The X Factor Announces Top 6

TV Watch

The X Factor

11/29/2012 at 09:40 PM EST

From left; Demi Lovato, Britney Spears and Simon Cowell

FOX

Mario Lopez called the first elimination on Thursday's The X Factor a "bit of a shocker."

And so was the second.

The top eight contestants sang No. 1 hits Wednesday in an emotional night. Keep reading to find out which two performers were sent packing – and who's in season 2's top six ...

Paige Thomas was the first to go – which is shocking because she toned down her over-the-top performing style to sing Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" like a like a "legitimate pop star," according to Simon Cowell.

That left Demi Lovato with just one singer on her team: CeCe Frey, who was told (by Cowell) to "pack her bags" Wednesday after her performance of "Lady Marmalade."

But L.A. Reid's contestant Vino Alan and Team Britney's Diamond White were in the bottom two and had to sing for survival. He performed "Trouble" and she sang Beyoncé's "I Was Here."

L.A. voted to send home Diamond; Britney returned the favor and voted to send home Vino. Demi voted Vino out as well. That left Simon ... and he fell in line with the female panelists, voting to get rid of Vino. Either one would have been a shock but Vino had been ranked third last week.

Here's how the top six rank this week:
1. Carly Rose Sonenclar
2. Tate Stevens
3. Emblem3
4. Fifth Harmony
5. CeCe Frey
6. Diamond White

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Clinton releases road map for AIDS-free generation

WASHINGTON (AP) — In an ambitious road map for slashing the global spread of AIDS, the Obama administration says treating people sooner and more rapid expansion of other proven tools could help even the hardest-hit countries begin turning the tide of the epidemic over the next three to five years.

"An AIDS-free generation is not just a rallying cry — it is a goal that is within our reach," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who ordered the blueprint, said in the report.

"Make no mistake about it, HIV may well be with us into the future but the disease that it causes need not be," she said at the State Department Thursday.

President Barack Obama echoed that promise.

"We stand at a tipping point in the fight against HIV/AIDS, and working together, we can realize our historic opportunity to bring that fight to an end," Obama said in a proclamation to mark World AIDS Day on Saturday.

Some 34 million people worldwide are living with HIV, and despite a decline in new infections over the last decade, 2.5 million people were infected last year.

Given those staggering figures, what does an AIDS-free generation mean? That virtually no babies are born infected, young people have a much lower risk than today of becoming infected, and that people who already have HIV would receive life-saving treatment.

That last step is key: Treating people early in their infection, before they get sick, not only helps them survive but also dramatically cuts the chances that they'll infect others. Yet only about 8 million HIV patients in developing countries are getting treatment. The United Nations aims to have 15 million treated by 2015.

Other important steps include: Treating more pregnant women, and keeping them on treatment after their babies are born; increasing male circumcision to lower men's risk of heterosexual infection; increasing access to both male and female condoms; and more HIV testing.

The world spent $16.8 billion fighting AIDS in poor countries last year. The U.S. government is the leading donor, spending about $5.6 billion.

Thursday's report from PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, outlines how progress could continue at current spending levels — something far from certain as Congress and Obama struggle to avert looming budget cuts at year's end — or how faster progress is possible with stepped-up commitments from hard-hit countries themselves.

Clinton warned Thursday that the U.S. must continue doing its share: "In the fight against HIV/AIDS, failure to live up to our commitments isn't just disappointing, it's deadly."

The report highlighted Zambia, which already is seeing some declines in new cases of HIV. It will have to treat only about 145,000 more patients over the next four years to meet its share of the U.N. goal, a move that could prevent more than 126,000 new infections in that same time period. But if Zambia could go further and treat nearly 198,000 more people, the benefit would be even greater — 179,000 new infections prevented, the report estimates.

In contrast, if Zambia had to stick with 2011 levels of HIV prevention, new infections could level off or even rise again over the next four years, the report found.

Advocacy groups said the blueprint offers a much-needed set of practical steps to achieve an AIDS-free generation — and makes clear that maintaining momentum is crucial despite economic difficulties here and abroad.

"The blueprint lays out the stark choices we have: To stick with the baseline and see an epidemic flatline or grow, or ramp up" to continue progress, said Chris Collins of amFAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research.

