Evening Edition

The study, which the White House hopes will pave the way for Congress to lift the ban, concluded the risk “to overall military effectiveness is low” if the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law is repealed.

“We are both convinced that our military can do this, even during this time of war,” wrote the report’s authors, General Carter Ham, and the Pentagon’s top legal adviser, Jeh Johnson.

Widespread fraud allegations following Sunday’s polls had added to the climate of intimidation and fear that persists in Haiti, a Caribbean nation whose recent past was plagued by dictatorship and violent political upheaval.

Election results are not due to be announced for weeks, but an unexpectedly candid admission from the ruling INITE (Unity) party that it may have lost the polls mustered belief that a real political shift could be imminent.

Gripped by cholera and traumatized by January’s earthquake, Haiti faced the specter of political unrest on Sunday when 12 of the 18 candidates cried foul before polls had closed. Thousands of protesters took to the streets.

On Monday, longtime opposition leader and pre-election favorite Mirlande Manigat and popular musician Michel Martelly, another leading candidate, dramatically reversed their calls for the polls to be scrapped.

China demanded action and Russia’s spy agency indicated it was eager to hunt for secrets after the whistle-blower site WikiLeaks obtained thousands of classified US cables — apparently from a disgruntled US soldier.

The State Department said it had temporarily suspended the Pentagon’s access to some of its correspondence, halting a trend to greater information sharing within the US government launched after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Meanwhile new diplomatic cables continued to trickle out, including one saying Iran’s supreme leader has cancer and will be dead “within months” and another saying that China would eventually accept a reunited Korea.

In a lengthy statement, the secretary of state had attempted to limit the damage as she told reporters the United States “deeply regrets” the release of the 250,000 diplomatic cables, all apparently from the State Department.

Two days after the whistle-blower website began releasing a trove of files, signs emerged that more damaging disclosures were on the way with officials saying WikiLeaks had thousands of cables on the sensitive US role in Taiwan.

China warned against “any disturbance to China-US relations” after leaked cables indicated that Beijing was frustrated with longtime ally North Korea and may accept its collapse and absorption by the US-backed South.

Japan echoed its key ally the United States in describing the leaks as “criminal” and said governments alone had the right to decide on the release of sensitive documents.

But WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange, who defended the decision to reveal some 250,000 diplomatic cables, found support from leftist governments in South America, including an offer for sanctuary as the backlash widened.

The stark warning from a president, who has a history of taking a softer line on Western policy, came during a wide-ranging state-of-the-nation address that Medvedev primarily devoted to domestic issues.

But he diverged briefly into foreign affairs to present the West with a choice — either work with Russia on missile defence or face the consequences.

The euro fell under 1.30 dollars for the first time since mid-September, dropping at one point to 1.2969 dollars from 1.3121 dollars late Monday. The single currency later edged back up to 1.2982 dollars.

Upward pressure intensified on 10-year borrowing rates for countries seen at risk of needing a rescue after Greece and Ireland, with attention focused on Spain, a potentially much bigger problem for the EU.

In mid-morning London trading, the euro slid to 1.2999 dollars — the lowest point since September 16. It later stood at 1.3000 dollars, which compared with 1.3121 dollars late in New York on Monday.

The dollar fell to 83.98 yen from 84.25 yen on Monday.

The euro dropped under 1.30 dollars on Tuesday for the first time since mid-September to 1.2999 dollars — the lowest point since September 16.

The upward pressure on 10-year borrowing rates for countries seen as at risk of needing a rescue, after Greece and Ireland, rose, with particular attention focused on Spain because the size of its economy puts it in a far bigger problem category

The renewed allegations and action by the International Olympic Committee failed to dampen an intense lobbying drive by British prime minister David Cameron in Zurich to woo support for England’s 2018 bid ahead of Thursday’s vote.

But a spokesman for Vladimir Putin said that the Russian premier would follow in his rival’s steps, as officials from Russia 2018 suggested that the members of the FIFA executive committee had already made up their mind.

