Military contractors are hard to fire

WASHINGTON - ITT Federal Services International, a defense contractor hired to maintain battle gear for U.S. troops in Iraq, repeatedly failed to do the job right.

Combat vehicles ITT declared as repaired and ready for action flunked inspections and had to be fixed again. Equipment to be sanitized for return to the United States was found caked with dirt. And ITT's computer database for tracking the work was rife with errors.

Formal "letters of concern" were sent to the contractor. Still, the Army didn't fire ITT. Instead, it gave the Colorado Springs, Colo.-based company more work to do. Since October 2004, ITT has been paid $638 million through the Global Maintenance and Supply Services contract.

The Army's ongoing arrangement with ITT, detailed in an audit from the Government Accountability Office, shows how captive the military has become to the private sector for overseas support. Even when contractors don't measure up, dismissing them may not be an option because of the heavy pace of operations.

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., co-author of legislation creating a special commission to examine wartime contracting, said poor-performing contractors are more likely to get bonuses than to be penalized.

"It has just been a mess," McCaskill, a former state auditor, said in an interview with The Associated Press. "It's bad enough how much this war is costing. But it's heartbreaking the amount of money that has just gone up in smoke."

In ITT's case, there were too few soldiers to handle the maintenance duties and no other contractors ready to step in quickly, according to Redding Hobby, the Army Sustainment Command's executive director for field support operations.

"I'm not sure that our manning levels would have allowed us to do anything except wring our hands and worry and work people harder and work people overtime," Hobby said in a telephone interview.

In a brief statement, ITT said it objected to the GAO's conclusions and has "taken numerous corrective actions." The company also said it has met the Army's requirements.

Contract personnel working for the Defense Department now outnumber U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan; there are 196,000 private-sector workers in both countries compared to 182,000 troops.

Contractors are responsible for a slew of duties, including repairing warfighting equipment, supplying food and water, building barracks, providing armed security and gathering intelligence.

The dependence has come with serious consequences.

During a congressional hearing on Jan. 24, Jack Bell, a senior Pentagon acquisition official, called the situation "unprecedented" and one "that, frankly, we were not adequately prepared to address."

A shortage of experienced federal employees to oversee this growing industrial army is blamed for much of the waste, fraud and abuse on contracts collectively worth billions of dollars.

"We do not have the contracting personnel that we need to guarantee that the taxpayer dollar is being protected," said William Moser, the State Department's deputy assistant secretary for logistics management.

"We are very, very concerned about the integrity in the contracting process," added Moser, who appeared at the same hearing as Bell. "We don't feel that we've had major scandals up to now, but we don't feel like that we can continue in the same situation."

The office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction has 52 open cases related to bribery, false billing, contract fraud, kickbacks and theft; 36 of those cases have been referred to the Justice Department for prosecution, according to the inspector general's office.

The Army Criminal Investigation Command is busy, too. The command has 90 criminal investigations under way related to alleged contract fraud in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan, according to spokesman Chris Grey. Two dozen U.S. citizens have been charged or indicted so far — 19 of those are Army military and civilian employees — and more than $15 million in bribes has changed hands, Grey said.

To deal with the problem, the Army is implementing many of the recommendations of a blue-ribbon panel formed last year to reform contracting procedures. The most significant are the creation of a contracting command to be led by a two-star general and the addition of 1,400 acquisition personnel.

David Maddox, a retired four-star general who served on the panel, said the Army understands the need to change. He's less sure the message has spread throughout the Defense Department. That's necessary to drive the broader changes needed to curb future problems in defense contracting.

"The Army is moving out," Maddox said. "I'm a little more concerned with the degree DoD is moving out."

The audit by the GAO, Congress' investigative arm, does not say there were any improprieties stemming from the ITT contract. Rather, neither the contractor nor the government were ready for the demands placed on each.

At one point, although the Army had documented several incidents of poor performance, ITT was paid an additional $33 million to overhaul 150 Humvees a month. Over a nearly yearlong period, the contractor never came close to meeting the mark but still got the money, according to the GAO.

Many of the problems occurred in 2005 and 2006, when the insurgency in Iraq was at its height and there was a heavy burden on the contractor to get equipment back into the fight as quickly as possible, according to Hobby, the Army Sustainment Command official.

The terms of the contract called for ITT to be compensated for all labor costs. That meant the company was often paid twice to fix equipment it didn't repair correctly the first time.

"Although it sounds bad economically, back at the time we were trying to (implement) a repair program that would maintain equipment for our soldiers, and that was a good alternative," Hobby said of the ITT contract. "It was expensive. We knew there were risks there. And, quite frankly, we didn't have the government (personnel) in place to ensure success. But we've learned an awful lot of lessons from this."

The ITT contract and other similar support arrangements will be changed so a company's profits are linked to performance, Hobby said.

"We are transitioning to a contract that gives an incentive to the contractor," Hobby said. "Our argument would be, 'We paid you to fix these vehicles, they didn't get fixed on time, so you lose your award fee.' A penalty, so to speak."

ITT's performance has improved substantially, Hobby said, and the Army will decide in the next few months whether to extend the arrangement for another year.

Still, he doesn't diminish the gravity of the GAO's audit.

"I think if Joe Sixpack or Sally Homemaker read that report, they would probably have the same feeling," Hobby said when asked why ITT's contract was not terminated. "I share your pain."

Obama says he'd be better against McCain

LOS ANGELES - Democratic Sen. Barack Obama sees one of the best arguments for his presidential candidacy in the rise of Republican Sen. John McCain. McCain has become Obama's favorite punching bag, an easier mark in front of partisan audiences than the rival Obama will have to beat first to get to the general election — Hillary Rodham Clinton.

But he also likes to lump the two of them together as co-supporters of the war in Iraq.

"It is time for new leadership that understands the way to win a debate with John McCain or any Republican who is nominated is not by nominating someone who agreed with him on voting for the war in Iraq," Obama said during a speech in Denver Wednesday.

The pitch is a timely pivot back to the issue that helped fuel Obama's candidacy — his early opposition to Iraq. Recently the war has become a secondary issue to the declining economy — an issue on which Clinton outdistances Obama in the polls as the more experienced hand to guide the nation though financial turmoil.

Asked about Obama's criticism Friday, McCain said a debate with Obama over the war "will be the difference between victory and surrender."

