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Bernie Schupbach needed to sell his home in the height of the real estate crash.

His home in Yorkville, Ill., was unoccupied. It had lingered on the market for a long time — and Schupbach, a radiologist in Aurora, Ill., was growing uncomfortable.

"To me, you worry about a pipe breaking in winter. You worry about the heat going out. You worry about vandals. You worry about animal infestation," he says. "My big concern was: There's nobody there, I'm 30 miles away."

Then somebody mentioned Showhomes to Schupbach and his wife, Lynn.

Showhomes is a home-staging company that helps people sells their homes. Its employees make minor suggestions like changing a paint color or fixing up a front door, but also de-clutter and depersonalize a home.

And nothing depersonalizes a home more than having another person, couple or family living in it — meet Showhomes' unique Home Managers program.

Home managers are actively recruited — and vetted — by the staging company, through avenues like real estate agents and Craigslist. Showhomes gets paid by both the homeowner and the home manager.

The home manager pays a fee that's one-third to half of what traditional rent in a specific market might be plus utilities, says Matt Kelton, chief operating officer of Showhomes.

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Updated at 2:55 p.m. ET.

Moscow has issued a quid pro quo for sanctions imposed on it by Washington, banning a U.S. congressman and 12 other Americans from entering Russia.

NPR's Hansi Lo Wang reports that the Foreign Ministry in Moscow says the new blacklist is in response to U.S. visa restrictions on Russian citizens in the wake of Moscow's annexation of Crimea and its continuing support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Virginia Democrat Rep. Jim Moran, who announced in January that he would retire at the end of the year, is on the list. Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said Moran had been repeatedly accused of financial misdeeds but did not elaborate, according to The Associated Press.

In a statement, Moran said he has no plans to travel to Russia and speculated that his name was "due to my amendment banning the US purchase of helicopters from Rosoboronexport, the Russian state arms dealer and principal supplier to the Assad regime in Syria."

Twelve other U.S. citizens connected with either the Guantanamo Bay detention center or the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq are on Russia's visa blacklist.

The U.S. Treasury Department announced similar bans against a Russian lawmaker earlier this month.

Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte is expressing shock and anger over the chaotic scene at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines MH17, where nearly 200 Dutch citizens were killed, saying Russia has "one last chance" to use its influence with Ukrainian rebels to provide access to the scene.

Reuters quotes Rutte as saying he had a "very intense" conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"I was shocked at the pictures of utterly disrespectful behavior at this tragic spot," he said, referring to allegations that bodies of the passengers, including 193 of his countrymen, were being dragged about and allowed to rot at the scene, Reuters says.

"He has one last chance to show he means to help," Rutte said after the two leaders' chat.

The Dutch premier said the leaders of Germany, Britain and Australia – all of whom had citizens who were killed when the plane crashed in eastern Ukraine — shared his view.

Meanwhile, Rutte and Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron also discussed the matter over the phone on Saturday afternoon, according to a statement from the British prime minister's office.

"The PM and PM Rutte agreed that the EU will need to reconsider its approach to Russia in light of evidence that pro-Russian separatists brought down the plane," it said.

Goats and Soda

No School, No Handshakes: Reporting On Ebola From Sierra Leone

In February, Ethiopian-born singer Meklit Hadero was flying home from Uganda to the U.S. when her plane had to land unexpectedly near the Arctic Circle. It was so cold that to keep her fingers warm she put on oven mitts (decorated with an African print) that she'd bought to bring home.

A fellow passenger introduced himself: Leelai Demoz, he's Ethiopian, too. He'd just finished co-producing Difret, a movie based on the true story of a 14-year-old Ethiopian girl abducted by a man who wanted to marry her; the girl shot him and was tried for murder.

Hadero and Demoz hung out, hoped to see the Northern Lights (no luck, it was foggy). By coincidence, a few weeks later, Hadero got a call from Lincoln Center to see if she'd sing at a screening of Difret.

So it's a small world for global artists.

And that's especially true for African musicians who've come to the West. They can get together and mix it up in diaspora more readily than on the continent, says Hadero, who left Ethiopia as a toddler in 1981 and now lives in the Bay Area. "There are 437 million people in the Nile Basin. There are all sorts of political tensions around how we share water," she says. "There are barriers to getting to know each other. There's not a lot of access."

Her solution was to co-found the Nile Project, along with Egyptian ethnomusicologist Mina Girgis. They invite musicians from the 10 countries along the Nile River to play together and record an album. She was returning from a three-weeks session in Kampala, Uganda, when she had her Arctic detour.

Back home, Hadero talked about her music, how the Nile Project has changed it — and what it's like to be compared to Joni Mitchell. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Did you contribute any songs to the movie?

No, but I wrote a song for the [concert]. It doesn't have a name yet. It's about the strength and resilience of women and what happens when a personal story becomes a way for a whole country to move forward around a particular issue. The story of the film is how [this practice of abducting a bride] became illegal.

Your new album, We Are Alive, draws from Ethiopia as well — you sing "Kemeken," an Ethiopian folk song.

This post updated at 10:15 a.m. ET.

A Ukrainian government spokesman says one of its warplanes was shot down in the country's east by a Russian air force jet, as the U.S. and Europe stepped up sanctions on Moscow over its support of separatist rebels.

Ukraine says a ground-attack Su-25 was downed by an air-to-air missile Wednesday evening over the eastern region of Luhansk. The pilot reportedly safely ejected before the plane crashed. Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the United Nations, denied that his country was responsible for the downed plane.

Reuters notes that Kiev's comment on the incident is "the strongest Ukrainian allegation to date of direct Russian military involvement in the conflict."

Separately, another Ukrainian Su-25 was hit by a rebel missile, but suffered only slight damage and landed safely, according to Ukrainian officials.

In another incident last week, Ukraine said one of its AN-26 transports was shot down by a ground or air-launched missile fired from Russia. Two of the eight crew members were killed.

According to the BBC:

"[Pro-Kiev] activists have pointed to videos which appear to show Grad multiple rocket launchers being fired from Russian soil in the direction of Ukraine.

"Nato says that Russian troop numbers on the border have increased again to about 12,000."

Australia became the first country in the world to repeal a carbon tax on the nation's worst greenhouse gas polluters, as Prime Minister Tony Abbott made good on a campaign promise to get rid of the unpopular law.

The Senate voted 39 to 32 to eliminate the tax enacted by the previous center-left government two years ago. The law imposed the equivalent of a $22.60 tax per metric ton of carbon dioxide emissions on about 350 of the nation's worst polluters.

"Today, the tax that you voted to get rid of is finally gone: a useless, destructive tax which damaged jobs, which hurt families' cost of living and which didn't actually help the environment," Abbott told reporters in Canberra.

Abbott's government came to power on a promise to eliminate the tax, "assuring voters that removing it would reduce household electricity bills. He plans to replace the measure with a taxpayer-financed AU$2.55 billion fund to pay industry incentives to use cleaner energy," according to The Associated Press.

However, Abbott and Environment Minister Greg Hunt have repeatedly refused to rule out a price on carbon in the future.

The Sydney Morning Herald says:

"Mr Abbott said he did not accept that with the carbon price now abolished, and legislation needed for Direct Action yet to pass the Senate, his government was leaving Australia without a mechanism to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

"'We are a government which absolutely appreciates that we have only got one planet and we should pass it on to our children and grandchildren in at least as good shape as we found it,' he said.

"'So we are a conservationist government and we will do what we think is the sensible thing to try to bring emissions down.'"

The menus of millennia past can be tough to crack, especially when it comes to fruits and vegetables. For archaeologists studying a prehistoric site in Sudan, dental plaque provided a hint.

"When you eat, you get this kind of film of dental plaque over your teeth," says Karen Hardy, an archaeologist with the Catalan Institute for Research and Advanced Studies at the Universitat Autnoma de Barcelona.

"If you don't clean it off, it mixes up with bits of food and it gets stuck in this area below the gum," she says. "It can calcify within about two weeks, and once it's calcified it's very hard."

That plaque is so hard that it lasts thousands of years. And since Prehistoric folk were not known for their flossing habits, the plaque that survived them can serve as a kind of scrapbook for what they ate and breathed.

Hardy and her colleagues were studying skeletons from Al Khiday in Central Sudan, a burial site that was used between around 2,000 and 9,000 years ago, since before the advent of farming in the area.

Using a few isotope and chemical analysis techniques, Hardy says they found "all sorts of different things" in the teeth of 19 individuals, things like sand, dirt, pollen, plant fibers — even evidence of carbon, from breathing smoke from a fire.

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Here's an experience many of us have had: You're shopping on your smartphone. You go click on the shoes or books you want. But then, when you get to the shopping cart, you abandon ship. Visa says that's a big problem for retailers. On Wednesday, the credit card company announced it's rolling out a brand new system designed to get us to spend more money online.

One Password, Many Tokens

Visa is actually trying to fix two problems with one swipe.

First, shopping on your smartphone is great — until it gets tedious and you have to use your big thumbs to type lots of digits.

"All of the wonderful benefits that consumers get from using their mobile phone when you're out and about kind of fall apart when you get to the payment part of the process," says Jim McCarthy, Visa global head of product.

The new Visa Checkout should make it "really easy" for consumers, he says. Every Visa customer gets an account that stores their credit card number and billing address. And retailers connect with Visa to accept that account.

So when you're out and about in the digital mall, McCarthy says, "you'll just provide a username and password, and all that information will be provided securely on your behalf to the merchant for checkout." The first retailers to join the new system include Neiman Marcus and United Airlines.

Behind the scenes, there's a big security upgrade.

Visa, MasterCard and American Express all worked together on a new technology called tokenization. Under it, the 16 digits of your credit card stop running out in the wild, and stay inside the card company's server walls. The retailer just gets a randomly generated 16-digit token that can't be used anywhere else.

So if hackers break into, say, Target, the tokens they steal are no good at Amazon or Pizza Hut. "What we're trying to do is make the whole experience of someone trying to steal cards less profitable," McCarthy says.

