|  |  |  | | | | | The Guardian World News | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: Can Seattle Sounders halt San Jose Earthquake's march to the Supporters Shield? Find out with Graham Parker
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: San Jose Earthquakes continue their march to the Supporters Shield with a 2-1 win at Seattle Sounders. Graham Parker describes the action
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | David Villalobos, 25, told police he wanted to be 'one with the tiger' after jumping into tiger enclosure from elevated monorail A man who was mauled by a Siberian tiger after jumping into the animal's den at New York's Bronx zoo will be charged with criminal trespassing, New York City police said on Saturday. David Villalobos, 25, was riding the zoo's elevated monorail Friday afternoon and leapt from a car, clearing a fence around the tiger enclosure, according to a statement from the zoo. Villalobos was taken to a local hospital in critical condition, which was upgraded to stable later in the day, a spokeswoman for the Jacobi Medical Center said. She could provide no further information Saturday, at his family's request. A law enforcement source, who did not wish to named, on Saturday confirmed a report that the man told police he had wanted to be "one with the tiger." Zoo and fire officials said Villalobos received bites or puncture wounds on his arms, legs and shoulder during the roughly 10 minutes he was alone with the tiger. "One leg was severely injured," said Frank Dwyer, a fire department spokesman. In rescuing the man, the zoo's emergency workers used a fire extinguisher to repel the tiger, then ordered the man to roll under an electrified perimeter wire to safety. The staff had been prepared to use deadly force if necessary, zoo director Jim Breheny told a televised news conference on Friday. "If not for the quick response by our staff and their ability to perform well in emergency situations, the outcome would have been very different," the zoo director said. The tiger involved is an 11-year-old, 400lb male named Bachuta, Breheny said. The director said the zoo would review the incident but would not put the tiger down or take it out of the exhibit. Breheny said the incident was "just an extraordinary event that happened because somebody was trying to endanger themselves." "The tiger did nothing wrong in this case at all," he said. In July, tigers at a zoo in Copenhagen killed a man who scaled a fence and crossed a moat to get into their den, and wolves at Sweden's largest zoo killed a zookeeper in their enclosure in June.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Tonight's Emmys could mark a rapid rise for the creator and star of the US coming-of-age series Girls. At 26, she has been hailed as the most perceptive and witty voice of her generation In theory, Lena Dunham should be out of place amid all the glitz of tonight's Emmy awards. As America's television industry gathers to schmooze in downtown Los Angeles, this explorer of modern women's mishaps, mistakes and neuroses should stick out like a sore thumb. For Dunham, who at just 26 is already a household name among her own generation in America, has risen to fame with her painfully honest explorations of her own life. In her short videos, essays, a feature film and now the hit TV series Girls , Dunham has taken on awkward sex, job failures, losing your virginity, abortion and weight issues in ways both brave and shamelessly autobiographical. While most TV, especially in America, is full of aspirational images of body types and careers, Dunham has tacked furiously in the opposite direction. This is especially true of Girls, which she writes, directs and stars in and which has scooped four Emmy nominations. It chronicles the painful comic adventures of four young women, fresh out of college, as they seek to find their way in New York. Her characters are flawed, their motives confused, their prospects limited. With Dunham playing the lead of Hannah Horvath, the star of the show is not the blonde, thin archetypal female so common in TV land. Instead, it is Dunham's own pale-skinned, brunette, imperfect, humanly flawed frame that is put on display. It will be refreshing to see Dunham on the Emmys red carpet amid the nose jobs, high heels and exquisitely chiselled cheek bones. Whatever one thinks of her privileged New York background and whether she wins or loses an award, Dunham's success represents a breath of fresh air. In many ways, she is there not just for herself, but for the legions of women – and not a few men – who have become Girls fans. They revel in and relate to the characters' tribulations, just as a previous generation (and a less fiscally troubled one) caught on to Sex and the City. Dunham once explained Hannah's attraction: "She is real and complicated and weird and annoying… the reason she resonates with people is because she feels like a multidimensional woman. She looks like people they might know and she is behaving in ways we can all relate to." So as Dunham laps up the plaudits at the Emmys, millions of her fans and viewers will – in some small way – feel they, too, are at last being recognised. Yet Dunham is hardly the most obvious choice to step up for the unrepresented. After all, she was born into a life of artistic and material wealth in downtown Manhattan. If Lena as Hannah resonates because people feel they might know her, the chances of anyone outside a small New York social set knowing her for real are fairly small. Her mother is famed photographer Laurie Simmons and her father is the artist Carroll Dunham. Dunham was born in New York on 13 May 1986 and grew up in a succession of loft apartments. First, the family lived on the lower reaches of Broadway, there then followed a brief sojourn in Brooklyn Heights, before returning to Manhattan and a huge, spacious loft in Tribeca, once a warehouse district but now home to a famous film festival, Hollywood stars and Wall Street bankers. Dunham's childhood, as described in numerous interviews, was not exactly normal and suburban. Her liberal parents took her to gallery openings and parties with their famous friends, where she mingled happily with artists, writers and critics. She went to elite Manhattan private schools of the sort designed to encourage wealthy children to express themselves rather than learn multiplication tables. By the age of 12, Dunham found herself at the famed Saint Ann's school where one of her babysitters was fashion designer Zac Posen and a classmate was art dealer Vito Schnabel. It was clear Dunham was not exactly a regular child or at least not regular for anyone outside her own world. She had been in therapy since the age of seven and at Saint Ann's she wrote a play about waiting in an abortion clinic. Her Christmas present when she was 14 was a series of stand-up comedy lessons. (She used them and gave several shows in bars, with her mother acting as chaperone.) But while flourishing artistically, Dunham was no genius at exams. Her final marks did not send her to the Ivy League college that might have beckoned, so she spent a year at New York's the New School and then transferred to the liberal and artistic surroundings of the private Oberlin College in Ohio. It was here that Dunham really emerged. She began shooting videos and short films, putting them online. Often, they were prankish in nature. "She was like Ali G on campus," one friend told the New Yorker. Watching them now, it is almost as if Dunham appeared fully formed. All the Dunham tropes are there: the awkward but honest explorations of young adult themes, the use of friends and family, the wry humour and herself in the starring role. One of the biggest hits was The Fountain, in which Dunham, wearing a bikini, does her morning wash in an Oberlin public fountain. The short got millions of hits with many YouTube commenters weighing in unpleasantly on Dunham's full figure. Eventually, she took it down. But that has been a rare – if not unique – moment of Dunham backing off from exposing herself and her insecurities. It is hard to imagine anyone bar the most extreme of performance artists mining her real life for artistic purposes as much as Dunham. Or so repeatedly blurring the boundaries between reality and fiction. Just take her breakout film, Tiny Furniture, which was a low-budget hit in 2010. In it, Dunham, who had just left Oberlin and moved back to New York to live with her artist parents, plays Aura, who has who has just left Oberlin and moved back to New York to live with her artist mother. In the film, Aura's mother is played by Dunham's real mother. Her sister in the film was played by her sister in real life. At one stage, Aura reads from her fictional mother's diary, which was in fact Dunham's mother's real-life diary. Similar stuff happens in Girls. She is friends with many people involved in the show, both behind the scenes and on screen. Many events are taken from her real life and her real social circle. Indeed, the lead credits of Girls read less like the result of a casting call and more like a club for daughters of Manhattan's arts scene. (One is the daughter of newscaster Brian Williams, another's father is playwright David Mamet.) By drawing so heavily on her own social scene for her inspiration, Dunham has faced inevitable accusations of elitism and racism. There's certainly no denying that her work is markedly short of non-white characters or people who are not part of New York's arts and hipster scene. As one critic memorably posted on Twitter: "I think Tiny Furniture is good but it does represent the cinema of unexamined privilege." That is true. But also unfair. Just as you do not have to be a heroin addict to appreciate Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting, you do not have to be a well-off, neurotic yet smart white girl in New York to tap into the emotional depths and mordant wit of Girls. An oft-quoted line from the show appears to make such broad universal claims when Hannah moans to her parents: "I think I may be the voice of my generation. Or at least a voice of a generation." That might be a step too far. But her relentless exploration of the self does seem to fit a modern internet-obsessed generation where old notions of privacy have been replaced by the never-ending sharing of Twitter and Facebook. Dunham's unveiling of her insecurities, dreams and disappointments seems to hit a spot, personal as well as public. Perhaps if she had been born poor, or born black, or born the daughter of dentists, or born in Indiana, she would not have been such a big hit. But Dunham played the lucky cards she was dealt and she has played a blinder. And, even with all her advantages, she still had to get over the biggest obstacle to becoming an on-screen leading lady: she was not born conventionally beautiful. Yet instead of changing that, she celebrated it. "The parts I enjoy playing aren't really available to me," she once said. "So I have to write them." And that is exactly what she did.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Barack Obama spends Saturday in Wisconsin, home state of Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan President Barack Obama headed for the key battleground of Wisconsin on Saturday, as he took the fight for the White House to the home state of the Republican vice presidential candidate, Paul Ryan. Republican challenger Mitt Romney's pick of the firebrand conservative
congressman was meant to put the Midwest state in play in the election
and expand the list of vital swing states that could decide who sits
in the Oval Office next year. Obama's visit to Wisconsin, his first since February, appeared to be designed to shore up Democratic support there. Certainly Republicans in the state – buoyed by the recent recall victory of Republican governor Scott Walker – painted Obama's visit as a sign their party could win in November. "With his visit today, President Obama admits he has a Wisconsin problem," Walker said in a statement issued ahead of a planned Obama rally and fundraiser in Milwaukee. However, recent polls suggest Obama has a lead in Wisconsin, as he does in most swing states and national polls. Obama won Wisconsin easily in 2008 but Ryan is popular. Some Republican pollsters detected a bump for Romney in the state shortly after Ryan was named his running mate. Wisconsin's 7.5% unemployment rate is below the national average, but the state's manufacturing industry has been hit hard in recent years. Obama's campaign is focused on running up big margins in Milwaukee and Madison, which are both Democratic strongholds. Obama and Romney will be closely watching the Green Bay region, a swing area that could tip the balance in a close contest. Vice-president Joe Biden was also out on the campaign trail on Saturday, using an address in New Hampshire to criticise Romney and Ryan, particularly over Medicare and the budget. "[Romney and Ryan] would deny benefits for 48 million people," said Biden. "What they don't want to tell you is that it would turn Medicare into a voucher program." Biden then defended Obama 's efforts to reduce federal spending, and claimed the government was merely trying to fix a problem originally caused by Republicans. "[Romney and Ryan] haven't offered one single, solitary idea to solve the problem," said Biden. Romney was raising money this weekend in California, in hopes of recovering his fundraising advantage. Last month, for the first time, Obama and the Democratic Party raised more than Romney and the Republican Party – $114m to $111.6m. The beleaguered Republican candidate has suffered a nightmarish few weeks after a nominating convention in Tampa that was widely seen as a damp squib. Since then he has made several notable gaffes, endured minute examination of his tax returns and been hit hard by the leak of a video shot at a private fundraiser in which he lambasted "the 47%" of Americans who pay no income taxes and get government help. In response, Romney has opened a new line of attack against Obama, saying the president has failed to deliver on his promise of change. Ryan, campaigning on Saturday in Miami, reinforced that message by poking at Obama's recent suggestion that it is hard to change Washington from the inside without mobilizing public pressure on Congress from the outside. "Why do we send presidents to the White House in the first place?" Ryan asked. "We send presidents to change and fix the mess in Washington, and if this president has admitted that he can't change Washington, then you know what, we need to change presidents." Obama is hitting back by portraying Romney as an insider beholden to partisan and corporate interests. Vice president Biden seconded the president on Saturday, saying to an audience of teamsters it was because of unions that the US has a strong middle class. Biden also accused Romney and Ryan of "doubling down on everything that caused the economic crisis in the first place". Obama entered the weekend with polls showing him in a near tie with Romney nationally. But the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News/Marist poll shows the president with leads among likely voters of 8% in Iowa and 5% in Colorado and Wisconsin, some of the most competitive states. Polls published earlier this week pointed to leads for Obama in closely contested Virginia and Ohio.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Hank Aaron to supply star power at two fundraisers in Milwaukee while Romney heads to California to tap west coast cash President Barack Obama headed for the key battleground of Wisconsin on Saturday, as he took the fight for the White House to the home state of the Republican vice presidential candidate, Paul Ryan. Republican challenger Mitt Romney's pick of the firebrand conservative
congressman was meant to put the Midwest state in play in the election
and expand the list of vital swing states that could decide who sits
