'The Hobbit' stays atop box office for third week

LOS ANGELES (AP) — "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" continues to rule them all at the box office, staying on top for a third-straight week and capping a record-setting $10.8 billion year in moviegoing.

The Warner Bros. fantasy epic from director Peter Jackson, based on the beloved J.R.R. Tolkien novel, made nearly $33 million this weekend, according to Sunday studio estimates, despite serious competition from some much-anticipated newcomers. It's now made a whopping $686.7 million worldwide and $222.7 million domestically alone.

Two big holiday movies — and potential Academy Awards contenders — also had strong openings. Quentin Tarantino's spaghetti Western-blaxploitation mash-up "Django Unchained" came in second place for the weekend with $30.7 million. The Weinstein Co. revenge comedy, starring Jamie Foxx as a slave in the Civil War South and Christoph Waltz as the bounty hunter who frees him and then makes him his partner, has earned $64 million since its Christmas Day opening.

And in third place with $28 million was the sweeping, all-singing "Les Miserables," based on the international musical sensation and the Victor Hugo novel of strife and uprising in 19th century France. The Universal Pictures film, with a cast of A-list actors singing live on camera led by Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway and Russell Crowe has made $67.5 million domestically and $116.2 worldwide since debuting on Christmas.

Additionally, the smash-hit James Bond adventure "Skyfall" has now made $1 billion internationally to become the most successful film yet in the 50-year franchise, Sony Pictures announced Sunday. The film stars Daniel Craig for the third time as the iconic British superspy.

"This is a great final weekend of the year," said Paul Dergarabedian, an analyst for box-office tracker Hollywood.com. "How perfect to end this year on such a strong note with the top five films performing incredibly well."

The week's other new wide release, the Billy Crystal-Bette Midler comedy "Parental Guidance" from 20th Century Fox, made $14.8 million over the weekend for fourth place and $29.6 million total since opening on Christmas.

Dergarabedian described the holding power of "The Hobbit" in its third week as "just amazing." Jackson shot the film, the first of three prequels to his massively successful "Lord of the Rings" series, in 48 frames per second — double the normal frame rate — for a crisper, more detailed image. It's also available in the usual 24 frames per second and both 2-D and 3-D projections.

"I think people are catching up with the movie. Maybe they're seeing it in multiple formats," he said. "I think it's just a big epic that feels like a great way to end the moviegoing year. There's momentum there with this movie."

"Django Unchained" is just as much of an epic in its own stylishly violent way that's quintessentially Tarantino. Erik Lomis, The Weinstein Co.'s president of theatrical distribution, said the opening exceeded the studio's expectations.

"We're thrilled with it, clearly. We knew it was extremely competitive at Christmas, particularly when you look at the start 'Les Miz' got. We were sort of resigned to being behind them. The fact that we were able to overtake them over the weekend was just great," Lomis said. "Taking nothing away from their number, it's a tribute to the playability of 'Django.'"

"Les Miserables" went into its opening weekend with nearly $40 million in North American grosses, including $18.2 on Christmas Day. That's the second-best opening ever on the holiday following "Sherlock Holmes," which made $24.9 million on Christmas 2009. Tom Hooper, in a follow-up to his Oscar-winner "The King's Speech," directs an enormous, ambitious take on the beloved musical which has earned a CinemaScore of "A'' from audiences and "A-plus" from women.

Nikki Rocco, Universal's head of distribution, said the debut for "Les Miserables" also beat the studio's expectations.

"That $18.2 million Christmas Day opening — people were shocked ... This is a musical!" she said. "Once people see it, they talk about how fabulous it is."

It all adds up to a record-setting year at the movies, beating the previous annual record of $10.6 billion set in 2009. Dergarabedian pointed out that the hits came scattered throughout the year, not just during the summer blockbuster season or prestige-picture time at the end. "Contraband," ''Safe House" and "The Vow" all performed well early on, but then when the big movies came, they were huge. "The Avengers" had the biggest opening ever with $207.4 million in May. The raunchy comedy "Ted" and comic-book behemoth "The Dark Knight Rises" both found enormous audiences. And Paul Thomas Anderson's challenging drama "The Master" shattered records in September when it opened on five screens in New York and Los Angeles with $736,311, for a staggering per-screen average of $147,262.

