Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- A federal judge Friday ruled in favor of a former UCLA college basketball star who sued to end the NCAA's control over the rights to college athletes' names, images and likenesses.

In a landmark decision, U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken sided with Ed O'Bannon in his lawsuit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association. O'Bannon argued athletes in the top tier of college basketball and football should be allowed to profit from their schools' use of their likenesses.

In a 99-page ruling, Wilken wrote that current NCAA rules "unreasonably restrain trade in the market for certain educational and athletic opportunities offered by NCAA Division I schools."

Wilken issued an injunction to block the NCAA from prohibiting its member schools and conferences from offering their Football Bowl Subdivision or Division I basketball recruits a limited share of the revenues generated from the use of their names, images, and likenesses.

She did rule, however, that the NCAA could set a cap on the money paid to athletes, as long as it allows at least $5,000 per athlete per year.

"The NCAA's witnesses stated that their concerns about student-athlete compensation would be minimized or negated if compensation was capped at a few thousand dollars per year," the judge wrote.

O'Bannon's suit alleged the waivers the athletes are required to sign are illegal and asked that players be able to collectively negotiate the terms of their likenesses in order to keep a share of those profits.

"Before the court in this case is only whether the NCAA violates antitrust law by agreeing with its member schools to restrain their ability to compensate Division I men's basketball and FBS football players any more than the current association rules allow," Wilken wrote. "For the reasons set forth above, the court finds that this restraint does violate antitrust law."

The ruling could potentially change college sports drastically, eventually forcing the NCAA to restructure its amateur model and allow college athletes to be paid.

NCAA chief legal officer Donald Remy said: "We disagree with the court's decision that NCAA rules violate antitrust laws. We note that the court's decision sets limits on compensation, but are reviewing the full decision and will provide further comment later."

William Isaacson, an attorney for the plaintiffs, called the ruling "a big step forward for common decency."

"One of the things the judge is saying here ... is some sharing is OK," he said. "It won't affect amateurism, won't affect the popularity of the sport. She made a very reasonable and significant and measured decision."

Ramogi Huma, president of the National College Players Association, said the ruling was "a big win" that signaled "the time for college athletes to get their due," though he was critical of the $5,000 compensation cap.

"The ruling says the NCAA was operating illegally and college athletes do have rights," said Huma, who helped find players to join the case. "Even if you label them student-athletes and want to call it amateurism, it doesn't give the NCAA the right to deny them the rights that other Americans deserve."

Sonny Vaccaro, who started the lawsuit by introducing O'Bannon and lead attorney Michael Hausfeld, said the decision was precedent-setting.

"The key is, they're allowed to get paid," said Vacarro, who helped pioneer branding athletes by putting Nike shoes on Michael Jordan.

Vacarro called the decision his most important career accomplishment.

"It's more important to me that these kids won and this go forward and the principles are right," he said. "To me, it's more important than the Jordan and Kobe and things I did in my professional life. ...This was just something that was wrong and I totally believed in it."

The judge wrote that the injunction will not affect student-athletes who enroll in college before July 1, 2016.

When athletes commit to a university, players are required to sign a waiver that relinquishes their right to their own likenesses in every form.

That means they can't make money off their television appearances, their jerseys, or in any other way.

The universities get any revenues from selling sports paraphernalia or other material related to the players.

The trial began June 9 in federal court in Oakland, California. The plaintiffs were 20 current and former student athletes who play or played for an FBS football or Division I men's basketball team starting in 1956.

Legal appeals could delay a final outcome for years but the decision is in a position to be the first major NCAA reform effort to take hold.

Already the issues brought up in the case have had an effect, even before the ruling was made.

Texas A&M, the University of Arizona and Northwestern University have decided to stop selling jerseys with the numbers of specific players.

Instead, Texas A&M will sell the number 12 jersey, in keeping with its 12th man tradition; and Arizona will sell jerseys with numbers that correspond to the year of competition -- 14 for this year, according to a school spokesman. Northwestern will sell only jersey number 51, in honor of its head coach, Pat Fitzgerald, and legendary Chicago linebacker Dick Butkus.

The NCAA's argument in both the ongoing O'Bannon suit and another one filed by former quarterback Sam Keller, also in federal court in Oakland, is that it is trying to protect the amateur model of college sports.

Paying college athletes would hurt traditions, NCAA chief testifies

NCAA under fire: 5 things to know

NCAA faces change, legal challenges in months ahead

Response: The judge sides with an ex-UCLA college basketball star who challenged the NCAA. The NCAA says college athletes are amateurs, rewarded with an education. The ruling could potentially change college sports drastically.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:President Barack Obama apologized Thursday to those Americans whose insurance plans are being canceled due to the federal health law he championed even though he said repeatedly they could keep their coverage if they liked.

"I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he told NBC News in an exclusive interview.

"We've got to work hard to make sure that they know we hear them and we are going to do everything we can to deal with folks who find themselves in a tough position as a consequence of this," he added.

Obama's comments come days after he attempted to clarify what he meant when he assured Americans in previous years that they would be able to keep their plans under the Affordable Care Act, a controversy that is prompting legislation in Congress to address it.

Obama further alters 'you can keep your plan' pledge

Republicans have hammered Obama over the promise since insurers began discontinuing coverage for some of the 12 million Americans who buy individual policies on the private market that don't meet Obamacare requirements for more comprehensive care.

GOP moves past troubled Obamacare website

Insurance companies appear to be doing this for a variety of reasons; some are pulling all their plans from certain states where they have fewer subscribers in order to save money.

In many cases, affected policyholders are being squeezed. They either don't qualify for subsidies to lower the cost of new premiums or they may have to pay more in the health care exchange marketplace.

When Obama says he's looking to fix it, he primarily means steps that can be taken administratively, senior administration officials said.

Some experts suggest one possible approach would be to ask insurers to delay the cancellation of plans and extend them into the New Year so that people are not left without insurance. That has been done, for example, in the state of California.

But House Speaker John Boehner said an Obama apology was in order and said the Republican-led House had its own plan in mind.

"What Americans want to hear is that the President is going to keep his promise. That's why the House will vote next week to allow anyone with a health care plan they like to keep it," Boehner said. "If the President is sincerely sorry that he misled the American people, the very least he can do is support this bipartisan effort. Otherwise, this apology doesn't amount to anything."

The administration eventually knew that many policies would be changed by the insurance carriers after Obamacare was introduced, and the associated political uproar since its October 1 online rollout has also angered Democrats and fueled Republican efforts to extend related controversies onto the campaign trail.

Vulnerable Senate Democrats voice concerns

In 2010, the Health and Human Services Department estimated that 40% to 67% of individual plans would eventually lose their "grandfathered" status, which only was conferred if a plan was purchased before the health care law was approved in 2010.

Although Obama said the "buck stops" with him on Obamacare problems to date -- including the rocky rollout of the website -- he still was resolute that his initiative to provide coverage for the uninsured and better coverage for many others would be better for the country.

"Most of the folks who ... got these cancellation letters, they'll be able to get better care at the same cost or cheaper in these new marketplaces," Obama said, also noting that "we have to make sure" people do not feel as if they've been betrayed by an effort carried out with their best interests in mind.

"They'll have more choice, they'll have more competition. They're part of a bigger pool. The insurance companies are going to be hungry for their business. So the majority of folks will end up being better off," he said.

Key elements of the health law prohibit discrimination for pre-existing conditions and require new plans cover maternity care, mental health and other areas. The program was developed to put comprehensive care within reach of millions of uninsured Americans.

About 95% of legal U.S. residents receive health insurance through private employers or the federal government, the Obama administration says. But more than 48 million Americans don't have any coverage.

Debunking 4 Obamacare myths: Both sides get it wrong

Obama's apology comes a week after similar refrains were made by Vice President Joe Biden and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius regarding the botched Obamacare online rollout.

Five things we learned from Obamacare records

WH: Chief tech officer too busy for congressional testimony

Asked if he thinks Americans will be able to trust what he says in the future, Obama said he thinks he'll ultimately be "judged on whether" Obamacare is better for Americans overall.

"When you try to do something big like make our health care system better ... there are going to be problems along the way, even if ultimately what you're doing is going to make a whole lot of people better off, and I hope that people will look at the end product and they're going to be able to look back and say, you know what, we now have protections we didn't have before," he said.

In the NBC interview, Obama reiterated the administration's line that he's "confident" a "majority of people" will be able to use the website and apply for insurance by November 30. But he did not say whether he would push back the March 31 deadline to enroll or the penalty for those who do not purchase insurance.

Obamacare depends on younger, healthier Americans to buy into the program and pay premiums to offset costs for covering older people who need more health care. Those without insurance who do not sign up for a plan face a fine.

What else could go wrong with Obamacare?

A Gallup poll conducted just over a week ago showed 36% of Americans said they didn't think that in the long run the Affordable Care Act would make much of a difference to their family's health care situation. Just over a third said the health care law would make matters worse, and one in four said that Obamacare would make things better.

Opinion: Here's the truth about Obamacare

Response: Obama says in interview with NBC he's sorry. Some people are losing their health coverage due to Affordable Care Act. Obama said previously Americans could keep their plans if they liked them. House will vote next week on bill allowing Americans to keep their health plans.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:In July, Iran lost one of its most acclaimed playwrights and directors when Mahmoud Ostad-Mohammad passed away in Tehran at the age of 62.

Scores of relatives, friends, and theater lovers attended his funeral ceremony that was adorned with pictures of Ostad-Mohammad -- his trademark mustache and playful smile on display. Some wept while embracing copies of his famous screenplays.

Among the mourners was Ostad-Mohammad's daughter, Mana, who is convinced that Western sanctions against Iran were partly to blame for his father's passing.