"Without in any way denigrating or in any way being critical of Senator Obama, who I have great respect for, it's a product of his inexperience," McCain told reporters on his campaign plane. "And we'll be highlighting that. And, inexperience, a lack of knowledge of national security issues can only lead one to the conclusion, that you would have immediate withdrawal from Iraq."

McCain noted that Clinton had a similar position and said he eagerly awaits a one-on-one debate with either of them.

Obama advisers have said privately for months that McCain would be their preferred opponent among all those who sought the GOP nomination. They said a race between Obama, 46, and McCain, 71, would provide the starkest contrast between old vs. new, the future versus the past. It's an argument that Obama also has been using against Clinton, but his campaign feels it would be even stronger against McCain.

Clinton and McCain have worked closely together — one source of their shared reputation for working across party lines on common interests. The two serve on the Armed Services Committee and were drinking buddies at least for a night. The New York Times reported that Clinton challenged McCain to a vodka drinking contest during a congressional trip to Estonia in 2004.

Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson said Clinton has the strength and experience to take on McCain on national security. And he said it's the New York senator who provides the starker contrast with McCain — because her health care plan would require coverage for everyone while Obama's would not.

"Hillary Clinton will be able to say to John McCain that her health care plan will cover every American while his will leave millions out," Wolfson said. "Because Senator Obama's plan leaves 15 million without health care, that's not a contrast he will be able to make."

Repeatedly during a debate with Clinton Thursday night, Obama brought up McCain as if he were the presumptive GOP nominee. McCain has yet to lock up the race, but a recent win in Florida has made him the front-runner.

"I respect that John McCain, in the first two rounds of Bush tax cuts, said it is irresponsible that we have never before cut taxes at the same time as we're going into war," Obama said. "And somewhere along the line, the `Straight Talk Express' lost some wheels and now he is in favor of extending Bush tax cuts."

Later in the debate, he turned to McCain's position that troops could be in Iraq for the long haul. "When John McCain suggests that we might be there 100 years, that, I think, indicates a profound lack of understanding that we've got a whole host of global threats out there."

While Clinton voted for the war resolution in 2003 and has refused to apologize for it, she has said she would never have given Bush the authority to go to war if she had known he would abuse it. And she says she'll end the war if elected commander in chief.

Obama argued in a press conference Friday that Clinton's war vote makes her a weaker opponent to McCain.

"There is going to be a contest with John McCain potentially — somebody who's been very clear and firm about his position on the war," Obama told reporters. "If we go in there suggesting that it just was not managed well by George Bush, then Senator McCain I think will be able to come back and argue that in fact we have reduced violence in the surge."

"I think it's easier for me to dispute given it's my long-standing belief that it was a strategic error on the part of the Bush administration," Obama said.

He also argued that he would be more electable in a general election matchup against McCain than Clinton.

"I am attracting new voters and independent voters into the process in a way Clinton cannot do," Obama said at his news conference. "I think that'll be particularly important if Senator McCain is the nominee on the Republican side."

Envoy: US troops to be in Iraq into '09

WASHINGTON - President Bush's top diplomat in Iraq said Friday that the U.S. plans to keep combat troops there into 2009, seen as the tipping point for establishing the nation's long-term security, and he offered no deadline for a full withdrawal.

Ambassador Ryan Crocker told The Associated Press that he can't make any promises if, as the Democratic candidates have signaled, the next president pulls forces out faster or in greater numbers.

Crocker said America remains "a center of gravity" in Iraq almost five years after invasion, and that violence and political development both hinge to a considerable degree on whether U.S. forces remain there.

Crocker said he and Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, would make the best of any change in plans ordered from the top.

"Obviously, we're not the ones who make the policy decisions — not in this administration and not in the next one," Crocker said. "If someone wants to reset the conditions, then obviously we'll do the best we can within the context but those aren't assumptions that we start with."

Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., have said they would begin withdrawing forces quickly if elected — Obama would bring all combat forces home within 16 months. Clinton has not set a deadline but says she wants to bring most home inside one year.

Both candidates would phase out the withdrawals — and leave a small number of forces behind for specific missions. Either Clinton or Obama is expected to become the Democratic nominee.

Republican front-runners Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney say they would essentially continue Bush's strategy of bringing troops home only as conditions warrant.

The Iraq chiefs are working off a blueprint that calls for "conditions-based withdrawal," Crocker said. That could bring combat troops home by sometime next year if security conditions allow it but leave other forces in Iraq for long-haul missions such as training.

Crocker said the two men stand by an earlier assessment that Iraq would be more or less secure and stable by summer of 2009. American combat troops will be needed at least into 2009 to battle a resilient al-Qaida and still-vibrant insurgency, he said.

Crocker and Petraeus will make their next report to Congress in April. Crocker would not speculate on whether Bush's planned force drawdown would continue after this summer, and he offered no firm predictions on how long any troops would remain.

Bush has indicated he is willing to leave more troops in Iraq at the close of his presidency than envisioned only weeks or months ago. The president said last month that it's fine with him if Petraeus wants to "slow her down" to meet current security needs.

One Army brigade and two Marine battalions have already returned home and will not be replaced. Four other Army brigades are to depart by July, leaving 15 brigades, or roughly 130,000 to 135,000 troops in Iraq. Those troops were part of Bush's 2007 escalation to confront a steep rise in violence, especially in Baghdad.

The escalation worked, within limits, to reduce violence in the capital and allow what Crocker called a returning sense of normalcy. He spoke, however, hours after coordinated suicide bombings that killed dozens at outdoor markets in Baghdad. It was the single deadliest day in Iraq since Washington flooded the capital with 30,000 extra troops last spring.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the bombings prove al-Qaida is "the most brutal and bankrupt of movements" and will strengthen Iraqi resolve to reject terrorism. The bombs were strapped to two mentally disabled women and set off by remote control. The women may have been unknowing agents of death.

Crocker will be the top U.S. negotiator in talks on the American presence with the Iraqis expected to begin this month. He said he expected an eventual "status of forces agreement" to allow for great flexibility in pursuing insurgents while not setting definite troop levels.

"I don't think al-Qaida is going to have gone away after this year, and we and the Iraqis are going to want to make sure we are able to pursue them, but questions of force levels and what not, those will be executive decisions by this president and by the next," he said. "This agreement is in no way going to get into that executive decision prerogative."

Crocker also said that Iran continues to play a negative role in training and supplying insurgents with weapons and explosives, but the ambassador made clear he remains open to renewing a three-way security dialogue with Iranian and Iraqi officials.

