Egypt crash kills 49 schoolchildren; transportation chief resigns

CAIRO — The Egyptian transportation minister resigned Saturday after 49 children were killed on their way to school in southern Egypt in a collision between their bus and a train.

The state-run news agency said a total of 51 people died in all in the accident near Mandara village in Assiut province. Another 16 were injured.

Before submitting his resignation and taking responsibility for the crash, Transportation Minister Mohamed Rashad Metiny requested an investigation by the national Railways System.

The bus, which was carrying 60 students, collided with the train as it was crossing the track.

Roads and railways in Egypt are known for their poor safety record. Many have not been renovated in 30 years. The accident Saturday was the second serious mishap in the two months.

In October, as many as six people died in a train crash near the Nile Delta. Police officials arrested the assistant conductor, who was put under investigation.

The railway system is a popular means of transportation for many of Egypt's 82 million citizens. Egyptians have repeatedly called on the government to invest in the rails and provide newer, safer train cars.

The country's crumbling infrastructure and hazardous transportation system serves as another obstacle for President Mohamed Morsi, who most Egyptians say failed to deliver on his promises in his first 100 day-plan as president. Morsi briefly addressed the nation after Saturday’s crash. He sent condolences and promised support to families of the deceased.

"President Mohamed Morsi is responsible and must follow up personally," the April 6 group, an activist organization said in a statement. "He is the one who chose this failed government whose disasters increase day after day."

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Israel's Rocket-Hunting Ace Got His Start Playing <em>Warcraft</em>

War has once again erupted between Hamas and the Israel Defense Forces, with the Gaza-based militant group launching hundreds of rockets and missiles at Israeli towns. But many of these projectiles never made it to their targets, thanks to the new Iron Dome missile defense system that’s arguably become this conflict’s most important technological difference-maker. This article, first published in April, tracks the story of Iron Dome’s most prolific “gunner.” While his record for shooting down missiles and rockets has by now undoubtedly fallen, the tale still gives insight into the battle now gripping Israel and Gaza.

KFAR GVIROL, Israel — While many of the boys in Idan Yahya’s high school class were buffing up and preparing themselves for selection into elite combat units, this gawky teenager was spending “a lot of time” playing Warcraft — the real-time strategy computer game where opposing players command virtual armies in a battle to dominate the fictional world of Azeroth.

Four years later, the high school jocks who sweated it out in pre-military academies so they could make the cut into the Israel Defense Force’s Special Operations units are now crawling through the sand dunes on the outskirts of the Gaza Strip and watching while Idan knocks rockets out of the sky hundreds of meters above their heads. Idan Yahya, 22, an Iron Dome “gunner” in the Active Air Defense Wing 167, currently holds the record for the number of rockets intercepted: eight.

People in the army describe him variously as a geek and an ace. But the geek who grew up playing Warcraft is now a highly prized soldier on the cutting edge of real war craft. He’s the Israeli army’s top rocket interceptor.

The Iron Dome is a mobile anti-rocket interception system that Israel moves around the country to shoot down the rockets fired at its civilian population centers by armed groups in Gaza and southern Lebanon. Its radar picks up launches and fires interceptor missiles at them if they’re calculated to be heading towards populated centers. The system has become increasingly important as Hamas, Hezbollah and other groups amass surface-to-surface missiles to hit the Israeli home front with, thus bypassing the Israel Defense Force’s overwhelming advantage of concentrated firepower and fighter aircraft. Should Israel attack Iran’s nuclear installations, the expected rocket reprisals from the armed groups on its borders will keep Iron Dome very, very busy.

As the war between Israelis and Arabs enters its sixth decade (or its 500th depending on who you ask), it is increasingly becoming a hi-tech rocket war. The IDF’s Director of Military Intelligence Maj. Gen. Aviv Kochavi in February said there were 200,000 rockets aimed at Israel from the south, north and east. And in this increasingly technological battlefield of rockets, anti-rocket interceptors, radars, control rooms, drones and drone hacking, it is soldiers like Idan Yahya (and whoever his counterparts on the Arab side are) who are making the most impact.

Computer geek, keyboard combatant, soldier, call him what you will, Idan and others like him man the controls of the latest rock star in advanced military technology. “There are a lot of flashing blips, signs, symbols, colors and pictures on the screen. You look at your tactical map; see where the threat is coming from. You have to make sure you’re locked onto the right target. There’s a lot of information and there is very little time. It definitely reminds me of Warcraft and other online strategy games,” Idan says.

