House Republicans say resigned to tax hike in fiscal cliff

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are resigned to seeing some sort of income tax increase in legislation to avoid a "fiscal cliff," but such efforts could be doomed in the absence of spending cuts, some Republican lawmakers say.
Congress and President Barack Obama are gearing up for a last-ditch attempt to avoid $600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts that could halt progress in the U.S. economy, which lately has been showing signs of gaining ground.
The White House said Obama will host a meeting on Friday with the four top congressional leaders - Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The Republicans have a majority in the House, while Obama's Democrats control the Senate.
House Speaker John Boehner informed his 241 Republican members on Thursday that the House would come back into session late on Sunday in anticipation of possible fiscal-cliff votes.
This Sunday's session "was about the only thing decided" during a half-hour conference call among House Republicans, said Representative Jeff Flake of Arizona, who will leave the House at the year-end to join the Senate.
In an interview shortly after the phone call, Flake said Republicans in the House and Senate were resigned to seeing some sort of increase in top income-tax rates, although he did not specify a dollar threshold.
While he said he did not want to see any income tax rates go up, Flake said: "I've felt we should've moved a week or two ago to accept the top rate going up and tell the president 'congratulations.'"
The bigger problem in avoiding the fiscal cliff, Flake said, would be if Obama demanded cancellation of the $109 billion in automatic spending cuts set to begin on January 2 without alternative spending cuts to replace them.
"There will be resistance from a lot of House conservatives to a deal that does that," Flake said.
Asked if the days leading up to next Monday, December 31 could thus be fruitless, Flake said, "That is what I am afraid of."
A Senate Democratic aide did not discount the possibility of some spending cuts being included in a limited bill to avert the fiscal cliff - even if they fell far short of the $1 trillion or so in cuts over 10 years that at one point was being discussed in talks between Boehner and Obama.
'TIRED OF WAITING'
Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma, who also participated in Thursday's House Republican conference call, said its overarching theme was that the Senate should take the bill passed by the House earlier this year to extend all expiring income tax rates and amend it in a way senators see fit.
The House could then either accept that measure, or amend it, and bounce it back to the Senate.
"People are tired of waiting on the Senate to do things," Cole said.
Senate Democrats counter that last July they passed a bill extending the Bush-era tax cuts - except on net household income above $250,000 a year.
Nevertheless, the Senate must still couple its tax-cut bill with Obama's request for extending jobless benefits and possibly some other budget or tax measures.
"I assume the House would want to come back on Sunday knowing that we (the Senate) were going to do something on Friday or Saturday," said Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri, a member of the Senate's Republican leadership.
House Republican leaders informed their members that the chamber could stay in session dealing with the fiscal cliff through Wednesday, January 2 - the last day of the current Congress and a day before the new Congress is sworn in.
Cole said Boehner "made very apparent he is not interested in passing a bill that didn't have a majority of Republicans" supporting it.
But Cole said this was "not quite as elusive to achieve" as many people thought. He said Boehner had "over 200 votes" out of 241 Republicans for his failed "Plan B" - a bill extending lower tax rates except for millionaires - which everyone knew would not become law.
Thus, a bill with prospects of being enacted could attract more support, Cole suggested.
If a new bill came to the House floor to raise taxes on upper incomes, Boehner could force passage with a combination of Democratic and Republican votes.
With public opinion polls showing that Republicans would get most of the blame if the country were to go over the fiscal cliff, some House Republicans have become nervous about their political fortunes.
Both Flake and Cole told Reuters that during Thursday's conference call, some Republicans urged Boehner to bring the House back to Washington sooner than Sunday - a request Flake described as being aimed at improving the "optics" of House Republicans being absent from Washington so close to the December 31 deadline.
But Boehner stuck with his promise to give members at least 48 hours notice of a return.
Cole remained upbeat about a positive end to the fiscal-cliff mess that has gripped Washington for two months now.
"I'm a hopeless optimist. I still think there's a chance we'll get things done. All major deals get done at the end," said Cole, who was one of the first House Republicans to say that he could go along with raising some income-tax rates.