As prime ministers and royalty headed for the Swiss city of Zurich ahead of Thursday’s two announcements, fresh media allegations even prompted a call for football’s world governing body to postpone the decision.

And Russia, one of the frontrunners to stage the 2018 tournament, railed against the move to award two tournaments in one go, saying it encouraged collusion.

Yes, says 72-year-old Ingmar Eriksson, the proprietor of Tjudoe Vineyard in the autonomous Finnish province of Aaland, where the wine is made from apples and served with slabs of ostrich steak.

And he is not alone.

“A richer tapestry of efforts is needed,” UN climate chief Christiana Figueres warned, as she spelt out the tasks facing the 12-day conference in the Mexican resort city of Cancun.

“A tapestry of holes will not work — and the holes can only be filled in through compromise.”

By December 10, the 12-day gathering hopes to kickstart operational work after a year in which political interest in climate change has all but dropped off the map.

“The discussions yesterday were generally good, but there are holes,” said Nina Jamal of Indyact, a watchdog on green and social issues.

“The court today formally approved the restructuring plan,” said Hideo Seto, president of the Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corp. (ETIC), which is charged with leading the restructuring process.

“With the approval of the plan, we have built the foundation to create a new Japan Airlines,” he told a press conference.

The results of the study dismissed or minimized concerns raised in Congress and some quarters of the military about President Barack Obama’s plans to repeal the 17-year-old “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy — hopefully by the end of the year.

“We are both convinced that our military can do this, even during this time of war,” concluded study authors Army General Carter Ham and Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Johnson.

Obama said he appointed Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and budget director Jack Lew to work with congressional Republicans and Democrats to come up with a compromise to prevent broad tax increases from occurring next year.

“We should work to make sure that taxes will not go up by thousands of dollars on hard-working middle-class Americans come January 1, which would be disastrous for those families but also could be crippling for the economy,” Obama told reporters after a meeting with congressional leaders at the White House.

The Senate voted 73-25 to pass the bill. The House of Representatives backed a different version in July 2009. With their post-election session due to end by mid-December, lawmakers have just weeks to resolve their differences and send legislation to President Barack Obama to sign into law.

“I urge the House — which has previously passed legislation demonstrating its strong commitment to making our food supply safer — to act quickly on this critical bill, and I applaud the work that was done to ensure its broad bipartisan passage in the Senate,” Obama said in a statement.

Launching a tour amid uproar over the leak of a huge cache of classified U.S. diplomatic cables by a whistleblower website, Clinton also said she was committed to Internet freedom.

She said it was important that “governments don’t overreact” to information that they do not like being aired in public.

European policymakers came out in force to try to calm markets, with European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet warning that pundits were underestimating the determination of governments to keep the euro zone stable.

But markets paid little attention, pressuring Portugal, Spain and Italy only days after the EU agreed to an 85 billion euro ($110.7 billion) bailout for Ireland.

Union leaders said they wanted to talk to Prime Minister Jose Socrates over their worries rather than take to the streets. A general strike last week paralyzed public transport and shut down many services.

Their words were a glimmer of good news for Socrates, who says the austerity measures can succeed in pulling Portugal out of its debt crisis even though many economists and investors believe a bailout is inevitable.

Europe has softened its tone on private investor involvement in any possible future default in recent days, saying it will follow the example of the International Monetary Fund rather than putting in place an automatic process.

“I had called upon governments to clarify their position and avoid ambiguity vis-a-vis investors, savers and market participants,” Trichet said at an European Parliament hearing.

After Greece’s deficit and debt problems emerged in late 2009, there were five months of steadily rising Greek sovereign bond yields and efforts by EU officials to contain the threat before a 110 billion euro ($140 billion) bailout was arranged.

The lag was understandable because the EU had never had to deal with such a crisis since the euro’s introduction in 1999. Once a rescue mechanism was agreed for Athens, it was only a matter of days before the funds were disbursed.

The extension of Ireland’s deadline for plugging its budget black hole is also a positive step but the challenge to stabilize the country’s financial system remain.

