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“I mean, Marie Brenner, one of our best writers, did a great piece on him, and she noted in the piece that he had Hitler’s speeches in his office, and he went absolutely ballistic.” Brown says the future president got his revenge at a party a year later: “She suddenly felt something cold and wet in the back of her dress

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Tina Brown has been the guiding hand behind some of our most provocative magazines. Time now for some questions-and-answers with the legendary editor, talking with Tony Dokoupil:

It rarely happens that a magazine cover can still make waves 25 years after it hit newsstands.

“Demi was totally up for it. I mean, this was very brave of Demi to do, really,” said Tina Brown.

But Brown’s 1991 Vanity Fair cover of Demi Moore, photographed by Annie Leibovitz, has helped turn naked baby bump images into a celebrity rite of passage.

“And the funny thing is, it’s still going on,” Brown said. “I mean, there are stars now who feel the need to do a Demi Moore pregnant shot.”

During the 1980s and ’90s, Brown edited two of the most prestigious and powerful magazines in America — reviving Vanity Fair, and then The New Yorker. 

“My goal was seduction — seduction, seduction, seduction,” she said.

Now the fabled queen of buzz, who burnished the careers of so many cover subjects, is a cover story herself, with a new memoir, “The Vanity Fair Diaries: 1983-1992” (Macmillan). 

Brown wrote it all by hand. “It was just, you know, written on planes, written at night, written on the heat of the moment.”

And what a moment it was.

Take March 20, 1985, a photo shoot of President Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy. 

“It came together really because Harry Benson, the photographer, had a genius idea to bring a boombox to the White House with a cassette in it: Frank Sinatra singing, ‘Nancy With the Laughing Face.’ Nancy says, ‘Honey, let’s dance!’ I mean, it’s as we weren’t there.”

Dokoupil asked, “When you saw that kiss happen, what’s going through your head?”

“Oh my God! Oh my God! We’re turned around the magazine.”

It flew off the newsstands, Brown said.

In those pre-digital years, print magazines were often fat with advertising and bursting with life — but for a time, Vanity Fair was not. “It was a huge snore,” she said. “I bought it and it just slipped from my hand out of sheer boredom.”

When Conde Nast turned to Brown, she was barely 30. She was a genteel daughter of filmmakers whose wit got her kicked out of three British boarding schools. 

“I was a kind of wicked describer. I mean, one school I was kicked out for writing my diary, which, you know, was prescient, in which the headmistress discovered that I’d referred to her bosoms as unidentified flying objects.”

At Vanity Fair, Brown pioneered a now-familiar blend of high culture and low. “Many people kept saying, ‘Well, is it a fashion magazine? Is it a celebrity magazine? Is it a serious journalism magazine? Is it a political magazine? The point was, it was all of those things, because we are all of those things.”

Brown dealt in gossip, too … some of it more relevant than ever. “Yeah, I love gossip,” she said. “Gossip’s irresistible. But gossip’s powerful and important, too, because frequently gossip is the first way stories begin. Frequently, gossip’s right.”

As she told “60 Minutes” in 1990, “Donald Trump always came on the line with a gag, and in a funny way, it did win him the hearts of the press, I think.”

She told Dokoupil, “I found him very beguiling, actually. I thought he had a kind of freshness and bravado that made me laugh. But then he got less and less entertaining, to be honest.”

“Why?” Dokoupil asked.

“Because the desire for publicity made him so impossible to deal with,” said Brown. “I mean, Marie Brenner, one of our best writers, did a great piece on him, and she noted in the piece that he had Hitler’s speeches in his office, and he went absolutely ballistic.”

Brown says the future president got his revenge at a party a year later: “She suddenly felt something cold and wet in the back of her dress. As she turned around, she saw Donald Trump progressing across the room and realized that he had emptied wine down her dress.”

And of course, there were the perils of editing while female, such as the Warren Beatty episode: “I’m talking about a cover; he’s talking about, when is my husband next out of town?”

For 35 years, Tina Brown has been married to the author and newspaper editor Sir Harold Evans.