in the Oval Office next year. Obama's visit to Wisconsin, his first since February, appeared to be designed to shore up Democratic support there. Certainly Republicans in the state – buoyed by the recent recall victory of Republican governor Scott Walker – painted Obama's visit as a sign their party could win in November. "With his visit today, President Obama admits he has a Wisconsin problem," Walker said in a statement issued ahead of a planned Obama rally and fundraiser in Milwaukee. However, recent polls suggest Obama has a lead in Wisconsin, as he does in most swing states and national polls. Obama won Wisconsin easily in 2008 but Ryan is popular. Some Republican pollsters detected a bump for Romney in the state shortly after Ryan was named his running mate. Wisconsin's 7.5% unemployment rate is below the national average, but the state's manufacturing industry has been hit hard in recent years. Obama's campaign is focused on running up big margins in Milwaukee and Madison, which are both Democratic strongholds. Obama and Romney will be closely watching the Green Bay region, a swing area that could tip the balance in a close contest. Vice-president Joe Biden was also out on the campaign trail on Saturday, using an address in New Hampshire to criticise Romney and Ryan, particularly over Medicare and the budget. "[Romney and Ryan] would deny benefits for 48 million people," said Biden. "What they don't want to tell you is that it would turn Medicare into a voucher program." Biden then defended Obama 's efforts to reduce federal spending, and claimed the government was merely trying to fix a problem originally caused by Republicans. "[Romney and Ryan] haven't offered one single, solitary idea to solve the problem," said Biden. Romney was raising money this weekend in California, in hopes of recovering his fundraising advantage. Last month, for the first time, Obama and the Democratic Party raised more than Romney and the Republican Party – $114m to $111.6m. The beleaguered Republican candidate has suffered a nightmarish few weeks after a nominating convention in Tampa that was widely seen as a damp squib. Since then he has made several notable gaffes, endured minute examination of his tax returns and been hit hard by the leak of a video shot at a private fundraiser in which he lambasted "the 47%" of Americans who pay no income taxes and get government help. In response, Romney has opened a new line of attack against Obama, saying the president has failed to deliver on his promise of change. Ryan, campaigning on Saturday in Miami, reinforced that message by poking at Obama's recent suggestion that it is hard to change Washington from the inside without mobilizing public pressure on Congress from the outside. "Why do we send presidents to the White House in the first place?" Ryan asked. "We send presidents to change and fix the mess in Washington, and if this president has admitted that he can't change Washington, then you know what, we need to change presidents." Obama is hitting back by portraying Romney as an insider beholden to partisan and corporate interests. Vice president Biden seconded the president on Saturday, saying to an audience of teamsters it was because of unions that the US has a strong middle class. Biden also accused Romney and Ryan of "doubling down on everything that caused the economic crisis in the first place". Obama entered the weekend with polls showing him in a near tie with Romney nationally. But the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News/Marist poll shows the president with leads among likely voters of 8% in Iowa and 5% in Colorado and Wisconsin, some of the most competitive states. Polls published earlier this week pointed to leads for Obama in closely contested Virginia and Ohio.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Militiamen found apparently executed the day after protestors stormed jihadists' bases in Libyan city of Benghazi The Libyan city of Benghazi was tense after the bodies of six militiamen apparently executed after the storming of a base on the southern outskirts were discovered in a field. The bodies were found the day after crowds marched on three militia bases, including that of Ansar al-Sharia, blamed by many in the city for the murder of the US ambassador, Chris Stevens, earlier this month. Funerals were held for nine protesters killed when crowds tried to force their way into the Rafallah al-Sahati militia base early on Saturday morning. The militia was the only one of three to fire back when demonstrators swarmed over their bases, following a rally on Friday in which 30,000 people vowed to retake the streets of the city. The interior minister, Fawzi Abdul Al, who was criticised for his failure to launch a full investigation of the murder of Stevens and three fellow diplomats, criticised the action of the crowds, saying the militias should have been given more time to incorporate into the official security forces. The mood in Benghazi is one of both triumph and sorrow at the toll of dead and wounded. Mohammed El Kish, whose cousin was killed by a stray bullet more than a mile from the clashes, said: "He was not even involved in the actions, it is terrible." City hospitals were braced for more violence after the Rafallah al-Sahati militia reoccupied its looted base. Several hundred unarmed people gathered outside. "This is not good, they should not be here. When the funerals have finished there will be trouble," said Ashraf Saleh. Police remained in control of the Ansar al-Sharia compound, which is now a looted ruin. A spokesman for Ansar al-Sharia, whose units have dispersed outside the city, insisted they had withdrawn rather than confront protesters "for reasons of security". The chaos at the heart of Libya's government remains, with some angry that Rafallah was attacked after it had formally been incorporated into the Libyan army. Such designations are lost on many ordinary Libyans, who say many militias from last year's revolution have simply cut deals with ministries, enabling them to form what are in essence private armies. Washington is likely to draw quiet comfort from the sight of ordinary Libyan civilians confronting jihadists, after a week in which embassies across the Muslim world were firebombed and protests claimed 15 lives in Pakistan. US diplomats in Libya had been at pains not to inflame public opinion, with no criticism of the failure of the Libyan police to launch a full investigation into the killing of Stevens. Nearly two weeks after his death, an FBI team sent to Tripoli has yet to be given permission to travel to Benghazi. The city's chief prosecutor Saleh Adem Mohammed refused to discuss the case, nor confirm reports of four men arrested on suspicion of the killing. "We are not responsible for what the politicians say." Rumours are sweeping Benghazi that one of the two US compounds in the city that came under attack housed a small "black ops" unit that had moved to Libya after the rocket attack on the British ambassador in the city in June. The US has yet to explain why some 30 diplomats needed to be evacuated from a consulate that might be expected to have less than half that staff. But as more eyewitness evidence accumulates, it is clear that the attack on the consulate was unprovoked, and that statements from Washington that it grew out of an anti-American protest appear to be false.