Celebrations planned as Wash. legalizes marijuana

SEATTLE (AP) — Legal marijuana possession becomes a reality under Washington state law on Thursday, and some people planned to celebrate the new law by breaking it.

Voters in Washington and Colorado last month made those the first states to decriminalize and regulate the recreational use of marijuana. Washington's law takes effect Thursday and allows adults to have up to an ounce of pot — but it bans public use of marijuana, which is punishable by a fine, just like drinking in public.

Nevertheless, some people planned to gather at 12:01 a.m. PST Thursday to smoke in public beneath Seattle's Space Needle. Others planned a midnight party outside the Seattle headquarters of Hempfest, the 21-year-old festival that attracts tens of thousands of pot fans every summer.

"This is a big day because all our lives we've been living under the iron curtain of prohibition," said Hempfest director Vivian McPeak. "The whole world sees that prohibition just took a body blow."

In another sweeping change for Washington, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Wednesday signed into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage. The state joins several others that allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.

That law also takes effect Thursday, when gay and lesbian couples can start picking up their wedding certificates and licenses at county auditors' offices. Those offices in King County, the state's largest and home to Seattle, and Thurston County, home to the state capital of Olympia, planned to open the earliest, at 12:01 a.m. Thursday, to start issuing marriage licenses. Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.

The Seattle Police Department provided this public marijuana use enforcement guidance to its officers via email Wednesday night: "Until further notice, officers shall not take any enforcement action — other than to issue a verbal warning — for a violation of Initiative 502."

Thanks to a 2003 law, marijuana enforcement remains the department's lowest priority. Even before I-502 passed on Nov. 6, police rarely busted people at Hempfest, despite widespread pot use, and the city attorney here doesn't prosecute people for having small amounts of marijuana.

Officers will be advising people to take their weed inside, police spokesman Jonah Spangenthal-Lee wrote on the SPD Blotter. "The police department believes that, under state law, you may responsibly get baked, order some pizzas and enjoy a 'Lord of the Rings' marathon in the privacy of your own home, if you want to."

Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce for those over 21, but for now selling marijuana remains illegal. I-502 gives the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage. Analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.

But marijuana remains illegal under federal law. That means federal agents can still arrest people for it, and it's banned from federal properties, including military bases and national parks.

The Justice Department has not said whether it will sue to try to block the regulatory schemes in Washington and Colorado from taking effect.

"The department's responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged," said a statement issued Wednesday by the Seattle U.S. attorney's office. "Neither states nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress" — a non-issue, since the measures passed in Washington and Colorado don't "nullify" federal law, which federal agents remain free to enforce.

The legal question is whether the establishment of a regulated marijuana market would "frustrate the purpose" of the federal pot prohibition, and many constitutional law scholars say it very likely would.

That leaves the political question of whether the administration wants to try to block the regulatory system, even though it would remain legal to possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

Colorado's measure, as far as decriminalizing possession goes, is set to take effect by Jan. 5. That state's regulatory scheme is due to be up and running by October 2013.

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Johnson can be reached at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

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Washington fears 'desperate' Assad could use chemical arms

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Western powers are whipping up fears of a fateful move to the use of chemical weapons in Syria's civil war as a "pretext for intervention", President Bashar al-Assad's deputy foreign minister said on Thursday.

He spoke as Germany's cabinet approved stationing Patriot anti-missile batteries on Turkey's border with Syria, a step requiring deployment of NATO troops that Syria fears could permit imposition of a no-fly zone over its territory.

"Syria stresses again, for the tenth, the hundredth time, that if we had such weapons, they would not be used against its people. We would not commit suicide," Faisal Maqdad said.

U.S. President Barack Obama and other NATO leaders have warned that using chemical weapons would cross a red line and "there would be consequences". Assad would probably lose vital diplomatic support from Russia and China that has blocked military intervention in the 20-month-old uprising that has claimed more than 40,000 lives.

Maqdad said Western reports that the Syrian military was preparing chemical weapons for use against rebel forces trying to close in on the capital Damascus were simply "theatre".

