Newtown residents ready to step out of media glare

Hundreds of reporters from around the world converged on Newtown, Conn., after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary …NEWTOWN, Conn.-- Message to the media: It's time to go away.

That's what many residents here have been saying about the media since Monday, when funerals began for more than two dozen adults and children killed in last week's massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

"There are people who should be able to get to these funerals," Janice Butler of Newtown told Yahoo News on Wednesday, standing a few hundred yards from the entrance to the school where Friday's shootings took place. "But some of them can't because you all are here."

At the Newtown General Store, when a member of the media thanked a store employee for breakfast sandwich, she replied, smiling, "Thank you for leaving."

In the first days after the tragedy, most reporters here were respectful of the town's 27,000 residents, sharing in their shock and grief while trying to cover it. And most residents and shop owners seemed to understand that it was a major news story of deep interest to many readers and viewers.

Figs Restaurant here welcomed TV host Geraldo Rivera for two meals late Saturday afternoon. By Tuesday, though, the restaurant had stationed one of the cooks in the parking lot, barring media from parking there.

Also Saturday, a Newtown teacher offered use of his bathroom and WiFi to several reporters. And the back dining room of the Iron Bridge bar in Sandy Hook became an ABC News bureau on Sunday, where network staff watched President Barack Obama's speech at the interfaith vigil at Newtown High School.

But on Monday, the Newtown Bee posted a note on its Facebook page, imploring its colleagues and journalists in the media to leave families of the dead alone. "PLEASE STAY AWAY FROM THE VICTIMS," the note said.

"We acknowledge it is your right to try and make contact," the paper added on Facebook, "But we beg you to do what is right and let them grieve and ready their funeral plans in peace."

Several local residents visited the page, adding their voices to the chorus of criticism.

"We want our town, our lives back," Dennis Brinkmann wrote. "You did your job, now leave us be."

"Journalists should be reporters not voyeurs," wrote another.

"We did turn to you when it was unfolding, because we needed to know what was going on, but now leave," Dorene Doran wrote. "We need to give these families time to themselves. Don't worry they will seek you out if they want to talk to you."

"As I drove down Main Street today I was upset at the number of cameras just aimed at the door to the funeral home," Gail Lovorn wrote, suggesting the community erect a screen to block the view. "The last thing these families need is to see their family and friends in these tender moments broadcast for the world to see."

On Tuesday night, a man walking up Church Hill Road carried a sign that read: "Dear Media, GTFO!"

There are signs that the media swarm is beginning to ease.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, who arrived Saturday, left Newtown after his broadcast on Tuesday night. Most of the satellite trucks that lined the center of Sandy Hook, steps from a makeshift memorial and less than a half mile from Sandy Hook Elementary, were gone on Wednesday. The parking lot at Treadwell Park, where nearly close to 100 satellite trucks were parked on Saturday, sat empty, too.

The Starbucks next to Saint Rose of Lima Church on Church Hill Road served as a makeshift international media center since the funerals began. On Wednesday, it was filled with residents heading to services for 7-year-old victim Daniel Barden--no media in sight.

But not everyone in Newtown wants to see the media gone.

"Please, please don't leave," a Sandy Hook resident named Dennis told Connecticut Public Radio's Colin McEnroe on Wednesday. "Because I know that people on the outside are feeling the same thing that the people on the inside are feeling. And it's ... it's just helplessness. So the more information they can get--as long as it's correct information--it might help them a little bit. It might, you know?"

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NationalIncontinence.com Offers 3 New Incontinence Products for Winter

For individuals experiencing urinary incontinence, National Incontinence, a major retailer of bladder control products, is offering three new incontinence products to help people better manage their bladder problems during the colder season.

Ashton, MD (PRWEB) December 20, 2012

Winter is finally here, and with that, comes hot chocolate and holiday fun. However, for people experiencing urinary incontinence, the colder season can make bladder control problems worse.

“From drier skin to increased bladder irritation, the winter season can be a nightmare for those with incontinence. This is the perfect time to highlight three new products that will help with better bladder control and skin care,” said Renee Mercer, president of National Incontinence, a leading retailer of incontinence supplies.

