Interstates reopening after Great Plains snowstorm

Mackenzie Nix clears the snow from her driveway on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, in Hays, Kansas, after a winter storm dumped up to 10 inches of snow as it moved northeastward Monday out of New Mexico. (AP Photo/The Hays Daily News, Steven Hausler)

Mackenzie Nix clears the snow from her driveway on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, in Hays, Kansas, after a winter storm dumped up to 10 inches of snow as it moved northeastward Monday out of New Mexico. (AP Photo/The Hays Daily News, Steven Hausler)

An unidentified youth tosses a snowball while playing along a street in Solomon, Kan., Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011. A deadly storm that halted travel throughout the Great Plains weakened Tuesday as it headed east into Missouri and toward the Great Lakes, and officials reopened interstates in areas where motorists had been forced to adjust holiday plans mid-trip. (AP Photo/Orlin Wagner)

Lorenzo Garcia begins the daunting task of snow removal as he helps clear a driveway near Fleming and Harding streets in Garden City, Kan. on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2001 after more than a foot of snow fell on the region. A deadly storm that halted travel throughout the Great Plains weakened Tuesday as it headed east into Missouri and toward the Great Lakes, and officials reopened interstates in areas where motorists had been forced to adjust holiday plans mid-trip. (AP Photo/The Garden City Telegram, Laurie Sisk)

Emergency responders assists victims of a multiple-vehicle accident on westbound Interstate 40 about 15 miles west of Amarillo, Texas Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011. Travelers in the Texas Panhandle were urged to stay off ice-packed roads Tuesday after up to 10 inches of snow covered parts of the region. (AP Photo/The Amarillo Globe News, Michael Schumacher)

Fog begins to lift from the Sandia Mountains near Albuquerque, N.M., on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, after a major winter storm moved through the state. New Mexico highway officials say they are mopping up and getting major thoroughfares reopened. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan)

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) ? Holiday travelers were breathing a sigh of relief Wednesday after a storm that dumped up to 15 inches of snow and forced the closure of interstates across the Great Plains moved out of the region, allowing crews to clear drifts and stranded motorists to leave roadside hotels.

The storm was blamed for at least two fatal car accidents as it crawled from eastern New Mexico and Colorado through the Texas Panhandle, Oklahoma and Kansas. The fierce winds and heavy snowfall closed several major roadways before weakening Tuesday and moving into Missouri and toward the Great Lakes.

But another storm threatened some of those areas hit earlier in the week, including the Rockies and parts of Wyoming, New Mexico and western Kansas. Those areas could see another round of snow and wind over the next few days, but it won't be as heavy as the recent storm, according to meteorologist Brian Barjenbruch of the National Weather Service in Topeka, Kan.

"It's tough to match what we had in some areas with this past storm," he said early Wednesday.

Meanwhile, authorities still reported snow drifts of up to 10 feet high in southeast Colorado, and Texas officials warned drivers to stay off the road in the Panhandle so crews could remove ice and snow. Some highways in the western half of the Oklahoma Panhandle remained closed early Wednesday, with transportation officials warning of hazardous conditions.

At least 40 people were stranded at the Longhorn Motel in Boise City, Okla., where manager Pedro Segovia said blowing snow had created drifts 2- and 3-feet high and closed the main road.

"Some people cannot even get out of their houses. There is too much snow," Segovia said Tuesday. "It was blowing. We've got big piles. It's real bad."

Receptionist MaKenzee Grove sympathized with the 50 or so people stranded at the hotel where she works in Guymon, about 60 miles east of Boise City.

"I have this rinky-dink car that does not do well in this," Grove said. "If we wouldn't have had the wind, it wouldn't have been as bad. The winds ... made the drifts really bad."

A few guests traveling to Oklahoma City managed to leave Tuesday, but others were staying another night until all the roads were clear, she said.

Officials reopened Interstate 40 in the Texas Panhandle and New Mexico, and portions of Interstate 70 in western Kansas that had been closed Tuesday. New Mexico reopened a closed section of Interstate 25, the main route from Santa Fe to the Colorado line, after crews cleared drifts as high as 5 feet.

In Kansas, schools in Manhattan canceled classes Tuesday, anticipating several inches of snow. The National Weather Service reported later that 3 inches or less fell.

To the east, a cold rain pelted the Topeka area, turned into a mix of light sleet and snow without much accumulation and tapered off. Forecasters said the storm became less potent as it moved northeast toward the Great Lakes.

Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper Ben Gardner said the patrol dealt with dozens of accidents in which motorists slid off highways Tuesday.

