C. African Republic president seeks foreign help

The rebels behind the most recent instability signed a 2007 peace accord allowing them to join the regular army, but insurgent leaders say the deal wasn't fully implemented.

___

Already, the rebel forces have seized at least 10 towns across the sparsely populated north of the country, and residents in the capital now fear the insurgents could attack at any time, despite assurances by rebel leaders that they are willing to engage in dialogue instead of attacking Bangui.

U.S. officials said Thursday the State Department would close its embassy in the country and ordered its diplomatic team to leave. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were unauthorized to discuss the evacuation publicly.

At least four different rebel groups are involved, though their overall numbers could not immediately be confirmed.

The rebels have claimed that their actions are justified in light of the "thirst for justice, for peace, for security and for economic development of the people of Central African Republic."

Bozize, a former military commander, came to power in a 2003 rebel war that ousted his predecessor, Ange-Felix Patasse. In his address Thursday, Bozize said he remained open to dialogue with the rebels, but he also accused them and their allies of financial greed.

"The main thing they say is that the north of the country, and especially in their case the northeast, has always been neglected by the central government in all ways," he said.

Central African Republic, a landlocked nation of some 4.4 million people, is roughly the size of France. It has suffered decades of army revolts, coups and rebellions since gaining independence in 1960 and remains one of the poorest countries in the world.

About 200 French soldiers are already in the country, providing technical support and helping to train the local army, according to the French defense ministry.

Despite Central African Republic's wealth of gold, diamonds, timber and uranium, the government remains perpetually cash-strapped. Filip Hilgert, a researcher with Belgium-based International Peace Information Service, said rebel groups are unhappy because they feel the government doesn't invest in their areas.

"France has the means to stop (the rebels) but unfortunately they have done nothing for us until now," Bozize said.

"For me, there are individuals who are being manipulated by an outside hand, dreaming of exploiting the rich Central African Republic soil," he said. "They want only to stop us from benefiting from our oil, our diamonds, our uranium and our gold."

But the rebels also are demanding that the government make payments to ex-combatants, suggesting that their motives may also be for personal financial gain.

Those allies, he implied, are outside Central African Republic.

BANGUI, Central African Republic (AP) — The president of Central African Republic on Thursday urgently called on France and other foreign powers to help his government fend off rebels who are quickly seizing territory and approaching this capital city, but French officials declined to offer any military assistance.

Speaking to crowds in Bangui, a city of some 600,000, Bozize pleaded with foreign powers to do what they could. He pointed in particular to France, Central African Republic's former colonial ruler.

The developments suggest Central African Republic could be on the brink of another violent change in government, something not new in the history of this resource-rich, yet deeply impoverished country. The current president, Francois Bozize, himself came to power nearly a decade ago in the wake of a rebellion.

C. African Republic president seeks foreign help

Larson reported from Dakar, Senegal. Associated Press writer Sarah DiLorenzo in Paris contributed to this report.

Paris is encouraging peace talks between the government and the rebels, with the French Foreign Ministry noting in a statement that negotiations are due to "begin shortly in Libreville (Gabon)." But it was not immediately clear what, if any, dates have been set for those talks.

Bozize's government earlier reached out to longtime ally Chad, which pledged to send 2,000 troops to bolster Central African Republic's own forces. But it was unclear if the Chadian troops had all arrived, and even then, it is far from certain if the combined government forces could withstand rebel attacks.

French President Francois Hollande said Thursday that France wants to protect its interests in Central African Republic and not Bozize's government. The comments came a day after dozens of protesters, angry about a lack of help against rebel forces, threw rocks at the French Embassy in Bangui and stole a French flag.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, meanwhile, spoke via phone with Bozize, asking the president to take responsibility for the safety of French nationals and diplomatic missions in Central African Republic.

Maine wind power inches toward generation goals

A national industry group, the American Wind Energy Association, says that with the looming expiration of the credit, wind project developers are not making plans in the United States and American manufacturers are not receiving orders, costing jobs.

Permits have been approved for First Wind's Oakfield project in Aroostook County and Patriot Renewables' Saddleback Ridge in Oxford County, but those approvals are being challenged by citizen opposition groups. Patriot's Canton Mountain project, also in Oxford County, is under DEP review. The Pisgah Mountain Windpower in Penobscot County is also being challenged.

Maine's operating wind power plants have a capacity to produce 468 megawatts online now, according to figures from the state Department of Environmental Protection, which regulates grid-scale projects in Maine's Unorganized Territory.

"We don't expect an application before 2014," said Mark Bergeron, director of DEP's Division of Land Resources Regulation.

Conceptual plans for projects in Moscow in Somerset County and Alder Stream in Franklin County have emerged. The latter has already gotten a boost from the federal government.

But new projects that are in conceptual stages, under regulatory review or approved but facing challenges could catapult the state to half of its wind-power goal of 2,000 megawatts by 2015. The Legislature has set that goal for installed wind power capacity, along with 3,000 megawatts by 2020.

TransCanada Maine LLC completed the state's largest operating wind farm, with 44 turbines, in Kibby Township in Franklin County in 2010 and expanded it by 11 at a second site. In Oxford County, Independence Wind's Record Hill and Patriot Renewables' Spruce Mountain projects are producing power.

