now stores are opening earlier, and those deals are getting more extreme, he said.

"There's an awful lot of psychology going on here," Jacoby said. "There's the notion of scarcity ? when something's scarce it's more valued. And a resource that can be very scarce is time: If you don't get there in time, it's going to be gone."

There's also a new factor, Williams said: the rise of coupon websites like Groupon and LivingSocial, the online equivalents of doorbusters that usually deliver a single, one-day offer with savings of up to 80 percent on museum tickets, photo portraits, yoga classes and the like.

The services encourage impulse buying and an obsession with bargains, Williams said, while also getting businesses hooked on quick infusions of customers.

"The whole notion of getting a deal, that's all we've seen for the last two years," Williams said. "It's about stimulating consumers' quick reactions. How do we get their attention quickly? How do we create cash flow for today?"

To grab customers first, some stores are opening late on Thanksgiving Day, turning bargain-hunting from an early-morning activity into an all-night slog, said Ed Fox, a marketing professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Midnight shopping puts everyone on edge and also makes shoppers targets for muggers, he said.

In fact, robbery appeared to be the motive behind the shooting in San Leandro, about 15 miles east of San Francisco. Police said robbers shot a victim as he was walking to a car with his purchases around 1:45 a.m. on Friday.

"There are so many hours now where people are shopping in the darkness that it provides cover for people who are going to try to steal or rob those who are out in numbers," Fox said.

The violence has prompted some analysts to wonder if the sales are worth it, and what solutions might work.

In a New York Times column this week, economist Robert Frank proposed slapping a 6 percent sales tax on purchases between 6 p.m. on Thanksgiving and 6 a.m. on Friday in an attempt to stop the "arms race" of earlier and earlier sales.

Small retailers, meanwhile, are pushing so-called Small Business Saturday to woo customers who are turned off by the Black Friday crush. President Barack Obama even joined in, going book shopping on Saturday at a small bookstore a few blocks from the White House.

"A lot of retailers, independent retailers, are making the conscious decision to not work those crazy hours," said Patricia Norins, a retail consultant for American Express.

Next up is Cyber Monday, when online retailers put their wares on sale. But on Saturday many shoppers said they still prefer buying at the big stores, despite the frenzy.

Thomas said she likes the time with her sisters and the hustle of the mall too much to stay home and just shop online.

To her, the more pressing problem was that the Thanksgiving weekend sales didn't seem very good.

"If I'm going to get shot, at least let me get a good deal," Thomas said.

___

Associated Press Writers Julie Walker in New York, Christina Rexrode in Raleigh, N.C., John C. Rogers in Los Angeles and Terry Tang in Phoenix contributed to this report

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2011-11-26-Black%20Friday-What's%20To%20Blame?%203rd%20Ld-Writethru/id-77a65dea90c64931b64c29feeb91ff0f

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Zazoo Photo Clock Review

I am guessing pretty almost every parent has had a moment where your little one has decided to wake just at the sight of sunlight in the morning, ready to take on the day hours before you would like him or her up. ?Zazoo Kids has created the Zazoo Photo Clock to help alleviate some [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2011/11/25/zazoo-photo-clock-review/

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