Monday, December 5, 2011
Tiger Woods ends 2-year victory drought
By DOUG FERGUSON
THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. (AP) — After going more than two years and 26 tournaments without a win, and after so much turmoil in his personal life and with his golf game, Tiger Woods stood over a 6-foot birdie putt Sunday to win the Chevron World Challenge and felt as though nothing had changed.
Finally, the outcome was familiar, too.
Woods poured in the putt to cap off a birdie-birdie finish at Sherwood, close with a 3-under 69 and beat former Masters champion Zach Johnson by one shot. The win ended a drought that lasted 749 days, and might have signaled a change that Woods is on his way back.
He swept his arm across the air, yelled through the din of the gallery and slammed his fist in a celebration that was a long time coming.
Relief? Satisfaction? Vindication?
Woods wasn't sure, and he didn't much care.
"It just feels awesome whatever it is," he said.
Trailing by one shot with two holes to play, Woods came up with two clutch putts. He holed a 15-footer for birdie on the par-3 17th to pull into a tie with Johnson, then hit a 9-iron from 158 yards that landed on the ridge behind the hole and rolled down to 6 feet.
"I've been in contention twice this year, which is not very often," Woods said. "So that's my third time with a chance to win it. I pulled it off this time."
It was his 83rd win worldwide in tournaments that award ranking points, but his first since he won the Australian Masters on Nov. 15, 2009, back when he looked as though he would rule golf for as long as he played.
But he crashed his car into a fire hydrant outside his Florida home on Thanksgiving night, and shocking revelations of extramarital affairs began to emerge, which shattered his image, led to a divorce and cost him four major sponsors. Since then, he has changed swing coaches, caddies and endured more injuries, causing him to miss two majors and fail to make the cut in another.
Now, however, it looks clear that Woods is on an upward path.
"If the man is healthy, that's paramount," Johnson said. "I mean, he's the most experienced and the best player I've ever played with. In every situation, he knows how to execute and win."
Even though those situations have been rare, Woods looked as though he had not forgotten how to win. The only other times he has been in contention this year were the Masters and the Australian Open.
"I felt normal, felt very comfortable," Woods said. "I've been here so many times that, you know, I just feel very comfortable being here in this position. Was I nervous? Absolutely. Always nervous in that position. But it's a comfortable feeling, and I enjoy being in that position. For some reason, it's kind of a comfort to be in there with a chance to win."
Woods won the Chevron World Challenge, which he hosts for his foundation, for the fifth time. He finished at 10-under 278 and donated the $1.2 million to his foundation.
The win moved him from No. 52 to No. 21 in the world ranking, and likely will send expectations soaring for 2012. Woods will not play again until starting his year in Abu Dhabi at the end of January.
If this win felt differently than the last one, Woods wasn't saying.
"They all feel good," he said. "They're not easy. People don't realize how hard it is to win golf tournaments. I've gone on streaks where I've won golf tournaments in a row, but still ... I don't think I've taken it for granted. And I know because of how hard it is."
He had a worthy adversary in Johnson, who had a one-shot lead going into the final round and trailed for only three holes. Johnson tied Woods with a birdie on the par-5 13th, made an unlikely par on the 14th by chipping from the bottom of the green, and appeared to seize control by holing a 12-foot birdie putt on the 16th hole.
Johnson thought his birdie putt on the 17th was good all the way until it burned the edge of the cup. Woods, running out of time, drained his birdie putt to force a tie and send the tournament to the 18th. Johnson missed a 15-foot birdie try, leaving the stage to Woods.
Johnson closed with a 71 and still took home $650,000 for the holidays. Paul Casey, who opened with a 79, had his third straight round in the 60s to finish alone in third at 5 under.
"Tiger can have a long career," Casey said when he finished. "We might look back in another 10 years and actually forget about the last couple of years."
Woods had a four-shot lead over Graeme McDowell a year ago, a margin that evaporated quickly when Woods showed early signs of a struggle, particularly with a pair of three-putts. There was no such evidence this time.