“Tina has an amazing scent for the big story, the next big story, a news nose which is exceptional,” Evans said. Also, “a judge of character; and the ability to translate that character into somebody you feel you know.”

After Vanity Fair, Brown partnered with recently-accused sexual predator Harvey Weinstein on a magazine called Talk. But, she says she never suspected the film producer’s alleged dark side.

Dokoupil asked, “Should you have dug deeper?”

“No, because it wasn’t my business to pry into what he did after hours,” she said. “I had no idea what was going on.”

“Did Harvey Weinstein ever come on to you inappropriately?”

“Never. I think Harvey’s taste was, you know, girls of 21 who were in high-heeled shoes from Hollywood. But you know, it’s a very shocking and disturbing story. And I think it’s been very cathartic indeed to hear the silence broken.”

By the way, Brown’s own story later included an adventure as Dokoupil’s editor at the old Newsweek. He reminded her, “You sent me to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in a submarine. I went to astronaut training camp. I went …”

“Are you whining, Tony?” she laughed.

These days, all of her big-name editorships have fallen away, replaced by a live conference business … and 전주 마사지 more time for tea at home.

But Tina Brown is still Tina Brown.

Does she miss it now? “Sometimes,” she said. “I don’t have Vanity Fair or The New Yorker behind me now. But I have a life. I have a reputation. And I can still get things done.”

         For more info:

tinabrownmedia.com


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“The approval was sent through the diplomatic channels to Washington,” a diplomat with knowledge of the decision told CBS News on condition of anonymity

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“The approval was sent through the diplomatic channels to Washington,” a diplomat with knowledge of the decision told CBS News on condition of anonymity.

The approval comes just one month after a meeting in Damascus between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and senior 천안 마사지 U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell.


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Also, “a judge of character; and the ability to translate that character into somebody you feel you know.” After Vanity Fair, Brown partnered with recently-accused sexual predator Harvey Weinstein on a magazine called Talk

Tags : 

Tina Brown has been the guiding hand behind some of our most provocative magazines. Time now for some questions-and-answers with the legendary editor, talking with Tony Dokoupil:

It rarely happens that a magazine cover can still make waves 25 years after it hit newsstands.

“Demi was totally up for it. I mean, this was very brave of Demi to do, really,” said Tina Brown.

But Brown’s 1991 Vanity Fair cover of Demi Moore, photographed by Annie Leibovitz, has helped turn naked baby bump images into a celebrity rite of passage.

“And the funny thing is, it’s still going on,” Brown said. “I mean, there are stars now who feel the need to do a Demi Moore pregnant shot.”

During the 1980s and ’90s, Brown edited two of the most prestigious and powerful magazines in America — reviving Vanity Fair, and then The New Yorker. 

“My goal was seduction — seduction, seduction, seduction,” she said.

Now the fabled queen of buzz, who burnished the careers of so many cover subjects, is a cover story herself, with a new memoir, “The Vanity Fair Diaries: 1983-1992” (Macmillan). 

Brown wrote it all by hand. “It was just, you know, written on planes, written at night, written on the heat of the moment.”

And what a moment it was.

Take March 20, 1985, a photo shoot of President Ronald Reagan and his wife, 청주 안마 Nancy. 

“It came together really because Harry Benson, the photographer, had a genius idea to bring a boombox to the White House with a cassette in it: Frank Sinatra singing, ‘Nancy With the Laughing Face.’ Nancy says, ‘Honey, let’s dance!’ I mean, it’s as we weren’t there.”

Dokoupil asked, “When you saw that kiss happen, what’s going through your head?”

“Oh my God! Oh my God! We’re turned around the magazine.”

It flew off the newsstands, Brown said.

In those pre-digital years, print magazines were often fat with advertising and bursting with life — but for a time, Vanity Fair was not. “It was a huge snore,” she said. “I bought it and it just slipped from my hand out of sheer boredom.”

When Conde Nast turned to Brown, she was barely 30. She was a genteel daughter of filmmakers whose wit got her kicked out of three British boarding schools. 

