Inauguration to Cost Millions But Total Price Unclear

How much will all the inaugural events cost? It's hard to say.

While most events that occur in the capital have a hard-and-fast budget, the inauguration's many moving parts, safety concerns and large geographic reach make it hard to quantify – especially before the main event.

In 2009, ABC reported the total cost of Obama's first inauguration was $170 million. While incumbent presidents historically spend less on a second inauguration, it's unclear what the total bill will be this time around. Analysis of some of the known appropriations so far puts the total at $13.637 million, but it will no doubt be a much larger price tag when everything is accounted for.

RELATED: 12 Things You Didn't Know About the Inauguration

One of the main chunks missing from this year's tab is the budget for the Presidential Inaugural Committee – the group responsible for using donated money to put together this year's celebrations, including National Day of Service, the Kids' Inaugural Concert, the Parade and the Inaugural Balls.

In 2009, the PIC collected more than $53 million in donations, according to a report filed with the Federal Elections Commission 90 days after the inauguration.

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Politically Dressed: Inauguration First Daughters Watch Video

While enthusiasm for the inauguration was running higher that year, it is possible the PIC will haul in more money this time around, as they have eliminated some of the self-imposed regulations on the kinds of donations they can accept. For his first inauguration, President Obama did not take money from corporations or gifts that exceeded $50,000.

In 2013, his committee did away with those rules. PIC spokesman Brent Colburn would not say why the change took place, insisting that each committee operates independently from the precedent set by the inaugurations before – even if staff like Colburn are repeats on the committee from 2009.

RELATED: Inauguration Weekend: A Star-Powered Lineup

The PIC also won't say how much they have already collected or even what their goal was. Colburn explained that these are "moving budgets," which won't stabilize until after the inauguration.

They have, however, released the names of donors on their website weekly. As of Friday afternoon, they were up to 993 donors.

Another leg of the costs is covered by the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies. They take care of the swearing-in ceremony and the Congressional luncheon. For those events they have a total budget of $1.237 million, down by about $163,000 from 2009. Whereas the PIC budget comes from donations, the American taxpayers foot the bill for the JCCIC.

Beyond those two inauguration-focused groups, there are a myriad of broader organizations that spend money on the inauguration as well.

RELATED: Plenty of Room at the Inns for 2013 Inauguration

A Congressional Research Service report from December says the government spent $22 million reimbursing local and state governments and the National Park Service for their participation in the 2009 inauguration, but that figure is low. The D.C. government alone received twice that amount, according to the mayor's office. Officials from D.C., Maryland and Virginia estimated their total need to be $75 million.

NPS got an appropriation from Congress of $1.2 million so far this year, according to communications officer Carol Johnson, and another $1.4 million went to the U.S. Park Police.

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U.S. 'needs tougher child labor rules'

Cristina Traina says in his second term, Obama must address weaknesses in child farm labor standards

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Cristina Traina: Obama should strengthen child farm labor standards


• She says Labor Dept. rules allow kids to work long hours for little pay on commercial farms


• She says Obama administration scrapped Labor Dept. chief's proposal for tightening rules


• She says Labor Dept. must fix lax standards for kid labor on farmers; OSHA must enforce them

Editor's note: Cristina L.H. Traina is a Public Voices Op Ed fellow and professor at Northwestern University, where she is a scholar of social ethics.

(CNN) -- President Barack Obama should use the breathing space provided by the fiscal-cliff compromise to address some of the issues that he shelved during his last term. One of the most urgent is child farm labor. Perhaps the least protected, underpaid work force in American labor, children are often the go-to workers for farms looking to cut costs.

It's easy to see why. The Department of Labor permits farms to pay employees under 20 as little as $4.25 per hour. (By comparison, the federal minimum wage is $7.25.) And unlike their counterparts in retail and service, child farm laborers can legally work unlimited hours at any hour of day or night.

The numbers are hard to estimate, but between direct hiring, hiring through labor contractors, and off-the-books work beside parents or for cash, perhaps 400,000 children, some as young as 6, weed and harvest for commercial farms. A Human Rights Watch 2010 study shows that children laboring for hire on farms routinely work more than 10 hours per day.

As if this were not bad enough, few labor safety regulations apply. Children 14 and older can work long hours at all but the most dangerous farm jobs without their parents' consent, if they do not miss school. Children 12 and older can too, as long as their parents agree. Unlike teen retail and service workers, agricultural laborers 16 and older are permitted to operate hazardous machinery and to work even during school hours.

In addition, Human Rights Watch reports that child farm laborers are exposed to dangerous pesticides; have inadequate access to water and bathrooms; fall ill from heat stroke; suffer sexual harassment; experience repetitive-motion injuries; rarely receive protective equipment like gloves and boots; and usually earn less than the minimum wage. Sometimes they earn nothing.

Little is being done to guarantee their safety. In 2011 Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis proposed more stringent agricultural labor rules for children under 16, but Obama scrapped them just eight months later.

Adoption of the new rules would be no guarantee of enforcement, however. According to the 2010 Human Rights Watch report, the Department of Labor employees were spread so thin that, despite widespread reports of infractions they found only 36 child labor violations and two child hazardous order violations in agriculture nationwide.

This lack of oversight has dire, sometimes fatal, consequences. Last July, for instance, 15-year-old Curvin Kropf, an employee at a small family farm near Deer Grove, Illinois, died when he fell off the piece of heavy farm equipment he was operating, and it crushed him. According to the Bureau County Republican, he was the fifth child in fewer than two years to die at work on Sauk Valley farms.