"We were able to get this record without scratching and clawing to a record," he said.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," $32.9 million ($106.5 million international).

2."Django Unchained," $30.7 million.

3."Les Miserables," $28 million ($38.3 million international).

4."Parental Guidance," $14.8 million ($7 million international).

5."Jack Reacher," $14 million ($18.1 million).

6."This Is 40," $13.2 million.

7."Lincoln," $7.5 million.

8."The Guilt Trip," $6.7 million.

9."Monsters, Inc. 3-D," $6.4 million.

10."Rise of the Guardians," $4.9 million ($11.6 million).

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Estimated weekend ticket sales at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada) for films distributed overseas by Hollywood studios, according to Rentrak:

1."The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," $106.5 million.

2."Life of Pi," $39.2 million.

3."Les Miserables," $38.3 million.

4."Wreck-It Ralph," $20.4 million.

5."Jack Reacher," $18.1 million.

6."Rise of the Guardians," $11.6 million.

7."Parental Guidance," $7 million.

8."The Tower," $6.6 million.

9."Pitch Perfect," $6.2 million.

10."De L'autre Cote Du Periph," $4 million.

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Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

http://www.rentrak.com

___

Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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Well: Exercise and the Ever-Smarter Human Brain

Anyone whose resolve to exercise in 2013 is a bit shaky might want to consider an emerging scientific view of human evolution. It suggests that we are clever today in part because a million years ago, we could outrun and outwalk most other mammals over long distances. Our brains were shaped and sharpened by movement, the idea goes, and we continue to require regular physical activity in order for our brains to function optimally.

Phys Ed

Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness.

The role of physical endurance in shaping humankind has intrigued anthropologists and gripped the popular imagination for some time. In 2004, the evolutionary biologists Daniel E. Lieberman of Harvard and Dennis M. Bramble of the University of Utah published a seminal article in the journal Nature titled “Endurance Running and the Evolution of Homo,” in which they posited that our bipedal ancestors survived by becoming endurance athletes, able to bring down swifter prey through sheer doggedness, jogging and plodding along behind them until the animals dropped.

Endurance produced meals, which provided energy for mating, which meant that adept early joggers passed along their genes. In this way, natural selection drove early humans to become even more athletic, Dr. Lieberman and other scientists have written, their bodies developing longer legs, shorter toes, less hair and complicated inner-ear mechanisms to maintain balance and stability during upright ambulation. Movement shaped the human body.

But simultaneously, in a development that until recently many scientists viewed as unrelated, humans were becoming smarter. Their brains were increasing rapidly in size.

Today, humans have a brain that is about three times larger than would be expected, anthropologists say, given our species’ body size in comparison with that of other mammals.

To explain those outsized brains, evolutionary scientists have pointed to such occurrences as meat eating and, perhaps most determinatively, our early ancestors’ need for social interaction. Early humans had to plan and execute hunts as a group, which required complicated thinking patterns and, it’s been thought, rewarded the social and brainy with evolutionary success. According to that hypothesis, the evolution of the brain was driven by the need to think.

But now some scientists are suggesting that physical activity also played a critical role in making our brains larger.

To reach that conclusion, anthropologists began by looking at existing data about brain size and endurance capacity in a variety of mammals, including dogs, guinea pigs, foxes, mice, wolves, rats, civet cats, antelope, mongooses, goats, sheep and elands. They found a notable pattern. Species like dogs and rats that had a high innate endurance capacity, which presumably had evolved over millenniums, also had large brain volumes relative to their body size.

The researchers also looked at recent experiments in which mice and rats were systematically bred to be marathon runners. Lab animals that willingly put in the most miles on running wheels were interbred, resulting in the creation of a line of lab animals that excelled at running.

Interestingly, after multiple generations, these animals began to develop innately high levels of substances that promote tissue growth and health, including a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor, or BDNF. These substances are important for endurance performance. They also are known to drive brain growth.

What all of this means, says David A. Raichlen, an anthropologist at the University of Arizona and an author of a new article about the evolution of human brains appearing in the January issue of Proceedings of the Royal Society Biology, is that physical activity may have helped to make early humans smarter.