Developers' interest does not appear to have waned in Maine, which is by far New England's largest wind producer but accounts for only a small fraction of total U.S. output. According to the American Wind Energy Association, the U.S. wind industry totaled 51,630 megawatts of cumulative wind capacity through the end of September.

The two smallest sites, with three turbines each, are Fox Island Wind LLC's site on Vinalhaven island in Knox County and Beaver Ridge LLC's project in Freedom, Waldo County.

That's caused "very legitimate" concerns among wind power developers, said Jeremy Payne, executive director of the Maine Renewable Energy Association. "It's a very important piece of development" in wind projects, he said.

Wind power produced in Maine is fed into the regional grid, but some stays in the state, Payne said. A 2011 power purchase agreement keeps Mars Hill power in northern Maine, and part of the Rollins wind deal was to keep power in Maine.

Maine has 11 operational wind farms producing anywhere from 4.5 to 132 megawatts, five of which are owned by Massachusetts-based First Wind. They include First Wind's Mars Hill in Aroostook County, Rollins in Penobscot County, Stetson I and II in Washington County, and its newest, Bull Hill in Hancock County.

Independence Wind's Highland proposal for a 39-turbine, 117-megawatt project in Somerset County has been withdrawn, and Noble Environmental Power LLC's Passadumkeag Wind Park proposal in Penobscot County has been denied.

The year's end brings the possibility of big change to the industry. The federal Production Tax Credit, used to encourage development of renewable energy projects, is due to expire at the end of 2012.

AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) -- Wind power generated in Maine is now producing nearly 500 megawatts, enough to supply the average needs of 175,000 households. However, it's still well short of the state's goal for wind generation by 2015.

Also expected by the end of January is an application for an expansion at Bull Hill.

In early 2012, the Energy Department awarded $1 million to the Penobscot Indian Nation to help it move closer to developing the 227-megawatt Alder Stream project. The grant is to help with engineering designs, meet permit requirements and identify power purchasers.

First Wind is expected to submit an application by the end of January for a 60- to 65-turbine project that would be built in Kingsbury Plantation in Piscataquis County, the DEP said. It is known as the Bingham Wind Project.

Maine wind power inches toward generation goals

Meanwhile, the DEP is reviewing First Wind's revised application to build a wind farm on Bowers Mountain straddling Penobscot and Washington counties in eastern Maine. The new plan envisions 16 instead of 27 turbines as originally proposed, and placing them in less visible locations.

"Developers stand ready to sign more of these contracts" to keep Maine-generated wind power in the state, Payne said.

But several more projects are in process at the Department of Environmental Protection or are expected to be in the year ahead. Their approval and development would bring the state closer to meeting its goals, which is intended to increase the reliability of the region's electricity supply through indigenous renewable power that will not produce greenhouse gas emissions or other air pollution.

Wis. man's Little Free Library copied worldwide

"We are working very hard to get close to making it financially viable, but it will be a while," Brooks said. "What's encouraging is that every day people call us and they have the most clever, interesting and sometimes moving ideas."

"I absolutely love them," said Melanie Sanco, the district's point person on the effort. "It sparks the imagination. You see them around and you want one. ... They're cute and adorable." Kids who have books stay in school longer, she said.

Most of the nonprofit's money comes from sale of pre-built little libraries, which cost from $250 to $600, and a $25 fee to register a library on the organization's web site. The AARP Foundation has also provided a $70,000 grant as part of a new program to provide book boxes for seniors and kids to read to them.

Little Free Libraries: http://www.littlefreelibrary.org

Educators in particular have seized on the potential of something so simple and self-sustaining.

Enlarge Photo

HUDSON, Wis. (AP) — It started as a simple tribute to his mother, a teacher and bibliophile. Todd Bol put up a miniature version of a one-room schoolhouse on a post outside his home in this western Wisconsin city, filled it with books and invited his neighbors to borrow them.

Enlarge Photo

The groups are working with Antoinette Ashong, a pro-literacy activist and headmistress of a girls' school in the capital of Accra. "I want to spread reading in Africa, which is a problem because in Africa it is very, very difficult to get books to read," Ashong said in a Skype interview. She has already put up 45 boxes in poor neighborhoods.

Bol and Brooks, who runs outreach programs at the University of Wisconsin, see the potential for a lot more growth. At one point, they set a goal of 2,510 boxes — surpassing the number of public libraries built by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. They passed that mark this summer.

___

In this Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012…

They loved it, and began dropping by so often that his lawn became a gathering spot. Then a friend in Madison put out some similar boxes and got the same reaction. More home-crafted libraries began popping up around Wisconsin's capital.

In this Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012…

In this Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012,…

Enlarge Photo

"I do this and I feel like I'm smart," the girl said.

Each little library invites passersby to "take a book, return a book."

Bol and Brooks recently began drawing paychecks after several years of work as volunteers. Bol, the full-time executive director, said he hopes to earn $60,000 a year eventually, but added, "we're not there yet." The group will remain a nonprofit, Bol said, but they want to develop stable revenue streams and management systems so it can continue to grow.

