School murders silence “cliff” rhetoric as deadline nears

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mass murder in Connecticut silenced “fiscal cliff” talk on Saturday as the White House and Congress quietly got ready for a final scramble to avert the tax hikes and spending cuts set for the New Year, with sessions of the U.S. House of Representatives now scheduled just days before Christmas.

President Barack Obama canceled a trip he had planned to make next Wednesday to Portland, Maine to press his case for tax hikes for the wealthy. His weekly radio and Internet address on Saturday focused on Newtown, the site of Friday’s school shootings, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life.

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio canceled the standard Republican radio response to Obama “so that President Obama can speak for the entire nation at this time of mourning,” he said in a statement issued late Friday.

The moratorium on cliff pronouncements masked a growing recognition that the two sides could remain deadlocked at the end of the year on the key sticking point – whether to leave low tax rates in place except for high earners, as Obama wants, or extend them for all taxpayers, as Boehner wants.

With multiple polls showing that the public supports Obama’s position, Republicans in the U.S. Senate prodded their counterparts in the House to make a face-saving retreat, in a fashion that would allow Obama’s proposal to pass the Republican-controlled House while simultaneously letting Republicans cast a vote against it.

Republicans could then shift the debate onto territory they consider more favorable to them, cutting government spending to reduce the deficit.

“Just about everyone is throwing stuff on the wall to see if anything sticks,” one Republican aide said with reference to various proposals being discussed on how to proceed. Alluding to public opinion polls, the aide added: “We know if there is no deal, we will get blamed.”

“We could win the argument on spending cuts,” said a Republican senator who asked not to be identified. “We aren’t winning the argument on taxes.”

However, Republican leaders in both chambers are leery about seeming to cave on taxes. “There’s concern that if we did that, Obama would simply declare victory and walk away and not address spending,” said one aide. “We don’t trust these guys.”

Some of the prodding was coming from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Don Stewart, a McConnell spokesman, said the minority leader in the Democratic-controlled Senate hasn’t embraced any single plan, but has discussed and circulated measures offered by fellow Senate Republicans.

“Senator McConnell does not advocate raising taxes on anybody or anything,” Stewart said.

“We’re focused on getting a balanced plan from the White House that will begin to solve the problem of our debt and deficit to improve the economy and create American jobs,” said Boehner spokesman Michael Steel.

“Right now, all the president is offering is massive tax hikes with little or no spending cuts and reforms,” Steel said.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor scheduled “possible legislation related to expiring provisions of law,” a reference to the expiring tax cuts, for the end of the week, portending a weekend session.

Cantor has said the House would meet through the Christmas holidays and beyond.

Hopes expressed after the November6 general election of some “grand bargain” on deficit reduction have all but disappeared, at least for this year. This is partly because time is running out and partly result of growing warnings from Democrats in Congress that they would not support big changes in the Medicare program, the government-run health insurance program for seniors that is a major contributor to the government’s debt.

House Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California ruled out one frequently mentioned proposal – raising the age of eligibility for Medicare, in a December 12 CBS television interview.

Asked if she was drawing a “red line,” around that idea, Pelosi said her comments were “something that says, ‘don’t go there,’ because it doesn’t produce money.

(Reporting by Thomas Ferraro and Kim Dixon; Editing by Fred Barbash and David Brunnstrom)

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Economic slowdown throughout euro zone a worry for ECB: Liikanen

BERLIN (Reuters) – Economic growth is slowing to a worrying degree across the euro zone and not only in the periphery, European Central Bank Governing Council member Erkki Liikanen said in an interview to be published on Sunday in Germany’s Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

“There are a number of indications that the economy is getting weaker and not only in the indebted southern European countries, but across the euro zone,” Liikanen was quoted as saying in an excerpt released on Saturday.

“Economic developments are causing us concern,” he said, adding that no-one is immune to the effects of the debt crisis. “Not even the German economy.”

Liikanen did not say what action should be taken to deal with the slowdown, and a Reuters poll this week found economists are evenly split on what else – if anything – the ECB will do.