“I was a kind of wicked describer. I mean, one school I was kicked out for writing my diary, which, you know, was prescient, in which the headmistress discovered that I’d referred to her bosoms as unidentified flying objects.”

At Vanity Fair, Brown pioneered a now-familiar blend of high culture and low. “Many people kept saying, ‘Well, is it a fashion magazine? Is it a celebrity magazine? Is it a serious journalism magazine? Is it a political magazine? The point was, it was all of those things, because we are all of those things.”

Brown dealt in gossip, too … some of it more relevant than ever. “Yeah, I love gossip,” she said. “Gossip’s irresistible. But gossip’s powerful and important, too, because frequently gossip is the first way stories begin. Frequently, gossip’s right.”

As she told “60 Minutes” in 1990, “Donald Trump always came on the line with a gag, and in a funny way, it did win him the hearts of the press, I think.”

She told Dokoupil, “I found him very beguiling, actually. I thought he had a kind of freshness and bravado that made me laugh. But then he got less and less entertaining, to be honest.”

“Why?” Dokoupil asked.

“Because the desire for publicity made him so impossible to deal with,” said Brown. “I mean, Marie Brenner, one of our best writers, did a great piece on him, and she noted in the piece that he had Hitler’s speeches in his office, and he went absolutely ballistic.”

Brown says the future president got his revenge at a party a year later: “She suddenly felt something cold and wet in the back of her dress. As she turned around, she saw Donald Trump progressing across the room and realized that he had emptied wine down her dress.”

And of course, there were the perils of editing while female, such as the Warren Beatty episode: “I’m talking about a cover; he’s talking about, when is my husband next out of town?”

For 35 years, Tina Brown has been married to the author and newspaper editor Sir Harold Evans.

“Tina has an amazing scent for the big story, the next big story, a news nose which is exceptional,” Evans said. Also, “a judge of character; and the ability to translate that character into somebody you feel you know.”

After Vanity Fair, Brown partnered with recently-accused sexual predator Harvey Weinstein on a magazine called Talk. But, she says she never suspected the film producer’s alleged dark side.

Dokoupil asked, “Should you have dug deeper?”

“No, because it wasn’t my business to pry into what he did after hours,” she said. “I had no idea what was going on.”

“Did Harvey Weinstein ever come on to you inappropriately?”

“Never. I think Harvey’s taste was, you know, girls of 21 who were in high-heeled shoes from Hollywood. But you know, it’s a very shocking and disturbing story. And I think it’s been very cathartic indeed to hear the silence broken.”

By the way, Brown’s own story later included an adventure as Dokoupil’s editor at the old Newsweek. He reminded her, “You sent me to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean in a submarine. I went to astronaut training camp. I went …”

“Are you whining, Tony?” she laughed.

These days, all of her big-name editorships have fallen away, replaced by a live conference business … and more time for tea at home.

But Tina Brown is still Tina Brown.

Does she miss it now? “Sometimes,” she said. “I don’t have Vanity Fair or The New Yorker behind me now. But I have a life. I have a reputation. And I can still get things done.”

         For more info:

tinabrownmedia.com


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Little Julia Lira is scheduled to perform for the packed Sambadrome stadium – and for millions more around the country via live television – early Monday morning when the Viradouro samba group parades

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Little Julia Lira is scheduled to perform for the packed Sambadrome stadium – and 강남 안마 for millions more around the country via live television – early Monday morning when the Viradouro samba group parades.

충북 홈타이_헬시“We received the news this morning that the judge will let Julia parade,” Viradouro said spokeswoman Joice Hurtado. “The group is ecstatic that she will be able to samba.”

The Rio state agency for child protection confirmed the ruling and said it would appeal to the Justice Ministry. Calls to Judge Ivone Caetano, who decided the case, were not immediately returned.

Viradouro’s plan to make Julia its Carnival queen has created a stir in Rio and made headlines around the globe, with some child’s rights advocates saying it’s inappropriate for a young girl to be in such a traditionally sexualized role.

“The decision sets a negative precedent that will have implications across Brazil,” said Carlos Nicodemos, who as director of the Rio de Janeiro state Council for the Defense of Children and Adolescents had asked the court to block Julia’s participation.