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“Sister” Director Tackles Taboo of Switzerland’s Class Divide With Her Oscar Contender

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Director Ursula Meier can hardly believe that her film “Sister” – which depicts tenements, poverty and a seemingly rigid class system in lovely Switzerland – has made it over the Alps to Hollywood for Academy consideration.

“It shows a not-very-usual aspect of Switzerland,” Meier told the audience at a showing of “Sister” Thursday night at the Landmark, part of TheWrap’s Academy Screening Series. “We don’t show the beautiful mountains and the green and the lush life … For me it was important to show another point of view on this country to the world. Because usually it’s Montblanc, chocolate, and Swatch.”

Indeed, with her second film, Meier has given international audiences something else to associate with Switzerland: larcenous snow urchins.

“Sister” centers mostly around 12-year-old Simon (Kacey Mottet Klein), who lives in a high-rise tenement in a not-so-snowy valley far below a ski resort and takes gondolas to the top to steal wealthy tourists’ skis right out from under their goggles.

Wily Simon is financing not just his own existence but that of Louise (Lea Seydoux), the title character, who just might be the worst parental figure or caretaker in a cinematic year that did, after all, include “Beasts of the Southern Wild.”

It would involve spoilers to explain why Simon’s older sis is not everything she’s cracked up to be. But there’s nothing misleading about this boy-crazy, substance-abusing twentysomething gal’s unfitness to watch over Simon, the breadwinner of their sad two-person family.

He has to empty out his cash drawer to bribe Louise into snuggling with him, and when he entrusts her with the mere task of waxing skis, she can’t even do that without spilling cigarette ashes on the stolen merchandise.

“It was important for me, when we were at the ski resort, to showing the back door of the restaurant, and the workers inside … And it’s just at the end, when it’s finished, when there is no more snow and the ski resort is closed, for the first time Simon looks at the landscape. And we can see how beautiful this place is, but it’s too late now.”

Meier worked with her young leading man on her first theatrical feature, 2009′s “Home,” where he played Isabella Huppert’s son when he was just 7. She’s emphatic that Klein is not the kind of child actor who has to be tricked into giving a performance.

“During the first casting, I ask him, ‘What do you like to do in your life, Kasey?’ And he told me, ‘Thinking.’ So I said ‘OK, think,’ and I turned on the camera, and he was amazing … He understands that acting is to be, not to look like. So I really wanted to write for him with this film, because it was such an amazing experience on my first film.”

The role of the severely neglectful “sister” was tougher to nail down, both for the director and her leading actress.

“This character was the challenge of the film,” Meier said. “Because Kacey’s character is a child, so for the spectator, of course he’s a victim. But with the character of Louise, for Lea as an actress, at the beginning for her it was very hard to find the fragility of the character. I showed her a lot of films like ‘Vagabond’ … I explained to her, you were 14 when you were pregnant; it was too young for a girl, and you stopped your studies and got bad jobs you cut with your family.”

Sometimes, she said, they’d fight because “she couldn’t find the fragility of the character, and suddenly, months later, wow – it was like we cut something open and all the emotion that came out from her was very deep. I was afraid of the spectators judging the character. It was not easy, in the writing, or in the directing with the actors, because I wanted that they would love these characters, even if they’re sometimes terrible. But I like terrible characters.”

Pond told Meier that when it came to supporting actress Gillian Anderson, of “X-Files” fame, “the first time I watched, I didn’t realize it was her till the end credits” – an experience probably shared by most of those in attendance at the screening.

“I’m very happy that you say that,” said Meier, “because if you recognize the actress, you think about the actress.” But the director did want Armstrong to provoke a where-have-I-seen-you-before vibe.

“I really wanted to be played by a star – not to have a star in my film, but because it was important for Simon to have a kind of phantasma this lady, of what he wants as a mother.

And as a spectator, you can have a phantasma on the star. So I like that she came from another country, and not speak French, because she’s almost an apparition.”

Meier admitted she was frightened before the Swiss premiere – before “Sister” went on to play various fests and win the special Golden Bear award at the Berlin Film Festival.

“When I had the first screening in Switzerland, a lady came back to me and was very moved by the film, because it’s usually a taboo to show poverty in Switzerland. She cried and told me, ‘I grew up in exactly the same place. My father was a worker in the factory we saw in the film, and as a child we never had the money to go up.’ I liked that she just said up.”

Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Well: Meatless Main Dishes for a Holiday Table

Most vegetarian diners are happy to fill their plates with delicious sides and salads, but if you want to make them feel special, consider one of these main course vegetarian dishes from Martha Rose Shulman. All of them are inspired by Greek cooking, which has a rich tradition of vegetarian meals.

I know that Greek food is not exactly what comes to mind when you hear the word “Thanksgiving,” yet why not consider this cuisine if you’re searching for a meatless main dish that will please a crowd? It’s certainly a better idea, in my mind, than Tofurky and all of the other overprocessed attempts at making a vegan turkey. If you want to serve something that will be somewhat reminiscent of a turkey, make the stuffed acorn squashes in this week’s selection, and once they’re out of the oven, stick some feathers in the “rump,” as I did for the first vegetarian Thanksgiving I ever cooked: I stuffed and baked a huge crookneck squash, then decorated it with turkey feathers. The filling wasn’t nearly as good as the one you’ll get this week, but the creation was fun.

Here are five new vegetarian recipes for your Thanksgiving table — or any time.

Giant Beans With Spinach, Tomatoes and Feta: This delicious, dill-infused dish is inspired by a northern Greek recipe from Diane Kochilas’s wonderful new cookbook, “The Country Cooking of Greece.”

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Northern Greek Mushroom and Onion Pie: Meaty portobello mushrooms make this a very substantial dish.

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Roasted Eggplant and Chickpeas With Cinnamon-Tinged Tomato Sauce and Feta: This fragrant and comforting dish can easily be modified for vegans.

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Coiled Greek Winter Squash Pie: The extra time this beautiful vegetable pie takes to assemble is worth it for a holiday dinner.

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Baked Acorn Squash Stuffed With Wild Rice and Kale Risotto: Serve one squash to each person at your Thanksgiving meal: They’ll be like miniature vegetarian (or vegan) turkeys.

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Privatizing Greece, Slowly but Not Surely

Eirini Vourloumis for The International Herald Tribune

Potential privatization hit a wall at Katakolo, a seaside town where Christos Konstantopoulos paused near abandoned beachfront homes. More Photos »

THE government inspectors set out from Athens for what they thought was a pristine patch of coastline on the Ionian Sea. Their mission was to determine how much money that sun-kissed shore, owned by the Greek government, might sell for under a sweeping privatization program demanded by the nation’s restive creditors.

What the inspectors found was 7,000 homes — none of which were supposed to be there. They had been thrown up without ever having been recorded in a land registry.

“If the government wanted to privatize here, they would have to bulldoze everything,” says Makis Paraskevopoulos, the local mayor. “And that’s never going to happen.”

Athens agreed. It scratched the town, Katakolo, off a list of potential properties to sell. But as Greece redoubles its efforts to raise billions to cut its debt and stoke its economy, the situation in Katakolo illustrates the daunting hurdles ahead.

In the three years since the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission — the so-called troika of lenders — first required Greece to sell state assets, a mere 1.6 billion euros have been raised. Last Tuesday, European leaders said Greece needed an additional 15 billion euros in aid through 2014 to meet debt-reduction targets — partly because Athens has failed to make money on privatization.

Now, the troika may consider cutting an already lowered target for Greece to raise 19 billion euros by 2015 to about 10 billion euros as investors worry that Greece may have to leave the euro. The troika is requiring that Greece must still raise 50 billion through privatizations by 2022.

The I.M.F. estimates that those funds, should they materialize, will trim only up to 1 percent from Greece’s debt, which is expected to rise to a staggering 189 percent of the nation’s economic output in 2013, from 175 percent this year.

But with Greece’s economy headed into its sixth year of recession, and unemployment at 25 percent, the nation’s immediate goal is to lure any investment it can through long-term leases on state properties to create jobs and get money flowing into depleted public coffers.

“This could put the economy back in motion,” says Andreas Taprantzis, the executive director of the Hellenic Republic Asset Development Fund, a new agency set up to hasten privatization. If investors develop land, restructure highways or build business parks, the activity would “help employment, which is a major issue for Greece,” he says.

Indeed, privatization is one of the last hopes here for luring foreign cash.

Efforts stumbled anew last summer, when the government fell and two chaotic elections were held, amplifying fears of what is known in financial circles as a “Grexit” — a Greek exit from the euro. Investor confidence fell so low that a recent survey by the BDO consulting firm found that Greece was considered more risky for investment than Syria.

Yet as Prime Minister Antonis Samaras took steps last week to secure an additional 31.5 billion euros of bailout money from creditors, the thinking is that if one major asset can be sold now, investors will feel better about spending their money on Greece.

