Stock futures rise after German data; Fed eyed


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures were higher on Tuesday after unexpectedly cheery data out of Europe and as the Federal Reserve was set to kick off its two-day policy meeting.


Though the pace of talks in Washington to avert impending U.S. tax hikes and spending cuts quickened, senior politicians on both sides cautioned that an agreement on all the outstanding issues remained uncertain.


The lack of progress in negotiations about the "fiscal cliff" has kept investors from making aggressive bests in recent weeks, though most expect a deal will eventually be reached.


In Germany, analyst and investor sentiment rose sharply in December, entering positive territory for the first time since May, a leading survey showed. The data helped drive European shares higher.


"We've been getting a lot of the beginning of our day from seeing what Europe has been doing and I think that's going to hold true today," said Kim Forrest, senior equity research analyst at Fort Pitt Capital Group in Pittsburgh.


The Fed will begin its policy-setting meeting on Tuesday. The central bank is expected to announce a new round of Treasury securities purchases when the meeting ends on Wednesday, according to a Reuters poll. The program would replace its "Operation Twist" stimulus which expires at the end of the year.


S&P 500 futures rose 3.2 points and were above fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures gained 34 points, and Nasdaq 100 futures added 7 points.


The U.S. Treasury is selling its remaining stake in insurer American International Group Inc , bringing an end to government ownership of the company about four years after a $182 billion bailout. AIG's shares were up 1.2 percent at $33.75 in premarket trade.


Texas Instruments Inc slightly improved its profit target late on Monday, excluding a massive restructuring charge, as the company cuts costs.


Also in the tech sector, Intel Corp said it is on track to launch a new generation of chips for smartphones and tablets as it rushes to catch up with the competition.


Morgan Stanley might seek approval from the Federal Reserve to repurchase shares for the first time in four years, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the firm's thinking.


On the macro front, U.S. international trade data for October is due at 8:30 am ET (1330 GMT) and wholesale inventories is due at 10:00 am ET (1500 GMT).



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IHT Rendezvous: IHT Quick Read: Dec. 11

NEWS Besieged by economic woes and insistent questions about its future, the European Union accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on Monday with calls for further integration and a plea to remember the words of Abraham Lincoln as he addressed a divided nation at Gettysburg. Andrew Higgins reports from Oslo.

North Korea said on Monday that a technical issue had been found in the rocket it had planned to launch as early as this week to put a satellite in orbit, but that it still planned to try the launching by the end of the month. Choe Sang-Hun reports from Seoul.

Some Moroccans wonder whether the Arab Spring brought only cosmetic changes, questioning whether the king and his entourage gave up any of their power. Suzanne Daley reports from Tangier, Morocco.

Italian stock and bond prices fell on Monday after a weekend of political turmoil in Italy gave rise to fears that the country was headed for renewed instability. Shares of Italian banks, which are big holders of the government’s bonds, were among the hardest hit. Elisabetta Povoledo and David Jolly report.

Returns from Romania’s parliamentary elections on Monday gave an overwhelming victory to the center-left alliance of Prime Minister Victor Ponta, leaving the country poised for Round 2 of a political standoff that has destabilized one of the European Union’s newest and poorest members. Dan Bilefsky reports.

Huawei Technologies, a Chinese maker of telecommunications equipment, said on Monday that it planned to open a research and development center in Helsinki next year, accelerating its investments in Europe, where its business is expanding rapidly. Eric Pfanner reports from Paris.

FASHION The Chanel show that Karl Lagerfeld put on last week at Linlithgow Palace, near Edinburgh, was spectacular in every sense of the word. The burning braziers, sending quivering light over old stone, and the dinner held in a tented space, arising like magic on the hillside, were outshone only by an exceptional collection. Suzy Menkes reviews from Edinburgh.

ARTS “Tarzan” is only one of the shows that proves that even out-and-out flops on Broadway can go on to lucrative afterlives in Hamburg, as long as the shows have the spectacle and pageantry that theater producers here say enthrall a German audience. Patrick Healy reports from Hamburg.