Nicodemos said he worries about what message it sends to a nation that has long had a problem with sexual exploitation of children, especially in the lawless Amazon region.

Julia’s father, Marco – who is also the president of Viradouro – has said concerns about the girl’s well-being are overblown. He says the girl will wear a costume that is not too skimpy for a 7-year-old, and both he and his wife will watch her closely to make sure she doesn’t get too tired during the 80-minute parade.

More than just a massive street party, Rio’s Carnival parade is also a fierce competition between 12 top-tier samba “schools” whose winner is hailed by fans across Brazil.

Viradouro, which won the title in 1997, is no stranger to controversy. In 2008, a judge blocked the group from putting a dancer dressed as Adolf Hitler on a float loaded with naked people representing Holocaust victims.


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The judge decided the Americans had no “criminal intentions” when they tried to take the children out of Haiti, according to Reuters’ report

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A Haitian judge has decided to release 10 American missionaries accused of kidnapping children in Haiti, Reuters news agency reported Wednesday afternoon, siting a “judicial source”.

The judge decided the Americans had no “criminal intentions” when they tried to take the children out of Haiti, according to Reuters’ report.

A defense lawyer for the Americans, however, tells The Associated Press that the judge deciding whether the Baptist group should face trial for attempting to take a busload of children out of the country is probably ready to make his ruling, but has not yet decided what that ruling will be.

Judge Bernard Saint-Vil finished questioning the Americans on Wednesday and now must transmit his recommendation to the prosecutor, lawyer Gary Lassade toldd the AP.

The prosecutor could appeal if the judge recommended dropping charges, but the judge has the last say, the attorney told The Associated Press on Wednesday. He said he expected the judge to issue that final decision Thursday.

Haiti Earthquake – Latest CoverageHaiti Relief: How You Can Help

“The judge will not take a decision before he sends his finding to the prosecutor,” Lassade told the AP.

The Americans, most from an Idaho Baptist group, were charged last week with child kidnapping and criminal association after being arrested Jan. 29 trying to take 33 children, ages 2 to 12, across the border to an orphanage they were trying to set up in the Dominican Republic.

The day after the group’s arrest, its leader, Laura Silsby of Meridian, Idaho, told the AP that the children were obtained either from orphanages or from distant relatives. She said only children who were found not to have living parents or relatives who could care for them might be put up for adoption.

Who is Laura Silsby?

However, at least 20 of the children are from a single village and have living parents. Some of the parents told the AP they willingly turned over their children to the missionaries on the promise the Americans would educate them and allow relatives to visit.

Saint-Vil questioned at least two of the parents Wednesday as well as the 10 Americans.

In a brief conversation afterward through cell bars in the stuffy, grimy jail where they have been held, the missionaries refused to be interviewed by the AP.

“We’ve said all we’re going to say for now. We don’t want to talk now,” Silsby said. “Maybe tomorrow.”

The women were held separately from the men, who shared their cell with nine Haitian men, some of whom played checkers on the cell floor.

“We will not talk unless our lawyer is present,” said Paul Thompson, 청주 안마 pastor of the Eastside Baptist Church in Twin Falls, Idaho. Lassade represents Thompson’s cousin, Jim Allen of Amarillo, Texas.

A Dallas attorney for Allen, Hiram Sasser, told the AP that his client was recruited just 48 hours before the group left last month for the Dominican Republic on what Silsby termed an emergency rescue mission.

“He did not know many of the other people who were on the mission trip, or what other people were going to do, or about paperwork,” Sasser said.

Silsby had decided last summer to create an orphanage in the Dominican Republic and in November registered the nonprofit New Life Children’s Refuge foundation in Idaho.

After Haiti’s catastrophic Jan. 12 earthquake she accelerated the plan and recruited her fellow missionaries. Silsby told the AP she was only interested in saving suffering children.

She told the AP after her arrest, however, that she did not have all the Haitian papers required to take the children out of the country.