Type Less, Spend More

Companies that sell products online — from the big box retailers to the mom-and-pop startups — have all been puzzling over how to get customers to not abandon the shopping cart.

Jamie Viggiano, head of marketing at TaskRabbit.com, says the new Visa Checkout could give a boost to online shopping. When you exchange cash or hand over a credit card, it feels like a financial transaction. A login and password don't.

The Two-Way

MasterCard, Visa Team Up To Improve Payment Security

Shots - Health News

So You Found An Exchange Plan. But Can You Find A Provider?

At least a dozen people were killed as the Philippines was battered by its first typhoon of the season on Wednesday. Since the storm passed through major population centers, officials were relieved that the death toll wasn't higher.

The storm, known as Rammasun but called Glenda locally, sideswiped Manila but knocked out power there and across Luzon, the most populous island of the archipelago.

"I am happily surprised because of the minimal casualties and damage," Public Works and Highway Secretary Rogelio Singson told Reuters, noting that 17 million people lived in the typhoon's path.

Singson said that the government was better prepared after the devastation caused by Haiyan, the "super typhoon" that killed more than 6,000 people and left more than 1,000 missing last November.

"It was like a drill," Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada told The Associated Press. "We hauled people away from dangerous seaside areas, whether they liked it or not."

More than 370,000 people had been evacuated before the typhoon made landfall, mostly in the eastern province of Albay.

The wind toppled utility poles and ripped roofs off houses. More than half of Luzon is without power, according to the BBC.

The typhoon, which had gusts of up to 115 mph, weakened before blowing out of the country, heading toward China's Hainan Island and Vietnam. It could regain strength while crossing the South China Sea.

The Australian Broadcasting Corp. has published a gallery of photos and videos tweeted by eyewitnesses.

A court in the Netherlands ruled today that the country's government was partly liable for the deaths of 300 Bosnian Muslims whom Dutch peacekeepers failed to protect in Srebrenica in 1995.

But The Associated Press notes that the court decision clears the government of liability in the deaths of the others who were killed in Srebrenica.

The AP added: "Relatives of the dead welcomed the limited finding of liability, but lamented that it did not go much further."

The court did not specify how much compensation the families of the 300 victims should receive.

Teri Schultz tells our Newscast unit that the decision could have a far-ranging impact on countries' willingness to serve in U.N. missions. She reports:

"The court says Dutch peacekeepers should have known they were sending hundreds of Bosnian Muslims to their deaths when they kicked them out of the U.N.-declared safe haven near Srebrenica during the Bosnian civil war. The Dutch soldiers handed the Bosnian Muslims over to the Bosnian Serb army, telling them they'd be 'safe.' Instead, most of the men in the group became some of the 8,000 victims in the Srebrenica genocide, the worst massacre in Europe since World War II. The court says the Dutch government is partially responsible for the deaths and liable to pay compensation."

Pakistani award-winning author Jamil Ahmad has died at the age of 83. Steve Inskeep revisits an interview with the author of "The Wandering Falcon" — who published his debut novel at the age of 79.

A most unusual regatta recently took place off Tuscany's southern coast: Vintage sailboats known as the Grandes Dames of the Sea — some more than 100 years old — plied the waters of Porto Santo Stefano, a fishing village known for ideal sailing conditions

Among the more than 40 yachts was one, Manitou, that was known as "the floating White House" when her owner was President John F. Kennedy.

The boat is made of mahogany — a 62-foot boat that weighs 30 tons, skipper Alex Tillery says proudly. In contrast, he says, a modern 62-footer would probably weigh 8 tons.

Manitou, designed by the legendary American yacht designer Olin Stephens, first launched in 1937. Sailing such vintage boats, says Tillery, requires different skills than sailing those built today.

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The Tea Party-aligned groups that pushed the strategy that led to last fall's government shutdown are back, this time urging a "no" vote on the short-term extension to the federal highway funding program.

FreedomWorks, Heritage Action, and the Club for Growth have all announced they intend to use the vote when grading lawmakers.

Call it the latest round in the Republican's Party's battle between its establishment and Tea Party wings. And as has often been the case in recent months, on Tuesday afternoon, the establishment prevailed.

The House passed a 10-month replenishment of the Highway Trust Fund on a 367-55 vote. That included 181 of the 226 Republicans voting.

House Speaker John Boehner called it a "solid piece of legislation."

"These are difficult decisions in difficult times, in an election year. But it's important we find a solution," Boehner said.

The bill transfers $11 billion to the fund, which is weeks away from dropping to zero. Some of that money comes from extending customs fees for another year. Some comes from a fund for cleaning up leaky underground storage tanks. But more than half comes from an accounting maneuver called "pension smoothing," which essentially increases tax collections in the near term but decreases revenue from corporate income taxes in later years.

The outside groups and other critics called those transfers "a bailout," and urged lawmakers to oppose the plan.

"The costly 2012 transportation bill spent so much taxpayer money that it exhausted the Highway Trust Fund," Heritage Action's Michael Needham wrote in a fundraising e-mail a few hours before the vote. "And now liberals want new deficit spending to bail out their program. And unfortunately, they might get their way."

Those pleas, though, got little attention in the House and are likely to get even less attention in the Democratically controlled Senate. Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden is also using pension smoothing, though not to the same extent, in his version of the bill.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has warned the states that, absent congressional action, they would start getting reduced reimbursement checks by mid-August for their highway construction projects.

Florida once had 150 cigar factories but now there's just one left. The J.C. Newman company worries that new FDA rules on cigars may put it out of business. Now, it's enlisting the help of elected officials in Florida.

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And we didn't have the technology that we do now with emails and immediate news. I had Christiane Amanpour, who I just hung onto her every word on CNN back then — that was all I knew. And [I had] the few letters that I got from [my husband]. So, to me, that was truly a deployment.

After that, he went to Macedonia, he went to Bosnia, he went to Kosovo, and those were each six months. Then he did two about a half-a-year deployments in Afghanistan, then a 15-month deployment to Iraq, then a year in Afghanistan.

On her ROTC basic training at Fort Knox and realizing why she didn't want to be a soldier

It was the rules and the structure. I [always] wanted to know why.

Every time they told me to do something, I just really wanted to say: "That's really stupid. Who cares if there are water droplets in the water fountain?" That was my job in the barracks was to make sure there were no water droplets in ... the drinking fountain. I thought that was really dumb. It did not work for me at that kind of a level.

I think that when you're a soldier, you definitely fit this sort of mold where you can take orders and you don't need to know why — you just do what you're told.

On her husband's last deployment to Afghanistan

This last deployment, our oldest son, Jack ... he was in sixth grade, so he was just getting to the point where he really missed his dad. And he was angry that his dad was gone because he knew that his dad had volunteered for that last year in Afghanistan, and that he didn't have to go. It's a really weird mix of pride and also some anger, too ... definitely a feeling of being a second priority.

On the emotional difficulty of saying goodbye

The "black soul" is the numbness that you reach a point after the first few deployments — it just rips your gut out when you say goodbye. And you're just left in this puddle of tears and emotional and weepy for days. That can only happen so many times. Just like they say you can really only have your heart broken once. ...

I've become kind of stoic in general. People cry at movies, and I look at them and say, "Really? You're really crying at this movie?" Because I just feel very unfazed by a lot of things that should faze me.

On getting over the resentment of parenting alone

I was resentful, and that's where counseling came in for us. That's where our therapist really showed us that he had a right to feel the way that he felt, and I definitely had a right to feel the way I felt, but that we had to move on from that. Especially now that he's transitioned away from the infantry and likely will not go back to that, he just really appreciates every moment with our kids a lot more [than] what I've seen [in] regular families — dads who haven't been gone the way he has, they sort of take the time with their kids a little more for granted, I guess. ...

He really does a great job at making up for what he's missed. That takes away a lot of the resentment for me. Every now and then, though, it's hard for me to say "our children." It does much more easily come to me to say "my daughter, my son, my whatever." If he's there, he'll correct me and say "our daughter, our son."

Read an excerpt of No Man's War

Code Switch

Immigrants Are Sending More Money Back To Less Poor Countries

OAKLAND, Maine (AP) — Police in the Maine town of Oakland are looking for a pig that threatened two children walking through the woods.

Capt. Rick Stubbert tells the Morning Sentinel (http://bit.ly/1w4FF9U ) that the children were walking along a trail in the wooded area between the local middle school and the high school at about 1:45 p.m. Tuesday when the pig confronted them "screaming at the kids and chasing them."

The children were so frightened they flagged down a police officer. Police did not disclose the children's age.

Officers, including animal control, responded to the scene, and although they found tracks that confirmed the pig was real, they didn't find the animal.

Stubbert says he doesn't know where the pig came from or why it might have been acting aggressively.

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Information from: Morning Sentinel, http://www.onlinesentinel.com/

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Before Emmy nominations were announced Thursday, the president of the television academy declared that "quality television is now platform-agnostic," with awards-worthy content distributed by broadcast, cable and Internet outlets.

TV's top talents — the stars and producers nominated this year — say they prefer shows large and on-demand. Most rely on digital video recorders to track their favorite programs, and avoid watching on tablets and smartphones.

"I have a big-screen TV," said Kate Mulgrew, nominated for her role as Red on "Orange Is the New Black." "That's how I always prefer to watch television."

"I'm a DVR person most of the time," said Anna Chlumsky, who was nominated for her supporting role on "Veep." "It's funny, because of 'Veep' and because of 'Game of Thrones,' Sunday night is still HBO appointment TV for me. If we can get home on time for it, then I watch it at home at the prescribed time."

Matt LeBlanc, nominated for his starring role in Showtime's "Episodes," uses his DVR, but still likes channel surfing.

Billy Bob Thornton, who describes himself as "kind of a TV junkie," likes DVDs and the DVR, but he watched his own show, FX's "Fargo" on its regular night.

"I watched it as an audience member. I just watched it every Tuesday night," he said. "I didn't get the DVDs ahead of time from the studio or whatever. When it was over, I was a little sad. What am I gonna do next Tuesday night?"

