For the first time, the Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden tells his story — speaking not just about the raid and the three shots that changed history, but about the personal aftermath for himself and his family. And the startling failure of the United States government to help its most experienced and skilled warriors carry on with their lives.

The man who shot and killed Osama bin Laden sat in a wicker chair in my backyard, wondering how he was going to feed his wife and kids or pay for their medical care.

It was a mild spring day, April 2012, and our small group, including a few of his friends and family, was shielded from the sun by the patchwork shadows of maple trees. But the Shooter was sweating as he talked about his uncertain future, his plans to leave the Navy and SEAL Team 6.

He stood up several times with an apologetic gripe about the heat, leaving a perspiration stain on the seat-back cushion. He paced. I didn't know him well enough then to tell whether a glass of his favorite single malt, Lagavulin, was making him less or more edgy.

We would end up intimately familiar with each other's lives. We'd have dinners, lots of Scotch. He's played with my kids and my dogs and been a hilarious, engaging gentleman around my wife.

In my yard, the Shooter told his story about joining the Navy at nineteen, after a girl broke his heart. To escape, he almost by accident found himself in a Navy recruiter's office. "He asked me what I was going to do with my life. I told him I wanted to be a sniper.

"He said, 'Hey, we have snipers.'

"I said, 'Seriously, dude. You do not have snipers in the Navy.' But he brought me into his office and it was a pretty sweet deal. I signed up on a whim."

"That's the reason Al Qaeda has been decimated," he joked, "because she broke my fucking heart."

A nine-year-old Mexican girl has given birth to a baby of her own, local authorities and family members said.

"The girl was just over eight when she got pregnant. The father is a boy who is 17, but we have not found him, since he ran away," the mother of the girl, identified only as Dafne, told local officials in Jalisco state.

"We are looking for the young man to get his story because she does not understand what has happened. This is a rape or child sex abuse case," said Jorge Villasenor with the state prosectors' office.

The baby girl was born on January 27 in Zoquipan Hospital, weighing 2.7 kg.

Both girls were released from the hospital over the weekend, apparently doing well but the hospital said it would have to do extensive followup due to the new mother's age.
[Source]

 Syrian rebels have taken control of the country's biggest hydro-electric dam on the Euphrates River, activists said, dealing a strategic blow to President Bashar al-Assad.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and other Syrian activists said Islamist fighters seized the entrances to the dam, although gunmen had not entered the main operations room and the dam had continued to function.

They had earlier swept through the nearby town of Tabqa, renamed al-Thawra (Revolution) by the country's rulers. A statue of Assad's father, the late President Hafez al-Assad, was set on fire in the town, video footage showed.

Other video posted on the Internet showed what activists said was an abandoned Air Force Security base next to the dam and army installations inside the town.

"The dam was protected by an artillery battery and many intelligence units. The rebels moved on them in a lightning offensive yesterday, overrunning their positions and capturing scores of personnel," said Abu Ziad Teif, an opposition activist in contact with rebels in the area.

He said it was not clear whether the rebels would be able to keep the dam in operation and whether enough employees were left at the site. Extra power cuts were reported in the war ravaged city of Aleppo, which is partly supplied by the dam.

Rami Abdulrahman of British-based Syrian Observatory described the swift collapse of Assad's forces in Tabqa and around the dam as one of the president's biggest strategic setbacks in the 22-month-old Syrian uprising.

 Pope Benedict said on Monday he will resign on Feb 28 because he no longer has the strength to fulfill the duties of his office, becoming the first pontiff since the Middle Ages to take such a step.

The 85-year-old pope said he had noticed that his strength had deteriorated over recent months "to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me".

"For this reason, and well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter," he said according to a statement from the Vatican.

A Vatican spokesman said the pontiff would step down from 1900 GMT on February 28, leaving the office vacant until a successor is chosen.

 A southern Philippine town plans to hold funeral rites for the world's largest saltwater crocodile and then preserve its remains in a museum to keep tourists coming and prevent their community from slipping back into obscurity, the town's mayor said Monday.