A Dominican diplomat who said she visited him the same day the missionaries tried to take the children out of the country told the AP that he warned her that without those papers she could be arrested.


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intelligence agencies

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In messages to The Associated Press on Wednesday, the officials did not provide details of how or when Hakimullah Mehsud died. But it was the first time Pakistani authorities have categorically said the militant chief is dead.

The intelligence official spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak on the record.

Rumors of Mehsud’s death have swirled for weeks, after a spate of U.S. missiles hit his stronghold in Pakistan’s northwest in mid-January. Mehsud was said to have died of wounds suffered in one of the strikes.

The Taliban have denied his death, but have failed to prove that he is alive.

A U.S. counterterrorism official told CBS News correspondent Bob Orr late Tuesday that “the onus is really on the Pakistani Taliban” to prove he’s not dead.

“Hakimullah certainly hasn’t shied away from the terrorist limelight before,” the official said, referring to Mehsud’s previous appearances in Taliban propaganda videos. “So, if he’s alive, why is he doing so now when there’s so much speculation about his demise?”

The U.S. has yet to officially confirm the death of Mehsud, who commands an al Qaeda-allied movement that is blamed for 대전 안마 scores of suicide bombings and is suspected in a deadly attack on a CIA base in Afghanistan late last year.

His death would represent a major victory for Pakistan’s government and its allies in the West over the Islamic militant groups which operate along the border with Afghanistan.

Earlier this month, a U.S. intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security matters, told the AP that American officials had reached the conclusion that Mehsud was likely dead based on collective information of U.S. intelligence agencies.


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Even some government officials are expressing skepticism about the numbers

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Haiti issued wildly conflicting death tolls for the Jan. 12 earthquake on Wednesday, adding to confusion about how many people actually died — and to suspicion that nobody really knows.

A day after Communications Minister Marie-Laurence Jocelyn Lassegue raised the official death toll to 230,000, her office put out a statement quoting President Rene Preval as saying 270,000 bodies had been hastily buried by the government following the earthquake.

Complete Coverage: Devastation in Haiti Haiti Quake: How You can Help

A press officer withdrew the statement, saying there was an error, but re-issued it within minutes. Later Wednesday, the ministry said that due to a typo, the number should have read 170,000.

The number buried in mass graves is not necessarily the same as the government’s official estimate for the overall death toll and it remains unclear who’s doing the counting.

Government officials were not available to comment on the confusion.

The 270,000 figure, which Preval’s office said he announced at a meeting with South American presidents in Ecuador, was 40,000 higher than one released by Preval’s communications minister the previous day, even though a gravedigger at the mass graves just north of Port-au-Prince said only two bodies have been buried there this week.

Haitian officials offer no convincing explanation for how they are compiling the death toll – which has climbed from a precise 111,481 on Jan. 23 to 150,000 on Jan. 24, to 212,000 on Saturday, to 230,000 on Tuesday before Wednesday’s erroneous report of 270,000 and quick reversal to 170,000. Even some government officials are expressing skepticism about the numbers.

“I personally think that a lot of information being given to the public by the government is estimates,” said Haiti’s chief epidemiologist, Dr. Roc Magloire.

There is no doubt that the death toll — whatever it is — is one of the highest in a modern disaster.

A third of Haiti’s 9 million people were crowded into the chaotic capital when the quake struck just to the southwest a few minutes before 5 p.m. Many were preparing to leave their offices or schools. Some 250,000 houses and 30,000 commercial buildings collapsed, according to government estimates, many crushing people inside.

For days, people piled bodies by the side of the road or left them half-buried under the rubble. Countless more remain under collapsed buildings, identified only by a pungent odor.

No foreign government or independent agency has issued its own death toll. Many agencies that usually can help estimate casualty numbers say they are too busy helping the living to keep track of the dead. And the Joint Task Force in charge of the relief effort — foreign governments and militaries, U.N. agencies and Haitian government officials — quotes only the government death toll.

That toll has climbed from a precise 111,481 on Jan. 23 to 150,000 on Jan. 24, to 212,000 on Saturday, to 230,000 on Tuesday. Preval’s count of 170,000 bodies buried in mass graves may represent only a piece of the toll — but nobody at his office was available to clarify.

