Manning injury raises temp for coaches of AFC South hot-seat

Coincidentally, two coaches in the Indianapolis Colts' division may be running out of time, as well.
And definitely out of excuses.

While various angles of Manning's continuing recovery from offseason neck surgery have been analyzed and scrutinized the past several days, here is one potential ramification that really hasn't garnered much publicity: the effect that it may eventually have on the futures of coaches Gary Kubiak of the Houston Texans and Jack Del Rio of the Jacksonville Jaguars.

The logic might be a bit convoluted but, rest assured, Manning's pain in the neck could conceivably put the heads of Del Rio and Kubiak on the chopping block. The trickle-down effect of the Manning situation, or at least their teams' abilities to benefit from it, could have dire results for the employment outlooks of the coaches.

Beyond the fact that both men have contracts that run through 2012, and each is widely considered to have only tenuous job security entering this season, the veteran coaches have a lot in common as regards Manning and the Colts. Both have losing records -- Del Rio at 5-11 and Kubiak 2-8 -- vs. the Colts during their respective AFC South tenures. Neither coach has ever won a division championship.

Indianapolis, on the other hand, has claimed eight of nine AFC South titles, and has been to the playoffs nine straight times. Kubiak, who assumed the Houston reins in 2006, has carved out only one winning season in five years and the Texans have never even advanced to the playoffs in his stewardship.

The possible absence of Manning, who might be significantly less than 100 percent even if he beats the odds and is ready to start the season, figures in theory to provide the Texans and Jaguars a huge edge in the division. Even winning an AFC South title with the Colts undermanned by Manning's absence could earn Kubiak or Del Rio an additional year.

Manning has a 96.5 passer rating against the Jaguars in the period Del Rio has been the Jacksonville coach. Against the Kubiak-led Texans, it is 107.3.

The other coach in the AFC South, Mike Munchak of Tennessee, is a rookie, having succeeded Jeff Fisher, and he is pretty much assured of not being fired. But for Kubiak and Del Rio, who some have suggested are living on borrowed time anyway, the possible Manning idleness, even for the first month or so of the season, leaves the door ajar. And if their teams can't get through the generous opening and take full advantage of the situation, then Jaguars owner Wayne Weaver and counterpart Bob McNair of Houston may decide it's time to slam the door on their coaches.

"Certainly [the Manning injury] more than levels the playing field in the division," said a general manager of an AFC team outside the division, in discussing the implications. "He is the most dominant force [in the division]. Arguably in the entire league. Take him out of the equation and it's another story and a far different division. It's an equalizer. Manning is maybe the biggest difference-maker in the league, and if the Colts don't have him, they become a lot more vulnerable. No one can [use the excuse], 'Yeah, they've got Peyton.' That kind of rationalization is gone."

And so, too, could be Del Rio and Kubiak if they don't make hay with Manning on the sideline, even for a few weeks.

The Texans, as noted earlier, get the Colts right out of the chute, and at home. Houston defeated Indianapolis at Reliant Stadium in the season opener a year ago 34-24 yet still finished four games in arrears in the division. Jacksonville split with the Colts but, after a late-season fade, were two games behind Indianapolis when the year concluded. In Del Rio's eight seasons, the Jaguars have never finished within fewer than two games of the Colts. Since he took over the Jags in 2003, the average differential between the clubs has been four games.

Noted the AFC general manager: "The Manning thing, if he can't play, gives everyone a big break."

Houston's second matchup with the Colts isn't until Dec. 22, the penultimate game on the schedule for both franchises. The Jaguars don't face the Colts until Nov. 13, then in the season finale. Even by the most pessimistic timeframes, Manning figures to have returned for those three games. But in addition to Houston, the Colts face the Browns, Steelers and Bucs in the first four weeks. They could struggle to be even .500 vs. that quartet if Manning is idled.

In the nine seasons since realignment created the AFC South in 2002, Indianapolis has averaged 12.1 victories. It has taken an average of 11 wins to capture the division title. Minus Manning for a stretch, the Colts could be hard-pressed to approximate those kinds of numbers.