"We had ice-covered roads, covered by snow packed on top," he said.

The late-autumn snowstorm lumbered into the region Monday, turning roads to ice and reducing visibility to zero. Many of the areas hit had enjoyed relatively balmy 60-degree temperatures just 24 hours earlier.

The storm was blamed for at least six deaths, authorities said. Four people were killed when their vehicle collided with a pickup truck in part of eastern New Mexico where blizzard-like conditions are rare, and a prison guard and inmate died when a prison van crashed on an icy road in eastern Colorado.

The Colorado Army National Guard said it rescued two stranded motorists early Tuesday in eastern Las Animas County, in the state's southeast corner, using a special vehicle designed to move on snow. Smaller highways in that area remained closed.

___

Associated Press writers Jeri Clausing in Albuquerque, N.M.; Matt Curry in Dallas; and Tim Talley in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2011-12-21-US-Winter-Weather/id-fa1e1588207449cf977ed01a8f77151c

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Charlie Day, Mary Elizabeth Ellis Welcome Son Russell Wallace

The Always Sunny stars welcomed son Russell Wallace Day on Thursday, Dec. 15 in Los Angeles, they confirm to PEOPLE exclusively.

Source: http://feeds.celebritybabies.com/~r/celebrity-babies/~3/ygZX1PTv1fQ/

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China villagers defy government in standoff over death (Reuters)

BEIJING (Reuters) ? Villagers in southern China on Thursday defied authorities and continued protests over a death in custody and land dispute in the latest outburst of simmering rural discontent that is eroding the ruling Communist Party's grip at the grassroots.

Many hundreds of residents in Wukan Village in Guangdong province held an angry march and rally despite moves by authorities to halt a land project at the center of the months-long unrest and detain local officials involved.

"The whole village is distraught and enraged. We want the central government to come in and restore justice," said one resident who described the scene.

He and another resident, both speaking on condition of anonymity, said villagers remain enraged over last weekend's death in custody of Xue Jinbo, 42, who was detained on suspicion of helping organize protests against land seizures.

"We won't be satisfied until there is a full investigation and redress for Xue Jinbo's death," said the second resident.

"If you say he wasn't beaten to death, then you can show us the body," another villager who had his face hidden from the camera by the hood of his jacket told Hong Kong's Cable TV.

"If there really isn't any injury on the body, then why would you not return the body to us?"

Rural land in China is mostly owned in name by village collectives, but in fact officials can mandate its seizure for development in return for compensation, which residents often say is inadequate and does not reflect the profits reaped.

The government of Shanwei, a district including Wukan, said on Wednesday a "handful" of Communist Party members and officials accused of misdeeds over the disputed land development were detained and that the main land development project had been suspended, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

In a bid to allay suspicions that other villagers detained over protests in September had been abused, the local government put online footage of four suspects being visited by relatives and reassuring them of their wellbeing. (http://www.shanwei.gov.cn/163661.html)

FURY

But for the two residents interviewed it was not enough to defuse fury over the death of Xue, whom villagers believe was the victim of police brutality -- a charge the government denies, citing an autopsy that found he died of heart failure.

Wukan has been surrounded by police and anti-riot units.

China's leaders, determined to maintain one-party control, worry that such outbursts might turn into broader and more persistent challenges to their power.

But they usually stay local and Beijing's grip remains strong, said Kenneth Lieberthal, an expert on Chinese politics.

"Is there a risk of disruption? Yes, absolutely. Is this a place just waiting to explode? No," said Lieberthal, director of the John L. Thornton China Center at the Brookings Institution, a Washington D.C. think tank.

"The chances of long-term, systemic instability are very, very small. The chances of some major disruption -- like 1989, but on a much larger scale -- are considerably greater, but still the odds are they can avoid it," he said.

Wukan, with its clannish unity and big stake in rising land values, is an example of the kind of slow-burning discontent that is corroding party power at the grassroots.

Residents say hundreds of hectares of land was acquired unfairly by corrupt officials in collusion with developers. Anger in the village boiled over this year after repeated appeals to higher officials.

Although China's Communist Party has ruled over decades of economic growth that have protected it from challenges to its power, the country is confronted by thousands of smaller scale protests and riots every year.

One expert on unrest, Sun Liping of Tsinghua University in Beijing, has estimated that there could have been over 180,000 such "mass incidents" in 2010. But most estimates from Chinese scholars and government experts put numbers at about half that in recent years.

The Chinese government has not given any unrest statistics for years.

