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8A Daily News – Wednesday, August 31, 2011 WORLD BRIEFING Libyan rebels say they're closing in on Gadhafi HEISHA, Libya (AP) — Libyan rebels say they're closing in on Moammar Gadhafi and issued an ultimatum Tues- day to regime loyalists in the fugitive dictator's hometown of Sirte, his main remaining bastion: surrender this weekend or face an attack. ''We have a good idea where he is,'' a top rebel leader said. The rebels, tightening their grip on Libya after a military blitz, also demanded that Algeria return Gadhafi's wife and three of his children who fled there Monday. Grant- ing asylum to his family, including daughter Aisha who gave birth in Algeria on Tuesday, was an ''enemy act,'' said Ahmed al-Darrad, the rebels' interior minister. Rebel leaders insisted they are slowly restoring order in the war-scarred capital of Tripoli after a week of fighting, includ- ing deploying police and collecting garbage. Reporters touring Tripoli still saw chaotic scenes, including desperate motorists stealing fuel from a gas station. In the capital's Souk al Jumma neighborhood, about 200 people pound- ed on the doors of a bank, demanding that it open. Civil servants said they were told they would receive a 250-dinar (about $200) advance on their salaries for the three-day Muslim holiday of Eid al- Fitr, which starts Wednes- day in Libya. Helicopters rush food, water to Vermont NEWFANE, Vt. (AP) — National Guard heli- copters rushed food and water Tuesday to a dozen cut-off Vermont towns after the rainy remnants of Hurricane Irene washed out roads and bridges in a deluge that took many people in the landlocked New England state by sur- prise. ''As soon as we can get help, we need help,'' Liam McKinley said by cellphone from a moun- tain above the flood- stricken town of Rochester, Vt. Up to 11 inches of rain from the weekend storm turned placid streams into churning, brown torrents that splintered buildings, knocked homes off their foundations, flattened trees and took giant bites out of the asphalt across the countryside. At least three people died in Ver- mont. ''I think that people are still a little shell-shocked right now. There's just a lot of disbelief on peo- ple's faces. It came through so quickly, and there's so much damage,'' Gail Devine, director of the Woodstock Recre- ation Center, said as vol- unteers moved furniture out of the flooded base- ment and shoveled out thick mud that filled the center's two swimming pools. As crews raced to repair the roads, the National Guard began fly- ing in supplies to the towns of Cavendish, Granville, Hancock, Killington-Mendon, Marlboro, Pittsfield, Ply- mouth, Rochester, Stock- bridge, Strafford, Stratton and Wardsboro. The Guard also used heavy- duty vehicles to bring relief to flood-stricken communities still reach- able by road. Consumers gloomy WASHINGTON (AP) — Economists have advice for anyone worried that consumers are too fearful to keep spending: Look at what they're doing, not what they're saying. A survey of consumer confidence shows that Americans were spooked early this month by the standoff over the debt ceiling, a downgrade of U.S. long-term debt and a swoon in stock prices. But maybe only tem- porarily. If stock prices stay steady, consumers will likely keep spending, and the economy should Win WinWin Win You could $100* Just for sharing your local shopping and media preferences! Take the Pulse Research survey online only at: www.pulseresearch.com/redbluffdailynews Do it today – Survey will end when enough surveys are completed. *$100 gift certificates will be awarded to four individuals selected at random from among those completing the survey. Those selected may choose any store or business in Tehama County at which to redeem their gift certificate. Individual survey responses will not be shared with any third party. D NEWSAILY RED BLUFF TEHAMACOUNTY improve modestly in the months ahead, econo- mists say. Most down- played the results of a Conference Board survey released Tuesday that showed consumers were in a gloomy mood in early August. ''They tend to register their anxiety about the future in these surveys ... without actually curtail- ing their spending,'' said Chris Rupkey, chief finan- cial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ. Russia teams up with Exxon Mobil MOSCOW (AP) — Russia's state-owned Rosneft teamed up with U.S. company Exxon Mobil on Tuesday in a multibillion deal to devel- op offshore oil fields in the Russian Arctic — one of the last regions with immense and untapped hydrocarbon deposits — in return for access to resources in the Gulf of Mexico. Because Rosneft does not have its own technolo- gy for deep sea drilling, it was looking for partners to develop the offshore projects in the Arctic and other regions of Russia. A deal it was pursuing with Britain's BP earlier this year fell through, leaving the path open for Exxon Mobil. The oil giant already has experience drilling in the Arctic regions of Canada. Rosneft spokesman Rustam Kazharov told The Associated Press that the ''strategic partner- ship'' with Exxon was signed in the presence of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. He was unable to name the plots that Ros- neft will work on in the Gulf of Mexico and Texas. Exxon Mobil said in a statement that Tuesday's agreement includes $3.2 billion to be spent on exploring three giant undeveloped oil and gas fields in the Kara Sea — between the northeastern corner of continental Rus- sia and the Arctic archi- pelago of Novaya Zemlya — in the Arctic as well as a sector in the