The 1-ton crocodile was declared dead Sunday a few hours after flipping over with a bloated stomach in a pond in an eco-tourism park in Bunawan town, which had started to draw tourists, revenue and development because of the immense reptile, Mayor Edwin Cox Elorde said.

"The whole town, in fact the whole province, is mourning," Elorde said from Bunawan in Agusan del Sur province. "My phones kept ringing because people wanted to say how affected they are."

Guinness World Records had proclaimed it the largest saltwater crocodile in captivity last year, measuring the giant at 6.17 meters (20.24 feet). The reptile took the top spot from an Australian crocodile that measured more than 5 meters (17 feet) and weighed nearly a ton.

The crocodile was named Lolong, after a government environmental officer who died from a heart attack after traveling to Bunawan to help capture the beast. The crocodile, estimated to be more than 50 years old, was blamed for a few brutal deaths of villagers before Bunawan folk came to love it.

The giant reptile has come to symbolize the rich bio-diversity of Agusan marsh, where it was captured. The vast complex of swamp forests, shallow lakes, lily-covered ponds and wetlands is home to wild ducks, herons, egrets and threatened species like the Philippine Hawk Eagle.

Wildlife experts were to perform an autopsy as early as Monday to determine the cause of its death, Elorde said.

Bunawan villagers planned to perform a tribal ritual, which involves butchering chicken and pigs as funeral offerings to thank forest spirits for the fame and other blessings the crocodile has brought, Elordie said. A group of Christians would separately offer prayers before the autopsy.

The rites would be held at the eco-tourism park, where the reptile had emerged as a star attraction, drawing foreign tourists, scientists and wildlife reporting outfits like the National Geographic to Bunawan, a far-flung town of 37,000 people about 515 miles (830 kilometers) southeast of Manila.

The crocodile's capture in September 2011 sparked celebrations in Bunawan, but it also raised concerns that more giant crocodiles might lurk in a marshland and creek where villagers fish. The crocodile was captured with steel cable traps during a hunt prompted by the death of a child in 2009 and the later disappearance of a fisherman. Water buffalos have also been attacked by crocodiles in the area.

About 100 people led by Elorde pulled the crocodile from a creek using a rope and then hoisted it by crane onto a truck.

The manhunt for Christopher Dorner led LAPD SWAT officers to a Northridge Lowe's home improvement store after people reported seeing someone who resembled the fugitive former police officer there.

LAPD swarmed the store off Nordhoff Street about 5 p.m. Customers were escorted out of the store as police looked for any signs of Dorner.

LAPD stressed that it was an unconfirmed sighting.

There have been several reports similar to this one in recent days that didn't pan out.

The search came several hours after the LAPD issued a tactical alert as it handled the Dorner manhunt as well as security for the Grammys.

The LAPD did not detail its Grammy security arrangements, but the department regularly sends a large contingent of officers to awards shows.

This year, the Grammys occurred on the fifth day of a manhunt for Dorner, who is suspected of killing an Irvine couple and a Riverside police officer.

The tactical alert came the same day that Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced a $1-million reward for information leading to Dorner's capture.

“We will not tolerate anyone undermining the security of this community,” Villaraigosa said at a news conference at LAPD headquarters downtown. “We will not tolerate this reign of terror.”

Dorner allegedly carried out the slayings as part of a vengeful campaign sparked by his 2009 dismissal from the Los Angeles Police Department, authorities said.

Sunday's tactical alert was declared shortly after 2 p.m. In a tactical alert, officers can be held over on their shifts and do not respond to low-priority radio calls.

Officials hope the huge reward will give police the break they've been waiting for.

Police Chief Charlie Beck said the reward was "the largest local reward ever offered to our knowledge." The reason for such a significant reward, Beck said, was "not about capturing a fleeing suspect, but about preventing another crime, likely another murder."


"This is an act of domestic terrorism," Beck said of those killed and allegedly targeted by Dorner. "He has targeted those we entrust to protect the public."

