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Yes, Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow which means 6 more weeks of winter. The forecast from Punxsutawney Phil at the annual ceremony of Groundhog Day 2012 – “Many shadows do I see: six more weeks of winter it must be.”
Thousands of people that were gathered for the annual groundhog day event groaned when Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow. An event that has some 15.000 to 18.000 people there to witness the furry creature’s prognostication ceremony at 7:30 a.m. EST. When the groundhog came from his burrow at dawn, it was only near freezing, which is above average for this time of year in Pennsylvania. Usually, the temperature is around 17 degrees, according to the National Weather Service.
According to the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club’s Inner Circle, Phil has seen his shadow 100 times and hasn’t seen it 16 times since 1886. In Groundhog Club’s records, Phil has predicted 99 long winters and 15 early springs, with nine years of records lost. Those predictions have been right only 39 percent of the time — 36 percent if you look at post-1969 predictions, when weather records are more accurate.
Tim Roche, a meteorologist at Weather Underground said: “If Punxsutawney Phil is right 39 percent of the time, that’s much, much worse than a climatological prediction. Even if you flip a coin, you’ll still be right close to half of the time. That’s a 50 percent accuracy rate. So you’ll be better off flipping a coin than going by the groundhog’s predictions.”
Still tradition lives on with Groundhogs day and Punxsutawney Phil will emerge from his burrow every Feb. 2 on the Christian holiday, Candlemas Day. All to celebrate a German superstition about hibernating animals casting shadows to predict winter.

Groundhog Punxsutawney Phil.

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Don Cornelius (creator of iconic dance program “Soul Train” that helped introduce Americans to black culture on TV) died after shooting himself in the head, officials said on Wednesday. He was 75.
“The death was reported as a suicide, a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head” – said coroner’s assistant chief Ed Winter. Cornelius was pronounced dead at 4:56 a.m., Winter said.
Police discovered the popular personality’s body at his house after responding to reports of shots fired in the wealthy, hillside area of Los Angeles called Sherman Oaks where he lived. The community is home to many celebrities and entertainment executives.
Cornelius was taken to a nearby hospital where he was officially pronounced dead, LAPD spokesman Kevin Maiberger said. He declined to give details because detectives were still at the scene investigating on Wednesday morning.
Cornelius launched “Soul Train” in the early 1970′s as a local dance show from Chicago. It relocated to Los Angeles the following year and eventually became part of pop culture history by boosting the careers of young artist breaking out, such as the Jackson Five, and older artists like James Brown that were looking to tap into a young, funky audience. As the smooth-talking host with a deep voice, Cornelius gave to hip young kids of the ’70s what American Bandstand creator Dick Clark offered to viewers in the early days of rock ‘n’ roll.
As the popularity of “Soul Train” grew, the show began to cross over into mainstream America and R&B artists soon broadened their fan base.

Don Cornelius.

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The nation’s leading breast-cancer charity, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is halting its partnerships with Planned Parenthood affiliates — creating a bitter rift, linked to the abortion debate, between two iconic organizations that have assisted millions of women.
The change will mean a cutoff of hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants, mainly for breast exams.
Planned Parenthood says the move results from Komen bowing to pressure from anti-abortion activists. Komen says the key reason is that Congress is investigating Planned Parenthood (an inquiry launched by a conservative Republican who was urged to act by anti-abortion groups).
Planned Parenthood said the Komen grants totaled roughly $680.000 last year and $580.000 the year before, going to at least 19 of its affiliates for breast-cancer screening and other breast-health services.
Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest receives two Komen grants for breast-cancer outreach and screening for two groups of vulnerable women, said spokeswoman Kristen Glundberg-Prossor.
In Clallam County, she said, a $52.492 Komen grant funded outreach to Native-American, Latina, underinsured and isolated women, including a mobile unit that screened and administered mammograms for more than 400 women last year. That grant runs through midyear.
“We won’t be applying for that money next year” – Glundberg-Prossor added.
In Idaho, a $23.544 grant helped bring screening to about 400 refugee women in the Boise-Twin Falls area last year. Glundberg-Prossor said the Idaho Komen affiliate told Planned Parenthood at the end of the year that the grant wouldn’t be renewed “because we were being investigated.”

Susan G. Komen.

