Michael Arndt is no longer writing the script for Star Wars: Episode VII.
Screenwriting duties are being taken over by Lawrence Kasdan, who co-wrote Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back and Raiders of the Lost Ark, and by J.J. Abrams, who is already on board as director.
"I am very excited about the story we have in place and thrilled to have Larry and J.J. working on the script," Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy said in a post on StarWars.com. "There are very few people who fundamentally understand the way a Star Wars story works like Larry, and it is nothing short of incredible to have him even more deeply involved in its return to the big screen. J.J. of course is an incredible storyteller in his own right. Michael Arndt has done a terrific job bringing us to this point and we have an amazing filmmaking and design team in place already prepping for production."
Arndt has been working on Star Wars even before Disney announced it was buying Lucasfilm in October 2012, writing a 40- to 50-page treatment for Episode VII. The announcement also contained the news that Disney was planning new movies in the Star Wars universe, including Episode VII, with a 2015 release planned. Then in late 2012, Arndt was formally hired to write the screenplay.
While George Lucas is considered the author of the stories for the Star Wars movies, the screenplays for both The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi were written with collaborators.
Kasdan and Leigh Brackett collaborated on the script for Empire -- considered by many fans and most critics to be the best story of all the Star Wars movies -- and also worked with Lucas on Return.
The Episode VII script news was announced on StarWars.com, which also revealed the below-the-line crew that Abrams has assembled, which includes Dan Mindel, the director of photography behind Abrams' Mission: Impossible III, Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness.
Also on board are production designers Rick Carter (Lincoln, Avatar) and Darren Gilford (Oblivion, TRON: Legacy), costume designer Michael Kaplan (Star Trek Into Darkness, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, Fight Club), special effects supervisor Chris Corbould (The Dark Knight Rises, Inception), sound designer Ben Burtt(Wall-E, Star Wars: Episodes I-VI), re-recording mixer Gary Rydstrom (Jurassic Park, Saving Private Ryan), supervising sound editor Matthew Wood (The Master, There Will Be Blood) of Skywalker Sound, and visual effects supervisor Roger Guyett (Star Trek Into Darkness, Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith) of Industrial Light & Magic.
Physicists decode decision circuit of cancer metastasis
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
24-Oct-2013
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Contact: David Ruth david@rice.edu 713-348-6327 Rice University
Rice U. research reveals 3-way genetic switch for cancer metastasis
Cancer researchers from Rice University have deciphered the operating principles of a genetic switch that cancer cells use to decide when to metastasize and invade other parts of the body. The study found that the on-off switch's dynamics also allows a third choice that lies somewhere between "on" and "off." The extra setting both explains previously confusing experimental results and opens the door to new avenues of cancer treatment.
The study appears online this week in the Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"Cancer cells behave in complex ways, and this work shows how such complexity can arise from the operation of a relatively simple decision-making circuit," said study co-author Eshel Ben-Jacob, a senior investigator at Rice's Center for Theoretical Biological Physics (CTBP) and adjunct professor of biochemistry and cell biology at Rice. "By stripping away the complexity and starting with first principles, we get a glimpse of the 'logic of cancer' -- the driver of the disease's decision to spread."
In the PNAS study, Ben-Jacob and CTBP colleagues Jos Onuchic, Herbert Levine, Mingyang Lu and Mohit Kumar Jolly describe a new theoretical framework that allowed them to model the behavior of microRNAs in decision-making circuits. To test the framework, they modeled the behavior of a decision-making genetic circuit that cells use to regulate the forward and backward transitions between two different cell states, the epithelial and mesenchymal. Known respectively as the E-M transition (EMT) and the M-E transition (MET), these changes in cell state are vital for embryonic development, tissue engineering and wound healing. During the EMT, some cells also form a third state, a hybrid that is endowed with a special mix of both epithelial and mesenchymal abilities, including group migration.
The EMT transition is also a hallmark of cancer metastasis. Cancer cells co-opt the process to allow tumor cells break away, migrate to other parts of the body and establish a new tumor. To find ways to shut down metastasis, cancer researchers have conducted dozens of studies about the genetic circuitry that activates the EMT.