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French government says will propose a rejigged 75 percent tax plan

PARIS (Reuters) - The French government will redraft a proposal for a 75 percent upper income tax band and resubmit it, the prime minister's office said on Saturday, after the Constitutional Council rejected the measure included in the 2013 budget.
"It will be presented as part of the next budget law," Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault's office said in a statement, without giving a time frame. The statement said the Council's rejection of the 75 percent tax would not affect efforts to trim the public deficit.

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French court rejects 75 percent millionaires' tax

PARIS (Reuters) - 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.
The Constitutional Council is a politically independent body that rules on whether laws, elections and referenda are constitutional.

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TEST:Pakistan: US drones kill 13, including commander

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — A pair of U.S. drone strikes in northwest Pakistan near the Afghan border killed 13 people Thursday, including a senior militant commander who had a truce with the Pakistani military, intelligence officials and residents said.
Five Pakistani security officials said the commander, Maulvi Nazir, was reportedly among nine people killed in a missile strike on a house in the village of Angoor Adda in the South Waziristan tribal region early Thursday. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
Nazir's killing could prove to be a contentious issue between Washington and Islamabad, which is believed to have struck a nonaggression pact with Nazir ahead of the Pakistani military's 2009 operation against militants in South Waziristan.
Militants under Nazir's command focused their attacks on American forces in neighboring Afghanistan, earning the militant leader the enmity of the U.S. But Pakistan's military viewed Nazir and militant chiefs like him as key to keeping the peace internally because they do not attack Pakistani targets.
Residents in both Angoor Adda and Wana, the biggest town in South Waziristan, said they heard announcements on mosque loudspeakers announcing Nazir's death. One resident, Ajaz Khan, told The Associated Press by telephone that 5,000 to 10,000 people attended the funeral of Nazir and six other people in held in Angoor Adda.
Reports of individual deaths are difficult to independently verify. It is difficult for Pakistani and foreign journalists to travel to the remote areas where many of these strikes occur, and the U.S. rarely comments on its secretive drone program.
The second drone strike took place near Mir Ali, the main town of the North Waziristan tribal region. One missile hit a vehicle near the town, followed by another missile when people rushed to the vehicle to help people in the car. The officials say four people were killed in the strike, although the identities of the dead were not immediately known.
Nazir was attacked by a suicide bomber in November as he was arriving at an office he used to meet with locals and hear their complaints. Nazir and more than a dozen other people were wounded in the attack, and seven people were killed.
No group claimed responsibility for the attack, but suspicion immediately fell on rival militants who have been jockeying with Nazir for power in South Waziristan.
Nazir outraged many Pakistanis in June when he announced that he would not allow any polio vaccinations in territory under his control until the U.S. stops drone attacks in the region. Pakistan is one of three countries where polio is still endemic. Nine workers helping in anti-polio vaccination campaigns were killed last month by militant gunmen.
The former chief of intelligence in northwest Pakistan, retired brigadier Asad Munir, said Nazir's killing will complicate the fight against militants in the tribal region, and could prompt Nazir's group to carry out retaliatory attacks against the Pakistani army in South Waziristan.
It will also raise questions among military commanders here who would like the U.S. to use its firepower against the Pakistani Taliban, which attacks domestic targets, and not against militants like Nazir who aren't seen as posing as much of a threat to the Pakistani state, Munir said.
He added that the risk now for Pakistan is that the remnants of Nazir's group could join ranks with the Pakistani Taliban in its war with the government and army.
The American drone program is extremely controversial in Pakistan where it is seen as an infringement of the country's sovereignty. And while the U.S. maintains that it targets militants, many Pakistanis complain that innocent civilians have also been killed.
America's use of drones has increased substantially under President Barack Obama. According to the Long War Journal, which tracks drone strikes, there were 35 strikes in Pakistan during 2008, the last year President George W. Bush was in office.
In 2009, that number went up to 53 and then shot up to 117 in 2010, the year with the most drone strikes in Pakistani territory. Last year, the U.S. carried out 46 strikes, and the Thursday strike that killed Nazir was the first of 2013.
The program has killed a number of top militant commanders over the past year, including al-Qaida's then-No. 2, Abu Yahya al-Libi, who died in a drone strike in June on the Pakistani village of Khassu Khel in North Waziristan.
In August, another missile strike in North Waziristan killed Badruddin Haqqani, who has been described as the day-to-day operations commander of the Haqqani network, which has been blamed by the U.S. for carrying out some of the most high-profile attacks against American and NATO troops in Afghanistan.

