Pak commerce minister’s India visit under cloud

NEW DELHI: Economic engagement can be carried forward in an environment of peace and stability and it is for Pakistan to realize where the well-being of its economy lies, commerce minister Anand Sharma said on Wednesday.

Sharma said the incident along the Line of Control was "horrific, unacceptable and highly provocative", but he did not announce any scrapping of trade ties or a pause in the trade dialogue.

India and Pakistan have made considerable progress in normalizing trade and economic relations. The two countries have held several rounds of discussions while Sharma has led a high profile business delegation to Pakistan. The two sides have also vowed to boost economic ties and Islamabad had promised to accord Most Favoured Nation status to India. Although it has missed the December deadline, expectations are that Pakistan will fulfil its promise shortly.

Pakistani trade minister Makhdoom Amin Fahim is expected to take part in a conference in Agra later this month. Officials say Pakistan is expected to announce full MFN status to India during his visit but the heightened tension between the two nuclear-armed neighbours has cast doubts on the trip.

"As of now, we have not given any consideration to this matter in a negative sense, because, yes what has happened is horrific, it is unacceptable, highly provocative," Sharma said. He added, "And this is for Pakistan to realize that where the well-being of the economies of the countries lies. Economic engagement can be enhanced in an environment of peace and stability and anything which undermines that environment is not conducive."

Sharma said economic engagement was the only way forward to peace and stability. "And there is no other way forward for this region. So it is for Pakistan to take action and hold those who are responsible for this horrific act not only accountable but to punish them. That would be in Pakistan's own interest, not only for bilateral relations but its global image as a responsible nation state," he added.

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6 Ways Climate Change Will Affect You

Photograph by AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez

The planet keeps getting hotter, new data showed this week. Especially in America, where 2012 was the warmest year ever recorded, by far. Every few years, the U.S. federal government engages hundreds of experts to assess the impacts of climate change, now and in the future.

From agriculture (pictured) to infrastructure to how humans consume energy, the National Climate Assessment Development Advisory Committee spotlights how a warming world may bring widespread disruption.

Farmers will see declines in some crops, while others will reap increased yields.

Won't more atmospheric carbon mean longer growing seasons? Not quite. Over the next several decades, the yield of virtually every crop in California's fertile Central Valley, from corn to wheat to rice and cotton, will drop by up to 30 percent, researchers expect. (Read about "The Carbon Bathtub" in National Geographic magazine.)

Lackluster pollination, driven by declines in bees due partly to the changing climate, is one reason. Government scientists also expect the warmer climate to shorten the length of the frosting season necessary for many crops to grow in the spring.

Aside from yields, climate change will also affect food processing, storage, and transportation—industries that require an increasing amount of expensive water and energy as global demand rises—leading to higher food prices.

—Daniel Stone

Published January 16, 2013

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NRA President Defends Ad Attacking Obama

Jan 16, 2013 6:40pm

Christian Gooden/St. Louis Post-Dispatch/AP Photo

In an interview with ABC News this evening, NRA President David Keene said the gun-rights lobby is aggressively preparing for “battle” with the White House and Congress over President Obama’s sweeping new proposals to curb gun violence.

Keene criticized Obama’s announcement today, surrounded by four children from around the country, for “using kids to advance an ideological agenda.” And he expressed cautious confidence that few of the legislative measures would ultimately pass.

“It’s going to be very tough for the president to accomplish some of these things, but that doesn’t mean he can’t do it if he really turns it on,” Keene told ABC.

“All bets are off when a president really wants to go to war with you,” he said. “We’re gonna be there and we’re gonna fight it.”

INFOGRAPHIC: Guns in America: By The Numbers

Keene said passage of the 1994 assault weapons ban remains fresh in the minds of NRA leaders, noting that initial widespread congressional opposition gradually gave way to a narrow margin in favor, thanks in part to pressure from then-President Bill Clinton.

NRA members would hold accountable any politicians who “sell them out to some pie-in-the-sky scheme such as the president is proposing,” he said.

The group launched a new “Stand and Fight” advocacy campaign Tuesday night, opposing Obama’s gun control measures, anchored by a controversial new TV ad that began airing online and on the Sportsman Channel.

The ad calls President Obama an “elitist hypocrite” for sending his daughters to a private school with armed guards while questioning whether all other U.S. schools should have the same security measures. The White House blasted the ad as “repugnant and cowardly.”