“It isn’t just a matter of showing that banks are adequately capitalized. You have to show that they have adequate access to funding,” John Lipsky told Reuters Insider.

In his annual state of the nation address, Medvedev called for closer cooperation with the United States and the European Union, holding out the prospect of closer ties two decades after the Soviet Union’s collapse ended the Cold War.

He said tension would ratchet up fast, forcing Russia to bolster its military arsenal, if Western offers of cooperation on a system to defend against missile threats failed to produce a concrete agreement.

WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy said the G20 and APEC summits this month had signaled they wanted the nine-year-old Doha round concluded and 2011 was a window of opportunity.

“We have the political signal, we have the technical expertise and we have the work program,” Lamy told a WTO meeting called to review the state of the Doha talks.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee angered Beijing last month by awarding the Nobel to Liu, who is serving an 11-year jail term on subversion charges for his role in advocating democratic reform and an end to the Communist party’s power monopoly.

The Asian superpower has snubbed Norwegian ministers and pressured diplomats to boycott the December 10 award ceremony, set to focus the world’s media spotlight on human rights in China.

While both are important for healthy bones, North Americans may be confused about how much they need, the Institute of Medicine committee said.

Contrary to popular wisdom, many Americans and Canadians get plenty of vitamin D from the sun and do not need extra supplements to keep their bones strong, the expert panel advised.

The pay freeze is part of Obama’s efforts to push back against Republicans, who have labeled the president and his Democrats as big spenders while taking aim at his policies such as an $814 billion economic stimulus package and healthcare reform.

The White House estimates the pay freeze would save about $2 billion in the current 2011 fiscal year and $28 billion over five years. It would require congressional approval.

The study provides ammunition to congressional Democrats struggling to overturn the law. But even with the release of Tuesday’s report, there is no indication they can overcome fierce Republican objections with just a few weeks left in this year’s postelection congressional session.

Still, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, said Congress should act quickly because of a recent effort by a federal judge to overturn the law.

“The American people did not vote for gridlock,” Obama said following their meeting at the White House. “They did not vote for unyielding partisanship. They’re demanding cooperation and they’re demanding progress, and they’ll hold all of us, and I mean all of us, accountable.”

There was no consensus on whether to keep Bush-era tax cuts in place for the middle class and wealthy alike. But the eight bipartisan congressional leaders and the president agreed to try to break through their differences by appointing a working group to negotiate a tax cut agreement in short order.

Obama also made a strong plea to Senate Republicans to permit ratification of a new arms control treaty with Russia by year’s end, raising the issue first in a session in the White House’s Roosevelt Room and then in a follow-up meeting without aides present, officials said.

No substantive agreements on essential year-end legislation emerged from the session, and none had been expected. Instead, the meeting was a classic capital blend of substance and style, offering a chance for Obama, House Speaker-in-waiting John Boehner and Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell to become more comfortable in one another’s presence.

But with the House set to tumble into GOP hands and anti-earmark reinforcements coming to the Senate in January, the window seems to be closing on the practice.

Tuesday’s 39-56 tally rejected a GOP bid to ban the practice of loading spending bills with so-called earmarks – those parochial provisions that lawmakers deliver to their states – but it appears the curtain is coming down on the practice.

President Barack Obama has insisted that completion of the treaty is a national security imperative and he argued for the pact at a White House meeting with congressional leaders on Tuesday.

“We need to get it done,” Obama told reporters after the morning session.

No one steps into the cellblock when the attacker sits down to rest, and no one stops him when he resumes the beating.

Videos of the attack obtained by The Associated Press show officers watching the beating for several minutes. The footage is a key piece of evidence for critics who claim the privately run Idaho Correctional Center uses inmate-on-inmate violence to force prisoners to snitch on their cellmates or risk being moved to extremely violent units.

The $1.4 billion bill, which would also place stricter standards on imported foods, passed the Senate 73-25. Supporters say passage is critical after widespread outbreaks in peanuts, eggs and produce.

