Israel Ex-Official Avigdor Lieberman’s Trial Starts

JERUSALEM — Israel’s tough-talking former foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, pleaded not guilty on Sunday to charges of fraud and breach of trust in a criminal case that leaves his political future hanging in the balance.

An outspoken hard-liner and senior political partner of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Mr. Lieberman made his plea, through a lawyer, in a short court appearance that was mainly procedural as his trial opened. He is accused of having promoted Israel’s former ambassador to Belarus for another post after the ambassador had provided the foreign minister with classified information relating to a police investigation into Mr. Lieberman’s financial affairs.

As the trial opens, Mr. Netanyahu is engaged in delicate negotiations to form a new governing coalition after the January elections in which Mr. Lieberman ran as Mr. Netanyahu’s No. 2 on a joint rightist ticket.

“We are very pleased; we’ve passed the preliminaries,” one of Mr. Lieberman’s lawyers, Jacob Weinroth, told reporters after Sunday’s session, adding, “We want this to end quickly and we want it to end well.” The next four court sessions were set for late April and early May.

Mr. Lieberman will not be eligible for a ministerial post unless he is acquitted, but he has indicated that he intends to clear his name and return to the cabinet, preferably as foreign minister. Earlier this month he told Israeli television that the foreign affairs portfolio would remain with Mr. Netanyahu pending the conclusion of the trial.

Mr. Lieberman, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union who rose to prominence as the leader of the ultranationalist party Yisrael Beiteinu, is currently serving as a member of Parliament and as temporary chairman of Parliament’s prestigious Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. But if he is convicted of offenses that include a finding of moral turpitude or receives a prison sentence of three months or more, he is likely to be forced to quit political life for several years.

Critics of the former foreign minister are asking how employees of the Foreign Ministry who may be called as witnesses by the prosecution can be expected to testify against Mr. Lieberman given the possibility that he may return to the ministry as their boss.

Israelis have almost gotten used to the spectacle of seeing senior public figures on the witness stand. A former prime minister, Ehud Olmert, was acquitted last year of corruption charges in two major matters but was convicted of breach of trust in a third episode. He remains embroiled in another corruption case having to do with the construction of a huge residential complex while he was the mayor of Jerusalem. Moshe Katsav, a former president, is serving a seven-year prison term after being convicted of rape.

A highlight of the Lieberman trial is likely to be the testimony of the prosecution’s central witness — Danny Ayalon, who served as deputy foreign minister under Mr. Lieberman. Mr. Lieberman then dumped Mr. Ayalon from the party’s ticket shortly before the elections, for reasons that were not publicly specified.

Mr. Lieberman’s case is expected to rest partly on the argument that he did not intervene to promote the diplomat to the post of ambassador to Latvia but that the diplomat was the best candidate for the job.

According to the prosecution, Mr. Lieberman instructed Mr. Ayalon, who led the Foreign Ministry’s Appointments Committee, to advance the appointment of the diplomat to the post in Latvia and Mr. Ayalon did as he was asked.

Since his unexpected exclusion from the new Parliament Mr. Ayalon has become critical of Mr. Lieberman and his policies as foreign minister. On Saturday, Mr. Ayalon said in speech at a regional forum that Mr. Lieberman had tried to push through inappropriate diplomatic appointments that Mr. Ayalon said he had resisted, according to the newspaper Haaretz. He also said that Mr. Lieberman had failed to win the trust of foreign governments and should not serve another term as foreign minister.

“Anyone who wants to hear the testimony of outgoing Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon against Lieberman is going to have to order tickets,” Shalom Yerushalmi, a commentator, wrote Sunday in the newspaper Maariv. He added, “Ayalon is brimming with revenge.”

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Willis' new 'Die Hard' scores with $25M debut

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Bruce Willis remains a die-hard at the box office.

Willis' action sequel "A Good Day to Die Hard" debuted as the weekend's top draw with a $25 million debut from Friday to Sunday. The 20th Century Fox release raised its domestic total to $33.2 million since opening Thursday for Valentine's Day to get a jump on the long President's Day weekend.

The movie comes 25 years after the original "Die Hard" and six years after "Live Free or Die Hard," the hit that resurrected the franchise centered on Willis' relentless New York City cop John McClane.

The previous weekend's No. 1 movie, Universal's comedy "Identity Thief" starring Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy, was a close second with $23.4 million to lift its haul to $70.7 million.