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Video fuels rumor NKorean leader's wife gave birth

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The seemingly pregnant belly sported by the wife of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in mid-December appeared to be gone by New Year's Day.
That's sent South Korean media into a frenzy of speculation that there's a new baby in the ruling Kim dynasty.
Video broadcast Dec. 17 showed Ri Sol Ju wearing a billowing black dress that covered what appeared to be a swollen belly.
Rumors swept Seoul and Pyongyang that she was pregnant, although it was difficult to tell for sure from the images. There has been no official word from Pyongyang.
But Ri was shown by state TV at a New Year's concert wearing a tighter dress and looking noticeably slimmer. That's causing more speculation in Seoul that she may have given birth.

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Pakistan says US drones kill senior Taliban figure

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Two U.S. drone strikes on northwest Pakistan killed a senior Taliban commander who fought American forces in Afghanistan but had a truce with the Pakistani military, intelligence officials said Thursday.
The commander, Maulvi Nazir, was among nine people killed in a missile strike on a house in the village of Angoor Adda in the South Waziristan tribal region near the border with Afghanistan late Wednesday night, five Pakistani security officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
At least four people were killed in a separate drone strike on Thursday morning near Mir Ali, the main town of the North Waziristan tribal region.
America's use of drones against militants in Pakistan has increased substantially under President Barack Obama and the program has killed a number of top militant commanders over the past year.
But the drone strikes are extremely contentious in Pakistan, seen as an infringement on the country's sovereignty. And while the U.S. maintains that it targets militants, many Pakistanis complain that innocent civilians have also been killed.
Nazir's killing could cause even more friction in the already tense relations between Washington and Islamabad. Pakistan is believed to have struck a nonaggression pact with Nazir ahead of its 2009 military operation against militants in South Waziristan.
Fighters under Nazir's command focused their attacks on American forces in neighboring Afghanistan, earning him the enmity of the U.S.
But many in Pakistan's military viewed Nazir and militant chiefs like him as "good Taliban," meaning they focus attacks only on foreign forces in Afghanistan, keeping domestic peace by not attacking Pakistani targets.
Nazir outraged many Pakistanis in June when he announced that he would not allow any polio vaccinations in territory under his control until the U.S. stops drone attacks in the region.
Pakistan is one of three countries where polio is still endemic. Nine workers helping in anti-polio vaccination campaigns were killed last month by militant gunmen and the killings this week of five female teachers and two aid workers may also have been linked to their work on the polio campaigns.
Residents in Angoor Adda and Wana, the biggest town in South Waziristan, said mosque loudspeakers announced Nazir's death. One resident, Ajaz Khan, said 5,000 to 10,000 people attended the funeral of Nazir and six other people in Angoor Adda.
Ahmed Yar, a resident who attended the funeral, said Nazir's body was badly burned and his face unrecognizable.
Reports of individual deaths in such cases are often difficult to independently verify. Pakistani and foreign journalists have a hard time traveling to the remote areas where many of these strikes occur, and the U.S. rarely comments on its secretive drone program.
Nazir was active in many parts of Afghanistan and had close ties with Arab members of al-Qaida as well as the Afghan Taliban, said Mansur Mahsud, the head of the Islamabad-based FATA Research Centre, which studies the tribal regions.
"His death is a great blow to the Afghan Taliban," he said.
The Taliban is a widely diverse group. The Afghan Taliban is made up mostly of Afghans who fight against U.S. and NATO troops. In Pakistan the group has been divided with some fighting the Pakistani government because of its support for the U.S. Other Taliban groups in Pakistan, such as Nazir's, focus their energies on fighting American and NATO troops in Afghanistan but have a truce with the Pakistani military.