One clear finding from previous studies is that a two-component genetic switch is the key to both the EMT and MET. The switch contains two specialized pairs of proteins. One pair is SNAIL and microRNA34 (SNAIL/miR34), and the other is ZEB and microRNA200 (ZEB/miR200).
Each pair is "mutually inhibitory," meaning that the presence of one of the partners inhibits the production of the other.
In the mesenchymal cell state -- the state that corresponds to cancer metastasis -- both SNAIL and ZEB must be present in high levels. In the epithelial state, the microRNA partners dominate, and neither ZEB nor SNAIL is available in high levels.
"Usually, if you have two genes that are mutually limiting, you have only two possibilities,"
Ben-Jacob said. "In the first case, gene A is highly expressed and inhibits gene B. In the other, gene B is highly expressed and it inhibits A. This is true in the case of ZEB and miR200. One of these is 'on' and the other is 'off,' so it's clear that this is the decision element in the switch."
SNAIL and miR34 interact more weakly. As a result, both can be present at the same time, with the amount of each varying based upon inputs from a number of other proteins, including several other cancer genes.
"One of the most important things the model showed us was how SNAIL and miR34 act as an integrator," Ben-Jacob said. "This part of the circuit is acted on by multiple cues, and it integrates those signals and feeds information into the decision element. It does this based upon the level of SNAIL, which activates ZEB and inhibits miR200."
In modeling the ZEB/miR200 decision circuit, the team found that it operates as a "ternary" or three-way, switch. The reason for this is that ZEB has the ability to activate itself by a positive feedback loop, which allows the cell to keep intermediate levels of all four proteins in the switch under some conditions.
Ben-Jacob said the hybrid, or partially on-off state, also supports cancer metastasis by enabling collective cell migration and by imparting stem-cell properties that help migrating cancer cells evade the immune system and anticancer therapies.
"Now that we understand what drives the cell to select between the various states, we can begin to think of new ways to outsmart cancer," Ben-Jacob said. "We can think about coaxing the cancer to make the decision that we want, to convert itself into a state that we are ready to attack with a particularly effective treatment."
The cancer-metastasis results correspond with findings from previous studies by Ben-Jacob and Onuchic into the collective decision-making processes of bacteria and into new strategies to combat cancer by timing the delivery of multiple drugs to interrupt the decision-making processes of cancer.
"At CTBP, we allow the underlying physics of a system to guide our examination of its biological properties," said Onuchic, CTBP co-director and Rice's Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Professor of Physics and Astronomy and professor of chemistry and of biochemistry and cell biology. "In this case, that approach led us to develop a powerful model for simulating the decision-making circuitry involved in cancer metastasis. Going forward, we plan to see how this circuit interacts with others to produce a variety of cancer cells, including cancer stem cells."
The research is supported by the National Science Foundation, the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas and the Tauber Family Funds at Tel Aviv University. Lu is a postdoctoral researcher at CTBP, and Jolly is a graduate student in bioengineering. Levine is co-director of CTBP and Rice's Karl F. Hasselmann Professor in Bioengineering. Ben-Jacob is also the Maguy-Glass Professor in Physics of Complex Systems and professor of physics and astronomy at Tel Aviv University.
This release can be found online at news.rice.edu.
Follow Rice News and Media Relations via Twitter @RiceUNews.
Located on a 300-acre forested campus in Houston, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation's top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of Architecture, Business, Continuing Studies, Engineering, Humanities, Music, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and is home to the Baker Institute for Public Policy. With 3,708 undergraduates and 2,374 graduate students, Rice's undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice has been ranked No. 1 for best quality of life multiple times by the Princeton Review and No. 2 for "best value" among private universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance. To read "What they're saying about Rice," go to http://tinyurl.com/AboutRiceU.
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Physicists decode decision circuit of cancer metastasis
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
24-Oct-2013
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Contact: David Ruth david@rice.edu 713-348-6327 Rice University
Rice U. research reveals 3-way genetic switch for cancer metastasis
Cancer researchers from Rice University have deciphered the operating principles of a genetic switch that cancer cells use to decide when to metastasize and invade other parts of the body. The study found that the on-off switch's dynamics also allows a third choice that lies somewhere between "on" and "off." The extra setting both explains previously confusing experimental results and opens the door to new avenues of cancer treatment.
