Judge orders state to pay attorney fees in drug test case

TALLAHASSEE --
Florida’s attempt to drug test employees will cost taxpayers $190,589.74 after a federal judge in Miami on Friday ordered the state to pay attorney fees in a case challenging an executive order issued by Gov. Rick Scott last year.

U.S. District Court Judge Ursula Ungaro ordered the payment to the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 79, which filed suit in May 2011. The union is plaintiff in the lawsuit challenging Scott’s ability to randomly drug tests workers in agencies his office oversees.

But Ungaro on Friday denied legal payments of $17,455 to the ACLU, which represents AFSCME in the case, saying the civil rights group was not a prevailing party and therefore was not entitled to reimbursement by the state.

In April, Ungaro ruled that Scott’s attempt to require random drug testing for tens of thousands of state workers is unconstitutional, saying Scott did not show a "compelling need" for the controversial plan.

A month later, Scott appealed to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Ungaro ruled that requiring drug tests violates the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which protects against unreasonable searches.

Scott issued the executive order last year to require drug testing at agencies under his control, though the plan was placed on hold because of the legal challenge, except for some workers at the Department of Corrections. Ungaro’s ruling said the Scott-controlled agencies include about 85,000 employees, or 77 percent of the state workforce.

Despite the legal uncertainty, lawmakers and Scott this year approved a new bill that would allow drug testing of employees – though not require it.

That measure (HB 1205), which lets agencies conduct random testing every three months, is also being challenged in federal court.

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Facebook Instagram use dived after photo fiasco: AppData

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc’s Instagram lost almost a quarter of its daily users a week after it rolled out and then withdrew policy changes that incensed users who feared the photo-sharing service would use their pictures without compensation.

Instagram, which Facebook bought for $ 715 million this year, saw the number of daily active users who accessed the service via Facebook bottom out at 12.4 million as of Friday, versus a peak of 16.4 million last week, according to data compiled by online tracker AppData.

The popular app, which allows people to add filters and effects to photos and share them over the Internet or smartphones, experienced the drop over the brief, often-volatile holiday period.

Other popular apps also saw slippage in usage, and some were more pronounced. Yelp, for instance, saw daily active users — again via Facebook — slide to a weekly low of half a million on Thursday, from a high of 820,000 one week ago.

Instagram disputed the AppData survey, which was compiled from users that have linked the photo service to their own Facebook accounts, historically between 20 and 30 percent of Instagram members.

“This data is inaccurate. We continue to see strong and steady growth in both registered and active users of Instagram,” a spokeswoman said in an emailed statement on Friday.

Looking out over a broader timeframe, Instagram’s monthly active users edged up to 43.6 million as of Friday, an increase of 1.7 million over the past seven days, according to AppData.

“We’ll have to monitor the data over the coming weeks to gain perspective on trends in Instagram’s performance,” AppData marketing manager Ashley Taylor Anderson said in an email.

ATTENTION-SEEKING

The sharp slide in activity highlighted by AppData was bound to draw attention on the heels of the controversial revision to Instagram’s terms of service that, among other things, allowed an advertiser to pay Instagram “to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata)” without compensation.

The subsequent public outrage prompted an apology from Instagram founder Kevin Systrom. Last week, a California Instagram user sued the company for breach of contract and other claims, in what may have been the first civil lawsuit to stem from the controversial change.

Instagram subsequently reverted to some of its original language.

The move renewed debate about how much control over personal data users must give up to live and participate in a world steeped in social media.

Analysts say Facebook, the world’s largest social network, was laying the groundwork to begin generating advertising revenue, by giving marketers the right to display profile pictures and other personal information, such as who users follow in advertisements.

Its shares closed down 13 cents or 0.5 percent at $ 25.91 on the Nasdaq, in line with the broader market.

(Reporting By Edwin Chan; Editing by Leslie Adler and Andrew Hay)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Matthew McConaughey Welcomes Baby No. 3

Matthew McConaughey and his wife Camila Alves have another reason to celebrate this holiday season -- they welcomed a new baby into the family!

A source tells ET the Magic Mike star was present for the baby's birth Friday at a hospital in Austin, TX. Specific details were not immediately available.

RELATED: Matthew McConaughey Wedding Details!

McConaughey proposed to his 30-year-old Brazilian model/handbag designer girlfriend on Christmas Day 2011, and they got married during a ceremony in Texas last June.

PIC: Matthew McConaughey unrecognizable after weight loss for role

The couple began dating in 2006 and have two other children together, daughter Vida, who is almost three, and four-year old Levi.

RELATED: Matthew McConaughey Weighs In On His Dramatic Weight Loss

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NYPD recruits sworn in at graduation ceremony

They came from all corners of the globe to join their brothers in blue.

The NYPD recruits sworn in at a graduation ceremony in Brooklyn’s Barclays Center today were born in countries like Nigeria, South Korea, China, Albania, Pakistan, and Somalia — and speak 59 languages.

Others came from less exotic locales like Brooklyn and Queens.

The new class of 1,159 cops was made up of 16 percent women. The racial breakdown is 53 percent white, 25 percent Hispanic, 12 percent black and 9 percent Asian.

Nearly all of them — 99 percent — have a college degree.

Police union president Patrick Lynch and his son, Patrick, at today's NYPD graduation ceremony.

One graduate from Rockland County wore the shield of her father, who was killed trying to help people escape from the World Trade Center on 9-11.

Erin Coughlin, 27, was proud to honor the memory of Sgt. John Coughlin, who had served in the elite Emergency Services Unit.

“It’s an absolute honor. It was surreal — I knew he was looking down on me,” said Coughlin, 27, beaming. “I took the same oath he did. I held it together until we had to salute.”

Her mother Patty was also moved. “I’m glad she got his shield,” she said. “It’s amazing that I was at the graduation for him, and now her.”

The graduating class included the son of police union president Patrick Lynch. “It’s something I always looked forward to,” said 21-year-old Patrick Lynch.

His father said he was “extremely proud” to see the shield on his son’s chest.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly praised Lynch and three other cops during the graduation for making a good collar in Queens while driving home from the police academy in September.

The four spotted a young man beating up another man in Bayside on Sept. 13, and intervened to stop the attack.

Lynch was one of many new cops who has the NYPD in his blood.

“Growing up, I had a lot to look up to,” said Officer Adam Torres, 25, whose father Felix Torres, 46, is retired.

“For many of you, this moment was a long time coming,” said Kelly. “Some of you dreamed of wearing this uniform from the time you were children.”

Kelly also hailed the recruits’ life-saving work during Hurricane Sandy.

Newly minted officer John Lattanzio was praised for walking through waist-deep water to rescue people in Bergen Beach, Brooklyn — carrying one person out on his shoulders — even though his own home was flooded.

