Microsoft's Yahoo! Bid Is a Move on Google

Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's chief executive, said, "We have great respect for Yahoo, and together we can offer an increasingly exciting set of solutions for consumers, publishers, and advertisers while becoming better positioned to compete in the online services market." Yahoo! said it would "evaluate this proposal carefully and promptly."

The deal gives Microsoft some much needed heft in the Internet advertising field and marks a big step in creating tougher competition for search leader Google, which saw its shares slide 8 percent ahead of the bell.

But it doesn't change the fact that Google is winning the search and advertising battle by a solid margin. Citigroup analysts said there's still no reason to expect users to give up their "overwhelming preference" for Google but said the long-term potential for Microsoft is there if it can help Yahoo! reverse course.

Earlier this week Yahoo! warned 2008 would be a difficult year as it struggled to revamp its online services under cofounder Jerry Yang, who returned to Yahoo! last year.

Despite those efforts, a buyout has been a popular topic for some time as Yahoo! shares slumped more than 45 percent since October and its share of the Internet search pie declined.

Henry Blodget, a blogger and former tech analyst, wrote that the move by Microsoft is "brilliant," because it's "a big premium dangled in front of battered Yahoo! shareholders, but a price that would have seemed absurdly low as recently as six months ago. Given Yahoo!'s battered stock and low 2008 outlook, we expect the offer will be accepted."

Q&A: Michelle Obama

For a woman who insisted she never wanted a political life, Michelle Obama now finds herself at the center of one of the most historic presidential elections in the nation's history. And she's become a potent campaigner for her husband, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama. The 44-year-old Harvard Law School graduate drew thousands at an appearance in Delaware last week before returning to Chicago and daughters Malia, 9, and Sasha, 6. U.S. News caught up with Michelle Obama on her way to a women's roundtable in Connecticut. Excerpts:

(Charles Rex Arbogast/AP)

You've said your husband's presidential run is now or never. Why?
One is practical. We've got small kids, and the thought of putting them through this very taxing endeavor again and again is to me almost unthinkable. The second thing is bringing in someone who is still very closely planted to the ground. Our lives are so close to normal, if there is such a thing when you're running for president. When I'm off the road, I'm going to Target to get the toilet paper, I'm standing on soccer fields, and I think there's just a level of connection that gets lost the further you get into being a candidate.

Was there a moment you realized your life would never be the same?
It's been very gradual, from the day Barack announced to 16,000 people standing out in the frigid cold in Springfield, Ill. You thought "Wow!" ok. You didn't expect that. And it's been that for the whole year.

What do you miss most about your old life?
Family time. Barack has been home with time off this year for maybe 10 days.

Did you ever think the two of you would end up playing this role in history?
Not at this magnitude, no! There is a special quality to Barack, for sure, that is unmistakable when you meet him. A great intellect, common sense, humor and self-deprecation, and a willingness to put himself in really hard situations to help the greatest number of people. I think I knew it was there, but I didn't believe the nation would be ready anytime soon to embrace someone so unconventional.

What about racism? Did you and your husband expect it on the campaign trail?
It's not just race, but his youth, his level of experience, his name, his background, everything—there's just so much that is unconventional. The question is, Is that too much for people? But our strategy is to be as honest and open as possible. Basically folks are the same. They want to feel like they can trust you. They want to feel like you'll listen. All [the other] stuff breaks down when people get to know each other.

In his comments before the South Carolina primary, was Bill Clinton intentionally creating a white-black scenario?
I wouldn't begin to second-guess somebody else's motives. I know that these campaigns are tough and hard fought. And there are always times when people say things that they shouldn't say, that aren't accurate, and I think that this was one of those cases.

What would be your White House role?
I think I can bring visibility and a voice to a whole range of issues, like work-family balance. We talk a lot about the struggle that women have just to survive in a climate where wages are decreasing, where you have to hold two or three jobs to cover the basics. All of these things lead to greater stresses on families in ways that we need to talk about.