The study appears online this week in the Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"Cancer cells behave in complex ways, and this work shows how such complexity can arise from the operation of a relatively simple decision-making circuit," said study co-author Eshel Ben-Jacob, a senior investigator at Rice's Center for Theoretical Biological Physics (CTBP) and adjunct professor of biochemistry and cell biology at Rice. "By stripping away the complexity and starting with first principles, we get a glimpse of the 'logic of cancer' -- the driver of the disease's decision to spread."
In the PNAS study, Ben-Jacob and CTBP colleagues Jos Onuchic, Herbert Levine, Mingyang Lu and Mohit Kumar Jolly describe a new theoretical framework that allowed them to model the behavior of microRNAs in decision-making circuits. To test the framework, they modeled the behavior of a decision-making genetic circuit that cells use to regulate the forward and backward transitions between two different cell states, the epithelial and mesenchymal. Known respectively as the E-M transition (EMT) and the M-E transition (MET), these changes in cell state are vital for embryonic development, tissue engineering and wound healing. During the EMT, some cells also form a third state, a hybrid that is endowed with a special mix of both epithelial and mesenchymal abilities, including group migration.
The EMT transition is also a hallmark of cancer metastasis. Cancer cells co-opt the process to allow tumor cells break away, migrate to other parts of the body and establish a new tumor. To find ways to shut down metastasis, cancer researchers have conducted dozens of studies about the genetic circuitry that activates the EMT.
One clear finding from previous studies is that a two-component genetic switch is the key to both the EMT and MET. The switch contains two specialized pairs of proteins. One pair is SNAIL and microRNA34 (SNAIL/miR34), and the other is ZEB and microRNA200 (ZEB/miR200).
Each pair is "mutually inhibitory," meaning that the presence of one of the partners inhibits the production of the other.
In the mesenchymal cell state -- the state that corresponds to cancer metastasis -- both SNAIL and ZEB must be present in high levels. In the epithelial state, the microRNA partners dominate, and neither ZEB nor SNAIL is available in high levels.
"Usually, if you have two genes that are mutually limiting, you have only two possibilities,"
Ben-Jacob said. "In the first case, gene A is highly expressed and inhibits gene B. In the other, gene B is highly expressed and it inhibits A. This is true in the case of ZEB and miR200. One of these is 'on' and the other is 'off,' so it's clear that this is the decision element in the switch."
SNAIL and miR34 interact more weakly. As a result, both can be present at the same time, with the amount of each varying based upon inputs from a number of other proteins, including several other cancer genes.
"One of the most important things the model showed us was how SNAIL and miR34 act as an integrator," Ben-Jacob said. "This part of the circuit is acted on by multiple cues, and it integrates those signals and feeds information into the decision element. It does this based upon the level of SNAIL, which activates ZEB and inhibits miR200."
In modeling the ZEB/miR200 decision circuit, the team found that it operates as a "ternary" or three-way, switch. The reason for this is that ZEB has the ability to activate itself by a positive feedback loop, which allows the cell to keep intermediate levels of all four proteins in the switch under some conditions.
Ben-Jacob said the hybrid, or partially on-off state, also supports cancer metastasis by enabling collective cell migration and by imparting stem-cell properties that help migrating cancer cells evade the immune system and anticancer therapies.
"Now that we understand what drives the cell to select between the various states, we can begin to think of new ways to outsmart cancer," Ben-Jacob said. "We can think about coaxing the cancer to make the decision that we want, to convert itself into a state that we are ready to attack with a particularly effective treatment."
The cancer-metastasis results correspond with findings from previous studies by Ben-Jacob and Onuchic into the collective decision-making processes of bacteria and into new strategies to combat cancer by timing the delivery of multiple drugs to interrupt the decision-making processes of cancer.
"At CTBP, we allow the underlying physics of a system to guide our examination of its biological properties," said Onuchic, CTBP co-director and Rice's Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Professor of Physics and Astronomy and professor of chemistry and of biochemistry and cell biology. "In this case, that approach led us to develop a powerful model for simulating the decision-making circuitry involved in cancer metastasis. Going forward, we plan to see how this circuit interacts with others to produce a variety of cancer cells, including cancer stem cells."