If this year follows trends, Curvin will be only one of at least 100 children below the age of 18 killed on American farms, not to mention the 23,000 who will be injured badly enough to require hospital admission. According to Center for Disease Control and Prevention statistics, agriculture is one of the most dangerous industries. It is the most dangerous for children, accounting for about half of child worker deaths annually.

The United States has a long tradition of training children in the craft of farming on family farms. At least 500,000 children help to work their families' farms today.

Farm parents, their children, and the American Farm Bureau objected strenuously to the proposed new rules. Although children working on their parents' farms would specifically have been exempted from them, it was partly in response to worries about government interference in families and loss of opportunities for children to learn agricultural skills that the Obama administration shelved them.

Whatever you think of family farms, however, many child agricultural workers don't work for their parents or acquaintances. Despite exposure to all the hazards, these children never learn the craft of farming, nor do most of them have the legal right to the minimum wage. And until the economy stabilizes, the savings farms realize by hiring children makes it likely that even more of them will be subject to the dangers of farm work.

We have a responsibility for their safety. As one of the first acts of his new term, Obama should reopen the child agricultural labor proposal he shelved in spring of 2012. Surely, farm labor standards for children can be strengthened without killing off 4-H or Future Farmers of America.

Second, the Department of Labor must institute age, wage, hour and safety regulations that meet the standards set by retail and service industry rules. Children in agriculture should not be exposed to more risks, longer hours, and lower wages at younger ages than children in other jobs.

Finally, the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration must allocate the funds necessary for meaningful enforcement of child labor violations. Unenforced rules won't protect the nearly million other children who work on farms.

Agriculture is a great American tradition. Let's make sure it's not one our children have to die for.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Cristina Traina.

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Toyota settles 'bellwether' US wrongful death suit

WASHINGTON: Japanese automaker Toyota has settled a wrongful death lawsuit in the United States over sudden, unintended acceleration that allegedly killed two people in Utah in 2010.

"We are satisfied that both parties reached a mutually acceptable agreement to settle this case," Toyota Motor Corp said in a statement late Thursday.

A Toyota spokeswoman, Celeste Migliore, told AFP it was the first "bellwether" settlement among hundreds of cases pending in a federal court in California.

Toyota did not reveal financial details of the settlement, but said in a statement it "will have a number of other opportunities to defend our product at trial... and other legal venues."

"We would emphasize that at no time has anyone put forth any reliable scientific evidence of an alleged electronic defect in our vehicles that could cause unintended acceleration," it said.

The settled case involved a man and woman in the US state of Utah killed when the Toyota Camry they were traveling in slammed into a wall.

Critics have argued that Toyota's accelerator technology was behind several deadly accidents.

But Japan's biggest automaker said its accelerator technology was confirmed as safe.

"We sympathize with anyone in an accident involving one of our vehicles; however, we continue to stand fully behind the safety and integrity of Toyota's Electronic Throttle Control System, which multiple independent evaluations have confirmed as safe," the statement said.

The acceleration problem prompted a recall of millions of Toyota vehicles in 2009-2010, severely damaging the carmaker's once-sterling reputation.

Toyota has argued at least in some cases that the problems involved floor mats that came loose and trapped the accelerator pedal.

Last year, Toyota added two models to 2009-2010 recalls citing the floor mat problem.

Toyota's mishandling of its vehicle problems led to a US congressional probe, more than $50 million in fines from US regulators and public apologies by its chief.

In December, the automaker announced an agreement to pay about $1.1 billion to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by US vehicle owners who said the value of their cars had fallen due to the recalls.

It also agreed to pay a record $17.35 million fine for failing to promptly notify US authorities that floor mats could also be trapped under the accelerators of 2010 Lexus models.

In November Toyota agreed to pay $25.5 million to settle claims from shareholders who lost money after its stock price plummeted in the wake of the recalls.

- AFP/de

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Report: Hundreds of hostages freed in Algeria

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: U.S. rejects reported prisoner exchange offer from jihadist spokesman


• It's unclear how many hostages are left at the remote gas facility


• An escaped hostage says explosives were tied to his neck


• Attackers apparently are upset that Algeria supported anti-terror operations in neighboring Mali

(CNN) -- Militants strapping plastic explosives around the necks of foreign workers seized in the remote Algerian desert. Hostages secretly inventing disguises to escape their captors.

These are just some of the few concrete details that have emerged from the survivors of a massive terrorist assault on an Algerian gas field, an ordeal that is entering a third day.

It isn't clear how many hostages were initially seized by the Islamic militants, how many are still being held or how many have been killed. Some may still be hiding in the complex, according to the state-run Algerian Press Service.

The press service said Friday that an Algerian military operation freed 650 hostages, including 100 foreigners. At least 30 foreign workers are still unaccounted for, according to the unconfirmed media report.

It said there were numerous casualties in the military operation, without offering details.

Facing criticism that it didn't alert other countries before launching its military operation Thursday, Algeria said it had to act fast before the hostages were moved to another country.

Like most of the information about the situation, there are conflicting reports over whether the operation is still ongoing.

Algeria's state media reported it was over, but British Prime Minister David Cameron said Friday morning that the Algerians were still pursuing terrorists and possibly hostages at the large and complex site.

