Friday, March 29, 2013

Pepsi 'Kickstarts' Mountain Dew with New Breakfast Drink

If you don't like coffee or tea, Mountain Dew has a new breakfast drink that might perk you up.

PepsiCo is rolling out a new drink called Kickstart this month that has Mountain Dew flavor but is made with five percent juice and Vitamins B and C, along with an extra jolt of caffeine.

The company, based in Purchase, N.Y., is hoping to boost sales by reaching Mountain Dew fans at a new time of day: morning.

PepsiCo said it doesn't consider Kickstart to be an energy drink, noting that it still has far less caffeine than drinks like Monster and Red Bull and none of the mysterious ingredients that have raised concerns among lawmakers and consumer advocates.

But Kickstart, which comes in flavors such as "energizing orange citrus"and "energizing fruit punch," could nevertheless give the company a side-door into the fast-growing energy drink market without getting tangled in any of its controversies.

It also comes in the same 16-ounce cans as popular energy drinks made by Monster Beverage Corp., which also offers options with juice content.

Simon Lowden, chief marketing officer for PepsiCo's Americas beverages, says the idea for Kickstart came about after the company learned through consumer research that Mountain Dew fans were looking for an alternative to traditional morning drinks such as coffee, tea and juice.

"They didn't really see anything that fit their needs," he said.

Lowden said Kickstart was developed independently from a Taco Bell breakfast drink introduced last year that combines Mountain Dew and orange juice.

With the growth of energy drinks such as Monster and Red Bull expected to slow, Kickstart could also signal the emergence of a new category that plays off the promise of energy and other health benefits, said John Sicher, publisher of the trade journal Beverage Digest.

In a nod to the growing concerns about sugary drinks, for example, Kickstart also uses artificial sweeteners to reduce its caloric content to about half that of regular soda; a can has 80 calories.

"It's a very interesting experiment capturing a number of attributes," Sicher said, likening it to Starbucks' Refreshers drinks, which promise "natural energy" from green coffee extract.

The promise of "energy" has been a big seller in the beverage industry in recent years, with the energy drink market increasing 17 percent in 2011 even as broader soft drink consumption has continued to decline, according to Beverage Digest.

PepsiCo and Coca-Cola have largely watched that growth from the sidelines, however, with players such as Monster Beverage and Red Bull dominating the market.

Butthe surging popularity of energy drinks has also led to sharper scrutiny.This summer, New York's attorney general launched an investigation into the marketing prices of energy drink makers including Monster and PepsiCo, which also makes Amp.

Lawmakers and consumer advocacy groups have also called on the Food and Drug Administration to investigate the safety of the high levels of caffeine in energy drinks for younger people.

Although Kickstart may look like an energy drink, it has far less caffeine,at 92 milligrams for a 16-ounce can. A comparable amount of regular Mountain Dew would have 72 milligrams of caffeine while a can of PepsiCo's Amp energy drink has 142 milligrams, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

By comparison, a 16-ounce cup of Starbucks coffee has 330 milligrams of caffeine.


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Biden to field gun questions from Field & Stream magazine

Vice President Biden will sit Thursday for an interview with Field & Stream magazine, as the White House tries to rally additional support for its package of new gun reforms.

The sportsman magazine is inviting readers to submit questions to ask the vice president ahead of the sit-down interview.

“Do you have a question for the Obama administration about guns? Now's your chance to get it answered,” a post on the magazine's website reads.

The editors of the magazine go on to say that, unsurprisingly, the interview will focus solely on the administration’s gun-control efforts.

“What do you want to know about the administration's plans for and positions on making background checks universal? Limiting high capacity magazines? Banning so-called 'assault' weapons? The importance of the Second Amendment? Any question is valid, as long as it pertains to guns,” the announcement reads.

President Obama has called for sweeping new gun restrictions in the wake of the Newtown, Conn., elementary school shooting that left 20 children and six staff members dead. The president has proposed a renewed assault weapons ban, limits on magazine capacities and universal background checks.