After nearly driving into trouble to the right of the par-5 second, Woods escaped and hit wedge to 3½ feet for birdie. His lone bogey on the front nine came at the par-3 eighth, with a back right pin that requires a fade. Woods tugged it well left of the green, and his pitch at a 45-degree angle was too strong and rolled into the fringe about 15 feet away.
Johnson's chip on the third was too strong, he three-putted from about 35 feet for bogey on the fifth and he played a poor chip from below the eighth green for another bogey.
They were tied at the turn when Woods began to pull away. From the right rough, Woods hit a soft sand wedge that landed in the first cut short of the green and fed down the slope to about 4 feet. He two-putted from long range for birdie on the par-5 11th to stretch his lead to two shots when Johnson caught a buried lie in the bunker.
Woods bogeyed the 12th from a bunker, though, and Johnson's birdie on the 13th set up a final hour that was up for grabs until Woods came through in the clutch on the last two holes.
Woods' tournament, which has an 18-man field, has been a good omen for others over the years. The most recent example was Jim Furyk, who won in 2009 and then had his first three-win season the next year and captured the FedEx Cup.
No one ever imagined Woods needing a boost, but that might be the case.
"I don't think we're going to see another 2011, if that makes sense," Furyk said, alluding to Woods failing to reach the FedEx Cup playoffs this year. "If he steadily progresses, keeps getting confidence and moving forward, he's going to return and be one of the best players in the game again."
Clinton criticism sparks Israeli anger
By afp
Israeli ministers reacted angrily on Sunday after local media quoted U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as saying she feared for the future of Israel’s democracy and the rights of women in the Jewish state.
Clinton’s remarks, reportedly made Saturday behind closed doors at the Saban Forum in Washington, made headlines in most Israeli newspapers, which reported them without explaining how they obtained the comments.
Top-selling Yediot Aharonot said Clinton had expressed concern about a slew of “anti-democratic” bills proposed by right-wing members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
And the newspaper said Clinton had described shock at hearing that some buses in Jerusalem were gender segregated and some religious Israeli soldiers refused to attend events where women would sing.
The comments sparked a quick backlash in Jerusalem, where Israeli ministers holding a weekly cabinet meeting accused Clinton of hyperbole.
Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz called Clinton’s remarks “totally exaggerated,” Israeli media reported.
“Israel is a living, breathing liberal democracy,” he said.
Steinitz reportedly acknowledged that gender segregation was a problem in Israel, “but to claim there is a threat on Israeli democracy is a big stretch.”
Environment Minister Gilad Erdan also acknowledged some concerns about growing calls for gender segregation by Israel’s ultra-Orthodox community, but suggested Clinton direct her attention elsewhere.
“Elected officials all over the world should first worry about their problems at home,” he said.
And Interior Minister Eli Yishai of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, defended the Jewish state, saying it remained the “only democracy in the Middle East.”
“I assume that whatever will be done here will be within the measure of the law,” local media quoted him as saying.
Israeli lawmakers have in recent months championed a series of bills criticized by local rights groups as an attempt to rein in left-leaning NGOs and journalists.
Among the most controversial of the proposed laws is one that would limit foreign funding for certain NGOs − legislation that leftist activists say targets groups opposed to Israeli occupation that report on violations of Palestinian human rights.
That bill has already attracted international criticism, and Israeli daily Haaretz reported on Sunday that the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Daniel Shapiro, had relayed Washington’s concerns about the legislation to Netanyahu’s staff.
A similar message was relayed by Germany’s ambassador several weeks earlier, the newspaper said.
The comments sparked a quick backlash in Jerusalem, where Israeli ministers holding a weekly cabinet meeting accused Clinton of hyperbole.
Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz called Clinton’s remarks “totally exaggerated,” Israeli media reported.
“Israel is a living, breathing liberal democracy,” he said.
Steinitz reportedly acknowledged that gender segregation was a problem in Israel, “but to claim there is a threat on Israeli democracy is a big stretch.”