In this Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012…

In Minneapolis, school officials are aiming to put up about 100 in neighborhoods where many kids don't have books at home. A box at district headquarters goes through 40 books a day, serving children whose parents come to register them and adults who come to prepare for high school equivalency tests.

The girl told her no, Holben said, but ran her finger over the words as if following the text.

Enlarge Photo

"It's weird to be an international phenomenon," said Bol, a former international business consultant who finds himself at the head of what has become the Little Free Libraries organization. The book-sharing boxes are being adopted by a growing number of groups as a way of promoting literacy in inner cities and underdeveloped countries.

In this Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012,…

Bol, his Madison friend Rick Brooks, and helpers run the project from a funky workshop with a weathered wood facade in an otherwise nondescript concrete industrial building outside Hudson, a riverside community of 12,000 about 20 miles east of downtown St. Paul, Minn. They build wooden book boxes in a variety of styles, ranging from basic to a miniature British-style phone booth, and offer them for sale on the group's website, which also offers plans for building your own. Sizes vary. The essential traits are that they are eye-catching and protect the books from the weather.

Online:

Three years later, the whimsical boxes are a global sensation. They number in the thousands and have spread to at least 36 countries, in a testimonial to the power of a good idea, the simple allure of a book and the wildfire of the internet.

Wis. man's Little Free Library copied worldwide
Related Content prevnext

Enlarge Photo

Sage Holben, who put up a Little Free Library in her tough neighborhood near downtown St. Paul, said she thinks it has made a positive difference. Although crime and violence are common on the block, no one has vandalized the box or stolen the books, and she routinely sees kids exploring the contents. She said she asked one 8-year-old neighbor if she really intended to read a romance novel she had taken.

The Rotary Club plans to use the book boxes in its literacy efforts in the west African nation of Ghana. Books for Africa, a Minnesota-based group that has sent over 27 million books to 48 countries since 1988, recently decided to ship books and little libraries to Ghana, too.

Storm brings white Christmas, tornado threat to central U.S

The storm is expected to expected to evolve into a blizzard from Arkansas to southern Illinois Tuesday night, with snowfall of up to a foot in some areas, according to Accuweather.com.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson and Mary Wisniewski; Editing by Sandra Maler and Todd Eastham)

The storm system surging east from Kansas and the Texas Panhandle included tornados and severe thunderstorms along its southern fringe, from southeastern Texas to Alabama, the National Weather Service said.

Ahead of the storm's path, parts of eastern West Virginia are under a winter storm warning. Ice accumulations of up to half an inch are expected in higher elevations, the National Weather Service said.

A tornado destroyed a building 13 miles southeast of Crockett, Texas, and a bank lost a section of its roof, according to Accuweather.com.

Accuweather.com senior meteorologist Kristina Pydynowski warned on the website that travel will be "extremely treacherous, if not impossible, as the snow clogs roads, such as interstates 24, 55 and 57, and the blowing snow severely lowers visibility."

In a rare taste of Christmas snow, Oklahoma City was forecast to get 3 to 6 inches of the white stuff on Tuesday. The city's biggest Christmas snowfall was 6.5 inches in 1914, and measurable amounts have been recorded only a handful of times on the date.

Storm brings white Christmas, tornado threat to central U.S.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A major winter storm brought a rare white Christmas to the southern U.S. plains on Tuesday, contributing to a 21-vehicle pile-up that shut down a major highway in Oklahoma, thousands of power outages and the death of a Texas man.

The snowstorm will shift Wednesday to the eastern Great Lakes and northeast, she said.

Freezing drizzle overnight led to 10 separate collisions on Interstate 40 at Oklahoma City just before 3 a.m., said Trooper Betsy Randolph, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

San Francisco International Airport had delays for inbound flights of over an hour due to low clouds.

Southern Indiana is under a blizzard warning starting early Wednesday morning, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Crystal Pettet. Indianapolis could see its biggest snowfall in four years, with a possibility of 10-12 inches of snow.

The service reported a tornado warning for the Mobile, Alabama area late Tuesday afternoon.

A 25-year-old Texas man was killed Tuesday when a tree fell across a road in Harris County, in the Houston metropolitan area, according to Thomas Gilliland of the county's sheriff's office.

"Conditions should be pretty bad in time for rush hour," said Pettet.

The 21-vehicle pile-up included three tractor-trailers and shut down the westbound lanes for about five hours, she said. Twelve people were taken to hospitals, and troopers are checking on the severity of their injuries.

CenterPoint Energy reported more than 20,000 customers without power in the Houston area Tuesday afternoon.

The FlightAware website, which tracks flight delays, reported departure delays of 40 minutes from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport at 5 p.m. local time and 32 minutes from Chicago/O'Hare International Airport.

Egypt constitution passes with 63.8 percent

Dawoud said the National Salvation Front, the main opposition group that brings together liberal, leftists parties and groups, will continue to fight the constitution through preparing for the parliamentary elections. In the parliament, the group will work to amend the constitution, which he said restricts freedoms and undermines social and economic rights of Egyptians.

Egypt constitution passes with 63.8 percent

Abou el-Maati said results were thrown out from polling stations where violations, such as closing early or improper supervision.

He also denied that Christians were preventing from casting their ballots at some stations, a claim widely reported during the two stages of voting on Dec. 15 and Dec. 22.

