Priest Is Planning to Defy the Vatican’s Orders to Stay Quiet

Jekaterina Saveljeva for The New York TimesThe Rev. Tony Flannery, an Irish priest, was suspended by the Vatican last year. “I refuse to be terrified into submission,” he said. DUBLIN — A well-known Irish Catholic priest plans to defy Vatican authorities on Sunday by breaking his silence about what he says is a campaign against him by the church over his advocacy of more open discussion on church...

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100 Years of U.S. Presidential Inaugurations

On March 4, 1913, Woodrow Wilson took the oath of office. Nearly 100 years later, Barack Obama will take that same oath.The U.S. presidential inauguration looks a tad different than it did a century ago. In 1913, women still did not have the right to vote and Wilson rode to the Capitol in a horse-drawn carriage. And don’t expect to see President Obama wearing a silk top hat like Wilson either.[More...

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Baseball reflects on HOF pair Weaver, Musial

One was born in St. Louis, the other became a star there.Aside from that, Earl Weaver and Stan Musial were about as different as two Hall of Famers could be."Talk about your odd couple," said George Vecsey, the longtime sports columnist for The New York Times who wrote a recent biography of Musial.Weaver was a 5-foot-6 rabble rouser whose penchant for quarreling with umpires belied a cerebral approach...

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Well: Holly the Cat's Incredible Journey

Nobody knows how it happened: an indoor housecat who got lost on a family excursion managing, after two months and about 200 miles, to return to her hometown.Even scientists are baffled by how Holly, a 4-year-old tortoiseshell who in early November became separated from Jacob and Bonnie Richter at an R.V. rally in Daytona Beach, Fla., appeared on New Year’s Eve — staggering, weak and emaciated — in...

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The Boss: New Leaders Inc. C.E.O. on Giving Children a Chance

I AM the youngest of 10 children in my family, and the only one born in the United States. My father was a municipal judge who fled Haiti during the Duvalier regime. He and my mother settled in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn, but could not initially afford to bring over my four brothers and five sisters, who stayed in Haiti with relatives. Jean S. Desravines is the chief executive...

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New Northern Ireland Violence May Be About More Than the British Flag

Peter Muhly/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesPolice officers in Belfast, Northern Ireland, remained with their armored vehicles as a car burned after violence between unionists and loyalists on Jan. 12. BELFAST, Northern Ireland — For more than six weeks, it has been a dismal case of back-to-the-future, a crudely sectarian upheaval that has defied all attempts at peacemaking. Paul...

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Paid apps are history

This week marked an important moment in the evolution of the iOS app market. As Pages just slipped out of the iPad top 10 highest grossing apps chart, there are now no paid apps among the ten applications that generate most revenue on the iPad. When the iPad application market was born a few years ago, it was dominated by relatively stiffly priced applications, mimicking the PC software or game...

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Armstrong turns emotional in 2nd part of interview

CHICAGO (AP) — Lance Armstrong finally cracked.Not while expressing deep remorse or regrets, though there was plenty of that in Friday night's second part of Armstrong's interview with Oprah Winfrey.It wasn't over the $75 million in sponsorship deals that evaporated over the course of two days, or having to walk away from the Livestrong cancer charity he founded and called his "sixth child." It wasn't...

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Business Briefing | Medicine: F.D.A. Clears Botox to Help Bladder Control

Botox, the wrinkle treatment made by Allergan, has been approved to treat adults with overactive bladders who cannot tolerate or were not helped by other drugs, the Food and Drug Administration said on Friday. Botox injected into the bladder muscle causes the bladder to relax, increasing its storage capacity. “Clinical studies have demonstrated Botox’s ability to significantly reduce the frequency...

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Analysis: Amid Tears Lance Armstrong Leaves Unanswered Questions in Oprah Winfrey Interview

In an extensive interview with Oprah Winfrey that was shown over two nights, Lance Armstrong admitted publicly for the first time that he doped throughout his cycling career. He revealed that all seven of his Tour de France victories were fueled by doping, that he never felt bad about cheating, and that he had covered up a positive drug test at the 1999 Tour with a backdated doctor’s prescription...

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China Objects After Shell Is Fired From Myanmar

BANGKOK — China said Thursday that it had expressed “grave concern” to the Myanmar government after a shell, apparently fired during fighting between Myanmar troops and ethnic rebels, landed in Chinese territory, and a Chinese government spokesman called for an immediate cease-fire. The Chinese response was unusually strong given the close ties between the two countries in recent years, and...

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ASUS in talks with Microsoft to develop a Windows Phone 8 smartphone

The PC industry is in shambles and manufacturers have begun to explore new options to increase revenue. According to The Wall Street Journal, ASUS (2357) is in talks with Microsoft (MSFT) on a licensing deal to offer Windows Phone 8 device. This makes sense for ASUS since smartphone shipments increased by nearly 50% in 2012, compared to a mere 3.2% growth in computer shipments, and the company already...

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Armstrong admits doping: 'I'm a flawed character'

CHICAGO (AP) — He did it. He finally admitted it. Lance Armstrong doped.He was light on the details and didn't name names. He mused that he might not have been caught if not for his comeback in 2009. And he was certain his "fate was sealed" when longtime friend, training partner and trusted lieutenant George Hincapie, who was along for the ride on all seven of Armstrong's Tour de France wins from...

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Well: The Fallout of a Chance Medical Finding

An incidental finding — I was convinced of it. My patient had undergone a CT scan of the abdomen at another hospital because of stomach pains and “incidentally noted” was a 2-centimeter mass in her adrenal gland. She brought in the report for me to see, nervous that she might have cancer.I reassured her that it was exceedingly unlikely that she had cancer. Benign masses in the adrenal gland are nearly...

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DealBook: Michael Dell’s Empire in a Buyout Spotlight

The computer empire of Michael S. Dell spreads across a campus of low-slung buildings in Round Rock, Tex.But his financial empire — estimated at $16 billion — occupies the 21st floor of a dark glass skyscraper on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.It is there that MSD Capital, started by Mr. Dell 15 years ago to manage his fortune, has quietly built a reputation as one of the smartest investors on Wall Street....

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India Ink: A Hospital Network With a Vision

Fixes looks at solutions to social problems and why they work.As the United States struggles to find new business models for health care, some innovators are looking to other industries, ones that provide high-quality services for low prices. In a recent article in The New Yorker, for example, Atul Gawande suggests that the Cheesecake Factory restaurant chain — with its size, central control and accountability...

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