Thirty-nine economists said the ECB would hold its main refinancing rate at its current record low of 0.75 percent through the first quarter of next year, while 38 believed it would cut the rate to 0.5 percent.

The ECB on December 6 predicted the euro zone economy would shrink again in 2013. Its projections for economic performance ranged from a 0.9 percent drop to a meager 0.3 percent rise next year, suggesting contraction is far more likely than not.

It had previously penciled in a range of -0.4 percent to +1.4 percent for the euro area economy.

On Dec 7. the central banks of Germany and Austria forecast barely any economic growth in 2013, with the Bundesbank flagging risks of a recession in the euro zone’s biggest economy as the debt crisis hits the bloc’s core.

(Reporting By Erik Kirschbaum; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

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Nigeria governor, 5 others die in helicopter crash

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A navy helicopter crashed Saturday in the country’s oil-rich southern delta, killing a state governor and five other people, in the latest air disaster to hit Africa’s most populous nation, officials said.

Nigeria‘s ruling party said in a statement that the governor of the central Nigerian state of Kaduna, Patrick Yakowa, died in the helicopter crash in Bayelsa state in the Niger Delta. The People’s Democratic Party’s statement described Yakowa’s death as a “colossal loss.”

The statement said the former national security adviser, General Andrew Azazi, also died in the crash. Azazi was fired in June amid growing sectarian violence in Nigeria, but maintained close ties with the government.

Yushau Shuaib, a spokesman for Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency, said four other bodies had been found, but he could not immediately give their identities.

The crash occurred at about 3:30 p.m. after the navy helicopter took off from the village of Okoroba in Bayelsa state where officials had gathered to attend the burial of the father of a presidential aide, said Commodore Kabir Aliyu. He said that the helicopter was headed for Nigeria’s oil capital of Port Harcourt when it crashed in the Nembe area of Bayelsa state.

Aviation disasters remain common in Nigeria, despite efforts in recent years to improve air safety.

In October, a plane made a crash landing in central Nigeria. A state governor and five others sustained injuries but survived.

In June, a Dana Air MD-83 passenger plane crashed into a neighborhood in the commercial capital of Lagos, killing 153 people onboard and at least 10 people on the ground. It was Nigeria’s worst air crash in nearly two decades.

In March, a police helicopter carrying a high-ranking police official crashed in the central Nigerian city of Jos, killing four people.

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Sony’s PlayStation 4 could lose to the next Xbox before it’s even released

I love all game consoles equally. My Xbox 360 is used equally as much as my PlayStation 3. The Wii — oh, I’ll just leave it at that. The current generation of consoles is all but over — 10-year life cycle be damned — and new consoles are rumored to be coming next fall. If not next fall, then in 2014. Whatever is the case, Sony (SNE) can’t afford to lag in third place again. Sure, the Xbox 360 and PS3 are neck-in-neck in global lifetime sales, and the Xbox 360 did have a one year head start, but coming off the disappointing PS Vita, “confidence is less high” that Sony will deliver a console next year in time to compete with Microsoft (MSFT), according to Kotaku.

[More from BGR: Has the iPhone peaked? Apple’s iPhone 4S seen outselling iPhone 5]

I want a new console just as much as any other gamer. There’s a reason people are still pouncing on those Wii U consoles and flipping them on eBay. Six years is unusually long for a console to still be kicking around.

[More from BGR: Apple execs said to be ‘seething’ over Google Maps praise]

According to the well-informed Stephen Totilo, Editor-in-Chief of Kotaku, the game blog that first broke news on the next-gen Xbox, Microsoft’s “Durango” is ”on the mark” and “Sony appears to inspire less confidence…due to the on-and-off troubles of the PlayStation 3 and the struggles of the Vita vs. how much lost confidence is due to any problems looming for PS4.“

Totilo says “confidence is high that the next Xbox will be out in time for next Christmas” and confidence is low that the PS4 will be right there on store shelves next to it.