Pressure sores become a bigger threat during the winter as the skin gets extra dry and sensitive. The Attends CairPad is a popular option for caregivers who are caring for bedridden loved ones, as these individuals are most at risk for skin breakdown. The disposable underpad features a highly absorbent material that locks in urine, keeping painful bedsores from developing. Not only does the breathable pad help prevent skin rashes, but it also protects the bed from adult bedwetting.

Diaper rashes and incontinence often come hand-in-hand, especially for elderly adults with fragile skin. The Aloe Vesta Protective Ointment is a barrier cream that moisturizes dry winter skin and forms a protective layer between the skin and damp conditions. Adult diaper creams are an essential in keeping the perineal area clean and free from skin irritations.

Along with colds and runny noses, cooler temperatures can lead to increased bladder spasms and sudden urges to urinate. The new Tena Stretch Briefs provides full protection against heavy incontinence in both a diaper and pull up underwear style. This Tena brief uses special micro-beads that help lock in liquids and reduce urine odor, so that users remain dry and comfortable. The Tena Stretch also features stretchable sides for a better fit and leakage protection.

For more information on how to manage incontinence, visit National Incontinence’s blog and Tips and Advice Center.

About NationalIncontinence.com

National Incontinence provides products throughout the United States for people of all ages with bladder control problems. They have helped more than 100,000 patients with bladder issues. Their pediatric division, the Bedwetting Store, is now the largest distributor of pediatric enuresis products in the United States. National Incontinence is proud to serve the millions of families who seek information and practical solutions to bladder control problems and want the best products at the lowest prices.

Nancy Pham
National Incontinence
1-800-998-1745
Email Information

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State Department security chief leaves post over Benghazi

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. State Department said on Wednesday its security chief had resigned from his post and three other officials had been relieved of their duties following a scathing official inquiry into the September 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi.

Eric Boswell has resigned effective immediately as assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a terse statement. A second official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Boswell had not left the department entirely and remained a career official.

Nuland said that Boswell, and the three other officials, had all been put on administrative leave “pending further action.”

An official panel that investigated the incident concluded that the Benghazi mission was completely unprepared to deal with the attack, which killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

The unclassified version of the report, which was released on Tuesday, cited “leadership and management” deficiencies, poor coordination among officials and “real confusion” in Washington and in the field over who had the authority to make decisions on policy and security concerns.

“The ARB identified the performance of four officials, three in the Bureau of the Diplomatic Security and one in the Bureau of (Near Eastern) Affairs,” Nuland said in her statement, referring to the panel known as an Accountability Review Board.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accepted Boswell’s decision to resign effective immediately, the spokeswoman said.

Earlier, a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Boswell, one of his deputies, Charlene Lamb, and a third unnamed official has been asked to resign. The Associated Press first reported that three officials had resigned.

PANEL STOPS SHORT OF BLAMING CLINTON

The Benghazi incident appeared likely to tarnish Clinton’s four-year tenure as secretary of state but the report did not fault her specifically and the officials who led the review stopped short of blaming her.

“We did conclude that certain State Department bureau-level senior officials in critical positions of authority and responsibility in Washington demonstrated a lack of leadership and management ability appropriate for senior ranks,” retired Admiral Michael Mullen, one of the leaders of the inquiry, told reporters on Wednesday.

The panel’s chair, retired Ambassador Thomas Pickering, said it had determined that responsibility for security shortcomings in Benghazi belonged at levels lower than Clinton’s office.

“We fixed (responsibility) at the assistant secretary level, which is, in our view, the appropriate place to look for where the decision-making in fact takes place, where – if you like – the rubber hits the road,” Pickering said after closed-door meetings with congressional committees.

The panel’s report and the comments by its two lead authors suggested that Clinton, who accepted responsibility for the incident in a television interview about a month after the Benghazi attack, would not be held personally culpable.

Pickering and Mullen spoke to the media after briefing members of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee and Senate Foreign Relations Committee behind closed doors on classified elements of their report.

Clinton had been expected to appear at an open hearing on Benghazi on Thursday, but is recuperating after suffering a concussion, dehydration and a stomach bug last week. She will instead be represented by her two top deputies.

Clinton, who intends to step down in January, said in a letter accompanying the review that she would adopt all of its recommendations, which include stepping up security staffing and requesting more money to fortify U.S. facilities.