Debuting at No. 3 with $21.4 million was Relativity Media's romance "Safe Haven," starring Julianne Hough and Josh Duhamel in an adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks novel about a woman who flees her abusive husband and takes up with a sensitive widower. Since opening on Valentine's Day, "Safe Haven" has taken in $30.3 million.

The Weinstein Co. animated tale "Escape from Planet Earth" opened at No. 4 with $16.1 million. With a voice cast that includes Brendan Fraser, Jessica Alba, Sarah Jessica Parker and Rob Corddry, the movie follows the adventures of aliens captured by the U.S. military.

Making a weak debut at No. 6 was the Warner Bros. teen fantasy "Beautiful Creatures," which pulled in $7.5 million for the weekend and $10 million since opening Thursday. The movie is based on the first in the best-selling series about a Southern misfit (Alden Ehrenreich) who falls under the spell of a teen witch (Alice Englert).

"A Good Day to Die Hard" did solid business despite bad reviews for the latest installment, which sends Willis' McClane to Moscow in search of his estranged son, an undercover spy who winds up teaming with the old man against Russian bad guys.

The movie's success follows notable flops from two other holdovers of the 1980s action scene, Sylvester Stallone with "Bullet to the Head" and Arnold Schwarzenegger with "The Last Stand."

"There's still life left in the 'Die Hard' franchise. Given the fact that pretty much every other R-rated action movie that's come out this year has completely fallen flat, this is a pretty good showing," said Paul Dergarabedian, an analyst for box-office tracker Hollywood.com. Willis is "one of the old-guard action stars who still has a solid career going, whereas a lot of these aging action heroes, unless they're in an ensemble cast, they're not able to draw audiences the way they used to."

Overall Hollywood business remained slow, with revenues off for the fourth-straight weekend compared to the same period last year. Domestic business from Friday to Sunday totaled $141 million, down 9.4 percent from the same weekend a year ago, when "Safe House" and "The Vow" led the way with about $23 million each.

A bright spot this year has been strong business for top Academy Awards contenders leading up to next Sunday's Oscars. The weekend's top-20 films included eight of the nine best-picture nominees, seven of which have either topped $100 million domestically or are close.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are included. Final domestic figures will be released Tuesday.

1. "A Good Day to Die Hard," $25 million.

2. "Identity Thief," $23.4 million.

3. "Safe Haven," $21.4 million.

4. "Escape from Planet Earth," $16.1 million.

5. "Warm Bodies," $9 million.

6. "Beautiful Creatures," $7.5 million.

7. "Side Effects," $6.3 million.

8. "Silver Linings Playbook," $6.1 million.

9. "Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters," $3.5 million.

10. "Zero Dark Thirty," $3.1 million.

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Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

http://www.rentrak.com

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Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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Cuomo Bucks Tide With Bill to Lift Abortion Limits

ALBANY — Bucking a trend in which states have been seeking to restrict abortion, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo is putting the finishing touches on legislation that would guarantee women in New York the right to late-term abortions when their health is in danger or the fetus is not viable.

Mr. Cuomo, seeking to deliver on a promise he made in his recent State of the State address, would rewrite a law that currently allows abortions after 24 weeks of pregnancy only if the pregnant woman’s life is at risk. The law is not enforced, because it is superseded by federal court rulings that allow late-term abortions to protect a woman’s health, even if her life is not in jeopardy. But abortion rights advocates say the existence of the more restrictive state law has a chilling effect on some doctors and prompts some women to leave the state for late-term abortions.

Mr. Cuomo’s proposal, which has not yet been made public, would also clarify that licensed health care practitioners, and not only physicians, can perform abortions. It would remove abortion from the state’s penal law and regulate it through the state’s public health law.

Abortion rights advocates have welcomed Mr. Cuomo’s plan, which he outlined in general terms as part of a broader package of women’s rights initiatives in his State of the State address in January. But the Roman Catholic Church and anti-abortion groups are dismayed; opponents have labeled the legislation the Abortion Expansion Act.

The prospects for Mr. Cuomo’s effort are uncertain. The State Assembly is controlled by Democrats who support abortion rights; the Senate is more difficult to predict because this year it is controlled by a coalition of Republicans who have tended to oppose new abortion rights laws and breakaway Democrats who support abortion rights.

New York legalized abortion in 1970, three years before it was legalized nationally by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade. Mr. Cuomo’s proposal would update the state law so that it could stand alone if the broader federal standard set by Roe were to be undone.

“Why are we doing this? The Supreme Court could change,” said a senior Cuomo administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the governor had not formally introduced his proposal.