A new meeting among the three sides could happen in "the next week or so," he said. But he noted that he had expected such talks to take place in early January after the United States indicated it was willing to participate a month earlier.

"The Iranians may be ready to come back to the table and if they are, we'll be there," Crocker said. "I am perfectly ready to sit down with my counterpart and would expect to do so."

However, he said a lower-level meeting of security officials probably would precede any ambassadorial meeting, which would be his fourth with the Iranian ambassador to Iraq since he arrived in Baghdad nearly one year ago.

Another Iraqi neighbor, Syria, which Washington accuses of allowing foreign fighters to enter Iraq from its territory, appears to have clamped down on such border crossings, Crocker said.

"We have seen a downturn in the number of suicide bombers coming across" the border and that "was not just a coincidence," he said.

Romney aims for a split in California

DENVER - Republican Mitt Romney is conceding the bulk of the Northeast to rival John McCain, counting instead on his home state of Massachusetts, a split in California and wins in a series of caucus states to extend his presidential campaign beyond Super Tuesday.

Missing from Romney's latest campaign schedule were winner-take-all states of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, which account for 180 of the 1,023 delegates at stake. The omissions were telling with voting in 21 GOP contests on Tuesday.

The former Massachusetts governor was in Colorado Friday and planned to attend the funeral of Mormon church President Gordon B. Hinckley on Saturday in Utah. Romney also scheduled campaign events in Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri, Tennessee, Georgia and West Virginia before arriving home Tuesday.

Colorado and Minnesota are caucuses states where a grass-roots effort could help secure a win, while West Virginia will award its delegates at a convention Romney plans to address before flying to Massachusetts to both vote and await the returns.

Romney has also deployed four of his five sons to Maine, Montana and Idaho, which hold caucuses on Saturday and Tuesday, and Alaska, which has a party convention on Tuesday.

If he fails to capture enough delegates to offset McCain's likely wins in other states and strong showing in California, where the Arizona senator has the backing of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Romney could end his campaign in Boston on Wednesday.

During a news conference Friday outside a Ford dealership here, he passed up three opportunities to declare he would carry on if he fails to surpass McCain in the Super Tuesday voting.

"I really thought it would all be over, you know, early in January, and now we're going to go into February, and I just can't predict what will happen in February," he said, "so we'll see what happens."

This week the multimillionaire former venture capitalist authorized only a modest $3 million advertising buy, after committing $35 million of his own money last year in an effort to lock up the nomination early with back-to-back wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.

While Romney won in Wyoming, Michigan and Nevada, McCain beat him in major head-to-head battles in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida. Huckabee prevailed in the leadoff Iowa caucuses. He has vowed to remain in the race, taking critical conservative support from Romney.

Currently, Romney trails McCain in delegates to the Republican National Convention, 83-59. A total of 1,191 are needed for the nomination.

Simple mathematics highlight the challenge confronting Romney.

California has 170 delegates at stake Tuesday, but it will award 159 of them — three at a time — to the winner in each of the state's 53 congressional districts.

If Romney and McCain were to split those delegates, the biggest bloc up for grabs Tuesday, they would each claim about 80 delegates.

Of the remaining states where Romney is personally campaigning, Colorado (43), Minnesota (38), Illinois (57), Tennessee (52) and Georgia (72) award their delegates in proportion to the vote percentage received by each candidate.

Only Utah (36), where Romney enjoys strong support from his fellow Mormons, Missouri (58), where he has the backing of Gov. Matt Blunt, and West Virginia (18), whose convention he will address, award all their delegates to the candidate winning the majority of votes on Tuesday.

McCain's home state of Arizona (53) and Delaware (18) are winner-take-all states, with North Dakota (23) being one as well if the winner gets two-thirds of the vote.

If Romney wins the winner-take-all states he visits and McCain won the others, the Arizona senator would outscore him on delegates, leaving Romney with the choice of either quitting or dumping more of his own money in a protracted battle for delegates. He has said that he and his wife have set a limit on their personal contribution to the race, although they have not divulged the figure.

Romney's only public appearance of the day was a rally in the jam-packed showroom of a Denver Ford dealer. He mentioned McCain only once as he sought to contrast his 25 years as a businessman with McCain's four terms in the Senate.

"At a time like this, in a country like this, I think it is important to have a president for whom the economy is his strong suit," Romney said to howls of support.

Earlier in the day, Romney conducted a series of satellite television interviews in Super Tuesday states, speaking to three markets in Illinois and one each in North Dakota, Missouri and West Virginia.

He also continued his outreach to bedrock conservatives he hopes are wary of McCain, conducting a conference call with conservative bloggers and sending out a series of e-mails highlighting or seeking additional conservative support.

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania also announced their endorsements of Romney, as did the Denver Post.

In addition, Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina sent an e-mail to conservatives, writing: "All of the major campaigns have had their moment in the sun, but now, with this race at a critical juncture, conservatives must no longer divide their votes. We must come together and rally behind the real consensus conservative in this race."

Snackers, please no double dipping

SALEM The Super Bowl Sunday is known not only as a display of football but a time for people to come together and celebrate.

Clemson University researchers now say there's a new danger these parties can present, and it's connected to the infamous "double dip."

The study was conducted by measuring the amount of bacteria in a dip that came from the mouths of the study participants. From this the participants were asked to take a bite out of a cracker that they had just scooped up with dip.

After performing the double dip eight times, the study found that the dip had a few extra ingredients in it that most would no prefer to eat bacteria.

Is there a health risk associated with sticking a piece of partially eaten food into a dip or salsa?

"Yes, you have a lot of bacteria on your skin and more in your mouth," said Joanne Konschak, director of infectious disease control of South Jersey Healthcare. "(For most bacteria) the dip becomes a breeding ground they can use to feed off."

And double dipping is not the only way party food can become a danger.

The United States Department of Agriculture on its Web site explains that any dish left out for more then two hours, not being preserved by added heat or cold, should be discarded.

The USDA states that after two hours the food can become a home for area bacteria.

The practice of double dipping was highlighted in an episode of the television show "Seinfeld." In the episode George Costanza is seen taking a bite out of his chip, and then re-dipping the same chip.

"That's like putting your whole mouth right in the dip," explained Timmy, a character from in the famous "Seinfeld" episode, in reference to George Costanza double-dipping a chip. "From now on, when you take a chip, just take one dip and end it!"

Keiki get free dental screenings

Kids truly were smiling yesterday after dentists examined their teeth at some isle schools for "National Give Kids a Smile Day," said Dr. Russell Masunaga.