The National Defense Authorization Act for 2013, which is expected to go to Congress for final approval this week, includes a measure directing the Pentagon to increase the Marine Corps presence at diplomatic facilities by up to 1,000 Marines.

Some Capitol Hill Republicans who had criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the Benghazi attacks said they were impressed by the report.

“It was very thorough,” said Senator Johnny Isakson. Senator John Barrasso said: “It was very, very critical of major failures at the State Department at very high levels.” Both spoke after the closed-door briefing.

Others, however, took a harsher line and called for Clinton to testify as soon as she is able.

“The report makes clear the massive failure of the State Department at all levels, including senior leadership, to take action to protect our government employees abroad,” Representative Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.

Senator Bob Corker, who will be the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the new Congress is seated early next year, said Clinton should testify about Benghazi before her replacement is confirmed by the Senate.

Republicans have focused much of their firepower on U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who appeared on TV talk shows after the attack and suggested it was the result of a spontaneous protest rather than a premeditated attack.

The report concluded that there was no such protest.

Rice, widely seen as President Barack Obama’s top pick to succeed Clinton, withdrew her name from consideration last week.

(Additional reporting by Tabassum Zakaria and Susan Cornwell; Editing by Christopher Wilson)

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Claire Danes and Hugh Dancy welcome a baby boy

NEW YORK (AP) — Claire Danes and Hugh Dancy‘s “Homeland” just got bigger.

Danes’ rep confirms the couple welcomed a baby boy named Cyrus Michael Christopher.

People.com first reported Monday’s birth.

It’s the first child for 33-year old Danes and 37-year-old Dancy. They were married in 2009.

There’s no word yet whether the new mom will attend the Golden Globe Awards on Jan. 13. She’s nominated for Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series for her work on Showtime’s “Homeland.”

Up next, Dancy stars in NBC’s “Hannibal,” an adaptation of Thomas Harris’ novel “Red Dragon.”

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Google to sell part of Motorola for $2.35 billion

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google is selling Motorola Mobility‘s TV set-top business for $ 2.35 billion, lightening the load that the Internet search leader took on earlier this year when it completed the biggest acquisition in its history.

The cash-and-stock deal announced late Wednesday will turn over Motorola‘s set-top division to Arris Group Inc., a relatively small provider of high-speed Internet equipment that is looking to become a bigger player in the delivery of video. Investors applauded the move, driving up Arris‘ stock by nearly 17 percent.

Google‘s decision to jettison the set-top boxes comes seven months after the Mountain View, Calif., company took control of Motorola Mobility Holdings in a $ 12.4 billion purchase.

The set-top boxes were never a big allure for Google, although the company is interested in finding ways to pipe its service on to TVs so it can sell more advertising.

Google prized Motorola for its portfolio of more than 17,000 mobile patents. Those form an arsenal that it can use in a fierce battle that has broken out over intellectual property as smartphones and tablet computers have emerged as hot commodities in recent years.

Motorola also makes smartphones and tablets, a manufacturing business that Google will retain, despite lingering concerns on Wall Street about the hardware shrinking Google‘s profit margins and possibly alienating other device makers that use the company’s Android software.

Besides not being a natural fit for Google, Motorola‘s set-top box also has become a potentially expensive liability. Digital video recorder pioneer TiVo Inc. is seeking billions of dollars in damages in a lawsuit alleging that Motorola‘s boxes infringed on its patents. Those claims are scheduled to go to trial next year in federal court in Texas.

Although they declined to provide specifics, Arris Group executives told analysts in a Wednesday conference call that Google still must cover most of the bill for any damages or settlement that TiVo might win.

TiVo already has negotiated about $ 1 billion in combined settlements in other patent-infringement cases it has brought against other companies, including Dish Network Corp., AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications.

The proposed sale of Motorola‘s set-top division calls for Google to receive $ 2.05 billion in cash and $ 300 million worth of Arris stock. If the deal wins regulatory approval, Arris Group expects to take over the division before the end of June.

Google will also pare its expenses, something likely to please investors concerned about Motorola being a drag on the company’s earnings. Arris said about 7,000 people work in Motorola‘s set-top division. Google ended September with about 53,500 employees, including 17,400 who worked on the Motorola side of its operations. More than 20,000 people worked at Motorola Mobility when Google became the owner in late May, but the payroll was slashed as part of an effort to pare the losses that have been piling up within Motorola as its once popular cellphones lost market share to Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics.

