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People are reflected in a glass wall as they enter a door during a tour of Nissan's new North American headquarters in Franklin, Tenn., Tuesday, July 22, 2008. Twenty-five years after Nissan Motor Co. became the first foreign automaker in the South, its chief executive dedicated a new $100 million North America headquarters and said the company's future on the road will be "electric." (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

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Wednesday, 23 July 2008
Nation Briefing 7/23 Print E-mail
Daily Herald   

Dolly upgraded to hurricane; set to hit Texas coast

McALLEN, Texas -- Dolly spun into a hurricane Tuesday, heading toward the U.S.-Mexico border and the heavily populated Rio Grande Valley, where officials feared heavy rains could cause massive flooding and levee breaks.

Dolly was upgraded from a tropical storm Tuesday afternoon with sustained winds near 75 mph, and some strengthening of the Category 1 storm is forecast before landfall today. At 5 p.m. EDT, the storm's center was about 165 miles east-southeast of Brownsville, moving northwest at about 10 mph.

A hurricane warning is in effect for the coast of Texas from Brownsville to Corpus Christi and in Mexico from Rio San Fernando northward.

In Mexico, Tamaulipas Gov. Eugenio Hernandez said officials are planning to evacuate 23,000 people to government shelters in Matamoros, Soto La Marina and San Fernando.

Texas officials urged residents to move away from the Rio Grande levees because if Dolly continues to follow the same path as 1967's Hurricane Beulah, "the levees are not going to hold that much water," said Cameron County Emergency Management Coordinator Johnny Cavazos.


Detroit mayor accused of texting more women

DETROIT -- Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is now charged with exchanging romantic text messages with additional women in the scandal that has him fighting allegations that he lied under oath about an intimate relationship with his former chief of staff.

An investigator's report says the Wayne County prosecutor's office has determined that Kilpatrick sent and received text messages with "intimate or romantic content" to several women who were not his wife or former Chief of Staff Christine Beatty.

The report says the office was able to locate and identify the women, but it does not list their names.

The allegations led the prosecutor's office to amend two current charges against the 38-year-old mayor. The amended complaint was signed by a district court magistrate and changes a misconduct-in-office charge and one of four perjury charges.


Feds drop tax probe against Rev. Sharpton

NEW YORK -- Federal prosecutors have decided not to seek criminal charges against the Rev. Al Sharpton over his chronic tax problems, his lawyers said Tuesday.

The investigation was disbanded only after the government received a down payment Monday topping $1 million on a tax debt that had threatened to land Sharpton before a grand jury, the minister's lawyers said.

Sharpton said Tuesday he was glad to be in the clear. "I'm just grateful to God and my family, and all of our supporters," he said.

More payments will follow as Sharpton clears up a decade's worth of delinquent tax bills related to his personal business interests and his Harlem civil rights group.


Prosecutor: Missing Fla. girl may be dead

ORLANDO, Fla. -- The mother of a missing 2-year-old is a person of interest in a case that is beginning to look like a homicide, prosecutors said Tuesday. Sheriff's deputies said they still hope to find the girl alive.

Casey Anthony, 22, is charged only with child neglect and lying to investigators. Circuit Court Judge Stan Strickland set her bond at $500,000 Tuesday, saying the law did not allow him to hold her without bail.

He set the unusually high amount after hearing about evidence of human decomposition allegedly found in Anthony's yard and car. Her daughter, Caylee Marie Anthony, has been missing since mid-June.

"Not a bit of useful information has been provided by Ms. Anthony as to the whereabouts of her daughter," Strickland said. "And I would add that the truth and Ms. Anthony are strangers."


Viagra may have sexual benefits for women on antidepressants

Viagra's effect in women has been disappointing, but a new small study finds those on antidepressants may benefit from taking the little blue pills. The research involving 98 premenopausal women found Viagra helped with orgasm. But the benefits did not extend to other aspects of sex such as desire, researchers report in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.

"For women on antidepressants with orgasm problems, this may provide some wonderful relief," said psychologist Stanley Althof, director of the Center for Marital and Sexual Health of South Florida in West Palm Beach, who was not involved in the study. "But it will not improve their desire or arousal."

Antidepressants can interfere with sex drive and performance even as the drugs help lift crippling depression. Switching drugs or reducing the dose can help. But many people, men and women, stop taking them because of their sexual side effects.

The complaints are common. More than half the people who take antidepressants develop sexual problems, prior studies have found, especially for people taking Prozac, Paxil, Celexa and other drugs that work by increasing the chemical serotonin in the brain. Serotonin is thought to slow down orgasm, perhaps by diminishing the release of another brain chemical, dopamine. Viagra increases blood flow to sex organs.

Pfizer Inc. spokeswoman Sally Beatty said the company currently has no plans to pursue FDA approval for using its drug Viagra as a treatment for female sexual dysfunction. The company ended its internal research on Viagra for women in 2004. While Viagra was found to be safe, the results were inconclusive, Beatty said in an e-mail.