But opponents of abortion rights, already upset at the high rate of abortions in New York State, worry that rewriting the abortion law would encourage an even greater number of abortions. For example, they suggest that the provision to allow abortions late in a woman’s pregnancy for health reasons could be used as a loophole to allow unchecked late-term abortions.

“I am hard pressed to think of a piece of legislation that is less needed or more harmful than this one,” the archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, wrote in a letter to Mr. Cuomo last month. Referring to Albany lawmakers in a subsequent column, he added, “It’s as though, in their minds, our state motto, ‘Excelsior’ (‘Ever Upward’), applies to the abortion rate.”

National abortion rights groups have sought for years to persuade state legislatures to adopt laws guaranteeing abortion rights as a backup to Roe. But they have had limited success: Only seven states have such measures in place, including California, Connecticut and Maryland; the most recent state to adopt such a law is Hawaii, which did so in 2006.

“Pretty much all of the energy, all of the momentum, has been to restrict abortion, which makes what could potentially happen in New York so interesting,” said Elizabeth Nash, state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. “There’s no other state that’s even contemplating this right now.”

In most statehouses, the push by lawmakers has been in the opposite direction. The past two years has seen more provisions adopted at the state level to restrict abortion rights than in any two-year period in decades, according to the Guttmacher Institute; last year, 19 states adopted 43 new provisions restricting abortion access, while not a single significant measure was adopted to expand access to abortion or to comprehensive sex education.

“It’s an extraordinary moment in terms of the degree to which there is government interference in a woman’s ability to make these basic health care decisions,” said Andrea Miller, the president of NARAL Pro-Choice New York. “For New York to be able to send a signal, a hopeful sign, a sense of the turning of the tide, we think is really important.”

Abortion rights advocates say that even though the Roe decision supersedes state law, some doctors are hesitant to perform late-term abortions when a woman’s health is at risk because the criminal statutes remain on the books.

“Doctors and hospitals shouldn’t be reading criminal laws to determine what types of health services they can offer and provide to their patients,” said M. Tracey Brooks, the president of Family Planning Advocates of New York State.

For Mr. Cuomo, the debate over passing a new abortion law presents an opportunity to appeal to women as well as to liberals, who have sought action in Albany without success since Eliot Spitzer made a similar proposal when he was governor. But it also poses a challenge to the coalition of Republicans and a few Democrats that controls the State Senate, the chamber that has in the past stood as the primary obstacle to passing abortion legislation in the capital.

The governor has said that his Reproductive Health Act would be one plank of a 10-part Women’s Equality Act that also would include equal pay and anti-discrimination provisions. Conservative groups, still stinging from the willingness of Republican lawmakers to go along with Mr. Cuomo’s push to legalize same-sex marriage in 2011, are mobilizing against the proposal. Seven thousand New Yorkers who oppose the measure have sent messages to Mr. Cuomo and legislators via the Web site of the New York State Catholic Conference.

A number of anti-abortion groups have also formed a coalition called New Yorkers for Life, which is seeking to rally opposition to the governor’s proposal using social media.

“If you ask anyone on the street, ‘Is there enough abortion in New York?’ no one in their right mind would say we need more abortion,” said the Rev. Jason J. McGuire, the executive director of New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms, which is part of the coalition.

Members of both parties say that the issue of reproductive rights was a significant one in November’s legislative elections. Democrats, who were bolstered by an independent expenditure campaign by NARAL, credit their victories in several key Senate races in part to their pledge to fight for legislation similar to what Mr. Cuomo is planning to propose.

Republicans, who make up most of the coalition that controls the Senate, have generally opposed new abortion rights measures. Speaking with reporters recently, the leader of the Republicans, Dean G. Skelos of Long Island, strenuously objected to rewriting the state’s abortion laws, especially in a manner similar to what the governor is seeking.

“You could have an abortion up until the day the child would be born, and I think that’s just wrong,” Mr. Skelos said. He suggested that the entire debate was unnecessary, noting that abortion is legal in New York State and saying that is “not going to be changed.”

The Senate Democratic leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins of Yonkers, who is the sponsor of a bill that is similar to the legislation the governor is drafting, said she was optimistic that an abortion measure would reach the Senate floor this year.

“New York State’s abortion laws were passed in 1970 in a bipartisan fashion,” she said. “It would be a sad commentary that over 40 years later we could not manage to do the same thing.”

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A First Step on Continent for Google on Use of Content

PARIS — Publishers in France say they have struck an innovative agreement with Google on the use of their content online. Their counterparts elsewhere in Europe, however, say the French gave in too easily to the Internet giant.