But Motorola‘s set-top business had been making money, according to Google, though the company didn’t say how much.

In the past year ending in September, Motorola‘s set-top operations generated $ 3.4 billion in revenue. That makes it twice as big as Arris Group, whose revenue totaled $ 1.3 billion during the same period. Arris Group, which is based Suwanee, Ga., had earned $ 39 million through the nine months of last year after suffering a loss of nearly $ 13 million for all of 2011.

“This represents a great leap forward for Arris,” CEO Bob Stanzione said during Wednesday’s conference call.

Arris’ stock surged $ 2.46 to $ 17 in extended trading Wednesday while Google‘s stock dipped $ 2.61 to $ 717.50.

The other half of the old Motorola Inc., Motorola Solutions Inc., remains an independent company. Based in Schaumburg, Ill., it sells communications equipment to government and corporate customers.

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More funerals as gun control debate swirls

NEWTOWN, Connecticut (Reuters) - Six more victims of the Newtown school shooting will be honored at funerals and remembrances on Wednesday, including the school principal who was killed with 20 of her students and five other staff members at the Sandy Hook Elementary School.

The massacre of so many children, most of them just 6 or 7 years old, has shocked the United States and the world, renewing debate over gun control in a nation where the right to bear arms is protected by the Constitution and fiercely defended by many.

Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old shooter, carried hundreds of rounds of ammunition in extra clips and shot his victims repeatedly, one of them 11 times. He also shot and killed his mother before driving to the school, and then killed himself.

The family of Principal Dawn Hochsprung invited mourners to visit at a local funeral home on Wednesday afternoon, though the burial was due to be private at an undisclosed time.

Another of the teachers, Victoria Soto, was among those to be buried at a funeral on Wednesday.

Funerals were also scheduled for 6-year-old Charlotte Bacon, 7-year-old Daniel Barden and 6-year-old Caroline Previdi, while the family of 7-year-old Chase Kowalski invited mourners to a public visitation and prayer vigil.

The surviving children from Sandy Hook Elementary faced another day at home as school authorities and parents made plans for an eventual return to a different location - the unused Chalk Hill School in nearby Monroe, where a sign across the street read, "Welcome Sandy Hook Elementary!"

At Sandy Hook itself, well wishers and mourners had left tributes such as candles, flowers and stuffed animals. A heavy rain that fell most of Tuesday had soaked many of them and extinguished some of the candles, leaving a smell of burned wax in the air as police continued their investigations inside.

They have said the investigation could take months and have revealed nothing yet about Lanza's motive.

Well wishers came to the town from as far afield as Iowa. Beth Howard said she had driven 17 hours from Eldon, Iowa, in an effort to do whatever she could to help. She joined a group of people from New Jersey who decided to bake pies for residents of the town to show their solidarity and support.

"It has already made the trip worthwhile," said Howard, describing the smiles she got from local residents.

The first of many funerals was held on Monday and two children were laid to rest on Tuesday. Most of the town's schools reopened on Tuesday, but there was no immediate word on when the Sandy Hook students would be back in the classroom.

The impact of the shooting was felt in the business world on Tuesday when private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP said it would sell its investment in the company that makes the AR-15-type Bushmaster rifle that was used by Lanza.

The powerful gun industry lobby, the National Rifle Association, broke its silence on Tuesday for the first time since the shootings, saying it was "shocked, saddened and heartbroken" and was "prepared to offer meaningful contributions" to prevent such massacres.

The NRA uses political pressure against individual lawmakers and others to press for loosening constraints on gun sales and ownership across the United States while promoting hunting and gun sports.

The group, which said it had not commented until now out of respect for the families and to allow time for mourning and an investigation, planned a news conference on Friday.

The massacre prompted some Republican lawmakers to open the door to a national debate about gun control, a small sign of easing in Washington's entrenched reluctance to seriously consider new federal restrictions.

(Additional reporting by Greg Roumeliotis, Edith Honan, Dan Burns, Patricia Zengerle, David Ingram, Chris Francescani; Writing by Claudia Parsons; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

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Three more polio workers shot in Pakistan; eight dead in 48 hours

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Three workers in a polio eradication campaign were shot in Pakistan on Wednesday, and two of them were killed, the latest in a string of attacks that has partially halted the U.N.-backed global health campaign to stamp out the crippling disease.