OFFICIALS are trotting out Greece’s most tempting offer: OPAP, the highly profitable gambling company in which the government has a major stake. Its gambling agencies abound around Athens and in Greek villages. Last week, as the government went on a road show to China to drum up investor interest, eight bids landed, including one from a Chinese concern.

Still, Mr. Taprantzis’s agency faces a daunting task. The idea of the country selling off its crown jewels touches a raw nerve here. Many Greeks say the government is buckling to decrees from the troika. Citizen protests have flared over nearly every state asset up for offer, including ones that have long bled cash — even if shedding them would help Greece’s finances.

Others say the government is so desperate that prime assets will be sold too cheaply. In the case of OPAP, Greeks grumble about the government’s logic in selling one of the few things that brings a steady stream of money to the treasury.

Given the culture of clientelism that pervades business dealings in Greece, others are concerned that properties will wind up in the hands of powerful Greek oligarchs who, these critics worry, may be waiting for an opportunity to get them at a cut-rate price.

Dimitris Bounias contributed reporting.

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David Petraeus didin't settle partisan divide on Benghazi

WASHINGTON – Appearing before two congressional committees in closed-door sessions, former CIA Director David Petraeus did little to dispel the partisan divide over whether Obama administration officials misled the public in the days after heavily armed militants killed four Americans in Benghazi,Libya,  lawmakers said Friday.

Petraeus told the House and Senate intelligence committees that he believed almost immediately that the Sept. 11 assault was an organized terrorist attack, according to lawmakers and staff sources. But he said the administration initially withheld suspicion that specific Al Qaeda affiliates were involved to avoid tipping off the terrorist groups.

Petraeus also said some early intelligence reports appeared to support Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, when she said five days after the deadly raid that it had grown out of a protest that was hijacked by extremists, comments that some Republicans contend were meant to downplay the significance of the attack before the election. Even now, the intelligence community has evidence that some attackers were motivated by protests earlier that day in Cairo over an anti-Islamic video, sources familiar with the intelligence said.

"The general completely debunked the idea that there was some politicization of the process," said Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank).

Petraeus, who has not appeared in public since he resigned from the CIA on Nov. 9 after admitting that he had an extramarital affair, avoided a throng of reporters and cameras before and after the two back-to-back sessions. Lawmakers lined up to speak after the hearings, however.

Democrats defended Rice and the administration, while some Republicans said they were unshaken in their belief that intelligence was misused to bolster White House claims that it had decimated the leadership of Al Qaeda. Some Republicans, including Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), have vowed to block any effort to make Rice the next secretary of State to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has said she will step down next year

Rice relied on unclassified written guidance, known as talking points, from the CIA, Democrats said. But some key words were changed from initial drafts as other agencies weighed in, Republicans countered. The word “attack” was changed to "demonstration," for example, and the phrase "with ties to Al Qaeda" was removed, a senior Republican congressional official said.

Precisely who made the changes is not yet clear. "If it was altered by somebody not within the intelligence community, we should know that," the official said.

The CIA ultimately signed off on those changes, the official said. Intelligence officials say the changes were part of a normal vetting process for public comments, and was consistent with the CIA’s assessment at the time. That assessment later was revised to discount the video as a motivating factor before armed militants stormed and burned the State Department mission in Benghazi, and hours later, launched a mortar barrage on a CIA compound 1½ miles away by road.

The U.S. ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and an embassy employee were killed at the mission, and two CIA contractors were killed later by the mortar fire.

The nighttime attack was not planned in advance, however, and initially appeared as a mob of looters, intelligence officials have said.

The extent of Al Qaeda's involvement also remains in dispute. Democrats and administration officials say the ties between the militants who attacked the mission and Al Qaeda's North African affiliate are remote, while some Republicans describe the Benghazi incident as an attack by "Al Qaeda."

A few Republicans said they believe that  the more important question is whether U.S. security was adequate for the threat, and whether warnings were ignored.

"The focus is moving toward 'Did they have enough security?'" said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla). "Clearly the security measures were inadequate, despite an overwhelming and growing amount of information that showed the area in Benghazi was dangerous, particularly on the night of Sept. 11."

Lawmakers declined to discuss where security arrangements fell short, saying some details are classified and the investigation is ongoing.

The Senate Intelligence Committee may issue a public report about Benghazi, staffers said, and a State Department accountability review board is also investigating.