Environment Minister Gilad Erdan also acknowledged some concerns about growing calls for gender segregation by Israel’s ultra-Orthodox community, but suggested Clinton direct her attention elsewhere.
“Elected officials all over the world should first worry about their problems at home,” he said.
And Interior Minister Eli Yishai of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, defended the Jewish state, saying it remained the “only democracy in the Middle East.”
“I assume that whatever will be done here will be within the measure of the law,” local media quoted him as saying.
Israeli lawmakers have in recent months championed a series of bills criticized by local rights groups as an attempt to rein in left-leaning NGOs and journalists.
Among the most controversial of the proposed laws is one that would limit foreign funding for certain NGOs − legislation that leftist activists say targets groups opposed to Israeli occupation that report on violations of Palestinian human rights.
That bill has already attracted international criticism, and Israeli daily Haaretz reported on Sunday that the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Daniel Shapiro, had relayed Washington’s concerns about the legislation to Netanyahu’s staff.
A similar message was relayed by Germany’s ambassador several weeks earlier, the newspaper said.
Iran threatens retaliation after drone shot down
Iran's military said on Sunday it had shot down a US reconnaissance drone aircraft in eastern Iran and warned it would retaliate on foreign soil for the incursion.
"Iran's military has downed an intruding RQ-170 American drone in eastern Iran," Iran's Arabic-language Al Alam state television network quoted the unnamed source as saying.
"The spy drone, which has been downed with little damage, was seized by the Iranian armed forces."
Iran shot down the drone at a time when it is trying to contain foreign reaction to the storming of the British embassy in Tehran on Tuesday, shortly after London announced that it would impose sanctions on Iran's central bank in connection with Iran's controversial nuclear enrichment programme.
Britain evacuated its diplomatic staff from Iran and expelled Iranian diplomats in London in retaliation, and several other EU members recalled their ambassadors from Tehran.
The attack dragged Iran's relations with Europe to a long-time low.
Washington and EU countries have been discussing measures to restrict Iran's oil exports since the United Nations nuclear watchdog issued a report in November with what it said was evidence that Tehran had worked on designing an atom bomb.
Iran says its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful.
Iran had already warned the West that any move to block its oil exports would more than double crude prices with devastating consequences on a fragile global economy.
"As soon as such an issue is raised seriously the oil price would soar to above $250 a barrel," Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said in a newspaper interview.
The comments come as Iran strives to contain international reaction to the storming of the British embassy last week, a move which drew immediate condemnation from around the world and may galvanise support for tougher action against Tehran.
The U.S. Senate voted on Thursday to penalise foreign financial institutions that do business with Iran's central bank - which takes payment for the 2.6 million barrels Iran exports a day. The European Union is considering a ban - already in place in the United States - on Iranian oil imports.
Until recently, Iran had dismissed as ineffective mounting sanctions aimed at forcing it to halt its nuclear activities. Mehmanparast's comments admitted that the penalties had caused damage.
"No one welcomes the sanctions, we know that sanctions create obstacles, but we want to say we will overcome these obstacles," Mehmanparast told Sharq daily. "Imposing sanctions on oil and gas is among the sanctions that, if one wants to do that, the consequences should be fully considered before taking any action.
"I do not think the situation in the world and especially in the West today is prepared enough to raise such discussions."
Friday, December 2, 2011
'Prepare for armageddon'
Banks told to prepare for Eurozone collapse
BRITAIN'S banks have been told to prepare for the end of the Eurozone, it emerged today.
City regulator the Financial Services Authority has told banks to ready themselves for armageddon by running "stress tests" on their balance sheets.
FSA chief Hector Sants met the heads of BARCLAYS, SANTANDER, HSBC, LLOYDS and RBS last week.
News of the shock warning came as the world's biggest central banks today launched a desperate bid to save the global economy by flooding markets with cheaper cash.
The Bank of England was one of six pledging to make it cheaper for big banks to access "unlimited amounts" of US dollars.
And EU chiefs warned Europe had TEN DAYS to solve the debt crisis or face catastrophe.