The research is supported by the National Science Foundation, the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas and the Tauber Family Funds at Tel Aviv University. Lu is a postdoctoral researcher at CTBP, and Jolly is a graduate student in bioengineering. Levine is co-director of CTBP and Rice's Karl F. Hasselmann Professor in Bioengineering. Ben-Jacob is also the Maguy-Glass Professor in Physics of Complex Systems and professor of physics and astronomy at Tel Aviv University.
This release can be found online at news.rice.edu.
Follow Rice News and Media Relations via Twitter @RiceUNews.
Located on a 300-acre forested campus in Houston, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation's top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of Architecture, Business, Continuing Studies, Engineering, Humanities, Music, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and is home to the Baker Institute for Public Policy. With 3,708 undergraduates and 2,374 graduate students, Rice's undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice has been ranked No. 1 for best quality of life multiple times by the Princeton Review and No. 2 for "best value" among private universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance. To read "What they're saying about Rice," go to http://tinyurl.com/AboutRiceU.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Relatives of Westgate attack victim Mitul Shah observe a list of names of some of those who died at a memorial service marking one month since the Sept. 21 terrorist attack in Nairobi, Kenya, on Monday.
Ben Curtis/AP
Relatives of Westgate attack victim Mitul Shah observe a list of names of some of those who died at a memorial service marking one month since the Sept. 21 terrorist attack in Nairobi, Kenya, on Monday.
We begin with the fallout from the leaks over the National Security's Agency surveillance operations.
Germany has summoned the U.S. ambassador over allegations the NSA spied on Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Merkel called President Obama on Wednesday to demand an explanation over the allegations, which were revealed by Der Spiegel. Obama denied the German chancellor was targeted.
The German news report is the latest embarrassment for the U.S., which earlier this week found itself trying to explain a report in the French newspaper Le Monde that the NSA had monitored millions of French phone records during a 30-day period.
Kenya's police chief David Kimaiyo says journalists will be arrested and prosecuted for reporting on the apparent looting by Kenya Defence Forces personnel at Nairobi's Westgate Mall during the siege there last month.
The newspaper reported that Kimaiyo accused journalists of "provoking propaganda" and inciting citizens against authorities with their reporting. The newspaper says:
"The Inspector-General's announcement is the latest in a sustained assault on press freedom in Kenya in recent months, which has seen the tabling in Parliament of bills giving government control over media operations."
The military says soldiers weren't looting, but were, in fact, carrying water in shopping bags.
But The Associated Press reports that security camera footage its reporters saw appeared to show armed forces looting a store during the four-day siege that began Sept. 21. At least 67 people were killed in the attack by Islamists militants.
Canada mostly was unharmed during the global economic crisis, but a gloomier outlook prompted the country's central bank to put on hold a planned increase of a key interest rate. And that decision is upsetting pension funds, insurers and banks.
"For anybody who is in the business of saving money, this is not good news," Jim Leech, CEO of the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan, told the newspaper. "It will be tougher and tougher for people to save money to meet their retirement needs. And it doesn't matter if you're in a defined benefit [pension plan] or defined contribution pension plan or your own RRSP, your savings rates are going to be low."
Long-term interest rates in Canada began rising this year, boosting the country's pension funds. Those funds have struggled over the past decade because of low interest rates. The newspaper cited data as saying the average Canadian pension plan was 88 percent funded as of Sept. 30; it was at 69 percent at the start of the year.
The newspaper reported that insurers expressed relative confidence with the Bank of Canada's decision while commercial banks also saw a silver lining: low mortgage rates.
Finally, police in Singapore are investigating an incident at a bus stop on Tuesday in which a man spat at two women following a dispute over cutting in line.
A video of the incident was posted on Facebook where it went viral, the newspaper reported.
Singapore's public transport operator SMRT reminded passengers that "that inappropriate behaviour is not tolerated and will be reported."
Caffeine and free Wi-Fi are a potent recipe for productivity. It’s what lures you and many other telecommuters to spend serious work time in convenient coffee shops. But whether you’re just getting out of the office or the sidewalk café is your office, working in a public space has some special challenges. These tips will help you stay safe and productive.