Black Sea. Petraeus hangs up his uniform WASHINGTON (AP) — David Petraeus, Amer- ica's best-known general and the wartime model of a soldier-scholar-states- man, is retiring as arguably the most conse- quential Army leader of his generation. Petraeus is bidding an official farewell to the Army on Wednesday and then opening a new chap- ter as director of the CIA, where he will try to keep up the pressure on al- Qaida and other terrorist groups plotting attacks from havens in Pakistan and beyond. He is to be sworn in as the nation's spy chief on Sept. 6, less than one week before the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 in New York, Washington and Pennsyl- vania. After a series of six command assignments as a general officer, includ- ing three in Iraq, many expected Petraeus would ascend to the military's top post, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Instead, President Barack Obama asked him to take over at CIA as part of a major shuffle of top national security officials that included Leon Panet- ta moving from CIA director to succeed the retiring Robert Gates as secretary of defense. Close friends and col- leagues of Petraeus say that when he realized the White House would not make him chairman of the Joint Chiefs, he saw CIA as the best alternative. ''I wanted this job,'' he told senators at his confir- mation hearing, saying he had discussed the CIA post with the Obama administration for months. Result can be deadly when pilots forget how to fly WASHINGTON (AP) — Pilots' ''automation addiction'' has eroded their flying skills to the point that they sometimes don't know how to recov- er from stalls and other mid-flight problems, say pilots and safety officials. The weakened skills have contributed to hundreds of deaths in airline crash- es in the last five years. Some 51 ''loss of con- trol'' accidents occurred in which planes stalled in flight or got into unusual positions from which pilots were unable to recover, making it the most common type of air- line accident, according to the International Air Transport Association. ''We're seeing a new breed of accident with these state-of-the art planes,'' said Rory Kay, an airline captain and co- chair of a Federal Avia- tion Administration advi- sory committee on pilot training. ''We're forget- ting how to fly.'' Opportunities for air- line pilots to maintain their flying proficiency by manually flying planes are increasingly limited, the FAA committee recently warned. Airlines and regulators discourage or even prohibit pilots from turning off the autopilot and flying planes themselves, the committee said. Fatal airline accidents have decreased dramati- cally in the U.S. over the past decade. However, The Associated Press interviewed pilots, indus- try officials and aviation safety experts who expressed concern about the implications of decreased opportunities for manual flight, and reviewed more than a dozen loss-of-control accidents around the world. ATF chief, US Attorney replaced WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department replaced three officials Tuesday who played criti- cal roles in a flawed law enforcement operation aimed at major gun-traf- ficking networks on the Southwest border. The department announced that the acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the U.S. attorney in Arizona had resigned and an administration official said a prosecutor who worked on the operation was reassigned to civil cases. The operation, known as Fast and Furious, was designed to track small- time gun buyers at several Phoenix-area gun shops up the chain to make cases against major weapons traffickers. It was a response to longstanding criticism of ATF for con- centrating on small-time gun violations and failing to attack the kingpins of weapons trafficking. A congressional inves- tigation of the program has turned up evidence that ATF lost track of many of the more than 2,000 guns linked to the operation. The Justice Department inspector general also is looking into the operation at the request of Attorney General Eric Holder. The operation has resulted in charges against 20 people and more may be charged. This month America's deadliest in Afghan war KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — August has become the deadliest month yet for U.S. forces in the nearly 10- year-old war in Afghanistan, increasing pressure on the Obama administration to bring troops home sooner rather than later. The 66 U.S. service members killed this month eclipses the previous record of 65 killed in July 2010, according to an Associated Press tally. Nearly half the August deaths occurred when insurgents shot down a Chinook helicopter Aug. 6, killing 30 American troops, mostly elite Navy SEALs. Violence is being report- ed across Afghanistan despite the U.S.-led coali- tion's drive to rout insur- gents from their strongholds in the south. Though American mili- tary officials predicted high casualties this summer as the Taliban try to come back after recent offensives, the grim milestone increases pressure on the Obama administration to withdraw U.S. forces quickly. The military has begun to implement President Barack Obama's order to withdraw the 33,000 extra troops he dispatched to the war. He ordered 10,000 out this year and another 23,000 withdrawn by the summer of 2012, leaving about 68,000 U.S. troops on the ground. Although major combat units are not expect- ed to start leaving until late fall, two National Guard regiments comprising about 1,000 soldiers started going home last month. 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