The “on-and-off troubles of the PlayStation 3″ Totilo is referring to is the anchor that’s weighed the console down since launch: tougher development due to the Cell processor and less available RAM – 256MB vs. 512MB in the Xbox 360.

In the months before the PS3′s launch in 2006, Sony said the console would be the most powerful console ever created, and here we are six years later and multi-platform games on the console consistently end up being buggier and uglier than on the Xbox 360 in many cases. Cases in point: Skyrim, Mass Effect 3 and Call of Duty: Black Ops II.

Sony’s in a rut right now. It has the chops to build beautiful and powerful hardware that’s a developer’s dream (ex: PS Vita), but at the same time, it’s always launching after the competition nowadays.

If Sony’s learned any lessons in the last half a decade, it better apply them to the PS4. The console needs to offer next-level processing and graphics. It needs to be backward-compatible with PS3 games and play Blu-ray discs. It should be small and quiet. It should have a strong online platform, support a greater array of apps and most importantly be easy for developers to program for.

Game exclusives will always be important, but now that games are million-dollar productions, multi-platform will be where developers hope to reap back their costs.

With Microsoft said to be preparing an “Xbox 720″ and an “Xbox Lite,” Sony can’t make the mistake of launching late or pricing the console too high. A launch in spring of 2014 would mean Sony will miss Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the two biggest shopping days of the year that bring in massive sales.  Ceding sales and market share to Microsoft and Nintendo by launching late would be disastrous.

The PS3 screwed up too many times. At this point, the PS4 needs to be perfect out of the door.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Menopause quality of life unchanged by soy supplements

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Menopausal women who took soy supplements during a two-year trial reported no differences in quality of life compared to their counterparts taking placebo pills, U.S. researchers report.

It’s possible that soy could still offer women some benefits through menopause, said the study’s lead author Dr. Paula Amato, from Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, “but I think if you are similar to the subjects in the study, then probably taking supplements isn’t going to make a huge impact on your quality of life.”

In light of health concerns attached to taking hormones, soy has been seen as an attractive alternative for relieving menopausal symptoms. But research on the effectiveness of soy extracts for hot flashes and other bothersome symptoms has yielded conflicting results so far.

In the new report, published in the medical journal Menopause, Amato and her colleagues looked not just at specific symptoms but overall quality of life measures among healthy women, mostly in their 50s and six years or more into menopause on average.

Several hundred women were asked to take supplement pills three times a day for two years. Among them, 126 took a fake supplement that contained no soy extract, while 135 women took tablets containing a total of 80 milligrams a day of soy protein and another 123 women took 120 mg each day.

At the start of the study and again one and two years into it, the women filled out a quality of life survey that asked about mental, physical and sexual health as well as about hot flashes.

In each of the surveys, the women in all three groups scored similarly on the main measures in the questionnaire.

“From our study and the good amount of the literature to date it appears that taking soy supplements after menopause does not improve quality of life,” said Amato. “We can’t really recommend it to our patients.”

Mark Messina, president Nutrition Matters and an adjunct professor at Loma Linda University in California, cautioned against concluding that the key ingredients in soy supplements, known as isoflavones, don’t have any effect on hot flashes, however.

“Unfortunately, because of the severe limitations of this study, very little if anything can be learned about isoflavones and hot flashes,” Messina wrote in an email to Reuters Health.

For one, he said, the levels of a particular type of isoflavone – called genistein – were lower than in other studies that have found benefits from soy extracts.

Additionally, the researchers originally set out to look at the effects of soy extracts on bone health, and did not recruit women specifically with hot flash or quality of life concerns in mind.

“So in my opinion, no useful information about isoflavones and hot flashes is provided by this study,” said Messina, who regularly consults for companies that make or sell soy foods and supplements.

Isoflavone companies market the supplements, sold for about $ 17 for 90 50-mg pills, as “potentially” easing the changes associated with menopause.

Amato agreed that the study has some limitations, and that the findings can’t be generalized to all forms of soy in all types of women.