"So You Think You Can Dance" host Cat Deeley admits to occasional binge-viewing.

"I'll buy an entire series and I'll have a weekend where I don't get out of my pajamas, I barely brush my teeth, and I just do back to back (episodes) and sit there wallowing in my own filth," she said. The last series she indulged in this way? "Breaking Bad."

Allison Tolman, nominated for her supporting role in "Fargo," said, "I hardly ever watch anything in real time anymore."

"I watch a lot of things that night but a little bit after they've aired," she said. "I also am quite a binge-watcher... I just started 'Game of Thrones' since I hadn't seen it yet, so now I'm watching one episode after the other on demand."

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AP Entertainment Writer Derrik J. Lang contributed to this report.

LOWELL, Mass. (AP) — Seven people died in a fast-moving Massachusetts apartment fire in the pre-dawn hours Thursday, officials said.

All seven victims were found in units on the top floor of the three-story building that had businesses on the ground floor and apartments on the upper floors, fire officials said.

"It's a tragic day for the city of Lowell," Mayor Rodney Elliott said.

A police officer on routine patrol was the first to report the fire just before 4 a.m., while several tenants ran about 100 yards down the street to the nearest fire station to sound the alarm, Fire Chief Edward Pitta said. But the building was fully involved by the time firefighters arrived. The fire eventually went to three alarms.

The victims' names were not immediately made public.

The cause and origin of the blaze remain under investigation, State Fire Marshal Stephen Coan said.

The building did not have a sprinkler system, but was not required to, Pitta said. It did have an alarm system, and whether that was working will be part of the investigation.

Authorities say 48 people lived in the building, which sustained heavy damage. The roof was entirely burned away, while the outer walls were charred and the siding melted.

Several people had to be rescued from upper floors and taken to the hospital. The exact number was not known.

Witnesses said tenants were jumping out of windows.

Neighbor Sarin Chun said she awoke to screams and saw someone hand a child out a window to another person on the street.

The Red Cross is assisting displaced tenants and the city is accepting donations of clothing and other essentials, Elliott said. A relief fund has been set up at the Jeanne D'Arc Credit Union in the city.

Lowell is a city of more than 100,000 residents located about 25 miles northwest of Boston.

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No, the United States military isn't trying to build a force of centenarians.

It just seems that way after the Selective Service System mistakenly sent notices to more than 14,000 Pennsylvania men born between 1893 and 1897, ordering them to register for the nation's military draft. The agency realized the error when it began receiving calls from bewildered families last week.

Selective Service spokesman Pat Schuback tells The Associated Press that the error originated with the Pennsylvania Department of Motor Vehicles, which sent the federal agency a batch of records of males born between 1993 and 1997 mixed with the records of men born a century earlier.

Schuback says that families who received the notices in error can simply ignore them.

Child actors are invariably distinguished by being cute as a button, being naturals at acting and having an aggressive parent. Few of them can sustain their stardom as they grow up. Athletic prodigies, however, often continue succeeding smoothly into adulthood — look no further than LeBron James or Bryce Harper.

The Edge

Skater Sonja Henie 'Put A Dollar Sign' Behind The Gold

Why is it that Europeans don't pay as much attention to time in sports as we do?

You American novices to soccer, who climbed on the World Cup bandwagon this summer –– you must have been completely baffled by how soccer has a thing called "stoppage time." That means that the game goes on after regulation time is up for an undisclosed period that only the referee knows.

Or, if you've been following Wimbledon, you know that in the final fifth set for men or the deciding third set for women, the tie-break doesn't apply as it does in the United States. The match is forced to drag on eternally — even, if you recall John Isnur and Nicolas Mahut four years ago, for 11 awful hours to a score of 70 games to 68. Even Camille died faster than it took to play that dreadful set.

Cricket you don't have to know much about, except they actually break for tea.

Americans, on the other hand, only dilly-dally for crucial, life-affirming reasons: to allow commercials. The American way of life. We Yanks are crass-conscious.

Thus, especially in basketball, the last few minutes of most games are interminable, as everybody calls time out and shoots fouls, allowing for commercials that you can't avoid because the game is on the line. Football is almost as bad.

But say this for both basketball and football: they have time clocks. You can't just kick the ball back and around. You gotta shoot in 24 seconds. You gotta get a play off in 25. That's the American way. That's what Henry Ford taught us on the assembly line. Move it!

Click on the audio link above to hear Deford's conclusion on the issue, including, in honor of the World Cup, the extra point he gets to make during stoppage time.

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks fell Thursday as worries about the soundness of a European bank spooked U.S. investors, prompting them to sell off stocks and snap up less risky assets like gold and governments bonds.

Fears emerged overnight about the financial stability of Espirito Santo International, a holding company that is the largest shareholder in a group of firms, including the parent of Portugal's largest bank, Banco Espirito Santo.

Espirito Santo International reportedly missed a debt payment this week and was cited for accounting irregularities — issues that sparked Europe's debt crisis four years ago. The bank troubles had traders and investors talking about another European debt crisis.

Thursday's stock sell-off started in Europe, and spread to the U.S, where the Dow Jones industrial average plunged as much as 180 points in the first half hour of trading.

But anxiety in the U.S. quickly subsided and the market steadily clawed back for the rest of the day. While stocks never fully bounced back, the decline in the Dow was roughly half of what it was at the beginning of Thursday's session.

"Today's news did reignite some of those contagion fears," said Ryan Larson, head of equity trading for RBC Global Asset Management.

Portugal is one of the smaller eurozone economies and, like Greece and Ireland, needed an international rescue in 2011 during the continent's debt crisis. A three-year economic recovery program was supposed to straighten out its finances.

That debt crisis in Europe was largely responsible for the U.S. stock market's last decline of 10 percent or more, known as a "correction" in Wall Street parlance. Investors back then worried that the crisis would spread to the U.S., which was starting to recover from its own financial trauma.

On Thursday, the Dow ended down 70.54 points, or 0.4 percent, to 16,915.07. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 8.15 points, or 0.4 percent, to 1,964.88 and the Nasdaq composite fell 22.83 points, or 0.5 percent, to 4,396.20.

Traders and market strategists pointed to a couple of reasons why stocks didn't continue falling in the U.S.

First, it has been a relatively quiet week for Wall Street, with little economic data and only a couple companies reporting their quarterly results, so any negative news was likely to "be met with overreaction," Larson said.

"After participants had time to step back and assess, many realized the U.S. is in a relatively good spot compared with (Europe)," he said.

Second, even with the U.S. market trading near all-time highs, many investors are sitting on large amounts of cash that haven't been put into the market. Any noticeable fall in stock prices would likely be met by investors willing to step in.

"Generally, people are willing to put money into this market when the opportunity presents itself," said Erik Davidson, deputy chief investment officer of Wells Fargo Private Bank, which manages $170 billion in assets.

Investors did seek out some protection Thursday. Bond prices and gold rose as investors moved money into the traditional havens. The yield on the U.S. 10-year note fell to 2.54 percent from 2.55 percent late Wednesday. Gold rose $12, or 1 percent, to $1,336.30 an ounce.

In stocks, investors moved money into utility and telecommunication stocks, also common areas to invest when uncertainty emerges. Utility and telecom companies typically pay a higher-than-average dividend, which makes them attractive when investors don't expect stock prices to go higher.

The Dow Jones utility index, a collection of 15 utility companies, rose 0.6 percent — the only major index to rise Thursday. Telecommunication stocks rose an average of 0.8 percent.

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Economists regularly issue reports calling inflation tame or mild, or some other word that suggests consumers shouldn't be feeling much pain.

One example: "Inflation has been tame and this is providing households with some relief" from economic stress, according to an assessment done this week by PNC Financial Services.

But if you happen to be buying gasoline or groceries, you may not be feeling relieved — at all.

"It's kind of hard to even buy milk and bread," said Kimberly Acevedo, a bank teller who was shopping at a Best Market in Harlem. To search for lower prices, "you could find yourself going to four supermarkets ... one for meat, one for fresh fruit, and one for other things."

The gap between what economists say and what you feel at the register can seem so wide. Here's why:

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics measures inflation by studying the retail price of thousands of goods, compiling the data into the consumer price index. For the past year, the CPI is up 2.1 percent.

"That is below the historical average," BLS economist Jonathan Church said. "Since 1913, the CPI has increased at an average annual rate of 3.2 percent."

So if you were to look only at the CPI, then you would conclude that inflation is low and consumers should be feeling pretty good at the checkout.

Economy

Hiring Looks Good Now, But Wage Growth Lags

BERLIN (AP) — Germany's foreign minister said Friday he will tell U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at a meeting this weekend that Berlin wants to reinvigorate the two countries' friendship "on an honest basis" after asking Washington's top spy to leave.

Thursday's decision to demand the departure of the intelligence representative at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin was "the right decision, a necessary step and an appropriate reaction to the breach of trust that has taken place," Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters in Berlin.

It followed reports over the past 10 days that U.S. intelligence had recruited two Germans — a man who worked at the country's foreign intelligence agency and a defense ministry employee. Steinmeier said those reports were "troubling."

They added to friction and frustration over reports last year that the U.S. was intercepting Internet traffic in Germany and eavesdropping on Chancellor Angela Merkel's cellphone calls

Steinmeier said he will meet Kerry on the sidelines of talks in Vienna about Iran's nuclear program. The U.S. State Department confirmed that a bilateral meeting would take place.

There is "no alternative" to Germany's longstanding partnership with the United States in view of challenges in Ukraine, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere, Steinmeier stressed. "That is why this cooperation must be marked not just by trust but by mutual respect."

"We want to reinvigorate our partnership, our friendship on an honest basis — we in any case are prepared to do that," he said. "And that will be the message I will give to my American colleague."

Government spokesman Steffen said Germany expects the unidentified American spy to leave the country "promptly."