1. Stake out your turf
Before you put down your coffee, consider the location of your temporary office. Is it too close to the door? Too far from the restroom? Right under a vent that pumps out freezing-cold air? Discomfort and distractions will hamper your productivity. Don’t be shy about asking to share a table. Other telecommuters, in particular, understand that it’s part of the social contract of working in a public place. And be sure to bring a jacket or sweater that you can drape over your chair to hold your spot.
2. Power up
Whether your device is a laptop, a hybrid, or a tablet, its battery must be able to keep up with you. If you plan to work remotely a lot, consider investing in a laptop that carries one of Intel’s new Haswell processors—which offer significantly better battery life than their Ivy Bridge predecessors—or using a power-efficient tablet instead of a traditional laptop.
Image: Robert CardinNew laptops based on Intel's Haswell processors offer the longer battery life you need at a cafe.
If you plan to settle in for more than a few hours, bring a power cord. Most retail establishments that provide free Wi-Fi allow customers to plug into the outlets, too. Of course, that means finding a seat near an outlet. If the outlets are all taken, and you have a power emergency, ask a better-situated patron if you can take a turn with the outlet.
3. Be wary of free Wi-Fi
One of the main attractions of Starbucks and similar retailers is their free Wi-Fi. Starbucks is in the midst of switching from AT&T to Google as its service provider. The new Google service is 10 times faster (or more, in areas served by Google Fiber gigabit broadband). If your neighborhood Starbucks has already made the switch, you’ll have even more incentive to work from that location.
In most cases, though, the adage “you get what you pay for” applies—so you shouldn’t rely on free Wi-Fi to support a business-critical videoconference. At the very least, make sure that you have a reliable Plan B—such as using a 4G/LTE smartphone, tablet, or hotspot—for network connectivity in a pinch. Most mobile devices can allow other devices to connect over Wi-Fi and share the cellular data connection, and the wireless providers offer dedicated mobile hotspots that do the same thing. Bear in mind, though, that using your smartphone or tablet as a Wi-Fi hotspot will consume data from your cellular data plan.
4. Bring a headset
Working in a café means contending with the din of multiple conversations, hissing espresso machines, and baristas announcing triple no-foam lattes. All that ambient noise will muddy your phone calls and video chats. To ensure clear communications, bring a noise-canceling headset like the Plantronics Rig.
ROBERT CARDINNoise-canceling headphones can help you focus—and handle business calls—without background noise.
Even if you’re just planning to put your head down and power through some documents, you may benefit from using ear buds or headphones either to chill to some music while you work or to dampen surrounding sound.
Finally, be considerate of other patrons. They don’t want to hear you drone on about quarterly reports, so if you know you have a call on which you’ll be presenting or talking a lot, work from home instead.
5. Stay secure
It’s easy to lose touch with your environment when you’re focusing intently on a task, but remember to keep a close eye on your briefcase, purse, and other belongings. The retailer is not responsible for your stuff and has no liability if it gets stolen.
The Targus Defcon CL can secure your laptop or other mobile device to a handy chair or table.
If you have to use the restroom, either ask someone to keep an eye on your stuff for you, or pack it all up and set up shop again when you return. The pitfalls of those two options are obvious, so the best solution may be a laptop lock like the Targus Defcon CL to secure your hardware to the table.
Even if your laptop is secure, don’t forget to take things like your wallet and car keys with you when you leave your seat.
Another aspect of physical security involves making sure that others can’t see your display, especially if you’re typing sensitive information such as a password or a credit-card number. You can invest in privacy screen film that minimizes the display’s range of functional viewing angles, so people can’t peek at it from the next table. You should also be aware of people behind you who may be looking over your shoulder.
Network sniffers can use apps like DroidSheep to see what everyone's up to on a public Wi-Fi network.
As for digital security, when you’re connecting to the public Wi-Fi network, make sure that you’re connecting to the right one. Criminals sometimes set up rogue open wireless networks with familiar-looking SSID names to dupe users into connecting to them—making it that much easier for the attacker to monitor and intercept all traffic.