"This was the doctor's testimony," said Mana Ostad-Mohammad. "This is based on my father's medical tests."

Through five decades, some of the most famous Iranian plays were brought to life by Ostad-Mohammad. Some were Iranian classics. Others were originals.  All were stories about the loves and losses of everyday Iranians.

Then in 2011, came a diagnosis of late-stage liver cancer. Surgery was not an option, but Ostad-Mohammad's oncologist prescribed the cancer drug Nexavar. According to his doctor and medical tests, the drug appeared to stop the cancer from spreading.

"We were very hopeful that if he gets through this stage, he could get healthy and start living his life again," said his daughter Mana.

But beginning last year -- soon after Washington and Western powers imposed additional sanctions against Iran to rein in its nuclear program -- Iranian doctors, pharmacists and patients say finding Nexavar and several other drugs that treated deadly diseases became increasingly difficult.

Western powers have stepped up the pressure on Iran since 2006, when the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to impose new sanctions for Tehran's failure to suspend its nuclear program. The European Union imposed further sanctions last year.

U.S. officials have long said medical goods are exempt from the measures and that Western sanctions are specifically designed to target the government, not ordinary Iranians.

But Iranian officials say with the Western ban on Iranian banks doing business with much of the outside world, even medical goods that are exempt from the sanctions are often impossible to import.

"We have a serious shortage of drugs due to high prices or because they're impossible to purchase," says Tehran-based pharmacist Imen Heirani.

Heirani said everyday he gets as many as 30 calls a day from patients looking for hard-to-find drugs.

"They're obviously tired because they've been searching for a while."

Mana was getting tired too. This year, finding Nexavar -- the drug that helped keep her father alive -- became harder than ever.

"It was very unexpected," said Mana. "For 18 months we could easily get the drug but now we couldn't. We didn't know what to do."

Searching for the drug became Mana's daily mission.

If pharmacies in Tehran didn't have Nexavar, Mana would open her phone book and start dialing pharmacies in other Iranian cities like Tabriz, Isfahan and Mashad.

But last March finding Nexavar became virtually impossible, she says.

Medical tests then showed her father's feto-protein level -- an indicator of cancer -- skyrocketed over the four months he went without Nexavar.

On July 25, Ostad-Mohammad lost his fight with cancer. Iran lost a beloved playwright. And a daughter lost a father who she believes was a victim of Western sanctions and a political conflict that had nothing to do with him.

"More than being angry, I think about how simple-minded politicians are," she said.

"Sanctions are impacting the people, not the groups politicians say they're impacting."

Response: Iranians say access to life-saving drugs is difficult because of Western sanctions. West has imposed harsh economic sanctions for Iran's failure to suspend nuclear program. Economic sanctions targeting Iranian banks and energy sector have crippled Iran's economy. U.S. officials say Western sanctions are designed to target government, not citizens.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Renee Mosier was one of an estimated half-million patients in the United States who were unable to get the drugs they needed because of shortages.

"You feel like you're in a fight with one hand tied behind your back," said Mosier, 56.

It was a fight she lost in June.

According to the Food and Drug Administration, the number of drug shortages has increased nearly 300% since 2005. More than half of the drugs on the shortage list are considered critical -- meaning they have no alternative. The drugs most often in short supply include anesthetics and oncological drugs.

Mosier was diagnosed in 2006 with ovarian cancer, the fifth-deadliest cancer for women, according to the American Cancer Society.

Surgery and treatment were able to keep her tumors at bay until 2009, when she returned to surgery. She was back in remission until June 2011, when her cancer appeared once again.

Mosier was able to get her required surgery, but her doctor, Dr. Wendel Naumann, was unable to get Doxil, the chemotherapy treatment she needed.

'A huge, growing crisis in this country'

"This is a huge, growing crisis in this country, where we're actually having to ration drugs," said Naumann, who calls it "unbelievable."

In November 2011, Mosier appeared on CNN's "Sanjay Gupta, MD" to share her ordeal. She told Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, that without Doxil, she had few alternatives.

"At the time we just said, 'Let's go with what we have, and see what happens,' and the cancer pretty rapidly recurred."

Mosier was never able to get another dose of Doxil and spent the last month of her life in hospice care. She was able to make one last trip -- to the Bahamas to attend her daughter's wedding.

In a follow-up interview with Mosier's daughters on this past weekend's "Sanjay Gupta, MD," daughter Michelle Philipp told Gupta, "We weren't sure until even (the) last minute if she was able to come. So we bought her the ticket, hoping it would give her something for her to look forward to, and she did, and it was just wonderful."

On June 29, 2012, Mosier died.

Philipp's sister, Nicole Penninger, didn't hide her frustration with the situation. "You feel like you're in this time now, it's 2012. You feel like, you're in America. Why can't she get these drugs, that she needs to treat something so serious?"

Critical dependence on a few companies

How did it get to this point?

According to Naumann, "We only have a couple of companies, and the problem is that if one of these companies goes down because of FDA inspections, manufacturing problems or something like that, we don't have those drugs if only one company is making them."

The House Oversight Committee came to the same conclusion. In a recent report, the panel claimed the FDA -- the very agency tasked with dealing with shortages -- is partly to blame for the shortage situation.

The report paints a scathing picture of a regulatory agency that gave little consideration to the potential outcome of its actions.

"The committee has learned that FDA regulatory activity has effectively shut down 30% of the total manufacturing capacity at four of America's largest producers of generic injectable medications," it said.

"The FDA has failed to ensure that enforcement and compliance activities are conducted in a manner that does not create unnecessary shortages of critical drugs," according to the House report.

That report is disputed by the FDA.

"Let me just say, very clearly, that the report is incorrect," Dr. Sandra Kweder of the FDA said on "Sanjay Gupta, MD." "We are not in this situation because the FDA is shutting down companies. FDA is part of the solution."

Kweder is the deputy director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Office of New Drugs.

She said FDA inspection processes and enforcement rules have not changed.

"What has changed is that there is an aging manufacturing infrastructure, and there are serious quality problems that have required companies to close down to fix the problems."

On Monday, the FDA issued a letter to Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Maryland) of the House Oversight Committee, responding to the committee's blaming the FDA for the shortages. The letter reiterated the report was false and emphasized the FDA is part of the solution.

What happened with Doxil

While Doxil is not a generic drug, it was manufactured by Ben Venue Laboratories, one of the country's four largest producers of generic injectables.

The Ben Venue lab was the sole manufacturer of Doxil in the nation. It voluntarily shut down in November 2011.

A May 2011 FDA inspection found a string of problems, including inadequate oversight and metallic particle shards in some of the drugs produced on site.

A November 2011 FDA inspection found additional problems, including finding a 10-gallon can in a storage area that contained urine.

In a statement sent to CNN after it shut down, Ben Venue labs said its team "has been working around the clock to implement changes needed to ensure a more sustained supply of the medicines we produce and to address the manufacturing-related issues at our facility noted in recent inspections by the FDA and other global regulatory agencies."

However, Ben Venue maintained that none of the Doxil supply was affected.

From their findings, the House Oversight Committee found that 58% of the drugs on the shortage list were produced at facilities cited by the FDA. They also found that the FDA's warning letters increased 156% from 2010 to 2011.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, former FDA deputy commissioner, said the FDA isn't concerned about the outcome, though.

"They go in, they inspect facilities and then they issue findings. You're not asked to worry if there's a stable supply. You're asked to make sure the facility falls in line."

But Kweder says it's quite the opposite. "Well, it's our job to worry about it in our drug shortages team. When we issue warning letters today, we ask companies to very specifically communicate with us how they plan to address the problem, so we can assess what the potential of a shortage is, " she told CNN.

Kweder also cited the recent reauthorization of the Prescription Drug User Fee Act as a key to preventing shortages.

Signed by President Barack Obama earlier this month, the act will help the FDA expedite the drug review process, particularly for drugs in shortage. It will also require companies to notify the FDA if they anticipate an interruption in production.

"It allows us as a regulatory agency to step in, and try and prevent the shortage in the first place," Kweder said. "So for example, we can go to other companies to ask them to increase their production. We can assist companies that are having difficulties to finding alternatives for the difficulties they are having, and even in rare cases, we can seek sources of medications from other countries, where they might be being produced to our standards."

Help comes from abroad

That's actually what happened in the case of Doxil.

In February, the FDA stepped in and allowed the importation of Lipodox from an Indian manufacturer, a possible therapeutic alternative. But Naumann said he was never able to get his hands on it.

"The key is having enough notice," says Kweder. Since Obama signed an executive order requesting early notification from manufacturers in November 2011, more and more companies have been able to give the FDA the needed heads-up.

"We've done that successfully innumerable times. Just since January, at our count, we've prevented 94 to 100 shortages, things the public never sees," Kweder told Gupta.

"I think it's a start," says Naumann, but it's not enough.

"I think these shortages are going to continue because of the same problems that we have. There are certainly fixes out there for it. I don't think these shortages are going to go away because of this bill."

For Mosier's daughters, it's all too late.

Had Mosier gotten the Doxil, Philipp says, "I think she thought it would have at least put her in remission in another time, or it would save her from the chemo that was detrimental to her."

Response: Renee Mosier, who had cancer, died after not receiving the drug she needed. The number of drug shortages is up 300% since 2005, according to the FDA. The House Oversight Committee blames the FDA for shortages.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:If the Gaza truce holds and Israel's Operation Protective Edge comes to its conclusion, some things are certain.

Both Israel and Hamas will declare military victory -- Israel pointing to the destruction of militants' tunnels and depletion of Hamas' rocket supply; Hamas pointing to dozens of dead Israeli troops and the survival of Hamas leadership in Gaza.