The interview comes amid a packed week of gun-related events for the White House.

Biden is also slated to meet with law enforcement officials on Monday in Philadelphia, while Obama will posthumously award the Presidential Citizens Medal on Friday to the six teachers and administrators who died in December's Newtown shooting. Obama is also scheduled to travel to Chicago on Friday for a public event that is likely to touch on gun violence, and first lady Michelle Obama will reportedly host the mother of a slain Chicago teenager at Tuesday night’s State of the Union.

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Federal Reserve Vice Chair Excoriates Congress For Failing To Boost The Economy

Federal Reserve Vice Chair Janet Yellen

After passage of the 2009 economic stimulus package, which helped save or create millions of jobs, Congress all but gave up providing support to the labor market. Instead, in the last two years, the nation’s deficits have been reduced by $2.5 trillion, with the overwhelming majority coming from spending cuts.

In a speech today, Federal Reserve Vice Chair Janet Yellen took policymakers to task for failing to provide support for the economy, noting that spending cuts have been a “headwind for the recovery“:

Discretionary fiscal policy hasn’t been much of a tailwind during this recovery. In the year following the end of the recession, discretionary fiscal policy at the federal, state, and local levels boosted growth at roughly the same pace as in past recoveries, as exhibit 3 indicates. But instead of contributing to growth thereafter, discretionary fiscal policy this time has actually acted to restrain the recovery.

State and local governments were cutting spending and, in some cases, raising taxes for much of this period to deal with revenue shortfalls. At the federal level, policymakers have reduced purchases of goods and services, allowed stimulus-related spending to decline, and have put in place further policy actions to reduce deficits…While a long-term plan is needed to reduce deficits and slow the growth of federal debt, the tax increases and spending cuts that would have occurred last month, absent action by the Congress and the President, likely would have been a headwind strong enough to blow the United States back into recession. Negotiations continue over the extent of spending cuts now due to take effect beginning in March, and I expect that discretionary fiscal policy will continue to be a headwind for the recovery for some time, instead of the tailwind it has been in the past.

Former President Bill Clinton said much the same thing last week, noting that “everybody that’s tried austerity in a time of no growth has wound up cutting revenues even more than they cut spending because you just get into the downward spiral and drag the country back into recession.” The experience of Europe should be showing U.S. policymakers that cutting spending in a weak economy backfires, squashing economic growth, which causes debt to expand. But it doesn’t seem like that lesson is taking hold.


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WashPost On Faith Page Celebrates Muslim Modesty But Trashes Catholic Bishops As Prudish on Sex

Ken Shepherd's picture

Today's "On Faith" page in the Washington Post featured a puzzling contrast that shows the left-wing media's schizophrenia when it comes to traditional religious faith. The paper's religion section editors ran these two items side-by-side: a Religion News Service (RNS) article that was thoroughly positive about Muslim women who want to design and/or model fashionable yet modest clothing, and Post religion writer Lisa Miller's attack on Catholic bishops for their stances on Christian sexual ethics in general and opposition to the ObamaCare contraception mandate in particular.

In "A Muslim fashion statement: Agency connects modesty-minded models with designers," Omar Sacirbey of RNS opened his 23-paragraph feature with the story of Savannah Uqdah, a devout Muslim woman who at one time aspired to be a fashion model but "didn't want to violate Islam's tenets on modesty." As such, Uqdah "shelved her modeling dreams and instead expressed herself through the fashions she wore." But now that modeling agencies eye a lucrative market in fashionable yet modest attire, Sacirbey notes, women like Uqdah are excited at the potential to live out their dreams.

At no point in Sacirbey's feature did he turn to anyone to deride as outdated or retrograde the very notion of modesty as informed by traditional Muslim teaching. The next column over, however, was a far different story, with Miller waging a full-throated attack on Catholic teachings on sexual morality.