Even if you’re connected to the correct wireless network, be careful what you do online. Most public Wi-Fi networks are not secured, so anyone within range can capture the traffic. Even on a Wi-Fi network that requires a password, your activity may be exposed to other computers connected to that network. Think twice (or three or four times) before logging in to sensitive sites when you’re using a public Wi-Fi network. You should connect to business resources via VPN, and make sure that other sites you visit use secure, HTTPS connections.
Following on from this weekend's International Archaeology Day, Gizmodo thought we'd take a quick look at some of the uses of digital technology in discovering, researching, and documenting historic sites, from the ancient to the comparatively recent, from the urban to the rural. It's our own day of archaeology here on the site.
Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio (center), with House GOP leaders, speaks briefly to reporters on Oct. 1. Joining Boehner are (from left) House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., the Republican conference chairwoman.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio (center), with House GOP leaders, speaks briefly to reporters on Oct. 1. Joining Boehner are (from left) House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., the Republican conference chairwoman.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
How badly did the recent fiscal fight go for the GOP?
Here's one hint: Prominent Republican pollster Bill McInturff opens his "after action report" on the government shutdown with a quote from Chinese philosopher Sun Tzu on the skills needed in picking the terrain of battle: "He who knows them not, nor practices them, will surely be defeated."
McInturff then goes on to catalog the woes the party has suffered over the previous month. "Defunding" President Obama's health care law, the original goal of the showdown, actually got less popular over time. Voter sentiment shifted to support Democrats for Congress. And approval ratings for Republicans have plummeted — to below 30 percent, nationally.
"There's no question that the Republican Party brand and the public perception of Congress are at historic lows," McInturff said in an interview with NPR.
McInturff is the Republican half of the bipartisan polling team for NBC News and The Wall Street Journal, but this report was done for his clients and colleagues. He said it was drawn from those joint polls, but that he also used some data from Gallup polling.
One section titled "Why it happened" features bar graphs showing the ideological range of the House over time, from most liberal to most conservative. In 1982, 344 of the 435 members fell between a broad swath bounded by "most liberal Republican" and "most conservative Democrat." Three decades later, that number has shrunk to just 11 members.
McInturff also points to a lack of "long term" institutional knowledge in Congress –- 47 percent of the House and 44 percent of the Senate have only been in office since the start of the Obama administration five years ago.
By further way of explanation for the push to get rid of Obama's signature achievement, McInturff has a page titled "Understanding the world through the view of Republican members of Congress in their districts." While in the country as a whole, Obama's approval rating is within a few points of his disapproval, in the 233 Republican districts Obama's numbers are 37 approve to 57 percent disapprove. And while the nation as a whole prefers a Democratic-controlled Congress by nearly double digits, the exact opposite is true in the Republican districts.
This helps explain one of McInturff's forecasts for the coming months: "Do not expect much change in how Congress functions and the level of likely paralysis that continues to lay ahead."
Another of McInturff's predictions offers some comfort to Republicans worried about the possible consequences of the government shutdown: "The significant shifts in attitude today are not a predictor, though, of whether the shutdown will end up truly impacting the 2014 election."
There is, after all, more than a full year between now and Election Day 2014.
"In America, the big story of today is rarely the big story a year from now. Whether it be the impeachment votes against President Clinton in 1999 that everyone presumed would be hugely consequential in the next election, the Democrats not voting for the use of force in the two Iraq wars — all of these were perceived at the time to be game changers for the next election, and none of them mattered," McInturff said, pointing out that over the past two months, the story of the day has moved from Syria to the shutdown to the health care law's website. "By next October, there will be national events, world events — there will be things of such consequence that it is very unlikely that the October campaigns of 2014 are going to be dealing with what happened in the shutdown of 2013."
S.V. Dáte edits politics and campaign finance coverage for NPR's Washington Desk.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Bank of America Corp was found liable for fraud on Wednesday over defective mortgages sold by its Countrywide unit, a major win for the U.S. government in one of the few trials stemming from the financial crisis.
After a four-week trial, a federal jury in New York found the bank liable on one civil fraud charge. Countrywide originated shoddy home loans in a process called "Hustle" and sold them to government mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government said.
The four men and six women on the jury also found former Countrywide executive Rebecca Mairone liable on the one fraud charge she faced.