"We still believe because of the low turnout, this is not the constitution the Egyptians people had aspired for," Dawoud said. "This is not a constitution that will last for a long time."

Judge Samir Abou el-Maati, the head of the electoral commission, denied allegations that judicial supervision was lacking in the vote. He said the total number of people who voted against the constitution was 6.06 million out of 16.7 million valid votes, or about 36.2 percent.

The official results closely mirror unofficial results announced by the Muslim Brotherhood, which said 64 percent voted "yes."

CAIRO (AP) -- Egypt's disputed Islamist-backed constitution passed with a 63.8 percent "yes" in a referendum, the election commission announced Tuesday, rejecting opposition allegations of significant vote fraud.

He also said Abou el-Maati did not address violations such as backers of the constitution instructing voters to cast a "yes" ballot within the polling stations.

Mohammed Badie, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, offered congratulations on the passing of the constitution and said Egyptians continue to "teach" the world.

This is the first constitution since Mubarak's ouster. The opposition had campaigned against it with massive street protests that sometimes turned deadly, arguing that it will usher in Islamic rule in Egypt and restrict freedoms. It has vowed to challenge the referendum results and fight for a share of power in the upcoming parliamentary vote expected within two months.

"Let's all begin to build the renaissance of our country with free will, good intentions and strong determination, men, women, Muslims and Christians," Badie said on his Twitter account. The Brotherhood was the main group that backed the charter.

Opposition spokesman Khaled Dawoud said the judge didn't address complaints about overcrowding of polling stations. The opposition says the overcrowding was due to a boycott by some judges who traditionally oversee elections and that was a major factor in the low turnout.

Turnout of 32.9 percent of Egypt's nearly 52 million registered voters was quite a bit lower than most other elections since the uprising nearly two years ago that ousted authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak.

Colleges help students put best Web foot forward

Colleges help students put best Web foot forward

"Fortunately, I didn't have to deal with anything negative under my profile," said Katz, who used the reputation website BrandYourself.com while pursuing dual degrees in public relations and international affairs. "What I was trying to form was really a nice, clean, neat page, very professional."

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) -- Samantha Grossman wasn't always thrilled with the impression that emerged when people Googled her name.

"These students have been comfortable with the intimate details of their lives on display since birth," said Lisa Severy, president-elect of the National Career Development Association and director of career services at the University of Colorado-Boulder, which does not offer the service.

Syracuse, Rochester, and Johns Hopkins in Baltimore are among the universities that offer such online tools to their students free of charge, realizing ill-considered Web profiles of drunken frat parties, prank videos and worse can doom graduates to a lifetime of unemployment — even if the pages are somebody else's with the same name.

It's a growing trend based on studies showing that most employers Google prospective hires and nearly all of them won't bother to go past the first page of results. The online tools don't eliminate the embarrassing material, they just put the graduate's most flattering, professional profile front and center.

So before she graduated from Syracuse University last spring, the school provided her with an online tool that allowed her to put her best Web foot forward. Now when people Google her, they go straight to a positive image — professional photo, cum laude degree and credentials — that she credits with helping her land a digital advertising job in New York.

Before his 2011 graduation, he took the university up on its offer of the BrandYourself account and said it gave him a leg up with potential employers and internship supervisors.

BrandYourself works by analyzing search terms in a user's online profile to determine, for example, that a LinkedIn account might rank 25th on Google searches of the user's name. The program then suggests ways to boost that ranking. The software also provides alerts when an unidentified result appears on a user's first page or if any links rise or fall significantly in rank.

"It's becoming more and more important for students to be aware of and able to manage their online presence, to be able to have strong, positive things come up on the Internet when someone seeks them out," said Mike Cahill, Syracuse's career services director.

"He couldn't get an internship because he was getting mistaken for a drug dealer with the same name," said co-founder Patrick Ambron. "He couldn't even get calls back and found out that was the problem."

Google his name and up pops his LinkedIn page with a listing of the jobs he's held in digital media and the "500+ connections" badge of honor. His Facebook account is adorned with Katz smiling over an elegant Thanksgiving dinner table. There are a couple of professional profiles and his Tumblr link, one after another on the first page of results and all highlighting his professional experience.

"I wanted to make sure people would find the actual me and not these other people," she said.

Nati Katz, a public relations strategist, views his presence online as a kind of virtual storefront that he began carefully tending while in graduate school at Syracuse.

"It wasn't anything too horrible," she said. "I just have a common name. There would be pictures, college partying pictures, that weren't of me, things I wouldn't want associated with me."

"We want our students and alumni actively involved in shaping their online presence," said Johns Hopkins Career Center Director Mark Presnell. Students are encouraged to promote positive, professional content that's easily found by employers, he said.

An April survey of 2,000 hiring managers from CareerBuilder found nearly two in five companies use social networking sites to research job candidates and 11 percent said they planned to start. A third of the hiring managers who said they research candidates reported finding something like a provocative photo or evidence of drinking or drug use that cost the candidate a job.

After initially supplying BrandYourself accounts to graduating seniors, Syracuse University this year struck a deal with the company — begun by a trio of alumni — to offer accounts to all of its undergraduate and graduate students and alumni at no additional charge. About 25,000 people have access to it so far.

