India Takes Aim at Poverty With Cash Transfer Program

Manish Swarup/Associated PressPoor and homeless people waited for food on Tuesday at a New Delhi temple. NEW DELHI — India has more poor people than any nation on earth, but many of its antipoverty programs end up feeding the rich more than the needy. A new program hopes to change that. On Jan. 1, India eliminated a raft of bureaucratic middlemen by depositing government pension and scholarship...

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Ohio sheriff confronts protesters in football rape case

STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (Reuters) – A county sheriff under fire for how he has handled a high school rape investigation faced down a raucous crowd of protesters on Saturday and said no further suspects would be charged in a case that has rattled Ohio football country.Ma’lik Richmond and Trenton Mays, both 16 and members of the Steubenville High School football team, are charged with raping a 16-year-old...

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Bethenny Frankel Divorcing Jason Hoppy

By Sarah Michaud 01/05/2013 at 05:00 PM EST Bethenny Frankel and Jason Hoppy Albert Michael/Startraks It's official – Bethenny Frankel and Jason Hoppy's marriage is over.Having announced a separation over the holidays, the reality star began the divorce process...

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FDA: New rules will make food safer

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration says its new guidelines would make the food Americans eat safer and help prevent the kinds of foodborne disease outbreaks that sicken or kill thousands of consumers each year.The rules, the most sweeping food safety guidelines in decades, would require farmers to take new precautions against contamination, to include making sure workers' hands are...

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Girl found dead in snow after casino New Year's Eve party

After days of searching, the body of a teenager missing since New Year’s Eve was found in the snow near South Lake Tahoe.Authorities said there was no evidence of foul play but stressed the investigation was continuing.Alyssa Byrne, 19, went to the Snow Globe Music Festival in South Lake Tahoe on Monday night and hadn't been seen since."Our preliminary investigation with this morning's discovery,...

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Afghanistan Releases Detainees Ahead of Trip by Karzai to Washington

KABUL, Afghanistan — Just ahead of a trip to Washington by President Hamid Karzai, the Afghan government released 80 detainees on Friday, part of a continuing effort to assert its sovereignty over the contentious issue of how prisoners are handled. American officials have long complained that the Afghans release prisoners too soon, raising the risk that many will return to the battlefield....

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“GameStick” Will Be the Size of a USB Memory Stick, Plug into Your TV

When the Ouya game console (scheduled to launch in April) made headlines last year, it was for three reasons. One, its size and price — the $ 99 box, which plugs into a TV, is the size of a Rubik’s cube. Two, its choice of operating system — it runs the same Android OS which powers smartphones and tablets. And three — its rise to fame on Kickstarter, where it shattered records and received millions...

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Aww! Ava Totes Tennessee While Reese Witherspoon Snaps a Picture

Mom & Babies Celebrity Baby Blog 01/04/2013 at 05:00 PM ET Life’s a beach for Reese Witherspoon, who spend New Year’s in the sand with her family.The actress was spotted in Hawaii with husband Jim Toth, their newborn son Tennessee James, 3 months, and her elder children Deacon, 9, and Ava, 13.Witherspoon,...

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FDA proposes sweeping new food safety rules

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration on Friday proposed the most sweeping food safety rules in decades, requiring farmers and food companies to be more vigilant in the wake of deadly outbreaks in peanuts, cantaloupe and leafy greens.The long-overdue regulations are aimed at reducing the estimated 3,000 deaths a year from foodborne illness. Just since last summer, outbreaks of listeria...

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Teens drugged parents to they could use Internet

Two teenage girls were arrested in Northern California this week after they used sleeping pill-laced milkshakes to drug one girl's parents because they wouldn't let her use the Internet past 10 p.m., police said.The incident unfolded in Rocklin -- about 20 miles northwest of Sacramento -- the night of Dec. 28, when the parents fell asleep about an hour after drinking  milkshakes their...

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Attacks in Iraq Kill at Least 32 Pilgrims

BAGHDAD — Attackers killed at least 32 pilgrims in Iraq on Thursday, the police said, in what appeared to be a spate of sectarian-motivated violence as the country continued to struggle with a political crisis in its fractured government. At the culmination of one of Shiite Islam’s holiest rituals, at least 28 people were killed and 35 were wounded when a car bomb exploded in central Musayyib,...