Jacksonville and Houston also have tough first-month schedules -- the Texans must play New Orleans and Pittsburgh, while the Jaguars get the Saints and New York Jets -- but the teams need to put some meaningful distance between themselves and the Colts if Manning is not available. If they don't, McNair and Weaver could conclude they may never win the division until perhaps Manning retires for good.

Despite having been a chic playoff-caliber choice of the pundits for the past few years, Houston is only 37-43 with Kubiak at the controls. The Texans are once again chosen by many experts to earn their first-ever postseason berth in '11. Creating a cushion against the potentially Manning-less Colts would be a start. The Jaguars have had some successes against the Colts under Del Rio, but are only 66-65 overall, including playoffs, in his eight seasons. There is a suspicion in some quarters that the lockout helped each man to retain his job for 2011.

WA City Ending Search Warrant Hunt for Cartoonis

RENTON, Wash. (AP) — The city of Renton is halting any further search warrant efforts to force Google to reveal the real name of the person who created animated Internet videos that mocked Renton police and some city employees.

Renton Chief Administrative Officer Jay Covington said Thursday that police so far have uncovered no relevant information to further a criminal investigation of what they had called a cyberstalking case. Police recently obtained a search warrant that sought to force Google to turn over the filmmaker's real name. The videos were posted on YouTube. A judge issued a stay of the search warrant this week.

Covington says police believe the filmmaker is a current police officer. He says an internal investigation will continue.

The cartoons parody everything from officers of an unidentified law enforcement agency having sex on duty to certain employees getting promoted without necessary qualifications.

Economy still feeling recession's effects in The U.S

Economists began 2011 highly optimistic about the prospects for economic growth this year and in 2012. They have been sorely disappointed. As the U.S. economy continues to struggle to recover from the problems that grew out of the 2008 recession, the economy has suffered the second economic "soft patch" in as many years.

Even worse, with rising concerns about the sustainability of global economic growth, the sunny economic forecast for the second half of 2011 increasingly seems at risk of "clouding over" -- if not of being "rained out" entirely. Because this economic cycle has made disappointing progress in creating new jobs and solving other problems within the economy, it is essential that the U.S. economy continue to expand for as long as possible.

The case for improved growth in the third quarter seems relatively strong. The sharp deceleration of growth we saw in the second quarter that has been termed the soft patch seemed largely due to supply disruptions growing out of the Japanese tsunami and the sharp spike earlier this year in commodity prices.

With Japan making better-than-expected progress toward resolving the supply disruptions, and with commodity prices easing back from their sharp run-up earlier this year, the odds of improved economic growth in the third quarter seem relatively solid. The auto industry, by itself, could add 0.5 percent to as much as 2.5 percent to overall GDP growth in the third quarter as it makes up for lost production. Still, improved economic growth is far from guaranteed.

Consumer spending growth decelerated sharply in the second quarter as gasoline and other living costs spiked higher. Although those costs have moderated, consumer confidence plunged as prices rose and has not bounced back significantly.

We saw a similar loss of confidence in the business community, particularly among smaller businesses. If the public loss of confidence continues to hamper spending, the growth surge as we emerge from the economic soft patch may be muted.

As we look to the end of 2011 and into 2012, two additional problems present rising risks to continued growth of the U.S. economy. Over the course of this economic cycle, the domestic sources of economic growth -- consumer and business spending -- have provided very weak growth compared to previous economic cycles.

Fortunately, strong export growth has provided a much-needed spark of growth for the broader U.S. economy. But we now see two significant trends in overseas markets that could severely limit the growth that exports will provide.

Problems centered in the heavily indebted sovereign nations of  Europe have reduced the potential for economic growth in that region and pose the possibility of another significant credit crisis that could also restrict global economic growth. With sharply divergent political interests making it difficult to find a meaningful solution to the financial problem, the risks that financial markets will impose a solution through crisis have risen dramatically.

While restricting debt defaults to one or two of the smaller European debtors may be possible, financial crises by their very nature have a tendency to cascade out of control. Cascading defaults in Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Italy and Spain could create significant losses for banks around the world. That could push Europe and a number of economies around the world into recession.