A massive manhunt for Dorner began last week after the 33-year-old former officer and Navy veteran allegedly began a deadly campaign that has left an Irvine couple and a Riverside police officer dead.

The city of Los Angeles, law enforcement organizations, private groups and anonymous donors have all contributed to the reward fund, according to law enforcement sources familiar with the investigation.


Los Angeles County Supervisors Michael D. Antonovich and Mark Ridley-Thomas are expected to ask the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday to contribute $100,000 to the fund, according to Tony Bell, an Antonovich spokesman.

In addition to Los Angeles officials, representatives from the Riverside and Irvine police departments and the FBI and U.S. Marshals Service attended the news conference.

The frustrating search for Dorner has gone from Riverside to Corona to Big Bear to Point Loma in San Diego. There have been numerous false starts, but officials say the heightened publicity has not brought them closer to making an arrest.

The smell of bacon was in the air Saturday as thousands converged on Iowa's capital city for an increasingly popular festival celebrating all things connected with the meat.

Some people wore Viking hats and others walked around with makeshift snouts for the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. The annual event featured more than 10,000 pounds of bacon served in unusual ways, such as chocolate-dipped bacon and bacon-flavored cupcakes and gelato.

"I love bacon more than I love my job," said Katie Nordquist, who was dressed in a tuxedo T-shirt that looked like bacon Saturday for her first time at the festival.

And there was a lot of bacon to choose from. The smell of unique concoctions like bacon gumbo and chocolate bacon bourbon tarts wafted through one of two buildings at the Iowa State Fairgrounds. The other building had an Iceland theme, with a Viking boat and Icelandic dishes with bacon, to honor a group of delegates visiting from the country.

Urbandale resident Mike Vogel showed up for a fourth year wearing a head-to-toe bacon costume. He said a widespread love for bacon is the reason about 8,000 tickets to the event sold out in just over three minutes.

"I think it's the right time of year when everybody's been cooped up," said the 39-year-old videographer. "It's a good time to get out, have some fun, try some new stuff, have a few beers and enjoy yourselves with everybody else."

Other events scheduled included lectures about bacon and an eating competition. The festival was preceded earlier in the week with a bacon queen pageant and a pig pardon by Gov. Terry Branstad.

Jessica Dunker, president and CEO of the Iowa Restaurant Association, said bacon used to be just a breakfast food. Now chefs from across the state and country use it in everything from vegetable dishes to desserts.

"It's come a long way and you can find it in almost any kind of food or beverage offering," she said.

Festival co-founder Brooks Reynolds, who officially started the event just a few years ago, said it's become the largest bacon showcase in the world. He called the event a "bacon fellowship."

Los Angeles police said Saturday that they would reopen an investigation into the firing of Christopher Jordan Dorner, a former cop accused of killing three people as part of a revenge plot targeting law enforcement officers.

Dorner wrote a manifesto declaring war on police in retaliation for being fired from his job as an LAPD officer and losing an appeal to be reinstated. He promised to bring "unconventional and asymmetrical warfare" to officers and their families, calling it the "last resort" to clear his name and strike back at a department that he says mistreated him.

"I do this not to appease a murderer. I do it to reassure the public that their police department is transparent and fair in all the things we do," Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck said in a statement.

He said police would also look into any allegations made in the manifesto.

Beck addressed what he described as the "ghosts of the LAPD's past," and said that one of his biggest worries was that those ghosts would be "resurrected by Dorner's allegations of racism."

"As hard as it has been to change the culture of the Los Angeles Police Department, it has been even more difficult to win and maintain the support of the public. As much as I value our successes in reducing crime, I value even more our gains in public confidence," he said.

The development came as police continued their search for Dorner, 33, in snowbound mountains. Bundled up in winter gear, teams returned to the pine forests and trails surrounding Big Bear Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains.

A simple game of tug-of-war ended horribly for two California high school seniors.