"In fact, we fear a conspiracy ... by the United States and some European states, which might have supplied such weapons to terrorist organizations in Syria, in order to claim later that Syria is the one that used these weapons," he said on Lebanon's Al Manar television, the voice of Hezbollah.

"We fear there is a conspiracy to provide a pretext for any subsequent interventions in Syria by these countries that are increasing pressure on Syria."

UNCONTROLLABLE

Exactly what Syria's army has done with suspected chemical weapons to prompt a surge of Western warnings is not clear. Reports citing Western intelligence and defense sources are vague and inconsistent.

The perceived threat may be discussed in Dublin on Thursday when Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meet international Syria mediator Lakhdar Brahimi to try to put a U.N. peace process for Syria back on track.

The talks come ahead of a meeting of the Western-backed "Friends of Syria" group in Marrakech next week which is expected to boost support for rebels fighting to overthrow Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Brahimi wants world powers to issue a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a transitional administration.

In addition to the possible use of chemical bombs by "an increasingly desperate" Assad, Clinton said Washington was concerned about the government losing control of such weapons to extreme Islamist armed groups among the rebel forces.

The United States is considering blacklisting one group suspected of ties to al Qaeda. U.S. officials confirmed that Jabhat al-Nusra, an influential rebel group accused of indiscriminate tactics that has advocated an Islamic state in Syria, was under review for blacklisting.

An explosion in front of the Damascus headquarters of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent killed at least one person on Thursday, Syrian state television said.

It blamed "terrorists from al Qaeda" -- a term often employed to refer to rebel forces.

Meanwhile, activists said the army pummeled several eastern suburbs of Damascus, where the rebels are dominant, with artillery and mortar fire. The suburbs have also been cut off from the city's water and electricity for weeks, rebels say, accusing the government of collective punishment.

COLLAPSE

Assad responded to past warnings about chemical weapons by taking steps to secure them, according to Israel's vice prime minister Moshe Yaalon.

"There is speculation that the chemical arsenal will fall into the hostile and irresponsible hands of the likes of al Qaeda or other terrorist groups. In the past, clear messages were relayed to Assad on a number of occasions, and in response Assad in fact gathered up the weaponry and separated the materials," Yaalon said on Wednesday.

Rebels say they have surrounded an air base 4 km (2-1/2 mikes) from the center of Damascus, a fresh sign the battle is closing in on the Syrian capital.

Maqdad, in his interview on Thursday, argued that reports of such advances were untrue: "What is sad is that foreign countries believe these repeated rumors."

But residents inside the capital say that the sound of shelling on the outskirts has become a constant backdrop and many fear the fight will soon come to Damascus.

The Western military alliance's decision to send U.S., German and Dutch Patriot missile batteries to help defend the Turkish border would bring European and U.S. troops to Syria's frontier for the first time in the 20-month-old civil war.

The actual deployment could take several weeks.

"Some countries now are now supplying Turkey with missiles for which there is no excuse. Syria is not going to attack the Turkish people," Maqdad said.

But a veteran Turkish commentator, Cengiz Candar of the Radikal newspaper, said Ankara fears Syria's 500 short-range ballistic missiles could fall into the wrong hands.

The government is "of the view that Syria was not expected to use them against Turkey, but that there was a risk of these weapons falling into the hands of 'uncontrolled forces' when the regime collapses", he wrote.

(Writing by Douglas Hamilton; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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Death toll from Philippine typhoon passes 280

NEW BATAAN, Philippines (AP) — Stunned parents searching for missing children examined a row of mud-stained bodies covered with banana leaves while survivors dried their soaked belongings on roadsides Wednesday, a day after a powerful typhoon killed more than 280 people in the southern Philippines.

Officials fear more bodies may be found as rescuers reach hard-hit areas that were isolated by landslides, floods and downed communications.

At least 151 people died in the worst-hit province of Compostela Valley when Typhoon Bopha lashed the region Tuesday, including 78 villagers and soldiers who perished in a flash flood that swamped two emergency shelters and a military camp, provincial spokeswoman Fe Maestre said.

