Regular season winners don't always make champions

DENVER (AP) — The Denver Broncos and Atlanta Falcons, who tied for the league's best record at 13-3, are well aware of one of the NFL's biggest truisms: more often than not, the regular season is for suckers.Over the last decade, just two of the 13 teams that had the best regular season record — or tied for the best mark — went on to win the Super Bowl: the '02 Buccaneers and the '03 Patriots.The...

Read More..

NFL: Playoffs offer clash of generations

With Robert Griffin III, Andrew Luck and Russell Wilson set to make playoff debuts, the year of the rookie continues in the National Football League (NFL).But defense and experience win championships and few know the road to the Super Bowl better than longtime quarterbacks Tom Brady and Peyton Manning.The wild-card weekend kicks off on Saturday with the Cincinnati Bengals visiting the Houston Texans,...

Read More..

Nuggets end Clippers 17-game winning streak

 The Nuggets brought the Los Angeles Clippers' franchise record 17-game winning streak to a halt on Tuesday with a 92-78 victory in Denver.The Clippers (25-7), who went 16-0 in December to join the 1995-96 San Antonio Spurs and 1971-72 Los Angeles Lakers as the only teams to go a calendar month undefeated, stumbled into the new year absorbing their most lopsided loss of the season.It was the...

Read More..

Syrian moderates fear being edged out of uprising

Abdul Rahman, a quiet, even-tempered man, leads a collection of moderate Free Syrian Army battalions in Aleppo. He says groups like his are becoming harder to find as the 21-month uprising drags on and more groups lean either secular or Islamist extremist.At a time when opposition fighters live and die by their ability to get equipment, Mr. Rahman says it’s become more difficult for those in the middle...

Read More..

Tunisia seeks gold in former dictator's assets

On a crisp December morning in Tunis, a finance ministry official named Mohamed Hamaied was demonstrating the horsepower of maroon V-12 BMW on the runway of a national guard airfield. Beside him sat an agent for a potential buyer.“You know, this is the same runway that Ben Ali fled from,” remarked another passenger, automotive expert Mourad Bouzidi, from the back seat.The BMW is among the seized possessions...

Read More..

Russia's adoption ban exposes political rift

Russia's upper house of parliament today unanimously approved a ban on US citizens adopting Russian children, a highly charged move that appears to have prompted an unusual public split among government officials.The Dima Yakovlev bill, named after one of 19 Russian children to die due to abuse or negligence at the hands of adoptive US parents in the past two decades, now goes to the Kremlin for President...

Read More..

Italians, backed by the Catholic Church, aim to stop Sunday shopping

Italians are fighting a government lift of regulations on business operation hours, insisting that the move will eventually hurt the small shops and values that have long been the foundation of the Italian business community.The deregulation, put into effect January 2012, removes restrictions on business operating hours, including Sundays and holidays. It is intended to stimulate competition in what...

Read More..

A year after being literally wiped out, a Russian hockey team flourishes

Wooden hockey sticks smack into rubber pucks as the metal blades of skates slice through the ice. The sounds echo through an empty arena in the Czech capital Prague in late November as a visiting hockey team prepares for another game in the Kontinental Hockey League.But this is no ordinary squad. This is Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, a Russian team that was literally wiped out last year in an air tragedy that...

Read More..

KWANZAA: HOLIDAY BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE FBI

Is it just me, or does Kwanzaa seem to come earlier and earlier each year? And let's face it, Kwanzaa's gotten way too commercialized.A few years ago, I suspended my annual Kwanzaa column because my triumph over this fake holiday seemed complete. The only people still celebrating Kwanzaa were presidential-statement writers and white female public school teachers.But it seems to be creeping back. A...

Read More..

Connecticut Job Shops and Contract Manufacturers Join the MFG.com Manufacturing Marketplace

Connecticut manufacturers prove to be uniquely qualified for entrance into the largest global manufacturing ecosystem.Atlanta, GA (PRWEB) December 18, 2012MFG.com, the world’s largest online manufacturing marketplace for made-to-order parts, announced that prominent Connecticut-based manufacturers have joined the MFG.com marketplace.A few of the recent additions include:Perfection Screw & Rivet...

Read More..