SPORTS The essence of Lionel Messi is not in the bare statistic that now makes him the most prolific scorer of goals in a single year in the history of the game. It is in the way that he does it. Rob Hughes reports from London.

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BlackBerry Messenger 7 adds free Wi-Fi voice calling, split-screen multitasking and more






Research in Motion (RIMM) updated its BlackBerry Messenger to version 7 on Monday, adding a new key feature called “BBM Voice” that “will allow customers to make free voice calls to their BBM contacts around the world over a Wi-Fi connection.” BBM 7 also introduces multitasking with split-screen, which allows users to BBM, check email, or use other apps while on a BBM Voice call; new compatibility with Bluetooth headsets and accessories, 16 new emoticons; direct BBM Update Notification that provides in-app alerts when new versions of an app are available and an easier way to synchronize BBM profiles; Groups; and Contacts with BBIDs for simpler backup and restores. BBM 7 is available as a free update for all BlackBerry smartphones running BlackBerry 6 OS or higher. Users on BlackBerry OS 5 will get BBM Voice “early next year.”


“BBM began as a convenient and effective business messaging tool, and today it is an essential part of daily communications for customers around the world,” said T.A. McCann, RIM’s Vice President of BBM and Social Communities. ”Now, with BBM version 7, customers have a new option: they can text and talk with their BBM contacts near and far, for free.”






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Amanda Seyfried: 'Everyone Wants to Have Sex' with Channing Tatum















12/11/2012 at 08:00 AM EST



Amanda Seyfried has worked with a lot of good-looking men, but there's one in particular who rises to the top of her list.

"Channing [Tatum] was amazing. He's a superstar," the actress, 27, tells the January issue of InStyle about PEOPLE's 2012 Sexiest Man Alive.

Seyfried, who starred opposite Tatum in 2010's Dear John, is well-aware of her former costar's appeal.

"Everybody wants to have sex with him. And the only person he wants to have sex with is his wife, Jenna [Dewan-Tatum]. He's the most loyal husband," she says.

But while Tatum and Dewan-Tatum have managed to find marital bliss in spite of being in the spotlight, Seyfried admits she's not as lucky.

"The thing is, I can't date anybody without it being portrayed as a serious relationship in the tabloids. It sucks! Like Josh Hartnett and I were friends; we hung out, we dated. I don't actually have sex with every male I come into contact with," she says.

Another of Seyfried's costars getting a lot of attention is Anne Hathaway, who chopped off her locks and went on a drastic diet for her role in the upcoming Les Misérables, opening Dec. 25 (Seyfried plays Cosette, and Hathaway is Fantine).

"I would have done that for sure," Seyfried says of the haircut, but she draws the line there. "I probably wouldn't lose or gain weight for a role, though. I'm too health-conscious. And I don't think I could actually lose weight because I couldn't be on that kind of a diet. I would lose my mind."

Stripping for Lovelace

But playing the late porn-star-turned-feminist Linda Lovelace for the upcoming biopic Lovelace did have Seyfried focusing on her physique, which she doesn't mind.

"It's not about my body. It's not about me," she says of doing nude scenes. "You're playing somebody else. You're not going to believe a love scene if the people are dressed. You're not going to believe a stripper who has on a bra and underwear the whole time. At the same time, it has to do with how comfortable you are with letting people see your skin. For me, I'm okay with it."

Seyfried also says that being diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder – which she manages with Lexapro – has positively contributed to her acting.

"I don't feel like I'm struggling with it. I think OCD is a part of me that protects me. It's also the part of me that I use in my job, in a positive way," she tells the magazine. "The only thing I'd like to get beyond is my fear of driving over bridges and through tunnels. I can't overcome it."

See Amanda Seyfried's best red carpet looks at Instyle.com

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New tests could hamper food outbreak detection


WASHINGTON (AP) — It's about to get faster and easier to diagnose food poisoning, but that progress for individual patients comes with a downside: It could hurt the nation's ability to spot and solve dangerous outbreaks.


