Social Issues

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Nurses, who are also midwives, gather at a village health room for a briefing given by a UNICEF child-nutrition specialist in Zee Phyu Kwin, in the Irrawaddy Delta of Myanmar. Myanmar spent less than $1 per person on health in 2008, minus donor money, and ranks among the lowest countries in nearly every category of health care funding. Now, with the dramatic change that has given Myanmar an elected government, there are hopes for improvement. (Associated Press)

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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (center), Kentucky Republican, makes his way to the U.S. Senate floor at the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington on Dec. 27, 2012. (Andrew Harnik/The Washington Times)

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House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer holds a press conference at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Thursday, Dec. 27, 2012, to call on House Speaker John A. Boehner to bring the House back into session immediately to work on a "fiscal cliff" deal. (Andrew Harnik/The Washington Times)

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House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer, Maryland Democrat, holds a press conference at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Thursday, Dec. 27, 2012, to call on House Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, to bring the House back into session immediately to work on the fiscal cliff. (Andrew Harnik/The Washington Times) ** FILE **

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George Bush, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, looks through papers during the adoption of the agenda at the United Nations General Assembly at the headquarters in New York, Sept. 22, 1971. The U.S. and 16 other countries called on the General Assembly to seat Communist China in the United Nations while permitting Nationalist China to remain. (AP Photo)

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Vice President Joe Biden, left, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., second from left, House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, second from right, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, right, watch during a ceremony for Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, the second-longest-serving senator in history, as he lies in state in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 20, 2012. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

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The Harrold Independent School District in Harrold, Texas, has a policy allowing teachers and other school employees to carry concealed weapons, a controversial policy that's now being considered in at least five other states in the wake of the deadly school shooting in Newtown, Conn. (AP Photo/Angela K. Brown)

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Russian police officers detain a demonstrator protesting against a bill banning U.S. adoptions of Russian children outside the Russian parliament’s upper chamber in Moscow on Wednesday. The chamber unanimously voted in favor of the measure. (Associated Press)