The new rookies will protect half a million visitors to Times Square on New Year’s Eve.

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Resources for South Florida small businesses

•  Florida Small Business Development Centers. Counseling and training at centers in South Florida and around the state, www.floridasbdc.org.

•  SCORE Workshops, online training and free coaching at local branches, www.score.org, miamidade.score.org, browardscore.org, southbroward.score.org

• Florida Women’s Business Center. Provides training, mentoring and resources to women entrepreneurs, http://www.flwbc.org.

• The Commonwealth Institute. Helps women entrepreneurs, CEOs and corporate executives build businesses through peer mentoring programs and annually honors top women-led businesses in Florida, www.commonwealthinstitute.org.

The Hispanic Business Initiative Fund of Florida. Nonprofit, with a Miami office, provides free bilingual seminars, workshops and technical assistance to Hispanic entrepreneurs launching or expanding businesses in Florida. www.HBIFflorida.org.

•  Barry University, Barry Institute for Community and Economic Development. Counseling, workshops and training for Miami-Dade small businesses through the Entrepreneurial Institute, www.barry.edu/biced.

•  Broward College. Offers a 24-credit entrepreneurship certificate, www.broward.edu. For noncredit business courses, including training through its Entrepreneurial Institute, http://www.broward.edu/ce.

•  Florida International University, Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center. Workshops, webinars and more, entrepreneurship.fiu.edu.

•  Miami Dade College. Offers a 12-credit entrepreneurship certificate program, www.mdc.edu/business. For noncredit classes, www.mdc.edu/ce. The Meek Entrepreneurial Education Center offers many programs, www.mdc.edu/north/eec.

•  University of Miami, The Launch Pad. Workshops, networking, resources and coaching, www.thelaunchpad.org.

•  Southern Florida Minority Supplier Development Council. Connects large businesses with minority businesses across South Florida, www.sfmsdc.org.

•  Startup Florida. Programs and training, plus register your company in this Startup America initiative, www.startupfl.org.

•  Partners for Self-Employment. Offers training, technical assistance and loans in Miami-Dade and Broward. www.partnersforselfemployment.com

•  Miami Bayside Foundation. Provides loans of $10,000 to $50,000 to minority-owned businesses in the city of Miami. www.miamibaysidefoundation.org..

•  MetroBroward. Nonprofit offers financing, incubation and training for businesses in low- to moderate-income areas of Broward, www.metrobroward.org.

• ACCION USA. Provides microloans up to $50,000 and financial education, with South Florida offices and programs, www.accionusa.org.

ClearPoint Credit Counseling Solutions. Nonprofit offers one-on-one, over the phone or Internet credit counseling to entrepreneurs and consumers with poor credit. 305-463-6739, ext 1019 or www.clearpointccs.org .

•  Incubate Miami. Start-up businesses in technology can get mentorship, office space and now early-stage funding, www.incubatemiami.com.

• The Technology Business Incubator at the Research Park at Florida Atlantic University. Offers mentors, investor connections and business services, http://www.research-park.org

•  South Florida Urban Ministries’ ASSETS Business Development. Nonprofit offers small business development program including one-on-one business coaching and consulting in areas of start-up, marketing, finance and more, www.sflum.org.

• United Way Center for Financial Stability. Center offers a wide array of tools and resources to help families and individuals achieve financial independence. www.unitedwaymiami.org/WhatWeDo/CFS.

•  The Startup Forum. Organization’s mission is to foster the development of vibrant regional startup communities, www.startupforum.net.

•  StartupDigest. Begun in Silicon Valley as a place to find events for entrepreneurs, this has spread to other cities, including Miami, www.startupdigest.com

If your organization should be on this list, email ndahlberg@miamiherald.com

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Keys charter school principal shoots herself

The principal at a Florida’s Keys charter school died after she shot herself at a Pembroke Park gun range, authorities said Thursday.

Adri Anna Stewart’s death has been ruled a suicide, according to the Broward Sheriff’s Office.

Stewart, 30, had been the principal at Key West Collegiate Academy, which is on Stock Island and managed by Academica. She took over last summer.

Previously, she worked at several South Florida schools, including Somerset Academy’s central Miramar campus.

On Wednesday, Stewart went to the Pembroke Gun and Range at 3130 SW 19th St., where she shot herself about 2 p.m. She was taken by paramedics to Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood, where she died.

A viewing is set for 6 p.m. Friday at the Bernardo Garcia Funeral Home, 865 W. 49th St., Hialeah.

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Crawling All Over Pattinson's Face in 'Cosmopolis'

Twilight vamp Robert Pattinson plays a bloodsucker of an altogether different kind – the Wall Street kind – in his new movie Cosmopolis, on Blu-ray and DVD New Year's Day, and the film's director David Cronenberg tells ETonline that he was actually quite impressed with what Rob brought to the table, and that after the baggage of casting -- once you get to that point when you're on set and cameras are rolling -- "Twilight is irrelevant."

Video: Robert Pattinson Smells of Sex in 'Cosmopolis'

"He surprised me every day with good stuff," says Cronenberg. "I don't do rehearsals, and I try not to shape the actor's performance at first. I want to see what his intuition is going to deliver. And then if there's a problem then I start to shape it, nudge it, manipulate it a little bit. I did very little of that with Rob."

Based on the novel by Don DeLillo, Cosmopolis follows one day in the wild life of multi-billionaire asset manager Eric Packer, who travels aimlessly through the streets of New York City in his limousine while conducting investment trading from the back seat. As the day progresses, it devolves into an odyssey with a cast of characters that start to tear his world apart.

"He absolutely would say to you right now, 'I had no idea what I was doing at any time,' and he would mean it," says the veteran director of Rob's performance. "I think he really didn't realize how good he was. … He was surprising himself, but he was surprising me by his accuracy. It was just dead on. I mean, by the end of it we were doing one take. Honestly the whole last scene, the whole last shot in the movie with him and Paul [Giamatti] -- one take. And it's a long take as well. And it's very emotional, and very subtle. One take for both of them, it was so good. … In fact, we finished the shoot five days early, and a lot of that was due to Rob."

Video: Robert Pattinson on Playboy Role in 'Cosmopolis'

Of course, when Cronenberg first cast Rob, he had to overcome what he calls Twilight "baggage," explaining, "You often have to consider what we call baggage for an actor, and you have to decide whether it's a problem or not. I hate the idea of it because I know I'm going to be on the set with the guy at three in the morning shooting in the streets of Toronto, and none of that stuff is relevant. We're just two people trying to make the movie work. So his past performances, or his fame, or lack of it, or whatever the factor is, is at that point irrelevant. What's relevant only is what we can do creatively with each other.