By contrast, in her B2 column headlined "Where bishops have trouble understanding young: Sex," Miller opened with an all-too-predictable line of secularist liberal attack on the Catholic Church: they're out of touch with modern times:

The headline last week in the National Catholic Reporter, the country’s go-to source for all things Catholic, might have run on the satirical news site “The Onion”: “Vatican admits it doesn’t fully understand youth culture,” it said. Next week, perhaps NCR will run a follow-up piece: “Bishops admit they have no clue about sex.”

But it's not just that the Church is out of step with modernity, in Miller's eyes at least, no, it's that they're out of step with the Obama administration and with the Washington Post:

The Obama administration has tried to be sensitive to the bishops’ claims to conscience. After much yelling about the trampling of religious liberties, most notably by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the administration last week unveiled adjustments to its health-care plan that would allow religious organizations to abstain from offering their employees contraceptive coverage under their group plans while, at the same time, requiring insurers to offer the coverage separately. The compromise is a win-win-win, the Department of Health and Human Services argues. The religious employer can follow his conscience. The woman gets the coverage, if she wants it. And the insurer doesn’t have to pay the higher costs associated with unplanned, unwanted pregnancies. In an editorial, The Washington Post supported the compromise.

Yes, those pesky bishops are belligerently seeking a fight, against both the Obama White House and the 21st century, Miller sighed (emphasis mine):

But some bishops just won’t be satisfied. Three American bishops said on Jan. 30 that they’d sooner go to jail than submit to the contraceptive mandate. The archbishop of Philadelphia, Charles Chaput, called the administration’s concessions “minimalist” and used the phrase “immoral services” as a euphemism for birth control. The spokeswoman for the USCCB, Sister Mary Ann Walsh, said the accommodations “did not completely satisfy concerns related to conscience rights,” and Cardinal Timothy Dolan’s fuller response was equally chary.

What these most conservative advocates want, it seems, is for American women to be thrust back to a time before Vatican II, when legal birth control was scarce, expensive and difficult to procure.

Miller then brought it back to the National Catholic Reporter -- which she failed to mention, by the way, is a theologically liberal Catholic publication -- to round out her column and suggest that when it comes to sexual ethics, it's the shepherds of the church who should be listening to the sheep (emphasis mine):

Which brings me back to the NCR piece, and the Vatican’s articulated lack of understanding of youth culture. The hierarchy is worried enough about its hold on the young to have held a closed-door conference in Rome from Wednesday through Saturday at which bishops listened to experts on youth in an effort to improve their messaging to the young and recapture some of the generation who — in the developed West, at least — are falling away. In preparation for the conference, the president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, said he’d been listening to Amy Winehouse.

Ravasi will probably come to this on his own, but in case he doesn’t, here’s a clue: Young people care about sex.

And it’s not just having sex that they care about. It’s how religious leaders talk about sex. In America, young people emphatically don’t like religions that preach negative messages about sex. They don’t like to be told that sex is bad or that premarital sex is a paving stone on the road to hell or that homosexuals are in any way, as the catechism says, “intrinsically disordered.” The conservative insistence on birth control as “immoral,” as Chaput would have it, is, for young Catholics, a turnoff.

Donna Freitas, a scholar of religion and a Catholic who studies college students’ attitudes toward sex, wrote as much in 2010: “Catholic students especially spoke with great sarcasm about the ‘don’ts’ with regard to sex in the Catholic tradition, which make them feel alienated, and which make them think that Catholicism is utterly out of touch.” To underscore her point: 98 percent of Catholic women have used birth control at some point in their lives, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Social conservatives like to point to the widespread use of the pill, and the subsequent sexual revolution, as the beginning of the end of American morals, the gateway to the erosion of family and marriage, the beginning of the end of a healthy respect for sex as an act of great emotional significance, as well as the means of procreation. But recent data fail to support this thesis. Teen pregnancy rates have sunk to record lows, according to a report last year by the Guttmacher Institute. Teenagers are waiting longer than they did in the 1990s to have sex for the first time, and when they do have sex, it is usually in their later teens, with contraception and a steady boyfriend or girlfriend.