"The first item on our 'five things to do before you graduate' list is 'clean up your online profile,'" she said. "We call it the grandma test — if you don't want her to see it, you probably don't want an employer to, either."

Online reputation repair companies have been around for at least a couple of years, often charging hundreds or thousands of dollars a year to arrange for good results on search engine result pages. BrandYourself, which normally charges $10 a month for an account, launched two years ago as a less expensive, do-it-yourself alternative after co-founder Pete Kistler ran into a problem with his own name.

Motive a mystery in NY ambush deaths of 2 firemen_4

Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the State Police and Office of Emergency Management were working with local authorities.

___

"Volunteer firefighters and police officers were injured and two were taken from us as they once again answered the call of duty," Cuomo said in a statement. "We as the community of New York mourn their loss as now two more families must spend the holidays without their loved ones."

A Monroe County Sheriff's Department…

The shooting and fires were in a neighborhood of seasonal and year-round homes set close together across the road from the lakeshore. The area is popular with recreational boaters but is normally quiet this time of year.

The police officer who exchanged gunfire with Spengler "in all likelihood saved many lives," Pickering said.

The West Webster Fire District learned of the fire early Monday after a report of a car and house on fire on Lake Road, on a narrow peninsula where Irondequoit Bay meets Lake Ontario, Monroe County Sheriff Patrick O'Flynn said.

Authorities did not offer a possible motive.

A police armored vehicle was used to recover two men, and eventually it removed 33 people from nearby homes, the police chief said. The gunfire initially kept firefighters from battling the blazes.

Vercruysse also said Spengler "couldn't stand his sister" and "stayed on one side of the house and she stayed on the other."

A friend said Spengler hated his sister. Roger Vercruysse lived next door to Spengler and recalled a man who doted on his mother, whose obituary suggested contributions to the West Webster Fire Department.

The dead men were identified as police Lt. Michael Chiapperini, 43, the Webster Police Department's public information officer; and 19-year-old Tomasz Kaczowka, also a 911 dispatcher.

Pickering described Chiapperini as a "lifetime firefighter" with nearly 20 years in the department, and he called Kaczowka a "tremendous young man."

The fire appeared from a distance as a pulsating ball of flame glowing against the early morning sky, flames licking into treetops and reflecting on the water, with huge bursts of smoke billowing away in a brisk wind.

O'Flynn lamented the violence, which comes on the heels of other shootings including the massacre of 20 students and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

"It's sad to see that this is becoming more commonplace in communities across the nation," O'Flynn said.

About 100 people attended an impromptu memorial vigil Monday evening in Webster, a suburb of Rochester. Dozens of bouquets were left at the fire station, along with a handwritten sign that said, "Thanks for protecting us. RIP."

Authorities used an armored vehicle to help residents flee dozens of homes on the shore of Lake Ontario a day before Christmas. Police restricted access to the neighborhood, and officials said it was unclear whether there were other bodies in the seven houses left to burn.

Hofstetter, also a full-timer with the Rochester Fire Department, was hit once in the pelvis, and the bullet lodged in his spine, authorities said. Scardino was hit in the chest and knee.

Webster, a middle-class suburb, now is the scene of violence linked to house fires for two Decembers in a row.

Emergency radio communications capture someone saying he "could see the muzzle flash coming at me" as Spengler carried out his ambush. The audio posted on the website RadioReference.com has someone reporting "firefighters are down" and saying "got to be rifle or shotgun - high powered ... semi or fully auto."

Spengler lay in wait outdoors for the firefighters' arrival, then opened fire probably with a rifle and from atop an earthen berm, Pickering said. "It does appear it was a trap," he said.

On Monday, Spengler fired at the four firefighters when they arrived shortly after 5:30 a.m. at the blaze, town police Chief Gerald Pickering said. The first police officer who arrived chased the gunman and exchanged shots.

A handwritten sign says, "Thanks for protecting us, RIP." Two candles were lit to honor the dead.

Grieving firefighters declined to talk to reporters. At an impromptu memorial vigil Monday evening, about 100 people stood in the cold night air, some holding candles. A fire department spokesman made a brief appearance, thanked them all and told them to go home and appreciate their families.

"We have very few calls for service in that location," Pickering said. "Webster is a tremendous community. We are a safe community, and to have a tragedy befall us like this is just horrendous."

Cathy Bartlett was there with her teenage son, who was good friends with Kaczowka. Bartlett's husband, Mark Bartlett, has been a firefighter there for 25 years but missed the call this morning.

The two wounded firefighters, Joseph Hofstetter and Theodore Scardino, remained in guarded condition Tuesday at Strong Memorial Hospital, authorities said. Both were awake and alert and are expected to recover.

Authorities said Spengler hadn't done anything to bring himself to their attention since his parole. As a convicted felon, he wasn't allowed to possess weapons. Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley said Spengler led a very quiet life after he got out of prison.

"He loved his mama to death," said Vercruysse, who last saw his friend about six months ago.