Follow Politics Now on Twitter and Facebook

ken.dilanian@latimes.com

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Wired Readers Create Epic Soundtrack for Space Photo of the Day

Last week I was listening to the Inception soundtrack and flipping through the Wired Science Space Photo of the Day gallery, a collection of the best astronomical images on the web, hand-selected by the Wired Science staff. It was quite possibly the most dramatic thing my brain has ever comprehended, even more so than weddings and the Olympics and such. So I sent out the following tweet:

And it got a lot of response. So I sent out another tweet, which @wired retweeted, asking Wired readers to pick the most dramatic/epic music they could find on Spotify, so we might build a playlist worthy of being the soundtrack to nebulas, dying stars, and swirling galaxies.

This is that playlist. All six hours of it: The Wired Science Space Photo of the Day Spotify Playlist

It’s by no means comprehensive. If you keep sending in your picks, we’ll keep expanding the playlist. Ping me at @mrMattSimon or drop a comment below.

At the top of this post is a silent video slideshow we’ve put together to pair with the soundtrack if you want to sit back and give your clicker finger a rest, or feel free to click through your own selection of images. Please note that if you have a slow connection the video quality may kick down automatically.

And we must insist you go full-screen on this one. So get some good headphones, find some dramatic tunes, and experience the glory of the universe.

Matt is the host of Wired's Footnotes show and editor of the This Day in Tech blog, where he writes about all manner of milestones while respectfully declining requests from friends and family to write about their birthdays.

Read more by Matt Simon

Follow @mrMattSimon on Twitter.

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Can NBC keep up its ratings swagger without NFL, “The Voice”?

NEW YORK (Reuters) – NBC is expected to wrap up its fall season as the No. 1 broadcast network in the key 18-49 advertising demographic for the first time in a decade.

The network’s catapult to first place from fourth in the ratings is the biggest surprise so far of the young TV season. The question is how long can its ratings momentum last.

The Comcast-owned network has seen a surge in the fall fueled by two shows that won’t be around by the end of December, its red-hot Sunday Night NFL telecast and the hugely popular singing competition “The Voice.”

The numbers are shining a positive light on Entertainment Chief Bob Greenblatt, in his second year since moving over from the Showtime cable network. In the first quarter of 2013, however, analysts and advertising buyers say holes in NBC‘s lineup can’t make up for the loss of its two top shows.

“I’m skeptical about whether their ratings are sustainable,” said Brad Adgate, who heads research for the advertising firm Horizon Media. “Once those shows go on hiatus or they are doing repeats, I’d be surprised if what they replace with them with will deliver those type of numbers.”

When the TV season started, NBC boosted its ratings by adding a second season of the “The Voice” in the fall, instead of airing it only during the spring, and showing it on Mondays and Tuesdays.

The show gave NBC ratings victories in the 18-49 demographic, the age group that advertisers seek, has consistently won its time slots while boosting shows like “Revolution” and “Go On” that followed it.

Total viewers increased from a year ago by 20 percent, to an average of 8.8 million per night, while rivals CBS, FOX and ABC are all down in total viewers.

NBC‘s ratings engines throttle back without “The Voice,” which goes off the air from Dec 17 until March 25. When it returns, it also faces an uncertain reception as new judges Shakira and Usher replace Christina Aguilera and Cee Lo Green.

On December 30, NBC will air its final Sunday night football game of the year, taking prime time’s top-rated show with it, Jeff Bader, NBC‘s president of program planning, strategy and research, said in an interview on Thursday.

NBC‘s ratings will weaken in January, he conceded. The January-to-March period won’t be “necessarily about winning” in the ratings but about getting one or two shows to stick with viewers, he said.

“I wish we had Sunday night football all year, but hopefully these other returning shows will keep us in the hunt,” Bader said.

UBS analyst John Janedis predicts that CBS and FOX will move past the Peacock network by the end of the TV season, and CBS’ Chief Executive Les Moonves vowed on a November 7 earnings call that his network will finish “on top” and “strong in every single one of the key demos.”

“The Voice” served as a launch pad for the hit drama “Revolution,” a post-apocalyptic thriller that airs on Mondays and is set 15 years after all the world’s electricity stopped functioning. But that show, like “The Voice,” is going on hiatus from November 26 to March 25.

Greenblatt has “to make sure that ‘Revolution’ stays strong, said Optimedia media buyer Maureen Bosetti. “I’m a little bit cautious to say he’s a huge success until he’s got more solid hits under his belt that he’s developed.”