During Spirit Week at South El Monte High School outside of Los Angeles, Edith Rodriguez and Pablo Ocegueda were playing tug-of-war when the rope snapped. The rope had wrapped around the hands of Rodriguez and Ocegueda, so when it snapped, several of their fingers were severed.

Rodriguez, a soccer player, and Ocegueda, a football player, were immediately brought into Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center for surgery to reattach their fingers.

Eddie Pickett, a supervising dispatcher with the Los Angeles County Fire Department, told NBC News that the teens lost four fingers on each hand while Rodriguez also lost the thumb on her right hand.

"They were just both in shock, staring at their hands," Jennifer Jiminez, a freshman at South El Monte, told KCBS. "They didn't know what to do."

Nick J. Salerno, Superintendent of El Monte Union High School District, said its schools have been playing tug-of-war for years.

"I've never heard of anything like this happening," Salerno said. "It's unbelievable to me, it's shocking."

Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency medicine physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York, was not involved in the treatment of the South El Monte students but in an email to CBS he wrote that he could see how injuries like these would happen.

"Loops, knots and other types of 'holdings' -- used to wrap the rope around hands or any part of the body is extremely dangerous -- and can place individuals at risk for finger and hand injuries," Glattner wrote. "Including traumatic amputations and joint dislocations."

While extremely rare, there are several documented cases of similar injuries resulting from games of tug-of-war.

In 2007 two Colorado high schoolers partially severed their hands during a game of tug-of-war. One year later an 8-year-old Minnesota girl lost four fingers when her hand got tangled in the rope.

Tug-of-war was an Olympic sport until 1920, and the sport's supporters are hopeful that renewed interest could help getting the event restored by 2024. In the meantime, the Tug-Of-War World Championship in 2014 will be held in Madison, Wis.

At a time when breastfeeding in public is already controversial, pictures of two military moms doing so while wearing their uniforms is sparking outrage.

The photo is part of a local breastfeeding awareness campaign by Mom2Mom of Fairchild Air Force Base, a support group launched in January by Crystal Scott, a military spouse and mother of three. Among the intimate close-ups of smiling young mothers cuddling their adorable babies, the images of the two airmen stand out.

Related: Moms react to the "Time" magazine's "Are You Mom enough?" breastfeeding cover

"People are comparing breastfeeding in uniform to urinating and defecating in uniform. They're comparing it to the woman who posed in "Playboy" in uniform [in 2007]" Scott told Yahoo! Shine in an interview. "We never expected it to be like this."

"I'm an X-ray tech and I breastfeed in my uniform all the time," Scott says. "Granted they're scrubs. But people do it all the time in their uniforms. If you have a hungry baby, why would you take the time to change completely?"

Related: Army mom home from Afghanistan surprises her son

Terran Echegoyen-McCabe, a member of the Air National Guard who was photographed in uniform nursing her 10-month-old twin daughters, says that she's surprised by the reaction to the photos.

"I have breastfed in our lobby, in my car, in the park ... and I pump, usually in the locker room," she told the "Today" show, adding that she usually nurses her babies while on her lunch break during drill weekends. "I'm proud to be wearing a uniform while breast-feeding. I'm proud of the photo and I hope it encourages other women to know they can breastfeed whether they're active duty, guard or civilian."

All of the women in the photos volunteered to appear in the awareness campaign, and Echegoyen-McCabe is featured -- wearing civilian clothing -- in a few of the other candid shots. None of the photos are posed; the women are simply feeding their babies the way they usually do. But even though some of the other photographs are just as revealing, only the ones of Echegoyen-McCabe and her friend Christina Luna in uniform have been criticized.

"The Air Force has never endorsed these photos," the photographer, Brynja Sigurdardottir points out on her website, where she posted several other photos from the Mom2Mom campaign. "These women just happen to be in the Air Force, in their uniform, breastfeeding their babies."

A teenage girl–an honor student who had just performed at President Obama’s inaugural–was gunned down Tuesday afternoon in the Kenwood neighborhood, just blocks from the high school she attended.