“When the question is the protection of children, which is what this is all about… it’s perfectly legitimate to ask why some children should be protected and other children should not be protected,” Keene said, defending the ad.

“We were not talking about the president’s kids. We were talking about an elite class who criticizes others in their desire to be safe while making sure that they and their families and their children are always protected.

“We’re not talking about the Secret Service protection the president’s children enjoy — they ought to have that wherever they go,” he added.

PHOTOS: Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

Keene also ribbed Obama for using children as “props” for his announcement:  “We didn’t line them up on a stage and pat them on the shoulder while we were urging somebody to take our position,” he said.

The NRA has acknowledged some areas of common ground for curbing gun violence included the Obama proposal — namely beefed up resources for mental health care, better background check data and increased presence of school resource officers (police) at public schools.

But Keene said many of those steps were just “fig leaves.”

“What the president did is say … ‘I care about armed security.’ He can check off that box on the Gallup polls. He can say to the people concerned about it, ‘It’s part of my package.’ … He said the problem of severely, mentally ill — we’re going to study it.”

Obama called for federal aid to states for the hiring of up to 1,000 new resource officers and school counselors.  Currently, there are armed resource officers at 28,000 U.S. schools.

“That’s a drop in the ocean in terms of the problem,” Keene said. “It’s simply a fig leaf so he can pursue an anti-gun agenda. It has less to do with security and more to do with gun.”

SHOWS: Good Morning America World News

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The age-old truth: Stress gives presidents more than a few gray hairs

Why presidents age quickly

Presidents face unabated, unfathomable stress. “You see it over a term,” said Ronan Factora, a physician specializing in geriatric medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. “It’s a good study of chronic stress on a person’s overall health.”

Obama and his national security team monitor the hit on Osama bin Laden. (Pete Souza/White House; Photo altered to obscure a classified document.)

Changes in skin or hair are gradual, he said. “If you do have a stressful event, nothing is going to happen right away.” Nothing visible anyway. Inside the body, the pituitary gland jolts the adrenal gland, just above the kidneys. Hormones start coursing. Adrenaline cranks up heart rates and blood pressure. Cortisol, another hormone from the same gland, causes inflammation and preps the body for converting sugars into energy.

“It’s not intended that people would be chronically exposed to these levels,” said Sherita Golden, a physician at the Johns Hopkins Medical Bloomberg School of Public Health. Cortisol strains the circulatory system, battering artery walls. The hormone also thins the skin, makes muscles waste and bones lose mass. The immune system weakens, and viruses that cause colds and cold sores take hold. Sleep turns fitful.

“Your cognition slows, you may feel more depressed, your ability to concentrate goes down,” Factora said. “And it just builds on itself — a real cascade.”

The only known cure

There is one known treatment: exercise. “It is the best benefit a physician can recommend,” Factora said. “There is no drug that can present as many benefits as exercise can.”

Obama plays basketball during his 2008 campaign. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Obama is a fiend for exercise. In hour-long workouts, he has been known to hit treadmills hard, weight train with arms and legs, build quickness through “plyos” or plyometrics — exercises that involve explosive movements. He also throws footballs, shoots basketballs and thwacks at golf balls.

His predecessors exercised, too, some of them fiercely. George W. Bush ran till his aging knees made cycling a better option. Presidents Carter and Bill Clinton jogged, while Ronald Reagan rode horses and split logs with such vigor, he once cut his thigh. President Gerald Ford performed a daily exercise regimen while still in his robe and PJs.

Good exercise leads to better thinking, brain-mapping has shown. “Exercise actually brings more blood flow,” explained Linda Fried, an epidemiologist and geriatrician at Columbia University. “Parts of the brain are activated and they’re associated with complex thinking and problem-solving.” Workouts also force a president to — truly, finally, deeply — rest. Only then can the relaxed brain start to make creative associations.

Infirmity and vice

The job has compounded certain human frailties. Most famous perhaps is the lethal case of pneumonia that 68-year-old William Henry Harrison caught at his inauguration. Woodrow Wilson’s stroke certainly limited his leadership of the country, and Franklin D. Roosevelt worked around the problems related to his polio more ably than might have been expected.