But unlike in previous conflicts, when Hamas had the support of many Arab nations, things have changed. This time, as CNN has reported, the fighting between Israel and Hamas has been a proxy war for the Mideast.

Key regional players Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have their own reasons to want to fend off the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is part, experts say. And Europe, like the United States, lists Hamas as a terrorist organization for its numerous attacks on civilians.

But the group does have the support of some countries.

"It's no longer the Muslims against the Jews," said Danielle Pletka, vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. "Now it's the extremists -- the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, Hezbollah, and their backers Iran, Qatar and Turkey -- against Israel and the more moderate Muslims including Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia."

A look at some key Hamas supporters:

Turkey

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan openly supports Hamas.

"Erdogan has tried to use the cause of the Brotherhood to bolster his own Islamist credentials at home," says Eric Trager, of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Turkey also has "more of an ideological sympathy with the Brotherhood," Trager says.

Qatar

Qatar supported the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt -- which was toppled from power in a coup last year. Qatar funds many Muslim Brotherhood figures in exile, including Hamas political leader Khaled Meshaal, who is believed to have orchestrated numerous terrorist attacks.

"Qatar has a long history of providing shelter to Islamist groups, amongst them the Muslim Brotherhood and the Taliban," Shashank Joshi of the Royal United Services Institute tells Time.

Advocating for Hamas is beneficial to Turkey and Qatar in their political objectives because the cause draws popular support at home, says world affairs writer Frida Ghitis in a CNN.com column.

But some question whether Qatar's support for Hamas is still strong. The country's financial support to the group "largely dried up" as Qatar sought "to mend ties with its neighbors, with whom it had fallen out in part for backing the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt," the Council on Foreign Relations said.

While Qatar and Turkey are powerful allies, "Hamas might wish for more support given the breadth of the Arab world," Time reported.

Iran and Syria

In the past, Iran and Syria supported Hamas. Iran supplied the group with weapons; Syria was home to Meshaal.

But Meshaal did not support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the country's civil war. In 2012, Meshaal left for Qatar, causing a breakdown in his relationship with both Syria and its ally Iran, says Firas Abi Ali, head of Middle East and North Africa Country Risk and Forecasting at the global information company IHS.

And while Iran still professes to support Hamas, such claims "are more ostentatious, showy, exaggerated and theatrical rather than genuine and practical," writes Majid Rafizadeh, an Iranian-American scholar at Harvard University, in a column for al Arabiya.

Iran, which is a Muslim but not an Arab nation, "uses Hamas (as well as Tehran's support for the Palestinian cause) as a tool to project its power and influence in the Arab world," he argues.

The Council on Foreign Relations says Iran, while cutting its funding to Hamas in recent years, "sought to bolster its ties to other resistance groups in the region, such as Islamic Jihad."

Hezbollah

The Lebanese militant group based in Lebanon is aligned with al-Assad's regime in Syria. During the conflict, Hezbollah reached out to Hamas, praising its "steadfastness."

This does not mean the relationship is repaired to where it stood before Syria's civil war, but "a new realignment might happen," Farwaz Gerges of the London School of Economics told Time.

Popular support

Hamas' greatest support in the wake of the conflict with Israel may be from the public in Gaza and other parts of the Arab world.

"Hamas is not a monolith, nor is it only a terrorist group," Ed Husain of the Council on Foreign Relations writes on CNN.com. "It is a social movement, with a mass membership, a popular message of resistance that resonates across the Muslim world, and a political party with which we must negotiate."

Some analysts believe Hamas will emerge stronger from the fight with Israel. The conflict "will only further radicalize the Palestinian population -- and alienate frustrated friends in the United States," Mark Perry of Foreign Policy argues.

Before Operation Protective Edge, a poll by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy found that most Palestinians in Gaza oppose a two-state solution and want to work toward abolishing Israel -- a goal that is in line with Hamas' charter.

But the poll also found most Palestinians support nonviolent methods of achieving their goals.

Support could affect arms supply

While Hamas' recruitment might soar now, militarily the group "is on the ropes," with tunnels destroyed and much of its rocket supply depleted, writes Rick Francona, retired U.S. Air Force intelligence officer and CNN military analyst.

"After similar conflicts in the past, Hamas has been rearmed and resupplied by its supporters, primarily Iran and to some extent Syria. The most efficient method for the rearming and resupply effort has been via the large number of smuggling tunnels between Gaza and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula.

"That is not likely to be the case this time -- another blow to Hamas, which it must factor in to its assessment of this conflict as well as its future planning."

What is Hamas' endgame in Gaza?

What is Israel's endgame in Gaza?

Response: Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia don't support Hamas, analysts say. Turkey and Qatar do; some question the extent of Qatar's support. Iran and Syria had a falling out with Hamas. Popular support may spike, but weapon supply is limited, analysts say.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Actress Lindsay Lohan's father jumped from a third-floor balcony Thursday to try to escape re-arrest, police said, but officers soon caught up with him and took him into custody -- again.

Officers detained Michael Lohan after his girlfriend, Kate Major, said he violated terms of his release from jail earlier this week by calling her, the Tampa Police Department said in a statement. Investigators arrested Lohan on suspicion of domestic violence after an incident on Monday night, but they let him out of jail after he posted bail.

Just after 1 a.m. Thursday, Lohan's girlfriend called police to say Lohan had violated the terms of his release by calling her, the police statement said. Lohan called his girlfriend again while she was talking with police, and she put him on speakerphone, it said.

After prosecutors authorized Lohan's re-arrest, officers went to a hotel, the Tahitian Inn, where he was staying.

"Upon seeing officers, he jumped out of a third-story balcony in an attempt to escape arrest," the police statement said.

Officers took him into custody after a short chase and discovered after taking him to jail that he may have broken his foot, police said. Doctors were evaluating him.

Lohan is not expected to be released from Tampa General Hospital Thursday and has been admitted for overnight observation, said Tampa police spokeswoman Andrea Davis.

Police responded to a domestic violence call at Michael Lohan's home Monday and arrested him for the battery of his live-in girlfriend, police said.

Lohan told reporters Wednesday he "didn't lay a hand" on his girlfriend.

"I did not hurt her," he said.

Lohan also said he never was served with a restraining order to stay away from the woman. According to CNN Tampa affiliate WFTS, a Sarasota County judge issued a temporary restraining order Tuesday.

Lohan, 51, was arrested in Los Angeles in March in connection with alleged domestic violence and was charged with one misdemeanor count of corporal injury to a cohabitant.

The relationship between Lohan and his daughter has been publicly strained for years, although the two did undergo family counseling together during her treatment at the Betty Ford Center.

CNN's Rich Phillips contributed to this report.

Response: NEW: Lohan has been admitted for overnight hospital observation, police said. Officers say they caught him after a short chase. Lohan may have broken his foot and is being evaluated by doctors. Michael Lohan jumped off a third-floor balcony to escape arrest, police said.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- North Korea resumed firing near its sea border with South Korea on Thursday, South Korean media said, citing Seoul officials.

Artillery shells were fired toward South Korean-controlled Yeonpyeong Island, Yonhap News Agency quoted the officials as saying, adding that the shells fell in waters north of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de facto inter-Korean maritime border.

The North fired artillery shells on Wednesday in the same area, saying they were part of an annual training drill.

"We have confirmed North Korea's firing of several artillery shells, but they did not cross" the two countries' maritime border, said Park Sung-woo, of Seoul's joint chiefs of staff, according to Yonhap. "We are on high military alert."

"Following the firing by North Korea, South Korea responded by shooting vulcan canons into the air, a statement that it would not be intimidated by saber-rattling by the communist neighbor," Yonhap said.

There were no reports of casualties.

Also Thursday, a South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman said that despite the tension, talks slated for Monday with North Korea would still go forward in the North Korean border town of Kaesong, Yonhap reported.

Seventeen South Korean officials are expected to attend those talks, Yonhap cited Chun Hae-sung, the official, as saying.

Response: NEW: Talks still on for Monday in North Korean border town, South Korean official says. North says firing of artillery shells is part of an annual training drill. Inter-Korean talks still set for Monday, Yonhap cites S. Korean official as saying.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Parts of the Eastern United States on Friday fended off freezing rain and snow as a powerful winter storm lumbered through the Great Lakes, driving thunderstorms eastward.

The National Weather Service predicted the storm would affect the Upper Midwest, Great Lakes and the Northeast, with blizzard conditions in Minnesota and Iowa and strong winds across a portion of the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley.

Severe storms -- with wind and large hail -- were possible from Boston to Miami, said CNN meteorologist Sherri Pugh.

Frozen conditions may have been a factor in a crash early Friday in Maine that left a driver dead. An SUV driver lost control of the vehicle while it was traveling on a snow-covered stretch in Somerville and slammed into a big rig, the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office said.

Several New York-area airports -- LaGuardia, Kennedy and Newark in northern New Jersey -- were experiencing ground delays as of 6 p.m, due to limited visibility, the Federal Aviation Administration reported online.

The wild weather also brought strong winds to parts of the Southeast and mid-Atlantic, though that threat was over by evening.

Before then, the weather service reported two possible tornadoes early Friday afternoon in south-central Georgia, including one in Johnson County that damaged 12 buildings, including ripping the front doors off a fire station.

There was also an EF0 tornado -- indicating 65 to 85 mph winds lasting three seconds or more -- in Compton, Maryland, 60 miles southeast of Washington, D.C.

Heavy winds also downed trees in Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia, while up to quarter-size hail was reported on Florida's Atlantic coast around St. Augustine.

This all came on the heels of severe storms that struck Illinois late Thursday afternoon, knocking out power, damaging buildings and spawning floods, the National Weather Service reported.