“We think that what happened” in our early hunter-gatherer ancestors, he says, is that the more athletic and active survived and, as with the lab mice, passed along physiological characteristics that improved their endurance, including elevated levels of BDNF. Eventually, these early athletes had enough BDNF coursing through their bodies that some could migrate from the muscles to the brain, where it nudged the growth of brain tissue.

Those particular early humans then applied their growing ability to think and reason toward better tracking prey, becoming the best-fed and most successful from an evolutionary standpoint. Being in motion made them smarter, and being smarter now allowed them to move more efficiently.

And out of all of this came, eventually, an ability to understand higher math and invent iPads. But that was some time later.

The broad point of this new notion is that if physical activity helped to mold the structure of our brains, then it most likely remains essential to brain health today, says John D. Polk, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and co-author, with Dr. Raichlen, of the new article.

And there is scientific support for that idea. Recent studies have shown, he says, that “regular exercise, even walking,” leads to more robust mental abilities, “beginning in childhood and continuing into old age.”

Of course, the hypothesis that jogging after prey helped to drive human brain evolution is just a hypothesis, Dr. Raichlen says, and almost unprovable.

But it is compelling, says Harvard’s Dr. Lieberman, who has worked with the authors of the new article. “I fundamentally agree that there is a deep evolutionary basis for the relationship between a healthy body and a healthy mind,” he says, a relationship that makes the term “jogging your memory” more literal than most of us might have expected and provides a powerful incentive to be active in 2013.

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Obama blames GOP for 'fiscal cliff' brinksmanship

WASHINGTON -- President Obama blamed Republican leaders for the latest round of brinkmanship in Washington and said it was now up to lawmakers to find a way back from the so-called fiscal cliff.

In an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” aired Sunday, Obama said he had reached out to Republicans for weeks, but their refusal to raise taxes had blocked progress.

“They have had trouble saying yes to a number of repeated offers,” Obama said. In Friday’s meeting with congressional leaders at the White House, “I suggested to them if they can't do a comprehensive package of smart deficit reductions, let's at minimum make sure that people's taxes don't go up and that 2 million people don't lose their unemployment insurance.

“And I was modestly optimistic yesterday,” he added in the interview taped Saturday, referring to the aftermath of that meeting, “but we don't yet see an agreement. And now the pressure's on Congress to produce.”

PHOTOS: Notable moments of the 2012 presidential election

Senate leaders and their aides spent Saturday working on a deal that would protect most taxpayers from seeing their incomes taxes rise Jan. 1. The deal may also set new estate tax rates, prevent an expansion of the alternative minimum tax and extend unemployment insurance.

If the effort is successful, a final proposal is expected later Sunday, when senators are set to meet in party caucuses.

A spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell responded to the president's criticism:

"While the president was taping those discordant remarks yesterday, Sen. McConnell was in the office working to bring Republicans and Democrats together on a solution," Don Stewart said. "Discussions continue today."

In the interview, Obama said he expected an “adverse reaction in the markets” and depressed consumer spending if lawmakers allow the tax increase to take effect as scheduled -- and he tried to lay the blame on Republicans. Economists have suggested the combination of the tax increases, along with nearly $65 billion in spending cuts, could knock the economy back into a recession.

Obama did not offer a clear strategy for avoiding those spending cuts, which Congress and the president agreed to in 2011 as a way to force themselves to act on a larger deficit reduction deal. That deal has remained elusive, and Obama said in the interview that Republicans have had trouble saying yes to his offers.

QUIZ: How much do you know about the fiscal cliff?

Pressed by host David Gregory on why that is, Obama answered:

“That's something you're probably going to have to ask them, because, David, you follow this stuff pretty carefully. The offers that I’ve made to them have been so fair that a lot of Democrats get mad at me. I mean, I offered to make some significant changes to our entitlement programs in order to reduce the deficit,” he said, referring specifically to a change in the way Social Security cost of living increases are calculated, which many liberal groups opposed.