CBS 2’s Mike Parker reports the victim, 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, was taking shelter from the rain with a group of 10 to 12 teenagers under a canopy in Vivian Gordon Harsh Park on the 4500 block of South Oakenwald Avenue around 2:30 p.m., when someone jumped a fence, ran up to them, and opened fire.

Just days before, Hadiya performed with her high school band at President Obama’s inauguration.

The park is near King College Prep High School — where Pendleton was an honor student, volleyball player, and majorette.

A witness said the teens scattered and ran out of the park in a panic after the shots were fired. Pendleton and a boy who also was shot collapsed about a block away, in front of one of the upscale condo row houses that line Oakenwald.

Pendleton was struck once in the back, and died at the University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital less than an hour later.

The teenage boy who was shot was struck in the leg. He also was being treated at Comer Children’s Hospital.

For Zack Kopplin, it all started back in 2008 with the passing of the Louisiana Science Education Act. The bill made it considerably easier for teachers to introduce creationist textbooks into the classroom. Outraged, he wrote a research paper about it for a high school English class. Nearly five years later, the 19-year-old Kopplin has become one of the fiercest — and most feared — advocates for education reform in Louisiana. We recently spoke to him to learn more about how he's making a difference.

Kopplin, who is studying history at Rice University, had good reason to be upset after the passing of the LSEA — an insidious piece of legislation that allows teachers to bring in their own supplemental materials when discussing politically controversial topics like evolution or climate change. Soon after the act was passed, some of his teachers began to not just supplement existing texts, but to rid the classroom of established science books altogether. It was during the process to adopt a new life science textbook in 2010 that creationists barraged Louisiana's State Board of Education with complaints about the evidence-based science texts. Suddenly, it appeared that they were going to be successful in throwing out science textbooks.
A pivotal moment

How 19-year-old activist Zack Kopplin is making life hell for Louisiana's creationists "This was a pivotal moment for me," Kopplin told io9. "I had always been a shy kid and had never spoken out before — I found myself speaking at a meeting of an advisory committee to the State Board of Education and urging them to adopt good science textbooks — and we won." The LSEA still stood, but at least the science books could stay.

No one was more surprised of his becoming a science advocate than Kopplin himself. In fact, after writing his English paper in 2008 — when he was just 14-years-old — he assumed that someone else would publicly take on the law. But no one did.

"I didn't expect it to be me," he said. "By my senior year though, I realized that no one was going to take on the law, so for my high school senior project I decided to get a repeal bill."

Indeed, it was the ensuing coverage of the science textbook adoption issue that launched Kopplin as an activist. It also gave him the confidence to start the campaign to repeal the LSEA.

Encouraged by Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University — and a staunch critic of intelligent design and the Discovery Institute — Kopplin decided to write a letter that could be signed by Nobel laureate scientists in support of the repeal. To that end, he contacted Sir Harry Kroto, a British chemist who shared the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Robert Curl and Richard Smalley. Kroto helped him to draft the letter — one that has now been signed by 78 Nobel laureates.

In addition, Kopplin has introduced two bills to repeal the LSEA, both of which have been sponsored by State Senator Karen Carter Peterson. He plans on producing a third bill later this spring. And along with the Nobel laureates, he has the support of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), New Orleans City Council, and many others.

But as the early results of his efforts have shown, it's not going to be an easy battle.

"We've had gains over the last few years," he says, "But our first attempt to repeal the LSEA was defeated 5-1 in committee, and in our second attempt we lost 2-1." Kopplin is hoping to get out of committee this year.

He also has his eyes set on vouchers. After an Alternet story came out about a school in the Louisiana voucher program teaching that the Loch Ness Monster was real and disproved evolution, Kopplin looked deeper into the program and found that this wasn't just one school, but at least 19 other schools, too.

School vouchers, he argues, unconstitutionally fund the teaching of creationism because many of the schools in these programs are private fundamentalist religious schools who are teaching creationism.