So, despite all the hysteria about the eroding effects on values of social media and YouTube and the fear that the availability of birth control will lead to a nation of hedonistic narcissists, the kids are all right. They’re sensible and self-protective. But they’re less likely than ever to take advice about personal morality from older men who think they know better.

To Miller, an atheist who affiliates on the high holy days with Reform Judaism, the bishops of the Church are just celibate old men who think they're know it alls, not men who take vows to shepherd the flock of God with care for the immortal souls in their charge.

But this sort of derision is reserved exclusively for conservative Catholics and conservative evangelicals who insist on standing by the Bible's teachings on sexual ethics and abortion. While traditional Muslim teaching on sexual ethics is equally if not more so prudish by the secularist standards of folks like Ms. Miller and the editors of the On Faith page, don't hold your breath for them to mock Muslims who are serious about living out the tenets of their faith on such matters.

When it comes to bashing conservative religious folks as backward and self-righteous simpletons, the media are not equal opportunity.


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White House monitoring track of Nemo snowstorm

President Obama and federal officials are monitoring the winter snowstorm barreling down on the Northeastern U.S., The White House said Friday.

The storm, dubbed "Nemo" by the Weather Channel, is expected to deposit up to two feet of snow and shut down travel along the nation's most populated corridor.

"The president will obviously be updated on this regularly," White House spokesman Jay Carney said Friday, adding that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was working with partners to monitor the storm.

"FEMA’s regional offices in Boston and New York City are in contact with state emergency management counterparts," Carney said. "FEMA’s National Watch Center here in Washington continues to monitor the situation and hold regular operational briefings with regional and federal partners as the severe winter weather advances and as impacts are felt throughout -- through the overnight hours into Saturday."

Officials on the ground in Northeastern cities and states are warning local residents against travel and updating them on emergency efforts.

In Massachusetts, Gov. Deval Patrick ordered the roads closed Friday afternoon. The Associated Press reported that 4,000 flights had been canceled as major airports in the Boston and New York areas shuttered.

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Remarks by the President at the National Prayer Breakfast

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For Immediate Release February 07, 2013 Remarks by the President at the National Prayer Breakfast Washington Hilton
Washington, D.C.