It all started Wednesday, when the al Qaeda-linked militants -- apparently angry about Algeria's support in a rout of their comrades in neighboring Mali -- targeted the remote gas field, which is operated by Algeria's state oil company in partnership with foreign companies, including Britain's BP and Norway's Statoil.

The massive gas field is in the southern Algerian town of In Amenas, just 60 kilometers (37 miles) from the Libyan border.

Officials from Britain, the United States, Norway, France, Malaysia and Japan have said their nationals are also among those involved, without offering further details, citing conflicting reports.

Cameron said Friday that the number of Britons unaccounted for is "significantly" fewer than 30.

A reported offer to negotiate the release of an unknown number of American hostages has been rejected by the United States.

A spokesman for Moktar Belmoktar, a veteran jihadist who leads the the Brigade of the Masked Ones, which has claimed responsibility for the kidnappings, made the offer in an interview with a Mauritanian private news agency.

The spokesman said Belmoktar is willing to release the American hostages in exchange for Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, the mastermind behind the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani woman who is jailed in the United States on terrorism charges.

When asked Friday about the reported prisoner exchange offer, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland restated the United States' policy of not negotiating with terrorists.

It's unclear how many Americans are being held. There could be as few as three American hostages, two U.S. officials said Wednesday.

A dangerous escape

At the beginning of the siege, the militants rounded up all the Westerners into one group and tied them up, according to survivors' accounts.

The kidnappers were equipped with AK-47 rifles and put explosives-laden vests on some of the hostages, a U.S. State Department official said.

Some were able to escape by disguising themselves, according to Regis Arnoux, who runs a catering firm at the site and spoke to some of his 150 employees who were freed. He said they all were "traumatized" by their ordeal as hostages.

Some Algerian hostages were free to walk around the site but not to leave, according to Arnoux. Some managed to escape by themselves.

As the Algerian military launched its operation, the militants moved some of the hostages, according to one survivor's account.

With plastic explosives strapped around their necks, these hostages were blindfolded and gagged before being loaded into five Jeeps, according to the brother of former hostage and British national Stephen McFaul.

McFaul managed to escape after the vehicle he was in -- one of several targeted by Algerian fighters -- crashed, with the explosives still around his neck, his brother told CNN's Matthew Chance.

"The joy was unreal," Brian McFaul said upon hearing that his brother was safe. "I haven't seen my mother move as fast in all my life, and my mother smile as much, hugging each other. ... You couldn't describe the feeling."

Sadly, McFaul said the other four Jeeps were "wiped out" in an explosion, and his brother believed that the hostages inside did not survive.

Nations react

Britain has deployed a team of trauma experts and consular affairs officers who can issue emergency passports to a location about 450 kilometers (280 miles) away from the besieged plant, a Foreign Office official said.

"It's the kind of thing we have done before in similar situations," the official said. "This is us getting as close and as ready as we can."

Those freed include some Americans, while other U.S. nationals are still unaccounted for, U.S. officials said.

"This incident will be resolved -- we hope -- with a minimum loss of life," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday. "But when you deal with these relentless terrorists, life is not in any way precious to them."

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, speaking in London, said the United States was working round the clock to ensure the safe return of its citizens.

The U.S. is evacuating between 10 and 20 people caught up in the hostage-taking, a U.S. defense official told CNN on Friday.

They will be taken to U.S. facilities in Europe, the official said, and the condition of those who are injured will be assessed.

BP said Friday that a "small number of BP employees" are still unaccounted for, while Norway's Statoil said the fate of eight of its employees at In Amenas was still uncertain. Nine other Statoil workers who were at the plant are safe, it said.

Both firms are pulling personnel from Algeria, which is Africa's largest natural gas producer and a major supplier of natural gas to Europe.

BP said it had flown 11 of its own employees and several hundred staff from other companies out of the North African country Thursday and expected another flight Friday.

Three workers for a Japanese engineering company that was working on the site have been contacted and are safe, said Takeshi Endo, a senior manager for JGC Corp. But the company had not been able to contact 14 others, he said.

CNN affiliate BFM-TV reported that a French nurse who was working at the site at the time of the attack had been freed.

'Terribly disappointed'

Algeria faces tough questions from the governments of kidnapped nationals over its handling of the crisis amid fears that hostage safety is not being put first.

Neither the United States nor Britain was informed before Algeria's military operation Thursday.

But, speaking to lawmakers Friday, Cameron stressed that militants were to blame for the attack.

At least one Briton has been killed in the incident.

Japanese Vice Minister Shunichi Suzuki summoned the Algerian ambassador Friday to express Tokyo's concern, the Japanese Foreign Ministry said. And Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is cutting short a foreign trip to deal with the crisis, his office said.

"There is so much conflicting information on safety of the hostages," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters in Tokyo. "Safety of 14 Japanese citizens still remains unknown."

He said Japanese officials had urged the Algerian government to avoid exposing the hostages to danger. "We are terribly disappointed about the Algerians' military operation," he said.

Before the Algerians launched the operation, U.S. officials urged them to be cautious and make the hostages' safety their first priority, an Obama administration official said.

A senior U.S. official said U.S. officials did not trust the information they were getting from the Algerians, "because we hear one thing and then we hear something else."

Algerian forces went in Thursday after noticing the hostages being moved toward "a neighboring country," where kidnappers could use them "as a means of blackmail with criminal intent," Algerian Communications Minister Mohamed Said told state television.