NBC will air the weight-loss reality show “The Biggest Loser” in the place of “the Voice” on Mondays, followed by “Deception,” a one-hour soap opera about a murder in a wealthy family that replaces “Revolution.” On Tuesdays, a reality show called “Betty White’s Off Their Rockers” featuring senior citizens playing pranks will take “the Voice” slot.

Ad agency GroupM media buyer Shari Cohen is more optimistic about NBC‘s chances without “The Voice” and said she is impressed by the network’s comeback this season.

“The void will be felt, but there’s confidence enough in their strategy and other nights of the week where they have been gaining traction and things that will be coming back in 2013 like ‘Smash’,” Cohen said.

“Smash,” a lavishly produced and heavily promoted musical drama about a Broadway show starring Katharine McPhee and Debra Messing, finished as NBC‘s top drama in its first season in 18-49 age group and will return for its second season February 5.

The show is heavily championed by Greenblatt, the programming chief who came to Comcast in 2011 after it took control of NBC in a $ 30 billion deal. When he left the CBS-owned Showtime cable channel, it was in the midst of a phenomenal run of developing hit shows such as “Dexter,” “Weeds,” and “The L Word” for cable’s Showtime network.

Greenblatt’s programming performance has been mixed at NBC. He inherited the “The Voice,” and had the benefit of this summer’s NBC Olympic telecast, which enabled him to promote the fall lineup before the more than 30 million people who tuned into the London games each night.

That gave a boost to “Revolution, “Go On” and “The New Normal,” a sitcom from “Glee” creator Ryan Murphy, which were all ordered for full-seasons and are all highly rated new shows. But “Animal Practice,” another program that aired in a special preview after one Olympics telecast, was canceled after six episodes.

NBC is coming off a strong third quarter in which its revenue jumped 31.2 percent to $ 6.8 billion thanks Deto the London Olympics. Excluding the Olympics, its revenue increased 8.3 percent, the company said.

Amy Yong, a sell-side analyst for Macquarie bank, raised her estimates on Comcast in October, citing ratings growth at NBC as a contributing factors.

The NBC model for continued success resembles a strategy employed by Fox, which scheduled shows like “House” and “Bones” after the then-towering ratings champ “American Idol.”

Bader, the NBC scheduling executive, said his network will continue to use “The Voice”‘s momentum as best it can even as it heads toward its three-month break. After the December 17 finale, NBC will air a preview of a new comedy set in the White House called “1600 Penn.”

(Reporting By Liana B. Baker; Editing by Ronald Grover and Leslie Gevirtz)

TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Personal Health: Quitting Smoking for Good

Few smokers would claim that it’s easy to quit. The addiction to nicotine is strong and repeatedly reinforced by circumstances that prompt smokers to light up.

Yet the millions who have successfully quit are proof that a smoke-free life is achievable, even by those who have been regular, even heavy, smokers for decades.

Today, 19 percent of American adults smoke, down from more than 42 percent half a century ago, when Luther Terry, the United States surgeon general, formed a committee to produce the first official report on the health effects of smoking. Ever-increasing restrictions on where people can smoke have helped to swell the ranks of former smokers.

Now, however, as we approach the American Cancer Society’s 37th Great American Smokeout on Thursday, the decline in adult smoking has stalled despite the economic downturn and the soaring price of cigarettes.

Currently, 45 million Americans are regular smokers who, if they remain smokers, can on average expect to live 10 fewer years. Half will die of a tobacco-related disease, and many others will suffer for years with smoking-caused illness. Smoking adds $96 billion to the annual cost of medical care in this country, Dr. Nancy A. Rigotti wrote in The Journal of the American Medical Association last month. Even as some adult smokers quit, their ranks are being swelled by the 800,000 teenagers who become regular smokers each year and by young adults who, through advertising and giveaways, are now the prime targets of the tobacco industry.

People ages 18 to 25 now have the nation’s highest smoking rate: about 34 percent counted in the National Survey on Drug Use and Health in 2010 reported smoking cigarettes in the previous month. I had to hold my breath the other day as dozens of 20-somethings streamed out of art gallery openings and lighted up. Do they not know how easy it is to get hooked on nicotine and how challenging it can be to escape this addiction?

Challenging, yes, but by no means impossible. On the Web you can download a “Guide to Quitting Smoking,” with detailed descriptions of all the tools and tips to help you become an ex-smoker once and for all.

Or consult the new book by Dr. Richard Brunswick, a retired family physician in Northampton, Mass., who says he’s helped hundreds of people escape the clutches of nicotine and smoking. (The printable parts of the book’s provocative title are “Can’t Quit? You Can Stop Smoking.”)