Rate concerns
Europe is a significant export market for the United States, so the trends toward slowing European growth and the risks of a European credit crisis constitute significant "storm clouds" for the U.S. economy as we look toward the end of the year.

The "clouds" are also darkening on the horizon as we look to the emerging markets of the world. Inthe past year, many emerging countries raised interest rates to combat sharply higher inflation rates.

Interest-rate hikes, however, tend to reduce economic growth -- but with a very long lag. Emerging economies that were the first to raise rates are now showing sharply slower economic growth. As we approach the point where hikes implemented over the last year should have their maximum effect on the respective economies, it seems likely that we will see more slowing in many parts of the emerging world.

Since the emerging economies have been an important source of growth for most other countries of the world, significant slowing in the emerging markets would darken the prospects for the global economy significantly.

While the outlook may be growing darker, it is by no means bleak. While the cautious spending of consumers and businesses have made this an anemic growth cycle, that same cautiousness has also helped the economy avoid some of the excesses that tend to make recessions more severe.

Thus, even if the economy does begin to slip back into recession this year or next, we have reason to hope that it would be shorter and/or less severe than a "typical" economic downturn. At the same time, we also need to keep in mind that the aging of economic cycles tends to be a natural part of the process.

While recessions are not required by law, like the passage from the warm breezes of summer to the harsh winds of winter, this growth cycle will almost certainly succumb to another recession at some point.

Still, as important as the shorter term "seasonal" changes of the economy may be, the real question is whether the U.S. economy can meet the challenges it must overcome to prosper in a world that is increasingly global. This economic cycle has been all the more challenging because of the ongoing equalization of global economic power between the already-industrialized countries of the world and the many new emerging economies.

True economic prosperity is not rooted in the roughly four-year economic cycle, but instead comes from the careful long-term development that prepares an economy to produce the quality goods and services that others will want to buy in the decades ahead.

Second Recession in U.S. Could Be Worse

If the economy falls back into recession, as many economists are now warning, the bloodletting could be a lot more painful than the last time around.

Given the tumult of the Great Recession, this may be hard to believe. But the economy is much weaker than it was at the outset of the last recession in December 2007, with most major measures of economic health — including jobs, incomes, output and industrial production — worse today than they were back then. And growth has been so weak that almost no ground has been recouped, even though a recovery technically started in June 2009.

“It would be disastrous if we entered into a recession at this stage, given that we haven’t yet made up for the last recession,” said Conrad DeQuadros, senior economist at RDQ Economics.

When the last downturn hit, the credit bubble left Americans with lots of fat to cut, but a new one would force families to cut from the bone. Making things worse, policy makers used most of the economic tools at their disposal to combat the last recession, and have few options available.

Anxiety and uncertainty have increased in the last few days after the decision by Standard & Poor’s to downgrade the country’s credit rating and as Europe continues its desperate attempt to stem its debt crisis.

President Obama acknowledged the challenge in his Saturday radio and Internet address, saying the country’s “urgent mission” now was to expand the economy and create jobs. And Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said in an interview on CNBC on Sunday that the United States had “a lot of work to do” because of its “long-term and unsustainable fiscal position.”

But he added, “I have enormous confidence in the basic regenerative capacity of the American economy and the American people.”

Still, the numbers are daunting. In the four years since the recession began, the civilian working-age population has grown by about 3 percent. If the economy were healthy, the number of jobs would have grown at least the same amount.

Instead, the number of jobs has shrunk. Today the economy has 5 percent fewer jobs — or 6.8 million — than it had before the last recession began. The unemployment rate was 5 percent then, compared with 9.1 percent today.

Even those Americans who are working are generally working less; the typical private sector worker has a shorter workweek today than four years ago.

Employers shed all the extra work shifts and weak or extraneous employees that they could during the last recession. As shown by unusually strong productivity gains, companies are now squeezing as much work as they can from their newly “lean and mean” work forces. Should a recession return, it is not clear how many additional workers businesses could lay off and still manage to function.

With fewer jobs and fewer hours logged, there is less income for households to spend, creating a huge obstacle for a consumer-driven economy.

Adjusted for inflation, personal income is down 4 percent, not counting payments from the government for things like unemployment benefits. Income levels are low, and moving in the wrong direction: private wage and salary income actually fell in June, the last month for which data was available.