"On the other hand, when you're financing a movie you have to have lead actors who have some weight and some substance and will attract investors so that you can get your movie financed, so it's a weird situation," he continues. "Aside from the fact that yes, he was an exciting and interesting, surprising choice in terms of how investors viewed it -- and it worked because we got the financing for the movie -- after that Twilight is irrelevant, you know?"

What mattered most to Cronenberg was that his lead could carry the scene and had the proper charisma: "It starts very simply with is he the right age, does he have the right look, does he have the right presence onscreen?" he says. "He is in absolutely every scene in the movie, and that's really quite rare. Even in a movie with Tom Cruise, you don't see Tom in every scene. But in this case you do, and so he has to have some charisma. You have to want to watch him for that long and that intensely, because I knew I was going to be crawling all over his face with the camera."

Video: Robert Pattinson's First ET Interview

Of course, it wouldn't be a David Cronenberg film without a little oral or anal fixation – themes prominently placed in such films of his as Naked Lunch, Dead Ringers and Videodrome – and there's an especially amusing scene during Cosmopolis in which Rob gets examined by a doctor in his limo and discovers that he has an "asymmetrical prostate."

"Orifices are the entry and exit of our bodies, and that really talks about identity and where the boundaries of an individual identity end and where the environment begins," says a straight-faced Cronenberg, adding with a laugh, "I could do an academic analysis of my own movies, but that wouldn't help me create [my new] movies. … You could do that analysis and make those connections amongst the movies, and you'd be correct."

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TSA has taken more than 1,500 guns from airline passengers

Security screeners have taken more than 1,500 guns from airline passengers so far this year, far ahead of last year’s tally, the Transportation Security Administration said today.

If the trend holds through Dec. 31, the number of TSA gun seizures will be more than 15 percent ahead of last year’s tally of 1,320 guns.

During the week that ended Dec. 21 — the most recent data the TSA has published — screeners took 34 guns from passengers, including 32 that were loaded.

In the previous week, screeners found 29 guns, including 21 that were loaded.

TSA officials say many people caught with guns simply forgot that they were carrying them.

The agency posts pictures of unusual weaponry seized from passengers on its Web site.

Earlier this month, screeners at Kennedy Airport found a passenger with 26 stun guns in a carry-on bag. Stun guns aren’t included in the firearm tally, but are not allowed on planes.

Among the other items taken from passengers around the country in recent weeks were an A4 rocket launcher found in a checked bag at an airport in Latrobe, PA, and a speargun found in a carry-on bag in Houston.

bsanderson@nypost.com

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Royal Caribbean orders third Oasis-Class vessel

Royal Caribbean Cruises announced Thursday that it has contracted with STX France to build a third Oasis-class vessel for delivery in mid-2016. In October, the cruise line announced it planned another sister ship to the successful Oasis of the Seas and Allure of the Seas.

The contract, subject to financing and other conditions, includes the transfer of Pullmantur’s Atlantic Star. STX France has also provided the company with a one-year option for the mid-year 2018 delivery of a fourth Oasis-class vessel at similar pricing.

Oasis of the Seas and Allure of the Seas, with 16 decks and 2,700 staterooms, are the largest cruise ships in the world. The ships sail weekly to the Caribbean from their home port of Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale.

Miami Herald Staff

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40 years later, survivors of Eastern Flight 401 want memorial

Forty years have passed since Eastern Flight 401 slammed down in the Florida Everglades, yet no memorial has been raised to remember the 101 people who perished that night.

It's time to change that, say survivors and families of the victims, who hope to raise $15,000 for a granite block containing the names of those who died.

“We want to get something that's permanent, because the memory lives on forever,” said Ron Infantino, a passenger on the Lockheed-1011 that crashed 18 miles northwest of Miami on Dec. 29, 1972.

On Saturday, at 4 p.m., about 40 survivors and family members will gather at the ValuJet Memorial in far southwest Miami-Dade County to remember those lost on the Eastern flight. ValuJet Flight 592 crashed about two miles away from the Eastern site — 24 years later.

To read the entire Sun Sentinel story click here.

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Ex-President George H.W. Bush in ICU

Former President George H.W. Bush has been transferred to the intensive care unit at a Houston hospital as he continues to recover from a fever and a persistent cough.

A spokesman for the 88-year-old Bush told ET that the former president has been in the ICU of Methodist Hospital since Sunday.

RELATED: Jenna Bush Hager: I'm Pregnant

"Following a series of setbacks including a persistent fever, President Bush was admitted to the intensive care unit at Methodist Hospital on Sunday where he remains in guarded condition," spokesman Jim McGrath said. "Doctors at Methodist continue to be cautiously optimistic about the current course of treatment. The President is alert and conversing with medical staff, and is surrounded by family."

Bush -- who served as the nation's 41st president from 1989-1993 -- was initially hospitalized on November 23 with a bronchitis-like cough.

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Repairs underway for collapsed wall in Chelsea building

Repairs are underway on a landmarked Chelsea building that was evacuated when part of a structural wall fell to the sidewalk.

The seven-story building at 655 Sixth Avenue was emptied on Tuesday night when the wall failed on the building’s West 20th Street side.

Workers began constructing a sidewalk bridge around the collapsed area today. They don’t expect to start working on the structure itself until tomorrow.

Residents of the wing of the building that fronts on West 20th Street were barred from returning to their homes.

Apartments and businesses on the Sixth Avenue side of the building were allowed back inside yesterday morning. The building, which dates to 1875, has retail on its first floor and condos upstairs.

R. Umar Abbasi

655 Sixth Avenue.

“The building won’t fall. They don’t build buildings like this anymore,” said Maurice Laboz, 75, a real estate developer who has lived in the building’s penthouse for five years.

No one was injured by the collapse.

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90-year-old real estate baron, philanthropist Jay Kislak is forever young

Real estate baron Jay I. Kislak discovered a Fountain of Youth of sorts that springs from an inquisitive and acquisitive mind.

At 90, Kislak is wheeling and dealing in real estate, and he’s exploring history and art with the fervor of a man generations younger.

The patriarch of The Kislak Organization marked 74 years in real estate this year, 59 spent in Miami.

While he has long since appointed a protégé, Thomas Bartelmo, as president and CEO of the diverse family-owned real-estate businesses, Kislak remains chairman. And he is a regular at the headquarters in Miami Lakes.

That is, when he’s not off to Maine for the summer.

Or busy chairing a blue-ribbon commission named by the U.S. Interior Secretary to orchestrate the 450th anniversary in 2015 of the founding of St. Augustine.

Or jetting off to evaluate a possible acquisition. (Kislak recently looked at the potential for real estate development in North Dakota, booming with shale oil, but decided to pass.)

Kislak’s empire has gone through dramatic changes over the years. He built — and eventually sold — commercial banking, mortgage servicing and insurance firms.