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Militiamen found apparently executed the day after protesters stormed jihadists' bases in Libyan city of Benghazi The Libyan city of Benghazi was tense after the bodies of six militiamen apparently executed after the storming of a base on the southern outskirts were discovered in a field. The bodies were found the day after crowds marched on three militia bases, including that of Ansar al-Sharia, blamed by many in the city for the murder of the US ambassador, Chris Stevens, earlier this month. Funerals were held for nine protesters killed when crowds tried to force their way into the Rafallah al-Sahati militia base early on Saturday morning. The militia was the only one of three to fire back when demonstrators swarmed over their bases, following a rally on Friday in which 30,000 people vowed to retake the streets of the city. The interior minister, Fawzi Abdul Al, who was criticised for his failure to launch a full investigation of the murder of Stevens and three fellow diplomats, criticised the action of the crowds, saying the militias should have been given more time to incorporate into the official security forces. The mood in Benghazi is one of both triumph and sorrow at the toll of dead and wounded. Mohammed El Kish, whose cousin was killed by a stray bullet more than a mile from the clashes, said: "He was not even involved in the actions, it is terrible." City hospitals were braced for more violence after the Rafallah al-Sahati militia reoccupied its looted base. Several hundred unarmed people gathered outside. "This is not good, they should not be here. When the funerals have finished there will be trouble," said Ashraf Saleh. Police remained in control of the Ansar al-Sharia compound, which is now a looted ruin. A spokesman for Ansar al-Sharia, whose units have dispersed outside the city, insisted they had withdrawn rather than confront protesters "for reasons of security". The chaos at the heart of Libya's government remains, with some angry that Rafallah was attacked after it had formally been incorporated into the Libyan army. Such designations are lost on many ordinary Libyans, who say many militias from last year's revolution have simply cut deals with ministries, enabling them to form what are in essence private armies. Washington is likely to draw quiet comfort from the sight of ordinary Libyan civilians confronting jihadists, after a week in which embassies across the Muslim world were firebombed and protests claimed 15 lives in Pakistan. US diplomats in Libya had been at pains not to inflame public opinion, with no criticism of the failure of the Libyan police to launch a full investigation into the killing of Stevens. Nearly two weeks after his death, an FBI team sent to Tripoli has yet to be given permission to travel to Benghazi. The city's chief prosecutor Saleh Adem Mohammed refused to discuss the case, nor confirm reports of four men arrested on suspicion of the killing. "We are not responsible for what the politicians say." Rumours are sweeping Benghazi that one of the two US compounds in the city that came under attack housed a small "black ops" unit that had moved to Libya after the rocket attack on the British ambassador in the city in June. The US has yet to explain why some 30 diplomats needed to be evacuated from a consulate that might be expected to have less than half that staff. But as more eyewitness evidence accumulates, it is clear that the attack on the consulate was unprovoked, and that statements from Washington that it grew out of an anti-American protest appear to be false.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | President uses weekly radio address to attack Republicans in Congress over fall of bill designed to create $1bn jobs scheme President Barack Obama attacked the Republican party on Saturday, for scrapping a bill that would have established a $1bn scheme to help military veterans get jobs. In his weekly radio address, Obama attacked GOP politicians for failing to pass the planned law before Congress ended its session last week and lawmakers returned to their own states and districts ahead of the 6 November elections. "These men and women have made incredible sacrifices for our country. They shouldn't have to worry about finding a job when they get home. But last week, Republicans in Congress voted it down. And then they left," Obama said. The bill, which had some bipartisan support, would have given job priority to post-9/11 veterans, aiming to put them back to work as firefighters and police officers and in public work projects. Joblessness is a huge problem for many veterans, whose employment prospects are three points below the national average. But Republicans opposed the scheme on the grounds of cutting government expenditure, pointing to several existing schemes aimed at putting ex-military men and women back to work. The law attracted a handful of Republican supporters but fell in the Senate, two votes short of the majority of 60 needed to waive Republican objections. Supporters had modeled the proposal partly after the Civilian Conservation Corps that was used during the Great Depression to employ people to build parks and dams. "If Congress had done the right thing, we could be on our way to having a veterans' jobs corps that helps returning heroes find work as cops and firefighters in communities all across the country," Obama said. The failure of the bill attracted high-profile condemnation from veterans' groups. The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America described the vote as a "huge disappointment". Some Democratic activists have already used the vote as a way of attacking potentially vulnerable Republican politicians on the issue of national security. That was a sentiment Obama seemed to echo as he urged people to express their anger as Republicans campaign for re-election. "If you see them campaigning back home, tell them in person. Because there's been enough talk. It's time for action," the president said.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Police fire teargas at crowds while Pakistan, Nigeria and India also see demonstrations against Innocence of Muslims The controversy over an anti-Islam film made in the US continued to fuel protests and extreme reactions in the Muslim world. Scores of people were injured on Saturday in a clash in Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, between police and hundreds of demonstrators. In Pakistan, where more than 20 people died on Friday in clashes with police in cities throughout the country, a cabinet minister offered a £60,000 reward for the death of the filmmaker. The railways minister, Ghulam Ahmad Balor, said he would pay the reward out of his own pocket. He urged the Taliban and al-Qaida to perform the "sacred duty" of helping locate and kill the filmmaker. The film Innocence of Muslims has sparked violent protests throughout the Muslim world that resulted in the deaths of dozens. In Bangladesh, police fired teargas and used batons to disperse the stone-throwing protesters who burnt several vehicles. Dozens of protesters were arrested at the demonstration and inside the nearby National Press Club, where participants took refuge, a Dhaka metropolitan police official said on condition of anonymity in line with police policy. Police and witnesses said scores of people were injured. The clash erupted when authorities attempted to halt the demonstration, police said. Authorities have banned all protests near the city's main Baitul Mokarram mosque since Friday, when more than 2,000 people marched and burned an effigy of the US president, Barack Obama. The protesters announced a nationwide general strike on Sunday to protest against the police action. In Pakistan, protests continued on Saturday, with more than 1,500 people, including women and children, rallying in the capital, Islamabad. The crowd was peaceful but angry over the film, which portrays the prophet Muhammad as a fraud, a womaniser and a child molester. The protesters from the Minhaj-ul-Quran religious group marched through the streets then gathered near parliament, chanting slogans against the filmmaker and demanding stern punishment for him. Thousands of people also protested on Saturday in Nigeria's largest city, Kano. The crowd marched from a mosque to the palace of the emir of Kano, the region's top spiritual leader for Muslims. About 200 students in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-controlled Kashmir, chanted "Down with America" and "Long live Islam" in a peaceful protest. Some carried a placard that read: "There is no god but God and Muhammad is his messenger."