The deal was signed this month by President François Hollande of France and Eric E. Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, who called it a breakthrough in the tense relationship between publishers and Google, and as a possible model for other countries to follow.

Under the deal, Google agreed to set up a fund, worth €60 million, or $80 million, over three years, to help publishers develop their digital units. The two sides also pledged to deepen business ties, using Google’s online tools, in an effort to generate more online revenue for the publishers, who have struggled to counteract dwindling print revenue.

But the French group, representing newspaper and magazine publishers with an online presence, as well as a variety of other news-oriented Web sites, yielded on its most important demand: that Google and other search engines and “aggregators” of news should start paying for links to their content.

Google, which insists that its links provide a service to publishers by directing traffic to their sites, had fiercely resisted any change in the principle of free linking.

The agreement dismayed members of the European Publishers Council, a lobbying group in Brussels, which has been pushing for a fundamental change in the relationship between publishers and Google. The group criticized the French publishers for breaking ranks and striking a separate business agreement that has no statutory standing.

The deal “does not address the continuing problem of unauthorized reuse and monetization of content, and so does not provide the online press with the financial certainty or mechanisms for legal redress which it needs to build sustainable business models and ensure its continued investment in high-quality content,” Angela Mills Wade, executive director of the publishers council, said in a statement.

German publishers were also scornful, with Anja Pasquay, a spokeswoman for the German Newspaper Publishers’ Association, saying: “Obviously the French position isn’t one that we would favor. This is not the solution for Germany.”

Germany has been in the forefront of the push to get Google to share with online news publishers some of the billions of euros that the company earns from the sale of advertising. A proposed law, endorsed by the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel and working its way through the federal legislature, would grant a new form of copyright to digital publishers. If enacted, it could allow publishers to charge search engines or aggregators for displaying even snippets of news articles alongside links to other Web sites.

Mr. Hollande had vowed to introduce similar legislation this winter if Google and the publishers did not come to terms. It appears that Google, which had threatened to stop indexing French Web sites’ content if it had to pay for links, has sidelined the threat of legislation, at least for now; the agreement will be reviewed after three years, Mr. Hollande has said.

Under the deal, Google says it will help the publishers use several of its digital advertising services, including AdSense, AdMob and Ad Exchange, more effectively.

Publishers are already free to use these services, and it was not immediately clear how they would be able to generate more revenue from them; this part of the accord remains confidential, both sides say, because they are still negotiating the fine print.

“This agreement can help accelerate the move toward greater advertising revenues in the digital world,” said Marc Schwartz of Mazars, a consulting firm, who is serving as an independent mediator in the talks. “I’m not saying we have done everything, but it’s a first step in the right direction.”

More has been said about the planned innovation fund. Publishers will submit proposals to the fund, which will select ideas to finance and develop, with the involvement of Google engineers.

“The idea is that it would inject innovation into the sector in France,” said Simon Morrison, copyright policy manager at Google.

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Julian Newman’s Age and Size Stand Out, but So Does His Talent

Gary Bogdon for The New York Times

Newman plays and practices with intensity, sinking 100 free throws, 200 floaters and 200 jump shots every day.

ORLANDO, Fla. — The Downey Christian School varsity basketball team bursts from the locker room in single file, led by a boy 14 inches shorter than the next smallest player, four years younger than the next youngest.

His jersey straps are twisted and bound with plastic ties to prevent them from slipping down his bony 4-foot-5, 70-pound frame. Tricolor socks with pastel waves cover his feet, conveying the notion that he might be a stylish student manager.

At road games, the boy, point guard Julian Newman, is asked, “Are you on the team?” Here, in the Patriots’ gymnasium, there is no doubt.

The grand marshal of the player parade, Julian, an 11-year-old fifth grader, guides his team into warm-ups, bouncing two balls at once. He glides into a pregame routine that shuffles through jab steps, hesitation moves and effortless dribbles — between his pipestem legs, behind his back, rapid crossovers. The scene is incongruous enough to seem computer-animated.

Not long ago, Newman was a mere curio in the compact circle of sports programs at small Christian schools in Central Florida. But his age, his size and the wild contrast of his stature on the court with relative giants have brought global attention through Internet videos. The most watched clip of Julian has generated more than 1.27 million views on YouTube. It has prompted a visit from “Inside Edition,” an appearance on “Steve Harvey,” comments on Twitter by Baltimore Ravens players, coverage by news agencies from as far as China and a performance at an Orlando Magic game.