“There is no magic pill or formula for beating back nicotine addiction,” Dr. Brunswick said. “However, with a better understanding of why you smoke and the different tools you can use to control the urge to light up, you can stop being a slave to your cigarettes.”

Addiction and Withdrawal

Nicotine beats a direct path to the brain, where it provides both relaxation and a small energy boost. But few smokers realize that the stress and lethargy they are trying to relieve are a result of nicotine withdrawal, not some underlying distress. Break the addiction, and the ill feelings are likely to dissipate.

Physical withdrawal from nicotine is short-lived. Four days without it and the worst is over, with remaining symptoms gone within a month, Dr. Brunswick said. But emotional and circumstantial tugs to smoke can last much longer.

Depending on when and why you smoke, cues can include needing a break from work, having to focus on a challenging task, drinking coffee or alcohol, being with other people who smoke or in places you associate with smoking, finishing a meal or sexual activity, and feeling depressed or upset.

To break such links, you must first identify them and then replace them with other activities, like taking a walk, chewing sugar-free gum or taking deep breaths. These can help you control cravings until the urge passes.

If you’ve failed at quitting before, try to identify what went wrong and do things differently this time, Dr. Brunswick suggests. Most smokers need several attempts before they can become permanent ex-smokers.

Perhaps most important is to be sure you are serious about quitting; if not, wait until you are. Motivation is half the battle. Also, should you slip and have a cigarette after days or weeks of not smoking, don’t assume you’ve failed and give up. Just go right back to not smoking.

Aids for Quitting

Many if not most smokers need two kinds of assistance to become lasting ex-smokers: psychological support and medicinal aids. Only about 4 percent to 7 percent of people are able to quit smoking on any given attempt without help, the cancer society says.

All 50 states and the District of Columbia have free telephone-based support programs that connect would-be quitters to trained counselors. Together, you can plan a stop-smoking method that suits your smoking pattern and helps you avoid common pitfalls.

Online support groups and Nicotine Anonymous can help as well. To find a group, ask a local hospital or call the cancer society at (800) 227-2345. Consider telling relatives and friends about your intention to quit, and plan to spend time in smoke-free settings.

More than a dozen treatments can help you break the physical addiction to tobacco. Most popular is nicotine replacement therapy, sold both with and without a prescription. The Food and Drug Administration has approved five types: nicotine patches of varying strengths, gums, sprays, inhalers and lozenges that can curb withdrawal symptoms and help you gradually reduce your dependence on nicotine.

Two prescription drugs are also effective: an extended-release form of the antidepressant bupropion (Zyban or Wellbutrin), which reduces nicotine cravings, and varenicline (Chantix), which blocks nicotine receptors in the brain, reducing both the pleasurable effects of smoking and the symptoms of nicotine withdrawal. Combining a nicotine replacement with one of these drugs is often more effective than either approach alone.

Other suggested techniques, like hypnosis and acupuncture, have helped some people quit but lack strong proof of their effectiveness. Tobacco lozenges and pouches and nicotine lollipops and lip balms lack evidence as quitting aids, and no clinical trials have been published showing that electronic cigarettes can help people quit.

The cancer society suggests picking a “quit day”; ridding your home, car and workplace of smoking paraphernalia; choosing a stop-smoking plan, and stocking up on whatever aids you may need.

On the chosen day, keep active; drink lots of water and juices; use a nicotine replacement; change your routine if possible; and avoid alcohol, situations you associate with smoking and people who are smoking.

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This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: November 16, 2012

An earlier version of this column stated imprecisely the rate of smoking among young adults. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, in 2010 about 34 percent of people ages 18 to 25 smoked cigarettes in the month before the survey -- not daily. (About 16 percent of them reported smoking daily, according to the survey.)

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: November 14, 2012

An earlier version of this column misstated the rate of smoking among young adults. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, in 2010 about 34 percent of people ages 18 to 25 smoked cigarettes, not 40 percent. (That is the share of young adults who use tobacco products of any kind, according to the survey.)

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Advertising: A Formerly Button-Down Brand Loosens Up

WITH so many young men spending their college years shuffling to class in pajama bottoms and sweatshirts, it should come as no surprise that they are largely ambivalent about fashion.

Only 29 percent of men agree with the statement “I like to keep up with the latest trends in fashion,” according to a survey of men 18 and older conducted by Mintel, a market research firm. What men most want from clothing has little to do with appearance; 85 percent agree with the statement, “I dress for comfort.”