For instance, “taking supplements just might not be the same as eating a high soy content diet your entire life,” she told Reuters Health.

But “if you look at this specific supplement for this particular group of women for this reason, quality of life, I’m convinced by this study it’s not terribly helpful,” she added.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/UsyPIY Menopause, online December 3, 2012.

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Best Buy extends deadline for founder bid

(Reuters) – Best Buy Co Inc agreed to extend the deadline to February 28 for founder Richard Schulze to make a bid for the company, continuing the uncertainty for shareholders over whether he can put a bid together.

Best Buy shares fell 14.2 percent to $ 12.12 on the New York Stock Exchange.

The company said on Friday the extension would allow Schulze to include the consumer electronics retailer’s full-year results as part of his due diligence review.

The new deadline will also give him more time to line up partners and financing for a bid. A source told Reuters on Thursday that Schulze didn’t have financing lined up in time for a December bid.

Schulze, who founded Best Buy in 1966, has said he would fund any deal through a combination of private equity and debt financing, as well as the reinvestment of some of his own equity in the company.

“Obviously with the extension, there is still some hesitation on the part of his private equity suitors about how much financing they would want to put up for this deal,” Morningstar analyst R J Hottovy said.

Under the extension, Schulze will be able to submit an offer any time during February, and the company will have 30 days to review and make a decision on the bid.

In August, Schulze made an informal proposal to acquire Best Buy for $ 24 to $ 26 per share, or a total of $ 8.16 billion to $ 8.84 billion. Including debt, it would be as much as $ 10.9 billion.

But Best Buy’s performance has continued to lag and its stock has slid since. Last month, the company reported a decline in same-store sales for the ninth time in the last 10 quarters.

Best Buy’s fortunes have faltered as consumers increasingly use its big box stores as showrooms for products they end up buying online at Amazon.com Inc and other websites.

To add to its troubles, the company forced out Schulze’s protégé, Brian Dunn, as chief executive earlier this year amid allegations he was having an inappropriate relationship with a female employee.

That scandal led to the ouster of Schulze from the board, and Best Buy hired turnaround expert Hubert Joly as CEO to come up with its own restructuring plan.

Schulze remains Best Buy’s largest shareholder with about one-fifth of the company’s outstanding shares.

If he can come in with a bid at about $ 16 or $ 17 a share when the market thinks the stock is only worth $ 12, it is in the interests of shareholders to extend the deadline, Hottovy said.

Others agreed.

“That’s really the best hope for investors, that Schulze takes it out because there’s been no other good news for the company,” said Rakesh Agrawal, principal analyst at San Francisco-based consulting firm reDesign Mobile.

Agrawal, who also advises hedge funds and money managers on the technology sector, said at this point the stock was trading entirely on whether a deal can get done or not.

A Best Buy spokesman said the extension will not affect the company’s day-to-day operations, especially during the all-important holiday season.

“We are determined to have a strong holiday season,” both in stores and online, spokesman Matt Furman said, adding that the company was moving “full speed ahead” with its turnaround plan.

(Writing by Brad Dorfman; Additional reporting by Olivia Oran in New York, and Siddharth Cavale in Bangalore; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

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NKorea rocket launch shows young leader as gambler

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — A triumphant North Korea staged a mass rally of soldiers and civilians Friday to glorify the country’s young ruler, who took a big gamble this week in sending a satellite into orbit in defiance of international warnings.

Wednesday’s rocket launch came just eight months after a similar attempt ended in an embarrassing public failure, and just under a year after Kim Jong Un inherited power following his father’s death.

The surprising success of the launch may have earned Kim global condemnation, but at home the gamble paid off, at least in the short term. To his people, it made the 20-something Kim appear powerful, capable and determined in the face of foreign adversaries.

Tens of thousands of North Koreans, packed into snowy Kim Il Sung Square, clenched their fists in a unified show of resolve as a military band tooted horns and pounded on drums.

Huge red banners positioned in the square called on North Koreans to defend Kim Jong Un with their lives. They also paid homage to Kim Jong Un’s father, Kim Jong Il, and his grandfather, North Korean founder Kim Il Sung.