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Unanimously passed Thune bill aims to enable US airlines to avoid paying for their carbon emissions on European flights The US Senate unanimously passed a bill on Saturday that would shield US airlines from paying for their carbon emissions on European flights, pressuring the European Union to back down from applying its emissions law to foreign carriers. Since January, the European Commission has been enforcing its law to make all airlines take part in its Emissions Trading Scheme, which aims to combat global warming. The Senate approved the bill shortly after midnight, as it scrambled to complete business to recess ahead of the 6 November congressional and presidential elections. Republican senator John Thune, a sponsor of the measure, said it sent a "strong message" to the EU that it cannot impose taxes on the United States. "The Senate's action today will help ensure that US air carriers and passengers will not be paying down European debt through this illegal tax and can instead be investing in creating jobs and stimulating our own economy," Thune said in a statement. The House of Representatives has passed a similar measure, and could either work out differences with the Senate's version or accept the Senate bill when Congress returns for a post-election session. Nearly all airlines have complied reluctantly with the EU law, but Chinese and Indian carriers missed an interim deadline to submit information required under it. Earlier this year, China threatened retaliation – including impounding European aircraft – if the EU punished Chinese airlines for not complying with its emissions trading scheme. The dispute between China and the EU froze Airbus purchase deals worth up to $14bn, though China signed an agreement with Germany for 50 Airbus planes worth over $4bn during Chancellor Angela Merkel's visit to Beijing last month. The Senate bill gives the US transportation secretary authority to stop US airlines from complying with the EU law. But new amendments agreed to during negotiations among lawmakers said the secretary could only do so if the EU trading scheme is amended, an international alternative is agreed to or the United States implements its own program to address aviation emissions. This increases pressure on the UN International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to devise a global alternative to the EU law. Connie Hedegaard, the European climate commissioner, said on Saturday that while the bill encourages the United States to work within the UN organization for a global deal on aviation emissions, she is skeptical that Washington will accept such a deal. "It's not enough to say you want it, you have to work hard to get it done," she said. "That means that the US needs to change its approach in ICAO and show willingness to actually seal a meaningful global deal that will facilitate action." Annie Petsonk, a lawyer for the Environmental Defense Fund, said the bill would put pressure on the UN body, which has been working on a global framework for years. "Passage of the Thune bill amps up the pressure on ICAO to move swiftly to reach a global agreement on addressing aviation's global warming pollution," she said.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Clemons, who has spent almost 20 years on death row, makes last-ditch effort to clear his name over murder of sisters in 1991 After almost two decades on death row, a scheduled execution date that brought him within 12 days of death by lethal injection, and multiple appeals and petitions, Reggie Clemons this week was given his final chance to save his own life. Over four dramatic days of testimony, a courtroom in St Louis packed with relatives and friends of both the prisoner and his two alleged victims was taken on a legal white-knuckle ride. The court heard conflicting evidence that damages Clemons' hopes of proving his innocence but also supports his contention that he was sentenced to death as a result of an unfair trial. Clemons' efforts to clear his name emerged battered from the four-day hearing after he was warned by the presiding judge, Michael Manners, that his refusal to answer questions about what happened at the crime scene 21 years ago would work against him. Clemons pleaded the fifth amendment in response to 29 questions, but was told by the judge that the constitutional safeguard against self-incrimination that the amendment affords would not protect him in this case. Clemons was convicted along with three other co-defendants of the April 1991 murder of two young sisters, Julie and Robin Kerry. The four were accused of raping the women, then pushing them off the disused Chain of Rocks bridge over the Mississippi river where they drowned. Clemons, now 41, has always pleaded his innocence. In an interview with the Guardian conducted in prison several months ago, he said: "I know, and God knows I'm not a rapist. I know I'm not a murderer or a killer. I know that I didn't do any of these things. I know I'm innocent." Clemons was scheduled to be executed in 2009, but was spared death on that occasion less than two weeks beforehand in a dispute over the lethal injection drugs that were to be used. Soon after, the Missouri supreme court agreed to grant him one last special review of his death sentence after new evidence emerged that supported Clemons' claim that the confession he had made in 1991 to raping one of the sisters had been beaten out of him. The new evidence involved the revelation that the star prosecution witness in Clemons' trial – Thomas Cummins, a cousin of the Kerry sisters who had been on the bridge with them that night – had received a payment of $150,000 to settle a dispute with St Louis police. Cummins had claimed the police had beaten a confession out of him, in terms that were remarkably similar to Reggie Clemons's account of his alleged forced confession. Clemons' lead lawyer, Josh Levine, argued in opening statements that there had been "craven violations" of the legal process by police and prosecutors. "Reggie did not receive a fair trial, and a death sentence is not appropriate in this case – his death sentence should be set aside and he should receive a new trial." But when the Missouri attorney general's office came to defend the death sentence, the tide turned against Clemons. After taking the stand, Clemons initially denied that he had killed the women or taken part in any plan to do so. But then, when he was bombarded with a further 32 searing questions about what happened on the bridge that night, he refused to answer. The questions included: "Is it true the girls were fighting when they were being raped?"; "Did you rape both girls or only one?"; "Did you throw the girls' clothes off the bridge?"; "Did you say afterwards 'Let's go, we threw them off'?" After each question, Clemons said: "On advice of my counsel, I plead the fifth." Only after Manners had cautioned him to think carefully about what he was doing did Clemons return to the stand and answer three of the questions, denying that he had prevented the sisters from escaping from under the bridge before they were allegedly pushed in the water by his cousin Antonio Richardson. New DNA evidence was also presented by the DA's office – evidence that was inconclusive in regard to Clemons but that implicated Marlin Gray, one of his co-defendants who was executed in 2005. DNA traces that under testing were deemed "very likely" to have come from one of the Kerry sisters were discovered both on a used condom found on the bridge, and on stains on Gray's trousers and underpants. The two other defendants in the case were Richardson, whose initial death sentence was commuted to life without parole, and Daniel Winfrey, the only white member of the group of four, who pleaded guilty in a deal with prosecutors and was then released on parole in 2007. Though aspects of the hearing were problematic for Clemons in his bid to avoid the death chamber, evidence presented to the judge also proved to be highly embarrassing for the Missouri authorities. The court heard of alleged flagrant procedural abuses by the prosecuting authorities that raise fundamental questions about the application of the death penalty in modern America. Clemons' mother, Vera Thomas, testified that when police turned up at her house to arrest her son, they advised her that there was no need for him to have a lawyer, even though he was facing interrogation over a double murder. The judge also heard that the chief prosecutor, Nels Moss, had attempted to have crucial police records altered, scrawling in his own handwriting proposed revisions to an official report of an interview with a key witness in which he had not participated. Moss also admitted under questioning that either senior police detectives involved in the case, or Thomas Cummins, the prosecution's star witness, must have lied under oath at the Reggie Clemons trial. During the trial, Cummins