Some fear for your husband's safety. How do you manage your concern for him and for your family?
Barack has Secret Service protection, and that in and of itself provides a level of security that didn't exist in our everyday lives. So, I think that the question of security has been a bit overblown. We didn't make the decision to enter this worrying about safety. When you look at people who came before us, people like Martin Luther King Jr., there was a real reason to be afraid. We're living in different times. As far as I'm concerned, whatever we are sacrificing is nothing compared to what others have sacrificed.

What inspired you and your brother? And if you hadn't chosen law, what might you have done?
We had very hardworking parents. They didn't go to college, but they believed in the importance of education; they were staunch supporters of us, so we always had two parents telling us how wonderful we were. In terms of other careers, I think I gave up the notion of being a pediatrician after I realized that organic chemistry was going to be [required.] [But] I don't think I have put my heart and soul into the notion of being a lawyer.

Excluding births and marriage, can you share a special moment in your life, a time you like to think back on?
We have just some of the most wonderful times when we visit Barack's grandmother in Hawaii. Those are always wonderful times, warm weather, a time to be together and laugh, when everybody's relaxed, no schedules, no nothing, just a lot of good fun together.

India's Black Market Racket in Human Kidneys

An organ procurer promised Ponraj, 38, an auto rickshaw driver with a fourth-grade education, $2,500 for one of his kidneys. "Humans don't need two kidneys, I was made to believe," he says, now lamenting his decision. "I can sell my extra kidney and become rich, I thought." But he was swindled and received only half that much. And since the operation, Ponraj often misses work because of excruciating pain around his hip, pushing him more deeply into debt.

Many Indian cities, such as Chennai in southern India, are becoming hubs for the illicit kidney business, despite a 1994 ban on such trade in human organs. Organized rings of hustlers, working in cooperation with some doctors, prowl slum neighborhoods for vulnerable donors like Ponraj to supply a growing number of mainly foreign patients seeking kidney transplants.

In Gurgaon, an upscale Delhi suburb, the Indian police in late January dismantled an illegal organ racket—which authorities described as the largest ever broken up in India—that allegedly removed kidneys from about 500 laborers, the majority of them abducted or conned, and sold the organs to wealthy clients over a period of years. Police allege that the doctor, Amit Kumar, 40, drove around looking for possible donors, sometimes testing them on the spot with equipment in his car and other times luring them to an apartment where he has surgical gear.

Letters and E-mail messages from would-be transplant recipients in nine countries were discovered in Kumar's office, Indian authorities said. "It is believed that during the past eight years around 500 people were forcibly operated on and their kidneys transplanted to foreign patients in a secret operating theater," according to an Interpol alert for Kumar, who has evaded authorities in India.

Analysts say the kidney business thrives with foreigners drawn here for many of the same factors that have made India a top destination for medical tourism: low costs and highly qualified doctors. An illegal kidney transplant here can cost a third of the $70,000 price of the operation in China, not to mention avoiding the kind of strict organ-donation rules that apply in western countries.

Corrupt doctors in India work in tandem with organized middlemen adept at circumventing Indian law. The 1994 Transplant of Human Organ Act permits only relatives of patients to donate kidneys for transplantation (or a reciprocal arrangement between two needy families). But middlemen manage to masquerade donors as relatives or otherwise find ways to elude the rules, with little interest in the well-being of kidney providers.

A kidney recipient here may pay as much as $25,000 to illegally get a new organ, of which perhaps $2,500, and often half that much, goes to the donor, according to Action Aid India, an international NGO that has worked with kidney trade victims in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. That leaves a lot of money for unscrupulous organ hunters. "These middlemen act more like cut-and-grab men whose only interest is to hack out the organ," says Annie Thomas, a field coordinator for Action Aid in Chennai. "This is a reprehensible abuse of the poor, and this practice needs to be curbed."