About 80 people survived the deluge in New Bataan town with injuries, but between 50 and 319 others remain missing, according to varying estimates by government officials and the army.

The farming town of 45,000 people was a muddy wasteland of collapsed houses and coconut and banana trees felled by Bopha's ferocious winds.

On a roadside, dozens of mud-stained bodies were laid side-by-side, covered by cloth and banana leaves and surrounded by villagers. A man sprayed insecticide on the remains to keep away swarms of flies.

A father wept when he lifted a plastic cover and found the body of his child. A mother, meanwhile, went away in tears, unable to find her missing children. "I have three children," she said repeatedly, flashing three fingers before a TV cameraman.

Interior Secretary Mar Roxas, who visited the devastated town, said a day of searching by soldiers and volunteers did not turn up any of the 319 people reported missing in New Bataan.

"These were whole families among the registered missing," Roxas told the ABS-CBN TV network. "Entire families may have been washed away."

In nearby Davao Oriental, the coastal province first struck by the typhoon as it blew inland from the Pacific Ocean, at least 115 people perished, mostly in three towns that were so battered that it was hard to find any buildings with roofs remaining, provincial officer Freddie Bendulo and other officials said.

"We had a problem where to take the evacuees. All the evacuation centers have lost their roofs," Davao Oriental Gov. Corazon Malanyaon said.

Disaster-response agencies reported 13 other typhoon-related deaths elsewhere.

Unlike the previous day's turbulent weather, the sun was shining brightly Wednesday, prompting residents to lay their soaked clothes, books and other belongings out on roadsides to dry and revealing the extent of the damage to farmland. Thousands of banana trees in one Compostela Valley plantation were toppled by the wind, the young bananas still wrapped in blue plastic covers.

After slamming into Davao Oriental and Compostela Valley, Bopha roared quickly across the southern Mindanao and central regions, knocking out power in two entire provinces, triggering landslides and leaving houses and plantations damaged. More than 170,000 fled to evacuation centers.

The typhoon, one of the strongest to hit the country this year, had blown past southwestern Palawan province into the South China Sea by midday Wednesday and could head to either Vietnam or southern China, according to government forecasters.

The deaths came despite efforts by President Benigno Aquino III's government to force residents out of high-risk communities as the typhoon approached.

Some 20 typhoons and storms lash the northern and central Philippines each year, but they rarely hit the vast southern Mindanao region.

A rare storm in the south last December killed more than 1,200 people and left many more homeless.

The United States extended its condolences and offered to help its Asian ally deal with the typhoon's devastation. It praised government efforts to minimize the deaths and damage.

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Associated Press writers Jim Gomez, Teresa Cerojano and Oliver Teves in Manila contributed to this report.

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Cashing in on Gangnam Style's YouTube fame

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — As "Gangnam Style" gallops toward 1 billion views on YouTube, the first Asian pop artist to capture a massive global audience has gotten richer click by click. So too has his agent and his grandmother. But the money from music sales isn't flowing in from the rapper's homeland South Korea or elsewhere in Asia.

With one song, 34-year-old Park Jae-sang — better known as PSY — is set to become a millionaire from YouTube ads and iTunes downloads, underlining a shift in how money is being made in the music business. An even bigger dollop of cash will come from TV commercials.

From just those sources, PSY and his camp will rake in at least $7.9 million this year, according to an analysis by The Associated Press of publicly available information and industry estimates. But for online music sales in South Korea, he'll earn less than $60,000.

Here's how it works.

YOUTUBE

"Gangnam Style" with its catchy tune and much imitated horse-riding dance is the most-watched video on YouTube ever.

The viral video has clocked more than 880 million YouTube views since its July release, beating Justin Bieber's "Baby," which racked up more than 808 million views since February 2010. PSY's official channel on YouTube, which curates his songs and videos of his concerts, has nearly 1.3 billion views.

TubeMogul, a video ad buying platform, estimates that PSY and his agent YG Entertainment have raked in about $870,000 as their share of the revenue from ads that appear with YouTube videos. The Google Inc.-owned video service keeps approximately half.