Those outbreaks have exposed a lack of resources and authority at the FDA as the embattled agency struggled to contain and trace the contaminated products. The agency rarely inspects many food facilities and farms, visiting some every decade or so and others not at all.

Prices are falling even in places like San Francisco and San Diego, which had posted strong increases just a few months ago. Analysts say many markets won’t improve until they see fewer foreclosures and more job gains.

“Unemployment is still high, people are afraid of losing their homes and credit is hard to get,” said Maureen Maitland, vice president of Standard & Poor’s indices.

The decision by the prestigious Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences, could put some brakes on the nation’s vitamin D craze, warning that super-high levels could be risky.

“More is not necessarily better,” cautioned Dr. Joann Manson of Harvard Medical School, who co-authored the Institute of Medicine’s report being released Tuesday.

The European Commission’s move, announced Tuesday, is the first formal investigation by a major regulatory agency into these issues and could potentially result in billions in fines, as in the recent cases of Microsoft Corp. and Intel Corp.

Several competitors, one owned by Microsoft, say that links to their services appear too low on Google’s general search results. They also claim that when Google offers similar services, such as online price comparison, it puts its own links higher on the sponsored search results, the ones companies have to pay for.

The torrent of condemnation heaped on WikiLeaks from around the globe did suggest a widespread sense – among government officials, but also among the sometimes more jaded observer and analyst class – that in releasing U.S. diplomatic documents the group crossed a dangerous line.

The prime minister of Israel, a man hardly accustomed to representing global consensus, on Monday found himself in lockstep with most of his peers as he warned that statecraft itself was imperiled by a reality in which no secret is safe if it is written.

The two-hour-plus hearing in the case of Xue Feng ended without a judgment. He and his lawyer argued the government wrongly applied its broad powers to classify as secrets information that should be commonly available, said the lawyer, Tong Wei.

Outside the Beijing High People’s Court, a senior U.S. Embassy official called for Xue’s release and return to the U.S. and fumed about the court’s decision to exclude American diplomats.

The case follows similar legal fights in other states where courts have ruled that it is unconstitutional under equal protection rights to deny Medicaid coverage to legal immigrants while providing the coverage to citizens with similar health and economic problems.

The Connecticut Supreme Court didn’t immediately rule on the matter Tuesday. A decision could take months.

“I hope they can realize sooner or later how important it is for the future,” Calderon said Monday.

At the same time, in an implicit criticism of China, the Mexican leader also spoke of poorer nations taking a “radical” position against any legally binding commitments to rein in their emissions of carbon dioxide and other industrial, transport and agricultural gases blamed for global warming, something he said Mexico is willing to do.

Authorities say they then shaved a swastika on the back of the 22-year-old victim’s head and used markers to scrawl messages and images on his body, including “KKK,” `’White Power,” a pentagram and a graphic image of a penis.

The men have become the first in the nation to be charged under a new law that makes it easier for the federal government to prosecute people for hate crimes.

The defections underscore dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party – particularly in the South – and will give Republicans a stronger hand in everything from pushing a conservative fiscal and social agenda to redrawing political maps.

In Alabama, four Democrats announced last week they were joining the GOP, giving Republicans a supermajority in the House that allows them to pass legislation without any support from the other party. The party switch of a Democratic lawmaker from New Orleans handed control of Louisiana’s House to Republicans for the first time since Reconstruction.

The federal government has been turned back twice in its efforts to get wolves off the endangered species list. Success would open the door to public hunting – something the governors of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming say is badly needed to keep the predators’ expanding population in check.

All three states are anxious to reduce wolf numbers to protect other wildlife and reduce livestock attacks.

“I was exposed to so much death, so many bodies,” said Officer Gregory McRae, one of two officers charged with burning the body of 31-year-old Henry Glover in the back seat of a car on Sept. 2, 2005.

McRae said nobody ordered him to torch the car or Glover’s body, and he denied setting the fire to cover up a police shooting. McRae said his decision was influenced by having seen other bodies floating in the flood waters that inundated New Orleans.