But daily habits also affect presidential well-being in lesser-known ways. Dwight D. Eisenhower was so dedicated to his form of exercise that he played 800 rounds of 18 holes over eight years as president, according to Evan Thomas, the author of “Ike’s Bluff: President Eisenhower’s Secret Battle to Save the World.” Then, in 1955, Eisenhower had a heart attack, and two years later, a stroke. Intestinal surgery came in between, all as he was staving off nuclear war and realigning Southeast Asia.

“Toward the end,” Thomas said, “he was taking an extra sleeping pill at night” — the powerful, old-school kind, with barbiturates. And that was on top of a nightly scotch, never more than five ounces, except when it was, Thomas said. “A couple of times he says to his doctor, ‘Let’s get drunk.’ ”

To the best of the public’s knowledge, recent presidents have not exacerbated their stress through bad behaviors such as drinking. Obama, however, confirmed that he had to kick a cigarette habit of unknown intensity at some midpoint in his first term.

The side effects of smoking might show up as those lines in his face, the doctors said. While sun exposure can also make a face look withered, Obama’s darker skin has melanin to alleviate UV ray damage. That same coloring, however, can make his white hair look more pronounced.

A special lot

Obama had a fitness test on Jan. 12, and the White House said the results would be released by February. His previous physical was in October 2011; it showed that he had added one pound since his February 2010 physical (his 2011 weight: 181, very good for a man who was then 50 and 6-foot-1).

Like all presidents since 1992, Obama has been under constant medical watch: a military physician is on hand wherever a president goes. Burton Lee,whom the first President Bush brought to the White House to monitor his health, agreed with Mariano that presidents are a special lot. They push their bodies and minds, and thus they develop a greater capacity to fight off infection. They shake enough hands to fell a lesser creature, he said.

But the mental intrusions — the sense that someone needs something from the president every moment of every day — are as insidious as the germs. “It’s just a phenomenally demanding job,” he said. “You never get one minute off.”

Despite the extraordinary stress levels, many recent presidents have lived well beyond normal life expectancy. Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford died at 93; Jimmy Carter and the George H.W. Bush are 88. Doctors are coming to understand that stress may have an upside. “Human beings need some degree of stress to keep their systems tuned,” Fried said. “Some people enjoy the stimulation of it and the excitement and couldn’t live without it.”

Plus, human minds literally seek reasons to live. “Many people, as they get older, deeply care about future generations and the world’s survival,” Fried said. “If they have a chance to make a difference, that keeps people healthy.”

As Texas governor, George W. Bush was an avid runner, and sometimes invited journalists to pant alongside. But as president, Bush's knees literally got weak, and mountain biking became a better option, always on agent-protected terrain like his ranch in Crawford, Texas, or the Secret Service training site in Greenbelt. A teetotaler, the president went to bed early and exercised often, which helped stave off stress. Between meals, as a candidate, Bush famously chomped Cheetos, and as president, never lost his hankering for good Tex-Mex cooking.

On many occasions, Bill Clinton's physician found it difficult to determine whether he was super-stressed or full-on infirm. They proved the two basic conditions of presidential life.

“We were worried about Clinton when he was being impeached,” she recalled. “He looked like he had it all together, but we worried.” All she and her colleagues could do was ask; all he would say was “I’m tired.”

Mariano could still clearly envision both the first President Bush and Clinton pushing on, with bags under their eyes, to the next campaign event. “One factor Bill Clinton had in his favor: he could power-nap,” she said. When his helicopter went up, his eyelids would go down. Then upon landing, he announce, “OK, I’m ready! Showtime!”

After a bout of heart disease, cardiac surgery and a new commitment to vegan dieting, Clinton has regained strength — if not weight. Doctors were hesitant to attribute his ailment to all that cortisol damaging his circulatory system. “We don’t have a genetic twin of President Clinton,” said Factora, and that twin would have to rest for the eight years Clinton did not in order to qualify as an experimental control.

The first President Bush didn’t just work out, he worked out vigorously,” said his physician Lee, citing four-mile runs and ball games with Marines at Camp David. Once he even played tennis with Pete Sampras. “He broke the Stairmaster at Camp David, he pounded it till it didn’t work,” Lee recalled. “If I’m on it for five minutes, you have to take me out on a stretcher.”

Like appearance, endurance is highly individual; one person crumbles in circumstances where another thrives. Plus, what one person actively avoids, another embraces. “The one thing I noticed is that presidents have very unusual personalities,” Lee said. “Each is a different person, but for all, there is no easy day.”