PSY and YG Entertainment also earn money from views of videos that parody his songs.

Google detects videos that use copyrighted content. Artists can have the video removed or allow it to stay online and share ad revenue with YouTube. In the last week of September when "Gangnam Style" had around 300 million views, more than 33,000 videos were identified by the content identification system as using "Gangnam Style."

But since YouTube can be accessed from all over the world, wouldn't Asia be responsible for a significant chunk of the $870,000? The countries with the second and third-highest views of the video are Thailand and South Korea.

"Ads rates vary depending on which country the video is played. Developed countries have higher ad rates and developing countries lower," said Brian Suh, head of YouTube Partnership in Seoul.

And the country with the most views of "Gangnam Style?" The United States.

LEGAL DOWNLOADS, CDs

"Gangnam Style" has been downloaded 2.7 million times in the U.S. and has been the No. 1 or No. 2 seller for most weeks since its debut, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

The song sells for $1.29 on Apple's iTunes Store, the market leader in song downloads. Apple generally keeps about 30 percent of all sales, so the PSY camp could be due more than $2.4 million.

How much PSY keeps and how much goes to his managers, staff and record label is unclear. South Korean industry insiders said PSY likely gets 70 percent and YG Entertainment 30 percent for U.S. downloads.

But earnings from downloads in PSY's homeland are far from an embarrassment of riches.

South Koreans pay less than $10 a month for a subscription to a music service that allows them to download hundreds of songs or have unlimited access to a music streaming service. That makes the cost of a downloaded song about 10 cents on average. The average price for streaming a song is 0.2 cent.

PSY's cut for downloads is 14 percent. That falls to 7.5 percent for streamed songs. Yes, 7.5 percent of 0.2 cent. And that's before PSY's "Gangnam Style" co-composer take his share. The biggest cut goes to his agent and online retailers.

According to South Korea's national Gaon Chart, "Gangnam Style" was downloaded more than 3.6 million times and streamed around 40 million times as of November. That adds up to a little more than $61,000.

It's likely the fast fading music CD industry generated even smaller revenue. PSY's 9 percent cut from sales of 102,000 CDs in South Korea would earn him $50,000 or more, according to an estimate by Kim Dong-hyun, a senior manager at Korea Music Copyright Association.

As for many other parts of Asia, illegal downloads and pirated CDS are so pervasive that only a small minority are willing to pay up for the legal versions.

TV COMMERCIALS

PSY has been jetting around the world, performing on shows such as "The X-Factor Australia" and NBC's "Today Show," but such programs usually cover travel costs and not much else, said Gary Bongiovanni, editor-in-chief of concert trade magazine Pollstar.

It is television commercials that are the big money spinner for the most successful of South Korea's K-pop stars. PSY has been popping up in TV commercials in South Korea for top brands such as Samsung Electronics and mobile carrier LG Uplus.

Chung Yu-seok, an analyst at Kyobo Securities, estimates PSY's commercial deals would amount to 5 billion won ($4.6 million) this year.

The money is cool. The products not so much. PSY is now the face of a new Samsung refrigerator and a major noodle company.

THE FAMILY

A fact little known outside South Korea is that PSY's father, uncle and grandmother own a combined 30 percent of DI Corp., a company which makes equipment that semiconductor companies use to make computer chips.

It's a stretch to plausibly explain how the success of "Gangnam Style" will boost DI's profits but that doesn't matter to the South Korean stock market. Perhaps inspired by the pure power of pop, DI shares surged eightfold from July after PSY's hit reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 on the U.K. singles chart.

It was time to cash in for PSY's grandmother, who sold 5,378 shares for about $65,000.

The share price has fallen since then but is still about double what it was before the release of "Gangnam Style."

PSY's agent YG Entertainment has also done well. Its share price is up about 30 percent since mid-July. The value of CEO Yang Hyun-suk's stake has swelled to about $200 million, making him among the richest in South Korea's entertainment industry.

THE FUTURE

The question now hanging over PSY is whether he will replicate the blockbuster success of "Gangnam Style" or end up remembered as a one-hit wonder.