"It was a jovial thing all the way around," said Masunaga, director of the Hawaii Dental Association's Dental Samaritans, which participated for the fourth year in the national dental event.

The volunteer dentists noticed a slight increase in children needing dental attention, he said, with more referrals for dental work than in the past. But they also saw a high "restorative rate" among children with caps and fillings, he said.

The volunteer dentists and staff screened about 1,290 students at schools they had not visited in past years on Oahu and Kauai, Masunaga said.

They went to Ewa Elementary and Pohakea Elementary schools in Ewa Beach and Nanakuli Elementary School on Oahu and to Kekaha Elementary on Kauai.

Masunaga said dental hygienist Kendra Wong talked to each class for 10 to 20 minutes, and "they weren't afraid. ... We were truly giving them a smile."

Besides examining the children's teeth, dentists gave them an oral health lesson, free toothbrushes, toothpaste and informational packets.

The Oral Care package items were donated by national and local sponsors, including Crest Corp. and Global Medical & Dental.

Masunaga said the annual event is "a great opportunity" to improve oral health in the community "by calling attention to the oral health epidemic and the need to educate families and improve access to dental care."

Hawaii "is known to have the highest incidence of childhood cavities, but we also have the highest restorative rate" because of high utilization of access to care, he said.

On Oahu, participating dentists besides Masunaga included Drs. Edmund Cassella, Brian Kim, Chris Yamada, Glenn Kaneda, Cecile Sebastian and Karen Hu.

Those on Kauai were Drs. Masahiro Sato, Lisa Hirano, Timothy Hirano, Scott Shimabukuro and Stanwood Kanna, under the direction of Kauai County Dental President Antolin Apala.

Thromboembolism Prevention Is Underutilized

LONDON, Feb. 1 -- Hospital patients at risk for venous thromboembolism don't receive appropriate preventive care, no matter how developed a country they live in, researchers here said.

More than 40% of surgical patients and 60% of medical patients at risk for venous thromboembolism in a large international study failed to receive prophylaxis as recommended by the American College of Chest Physicians, reported Alexander T. Cohen, M.D., of King's College Hospital, and colleagues in the Feb. 1 issue of The Lancet.

Some 5% to 10% of overall inpatient mortality is attributed to pulmonary embolism. It is the leading preventable cause of death in hospitals, Dr. Cohen and colleagues said.

"Our data show that, globally, a large proportion of hospitalized individuals -- both surgical and medical -- are at risk for venous thromboembolism, and that recommended venous thromboembolism prophylaxis is underused," they wrote.

The researchers recommended that hospitals adopt more aggressive strategies to identify and treat at-risk patients.

Their results emerged from the Epidemiologic International Day for the Evaluation of Patients at Risk for Venous Thromboembolism in the Acute Hospital Care Setting (ENDORSE) study, involving chart reviews of each hospital's inpatients on a single specified day.

The analysis took in 68,183 inpatients at 358 randomly selected hospitals in 32 countries.

The patients included 30,827 surgical patients and 37,356 medical patients. Patients in the United States, western Europe, and Australia accounted for about half the sample. Less developed countries on every continent provided the rest.

Of the surgical patients, 64.4% (95% CI 63.8% to 64.9%) were at risk for venous thromboembolism according to consensus guidelines. The corresponding figure for medical patients was 41.5% (95% CI 41% to 42%).

Recommended prophylaxis includes anticoagulants (low molecular weight heparin most commonly), mechanical compression (intermittent pneumatic compression or graduated compression stockings most commonly), or antiplatelet agents, depending on bleeding risk.

Only 58.5% of at-risk surgical patients (95% CI 57.8% to 59.2%) and 39.5% of at-risk medical patients (95% CI 38.7% to 40.3%) received the recommended preventive treatment, Dr. Cohen and colleagues said.

The researchers found tremendous variability between countries. For example, 20% of at-risk medical patients and 26% of at-risk surgical patients in Russia received the recommended prophylaxis, whereas German hospitals provided the recommended treatment to 70% of medical and 92% of surgical patients.

The lowest rates were generally in the poorest countries, such as Bangladesh, where 3% of at-risk medical patients and 0.2% of at-risk surgical patients were given the recommended prophylaxis.

In the U.S., recommended prophylaxis was given to 48% of at-risk medical patients and 71% of at-risk surgical patients.

For medical patients with active malignancy and ischemic stroke, the rate of prophylaxis was 37%. Dr. Cohen and colleagues noted that this was below the overall average for medical patients even though these conditions confer very high risk for venous thromboembolism.

When the analysis was expanded to include any venous thromboembolism prophylaxis, it added only a few percentage points both overall and in nearly every individual country.

In the international totals, 48% of at-risk medical patients and 64% of at-risk surgical patients were given any kind of preventive treatment.

Dr. Cohen and colleagues said the higher rates of appropriate prophylaxis in surgical patients probably stem from better provider awareness and simpler assessment related to venous thromboembolism risk.

They acknowledged that individual patient factors such as bleeding risk may have driven decisions on preventive therapy.

"However, the low use of venous thromboembolism prophylaxis cannot be accounted for solely because of relative or absolute contraindications to anticoagulant prophylaxis, because these patients could have received ... recommended forms of mechanical prophylaxis," they pointed out.

Limitations of the study included its cross-sectional design, reliance on chart analysis, and lack of information on prophylaxis covering patients' entire hospital stay.

In an accompanying commentary, Walter Ageno, M.D., and Francesco Dentali, M.D., of the University of Insubria in Varese, Italy, said the ENDORSE results confirm earlier studies that found low rates of compliance with guidelines on venous thromboembolism prophylaxis.

They said that the low compliance could be explained by "ongoing disagreement about venous thromboembolism risk among practicing clinicians."

Drs. Ageno and Dentali noted that management guidelines for conditions such as heart failure and stroke do not uniformly recommend drug-based venous thromboembolism prophylaxis.

They called the lack of consensus "an important limitation of venous thromboembolism prophylaxis by general surgeons, urologists, and others.

For local programs to succeed in increasing prophylaxis rates, Drs. Ageno and Dentali added, medical and surgical societies first need to agree on guidelines for its proper use.

This Mother Grows Her Kids Inside Her Stomach!

There's nothing impressive in this Australian frog: dull coloration and just up to 5.5 cm (2.2 in) in length. But the Rheobatrachus frogs, first described in 1973, are nothing ordinary.
Their name of gastric-brooding frogs speaks about an amazing breeding behavior in this species.