NPR's Jason Beaubien is in Sierra Leone, covering the Ebola outbreak that began in March in Guinea and has spread to neighboring countries. We'll be speaking with him throughout the week about what he's seeing on the ground. Today he's in Kailahun, the largest town in the country's Eastern Province, with a population of about 18,000, and the epicenter of Sierra Leone's outbreak; in the past week, Doctors without Borders staff in Kailahun have treated more than 70 patients with Ebola-like symptoms. When we called, Beaubien was with a team driving to the treatment center to pick up the body of a 70-year-old woman who died of Ebola. Burial was scheduled for this afternoon.

What will happen at the burial?

The ministry of health is handing over body management to the Red Cross. This is one of the first bodies they're going out to do, so there's a whole bunch of people [who will be at the burial], it may turn into a bit of a mob scene. And there's a lot of anger in the community, there's a potential that family members might not be happy that such a large group of people are showing up at the burial.

What's fueling that anger?

There's been a lot of frustration and lack of understanding among the community about the need to not touch the body. Traditional burial would include washing the body by hand. So there's been some tension when the health teams come in telling people they're not allowed to touch the body, and that the body has to be zipped up in a body bag and disposed of by people in Hazmat suits.

Goats and Soda

Ebola 101: The Facts Behind A Frightening Virus

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CASTLETON, Va. (AP) — Conductor Lorin Maazel, whose prodigious career included seven years at the helm of the New York Philharmonic, died Sunday at his home in northern Virginia. He was 84.

Maazel died at Castleton Farms from complications following pneumonia, according to a statement by The Castleton Festival, an annual festival that Maazel founded with his wife in 2009. Maazel was rehearsing and preparing for the festival at the time of his death. The death was also announced on Maazel's official website.

Known for his relentless energy and passion for precision, Maazel led nearly 200 orchestras in at least 7,000 opera and concert performances during 72 years at the podium, according to a biography posted on his website.

Maazel, an American born in Paris in 1930, took his first violin lesson at age 5. A dazzling prodigy, he was 7 when he was invited by Arturo Toscanini to conduct the NBC Symphony. His New York Philharmonic debut came five years later, in 1942. By age 15, he had conducted most of the major American orchestras. At 16, he entered the University of Pittsburgh to study language, mathematics and philosophy and played the violin with the Pittsburgh Symphony to help pay tuition.

In 1960, at age 30, he became the first American to conduct at the Bayreuth Festival in Germany. He served as artistic director and chief conductor of the Deutsche Oper Berlin for five years starting in 1965.

He was music director of the Cleveland Orchestra from 1972 to 1982. He then served briefly as general manager, artistic director and principal conductor of the Vienna State Opera, the first American to do so. He was also music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony from 1988 to 1996.

Maazel was music director of the Symphony Orchestra of the Bavarian Radio for about a decade until 2002. That year, he was chosen to replace Kurt Masur as music director of the New York Philharmonic — America's oldest orchestra. Maazel served there for seven years and was with the orchestra at the time of its landmark visit to Pyongyang, North Korea in 2008.

Maazel also was a composer, although to lesser acclaim. His first opera, "1984," based on George Orwell's novel, met with largely negative reviews.

Maazel founded the Castleton Festival to mentor young musicians and to bring new energy to classical music with performances showcasing young talent. Maazel told the audience on the opening night of this year's festival on June 28 that working with young artists was "more than a labor of love — a labor of joy," the festival's statement said.

Maazel made more than 300 recordings, including works by Beethoven, Brahms, Debussy, Mahler, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, and Richard Strauss. He won 10 Grand Prix du Disques, according to his website.

In addition to Dietlinde Turban Maazel, his wife, Maazel is survived by four daughters, three sons and four grandchildren.

SAN LUIS, Ariz. (AP) — Federal agents inspecting a couple's belongings at an Arizona entry port on the U.S.-Mexico border found two live parrots hidden inside an Elmo doll.

The Customs and Border Protection says agriculture specialists found the birds on July 1 after cutting open the doll when an X-ray revealed something unusual about the contents.

The seized birds were placed in quarantine and transferred to a Department of Agriculture holding facility, while the couple was fined $300.

The border agency says birds entering the country are regulated because they can carry viral and bacterial diseases.

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Calling the church sex abuse scandal a "leprosy in our house," Pope Francis tells an Italian newspaper that 1 in 50 Catholic clerics are pedophiles.

In an interview with Eugenio Scalfari, the 90-year-old founder of La Repubblica, Francis is quoted as saying that advisers in the Church "reassure me" that the problem amounts to "about 2 percent."

"This data should hearten me but I have to tell you that it does not hearten me at all. In fact, I think that it is very grave," he was quoted by the newspaper as saying, according to a translation used by Reuters.

Most pedophilia takes place in family situations, but "even we have this leprosy in our house" he is quoted as saying of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Church must "weep and make reparation" for its crimes, he is quoted as saying.

Scalfari also quotes Francis as noting that the requirement of celibacy in the priesthood is a "problem," and that "there are solutions and I will find them."

The pope said that celibacy was instituted "900 years after Our Lord's death" and that in some Eastern Churches under the Vatican's purview, priests were already allowed to marry.

Reuters says the La Repubblica article was a reconstruction of an hour-long conversation between the pope and Scalfari,

The Vatican, in a statement said that Scalfari — the country's best-known journalist who is also a prominent atheist — normally conducts long interviews with public figures without taking notes, quoting them later from memory.

Papal spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said that the quote on celibacy, as well as another in which Francis says cardinals were among the sex abusers, are inaccurate. Lombardi accused La Repubblica of trying to "manipulate naive readers," according to Reuters.

NPR's Sylvia Poggioli, reporting from Rome, notes, "This is not the first time Francis' off-the-cuff remarks have caused problems for his spokespeople."

Indeed, Francis has called atheists "precious allies" in building peace and even suggested that non-believers could go to heaven, a position his Vatican handlers quickly sought to clarify.

A few months later, in a discussion of homosexuality in the Church, Francis proclaimed: "If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?"

And, despite the Vatican's suggestion that the pope's comments on celibacy are not accurately quoted, they are largely in line with a message transmitted by the Vatican's secretary of state, Archbishop Pietro Parolin, in September.

Half a world away, Chris Bosh could not escape the frenzy of last week.

An offer from the Houston Rockets was waiting. His longtime Miami teammate LeBron James was leaving. For a few moments, Bosh found himself wondering if his days with the Heat were over.

Then he looked at his family, and everything stopped.

"We've built a life in South Florida and we're comfortable," Bosh said Sunday. "So I had to do what's best now for myself and my family."

With that, his decision became very easy. Bosh will sign a $118 million, five-year deal to stay with the Heat, a formality only held up by the logistical challenge presented by him being in Ghana right now and with more exotic stops on a family vacation still to come before returning home.

When he finally puts pen to paper, the Heat locker room will essentially become his — and in an interview with The Associated Press, Bosh said that while it's a shock to realize James is no longer with Miami after four seasons, he's ready to have that voice.

"I can't lie to you: I'm excited. I'm excited for the challenge," Bosh said during a break from NBA Africa duties. "I want to step up to the challenge. I feel this is a chance to prove to myself and others that I can still do this.

"I want to see if I can do what's necessary to go in there and win every night. That's the challenge of being a leader. It excites me. It's been a long time and I feel like I'm a much better player and a leader now, so it'll be fun."

Bosh had that role in Toronto before coming to Miami, then was perceived as a No. 3 behind James and Dwyane Wade when they teamed up in 2010 to begin the "Big 3" era with the Heat.

Now, Bosh will be one of the league's highest-paid players over the next five seasons, and with that comes a responsibility role to lead.

"It's a very different process," Bosh said, "but I think I know how to do it."

The Heat called James' decision disappointing, and Bosh acknowledged that there was a "shock factor" when he heard, but Miami is moving on.

They've locked Bosh up, are closing in on a new deal with Wade, got a commitment Sunday from small forward Luol Deng, are talking about retaining point guard Mario Chalmers and have deals pending with forwards Josh McRoberts and Danny Granger.

Miami has been to the NBA Finals in each of Bosh's first four seasons there, the team's two-year run as champions coming to an end when the Heat lost in five games to San Antonio last month.

Bosh got over that loss fast.

"We weren't going to beat those guys," Bosh said. "They were clicking on all cylinders. ... You can accept losing to such a great team."

After that, free agency followed. Bosh, Wade and James met last month for lunch, one that created tons of speculation once word got out about the meal.

Bosh said much of what was reported was overblown, and that was the day he started thinking the run was over.

"It's not what everybody thought it was," Bosh said. "We were just talking and having lunch with each other. Did I expect to kind of figure things out? Yeah, for sure. But it wasn't that. We just enjoyed having lunch. That's when I could tell, there's a possibility that somebody could be in a different uniform next year."

Soon, the Rockets came calling. Their pitch: Come to Houston, join Dwight Howard and James Harden and keep contending for titles.

"I'd be lying if I sat here and said Houston wasn't enticing," Bosh said. "You look at their roster and you can kind of see why it makes sense for them to be interested in me, with the chance they have to be successful. They're going to be a good team regardless next year. It just seemed like I would be that final piece that they needed. It was a hard choice to turn down."

Bosh insists the Heat will be good next season. How good, that will largely be up to him.

"We have so much chemistry," Bosh said. "We'll just be continuing without LeBron. It's starting a different chapter. It's exciting. I think it should be motivation for everybody to step up to the plate. We're fortunate enough to have some of the same guys. We should be able to say, 'Hey, we can come out here and compete no matter what happens.'"

LONDON (AP) — It takes two to tango — but does a same-sex couple qualify?

Britain's governing body of ballroom dancing has stirred controversy by proposing to change the definition of a competing partnership to be "one man and one lady" — a move that equality advocates and same-sex dancers called discriminatory Friday.

The world of competitive ballroom dancing — satirized famously in Baz Luhrmann's film "Strictly Ballroom" — has traditionally been dominated by couples made up of a man and a woman, although a small number of same-sex dancers currently also compete alongside them.

Critics say the rule change proposed by the British Dance Council could ban same-sex couples from mainstream competitions.

The changes were proposed following complaints that all-male couples are physically stronger and have better stamina than mixed-sex couples.