Have we gone too far? It's a question we ask at the outset of every outrageous new reality series—be it "Survivor" or "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo." It's also usually an early sign of a show's success.
How reality TV hurts girls

But response to a new show teased as part of Oxygen Media's spring lineup, seems to mark a momentous moment when reality has truly jumped the shark. Collective and largely unchallenged outrage over the network's upcoming show "All My Babies' Mamas" is the unusual case of a show sparking enough controversy to potentially kill it.

"All My Babies' Mamas," a one-hour reality special slated to air in the spring of 2013, features Carlos "Shawty Lo" Walker, an Atlanta-based hip-hop artist with 11 children by 10 different women. Oh, he's also got a 19-year-old girlfriend, who's a year shy of his oldest child.

By the looks of the leaked sneak peak and an early press release, the show's take on this challenging family dynamic is more "Brady Bunch" than "An American Family."

"As the household grows, sometimes so does the dysfunction, leaving the man of the house to split his affection multiple ways while trying to create order," reads the goofy-sitcom-style description, in a press release posted the Oxygen's website late December. "Will there be a conflict over a family holiday, who needs school supplies and who holds the household finance purse strings, or can these feisty babies' mamas band together and live peacefully as one family unit?"

Since the show was publicized, the conflict has been primarily off-camera. Calls for a boycott of the network and a petition to pull the special from the network's lineup have risen to a fever pitch in the past week.

"By pushing these degrading images, your company seeks to profit from the humiliation of girls and women and the blatant stereotyping of African-Americans," writes, Sabrina Lamb, the woman behind the petition.

Lamb first noticed the press release on Oxygen's website, and after watching a 13-minute sample reel of the series on YouTube—which at one point features Shawty Lo unsuccessfully naming his 11 kids as quiz show music plays—she wrote an open letter to the present of Oxygen calling for the cancellation of the show before it goes to air.

"The focus of our outrage is that they would dare exploit the pain of these children and that Oxygen would promote this toxic situation to its young, impressionable female audience," Lamb, an author and cultural commentator, tells Yahoo! Shine. "There's no way this can go forward. We're going all the way to the end with this."

Every married person knows to be faithful, stay truthful and be there for her partner through good times and bad--they're in the wedding vows, after all. But most seasoned couples would admit that some unspoken rules are vital for getting past rough patches and growing stronger as a couple. Here, experts share 10 of the less apparent (but just as important) marriage rules to live by. Photo by Getty Images.

1. Don't criticize your partner's parents or friends. You know how it is-your family can tick you off but no one else had dare speak ill of them. That's why you should tread carefully with your in-laws and your husband's dearest friends. "Even when he's venting to you, your contributions can put him on the defensive," explains LeslieBeth Wish, EdD, a Florida-based psychologist and licensed clinical social worker. "When you take position A, you prompt your partner to take position B." Instead, says Dr. Wish, put yourself in his position so that you can empathize with him.

2. Tell your spouse about any ex encounters. Whether you get a Facebook friend request or run into an old flame at your kid's soccer game, keeping the news to yourself could backfire, despite having zero feelings for the ex. "If there's nothing to hide, why hide it?" says Deb Castaldo, PhD, a couples and family therapist and professor at Rutgers University School of Social Work in New Brunswick, NJ. "That leads to an air of secrecy and dishonesty," she says. Just clue in your hubby matter-of-factly: Try, "I knew it was only a matter of time before old boyfriends came out of the woodwork on Facebook. I got a friend request from one and ignored it." Or, "I saw my ex in the mall today. His kids are cute. Glad to see his life turned out nicely."

3. Keep unsolicited advice to yourself. Offer your support, lend your ear, but avoid speaking in an "I know what's best" tone. "We give advice because we're trying to be helpful, but it's seen as criticism when we offer too many corrections," says Harriet Lerner, PhD, clinical psychologist and author of Marriage Rules: A Manual for the Married and the Coupled Up. This goes for everything from your husband's outfit choices to how he deals with a work issue. Give your spouse space to make decisions and gain confidence through trial and error-and ask that he do the same for you, says Dr. Lerner. "What matters in a relationship is not that things get done 'right,' but that two people are dedicated to contributing to each other's happiness."