Motive a mystery in NY ambush deaths of 2 firemen Related Content

Enlarge Photo

Spengler had been living in the home in Webster, a suburb of Rochester, with his mother and sister since his parole in 1998. He had served 17 years in prison in the beating death of his 92-year-old grandmother in 1980, for which he had originally been charged with murder but pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of manslaughter. His mother, Arline, died in October.

But two months ago, William Spengler's mother died, leaving the 62-year-old ex-con in a Lake Ontario house with his sister, who he "couldn't stand," a friend said.

WEBSTER, N.Y. (AP) — A man who set his house on fire, then lured firefighters to their deaths in a blaze of flames and bullets, had attracted little attention since he got out of prison in the 1990s for killing his grandmother, authorities said.

Spengler set a car and a house in his neighborhood ablaze early Monday, and then killed two responding firefighters, wounded two others and injured a police officer while several homes burned around him, police said. Spengler then killed himself. His sister, Cheryl, was missing.

At West Webster Fire Station 1, there were at least 20 bouquets on a bench in front and a bouquet of roses with three gold-and-white ribbons saying, "May they rest in peace," ''In the line of duty" and "In memory of our fallen brothers."

Kaczowka's brother, reached at the family home Monday night, said he didn't want to talk.

Associated Press writers Chris Carola, George Walsh and Mary Esch in Albany contributed to this report.

"Thank God my husband slept through the first alarm and didn't get up until the second one went off," she said.

Lake Rd. residents are evacuated…

Two of the firefighters arrived on a fire engine and two in their own vehicles, Pickering said. After Spengler fired, one of the wounded men fled, but the other three couldn't because of flying gunfire.

Enlarge Photo

Last Dec. 7, authorities say, a 15-year-old boy doused his home with gasoline and set it ablaze, killing his father and two brothers, 16 and 12. His mother and 13-year-old sister escaped with injuries. He is being prosecuted as an adult.

Jack Klugman dies in Los Angeles

Jack Klugman dies in Los Angeles

Jack Klugman, the prolific, craggy-faced character actor and regular guy loved by millions as the messy one in TV's The Odd Couple and the crime-fighting coroner in Quincy, M.E., died Monday. He was 90.

Klugman, who lost his voice to throat cancer in the 1980s and trained himself to speak again, died with his wife at his side.

"He had a great life and he enjoyed every moment of it and he would encourage others to do the same," son Adam Klugman said.

Adam Klugman said he was spending Christmas with his brother, David, and their families. Their father had been convalescing for some time but had apparently died suddenly and they were not sure of the exact cause.

Advertisement
"His sons loved him very much," David Klugman said. "We'll carry on in his spirit."

Never anyone's idea of a matinee idol, Klugman remained a popular star for decades simply by playing the type of man you could imagine running into at a bar or riding on a subway with - gruff, but down to earth, his tie stained and a little loose, a racing form under his arm, a cigar in hand during the days when smoking was permitted.

His was a city actor ideal for The Odd Couple, which ran from 1970 to 1975 and was based on Neil Simon's play about mismatched roommates, divorced New Yorkers who end up living together.

The show teamed Klugman, the sloppy sports writer Oscar Madison - and Tony Randall - the fussy photographer Felix Unger, in the roles played by Walter Matthau and Art Carney on Broadway and Matthau and Jack Lemmon in the 1968 film.

Klugman had already had a taste of the show when he replaced Matthau on Broadway and he learned to roll with the quick-thinking Randall, with whom he had worked in 1955 on the CBS series Appointment with Adventure.

"There's nobody better to improvise with than Tony," Klugman said. "A script might say, 'Oscar teaches Felix football.' There would be four blank pages. He would provoke me into reacting to what he did. Mine was the easy part."

They were battlers on screen, and the best of friends in real life. When Randall died in 2004 at age 84, Klugman told CNN: "A world without Tony Randall is a world that I cannot recognize."

In Quincy, M.E., which ran from 1976 to 1983, Klugman played an idealistic, tough-minded medical examiner who tussled with his boss by uncovering evidence of murder in cases where others saw natural causes.

"We had some wonderful writers," he said in a 1987 interview. "Quincy was a muckraker, like Upton Sinclair, who wrote about injustices. He was my ideal as a youngster, my author, my hero.

"Everybody said, 'Quincy'll never be a hit.' I said, 'You guys are wrong. He's two heroes in one, a cop and a doctor.' A coroner has power. He can tell the police commissioner to investigate a murder. I saw the opportunity to do what I'd gotten into the theatre to do - give a message.

"They were going to do cops and robbers with Quincy. I said, 'You promised me I could do causes.' They said, 'Nobody wants to see that.' I said, 'Look at the success of "60 Minutes." They want to see it if you present it as entertainment.'"

For his 1987 role as 81-year-old Nat in the Broadway production of I'm Not Rappaport, Klugman wore leg weights to learn to shuffle like an elderly man. He said he would wear them for an hour before each performance, "to remember to keep that shuffle."

"The guy is so vital emotionally, but physically he can't be," Klugman said.

"We treat old people so badly. There is nothing easy about 80."