Following the violence, the United Nations in Pakistan has pulled all staff involved in the immunization campaign off the streets, spokesman Michael Coleman said.

Wednesday saw at least three separate attacks. In the northwestern district of Charsadda, men on motorbikes shot dead a woman and her driver, police and health officials said.

Hours earlier, a male health worker was shot and badly wounded in the nearby provincial capital of Peshawar. He remains in a critical condition, said a doctor at the Lady Reading Hospital where he is being treated.

Four other women health workers were shot at but not hit in nearby Nowshera, said Jan Baz Afridi, deputy head of the Expanded Programme on Immunisation.

It is not clear exactly who is behind the violence but some Islamists, including Taliban militants, have long opposed the campaign, with some saying it is aimed at sterilizing Muslims.

The Taliban have repeatedly issued threats against the polio eradication campaign and health workers said they received calls telling them to stop working with the “infidels”.

But a spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, Ihsanullah Ihsan, told Reuters his group was not involved in the violence.

On Monday and Tuesday, six female health workers were killed in attacks in the southern port city of Karachi and in Peshawar. The youngest was 17.

The shootings, five of which happened in Karachi, home to 18 million people, led provincial health authorities to suspend the polio eradication campaign in the province of Sindh.

But authorities in Khyber Paktunkhwa province, where the capital is Peshawar, said they would not accept a recommendation to suspend the campaign even as the United Nations ordered their staff to suspend work.

“You know halting the campaign at this stage would create more problems as it’s not a one-day phenomenon. If we stopped the campaign it would encourage the forces opposing the polio vaccination,” said an official in the province, Javed Marwat.

Despite this, many health workers told Reuters they would not be going to work until the security situation improved.

The Taliban have repeatedly said the campaign is a Western conspiracy to sterilize or spy on Muslims or said the vaccinations could only continue if attacks by U.S. drone aircraft stopped.

Their suspicions increased after it emerged that the CIA had used a fake vaccination campaign to try to gather information about Osama bin Laden, before he was found and killed in a northern Pakistani town last year.

On Wednesday, Pakistan Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf said the campaign needed to go on.

“We cannot and would not allow polio to wreak havoc on the lives of our children,” he said in a statement.

Pakistan had 20,000 polio cases in 1994 but vigorous vaccination efforts had brought the number down to 56 in 2012, the statement said.

A global vaccination campaign has eradicated the disease from everywhere except Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria.

Polio can paralyze or kill within hours of infection. It is transmitted person-to-person, meaning that as long as one child is infected, the disease can be passed to others.

(Reporting By Katharine Houreld; Editing by Michael Perry and Robert Birsel)

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Canada serial killer inquiry finds “systemic bias” by police

(Reuters) – Police made critical errors in pursuing Canadian serial killer Robert Pickton partly because of “systemic bias” against his victims, sex trade workers from a rough Vancouver neighborhood, according to the final report from a public inquiry released on Monday.

Commissioner Wally Oppal was asked by the British Columbia government to investigate, in effect, why Pickton was not caught sooner. Women disappeared from the Downtown Eastside neighborhood for more than a decade before the pig farmer’s 2002 arrest.

“The investigations of missing and murdered women were characterized by blatant police failures, and by public indifference,” Oppal said at a press conference in Vancouver that was frequently interrupted by protesters.

Pickton was convicted of six murders, but prosecutors believe he killed many more – 20 other charges were stayed after he received the maximum possible sentence.

Oppal outlined a string of police errors, from failing to take proper reports when women went missing and communicate adequately with families, to ineffective coordination across jurisdictions. He called his more than 1,200-page report, which is based on eight months of hearings, “Forsaken”.

“After reviewing the evidence of the investigations, I have come to the conclusion that there was systemic bias by the police,” he said.

Oppal recommended that the provincial government establish a compensation fund for the children of the victims and consider creating a regional police force for Vancouver, instead of the patchwork of jurisdictions currently in place.

After Oppal’s announcement, B.C. Minister of Justice Shirley Bond wiped away tears as she spoke to victims’ families.

“I want you to know that, however inadequate these words sound, we are sorry for your loss,” she said. “We will work hard to prevent these circumstances from being repeated in our province.”