Nazir, who was believed to be about 40 years old, had property in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. He used to be a member of Hizb-e-Islami, a militant Islamist group run by former Afghan prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. The group has thousands of fighters and followers across the north and east of Afghanistan.
Nazir had survived several assassination attempts including at least two previous American drone strikes.
In November, a suicide bomber tried to kill him as he was arriving at an office where he used to meet with local residents and hear their complaints. Nazir and more than a dozen other people were wounded in the attack, and seven were killed.
No group claimed responsibility, but suspicion immediately fell on rival militants including the head of the Tehrik-e-Taliban (TTP), Hakimullah Mehsud, who had been jockeying with Nazir for power in South Waziristan. The TTP is an umbrella group of militants formed to oust the Pakistani government and install a hardline Islamist regime. They have been behind much of the violence tearing apart Pakistan in recent years.
Nazir's non-aggression pact with the Pakistani military allowed the army to launch a massive operation in South Waziristan against the TTP which displaced more than 800,000 people and drove Hakimullah Mehsud from the region.
In retaliation for the assassination attempt, Nazir expelled members of the Hakimullah's Mehsud tribe from Wana. Nazir was meeting with supporters to discuss how to deal with the TTP when the missiles struck on Wednesday night, said Mehsud from the FATA center.
Nazir's group quickly appointed his close aide Bawal Khan as a replacement, according to one of Nazir's commanders. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.
But it remains to be seen what the new leader's policies will be and whether the tension with the TTP could lead to a power struggle in the region.
"Trouble will follow," said Mehsud.
The former chief of intelligence in northwest Pakistan, retired brigadier Asad Munir, said Nazir's killing will complicate the fight against militants in the tribal region, and could prompt Nazir's group to carry out retaliatory attacks against the Pakistani army in South Waziristan.
It will also raise questions among military commanders here who would like the U.S. to use its firepower against the Pakistani Taliban, which attacks domestic targets, and not against militants like Nazir who aren't seen as posing as much of a threat to the state, Munir said.
He added that the risk now for Pakistan is that the remnants of Nazir's group could join ranks with the Pakistani Taliban in its war with the government and army.
Drone strikes have been on the rise during Obama's presidency.
According to the Long War Journal, which tracks drone strikes, there were 35 strikes in Pakistan during 2008, the last year President George W. Bush was in office.
That number shot up to 117 in 2010 and then dropped the 46 last year. The strike that killed Nazir was the first of 2013.
The program has killed a number of top militant commanders over the past year, including al-Qaida's then-No. 2, Abu Yahya al-Libi, who died in a drone strike in June on the Pakistani village of Khassu Khel in North Waziristan.
In August, another missile strike in North Waziristan killed Badruddin Haqqani, who has been described as the day-to-day operations commander of the Haqqani network, which has been blamed by the U.S. for carrying out some of the most high-profile attacks against American and NATO troops in Afghanistan.

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Golf: Brunei Prince among Asian Tour qualifying school entries

 Prince Abdul Hakeem Jefri Bolkiah of Brunei is one of a record 761 golfers who will compete in the Asian Tour's qualifying school in Thailand this month.
The 39-year-old, who was his country's first Olympian when he took part in skeet shooting at the 1996 Games in Atlanta, will need to finish tied 40th or better to become the first Brunei golfer on tour.
The Prince, who took up golf having watched his grandfather - the former Sultan of Brunei - play, only turned professional last year after getting his handicap down to zero.
He is one of 156 golfers confirmed for the final stage (January 23-26) with more to come from the first stage which features 605 players split into two sections (January 9-12 and January 16-19).
Also taking part at the key final stage played at the Imperial Lakeview and Springfield Royal course is Germany's Alex Cejka, who has four European Tour wins, and Australia's Jake Higginbottom, the 2012 New Zealand Open winner as an amateur.
"The record numbers is another strong testament towards the Asian Tour's stature in world golf and shows that global players view the Asian Tour as the destination to build their careers," tour executive chairman Kyi Hla Han said in a statement.