While keeping them in an aquarium, researchers were taken totally by surprise to see how one of the frogs opened her mouth and started to spit out froglets: 11 offspring in 50 minutes. Next day, the mother spat out another 15 offspring. The 26 froglets made 40 % of the body weight of their mother.

These frogs swallow their eggs after being spawn on the soil and fertilized by the male. The gastric gestation lasts 6-8 weeks, a period when the mother's stomach is swelling enormously. The female does not eat during this period, living on her own reserves. The lungs can no longer function due to the distorted stomach, and breathing is made exclusively through the skin. The gastric brooding increases the survival chances of the offspring: they are not exposed to predators or to the drying of the pool in which they live.

The puzzle is how the chlorhydric acid and digestive juices of the stomach do not destroy the eggs and the developing embryos. One hypothesis is that a part of the swallowed eggs sacrifice themselves for the development of the others, and during their break down, they release a chemical that blocks the hormone that determines the acidity of the gastric juice. That chemical was even detected: a prostglandin called PGE2, proved to be stable at temperatures varying between 30o C and -20oC.

Only two species of gastric brooding frogs WERE known from northeastern Australia, in an area of less than 2000 km² (800 mi²), in creek systems in rainforests between 350 – 1400 m (1100 - 4600 ft). By the mid 80's, both species disappeared, due to not clearly understood reasons. Hypotheses include habitat loss and degradation, pollution, and the amphibian Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis fungus.

NASA to Send Our Fellow Aliens a Copy of The Beatles' “Across the Universe” Song

The radio transmission will be aimed towards the Polaris star, commonly known as the North Star, which is located 431 light years away from Earth, and will have the role to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the day when The Beatles recorded the song and, at the same time, five decades since NASA launched its first satellite into space, Explorer 1, and the foundation of the Deep Space Network, representing an international collaboration between radio observatories around the world to support missions for exploring the universe.

This is the second time when NASA engages in such actions, the first transmission
of this kind taking place in 2005 when it relayed a Beatles concert during the time Paul McCartney was playing the song 'Good Day Sunshine,' towards the International Space Station. In the same concert, the crew members of the ISS were also able to listen to the 'Here Comes the Sun', 'Ticket to Ride' and 'A hard Day's Night' songs.

In fact, the 4th of February was declared, by the Beatles fans, the 'Across The Universe Day' to commemorate the anniversaries. NASA has proposed the song to be played simultaneously with the transmission all over the world, in sign of participation to the event. The engineers involved in the transmission are mostly senior NASA employees, and some of the biggest fans of The Beatles in the agency. Network program executive at NASA Headquarters, Dr. Barry Geldzahler says he's been a fan of The Beatles ever since the Deep Space Network has opened, 45 years ago. "'Across the Universe' is my personal Favorite Beatles song", Geldzahler said.

"Amazing! Well done, NASA! Send my love to the aliens," said former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney. Also the widow of John Lennon, Yoko Ono, said that the transmission of the 'Across the Universe' song represents a significant event, and believes that such transmissions will eventually initiate an interstellar communication network across the Universe.

Intel to Release 3.33GHz Dual Core, Axes Pentium D

Intel is ready to go beyond its chips' current limit of 3.2 GHz with its new Core 2 Duo E8600 processor. The new CPU will be based on a 45-nanometer dual core Wolfdale architecture and seems to work at 3.33 GHz
(the stock core clock speed).

The Wolfdale processor will come with 6MB of L2 cache and will feature a thermal design power of 65 watts, which is quite impressive, given its 3.33GHz core frequency. Moreover, its low thermal envelope will allow enthusiasts to overclock it without problems in order to squeeze some 300-500 MHz using air-based cooling solutions.

The Core 2 Duo E8600 will give Intel some maneuver space, as AMD is gearing up for launching its dual- and tri-cores during the second quarter of the year. The B4 silicon revision is promising excellent AMD overclockers.

However, Intel is still keeping its 45-nanometer CPU stash hidden from the eyes of its customers. Although the company has been shipping its 45-nanometer Core 2 Extreme 9650 for some time, there will be little 45-nanometer-based parts to emerge during this quarter.

Only two percent of Intel's consumer-oriented CPUs will be based on the Intel Core 2 Quad 45-nanometer architecture, and only three percent of the chips will belong to the 45-nanometer Core 2 Duo family. The 65-nanometer dual core processor will claim their lion share on the market (about 42 percent of the total shipments), while the 65-nanometer quads will account for only 5 percent of the total shipments.

Moving along, the Dual Core E2000 series will represent 29 percent of Intel's shipments, and the Celeron 400 will only account for 14 percent of total consumer CPU shipments this quarter. The big surprise is yet to come, as 2008 seems to be the first year when Intel will not ship any Pentium-class processor. The company has successfully transitioned to the Core technology in both low- and high level products.

The chip manufacturer seems to have buried the last of the Netbursts, the dual-core Pentium D processor. Intel basically built its reputation on the Pentium brand and terminating the family surely was a tough decision. Pentium D is practically a museum rarity as of 2008, but don't worry, the Core 2 Celeron or the E1000 series give more than the Pentium D could even imagine.

Optimal Webmail Management

Email messages represent the main form of communication between you and your website visitors (customers). Disregarding the email message content, there are at least two ways
in which you could receive emails from your customers: through a web based form or due to the existence of a mailto link, like: Email Me

Every time you make available a possibility to receive emails from other people, you will be exposed to spammers. As a consequence, the handling of email accounts and general webmail settings at the web server level will play a very important role in receiving and respectively processing the email messages.

In order to minimize spam attempts, it is recommended to enable email filtering systems, which are available on any webhosting account. They will identify spam messages based on the email message content by analyzing the header, body, etc.

You can set the email filter to automatically delete the spam messages, but it is a better idea to redirect them in a certain folder because sometimes the filters could consider (by mistake) that a legal email message is spam. Another alternatives to minimize spam messages is provided by the email authentication methods.

In order to minimize the amount of email messages received from your website visitors, you can implement a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) on your website based on the main requests regarding certain topics. The autoresponders could also help you in reducing the number of emails that must be processed. If you are using an email client on a local computer, it also provides various option to organize the email messages in an efficient manner so that the time of processing to be minimized.

In conclusion, when you select a certain web hosting service, it is a good idea to check the possibilities of webmail configuration and the security features offered. You can also ask your web hosting provider to suggest what could be the recommended web mail settings for your specific needs.