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“The Help” cleaned up at the 18th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards Sunday night, claiming best ensemble cast, best actress and best supporting actress.
“The Artist” – too, claimed another key prize as Jean Dujardin won for best actor.
Hollywood’s acting guild spread awards across the television and film spectrum and gave “The Help” a boost in the acting categories for the Oscars, which will be handed out Feb. 26.
Octavia Spencer took best supporting actress, but co-star Viola Davis may have been the night’s biggest winner. She was named best movie actress and spoke for the cast of The Help when it collected its best-ensemble award.
“We had such great expectations” coming in to adapt the best-selling book – Davis said.
“The stain of racism and sexism isn’t just for people of color or women” – said the star of the civil rights drama. “It’s all of our burdens. All of us can inspire change.”
Not that “The Artist” would be ignored. “My God, my God, my God” – a tearful Dujardin said onstage. “It’s too much.”
Dujardin credits his success to daydreaming. “My teachers called me ‘John of the moon.’ I realized I never stopped dreaming. Thank you for this dream.”
Modern Family took its second SAG Award for best TV comedy.
30 Rock’s Alec Baldwin won for actor in a comedy series, calling the award proof that “obviously you people love Tina (Fey’s) writing.” Winning for the second straight year, Betty White took best actress in a comedy for Hot in Cleveland.
Jessica Lange, winner of best female actor in a drama series for American Horror Story, seemed surprised by the honor. “To be an actor means everything to me” – she said.

Viola Davis.

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Brooklyn-born actor Nick Santino committed suicide Wednesday, The New York Post reports.
The soap opera star was wracked with grief after his beloved pit bull Rocco was euthanized Tuesday – the same day Santino turned 47.
“Today I betrayed my best friend and put down my best friend” – Santino wrote in a suicide note, according to close friend Stuart Sarnoff. “Rocco trusted me and I failed him. He didn’t deserve this.”
The actor (who appeared on seven episodes of “All My Children” and six episodes of “Guiding Light”) had been feeling “harassed” by his building management company, according to his neighbor Lia Pettigrew.
He was allegedly threatened with a $250 fine for having a barking dog, but according to neighbor Kevan Cleary: “the dog was not a barker, but somebody complained that the dog would bark.”
Santino phoned a former girlfriend at 2 a.m. Wednesday. Police found Santino’s body in his bedroom later that afternoon. The actor had overdosed on pills.
The actor’s pet Rocco has been cremated. Friends tell The New York Post Santino’s remains will also be cremated.

Nick Santino.

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“Send an ambulance right now. This is an emergency.” So begins the dramatic 911 call, in which Demi Moore’s friends are desperately trying to get an ambulance to the actress’ Beverly Hills home as quickly as possible, which was released this morning by the Los Angeles Fire Department. On the heavily redacted recording, which lasts about 10 minutes, one of Moore’s friends begins arguing with the dispatcher amid confusion over which agency covers the neighborhood and should be sending paramedics.
“Why is there not an ambulance coming now?” the woman says testily before explaining what caused the star to “act crazy.”
“She smoked something. It’s not marijuana but it’s similar to incense. She seems to be having convulsions of some sort.
“She’s semi-conscious … barely. She’s convulsing.”
The phone is passed to another woman, who tells the dispatcher: “She’s not breathing normally … she’s burning up.”
Asked if she knows exactly what Moore smoked or any other drugs she might have consumed, the second woman replies – “She’s been having some issues with some other stuff lately. I don’t know what she’s been taking or not.”
The dispatcher calms the woman down and explains how to treat Moore, stressing to keep her airway open.
By the end of the call, the paramedics have arrived to take Moore to Sherman Oaks Hospital, where she has since been discharged.
As E! News has previously reported, the 49-year-old Moore had been hosting a birthday party for a friend at the time and had exhibited “pretty hyper” behavior in the moments before the 911 call.

Demi Moore.

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Robert Hegyes, the Jersey-born actor who played Jewish Puerto Rican wheeler-dealer Juan Luis Pedro Phillipo de Huevos Epstein on the 1970′s classic “Welcome Back Kotter,” died from an apparent heart attack after suffering chest pains at his Metuchen home this morning. He was 60.
Hegyes, who also co-starred on “Cagney and Lacey” and taught occasional master classes at his alma mater, Rowan University, was best known for his work on “Kotter” – in which he performed alongside a young John Travolta as one of the tough remedial students known at the Sweathogs. Hegyes and nearly all of the original cast members reunited last year at the TV Land Awards to recognize the show’s 35th anniversary.
On his website, Hegyes wrote that he modeled the swaggering, skirt-chasing Epstein after Chico Marx, whom he played in a national touring production of “A Night With Groucho.” He was a big fan of the Marx Brothers – “They were immigrant Jews, and I was an immigrant Italian. Groucho, Harpo, Chico, Gummo, and Zeppo were intellectuals … They all played the piano and took music lessons, and they were all juvenile delinquents; I could definitely relate.”
Hegyes had suffered a heart attack a couple of years ago and was not in good health, his brother Mark Hegyes of Montana said. Metuchen police responded to a call for medical assistance from Hegyes’ home at 9:02 a.m., and Hegyes, who was experiencing chest pains, was taken to JFK Medical Center in Edison, police said. By the time he arrived at the emergency room at 9:40 a.m., he was in full cardiac arrest and died, according to hospital spokesman Steven Weiss.