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Golf-McIlroy may turn down chance to play in 2016 Olympics

LONDON, Jan 3 (Reuters) - World number one Rory McIlroy may reject the opportunity to compete at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro to avoid any controversy over which country to represent.
Twice major winner McIlroy, 23, said he was mulling whether to play for Britain or Ireland and he told the BBC that he might opt out of playing altogether.
"I just think being from where we're from, we're placed in a very difficult position. I feel Northern Irish and obviously being from Northern Ireland you have a connection to Ireland and a connection to the UK," McIlroy said.
"If I could and there was a Northern Irish team I'd play for Northern Ireland.
"Play for one side or the other - or not play at all because I may upset too many people Those are my three options I'm considering very carefully."
Golf will return to the Olympics for the first time since 1904 and McIlroy said in 2009 he would "probably play for Great Britain".
He echoed those feelings in an interview with the Daily Mail newspaper last year but regrets saying so.
"It was a moment, I don't want to say of weakness, but a moment of frustration with it all," he said.
"People tune in to watch me play on TV and feel like they are connected to me in some way. I don't want to repay them for their support with something they don't want me to do."
Last year McIlroy became the second player after Luke Donald in 2011 to win both order of merit titles either side of the Atlantic and he has a sizeable advantage in the world rankings over second-placed Donald going into the 2013 season.

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Golf-Valderrama course creator Ortiz-Patino dies aged 82

MADRID, Jan 3 (Reuters) - Jaime Ortiz-Patino, a Spain-based golf promoter who created the famous Valderrama course and who was one one of the driving forces behind the growth of the sport in the Iberian nation, has died at the age of 82.
"Jaime Ortiz-Patino...passed away this morning in the Costa del Sol hospital in Marbella," the Spanish golf federation (RFEG) said in a statement on their website (www.rfeg.es) on Thursday.
Born to Bolivian parents in Paris in June 1930, Ortiz-Patino created the Valderrama course, designed by Robert Trent Jones, in the mid 1980s and was able to lure the Ryder Cup there in 1997, the first time the competition has been held outside the British Isles.
The course was the home of the Volvo Masters between 1988 and 1996 and from 2002 to 2008 and has also hosted the Amex World Championships and the Andalucia Masters.
Known as "Jimmy" to his friends, Ortiz-Patino, whose grandfather was a fabulously wealthy Bolivian tin magnate, amassed a collection of golfing memorabilia that captured the history of the game over 500 years.
It included clubs, balls, prints, books and manuscripts, ceramics, photographs and paintings and was auctioned at Christie's in London last year.

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Everything You Need to Know About Steubenville High's Football 'Rape Crew'