On Thursday night, storms and high winds swept across Tennessee, pelting Nashville with rain and hail and leaving thousands in the dark.

In Illinois, damaging wind and golf ball-size hail were reported overnight. About 24,000 people in the state lost power, according to utility Ameren Illinois.

Effingham and Champaign counties in Illinois reported flooding.

"We have some power lines down and a little water in the road in some places," said Pam Jacobs, director of the Effingham County Emergency Management Agency.

John Dwyer, emergency management coordinator for Champaign County, reported road flooding and standing water in farm fields. He said the flooding was caused by 3 inches of rain Thursday coupled with the snow melt. The National Weather Service said radar indicated rainfall of 3 to 4 inches per hour.

The Illinois State Police reported that fog caused a wreck on Interstate 57 in northeast Illinois, involving at least 27 vehicles. Authorities said they received reports of injuries, none of them life-threatening.

As the storm moved eastward, winds knocked down dozens of trees in Nashville, reported CNN affiliate WSMV-TV. The station said trained weather spotters reported 1-inch hail and 95-mph winds.

CNN's Ed Payne, Greg Botelho and Ralph Ellis contributed to this report.

Response: NEW: Low visibility causes ground delays at three New York-area airports. NEW: Possible tornadoes touch down in Georgia, Maryland. NEW: High winds strike parts of the Southeast, mid-Atlantic. Storm is expected to affect the Upper Midwest, Great Lakes and Northeast.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Since China took part in the Olympic Games in 1984 after a three-decade absence, competitive sports have served one purpose -- to build national pride.

Athletes' victories on the global stage made us proud of the new China. The new "open" China was full of hopes, dreams and opportunities. A strong, united nation working together to build a better tomorrow was the higher calling for all of us. To serve this calling, many kids who were identified as potential elite athletes were enrolled into the government supported "sports schools." If they trained hard and were talented enough, they would make it to represent their city, their province and then one day their country.

When there is a demand, there was also a reward. Chinese Olympic champions were well rewarded through national and local government, both in terms of compensation and social status. Lang Ping, the star of the 1984 women's volleyball team that won a gold medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, was the Michael Jordan of China.

As the son of a sports reporter, I was fortunate enough to know her when I was a kid. The fact that I knew her made me very popular at school, pretty much like telling everybody at school today that Kobe Bryant is your friend.

In 2008, China won 51 gold medals (100 medals overall) and topped the gold medal tally at the Beijing Olympic Games. After this astounding success, many started to ask what's next?

Economic growth means that people have more options in terms of career. It is more and more difficult to find kids (and parents) who want to join the "sports school" system and aim for that one-in-a-million shot to become an Olympic gold medalist. Academic performance offers a more certain path to success. Better grades means better universities, better universities means better jobs. At least that has been (and will probably still be for a long time) the belief of many parents and teachers.

There is nothing wrong with the obsession towards winning, after all, that's what elite competitive sports is all about but there are other emerging trends that might change the face of sports in China.

A growing urban population and middle class are seeking a better quality of life and personal well-being. In 2013, more than 750,000 people participated in a running competition or marathon, up 50 percent on 2012, according to the China Track and Field Association

In 2014, there will be 53 marathons registered at the China Track and Field Association and this number is projected to grow at least at 20 percent annually. Compared to the 200 marathons held each year in Japan, China still has a long way to go but there is a new enthusiasm for sport at the grassroots level.

However, we also see that more kids (and parents) are embracing sport and the values it teaches. We operate a sports academy in Shanghai that teaches fencing, squash and Thai boxing. Through a season of sports training and competition, we help kids to build confidence, work in teams and develop leadership skills.

These are the qualities that will help them to secure that better future over and beyond their academic performance. The Chinese government and many Chinese educators are starting to see the value of sports in education. They could do more by making sports an important part of school grades.

Six years after the Beijing Olympic Games, there is another Olympic Games currently taking place in China this month -- the 2nd Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing. This Games is different.

At the opening ceremony, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach urged participants to take selfies to show off their good fortune and stressed the importance of sharing, learning and making friends. Most people don't know who won the first gold medal or how many gold medals China has won.

In today's China, the demand for sports has gone beyond Olympic gold medals and national pride.

Sport in China: What's wrong with winning?

Response: The meaning of competitive sports is changing in China. A growing urban population and middle class are seeking a better quality of life and personal well-being through sports. In 2013, more than 750,000 people participated in a running competition or marathon. More kids are embracing sport and the values it teaches.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Republican-controlled House of Representatives on Thursday passed the GOP leadership's 2013 budget plan -- a measure that has no chance of passing the Democratic-controlled Senate but creates a clear contrast between the two parties on a number of critical tax and spending issues ahead of the general election.

The resolution passed in a strongly polarized 228-191 vote. No Democrats backed the measure; only 10 Republicans opposed it.

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan's $3.53 trillion blueprint includes an overhaul of the nation's tax code and major changes to popular entitlements such as Medicare -- expensive programs that in the past have been considered politically untouchable.

Why the budget may never be balanced

Republicans say the plan is necessary to slow the growth of exploding federal deficits and put the federal government on the road to fiscal stability.

"We have one of the most predictable economic crises in this country coming. It's a debt-driven crisis. And so we have an obligation -- not just a legal obligation but a moral obligation -- to do something about it," Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, said Thursday morning. GOP leaders "think the key components are to get spending under control, reform our entitlement programs" and help stimulate economic growth.

Democrats, however, consider the plan a betrayal of last year's bipartisan deficit reduction deal and a GOP giveaway to the wealthy at the expense of the middle class and vulnerable seniors.

"In our view, we certainly don't want to return to some of the economic policies that got us into the mess to begin with. And we are concerned that the Republican budget does that," said Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, a member of the House Democratic leadership. "It disrupts the fragile recovery and undercuts investments that are going to be important for the long-term economic strength of the United States of America."

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney released a statement after the vote blasting House Republicans for banding "together to shower millionaires and billionaires with a massive tax cut paid for by ending Medicare as we know it and making extremely deep cuts to critical programs needed to create jobs and strengthen the middle class."

Romney garners two endorsements

Over the past two days, the sharply divided House has overwhelmingly rejected President Barack Obama's budget proposal, a House Democratic plan, a more conservative Republican alternative, and a bipartisan blueprint containing controversial spending cuts and tax hikes opposed by majorities in both parties.

The blueprint -- derived from proposals advanced by a special commission led by former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles and former Wyoming GOP Sen. Alan Simpson -- includes roughly $2 trillion in cuts and more than $1 trillion in new tax revenues over the next decade. The measure failed in a 382-38 vote.

While a budget resolution is not binding, it is used to guide congressional appropriators responsible for allocating federal dollars. Both chambers of Congress have not agreed on such a measure since the spring of 2009.

Among other things, the Ryan plan calls for a reduction in individual tax rates and brackets. Instead of today's six brackets, with rates from 10% to 35%, it calls for just two: 10% and 25%. The proposal would eliminate the alternative minimum tax while dropping the top corporate tax rate from 35% to 25%.

GOP leaders would compensate for lost revenue by closing a series of tax loopholes and ending numerous deductions. They have declined to offer any details, however, on exactly which loopholes and deductions would be affected, instead insisting that the matter will be taken up at the congressional committee level in the future.

Returning to one of the most controversial points from last year's budget fight, the proposal includes dramatic changes to the Medicare program. It would offer future seniors a choice of staying in the traditional fee-for-service plan or opting instead for a Medicare-approved private plan, all of which would be available via a new Medicare exchange.

No matter which plan they chose, including the traditional Medicare plan, seniors would receive a government subsidy to help pay for their choice.

While Republicans insist the change is necessary to ensure the program's long-term fiscal viability, Democrats accuse the GOP of trying to destroy a key legacy of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society.

The Republicans "want Medicare to wither on the vine, to die," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-California, said this month.

Medicaid, which provides health coverage for the poor, would be converted under the GOP plan into a series of block grants for states. Individual states would be empowered to tighten eligibility rules or revise enrollees' cost-sharing obligations.

The GOP proposal also protects defense spending by undoing a scheduled $55 billion cut in the Pentagon budget, replacing the reduction with cuts elsewhere. Ryan has previously called the scheduled Pentagon cuts -- part of the agreement reached in last summer's Budget Control Act -- "devastating to America's defense capabilities."

On Thursday, Ryan said senior military officials defending lower Pentagon spending proposals have not been honest.

"We don't think the generals are giving us their true advice," he said, accusing them of following an administration line. "I think there is a lot of budget smoke and mirrors in the (administration's) Pentagon budget, which is not really a true, honest and accurate budget. When you confront military experts -- retired or active -- they concede these things to us."

Republicans would compensate for higher defense spending in part by requiring greater federal worker pension contributions and more means-testing of entitlement benefits.

Overall, Ryan's plan caps 2013 domestic discretionary spending -- programs other than entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare -- at $1.028 trillion. Democrats immediately cried foul when the new proposed cap was unveiled, noting that it's nearly $20 billion below the total agreed to in last summer's deficit reduction deal.

House GOP leaders insist they can propose any amount under the $1.047 trillion level, because that figure simply represents the top limit for discretionary spending, not a level up to which Congress must spend.

While the House Republicans' proposed budget has no chance of becoming law, it could have a significant impact on this year's presidential and congressional campaigns. Democrats believe the proposed Medicare changes in particular could damage GOP hopes in key swing states such as Florida, which has a large elderly population.

Numerous Republicans, however, believe they'll be rewarded for having the political courage to tackle politically sensitive issues. They also argue that it's important to draw clear distinctions with Democrats before voters go to the polls in November.

CNN's Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report.