ScoutsFocus of Greenville, N.C., which evaluates and ranks high school players, helped put together the viral video that was filmed by a Patriots assistant.

“He’s a very talented kid and comes from a great family,” Joe Davis, the national recruiting coordinator for ScoutsFocus, said of Julian. “He’s smaller, so that’s going to be his main obstacle, but he has a great future once he hits a growth spurt or two.”

Two nights before his N.B.A. halftime performance, Julian said between bites of chicken tenders ordered from a children’s menu that he was working on a routine involving three basketballs. Despite his fame, he has maintained the same degree of obsession. There is little, if any, room for it to grow.

Julian fills his days by spending time in a gym or at the hoop in his front yard, where his father, Jamie, the Downey Christian coach, has painted lines to approximate a court. Julian sinks 100 free throws, 200 floaters and 200 jump shots every day. On 3-point attempts, he leans into the shots slightly, as if to guide the ball telepathically.

The process, on a good day, requires three hours, not that he is in a hurry. The neighbors have complained, Jamie said, that the thwonk of the ball has awakened them as late as 1 a.m.

Nor does bedtime necessarily close the book on his regimen. Lying on his bed, with 13 N.B.A. jerseys along with posters of Magic Johnson and LeBron James decorating the walls, with basketballs worn out within weeks scattered about, Julian soft-tosses a ball toward the ceiling, always perfecting his form, until nodding off.

By Julian’s reckoning, he has never taken off longer than two straight days, and then only to mend a sprained ankle. Before the Newmans go on vacations, he insists that a park or recreation center with a rim be nearby.

His mother, Vivian, was almost asked to leave a department store because Julian could not resist fetching a ball from sporting goods and dribbling it down the aisle. His wish lists for gifts are basketball-centric.

His scarce time on a computer is usually spent on the YouTube channel Superhandles. Operated by a former college player whose father exposed him at an early age to footage of Pete Maravich, as Julian was by his father, Superhandles features videos of dribbling drills and masterly moves. Julian commits them to memory, then goes to the closest court and mimics them.

The Newmans portray him as self-driven, a prodigy of sorts, eager to meet their basic requirements in order to pursue his. He earns straight A’s, they say, motivated by a policy effective enough to be every parent’s dream: homework before hoops. That explains why Julian used to knock out assignments during recess so he could start knocking down shots immediately after school.

His parents decline to impose time restrictions on basketball during weekends, holidays and summers.

“People say don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” Jamie said. “But it helps you.”

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Judge sets May trial date for Kardashian divorce

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Kim Kardashian has a due date for her baby and now a trial date for her divorce from NBA player Kris Humphries.

A judge on Friday set a May 6 trial for the reality TV star who wants to end her marriage before July, when her child with Kanye West is due.

Kardashian filed for divorce on Oct. 31, 2011, after she and Humphries had been married just 72 days. Their lavish, star-studded nuptials were recorded and broadcast by E! Entertainment Television.

The trial is expected to last three to five days and could reveal details about Kardashian's reality show empire, which includes "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" and several spinoffs.

Two judges determined Friday that Humphries' lawyers had adequate time to prepare for the trial.

Humphries wants the marriage annulled based on his claim that Kardashian only married him for the sake of her show.

She denies that allegation and says the case should be resolved through what would be her second divorce.

Humphries' attorney Marshall Waller asked for a delay until basketball season is over.

But Superior Court Judge Scott Gordon refused, saying firefighters, police officers, truck drivers and others have to miss work for trials, and Humphries must do the same if necessary.

Waller filed paperwork Thursday to withdraw from the case but didn't mention that development in court and refused to answer any questions about the document on Friday.

Waller said he was still hoping to obtain and review 13,000 hours of footage from Kardashian's reality shows to try to prove the fraud claim but noted he does not yet have an agreement to receive the footage.

Kardashian's lawyer said her client was ready for trial.

"Let's get this case dispensed with," attorney Laura Wasser said.

Humphries has provided a deposition in the case, as have West and Kardashian family matriarch Kris Jenner.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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Livestrong Tattoos as Reminder of Personal Connections, Not Tarnished Brand

As Jax Mariash went under the tattoo needle to have “Livestrong” emblazoned on her wrist in bold black letters, she did not think about Lance Armstrong or doping allegations, but rather the 10 people affected by cancer she wanted to commemorate in ink. It was Jan. 22, 2010, exactly a year since the disease had taken the life of her stepfather. After years of wearing yellow Livestrong wristbands, she wanted something permanent.

