Skype Files for IPOSkype filed plans to go public in the U.S., adding another high-profile name to the list of companies hoping to launch initial public offerings this year. Read Article     

  Baghdad's night life falls foul of religious rightIraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki accused of colluding with fundamentalists to shut down night clubsMartin Chulov, Baghdad The Observer, Article history Dancers perform for an all-male clientele in one of the clubs that reopened as security improved in Baghdad. Photograph: Hadi Mizban/AP The raids came just before midnight a week ago. At the start of Eid al-Adha, the four holiest days on the Islamic calendar, hundreds of Iraqi police and soldiers stormed each of Baghdad's 300 or so nightclubs. Officers from the most elite units stood outside as soldiers slapped owners' faces, scattered their patrons and dancing girls, ripped down posters advertising upcoming acts, and ordered alcohol removed from the shelves.They left many of the clubs with a warning – any owner who tried to reopen would be thrown into prison, along with his staff.The official reason for the mass raids is that none of the premises had licences. The reality is that a year-long renaissance in Baghdad's nightlife may be over, as this increasingly conservative city takes on a hardline religious identity. Bohemian Baghdad did not last long."They treated us like terrorists," said Sinan Kamal, a chef at the Jetar nightclub in east Baghdad, displaying both a licence and weekly receipts for fees collected by the Tourism Ministry. "They sat us on the ground and made us put our heads between our legs. They slapped us and were impolite with the girls. They were behaving like religious police."Until last week nightlife was a growth story in Baghdad – once renowned as a city of 1,001 vices. "You can forget about a fair few of those now," said Kamal. "Dancing clubs are gone, so are singers and bars. Welcome to the new Iraq." For the large numbers of Baghdadis who believed an older Iraq was on its way back, the raids, and what they signify, are a bitter disappointment.As security forces gradually won back the streets over the past year, areas of the capital that had long ago been hubs of entertainment were restored to their former decadent glory. Throughout the summer, garish shop fronts along the riverside suburb of Abu Nuwas and a nearby strip known as Sadoon Street were teeming with men and youths queueing for clubs touting dancing girls and whisky. Many of the clubs also doubled as brothels – a factor readily overlooked by Baghdad council and the Iraqi government, which were both apparently keen to breathe new nightlife – with all its trappings – back into the city's war-ravaged streets.In 2007, when American troops handed control of Abu Nuwas to Iraqi forces, they tried to rekindle the area's freewheeling past by offering grants. Throughout the 80s and early 90s, before Saddam Hussein rediscovered religion, the plush strip of sandstone homes and shops that spreads either side of the famous Palestine and Sheraton hotels was bustling with bars and gambling dens. On the lush green lawns, couples canoodled…

 Whitman met with protests in East L.A.The GOP gubernatorial candidate opens and office there and visits the "John and Ken" radio show. At both stops, a shifting stance on illegal immigration is criticized. Read Article

 Lessons for Europe from CaliforniaThe financial aftershocks being felt in Greece will show the EU what 'union' really means Steven Hill guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 17 February 2010 22.30 GMT Article historyOver a year ago, the world economy suffered a massive economic quake – and certain countries have been experiencing aftershocks ever since. Two such aftershocks have grabbed headlines, one recently in Greece and another last summer in California. A comparison of these two events reveals something about the respective features of the west's two leading capitalist economies, the US and Europe.

The Greek aftershock has roiled the financial markets in recent weeks. With some $25bn worth of loan payments coming due for which Greece will need to refinance, the bond markets became skittish that a Greek default may lead to a wave of other national defaults in Portugal and Spain, and drag down the euro itself (much like Lehman Brothers initiated the global financial industry's collapse).But that seems unlikely. Greece's economy comprises only 2% of the overall European economy – about the same magnitude as Indiana's in the United States. Greece's deficit to GDP ratio, while high at about 12.5%, is not that much higher than that of both the US and Japan, around 10.5%. True, Greece has a sizable accumulated debt over many years, estimated at about 110 percent of its GDP, but even the US has a debt to GDP estimated at 94% and projected to break 100% by 2012. And Greece is embedded within the euro zone which actually has a fairly low deficit to GDP ratio by today's post-collapse standards, only 6%. So there is little doubt that Europe has the capacity to absorb Greece's troubles. This is a matter of investor confidence, not economic fundamentals.But California by comparison makes up 14% of the US economy, about the same magnitude as Germany's economy in Europe, truly "too big to fail." Yet when California threatened to default on its loan obligations last summer and the governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, asked for a federal bailout, the Obama administration flatly rejected it. That caused California to have to issue IOUs as a way to pay its bills, and its bond rating plummeted.

California's situation in some ways is more worrisome than Greece's. Having a state that is one-seventh of the national economy in dire straits is a threat to the nation's economic recovery. It is analogous to having Germany struggling instead of Greece, striking at the heart of Europe. California has been shaken by widespread layoffs and furloughs – the city of Los Angeles just laid off 1,000 more workers – and core social programmes have been slashed. Millions of low income children have lost access to meal programmes, and community clinics have been closed. Almost 3 million low income adults have…

 Former aide to Duchess of York escapes from jailJane Andrews, who murdered her boyfriend after he refused to marry her, has absconded from an open prison in Kent