Algerian troops fired on at least two SUVs trying to leave the facility, Algerian radio said. And a reporter saw clashes near the site, the Algerian Press Service and radio reports said.

"There were a number of dead and injured, we don't have a final figure," the communications minister said.

The man behind the group claiming responsibility for the attack and kidnappings is a veteran jihadist known for seizing hostages.

Belmoktar, the veteran jihadist, is an Algerian who lost an eye fighting in Afghanistan in his teens. He has long been a target of French counterterrorism forces. Libyan sources said he spent several months in Libya in 2011, exploring cooperation with local jihadist groups and securing weapons.

The militants said they carried out the operation because Algeria allowed French forces to use its airspace in attacking Islamist militants in Mali. Media in the region reported that the attackers issued a statement demanding an end to "brutal aggression on our people in Mali" and cited "blatant intervention of the French crusader forces in Mali."

French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said the Algerian hostage situation "confirms the gravity of the terrorist threat and the necessity to fight it with a determined and united front."

CNN's Barbara Starr, Dan Rivers, Mitra Mobasherat, Saskya Vandoorne, Laura Perez Maestro, Junko Ogura, Dheepthi Namasivayam, Saad Abedine, Elise Labott, David Mattingly, Athena Jones, Jethro Mullen, Tim Lister, Joe Sterling and Greg Botelho contributed to this report, as did journalists Peter Taggart from Belfast and Said Ben Ali from Algiers.

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Holder urges mayors to pressure Congress on guns

Attorney General Eric Holder, flanked by Houston, Texas Mayor Annise Parker, left, and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Administrator John Pistole, speaks at the U.S. Conference of Mayors 81st winter meeting in Washington, Friday, Jan. 18, 2013. / AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

Attorney General Eric Holder urged the nation's mayors today to pressure Congress to move forward on gun control legislation President Obama recently proposed.

"Some have said that these changes will require 'tough' votes by members of Congress," Holder said at the U.S. Conference of Mayors event in Washington, D.C. " Public service is never easy, and there come times when those of us who are in elected or appointed positions must put the interests of those we are privileged to serve above that which might be politically expedient or professionally safe. This is one of those times."

Holder said it is "essential" that Congress pass bans on high-capacity magazines and on assault weapons. He also said Congress should pass new laws requiring universal background checks for gun purchasers and placing tougher penalties on gun traffickers. "It means taking action to ensure that, while our Second Amendment rights are upheld, we have the means to prosecute effectively those who use firearms to commit acts of violence," he said.

A new CBS News/New York Times poll released Thursday found that most Americans favor the president's proposals.

Holder was perhaps talking to a captive audience. Several of the mayors in attendance met with Vice President Joe Biden yesterday on the issue of gun violence. And 800 mayors have already joined New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's new group, Demand a Plan, pushing Congress to act.

Holder broadened the context of gun violence from the mass shootings of Newtown and Aurora to the daily violence that "plague[s] our cities and towns every day."

"This unspeakable tragedy, and the individual tragedies that take place on your streets all too often and all too often unnoticed, stand as stark reminders of our shared responsibility to address not just the epidemic of gun-related crimes, and the ongoing need for vigorous enforcement of our laws - but also the underlying conditions that give rise to gun violence," Holder said.

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Algeria Terrorists Want to Trade US Hostages for Blind Sheikh

The al Qaeda-linked terrorists holding Americans and other Westerners hostage at a gas plant in Algeria have now demanded the release of two convicted terrorists held in U.S. prisons, including the "blind sheikh" who helped plan the first attack on New York's World Trade Center, in exchange for the freedom of two American hostages, according to an African news service.

The terror group calling itself the Masked Brigade, which raided the BP joint venture plant in In Amenas early Wednesday, reportedly contacted a Mauritanian news service with the offer. In addition to the release of Omar Abdel-Rahman, who planned the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, they demanded the release of Aifia Siddiqui, a Pakistani scientist who shot at two U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan in 2008.

Asked about the unconfirmed report of a proposed swap, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said firmly, "The United States does not negotiate with terrorists." She repeated the statement again when questioned further. She also said she was not prepared to get into any details about the status of Americans in "an ongoing hostage situation."

At least three Americans were being held hostage by the militants when the Algerian military mounted a rescue operation at the facility Thursday that reportedly resulted in casualties.

Five other Americans who were at the facility when it was attacked by the terrorists are now safe and believed to have left the country, according to U.S. officials.

Mike Nelson/AFP/Getty Images

Algeria Hostage Situation: Military Operation Mounted Watch Video

Reports that dozens of hostages were killed during the Algerian military's attempt to retake the compound have not been confirmed, though Algeria's information minister has confirmed that there were casualties. It's known by U.S. and foreign officials that multiple British, Japanese and Norwegian hostages were killed.

According to an unconfirmed report by an African news outlet, the militants said seven hostages survived the attack, including two Americans, one Briton, three Belgians and a Japanese national. U.S. officials monitoring the case had no information indicating any Americans have been injured or killed, but said the situation is fluid and casualties cannot be ruled out.

On Friday, a U.S. military plane evacuated between 10 and 20 people in need of medical attention, none of them American, from In Amenas and took them to an American medical facility in Europe. A second U.S. plane is preparing to evacuate additional passengers in need of medical attention.