Pyongyang says the rocket put a crop and weather monitoring satellite into orbit. Much of the rest of the world sees it as a thinly disguised test of banned long-range missile technology. It could bring a fresh round of U.N. sanctions that would increase his country’s international isolation. At the same time, the success of the launch could strengthen North Korea’s military, the only entity that poses a potential threat to Kim’s rule.

The launch’s success, 14 years after North Korea’s first attempt, shows more than a little of the gambling spirit in the third Kim to rule North Korea since it became a country in 1948.

“North Korean officials will long be touting Kim Jong Un as a gutsy leader” who commanded the rocket launch despite being new to the job and young, said Kim Byung-ro, a North Korea specialist at Seoul National University in South Korea.

The propaganda machinery churned into action early Friday, with state media detailing how Kim Jong Un issued the order to fire off the rocket just days after scientists fretted over technical issues, ignoring the chorus of warnings from Washington to Moscow against a move likely to invite more sanctions.

Top officials followed Kim in shrugging off international condemnation.

Workers’ Party Secretary Kim Ki Nam told the crowd, bundled up against a winter chill in the heart of the capital, that “hostile forces” had dubbed the launch a missile test. He rejected the claim and called on North Koreans to stand their ground against the “cunning” critics.

North Korea called the satellite a gift to Kim Jong Il, who is said to have set the lofty goal of getting a satellite into space and then tapped his son to see it into fruition. The satellite, which North Korean scientists say is designed to send back data about crops and weather, was named Kwangmyongsong, or “Lode Star” — the nickname legendarily given to the elder Kim at birth.

Kim Jong Il died on Dec. 17, 2011, so to North Koreans, the successful launch is a tribute. State TV have been replaying video of the launch to “Song of Gen. Kim Jong Il.”

But it is the son who will bask in the glory, and face the international censure that may follow.

Even while he was being groomed to succeed his father, Kim Jong Un had been portrayed as championing science and technology as a way to lift North Korea out of decades of economic hardship.

“It makes me happy that our satellite is flying in space,” Pyongyang citizen Jong Sun Hui said as Friday’s ceremony came to a close and tens of thousands rushed into the streets, many linking arms as they went.

“The satellite launch demonstrated our strong power and the might of our science and technology once again,” she told The Associated Press. “And it also clearly testifies that a thriving nation is in our near future.”

Aside from winning him support from the people, the success of the launch helps his image as he works to consolidate power over a government crammed with elderly, old-school lieutenants of his father and grandfather, foreign analysts said.

Experts say that what is unclear, however, is whether Kim will continue to smoothly solidify power, steering clear of friction with the powerful military while dealing with the strong possibility of more crushing sanctions. The United Nations says North Korea already has a serious hunger problem.

“Certainly in the short run, this is an enormous boost to his prestige,” according to Marcus Noland, a North Korea analyst at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.

Noland, however, also mentioned the “Machiavellian argument” that this could cause future problems for Kim by significantly boosting the power of the military — “the only real threat to his rule.”

Successfully firing a rocket was so politically crucial for Kim at the onset of his rule that he allowed an April launch to go through even though it resulted in the collapse of a nascent food-aid-for-nuclear-freeze deal with the United States, said North Korea analyst Kim Yeon-su of Korea National Defense University in Seoul.

The launch success consolidates his image as heir to his father’s legacy. But it could end up deepening North Korea’s political and economic isolation, he said.

On Friday, the section at the rally reserved for foreign diplomats was noticeably sparse. U.N. officials and some European envoys stayed away from the celebration, as they did in April after the last launch.

Despite the success, experts say North Korea is years from even having a shot at developing reliable missiles that could bombard the American mainland and other distant targets.

North Korea will need larger and more dependable missiles, and more advanced nuclear weapons, to threaten U.S. shores, though it already poses a shorter-range missile threat to its neighbors.