Next-generation tests that promise to shave a few days off the time needed to tell whether E. coli, salmonella or other foodborne bacteria caused a patient's illness could reach medical laboratories as early as next year. That could allow doctors to treat sometimes deadly diseases much more quickly — an exciting development.


The problem: These new tests can't detect crucial differences between different subtypes of bacteria, as current tests can. And that fingerprint is what states and the federal government use to match sick people to a contaminated food. The older tests might be replaced by the new, more efficient ones.


"It's like a forensics lab. If somebody says a shot was fired, without the bullet you don't know where it came from," explained E. coli expert Dr. Phillip Tarr of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.


The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warns that losing the ability to literally take a germ's fingerprint could hamper efforts to keep food safe, and the agency is searching for solutions. According to CDC estimates, 1 in 6 Americans gets sick from foodborne illnesses each year, and 3,000 die.


"These improved tests for diagnosing patients could have the unintended consequence of reducing our ability to detect and investigate outbreaks, ultimately causing more people to become sick," said Dr. John Besser of the CDC.


That means outbreaks like the salmonella illnesses linked this fall to a variety of Trader Joe's peanut butter might not be identified that quickly — or at all.


It all comes down to what's called a bacterial culture — whether labs grow a sample of a patient's bacteria in an old-fashioned petri dish, or skip that step because the new tests don't require it.


Here's the way it works now: Someone with serious diarrhea visits the doctor, who gets a stool sample and sends it to a private testing laboratory. The lab cultures the sample, growing larger batches of any lurking bacteria to identify what's there. If disease-causing germs such as E. coli O157 or salmonella are found, they may be sent on to a public health laboratory for more sophisticated analysis to uncover their unique DNA patterns — their fingerprints.


Those fingerprints are posted to a national database, called PulseNet, that the CDC and state health officials use to look for food poisoning trends.


There are lots of garden-variety cases of salmonella every year, from runny eggs to a picnic lunch that sat out too long. But if a few people in, say, Baltimore have salmonella with the same molecular signature as some sick people in Cleveland, it's time to investigate, because scientists might be able narrow the outbreak to a particular food or company.


But culture-based testing takes time — as long as two to four days after the sample reaches the lab, which makes for a long wait if you're a sick patient.


What's in the pipeline? Tests that could detect many kinds of germs simultaneously instead of hunting one at a time — and within hours of reaching the lab — without first having to grow a culture. Those tests are expected to be approved as early as next year.


This isn't just a science debate, said Shari Shea, food safety director at the Association of Public Health Laboratories.


If you were the patient, "you'd want to know how you got sick," she said.


PulseNet has greatly improved the ability of regulators and the food industry to solve those mysteries since it was launched in the mid-1990s, helping to spot major outbreaks in ground beef, spinach, eggs and cantaloupe in recent years. Just this fall, PulseNet matched 42 different salmonella illnesses in 20 different states that were eventually traced to a variety of Trader Joe's peanut butter.


Food and Drug Administration officials who visited the plant where the peanut butter was made found salmonella contamination all over the facility, with several of the plant samples matching the fingerprint of the salmonella that made people sick. A New Mexico-based company, Sunland Inc., recalled hundreds of products that were shipped to large retailers all over the country, including Target, Safeway and other large grocery chains.


The source of those illnesses probably would have remained a mystery without the national database, since there weren't very many illnesses in any individual state.


To ensure that kind of crucial detective work isn't lost, the CDC is asking the medical community to send samples to labs to be cultured even when they perform a new, non-culture test.


But it's not clear who would pay for that extra step. Private labs only can perform the tests that a doctor orders, noted Dr. Jay M. Lieberman of Quest Diagnostics, one of the country's largest testing labs.


A few first-generation non-culture tests are already available. When private labs in Wisconsin use them, they frequently ship leftover samples to the state lab, which grows the bacteria itself. But as more private labs switch over after the next-generation rapid tests arrive, the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene will be hard-pressed to keep up with that extra work before it can do its main job — fingerprinting the bugs, said deputy director Dr. Dave Warshauer.