“They say that their biggest priority is making sure that we deal with the deficit in a serious way, but the way they're behaving is that their only priority is making sure that tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans are protected. That seems to be their only overriding, unifying theme.”

Obama has tried to frame the debate as a battle over taxes. One Republican acknowledged Sunday that the president appears poised to win the political battle on that front. If lawmakers agree on allowing taxes to rise on top earners, “it will accomplish a political victory for the president,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina

“Hats off to the president. He stood his ground; he’s going to get tax rate increases … on upper income Americans. And the sad news for the country is we’ve accomplished very little in terms of not becoming Greece or getting out of debt.… Hats off to the president -- he won.”

[For the Record, 8:05 a.m. PST  Dec. 30: This post has been updated to include reactions to Obama's comments from McConnell's office.]

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Some Arctic seals now officially listed as threatened with extinction

First came the polar bear. Now, the federal government has added two other marine mammals to the list of creatures threatened with extinction because of vanishing sea ice in a warming Arctic.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has officially listed bearded seal and the ringed seal as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

The reason is not inadequate supplies of fish and other food for these seals, or excessive hunting by humans. It's the loss of their sea ice habitat.

Ringed seals give birth and nurse their pups in snow caves built on ice floes. Warming temperatures bring less snow and more rain, causing these snow caves to collapse and leaving pups vulnerable to freezing to death.

Bearded seals, with thick whiskers that help them find crabs, clams, cod and other bottom-dwelling prey, also give birth and nurse their pups on pack ice over shallow waters near food sources.

This September, the Arctic sea ice receded to record low levels, a troubling trend for sea ice-dependent animals.

"Sea ice is projected to shrink both in extent and duration, with bearded seals finding inadequate ice even if they move North," NOAA Fisheries said in announcing that two distinct populations of bearded seals and four subspecies of ringed seals qualified as threatened with extinction.

A team of federal scientists, said Jon Kurland, protected resources director for NOAA Fisheries’ Alaska region, "concluded that a significant decrease in sea ice is probable later this century and that these changes will likely cause these seal populations to decline.”

Unlike the fight over the polar bear listing, the fate of the seals garnered little attention. NOAA's Fisheries, the agency in charge of protecting most marine mammals, finalized the listing just before Christmas. It was timed to meet a court-ordered deadline that stemmed from a petition by the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity.

It's part of the center's broader campaign to push the federal government to designate Arctic sea ice as critical habitat and then take steps to protect it. The only known way to do that is to reduce emissions of planet-warming carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses.

ken.weiss@latimes.com

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NORAD Santa trackers draw record number of phone calls, social media followers

PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. – NORAD says it drew a record number of phone calls and social media followers during its NORAD Tracks Santa operation on Christmas Eve.

The North American Aerospace Defence Command said Friday volunteers answered more than 114,000 calls, up 12,000 from 2011.

NORAD’s Santa Facebook page had more than 1.2 million followers, up from about 1 million last year. More than 129,000 people followed on Twitter, up from 101,000 last year.

NORAD got 11,000 emails, up from 7,700 in 2011.

More than 1,250 volunteers answered phone calls, including first lady Michelle Obama.

NORAD Tracks Santa began in 1955 when a newspaper listed the wrong number for children to call Santa. They wound up calling the Continental Air Defence Command, NORAD’s predecessor.

The operation is based at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo.

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FBI removes many redactions in Marilyn Monroe file

LOS ANGELES (AP) — FBI files on Marilyn Monroe that could not be located earlier this year have been found and re-issued, revealing the names of some of the movie star's communist-leaning friends who drew concern from government officials and her own entourage.

But the records, which previously had been heavily redacted, do not contain any new information about Monroe's death 50 years ago. Letters and news clippings included in the files show the bureau was aware of theories the actress had been killed, but they do not show that any effort was undertaken to investigate the claims. Los Angeles authorities concluded Monroe's death was a probable suicide.

Recently obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act, the updated FBI files do show the extent the agency was monitoring Monroe for ties to communism in the years before her death in August 1962.

The records reveal that some in Monroe's inner circle were concerned about her association with Frederick Vanderbilt Field, who was disinherited from his wealthy family over his leftist views.