"We're looking to regulate the situation, as there is nothing in the rules at the moment," said Bryan Allen, the body's president.

But dancers argue they should be judged by their dancing, not their gender.

Sergio Brilhante, a former professional who competed with a male partner, said the argument that men are stronger than women may work for sports like tennis but does not apply to dance — and it certainly does not apply to all-female couples.

"Dance is about technique and choreography, about moving well on the floor," he said. "People didn't react very well in the beginning, but after some judges saw us more than once, they came to understand we just dance like any other competitor."

The dance council insists it does not discriminate, and that same-sex couples could still take part in some competitions should the body vote to approve the rule change.

But Brilhante says there are very few events catering to same-sex dancers, and they are not as prestigious as the mainstream competitions.

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JERSEY CITY, N.J. (AP) — A gunman who killed a rookie officer responding to a report of an armed robbery at a drugstore early Sunday never tried to rob the store and instead lay in wait for police, telling a witness to watch the news because he was "going to be famous," authorities said.

Lawrence Campbell shot Officer Melvin Santiago in the head shortly after he and his partner arrived at the 24-hour Walgreens at around 4 a.m., Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said. Other officers returned fire at Campbell, killing him.

Campbell, 27, of Jersey City, was one of three suspects wanted by police for a prior homicide, Fulop said.

Fulop said Campbell was carrying a knife when he walked into Walgreens and asked for directions to the greeting card aisle. He assaulted an armed security guard at the store and snatched his gun, Fulop said.

According to Fulop, Campbell approached a witness and apologized for his conduct, then said to watch the news later because he was "going to be famous," then waited for officers to arrive and shot Santiago with what police believe was the guard's weapon.

"Today was a horrible day for Jersey City," Fulop said.

Dozens of officers stood single file at the entrance of the hospital and saluted as Santiago's flag-draped body was carried into an ambulance. A handful of younger officers consoled one another as they walked away. Santiago, 23, graduated from the police academy in December.

Fulop was there when Santiago's body arrived at the hospital. As Santiago's mother identified the body, Fulop said, she "just keep repeating the badge number and saying that it's not possible."

Santiago is the first Jersey City officer killed in the line of duty since Detective Marc DiNardo died in July 2009 during a raid on an apartment while searching for suspects in a robbery.

"It is a tragic situation when any officer is killed in the line of duty," Fulop said. "Melvin was an officer who represented everything one would want to see in a police officer. I know the entire city's thoughts and prayers are with the Santiago family during this difficult time and we mourn together."

Jean Belviso, who has been delivering newspapers for 10 years, was driving through the Walgreens parking lot when she said saw a man wearing burgundy sweatpants and a baseball cap walk out of the store. A police cruiser pulled up in front of Walgreens, and the suspect began shooting, the 61-year-old Belviso said.

"We thought he was running, coming toward us," said Belviso, who was riding along with a friend. "He kept on shooting."

Bullets flew through the cruiser's windshield, 13 in all. The suspect was shot multiple times, and officers slapped handcuffs on him, Belviso said.

Campbell's body remained on the ground next to the bullet-riddled cruiser for more than five hours after the shooting before it was placed in a coroner's van and taken away.

Markeisha Marshall, a spokeswoman for Walgreens, said the company was "deeply regretful" over the officer's death and extended its sympathies to his family and friends. The store has round-the-clock armed security, Marshall noted.

Police are also searching for another man who they believe was involved in the previous homicide with Campbell, Fulop said. They have been aggressively seeking Daniel Wilson for the last three days, Fulop said.

The Jersey City Police Benevolent Association said in a statement that their hearts were heavy over Santiago's death.

"Patrolman Santiago knew the risks associated with this job, yet he put himself in front of danger in order to keep Jersey City safe," the association said. "Words cannot adequately express our feelings about this senseless tragedy."

The officer's stepfather, Alex McBride, said Santiago was "very proud" to be a police officer, following in the footsteps of his uncle. McBride said he had been in Santiago's life for 14 years, noting that his stepson had wanted to be a police officer since playing the "Call of Duty" video game.

"Melvin was the best kid," he said, choking up as he sat hunched over on a plastic crate in an alley outside the family's apartment. "I watched him graduate from high school. He joined every sport, everything. He never did no harm to nobody. And he was full of life."

Gary Nahrwold, 24, recalled his friend Santiago first saying a decade ago that he wanted to become a police officer. Nahrwold also hopes to join the force and said he won't be discouraged by Santiago's slaying.

"It just gives me more purpose to do it," he said. "I'm not going to be deterred by some senseless crimes."

___

Associated Press writers Julio Cortez in Jersey City and Ashley Thomas in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

The illegal gambling operation is accused of taking millions of dollars in bets on FIFA World Cup soccer games.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Sitting in the Minnesota Twins locker room Sunday surrounded by many of the most promising minor leaguers, Christian Binford remembered back five years ago, when he was a 10th grader pitching for the Mercersburg Academy in Pennsylvania.

Up to the plate walked some stud on the other team who was good enough to attract 10-20 scouts.

"I'm going to try to one-up this guy," Binford recalled thinking. "I had terrible mechanics. I was just trying to throw as hard as I could, and I didn't know any better. I was having a great game up until that one pitch."

That pitch altered his life.

"It popped. I could hear it," he said. "I had no idea what the sound was at the time. I thought I just pulled a muscle. I took three days off and tried to throw, and I couldn't make it to 90 feet. The ball just didn't go anywhere. So I had an MRI, and it was completely torn."

Just 16 at the time, Binford joined the list of Tommy John surgery alumni.

Elbow ligament-replacement surgery isn't just for big leaguers these days. More than two dozen major leaguers have had the elbow ligament replacement operation in the last year, a group that includes Miami's Jose Fernandez, the New York Mets' Matt Harvey and Tampa Bay's Matt Moore. New York Yankees star Masahiro Tanaka has a partially torn ulnar collateral ligament and may need the procedure.

At least three players at the All-Star Futures game already had the surgery: Binford, a Double-A right-hander in the Kanas City Royals organization, was joined by Lucas Giolito, a Class A righty with the Washington Nationals who was the 16th overall pick in the 2012 draft, and Steven Moya, a Double-A outfielder with the Detroit Tigers.

"Sad to say," Giolito explained, "it's kind of become a kind of routine deal for pitchers — hopefully not all of them."

Several top orthopedists met last week in Seattle to come up with a recommendations for how Major League Baseball should proceed, among them Dr. James Andrews, New York Yankees team physician Dr. Christopher Ahmad, Los Angeles Dodgers head team physician Dr. Neal ElAttrache and Dr. Bert Mandelbaum, an orthopedist based in Santa Monica, California, who was tasked by MLB to head the project. The doctors developed a series of bullet points and consensus statements that were forwarded to baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, who plans an announcement later this month.

Binford, throwing consistently in the low 90s during a 1-2-3 inning in the Futures game, still remembers the warm reception he received at Andrews' office in Birmingham, Alabama.

"It was awesome, absolutely awesome," he said, "going down there and seeing Roger Clemens' jersey in our waiting room. He treated me like I was a big leaguer — he treated me with the same respect."

Giolito, who turns 20 on Monday, was 9-1 with a 1.00 ERA two years ago as a senior at Harvard Westlake in California, and was projected to be a high first-round draft pick before straining an elbow ligament. Before the draft, he was known for his Hollywood family: An uncle, Mark Frost, was a co-creator of the television show "Twin Peaks;" his mother, Lindsay Frost, appeared on "Boston Legal," "Crossing Jordan," "Lost" and "Frasier;" his grandfather, Warren Frost, was Mr. Ross on "Seinfeld."

Washington decided that even with the injury, Giolito had enough potential to justify using a first-round pick for him. When his elbow didn't get better, Giolito had surgery performed by Dr. Lewis Yocum that Sept. 13. He's back throwing 90 mph-plus, and gave up a two-run homer on an offspeed pitch to Chicago White Sox prospect Javier Baez in the fifth inning.

Giolito attributes his injury to "a brutal combination of me throwing too hard with my body not developed enough" and sees a need for change.

Many in baseball were shocked when Dylan Fosnacht, a high school pitcher for Rochester in Washington state, was allowed to throw 194 pitches during a tournament game in May.

"I hope that it starts to open the eyes of amateur coaches, even travel ball coaches for 11-, 12-year-old kids," Giolito said. "You see things like 10-year-old travel ball kids playing hundreds, thousands of innings a year, just nonstop baseball. I don't think that's good."

With snapped ligaments repeatedly in the news, those who haven't needed the surgery hope they'll remain healthy.

"I don't know what you're going to do, unless you're just not going to throw, which isn't ever going to happen," said Alex Meyer, a Minnesota Twins prospect who reached 97 mph in a four-pitch inning. "You don't really want to go out there thinking about anything like that. You just go out there and worry about getting guys out."

___

AP Sports Writer Dave Campbell contributed to this report.

Steve Inskeep talks to Ehab El-Ghussain, deputy information minister for the Palestinian government.

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A visiting artist from Cuba joins two Cuban-American artists from Miami for a discussion on what life is like for a typical Cuban family.

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) — Police on Sunday praised a dispatcher and crisis negotiator for persuading a gunman to surrender after he allegedly shot and killed three people in a Southern California neighborhood, wounded two others and fired on officers.

John Izeal Smith, 35, is suspected of killing a woman inside a Pasadena house Saturday, then killing two men outside and firing at officers before holing up back inside the house where the violence began.

Smith surrendered after a tense, 20-minute call to the dispatcher who was assisted by a crisis negotiator, Police Chief Phillip Sanchez said in a statement Sunday.

"The suspect willfully murdered and injured innocent people without warning as he fired more than 40 rounds from a semi-automatic rifle," Sanchez said. "However, the courage of our dispatchers, police officers, firefighters and community members who valiantly tried to help the victims is impressive and speaks to the resolve of our community."

The statement said the dispatcher and crisis negotiator convinced the gunman to surrender in part through their calm demeanor. Officials planned to release a recording of the 911 call on Monday.