Consumer spending, along with housing, usually drives a recovery. But with incomes so weak, spending is only barely where it was when the recession began. If the economy were healthy, total consumer spending would be higher because of population growth.

And with construction nearly nonexistent and home prices down 24 percent since December 2007, the country does not have a buffer in housing to fall back on.

Of all the major economic indicators, industrial production — as tracked by the Federal Reserve — is by far the worst off. The Fed’s index of this activity is nearly 8 percent below its level in December 2007.

Likewise, and perhaps most worrisome, is the track record for the country’s overall output. According to newly revised data from the Commerce Department, the economy is smaller today than it was when the recession began, despite (or rather, because of) the feeble growth in the last couple of years.

Gold Price Hits Parity With Platinum Price

LONDON—The price of gold is at parity with sister metal platinum for the first time since the end of 2008, as the yellow metal's value soars to new record highs.

Spot gold reached parity with platinum as it rallied to an all-time high of $1,715.29 a troy ounce on Standard & Poor's downgrade of the U.S. government's debt rating, which amplified investor jitters over the global economic outlook. Spot platinum—although still trading marginally higher on the day—meanwhile fell as low as $1,703 an ounce, as fears over demand for the industry-linked metal kept its spot price under pressure.

"We saw platinum and gold trading at the same price during the early stages of the global economic crisis and we are close to the same situation at the moment. Gold's status as a near-monetary asset is giving it considerable strength while platinum's greater exposure to economic growth is currently a weaker driver for price appreciation," said Mitsui precious-metals analyst David Jollie.

Ratios between the precious metals are closely watched by investors, who often examine shifts to help them decide which metal may be the better investment.

Sean Kingston sheds 45 lbs. after accident

Sean Kingston wowed the crowd last night at Fox's Teen Choice Awards show, his first red-carpet appearance since being injured in serious Jet Ski accident in Miami on May 29.

Photos:  Teen Choice 2011 red carpet

The star suffered a broken jaw, fractured wrist and battled water in his lungs. Doctors had to operate on Kingston multiple times when they discovered that his aorta was torn and blood was filling his chest.

The good news: "I'm 100 percent right now," he told MTV last week. "What the accident basically taught me is, in life, you have to count your blessings."

Kingston showed off a slimmer body last night, too. "Actually, I shed like 45 pounds, and I've been working out every day," Kingston told MTV News. "But I got to keep it up and lose more weight. It's easy to gain weight when you're in the studio. That's how it first started out but I'm cutting all that out."

For Rick Perry, An Opportunity by Crisis Response

In a San Angelo courtroom recently, a self-declared prophet (the most common kind) told jurors God wanted him to have lots of mothers-in-law. Prosecutors claimed Warren Jeffs, leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, has 78 wives, 24 of them under age 17. (Unless there are sisters in there, we're talking 78 mothers-in-law. Wasn't that one of the plagues?)

Jeffs said God would rain down retribution as a result of the child sexual assault conviction stemming from what he said are his religious convictions.

On the what-we-ask-of-God side of the ledger, Gov. Rick Perry back in April asked Texans to ask God to rain down rain on our parched state. "It seems right and fitting that the people of Texas should join together in prayer to humbly seek an end to this devastating drought and these dangerous wildfires," Perry proclaimed as he set April 22-24 as "Days of Prayer for Rain in the State of Texas."

So far, not much rain. But from April 25-28, it did get a bit stormy not far from Texas. More than 300 people died when tornadoes struck throughout the South, including in neighboring Arkansas. It was the most tornado deaths in a single day in the U.S. since 1932. What's that mean, vis-à-vis Perry's prayer proclamation? I don't know.

On Saturday, Gov. Rick Perry believed the believers (the ones who believe in Jesus Christ) should gather in a football stadium for "The Response: A call to prayer for a nation in crisis." An estimated 30,000 folks showed up. I was on the stadium floor among the believers for much of it, and I'm here to tell you they were deep into the event and its spirit.