British Prime Minister David Cameron told parliament today that the terror attack "appears to have been a large, well coordinated and heavily armed assault and it is probable that it had been pre-planned."

"The terrorist group is believed to have been operating under Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a criminal terrorist and smuggler who has been operating in Mali and in the region for a number of years," said Cameron.

Cameron said Algerian security forces are still in action at the facility. On Thursday, he said that the situation was "very bad … A number of British citizens have been taken hostage. Already, we know of one who has died. ... I think we should be prepared for the possibility for further bad news, very difficult news in this extremely difficult situation."

The kidnappers had earlier released a statement saying there are "more than 40 crusaders" held "including 7 Americans."

U.S. officials had previously confirmed to ABC News that there were at least three Americans held hostage at the natural gas facility jointly owned by BP, the Algerian national oil company and a Norwegian firm at In Amenas, Algeria.

"I want to assure the American people that the United States will take all necessary and proper steps that are required to deal with this situation," said Panetta. "I don't think there's any question that [this was] a terrorist act and that the terrorists have affiliation with al Qaeda."

He said the precise motivation of the kidnappers was unknown.

"They are terrorists, and they will do terrorist acts," he said.

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Did Scientology ad cross line?

The Church of Scientology is also at fault for thinking the advertorial would survive The Atlantic readers' scrutiny, Ian Schafer says.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• The Atlantic published and pulled a sponsored Scientology "story"


• Ian Schafer: On several levels, the ad was a mistake


• He says the content was heavy-handed and comments were being moderated


• Schafer: Experimenting to raise revenue makes sense, but standards should be clear

Editor's note: Ian Schafer is the founder and CEO of a digital advertising agency, Deep Focus, and the alter ego of @invisibleobama. You can read his rants on his blog at ianschafer.com.

(CNN) -- "The Atlantic is America's leading destination for brave thinking and bold ideas that matter. The Atlantic engages its print, online, and live audiences with breakthrough insights into the worlds of politics, business, the arts, and culture. With exceptional talent deployed against the world's most important and intriguing topics, The Atlantic is the source of opinion, commentary, and analysis for America's most influential individuals who wish to be challenged, informed, and entertained." -- The Atlantic 2013 media kit for advertisers

On Monday, The Atlantic published -- and then pulled -- a story titled "David Miscavige Leads Scientology to Milestone Year." This "story" went on to feature the growth of Scientology in 2012.

Ian Schafer

Any regular reader of The Atlantic's content would immediately do a double-take upon seeing that kind of headline, much less the heavy-handed text below it, shamelessly plugging how well Scientology's "ecclesiastical leader" Miscavige has done in "leading a renaissance for the religion."

This "story" is one of several "advertorials" (a portmanteau of "advertising" and "editorials") that The Atlantic has published online, clearly designated as "Sponsor Content." In other words, "stories" like these aren't real stories. They are ads with a lot of words, which advertisers have paid publications to run on their behalf for decades. You may have seen them in magazines and newspapers as "special advertising sections."

The hope is that because you are already reading the publication, hey, maybe you'll read what the advertiser has to say, too -- instead of the "traditional" ad that they may have otherwise placed on the page that you probably won't remember, or worse, will ignore.

There's nothing wrong with this tactic, ethically, when clearly labeled as "sponsored" or "advertising." But many took umbrage with The Atlantic in this particular case; so many, that The Atlantic responded by pulling the story from its site -- which was the right thing to do -- and by apologizing.

At face value, The Atlantic did the right thing for its business model, which depends upon advertising sales. It sold what they call a "native" ad to a paying advertiser, clearly labeled it as such, without the intention of misleading readers into thinking this was a piece of journalism.

But it still failed on several levels.

The Atlantic defines its readers as "America's most influential individuals who wish to be challenged, informed, and entertained." By that very definition, it is selling "advertorials" to people who are the least likely to take them seriously, especially when heavy-handed. There is a fine line between advertorial and outright advertising copywriting, and this piece crossed it. The Church of Scientology is just as much at fault for thinking this piece would survive The Atlantic readers' intellectual scrutiny. But this isn't even the real issue.

Bad advertising is all around us. And readers' intellectual scrutiny would surely have let the advertorial piece slide without complaints (though snark would be inevitable), as they have in the past, or yes, even possibly ignored it. But here's where The Atlantic crossed another line -- it seemed clear it was moderating the comments beneath the advertorial.

As The Washington Post reported, The Atlantic marketing team was carefully pruning the comments, ensuring that they were predominantly positive, even though many readers were leaving negative comments. So while The Atlantic was publishing clearly labeled advertiser-written content, it was also un-publishing content created by its readers -- the very folks it exists to serve.

It's understandable that The Atlantic would inevitably touch a third rail with any "new" ad format. But what it calls "native advertising" is actually "advertorial." It's not new at all. Touching the third rail in this case is unacceptable.

So what should The Atlantic have done in this situation before it became a situation? For starters, it should have worked more closely with the Church of Scientology to help create a piece of content that wasn't so clearly written as an ad. If the Church of Scientology was not willing to compromise its advertising to be better content, then The Atlantic should not have accepted the advertising. But this is a quality-control issue.

The real failure here was that comments should never have been enabled beneath this sponsored content unless the advertiser was prepared to let them be there, regardless of sentiment.

It's not like Scientology has avoided controversy in the past. The sheer, obvious reason for this advertorial in the first place was to dispel beliefs that Scientology wasn't a recognized religion (hence "ecclesiastical").