The woman killed in the house was identified as 59-year-old Maria Teresa Aguiar. The identities of the two men have not been released pending notification of family, the Los Angeles County Coroner's office said.

Two others suffered minor to moderate injuries.

Police said the shooting may have something to do with landlord-tenant dispute, but Aguiar's brother told KCAL-TV the shooting was a case of domestic violence. Carlos Aguiar said Smith was his sister's live-in boyfriend.

Officers who responded to the scene came under heavy attack as they approached one of the victims outside, police said. They sought cover and their cars were struck with bullets. No officers were injured.

MULHOUSE, France (AP) — German rider Tony Martin showed he has climbing skills to go with his speed by easily winning the hilly ninth stage of the Tour de France on Sunday, while Frenchman Tony Gallopin took the yellow jersey from Vincenzo Nibali of Italy.

The 29-year-old German, a three-time world time trial champion, broke away with specialist climber Alessandro De Marchi of Italy and eventually won by nearly three minutes.

"The objective was to win the stage. There was a chance to do it and I felt good, my legs felt good," Martin said. "I knew it would be one of my rare chances to win a stage."

The 170-kilometer (105.4-mile) trek from Gerardmer to Mulhouse — in the mid-sized Vosges mountain range near the German border — featured six mostly moderate uphill treks that posed Martin little problem, even though he is not a reputed climber.

"When the stage started to climb I realized I was stronger and started to attack and then things went well," he said. "We're close to Germany and that was an extra incentive."

Swiss rider Fabian Cancellara was second and Belgian rider Greg Van Avermaet was third — both 2 minutes, 45 seconds adrift in the chasing pack.

It was a good day for France with Gallopin set to defend the yellow jersey on Monday — Bastille Day — and for Germany, set to play football's showpiece World Cup final against Argentina later.

Martin, who clocked a winning time of 4 hours, 10 minutes, predicted another convincing German win.

"Let's say Germany will win — that's for sure," he said. "I'm a good omen. Let's say 3-0."

Gallopin, of the Lotto Belisol team, saw things differently.

"There are two Germans on our team, we've made bets," he said. "I'm betting on Argentina, because Germany knocked us (France) out (in the quarterfinals)."

Gallopin did enough to erase his deficit of more than three minutes to Nibali and leads him by 1:34.

Portuguese rider Tiago Machado is in third place overall, 4:08 back. But, like Gallopin, he is not considered a Tour contender.

"It's with great pride that I will ride on the national holiday day in the yellow jersey," the 26-year-old Gallopin said. "It's a little bit scary, but I will enjoy the day."

The last Frenchman to wear the yellow jersey was Thomas Voeckler in 2011. He also wore it in 2004 — the year disgraced cyclist Lance Armstron won the sixth of seven Tour wins, before later being stripped of all of his titles for doping.

"It was always a dream of wearing the yellow jersey. But there's a difference between dreams and reality," Gallopin said. "I think I'll have trouble sleeping, but I will have to rest properly to be ready for the battle tomorrow."

Two-time champion Alberto Contador finished safely in the main pack along with Nibali — both were nearly eight minutes adrift of Martin — and is 4:08 back down in ninth place overall.

They will resume their contest in the toughest stage so far — Monday's 161.5-kilometer (100-mile) trek from Mulhouse to La Planche des Belles Filles which features three step Category 1 climbs — before a rest day Tuesday.

"We'll have to decide whether or not we try to attack or ride defensively," Contador said. "It was a tough day."

The Tour has paid tribute to those who died in the First World War — 1914-18 — by riding along the battlefields where millions died.

Sunday's route took the peloton past the historical landmark where the Bataille du Linge was held in 1915 as some 17,000 French and German soldiers fell in three months of ferocious fighting. Le Linge is a mountainous pass full of groves and thickets, and this helped mask lethal sections of barbed wire protecting tight German defensive lines.

Shortly before the day's most difficult climb — a Category 1 ascent of 10.8 kilometers (6.7 miles) up Le Markstein — Martin broke away and Gallopin's chasing group was about two minutes behind him and Nibali more than six minutes adrift.

Martin was no threat to Nibali's yellow jersey, but Gallopin was.

Nibali was losing more and more ground, and urged his Astana teammates to step up the pace as they reached the last of climbs — a short, but sharp climb up Grand Ballon. But they had left themselves far too much to do.

Martin, who narrowly beat Tour champion Chris Froome in last year's time trial, continued to surge ahead, with a favorable wind behind him making for a quick descent down to the finish.

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BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (AP) — HBO says Beyonce and Jay Z will co-star in a concert special and Queen Latifah will play legendary blues singer Bessie Smith in a movie for the network.

The music special will feature the married couple on their "On the Run Tour" performing in Paris. It will air in September.

Starring Queen Latifah, "Bessie" is written and directed by filmmaker Dee Rees. Co-stars include Michael K. Williams, Oliver Platt and Mo'Nique. It premieres in 2015.

Sister network Cinemax shared good news about its upcoming series "The Knick," rewarding this drama of a circa-1900 New York hospital with a second season prior to its Aug. 8 premiere. "The Knick" stars Clive Owen, with both 10-episode seasons directed by Steven Soderbergh.

The announcements were made Thursday at the summer TV critics' tour.

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Google is trying to make sense of a sweeping decision about the Internet. In May, the European Court of Justice ruled that people have the right to be forgotten. That is, if you don't like something about you that pops up on a Google search, you can make Google hide that result.

The top court left a lot of room for interpretation. Google could have dragged its feet or waited for privacy regulators in the European Union to give more direction. Instead the search giant has moved swiftly to implement the ruling. But it's hitting some bumps.

A Simple Application

Let's start with the easy-to-use form.

Rafael Rodrguez Lpez, a local journalist in Vigo, Spain, has volunteered to fill it out. He finds a search result about him that is not a professional byline. It's a link to a silly article he shared with friends, on the racy ways you can get rid of the common cold.

"Anyone could see that I shared that kind of article," he says.

It takes him just a few minutes to check the right boxes on the Google form and explain his rationale. He also has to upload a picture ID — say from school or a driver's license with the serial numbers blacked out — to prove he is the Rafael Rodrguez Lpez in question.

Typically, official processes take a lot of paperwork and visits to bureaucracies. He's impressed: "This is relatively easy and quick for the Spanish standards."

Tough Balancing Act

The form may be simple. But the underlying law is not. Privacy and freedom of speech are both written into the European Union charter. Under the court ruling, search engines have to balance these bedrock rights.

Google feels stuck between a rock and a hard place. In a statement released on Friday, the company says it's received over 70,000 applications; it is putting every single one through human review; and the court order sets up tests that are "very vague and subjective."

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NEW YORK (AP) — A substantial number of the people who made CBS' "Under the Dome" the surprise hit of last summer appear to have lost interest in the fate of the fictional town of Chester's Mill, Maine.

The second-season premiere of the show about a town placed under a mysterious dome, written by Stephen King, had 9.4 million viewers on June 30. That's down from the 13.5 million who watched the series premiere in 2013, the Nielsen Co. said.

CBS pointed out that when time-shifted viewing is taken into account — people who watched a recording of "Under the Dome" either a day or two afterward — the viewership increased to 13.2 million last week. Time shifting lifted last year's premiere to 16.7 million.

This week, the live viewership dropped even further to 7.7 million. Last year, the average live viewership of the series was 11.2 million.

CBS debuted the second season on the week of July Fourth, traditionally the least-watched week of television each year, or close to it.

Miley Cyrus attracted some attention by a parents group that called on NBC to edit Saturday night's concert special so it would be appropriate for children. It didn't seem to matter much; the Cyrus special drew only 2 million viewers, making it the 90th ranked prime-time show of the week.

In fairness, concert specials often aren't big draws. A Coldplay special in May on NBC had 1.6 million viewers, and Rihanna had 1.7 million for a special on Fox last year.

CBS won the week in prime time, averaging 4.9 million viewers. NBC had 4.7 million, ABC had 3.7 million, Fox had 2.73 million, Univision had 2.7 million, Telemundo had 1.5 million and ION Television had 1.1 million.

TNT was the week's most popular cable network, averaging 2.01 million viewers in prime time. USA had 1.93 million, the Disney Channel had 1.87 million, History had 1.65 million and Fox News Channel had 1.51 million.

NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 7.5 million, its 251st weekly win in a row. But it was also the closest competition since September 2012; ABC's "World News averaged 7.4 million. The "CBS Evening News" had 5.7 million.

For the week of June 30-July 6, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: "America's Got Talent" (Tuesday), NBC, 11.14 million; "Under the Dome," CBS, 9.41 million; "60 Minutes," CBS, 8.59 million; "NCIS," CBS, 8.13 million; "The Big Bang Theory" (Monday, 9:30 p.m.), CBS, 7.03 million; "Night Shift," NBC, 6.87 million; "The Big Bang Theory," CBS, 6.479 million; "The Bachelorette," ABC, 6.476 million; "America's Got Talent" (Wednesday), NBC, 6.38 million; "The Big Bang Theory" (Monday, 9 p.m.), CBS, 6.37 million.

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ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox. NBC and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks.

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Online:

http://www.nielsen.com

For a Gazan perspective on the prospect of a cease-fire, Robert Siegel talks to Mukhaimer Abu Sada, a political scientist at Al-Azhar University. They discuss the Israeli air strikes in Gaza and what must happen before fighting settles.

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SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — When a woman's pickup stalled on a street in Santa Fe, New Mexico, local chef Jackson Ault stopped to lend a hand.

Ault and the driver both ended up with a surprise Thursday when Ault popped the hood and found a brown and yellow python slithering across the engine block.

A police lieutenant responded to a call for help. He retrieved the 20-pound snake.

The python was taken to the Santa Fe Animal Shelter, where spokesman Ben Swan says the reptile has minor injuries but otherwise is in good shape.

Police say the snake likely crawled into the pickup at the motorist's home several blocks from where the vehicle stalled. And Ault says he thinks the truck stalled because the snake dislodged an electrical wire.