(Time out for cheap one-liners I'm genetically unable to stifle: Some of the seats were saved. I thought all of these people were saved. A lot of the attendees showed up only because it gave them first shot at tickets for the prayoffs. It was a fast, but there was food for sale. Does that make it half-fast? Blame reader Andy Oberta of Austin for that last one.)

Are we a nation in crisis? I vote aye. Temperatures and unemployment are up, the Dow and our nation's bond rating are down, as is Americans' confidence in our major institutions. Two wars drag on. We awoke Saturday to the news that 31 American troops had died in a chopper crash in Afghanistan.

Overall, too many Americans think our nation is on the wrong course. And too few agree on how to put it on the right course.

"Our problems are God-sized problems," Richard Land, of the Southern Baptist Convention, said in kicking off the Response.

Crisis? Sure seems like it. For Perry, whom I expect to announce for president shortly after next weekend, crisis is opportunity. And that meant "The Response," for Perry, carried potential political peril as it aligned him with individuals and groups — including the American Family Association — that preach a brand of Christianity some people find intolerant. Some of the groups believe folks who don't share their religions beliefs are hell-bound.

But at the Reliant Stadium pulpit, the rhetoric was cranked down a notch or two, per instructions. We heard about traditional values, but none of the "It was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve" anti-gay stuff. Those sentiments, however, were communicated in words understood by the faithful.

"We are surrounded by evil and immorality," prayed Shirley Dobson, wife of James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family.

Perry's words and prayer on Saturday would have been unremarkable if offered in any church on any Sunday. He prayed for our nation, our president, our military and all of us, whether we wanted the prayer or not. He steered clear of politics, declaring God nonpartisan. And, as part of the effort to avoid church-state separation complaints, the stadium's big screen identified him as "Rick Perry, Austin, TX." There was no introduction, nothing that identified him as governor.

The proper response to "The Response"? If all you knew about it is what you saw in the stadium — and you were not aware of the background of the sponsoring organizations — you'd think it was a perfectly appropriate church service, albeit in a football stadium.

In fact, to me, it looked a lot more appropriate than the similar show that plays out at every Texas Republican Party state convention, a decidedly political event at which such displays of religion can be unsettling.

Simón Bolívar Symphony review of Orchestra

There are 4,000 Venezuelans in Britain. I don't know if all of them were in the queue for Gustavo Dudamel and his Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra's Prom, but it looked like it.

Broadcast on BBC Two tonight at 9pm, and on BBC Four on August 28 at 7.30pm

At its head, the prommers who had queued since morning wore smiles across tired faces; at its tail round the corner, smiles were thinner, twitching as the hour of no hope approached. As for the ones who bought their seats back on 7 May, when tickets sold out in hours, the smile was definitely smug.

This was the orchestra's second visit to the Proms. Much has changed since 2007, when the words "el sistema" rippled across the lips of a nation shocked to remember the self-evident truth that a youth educated in music are a youth ennobled and given hope. And if the Simón Bolívars are no longer officially a youth orchestra – the average age having risen to 24 – they still play with an energy and focused desperation that comes only from feeling your life, rather than your pension, depends on your music-making.

It is appropriate that their second visit should be for Mahler's Second Symphony. Not because the work is about the second coming, but because it is rooted in the sublimated theatricality on which the orchestra thrives. The great fanfares in the brass, the swirling colours of the strings – Mahler's extended palette of grand gestures demand immense skill and discipline to come off cleanly, and the Bolívars have both in spades.

At the same time, the symphony inverts its theatricality in offering an anatomy of sensibility. There may be emotions that remain outside the symphony's spectrum, but not many. Certainly by the end, when the superb National Youth Choir of Great Britain and the two resplendent Swedish soloists Miah Persson and Anna Larsson convinced the angels to let them through the pearly gates (or what remained after the percussion and brass finished battering them), any listener whose ears still functioned must have felt as if they've heard it all. I certainly did.

Friendship sms messages and quotes

Friendship Day is celebrated on the first Sunday of August every year. This year, it will fall on August 7.

Earlier, on April 27, 2011, the General Assembly of the United Nation declared July 30th as official International Friendship Day.