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Samsung and Apple are still the only winners in the mobile market

The duopoly of the U.S. mobile market intensified dramatically in 2012. Despite increased efforts from Motorola, LG (066570), HTC (2498), Nokia (NOK) and Microsoft (MSFT) to gain market share, Samsung (005930) and Apple (AAPL) continue to steal customers away from every other company. During a three-month period ending in November, comScore found that Samsung’s lead in the U.S. smartphone market increased...

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Anne Hathaway Says Falling Fast for Adam Shulman Was 'Scary'

By Andrea Billups 01/03/2013 at 05:45 PM EST Adam Shulman and Anne Hathaway Dave Allocca/Startraks Anne Hathaway believes in love at first sight – in fact, she experienced it with her husband, Adam Shulman."I knew from the second I met him that he was the love...

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CDC: 1 in 24 admit nodding off while driving

NEW YORK (AP) — This could give you nightmares: 1 in 24 U.S. adults say they recently fell asleep while driving.And health officials behind the study think the number is probably higher. That's because some people don't realize it when they nod off for a second or two behind the wheel."If I'm on the road, I'd be a little worried about the other drivers," said the study's lead author, Anne Wheaton...

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Greuel faults DWP for bypassing bids on lobbying contracts

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power repeatedly bypassed its competitive bidding process when it awarded $480,000 in...

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Dozens of Syrians Killed in Explosions Around Damascus

Andoni Lubaki/Associated PressRebel fighters patrol a neighborhood in Aleppo on Wednesday. BEIRUT, Lebanon — Dozens of Syrians were killed or wounded in an explosion at a gas station east of Damascus, the Syrian capital, on Wednesday, and explosions in another Damascus suburb killed at least six people and wounded many more, including women and children, according to videos and reports from antigovernment...

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Julianne Hough: I Was Physically Abused as a Child

By Mike Fleeman 01/02/2013 at 04:45 PM EST When Julianne Hough was 10 years old, she lived in London, away from her parents in Utah, studying dance.That's when the abuse began, she says. "I was abused, mentally, physically, everything," she says in Cosmopolitan's February issue, on newsstands Jan. 8. While attending...

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Brain image study: Fructose may spur overeating

This is your brain on sugar — for real. Scientists have used imaging tests to show for the first time that fructose, a sugar that saturates the American diet, can trigger brain changes that may lead to overeating.After drinking a fructose beverage, the brain doesn't register the feeling of being full as it does when simple glucose is consumed, researchers found.It's a small study and does not prove...

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Photographer following Justin Bieber Ferrari killed

Los Angeles police said the driver who hit a photographer after the paparazzo took photos of Justin Bieber's Ferrari is not likely to face charges.The photographer died at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. A friend of the photographer told KCAL-TV Channel 9 that he was not a professional.The incident took place on Sepulveda Boulevard near Getty Center Drive shortly before 6 p.m. Tuesday....

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Kim Jong-un, North Korean Leader, Makes Overture to South

SEOUL, South Korea — The North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, called for an end to the “confrontation” with rival South Korea on Tuesday in what appeared to be an overture to the incoming South Korean president as she was cobbling together South Korea’s new policy on the North. North Korea issued a major policy statement on New Year’s Day, following a tradition set by Mr. Kim’s grandfather,...

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Jessica Simpson and Kendall & Kylie Jenner Make Readers Smile - and Frown

01/01/2013 at 07:00 PM EST Splash News Online; Michael Simon/Startraks What's on the minds of PEOPLE readers this week? We love getting your feedback, and as always, you weighed in – even while celebrating during the holidays – with plenty of reactions to all...

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Brain image study: Fructose may spur overeating

This is your brain on sugar — for real. Scientists have used imaging tests to show for the first time that fructose, a sugar that saturates the American diet, can trigger brain changes that may lead to overeating.After drinking a fructose beverage, the brain doesn't register the feeling of being full as it does when simple glucose is consumed, researchers found.It's a small study and does not prove...

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Ruling over bumper-car injury supports amusement park

SAN FRANCISCO — The California Supreme Court, protecting providers of risky recreational activities from lawsuits, decided Monday...

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