Response: House of Representatives passes GOP Rep. Paul Ryan's budget plan. Ryan budget includes big changes in Medicare, tax code. Democrats say the plan would hurt the elderly and middle class. They argue that the plan is a betrayal of last year's deficit reduction deal.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:The ancient world was full of strange animals that have gone extinct, such as a group of marine species with claw-like structures emerging from their heads. A new study suggests that these creatures were related to spiders and scorpions.

Researchers discovered the fossilized remains of a species in southwest China that provides new insights into the evolution of animals in the modern era, scientists said. They report their findings in the journal Nature.

Scientists believe that the creature -- 1 inch long, and with two pairs of eyes -- lived 520 million years ago and that it crawled or swam in the ocean. They were able to reconstruct the creature's nervous system to gain insights about its evolutionary relationships to animals familiar to us.

"For the first time, we are able to use fossilised neural anatomy to sort out how fossil animals are related to animals today," study co-author Xiaoya Ma of the Department of Earth Sciences at the Natural History Museum in London wrote in an e-mail.

This creature belongs to the Alalcomenaeus genus, and its place in the animal kingdom lies in "a group of weird extinct animals" called the "megacheiran" or "great appendage" arthropods, Ma said.

The species of the Alalcomenaeus group had elongated, segmented bodies with about 12 pairs of appendages they used for swimming or crawling. They also had a pair of long, scissor-like head claws, most likely for grabbing or sensing.

Scientists say the reconstruction of the new creature's nervous system is the most complete for an arthropod living at that time, in the Cambrian geological period.

Discovery makes a splash: The rarest whale

The brain and central nervous system of the creature are organized in a way that is similar to those of the chelicerata, the group that includes horseshoe crabs and scorpions. This suggests a close evolutionary relationship between the ancient Alalcomenaeus and the living chelicerata.

A distinct group of arthropods called the mandibulates includes lobsters, insects, centipedes and millipedes.

Last year at the same site in China -- called the Chengjiang formation near Kunming -- Ma and colleagues discovered a 520 million-year-old crustacean-type nervous system in an animal called Fuxianhuia.

Taken together, these discoveries suggest that by 520 million years ago, the two major groups of arthropods had diverged. Their common ancestor must have been older, researchers said.

"This means the ancestors of spiders and their kin lived side by side with the ancestors of crustaceans," co-author Nick Strausfeld, neuroscience professor at the University of Arizona, said in a statement.

Strausfeld's team used sophisticated imaging techniques to look at the inch-long Alalcomenaeus fossil. One kind of scan revealed that iron had built up in the nervous system as the creature fossilized. They also used a technique called computed tomography that reconstructs 3-D features.

By combining these images and discarding any data that weren't in both, they were able to create a sort of negative X-ray photograph, "and out popped this beautiful nervous system in startling detail,"  Strausfeld said.

It confirmed what scientists had believed from the creature's outward appearance: The extinct genus Alalcomenaeus was related to chelicerates (spiders, scorpions and others).

They also saw that the brain in the fossil was like the brains found in modern scorpions and spiders.

If researchers find a fossil with features shared by this creature and the crustacean-like fossil Ma and colleagues found last year, that could be a common ancestor of both.

There's plenty more weirdness from ancient history to uncover.

18-foot oarfish discovered

Response: The fossil is 520 million years old and was found in China. Using multiple images of the animal, the researchers discovered the nervous system. They also saw the brain was like those of today's spiders, scorpions. The work shows the early evolutionary differences, researcher says.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- The first clue was a boat floating in the ocean with no one on board.

So teams of rescuers took off, unsure of they were looking for when one crew saw the unmistakeable second clue.

There on a sandbar were three huge letters -- S.O.S.

And there on a nearby rocky island were five people on a rocky outcrop off the northeastern coast of Australia, happy to see a helicopter after eight hours of waiting.

The incident occurred Monday when five people were snorkeling in the Pacific Ocean. They anchored their boat near the sandbar, the Courier-Mail newspaper of Brisbane reported, but the boat drifted away after its anchor broke.

They stamped out a large distress signal in the sand, but they knew it was only a matter of time before the tide claimed the signal.

The rocks were high enough, but the group had no phones or food, which floated away with the boat.

"We were a bit (sun)burned and it would have been fairly cold (if they had to stay out through the night)," Lyn Forbes-Smith told The Courier-Mail. She said they had gone diving at 8 a.m. and were picked up about 4 p.m.

A helicopter rescue crew from Central Queensland took off and after an hour spotted the SOS.

"We did two sweeps and then when we came across some guys on the rocks and we saw SOS written in the sand so we knew it was them straight away," crew member Damien Kross told Seven Network. "It was actually quite good because we knew we found them."

By the time the helicopter got there, the water level had made it impossible to send a boat in for a rescue attempt.

The crew used a winch and basket to bring the three men and two women into the helicopter. Kross said the five were in good spirits despite being a little dehydrated.

Response: Five people were snorkeling off northeastern coast of Australia when boat got away. They made a giant SOS on a sandbar and retreated to a rocky outcrop. Worried tide would wash away their message, helicopter crew finds them. They were lifted up to the helicopter in a basket rescue.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Sixty-four cases of measles have been diagnosed in the United States this year, the most in seven years, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Measles is a respiratory disease whose familiar symptom is red blotches on the skin.

In all but one of the cases, the people who contracted measles had not been vaccinated. Some were too young to have gotten the shots, which are administered from 12 to 15 months of age.

The CDC released the statistics Thursday to "serve as a reminder that measles can and still does occur in the U.S. Ongoing measles virus transmission was declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, but the risk of cases and outbreaks from imported disease remains," the organization said in a news release.  Interactive: More about measles »

In 54 of this year's cases the victims imported the measles from other countries, the CDC said.

Dr. Anne Schuchat, the director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said many of the imported cases came from European nations and Israel.  Watch more on the measles outbreak »

"Many people have forgot about measles in the United States," she said Schuchat at a news conference Thursday. "It is very important for travelers heading off to Europe to make sure their immunizations are up to date."

The cases were reported in nine states, it said, and cases are being treated in Wisconsin, Arizona, Michigan and New York.

Measles is a viral disease that can be deadly if not treated. The 64 patients ranged in age from 5 months to 71 years. Fourteen patients were hospitalized but no deaths were reported. E-mail to a friend

Response: CDC: 64 confirmed measles cases in nine states since January. 64 patients ranged in age from 5 months to 71 years. 63 of the 64 were unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status. Highest number reported for same time period since 2001.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- The Boston Bruins put down their hockey sticks on Monday and got decked out "Frozen"-style for a good cause.

Bruins defenseman Dougie Hamilton would never have been Disney's first choice for Elsa, the cartoon star of the hit "Frozen" movie. But he and forward Matt Fraser (now known as Elsa's sister, Anna) brought a bit of Halloween fun to the sick children at Boston Children's Hospital.

Rounding out the cast were Bruins defenseman Kevan Miller (Kristoff), forward Seth Griffith (Hans), defenseman Matt Bartkowski (Sven) and defenseman Torey Krug (Olaf).

"We're all fans of it. I've seen the movie, and I'm a fan so I'm not going to lie about that," Hamilton said on the team's blog. "It's fun to be able to be something that's popular and they all know it and make them smile."

It appears the movie's hit song "Let It Go" has even made its way into the players' song lists. "I've heard the song a lot of times, especially with my niece singing," Krug said. "I know the lyrics."

Response: Boston Bruins hockey players dress up "Frozen"-style for Halloween. The team made their annual visit to Boston Children's Hospital. Bruins defenseman Dougie Hamilton was decked out as Elsa. A few players knew the words to the movie's hit song, "Let It Go".


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:LONDON, England (CNN) -- Open any fashion magazine and you're instantly bombarded with a collection of blindingly beautiful celebrities, bedazzled with shimmering jewels and perfectly coiffed "messy hair."

Anna Boccia Lewis has been a DVF fan since the 1970s. Do you own a wrap dress? Tell us why.

They teeter on gorgeous stilettos strutting their perfectly toned figures in clothing that could cost as much as a typical mortgage.

Close that same fashion magazine -- or maybe ever-so-gently hurl it at the wall -- and perhaps you're left feeling slightly inadequate and envious. After all, why should we be left out of all the fun just because we can't afford the clothing in the magazine?

But there is one fashion item that has arguably been bridging the gap for more than three decades between the wealthy elite and the average woman. This item is Diane Von Furstenberg's wrap dress.

Just like the "Little Black Dress,"  Furstenberg's wrap dress is considered an essential in many womens' wardrobes.

Diane Von Furstenberg, or DVF as she's known, sold her first wrap dress in the 1970s.

"It has been a unique phenomenon, " the Belgian designer told CNN. "What was new about my wrap dress was that I did it in jersey and therefore it molded the body and it was very flattering to the body."

Technically speaking, a wrap dress is like a kimono.

"It's a very traditional form of clothing, it's a dress that has no buttons and no zipper," said Von Furstenberg.

Since its inception, millions have flown off the racks. But that isn't to say the dress didn't see its dark periods as well.

There was a time when the trend for wrap dresses was declared over, but like any good (or bad) fashion, it experienced a revival.

"Fashion changed completely and things went away," said Von Furstenberg. "Ten years ago I started again because I saw that very hip young girls were buying them in thrift shops."

That trend continues today. While the dresses are stocked in DVF stores, they are regularly bought and sold in vintage stores and through online auction sites, such as eBay.

"My love affair with the DVF wrap dress began in the 1970s," says Anna Boccia Lewis, a self-confessed "DVF addict" from California.

"One of my first purchases was a yellow floral vintage DVF shirtdress that I found at Goodwill in South San Francisco for $4.75.

"I think what I love the most about Diane's designs is that each one has its own special personality -- just like the woman who is wearing it," Anna said.