Today, with annual revenue in excess of $28 million, his organization focuses on the commercial brokerage business started by his father, Julius Kislak, in Hoboken, N.J., more than a century ago; on owning a portfolio of apartments and other property (Kislak is on the prowl for more), and on managing funds of property-tax certificates, a niche created by the economic downturn.

Looking out his office window at a bustling interchange recently, Kislak mused: “I remember when they built the Palmetto Expressway and you could drive down it and never see another car.”

“The same thing with I-95: There was hardly any traffic,” said Kislak, a slender man with a signature mustache and a thick Hoboken accent that never faded.

Kislak moved to Miami in 1953 to grow the mortgage business, but his world view hardly dates to 1950s Florida. Already a book lover, he began pulling on a thread of Florida history, soon broadening his interest to the early Americas.

Over the decades, Kislak, bankrolled by a stream of brokerage commissions, mortgage fees and apartment rent, grew into a prominent collector of rare books and maps, manuscripts, artifacts and art to feed his fascination with the pre-Columbian era and the European exploration of America.

His wife Jean Kislak shares his passion for collecting. They met at a party for Andy Warhol; it would be her second marriage, his third. Their quest for art, history and collecting has taken them to all continents, even Antarctica.

“We don’t quit [collecting]. But we are going to quit,” said Jean, a former corporate art director. “Acquisition has always been a part of my life. I don’t know if it’s a sickness.”

In 2004, Kislak gave away much of the treasure. His foundation donated more than 3,000 rare maps, manuscripts, paintings and artifacts to the Library of Congress. The gift, estimated to be worth in excess of $150 million, is housed in the ornate Thomas Jefferson building in an exhibit that bears his name. Kislak also funds fellowships for studies of the collection, part of his diverse efforts over the years to support education. Among other things, his family foundation endowed the Kislak Real Estate Institute at Monmouth University, in West Long Branch, N.J., and has provided key support to a real estate program at Florida State University.

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Causeway victim Ronald Poppo finds peace but not healing

When Ronald Poppo was a kid in the 1950s and ’60s, a family Christmas in Brooklyn meant wind-up model trains circling the tree, Italian dinners of lasagna and stuffed squid, and, because Dec. 25 was also his father’s birthday, ricotta-filled cassata cake.

There was always music, because the Poppos have musical talent. Ronnie, as his older sister and two older brothers called him, played the violin as a child and guitar as a teenager.

And there was church, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, as their mother was a devout Baptist.

An aunt brought Christmas presents, recalled Ronald’s sister, Antoinette Poppo, who still lives in New York.

“We were poor, but we didn’t know we were poor,’’ she said.

It’s hard to say when Ronald Poppo last enjoyed childhood Christmas memories, had a merry — or even comfortable — Christmas. After vanishing from the family in the early 1970s, he encamped on the gritty streets of Miami, an inebriated vagrant drifting ever further from the mainstream.

His last known home was the concrete stairwell of a tourist-attraction parking garage.

He surfaced again May 26 as the hapless victim in one of South Florida’s most sensational, blood-drenched crimes. That day, a naked, crazed, 31-year-old Rudy Eugene attacked 65-year-old Poppo on the MacArthur Causeway, stripping away his clothes then gnawing on Poppo’s face, leaving him mutilated and blind.

Police shot and killed Eugene about 18 minutes into the assault.

Through news of the event, Poppo’s stunned siblings learned he’d been alive all along, and people from his past began to emerge with snippets of information about his life before he disappeared onto the streets.

Following intensive medical treatment at Jackson Memorial Hospital, Poppo moved to Jackson Memorial Perdue Medical Center, an 11-acre, 163-bed nursing home/rehab facility in South Miami-Dade, its halls now cheerily decked with holiday decorations.

He has refused all interview requests since the incident, and apart from allowing doctors to hold a news conference in June, he hasn’t authorized his treating physicians to talk about his medical condition.

Jackson officials closely guard his privacy.

Photos displayed at the June news conference showed Poppo’s face as a mass of clots and raw tissue, his eye sockets hidden under flaps of skin, his nose gone, his cheeks and forehead partially so. Doctors had to remove one mangled eyeball but at the time hoped to save the other, and at least some sight.

They weren’t able to.

His sister says that when they talk, brother Ronnie doesn’t mention the attack, the past, or how he spends his time. But he did recently say that he likes his accommodations and the people who care for him.

“He says they take him outside and walk him around the place,’’ Antoinette Poppo said. “He’s glad to be there. ... He doesn’t really talk much at all. He says, ‘Take care of yourself.’ It’s so sad he can’t see, and has to depend on other people.’’

He told her that “his face hasn’t healed yet,’’ but that he doesn’t want more surgery because “it’s going to hurt.’’

If so inclined, Poppo could have participated in all sorts of Christmas festivities at Perdue, where well-wishers from The Cocoplum and Cutler Ridge Women’s Clubs, the Soroptimist Club of Coral Gables, the Grupo de Kendall, Bethel Baptist Church, and the Teddy Bear Club brought gifts for residents including shampoo, batteries, home-made goodies — and teddy bears.

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Tajikistan blocks scores of websites as election looms

DUSHANBE (Reuters) – Tajikistan blocked access to more than 100 websites on Tuesday, in what a government source said was a dress rehearsal for a crackdown on online dissent before next year’s election when President Imomali Rakhmon will again run for office.

Rakhmon, a 60-year-old former head of a Soviet cotton farm, has ruled the impoverished Central Asian nation of 7.5 million for 20 years. He has overseen constitutional amendments that allow him to seek a new seven-year term in November 2013.

The Internet remains the main platform where Tajiks can air grievances and criticize government policies at a time when the circulation of local newspapers is tiny and television is tightly controlled by the state.

Tajikistan’s state communications service blocked 131 local and foreign Internet sites “for technical and maintenance works”.

“Most probably, these works will be over in a week,” Tatyana Kholmurodova, deputy head of the service, told Reuters. She declined to give the reason for the work, which cover even some sites with servers located abroad.

The blocked resources included Russia‘s popular social networking sites www.my.mail.ru and VKontakte (www.vk.com), as well as Tajik news site TJKnews.com and several local blogs.

“The government has ordered the communications service to test their ability to block dozens of sites at once, should such a need arise,” a senior government official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

“It is all about November 2013,” he said, in a clear reference to the presidential election.

Other blocked websites included a Ukrainian soccer site, a Tajik rap music site, several local video-sharing sites and a pornography site.

VOLATILE NATION

Predominantly Muslim Tajikistan, which lies on a major transit route for Afghan drugs to Europe and Russia, remains volatile after a 1992-97 civil war in which Rakhmon’s Moscow-backed secular government clashed with Islamist guerrillas.

Rakhmon justifies his authoritarian methods by saying he wants to oppose radical Islam. But some of his critics argue repression and poverty push many young Tajiks to embrace it.