told the jury that he had been beaten by police in the hours following the death of his cousins, at a time when he was the prime suspect. The allegation that they treated him brutally in order to get him to confess – a charge that Clemons also made – was flatly denied by detectives. Moss conceded that Cummins and the detectives could not have both been telling the truth. The emotional impact of such powerful evidence was palpable in the courtroom. Along with Reggie Clemons's mother was Ginny Kenny, the mother of the two sisters, and a grandmother of Marlin Gray. Ginny Kerry, who broke down while opening statements were read, spoke to the Guardian during the hearing. She expressed her anger that more than 20 years after she lost her children she was still having to listen to what she called Clemons' lies. "He confessed to killing my children 21 years ago, and now it's all about 'poor Reggie'. Gee, I wonder if my kids were hurting when they were being beaten and raped, their clothes being torn off of them in the cold night by strange, horrible men." Kerry added: "He needs to be executed. He executed my children, did he not?" The wider family of the two victims, including their sister Jamie Kerry, also put out an angry and passionate statement in which they accused Clemons of engaging in "elaborate distractions" and blamed the news media for being "such malleable and wilful participants in this charade". The ultimate decision on whether Clemons will live or die is probably still months away. It will be taken by the Missouri supreme court, acting with the benefit of the recommendation that Manners will produce. The judge has asked both sets of legal teams to present him with final written pleadings by 1 December. Manners' recommendation could run the full gamut of legal options. He could make the case for Clemons to be freed outright, a new trial, commutation of his sentence to life, or his return to death row pending an execution that would then almost certainly go ahead.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Moviegoers wounded when gunman opened fire at screening of The Dark Knight Rises sue owner of theater, Cinemark USA Three Colorado moviegoers who were wounded when a gunman opened fire at a July screening of The Dark Knight Rises on Friday sued the owner of the theater, Cinemark USA, accusing it of failing to provide adequate security, their lawyers said. The action marks the first known civil lawsuits filed over the 20 July shootings at a suburban Denver screening of the Batman movie that killed 12 people and wounded 58 others. James Holmes, a 24-year-old former neuroscience graduate student at the University of Colorado, has been charged with murder and attempted murder in the case. "Readily available security procedures, security equipment and security personnel would likely have prevented or deterred the gunman from accomplishing his planned assault on the theater's patrons," the law firm of Keating, Wagner, Polidori and Free said in a written statement. Representatives of Cinemark could not immediately be reached for comment. On the day of the shooting, prosecutors allege Holmes bought a ticket to the movie and then left the theater through an exit door, propping it open on his way out. He then returned to the theater clad in ballistic protective gear and armed with multiple weapons, opening fire on the crowd, prosecutors say. Public defender Daniel King has said his client suffers from mental illness and sought help before the shootings. In the lawsuit filed in Denver federal court, victims Joshua Nowlan, Denise Traynom and Brandon Axelrod claim the theater chain was aware of previous criminal activity at or near the cinema including "assaults and robberies" and at least one other shooting involving gang members. "Although the theater was showing a midnight premiere of the movie and was expecting large crowds of people to attend the midnight showing, no security personnel were present for that showing," the lawsuit said. Nowlan suffered disabling injuries to his left leg and his right arm, which was nearly severed from the gunshots, the lawsuit said. Traynom was shot in the buttocks and Axelrod was shot in the right knee and ankle. The lawsuit also states "there was no action taken by theater employees to safely evacuate the many people" in the theater once the shooting spree got underway. The judge presiding over the criminal case ruled on Friday that some documents in the court file can be publicly released, but arrest and search warrants that detail the specifics of the crime will remain sealed because of the ongoing investigation. Also on Friday, Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan said that Cinemark will reopen the theater, which has been closed since the shooting, next year. "The theater has been a valued part of our community for many years," Hogan said in a statement. "I am confident Cinemark will continue to remain sensitive to victims, their families, their employees and our community throughout their process of remodeling and reopening."
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Free Syrian Army says command centre moved into liberated areas last week to speed Bashar al-Assad's downfall Syrian rebels have moved their headquarters from Turkey to areas they control in Syria, according to one of their leaders. Brigadeer General Mustafa al-Sheikh, who heads the Free Syrian Army's military council, told the Associated Press that the group moved headquarters last week in order to hasten the fall of the president, Bashar al-Assad. He would not say where the new headquarters are located. In the past few months, rebels have been able to capture wide swaths of territory along the Turkish border and three border crossing points on the frontier, which has allowed them to ferry both materiel and people to help in the fight to oust Assad. The rebels also have seized control of several neighbourhoods in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, the country's largest city and commercial capital, in weeks of bloody fighting. "There are liberated areas now and it's better for the command to be with the rebels instead of being abroad," Sheikh said from Turkey. The general said he has been going back and forth to Syria. Sheikh said moving the command to Syria "will speed up the fall of the regime because it will give a big boost to the morale of rebels and there will be a command to follow up on operations." Meanwhile rebel fighters have shot down a government fighter jet as it flew over the northern Syrian town of Atarib in Aleppo province, a witness said. The witness, an independent journalist who asked to remain anonymous, said rebel fighters were attacking a military base near the town when the jet flew over and rebels shot it down with anti-aircraft guns. Elsewhere, Syrian activists said rebels and government troops fought a fierce battle near the border with Jordan that lasted several hours. Activists said the fighting in and around the Syrian border town of Nasib continued until dawn on Saturday. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said there were casualties on both sides without giving figures. Mohammed Abu Houran, an activist in the area, said the rebels attacked an air defence base near Nassib then clashed with Syrian border guards as they were withdrawing. Nasib is in the southern province of Daraa, where the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's regime began in March last year. The uprising turned into a civil war which activists say has claimed the lives of nearly 30,000 people. On 27 August rebel fighters shot down a helicopter on the outskirts of Damascus and three days later rebels said they had brought down a jet in Idlib, near the Turkish border.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Plane reported downed over northern town, while rebels and regime troops fight fierce battle near border with Jordan Rebel fighters have shot down a government fighter jet as it flew over the northern Syrian town of Atarib in Aleppo province, a witness said. The witness, an independent journalist who asked to remain anonymous, said rebel fighters were attacking a military base near the town when the jet flew over and rebels shot it down with anti-aircraft guns. Elsewhere, Syrian activists said rebels and government troops had fought a fierce battle near the border with Jordan that lasted several hours. The activists said the fighting in and around the Syrian border town of Nasib continued until dawn on Saturday. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said there were casualties on both sides without giving figures. Mohammed Abu Houran, an activist in the area, said the rebels attacked an air defence base near Nassib then clashed with Syrian border guards as they were withdrawing. Nasib is in the southern province of Daraa, where the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's regime began in March last year. The uprising turned into a civil war which activists say has claimed the lives of nearly 30,000 people. On 27 August rebel fighters shot down a helicopter on the outskirts of Damascus and three days later rebels said they had brought down a jet in Idlib, near the Turkish border.