"When this slows down, what comes next for PSY?" said Nielsen analytics vice president David Bakula. "Is it the evolution of a new musical style, something audiences are going to be craving en masse, or is it something that's just a passing fancy?"

Analysts say "Gangnam Style" alone will not be enough to propel PSY into the ranks of musicians such as Adele and may not even be enough to make him the top-grossing K-pop star. That will depend largely on his upcoming album, which PSY said will be released in March.

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Ryan Nakashima contributed to this report from Los Angeles.

Youkyung Lee can be reached via Twitter: www.twitter.com/YKLeeAP

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Study: Drug coverage to vary under health law

WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study says basic prescription drug coverage could vary dramatically from state to state under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.

That's because states get to set benefits for private health plans that will be offered starting in 2014 through new insurance exchanges.

The study out Tuesday from the market analysis firm Avalere Health found that some states will require coverage of virtually all FDA-approved drugs, while others will only require coverage of about half of medications.

Consumers will still have access to essential medications, but some may not have as much choice.

Connecticut, Virginia and Arizona will be among the states with the most generous coverage, while California, Minnesota and North Carolina will be among states with the most limited.

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Online:

Avalere Health: http://tinyurl.com/d3b3hfv

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Philippines death toll climbs, hundreds still missing after typhoon

NEW BATAAN, Philippines (Reuters) - Blocked roads and severed communications in the southern Philippines frustrated rescuers on Wednesday as teams searched for hundreds of people missing after the strongest typhoon this year killed at least 283 people.

Typhoon Bopha, with central winds of 120 kph (75 mph) and gusts of up to 150 kph (93 mph), battered beach resorts and dive spots on Palawan island on Wednesday but it was weakening as it moved west.

Hardest hit was the southern island of Mindanao, where Bopha made landfall on Tuesday. It triggered landslides and floods along the coast and in farming and mining towns inland.

Interior Minister Manuel Roxas said 300 people were missing.

"Entire families were washed away," Roxas, who inspected the disaster zone, told reporters.

Most affected areas were cut off by destroyed roads and collapsed bridges and army search-and-rescue teams were being flown in by helicopter.

Power was cut and communications were down.

According to tallies provided by the military and disaster agency officials, 283 people were killed.

Thousands of people were in shelters and officials appealed for food, water and clothing. Dozens of domestic flights were suspended on Wednesday.

The governor of the worst-hit province, Compostela Valley, in Mindanao said waves of water and mud came crashing down mountains and swept through schools, town halls and clinics where huddled residents had sought shelter.

The death toll in the province stood at 160. In nearby Davao Oriental province, where Bopha made landfall, 110 people were killed.

"The waters came so suddenly and unexpectedly, and the winds were so fierce," the Compostela Valley governor, Arthur Uy, told Reuters by telephone.

He said irrigation reservoirs on top of mountains had given way sending large volumes of water down to the valleys. Torrential rain often triggers landslides down slopes stripped of their forest cover.

Damage to agriculture and infrastructure in the province was extensive, Uy said.

STUNNED

Corn farmer Jerry Pampusa, 42, and his pregnant wife were marooned in their hut but survived.

"We were very scared," Pampus said. "We felt we were on an island because there was water everywhere."

Another survivor, Francisco Alduiso, said dozens of women and children who had taken shelter in a village centre, had been swept away.

"We found some of the bodies about 10 km (6 miles) away," Alduisa told Reuters. The only building left standing in his village was the school.

Another survivor, Julius Julian Rebucas, said his mother and brother disappeared in a flash flood.

"I no longer have a family," a stunned Rebucas said.

An army commander said two dozen people had been pulled from the mud in one area and were being treated in hospital.

About 20 typhoons hit the Philippines every year, often causing death and destruction.

Almost exactly a year ago, Typhoon Washi killed 1,500 people in Mindanao.

(Additional Reporting by Rosemarie Francisco and Manny Mogato; Editing by Robert Birsel)

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Typhoon pounds the Philippines, killing at least 7

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — One of the strongest typhoons to hit the Philippines this year barreled across the country's south on Tuesday, killing at least seven people and forcing more than 50,000 to flee from inundated villages.