His group has estimated that more than 276,000 people would miss out on HIV treatment if U.S. dollars for the global AIDS fight are part of across-the-board spending cuts set to begin in January.

Thursday's report also urges targeting the populations at highest risk, including gay men, injecting drug users and sex workers, especially in countries where stigma and discrimination has denied them access to HIV prevention services.

"We have to go where the virus is," Clinton said.

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Wall Street ends higher after swings on 'fiscal cliff'

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks finished higher on Thursday as investors bought on sporadic dips in a market roiled by conflicting comments from Washington about negotiations on an agreement to avoid the "fiscal cliff."

Tech shares, including Research In Motion and Advanced Micro Devices , helped the Nasdaq outperform the broader market. Telecommunications and health-care stocks were the day's best-performing sectors.

Reflecting the uncertainty surrounding U.S. budget talks, trading was choppy. Wall Street reversed early gains and fell shortly after House Speaker John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, dashed hopes that lawmakers were getting closer to a budget deal that would avert automatic tax increases and spending cuts set for early 2013 - the fiscal cliff - that could push the U.S. economy into a recession next year. But the market rebounded by afternoon and the three major U.S. stock indexes rebounded to near their session highs.

"There is an emotional part in buying on the small dips here. Investors are more worried about missing the rally than losing money as they believe that the 'fiscal cliff' will be solved eventually," said James Dailey, portfolio manager at TEAM Asset Strategy Fund in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

"Until the fiscal cliff is solved, the madness of the crowd will not subside."

Discussions on Capitol Hill are aimed at avoiding big automatic spending cuts and tax hikes, known as the fiscal cliff, that will start taking effect beginning in January.

Boehner's comment about a lack of progress in talks with the White House was one of a series of contrary pronouncements by lawmakers and the Obama administration over whether Washington will finally cut a deal.

There have been some signs that leaders are moving closer to a fiscal agreement. The S&P 500 has gained about 5 percent recently after a sell-off that took it down almost 8 percent following the U.S. election on November 6. But investors remain wary that politicians' ad hoc statements can spark quick reversals in the market.

U.S.-listed shares of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion rose 4 percent to $11.54 after Goldman Sachs upgraded the stock to "buy" from "neutral" on optimism ahead of the launch of the BlackBerry 10 smartphone.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc shares gained 4.1 percent to $2.04 on plans to sell and lease back its campus in Austin, Texas. The sale and lease-back will raise cash and fund its chipmaking business as Advanced Micro Devices diversifies beyond the struggling PC industry into new markets.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 36.71 points, or 0.28 percent, to 13,021.82 at the close. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> gained 6.02 points, or 0.43 percent, to 1,415.95. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> advanced 20.25 points, or 0.68 percent, to close at 3,012.03.

So far this week, the Dow is up 0.1 percent, the S&P 500 is up 0.5 percent and the Nasdaq is up 1.5 percent.

But shares of top retailers retreated in the wake of data showing a weak start to November sales after Superstorm Sandy. Kohl's Corp fell 12 percent to $45.02.

Tiffany shares dropped 6.2 percent to $59.80 after the upscale jeweler reported quarterly results and cut its full-year sales and profit forecasts.

Supervalu shares sank 18.6 percent to $2.28 after a report that Cerberus Capital Management was having difficulty obtaining financing to buy out the troubled grocery chain.

Data showed the U.S. economy grew faster than initially thought in the third quarter as businesses restocked, but consumer and business spending were revised lower in a sobering reminder of the economic recovery's underlying weakness.

Contracts to buy previously owned U.S. homes rose more than expected in October, a sign the housing market recovery advanced into the fourth quarter despite a mammoth storm and concerns over looming tax hikes. Homebuilders' shares rose. The PHLX housing index <.hgx> rose 0.8 percent.

About 6.15 billion shares changed hands on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and NYSE MKT, below the daily average so far this year of about 6.48 billion shares.

On both the NYSE and the Nasdaq, roughly three stocks rose for every one that fell.

(Editing by Kenneth Barry and Jan Paschal)

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U.S. Is Weighing Stronger Action in Syrian Conflict

Francisco Leong/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Rebels in northern Syria celebrated on Wednesday next to what was reported to be a government fighter jet.