 9:03 A.M. EST THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  Please have a seat.Mark, thank you for that introduction.  I thought he was going to talk about my gray hair.  (Laughter.)  It is true that my daughters are gorgeous.  (Laughter.)  That's because my wife is gorgeous.  (Applause.)  And my goal is to improve my gene pool. To Mark and Jeff, thank you for your wonderful work on behalf of this breakfast.  To all of those who worked so hard to put this together; to the heads of state, members of Congress, and my Cabinet, religious leaders and distinguished guests.  To our outstanding speaker.  To all the faithful who’ve journeyed to our capital, Michelle and I are truly honored to be with you this morning.  Before I begin, I hope people don't mind me taking a moment of personal privilege.  I want to say a quick word about a close friend of mine and yours, Joshua Dubois.  Now, some of you may not know Joshua, but Joshua has been at my side -- in work and in prayer -- for years now.  He is a young reverend, but wise in years.  He’s worked on my staff.  He’s done an outstanding job as the head of our Faith-Based office.   Every morning he sends me via email a daily meditation -- a snippet of Scripture for me to reflect on.  And it has meant the world to me.  And despite my pleas, tomorrow will be his last day in the White House.  So this morning I want to publically thank Joshua for all that he’s done, and I know that everybody joins me in wishing him all the best in his future endeavors -- including getting married.  (Applause.)         It says something about us -- as a nation and as a people -- that every year, for 61 years now, this great prayerful tradition has endured.  It says something about us that every year, in times of triumph and in tragedy, in calm and in crisis, we come together, not as Democrats or Republicans, but as brothers and sisters, and as children of God.  Every year, in the midst of all our busy and noisy lives, we set aside one morning to gather as one community, united in prayer.     We do so because we’re a nation ever humbled by our history, and we’re ever attentive to our imperfections -- particularly the imperfections of our President.  We come together because we're a people of faith.  We know that faith is something that must be cultivated.  Faith is not a possession.  Faith is a process.   I was struck by the passage that was read earlier from the Book of Hebrews:  “Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and He rewards those who diligently seek Him.”  He rewards those who diligently seek Him -- not just for one moment, or one day, but for every moment, and every day.   As Christians, we place our faith in the nail-scarred hands of Jesus Christ.  But so many other Americans also know the close embrace of faith -- Muslims and Jews, Hindus and Sikhs.  And all Americans -- whether religious or secular -- have a deep and abiding faith in this nation.   Recently I had occasion to reflect on the power of faith.  A few weeks ago, during the inauguration, I was blessed to place my hand on the Bibles of two great Americans, two men whose faith still echoes today.  One was the Bible owned by President Abraham Lincoln, and the other, the Bible owned by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  As I prepared to take the sacred oath, I thought about these two men, and I thought of how, in times of joy and pain and uncertainty, they turned to their Bibles to seek the wisdom of God’s word -- and thought of how, for as long as we’ve been a nation, so many of our leaders, our Presidents, and our preachers, our legislators and our jurists have done the same.  Each one faced their own challenges; each one finding in Scripture their own lessons from the Lord.   And as I was looking out on the crowd during the inauguration I thought of Dr. King.  We often think of him standing tall in front of the endless crowds, stirring the nation’s conscience with a bellowing voice and a mighty dream.  But I also thought of his doubts and his fears, for those moments came as well -- the lonely moments when he was left to confront the presence of long-festering injustice and undisguised hate; imagined the darkness and the doubt that must have surrounded him when he was in that Birmingham jail, and the anger that surely rose up in him the night his house was bombed with his wife and child inside, and the grief that shook him as he eulogized those four precious girls taken from this Earth as they gathered in a house of God.  And I was reminded that, yes, Dr. King was a man of audacious hope and a man of relentless optimism.  But he was always -- he was also a man occasionally brought to his knees in fear and in doubt and in helplessness.  And in those moments, we know that he retreated alone to a quiet space so he could reflect and he could pray and he could grow his faith.  And I imagine he turned to certain verses that we now read. I imagine him reflecting on Isaiah, that we wait upon the Lord; that the Lord shall renew those who wait; that they shall mount up with wings as eagles, and they shall run and not be weary, and they shall walk and not faint.   We know that in Scripture, Dr. King found strength; in the Bible, he found conviction.  In the words of God, he found a truth about the dignity of man that, once realized, he never relinquished.   We know Lincoln had such moments as well.  To see this country torn apart, to see his fellow citizens waging a ferocious war that pitted brother against brother, family against family -- that was as heavy a burden as any President will ever have to bear.   We know Lincoln constantly met with troops and visited the wounded and honored the dead.  And the toll mounted day after day, week after week.  And you can see in the lines of his face the toll that the war cost him.  But he did not break.  