Typhoon Bopha slammed into the Davao region at dawn, its ferocious winds ripping roofs from homes and its 500-kilometer- (311-mile-) wide rain band flooding low-lying farmland. The storm, packing winds of 160 kilometers (99 miles) per hour and gusts of up to 195 kph (121 mph), toppled trees, triggered landslides and sent flash floods surging across the region's mountains and valleys.

In the gold-mining province of Compostela Valley, the fierce wind and rain forced a wall of mud and boulders to cascade down on a house, killing three children. Their bodies were wrapped in blankets by their grieving relatives and placed on a basketball court in Maparat village.

"The only thing we could do was to save ourselves. It was too late for us to rescue them," said Valentin Pabilana, who survived the landslide.

A soldier died and 20 villagers were missing after a flash flood raced down a mountain in Andap town, washing away a truck, according to Compostela Valley Governor Arturo Uy and military officials.

In nearby Davao Oriental, a poor agricultural and gold-mining province about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) southeast of Manila, an elderly woman was killed when her house was struck by a tree felled by howling wind, said Benito Ramos, an ex-army general who now heads the government's disaster-response agency.

A man died a few hours later when a tree knocked him down while he was traveling on a scooter on a road in Misamis Oriental province. One storm-related death was also reported on central Siquijor island, Ramos said.

He said the death toll was expected to rise once soldiers and police gain access to some far-flung villages isolated by floods, fallen trees and downed communications.

Regional disaster-response officer Liza Maso told The Associated Press by telephone that she was trying to confirm an army report that a flash flood washed away a truck carrying an undetermined number of people in New Bataan town, also in Compostela Valley.

While some 20 typhoons and storms normally lash the archipelago nation annually, the southern provinces being battered by Bopha are unaccustomed to fierce typhoons. A rare storm that took the area by surprise last December killed more than 1,200 people and left many more homeless and traumatized.

Officials were taking no chances this year, and President Benigno Aquino III made an appeal on national TV Monday for people in Bopha's path to move to safety and take storm warnings seriously.

"This typhoon is not a joke," Aquino said after meeting top officials in charge of disaster-response.

"But we can minimize the damage and loss of lives if we help each other," he added.

Aquino outlined preparations, including evacuations and the deployment of army search and rescue boats in advance. Authorities also ordered small boats and ferries not to venture out along the country's eastern seaboard, warning of rough seas with up to 4-meter (13-foot) waves.

In Compostela Valley, authorities halted mining operations and ordered villagers to evacuate to prevent a repeat of deadly losses from landslides and the collapse of mine tunnels seen in previous storms.

Bopha, a Cambodian word for flower or a girl, is the 16th weather disturbance to hit the Philippines this year. Forecasters say at least one more storm may hit the country before Christmas.

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Associated Press writer Teresa Cerojano contributed to this report.

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Yahoo sees several flaws in $2.7 billion Mexico ruling: source

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Yahoo Inc believes it has “numerous” grounds to appeal a Mexico City civil court‘s $ 2.7 billion preliminary judgment against the company, including both errors in procedure and in application of law, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters on Monday.

The ruling in the case, which involves allegations of breach of contract related to an online yellow pages listings service, was made by the 49th Civil Court of the Federal District of Mexico City, Yahoo said on Friday.

The case has perplexed many investors and tech-industry observers since Yahoo disclosed it, particularly given the large value of the “non-final” judgment.

The lawsuit was brought by Worldwide Directories S.A. de C.V. and Ideas Interactivas S.A. de C.V. against Yahoo and Yahoo de Mexico, Yahoo said.

The companies could not be reached for comment, although Carlos Bazan-Canabal, who describes himself as a founder of Worldwide Directories, told Reuters via email that he had contracted a U.S.-based law firm to handle the Yahoo case.

He declined to comment further on the matter.