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, hoping that the conflict in Syria has reached a turning point, is considering deeper intervention to help push President Bashar al-Assad from power, according to government officials involved in the discussions.

While no decisions have been made, the administration is considering several alternatives, including directly providing arms to some opposition fighters.

The most urgent decision, likely to come next week, is whether NATO should deploy surface-to-air missiles in Turkey, ostensibly to protect that country from Syrian missiles that could carry chemical weapons. The State Department spokeswoman, Victoria Nuland, said Wednesday that the Patriot missile system would not be “for use beyond the Turkish border.”

But some strategists and administration officials believe that Syrian Air Force pilots might fear how else the missile batteries could be used. If so, they could be intimidated from bombing the northern Syrian border towns where the rebels control considerable territory. A NATO survey team is in Turkey, examining possible sites for the batteries.

Other, more distant options include directly providing arms to opposition fighters rather than only continuing to use other countries, especially Qatar, to do so. A riskier course would be to insert C.I.A. officers or allied intelligence services on the ground in Syria, to work more closely with opposition fighters in areas that they now largely control.

Administration officials discussed all of these steps before the presidential election. But the combination of President Obama’s re-election, which has made the White House more willing to take risks, and a series of recent tactical successes by rebel forces, one senior administration official said, “has given this debate a new urgency, and a new focus.”

The outcome of the broader debate about how heavily America should intervene in another Middle Eastern conflict remains uncertain. Mr. Obama’s record in intervening in the Arab Spring has been cautious: While he joined in what began as a humanitarian effort in Libya, he refused to put American military forces on the ground and, with the exception of a C.I.A. and diplomatic presence, ended the American role as soon as Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi was toppled.

In the case of Syria, a far more complex conflict than Libya’s, some officials continue to worry that the risks of intervention — both in American lives and in setting off a broader conflict, potentially involving Turkey — are too great to justify action. Others argue that more aggressive steps are justified in Syria by the loss in life there, the risks that its chemical weapons could get loose, and the opportunity to deal a blow to Iran’s only ally in the region. The debate now coursing through the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and the C.I.A. resembles a similar one among America’s main allies.

“Look, let’s be frank, what we’ve done over the last 18 months hasn’t been enough,” Britain’s prime minister, David Cameron, said three weeks ago after visiting a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan. “The slaughter continues, the bloodshed is appalling, the bad effects it’s having on the region, the radicalization, but also the humanitarian crisis that is engulfing Syria. So let’s work together on really pushing what more we can do.” Mr. Cameron has discussed those options directly with Mr. Obama, White House officials say.

France and Britain have recognized a newly formed coalition of opposition groups, which the United States helped piece together. So far, Washington has not done so.

American officials and independent specialists on Syria said that the administration was reviewing its Syria policy in part to gain credibility and sway with opposition fighters, who have seized key Syrian military bases in recent weeks.

“The administration has figured out that if they don’t start doing something, the war will be over and they won’t have any influence over the combat forces on the ground,” said Jeffrey White, a former Defense Intelligence Agency intelligence officer and specialist on the Syria military. “They may have some influence with various political groups and factions, but they won’t have influence with the fighters, and the fighters will control the territory.”

Jessica Brandt contributed reporting from Cambridge, Mass.

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Samsung takes aim at Japanese rivals with Android camera

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean consumer electronics giant Samsung Electronics Co is taking aim at its Japanese rivals with an Android-powered digital camera that allows users to swiftly and wirelessly upload pictures to social networking sites.

The Galaxy camera lets users connect to a mobile network or Wi-Fi to share photographs and video without having to hook up the camera to a computer.

While it’s not the first to the market, Samsung‘s financial and marketing clout suggest it could be the biggest threat to Japanese domination of a digital camera industry which research firm Lucintel sees growing to $ 46 billion by 2017 and where big brands include Canon Inc, Sony Corp, Panasonic Corp, Nikon Corp and Olympus Corp.

“Samsung has a tough row to hoe against the likes of Canon and Nikon in the camera brand equity landscape,” said Liz Cutting, senior imaging analyst at research firm NPD Group. “Yet as a brand known more in the connected electronic device arena, Samsung has a unique opportunity to transfer strength from adjacent categories into the dedicated camera world.”