Tighter Internet controls echo measures taken by other former Soviet republics of Central Asia, where authoritarian rulers are wary of the role social media played in revolutions in the Arab world and mass protests in Russia.

The government this year set up a volunteer-run body to monitor Internet use and reprimand those who openly criticize Rakhmon and other officials.

In November, Tajikistan blocked access to Facebook, saying it was spreading “mud and slander” about its veteran leader.

The authorities unblocked Facebook after concern was expressed by the United States and European Union, the main providers of humanitarian aid for Tajikistan, where almost a half of the population lives in abject poverty.

Asomiddin Asoyev, head of Tajikistan’s association of Internet providers, said authorities were trying to create an illusion that there were no problems in Tajik society by silencing online criticism.

“This is self-deception,” he told Reuters. “The best way of resolving a problem is its open discussion with civil society.”

Moscow-based Central Asia expert Arkady Dubnov told Reuters that Rakhmon’s authoritarian measures could lead to a backlash against the president in the election. “Trying to position itself as the main guarantor of stability through repression against Islamist activists, the Dushanbe government is actually achieving the reverse – people’s trust in it is falling,” he said.

(Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Pravin Char)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Lady Gaga Documentary Announced

The nearly 33 million Little Monsters who follow Lady Gaga on Twitter got a massive Christmas present this morning as the singer revealed she'll soon be coming to a theater near you!

VIDEO - Lady Gaga Hosts Fame Picnic in Paris

"Merry Christmas little monsters," Gaga wrote. "Terry Richardson is making a #LadyGagaMOVIE documenting my life, the creation of ARTPOP + you!"

"Thank you for being so patient waiting for my new album ARTPOP I hope this gets u excited for things to come. I love you with all my heart!" Gaga announced her fourth album on August 6, 2012 and featured several of the songs in contention for inclusion on her recent Born This Wall Ball. Although no release date is yet known, it's rumored to be due out in Spring 2013.

VIDEO - The Secret Lady Gaga Never Told Beyonce

Gaga has previously collaborated with Richardson on countless magazine covers and 2011's Lady Gaga x Terry Richardson photobook.

Lady Gaga won't be the only major musician to be featured in a documentary next year. It was revealed on November 26 that HBO would be airing a Beyonce documentary on February 16, 2013.

VIDEO - Get A Sneak Peek at Beyonce's Documentary

The film promises extensive first-person footage -- some of it shot by Beyonce on her laptop -- in which she reflects on the realities of being a celebrity, the refuge she finds onstage and the joys of becoming a mother after giving birth to her daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, in January 2012. Watch a sneak peek below.

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Affleck won't run for Kerry's Senate seat

BOSTON -- Ben Affleck is taking his name off the list of possible candidates for U.S. Sen. John Kerry's seat, which would be open if the Democratic senator from Massachusetts is confirmed as secretary of state.

Affleck says in a Monday posting on his Facebook page that while he loves the political process, he will not be running for public office.

Speculation about the Cambridge, Mass., native rose slightly when he did not completely rule out a Senate bid during an appearance on CBS' Face The Nation on Sunday.

In his Facebook posting, Affleck says he would continue working with the Eastern Congo Initiative, a nonprofit organization that helps direct humanitarian aid to the war-torn region, and for other causes.

Getty Images

John Kerry (left) and Ben Affleck.

Affleck says Kerry would make a great secretary of state.

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Miami: We’re still busiest cruise port

Florida’s ports are steaming bow-to-bow in the race to be the world’s businest cruise ship port.

Though some publications have reported Port Canaveral in the lead with 3,761,056 million for its fiscal year ending Sept. 30, PortMiami officials Monday said they had hosted 3,774,452 passengers during the same period, putting it slightly ahead. Fort Lauderdale’s PortEverglades reported 3,689,000 passengers for the period, putting it slightly behind the others in third place.

“We’re all very close,’’ said Paula Musto, PortMiami spokeswoman.

PortMiami has slipped below its previous high of 4 million plus passengers because of changing ship deployments, she said. That number is expected to again cruise past 4 million in 2013 as several new ships homeport in Miami.

Jane Wooldridge

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New generation of judges serving on federal bench in South Florida

For a fleeting moment this fall, U.S. District Judge Robert N. Scola Jr. declared in jest that he wished he were “king of the world.”

If he had such power, Scola said from the bench, he would deny a defense lawyer’s request to travel to Pakistan to question a group of defendants charged in a Miami terrorism case along with two Muslim clerics. Since the missing defendants weren’t present, the judge considered them “fugitives.’’

But the judge let the defense team make the upcoming trip against fierce opposition from prosecutors, because case law allows such extraordinary depositions, he found.

Scola, a former Miami-Dade prosecutor and state circuit court judge, relishes his role as one of three new members on South Florida’s federal bench, which is experiencing a generational sea change as the result of several retirements and presidential appointments.

“I knew I wanted to be a judge when I was 10 years old; my father was a judge in Massachusetts,” Scola said, during a brief December interview wedged between verdicts in the South Beach “bar-girls” trial and the sentencing of a mental-health clinic director convicted of Medicare fraud.

Over the past few years, the federal court in the Southern District of Florida has seen the departure of four judges — Daniel T.K. Hurley, Paul C. Huck, Alan S. Gold and Patricia A. Seitz — who have gone on “senior” status, meaning they handle lighter caseloads. Another federal judge, Adalberto Jordan, was confirmed this year as a member of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.

Those five vacancies, in one of the busiest federal districts for criminal and civil cases in the country, accounted for about one-third of all the positions on the federal bench in South Florida.

The retirements have generated coveted openings that have been filled by Scola, 57; Kathleen M. Williams, 56, a former Miami federal public defender; and Robin S. Rosenbaum, 46, a former Fort Lauderdale federal magistrate judge. Rosenbaum, also a one-time federal prosecutor, was sworn in as a new U.S. district judge Dec. 13.

“It’s pretty obvious that Robin is never going to make a decent living,” 11th Circuit Judge Stanley Marcus, for whom Rosenbaum once clerked, quipped about her public-service career during her investiture in Fort Lauderdale federal court.

But then Marcus struck a more serious note, describing federal district judges as the “crucible of justice” in the U.S. court system. “I have to say, Robin, this is work you were born to do,” he said.

Another recent nominee: Miami-Dade Circuit Judge William L. Thomas, a former assistant public defender in both the state and federal system. Thomas is scheduled for confirmation as a federal judge in 2013. If confirmed, he would become the first openly gay black man appointed to a federal judgeship in the nation.

Michael Caruso, the Miami federal public defender who replaced Williams in August, said the appointment of federal judges is in many ways a “president’s most enduring legacy.”