Bazan-Canabal operates a number of web sites. He said on one that he joined Yahoo in 1999, adding that he is a former executive of Yahoo Mexico, and that he helped to launch that company. Yahoo could not immediately be reached for comment on this.

The details of the suit remained unclear on Monday. Documents from local courts in Mexico are not available for public consultation. Yahoo declined to comment.

Yahoo signed a commercial relationship with the two companies in 2002, the person familiar with the matter said. Yahoo terminated the relationship with the companies in 2009, the person said.

Yahoo’s appeal is expected to be heard by a panel of three judges in a superior court in Mexico City, the person said who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. It was not clear when Yahoo might file its appeal.

Yahoo’s most recent 10Q filing, which lists major ongoing legal proceedings, makes no mention of the lawsuit.

“We believe the $ 2.7 billion figure appears high based on the seemingly small size of Yahoo’s business in Mexico, but we believe shares could trade off modestly on the news,” wrote JP Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth in a note to investors following Friday’s announcement.

“It’s not clear how the Mexican court arrived at the $ 2.7 billion figure, but it would represent 40 percent of our projected 2012 year-end cash balance for Yahoo,” and equate to about $ 2.30 per share, he wrote.

Shares of Yahoo closed Monday’s regular session down 1.2 percent, or 22 cents, at $ 18.55.

(Additional reporting by Dave Graham in Mexico City and Sarah McBride in San Francisco; Editing by Bernard Orr)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Court upholds $319M verdict in 'Millionaire' case

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A federal appeals court on Monday upheld a $319 million verdict over profits from the game show "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" and rejected Walt Disney Co.'s request for a new trial.

A jury decided in 2010 that Disney hid the show's profits from its creators, London-based Celador International. The ruling Monday by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found no issues with the verdict or with a judge's rulings in the case.

"I am pleased that justice has been done," Celador Chairman Paul Smith said in a statement.

Disney did not immediately comment on the decision.

The ruling comes more than two years after the jury ruled in Celador's favor after a lengthy trial that featured testimony from several top Disney executives. The company sued in 2004, claiming Disney was using creative accounting to hide profits from the show, which first ran in the United States from August 1999 to May 2002 and was a huge hit for ABC.

The jury found that Celador was owed $269.2 million, and a judge later added $50 million in interest to the judgment.

The appeals court determined the verdict was not "grossly excessive or monstrous" and that it was not based on speculation or guesswork.

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Does the GOP need a religious retreat?

(Photo by Brandon Thibodeaux/Getty Images)

It's no surprise that Florida Sen. Marco Rubio took heat for an interview he gave to GQ magazine this month: Departing from scientific consensus, the rising Republican star refused to state whether the Earth is billions of years old or a few thousand, as many fundamentalist Christians believe.

What no one expected was the rebuke from televangelist and longtime Christian conservative leader Pat Robertson, dismissing theories of a "young Earth."

"If you fight science, you are going to lose your children," Robertson said last week during an appearance on the Christian Broadcast Network, the television empire he founded three decades ago.

Robertson wasn't directly speaking to Rubio, but the senator and others in his party might heed the advice. Viewed by many voters as anti-science and too conservative on social issues such as gay marriage, the Republican Party is in danger of losing young and less religious voters for years to come.

In a post-election breakdown by the Public Religion Research Institute, the Obama religious coalition mirrors the demographics of 18-29 year olds, whereas Romney's mirrors those of voters aged 65 and up.

On Nov. 6, as President Barack Obama won a narrow but clear victory over Mitt Romney, voters in four states expressed support for gay marriage. Anti-abortion candidates lost in several states, including Senate contenders Todd Akin of Missouri and Richard Mourdock of Indiana, both of whom stirred outrage from their remarks on rape.

Many experts believe these developments point in part to a decisive shift in the religious makeup of the country, one that could make or break a GOP comeback.

"The way Republicans speak is turning off the youngest, fastest growing groups in the country—Latinos and significantly, the unchurched, those with no religious affiliation," said Mark Rozell, a public policy professor at George Mason University who studies religion and politics. "To them, the Republicans are proselytizing."