Stay tuned: Research is beginning to look for solutions that one day might allow rapid and in-depth looks at food poisoning causes in the same test.


"As molecular techniques evolve, you may be able to get the information you want from non-culture techniques," Lieberman said.


___


Follow Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick


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Stock futures lower on "fiscal cliff" apprehension


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures edged lower on Monday as investors awaited any sign of progress in talks to avert the United States' so-called fiscal cliff of tax hikes and spending cuts.


Developments in Europe also weighed before the opening bell after Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti announced over the weekend that he would resign once the 2013 budget is approved. The move added to uncertainty about handling the euro zone debt crisis and drove Italy's borrowing costs higher.


U.S. President Barack Obama met with Republican House Speaker John Boehner on Sunday to negotiate a deal for avoiding the fiscal cliff that is set to go into effect in the new year.


The two sides declined to provide details about the unannounced meeting.


The "fiscal cliff" talks have kept markets on edge in the last month as investors worry the scheduled measures could send the economy into recession if politicians do not reach a deal.


"It is taking its toll on consumers, no question about that, but at the very end there will be a deal," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital in New York.


Cardillo said he expected a choppy trading day that could end near Friday's close as investors start to turn their attention to the Federal Reserve's policy-setting meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday.


The Fed is expected to announce a new round of Treasury securities purchases at the end of the meeting, according to a Reuters poll. The bond buying would replace the "Operation Twist" stimulus, which expires at the end of December.


S&P 500 futures fell 1 point and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 5 points, and Nasdaq 100 futures dropped 4.25 points.


Ingersoll-Rand Plc said it will spin off its commercial and residential security business to form a new stand-alone company. The stock was up 2.5 percent at $49.80 in premarket trading.


Honeywell International said it will buy Intermec for $600 million. Shares of Intermec jumped 24.1 percent to $9.90.


China's export growth slowed sharply in November, highlighting the global headwinds dragging on the world's second-largest economy. But other data over the weekend showed both industrial output and retail sales rose in November at their fastest annual pace in eight months, suggesting China's economy is picking up.


(Editing by Kenneth Barry)



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Romania Faces Upheaval as Ponta Coalition Wins Vote





PARIS — Romania’s center-left government overwhelmingly won parliamentary elections, according to partial results released Monday, an outcome that threatened to push the country into further political upheaval because of bitter rivalry between the prime minister and the president.




The central electoral office said the center-left alliance led by Prime Minister Victor Ponta won about 59 percent of the seats in the 452-seat legislature, followed by about 17 percent for a center-right group linked to President Traian Basescu. Around 81.45 percent of the votes have been counted.


The clear victory in Sunday’s election made Mr. Ponta the front-runner for prime minister. But Mr. Basescu, who has the power to appoint a prime minister, has indicated that he would not select Mr. Ponta, in part because Mr. Ponta tried to have him impeached over the summer.


During the campaign, Mr. Basescu called Mr. Ponta a “compulsive liar” and an “ogre” and said that appointing the man who tried to oust him would be like swallowing a pig. Mr. Ponta’s coalition, in turn, threatened a new impeachment effort if it won a majority and Mr. Ponta was not named prime minister.


Analysts said Mr. Basescu could be forced to back down due to the large margin of the center-left’s victory, which made Mr. Ponta’s reappointment seem inevitable. As of Monday morning, the president had not announced his intentions.


If he refused to appoint Mr. Ponta, the standoff threatened to produce a protracted political fight that could destabilize the country, undermine its struggling economy and delay a loan deal from the International Monetary Fund that Romania is hoping to negotiate when its current arrangement expires early next year.


In Bucharest, the Romanian capital, political commentators called the election “Basescu’s revenge.”


“The most we can hope for is that it is not a long war, and the parties find a compromise,” said Cosmin Stan, a leading Romanian broadcaster with Realitatea Television.


