December video game retail sales drop 22 percent

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. retail sales of video games and gaming systems fell 22 percent in December, capping a year of declining sales for the industry.Research firm NPD Group said Thursday that overall sales fell to $ 3.21 billion from $ 4.1 billion in December 2011. NPD estimates that sales of new game hardware, software and accessories account for about half of what consumers spend on gaming.Sales...

Read More..

Inside Story: Life Without Lauren Spierer

By Kristen Mascia and Jeff Truesdell 01/12/2013 at 06:30 PM EST Lauren Spierer Jeremy Hogan/Bloomington Herald-Times/Polaris It's the little things, say Robert and Charlene Spierer, that hurt the most. For Robert it's the flash of a blonde ponytail on a city street...

Read More..

Q&A: Scramble for vaccine as flu season heats up

WASHINGTON (AP) — Missed flu-shot day at the office last fall? And all those "get vaccinated" ads? A scramble for shots is under way as late-comers seek protection from a miserable flu strain already spreading through much of the country.Federal health officials said Friday that there is still some flu vaccine available and it's not too late to benefit from it. But people may have to call around to...

Read More..

Wall Street Week Ahead: Attention turns to financial earnings

NEW YORK (Reuters) - After over a month of watching Capitol Hill and Pennsylvania Avenue, Wall Street can get back to what it knows best: Wall Street. The first full week of earnings season is dominated by the financial sector - big investment banks and commercial banks - just as retail investors, free from the "fiscal cliff" worries, have started to get back into the markets. ...

Read More..

Plenty of Theories, and Enemies, in Killing of 3 Kurds in Paris

Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe brother of Sakine Cansiz (on poster), one of three Kurdish activists found shot on Thursday, said his family was convinced that it was a professional assassination. PARIS — With her signature long hennaed hair, fiery resolve and olive-green military fatigues, Sakine Cansiz was a feminist, guerrilla fighter and former political prisoner as adept at...

Read More..

Canada natives block Harper’s office, threaten unrest

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Aboriginal protesters blocked the main entrance to a building where Canada’s prime minister was preparing to meet some native leaders on Friday, highlighting a deep divide within the country’s First Nations on how to push Ottawa to heed their demands.The noisy blockade, which lasted about an hour, ended just before Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his aides met with about 20 native...

Read More..

Nicole Kidman Would Love for Sunday to Be a Singer

Mom & Babies Celebrity Baby Blog 01/11/2013 at 02:00 PM ET From the land down under to the deep south, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban‘s daughters have become the perfect blend of southern belle – complete with Aussie accents.With their native Australian parents settling in the south — the...

Read More..

Flu season puts businesses and employees in a bind

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly half the 70 employees at a Ford dealership in Clarksville, Ind., have been out sick at some point in the past month. It didn't have to be that way, the boss says."If people had stayed home in the first place, a lot of times that spread wouldn't have happened," says Marty Book, a vice president at Carriage Ford. "But people really want to get out and do their jobs, and sometimes...

Read More..

Wall Street Week Ahead: Attention turns to financial earnings

NEW YORK (Reuters) - After over a month of watching Capitol Hill and Pennsylvania Avenue, Wall Street can get back to what it knows best: Wall Street. The first full week of earnings season is dominated by the financial sector - big investment banks and commercial banks - just as retail investors, free from the "fiscal cliff" worries, have started to get back into the markets. ...

Read More..

Sri Lankan Parliament Impeaches Chief Justice

NEW DELHI — Defying a court order, Sri Lanka’s Parliament voted overwhelmingly on Friday to impeach the nation’s chief justice, a significant step in a worsening showdown between the legislature and the judiciary that has alarmed democracy advocates and many foreign governments. President Mahinda Rajapaksa must now decide whether he is willing to take the last step in the impeachment process...

Read More..

A Tale of 2 Strategies: The Twitter Genius of Chuck Grassley and Cory Booker

If you’re on Twitter and not following Sen. Chuck Grassley, you’re not using Twitter correctly.The Iowa Republican is known for his colorful and personal Twitter feed. Take a gander: He personally tweets about everything from the History Channel to “Obamacare” to an incident in which he hit a deer with his car  (“assume dead”). Grassley’s tweets take us along for a ride, one that’s often...

Read More..

Diem Brown Blogs About Learning to Be Open to Therapy

In her PEOPLE.com blog, Diem Brown, the Real World/Road Rules Challenge contestant diagnosed with ovarian cancer for the second time, opens up about her desire for a child and the ups and downs of cancer and fertility procedures.I grew up an Army brat and lived in Germany from when I was six years old until I was about 10. During those years, my mom wanted to make sure we absorbed as much "culture"...

Read More..

