Personal Health: Keeping Blood Pressure in Check

Since the start of the 21st century, Americans have made great progress in controlling high blood pressure, though it remains a leading cause of heart attacks, strokes, congestive heart failure and kidney disease.Now 48 percent of the more than 76 million adults with hypertension have it under control, up from 29 percent in 2000.But that means more than half, including many receiving treatment, have...

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Advertising: Playing Whac-a-Mole With Piracy Sites

OVER the years, the fight against online piracy has led to countless lawsuits by media companies and to escalating levels of law enforcement, all with mixed results. Lately, though, new attention has turned to an aspect of online commerce that critics say finances online piracy: advertising. Prodding from the White House and a recent academic report have put pressure on the online...

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Live updates: SAG Awards 2013: Jennifer Lawrence wins; Danes, Moore and Costner score a threepeat

Are Daniel Day-Lewis and Jennifer Lawrence Oscar front-runners?The pair took trophies at the 19th Screen Actors Guild award...

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Lace 'Em Up: 4 Running Shoes Reviewed

Hitting the streets to get fit by spring? We review four new specialty sneakers for runners.Adidas' Adizero Feather 2.0 runners are so light (barely 7 ounces) and so responsive, running in them feels more like bouncing on fluffy clouds than pounding on pavement. OK, I'm exaggerating, but I was really blown away by the light weight when I took them out on long-distance runs. So effective was the feather-weight...

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Witch-hunting “Hansel & Gretel” wins box office

(Reuters) – A grown-up “Hansel & Gretel” grabbed the weekend box office title, pulling in $ 19 million in U.S. and Canadian ticket sales with its reinvention of the fairy tale characters as fierce bounty hunters.“Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters” knocked last weekend’s winner, low-budget horror flick “Mama,” into second place. “Mama” earned $ 12.8 million from Friday through Sunday, according...

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Ariel Sharon Brain Scan Shows Response to Stimuli

JERUSALEM — A brain scan performed on Ariel Sharon, the former Israeli prime minister who had a devastating stroke seven years ago and is presumed to be in a vegetative state, revealed significant brain activity in response to external stimuli, raising the chances that he is able to hear and understand, a scientist involved in the test said Sunday. Scientists showed Mr. Sharon, 84, pictures...

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Employers Increasingly Rely on Internal Referrals in Hiring

Sandy Huffaker for The New York TimesDanielle Cosgrove, left, referred Riju Parakh for a job at Ernst & Young. Ms. Parakh was hired within three weeks. Riju Parakh wasn’t even looking for a new job. But when a friend at Ernst & Young recommended her, Ms. Parakh’s résumé was quickly separated from the thousands the firm receives every week because she was referred by a current employee...

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L.A. mayoral candidates sound off on pot dispensaries

As Los Angeles voters face the possibility of as many as three medical marijuana initiatives on the May ballot, several mayoral...

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Crazy Alien Weather: Lightning-Filled Rocket Dust Storms of Mars

Scientists have modeled the internal workings of lightning-filled “rocket dust storms” on Mars that rise at speeds 100 times faster than ordinary storms and inject dust high into the Martian atmosphere.The Red Planet is a very dry and dusty place, with global storms that sometimes obscure the entire surface. Satellites orbiting Mars have seen persistent dust layers reaching very high altitudes,...

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Singer Tina Turner on path to Swiss citizenship

(Reuters) – Soul music legend Tina Turner has taken the first steps toward giving up her U.S. passport and becoming a citizen of Switzerland, the country she has called home for nearly 20 years.The Zurich suburb of Kusnacht has approved Swiss citizenship for the “Proud Mary” singer, pending confirmation from other authorities in the country, a spokeswoman for Turner said on Friday.Turner, who was...

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