It’s common in major disasters to see large discrepancies in death tolls: Governments may use lower figures to save face, or 대전 안마 higher figures to attract foreign aid. In Haiti’s case, however, where the very institutions responsible for compiling information were themselves devastated, reaching a death toll is particularly difficult.

Many citizens are even more cynical, accusing the government of inflating the numbers to attract foreign aid and to take the spotlight off its own lackluster response to the disaster.

“Nobody knows how they came up with the death count. There’s no list of names. No list of who may still be trapped. No pictures of people they buried,” said shop owner Jacques Desal, 45. “No one is telling us anything. They just want the aid.”

A few days after the quake, the state-run public works department, known as the CNE, began picking up bodies from the streets and dropping them in trenches dug by earth movers in Titanyen, just north of the capital, amid rolling chalk and limestone hills that overlook the Caribbean Sea.

The trenches are 6 meters (20 feet) deep and piled 6 meters (20 feet) high.

Preval said the government has counted 170,000 bodies during those efforts, and that the number does not include people buried in private ceremonies. But at Titanyen on Wednesday, worker Estelhomme Saint Val said nobody had counted the bodies.

“The trucks were just dropping people wherever, and then we would move in and cover them up,” he said. “We buried people all along the roads and roadsides. It was impossible to do a count.”

And although the government death toll jumped by the thousands from Saturday to Tuesday, Saint Val said at noon Wednesday that only one truck had arrived this week, and it carried two bodies. He said workers received 15 truckloads of bodies a day just after the quake, but the numbers dropped off about 10 days ago.

Lassegue, in announcing the Tuesday death toll, refused to say how it was calculated.

“For the moment we count 230,000 deaths, but these figures are not definitive,” she said. “It’s a partial figure.”

U.N. humanitarian spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs in Geneva, who has often cited Haitian government figures, said Wednesday that she said she doesn’t know how Haiti is calculating the death toll: “We cannot confirm these figures.”

Finding someone who can is difficult.

The government says the CNE is orchestrating the count. The CNE referred questions to the prime minister’s office. The prime minister’s chief of protocol referred questions to the prime minister’s secretary-general. The prime minister’s secretary-general could not be reached.

A report by the U.N. on Tuesday attributed the death toll to Haiti’s Civil Protection Agency instead of the CNE. Civil Protection director Alta Jean-Baptiste referred questions to the Ministry of Interior. Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aime said Wednesday that the Civil Protection toll is “217,000-and-some deaths,” despite the higher number given by his government.

“Civil Protection, before giving out the numbers, really is doing a precise count and the numbers that they give out are numbers that are proven,” he said.

He would not say how that count is being done.

A death toll of 230,000 would equal the number of people killed in the tsunami that devastated a dozen countries around the Indian Ocean following a magnitude-9.2 earthquake on Dec. 26, 2004. That disaster generated an outpouring of international aid — in part because of the number of dead.

An extremely high toll “probably elicits more public sympathy, so it might generate more visibility, more funding,” said Chris Lom, a spokesman for the International Organization for Migration.

But Byrs says inflating numbers can backfire.

“Regarding every estimate, we have to be very careful because we could lose credibility with donors, with humanitarian partners,” she told The Associated Press. “If you boost the figure, it’s counterproductive. It doesn’t help when you try to match assistance to needs.”


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Thousands Line Up For “American Idol”

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Some brought makeup kits, Starbucks cups filled with throat-clearing salt water and even karaoke machines. Others came before dawn, armed with sleeping bags and pillows. “Why wouldn’t I get here early? My No. 1 goal is to be on the program,” said Lonnie Beatty, 20, who spent the night on a trolley platform just outside the stadium grounds in order to be one of the first in line.

Producers said they expected more than 10,000 people to show up for their chance at stardom.

With the Comic-Con entertainment expo drawing a record crowd of more than 120,000 to San Diego over the weekend and thousands more in town for a sandcastle competition and an international youth soccer tournament, “Idol” hopefuls who wanted some shut-eye resorted to craigslist.com or even military bases for beds.