The next big question is how the outside world will punish Pyongyang — and try to steer North Korea from what could come next: a nuclear test. In 2009, the North conducted an atomic explosion just weeks after a rocket launch.

Scott Snyder, a Korea specialist for the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote recently that North Korea‘s nuclear ambitions should inspire the U.S., China, South Korea and Japan to put aside their issues and focus on dealing with Pyongyang.

If there is a common threat that should galvanize regional cooperation, “it most certainly should be the prospect of a 30-year-old leader of a terrorized population with his finger on a nuclear trigger,” Snyder said.

____

Jon Chol Jin in Pyongyang, and Foster Klug and Sam Kim in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this report. Follow Jean H. Lee on Twitter: (at)newsjean.

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Verizon Offering $5 Shared 4G Plan for Samsung Galaxy Camera

Imagine the powerful Samsung Galaxy S III smartphone, except that it can’t make phone calls and its backplate has been replaced by a digital camera — handgrip, zoom lens, and all. That’s basically the Samsung Galaxy Camera in a nutshell, and whether it’s a small, awkwardly-shaped Android tablet or a digital camera that you can play Modern Combat 3 on depends on how you look at it.

When the Galaxy Camera launched last month, it was only available in white, and cost $ 499 on AT&T’s network with a month-to-month data plan. But on Dec. 13, it launches on Verizon’s network, in both white and black. The Verizon Galaxy Camera costs $ 50 more up front, but in return it has 4G LTE instead of HSPA+, and Verizon is offering a “promotional price” for the monthly charge: Only $ 5 to add it to a Share Everything plan, instead of the usual $ 10 tablet rate.

A 4G digital camera

While it’s capable of functioning as an Android tablet (or game machine), the biggest reason for the Samsung Galaxy Camera’s 4G wireless Internet is so it can automatically upload photos it takes. Apps such as Dropbox, Photobucket, and Ubuntu One offer a limited amount of online storage space for free, where the Galaxy Camera can save photos without anyone needing to tell it to. Those photos can then be accessed at home, or on a tablet or laptop.

Most smartphones are able to do this already, but few (with the possible exception of the Windows Phone powered Nokia Lumia 920) are able to take photos as high-quality as the Galaxy Camera’s.

Not as good of a deal as it sounds

Dropbox is offering two years’ worth of 50 GB of free online storage space for photos and videos, to anyone who buys a Samsung Galaxy Camera from AT&T or Verizon. (The regular free plan is only 2 GB.)

The problem is, you may need that much space. The photos taken by the Galaxy Camera’s 16 megapixel sensor take up a lot more space, at maximum resolution, than ordinary smartphone snapshots do. Those camera uploads can eat through a shared data plan, and with Verizon charging a $ 15 per GB overage fee (plus the $ 50 extra up-front on top of what AT&T charges) it may make up for the cheaper monthly cost.

On top of that, the Galaxy Camera’s photos are basically on par with a $ 199 digital camera’s — you pay a large premium to combine that kind of point-and-shoot with the hardware equivalent of a high-end smartphone.

It does run Android, though, right?

The Galaxy Camera uses Samsung‘s custom software for its camera app, and lacks a normal phone dialer app. Beyond that, though, it runs the same Android operating system found on smartphones, and can run all the same games and apps.

Some apps don’t work the same on the Galaxy Camera as they do on a smartphone, however. Apps which only run in portrait mode, for instance, require you to hold the camera sideways to use them (especially unpleasant when they’re camera apps). And while it can make voice and even video calls over Skype, it lacks a rear-facing camera or the kind of speaker you hold up close to your ear. So you may end up making speakerphone calls and filming the palm of your hand.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.
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U.S. faces task of running dozens of health exchanges

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Fourteen U.S. states and the District of Columbia so far have told the federal government they plan to operate healthcare exchanges under President Barack Obama‘s reform law, leaving Washington with the daunting task of creating online marketplaces for at least two-thirds of the country.

On the eve of a federal deadline for states to say whether they will run their own exchanges, a top U.S. healthcare policy official told lawmakers that the exchanges will start enrolling eligible families starting on October 1, 2013.