“All presidents strive to appoint smart, fair and hardworking lawyers,” Caruso said, commenting on the four nominated by President Barack Obama in South Florida. “President Obama, in addition to choosing women and men who share these traits, has chosen those who’ve been trial lawyers in the criminal justice system and who have devoted a significant portion of their career to public service.”

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Find room for God in fast-paced world, pope says on Christmas eve

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict, leading the world’s Roman Catholics into Christmas, on Monday urged people to find room for God in their fast-paced lives filled with the latest technological gadgets.

The 85-year-old pope, marking the eighth Christmas season of his pontificate, celebrated a solemn Christmas Eve mass in St Peter’s Basilica, during which he appealed for a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict and an end to the civil war in Syria.

At the mass for some 10,000 people in the basilica and broadcast to millions of others on television, the pope wove his homily around the theme of God’s place in today’s modern world.

“Do we have time and space for him? Do we not actually turn away God himself? We begin to do so when we have no time for him,” said the pope, wearing gold and white vestments.

“The faster we can move, the more efficient our time-saving appliances become, the less time we have. And God? The question of God never seems urgent. Our time is already completely full,” he said.

The leader of the world’s some 1.2 billion Roman Catholics said societies had reached the point where many people’s thinking processes did not leave any room even for the existence of God.

“Even if he seems to knock at the door of our thinking, he has to be explained away. If thinking is to be taken seriously, it must be structured in such a way that the ‘God hypothesis’ becomes superfluous,” he said.

“There is no room for him. Not even in our feelings and desires is there any room for him. We want ourselves. We want what we can seize hold of, we want happiness that is within our reach, we want our plans and purposes to succeed. We are so ‘full’ of ourselves that there is no room left for God.”

PEACE CANDLE

Bells inside and outside the basilica chimed when the pope said “Glory to God in the Highest,” the words the gospels say the angels sang at the moment of Jesus’ birth.

Earlier on Monday the pope appeared at the window of his apartments in the apostolic palace and lit a peace candle, as a larger-than-life nativity scene was unveiled in St Peter’s Square below.

Reflecting on the gospel account of Jesus born in a stable because there was no room for Mary and Joseph in the inn, he said when people find no room for God in their lives, they will soon find no room for others.

“Let us ask the Lord that we may become vigilant for his presence, that we may hear how softly yet insistently he knocks at the door of our being and willing.

“Let us ask that we may make room for him within ourselves, that we may recognise him also in those through whom he speaks to us: children, the suffering, the abandoned, those who are excluded and the poor of this world,” he said.

He asked for prayers for the people who “live and suffer” in the Holy Land today.

The pope called for peace among Israelis and Palestinians and for the people of Syria, Lebanon and Iraq and prayed that “Christians in those lands where our faith was born may be able to continue living there, that Christians and Muslims may build up their countries side-by-side in God’s peace.”

The Vatican is concerned about the exodus from the Middle East of Christians, many of whom leave because they fear for their safety. Christians now comprise five percent of the population of the region, down from 20 percent a century ago.

According to some estimates, the current population of 12 million Christians in the Middle East could halve by 2020 if security and birth rates continue to decline.

At noon (1100 GMT/6 AM ET) the pope will deliver his twice-yearly “Urbi et Orbi” (to the city and the world) blessing and message from the central balcony of St Peter’s Basilica.

(Reporting By Philip Pullella; Editing by Myra MacDonald)

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ET Exclusive: Jamie Foxx Opens His Home & Heart

Jamie Foxx may be the most eligible bachelor in Hollywood, and our own Nancy O'Dell is exclusively with the Oscar winner at his Santa Monica, CA home to talk about his career, his family and how he handles the media when there's a woman in his life.

The star of the upcoming Django Unchained says the worst thing that can happen in a relationship is to go public with it: "I like to stay quiet with anyone that dating; that I'm really, really dating, "he says. "If there's somebody that you're dating, the worst thing that you can do is let that [camera] touch you. Because once the camera touches you, [it's out]."

Video: Jamie & Kerry Party 'Django' Style

Watch the video to get a tour of Jamie's amazing home that he shares with his whole family, set on 40 acres with a stunning pool, a recording studio and an avocado grove!

One thing you won't find at Jamie's home, however, is his Best Actor Oscar statuette that he won for his performance in Ray.

Pics: Jamie & Leo Smolder in 'Django'

"I never wanted to keep it at the house -- I never wanted to get stuck," says Jamie, whose pal and former manager Jamie King holds onto the statuette for him. "It changes you. … I just wanted to go back to being funny."

Watch the video for more of Jamie's interview, including his reaction to the current Oscar buzz for Django Unchained!

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Jack Klugman dies at 90

LOS ANGELES — Jack Klugman, the prolific, craggy-faced character actor and regular guy who was loved by millions as the messy one in TV's "The Odd Couple" and the crime-fighting coroner in "Quincy, M.E.," died Monday, a son said. He was 90.

Klugman, who lost his voice to throat cancer in the 1980s and trained himself to speak again, died with his wife at his side.

"He had a great life and he enjoyed every moment of it and he would encourage others to do the same," son Adam Klugman said.

Adam Klugman said he was spending Christmas with his brother, David, and their families. Their father had been convalescing for some time but had apparently died suddenly and they were not sure of the exact cause.

AP

Jack Klugman

"His sons loved him very much," David Klugman said. "We'll carry on in his spirit."

Never anyone's idea of a matinee idol, Klugman remained a popular star for decades simply by playing the type of man you could imagine running into at a bar or riding on a subway with — gruff, but down to earth, his tie stained and a little loose, a racing form under his arm, a cigar in hand during the days when smoking was permitted.

His was a city actor ideal for "The Odd Couple," which ran from 1970 to 1975 and was based on Neil Simon's play about mismatched roommates, divorced New Yorkers who end up living together. The show teamed Klugman — the sloppy sports writer Oscar Madison — and Tony Randall — the fussy photographer Felix Unger — in the roles played by Walter Matthau and Art Carney on Broadway and Matthau and Jack Lemmon in the 1968 film. Klugman had already had a taste of the show when he replaced Matthau on Broadway and he learned to roll with the quick-thinking Randall, with whom he had worked in 1955 on the CBS series "Appointment with Adventure."

"There's nobody better to improvise with than Tony," Klugman said. "A script might say, 'Oscar teaches Felix football.' There would be four blank pages. He would provoke me into reacting to what he did. Mine was the easy part."

They were battlers on screen, and the best of friends in real life. When Randall died in 2004 at age 84, Klugman told CNN: "A world without Tony Randall is a world that I cannot recognize."

In "Quincy, M.E.," which ran from 1976 to 1983, Klugman played an idealistic, tough-minded medical examiner who tussled with his boss by uncovering evidence of murder in cases where others saw natural causes.

"We had some wonderful writers," he said in a 1987 Associated Press interview. "Quincy was a muckraker, like Upton Sinclair, who wrote about injustices. He was my ideal as a youngster, my author, my hero.