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Civilian government prosecutors demand 15-20 years for 300 officers convicted in so-called 'Sledgehammer Coup' trial A Turkish court has sentenced three former generals to 20 years in prison on Friday for plotting a coup against the government, and convicted 330 of the 365 suspects in the so-called "Sledgehammer Coup" trial. The officers, all of who denied the charges against them, were accused of planning bomb attacks against mosques in Turkey to trigger conflict with neighbouring Greece in order to destabilise the country and justify a military coup against the Islamic AKP government. The Turkish military has traditionally played a dominant role in Turkish politics and staged coups in 1960, 1971, 1980 and 1997. The government's relationship with the military, which regards itself as the guardian of the secular Turkish republic, has been strained since the AKP came to power in 2002. Since then the military has been successfully kept in check by the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Former generals Çetin Dogan, Özden Örnek and Ibrahim Firtina were initially given life sentences, which were later decreased to 20 years. Six other generals and one former member of parliament from the nationalist party MHP were sentenced to 18 years in prison each. Prosecutors had demanded 15 to 20-year jail sentences for the 365 defendants, all but one of whom are serving or retired military officers. Thirty-four of the 365 suspects were acquitted. The former commander of Turkey's First Army, Çetin Dogan, who is said to be behind the coup, called the trial "unfair and unlawful". According to the transcript of his defence, he said: "Here we see a process unfolding to make the soldiers of Mustafa Kemal [Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey], who give their lives for their country, pay the price of their commitment to the republic and its principles." Erdogan said: "We still have to wait for the decision of the supreme court of appeals. We have to see the grounds for the verdict first." In a statement, lawyer Hüseyin Ersöz called the trial a "massacre of law" and said that the chance of a fair defence had been denied to the defendants.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | At least 11 killed as fighters blamed for killing US ambassador flee compound in face of demonstration against extremism Militias blamed for the killing of US ambassador Chris Stevens have been forced out of Libya's second city, Benghazi, by popular protests. At least 11 people were killed and 60 wounded as militiamen tried to defend their compounds against thousands of demonstrators protesting against extremism. Saturday morning's rout followed a day of demonstrations on Friday against the militias, in particular Ansar al-Sharia, which has been blamed for the murder of the US ambassador and three of his colleagues. The action against Ansar al-Sharia appeared to be part of a co-ordinated sweep of militia headquarters buildings by police, government troops and activists after a mass public demonstration against militia units on Friday. Demonstrators also attacked compounds belonging to pro-government militias which may have contributed to the casualties. Looters carried weapons out of the vacated Ansar al-Sharia military base as men clapped and chanted: "Say to Ansar al-Sharia, Benghazi will be your inferno." A spokesman for the group said they left Benghazi to preserve security. Chanting "Libya, Libya", "No more al-Qaida" and "The blood we shed for freedom shall not go in vain" hundreds of men waving swords and even a meat cleaver stormed Ansar al-Sharia's headquarters. "After what happened at the American consulate, the people of Benghazi had enough of the extremists," one demonstrator, Hassan Ahmed, said. "They did not give allegiance to the army. So the people broke in and they fled." Demonstrators pulled down militia flags and set a vehicle on fire inside what was once the base of former leader Muammar Gaddafi's security forces, who tried to put down the first protests that sparked last year's uprising. "This place is like the Bastille. This is where Gaddafi controlled Libya from, and then Ansar al-Sharia took it over. This is a turning point for the people of Benghazi," said Ahmed. Adusalam al-Tarhouni, a government worker who arrived with the first wave of protesters, said several pickup trucks with the group's fighters had initially confronted the protesters and opened fire. Two protesters were shot in the leg, he said. "After that they got into their trucks and drove away," he said. Protesters had freed four prisoners found inside, he said. As protesters left Ansar al-Sharia's headquarters, the crowd swelled, reaching thousands as it headed toward the Islamists' military base, which was shared with another militia group. Protesters said the militiamen opened fire as they arrived and several people were wounded. After the crowd entered that compound, Libyan army trucks sped away from the base carrying government troops cheering in victory and crying out: "God is greatest." Vigilantes armed with machetes and clubs blocked the road leading away from the compound, stopping cars to prevent looters from driving off with heavy weapons. "We went into the camp and we didn't find anyone. We just took these Kalashnikovs," said one youth, holding rifles. The demonstrators also took over a compound belonging to the Abu Slim brigade and another Ansar al-Sharia compound. The apparent defeat of Ansar al-Sharia across Benghazi and the huge outpouring of public support for the government marks an extraordinary transformation in a country where the authorities had seemed largely powerless to curb the influence of militia groups armed with heavy weapons. Nevertheless, Ansar al-Sharia and other Islamist militia have bases elsewhere in eastern Libya, notably around the coastal city of Derna, known across the region as a major recruitment centre for fighters who joined the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Man, 25, jumped from monorail into New York zoo's tiger enclosure, suffering multiple wounds during 10-minute episode A man was mauled by a 400lb tiger after leaping from a moving monorail train and plummeting over a protective fence at the Bronx zoo, authorities said. The man was alone with the tiger for about 10 minutes Friday before he was rescued by zoo officials, who used a fire extinguisher to chase it away. He suffered bites and punctures on his arms, legs, shoulders and back and broke an arm and a leg. Zoo director Jim Breheny said the man was lucky to escape the tiger's clutches. "If not for the quick response by our staff and their ability to perform well in emergency situations, the outcome would have been very different," Breheny said. The mauling happened at around 3pm in the Wild Asia exhibit, where a train with open sides takes visitors over the Bronx River and through a forest, where they glide along the top edge of a fence past elephants, deer and a tiger enclosure. Passengers aren't strapped in on the ride, and the man apparently jumped out of his train car with a leap powerful enough to clear the 16ft-high perimeter fence. The man was mauled by an 11-year-old male Siberian tiger named Bashuta, which has been at the zoo for three years. After zoo staff chased the tiger off, the man was instructed to roll under an electrified wire to get to safety, Breheny said. Zookeepers then called the tiger into a holding area, he said. The 25-year-old man was conscious and talking after the mauling, Breheny said. Police said he was hospitalized in critical condition. Officials believe he was visiting the zoo by himself. "When someone is determined to do something harmful to themselves," Breheny said, "it's very hard to stop that." The Bronx zoo, one of the US's largest zoos, sprawls over 265 acres and contains hundreds of animals, many in habitats meant to resemble natural settings. Its exhibits include Tiger Mountain, Congo Gorilla Forest and World of Reptiles. The tiger that mauled the man was returned to a holding area where it usually sleeps at night and will not be euthanized, zoo officials said. "The tiger did nothing wrong in this episode," Breheny said. There are 10 tigers at the Wild Asia exhibit, but Bashuta was the only one on display at the time. There are no surveillance cameras in that area of the exhibit. Zoo officials said they would review safety procedures but believe this was a highly unusual occurrence. "We review everything, but we honestly think we provide a safe experience," Breheny said. "And this is just an extraordinary occurrence … somebody was deliberately trying to endanger themselves."