In the past 24 hours, the story of an alleged rape in the small, football-driven Ohio town of Steubenville has transformed from a local controversy with a curious social-media angle to an all-out Internet crusade, with potential cover-ups, allegations of prosecutors colluding with coaches, disgusting new video, and hackers to the rescue. Here's a primer on what looks like it may become one of the most emotional and controversial news narratives of the new year:
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So there was a rape in this small town?
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Well, it's not that simple, but allegedly yes: Two 16-year-old boys from Steubenville High are each facing a rape charge for the assault in August of a 16-year-old girl apparently from across the Ohio River in Weirton, West Virginia.
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How come we're only hearing about this now?
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Because a lengthy New York Times story on the case last month got lost in the spotlight on the Newtown school shootings, maybe, or because the Anonymous hacking collective started calling major attention to it this week.
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But what makes this rape case different?
You see, Steubenville is the stuff of Friday Night Lights. The 19,000-person eastern Ohio town is a giant football community, and this alleged rape involves member of their storied Big Red team. "Everybody around here goes to games on Friday nights, and I mean everybody — people come for miles," a local told the Times's Juliet Macur and Nate Schweber. "It's basically the small-town effect. People live and die based on Big Red because they usually win and it makes everybody feel good about themselves when times are tough."
So how did this assault take place?
Well, back on the night of August 11, the alleged victim was at an end-of-summer party and had a lot to drink, police said, when Trent Mays and Malik Richmond allegedly approached her: "Richmond was behind her, with his hands between her legs, penetrating her with his fingers, a witness said," reported the The Times.
And how is that different from all the other assaults against young women in this country?
Here's the chilling part: the alleged victim didn't know she was assaulted until she started to find out about it on social media the next day.
Really? That's pretty gross. How did she find out?
Instagram, YouTube, and some pretty disgusting tweets. And the girl's mother told The Times that her daughter didn't even know the full extent of the attack until a local paper wrote about it the next day. On August 22, Mays and Richmond (right) were arrested on charges of rape and kidnapping. (Defense attorneys did not respond to requests for comment from The Atlantic Wire.)
Why only those two? They were at a party, right? And there were all those tweets?
Well, word spread among the students at or around the party quickly, and as the Cleveland Plain-Dealer reported, "Before the 16-year-old girl’s parents reported the crime to Steubenville police, many of the online posts had been deleted — or so students thought."
We live in an age when social media exists as evidence that can't just disappear, and Alexandria Goddard, who runs a crime blog called Prinniefied.com, turned up those deleted pictures from the night in question. Like this one:

What happened when that got out?
Goddard started posting on August 26, and attorneys for Mays and Richmond filed a defamation lawsuit October 25 — it was dismissed on December 27. But the local press had already picked up the story, and Goddard's site now carries the student Instagram photographer's apology:
“I deeply regret my actions on the night of August 11, 2012. While I wasn’t at the home where the alleged assault took place, there is no doubt that I was wrong to post that picture from an earlier party and tweet those awful comments. Not a moment goes by that I don’t wish I would have never posted that picture or tweeted those comments. I want to sincerely apologize to the victim and her family for these actions. I also want to acknowledge the work of several bloggers, especially Ms. Goddard at Prinniefied.com, in their efforts to make sure the full truth about that terrible night eventually comes out. At no time did my family mean to stop anyone from expressing themselves online – we only wanted to correct what we believed were misstatements that appeared on Ms. Goddard’s blog. I am glad that we have resolved our differences with Ms. Goddard and that she and her contributors can continue their work.” – Cody Saltsman
How come the other kids at the party didn't get in trouble? Isn't that aiding and abetting?
It's not like the cops didn't try: "The thing I found most disturbing about this is that there were other people around when this was going on," Steubenville Police Chief William McCafferty told the Times. "Nobody had the morals to say, 'Hey, stop it, that isn’t right.' ... If you could charge people for not being decent human beings, a lot of people could have been charged that night."
So what happened to the social media evidence? Isn't this supposed to be a case of our times?
That's where the investigation — a preliminary trial is scheduled for February 13 — runs into problems. Despite all the Instagramming and social media sharing, Chief McCafferty told the Times that witnesses failed to come forward:
The city’s police chief begged for witnesses to come forward, but received little response. In time, the county prosecutor and the judge in charge of handling crimes by juveniles recused themselves from the case because they had ties to the football team.
And, well, some of the evidence went "missing":
That player told the police that he was in the back seat of his Volkswagen Jetta with Mays and the girl when Mays proceeded to flash the girl’s breasts and penetrate her with his fingers, while the player videotaped it on his phone. The player, who shared the video with at least one person, testified that he videotaped Mays and the girl “because he was being stupid, not making the right choices.” He said he later deleted the recording.
Is anyone questioning the two boys' guilt?
Yes. About half the town of Steubenville, actually. Five months later, local students are still blaming the alleged victim for bringing the attack upon herself — she has been referred to on Facebook as "train whore":