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Miami: We’re still busiest cruise port

Florida’s ports are steaming bow-to-bow in the race to be the world’s businest cruise ship port.

Though some publications have reported Port Canaveral in the lead with 3,761,056 million for its fiscal year ending Sept. 30, PortMiami officials Monday said they had hosted 3,774,452 passengers during the same period, putting it slightly ahead. Fort Lauderdale’s PortEverglades reported 3,689,000 passengers for the period, putting it slightly behind the others in third place.

“We’re all very close,’’ said Paula Musto, PortMiami spokeswoman.

PortMiami has slipped below its previous high of 4 million plus passengers because of changing ship deployments, she said. That number is expected to again cruise past 4 million in 2013 as several new ships homeport in Miami.

Jane Wooldridge

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Former local Marine released from Mexican jail now in hospital

The Marine veteran from Palmetto Bay detained for months in a Mexican border prison for bringing his great-grandfather’s shotgun into the country was forced to take a detour on his way home.

Jon Hammar, 27, and his father were driving back to the Miami-area when Hammar had to be taken to an emergency room in Louisiana, his mother told Miami Herald news partner CBS4.

The two were to have arrived home on Monday, Christmas Eve. Those plans are now delayed.

“He’s got some sort of a stomach bug and bad chest cold,” Jon’s mother, Olivia Hammar, told CBS4.

It might be the same bug that Olivia Hammar said on Friday her son had gotten before he was released.

Hammar was arrested Aug. 13 when he and a fellow Marine veteran, who were headed to Costa Rica to surf, tried to cross into Mexico.

Hammar had been told by U.S. authorities he could declare a six-decades-old .410 bore Sears & Roebuck shotgun at the border. The firearm is suitable for shooting rabbits and birds.

But Mexican officials dismissed Hammar’s U.S. registration papers for the disassembled relic. Prosecutors charged him with possession of a weapon restricted for use to Mexico’s armed forces.

Hammar was sent to the Matamoros prison, where, at one point, inmates affiliated with local drug cartels called Hammar’s parents to try to extort money from them.

U.S. officials intervened, and Hammar was separated from the general inmate population. But he still spent much of his time chained to a bed.

He was released Friday.

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RIM’s biggest problem: It’s still scrambling to catch yesterday’s hottest mobile app

The moment I first realized that RIM (RIMM) was truly in enormous trouble was back in 2010 when I heard then co-CEO Jim Balsillie downplay the importance of apps. Yes, you read that correctly. Balsillie actually told attendees at a Web 2.0 summit in 2010 that the Internet itself was the most important “app” for mobile devices and contended that the “Web needs a platform that allows you to use your existing Web content, not apps.” My feelings on this matter were only solidified when I attended the BlackBerry World conference in May 2011 and watched RIM executives proudly announce that the Playbook tablet would soon get its own version of Angry Birds sometime in the near future. In reality, Angry Birds didn’t release for BlackBerry until late December of that year, or two full years after it was originally released for iOS.

[More from BGR: WhatsApp goes free for iPhone for a limited time]

All of which brings me back to RIM’s current state: Despite the great looking hardware and user interface pictures we’ve seen from new BlackBerry 10 smartphones so far, the company still has an app problem. I was reminded of this when I read a post over at CrackBerry titled, “There’s still a chance for WhatsApp on BlackBerry 10.” The issue here isn’t whether RIM eventually does or doesn’t get WhatsApp on its platform — the issue is that RIM always seems to be one step behind when it comes to getting the hottest apps of the day on its devices.

[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]

The most absurd example of this, of course, is Instagram. Yes, it’s very likely that BlackBerry 10 will support the popular photo-sharing app right out of the gate given the company’s partnership with Instagram owner Facebook (FB). But we still have no official confirmation that Instagram will be a BlackBerry 10 app just over a month before the new platform launches, and this is symbolic of the fact that RIM is always stuck at the back of line when it comes to app developers’ priorities.

Simply put, RIM can’t possibly hope to compete with Android, iOS or even Windows Phone 8 if its users will always wonder if they’ll be able to do all the cool things with their phones that their friends can do. In the unpredictable Wild West of today’s app market, where new apps seemingly go viral overnight to become global powerhouses, platform developers need to make sure they have quick and simple ways for app developers to port over their software. And until RIM figures out a way to get this done, it still has no shot in the long term.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Buzzmakers: New X Factor and Miss Universe Winners

What had ET readers buzzing this week?

1. 'The X Factor' Crowns A Winner!

And the $5 million recording contract goes to…

Tate Stevens! The 37-year-old country crooner beat out runner-up 13-year-old Carly Rose Sonenclar for the top prize Thursday night. 35 million votes were cast Wednesday to determine victory for L.A. Reid's mentee.

Near tears, the Raymore, Missouri native thanked his fans for their overwhelming support.

"This is the best day of my life," said an emotional Stevens.

Girl group Fifth Harmony, mentored by Simon Cowell, placed third in the competition. Earlier in the night, the holiday themed finale saw performances by One Direction and Pitbull.

Auditions for an all-new season of The X Factor USA have already begun online. In-person auditions will start on March 6, 2013 in Los Angeles.

The celebrity judging panel has yet to be announced, but L.A. Reid has already taken himself out of the running. Spears has expressed interest in returning to the show for season three, but nothing has been confirmed.

2. Miss Universe 2012 Crowned

Beauties from 89 countries strutted their stuff Wednesday night in pursuit of the Miss Universe crown, but only one woman would earn the coveted title.

In the end a panel of ten celebrity judges, including Cee Lo Green and U.S. Olympic gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings, appointed Miss USA Olivia Culpo the winner.

The 20-year-old Rhode Island native beat out Miss Brazil (Gabriela Markus) Miss Philippines (Janine Tugonon), Miss Mexico (Irene Sofía Esser Quintero), and Miss Australia (Renae Ayris) for the distinction.

Culpo follows in the footsteps of Miss Angola, Leila Lopes, who earned the crown in 2011.

The two-hour show was broadcast live from Las Vegas with musical acts One Direction and Train lending their talents to the annual extravaganza.

3. Exclusive: Arsenio on His Late Night TV Return

Break out the Woof! Woof! fist pump: Arsenio Hall is coming back to late night TV in the Fall of 2013 after a 17-year break from the game, and only ET is behind the scenes with the timeless talk show host as he shoots his first-ever promo for The Arsenio Hall Show!

"[This is] the first time America will see anything on television about the show," says Arsenio. "Instead of a commercial where I do something like say, 'I'm baaaaack' -- and everybody's, 'Ugh' -- they've come up with a real, unique, creative angle that -- actually, I looked at dailies, and it scared me. I looked at the dailies and I frightened myself."