In Korukkupet, a grubby Chennai slum seething with people, the trade is prevalent. Although there's no specific estimate, local activists claim it's hard to find a family here that doesn't have a member who has sold a kidney. A woman who goes by the name Muttama, a 29-year-old fish seller, says she was conned into selling a kidney for $1,250 two years ago. She says she was promised three times that much. She claims she sold her kidney through a local man, who goes from house to house to lure others to sell kidneys. " 'Follow my example,' he told me," Muttama remembers. " 'I was a very poor man. Now look at me. I became rich after I sold my kidney.' "

Other families interviewed in Korukkupet also identified the same individual as a kingpin in the kidney business, although he denies the allegations and authorities have not brought charges against him. Neighbors point to his house—grand compared with the surrounding sprawl of huts—where his wife can be seen wearing gold bangles, gold earrings, and a glittering necklace.

Conservative Radio Hosts Lampoon McCain

Typically, conservative talk show hosts attack the opposite side of the aisle; this cycle, they are going after one of their own

The kings and queens of conservative talk radio thrive on displays of anger and outrage. They summon it easily, and they direct it most frequently at Democrats. The godfather of talk radio, Rush Limbaugh, has already called Sen. Hillary Clinton a "whore" and Barack Obama a "Halfrican."

Being good partisans, Limbaugh and friends typically spare their fellow Republicans from similar treatment. But sometimes discord emerges, or even erupts, in the family, as it has in the past few days. Suddenly their outrage has narrowed, almost vindictively, to the man now moving hastily toward their party's nomination: Sen. John McCain.

On Monday, January 28, the day before the Florida GOP primary, which McCain won over Mitt Romney, Limbaugh said, "If, this autumn, voters must choose between Clinton and McCain, they will face, at least stylistically, an echo, not a choice."

Equating a Republican with Clinton is obviously a low blow, and Limbaugh's comment, it turned out, was just the opening salvo to a steady stream of vitriol that crackled over the transistor this week and scattered across the airwaves. Hugh Hewitt, another well-known conservative radio host, wrote dejectedly on his blog, "It is hard to hide the fact that this would be a second Bob Dole campaign, with less energy and fewer conservative principles. Many, many Republicans have to be worried not just about losing the White House but about a dispirited party and a down-ticket wipeout."

The chorus against McCain from certain elements of the party has no doubt grown louder as his candidacy has gained traction, attention, and front-runner status. Florida, as a closed primary state, was supposed to serve as a buffer for those who felt McCain was out of step with the party base; it did not. The departure of former Sen. Fred Thompson, an avowed conservative, and the reduction of the field to a largely two-man contest between McCain and Romney has only exacerbated the audible alarm. The New York Times endorsement of McCain last week didn't help, either.

But the ferocity of the charges being leveled at McCain is noteworthy, not only for its sheer decibel level but also for what it potentially means for the Republican Party. Conservative talk radio clearly sees McCain as being too moderate, even liberal, on social and economic issues, such as his opposition to the first round of Bush tax cuts. More to the point, they say his candidacy represents a fracturing of the Republican base and that Romney is a better pick. But many Republican voters still support McCain, as evidenced by Florida.

So what gives? One argument is that conservative talk radio, representing the bastion of the party's strength since the 1980s, is out of step with a country that is weary of George Bush. A second argument is that talk radio is not out of step at all; rather, voters have simply been willing to compromise when picking from a lackluster field. A third possibility, more foreboding for Republican chances this fall, is that the base has fractured. Division is never good for a party, but it is especially worrisome for Republicans, who typically rely on an energized base to drive voter turnout.

The last time the Republican Party was so strongly divided over its candidates was 1964, says Denison University political science Prof. Emmett H. Buell. That year, conservative Barry Goldwater won the nomination, alienated moderates and liberals, and ultimately lost to President Lyndon Johnson. Goldwater made no effort to reunite the party; McCain, however, has.

"McCain will have a difficult but not insurmountable task of uniting the party around him," Buell said. "This would be a tough act for any of the candidates. The Reagan coalition has come off its wheels. McCain is not all things to all Republicans, but neither is Romney or Huckabee." The one fact that will most likely help his cause: his polling against Hillary Clinton. Romney and Huckabee lose by large margins when matched against Clinton; McCain, according to at least one poll, beats her by a single point.