“I am confident that states and the federal government will be ready in ten months, when consumers in all states can begin to apply,” Gary Cohen, director of the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, told a health oversight panel in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Cohen, whose agency is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), was among federal officials who testified alongside state health authorities at a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health.

In written testimony, Cohen said 15 states have told the administration they will operate their own exchanges. He later explained under questioning that the count comprises 14 states and the District of Columbia.

Separately, HHS officials confirmed the count of 14 states but could not immediately explain why Cohen’s written testimony contained a higher number.

Some experts say the number of states planning to operate their own exchanges could reach 18 by the time the deadline arrives Friday. Still, the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation, which tracks healthcare issues, says only two states – Utah and Florida – remain undecided.

That would leave at least 30 states in which the administration would be required to run exchanges, a challenge that is raising questions about how successfully U.S. officials can implement a key provision of the healthcare reform law, known to opponents and advocates alike as “Obamacare”.

“I don’t envy them for the job that they have,” said Dennis Smith, a former federal healthcare official who now heads health services in Wisconsin, a state that has decided not to pursue its own exchange.

“At the end of the day, you’re trying to connect a buyer to a seller. And the fundamental things required to do that are not yet in place,” he said.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which Obama signed into law more than 2-1/2 years ago, is expected to extend health coverage to more than 30 million uninsured Americans. Those who enroll starting in October would be covered by insurance from January 1, 2014.

POLITICAL THEATER

About half of those newly insured individuals would purchase private coverage from online exchanges at federally subsidized rates. Ultimately, the number of people finding coverage through exchanges is expected to reach 26 million, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The remainder would be covered by expanding the Medicaid program for the poor to cover all adults earning up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, or about $ 15,000 for individuals and $ 30,600 for a family of four.

Thursday’s hearing provided a political stage for partisan rhetoric about Obama’s health reforms, which have survived repeated Republican repeal efforts, a nail-biting consideration by the Supreme Court and the Presidential election campaign.

Republicans and state officials from Republican-led states complained about compliance costs and accused HHS of delaying the release of vital details and rules needed to move forward on the exchanges and on the planned Medicaid expansion.

“The uncertain regulatory environment and the overall lack of response from HHS are not encouraging the states or the health plans to move forward,” said Representative Michael Burgess, a Texas Republican.

In response, Congressional Democrats and their state allies stressed the law’s benefits for senior citizens, protections for young adults and the sick, and the prospective economic benefits from an expected influx of billions of dollars in federal money.

“The (Republican) move now is to delay implementation under the guise of lack of information,” said Representative Frank Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat.

“The world in fact is not coming to an end,” he added. “The nation will be better because of the Affordable Care Act.”

States that don’t run their own exchanges would opt for one of two alternatives: a federally facilitated exchange that requires minimal state participation, or a federal partnership exchange in which states help by performing certain duties.

Kaiser Family Foundation expects six states to choose the partnership option and two dozen to opt for federally facilitated exchanges. Cohen said the count so far is four partnerships and seven facilitated exchanges.

States have until February 15 to say whether they intend to seek a federal partnership exchange. Four have done so already, Cohen said.

The administration will have to engineer an information technology system capable of processing operations in a way that meet the needs of healthcare consumers in different states.

Experts say the biggest challenge will likely be providing adequate customer service to handle enrollment, as well as fielding a technology system capable of interfacing seamlessly with the system of each state government.

Cohen told the panel the administration is building a website with interactive capabilities and a call center and has begun testing a data services hub to determine eligibility.

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Ros Krasny, Jilian Mincer, Nick Zieminski and David Gregorio)

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With SolarCity IPO, Elon Musk May Get Clean Tech Right

Over the past few years, Silicon Valley has pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into a vast array of “clean technology” companies. You probably can’t name many of them because, on the whole, they’ve been tremendous failures or totally underwhelming. Companies participating in particularly difficult areas such as solar have turned into laughingstocks and symbols of huge investments gone wrong.