The Korean group, battling for mobile gadget supremacy against Apple Inc, is already a global market leader in televisions, smartphones and memory chips.

Samsung last year brought its camera and digital imaging business – one of its smallest – under the supervision of JK Shin, who heads a mobile business that generated 70 percent of Samsung’s $ 7.4 billion third-quarter profit.

“Our camera business is quickly evolving … and I think it will be able to set a new landmark for Samsung,” Shin said on Thursday at a launch event in Seoul. “The product will open a new chapter in communications – visual communications,” he said, noting good reviews for the Samsung Galaxy camera which went on sale in Europe and the United States earlier this month.

AIMING AT ‘PRO-SUMERS’

The Galaxy camera, which sells in the United States for $ 499.99 through AT&T with various monthly data plans, features a 4.8-inch LCD touchscreen and a 21x optical zoom lens. Users can send photos instantly to other mobile devices via a 4G network, access the Internet, email and social network sites, edit photos and play games.

The easy-to-use camera, and the quality of the pictures, is aimed at mid-market ‘pro-sumers’ – not quite professional photographers but those who don’t mind paying a premium for user options not yet available on a smartphone – such as an optical, rather than digital, zoom, better flash, and image stabilization.

The appeal of high picture quality cameras with wireless connection has grown as social media services such as Facebook Inc drive a boom in rapid shoot-and-share photos.

“At a price point higher than some entry-level interchangeable-lens cameras, the Galaxy camera should appeal to a consumer willing to pay an initial and ongoing premium for 24/7 creative interactivity,” said Cutting.

Traditional digital camera makers are responding.

Canon, considered a leader in profitability in corporate Japan with its aggressive cost cutting, saw its compact camera sales eroded in the most recent quarter by smartphones, and has just introduced its first mirrorless camera to tap into a growing market for small, interchangeable-lens cameras that rival Nikon entered last year.

Nikon has also recently introduced an Android-embedded Wi-Fi only camera.

($ 1 = 1086.4000 Korean won)

(This story fixes typing error in paragraph 9)

(Additional reporting by Dhanya Skariachan in NEW YORK; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Angus T. Jones Is Not Leaving Two and a Half Men: Source

TV Watch

By Elizabeth Leonard

11/28/2012 at 07:50 PM EST

The Half is back!

Ever since Angus T. Jones bashed Two and a Half Men in a now-viral video, it begged the question: Will the 19-year-old actor return to the hit show?

If he has it his way, he will.

"Angus expects to report to work after the holiday break in January," says a source close to the star. "He intends to honor his contract through the end of the season."

Jones, who called the show "filth" and urged viewers in a video interview on a religious website to stop watching, issued an apology Tuesday night, saying he has the "highest regard" for the "wonderful people" on the show.

Although Jones is not featured in an episode that tapes next week, he intends to show up on schedule after the break, the source says.

In the meantime, the source adds, "Angus is feeling positive and he is concentrating on spending some downtime with family and friends."

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Simple measures cut infections caught in hospitals

CHICAGO (AP) — Preventing surgery-linked infections is a major concern for hospitals and it turns out some simple measures can make a big difference.

A project at seven big hospitals reduced infections after colorectal surgeries by nearly one-third. It prevented an estimated 135 infections, saving almost $4 million, the Joint Commission hospital regulating group and the American College of Surgeons announced Wednesday. The two groups directed the 2 1/2-year project.

Solutions included having patients shower with special germ-fighting soap before surgery, and having surgery teams change gowns, gloves and instruments during operations to prevent spreading germs picked up during the procedures.

Some hospitals used special wound-protecting devices on surgery openings to keep intestine germs from reaching the skin.

The average rate of infections linked with colorectal operations at the seven hospitals dropped from about 16 percent of patients during a 10-month phase when hospitals started adopting changes to almost 11 percent once all the changes had been made.

Hospital stays for patients who got infections dropped from an average of 15 days to 13 days, which helped cut costs.

"The improvements translate into safer patient care," said Dr. Mark Chassin, president of the Joint Commission. "Now it's our job to spread these effective interventions to all hospitals."

Almost 2 million health care-related infections occur each year nationwide; more than 90,000 of these are fatal.