Whether The Atlantic felt it was acting in its advertiser's best interest, or the advertiser specifically asked for this to happen, letting it happen at all was a huge mistake, and a betrayal of an implicit contract that should exist between a publication of The Atlantic's stature and its readership.

No matter how laughably "sales-y" a piece of sponsored content might be, the censoring of readership should be the true "third rail," never to be touched.

Going forward, The Atlantic (and any other publication that chooses to run sponsored content) should adopt and clearly communicate an explicit ethics statement regarding advertorials and their corresponding comments. This statement should guide the decisions it makes when working with advertisers, and serve as a filter for the sponsored content it chooses to publish, and what it recommends advertisers submit. It should also prevent readers from being silenced if given a platform at all.

As an advertising professional, I sincerely hope this doesn't spook The Atlantic or any other publication from experimenting with ways to make money. But as a reader, I hope it leads to better ads that reward me for paying attention, rather than muzzle my voice should I choose to interact with the content.

After all, what more could a publication or advertiser ask for than for content to be so interesting that someone actually would want to comment on (or better, share) it?

(Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly said native advertising accounts for 59% of the Atlantic's ad revenue. Digital advertising, of which native advertising is a part, accounts for 59% of The Atlantic's overall revenue, according to the company.)

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Ian Schafer.

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22 killed in third day of deadly Iraq violence

BAGHDAD: A spate of bombings targeting Shiite Muslims across Iraq killed 22 people on Thursday, the latest in a spike in unrest amid weeks of anti-government protests and a political crisis engulfing the country.

The attacks marked the third consecutive day of violence which has claimed 81 lives overall, including that of a Sunni Iraqi MP killed by a suicide bomber and 33 others who died in twin car bombs in an ethnically mixed northern city.

It comes as Iraq grapples with a long-running political dispute, with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki facing protests hardening opposition against his rule and calls from many of his erstwhile government partners for his ouster.

No group has claimed responsibility for the latest bombings, but Sunni militants often launch attacks in a bid to destabilise the government and push Iraq back towards the sectarian violence that blighted it from 2005 to 2008.

The bloodiest of Thursday's blasts took place in Dujail, 60 kilometres north of Baghdad, where a car bomb outside a Shiite mosque killed nine people and wounded 56 others, said town mayor Mohammed Hassan.

A car bomb killed seven other people and wounded 17 near a football stadium on the outskirts of the predominantly Shiite city of Hilla, south of the capital, officials said.

Witnesses reported residents throwing stones at a police officer after he blamed locals for helping militants carry out the bombing. Police in the town where the attack took place said the officer was later detained.

Bombings also struck Baghdad, Hawija and Karbala, while two soldiers and two policemen were killed in separate shootings near the northern cities of Mosul and Tuz Khurmatu.

There were no casualties in Hawija but two people were killed and one wounded in a roadside bomb in north Baghdad.

And in Karbala, a Shiite shrine city south of the capital, 17 people were wounded, including eight Afghan Shiite pilgrims, in a morning blast, followed by two explosions in the evening that left at least seven more injured.

Afghan ambassador to Baghdad Mohammed Anwarzai confirmed to AFP that a number of his compatriots were wounded in the morning blast.

The violence comes a day after 49 people were killed in attacks in Baghdad and north of the capital -- Iraq's bloodiest day since November 29 -- including seven who died from twin car bombs in the city of Kirkuk.

On Tuesday, a suicide attacker killed a Sunni Iraqi MP, Ayfan al-Essawi, west of Baghdad. Hundreds of mourners attended Essawi's funeral outside the mostly Sunni town of Fallujah on Wednesday.

The lawmaker was a former leader of the Sahwa -- Sunni tribal militias who turned against Al-Qaeda and sided with the US military from late 2006, helping to turn the tide of Iraq's bloody insurgency.

Sahwa fighters are frequently targeted for attacks by Sunni militants who view them as traitors.

The violence comes amid a political crisis that has pitted Maliki against several of his ministers just months ahead of key provincial elections.

Weeks of anti-government demonstrations in Sunni Arab majority areas, supported by several parties that are members of Maliki's unity cabinet, have hardened opposition against the premier, a Shiite.

The violence and political disputes come with barely three months to go before provincial elections, Iraq's first polls in three years and a key barometer to gauge the popularity of Maliki and his rivals.

Attacks in Iraq are down from their peak in 2006-2007, but they are still common across the country.

- AFP/jc

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His 2nd term, America's 2nd chance?

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Reeling from the turmoil of the last four years, the country may be ready to regroup


• President Obama, adopting a more assertive posture, will need to still persuade a divided country to get things done


• The economy is improving, the nation's demographics are shifting and a new America is emerging

Washington (CNN) -- On the eve of the inauguration, President Barack Obama's second term may also be America's second chance.

The country, in the last four years, has been battered by an economic earthquake while trying to reconcile a debt load threatening to cripple the next generation.

It has been pulled apart by political extremism and the inability to compromise in Washington. The people have been divided -- by demographic shifts, cultural battles and clashes between the rich and the poor, the haves and the have-nots.

So, days before the president's second inaugural, the nation, too, is set to regroup. What it does differently this time around and the decisions the people make, experts say, will speak to the kind of America that emerges during the next four years.