The real worry for Beijing is not the sheer number of such protests, but their tendency to become more persistent and organized - both features on display in the unrest in Wukan, where there were torrid riots in September.

(Addition reporting by Paul Eckert in Washington D.C. and Stefanie McIntyre in Hong Kong, Editing by Jonathan Thatcher and Yoko Nishikawa)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/china/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111215/wl_nm/us_china_unrest

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Barbara Walters reveals most fascinating person (Reuters)

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) ? Barbara Walters said she had hoped to get an interview with the person atop her 2011 Most Fascinating People list, but those hopes were dashed in October.

Walters revealed in her annual "10 Most Fascinating People of 2011" ABC special Wednesday that Apple founder Steve Jobs, who died on October 5, was still her top choice for the list.

Walters noted that picking Jobs went against a rule for her specials -- that the most fascinating people are always people who are still alive. But she added that it was appropriate because "rules were made to be broken, and that's certainly how Steve Jobs lived his life."

During the 90-minute special, Walters did chat with other celebs on her list, including Simon Cowell, who 'fessed up to wanting to have sex with Paula Abdul during their "American Idol" days; Yankee all-star Derek Jeter, who said he hopes to own his own baseball team someday; and, yes, the Kardashians, with Walters grilling Kim Kardashian about her infamous, career-launching sex tape and massive success despite a perceived lack of talent.

About the sex tape: "I've made mistakes in my life for sure," Kardashian admitted, before mom Kris Jenner jumped in to add, "It was devastating for the whole family. You cry yourself to sleep for a few nights, then you hire an attorney."

And then you turn your whole family into a brand....

And about that, Walters actually went there, telling Kim, "You don't really act, you don't sing, you don't dance you don't have any -- forgive me -- any talent!"

Kim Kardashian's defense: "I think it's more of a challenge for you to go on a reality show, and get people to fall in love with you for being you."

"None of us think we have talent," sister Khloe Kardashian added. "None of us think we can sing or act or dance."

At least we can all agree on that.

Other celebs on Walters' list: Pippa Middleton, Katy Perry, Herman Cain, Amanda Knox, Donald Trump, Eric Stonestreet and Jesse Tyler Ferguson.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/celebrity/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111215/people_nm/us_barbarawalters_mostfascinating

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'SNL' boss makes merry with annual holiday show (AP)

NEW YORK ? It's a holly, jolly Christmas for "Saturday Night Live" chief Lorne Michaels as he marks another holiday edition of the show he created 36 years ago, and as he welcomes back "SNL" alum Jimmy Fallon as guest host for this special yuletide bash.

Boasting singer Michael Buble as its musical guest, the program airs, of course, Saturday on NBC at 11:30 p.m. EST.

But on Thursday night, as Michaels welcomed a reporter to his Rockefeller Center office ? overlooking Studio 8H, from where "SNL" originates ? the clock was ticking: little more than two days until show time.

In the studio, a sketch was being blocked for the cameras: Denver Broncos quarterback (and famously devout Christian) Tim Tebow confronts Jesus in the locker room.

"It's been rewritten since last night when we read it," Michaels said. "We read 40-some-odd sketches yesterday, and narrowed them down to the pieces over there" ? he pointed to a board with a tentative rundown ? "and that's about 15 minutes (too) long. By the time `(Weekend) Update' gets done, the show will be maybe 25 minutes long, which is what we'll go into dress rehearsal with."

Dress rehearsal takes place in front of a live audience on Saturday evening, after which, according to the audience's response, the show is rearranged, cut and otherwise revamped during a crash session to whip it into shape to perform a couple hours later for the world.

For Michaels, dress brings pain every week.

"Things you were certain would work, don't," he sighed. "Things that were really bright flatten and fall apart."

So does this mean that, even after all these years of executive-producing "SNL," Michaels, the old hand at 67, is still caught by surprise at how an audience reacts?

"Every week," he nodded. "I think it's why I'm still here. It's not a thing you ever master."

Or do you?

"Lorne has done this for 36 years, and he knows what will work," Fallon had insisted during an interview earlier in the week. "He's a pro. He's a Beatle."

Fallon was an "SNL" cast member for six seasons before leaving in 2004. Then, in 2009, he was tapped by Michaels, who also executive-produces NBC's "Late Night," to fill its hosting job when Conan O'Brien graduated to "The Tonight Show."

Now, for the first time, Fallon has been invited back by Michaels to his old haunts at "SNL" to serve as host.