A lifelong runner, Mariash got the tattoo to mark her 10-10-10 goal to run the Chicago Marathon on Oct. 10, 2010, and fund-raising efforts for Livestrong. Less than three years later, antidoping officials laid out their case against Armstrong — a lengthy account of his practice of doping and bullying. He did not contest the charges and was barred for life from competing in Olympic sports.

“It’s heartbreaking,” Mariash, of Wilson, Wyo., said of the antidoping officials’ report, released in October, and Armstrong’s subsequent confession to Oprah Winfrey. “When I look at the tattoo now, I just think of living strong, and it’s more connected to the cancer fight and optimal health than Lance.”

Mariash is among those dealing with the fallout from Armstrong’s descent. She is not alone in having Livestrong permanently emblazoned on her skin.

Now the tattoos are a complicated, internationally recognized symbol of both an epic crusade against cancer and a cyclist who stood defiant in the face of accusations for years but ultimately admitted to lying.

The Internet abounds with epidermal reminders of the power of the Armstrong and Livestrong brands: the iconic yellow bracelet permanently wrapped around a wrist; block letters stretching along a rib cage; a heart on a foot bearing the word Livestrong; a mural on a back depicting Armstrong with the years of his now-stripped seven Tour de France victories and the phrase “ride with pride.”

While history has provided numerous examples of ill-fated tattoos to commemorate lovers, sports teams, gang membership and bands that break up, the Livestrong image is a complex one, said Michael Atkinson, a sociologist at the University of Toronto who has studied tattoos.

“People often regret the pop culture tattoos, the mass commodified tattoos,” said Atkinson, who has a Guns N’ Roses tattoo as a marker of his younger days. “A lot of people can’t divorce the movement from Lance Armstrong, and the Livestrong movement is a social movement. It’s very real and visceral and embodied in narrative survivorship. But we’re still not at a place where we look at a tattoo on the body and say that it’s a meaningful thing to someone.”

Geoff Livingston, a 40-year-old marketing professional in Washington, D.C., said that since Armstrong’s confession to Winfrey, he has received taunts on Twitter and inquiries at the gym regarding the yellow Livestrong armband tattoo that curls around his right bicep.

“People see it and go, ‘Wow,’ ” he said, “But I’m not going to get rid of it, and I’m not going to stop wearing short sleeves because of it. It’s about my family, not Lance Armstrong.”

Livingston got the tattoo in 2010 to commemorate his brother-in-law, who was told he had cancer and embarked on a fund-raising campaign for the charity. If he could raise $5,000, he agreed to get a tattoo. Within four days, the goal was exceeded, and Livingston went to a tattoo parlor to get his seventh tattoo.

“It’s actually grown in emotional significance for me,” Livingston said of the tattoo. “It brought me closer to my sister. It was a big statement of support.”

For Eddie Bonds, co-owner of Rabbit Bicycle in Hill City, S.D., getting a Livestrong tattoo was also a reflection of the growth of the sport of cycling. His wife, Joey, operates a tattoo parlor in front of their store, and in 2006 she designed a yellow Livestrong band that wraps around his right calf, topped off with a series of small cyclists.

“He kept breaking the Livestrong bands,” Joey Bonds said. “So it made more sense to tattoo it on him.”

“It’s about the cancer, not Lance,” Eddie Bonds said.

That was also the case for Jeremy Nienhouse, a 37-year old in Denver, Colo., who used a Livestrong tattoo to commemorate his own triumph over testicular cancer.

Given the diagnosis in 2004, Nienhouse had three rounds of chemotherapy, which ended on March 15, 2005, the date he had tattooed on his left arm the day after his five-year anniversary of being cancer free in 2010. It reads: “3-15-05” and “LIVESTRONG” on the image of a yellow band.

Nienhouse said he had heard about Livestrong and Armstrong’s own battle with the cancer around the time he learned he had cancer, which alerted him to the fact that even though he was young and healthy, he, too, could have cancer.

“On a personal level,” Nienhouse said, “he sounds like kind of a jerk. But if he hadn’t been in the public eye, I don’t know if I would have been diagnosed when I had been.”

Nienhouse said he had no plans to have the tattoo removed.

As for Mariash, she said she read every page of the antidoping officials’ report. She soon donated her Livestrong shirts, shorts and running gear. She watched Armstrong’s confession to Winfrey and wondered if his apology was an effort to reduce his ban from the sport or a genuine appeal to those who showed their support to him and now wear a visible sign of it.