A trip to Mexico earlier that year to shop for furniture brought Monroe in contact with Field, who was living in the country with his wife in self-imposed exile. Informants reported to the FBI that a "mutual infatuation" had developed between Field and Monroe, which caused concern among some in her inner circle, including her therapist, the files state.

"This situation caused considerable dismay among Miss Monroe's entourage and also among the (American Communist Group in Mexico)," the file states. It includes references to an interior decorator who worked with Monroe's analyst reporting her connection to Field to the doctor.

Field's autobiography devotes an entire chapter to Monroe's Mexico trip, "An Indian Summer Interlude." He mentions that he and his wife accompanied Monroe on shopping trips and meals and he only mentions politics once in a passage on their dinnertime conversations.

"She talked mostly about herself and some of the people who had been or still were important to her," Field wrote in "From Right to Left." ''She told us about her strong feelings for civil rights, for black equality, as well as her admiration for what was being done in China, her anger at red-baiting and McCarthyism and her hatred of (FBI director) J. Edgar Hoover."

Under Hoover's watch, the FBI kept tabs on the political and social lives of many celebrities, including Frank Sinatra, Charlie Chaplin and Monroe's ex-husband Arthur Miller. The bureau has also been involved in numerous investigations about crimes against celebrities, including threats against Elizabeth Taylor, an extortion case involving Clark Gable and more recently, trying to solve who killed rapper Notorious B.I.G.

The AP had sought the removal of redactions from Monroe's FBI files earlier this year as part of a series of stories on the 50th anniversary of Monroe's death. The FBI had reported that it had transferred the files to a National Archives facility in Maryland, but archivists said the documents had not been received. A few months after requesting details on the transfer, the FBI released an updated version of the files that eliminate dozens of redactions.

For years, the files have intrigued investigators, biographers and those who don't believe Monroe's death at her Los Angeles area home was a suicide.

A 1982 investigation by the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office found no evidence of foul play after reviewing all available investigative records, but noted that the FBI files were "heavily censored."

That characterization intrigued the man who performed Monroe's autopsy, Dr. Thomas Noguchi. While the DA investigation concluded he conducted a thorough autopsy, Noguchi has conceded that no one will likely ever know all the details of Monroe's death. The FBI files and confidential interviews conducted with the actress' friends that have never been made public might help, he wrote in his 1983 memoir "Coroner."

"On the basis of my own involvement in the case, beginning with the autopsy, I would call Monroe's suicide 'very probable,'" Noguchi wrote. "But I also believe that until the complete FBI files are made public and the notes and interviews of the suicide panel released, controversy will continue to swirl around her death."

Monroe's file begins in 1955 and mostly focuses on her travels and associations, searching for signs of leftist views and possible ties to communism. One entry, which previously had been almost completely redacted, concerned intelligence that Monroe and other entertainers sought visas to visit Russia that year.

The file continues up until the months before her death, and also includes several news stories and references to Norman Mailer's biography of the actress, which focused on questions about whether Monroe was killed by the government.

For all the focus on Monroe's closeness to suspected communists, the bureau never found any proof she was a member of the party.

"Subject's views are very positively and concisely leftist; however, if she is being actively used by the Communist Party, it is not general knowledge among those working with the movement in Los Angeles," a July 1962 entry in Monroe's file states.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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Surgery Returns to NYU Langone Medical Center

Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

Senator Charles E. Schumer spoke at a news conference Thursday about the reopening of NYU Langone Medical Center.

NYU Langone Medical Center opened its doors to surgical patients on Thursday, almost two months after Hurricane Sandy overflowed the banks of the East River and forced the evacuation of hundreds of patients.

While the medical center had been treating many outpatients, it had farmed out surgery to other hospitals, which created scheduling problems that forced many patients to have their operations on nights and weekends, when staffing is traditionally low. Some patients and doctors had to postpone not just elective but also necessary operations for lack of space at other hospitals.

The medical center’s Tisch Hospital, its major hospital for inpatient services, between 30th and 34th Streets on First Avenue, had been closed since the hurricane knocked out power and forced the evacuation of more than 300 patients, some on sleds brought down darkened flights of stairs.