Besides wanting to keep patients healthy, hospitals have a monetary incentive to prevent these infections. Medicare cuts payments to hospitals that have lots of certain health care-related infections, and those cuts are expected to increase under the new health care law.

The project involved surgeries for cancer and other colorectal problems. Infections linked with colorectal surgery are particularly common because intestinal tract bacteria are so abundant.

To succeed at reducing infection rates requires hospitals to commit to changing habits, "to really look in the mirror and identify these things," said Dr. Clifford Ko of the American College of Surgeons.

The hospitals involved were Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles; Cleveland Clinic in Ohio; Mayo Clinic-Rochester Methodist Hospital in Rochester, Minn.; North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System in Great Neck, NY; Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago; OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, Ill.; and Stanford Hospital & Clinics in Palo Alto, Calif.

___

Online:

Joint Commission: http://www.jointcommission.org

American College of Surgeons: http://www.facs.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

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Wall Street jumps in another "fiscal cliff" swing

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rallied on Wednesday after comments from House Speaker John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, on a possible compromise to avoid the "fiscal cliff" turned the market around.

The S&P 500 rebounded from a 1 percent decline, gaining more than 20 points from its low after Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said he was optimistic that a budget deal to avoid big spending cuts and tax hikes can be worked out. President Barack Obama added to the good feelings, saying he hoped to get a deal done in the next four weeks.

Whether or not those remarks reflect the reality of negotiations is another story.

"The fiscal cliff is dominating the discussion, and short term, we're a little bit too optimistic on it being fixed right away," said John Manley, chief equity strategist for Wells Fargo Advantage Funds in New York.

In expectation of higher dividend tax rates in 2013, companies have been shifting dividends or announcing special payouts to shareholders.

Costco Wholesale Corp , up 6.3 percent at $102.58, was the S&P 500's biggest percentage gainer after it became the latest company to announce a special dividend.

The market's move marked the second straight day where a leading legislator dictated trading action. On Tuesday, stocks fell on pessimistic remarks from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada.

The market has been swinging for weeks now on headlines from Washington, with Wednesday's gyrations once again highlighting the importance that Wall Street is giving to finding a solution to avoid the series of tax increases and spending cuts that could push the U.S. economy into recession.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 106.98 points, or 0.83 percent, to 12,985.11 at the close. The S&P 500 <.spx> gained 10.99 points, or 0.79 percent, to 1,409.93. The Nasdaq Composite <.ixic> added 23.99 points, or 0.81 percent, to close at 2,991.78.

The S&P 500 bounced off a strong support area near 1,385 that includes both its 200- and 14-day moving averages. It closed above 1,400 for the third session in four - an optimistic sign for stock bulls.

Knight Capital Group Inc shares jumped 15.2 percent to $3.42 on news that Getco Holding proposed a $1.4 billion merger with Knight, while Virtu Financial offered to buy Knight for at least $1.1 billion.

Apparel retailer Express Inc rose 8.9 percent to $14.15 after it forecast strong earnings for the current quarter as lower prices and easy-to-understand discounts led to robust Black Friday sales.

The S&P retail index <.spxrt> gained 1.4 percent.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters surged 27.3 percent to $36.86 a day after it forecast quarterly and full-year earnings well ahead of analysts' expectations.

Nearly 6.1 billion shares changed hands on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and NYSE MKT, below the daily average so far this year of about 6.48 billion shares.

On the NYSE, roughly seven stocks rose for every three that fell, and on Nasdaq, five issues rose for every three that fell.

(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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News Analysis: Sunni Leaders Gaining Clout in Mideast

Mohammed Saber/European Pressphoto Agency

A Palestinian woman in Gaza City on Tuesday walked amid the rubble left from eight days of fighting that ended in a cease-fire.

RAMALLAH, West Bank — For years, the United States and its Middle East allies were challenged by the rising might of the so-called Shiite crescent, a political and ideological alliance backed by Iran that linked regional actors deeply hostile to Israel and the West.

But uprising, wars and economics have altered the landscape of the region, paving the way for a new axis to emerge, one led by a Sunni Muslim alliance of Egypt, Qatar and Turkey. That triumvirate played a leading role in helping end the eight-day conflict between Israel and Gaza, in large part by embracing Hamas and luring it further away from the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah fold, offering diplomatic clout and promises of hefty aid.