Authorities say the owner hasn't turned up yet.

Egypt has proposed a ceasefire between Israel and Gaza that would take effect Tuesday.

Egypt's foreign ministry has called for Israel and Palestinians in Gaza to de-escalate their conflict by 2 a.m. Eastern Time (9 a.m. in Israel). A full ceasefire would go into effect within 12 hours.

"The proposal, which was published on the eve of US Secretary of State John Kerry's expected visit to Cairo, states that Israel would end all 'hostilities' in the Gaza Strip from the land, air and sea and would refrain from launching a ground offensive that targets civilians," the Jerusalem Post reports.

Israel's security cabinet will meet Tuesday morning to discuss the proposal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin "Netanyahu supports the Egyptian proposal for ceasefire in Gaza and will ask the cabinet [to] accept it," tweets Barak Ravid, diplomatic correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, citing an "Israeli official." But not all Israeli leaders are on board.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, in a televised address Monday, did not reveal how the organization, which governs the Gaza Strip, stands on Egypt's proposal.

He did say that Hamas is "open to all initiatives to end Israeli aggression," according to The Guardian, which is live-blogging reaction to the proposal.

If the two sides do agree to a ceasefire on Tuesday, it would be an unconditional truce. Within 48 hours of the ceasefire, both Israeli and Palestinian officials would travel to Cairo.

There, they would hold talks with neutral mediators, but not with each other.

Egypt mediated a truce between Israel and Hamas in 2012.

NPR's Ari Shapiro reports on what it might take to forge a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel.

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — A day after Indonesia's presidential elections failed to produce a clear winner, Jakarta's police chief promised to prevent violence by cracking down on anyone celebrating prematurely. With both candidates continuing to claim victory, the next leader of the world's third-largest democracy could be decided in court.

Wednesday's third direct presidential vote went smoothly, but fears of unrest surfaced after Jakarta Gov. Joko Widodo and ex-army general Prabowo Subianto both declared a win after the quick count results were released.

Any political instability in the world's most populous Muslim nation and Southeast Asia's biggest economy, which has just begun to flourish after decades of authoritarian rule, could have serious repercussions for its young democracy.

Widodo, known as Jokowi, came out ahead with 52 percent of the vote, according to the three most credible unofficial quick counts. But Subianto pointed to lesser-known surveys showing he came out on top, but later said he would consider the election commission's announcement in two weeks as the "only formal result of the election."

Both candidates met separately in private meetings with outgoing President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on Wednesday night. Widodo emerged afterward to urge supporters, who were setting off fireworks, waving flags and riding motorbikes around the heart of the capital, to stand down.

"We appeal to the party's members and sympathizers, volunteers and supporters, you don't need to parade to celebrate the presidential election victory. It's better for us to pray and give thanks," he said. "We need to minimize friction that could arise."

Yudhoyono also urged both sides to "restrain themselves" and not allow their supporters to publicly declare victory prematurely.

"We will not hesitate to take firm action," said Jakarta police chief Maj. Gen. Dwi Priyatno. He added that security forces were working closely with both camps "to anticipate everything that could cause friction among people and lead to massive rash acts."

The election commission, which began tallying the votes, will produce the official results by July 22. But if either candidate refutes the outcome due to evidence of fraud or other voting irregularities, the case will go to the Constitutional Court.

Subianto, who has ties to the country's political and business elite and was once married to former dictator Suharto's daughter, has already raised concerns about the quick count's legitimacy. The tally is a representative sample of votes cast around the country and civil society organizations have used the method to accurately forecast the results of previous elections.

"Prabowo-Hatta is leading the real vote count in many regions," Subianto said, referring to his running mate Hatta Rajasa. "That is the situation."

Some analysts say that in a country plagued by corruption, there is plenty of room for bribery, intimidation or other tactics to sully the official count of more than 140 million ballots that must be transported to regional centers, often from remote areas scattered across Indonesia's archipelago — spanning roughly the width of the United States.

"The Jokowi camp is clearly worried that there will be fraud in the aggregation process," said Jakarta-based political analyst Paul Rowland. "There is plenty of opportunities there to change the numbers."

Confidence in the Constitutional Court has also recently been shaken, though some are already predicting that's where Indonesia's next president will be decided. Last month, its former chief justice was jailed for life for accepting bribes while ruling on a regional election dispute.

"Considering victory claims from both candidates, it seems difficult to avoid a legal battle at the Constitutional Court," said Denny Indrayana, deputy minister of Law and Human Rights. "The credibility of the Constitutional Court as the last decider of the presidential election's results is at stake."

The election has energized the country of 240 million. Turnout was estimated around 75 percent in a race that was polarized by two very different figures.

Widodo, 53, of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, is the first candidate in a direct presidential election with no ties to former late dictator Suharto, who ruled for 30 years before being overthrown in 1998. He is a former furniture exporter from humble beginnings who has built a reputation of being an efficient leader, getting elected to run the capital in 2012. He is seen as a man of the people and ran a more grassroots campaign.

Subianto, 62, of the Great Indonesia Movement Party, comes from a wealthy, well-known family and is accused of widespread human rights, including ordering pro-democracy activists kidnapped before Suharto's fall. He surged forward in the polls just weeks before the election after picking up endorsements from most of the country's major political parties and running a more well-oiled campaign. He appealed to many voters by vowing strong leadership that many believe has been absent during Yudhoyono's presidency. He was constitutionally barred from running after serving two five-year terms.

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Associated Press writers Niniek Karmini and Ali Kotarumalos in Jakarta, Indonesia and Chris Brummitt in Hanoi, Vietnam contributed to this report.

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RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Germany won the World Cup. Host Brazil won a world of new friends.

The now four-time world champions, the first European team to win it on South American soil, earned the honor of lifting the most recognized trophy in sports after a 1-0 victory in a final as terrific as the tournament itself.

For a 32-day showcase of football at its best, the winning goal was beautifully appropriate. Mario Goetze controlled the ball with his chest and then volleyed it into the Argentine goal, making it look simple.

German chancellor Angela Merkel, sat in the VIP section with other notables, waved a clenched fist. Vladimir Putin later reached across to shake her hand.

CASTLETON, Va. (AP) — Conductor Lorin Maazel, whose prodigious career included seven years at the helm of the New York Philharmonic, died Sunday at his home in northern Virginia. He was 84.

Maazel died at Castleton Farms from complications following pneumonia, according to a statement by The Castleton Festival, an annual festival that Maazel founded with his wife in 2009. Maazel was rehearsing and preparing for the festival at the time of his death. The death was also announced on Maazel's official website.

Known for his relentless energy and passion for precision, Maazel led nearly 200 orchestras in at least 7,000 opera and concert performances during 72 years at the podium, according to a biography posted on his website.

Maazel, an American born in Paris in 1930, took his first violin lesson at age 5. A dazzling prodigy, he was 7 when he was invited by Arturo Toscanini to conduct the NBC Symphony. His New York Philharmonic debut came five years later, in 1942. By age 15, he had conducted most of the major American orchestras. At 16, he entered the University of Pittsburgh to study language, mathematics and philosophy and played the violin with the Pittsburgh Symphony to help pay tuition.

In 1960, at age 30, he became the first American to conduct at the Bayreuth Festival in Germany. He served as artistic director and chief conductor of the Deutsche Oper Berlin for five years starting in 1965.

He was music director of the Cleveland Orchestra from 1972 to 1982. He then served briefly as general manager, artistic director and principal conductor of the Vienna State Opera, the first American to do so. He was also music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony from 1988 to 1996.

Maazel was music director of the Symphony Orchestra of the Bavarian Radio for about a decade until 2002. That year, he was chosen to replace Kurt Masur as music director of the New York Philharmonic — America's oldest orchestra. Maazel served there for seven years and was with the orchestra at the time of its landmark visit to Pyongyang, North Korea in 2008.

Maazel also was a composer, although to lesser acclaim. His first opera, "1984," based on George Orwell's novel, met with largely negative reviews.

Maazel founded the Castleton Festival to mentor young musicians and to bring new energy to classical music with performances showcasing young talent. Maazel told the audience on the opening night of this year's festival on June 28 that working with young artists was "more than a labor of love — a labor of joy," the festival's statement said.

Maazel made more than 300 recordings, including works by Beethoven, Brahms, Debussy, Mahler, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, and Richard Strauss. He won 10 Grand Prix du Disques, according to his website.

In addition to Dietlinde Turban Maazel, his wife, Maazel is survived by four daughters, three sons and four grandchildren.

Nadine Gordimer has written about the agonies of apartheid in her novels and short stories. She died Sunday at the age of 90. In 1989, she spoke with Terry Gross during a visit to the U.S.

MANDAREE, N.D. (AP) — A company official says brine from a North Dakota pipeline spill extends nearly 2 miles down a steep ravine.

Miranda Jones, vice president of Crestwood Midstream Partners Inc., says the cause of the spill appears to involve a separation of the pipe that carries oil-drilling saltwater. Crestwood subsidiary Arrow Pipeline LLC owns the pipeline.

Jones says the path of the brine is 8,240 feet long and an area of dead vegetation extends about 200 yards from the source of the spill. It's estimated at about 1 million gallons.

Crews are carrying equipment down the steep badlands by hand because of the rough topography.

The EPA is checking to make sure none of the brine reached a lake used for drinking water by an American Indian reservation.

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ABERDEEN, Scotland (AP) — The second-round jinx that has afflicted Rory McIlroy this season struck once again at the Scottish Open on Friday when he followed up a course-record 64 with a 7-over 78 that left him just above the cut mark.

The former world No. 1 has failed to build on fast starts in a frustrating first half of 2014 and he says it is now becoming a mental issue.

McIlroy says "having to talk about it, it's always being brought up, it's sort of in your mind. Maybe I put myself under even more pressure to get off to a decent start and shoot a good score."

McIlroy, who is at level par, added with a laugh "it's another Friday out of the way — now I can go onto the weekend."

WASHINGTON (AP) — A string of fiery train derailments across the country has triggered a high-stakes but behind-the-scenes campaign to shape how the government responds to calls for tighter safety rules.