Strains
The central banks' shock action should make it easier for businesses and households to borrow — and for banks to fund themselves.
Stock markets around the world soared, with the FTSE 100 up 152 points by 2pm. Germany's DAX leapt four per cent.
In a statement, the Bank of England said: "The purpose of these actions is to ease strains in financial markets and thereby mitigate the effects of such strains on the supply of credit."
The Bank of England was joined by the European Central Bank, the US Federal Reserve, Bank of Japan, Bank of Canada and the Swiss National Bank.
They launched weekly and then three-monthly auctions of dollars in September in a bid to make more cash available.
But lowering the cost is a clear sign of the growing fear that the Eurozone crisis will spark a crippling double-dip.
Earlier today, EU monetary chief Olli Rehn warned: "We are now entering the critical period of ten days to complete and conclude the crisis response of the European Union."
France's central bank governor Christian Noyer added: "We are now looking at a true financial crisis."
The Western World Is 'Finished Financially': CIO
By: Antonya Allen / Assistant Editor, CNBC
The Western world has run out of ideas and is "finished financially" while emerging economies across the world will continue to grow, David Murrin, CIO at Emergent Asset Management told CNBC on the tenth anniversary of coining of the so-called BRIC nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China, by Goldman Sachs' Jim O'Neill.
"I still subscribe and I've spoken about it regularly on this show that this is the moment when the Western world realizes it is finished financially and the implications are huge, whereas the emerging BRIC countries are at the beginning of their continuation cycle," Murrin told CNBC.
Murrin added he believes the power shift from the West to emerging economies beyond Europe and the United States was "unstoppable" and he blamed a lack of ideas from Western leaders on how to stimulate growth together with contracted demographics and rising inflation as catalysts for Western decline.
"We suffer from no growth and we suffer from imported inflation… that means we have negative real growth and societies fracture when you have negative real growth and quite simply our society faces fractures for trying to stick Europe back together again is not going to work with that underlying paradigm, unless you can create five percent growth to overcome that imported inflation," Murrin explained.
Murrin said that the East was depending less on the West and the rise of a consumer society was the first step in the expansion of an economic empire.
"If you look at the cycle of an empire system from regionalization to expansion to empire, the first phases of that catalyst are when you have a self fuelled consumer society and so actually that process of building your consumer base which is really what's going on in China, day by day their consumer base increases and the dependence on the West decreases," he said.
Containing China
Murrin added that while China is by far the biggest emerging economy and would be at the center of a new economic order, other emerging nations were set to join the BRIC countries and new political orders and alliances would come about as a result.
"This isn't just a BRIC story, this is the end of the Christian Western Empire versus the rise of the whole emerging world led by China as the foremost and most powerful," Murrin told CNBC.
"I think it's going to be the whole world trying to contain China's growth and there's going to be completely new alliances that take place... between Australia, Japan and India and America and possibly Russia if the foreign policy is expansive enough, there's going to be a ring of containment trying to hold this bulging entity which is like no other nation we've ever seen coherently challenge for control of world commodities and resources," he added.
Intervention Not the Answer
Finally, Murrin stressed that Europe in particular was set to experience a rapid and deep decline and intervention by the European Union and its financial institutions was not a solution to stimulate growth.
"I think there's a real reality amongst investors and just taxi drivers, that without growth, the system's not sustainable, so intervention is just a drug and we all know that the more drugs you put into someone, the more the system becomes immune to their response and so I don't see this as a solution," he said.
Pointing to previous economic downturns, Murrin said the West was much less equipped than the emerging world to deal with its current decline.
"In all our examples of disastrous events, Argentina, Russia, the Asian crisis, they're not good references for us in the West because they take place in countries with good demographics, good commodity stories and essentially underlying tides which lift them away from their problems," he said.
"We in the West have none of those, we live in a world where resources are increasing in prices, where we're a consumer society, we're an old society, we're not innovative, we're not expansive, so we don't have any of those natural lifting qualities to actually pick us out of the mire which is what decline is really about," he added.
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