"The enormous promise that everyone felt four years ago, it isn't completely gone but we have diminished our horizons," said Robert Schmuhl, an American studies professor at the University of Notre Dame. "We have learned that we are now living in an era of limits." Obama is perhaps more keenly aware of this than most.

Hope and hurdles

The 44th President was ushered into the Oval Office by a wave of seemingly limitless optimism and buoyed by the historic nature of his presidency as the first African American elected to the lead the free world.

But once in office, he found his efforts to right an economy hobbled by high unemployment -- 10% at its worse in 2009 -- and home foreclosure rates -- one in 29 homes were in foreclosure between 2007 and 2012 -- were limited by the magnitude of the problem and the political realities of a partisan Congress.

His plan to reform the nation's healthcare system further expanded political divides in Washington and helped lead to huge losses among his party's moderates in the 2010 election.

His re-election this fall — due in no small part to demographic shifts that included large numbers of minorities and women — was quickly followed by a protracted and deeply partisan showdown over trimming the nation's debt.

"I think Obama has learned some things," said Curtis Gans, director of American University's Center for the Study of the American Electorate. "He's going to be unlike most second term presidents in that he will be far more assertive than he was in his first term. He will be stronger on pushback against some of the most extreme elements in the Republican House. He's willing to go to battle on the whole concept of getting the economy moving."

The public saw hints of that assertiveness on Monday during a surprise news conference, where he lashed out at Republicans in Congress for playing politics with the debt ceiling.

"We are not a deadbeat nation," Obama said during a nearly hour-long briefing from the East Room of the White House. It a newly combative tone, he called it "absurd" for the federal government not to pay "bills that have already been racked up" and said he will not negotiate "with a gun at the head of the American people."

From Obamacare to the economy to Sandy Hook

Over the next four years, the country will also get a chance to see whether the Affordable Care Act -- or "Obamacare" -- is a positive or negative step for the nation. In 2014, many of the most controversial provisions, including requiring individuals to either participate in a health insurance program or pay a penalty, take effect.

"We will see whether or not we have the strength within ourselves to figure out how we should deal with entitlement programs," Schmuhl said. "In a way, it's a period when the administration will be dealing with problems that are in process."

Obama's ability -- or failure -- to navigate all of this while coming off as a strong, levelheaded leader could help set the nation's tone for years to come.

"If the economy becomes more robust you will have no doubt he will point back and say see that's what I was doing," said Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University and CNN contributor.

Reagan, Clinton faced similar issues

It's what happened when former President Ronald Reagan, who led the nation at a time when the country was reeling from a tough economy and just starting to get over the Vietnam War. In his second term "there was a sense America was moving in the right direction in terms of how it was doing around the globe," Zelizer said.

When former President Bill Clinton took office the economy wasn't doing well, but by the second term the economy was picking up, allowing him to deliver a balanced budget and ultimate surplus by the end of his presidency.

"There was clearly a shift in the mood," Zelizer said. "In both cases, the presidents were good at claiming credit for it."

Mood matters in the age of austerity

Everyday folks have learned to cut back and suck it up—some after finding themselves underwater on mortgages they could not afford to pay; others after losing jobs that their companies could no longer afford to keep.

So, Americans have been using their credit cards less and paying down debt more -- household debt as a percentage of disposable personal income is at its lowest rate in almost 30 years, according to the Federal Reserve and credit card balances had reached their lowest level in more than a decade.

And many expect the same discipline from their government.

"Americans will be realistic, just as those in government need to be realistic," Schmuhl said of citizens' likely approach to their own finances over the next four years.

But, as Obama enters his second term, both the housing and job markets have been on a slow and steady uptick. Housing sales were up 6% in 2012 -- the biggest gain since 2005, according to CoreLogic -- and the unemployment rate had dropped to 7.8% in December, although there are still 4.8 million Americans -- or 39.1% of the jobless -- classified as long-term unemployed, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

"Going into the second term, the fiscal situation will continue the agenda and the discussion," he said. "It will say a lot about us and where not only the government but the nation might be going. If it is difficult and, shall we say, fractured and there's a sense coming out of it that things are not working as they should my guess is that the public will begin saying: 'When will Washington work on our behalf?'"

Governing on a deadline

That sentiment was foreshadowed in the frustration over the down-to-the-wire, partisan political maneuvering as the last Congress sought to avert the fiscal cliff's steepest domestic spending cuts.

Obama appeared to prevail on that skirmish, delivering on a promise to raise tax rates on wealthy Americans -- although he shifted his definition of "wealthy" from those making $250,000 or more to those making $400,000 and up.

According to Pew Research Center and Gallup polls, Americans were none too impressed with how lawmakers handled the negotiations or the deal that was struck.

Some 41% of those polled disapproved of the deal, according to Pew, and 52% thought the deal would hurt people like them. In the Gallup poll, 67% - disapproved of congressional Republicans' handled the negotiations while 55% disapproved of how Democrats performed.

Still, partly due to deliberate redistricting to protect -- or create -- more partisan congressional districts, American voters continued to elect or re-elect safe representatives to do their bidding in Congress. For instance, most of the 435 members of the House of Representatives -- Republicans and Democrats -- faced little real opposition on Election Day in 2012.

Other battlegrounds: Sequester, gun control, immigration

But the next battle looms. Just weeks after Obama takes his oath of office, a new Congress will be tasked with addressing the automatic spending cuts, or sequester, that were kicked down the road in order to pass a smaller deal at the end of the year.