The son of Russian Jewish immigrants, he was born in Philadelphia and began his acting career in college drama (Carnegie Institute of Technology). After serving in the Army during World War I, he went on to summer stock and off-Broadway, rooming with fellow actor Charles Bronson as both looked for paying jobs. He made his Broadway debut in 1952 in a revival of Golden Boy. His film credits included Sidney Lumet's 12 Angry Men and Blake Edwards' Days of Wine and Roses and an early television highlight was appearing with Humphrey Bogart and Henry Fonda in a production of The Petrified Forest. His performance in the classic 1959 musical Gypsy brought him a Tony nomination for best featured (supporting) actor in a musical.

He also appeared in several episodes of The Twilight Zone, including a memorable 1963 one in which he played a negligent father whose son is seriously wounded in Vietnam. His other TV shows included The Defenders and the soap opera The Greatest Gift.

In a 1987 interview in the New York Daily News, he said, "once I did three hourlong shows in 2½ weeks. Think we'd do that now? Huh! But then it was great. I did summer stock, played the classics. Me!"

Throat cancer took away his raspy voice for several years in the 1980s. When he was back on the stage for a 1993 revival of Three Men on a Horse, The Associated Press review said, "His voice may be a little scratchy but his timing is as impeccable as ever."

"The only really stupid thing I ever did in my life was to start smoking," he said in 1996. Seeing people smoking in television and films, he added, "disgusts me, it makes me so angry - kids are watching."

In his later years, he guest-starred on TV series including Third Watch and Crossing Jordan and appeared in a 2010 theatrical film, Camera Obscura.

Klugman's hobby was horse racing and he eventually took up raising them, too.

"I always loved to gamble," he said. "I never got close to a horse. Fate dealt me a terrible blow when it gave me a good horse the first time out. I thought how easy this is.

Fear and Fury Rise After a New School Rampage in China

Fear and Fury Rise After a New School Rampage in ChinaBEIJING ― The attacker’s first young target, a girl with a pink backpack, falls at the school gates as she tries to race away. She gets up, but stumbles again inside the gates as the man slashes at her with a meat cleaver. Two minutes later, dozens of students race out of the gates as the man rampages through the school, eventually wounding 23 children.
Perhaps most shocking is what the video of the attack 10 days ago shows about the school’s first line of defense: several children waving broomsticks try to block the man’s progress. Minutes later, local adults who had rushed into the building, also wielding brooms, chase the man from the school.

Such details were not in the immediate coverage of the attack, at the Chenpeng Village Primary School in Guangshan County, Henan Province, and the video was not released until days later.

The rampage came on Dec. 14, the same day a heavily armed 20-year-old man killed his mother and then opened fire at a school in Newtown, Conn., killing 20 first graders, 6 adults and then himself. Official Chinese news organizations had much more coverage of the Newtown massacre than of the Henan attack, and there was an outpouring of sympathy for the American tragedy as well as commentary drawing inevitable comparisons. Many Chinese Internet users pondered how many students at the Chenpeng school might have been killed if China had gun control laws as loose as those in the United States.

But now the Chinese video, circulating here on television and the Internet, has refocused attention on the Chenpeng attack, especially on security measures at the school and on local officials’ efforts to squelch coverage. Fury has been building because such rampages have recurred over the last three years, with intruders slashing at schoolchildren with knives and axes, including one who attacked with a hammer and then set himself on fire. Each case set off fear among parents across the country as well as criticism of government officials for not doing enough to protect children; each time, officials guaranteed schools would be secure. The video made blatant the gap between the official promises and reality.

“Did the government not say that no strangers can get into schools?” wrote one Internet user, Xia Ling, on a microblog. “Did the government not say that every school has security guards? Liars! You will eventually all face karma someday.”

Details were slow to filter out. Last Monday, the Internet operation of People’s Daily, the mouthpiece of the Communist Party, ran a report from a journalist who had traveled to Guangshan County. The article on the Web site, which is separate from the editorial operations of the print edition, said that even though school employees had asserted that a security guard was on the premises at the time, the attacker somehow managed to get to the third floor.

The same report said officials in Guangshan County appeared to be trying to cover up the attack. It said that the county propaganda office released details of the attack the day it occurred, but that someone later ordered the news removed from the county Web site. Officials canceled a news conference scheduled for the next day.

Reached by telephone, a county propaganda official told the reporter: “It takes time to check if the man with the knife has a mental disease. It’s pointless to discuss it. I need to eat first!”

The reporter found a deputy director of the education office playing a video game; that official refused to provide any answers. School officials and a village official also declined to discuss the attack. But the reporter unearthed the fact that two teenagers had been fatally stabbed in attacks in 2011 and last month at a high school across the street from the county education office.

On Tuesday, Xinhua, the state news agency, reported that six officials, including two school principals, had been fired.

Some other reports offered sketchy details about the arrested suspect, Min Yongjun, 36. Beijing News reported Wednesday that he felt deeply ashamed of his epilepsy. An article by Xinhua said Mr. Min believed in the ancient Mayan doomsday prophecy about the world ending on Dec. 21, implying that had somehow affected his behavior. Ouyang Mingguang, a deputy director of the Guangshan police, told Chinese reporters that Mr. Min had first attacked an elderly woman, Xiang Jiaying, and then decided that “he might as well just stab some students since he had already killed a person.” (Ms. Xiang was hospitalized but not fatally injured.)