Now Van Heusen, the 91-year-old clothing brand, is stepping up its efforts to use a different entry point — football — as a way to get young men interested in style.

A broad marketing effort called the Van Heusen Institute of Style features Steve Young and Jerry Rice, both Hall of Fame members, and Matthew Stafford, the current Detroit Lions quarterback, as guides to help men make the transition, in the words of the campaign, from “schlub to swagger.”

The average age of a Van Heusen consumer is 39, the company says, but the campaign is being pitched to younger men from 18 to 34.

The Van Heusen Web site and Facebook page have been transformed into an extended football metaphor. Fashion spreads featuring the players are called “playbooks” and feature gridiron lingo: one featuring fitted shirts is called “First and Fitted”; another with colorful shirts is called “Friday Night Brights.” First introduced in 2010, the newest iteration of the Institute of Style campaign is a collaboration between Van Heusen and Funny or Die, the comedy Web site. In a new online video produced by Funny or Die, Pete (played by comedian Rob Lathan) is about to meet with a banker for a small-business loan dressed in a hoodie, shorts, white socks and sandals.

Mr. Young and Mr. Rice, who are watching on a monitor in a van, stakeout-style, direct Mr. Stafford, who wears an earpiece, to scoop up Pete so they can dress him more suitably.

In the video, whose humor is in the over-the-top style of “Airplane” and “Police Squad,” Mr. Stafford takes Pete to a department store, where the quarterback runs through the men’s department knocking over mannequins as if scrambling for a first down.

The three-minute video, which concludes, naturally, with Pete looking dapper in Van Heusen clothes and getting the loan, will appear Sunday on Funny or Die and on the Van Heusen Web site and Facebook page.

Also on Sunday, during NBC’s “Sunday Night Football,” a 30-second commercial in the form of a trailer for the video will direct viewers to the Van Heusen Web site.

Van Heusen, a PVH Corporation brand, declined to reveal expenditures for the campaign, which also includes print advertising in GQ, Men’s Health and ESPN The Magazine. The brand spent $6.8 million on advertising in 2011, according to the Kantar Media unit of WPP.

Michael Kelly, executive vice president for marketing at PVH, said that Van Heusen took a fashion-intervention approach because men are in a sorry sartorial state.

“Men have sunken to an almost all-time low,” Mr. Kelly said. “Kids can get away with T-shirts and sweat pants in school, but the dress code allowed on campus is not the dress code allowed on Madison Avenue or Wall Street.”

In the age range of men the brand is pitching to, Mr. Kelly said that the ideal consumer is “a 26-year-old fan who is influenced by professional sports, and who is finding his way after leaving college.” Such fans, he added, are “getting their fashion cues from what they see athletes wearing postgame — on the sports runways, if you will.”

Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst at the NPD Group, a market research firm, said that while young men entering the work force today might admire the Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, they should think twice about emulating his hoodie-and-jeans wardrobe.

“Just a few years ago, you could go to work in your pajamas, and if you looked like you just rolled out of bed when you went to work, that meant you had the technological savvy to change the world,” Mr. Cohen said.

During the economic downturn, he said, applicants cannot afford to go to a job interview dressed sloppily.

Mr. Cohen lauded the Van Heusen strategy of using athletes whom many young men admire to prod them to dress more professionally.

Like its shirts, advertising for Van Heusen traditionally has been buttoned up, featuring Ronald Reagan and celebrities like Bob Hope and Jimmy Stewart. Charging Funny or Die with creating a humorous video that highlights Van Heusen but without an overt sales pitch is a departure for the brand.

“Once you move into the social space, you have to begin to give up control of the brand a bit, and if you’re not willing to do that, you can’t reach this new demographic,” Mr. Kelly, the brand marketer, said. “Writing messaging that’s edgy is a bit of a scary place.”

Founded by Will Ferrell, Adam McKay and Chris Henchy, Funny or Die draws about 19 million unique users a month, who on average watch between two and three videos per visit, according to the Web site.

Mr. Kelly was so impressed with the video that he decided to promote it with the commercial on Sunday, which had not been the original plan. But he noted that its humor did not resonate with all his colleagues.

“I reminded the old guys in the company when they were looking at this, ‘This is not targeted at you, so I really don’t care if you like it,’ ” Mr. Kelly said. “There’s a little bit of that ‘Saturday Night Live’ funniness, that you get it, or you don’t.”

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