Even as he buried a beloved son, he did not break.  Even as he struggled to overcome melancholy, despair, grief, he did not break.   And we know that he surely found solace in Scripture; that he could acknowledge his own doubts, that he was humbled in the face of the Lord.  And that, I think, allowed him to become a better leader.  It’s what allowed him in what may be one of the greatest speeches ever written, in his second Inaugural, to describe the Union and the Confederate soldier alike -- both reading the same Bible, both prayed to the same God, but “the prayers of both could not be answered.  That of neither has been answered fully.  The Almighty has His own purposes.” In Lincoln’s eyes, the power of faith was humbling, allowing us to embrace our limits in knowing God’s will.  And as a consequence, he was able to see God in those who vehemently opposed him.  Today, the divisions in this country are, thankfully, not as deep or destructive as when Lincoln led, but they are real.  The differences in how we hope to move our nation forward are less pronounced than when King marched, but they do exist.  And as we debate what is right and what is just, what is the surest way to create a more hopeful -- for our children -- how we're going to reduce our deficit, what kind of tax plans we're going to have, how we're going to make sure that every child is getting a great education -- and, Doctor, it is very encouraging to me that you turned out so well by your mom not letting you watch TV.  I'm going to tell my daughters that when they complain.  (Laughter.) In the midst of all these debates, we must keep that same humility that Dr. King and Lincoln and Washington and all our great leaders understood is at the core of true leadership.   In a democracy as big and as diverse as ours, we will encounter every opinion.  And our task as citizens -- whether we are leaders in government or business or spreading the word -- is to spend our days with open hearts and open minds; to seek out the truth that exists in an opposing view and to find the common ground that allows for us as a nation, as a people, to take real and meaningful action.  And we have to do that humbly, for no one can know the full and encompassing mind of God.  And we have to do it every day, not just at a prayer breakfast.   I have to say this is now our fifth prayer breakfast and it is always just a wonderful event.  But I do worry sometimes that as soon as we leave the prayer breakfast, everything we've been talking about the whole time at the prayer breakfast seems to be forgotten -- on the same day of the prayer breakfast.  (Laughter.)  I mean, you'd like to think that the shelf life wasn't so short.  (Laughter.)  But I go back to the Oval Office and I start watching the cable news networks and it's like we didn’t pray.  (Laughter.)   And so my hope is that humility, that that carries over every day, every moment.  While God may reveal His plan to us in portions, the expanse of His plan is for God, and God alone, to understand.  “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known.”  Until that moment, until we know, and are fully known, all we can do is live our lives in a Godly way and assume that those we deal with every day, including those in an opposing party, they're groping their way, doing their best, going through the same struggles we're going through.  And in that pursuit, we are blessed with guidance.  God has told us how He wishes for us to spend our days.  His Commandments are there to be followed.  Jesus is there to guide us; the Holy Spirit, to help us.  Love the Lord God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  See in everyone, even in those with whom you disagree most vehemently, the face of God.  For we are all His children.   That’s what I thought of as I took the oath of office a few weeks ago and touched those Bibles -- the comfort that Scripture gave Lincoln and King and so many leaders throughout our history; the verses they cherished, and how those words of God are there for us as well, waiting to be read any day that we choose.  I thought about how their faith gave them the strength to meet the challenges of their time, just as our faith can give us the strength to meet the challenges of ours.  And most of all, I thought about their humility, and how we don’t seem to live that out the way we should, every day, even when we give lip service to it.  As President, sometimes I have to search for the words to console the inconsolable.  Sometimes I search Scripture to determine how best to balance life as a President and as a husband and as a father.  I often search for Scripture to figure out how I can be a better man as well as a better President.  And I believe that we are united in these struggles.  But I also believe that we are united in the knowledge of a redeeming Savior, whose grace is sufficient for the multitude of our sins, and whose love is never failing.   And most of all, I know that all Americans -- men and women of different faiths and, yes, those of no faith that they can name -- are, nevertheless, joined together in common purpose, believing in something that is bigger than ourselves, and the ideals that lie at the heart of our nation’s founding -- that as a people we are bound together.    And so this morning, let us summon the common resolve that comes from our faith.  Let us pray to God that we may be worthy of the many blessings He has bestowed upon our nation.  Let us retain that humility not just during this hour but for every hour.  And let me suggest that those of us with the most power and influence need to be the most humble.  And let us promise Him and to each other, every day as the sun rises over America that it will rise over a people who are striving to make this a more perfect union.   Thank you.  God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.)   END9:21 A.M. EST