Robert Hegyes.

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Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer got a very public earful by President Barack Obama when she came to meet him on the tarmac outside of Phoenix on Wednesday.
The two leaders could be seen engaged in an intense conversation at the base of Air Force One’s steps. Both could be seen smiling, but speaking at the same time.
Asked moments later what the conversation was about, Brewer, a Republican, said: “He was a little disturbed about my book.”
Brewer recently published a book, “Scorpions for Breakfast,” something of a memoir of her years growing up, and defends her signing of Arizona’s controversial law cracking down on undocumented immigrants, which Obama opposes.
Obama was objecting to Brewer’s description of a meeting he and Brewer had at the White House, where she described Obama as lecturing her. In an interview in November Brewer described two tense meetings. The first took place before his commencement address at Arizona State University. “He did blow me off at ASU” – she said in the television interview in November.
She also described meeting the president at the White House in 2010 to talk about immigration. “I felt a little bit like I was being lectured to, and I was a little kid in a classroom, if you will, and he was this wise professor and I was this little kid, and this little kid knows what the problem is and I felt minimized to say the least.”
On the tarmac Wednesday, Brewer handed Obama an envelope with a handwritten invitation to return to Arizona to meet her for lunch and to join her for a visit to the border.
“I said to him, you know, I have always respected the office of the president and that the book is what the book is” – she told reporters Wednesday. She said Obama complained that she described him as not treating her cordially.

Jan Brewer.

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A State of the Union address is often difficult to fact check, no matter who is president. The speech is a product of many hands and is carefully vetted, so major errors of fact are so relatively rare that they sometimes can become big news – think of George W. Bush’s “sixteen little words” about Iraq seeking uranium in Niger. At the same time, State of the Union addresses are very political speeches, an argument for the president’s policies, so context – or the perspective of opponents – is often missing.
Here is a guide through some of President Obama’s more fact-challenged claims, in the order in which he made them. As is our practice with live events, we do not award Pinocchio rankings, which are reserved for complete columns.
“For the first time in nine years, there are no Americans fighting in Iraq. For the first time in two decades, Osama bin Laden is not a threat to this country. Most of al Qaeda’s top lieutenants have been defeated. The Taliban’s momentum has been broken, and some troops in Afghanistan have begun to come home.”
The killing of bin Laden, which Obama used to open and close his speech, is an achievement that few partisans would quibble with. But the story about Iraq and Afghanistan is much more muddled.
Yes, U.S. troops have left Iraq, in part because the Obama administration was unwilling or unable (take your pick) to extend a security agreement with Iraq. Since the U.S. departure, Iraq has descended into violence as the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has targeted Sunni opposition figures. The country at times appears to teeter on the edge of a new outbreak of sectarian violence.

Barack Obama.

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Sen. Rand Paul told his communications director this morning he was being detained by TSA at the Nashville airport.
The Twitter account associated with Paul staffer Moira Bagley, @moirabagley, tweeted around 10 a.m., ET: “Just got a call from @senrandpaul. He’s currently being detained by TSA in Nashville.”
A TSA spokesman disputed that Paul was ever “detained.” But he was not granted access to the secure area of the airport when he tried to board a flight Monday morning.
The standoff was short-lived. By late morning, according to TSA, Paul had been booked on another flight and made it through the screening process.
The TSA version of events is that Paul triggered an alarm during routine airport screening and refused to complete the screening process (pat-down) in order to resolve the issue. Paul was escorted out of the screening area by local law enforcement.
“When an irregularity is found during the TSA screening process, it must be resolved prior to allowing a passenger to proceed to the secure area of the airport” – according to an official statement released by TSA. “Passengers who refuse to complete the screening process cannot be granted access to the secure area in order to ensure the safety of others traveling.”
Paul’s office confirmed he set off an airport security full-body scanner “on a glitch” – according to a spokesman.
The Paul staffer said TSA agents would not let Paul walk back through the body scanner and were demanding a full body pat-down.

Rand Paul.

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