The Starting Point: Discoveries online and in Central Park – Yahoo! News
The Starting Point: Discoveries online and in Central Park
Tue Jul 7, 8:09 AM ET
The Starting Point is a snapshot of the news stories that occurred overnight. Look for updates throughout the day on Yahoo! News and in the news box on Yahoo.com.
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Top story overnight: Fresh protests erupted in China’s restive Xinjiang region, with both Han Chinese and Uighur groups facing off with riot police. To “avoid further chaos,” the government reportedly declared a curfew from 9 p.m. to 8 a.m. Click here to view pictures of the ethnic riots that have killed at least 156 people in the past two days.
In other news: Suspected U.S. missiles hit a Taliban training camp in Pakistan near the Afghan border. According to The Associated Press, two missiles hit the camp, which was run by Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud. At least 12 militants were killed in the missile strike.
Lear Corp has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Reuters reported. The auto parts maker’s business suffered due to steep production cuts by General Motors and Ford. “We intend to proceed on an expedited basis and expect to submit the plan to the Bankruptcy Court within 60 days,” Lear Chief Executive Bob Rossiter said.
Finally, Michael Jackson’s memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. ET/10 a.m. PT at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Click here to watch it live. Yahoo! News will have reporters on the scene as well; you can view their tweets @YStartingPoint.
Most-read stories overnight: Researchers at Carnegie-Mellon University said they can now predict some Americans’ Social Security numbers using public records, social networks and prediction models, The AP reported. Social Security spokesman Mark Lassiter said the public should not be alarmed by the report; however, “the agency has been developing a system to randomly assign SSNs. This system will be in place next year.” Considering the increased risk of identity theft, do you believe the U.S. government should issue new identification numbers to the public? Click here to share your thoughts.
Readers were also interested in this AP story about a wallet stolen by a pickpocket 27 years ago. The wallet, which was owned by Ruth Bendik, disappeared in 1982 while she watched the New York City Marathon. Last week, a tree-care supervisor for the Central Park Conservancy found the blue leather billfold inside a dying cherry tree. Although $20 in cash was missing, Bendik’s credit cards and ID were still inside.
Looking ahead: Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya will fly to Washington D.C. to discuss the political crisis in his country with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Al Franken will be sworn in at 12:15 p.m. today as the freshman senator from Minnesota. And a South Florida judge is expected to decide whether former New York Yankees star Jim Leyritz should await his upcoming DUI manslaughter trial behind bars.
Yesterday’s poll: Do you think Sarah Palin’s decision to resign will help or hurt her chances of becoming the Republican’s presidential contender in 2012? Seventy percent of respondents said quitting her job has hurt her chances.
Today in history: Four years ago, terrorist bombings in three London Underground stations and on a double-decker bus killed 52 victims and four suicide bombers.
Birthdays: Figure skater Michelle Kwan, 29. Actress Kirsten Vangsness, 37. Basketball player Lisa Leslie, 37. Actress Cree Summer, 40. Actress Jorja Fox, 41. Comedian Jim Gaffigan, 43. Singer Vonda Shepard, 46. Musician Mark White (Spin Doctors), 47. Actor Billy Campbell, 50. Actress Shelley Duvall, 60. Singer David Hodo (The Village People), 62. Actor Joe Spano, 63. Musician Ringo Starr, 69. Author David McCullough, 76. Bandleader Doc Severinsen, 82.
Note: The Starting Point Twitter feed is available @ystartingpoint. Sign up today!
–Jade Walker is the overnight editor of Yahoo! News. News doesn’t stop when the lights go out, and neither does Jade.
**Yahoo! News bloggers compile the best news content from our providers and scour the Web for the most interesting news stories so you don’t have to.
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For the Mayan civilization, the end of the 2012 will mean the end of a spiritual era and the birth of a new element called “ether”
According to the calendars of the great Mesoamerican civilizations, known as being the most precise on Earth, we are only 4 years away from the end of the world 2012.