Flu season strikes early and, in some places, hard

NEW YORK (AP) — From the Rocky Mountains to New England, hospitals are swamped with people with flu symptoms. Some medical centers are turning away visitors or making them wear face masks, and one Pennsylvania hospital set up a tent outside its ER to deal with the feverish patients.Flu season in the U.S. has struck early and, in many places, hard.While flu normally doesn't blanket the country until...

Read More..

Wall Street climbs as China data puts S&P back at five-year high

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Thursday and the S&P 500 ended at a fresh five-year high as stronger-than-expected exports from China spurred optimism about global growth prospects. Buying accelerated late in the day after the S&P 500 broke through technical resistance at 1,466.47, which was the market's closing level last Friday and the highest level since December 2007....

Read More..

Japan and Philippines to Bolster Maritime Cooperation

TOKYO — In a telling sign of how China’s rise has helped turn former wartime foes into allies, Japan and the Philippines agreed on Thursday to cooperate more closely on maritime security. During talks in Manila, the foreign ministers of Japan and the Philippines proclaimed their nations to be strategic partners that would collaborate more in resolving their separate territorial disputes with...

Read More..

Go Ahead, Keep Being Mean to Celebrities on Twitter

We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:  RELATED: The Honey Boo Boo Nature Special; Everyone’s Favorite Sleepwalking MomWe usually don’t condone...

Read More..

Jillian Michaels: Why I Decided to Come Back to The Biggest Loser

Jillian Michaels is back with a vengeance! The personal trainer, 38, is eager for people to watch her return to reality TV on The Biggest Loser's 14th season on NBC, focusing her attention on the show's overweight youth. "There were a lot of reasons for why I decided to come back," Michaels told PEOPLE on Wednesday in Pasadena, Calif., during the Television Critics Association's winter tour,...

Read More..

Retooling Pap test to spot more kinds of cancer

WASHINGTON (AP) — For years, doctors have lamented that there's no Pap test for deadly ovarian cancer. Wednesday, scientists reported encouraging signs that one day, there might be.Researchers are trying to retool the Pap, a test for cervical cancer that millions of women get, so that it could spot early signs of other gynecologic cancers, too.How? It turns out that cells can flake off of tumors in...

Read More..

Wall Street rises after Alcoa reports earnings

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Wednesday, rebounding from two days of losses, as investors turned their focus to the first prominent results of the earnings season. Stocks had retreated at the start of the week from the S&P 500's highest point in five years, hit last Friday, on worries about possible earnings weakness. Shares of Alcoa Inc were down 0.5 percent to...

Read More..

Venezuelan Court: Chávez Swearing-In Can Be Postponed

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's foreign minister is hosting a meeting with leaders from 19 Latin American and Caribbean nations. Nicolas Maduro plans to discuss issues related to Petrocaribe, a pact that has boosted the South American nation's influence in the region. Venezuela created Petrocaribe in 2005 to sell fuel to member countries at preferential terms and help finance...

Read More..

James Franco Does His Best Justin Bieber

We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:  RELATED: All We Want for Christmas Is Jimmy Fallon and Mariah Carey Singing to UsRemember when Justin...

Read More..

Real Housewives of O.C.'s Heather Dubrow Guest Stars on Hot in Cleveland

TV Watch Photo Exclusive By Dahvi Shira 01/08/2013 at 07:00 PM EST Heather Dubrow, Wendie Malick and Alan Dale Michael Yarish Heather Dubrow is heating up Hot in Cleveland!The Real Housewives of Orange County star makes a guest appearance on the Jan. 23 episode...

Read More..

Report: Death rates from cancer still inching down

WASHINGTON (AP) — Death rates from cancer are continuing to inch down, researchers reported Monday.Now the question is how to hold onto those gains, and do even better, even as the population gets older and fatter, both risks for developing cancer."There has been clear progress," said Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society, which compiled the annual cancer report with government and cancer...

Read More..

Wall Street slips as earnings season gets under way

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell on Tuesday, retreating from last week's rally on the "fiscal cliff" deal in Washington, as companies started to report results for the fourth quarter. After a 4.3 percent jump in the two sessions around the close of the fiscal cliff negotiations, the S&P has declined a bit, with investors finding few catalysts to extend the rally that took the benchmark...

Read More..

Venezuelan Government: Hugo Chávez to Miss Scheduled Swearing-In

Ramon Espinosa/Associated PressVenezuelan embassy workers hold up a framed image of ailing President Hugo Chávez. CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will miss Thursday's scheduled swearing-in ceremony for his third term due to health problems, the government said in a letter to Congress read out on Tuesday. Chavez has not been heard from since undergoing his fourth cancer...

Read More..