She announced the appointment of a former lieutenant governor, Steven Point, to serve as the report’s “champion”, guiding implementation. Bond said the government would immediately give new funding to WISH, a drop-in center for women who work in the Downtown Eastside’s sex trade.

POLICE RESPOND

The Vancouver Police Department said in a short statement that it is committed to learning from its mistakes and will study the report.

“We know that nothing can ever truly heal the wounds of grief and loss but if we can, we want to assure the families that the Vancouver Police Department deeply regrets anything we did that may have delayed the eventual solving of these murders,” it said.

Deputy Commissioner Craig Callens, who commands the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in British Columbia, said in a statement that his force will review the report.

Oppal said many individual police officers were diligent, and he commended several by name. But he said that as a system, the authorities failed because of bias against Pickton’s victims, many of whom were poor and addicted to drugs.

“Would the reaction of the police and the public have been any different if the missing women had come from Vancouver’s (more affluent) west side? The answer is obvious,” he said.

Aboriginal women were overrepresented among the victims, and Oppal repeatedly referred to the broader “marginalization” of aboriginal people in Canada.

“There has to be community responsibility for what has taken place,” he said, highlighting poverty and the conditions on the Downtown Eastside. “The social reality is that racism and gender bias are prevalent within Canadian society, and we must do something to eradicate those.”

Victims’ families and activists were on hand for Oppal’s press conference, and he stopped speaking several times as audience members shouted criticism, chanted and played drums.

The provincial government did not offer funding to a number of community organizations that said they needed support to participate in the lengthy and complex inquiry. In protest, other groups boycotted the process.

In November, several organizations, including the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, released their own report, criticizing the inquiry for, among other things, excluding too many aboriginal women, sex trade workers and drug users.

Bond, the justice minister, said she did not regret the decision not to fund those groups, but said she saw them participating in the future. “I think going forward this is room for us to include other voices.” (Reporting by Allison Martell; Editing by Eric Beech)

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“Zero Dark Thirty” review: Like a really good “Law & Order” – with waterboarding

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – It’s always a challenge to tell a story where the audience knows the ending. The trick comes in offering a new perspective on familiar events or at least generating suspense in a way that makes us nervous that Apollo 13 might not land safely, even when history tells us otherwise.

“Argo” and “Lincoln” are two films that successfully tread these waters, and now comes “Zero Dark Thirty,” Kathryn Bigelow‘s eagerly awaited follow-up to “The Hurt Locker.”

She and screenwriter Mark Boal have consciously chosen to take a just-the-facts-ma’am approach to the manhunt and subsequent killing of Osama bin Laden, and while there’s no denying the skill with which they’ve gone about telling the tale, the results are simultaneously uninvolving and somewhat infuriating.

Uninvolving, to some extent, because the people in this movie are not so much characters as they are plot functionaries, chess pieces that move around strategically to capture their target. Jessica Chastain stars as Maya, a CIA agent who, with each passing year, grows more determined to nab the man behind the 9/11 attacks.

There’s nothing wrong with this style of storytelling — giving us some backstory about Maya’s taste in men or love of antique cars or whatever wouldn’t necessarily add anything to what Bigelow and Boal are trying to do here – but it’s a gamble that doesn’t quite pay off.

After spending its first half getting into the false leads and call-tracing and all the nitty-gritty of a manhunt, “Zero Dark Thirty” subjects its capable lead character to the requisite scene in which she snaps and barks at her bureaucrat boss (played by Kyle Chandler) that she’s so close, and not to take her off the case.

It’s a moment that feels like it might have come from any given episode of “Homeland” or any TNT show about a plucky female cop, and it capsizes a movie that, until that point, had been a fairly fascinating examination of the unglamorous sausage-making that goes into a worldwide search for a terrorist.

The somewhat infuriating facet comes early on, as we watch Maya observe seasoned interrogator Dan (Jason Clarke, giving a fascinating performance) torture terror suspects to find out what they know about September 11. The movie indirectly implies that waterboarding and electrodes to the genitals and all that other stuff that George W. Bush‘s consiglieri convinced him were kosher actually resulted in actionable intelligence, despite the reams of reportage that suggested otherwise.