Related: Discover the 10 things men wish women knew about sex.


4. Don't take charge all the time. Whether you fold all the laundry because you don't like how your husband does it or you manage the finances because you don't think he's as careful, you may feel more at ease doing all the work. But stop! "The spouse who does the rescuing can become tired of that role," says Dr. Wish--and resentful that everything is on her shoulders, even if she volunteered for that burden. Get in the habit of asking your partner, "What do you think works best here?" or telling him, "I could use a hand cleaning out the pantry." These requests will foster the idea that you're teammates.

5. Don't bring up past arguments. Or at least put a statute of limitations on them. "People repeat ancient disagreements because they haven't resolved the problem," says Dr. Castaldo. Letting things fester often causes marriages to break down, she says. It's important to address issues as they happen and come to some sort of resolution--agreeing to disagree counts. "Leave it there, and respect each other's opinion," she says.

6. Choose your battles, but don't stifle your feelings. "There's going to be toothpaste globs here and Post-it notes there; that's human nature," says Dr. Wish. "You have to be able to say, 'this isn't important.'" Or if it is, speak up. "Tell your partner why it bothers you and that you'd like to work on a solution," suggests Dr. Wish. You'd be surprised what you could learn about each other. For instance, your husband may not leave dirty dishes in the sink anymore if you explain that your childhood home was piled high with plates and you were stuck washing them. It's also important to understand that he's not plotting to upset you every time he's sloppy or forgetful. A simple request like: "Honey, it'd be great if you could pick up the dry cleaning while you're out" beats getting mad that he didn't offer to help with errands.

France's Constitutional Council on Saturday rejected a 75 percent upper income tax rate to be introduced in 2013 in a setback to Socialist President Francois Hollande's push to make the rich contribute more to cutting the public deficit.

The Council ruled that the planned 75 percent tax on annual income above 1 million euros ($1.32 million) - a flagship measure of Hollande's election campaign - was unfair in the way it would be applied to different households.

Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said the government would redraft the upper tax rate proposal to answer the Council's concerns and resubmit it in a new budget law, meaning Saturday's decision could only amount to a temporary political blow.

While the tax plan was largely symbolic and would only have affected a few thousand people, it has infuriated high earners in France, prompting some such as actor Gerard Depardieu to flee abroad. The message it sent also shocked entrepreneurs and foreign investors, who accuse Hollande of being anti-business.

Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici said the rejection of the 75 percent tax and other minor measures could cut up to 500 million euros in forecast tax revenues but would not hurt efforts to slash the public deficit to below a European Union ceiling of 3 percent of economic output next year.

"The rejected measures represent 300 to 500 million euros. Our deficit-cutting path will not be affected," Moscovici told BFM television. He too said the government would resubmit a proposal to raise taxes on high incomes in 2013 and 2014.

The Council, made up of nine judges and three former presidents, is concerned the tax would hit a married couple where one partner earned above a million euros but it would not affect a couple where each earned just under a million euros.
UMP member Gilles Carrez, chairman of the National Assembly's finance commission, told BFM television, however, that the Council's so-called wise men also felt the 75 percent tax was excessive and too much based on ideology.

FRANCE UNDER SCRUTINY

Hollande shocked many by announcing his 75 percent tax proposal out of the blue several weeks into a campaign that some felt was flagging. Left-wing voters were cheered by it but business leaders warned that talent would flee the country.

Set to be a temporary measure until France is out of economic crisis, the few hundred million euros a year the tax was set to raise is a not insignificant sum as the government strives to boost public finances in the face of stalled growth.

Hollande's 2013 budget calls for the biggest belt-tightening effort France has seen in decades and is based on a growth target of 0.8 percent, a level analysts view as over-optimistic.