For the United States and Israel, the shifting dynamics offer a chance to isolate a resurgent Iran, limit its access to the Arab world and make it harder for Tehran to arm its agents on Israel’s border. But the gains are also tempered, because while these Sunni leaders are willing to work with Washington, unlike the mullahs in Tehran, they also promote a radical religious-based ideology that has fueled anti-Western sentiment around the region.

Hamas — which received missiles from Iran that reached Israel’s northern cities — broke with the Iranian axis last winter, openly backing the rebellion against the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad. But its affinity with the Egypt-Qatar-Turkey axis came to fruition this fall.

“That camp has more assets that it can share than Iran — politically, diplomatically, materially,” said Robert Malley, the Middle East program director for the International Crisis Group. “The Muslim Brotherhood is their world much more so than Iran.”

The Gaza conflict helps illustrate how Middle Eastern alliances have evolved since the Islamist wave that toppled one government after another beginning in January 2011. Iran had no interest in a cease-fire, while Egypt, Qatar and Turkey did.

But it is the fight for Syria that is the defining struggle in this revived Sunni-Shiite duel. The winner gains a prized strategic crossroads.

For now, it appears that that tide is shifting against Iran, there too, and that it might well lose its main Arab partner, Syria. The Sunni-led opposition appears in recent days to have made significant inroads against the government, threatening the Assad family’s dynastic rule of 40 years and its long alliance with Iran. If Mr. Assad falls, that would render Iran and Hezbollah, which is based in Lebanon, isolated as a Shiite Muslim alliance in an ever more sectarian Middle East, no longer enjoying a special street credibility as what Damascus always tried to sell as “the beating heart of Arab resistance.”

If the shifts seem to leave the United States somewhat dazed, it is because what will emerge from all the ferment remains obscure.

Clearly the old leaders Washington relied on to enforce its will, like President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, are gone or at least eclipsed. But otherwise confusion reigns in terms of knowing how to deal with this new paradigm, one that could well create societies infused with religious ideology that Americans find difficult to accept. The new reality could be a weaker Iran, but a far more religiously conservative Middle East that is less beholden to the United States.

Already, Islamists have been empowered in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, while Syria’s opposition is being led by Sunni insurgents, including a growing number identified as jihadists, some identified as sympathizing with Al Qaeda. Qatar, which hosts a major United States military base, also helps finance Islamists all around the region.

In Egypt, President Mohamed Morsi resigned as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood only when he became head of state, but he still remains closely linked with the movement. Turkey, the model for many of them, has kept strong relations with Washington while diminishing the authority of generals who were longstanding American allies.

“The United States is part of a landscape that has shifted so dramatically,” said Mr. Malley of the International Crisis Group. “It is caught between the displacement of the old moderate-radical divide by one that is defined by confessional and sectarian loyalty.”

The emerging Sunni axis has put not only Shiites at a disadvantage, but also the old school leaders who once allied themselves with Washington.

The old guard members in the Palestinian Authority are struggling to remain relevant at a time when their failed 20-year quest to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands makes them seem both anachronistic and obsolete.

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Dancing with the Stars Crowns an All-Star Winner

TV Watch
Update

By Mike Fleeman

UPDATED
11/27/2012 at 11:00 PM EST

• Originally published 11/27/2012 at 10:50 PM EST

Tom Bergeron and Brooke Burke Charvet

Adam Larkey/ABC

There's a new leading lady!

The first all-female finale of Dancing with the Stars featured all-stars Shawn Johnson, Kelly Monaco and Melissa Rycroft in a fierce battle Tuesday night for the mirror ball trophy.

After taking big risks in Monday night's performance show, the stars and their pro partners – Derek Hough, Val Chmerkovskiy and Tony Dovolani – performed "instant dances."

With the competitors getting their dance-style instructions less than an hour before hitting the floor, the field was whittled down to two couples. Read on to find out who won.

After Monaco was the first eliminated, it came down to Johnson and Rycroft. And the winner was ... Rycroft!

Amid showering confetti, the reality star and Dovolani clutched the trophy. They embraced and jumped up and down.

Rycroft was the only competitor among the final three all-stars to not have won before. Dovolani had labored 14 seasons without previously winning.

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