“People called me ‘Miss Livestrong,’ ” Mariash said. “It was part of my identity.”

She also said she did not plan to have her tattoo removed.

“I wanted to show it’s forever,” she said. “Cancer isn’t something that just goes away from people. I wanted to show this is permanent and keep people remembering the fight.”

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Group of 20 Pledges to Let Markets Set Currency Values

MOSCOW — In a concerted move to quiet fears of a so-called currency war, finance officials from the world’s largest industrial and emerging economies expressed their commitment on Saturday to “market-determined exchange rate systems and exchange rate flexibility.”

In a statement issued at the conclusion of a conference here of the Group of 20, the finance ministers from the Group of 20 promised: “We will refrain from competitive devaluation. We will not target our exchange rates for competitive purposes.”

In its statement, the group also vowed to “take necessary collective actions” to discourage corporate tax evasion, particularly by preventing companies from shifting profits to avoid tax obligations. For instance, a number of big American companies, including Apple and Starbucks, have come under scrutiny recently for seeking out the friendliest tax jurisdictions.

Over all, the statement largely echoed one last week by seven top industrial nations pledging to let market exchange rates determine the value of their currencies. Currency devaluation can be used to gain competitive advantage because it makes a country’s exports cheaper.

“We all agreed on the fact that we refuse to enter any currency war,” the French finance minister, Pierre Moscovici, told reporters at the conference, which was held in a meeting center just a short walk from the Kremlin and Red Square.

In the statement on Saturday, the Group of 20 pointedly avoided any criticism of Japan, where stimulus programs backed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have kept interest rates near zero and flooded the economy with money — leading to a roughly 15 percent drop in the value of the yen against the dollar over the last three months.

The Japanese policies, which have reduced the cost of Japanese products around the world, were the primary cause of fears of a currency war.

In essence, the Group of 20 expressed a view that loose monetary policy, including steps that weaken currency values, are acceptable when used to stimulate domestic growth but should not be used to benefit in global trade.

Critics of that view say that it amounts to a distinction without a difference because loose monetary policies stimulate growth and bolster exports at the same time.

The United States has also used a loose monetary approach to aid in the economic recovery, in the form of “quantitative easing” by which the Federal Reserve buys tens of billions of dollars in bonds each month.

The chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, who attended the conference in Moscow, gave brief remarks on Friday indicating support for Japan’s efforts.

Faster-growing, developing countries like Brazil and China have expressed concerns about the loose monetary policies of more established economies like Japan and the United States. The money created by policies like the Fed’s quantitative easing can prove destabilizing as it enters faster-growing economies.

The Group of 20 acknowledged this concern in its statement, saying: “Monetary policy should be directed toward domestic price stability and continuing to support economic recovery according to the respective mandates. We commit to monitor and minimize the negative spillovers on other countries of policies implemented for domestic purposes.”

As the three-day conference drew to a close, participants did not reach any new agreement on debt-cutting targets. Efforts to reach such a pact will continue at the annual Group of 20 summit meeting to be attended by President Obama and other world leaders in St. Petersburg in September.

But while the debt agreement was elusive, the Group of 20 leaders reiterated efforts to work together, promising to “resist all forms of protections and keep our markets open.”

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The Lede: Answering Readers' Questions About the Meteor Strikes

You asked us great meteor questions, readers, ones that went beyond the mere fact of the seriously cool video coming from all over Russia. But we wanted to give you a deeper look at the science behind bombardments from space, so we called in a respected source to help.

Clark R. Chapman is a senior scientist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio and a pioneer in the field of asteroid threat assessment. He is co-author of the 1989 book, “Cosmic Catastrophes,” with David Morrison, a senior scientist at the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif.

#NYTScience @WilliamJBroad Was the Russia case an exceptional one or is the earth constantly hit by meteor (mostly in non inhabited places?

— Gilberto Gribaudo (@GilGribaudo) 15 Feb 13

This is an unusual strike. It will take a while for analysis of the videos, and presumably of the seismic records of the explosion, before we can estimate the size of the projectile. I’m guessing it’s a once-in-a-decade kind of event.

Why unusual?

It’s unusual in the sense that it’s rare. It’s not the kind of event that happens very often. Also, they’re talking about maybe 1,000 people injured and some in the hospital. I’m not aware of a strike that has caused that much injury. That’s because it hit in a somewhat populated part of Russia, instead of the ocean or the desert or the middle of Siberia where relatively few people would have got hurt.