And some, like one of Steubenville High's 19 football coaches, are blaming her for shaming the storied program:
"The rape was just an excuse, I think," said the 27-year-old Hubbard, who is No. 2 on the Big Red’s career rushing list.
"What else are you going to tell your parents when you come home drunk like that and after a night like that?” said Hubbard, who is one of the team’s 19 coaches. "She had to make up something. Now people are trying to blow up our football program because of it."
If not everyone believes the rape happened, aren't the town's football allegiances going to get in the way of a fair trial?
Well, yes, there's this from the Times report: "the county prosecutor and the judge in charge of handling crimes by juveniles recused themselves from the case because they had ties to the football team."
Wait, is this some sort of cover-up?
Well, that's why the hacktivist collective known as Anonymous — and, more specifically, one of its  cells known as Knightsec — got involved. The hackers, and their partners at the site LocalLeaks, are "giving a voice to the victim of this horrible crime" by rounding up new information that the police haven't been able to — or at least that hasn't been made publicly available in advance of next month's trial. They seem to believe that there are more people involved, that there are more victims, that the accused are getting special treatment because they are football players, and that there's a bigger group of boys involved, which Anonymous has dubbed the "Rape Crew." Oh, and they've set up Occupy Steubenville protests too.
Why do they think there's a cover-up, exactly?
For starters, Steubenville High head coach Reno Saccoccia didn't even bench the players involved. The Times wrote:
Saccoccia, pronounced SOCK-otch, told the principal and school superintendent that the players who posted online photographs and comments about the girl the night of the parties said they did not think they had done anything wrong. Because of that, he said, he had no basis for benching those players.
....
Approached in November to be interviewed about the case, Saccoccia said he did not "do the Internet," so he had not seen the comments and photographs posted online from that night. When asked again about the players involved and why he chose not to discipline them, he became agitated.
"You made me mad now," he said, throwing in several expletives as he walked from the high school to his car.
Nearly nose to nose with a reporter, he growled: "You're going to get yours. And if you don't get yours, somebody close to you will."
So is the country prosecutor trying to get her son and his teammates off the hook?
That's one of many new alleged details Anonymous and Local Leaks claim they have evidence of, in a document dump that started Wednesday, which they're calling The Steubenville Files. We detailed the findings already, and we're not sure of their sourcing, but their leaks suggest that the football coach and the country Sheriff are friends. And even though the boys will now be tried as juveniles, they allege that Saccoccia has ties in the juvenile court system.
Wait, how many moer people are involved in the assault?
The hackers allege that there are more than two boys who perpetrated the alleged crime. They also suggest that one of the parties that the unconscious girl was dragged to actually took place at the county prosecutor's house. The leaks read:
When the family of the victim went to file the charges, Jane Hanlin [the prosecutor] was present. She strongly discouraged them from filing. Hanlin frightened not only the victim, but the parents as well. Telling them that her name was going to be dragged through the mud, she will be in and out of court for well over two years, the press wouldn’t leave any of the family alone once the crime was made public. Scared out of their wits, the parents said they didn’t want that and Hanlin then said not to worry just leave it up to her and the detectives on the case.
And the hackers even dug up this video that had been deleted, which we showed and warned you about yesterday, of a former Steubenville student laughing about the attack:
Should we trust this new info?
Anonymous is notorious for doing borderline criminal fact-finding with good intentions. Just by bringing more Internet attention to the case, they've already pushed it forward. They continue to ask for the witness accounts that the town police chief has been asking for.
But the kid in that video up there will have his name attached to this case for years to come. And while he might deserve it, there's also a question of vigilanteism, since Anonymous has already published the personal information of certain other students it's convinced belong to this "Rape Crew":

How emotional should everyone get about all this before the trial?
Well, just this week Congress failed to pass the Violence Against Women Act, which is supposed to help protect women against assault and encourage them to come out in public when assaults do happen. The bill's failure, for the first time since 1994, is sort of poetic.

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