While abstemious in an era when other statesmen chain-smoked cigars, Abraham Lincoln saw his legendary strength dwindle. At the start, the hale president was an able horseman who wrestled soldiers and challenged them to strength tests. One such test required a three-foot axe to be held out from his body with one hand, which is much harder than it sounds, said David Von Drehle, the author of “Rise to Greatness: Abraham Lincoln and America’s Most Perilous Year.”.

By the time of his death, the president had been wracked by insomnia and lost interest in food. He arrived at the White House as a sinewy 6-foot-4, 180-pound strongman. In the course of four years, he dropped 30 pounds. “He was sunken-eyed and grizzled, nothing like that bright-eyed lawyer of Springfield,” said Von Drehle. Lincoln sat for a famous series of portraits, and “by the last set of photographs, he looks 75 years old, but he’s 56.”

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Serbia hints willing to talk about UN seat for Kosovo

BELGRADE: Serbia, which fiercely opposes independence for Kosovo, hinted for the first time on Tuesday that it may give up its opposition to the breakaway territory's bid to join the United Nations.

Serbian Prime Minister Ivica Dacic said Belgrade was looking for a "comprehensive settlement" with its former southern province, which may include talking about a seat for Kosovo at the UN.

Since Kosovo unilaterally proclaimed independence from Serbia in 2008 -- a move Belgrade persistently rejects -- Kosovan authorities have repeatedly said their ultimate goal is UN membership.

Backed by its traditional ally Russia, which wields a veto on the UN Security Council, Serbia had vowed never to allow Kosovo to join the UN and other related international organisations.

But Dacic on Tuesday for the first time hinted at a change in Belgrade's attitude.

"We can agree on everything," Dacic told reporters.

"We are seeking a comprehensive settlement, but for that to happen something has to be given," he said ahead a new round of talks with Kosovo counterpart Hashim Thaci in Brussels later this week.

Serbia's parliament on Sunday adopted a resolution calling for autonomy for the Serb minority in Kosovo as a part of ongoing EU-backed talks with Pristina.

In return, Serbia would finally recognise Pristina's authority over the entire territory, including the Serb-populated north of Kosovo, currently under Belgrade's control.

Improvement of relations with Pristina is a key condition for Serbia to move toward eventual membership in the European Union.

"They (Kosovo) are pressuring us through the European Union, and we are not letting them into the United Nations. Are we supposed to be spiteful like that for years?" Dacic said.

Ever since the 1998-1999 war, when its forces were driven out of Kosovo by NATO, Serbia has had no control over the territory, except in areas dominated by the Serb minority.

However, Dacic recently told parliament that "Serbia's sovereignty (in Kosovo) is almost non-existent," the first time a top Serbian official admitted so.

More than 90 countries, including the United States and 22 out of 27 EU member states, have recognised Kosovo as an independent state.

- AFP/jc

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10 new faces inducted into Omar’s cabinet

JAMMU: In a major cabinet reshuffle, Jammu and Kashmir's chief minister Omar Abdullah inducted 10 new ministers in the state cabinet, who were administrated oath by governor N N Vohra on Tuesday.

This is the first reshuffle carried out by Omar after he was sworn-in as chief minister on 5 January, 2009. They included six cabinet ministers and four ministers of state with independent charge. Mohammad Akbar Lone (National Conference), Choudhary Mohamamd Ramzan (National Conference), Ajay Sadhotra (National Conference), Ghulam Ahmad Mir (Congress), Abdul Majid Wani (Congress) and Mir Saif-ul-lah (National Conference) have been inducted as cabinet ministers.

Mohammad Akbar Lone is the state assembly speaker and has often been in the thick of controversy over repeated verbal duels with the opposition, PDP. Ghulam Ahmed Mir, a Congress MLA from Dooru in South Kashmir, staged a comeback after he was acquitted of all the charges by a CBI court in connection with the 2006 sex scandal as all prosecution witnesses turned hostile.

Apart from them, Sajjad Ahmad Kichloo (National Conference), Feroz Ahmed (National Conference), Nazir Ahmed Gurezi (National Conference) and Viqar Rasool (Congress) have been inducted as MoS with independent charge. Besides chief minister Omar Abdullah, deputy chief minister Tara Chand along with state congress president Saifuddin Soz were also present at the oath taking ceremony.