CNN asked other women to tell us what it is about DVF dresses that make them so special. Tell us your story -- "Sound Off" below.

"They make me feel not only sexy, but successful, sophisticated and timeless," said Carolyn Yapp, a 24-year-old DVF devotee from Jamaica.

Melissa Calivis Green from Baltimore told us: "For me, the iconic prints represent a sense of powerful femininity and the promise of endless possibilities."

Tracey Jennings of the United Kingdom has been wearing DVF dresses for the last ten years. She said: "Like a lot of women, I have varied in size from year to year. As a result, my wrap dresses range from size four to size 10."

Kirsty Palmer, also from the United Kingdom, recently sold one of her DVF dresses on eBay. "I like to change my selection," she said. "Buying vintage wrap dresses makes them more affordable for me, yet I still get the benefit as if I were buying new due to their classic cuts and their durability."

Do you own a wrap dress? If so, we want to hear from you. Why did you buy it and what does it mean to you? "Sound off" below or Email us a picture or go to CNN's facebook page -- facebook.com/cnnintl.

Response: Diane Von Furstenberg's wrap dress has been a fashion staple for decades. The DVF wrap dress is made with jersey which flatters female shapes. Readers told CNN about their devotion to their wrap dresses since the 1970s. Do you own a wrap dress? Send an email and a photo to revealed@cnn.com.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Pakistan cricket legend Imran Khan has described how the unfolding crisis in Haiti revived harrowing memories of a similar earthquake in his own region.

The devastating 7.6 magnitude quake struck northern Pakistan and the divided Kashmir region in October 2005, claiming the lives of almost 80,000 people, according to official estimates, and leaving millions homeless.

Khan, who is now a prominent politician and campaigner for social issues in Pakistan, told CNN Thursday that he was left numbed by the scenes which greeted him as he traveled to some of the worst-affected areas in the aftermath.

"It was one of the most traumatic experiences I've ever had. Just watching human suffering, he said. "It was the children that really disturbed me ... their crushed limbs.

"There were so many people needing attention. I remember seeing makeshift hospitals where they were amputating. That was difficult to take.

"Families were torn apart as parents lost their children and children were orphaned. Whole families were caught inside buildings, while few escaped."

Khan recalled being overwhelmed by the sight of an entire town being reduced to rubble.

"We arrived in the town of Balakot and it was totally flattened. You don't know what to do or say. So many people needing help at one time and you don't have the infrastructure, you don't have the hospitals to help."

Desperation grips Haitian capital

Balakot was one of the worst-hit places, with one in 10 of about 20,000 residents killed, according to the local government of the Mansehra district, where the town of is located. Thousands more were injured.

Pakistani authorities later planned to move the town in the country's North West Frontier Province to a completely new location, owing to its current position on a volatile fault line.

The destruction of Balakot brought home to Khan how much people had lost. "Their livelihoods disappeared overnight," he said. "They had nothing, no business, money, food.

"From what I've seen on television it's similar to what is happening now in Haiti. Clearly they (Haiti) won't have the resources to cope with it, so it will require a real outside effort."

While acknowledging the importance of the international aid effort, Khan pointed to role ordinary Pakistanis played in 2005. "It was incredible. The government was incapacitated but there were little charities and groups forming all over the area trying to help.

"I was in an earthquake-hit area on the second day and I'll never forget seeing a three-mile queue of people trying to get to what was a largely remote area to help with whatever they could put in their cars.

"The government was paralyzed but people came forward, from rich to poor, young to old."

He also pointed to the success volunteer networks had in adopting villages and towns, taking responsibility for providing basic shelter, food and medicine. "Everyone took responsibility," recalled Khan.

"Each group would look after a specific issue until the local population was able to get back on its feet.

"It's so important that the aid effort continues months after the disaster."

Response: Earthquake struck northern Pakistan, divided Kashmir region in 2005, claiming 80,000 lives. Imran Khan recalled being overwhelmed by the sight of an entire town being reduced to rubble. Khan: "Their livelihoods disappeared overnight. They had nothing, no business, money, food". The politician and former cricketer said Haitians must be supported in the longer term.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Filipino hero Manny Pacquiao scored a comprehensive 12-round points victory over Timothy Bradley to regain the WBO welterweight title he controversially lost to the previously unbeaten American two years ago.

At 35, many had believed that the Pacman's best years were behind him, but he was an easy winner Saturday night in Las Vegas on all three of the judges' scorecards after dominating the bout.

Pacquiao improved to 56-5 with two drawn and predicted he would continue to ply his trade in the ring for some time yet.

"I think I can go another two years," said Pacquiao. "I'm so happy to be world champion again. Tim Bradley was not an easy fight."

Bradley had won their 2012 clash on a disputed points decision and Pacquiao also lost his next fight when knocked out by Juan Manuel Marquez in the sixth round.

But he beat the promising young Brandon Rios last November to revive his fortunes and was back to his peerless best to take Bradley's perfect record.

The WBO may mandate Pacquiao to face the winner of the Marquez-Mike Alvarado clash next month although the bigger prize may be a long-awaited clash with American superstar Floyd Mayweather.

Contractual and legal wrangles have to date prevented a money-spinning bout between the two boxing icons but Pacquiao's performance in beating Bradley has certainly restored his reputation.

A star-studded crowd watched the fight in the MGM Grand Arena and aside from a spell in the fourth round, Pacquiao was in control.

Back home in the Philippines, thousands watched the fight on big screens, cheering wildly as their national hero took command.

"The people of the nation are united in cheering on the victory of the nation's fist," President Benigno Aquino's spokesman told AFP after the victory.

Many Filipino's are still recovering from the devastating impact of Super Typhoon Haiyan last year and Aquino said Pacquiao was a symbol of resistance in the face of adversity, having himself recovered from the defeats to Bradley and Marquez.

Response: Manny Pacquiao regains WBO welterweight crown. 'Pacman' beats Timothy Bradley on unanimous points decision. Bradley beat Pacquiao in controversial circumstances in 2012. Pacquiao is a national hero in his native Philippines.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- It's the height of summer in Paris, and the director of the most famous art museum in the world is queuing like any other tourist.

Three-and-a-half hours later, Jean-Luc Martinez finally enters the Louvre, putting his bag through security, asking for directions, stopping to buy snacks and drinks.

It's a familiar story for anyone brave enough to join the snaking line during peak season. Less so, when you're the man who holds the key to the front door.

A few months after taking the top job at the Louvre, 49-year-old Martinez went on a covert mission to see what it's really like for the average Joe jostling against the snap-happy masses.

Why? "If you are a professional, there is a risk at certain times you are only going to look at the museum with the eyes of a professional," he told CNN in his first television interview with the international press, since taking the role in April.

"The people who visit the Louvre might only stop by once, and a trip to Paris is the holiday of their life. We have to make sure that they are received with a certain dignity."

The people's museum?

With over 9.7 million tourists streaming through the turnstiles last year -- easily making it the most popular museum on the planet -- the biggest challenge the institution now faces is not how to increase numbers, but how to improve the experience.

How will Martinez, one of the institution's youngest ever directors, make that happen?

"I hope it will be more welcoming, which means that when you arrive at the museum there are less queues, that the people of foreign origin find reference points in their language, that with the help of Wi-Fi and apps you understand what you see," he said.

"I picture a museum in which everyone finds their space. What threatens museums is that it is only an elite which understands the works of art. I want a museum where there are young people, children, elderly people -- and that requires work."

Modest Martinez

It's an ambitious vision for the 220-year-old gallery, an institution so steeped in prestige that Martinez underwent an interview with French President Francois Hollande before being offered the role.

But then, Martinez isn't like previous directors. Growing up in social housing just outside of Paris in the 1960s, his father was a postman, his mother a caretaker of an apartment building.

A former archeology and art history professor, Martinez was head of the Louvre's Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities department before taking over from 12-year director Henri Loyrette -- himself the son of a business lawyer.

Described by colleagues as a "quiet intellectual with a penchant for tweed and sweater vests," Martinez says the first time he visited the gallery as an 11-year-old on a school trip, it revolutionized his view of the world.

"I was a kid that lived in a modern city, almost entirely dating from the 1960s," he said. "And there I was, in the heart of Paris, shown works of art that were more than 5,000 years old and that history is profound."

Beyond the stars

Yet gaze across at the crowds scrambling to get a photo of the Mona Lisa -- while a room of precious Rembrandt paintings stands almost empty -- and you get the feeling not everyone shares Martinez's appreciation for the Louvre's vast collection.

"The majority of people want to see the works of art that are the most famous -- the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, and the Winged Victory of Samothrace," said Martinez.

"We have to do some profound work to valorize the other collections."

How? Through exhibitions of lesser-known works, new educational centers, and translating information plaques into English.

Brand Louvre

Of the Louvre's 460,000 works, just 35,000 are exhibited, the rest in storage deep under the famous building.

That's where Louvre Lens comes in -- a €150 million ($200 million) sister gallery in a former mining town in northern France. Opened last year, the gleaming new building displays around 200 pieces on loan from Paris.

It's part of a growing Louvre empire, with another gallery set to open in Abu Dhabi in 2015, exhibiting 300 works from French museums.

The United Arab Emirates is paying €400 million ($538 million) for the prestigious Louvre name. And in times of austerity, it's a deal which will help the French institution revamp its entrance and ticket areas.

Does the deal also devalue the Louvre brand?

"No," says Martinez. "It's an agreement, a scientific partnership, an economic partnership."

With Martinez at the helm, it's also the beginning of a brave new era for the beloved institution.