The U.S. Justice Department has said it would seek up to $848.2 million, the gross loss it said Fannie and Freddie suffered on the loans. But it will be up to U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff to decide on the penalty. Arguments on how the judge will assess penalties are set for December 5.
Any penalty would add to the more than $40 billion Bank of America has spent on disputes stemming from the 2008 financial crisis.
"The jury's decision concerned a single Countrywide program that lasted several months and ended before Bank of America's acquisition of the company," Bank of America spokesman Lawrence Grayson said. "We will evaluate our options for appeal."
Marc Mukasey, a lawyer for Mairone, called his client a "woman of integrity, ethics and honesty," adding they would fight on. "She never engaged in fraud, because there was no fraud," he said.
Wednesday's verdict was a major victory for the Justice Department, which has been criticized for failing to hold banks and executives accountable for their roles in the events leading up to the financial crisis.
The government continues to investigate banks for conduct related to the financial crisis. The verdict comes as the government is negotiating a $13 billion settlement with JPMorgan Chase & Co to resolve a number of probes and claims arising from its mortgage business, including the sale of mortgage bonds.
RISKY LOANS
The lawsuit stemmed from a whistleblower case originally brought by Edward O'Donnell, a former Countrywide executive who stands to earn up to $1.6 million for his role.
The case centered on a program called the "High Speed Swim Lane" - also called "HSSL" or "Hustle" - that government lawyers said Countrywide started in 2007.
The Justice Department contended that fraud and other defects were rampant in HSSL loans because Countrywide eliminated loan-quality checkpoints and paid employees based on loan volume and speed.
The Justice Department said the process was overseen by Mairone, a former chief operating officer of Countrywide's Full Spectrum Lending division. Mairone is now a managing director at JPMorgan.
Amy Bonitatibus, a JPMorgan spokeswoman, said, "We are reviewing the decision."
About 43 percent of the loans sold to the mortgage giants were materially defective, the government said.
Bank of America bought Countrywide in July 2008. Two months later, the government took over Fannie and Freddie.
Bank of America and Mairone denied wrongdoing. Lawyers for the bank sought to show the jury that Countrywide had tried to ensure it was issuing quality loans and that no fraud occurred.
The lawsuit was the first financial crisis-related case against a bank by the Justice Department to go to trial under the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act (FIRREA).
The law, passed in the wake of the 1980s savings-and-loan scandals, covers fraud affecting federally insured financial institutions.
The Justice Department, and particularly lawyers in the office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in the Southern District of New York, have sought to dust off the rarely used law and bring cases against banks accused of fraud.
Among its attractions, FIRREA provides a statute of limitations of 10 years and allows the government to bring civil cases for alleged criminal wrongdoing.
Virginia Gibson, a lawyer at the law firm Hogan Lovells, said the Bank of America verdict was a "big deal because it shows the scope of a tool the government has not used frequently since its inception."
Gibson and other lawyers say any appeal by Bank of America would likely focus on a ruling made by the judge before the trial that endorsed a government position that it can bring a FIRREA case against a bank when the bank itself was the financial institution affected by the fraud.
The case was one of three lawsuits in New York where judges had endorsed that interpretation. Banks have generally argued that the interpretation is contrary to the intent of Congress, which they said is more focused on others committing fraud on banks.
Bank of America's case was the first to go to trial, a rarity given that banks more typically choose to settle government claims instead of face a jury. But Bank of America had said that it "can't be expected to compensate every entity that claims losses that actually were caused by the economic downturn."
In a statement, Bharara said Bank of America "chose to defend Countrywide's conduct with all its might and money, claiming there was no case here."
"This office will never hesitate to go to trial to expose fraudulent corporate conduct and to hold companies accountable, particularly when it has caused such harm to the public," Bharara said.
In late afternoon trading, Bank of America shares were down 27 cents at $14.25 on the New York Stock Exchange.
The case is U.S. ex rel. O'Donnell v. Bank of America Corp et al, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 12-01422.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond; Additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel; Editing by Leslie Gevirtz and Edwina Gibbs)
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Image: Robert CardinNew laptops based on Intel's Haswell processors offer the longer battery life you need at a cafe.
Network sniffers can use apps like DroidSheep to see what everyone's up to on a public Wi-Fi network.
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