The tradition of dedicating a day in honor of friends began in US in 1935. Gradually the festival gained popularity and today Friendship Day is celebrated in large number of countries including India. On this day people spend time with their friends and express love for them.

The shops  are flooded  with special beaded friendship bands, tagged friendship cards, flowers and gifts to attract youths.But in the present techno world people  make use of internet services and cellphones  to wish each other on friendship day .People send Friendship SMS,  Friendship messages, Friendship Quotes, Friendship scraps and Friendship greetings are getting popular via cellphones and social networking websites.
On this occasion exchange of friendship bands is the most  popular custom, but these days different mediums are used by friends to get their message across.

People are over the world  make use of social networking sites like facebook , twitter , e-mail  and wish each other on the friendship day .
Now speacially the youths purchase gifts for their friends and also plan late night parties .

The idea of a World Friendship Day was first proposed on July 20, 1958 by Dr. Artemio Bracho during a dinner with friends in Puerto Pinasco, Paraguay.
The  malls hotels, resturants are also ready for the celebrations as they offer special things , offers on the friendship day
Here are few Friendship day SMS for the Samaylive readers:

A coin is easy to earn, a friend is hard to find. The coin depreciates but a friend appreciates. I lost a coin when I smsed u, but it's okay because I got u.

Thank you for touching my life in ways you may never know. My riches do not lie in material wealth, but in having friend like you - a precious gift from God.

"True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it be lost."

Honda recalls 1.5M vehicles in U.S

Honda is recalling about 1.5 million vehicles in the U.S. to update the software on the automatic transmission to decrease the possibility of transmission damage.
The recall affects certain 2005-10 four-cylinder Accord, 2007-10 CR-V and 2005-08 Element vehicles.
The company said Friday that without the change, the transmission's secondary shaft bearing can be damaged when the car is shifted too quickly. Honda said that can happen when a driver tries to get the vehicle dislodged from mud or snow.
Honda says it will begin sending recall notifications to customers on Aug. 31. The company says that no injuries or deaths have been reported.


Magna shares plunge after missing estimates
Magna International, North America's largest auto-parts supplier, fell the most in more than two years after missing analysts' second-quarter profit estimates.
Magna declined $4.82, or 11%, to $39.42 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, the stock's steepest one-day drop since March 5, 2009.
The company said it earned $1.11 a share, excluding onetime items, trailing the $1.38 average of 15 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News. Aurora, Ontario-based Magna said its European operations lost $13 million before interest and taxes in the quarter a year after earning $83 million, while it saw a 32% rise in sales.


Information technology
U.S. official praises recruitment effort
A growing information technology sector and involvement by corporate and other leaders have put Detroit ahead of other American cities attempting to reel in jobs that typically have been outsourced to other countries, the assistant U.S. commerce secretary said Friday.
John Fernandez toured the downtown offices of Quicken Loans, Compuware and GalaxE.Solutions.
GalaxE.Solutions, a provider of software services and IT business support systems, is behind the Outsource to Detroit initiative to bring in jobs. The company plans to hire 500 skilled IT workers.
"There may be places where it is happening, but it is not part of a bold strategy like you see here," Fernandez told reporters. "What strikes us as being the real energy here is the huge level of public-private partnerships, the mayor's engagement, members of Congress representing this area and corporate leadership. There is a shared purpose and commitment."


BANKS
No charges filed in Washington Mutual collapse
The Justice Department says it has closed its investigation into the collapse of Washington Mutual without any criminal charges filed.
In September 2008, the federal government seized Washington Mutual's flagship bank, based in Seattle, and sold its assets to JPMorgan Chase for $1.9 billion. It was the biggest bank failure in U.S. history.

Latest Stock Market News for August 4, 2011

The volatile run of the markets ended with modest gains, which was also marked one of the busiest days of trading since mid-March. Uncertainty over economic growth kept investors jittery, though the benchmarks escaped recording their longest losing streak since Jimmy Carter’s days in the White House. Traders believe the rebound was partially led by former Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Donald Kohn’s comments about the Fed considering a new stimulus plan, which brought the buyers into the market.