The new Congress will also consider raising the nation's debt ceiling, or the ability of the U.S. Treasury to borrow money to pay America's bills. Most agree that defaulting on the nation's obligations would be disastrous for America and the global economy, but some Republicans in Congress are starting to hint that they may be prepared to let that happen anyway if large spending cuts are not secured.

And after that, the fight over gun control, a high priority for the White House in the aftermath of the Connecticut school massacre, will pit the president against many members of the House and Senate from safe districts with high ratings and big-dollar donations from gun rights advocates.

The president and vice president unveiled a major plan on Wednesday that included 23 executive actions the president has ordered on his own, while urging the new Congress to take on the meaty issues of an assault weapons ban, limits on the number of bullets a gun magazine can hold, and other sweeping reforms the gun lobby and others say would gut the constitutional right to bear arms.

Immigration reform, another White House priority, will also stoke ideological differences and test the demographic shifts in Congress. For the first time, the House Democratic caucus is dominated by women and racial minorities, while the Republican caucus in that chamber is largely composed of white men. In the Senate, 20 women — the largest number in history — currently hold office.

But women and minorities are far outnumbered and outranked by white males on some of the most powerful congressional committees. And despite several high-ranking exceptions, Obama's Cabinet -- so far -- is shaping up to be largely male and white.

"The first thing we learned is that we're not post-race. That was a lot of willful imagining in '08 that his election would allow us to transcend these questions of race," said Mark Anthony Neal, a cultural and Black studies professor at Duke University. "The American electorate is looking different in terms of race and ethnicity and young folks being engaged. In 2016 our political realities will look more like our demographic realities."

And that's where the nation's shift over the next four years may be most visible.

But look first to the 2014 midterms and then the 2016 presidential election to see if the people signal continued frustration with the current regime -- in Congress and in the White House -- or demonstrate through the power of their vote that they feel the nation has finally turned the corner.

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Some children may lose autism diagnosis with age

Some children diagnosed with autism in early childhood may no longer have the disorder as they grow older, according to research funded by the National Institutes of Health.

"Although the diagnosis of autism is not usually lost over time, the findings suggest that there is a very wide range of possible outcomes," said Dr. Thomas R. Insel, NIMH director, said in a press release. "For an individual child, the outcome may be knowable only with time and after some years of intervention."

Autism spectrum disorders are a group of developmental disorders that cause behavioral, social and communication problems. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate one in 88 children have an ASD.

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Headlines: Report says kids can grow out of autism

The new study looked at 34 children between 8 and 21 who had an "optimal outcome," meaning they were diagnosed with autism earlier in life but functioned normally compared to their peers later on. These subjects were matched by age, sex, and nonverbal IQ with 44 children with high-functioning autism and an additional 34 typically developing peers.

The researchers reviewed their initial diagnoses to make sure they were accurate and enlisted a second diagnostic expert, who didn't know the child's status, to review reports where the initial diagnosis had been removed.

What they discovered was the "optimal outcome" children had milder social problems than those in the high-functioning autism group in early childhood. Verbal IQ of "optimal outcome" children were slightly higher than high-functioning autism individuals. However when it came to communication and behavioral problems, there were similarities to the high-functioning subjects.

The researchers then examined all the subjects using standard cognitive tests and parent questionnaires. The "optimal outcome" children were all in regular education classes with no special education aimed at autism. The whole group showed no signs of problems with language, face recognition, communication, and social interaction.

Researchers cannot speculate which percentage of children will outgrow their ASD, but they are hoping that through the research they gathered they can see whether the diagnosis changed because brain function normalized or the brain was able to make up for autism-related deficiencies.

10 Photos

Is it autism? Facial features that show disorder

"All children with ASD are capable of making progress with intensive therapy, but with our current state of knowledge most do not achieve the kind of optimal outcome that we are studying," study author Deborah Fein, a professor at the Department of Psychology at University of Connecticut, said in a press release. "Our hope is that further research will help us better understand the mechanisms of change so that each child can have the best possible life."

The study published Jan. 16 in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.

Researchers are also looking at which therapies led to the most success. Fein told HealthDay she believed behavioral treatments were the most likely to result in an "optimal outcome." However, even for children that lose the diagnosis, she said that parents should not stop therapy "prematurely" since these children are still at risk for attention problems and anxiety.

"But I want to point out that this is the result of years of hard work," she added. "This is not anything that happens overnight. I would say that at minimum we're talking about two to three years of intensive therapy to produce this outcome, but it could also be five years. It's variable.

"This is the first solid science to address this question of possible recovery, and I think it has big implications," added Dr. Sally Ozonoff of the MIND Institute at the University of California, Davis, who was not involved in the study, to the New York Times. "I know many of us as would rather have had our tooth pulled than use the word 'recover,' it was so unscientific. Now we can use it, though I think we need to stress that it's rare."

But, other experts warned that parents shouldn't get their hopes up that their child will outgrow their diagnosis.

"This study is looking at a small sample of high functioning people with autism and we would urge people not to jump to conclusions about the nature and complexity of autism, as well its longevity," Dr. Judith Gould, director of the National Autistic Society's Lorna Wing Centre for Autism, told the BBC. "With intensive therapy and support, it's possible for a small sub-group of high functioning individuals with autism to learn coping behaviors and strategies which would 'mask' their underlying condition and change their scoring in the diagnostic tests used to determine their condition in this research."

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