“I think it’s a little bit of a miracle on 34th Street that this happened so quickly,” Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York said Thursday.

Mr. Schumer credited the medical center’s leadership and esprit de corps, and also a tour of the damaged hospital on Nov. 9 by the administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, W. Craig Fugate, whom he and others escorted through watery basement hallways.

“Every time I talk to Fugate there are a lot of questions, but one is, ‘How are you doing at NYU?’ ” the senator said.

The reopening of Tisch to surgery patients and associated services, like intensive care, some types of radiology and recovery room anesthesia, was part of a phased restoration that will continue. Besides providing an essential service, surgery is among the more lucrative of hospital services.

The hospital’s emergency department is expected to delay its reopening for about 11 months, in part to accommodate an expansion in capacity to 65,000 patient visits a year, from 43,000, said Dr. Andrew W. Brotman, its senior vice president and vice dean for clinical affairs and strategy.

In the meantime, NYU Langone is setting up an urgent care center with 31 bays and an observation unit, which will be able to treat some emergency patients. It will initially not accept ambulances, but might be able to later, Dr. Brotman said. Nearby Bellevue Hospital Center, which was also evacuated, opened its emergency department to noncritical injuries on Monday.

Labor and delivery, the cancer floor, epilepsy treatment and pediatrics and neurology beyond surgery are expected to open in mid-January, Langone officials said. While some radiology equipment, which was in the basement, has been restored, other equipment — including a Gamma Knife, a device using radiation to treat brain tumors — is not back.

The flooded basement is still being worked on, and electrical gear has temporarily been moved upstairs. Mr. Schumer, a Democrat, said that a $60 billion bill to pay for hurricane losses and recovery in New York and New Jersey was nearing a vote, and that he was optimistic it would pass in the Senate with bipartisan support. But the measure’s fate in the Republican-controlled House is far less certain.

The bill includes $1.2 billion for damage and lost revenue at NYU Langone, including some money from the National Institutes of Health to restore research projects. It would also cover Long Beach Medical Center in Nassau County, Bellevue, Coney Island Hospital and the Veterans Affairs hospital in Manhattan.

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Stocks tumble as `fiscal cliff' deadline nears

Stocks fell for a fifth day on concern that Washington lawmakers will fail to reach a budget deal before a self-imposed year-end deadline.

The five-day losing streak for the Dow Jones industrial average was the longest since July.

The Dow dropped 158.20 points to 12,938.11 points, with losses accelerating in the last 20 minutes of trading as reports circulated that President Barack Obama would not be making a new budget proposal in a meeting with congressional leaders.

The Standard & Poor 500 index fell 15.67 points to 1,402.43, its longest losing streak in three months, and the Nasdaq dropped 25.59 points to 2,960.31.

“The reality, late in the day, is that a deal is just not going to get done,” said Ryan Detrick, a senior technical strategist at Schaeffer Investment Research. “We could be greeted by a big sell-off at the start of January.”

President Barack Obama returned from a Christmas break in Hawaii to meet with congressional leaders at the White House to try thrash out the terms of a deal that would prevent across-the-board tax increases for millions of Americans as well as simultaneous government spending cuts beginning Jan. 1. Those measures, if implemented, could push the economy back into recession, economists say.

Stocks closed lower Thursday but erased most of an early loss after Republicans said they would reconvene the House of Representatives Sunday in hopes of piecing together a last-minute budget deal.

Traders have been focusing on Washington, and the budget negotiations, since the Nov. 6 presidential election returned a divided government to power.

“I can't wait till this is done, so we can start talking about markets again and not just about politics,” said Doug Cote, chief market strategist at ING Investment Management. Cote doesn't expect lawmakers will manage to reach a deal before the deadline and says that when people assess the extent of tax increases on the way, “the market is going reel.”

Cote also expects slowing earnings growth to hit stocks.

Despite the fiscal gridlock in Washington, major stock indexes are holding on to gains for the year. The Dow is up 5.9 percent, the S&P 500 index is 11.5 percent higher and the Nasdaq is up 13.6 percent.

Stocks rose in 2012 on optimism that a housing market recovery, coupled with an improving job market, will support economic growth. The Federal Reserve has also extended its bond purchasing program, which is intended to lower borrowing costs and encourage spending and investment.