Earlier, the governor accepted the resignations of seven ministers recommended and forwarded to him by Abdullah.

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A Wild Start for Weather in the New Year

Here we go again. The weather's going to extremes: a snowstorm in Jerusalem, wildfires in Australia, a cold snap in China, a heat wave in Brazil. Based on the first two weeks of the new year, 2013's picking up right where 2012 left off.

(What's up with the weather? Read the September 2012 National Geographic story and see a gallery of extreme weather pictures.)

As much as 8 inches (20 centimeters) of snow fell on Jerusalem (map) last Thursday, closing roads across the city. It was the biggest winter storm there in 20 years. Scores of trees fell from the weight of the snow, snowball fights broke out in the parks, and Israeli President Shimon Peres was photographed building a snowman outside his residence with help from his bodyguards.

In Australia, where a heat wave was smashing records across the country, the national weather agency added two new colors to its maps to handle the possibility of unprecedented temperatures: deep purple for above 122°F (50°C) and pink for above 125.5°F (52°C). The first eight days of the year were among the warmest on record, with January 7 ranking as Australia's hottest day ever, with an average temperature of 104.6°F (40°C). Some beaches were so hot swimmers couldn't walk to the water without burning their feet on the sand.

Elsewhere around the globe, the weather has been equally extreme. While much of the eastern U.S. and northern Europe basked in springlike weather, Tokyo (map) saw 3 inches (7.6 centimeters) of snow fall on the city this weekend, nearly half of its typical total for a full year.

In China, the average temperature fell to 25°F (-4°C) in early January, the lowest in nearly three decades. More than a thousand ships in China's Laizhou Bay (map) have been frozen into the ice.

At the same time, a heat wave and drought in northeast Brazil prompted officials to consider rationing electricity for the first time in a decade, and the temperature in Rio de Janeiro (map) reached a record 109.8°F (43°C).

The New Normal

Extremes like these are becoming the norm, a team of 240 U.S. scientists warned in a draft report released Friday. In an open letter to the American people, the authors of the latest National Climate Assessment said that the frequency and duration of extreme conditions are clear signs of a changing climate.

"Summers are longer and hotter, and periods of extreme heat last longer than any living American has experienced," they wrote. "Winters are generally shorter and warmer. Rain comes in heavier downpours, though in many regions there are longer dry spells in between."

The impacts of such changes are easy to see, they added. "Corn producers in Iowa, oyster growers in Washington State, and maple syrup producers in Vermont have observed changes in their local climate that are outside of their experience. So, too, have coastal planners from Florida to Maine, water managers in the arid Southwest and parts of the Southeast, and Native Americans on tribal lands across the nation."

Their report followed by a week the announcement by NOAA's National Climatic Data Center that 2012 ranked as the warmest year on record for the lower 48 states. Across the nation, more than 99 million people sweltered in temperatures above 100°F (38°C) for more than ten days. The average temperature last year was more than three degrees higher than the average for the 20th century.

On top of all the heat waves, the nation suffered 11 disasters with damages of at least $1 billion each, including the severe drought across the Midwest and superstorm Sandy along the East Coast. (See top reader photos of superstorm Sandy.)

Rough Waters Ahead

In another troubling sign of a changing climate, the amount of ice covering the Arctic Ocean shrank to its lowest level ever in late 2012. Nearly half of the ocean was free of ice in mid-September, the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported. Some scientists have speculated that the warming ocean is changing the pattern of the jet stream over the Arctic, increasing the likelihood of extreme weather for lower latitudes. (Related: "Polar Ice Sheets Shrinking Worldwide, Study Confirms.")

Even with all this weird weather, things could have been even worse if El Niño conditions had developed this winter, as many experts had predicted. During an El Niño phase, the pattern of storms across the Pacific typically increases the amount of warm, dry weather that reaches places like Australia, leading to severe drought or extended heat waves.

But last November, the anticipated El Niño fizzled out. If it hadn't, the Australian heat could have been even worse. "The fact that we have neutral El Niño conditions this year is helping to keep things less extreme than they might be otherwise," said meteorologist Jeff Masters of Weather Underground.

Looking ahead to the spring, Masters cautioned that the U.S. may be in for still more extreme weather. "The great drought of 2012 is now a two-year drought," he said, referring to the record-breaking dry spell that wiped out crops across the Midwest last summer. "If we come into spring with drought conditions as widespread and intense as they are now, we're at high risk of another summer of extreme drought, which could cost tens of billions of dollars—again." (Pictures: Surprising Effects of the U.S. Drought.)