"There will be holiday-themed sketches for different religions," said Fallon, who said he arrived with "about 300 ideas" on Monday. "I'm working on some impressions that I haven't done before. I've got some surprises: Some old friends might be coming back for a cameo or two. And then I want to see if can dust off my `Update' suit."

Fallon was asked if any of the special demands of "SNL" had been hard to face again.

"Staying up late," he instantly replied. "I don't do that anymore. I have a 9-to-5 job now with `Late Night.' I got to work on keeping my energy up, so I'm ready to go on Saturday. Which I will be."

Once he steps onstage at the top of the show, "it's going to be an adrenaline rush," he predicted. It will also be an emotional rush to be back, in a proud guest-host role on the show he has loved all his life.

"I just hope I don't break down and cry," he said. "My mom and dad are going to be there. I got to make sure I don't make eye contact with them. I'd be a mess, a blubbering mess."

"I was down in Jimmy's dressing room a half-hour ago," Michaels said Thursday night, relaxing for a moment on a sofa in his office. "We were going over the monologue, and I could see he looked anxious about it. He's putting so much pressure on himself for this to be the greatest show of all time!

"I found myself saying, `You know, it's Thursday. It's NOT Friday. That means there's the rest of tonight and all day tomorrow for that missing piece to be written.'"

It's the step-by-step, day-by-day "SNL" process, a week-long evolution that's hard to keep in mind when you're in the middle of the stampede for Saturday.

"For a returning cast member or past host, the very last memory of having done the show is the party," Michaels said, "and, before that, how the show felt on the air, and the goodnights when it's ending.

"But you don't remember that on Monday there was nothing: `Really?! THOSE are the ideas?!' And then came the writing, and choosing which pieces, and the rewrites. It's rare that you're excited about the show on Tuesday, or even Thursday. But the process is all about it getting better.

"By the time Jimmy leaves here tomorrow night at 1 or 2 in the morning," Michaels said, "we'll know kind of what's looking good."

It's that process that keeps Michaels challenged, and fired up, and still very much in love with the job he said he has no thoughts of ever leaving.

"There's no other way to do it," he declared, and smiled resolutely as Saturday night loomed. "If there was, I would have figured it out. Trust me."

___

Online:

http://www.nbc.com

___

EDITOR'S NOTE ? Frazier Moore is a national television columnist for The Associated Press. He can be reached at fmoore(at)ap.org and at http://www.twitter.com/tvfrazier

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/entertainment/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111216/ap_en_ot/us_ap_on_tv_lorne_michaels

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Elevation Dock for iPhone

If you're a fan of the glass bead-blasted aluminum look of Apple's MacBook line and wished you could have an iPhone dock with the same level of elegant sophistication and industrial beauty, you're in luck -- head on over to Kickstarter and back the Elevation Dock now.

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HPV Test Spots Cervical Cancer Earlier Than Pap Smear: Study (HealthDay)

THURSDAY, Dec. 15 (HealthDay News) - To catch cervical cancer or the lesions that can lead to it, a human papillomavirus (HPV) test is the best option for women over 30, Dutch researchers report.

Using it in conjunction with the more traditional Pap smear resulted in earlier detection of precancerous lesions and prevented more cervical cancers from developing, said study author Dr. Chris Meijer, a professor of pathology at VU University Medical Centre in Amsterdam.

The study is published online Dec. 15 in The Lancet Oncology.

Nearly all cervical cancers are caused by HPV, a virus spread through sexual intercourse. Some HPV strains are more strongly linked with the cancer than others.

The superiority of HPV testing over traditional Paps at finding precancerous cervical lesions is established, Meijer noted. However, his team wanted to see if HPV testing also offered better protection and detection long-term -- in two screenings done over a five-year period.

They found it did.

While five years may sound like a long lag time between screenings, it is not, he said. "The Netherlands already has a screening interval of five years, starting from 30 years of age until 60 years," he said. The program is inexpensive and effective, he added.

In the study, Meijer's team evaluated nearly 45,000 women, aged 29 to 56. Women in one group got a traditional Pap smear and an HPV DNA test. The women in the other group got just the Pap test.

Five years later, all women got both tests.

The researchers looked to see whether HPV tests resulted in fewer high-grade cervical lesions and cervical cancer in the second screening, due to earlier detection and treatment.

In the first screen, the HPV tests found more of the early changes that can precede cervical cancer than the Pap smear alone did.

Five years later, far fewer women in the HPV group had more advanced lesions or cervical cancer than did the Pap-only women.