These great astrologists, the Mayans, have discovered 3 thousand years ago, that the Earth’s Axe oscillates and changes its position every 26 thousand years and as a result the positions of the neighboring stars change all the time.
Even as we speak, we are approaching the end of this big cycle, which in the eyes of the Mayan civilization coincides with the end of the world predicted for December 2012.
Lawrence E. Joseph, an American scientist, has verified this method with the Galilean method. He noticed that in 2012 we’ll be part at an outstanding alignment.
Furthermore, in 2012, the activity of the solar spots will reach a climax and poles will reverse exactly when the Mayans predicted. How weird is that! This can be an important factor contributing to the end of the world 2012 catastrophe.
The Maya prophecy regarding the year 2012 has always been a best seller in New Age culture. For the Maya civilization, the year 2012 will mark the transcending to a more spiritual era, in a new domain of a new element called “ether”.
The interpretations regarding the way this end will look are very different but many consider that it might be a violent transformation and that the final result could be the end of the entire world.
This is nothing new. But a very pragmatically and successful American scientist, Lawrence E. Joseph had verified this theory with the Galilean method and has presented his discovering in the book about the apocalypse, recently translated in Italy.
Joseph, who studied a lot physics and literature, went in the Guatemala jungle to look for remains and clues of the Mayan documents which described the cyclic movements. Joseph then said that on the date of 21 December 2012 the position of the Earth and Sun and the inclination will make the center of the Milky Way invisible (the center of the Milky Way is currently occupied by a black hole).
For the Mayans, the event would mark the end of an energy flux that would be vital for the human beings and that the lack of it could lead to the end of the world in 2012.
Although science can’t tell us much about the mysterious energy flux, the search for our destiny on the sky is not something irrational, notes “La Stampa”, reminding us that modern physics have given us travels in the infinite interstellar spaces, at the board of the Terra space ship, in a solar system which rotates around a galaxy which gets further and further away from other galaxies with an incredible speed.
This trip can have a lot of unexpected events like we had 65 million years ago because an asteroid collided with our planet.
So it is probable that the Mayans could have been informed about the end of the dinosaurs, and they have calculated the cycles of the alignments with an absolute precision. In 2012 we will assist at an extraordinary alignment. The strange thing is that the activity of the solar flares will reach its climax exactly on December 2012 which could bring the end of the world in 2012!
An even weirder thing is that in the magnetic field of the Earth have been reported holes similar to ozone holes.
It seems that the magnetic poles will soon reverse and this will affect our planet’s capacity to defend against heavy objects that will attack us in the future. The planetary alignment could lead to a huge solar storm.
Also scientists think that the solar system has just entered in an interstellar node with a very powerful energy and electromagnetic activity. The entire solar system is reacting, trying to adapt to the new situation.
They also say that the climax will be in 2012!
If the collision will be violent, the electromagnetic activity will unleash a huge quantity of energy in our direction. Comets and asteroids could suffer oscillations in their orbits and the risk of collisions will increase.
What will really happen? Is the “end of the world 2012″ prophect really true? We don’t know for sure because the facts are a little ambiguous, we’ll just have to wait and see. Only time will tell, but I sure hope the end will not come so soon because I have a lot of things to do on this Earth.
I hope you’ve been enjoying my posts lately. I thought I might do something different today and rustle up a few bits of info from around the WWW. These are some of the news items and blog posts that have been popular over the last few weeks. Leave me your thoughts.
Sotomayor: The Umpires Strike Out!
Right now, there are four die-hard Feddies on the US Supreme Court: Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. … Read More…
The Herald Bulletin, Anderson, Ind., Heather Bremer Column …
Woody Harrelson and his motley crew find a way to survive a zombie apocalypse. It involves guns, shovels and whatever other blunt instruments might be handy … Read More…
WORLDVIEW: Doomsday (the movie)
A major motion picture about it is coming to a theater near you — this year, of course, so it has plenty of time to go to DVD before the apocalypse. … Read More…
That’s all the news for today guys, so until next time, thanks for stopping by.
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