Eva Mendes Getting Professional Support, Reportedly in Rehab

Actress Eva Mendes is getting "professional support" for some "personal issues," her rep said Friday on the heels of a report saying she's in rehab battling a substance abuse problem.

"Eva has been working hard for the past year and made a positive decision to take some much-needed time off to proactively attend to some personal issues that, while not critical, she felt deserved some outside professional support," her rep told FOXNews.com.

"Out of respect for Eva's privacy, we do not wish to discuss further details," the rep added.

The "Ghost Rider" star, 33, has spent several weeks at Cirque Lodge in Utah, where Lindsay Lohan was recently treated, TMZ.com reported.

Mendes was just named "Sexiest Actress" of 2008 by Victoria's Secret, and Calvin Klein announced Friday that she will be featured in an upcoming Calvin Klein Fragrances advertising campaign, which will debut Fall 2008.

Michelle Mourns Heath, Asks for Peace

An emotionally wrought Michelle Williams has spoken out for the first time since the unexpected death of former fiancé Heath Ledger, asking fans and media to allow her and Ledger's other loved ones to mourn in peace.

"My heart is broken," the 27-year-old actress said in a statement released Friday through publicist Mara Buxbaum. "Please respect our need to grieve privately."

Williams met Ledger in 2005 while filming Brokeback Mountain. The duo welcomed a daughter, Matilda Rose Ledger, later that year.

"I am the mother of the most tender-hearted, high-spirited, beautiful little girl who is the spitting image of her father," Williams said. "All that I can cling to is his presence inside her that reveals itself every day.

"His family and I watch Matilda as she whispers to trees, hugs animals, and takes steps two at a time, and we know that he is with us still. She will be brought up in the best memories of him."

The statement is the first comment of any kind Williams has made since Ledger was found dead at his SoHo apartment on Jan. 22. An initial autopsy on the 28-year-old onetime Oscar nominee failed to determine a cause of death; an official report is expected in a few weeks, once toxicology testing is complete.

The actress received word of his passing shortly after wrapping up a film shoot in Sweden.

Sources close to the actress said she was "devastated" at the loss and immediately flew back to New York with Matilda, where she met with the Ledger family and attended a viewing. The group later flew to Los Angeles, where a private memorial took place.

Ledger's remains have reportedly since gone on to his hometown of Perth, Australia, where he is expected to be interred.

Producers announced earlier this week that production on Williams' next film, Blue Valentine, is on hold to allow the actress as much time as necessary to mourn.

Shooting on the drama, which costars Ryan Gosling, was originally scheduled to kick off Feb. 25.

Alcoa, Chinese firm to buy stake in Rio Tinto

SHANGHAI -- Alcoa Inc. and Aluminum Corp. of China say they plan to buy 12% of Rio Tinto in a deal valued at $14 billion.

It is the biggest foreign investment yet by a Chinese company, Chinalco said Friday, and appears to be meant to block a bid for London-based Rio Tinto by Australian mining giant BHP Billiton. Alcoa said it contributed $1.2 billion to the deal.

Beijing-based Chinalco, the country's biggest maker of both aluminum and alumina, said it made its purchase through its Shining Prospect subsidiary.

Neither Pittsburgh-based Alcoa nor Chinalco "currently intend to make an offer for Rio Tinto," though they reserved the right to participate in an offer within the next six months.

"Our acquisition of a significant strategic stake in Rio Tinto PLC today reflects our confidence in the long-term prospects for the rapidly evolving global mining sector," Chinalco President Xiao Yaqing said.

Rio Tinto became the world's biggest producer of aluminum and bauxite with its $39.7-billion purchase last year of Canada's Alcands.

Like many major Chinese industry groups, Chinalco has been rapidly expanding internationally, acquiring assets in Australia, Canada, Peru, Fiji and Guinea.

FOOD SAFETY: Slaughterhouse's meat banned

Two major hamburger chains and dozens of school districts around the nation have banned meat from a Chino, Calif., slaughterhouse after a video showed workers brutalizing sick and crippled cows, officials said Friday.

School districts in California, Arizona, Hawaii, Utah, Montana, Minnesota, North Dakota, Washington and other states have stopped using ground beef from Hallmark Meat Packing Co. and its associated Westland Meat Co. until completion of a federal investigation.

Of the eight truckloads of beef North Dakota has received this school year through the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National School Lunch Program, five included ground beef that originated from the Hallmark plant, said Linda Glaser, director of child nutrition and food distribution programs for the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction.

Some of the meat undoubtedly was served to students, but there have been no reports of illness or meat quality problems, she said.

The federal government asked state education officials to contact school districts and tell them to set aside beef connected to the slaughterhouse. Glaser said that was done Thursday. The beef in question is being left in school freezers.

Iraq vows to "crush terrorists" after 99 killed

Iraq's prime minister vowed on Saturday to ensure improved security is not derailed after two female bombers killed 99 people in the deadliest attacks in Baghdad since last April.

Nuri al-Maliki said Friday's bombings at popular pet markets in the capital would not herald a return to the savage violence that took Iraq to the brink of all-out sectarian civil war. The U.S. military blamed al Qaeda for the attacks.

"I swear on the blood (of the victims), we will achieve all our goals in securing a stable Iraq," he said in a statement. "We will continue to ... crush the terrorists and target their strongholds."

In the bloodiest attack, police said a female bomber killed 62 and wounded 88 at the Ghazil pet market in central Baghdad, one of the most popular meeting places in the city and a previous target for attacks.

That came just minutes after another blast killed 37 and wounded 57 at a bird market in southern Baghdad, police said.

Iraq's military has said the two women were mentally handicapped and the bombs were detonated by remote control.

"The terrorists used handicapped women in this crime. This shows the moral degradation of these criminal gangs and how much they hate mankind," Maliki said.

U.S. military officials said they had seen no evidence to suggest the women were handicapped, but one spokesman said on Saturday: "We don't have any reason to doubt that either".

Al Qaeda in Iraq, blamed by the U.S. military for the blasts and most other large-scale bombings, has increasingly used women wearing suicide vests to carry out strikes after increased security and protective walls made car bombings more difficult.

Friday's death toll was the worst in Baghdad since April 18, when multiple car bombings killed 191 people around the city.

The scale of the attack could damage growing confidence amongst Iraqis that their streets were becoming safer, leading them to venture out to markets and restaurants.