Four women in the HPV/Pap group were diagnosed with cervical cancer, while 14 in the Pap-only group were.

When they looked at cervical cancer or advanced lesions, 88 in the HPV arm of the study were diagnosed with one or the other compared to 122 in the Pap-alone arm.

The improved protection against advanced lesions, the researchers said, is due to the earlier detection of the precursor lesions. When they were treated, it helped prevent them from progressing.

In an accompanying commentary, scientists from the U.S. National Cancer Institute wrote that the Dutch trial does show the five-year screening interval is safe. But they added that it is unclear if the same results would hold true in a different population with different testing guidelines.

The HPV test can be done using the same specimen collected for the Pap test, Meijer said.

Costs of the tests differ. Meijer said Pap smears are about $38 in the Netherlands, while an HPV test costs about $64. However, the Dutch Minister of Health recently recommended lowering the cost of an HPV test to below that of the traditional Pap.

The new study is "further defining how we can incorporate HPV testing into our screening program," said Dr. Elizabeth Poynor, a gynecologic oncologist and pelvic surgeon at Lenox Hill Hospital, in New York City.

She noted that she doesn't think the HPV screen will replace the Pap test completely. "It may turn out to be a first-line screen. Stay tuned for more," she said. "Certainly ask your physician if you've had HPV."

In October, three U.S. cancer groups proposed new guidelines for cervical cancer testing, extending intervals between screenings and making other changes. These guidelines, issued by the American Cancer Society and others, call for combination HPV/Pap smear testing for women aged 30 and older.

After three normal Paps, women over 30 can have the test ever two to three years, according to the American Cancer Society.

However, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force remains cautious about the use of the HPV test, standing by the Pap as the best bet for now.

The Dutch study was funded by Zorg Onderzoek Nederland (the Netherlands Organization for Health Research and Development).

More information

To learn more about cervical cancer, visit the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/diseases/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20111215/hl_hsn/hpvtestspotscervicalcancerearlierthanpapsmearstudy

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PSU formally requests more time from NCAA (AP)

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. ? With a Friday deadline looming, Penn State has asked for more time to respond to an NCAA inquiry over the university's handling of accusations of child sex abuse against former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.

Penn State general counsel Cynthia Baldwin said in a letter to NCAA president Mark Emmert released Thursday that answers to the NCAA's questions about the Sandusky case might come from other, separate probes already in progress. Among them is a university trustees investigation spearheaded by former FBI director Louis Freeh.

Baldwin spoke to Emmert and other NCAA staff by phone Nov. 23 about the concurrent inquiries, according to the letter dated Dec. 12.

"The university understands that the NCAA will continue to monitor these investigations and will have access to the report" from Freeh and the trustees, Baldwin said.

"At that time, the NCAA will determine if further response from the university is necessary," she wrote before requesting more time.

Both the NCAA and Penn State have signaled in recent weeks the school may not make the Friday deadline to provide complete answers to questions posed by the college sports governing body.

The Big Ten announced last week it would also conduct its own review and reserved the right to hand down sanctions pending its findings. The 12-member league also planned an immediate review of institutional control of athletics at its schools.

The Department of Education also is looking into Penn State, along with the separate criminal case by the state attorney general's office.

Sandusky has pleaded not guilty and waived his preliminary hearing Tuesday on charges he molested 10 boys. He has requested a jury trial.

The Sandusky scandal led to the departures last month of Hall of Fame coach Joe Paterno and school president Graham Spanier, amid mounting pressure on trustees and criticism that school officials should have done more to prevent the alleged abuse.

University trustee Kenneth Frazier said this week at a business forum hosted by The Wall Street Journal in New York that he hoped Freeh's team would have findings by the end of the academic year. Penn State's spring semester ends in mid-May.

Spanier's replacement, Rodney Erickson, has pledged the university's full cooperation with the NCAA and other inquiries.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/sports/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111215/ap_on_sp_co_ne/fbc_penn_state_ncaa

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Panetta formally shuts down US war in Iraq

The US Forces Iraq colors are lowered before being encased in a ceremony in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Dec., 15, 2011. The ceremonies mark the official end of the US military mission in Iraq. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool)

The US Forces Iraq colors are lowered before being encased in a ceremony in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Dec., 15, 2011. The ceremonies mark the official end of the US military mission in Iraq. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool)

US Sec. of Defense Leon Panetta, right, walks across tarmac with Army Gen. Lloyd Austin, left, Commander of US Forces Iraq, during his arrival at Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Dec., 15, 2011. Panetta is participating in the ceremonies marking the end of the US military mission in Iraq. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool)

US Sec. of Defense Leon Panetta, second from the left, and Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey, far left, during the encasing of the US Forces Iraq colors, in Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Dec., 15, 2011. The ceremonies mark the official end of the US military mission in Iraq. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool)

BAGHDAD (AP) ? After nearly nine years, 4,500 American dead, 32,000 wounded and more than $800 billion, U.S. officials formally shut down the war in Iraq ? a conflict that U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said was worth the price in blood and money, as it set Iraq on a path to democracy.