Man rescued from gas well shaft in Texas

CRESSON, Texas -- A worker fell 40 feet into a narrow storage hole at a natural gas drilling site Tuesday and was trapped for three hours before being rescued, officials said.

The man was hospitalized with scrapes and bruises and was expected to be held overnight at a hospital, said Julie Wilson, a spokeswoman for Chesapeake Energy Corp., manager of the site.

The site was being prepared for the drilling of a well when the man fell into a hole designed to store pipes, Wilson said.

At ground level, the hole is about 3 feet wide and narrows as it descends to about 75 feet, Wilson said. The man lodged in the hole about 40 feet down, she said.

The man was an employee of Koda Rathole, an oil field services company, Wilson said. A company official said the incident was being investigated.


NASA uses cadavers to test new space capsule

HOUSTON -- File this one under "E" for "Ewww factor."

NASA has used human cadavers to test the new Orion space capsule that is supposed to take astronauts back to the moon sometime around 2020.

Three cadavers were used in experiments at Ohio State University last year to test the safety of new spacesuits and seats, allowing engineers to measure the extreme forces to which astronauts will be subjected when the capsule returns to earth by parachute after each mission.

NASA officials say they also use automotive crash-test dummies and computer simulations in their research, but actual bodies are necessary to monitor the effects of the descent on internal organs and the spinal cord.


Bush pushes free trade pact with Colombia

WASHINGTON -- President Bush on Tuesday seasoned his call to Congress to pass a free trade pact with Colombia with a little Latino music.

The White House event was billed as a celebration of July 20, 1810, the day Colombia declared its independence from Spain. Bush also noted the Colombian government's recent hostage rescue and kept time with the lively music of Colombian singer Jorge Celedon, accordionist Jimmy Zambrano and their band members.

But his main message was trade.

Bush said trade between Colombia and the United States is one-sided. While nearly all of Colombia's exports enter the United States duty-free, U.S. products exported to Colombia face tariffs of up to 35 percent, with rates even higher for some agricultural products, he said.

"Opening markets is especially important during this time of economic uncertainty," he said. "Last year, exports accounted for more than 40 percent of America's total economic growth. Doesn't it make sense to continue that kind of growth during these economic uncertain times? I think it does."


EPA puts off decision on ethanol requirements

LUBBOCK, Texas -- The Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday put off a decision on Texas's request to temporarily lower ethanol requirements for gasoline, a change Gov. Rick Perry says is needed to rein in corn prices.

EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson said the agency needs more time to review more than 15,000 public comments and consult with other departments. A decision had been due Thursday; the agency now says it hopes to have a decision in early August.

An energy bill passed in December required 9 billion gallons of ethanol to be blended into gasoline from Sept. 1 to Aug. 31 of next year. Perry, a Republican, asked the EPA in April to drop the Renewable Fuels Standard requirement to 4.5 billion gallons because the demand for ethanol is raising corn prices for livestock producers.


U.S. officials to return seized artifacts to Ecuador

MIAMI -- U.S. Customs and Border Protection authorities have seized four pre-Columbian artifacts originally from Ecuador and returned them to the government of the South American nation.

A ceramic bowl and vessel, a stone ax and a stone ball used as a fishing weight were discovered by a Customs and Border Protection officer at Miami International Airport in February 2006. They were handed over to Ecuadorean officials Tuesday.

Officials said the return was delayed by requirements such as having experts examine the materials.

Authorities say the ceramic pieces were made between 900 B.C. and 300 B.C. and the stone artifacts between 500 A.D. and 1550 A.D.

They were in the luggage of a person traveling from Quito, Ecuador to Miami. The person was not charged.


Kid Rock gets probation for Waffle House fight

DECATUR, Ga. -- Officials in Georgia say Kid Rock has been sentenced to a year's probation and fined $1,000 for his role in a fight at a suburban Atlanta Waffle House last fall.

The DeKalb County solicitor's office says the 37-year-old was also sentenced Monday to six hours of anger management counseling and 80 hours of community service.

The entertainer, whose real name is Robert J. Ritchie, pleaded no contest to one count of simple battery. Four counts of battery were dropped.


Workers dive into lake as bridge slips at casino

HAMMOND, Ind. -- An enclosed walkway being attached to a floating casino on Lake Michigan slipped Tuesday as it was being attached, sending seven construction workers into the water, authorities said.

After the workers fell, nine other workers jumped into the water to help them, including two men who were briefly trapped inside the fallen walkway, said Kevin Margraf, chief fire inspector for the Hammond Fire Department.

One of the workers was taken to a hospital complaining of shoulder pain and was later released, and several of the 15 others were treated at the scene for minor injuries, he said.

Just before 8 a.m., Margraf said five workers were on the barge using sledgehammers to adjust a shoring attached to the metal passageway for the new Horseshoe Casino.

Two other workers were inside the walkway working on hydraulic lifts.

Margraf said the barge shifted beneath the structure, causing the walkway to fall. The collapse hurled the two workers inside the walkway 12 to 15 feet into the lake while the five workers below jumped or fell into the water.

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