It also raises questions for the U.S. military, which has begun to reduce troop levels. Attacks have fallen by 60 percent across Iraq since last June, when 30,000 extra U.S. troops became fully deployed.

Troop levels will drop to around 135,000 by the middle of the year when more than 20,000 combat soldiers are withdrawn. There are currently around 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq.

U.S. commanders say they will have enough soldiers to maintain security. But they have repeatedly warned that al Qaeda remained a dangerous foe.

The fall in overall violence has also been attributed to local police units mainly made up of Sunni Arab tribes who turned against al Qaeda and a ceasefire by the feared Mehdi Army militia of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

U.S. won't say who killed militant

WASHINGTON -- The top U.S. military officer on Friday described the airstrike that killed a leading Al Qaeda commander in Pakistan as an important victory, but he refused to say whether the U.S. government had anything to do with it.

"The strike was a very important one, it was a very lethal one," Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a Pentagon news conference. He brushed aside questions about any role the Pentagon may have played.

The CIA and the Pakistani government also refused to say who might have fired the missile or missiles that are believed to have killed Abu Laith al Libi and perhaps other Al Qaeda leaders in a small compound in northwest Pakistan this week.

The U.S. government's reluctance to take public credit for the killing of Al Libi underscores the growing tensions between the United States and Pakistan over how to attack Al Qaeda as it entrenches itself on Pakistani territory, current and former U.S. officials and other experts said.

The government in Islamabad won't allow U.S. forces onto its soil to conduct counter-terrorism missions, so Washington has resorted to airstrikes launched from across the border in Afghanistan. But despite the occasional success, few in the counter-terrorism community believe that airstrikes are enough, and some have been openly pressing for more access.

In recent weeks, Director of National Intelligence J. Michael McConnell and CIA Director Michael V. Hayden made a trip to Pakistan to press for more cooperation from military and intelligence officials there. And Friday, Mullen said he too would be traveling to Islamabad this month to meet with Pakistani leaders, including the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kiani.

"While this particular strike was very successful, and we were very pleased with the outcome, there is still a great deal more work to do," Mullen said.

He said the U.S. remained "concerned about the safe havens" in the tribal areas near the Afghan border, a concern heightened by an increase in Al Qaeda and Taliban violence against targets in Pakistan in recent months.

"Being able to have an impact in a safe haven, I think, is an important one," Mullen said. "We're very committed to working with the Pakistanis on this."

He acknowledged that the United States was essentially powerless to do anything within Pakistan without the government's cooperation. He said he hoped to establish a personal relationship with Kiani and the rest of the Pakistani leadership and to "make sure that I understand his concerns and in fact work very hard to support them. . . . We will only do what is requested by Pakistan."

President Pervez Musharraf has maintained that Pakistani forces are capable of defeating Al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militants in the tribal areas. He has remained silent on Al Libi's death, which was announced this week on some Al Qaeda-affiliated websites.

Local officials had said about 12 people were killed in the strike late Monday or early Tuesday, most of them "foreigners" -- Arabs and Central Asians not from the area -- which fits the profile of Al Qaeda fighters in the tribal areas.

Residents had reported a missile strike on the small compound just outside the town of Mir Ali, which is considered a militant stronghold. Witnesses said they heard what they believed were Predator drones flying in the area shortly before the compound was hit.

Two Predator airstrikes were launched at suspected Al Qaeda targets, including Ayman Zawahiri, the network's second in command, in the tribal areas in 2006, but both appeared to be unsuccessful. One of them, on Jan. 13, 2006, in Damadola, sparked outrage among Pakistanis because at least 13 civilians were killed, prompting a sharp rebuke from Musharraf.

On Friday, some current and former U.S. counter-terrorism officials said Predator strikes would have little impact on Al Qaeda, especially given its increasingly strong connections to the Taliban and to tribal groups that also appear to be throwing in their lot with Osama bin Laden, or at least protecting his network out of loyalty or in return for financial compensation.

Bruce Riedel, a veteran Pakistan expert formerly with the CIA, State Department and National Security Council, said the silence surrounding who was behind the airstrike was designed to hide the fact that the U.S. was being forced to fight Al Qaeda at a distance without the full support of the Pakistani government.

"That no one seems to be responsible shows just how delicate and fragile our relationship . . . with Pakistan is," Riedel said. He said the situation in Pakistan had deteriorated significantly in recent months, and that the U.S. has grown more concerned with the spread of Taliban militants, especially since the assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and given the Musharraf government's preoccupation with winning parliamentary elections this month.

"We are now seeing a huge Al Qaeda and Taliban presence in Pakistan, and a Pakistan government that is not capable of dealing with it itself, and is reeling because of its own domestic political problems, and we have to resort to fighting it indirectly through unacknowledged Predator strikes. That is far from an optimal way of going about it," said Riedel, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a centrist Washington think tank.

Lisa Curtis, who was a Pakistan expert at the CIA, the State Department and as a professional staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the silence on who launched this week's attack was understandable given that a large percentage of Pakistanis have said they oppose their government's cooperation with the United States on counter-terrorism.

"The reason the United States and the Pakistanis don't talk openly about the details is because there is a possibility of a backlash among the general population, parts of which have sympathies with the Taliban," said Curtis, a senior research fellow on South Asia issues at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank.

"We have to assume that there is more cooperation than Musharraf wants to discuss publicly. The Pakistanis generally want to resolve the extremist problem in other ways beyond just military operations," Curtis said, adding that Washington was cooperating with Islamabad on some of these efforts.

NASA Says, ‘Hello, Universe. Meet the Beatles.’

If you’re out there in deep space, you’ll want to be tuning in at 7 p.m. Eastern time on Monday, Feb. 4 (plus however long it takes electromagnetic radiation to reach you from Earth doing the 186,000-miles-a-second speed limit).

That’s when NASA will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of its first space mission — the launch of the Explorer 1 satellite — by using the system of huge antennas that usually listen for inbound signals from space to send one outbound instead: the Beatles’ song “Across the Universe,” which as it happens was mostly recorded exactly 40 years earlier, on Feb. 4, 1968.

Reception will be best in the general direction of Polaris, 431 lightyears away, which is where NASA is aiming the signal. (That would be the North Star to us laymen.) But it ought to be audible in plenty of places on Earth as well, at least by imitation: NASA is encouraging space fans and Beatle fans alike to play the song themselves at the same time.