Fitch Ratings this month affirmed its triple-A rating on France but said there was no room for slippage. Standard & Poor's and Moody's have both stripped Europe's No. 2 economy of its AAA badge due to concern over strained public finances and stalled growth.

The International Monetary Fund recently forecast that France will miss its 3 percent deficit target next year and signs are growing that Paris could negotiate some leeway on the timing of that goal with its EU partners.

The INSEE national statistics institute this week scaled back its reading of a return to growth in the third quarter to 0.1 percent from 0.2 percent, and the government said it could review its 2013 outlook in the next few months.

Saturday's decision was in response to a motion by the opposition conservative UMP party, whose weight in fighting Hollande's policies has been reduced by a leadership crisis that has split it in two seven months after it lost power.

 From sunken steamboats to a millennium-old map engraved in rock, the drought-drained rivers of the nation's midsection are offering a rare and fleeting glimpse into years gone by.

Lack of rain has left many rivers at low levels unseen for decades, creating problems for river commerce and recreation and raising concerns about water supplies and hydropower if the drought persists into next year, as many fear.

But for the curious, the receding water is offering an occasional treasure trove of history.

An old steamboat is now visible on the Missouri River near St. Charles, Mo., and other old boats nestled on river bottoms are showing up elsewhere. A World War II minesweeper, once moored along the Mississippi River as a museum at St. Louis before it was torn away by floodwaters two decades ago, has become visible — rusted but intact.

Perhaps most interesting, a rock containing what is believed to be an ancient map has emerged in the Mississippi River in southeast Missouri.

The rock contains etchings believed to be up to 1,200 years old. It was not in the river a millennium ago, but the changing course of the waterway now normally puts it under water — exposed only in periods of extreme drought. Experts are wary of giving a specific location out of fear that looters will take a chunk of the rock or scribble graffiti on it.

"It appears to be a map of prehistoric Indian villages," said Steve Dasovich, an anthropology professor at Lindenwood University in St. Charles. "What's really fascinating is that it shows village sites we don't yet know about."

Old boats are turning up in several locations, including sunken steamboats dating to the 19th century.

That's not surprising considering the volume of steamboat traffic that once traversed the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. Dasovich said it wasn't uncommon in the 1800s to have hundreds of steamboats pass by St. Louis each day, given the fact that St. Louis was once among the world's busiest inland ports. The boats, sometimes lined up two miles deep and four boats wide in both directions, carried not only people from town to town but goods and supplies up and down the rivers.

Sinkings were common among the wooden vessels, which often were poorly constructed.

"The average lifespan of a steamboat on the Missouri River was five years," Dasovich said. "They were made quickly. If you could make one run from St. Louis to Fort Benton, Mont., and back, you've paid for your boat and probably made a profit. After that, it's almost like they didn't care what happened."

What often happened, at least on the Missouri River, was the boat would strike an underwater tree that had been uprooted and become lodged in the river bottom, tearing a hole that would sink the ship. Dasovich estimated that the remains of 500 to 700 steamboats sit at the bottom of the Missouri River, scattered from its mouth in Montana to its convergence with the Mississippi near St. Louis.

The number of sunken steamboats on the Mississippi River is likely about the same, Dasovich said. Steamboat traffic was far heavier on the Mississippi, but traffic there was and is less susceptible to river debris.

Boiler explosions, lightning strikes and accidents also sunk many a steamboat. One of the grander ones, the Montana, turned up this fall on the Missouri River near St. Charles. The elaborate steamer was as long as a football field with lavish touches aimed at pleasing its mostly wealthy clientele. It went to its watery grave after striking a tree below the surface in 1884.

The U.S. Coast Guard and Army Corps of Engineers urge sightseers to stay away from any shipwreck sites. Sandbars leading to them can be unstable and dangerous, and the rusted hulks can pose dangers for those sifting through them.

Plus, taking anything from them is illegal. By law, sunken ships and their goods belong to the state where they went down.