I believe Bigelow and Boal’s after-the-fact denials that they intended to glorify torture in any way, but when you include material like this in a movie that takes such a coolly detached tone in telling its story, you can’t then be surprised later when some viewers interpret a filmmaker’s neutral tone as an implicit endorsement.

Still, even if the eventual raid on the bin Laden compound isn’t as exciting as the film’s first half (this is where some “Argo”-style suspense might have come in handy), there’s a lot to recommend about “Zero Dark Thirty,” which more often than not reflects Bigelow’s consummate abilities as an action filmmaker; her no-frills skills in mounting car chases, surveillance and the other tools of the CIA trade get a full workout.

The acting is also uniformly strong, although if you found the parade of famous faces popping up in “Lincoln” to be distracting, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Many recognizable performers turn up very briefly for their chance to be in the new Bigelow movie, to the occasional point of distraction. (I started counting lines from well-known actors; “Torchwood” star John Barrowman? Two.)

And even if “Zero Dark Thirty” packs something less of a punch than “The Hurt Locker,” it’s still a movie that’s going to part of the national discussion, both politically and artistically, and deservedly so. Whether you love it, hate it, or have mixed feelings, it’s not to be ignored.

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Newtown students to return to classes

NEWTOWN, Connecticut (Reuters) - The schools of Newtown, which stood empty in the wake of a shooting rampage that took 26 of their own, will again ring with the sounds of students and teachers on Tuesday as the bucolic Connecticut town struggles to return to normal.

But among the normal sounds of a school day - teachers reading to children, the scratch of pencil on paper - students will hear new ones, including the murmur of grief counselors and the footsteps of police officers.

Four days after 20-year-old Adam Lanza strode into Sandy Hook Elementary school and gunned down a score of 6- and 7-year-olds, in addition to six faculty and staff, that school will remain closed. It is an active crime scene, with police coming and going past a line of 26 Christmas trees that visitors have decorated with ornaments, stuffed animals and balloons in the school colors of green and white as a memorial to the victims.

The massacre - one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history - shocked Americans, prompting some lawmakers to call for tighter restrictions on guns and causing school administrators around the country to assess their safety protocols.

Newtown police plan to have officers at the six schools scheduled to reopen on Tuesday, trying to offer a sense of security to the students and faculty, many of whom spent the weekend in mourning. Newtown Police Lieutenant George Sinko acknowledged it may be difficult to ease the worries of the roughly 4,700 returning students and their families.

"Obviously, there's going to be a lot of apprehension. We just had a horrific tragedy. We had babies sent to school that should be safe and they weren't," Sinko said. "You can't help but think ... if this could happen again."

DAY FOR 'HEALING'

Newtown High School Principal Charles Dumais, in an e-mail to parents, said schools in the district would open two hours later than usual, with counselors available to students and their families.

"This is a day to start healing," Dumais said.

While school officials have not yet decided when Sandy Hook students will resume their studies, the building that they will move into - the unused Chalk Hill School in the nearby town of Monroe - already showed signs of preparation.

On a fence opposite the building, a green sign with white lettering proclaimed "Welcome Sandy Hook Elementary!"

In Washington, the massacre prompted U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday to call a White House meeting with advisors to discuss ways to respond, a first step toward fulfilling the pledge he made a day earlier in Newtown. The administration's plans to curb violence include but are not limited to gun-control measures, a spokesman said.

Police have warned it could take months for them to finish their investigation into the attack, which started when Adam Lanza killed his mother, Nancy, at home, before driving to the school armed with a Bushmaster AR 15 rifle and two handguns. After shooting 26 people at the school, he turned his gun on himself when he heard police approaching.

In total, 28 people died in the incident.

Many of the students and faculty of Sandy Hook and its neighbors will still have funerals to attend.

The first two victims, Noah Pozner and Jack Pinto, both 6, were buried on Monday, with the boys' bodies laid out in white coffins. Jack was dressed in a New York Giants jersey with his favorite player's number, while mourners left a teddy bear outside Noah's service.

More funerals were expected on Tuesday, for victims including James Mattioli and Jessica Rekos. Each was 6 years old.

"It's still not real that my little girl, who was so full of life and who wants a horse so badly and who's going to get cowgirl boots for Christmas isn't coming home," Krista Rekos, Jessica's mother, told ABC News on Monday.

(Additional reporting by Peter Rudegeair and Edward Krudy; Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Jackie Frank)

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