Extending Middle Class Tax Cuts

Blog posts on this issue February 09, 2013 5:45 AM ESTWeekly Address: Averting the Sequester and Finding a Balanced Approach to Deficit Reduction

President Obama urges Congress to act to avoid a series of harmful and automatic cuts—called a sequester—from going into effect that would hurt our economy and the middle class and threaten thousands of American jobs.

February 08, 2013 6:21 PM ESTWeekly Wrap Up: “We Can Make a Difference”

Here's quick glimpse at what happened this week on WhiteHouse.gov.

February 08, 2013 5:47 PM ESTUpdate from Bruce Reed on the President's Plan to Reduce Gun Violence

Vice President Biden's Chief of Staff Bruce Reed sat down with us to give us a quick update on the work the President and Vice President have been doing since the President released his plan to reduce gun violence.

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FDA approves Celgene drug for blood cancer

WASHINGTON -- The Food and Drug Administration said Friday it approved a new drug from Celgene for patients with hard-to-treat multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood.

The agency approved the pill Pomalyst for cases of the disease that have spread even after treatment with two other cancer drugs.

Multiple myeloma mainly affects older adults and kills about 10,700 people annually, according to the National Cancer Institute.

FDA noted that Pomalyst is the second drug approved for multiple myeloma in the past year. The agency approved Kyprolis from Onyx Pharmaceuticals Inc. in July 2012.

"Treatment for multiple myeloma is tailored to meet individual patient's needs, and today's approval provides an additional treatment option for patients who have not responded to other drugs," said Dr. Richard Pazdur, FDA's office director for cancer drugs, in a statement.

Pomalyst carries a boxed warning, the most serious type, alerting patients and doctors that the drug can cause severe birth defects in pregnant women and can cause blood clots.

Shares of Celgene Corp., based in Summit, N.J., rose $2.29, or 2.4 percent, to $100.13. The stock added 17 cents to $100.30 in after-hours trading.


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From Russia, No Love For Gay Athletes

The major controversy over the 2014 Winter Olympics, which will be held in Sochi, Russia, has so far been about whether there would be enough snow to hold sports that depend on it. But there’s another controversy brewing that involves the sexuality of athletes, as Russia’s government is considering legislation that would outlaw “homosexual propaganda,” meaning public events that promote LGBT rights and public displays of same-sex affection will be illegal.

The legislation has sparked concern among out athletes like New Zealand speedskater Blake Skjellerup, who told USA Today that he was concerned about the legislation. “I don’t want to have to tone myself down about who I am,” Skjellerup said. “That wasn’t very fun and there’s no way I’m going back in the closet. I just want to be myself and I hate to think that being myself would get me in trouble.”

Even if the legislation doesn’t pass (it is expected to), Russia has already taken steps to fight homosexuality in its society and at its Olympics. Last year, a Russian judge banned the national Olympic committee from setting up a Pride House, a feature of the past several Olympics that hosts LGBT athletes. A Pride House, the judge wrote, would “undermine the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation” because it “contradict[s] the basics of public morality and the policy of the state in the area of family motherhood and childhood protection.” Meanwhile, an IOC spokesperson took a bold stand by telling USA Today that it was “too early for the IOC to comment on Russia’s proposed anti-gay legislation because it has not been voted on.”

There were 23 open athletes at the 2012 London Olympics, a sharp rise from the 10 that participated in Beijing in 2008. While they faced an atmosphere of tolerance in Britain, which approved marriage equality this week, their Winter counterparts won’t be greeted similarly.

The fault for that lies with the International Olympic Committee, which has shown little tolerance for racism (even though Russia is no saint in that department either) and sexism but has not fought for protections for gay athletes in the same manner. “We aren’t responsible for the running of or setting up of Houses,” an IOC representative said when the Pride House ruling was made. “So in this case it isn’t a decision of either us, or the organizing committee in Sochi. From our side, the IOC is an open organization and athletes of all orientations will be welcome at the Games.”

Here, though, is what the IOC is responsible for:

The purpose of the Olympic Movement is to:
– link sport with culture and education;
– promote the practice of sport and the joy found in effort;
– help to build a better world through sport practised in a spirit of peace, excellence, friendship and respect.

That’s the Olympic Mission, one that is undermined by the IOC’s unwillingness to take a stand for the gay athletes that will be in Sochi. And the IOC isn’t alone. FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, awarded the 2018 men’s World Cup to Russia and the 2022 version to Qatar, one of 79 countries voted in favor of removing sexual orientation from a United Nations resolution condemning arbitrary executions last year. So three of world’s largest and most popular sporting events will take place in countries that are openly hostile to gay athletes and fans, and neither organization will bat an eye at that fact (FIFA president Sepp Blatter, in fact, drew outrage when he suggested in 2010 that gay fans in Russia and Qatar “should refrain from any sexual activities.”)