Romania, a poor Balkan country that has struggled to shed the legacy of decades of dictatorship under Nicolae Ceausescu, has undergone some of its worst political turbulence in recent memory. The country has weathered a series of unstable governments and come under criticism from the European Union and the United States. In October, the European Commission, the union’s executive body, said that concerns about corruption and fraud had prompted it to block development aid potentially worth billions of euros. All the while, the public remains deeply disillusioned amid a simmering dissatisfaction with austerity — including a 25 percent cut in public sector wages — for which many voters blame Mr. Basescu.


Mr. Ponta, at 40 the youngest prime minister in the European Union, has been locked in a bitter power struggle with Mr. Basescu, a 61-year-old former sea captain. The acrimony was made worse by the July impeachment vote, which Mr. Basescu called a “coup d’état” and which drew sharp criticism from the European Union and the United States. Mr. Ponta had accused Mr. Basescu of overreaching his mandate by, among other things, refusing to appoint ministers chosen by the prime minister.


Many Romanians say they are tired of the dueling leaders, and in a sign of that discontent, the populist People’s Party of Dan Diaconescu, a flamboyant television station owner who campaigned in a white Rolls-Royce and is being investigated for fraud, won about 14 percent of the vote, according to the partial results. As part of his campaign, Mr. Diaconescu has promised around $26,000 to every Romanian who starts a business.


But the feud between Mr. Ponta and Mr. Basescu dominated the election.


Under the Constitution, the president must name a prime minister from the party that receives a majority, in consultation with the party. Mr. Ponta is the coalition’s choice. The candidate for prime minister then needs to be approved by the Parliament, where Mr. Ponta’s center-left coalition has won a strong majority. While the Constitution gives the president the prerogative to name the prime minister, he cannot ignore the popular vote.


George Calin contributed reporting from Bucharest, Romania.



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#OccupyCheerios: A Facebook Revolt






It wasn’t an obvious forum for an anti-GMO protest.


A YouTube video posted on Cheerio’s Facebook page depicts an elderly woman leaning over the highchair of her infant grandchild, cooing about family and the holidays, drawing a map with pieces of cereal representing relative’s far-flung houses. “But don’t you worry,” the grandmother says, pushing two Cheerios together, “we’ll always be together for Christmas.”






More than 1,200 users have commented on the vintage Cheerios commercial since it was posted last week, expressing outrage over the General Mills-owned brand’s use of genetically modified ingredients. Commenters have also been critical—like heavy-exclamation-points-use critical—of General Mills’ significant financial support of Prop. 37, California’s defeated GMO-labeling ballot initiative


Comments like “Can you please inform the public exactly why it is that General Mills spent $ 1.2 million to keep consumers in the dark about GMOs????” and “Nostalgic old commercials are no substitute for healthy ingredients. I won’t buy Cheerios until they are GMO-free” are a far cry from the stories of spending holidays with family—and perhaps a bit of Cheerios nostalgia—the post was surely intended to elicit.


The protest campaign was stoked by GMO Inside, an organization born of the failed Yes on 37 campaign. The group also called on people to comment-bomb a Cheerios app, which has since been removed from the company’s Facebook page. But beyond that, Cheerios’ response to the criticism has been . . . nothing. Anti-GMO comments are still piling up on the post, and no new material has been added to page in order to bury the video in the timeline.


Do 1,256 comments (and counting) cancel out $ 1.2 million of anti-Prop. 37 funding? Of course not. But just as the Occupy-style tactics being employed by protesters at Cooper Union and the Michigan State Capitol exhibit, showing up and voicing an opinion can be a powerful gesture, even if it’s not overpowering. 


Similar stories on TakePart


• Will GMOs Spell the End of Mexican Maize?


