Giant Sequoias Grow Faster With Age

Aging giant sequoia trees are growing faster than ever, with some of the oldest and tallest trees producing more wood, on average, in old age than they did when they were younger. (Read about redwoods, another species of giant tree, in National Geographic magazine.)A 2,000-year-old giant sequoia is just cranking out wood, said Steve Sillett, a professor at Humboldt State University in...

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Obama Rejects GOP 'Doomsday' Plan

President Obama's lead negotiator in the "fiscal cliff" talks said the administration is "absolutely" willing to allow the package of deep automatic spending cuts and across-the-board tax hikes to take effect Jan. 1, unless Republicans drop their opposition to higher income tax rates on the wealthy.Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said in an interview with CNBC that both...

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Football: Real Madrid hit four as Ajax crumble

MADRID: Real Madrid made light work of Ajax with an emphatic 4-1 win on Tuesday, but still had to settle for second place in Champions League Group D.Goals from Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka and a Jose Callejon double in the Santiago Bernabeu sealed the Spanish champions' victory, but top spot in the group went to Borussia Dortmund who beat Manchester City 1-0.Derk Boerrigter got the consolation...

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Cash scheme will influence polls, says CEC

CHENNAI/NEW DELHI: Chief election commissioner V C Sampath on Tuesday expressed his disapproval over the Centre's decision to go ahead with the direct cash transfer scheme when assembly elections were round-the-corner in Gujarat. Himachal Pradesh, the other state that went to polls, is yet to know the result, and model code of conduct is still in force. Sampath, who was in Chennai to review the...

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Oldest Giant Panda Relative Found in Spain

The oldest relative of the giant panda has been discovered in Spain—suggesting that the animals' ancestors originated in Europe, a new study says.Dubbed Kretzoiarctos beatrix, the 11-million-year-old species was previously named Agriarctos beatrix based on a few fossil teeth found at a paleontological site near Zaragoza, Spain (map). Agriarctos is an extinct genus of European bear and...

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Obama Sees 'Potential' for Averting the Fiscal Cliff

President Obama says he sees "potential" for averting the "fiscal cliff" in 28 days, but that no deal will get done unless Republicans consent to raise income-tax rates on the top 2 percent of U.S. earners."We're going to have to see the rates on the top 2 percent go up and we're not going to be able to get a deal without it," Obama told Bloomberg TV in his first televised interview...

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Football: Lionel Lewis calls it a day

SINGAPORE: He was Singapore's safest pair of hands for almost a decade and, despite retiring from international football last year with 73 caps, Lionel Lewis was playing well enough to warrant consideration for a recall to the national squad for the current ASEAN Football Federation Championship.But a persistent ankle injury put paid to the possibility of that happening, and now Lewis...

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Zee editors denied bail for 2nd time in a week

NEW DELHI: For the second time in less than a week, a trial court on Monday dismissed the bail applications of the two Zee group editors arrested for allegedly trying to extort Rs 100 crore from Congress MP Naveen Jindal's firm. Metropolitan magistrate Rajinder Singh on Monday dismissed the bail pleas, saying Zee News head Sudhir Chaudhary and Zee Business editor Samir Ahluwalia had not given...

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Photos: Kilauea Lava Reaches the Sea

Into the Sea Photograph by Hugh Gentry, ReutersA spectacular natural phenomenon was on display early this week as lava from a vent in Hawaii's Kilauea volcano flowed into...

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Boehner Makes Fiscal Cliff Counter-Offer

House Speaker John Boehner today sent President Obama a counter-proposal on how to cut the deficit that he called a “credible plan” to break the stalemate in negotiations to keep the country from going off the “fiscal cliff” but just hours later the White House quickly rejected the offer.In the plan, Republicans offer a total of $2.2 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade. That would...

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