Billions of dollars are riding on how these rules are written, and lobbyists from the railroads, tank car manufacturers and the oil, ethanol and chemical industries have met 13 times since March with officials at the White House and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

Their universal message: Don't make us pay for increased safety because that's another industry's problem.

The pitches illustrate why government officials, who must show that safety benefits outweigh the economic costs of rules, often struggle for years, only to produce watered-down regulations.

The Association of American Railroads, for example, is pushing for tougher safety standards for tank cars than the current, voluntary standards agreed to by industry in 2011. Railroads, though, typically don't own or lease tank cars and so wouldn't have to buy new cars or retrofit existing ones. The oil and ethanol industries that own the cars want to stick with the voluntary standards, also known as "1232" tank cars.

The railroads argue that better tank cars are needed because the kind of crude oil being produced in the oil boom Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana and in some other parts of the country is more likely to ignite if a tank car is punctured or ruptured in an accident. They want regulators to require that cars for crude have a thicker shell, an outer layer to protect from heat exposure, an outer "jacket" on top of that, and a better venting valve, among other changes.

Since 2008, there have been 10 significant derailments in the U.S. and Canada in which crude oil has spilled from ruptured tank cars, often resulting in huge fireballs. A year ago this month, a runaway train with 72 tank cars of crude en route from the Bakken to a refinery in Canada hurtled into the Quebec town of Lac-Megantic, exploded and killed 47 people.

The American Petroleum Institute, however, says Bakken crude is no different from other light, sweet crude oils and doesn't need special containers. The institute wants the government to adopt what are now the voluntary standards even though "1232" tank cars have ruptured in several accidents.

"We have billions invested in tank cars," said Bob Greco, a senior official with the American Petroleum Institute. "Every day new, modern 1232 tank cars are coming into service." By the end of next year, about 60 percent of the oil industry's 74,000 tank cars will be 1232s, each bought with the expectation that they would be in use for decades, he said.

The ethanol industry faces a similar quandary. It would cost about $3 billion to retrofit or replace the industry's 30,000 tank cars to make them tougher, said Bob Dinneen, head of the Renewable Fuels Association.

From 2006 to 2012, there were seven train derailments in which tank cars carrying ethanol ruptured. Several crashes caused spectacular fires that emergency responders were powerless to put out, including one near Cherry Valley, Illinois, that consumed a van with a family inside. A woman was killed, her husband suffered burned and their pregnant adult daughter miscarried.

The ethanol industry, including agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland, has told regulators that if tank car standards must be strengthened, the new requirements should apply only to crude oil, Dinneen said. He blamed poor communication by railroads for the Cherry Valley accident.

The chemical industry, which ships both flammable and nonflammable liquids in tank cars, has told regulators that if they propose a new tank car standard, it should be phased in, starting with oil shipments. Deadlines for chemical shipments would come later. The industry also questions whether the safety benefits justify the cost of upgrading existing tank cars to meet new standards.

Rather than new rules for tank cars, the oil and ethanol industries want regulators to turn their attention to whether railroads should do more to prevent accidents. "Keep these cars on the tracks and nobody has a problem," Dinneen said.

The government may try to do just that.

Edward Hamberger, head of the Association of American Railroads, said he is dismayed that regulators are considering lowering oil train speeds to 30 mph. Railroads already have voluntarily lowered speeds from 50 mph to 40 mph in urban areas, he said.

Lowering the speed of oil trains, some of which are 100 cars long, would slow overall freight traffic by about 10 percent and reduce the capacity of the nation's freight network by the same amount, Hamberger said. That's because 83 percent of the network is single track, with passing tracks located from 5 miles to 50 miles apart. Virtually every industry that ships freight by rail would be affected, he said, along with Amtrak, which widely uses freight tracks.

Burlington Northern-Santa Fe estimated that reducing speeds to 30 mph on just one portion of its network — its Aurora, Illinois, to Spokane, Washington, line — would cost the company $800 million.

Shippers that use a combination of trains and trucks to move products may switch to trucks, Hamberger said, putting more of those on the road.

Railroads also worry that regulators will require trains to have electronically controlled brakes that would cost the industry $12 billion to $21 billion, according to a CSX estimate.

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Follow Joan Lowy on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/AP_Joan_Lowy

___

Online:

Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration: http://tinyurl.com/k6gdt5p

Association of American Railroads: http://tinyurl.com/kmk8zag

Renewable Fuels Association: http://tinyurl.com/kam9s7z

American Petroleum Institute http://www.api.org/

Federal officials have announced that a young Mississippi girl, once thought to have been cured of HIV, now once again has detectable levels of the virus. This is a setback not just for the child, but also for hope of eradicating HIV in infants with a potent mix of drugs at birth.

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BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (AP) — Katherine Heigl is returning to television, with her mother in tow.

She stars on the new fall series "State of Affairs," playing a CIA attache who informs the president on high-level incidents around the world. It's the first TV series for Heigl since she left her Emmy-winning role on "Grey's Anatomy" in 2010 after six seasons.

Heigl's mother, Nancy, is serving as an executive producer on the NBC series debuting in November. She manages her 35-year-old daughter's career and has had similar credits on "One for the Money," "Life as We Know It" and "The Ugly Truth," all starring Heigl.

The notion that Heigl and her mother are difficult on set has followed the actress since "Grey's Anatomy."

Heigl says she doesn't see herself or her mother as being difficult and if the actress has ever disappointed someone, she says it wasn't intentional.

July 14, 2014 1:58 PM ET

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A look at this year's Emmy contenders with the most nominations:

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SERIES

— HBO's "Game Of Thrones," 19 nominations

— FX's "Fargo," 18 nominations.

— FX's "American Horror Story: Coven," 17 nominations.

— AMC's "Breaking Bad," 16 nominations.

— HBO's "The Normal Heart," 16 nominations.

— NBC's "Saturday Night Live," 14 nominations.

— Netflix's "House of Cards," 13 nominations.

— Fox's "Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey," 12 nominations.

— PBS' "Downton Abbey," 12 nominations.

— Netflix's Orange Is the New Black," 12 nominations.

— PBS' "Sherlock: His Last Vow," 12 nominations.

— HBO's "True Detective," 12 nominations.

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NETWORKS

— HBO, 99 nominations.

— CBS, 47 nominations.

— NBC, 46 nominations.

— FX, 45 nominations.

— ABC, 37 nominations.

— PBS, 34 nominations.

— Netflix, 31 nominations.

— AMC, 26 nominations.

— Showtime, 24 nominations.

— Comedy Central, 21 nominations.

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Online:

http://www.emmys.com

Many children's books and songs double as mini-lessons in counting (One Elephant), letters (the alphabet song) or fine-motor skills (Thumbkin). It's less common to find such activities for young children infused with basic science.

Take evolution. Perhaps it hasn't made it into classic nursery rhymes because it's all about sex and death — not the easiest topics to discuss with little folks. It's also challenging for adults to understand and accept, in part because a solid understanding of evolution rests on some pretty sophisticated concepts, including deep time and probability.

So I have great admiration for recent efforts to make evolution more accessible to young, inquiring minds. Grandmother Fish, for example, is a Kickstarter campaign (on track to be funded next week) that aims to produce "a child's first book of evolution," with a focus on communicating the idea of common descent. Great Adaptations is a book targeting older children, with contributions from a variety of scientists and illustrators showcasing biological adaptations.

But as far as I can tell, the burning need for a nursery rhyme about natural selection remains to be met. And I'm here to rise to the challenge. I offer — only half in jest — alternative lyrics to the classic Five Little Monkeys, fully uncensored, sex-and-death style. Thanks to two co-conspirators, Elizabeth Bonawitz and Tom Griffiths, you can appreciate it in full audiovisual grandeur:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two key lawmakers say President Barack Obama can alleviate a growing humanitarian crisis involving tens of thousands of child immigrants without waiting for Congress to act.

Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California and Republican Rep. Mike Rogers of Michigan both say Obama does not need to wait for changes in a 2008 human trafficking law before ordering the return of some children to their native countries.

The law requires immigration judges to decide the fate of young border crossers from countries that don't border the United States. The Obama administration has expressed some interest in changing the law.

Feinstein wrote the legislation at issue, while Rogers is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

More than 57,000 children, mostly from Central America, have crossed the border with Mexico since Oct. 1.

President Obama has sent Congress an almost $4 billion request to deal with the situation at the southern border, where children from Central America continue to arrive. The president has said it's a stopgap measure — that what's really needed is an immigration overhaul. But Republicans argue they can't trust Obama, as they point to other instances of laws they say he has ignored.

ENTIAT, Wash. (AP) — A wildfire burning on about 34 square miles of grass, brush and timber in central Washington did not grow on Saturday, but officials worry that storms forecast to arrive Sunday evening could cause explosive growth.

The Mills Canyon Fire, burning near Entiat (EHN'-tee-aht), was 25 percent contained on Sunday, said spokesman Vladimir Steblina of the Pacific Northwest Incident Management Team.

Residents of several dozen homes have been told to evacuate. People living in another 500 homes have been warned to be prepared to leave, if the fire gets closer.

The National Weather Service says thunderstorms with dry lightning were expected in the area around 8 p.m.

"When the winds start swirling around, you get really erratic winds," Steblina said. "We might end up with extreme fire growth around the thunder cells."

About 781 firefighters, assisted by eight helicopters were battling the fire on Sunday, concentrating on the north and south lines.

"The day has gone as planned," said fire spokeswoman Laurie Dowie on Sunday afternoon. Fire lines on both the south and north ends of the fire were strengthened.

No people have been injured in the fire, but three small sheds or outbuildings have been burned, Steblina said.

In addition to the blaze, firefighters are battling extreme heat. The high in nearby Wenatchee reached 106 degrees on Saturday. Fire officials were expecting temperatures above 90 again on Sunday.

"People are paying a lot of attention to being hydrated," Steblina said, noting that the only medical issues on the fire have been a few cases of poison ivy.