• Kellogg Recalls 2.8 Million Boxes of Cereal Due to Hazardous Metallic ‘Surprise’


• Anna Breslaw’s 600-Word Sprint: Nude Protests, Stripped Down



Willy Blackmore is the food editor at TakePart. He has also written about food, art, and agriculture for such publications as Los Angeles Magazine, The Awl, GOODLA Weekly, The New Inquiry, and BlackBook. Email Willy | TakePart.com


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Kyra Sedgwick: Kevin Bacon Makes Me Feel Like I'm the 'Only Girl in the Room'















12/10/2012 at 08:00 AM EST







Kyra Sedgwick


Courtesy Good Housekeeping


Ever wonder what Kyra Sedgwick finds sexy?

Her husband of 24 years, Kevin Bacon, has it all figured out.

"He is so honorable. He is so ethically true. He has high moral standards, and he doesn't lie and he doesn't cheat – and I find that sexy!" the actress, 47, says in the January issue of Good Housekeeping.

"I don't know how he does it, but he always makes me feel like I'm the most beautiful woman in the room – the only girl in the room," she says of her relationship with Bacon, 54, whom she married in 1988.

"He says 'Honey, you look beautiful. You are sexy!' Always, always, always!"

While their love has lasted over decades – an eternity in Hollywood – the couple is experiencing a kind of "second-honeymoon" now that their children Travis, 23, and Sosie, 20, have left the nest.

Kyra Sedgwick: Kevin Bacon Makes Me Feel Like I'm the 'Only Girl in the Room'| Couples, Loving Couples, The Closer, Kevin Bacon, Kyra Sedgwick

Kyra Sedgwick

Courtesy Good Housekeeping

"There's a lot more walking around the house naked," Sedgwick says.

But it's clearly more than occasional nudity that keeps their love alive.

"I am constantly in awe of Kevin's levelheadedness and his lack of 'crazy,' " she says.

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Smokers celebrate as Wash. legalizes marijuana


SEATTLE (AP) — The crowds of happy people lighting joints under Seattle's Space Needle early Thursday morning with nary a police officer in sight bespoke the new reality: Marijuana is legal under Washington state law.


Hundreds gathered at Seattle Center for a New Year's Eve-style countdown to 12 a.m., when the legalization measure passed by voters last month took effect. When the clock struck, they cheered and sparked up in unison.


A few dozen people gathered on a sidewalk outside the north Seattle headquarters of the annual Hempfest celebration and did the same, offering joints to reporters and blowing smoke into television news cameras.


"I feel like a kid in a candy store!" shouted Hempfest volunteer Darby Hageman. "It's all becoming real now!"


Washington and Colorado became the first states to vote to decriminalize and regulate the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana by adults over 21. Both measures call for setting up state licensing schemes for pot growers, processors and retail stores. Colorado's law is set to take effect by Jan. 5.


Technically, Washington's new marijuana law still forbids smoking pot in public, which remains punishable by a fine, like drinking in public. But pot fans wanted a party, and Seattle police weren't about to write them any tickets.


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.


The mood was festive in Seattle as dozens of gay and lesbian couples got in line to pick up marriage licenses at the King County auditor's office early Thursday.


King County and Thurston County announced they would open their auditors' offices shortly after midnight Wednesday to accommodate those who wanted to be among the first to get their licenses.


Kelly Middleton and her partner Amanda Dollente got in line at 4 p.m. Wednesday.


Hours later, as the line grew, volunteers distributed roses and a group of men and women serenaded the waiting line to the tune of "Chapel of Love."


Because the state has a three-day waiting period, the earliest that weddings can take place is Sunday.


In dealing with marijuana, the Seattle Police Department told its 1,300 officers on Wednesday, just before legalization took hold, that until further notice they shall not issue citations for public marijuana use.


Officers will be advising people not to smoke in public, 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."


He offered a catchy new directive referring to the film "The Big Lebowski," popular with many marijuana fans: "The Dude abides, and says 'take it inside!'"


"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."


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."


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.


Alison Holcomb is the drug policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and served as the campaign manager for New Approach Washington, which led the legalization drive. She said the voters clearly showed they're done with marijuana prohibition.


"New Approach Washington sponsors and the ACLU look forward to working with state and federal officials and to ensure the law is fully and fairly implemented," she said.


___


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


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