What are the statistical odds of a meteor this size & how often does a meteor of any size hit earth? @nytscience @williamjbroad #NYTScience

— Kylie Sobel (@KylieSobel) 15 Feb 13

These things happen continually. This one was probably a few meters in diameter but they’re flying by the Earth all the time. And they hit – ones this big – maybe once in a decade. Things that would really devastate a city if they hit would occur maybe once every few centuries. It happens on a scale (of meteors small and large). Anyone living out in the countryside or a rural area, if the skies are clear, can look up at night and see apple-seed-size meteors hitting every few minutes, or at least every few hours.

Is the meteor that his Russia 2012 DA14, the same one everyone was talking about, or a different one? #NYTScience

— Sasha Smith (@SashaSmish) 15 Feb 13

Conceivably it could be part of a swarm, but it’s not associated with DA14 [the big asteroid that is to fly close by the Earth on Friday]. They’re on totally different trajectories. I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but their orbits are totally different. They both intersect the Earth, more or less, but the asteroid is moving maybe south to north and the Russian meteorite west to east. They’d have to be coming in the same direction to be part of a swarm. It’s a remarkable coincidence that what may be the most damaging meteor strike in modern history would happen on the same day as the closest passage of an asteroid as big as DA14.

How big is DA14?

It’s about 100 feet across.

Should we be scared? What can we do?

The estimated danger from a large impact has dropped in recent decades because of telescopic observations and sky surveys. We should continue to monitor the skies for undiscovered large asteroids and for very much smaller ones that could still be quite dangerous, depending on where they hit. We should continue to look.

No space telescope now searches for such threats. Would such a device help?

That kind of project wouldn’t find what hit Russia (as the asteroid was too small) but it would find ones that are much more dangerous. And once they were detected, we could warn people. We could say, “It’s going to hit such an area at a certain time on a certain day and you should stay away from the windows.” You could provide warning of impacts that could be dangerous.

Could we divert a planetary threat?

If it’s found early enough – quite a few years in advance of its hitting – then NASA and the European Space Agency and other space agencies have the technology to divert the asteroid so it would miss the Earth.

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Charlie Sheen pays for injured teen's therapy dog

MILWAUKEE (AP) — MILWAUKEE (AP) — There's a 15-year-old Florida girl who didn't really know much about Charlie Sheen before this week — but does now.

The actor wired $10,000 to Teagan Marti and her family on Thursday for a therapy dog to help in her rehabilitation from injuries sustained when she plummeted 100 feet from a Wisconsin amusement park ride in 2010.

"I think he's a very kind person for helping me and my family and very generous," Teagan Marti said by phone Thursday from her home in Parkland, Fla.

Teagan Marti suffered brain, spine, pelvis and internal injuries in July 2010 when nets and air bags that were supposed to catch riders on a free-fall ride were not raised. She had convinced her family to make the trip from Florida to Extreme World in Wisconsin Dells after seeing the amusement park's Terminal Velocity ride on the Travel Channel.

She was hospitalized in Wisconsin and Florida for three months. She initially had no use of her arms or legs but through physical therapy is able to walk again with a walker.

Teagan Marti's mother, Julie Marti, said they are financially in trouble from the medical bills and her recent divorce. Their house is being foreclosed upon and insurance isn't covering physical therapy anymore, she said. She had no idea how they would pay for the English Golden Retriever puppy.

"I'm in such disbelief," Julie Marti said. "I was crying. ... What a guy. What a guy."

The dog is being trained in Fond du Lac to turn on lights, pick up objects and be the teen's constant companion.

Lucia Wilgus, of Eau Claire, became friends with the Martis after hearing of the accident and has spearheaded fundraising and helped find the dog and arrange training.

She sent a letter this week to Sheen through Sheen's godfather, who is a Wilgus family friend and Benedictine brother in the Benet Lake, Wis. She estimated the training and related costs would be around $6,000.

Sheen said he decided to give more for extra costs. The request had a "personal vibe" since it came through his godfather, and "if there's a need for more I told them to call me," he said.

"I like to pay it forward," Sheen said Thursday in a phone interview from Los Angeles. "People come into your orbit for a reason. You don't always know what that is ahead of time, but if I ignore these requests then I don't have any opportunity to see where these things lead us, or lead me."

He said he doesn't like to publicize most of his donations, but wanted to talk about this one to inspire others to donate.

Teagan Marti gets the dog on her birthday in September but hasn't made up her mind on a name.

"I think they should name the dog Charlie," Sheen joked.

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Follow Carrie Antlfinger at http://twitter.com/@antltoe

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