The abiding question of why was asked by one person in charge of the official microblog of People’s Daily. “School killings happen over and over again, and murderers who have mental diseases are not the minority,” the person wrote. “Has any of the self-examination brought us any changes? These schoolchildren just started their lives; why is it that criminals always attack innocent children?”

Some commentators said the attackers feel they have been wronged by society. “Chinese society is full of anger and rage,” Murong Xuecun, a best-selling novelist and popular online commentator, said in a telephone interview. “Everybody has anger. Everybody has hate. Those who have been treated unfairly harm those who are even more vulnerable. It must be noted that every society has its share of sociopaths. But for China to have so many is no doubt abnormal.”

Mr. Murong said the only way to alleviate that was to establish a fair legal system and to “achieve real justice in society, so that the people won’t be mired in despair.”

Other critics blame the lack of proper mental health care in China; at least one man who carried out fatal attacks on schoolchildren in 2010 had exhibited clear signs of schizophrenia, but had not been given proper treatment.

On Friday, the English edition of Global Times, a populist newspaper, published an op-ed by a Chinese writer based in New York that looked at some of the same issues in the context of the Newtown massacre. The writer, Rong Xiaoqing, said the mental health system in the United States also had its shortcomings when dealing with potential killers, since they cannot easily be distinguished from other members of society.

“In the U.S., psychologists and psychiatrists have long followed specific criteria to screen for mental illness,” she wrote. “But the mercurial and mysterious human mind isn’t always that easy to categorize.”

State Department security chief leaves post over Benghazi

Eric Boswell has resigned effective immediately as assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a terse statement. A second official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Boswell had not left the department entirely and remained a career official.
Nuland said that Boswell, and the three other officials, had all been put on administrative leave "pending further action."
An official panel that investigated the incident concluded that the Benghazi mission was completely unprepared to deal with the attack, which killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.
The unclassified version of the report, which was released on Tuesday, cited "leadership and management" deficiencies, poor coordination among officials and "real confusion" in Washington and in the field over who had the authority to make decisions on policy and security concerns.
"The ARB identified the performance of four officials, three in the Bureau of the Diplomatic Security and one in the Bureau of (Near Eastern) Affairs," Nuland said in her statement, referring to the panel known as an Accountability Review Board.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accepted Boswell's decision to resign effective immediately, the spokeswoman said.
Earlier, a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Boswell, one of his deputies, Charlene Lamb, and a third unnamed official has been asked to resign. The Associated Press first reported that three officials had resigned.
PANEL STOPS SHORT OF BLAMING CLINTON
The Benghazi incident appeared likely to tarnish Clinton's four-year tenure as secretary of state but the report did not fault her specifically and the officials who led the review stopped short of blaming her.
"We did conclude that certain State Department bureau-level senior officials in critical positions of authority and responsibility in Washington demonstrated a lack of leadership and management ability appropriate for senior ranks," retired Admiral Michael Mullen, one of the leaders of the inquiry, told reporters on Wednesday.
The panel's chair, retired Ambassador Thomas Pickering, said it had determined that responsibility for security shortcomings in Benghazi belonged at levels lower than Clinton's office.
"We fixed (responsibility) at the assistant secretary level, which is, in our view, the appropriate place to look for where the decision-making in fact takes place, where - if you like - the rubber hits the road," Pickering said after closed-door meetings with congressional committees.
The panel's report and the comments by its two lead authors suggested that Clinton, who accepted responsibility for the incident in a television interview about a month after the Benghazi attack, would not be held personally culpable.
Pickering and Mullen spoke to the media after briefing members of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee and Senate Foreign Relations Committee behind closed doors on classified elements of their report.
Clinton had been expected to appear at an open hearing on Benghazi on Thursday, but is recuperating after suffering a concussion, dehydration and a stomach bug last week. She will instead be represented by her two top deputies.
Clinton, who intends to step down in January, said in a letter accompanying the review that she would adopt all of its recommendations, which include stepping up security staffing and requesting more money to fortify U.S. facilities.
The National Defense Authorization Act for 2013, which is expected to go to Congress for final approval this week, includes a measure directing the Pentagon to increase the Marine Corps presence at diplomatic facilities by up to 1,000 Marines.
Some Capitol Hill Republicans who had criticized the Obama administration's handling of the Benghazi attacks said they were impressed by the report.
"It was very thorough," said Senator Johnny Isakson. Senator John Barrasso said: "It was very, very critical of major failures at the State Department at very high levels." Both spoke after the closed-door briefing.
Others, however, took a harsher line and called for Clinton to testify as soon as she is able.
"The report makes clear the massive failure of the State Department at all levels, including senior leadership, to take action to protect our government employees abroad," Representative Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.
Senator Bob Corker, who will be the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the new Congress is seated early next year, said Clinton should testify about Benghazi before her replacement is confirmed by the Senate.
Republicans have focused much of their firepower on U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who appeared on TV talk shows after the attack and suggested it was the result of a spontaneous protest rather than a premeditated attack.
The report concluded that there was no such protest.
Rice, widely seen as President Barack Obama's top pick to succeed Clinton, withdrew her name from consideration last week.
(Additional reporting by Tabassum Zakaria and Susan Cornwell; Editing by Christopher Wilson)