Sgt. Jessica Robson, a 26-year-old Iraq and Afghanistan veteran stationed at Fort Lewis, 부천 안마 Wash., said she snagged a bunk at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot but got up at 4 a.m. anyway.

Show executives said they hoped to winnow the contestants down to between 300 and 500 for the second round.

“We’ll see everyone who wants to be heard,” said Patrick Lynn, a senior producer. “It’s all about trying to find out who’s going to be the person who’s going to make it past the judges, who’s going to make it to Hollywood.”

Six more auditions are set in the coming weeks in Dallas; Omaha, Neb.; Atlanta; Charleston, S.C.; Miami and Philadelphia. The show returns to the air in January.

By Allison Hoffman


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Discussions have been “good,” and more shuras are planned in coming days as part of a larger strategy to enlist community support for the NATO mission, it said

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“That doesn’t necessarily mean an intense gun battle, but it probably will be 30 days of clearing,” Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson said. “I am more than cautiously optimistic that we will get it done before that.”

Squads of Marines and Afghan soldiers occupied a majority of Marjah, but gunfire continued as pockets of militants dug in and fought. Sniper fire forced Nicholson to duck behind an earthen bank in the northern part of the city where he toured the tip of the Marines’ front line held by Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines.

“The fire we just took reflects how I think this will go – small pockets of sporadic fighting by small groups of very mobile individuals,” he said.

Explosions from controlled detonations of bombs and other explosives were being heard about every 10 minutes in the area.

“There’s really a massive amount of improvised explosive devices,” Nicholson said. “We thought there would be a lot, but we are finding even more than expected.”

CBSNews.com Special Report: Afghanistan

The second day of NATO’s largest offensive since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan also was marked by painstaking house searches.

Using metal detectors and sniffer dogs, U.S. forces found caches of explosives rigged to blow as they went from compound to compound down streets riddled with thousands of homemade bombs and mines. Shots continued to ring out in some neighborhoods.

They also discovered several sniper positions, freshly abandoned and booby-trapped with grenades.

The troops also found two large caches of ammonium nitrate – a common ingredient in explosives – totaling about 8,800 pounds, said Lt. Josh Diddams, a Marine spokesman.

“We’re in the majority of the city at this point,” Diddams said. He said the nature of the resistance has changed from the initial assault, with insurgents now holding ground in some neighborhoods.

“We’re starting to come across areas where the insurgents have actually taken up defensive positions,” he said. “Initially it was more hit and run.”

NATO said it hoped to secure Marjah, the largest town under Taliban control and a key opium smuggling hub, within days, set up a local government and rush in development aid in a first test of the new U.S. strategy for turning the tide of the 8-year-old war.

At least two shuras, or meetings, have been held with local Afghan residents – one in the northern district of Nad Ali and the other in Marjah itself, NATO said in a statement. Discussions have been “good,” and more shuras are planned in coming days as part of a larger strategy to enlist community support for the NATO mission, 대전 안마 it said.

Afghan officials said Sunday that at least 27 insurgents had been killed in the operation.

Most of the Taliban appeared to have scattered in the face of overwhelming force, possibly waiting to regroup and stage attacks later to foil the alliance’s plan to stabilize the area and expand Afghan government control in the volatile south.

Two NATO soldiers were killed on the first day of the operation – one American and one Briton – according to military officials in their countries. At least seven civilians had been wounded, but there were no reports of deaths, Helmand provincial spokesman Daoud Ahmadi said.

More than 30 transport helicopters ferried troops into the heart of Marjah before dawn Saturday, while British, Afghan and U.S. troops fanned out across the Nad Ali district to the north of the mud-brick town, long a stronghold of the Taliban.

Maj. Gen. Gordon Messenger told reporters in London that British forces “have successfully secured the area militarily” with only sporadic resistance from Taliban forces. A Taliban spokesman insisted their fighters still controlled the town.

President Barack Obama was keeping a close watch on combat operations, White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said.