Organizations like FIFA and the IOC have played valuable roles in using their sports and their influence to make sports a more open and equitable place for people around the world. The IOC’s insistence that all countries include women in their delegations to the London Olympics broke barriers in countries like Saudi Arabia, while FIFA’s Football for Hope program has been used to expand access to the sport, education, and public health across poorer African nations. Both organizations have in the past been agents of social good, which makes it so much more of a shame that they refuse to take stands to protect the rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered athletes and fans they serve.


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How House Democrats Plan To Use Local Power To Stop Gun Violence – And How To Do It Better

On Thursday afternoon, the House Democratic Gun Violence Prevention Task Force released a framework document laying out fifteen proposals for gun violence prevention legislation. It’s a good document, reaching beyond the mainstay proposals like an assault weapon bans to less heralded, but equally important issues like restrictions on the federal government’s ability to help state and local police track local guns. But the most unique proposals in the framework are also some of the ones most in need of improvement: its recommendations for supporting local efforts against gun violence.

Other recent gun violence proposals (like those from President Obama and Sen. Dianne Feinstein [D-CA]) have focused primarily on increased direct federal legislation. The Task Force proposal also contains significant federal proposals, but amps up the focus on how the federal government can support innovative state and local initiatives to reduce gun violence. It’s a smart approach — NRA-sponsored legislation limits both local ability to regulate guns and efforts to research their effects, but what evidence we have suggests state and local efforts really can make a dent in gun violence. A study of 54 cities, for example, found that ones with tighter and better enforced gun laws substantially reduced the diversion of guns to criminals.

The Task Force’s approach to local enforcement involves highlighting smart local initiatives and supporting them. For example:

1. Comprehensive, public health youth gun violence initiatives. The Task Force rejects “tough on crime” approaches to youth violence that involve the mass incarceration of kids in favor of “comprehensive, evidence-based prevention and intervention programs directed toward at-risk youth” created by “representatives from local law enforcement, schools, court services, social services, health and mental health services, businesses, and other community organizations.” This appears to be a reference to the “public health” gun violence reduction approach enacted in, among other places, Boston and Minneapolis, which has saved hundreds of lives that might have been claimed by gunfire.

2. Criminal firearm disposal. “Over time, gun owners may lose their eligibility to possess a weapon under state or federal law, often because of criminal activity or mental health issues. Innovative programs designed to facilitate the disposal of firearms held by prohibited persons can prevent gun violence,” the Task Force notes. It goes on to suggest that “the federal government should encourage states to create and utilize programs that allow local law enforcement to assist gun owners who do not have the legal capacity to own them, in the sale or transfer of their illegal firearms.”

3. Community-level gun reduction. The Task Force recommends that “Congress should take measures to encourage state and local governments to use federal funds” to support “various strategies to better engage local communities in removing illegal or unused guns from their neighborhoods, such as illegal gun tip hotlines and voluntary gun buyback programs administered by municipalities or local law enforcement.” This sort of clarity (it even goes on to name specific federal funds that could be used for this purpose) could improve the Task Force’s other suggestions for local law enforcement.

Unfortunately, not all of these proposals for improved local gun action are accompanied by proposals for how the federal government can actually accomplish those ends ends. While the second of the above suggestions does, neither the first nor the third clarifies how, exactly, it plans to use federal law to encourage states, cities, and counties to adopt the outlined approach. Expressing support in the abstract is nice, but absent some kind of federal program providing financial or some other sort of assistance to locales, it’s won’t do very much.

Lack of concrete action for its local support plans isn’t the only problem in the recommendations — for example, its section on “increased prosecutions of persons who violate federal firearms law” focuses more on gun purchasers rather than the real problem, crooked gun dealers willing to sell to criminals. But overall, the proposals are excellent steps in the right direction.


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