Since the 1980s, organizations like Focus on the Family, the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition cemented religious conservatives as visible and potent force in the Republican coalition and enforced discipline on social issues such as abortion and gay rights. But now, the religious landscape is changing beneath their feet.

Studies suggest the number of unchurched has doubled in the past two decades and shot up by 25 percent in the last four years. The shift has taken place across the country and across economic classes, most notably among the young; one fifth of adults and one third of Americans under thirty now declare themselves religiously unaffiliated.

The new and expanding group of unchurched voters overwhelmingly support same sex-marriage and legal abortion, and so they gravitate toward the Democratic Party.

"It's clearly a concern—we have a lot of work to do," said Gary Marx, executive director of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, which worked to boost turnout among Catholics and evangelical voters.

The group, founded by conservative Christian activist Ralph Reed, helped deliver more religious voters to the polls this year than in 2008, but such efforts couldn't deliver a Romney victory.

In a press release following the election, Reed acknowledged that minorities and the young—and therefore, he might have added, the unchurched—made the difference for Obama.

Marx and his colleagues insist they aren't especially concerned about the growing secularization of young voters. They are primarily looking to diversify the GOP's religious coalition, Marx said.

To close the Latino gap, Marx says conservative activists are planning a major outreach effort to evangelical Hispanics and to Hispanic Catholics who attend Mass.

"We are casting a wider net—the politics of addition, not subtraction," Marx said, adding that Latinos and other minorities have been attracted to many conservative positions like education reform.

Marx pointed to Georgia, where Hispanic and black voters supported a state amendment allowing the state government to set up charter schools.

Marx also suggested the Democratic advantage with young minority voters was "candidate-centric" — a reflection of Obama's unique status as the first black president.

But the problem may run deeper, into the Republican base: There is growing evidence that young evangelicals are simply less interested in politicizing hot-button issues.

"Young evangelicals don't look at the country as a battlefield, but rather a mission field," says James Wilcox, a George Mason University political science professor. "They're are less scared than their forbearers: They see the 'War on Religion' narrative as nonsense; they see churches thriving, the outlets they have, and the extent of religious pluralism in this country."

The new generation sees community activism, rather than electoral politics, as the means for their faith to shape the world, Wilcox argues. They may disagree with liberals about same-sex marriage, but they also believe that states have the right to determine such policies.

Many younger evangelicals are also serious about addressing climate change, even as many high-profile conservatives have expressed doubt about whether climate change is real—with nominee Mitt Romney cracking jokes about it at this year's Republican National Convention.

None of this means the influence of religious conservatives on Republican politics is set to disappear. But it is most certainly about to change.

Between the rise of the unchurched and the moderation of young religious conservatives, experts say, a smaller movement may emerge — one that retains its current zeal but carries less sway over the selection of GOP nominees. Or the movement could retain its power by successfully diversifying and coming up with a new way to talk to voters.

"We plan to reach out with a softer, pro-family agenda—less emphasis on the sexual points, more talk about family," Marx of the Faith and Freedom Coalition said. He also said activists would develop a "forward-looking" policy agenda akin to President George W. Bush's "compassionate conservatism."

But at the same time, Marx believes that some of that message already has been lifted by social liberals: "It is true that gay rights activists have stolen that language of 'family' we've used successfully, and now use it for their purposes."

One way for religious conservatives to start again, Rozell said, would be to return the favor and take a tip from two much-heralded communicators: Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.

"Successful politicians can speak two languages, even if it's hard to do," Rozell said. Reagan did it, addressing both the Christian right and a largely secular small-government audience. Often times it's a shift in rhetoric rather than policy."

Rozell cited Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell of Virginia, a strong social conservative, who has maintained his popularity by using language that appeals to both religious and secular audiences.

Another strategy would be to borrow from the vocabulary of the other team, as Bill Clinton did when he co-opted the rhetoric of religious conservatives to crack down on the culture of sex and violence on TV.

"Put aside this talk of wars," Rozell says, "Republicans could easily adopt the rhetoric of "rights" and "tolerance" that liberals currently own, to speak to secular types about the value of pluralism and religious conscience."

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