The trailer-length promo from CBS Television Distribution pays homage to horror movies and begins airing today on all Arsenio Hall Show affiliate stations, kicking off the campaign for the new late night syndicated talk show that will be seen all across the country next year.

"I'm real excited about this; so many things have changed in pop culture since I left the air," says Arsenio about his return to late night. "I can't wait."

The Arsenio Hall Show premieres on 9/9/13. Look for much more with Arsenio between now and then, only on ET!

4. Claire Danes Gives Birth

It's a boy!

Homeland star Claire Danes and her husband Hugh Dancy welcomed their very first child together on Monday, December 17, her rep confirms to People Magazine.

The proud parents named their bouncing baby boy Cyrus Michael Christopher Dancy.

Danes, 33, wed Dancy, 37, in 2009 after two years of dating.

5. President Obama is Time's Person of the Year

For 2012, Time Magazine has selected President Barack Obama as their Person of the Year.

"For finding and forging a new majority, for turning weakness into opportunity and for seeking, amid great adversity, to create a more perfect union, Barack Obama is Time's 2012 Person of the Year," Time's Managing Editor Richzard Stengel explained.

He also cited both of the president's re-elections, snagging over 50 percent of the popular vote, as one reason he received this honor.

This is the second year Time has tapped Obama as their Person of the Year -- he previously was selected in 2008 for becoming the first black president of the United States.

Time previously named the eight finalists for 2012's Person of the Year. They included: Bill and Hillary Clinton, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Malala Yousafzai (the Pakistani girl who was shot by the Taliban for her crusade for better girls' education), Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer, Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi and the three scientists who discovered the Higgs Boson particle.

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Obama joins mourners at memorial service for late Sen. Inouye in Hawaii

AFP/Getty Images

President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama stand in respect as the casket carrying the late Senator Daniel Inouye is carried past at the National Memorial Cremetary of the Pacific in Honolulu.

HONOLULU — President Barack Obama, Gov. Neil Abercrombie and other dignitaries attended a memorial service for the late Sen. Daniel Inouye on Sunday.

A 19-gun cannon salute was fired as Inouye's coffin arrived for the service at Honolulu's National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, the final resting place to thousands of World War II veterans. More than 400 members of the storied Japanese-American 442nd Regimental Combat Team — of which Inouye was a part — are buried at the site.

REUTERS

President Barack Obama hugs Irene Hirano Inouye, widow of the late U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye, after she receives the flag that draped his casket at the memorial service at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

EPA

Senator Daniel Inouye died at the age of 88 Dec. 17. He was first Japanese-American elected to both houses of Congress and the second-longest serving senator in US history.

Several cabinet secretaries and a number of senators also attended the service, including fellow Hawaii Democrat Daniel Akaka and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

"Daniel was the best senator among us all," Reid told those assembled. "Whenever we needed a noble man to lean on, we turned to Sen. Dan Inouye. He was fearless."

The 88-year-old Inouye died of respiratory complications on Dec. 17.

He was the first Japanese-American elected to both houses of Congress and the second-longest serving senator in U.S. history.

The past week has been marked by tributes and honors for Inouye, with services held in Washington and in Hawaii. He lay in state at both the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on Thursday and the Hawaii state Capitol on Saturday.

Inouye was a high school senior in Honolulu on Dec. 7, 1941, when he watched dozens of Japanese planes fly toward Pearl Harbor and other Oahu military bases to begin a bombing that changed the course of world events.

He volunteered for a special U.S. Army unit of Japanese-Americans and lost his right arm in a battle with Germans in Italy. That scratched his dream of becoming a surgeon and went to law school and into politics instead.

He became known as an economic power in his home state as part of the Senate Appropriations Committee, where he steered federal money toward Hawaii to build roads, schools and housing.

Obama eulogized Inouye during a service at Washington's National Cathedral on Friday, saying that Inouye's presence during the Watergate hearings helped show him what could be possible in his own life.

The president arrived early Saturday in Honolulu for his annual Christmas family vacation.

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Time’s up for holiday shopping procrastinators

Last minute shoppers like Josette Tyne are in luck this year.

With a long weekend before Christmas, retailers want to make it easier for procrastinators to finish their gift buying. Macy’s for the first time is keeping all its stores open around the clock from Friday until Sunday at midnight. Toys “R” Us and Walmart Supercenters will be open non-stop until Christmas Eve.

Even those retailers skipping the all nighter still have added extended hours often as late as 11 pm or midnight. Coupled with a flurry of last minute promotions, they hope to lure shoppers, many of whom have been largely sitting on the sidelines since Black Friday.

Tyne, 33, just starting her shopping this week at Aventura Mall, armed with a list of about two dozen people and the presents they wanted. The list would have been longer if the Fort Lauderdale resident hadn’t limited it to the kids in her family.

“I’ll probably be shopping every day from now till Sunday,” said Tyne, as she wheeled the youngest of her three boys around H&M in a stroller before heading on to Game Stop, Urban Outfitters and BCBG. “Whatever catches my eye. Luckily the kids usually like everything I get. I’m the awesome Auntie.”

A Consumer Reports Poll released earlier this week found that with just five shopping days left until Christmas, a whopping 68 percent of shoppers — a projected 132 million Americans — have yet to finish their holiday shopping.

With an early Thanksgiving leaving an extra week until Christmas and a long weekend before Tuesday’s holiday, shoppers have felt little need to rush. They also haven’t found December deals to be quite as compelling as the November sales.

Based on disappointing sales trends earlier this month, ShopperTrak said Wednesday it was cutting its holiday sales forecast. The company, which counts foot traffic and its own proprietary sales numbers from 40,000 retail outlets across the country, now expects a 2.5 percent sales increase to $257.7 billion, down from the 3.3 percent growth it initially predicted. The National Retail Federation is sticking with its prediction of a 4.1 percent sales increase.

Online sales trends are more encouraging, up 13 percent to $35 billion from Nov. 1 through Dec. 16, according to comScore, an online research firm. But that pace is below the forecast of 17 percent for the season.

“It’s coming down to the wire,” said David Bassuk, managing director and co-head of the retail practice at AlixPartners, a global consulting firm. “It’s going to require retailers to be more aggressive with their promotions than they were hoping heading into the weekend.”

While the economy is certainly in a better position than it was during the recession, many consumers still feel uneasy this year about their financial future. Some are worried about the U.S. job market and others fear the stalemate between Congress and the White House over federal “fiscal cliff’’ that could lead to tax increases and less disposable income for shoppers.

That was the case for Latonya Jones, on the hunt for bargains at Aventura Mall, coupon-loaded iPad in hand.

“I wasn’t going to buy anything this year, because I wanted to save money,” said Jones, 39, of Miami Gardens, who was shopping with her daughter Richelle, 12, this week in Macy’s. “But then I changed my mind.”

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