Vietor said Defense Secretary Robert Gates would have the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, brief Mr. Obama on Sunday.

In Marjah, most of the Marines said they would have preferred a straight-up gunbattle to the “death at every corner” crawl they faced.

“Basically, if you hear the boom, it’s good. It means you’re still alive after the thing goes off,” said Lance Corp. Justin Hennes, 22, of Lakeland, Florida.

Local Marjah residents crept out from hiding after dawn Sunday, some reaching out to Afghan troops partnered with Marine platoons.

“Could you please take the mines out?” Mohammad Kazeem, a local pharmacist, asked the Marines through an interpreter. The entrance to his shop had been completely booby-trapped, without any way for him to re-enter his home, he said.

The bridge over the canal into Marjah from the north was rigged with so many explosives that Marines erected temporary bridges to cross into the town.

“It’s just got to be a very slow and deliberate process,” said Capt. Joshua Winfrey of Stillwater, Oklahoma, a Marine company commander.

Lt. Col. Brian Christmas, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines, said U.S. troops fought gunbattles in at least four areas of the town and faced “some intense fighting.”

To the east, the battalion’s Kilo Company was inserted into the town by helicopter without meeting resistance but was then “significantly engaged” as the Marines fanned out from the landing zone, Christmas said.

Marine commanders had said they expected between 400 and 1,000 insurgents – including more than 100 foreign fighters – to be holed up in Marjah, a town of 80,000 people that is the linchpin of the militants’ logistical and opium-smuggling network in the south.

The offensive, code-named “Moshtarak,” or “Together,” was described as the biggest joint operation of the Afghan war, with 15,000 troops involved, including some 7,500 in Marjah itself. The government says Afghan soldiers make up at least half of the offensive’s force.

Once Marjah is secured, NATO hopes to quickly deliver aid and provide public services in a bid to win support among the estimated 125,000 people who live in the town and surrounding villages. The Afghans’ ability to restore those services is crucial to the success of the operation and in preventing the Taliban from returning.By Associated Press Writer Alfred de Montesquiou; AP writers Noor Khan in Kandahar, Rahim Faiez and Heidi Vogt in Kabul, and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report


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He earned his bachelor’s degree from New York University in 1966

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Simic, who lives in Strafford, will replace another New Hampshire poet — Donald Hall of Wilmot.

Simic takes up his duties in the fall, opening the library’s annual literary series Oct. 17 with a reading of his work. He also will be the featured speaker at the Library of Congress National Book Festival on Sept. 29 in the poetry pavilion on the National Mall.

Simic taught at the University of New Hampshire for 34 years before moving to emeritus status. He won the Pulitzer Prize in poetry in 1990 for his book of prose poems, “The World Doesn’t End.” He also is an essayist, translator, editor and professor emeritus of creative writing and literature.

The poet laureate promotes poetry across the nation.

In a statement from Washington, Librarian of Congress James Billington said Simic handles language with the skill of a master craftsman. He has written 18 books of poetry.

“The range of Charles Simic’s imagination is evident in his stunning and unusual imagery,” Billington said. “He handles language with the skill of a master craftsman, yet his poems are easily accessible, often meditative and surprising. He has given us a rich body of highly organized poetry with shades of darkness and flashes of ironic humor.”

Born in Yugoslavia in 1938, Simic arrived in the United States in 1954. He has been a U.S. citizen for 36 years.

“I am especially touched and honored to be selected because I am an immigrant boy who didn’t speak English until I was 15,” he said.

Simic’s childhood was disrupted by World War II. He moved to Paris with his mother when he was 15 and joined his father in New York a year later. They then moved to Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago.

Simic graduated from the same high school as Ernest Hemingway. He started writing poetry in high school to attract girls, he said.

He attended the University of Chicago, working nights in an office at the Chicago Sun-Times, but was drafted into the Army in 1961. He served two years.

He earned his bachelor’s degree from New York University in 1966.

He wrote and translated poetry from 1966-1974. He also worked as an editorial assistant for 대구 마사지 a magazine.

He married fashion designer Helen Dubin in 1964. The couple has two children.


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