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NY Passes Nation's Toughest Gun Law

Today New York became the first state to pass a gun control law -- the toughest in the nation -- since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting massacre last month.

Acting one month and a day since the rampage killing that left 20 first-graders and six educators dead, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the bill into law shortly after 5 p.m.

Called the New York Safe Act, the law includes a tougher assault weapons ban that broadens the definition of what constitutes an assault weapon, and limits the capacity of magazines to seven bullets, down from 10. The law also requires background checks of ammunition and gun buyers, even in private sales, imposes tougher penalties for illegal gun use, a one-state check on all firearms purchases, and programs to cut gun violence in high-crime neighborhoods.

As he signed the bill into law, Cuomo said it was not only "the first bill" but the "best bill."

"I'm proud to be a New Yorker, because New York is doing something, because we are fighting back, because, yes, we've had tragedies, and yes, we've had too many innocent people lose their lives, and yes, it's unfortunate that it took those tragedies to get us to this point, but let's at least learn from what's happened, let's at least be able to say to people, yes, we went through terrible situations, but we saw, we learned, we responded, and we acted, and we are doing something about it," Cuomo said. "We are not victims.

'The View' on NRA Shooting App: Think It Out Watch Video

"You can overpower the extremists with intelligence and with reason and with commonsense," Cuomo continued, "and you can make this state a safer state."

New York's law also aims to keep guns out of the hands of those will mental illness. The law gives judges the power to require those who pose a threat to themselves or others get outpatient care. The law also requires that when a mental health professional determines a gun owner is likely to do harm, the risk must be reported and the gun removed by law enforcement.

The legislation also includes what is called a "Webster provision," named for the two firefighters ambushed on Christmas Eve in Webster, N.Y. The measure would mandate a life sentence with no chance of parole for anyone who kills a first responder.

The National Rifle Association issued a statement after the bill's signing, saying it was "outraged at the draconian gun control bill that was rushed through ... late Monday evening."

"Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature orchestrated a secretive end-run around the legislative and democratic process and passed sweeping anti-gun measures with no committee hearings and no public input," the statement read. "These gun control schemes have failed in the past and will have no impact on public safety and crime. Sadly, the New York Legislature gave no consideration to that reality. While lawmakers could have taken a step toward strengthening mental health reporting and focusing on criminals, they opted for trampling the rights of law-abiding gun owners in New York, and they did it under a veil of secrecy in the dark of night. The legislature caved to the political demands of a governor and helped fuel his personal political aspirations."

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Diversity and the Obama White House

Sometimes photos tell the story, sometimes not. But our colleague Karen Tumulty noted a contrast in these two images that might raise eyebrows.

The first is a picture on Sept. 11, 2001, of Vice President Dick Cheney on the phone in the White House Situation Room — perhaps talking with President George W. Bush — with several top aides standing by, including three women: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Bush senior adviser Karen Hughes and senior Cheney adviser Mary Matalin. There are also two African Americans in the small group.

Then there’s the iconic photo of Obama in the Situation Room on the night SEAL Team 6 dispatched Osama bin Laden. There’s one woman at the table, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and another woman in the doorway, Audrey Tomason, director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council. There’s only one African American.

Waiting and seeing

Speaking of diversity, President Obama may have been a bit defensive at his news conference Monday when he was asked about his first Cabinet picks.

His first term had “as diverse, if not more diverse, a White House and a Cabinet than any in history,” he said, adding that he “would just suggest that everybody kind of wait until they’ve seen all my appointments . . . before they rush to judgment.”

The White House confirmed Monday that Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano was staying on in her job. (Ah, we’ve been writing that for some time.)

On the other hand, another very senior woman, Nancy-Ann DeParle, White House deputy chief of staff and a major player in Obama’s health-care program, is leaving next week to join the Brookings Institution as a guest scholar in economic studies and will also lecture at Harvard Law School.

Another official said to be leaving is Mike Strautmanis, now counselor to White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, and before that deputy chief of staff in Obama’s Senate office. He’s probably headed to the private sector.

Meanwhile, the Agriculture Department said Monday that Obama asked Secretary Tom Vilsack to stay in his post and the former Iowan accepted. (This long-expected announcement may also mean his wife, Christie Vilsack, who lost a bid in Iowa for a House seat, has landed an administration job here.)