NASA’s press release includes some perfectly in-character comments from Sir Paul McCartney (”Amazing! Well done, NASA! Send my love to the aliens. All the best, Paul.”) and from Yoko Ono, widow of John Lennon, the song’s main author (”I see that this is the beginning of the new age in which we will communicate with billions of planets across the universe.”). Presumably, Julie Taymor will be pleased as well; her film “Across the Universe,” built around a soundtrack of Beatle songs, is still in theaters and contending for an Oscar; it is due for release on DVD on Tuesday.

The event also commemorates the 45th anniversary of the creation of the antenna system, the Deep Space Network, which NASA uses to explore space at one remove by listening to the electromagnetic radiation coming our way from Out There; the system also comes in handy for picking up data sent by space probes we have dispatched to the planets and beyond over the years.

NASA doesn’t often send outgoing mail this way; the last high-profile American broadcast meant specifically for extraterrestrial ears was also the first, dispatched by Professor Frank Drake of Cornell University in 1974 during the dedication of the upgraded Arecibo radiotelescope in Puerto Rico. (No reply, at least so far.) But Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute, which has been looking for signs of life beyond Earth since 1984, noted in an e-mail message to our colleague Dennis Overbye today that other groups in Ukraine and Canada have been sending signals in recent years.

Of course, vast amounts of electromagnetic signals flood out from the Earth every day as a side effect of ordinary human-to-human activity, from TV and radio broadcasts, radar stations, satellite uplinks and other sources, and the leading wave of that stuff has an eight-decade head start.

“Proof of our existence is already out there,” Dr. Shostak noted, “that’s simply a fact.”

An array of antennas that could pick up terrestrial TV signals in a distant solar system wouldn’t be hard to build, he observed. But there’s still plenty of time for any potential alien listener to tie-dye some T-shirts and stock the fridge before settling in to enjoy the song. Though scientists have found evidence of some 270 planets of other stars, most are extremely unlikely to support life, and all but a handful are far enough away that no readily detected, human-generated signal could yet have reached them.

“It’s safe to say that nobody knows of the existence of Homo sapiens (beyond this planet, of course),” Dr. Shostak observed.

A pity. The Lede was hoping for a little intergalactic help grokking that bit of Sanskrit in the chorus, “Jai guru deva om.”

VMware Offers Desktop Virtualization As Next Step

Industry analyst firm IDC predicts desktop virtualization will be a fresh wave of implementing virtualization technology in the enterprise, amounting to a $2 billion market by 2011.

VMware made the second version of its virtual desktop management software available this week to customers who want to extend their virtualized environments beyond servers in the data center.

Industry analyst firm IDC predicts desktop virtualization will be a fresh wave of implementing virtualization technology in the enterprise, amounting to a $2 billion market by 2011, but so far there's been more talk about desktop virtualization than action. While many IT managers can see potential benefits, problems of managing user IDs and supplying thousands of virtual machines and concurrent connections beset poorly planned initial steps.

VMware is looking to make desktop virtualization, through the second version of its Virtual Desktop Manager, an extension of what its existing virtualization management framework, Virtual Desktop Infrastructure, which in turn is linked to its general framework, Virtual Infrastructure 3.

VMware itself wanted to insure its desktop virtualization features were robust and secure before issuing the product, said Jerry Chen, senior director of enterprise desktops. Virtual Desktop Manager in its 1.0 version was not available for customers to install on their own. It was only available through VMware consulting services as VMware gained experience in the desktop market, said Chen in an interview.

"The key is, 'don't try to get too complex,'" said senior systems engineer Tony Arnett, an early adopter of Virtual Desktop Manager 2. He's virtualizing 10 desktops at a time at the Pentair Water Pool and Spa division of Pentair. He tested 10 desktops running on a single host with IT staffers before rolling out a test to 10 call center staffers. When he finishes testing with one group, he tears down their virtual machines and builds another 10 for a new group.

Early feedback indicates the virtual desktops are easier to manage and maintain with potential cost savings, but Arnett said the managers of the Pentair unit will have to review his results and determine how they wish to approach end users. For the testing, Arnett replaces a desktop machine with a Wyse thin client, a diskless Wyse V10L. But it's not been decided to replace all PCs with thin clients, he noted.

According to feedback, the virtualized Windows desktops and applications run the same, or possibly a little slower, in the virtualized environment.

VMware announced Virtual Desktop Manager 2 on Sept. 10; it became generally available yesterday.

The software is priced at $150 per concurrent user. It can be purchased in a $1,500 starter edition for 10 users or in a $15,000 package for 100 users.

Bidding reaches $18.55 bln in U.S. wireless auction

Bidding reached $18.55 billion on Friday in the U.S. Federal Communications Commission's record-setting auction of government-owned wireless airwaves, but there were no new offers for two large, closely watched slices of spectrum.

The total bidding, which covers five separate blocks of spectrum in the auction, was up from $15.64 billion on Thursday.

There were no new bids on a major slice of the airwaves, known as the "C" block, which will have to be made accessible using any device or software application, under FCC rules. A bid of $4.71 billion, made on Thursday morning remained the top offer.

Nor were there any new bids Friday on a nationwide piece of the spectrum, known as the "D" block, which must be shared with public safety agencies under auction rules set by the agency. A bid of $472 million from last week still stood.

The lone $472 million bid for the D block spectrum, which came in the first round of the auction a week ago, is far below the $1.3 billion minimum price set by the FCC. If bidding fails to reach the minimum, the FCC will have to decide whether to re-auction the D block or possibly modify the network-sharing requirement.

The open-access condition on the C-block spectrum is important because U.S. wireless carriers have traditionally restricted the models of cell phones that can be used on their networks and limited the software that can be downloaded onto them, such as ring tones, music or Web browser software.

But AT&T and Verizon began moving away from that restrictive stance in recent months.

The FCC is keeping bidders' identities secret until the entire auction ends. But analysts say Verizon Wireless and Internet search leader Google Inc (GOOG.O: Quote, Profile, Research) are the most likely bidders for the C block.

The 700-megahertz signals are valuable because they can go long distances and penetrate thick walls. The airwaves are being returned by television broadcasters as they move to digital from analog signals in early 2009.

In addition to the C and D blocks, the other spectrum includes more local chunks set aside in blocks designated "A" and "B". The final, "E" block, is considered less useful because it is limited to one-way data transmission.

The electronic auction will end when no more bids are submitted.

(Reporting by Peter Kaplan, editing by Leslie Gevirtz)