To better understand the origin of talk radio's beef with McCain, we've waded through recent audio from the morning shows of some of the country's most popular conservative hosts. Die-hards like Limbaugh and Beck have spoken the loudest and harshest; others, while expressing concerns with McCain, have tried to distance themselves from the caterwauling.

Presidential Campaign Ads Top $100 Million

Presidential candidates have spent a lot of money flooding your television sets with advertising during this campaign season. So much that they have already spent $107 million on TV ads as of last Sunday, a new study out of the University of Wisconsin Advertising Project found, and that was before Republican candidate Mitt Romney began his televised assault in some Super Tuesday states and before Barack Obama's "Change" ad showcased his message to last night's Super Bowl viewers.

While dozens of states scooted up their primaries and caucuses to Super Tuesday believing that holding an earlier primary would make their states more relevant to the nominating process, the holding of essentially a nationwide primary drove most television advertising to the even earlier primary states. Iowa and New Hampshire voters got the most TV ads thrown at them, followed by South Carolina, Nevada, Florida, and Michigan.

"Change" so far has been the magic word of this campaign. Barack Obama used "change" in 37 percent of his TV ads. Hillary Clinton used both "experience" and "change," using "experience" 30 percent of the time and "change" 27 percent of the time. None of Obama's ads touted "experience." In addition, Mitt Romney was a fan of "change" using the term in 29 percent of his ads.

And flags were the most popular symbol the presidential candidates used. John McCain depicted flags in 77 percent of his commercials. Rudy Giuliani had a flag in 65 percent of his. John Edwards used flags more than any other Democratic candidate, dawning the stars and stripes in 49 percent of his ads.

The wealth of the Democratic candidates in this cycle showed in the amount they were able to spend on advertising. Obama was the biggest spender—airing almost 30,000 ads costing the Senator from Illinois $57 million. Hillary Clinton aired more than 25,500 ads totaling more than $18 million. For the GOP, Mitt Romney led in advertisements, airing almost 35,000 commercials costing the former Massachusetts governor $29 million, more than all the other GOP contenders combined.

Though as we have seen, television advertising dollars may not necessarily translate to victories. While Romney outspent McCain in Florida by millions, McCain had a clean win last weekend in the Sunshine State.

Morning Buzz: Feb. 4, 2008

Google has issued a public reaction to Microsoft's $44 billion bid to acquire Yahoo! and the tone of its response is decidedly negative. The company's chief legal officer, David Drummond, published a statement on Google's website on Sunday in which he wrote: "Microsoft's hostile bid for Yahoo! raises troubling questions. This is about more than simply a financial transaction, one company taking over another. It's about preserving the underlying principles of the Internet: openness and innovation."

President Bush has put together a $3 trillion budget for his final year in office that increases funding for the military and homeland security while calling for cuts in government healthcare, according to administration officials. High-ranking Democrats who have seen the budget proposal have quickly condemned it and say it will lead to cutbacks and a sharply increased national debt.

The New York Giants upset Tom Brady and the New England Patriots last night 17-14 to win Super Bowl XLII and rob the Patriots of a perfect 19-0 season. Giants quarterback Eli Manning was named Super Bowl MVP.

U.S. Faces More Delay on Iran Sanctions

The ever frustrating U.S.-led quest for stepping up economic sanctions on Iran in response to its defiant nuclear stand is poised for yet more delays.

That was the clear implication of remarks today by France's ambassador to the United States, Pierre Vimont, in Washington. France, along with Britain, is a key partner in the diplomatic effort to ratchet up pressure on Iran for refusing to suspend its nuclear work, a move that has been set as a precondition for launching full-on talks on the nuclear issue, security problems in the Persian Gulf, and other political questions with Iran.

Vimont, in remarks to the Middle East Institute, pegged two new sources of delay. First, some of the new, nonpermanent members of the United Nations Security Council are not yet on board with even the relatively mild increase in sanctions that apparently have been agreed to by the United States, France, Britain, Germany, Russia, and China.

"This may take some time," Vimont said. "There is m