There does, however, seem to be one person getting quite wealthy off green technology, and that’s Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla Motors (TSLA) and the chairman of SolarCity (SCTY). When SolarCity began trading on Thursday, its shares jumped more than 50 percent in early trading (although the company had lowered its IPO price in recent days due to lackluster demand). Musk is now the largest shareholder in a pair of public clean-technology companies. (Going into the offering, Musk owned 31 percent of SolarCity, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. That would be worth $ 150.8 million at the $ 8 offering price. A second filing said he intended to buy more shares at the offering.)

“It’s possible that Elon’s two clean-tech companies will be the two most successful clean-tech companies in the U.S.,” said Peter Thiel, the entrepreneur, investor, and Facebook (FB) board member in an interview earlier this year. Thiel is an investor in Musk’s SpaceX venture.

Instead of playing in the cutthroat world of solar-panel production, SolarCity, founded in 2006, focused on leasing solar panels to consumers and businesses and making this process easier. It helps people calculate how much money they can expect to save with solar panels, sets up the financing, and coordinates the installation of the panel. Through the first nine months of the year, SolarCity brought in $ 103 million of sales. Its business has been booming, although the company has yet to turn a profit and is likely to see a number of the state and federal tax credits from which it benefits decline over time.

What makes Musk’s clean-technology empire intriguing are the ways in which he intertwines the businesses. Tesla, for example, has begun building out a network of solar-powered charging stations for its cars. People can drive long distances—San Francisco to Los Angeles, for instance—and refuel their Model S sedans for free using a type of superfast charger. Musk has pledged to keep this refueling service free “forever,” and it is SolarCity that helps set up the stations. Beyond this, Musk plans soon to unveil what he’s describing as a “new mode of transportation” that sounds like some kind of solar-powered, super-fast tunnel called the Hyperloop. (He describes it in some detail here.)

Musk helped come up with the business plan for SolarCity, which was then founded by his cousins, CEO Lyndon Rive and Chief Technology Officer Peter Rive. All the men grew up near each other in Pretoria, South Africa, where Musk led them on a variety of entrepreneurial ventures, including selling Easter eggs door to door. Their mothers were born in Canada, and at about age 15, Musk hatched a plan to move the entire clan to the U.S. after first obtaining Canadian citizenship. “Without Elon I would be stuck in South Africa,” Lyndon told me in an interview earlier this year. “His ability to help us leave the country was amazing.”

Lyndon eventually obtained his green card for the U.S. through his skills as an underwater hockey player. (Yes, this sport exists.) “The U.S. has this green card category for people with exceptional abilities, like if you’re really good at sports or an actor,” Lyndon says. “I’ve been playing the sport since I was 14, and to get the exception you have to prove that you’re one of the best players in the world.” Both Lyndon and his wife have played for the U.S. National Underwater Hockey team.

Once in the U.S., the Rive brothers started a data center software company called Everdream, which Musk bankrolled. Dell (DELL) eventually acquired the company for $ 120 million. The cousins took the money, gave their next venture a think, and all settled on SolarCity.

Both Tesla and SolarCity have their challenges. Tesla has just started pumping out its new Model S sedan at a regular rate. The good news is that it has thousands of back orders to fill. The bad news is that it needs to produce the machines profitability and reliably. Earlier this month, Musk revealed that Tesla had enjoyed a week of positive cash flow. Still, Tesla remains one of the most shorted stocks on the market, with big-time investors betting that Musk will fail. Mitt Romney drove this point home during the presidential debates, describing Tesla as a “loser.”

SolarCity has installed panels at more than 45,000 buildings and been at the forefront of an era when getting this type of technology put on a home or office became much, much easier. “Clean energy has taken a big hit, primarily on the solar side, because of a lot of the companies there were producing a commodity,” Lyndon says, referring to the solar-panel and substrate makers. “The stocks were overhyped because of overdemand and undersupply, and then supply caught up. This should not be a measurement of the market’s willingness to adopt clean energy. The market adoption is almost doubling every year.”

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