Miles to go

John Kerry
, assuming he becomes secretary of state, will have a difficult, if not impossible, task to best his immediate predecessors’ travel feats.

After all, in terms of miles traveled, Condoleezza Rice set a high bar with a record 1,059,247 miles logged, edging out the current secretary, Hillary Clinton, by about 100,000 miles. And Clinton set a formidable mark of visiting 112 countries during her tenure.

Kerry may decide first to visit those few countries Clinton didn’t get to or perhaps didn’t get to often.

She did leave Kerry a few unvisited places, such as war-torn Mali and Sudan, but those aren’t places one goes to frequently.

She also left him some fine spots.

First, he he can visit Austria. Clinton practically encircled Vienna (though she didn’t go to Slovenia and Slovakia), but, according to the State Department’s list, she never stopped for the Sacher torte, the famous chocolate cake at the Sacher Hotel in Vienna.

On that trip or another, Kerry can also stop in unvisited Luxembourg, Romania and Cyprus.

He could find some reason to go to Italy, which it appears Clinton only visited once in four years, and stop in Rome to see Ambassador David Thorne, a close pal and the twin brother of Kerry’s first wife.

While in Rome he could go to the Vatican, which it appears Clinton skipped, making her only the second holder of the job (Warren Christopher was the other) since Richard Nixon’s first secretary of state, William Rogers, to bypass the Holy See.

Kerry also might want to check in with the Israelis. Clinton visited, but only five times in all, the fewest number of visits since Rogers. (When George Shultz was secretary of state, he practically lived there during a lengthy peace effort.)

Loving Labor lost

The prospect of of post-Cabinet life is looking pretty sweet for Labor Secretary Hilda Solis. We spotted her last week, just a day after she announced her resignation, doing things we can only imagine were tough to manage in the days when her schedule was packed with wall-to-wall meetings.

A woman we’d swear was Solis was standing outside her Capitol Hill rowhouse wearing workout gear (Hitting the gym? On a weeknight? Now, that’s a luxury!) and chatting with two gal pals, also in athletic clothes . The crew appeared to be having a good time while checking out the exterior of the home and contemplating Solis’s putting it on the market. (Solis’s office thought we must have been mistaken, but we’d know our neighbor when we saw her.)

Solis told Labor Department employees last week in a letter that she planned to “return to the people and places” she loves, which most likely means she’s heading back to her native California, where many expect her to run for the powerful Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

Sounds as if she had better enjoy that downtime while she can.

With Emily Heil

The blog: washingtonpost.com/
intheloop. Twitter: @InTheLoopWP.

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Euro gains against US dollar in positive market

NEW YORK: The euro gained ground against the US dollar Monday as positive market sentiment spurred buying of riskier assets, such as the European currency.

The euro fetched US$1.3376 around 2200 GMT, up from US$1.3341 at the same time last Friday. Earlier, the unit brushed US$1.3404, its highest level in almost 11 months.

The euro continued to rise against the Japanese currency, to 119.65 yen from 119.00 yen late Friday, while the US dollar rose to 89.45 yen from 89.18 yen.

The market showed little reaction to a speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on the challenges facing the US economy, analysts said.

"I saw nothing very different from what has already been announced by the Fed," whether it be in the minutes from the last Federal Open Market Committee policy meeting in December or the FOMC statement, Charles St-Arnaud, a Nomura economist, said.

Wading into the Washington political fray over the federal budget and the borrowing limit, Bernanke called on Congress to lift the debt limit to avoid putting the country into default.

Kathy Lien of BK Asset Management said the market was waiting for Tuesday's US retail sales data for December, which covers the important holiday-shopping season.

"Consumer spending is the backbone of the US economy, and the only reason why investors obsess over the labour market is because they hope that stronger job growth will translate into stronger spending," Lien said.

The euro rise was buoyed by last week's upbeat comments by European Central Bank president Mario Draghi.

The yen, meanwhile, remained under selling pressure after Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday unveiled a US$226.5 billion stimulus plan in the latest bid to boost the world's fragile number-three economy.

The US dollar rose against the Swiss currency, buying 0.9216 francs compared with 0.9135 francs late Friday.

The pound fell to US$1.6074 from US$1.6129.

- AFP/jc

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