Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/100156
4B Daily News ��� Friday, December 21, 2012 WORLD BRIEFING back for now in Washington. Obama, ��� If lawmakers reach Dec. 31 without a deal, finanBoehner ���cliff��� cial markets might start to fall. House Speaker John Boehner differences and Obama are working to avoid that crunch point. aren���t really First so great WASHINGTON (AP) responders at ��� In the ������fiscal cliff������ standoff, President Barack Conn. school Obama wants to raise taxes by about $20 billion a year massacre more than House Speaker John Boehner. The presi- carry heavy dent wants to spend about that much more yearly than burdens Boehner does, too. That���s real money by most measures. Yet such numbers are hardly noticeable compared to the $2.6 trillion the government expects to collect in taxes next year, and to the $3.6 trillion it plans to spend. Going over the ������cliff������ could bring economy-shaking tax increases and spending cuts that start hitting in early January unless lawmakers act first. Their inability to compromise so far shows that their problem is far more than arithmetic ��� it���s also about the difficult politics that Obama and Boehner face when it comes to lining up votes. Timeline for negotiations Some key dates for negotiations involving the White House and congressional leaders to avert the year-end series of federal tax increases and spending cuts known as the ������fiscal cliff������: ��� It���s unclear if and when a deal may be reached, but it���s unlikely to be before Christmas. Senators are expected to leave for their holiday break Thursday or Friday. ��� Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said lawmakers would return to the Capitol on Dec. 27, the Thursday after Christmas, to try to hammer out a compromise. ��� President Barack Obama���s family is expected to be in Hawaii for Christmas, but the president is hanging NEWTOWN, Conn. (AP) ��� While the people of Newtown do their best to cope with loss and preserve the memories of their loved ones, another class of residents is also finding it difficult to move on: the emergency responders who saw firsthand the terrible aftermath of last week���s school shooting. Firefighter Peter Barresi was driving through Newtown on Friday when police cars with lights flashing and sirens blaring raced toward his oldest son���s elementary school. After he was sent to Sandy Hook school himself, he saw things that will stay with him forever. With anguished parents searching for their children, he prepared to receive the wounded, but a paramedic came back empty-handed, underscoring the totality of the massacre. Barresi, whose own son escaped unharmed, later discovered that among the 26 dead were children who played baseball with his son and had come to his house for birthday parties. ������For some of us, it���s fairly difficult,������ said Barresi, of the Sandy Hook Volunteer Fire and Rescue Co. ������Fortunately most of us did not go in.������ Newtown and environs weathered a fourth day of funerals Thursday, six days after a 20-year-old gunman killed his mother at home, Storm dumps foot of snow in Midwest, leads to pileup, outages 20 children and six adults at the school and himself for reasons still unknown. Mourners laid to rest Catherine Hubbard, Benjamin Wheeler, Jesse Lewis and Allison Wyatt, all 6 years old; and Grace McDonnell, 7. In Syria thousands will need long-term care after war ends ATMEH, Syria (AP) ��� A baby boy joined the ranks of Syria���s tens of thousands of war wounded when a missile fired by Bashar Assad���s air force slammed into his family home and shrapnel pierced his skull. Four-month-old Fahed Darwish suffered brain damage and, like thousands of others seriously hurt in the civil war, he will likely need care well after the fighting is over. That���s something doctors say a postconflict Syria won���t be able to provide. Making things worse, there has been a sharp spike in serious injuries since the summer, when the regime began bomb- ing rebel-held areas from the air, and doctors say a majority of the wounded they now treat are civilians. This week, Fahed was recovering from brain surgery in an intensive care unit, his head bandaged and his body under a heavy blanket, watched over by Mariam, his distraught 22-year-old mother. She said that after her first-born is discharged from the hospital in Atmeh, a village in an area of relative safety near the Turkish border, they will have to return to their village in a war zone in central Syria. WHY I ��� CORNING! An Olive City essay contest! A fun opportunity for residents and visitors alike to share why they love living, working or visiting California���s Olive City in 300 (three hundred) words or less. First, second and third place winners will be published in ���Corning 2013,��� the annual community resource guide and information directory, published January 31, 2013. Digital version will be published online for a full year, with links to the interactive edition posted on the Corning Chamber, City of Corning and Tehama County websites. Deadline for receipt of entries: Friday, January 11, 2013 1ST Prize: 2ND Prize: 3RD Prize: $200 $100 $50 DAILY NEWS RED BLUFF TEHAMA COUNTY and T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U NTY S I N C E 1 8 8 5 HOW TO ENTER: Via Email: Send c/o tehama.up@gmail.com Via Mail: I love Corning c/o The Daily News, PO Box 220, Red Bluff CA 96080 Entries must be accompanied by name of author, address, telephone number and email address if any. Original work only. All entries become the property of The Daily News and cannot be returned. Entries may be republished by The Daily News in whole or part, and may be afforded to the Corning Chamber of Commerce for community promotional purposes. Selection of winners will be made by a committee composed of representatives of The Daily News and Corning Chamber of Commerce. DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ��� The first widespread snowstorm of the season crawled across the Midwest on Thursday, with whiteout conditions stranding holiday travelers and sending drivers sliding over slick roads ��� including into a fatal 25-vehicle pileup in Iowa. The storm, which dumped a foot of snow in parts of Iowa and Wisconsin, was part of a system that began in the Rockies earlier in the week before trekking into the Midwest. It was expected to move across the Great Lakes overnight before moving into Canada. On the southern edge of the system, a tornado destroyed several homes in Arkansas, and strong winds peeled roofs off buildings and toppled trucks in Alabama and led to flight cancellations in Texas. In Iowa, drivers were blinded by blowing snow and didn���t see vehicles that had slowed or stopped on Interstate 35 about 60 miles north of Des Moines, state police said. A chain reaction of crashes involving semitrailers and passenger cars closed down a section of the highway. At least one person was killed. ������It���s time to listen to warnings and get off the road,������ said Iowa State Patrol Col. David Garrison. A big sell order at the NY Stock Exchange: Little-known rival will buy it for $8B NEW YORK (AP) ��� The Big Board just isn���t so big anymore. In a deal that highlights the dwindling stature of what was once a centerpiece of capitalism, the New York Stock Exchange is being sold to a little-known rival for $8 billion ��� $3 billion less than it would have fetched in a proposed takeover just last year. The buyer is IntercontinentalExchange, a 12-yearold exchange headquartered in Atlanta that deals in investing contracts known as futures. Intercontinental Exchange, known as ICE, said Thursday that little would change for the trading floor at the corner of Wall and Broad streets, in Manhattan���s financial district. But the clout of the twocenturies-old NYSE has gradually been eroded over decades by the relentless advance of technology and regulatory changes. Its importance today is mostly symbolic. World has places aplenty to survive doomsday Though the Mayans never really predicted that the world would end on Friday, some New Agers are convinced that humanity���s demise is indeed imminent. Or at least that it���s a good excuse for a party. Believers are being drawn to spots where they think their chances of survival will be better, and accompanying them are the curious, the partylovers and people wanting to make some money.