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The leaked video and Olympics gaffes have left the Republican candidate looking disgraced and dishevelled His disastrous summer has included a botched foreign tour, a mishandled response to the Middle Eastern crisis and the leak last week of a secret video from a private fundraising party where he lambasted many Americans as being "victims" of government aid who paid no income tax. The series of gaffes has seen the Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, fall behind President Obama in his long run for the White House. Now the challenger is looking to the first presidential debate as a way of hauling his campaign back into contention. The former governor of Massachusetts has already spent long hours preparing for the vital first duel with Obama, which happens on 3 October in Denver, the biggest city in the vital swing state of Colorado. In the minds of many seasoned observers – including some prominent Republicans who have gone public with their dismay at Romney's performance so far – something needs to happen soon to put him back in the contest. "The debate will be Romney's last real chance to bring himself back into the race," said Professor Scott McLean, a political scientist at Quinnipiac University. Romney has certainly been taking his debate preparations seriously. He spent three days recently holed up in the Vermont estate of former Massachusetts deputy governor Kerry Healey in practice. During the questions and answer sessions the part of Obama was played by Ohio senator Rob Portman, a former contender to be Romney's running mate. The retreat, isolated among the forests and mountains of the rural north-eastern state, was also attended by most of Romney's top campaign aides. Portman was chosen in part because he also played Obama in 2008 for the campaign of the then Republican candidate, John McCain. The Vermont retreat has been followed up by regular practices on the campaign trail, with Portman rejoining the candidate for further mock debates. The tactic has been a change for Romney. During the long battle to secure the Republican nomination, Romney eschewed mock debates in favour of simply prepping with top aides on different subjects. But clearly the vital importance of the 3 October event has prompted a change in tactics to try to create a "game-changing" moment. The Romney campaign has also started to pivot more to the centre in public, perhaps in a bid to counter last week's video release and also a barrage of negative ads from the Obama campaign and its supporters that have successfully portrayed him as a wealthy, out-of-touch elitist. However, given Romney's strong tack to the right during the nomination race, such a manoeuvre would be difficult to pull off. It is sure to be something Obama will bring up in the Denver debate as a sign of flip-flopping on key issues. "That change of strategy is going to be one of the Romney campaign's biggest problems. Obama will be ready for him," said McLean. There are also doubts about Romney's debating skills. Though he participated in no fewer than 19 debates during the nomination process, there were times when he made gaffes or appeared goaded by opponents into losing his cool, such as spontaneously offering to make a $10,000 bet with the Texas governor Rick Perry. "He seems to be somewhat thin-skinned," said Professor David Cohen, a political scientist at the University of Akron. Such moments are sure to have been studied in great detail by the Obama camp. Exact specifics of the president's debate preparations have been kept largely secret, but it has been reported that Massachusetts senator John Kerry has been playing the role of Romney in mock events held in Washington. Other sessions have included senior campaign advisers like David Plouffe and former aide Anita Dunn. Though Obama has not had to engage in a real debate since the 2008 campaign, he is widely seen as a skilled practitioner of the vital art. "He is smart, smooth and extremely calm. He seems not to get rattled. He is a very good debater. There is no disputing that," said Cohen. But a debate is not simply a straight match-up of skills. A vital part of who wins or loses depends on the expectations of the audience. Many people point to the vice-presidential debate of 2008, which pitted Sarah Palin against Obama's running mate Joe Biden. Palin was seen as such a poor potential debater that when she managed to get through the ordeal without any major gaffe it was seen as a victory by many observers. In this case the Romney team have an advantage in that they are seen as an underdog. Thus if Romney beats those expectations, or a complacent Obama stumbles, it could turn into a genuine opportunity for the Republican to claw back Obama's lead. Experts certainly see that lead as still vulnerable. Hamstrung by a still sickly economic recovery, high rates of joblessness and a disillusioned activist base, Obama's lead in the polls is not a chasm, despite a Romney campaign that has been engaged in nearly non-stop damage control for weeks on end. At the end of last week Clarus Research's national poll average had Obama beating Romney by just three points. The picture was more favourable for Obama in the individual swing states that will decide the election, but no one is predicting any sort of blow-out victory for the Democrats. "It remains a close race. I look at the numbers and a lot of the data suggests that this race will tighten again," said McLean. The Obama team have already been trying to spin that expectations game. Last week they sent out a memo to campaign journalists extolling Romney's virtues at debating and saying that the Republican clearly fancied his chances. "He's obviously banking on flawless performances in October to achieve the turnaround his campaign has projected," wrote Obama campaign manager Jim Messina. That is probably a deliberate exaggeration. But most experts do think that the many instant media pundits who have spent last week writing Romney's political obituary have jumped the gun. As the riots in the Middle East, inspired by an anti-Islamic film shot in California, have shown, unexpected and dramatic events are likely to still play a key role in deciding who sits in the Oval Office next year. As far as the Romney campaign is concerned, they will be going all-out to make sure that the first debate is one of them. Nor will it be their last chance. Two more debates will rapidly follow as the election enters its final weeks, with one touching on foreign policy and another held in a "town hall" format where questions will come from undecided voters who are members of the public picked by pollster Gallup. In all three debates the viewing audience is virtually guaranteed to be tens of millions of Americans. "I am definitely going to get my popcorn out for these debates," said Cohen. KEY MOMENTS
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | At least four killed as fighters blamed for killing US ambassador flee compound in face of demonstration against extremism Militias blamed for the killing of US ambassador Chris Stevens have been forced out of Libya's second city, Benghazi, by popular protests. At least four people were killed and 34 wounded as militiamen tried to defend their compounds against thousands of demonstrators protesting against extremism. Saturday morning's rout followed a day of demonstrations on Friday against the militias, in particular Ansar al-Sharia, which has been blamed for the murder of the US ambassador and three of his colleagues. The action against Ansar al-Sharia appeared to be part of a co-ordinated sweep of militia headquarters buildings by police, government troops and activists after a mass public demonstration against militia units on Friday. Looters carried weapons out of the vacated Ansar al-Sharia military base as men clapped and chanted: "Say to Ansar al-Sharia, Benghazi will be your inferno." Chanting "Libya, Libya", "No more al-Qaida" and "The blood we shed for freedom shall not go in vain" hundreds of men waving swords and even a meat cleaver stormed Ansar al-Sharia's headquarters. "After what happened at the American consulate, the people of Benghazi had enough of the extremists," one demonstrator, Hassan Ahmed, said. "They did not give allegiance to the army. So the people broke in and they fled." Demonstrators pulled down militia flags and set a vehicle on fire inside what was once the base of former leader Muammar Gaddafi's security forces, who tried to put down the first protests that sparked last year's uprising. "This place is like the Bastille. This is where Gaddafi controlled Libya from, and then Ansar al-Sharia took it over. This is a turning point for the people of Benghazi," said Ahmed. Adusalam al-Tarhouni, a government worker who arrived with the first wave of protesters, said several pickup trucks with the group's fighters had initially confronted the protesters and opened fire. Two protesters were shot in the leg, he said. "After that they got into their trucks and drove away," he said. Protesters had freed four prisoners found inside, he said. As protesters left Ansar al-Sharia's headquarters, the crowd swelled, reaching thousands as it headed toward the Islamists' military base, which was shared with another militia group. Protesters said the militiamen opened fire as they arrived and several people were wounded. After the crowd entered that compound, Libyan army trucks sped away from the base carrying government troops cheering in victory and crying out: "God is greatest." Vigilantes armed with machetes and clubs blocked the road leading away from the compound, stopping cars to prevent looters from driving off with heavy weapons. "We went into the camp and we didn't find anyone. We just took these Kalashnikovs," said one youth, holding rifles. The demonstrators also took over a compound belonging to the Abu Slim brigade and another Ansar al-Sharia compound. The apparent defeat of Ansar al-Sharia across Benghazi and the huge outpouring of public support for the government marks an extraordinary transformation in a country where the authorities had seemed largely powerless to curb the influence of militia groups armed with heavy weapons. Nevertheless, Ansar al-Sharia and other Islamist militia have bases elsewhere in eastern Libya, notably around the coastal city of Derna, known across the region as a major recruitment centre for fighters who joined the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria.
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