Panetta stepped off his military plane in Baghdad Thursday as the leader of America's war in Iraq, but will leave as one of many top U.S. and global officials who hope to work with the struggling nation as it tries to find its new place in the Middle East and the broader world.

He and several other U.S. diplomatic, military and defense leaders participated in a highly symbolic ceremony during which the flag of U.S. Forces-Iraq was officially retired, or "cased," according to Army tradition.

The U.S. Forces-Iraq flag was furled ? or wrapped ? around a flagpole and covered in camouflage. It will be brought back to the United States.

"You will leave with great pride ? lasting pride," Panetta told the troops. "Secure in knowing that your sacrifice has helped the Iraqi people to cast tyranny aside and to offer hope for prosperity and peace to this country's future generations."

During several stops in Afghanistan this week, Panetta made it clear that the U.S. can be proud of its accomplishments in Iraq.

"We spilled a lot of blood there," Panetta said. "But all of that has not been in vain. It's been to achieve a mission making that country sovereign and independent and able to govern and secure itself."

That, he said, is "a tribute to everybody ? everybody who fought in that war, everybody who spilled blood in that war, everybody who was dedicated to making sure we could achieve that mission."

Panetta echoed President Barack Obama's promise that the U.S. plans to keep a robust diplomatic presence in Iraq, foster a deep and lasting relationship with the nation and maintain a strong military force in the region.

As of Thursday, there were two U.S. bases and about 4,000 U.S. troops in Iraq ? a dramatic drop from the roughly 500 military installations and as many as 170,000 troops during the surge ordered by President George W. Bush in 2007, when violence and raging sectarianism gripped the country. All U.S. troops are slated to be out of Iraq by the end of the year, but officials are likely to meet that goal a bit before then.

The total U.S. departure is a bit earlier than initially planned, and military leaders worry that it is a bit premature for the still maturing Iraqi security forces, who face continuing struggles to develop the logistics, air operations, surveillance and intelligence sharing capabilities they will need in what has long been a difficult neighborhood.

U.S. officials were unable to reach an agreement with the Iraqis on legal issues and troop immunity that would have allowed a small training and counterterrorism force to remain. U.S. defense officials said they expect there will be no movement on that issue until sometime next year.

Still, despite Obama's earlier contention that all American troops would be home for Christmas, at least 4,000 forces will remain in Kuwait for some months. The troops will be able to help finalize the move out of Iraq, but could also be used as a quick reaction force if needed.

Obama met in Washington with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki earlier this week, vowing to remain committed to Iraq as the two countries struggle to define their new relationship. Ending the war was an early goal of the Obama administration, and Thursday's ceremony will allow the president to fulfill a crucial campaign promise during a politically opportune time. The 2012 presidential race is roiling and Republicans are in a ferocious battle to determine who will face off against Obama in the election.

Panetta acknowledged the difficulties for Iraq in the coming years, as the country tries to find its footing.

"They're going face challenges in the future," Panetta said Wednesday during a visit with troops in Afghanistan. "They'll face challenges from terrorism, they'll face challenges from those that would want to divide their country. They'll face challenges from just the test of democracy, a new democracy and trying to make it work. But the fact is, we have given them the opportunity to be able to succeed."

The ceremony at Baghdad International Airport also featured remarks from Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander in Iraq.

Austin is leading the massive logistical challenge of shuttering hundreds of bases and combat outposts, and methodically moving more than 50,000 U.S. troops and their equipment out of Iraq over the last year ? while still conducting training, security assistance and counterterrorism battles.

Over the coming days, the final few thousand U.S. troops will leave Iraq in orderly caravans and tightly scheduled flights ? a marked contrast to the shock and awe that rocked the country on March 20, 2003, as the U.S. invasion began.

Saddam Hussein has been ousted, the reports of weapons of mass destruction largely laid to rest. And the future of a nascent democracy awaits.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2011-12-15-Iraq/id-ec7cf86456a442b0a10013061d5a7a24