Stocks declined despite reports that suggested the outlook for the economy is improving.

A measure of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes increased last month to its highest level in two and a half years, the latest sign of improvement in the once-battered housing market. The National Association of Realtors said Friday that its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index rose to its highest since April 2010.

The Institute of Supply Management's Chicago-area purchasing managers index for December came in at 51.6, beating estimates for a gain to 51.

Bond prices rose as investors moved money into defensive investments. The yield on the benchmark rise 10-year Treasury note, which falls when bond prices rise, dropped to 1.70 percent from 1.75 percent late Thursday.

Among stocks making moves:

Hewlett-Packard fell 36 cents, or 2.6 percent, to $13.68 after the computer and printer maker said the Department of Justice is investigating H-P's business software unit Autonomy. H-P bought Autonomy for $10 billion in 2011 and has accused the company's former management of fudging its accounting before the acquisition. H-P has lost almost half its market value this year, making it the biggest decliner among the 30 stocks in the Dow average.

Barnes and Noble rose 62 cents, or 4.3 percent, to $14.97 after the U.K. publishing and education company Pearson said it is making an $89.5 million investment in the company's Nook Media division, as the two companies look to make a bigger digital push into the education sector.

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USC football: Matt Barkley will not play in Sun Bowl

Matt Barkley winces in pain after being sacked during USC's loss to UCLA. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times / December 27, 2012)

By Gary Klein

December 27, 2012, 11:25 a.m.

Lane Kiffin finally made it official Thursday, announcing USC quarterback Matt Barkley will not play in the Sun Bowl.

Redshirt freshman Max Wittek will start for the Trojans on Monday against Georgia Tech.

Barkley suffered a shoulder sprain on Nov. 17 against UCLA and has not practiced since, but Kiffin had said the senior would be evaluated once the Trojans arrived in El Paso, Texas. Barkley did not practice Wednesday or Thursday, except to perform some conditioning drills.

“Matt really wanted to play in the game and he was very close to being able to play and unfortunately for him our doctors have decided against it,” Kiffin said. “It’s nothing long term....  We ran out of time.”

 TIMELINE: College football 2012-13 bowl schedule

Barkley passed for 36 touchdowns, with 15 interceptions, in 11 games this season.

"I've worked as hard as I could to get back for this game and nature's not allowing it and doctor's aren't allowing it, which is the most important thing--they're looking out for my best interest," Barkley said. "I trust their judgment."

Barkley finishes his career with 64.1% completion percentage and 12,327 passing yards. Barkley passed for a Pac-12 Conference record 116 touchdowns, with 48  interceptions.

This will be the second start for Wittek, who played in the Trojans’ loss to Notre Dame in the regular-season finale.

ALSO:

David Beckham has plenty of options next year

Tim Tebow snubbed again; Mark Sanchez to start Sunday for Jets

Mayors of Stanford, Wisconsin hometowns announce Rose Bowl wager

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iOS apps see Christmas sales spike shrink in 2012

Distimo just released its statistics on Christmas Day app downloads and revenue growth… and the download spike is far smaller than it was last year. Back in 2011, Christmas Day iOS app download volume spiked 230% above the December average. This year, the increase was just 87% — far below industry expectations. The revenue spike came in at 70%.

[More from BGR: Google names 12 best Android apps of 2012]

Interestingly, iPad downloads increased by 140% this Christmas, implying that the iPhone download bounce was really modest.

[More from BGR: New purported BlackBerry Z10 specs emerge: 1.5GHz processor, 2GB RAM, 8MP camera]

A few weeks ago, AppAnnie released statistics showing that iOS app revenue growth had stalled over the summer of 2012, whereas Android app revenue growth was relatively strong at 48% over a five month period. Both Distimo and Appannie are respected companies and their analytics are closely followed by app industry professionals. Could it be that the pace of iPhone app revenue growth has slowed down sharply from 2011 levels, even if Distimo and AppAnnie numbers aren’t entirely accurate?

This article was originally published by BGR

Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Title Post: iOS apps see Christmas sales spike shrink in 2012
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