Response: Jean-Luc Martinez, new director of the Louvre, reveals plans to shake-up establishment. 49-year-old comes from modest background, father was a postman, mother a caretaker. Wants visitors to be treated with "dignity," plans multimillion revamp of ticket area. Says $538m deal to build Louvre Abu Dhabi will help pay for makeover of French institution.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN)Ever had a headache so big, you felt like drilling a hole in your head to let the pain out?

In Neolithic times trepanation -- or drilling a hole into the skull -- was thought to be a cure for everything from epilepsy to migraines.

It could even have been a form of emergency surgery for battle wounds.

But while there is still conjecture about the real reasons behind the mysterious procedure, what is known is that the implement often used to carry out the primitive surgery was made from one of the sharpest substances found in nature -- obsidian.

Obsidian -- a type of volcanic glass -- can produce cutting edges many times finer than even the best steel scalpels.

At 30 angstroms -- a unit of measurement equal to one hundred millionth of a centimeter -- an obsidian scalpel can rival diamond in the fineness of its edge.

When you consider that most household razor blades are 300-600 angstroms, obsidian can still cut it with the sharpest materials nano-technology can produce.

Even today, a small number of surgeons are using an ancient technology to carry out fine incisions that they say heal with minimal scarring.

Dr. Lee Green, professor and chair of the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Alberta, says he routinely uses obsidian blades.

"The biggest advantage with obsidian is that it is the sharpest edge there is, it causes very little trauma to tissue, it heals faster and more importantly it heals with less scarring," he said.

"It makes for the best cosmetic outcome."

He explained that steel scalpels at a microscopic level have a rough cutting edge that tears into tissue, a function of the crystals that make up the metal. Obsidian, meanwhile, cleaves into a fine and continuous edge when properly cut.

Dr. Green said he once helped documentary makers produce a program on surgical technology in ancient Egyptian, setting up a blind test on the cutting power of obsidian.

Using cultured-skin burn dressing, a substance composed of skin cells, he made an incision with a modern scalpel and a parallel incision with an obsidian scalpel.

The host of the program was then invited to look at the cuts under a video microscope and tell the difference.

"It wasn't hard to tell the difference at all -- as soon as he turned around everyone in the studio was like 'Ohhh'," Dr. Green said. "Under the microscope you could see the obsidian scalpel had divided individual cells in half, and next to it the steel scalpel incision looked like it had been made by a chainsaw."

Modern obsidian scalpels look nothing like the decorative flint-knapped knives of Neolithic man, often resembling their modern counterparts in everything except for the blade edge, but Dr. Green said they are a very different animal.

"The feel is very different because obsidian has no 'bite,'" he said. "If you look under the microscope at a steel scalpel edge it looks almost like a saw, it has teeth, whereas obsidian is smooth even microscopically.

"It's a very different feel to work with and you have to practice before you start using it in surgery.

"You also have to be careful not to nick yourself with it because you don't even feel it!"

And Dr. Green believes incisions made with these blades heal faster. He said a colleague who needed a mole removed agreed to undergo an experiment where half the procedure was carried out with an obsidian scalpel and the other half was removed with steel.

"What's really fun is seeing it heal," he said. "Four weeks later the difference was quite remarkable -- there was very much a difference in scarring."

In Germany, the manufacturer Fine Science Tools produces obsidian scalpels which can be used in situations where the patient may have an allergy to steel or metal.

"For studies where trace metals from ordinary scalpel blades cannot be tolerated, these very special obsidian scalpels may provide the answer," the company says.

At €99 per scalpel ($107.40), they represent a considerable saving on their diamond cousins which the company prices at €712.50 ($772.60).

But there has been little academic research into the efficacy of obsidian blades compared to steel scalpels, and they do have disadvantages: Obsidian scalpels are not Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved, and they are extremely brittle and prone to breaking if lateral forces are applied -- meaning they are unlikely to ever be in widespread use.

Dr. Green, whose scalpels were manufactured for him by an expert flint-knapper and archaeologist Errett Callahan, concedes the Stone Age scalpels are not for everyone.

"If it was let loose on the market there'd be far too many injuries from it," he said. "It's very fragile and it's very easy to break pieces off."

Response: Obsidian can produce cutting edges many times finer than even the best steel scalpels. Some surgeons still use the blades in procedures today.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:SAN FRANCISCO, California (CNN)  -- Imagine collecting thousands of empty plastic bottles, lashing them together to make a boat and sailing the thing from California to Australia, a journey of 11,000 miles (17,700 km) through treacherous seas.

This 60-foot sailboat, the Plastiki, is being built from more than 12,000 recycled plastic bottles.

You'd have to be crazy, or trying to make a point. David de Rothschild is trying to make a point.

De Rothschild hopes his one-of-a-kind vessel, now being built on a San Francisco pier, will boost recycling of plastic bottles, which he says are a symbol of global waste. Except for the masts, which are metal, everything on the 60-foot catamaran is made from recycled plastic.

"It's all sail power," he said. "The idea is to put no kind of pollution back into the atmosphere, or into our oceans for that matter, so everything on the boat will be composted. Everything will be recycled. Even the vessel is going to end up being recycled when we finish."

De Rothschild's vessel, scheduled to set sail from San Francisco in April, is called the Plastiki. Its name is an homage of sorts to Thor Heyerdahl, the fabled Norwegian explorer who in 1947 sailed 4,300 miles across the Pacific on the Kon-Tiki, a raft made from balsa wood.

De Rothschild is something of an adventurer himself. The scion of a wealthy British banking family, he is one of only several dozen people to traverse both the Arctic and Antarctic ice caps. In 2005 he founded Adventure Ecology, an organization that uses field expeditions to call attention to environmental issues.  Watch how the boat is constructed »

Joining him on the Plastiki will be a permanent crew of three sailors and scientists plus a handful of other crew members who will rotate through the voyage. The Plastiki is expected to stop in Hawaii, Tuvalu and Fiji on its way to Sydney, a trip estimated to take more than 100 days.

The plastic sailboat is taking shape in an old pier building not far from this city's famous Fisherman's Wharf. Here, thousands of two-liter soda bottles are being stripped of their labels, washed, filled with dry-ice powder and then resealed. The dry ice sublimates into carbon dioxide gas and pressurizes the bottle, making it rigid.

The vessel's twin hulls will be filled with 12,000 to 16,000 bottles. Skin-like panels made from recycled PET, a woven plastic fabric, will cover the hulls and a watertight cabin, which sleeps four.

"This actually is the same material that is made out of bottles," said de Rothschild of the PET fabric. "We actually wrap the PET fabric over the PET foam and then basically put it under a vacuum, heat it, press it and create these long PET panels. So that means the boat is, technically, one giant bottle."

Two wind turbines and an array of solar panels will charge a bank of 12-volt batteries, which will power several onboard laptop computers, a GPS and SAT phone.

Only about 10 percent of the Plastiki will be made from new materials, de Rothschild said. He declined to reveal how much it's costing him to build the boat.

"We could potentially put together a boat that costs a fraction of what normal conventional boats are made of," he said. "The idea is to take the Plastiki, break it down [after the voyage], and put it back into the system. So, it may come out being a jacket, a bag, more bottles. It's infinitely recyclable."

The ultimate goal of the Plastiki voyage is not just to encourage people to embrace clean, renewable energy but also to see consumer waste as a potential resource.

That's what this is all about -- showcasing cradle-to-cradle products rather than cradle-to-grave," de Rothschild said.

Whether the Plastiki will successfully complete its unique journey remains to be seen. But to conservationists concerned about the amount of energy required to manufacture and distribute plastic bottles, its symbolic message is a welcome one.

"Anything that gets in the news and makes people stop and think about plastic can be very helpful," said Betty McLaughlin, executive director of the Container Recycling Institute.

"But it strikes me as a long way to go. I flew from Los Angeles to Australia once, and it took forever. This trip strikes me as kind of dangerous."

Response: An adventurer is building a sailboat out of thousands of recycled plastic soda bottles. He plans to sail it this spring from California to Australia, a journey of 11,000 miles. Expedition leader is David de Rothschild, scion of a wealthy British banking family. Boat, the Plastiki, will be a symbol of how consumer waste can be repurposed.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN)  -- Martin Kaymer increased his lead in the Race to Dubai with a superlative final round of 66 at St.Andrews to claim a three-shot victory in the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship on Sunday.

The German birdied the final two holes at the home of golf to hold off a determined challenge by England's Danny Willett as he finished on 17-under 271.

But there was disappointment for Lee Westwood who needed a top two finish to immediately dislodge Tiger Woods as world number one, but struggled to a one-over 73 for a tie for 11th.

Westwood, who has been struggling with a recurrence of a calf injury, then confirmed he will not play again until the end of the month at the latest.

But due to a quirk of the rankings, it could mean the Englishman will take over at the top in three weeks' time unless Woods changes his plans and enters a tournament before next month's HSBC Champions in China.

"It's just got more aggravated and achy as the week has gone on," Westwood told Sky Sports after his round.

Kaymer, who claimed his first major title with victory at the PGA Championship, was winning his third straight tournament and again showed his cool under pressure.

With Willett challenging, Kaymer needed to get down in two from just off the green at the famous 17th Road Hole to stay at 15 under.

But he proceeded to hole his putt to suddenly open up a two-shot lead and despite finding a tricky lie on the road at the 18th hit his approach to within 10 feet.

Kaymer duly holed the putt to complete one of his ambitions of winning at St.Andrews and claim his fourth title of a superb season which has seen him move nearly $1.5 million clear of Ryder Cup teammate Graeme McDowell at the top of the European Tour money list.

He had his own views on the ongoing battle to top the rankings.

"To be honest I think at the moment Lee Westwood is number one in the world," Kaymer said. "He plays unbelievable golf."

Overnight leader John Parry of England recovered from a mid-round crisis to finish with a level-par 72 for 13-under and sole third. Another Englishman, Gary Boyd, finished a further shot back for fourth after a fine 68.