As the day began, investors were once again bogged down by concerns about the economy and the markets opened with steep losses. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) dipped 166 points before recouping its losses to settle at 11,896.21, up 0.3%. The Standard & Poor 500 (S&P 500) added 0.5% to finish the day at 1,260.36. The Nasdaq Composite Index closed with gains of 0.9% at 2,693.07. On most occasions over the past several days the markets have been posting below average volumes. However, yesterday saw one of the busiest trading sessions with roughly 10.5 billion shares changed hands on the New York Stock Exchange, Amex and Nasdaq as compared to the daily average of around 7.48 billion. On the NYSE, advancers outpaced the decliners by 1,725 to 1,274.

The Dow traded in the red during the opening session and looked set to match its longest losing streak of nine days, last recorded in February 1978. Nine out of the thirty Dow components had to miss out ending in the positive zone, while the gains were led by Walt Disney Co. (NYSE:DIS - Analyst Report), General Electric Co. (NYSE:GE - Analyst Report), Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC - Analyst Report), The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE:KO - Analyst Report), 3M Co. (NYSE:MMM - Analyst Report), Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ - Analyst Report) and AT&T, Inc. (NYSE:T - Analyst Report) and they were up 1.2%, 1.5%, 1.4%, 2.0%, 1.1%, 1.4% and 1.1%, respectively.

As for the S&P 500, the index hit its lowest level for the year at 1,234 before rebounding. The key index that is followed by money managers had also comfortably snapped its seven-day losing streak by the end of the day. However, a number of investors were of the view that the rebound in the S&P 500 will be short lived and the index had lost 6.8% over the seven days when it booked its place in the red zone. The technology sector moved up 1.2% and was one of the gainers in the S&P 500. Technology stocks like Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT - Analyst Report), Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL - Analyst Report), Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO - Analyst Report), Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR - Analyst Report), F5 Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV - Snapshot Report) and Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ:ORCL - Analyst Report) were up 0.5%, 0.7%, 0.2%, 3.7%, 3.5% and 2.2%, respectively.

Traders opined that a report in the Wall Street Journal had sparked the rally, as the website stated the last three directors of the Fed’s monetary affairs division, Donald Kohn, Vincent Reinhart and Brian Madigan supported a new stimulus plan which the Federal Reserve might consider implementing. 

Also, technology stock Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM - Analyst Report) jumped 4.9%, which also contributed to gains in the tech-laden Nasdaq, after it unveiled two new versions of BlackBerry Torch.

The decline during the opening session was also due to data on the services sector released by the Institute for Supply Management. The nation’s services sector posted its slowest pace of growth since February last year. According to the report: “The NMI registered 52.7 percent in July, 0.6 percentage point lower than the 53.3 percent registered in June, and indicating continued growth at a slower rate in the non-manufacturing sector. The Non-Manufacturing Business Activity Index increased 2.7 percentage points to 56.1 percent, reflecting growth for the 24th consecutive month and at a faster rate than in June. The New Orders Index decreased by 1.9 percentage points to 51.7 percent”.

Gabrielle Giffords returns to Congress

On Monday afternoon, it would have seemed unlikely that anyone could steal the thunder of the debt standoff compromise, but someone did.

Monday evening, with two minutes remaining on the voting clock, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) returned to the House floor for the first time since her near-fatal shooting in Tucson seven months ago to cast her ballot on the compromise.

Her appearance was only a prelude: Tuesday morning CBS News’s the Early Show announced on Twitter Giffords would run for relection in November.

 Giffords appeared with cropped, brown hair and still-visible scars on her head, beaming saying thank you to a standing ovation, cheers and hugs from her colleagues. One legislator even “dropped his dignity and climbed on a chair to see what the fuss was about,” The Post’s David Fahrenthold and Felicia Sonmez reported.

More than 4,000 people commented in response to Gifford’s post. A man from Oregon named Bill Hause responded by saying: “Welcome back Gabby, EVERYONE in this Nation loves you. But please don’t overdo [it]. We need you to mend the divisions in Congress.”

Giffords seemed to know that was true.

“I have closely followed the debate over our debt ceiling and have been deeply disappointed at what’s going on in Washington,” Giffords said in a statement later. “I had to be here for this vote. I could not take the chance that my absence could crash our economy.”