Response: Martin Kaymer of Germany wins the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. The victory increases his lead over second-placed Graeme McDowell in the Race to Dubai. Lee Westwood fails in his bid to take over as world number one from Tiger Woods. Danny Willett of England finishes with a 67 to claim second place.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- One half Indian, the other Pakistani, they are the most talked-about partnership in tennis.

Dubbed "the Indo-Pakistan Express," Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi hope to end their breakthrough year with a showdown at the infamous Wagah border that divides their countries.

Bopanna, an Indian Hindu, and Qureshi, a Pakistani Muslim also aged 30, reached their first major doubles final at the U.S. Open in September and climbed to eighth in the world rankings.

Yet their work off the court has attracted just as much attention as they try to soften the often-fractious relationship between their two nations since partition in 1947.

The pair have been honored with a string of awards for their humanitarian work in the past 12 months, and are determined to start picking up tournament titles in 2011.

Can champion duo's reunion spark an Indian tennis boom?

But a showpiece clash at the notorious border crossing that hosts a nightly pageant between India and Pakistan's border forces would be the perfect way to carry their "Stop War, Start Tennis" campaign into the new year.

"We're thinking how to get to a wider audience and spread the message of peace through our partnership and thought," Qureshi told CNN's Open Court.

"How about playing a match at the Wagah border, with Rohan playing on the Pakistani side and me on the Indian side for a gesture of friendship?

"At the U.S. Open the ambassadors to the United Nations for Pakistan and India both came to watch the semifinals and finals. That was a huge deal because normally you don't see two diplomats cheering for one cause -- it was a really positive sign. I just hope in the near future we can have that match at the border, that would be great."

The village of Wagah, near the Indian city of Amritsar and the Pakistani city of Lahore, is the only road border crossing between the two countries, and the daily ceremony -- which includes a lot of strutting, stamping and saluting -- regularly attracts a crowd of thousands.

A match there could be a watershed moment for a pairing that first emerged in 2003 but did not make a major impact until this season.

Their burgeoning partnership on court is allied to a deep-rooted desire to strengthen links between two countries which have a long and deep distrust of each other.

"We're both brand ambassadors for an organization called Peace and Sport," Bopanna said. "Right now we're trying to see if we can help tennis in both our countries, promote it and keep the sport growing as much as we can."

As well as receiving the Arthur Ashe Humanitarian of the Year award at the recent ATP World Tour Finals in London, they were also given the Peace and Sport Award for 2010 at a glittering ceremony in Monaco.

The citation read: "Their commitment to promoting peace between the two countries and their conviction that peace was possible was shown amply during the year."

Joel Bouzou, president of the Peace and Sport Foundation, added of the proposed Wagah match: "The sport is ready for peace. Will the two governments rise to the occasion?"

Their partnership may have attracted plenty of headlines but for Qureshi, teaming up with his Indian counterpart made perfect sense.

"I've been playing with Indian players ever since I started playing tennis," he said.

"Unfortunately there are not that many Pakistanis on the tour, and playing with an Indian was actually the most natural thing that came to me -- having the same language, most of the time having the same dinner, Indian or Pakistani foods in the evening.

"The first time I ever traveled to India when I was 16, I was one of the top [Pakistani] juniors and he was one of the top juniors in India and that's how I got to know him.

"Knowing his attacking style of play, I always knew if we played together we'd be able to make a really good impact. I think results clearly show in that way I was right, though normally he tells me that I am always wrong!"

As well as their run to the final of the U.S. Open, where they were beaten by the Bryan brothers from America, they also enjoyed success at Wimbledon which made them household names back home.

"This year we made the quarterfinal at Wimbledon and that was very, very big in Pakistan," Qureshi said. "I've always told him I think he's the most popular Indian guy in Pakistan this year!

"I can thank him enough for that because obviously without him I wouldn't have been able to achieve all those goals, and with him being my best friend on the tour it makes it the icing on the cake. It's been a great journey so far."

Response: Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi are the most talked about doubles pairing in tennis. Bopanna is an Indian Hindu while Qureshi is a Pakistani Muslim. The pair are known for their Humanitarian work to strengthen links between their countries. They made the 2010 U.S. Open final and want to stage a match on the India-Pakistan border.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:Tokyo (CNN) -- Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged to move forward swiftly with his plans to revive Japan's staggering economy after weekend elections gave his Liberal Democratic Party control of the upper house of parliament.

The conservative LDP and its coalition partner together won 76 of the 121 seats in the House of Councillors, giving them a total of 133 votes in the 242-member chamber. Afterward, Abe said he wanted to press ahead with his plans -- including his economic programs -- "with speed."

"I would like to meet the expectation of the Japanese people," Abe said after Sunday's vote. "Since the inauguration of my administration, we have been appealing that our policies are the only way to go. We believe that the Japanese people pushed us to make policy decisions and bring about the result."

The LDP controls the lower house of the Diet, Japan's parliament. But until Sunday, the House of Councillors was led by opposition parties that had made it difficult for Abe to get his program through the chamber.

Abe took office in December, becoming Japan's seventh prime minister in six years and taking a second turn at the job. He immediately launched a program nicknamed "Abenomics," a combination of coordinated government spending, structural reforms and central bank stimulus.

The plan was to boost prices and end 15 years of deflation, leading to more robust growth for the world's third-largest economy. And Japan's economy surged in the first quarter of 2013, growing a faster-than-expected 3.5% -- but a stock-market skid in June raised questions about whether policymakers can pull off the high-wire act in the heavily indebted country.

CNN's Yoko Wakatsuki reported from Tokyo; Matt Smith reported and wrote from Atlanta.

Response: "Our policies are the only way to go," Abe says. His ruling Liberal Democrats won control of Japan's upper house on Sunday. He has launched an ambitious plan to revive Japan's economy.


Prompt:
Explain the text in one sentence.
 Text:(CNN) -- Bryan and Donna Scott married a year and a half after meeting on the beach in their home state of Florida. For their wedding, they received several antiques that they often spent weekends fixing up. The hobby became a habit as they frequented garage and estate sales, looking for old lighting fixtures they could make new.

Eventually, requests came in from family and friends who wanted them, and then from an online store Bryan set up.

By 2008, when recession caused many small businesses to close shop, the Scotts left their day jobs to grow the business, Barn Light Electric Company.

"I always tell people I became an accidental business owner," founder and owner Bryan said. "It just happened. It was so successful and grew so much."

The Scotts, both 48, left careers in law enforcement and nursing to focus on Barn Light. The company, based in Titusville, Florida, manufactures and sells vintage-inspired lighting fixtures and has expanded into other industrial-styled goods. Last year, Scott reported, the company pulled in $10 million in revenue.

It wasn't always easy. They used their first profits to pay off bills in the event their success was only a flash.

"After we quit our jobs, it was scary at that point. I didn't know if it was going to last," he said. Going from "fixed income to being responsible for your own paycheck," they realized that the livelihood of their three children and then-staff of three employees depended on Barn Light's success.

It motivated them to keep working hard and stay grounded. They've been married for 29 years, Scott said, and building Barn Light made them stronger. He is the "gas," and Donna is the "bricks," he said of their collaborative management of the company; he runs the manufacturing while she heads the administration, sales and marketing.

He has some advice for others interested in turning their hobbies into a business.

"First, have a passion for what you're doing and don't approach it as a money-making opportunity," he said. "Second, find that unserved niche within your hobby and aggressively go after it. Third, be a good blogger/copywriter or find someone who can do this for you."

Scott attributes their success largely to being unique. They're manufacturing vintage-inspired lighting styles and specialize in porcelain enamel finishes, a process the company says "has not been seen in America for over 50 years." The company bought the patents of old lighting businesses, including Benjamin Electric Manufacturing Company, and allows employees and customers to suggest ideas for new styles.

A sense of family within the workplace and a strong connection to their Florida town has helped sustain and grow the business, they said. The Scotts both grew up in Titusville, famous for the Kennedy Space Center. They've hired an eclectic group of employees, including longtime workers on the space shuttle program, coal miners and about a dozen convicted felons with whom that Bryan developed relationships and offered a second chance.

"They put heart and soul into the company. [They're] some of our best workers," Scott said, and noted that some of them are now in managerial positions.

Johnny Bragg, manufacturing general manager for Barn Light and Bryan Scott's uncle, calls Barn Light the best job he's ever had.

"I'm a veteran. I like American-made products," he said. "Employees take pride in their work."

Bragg thinks of his fellow employees as close friends, he said. They "don't just leave because it's the end of the day but because they've done a good job for Barn Light."

The company pays well, employees said, and has a sense of humor, too.

After a string of visitors became pregnant after drinking from a certain water fountain, they hung a sign that says, "Warning! Drinking from this water may cause pregnancy." One employee's wife intentionally drank from the fountain to test the myth -- and turned out to be pregnant.

They grew from a spare bedroom, to the garage, to a storefront and eventually, to three facilities -- shipping and assembly, porcelain enamel production and administration. The company is planning a move into one large building to bring their 80 employees under one roof in September, although projected growth suggests they might need to move in a few years.

Locals may see a new building and go "Oh, its Barn Light, they're getting bigger again," Barn Light's communications coordinator Betty Lynne said.

"It speaks to his heart," Lynne says of Bryan and the work ethic of the couple. "He's one of the few people I know that loves going to work every day and loves what he does."

Response: Barn Light Electric Company started as an interest in refurbishing antique lighting. Its husband-and-wife founders left their jobs to grow the company. Barn Light's presence has helped to keep jobs in their hometown of Titusville, Florida. Founder: "Have a passion for what you're doing ... find that unserved niche".