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Heart was one of the most popular r ock bands of the 1980s. The group is making a successful comeback with its new album, "Red Velvet Car."Heart's new album, "Red Velvet Car," entered the Billboard 200 at Number 10, and the Rock Albums chart at Number 3 to become the group's highest debut ever.Heart is led by sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson, who are now 60 and 57-years-old, respectively. They grew up in San Diego, California, and Taiwan before settling with their family in Seattle, Washington. Ann and Nancy b egan performing together in various bands in the 1960s. They formed Heart after moving to Canada in the early-'70s. The band's 1976 debut album, "Dreamboat Annie," sold more than one-million copies in the United States.Considered pioneers for women in rock, Heart's many hits during the 1980s included "What About Love," "Never" and "All I Wanna Do Is Make Love To You." They reached Number One with two songs, "These Dreams" and "Alone."Critical response to Heart's new album has been universally positive. Rolling Stone wrote, "The barracudas are back and at the top of their game." And, a music critic at said, "In the five years that I've b een writing these reviews, I have only given one perfect score.I hereby award the second on e to Heart for 'Red Velvet Car.'"Nancy wrote one track on the album as a birthday present for Ann. It's called "Sunflower."Heart appeared on the recent multi-artist Lilith Fair tour and is currently performing its own U.S. concerts to support "Red Velvet Car." The album's debut single marks the band's first chart hit since 2004. Here's Heart with "Hey You."2Advocates of liberal political positions have converged in the nation capital Saturday to express their concerns before Congressional elections in November. Many said they hoped Democrats will retain control of Congress, but that reform and change has been too slow since President Barack Obama took office last year.A drummer called on tens of thousands of protesters to converge onto the grounds of the Lincoln Memorial.Speeches took place around the National Mall, including one against war by a group called the United National Antiwar Committee.A group called Code Pink chanted "I like justice with my tea, but funding war is not for me", in reference to the anti-big government but mostly pro-military movement called the Tea Party.The conservative grassroots movement held their own march called 'Restoring Honor' at the same location several weeks ago. So-called Tea Party candidates have won several important primary opposition Republican elections, worrying both their Democratic Party competition in November as well as some members of the Republican Party establishment.Saturday's march for liberal principles was called 'One Nation'. Participant Lance Pyburn explained, saying "We have all these different people from all these different organizations coming out for this rally, and I think that it is really important for us to realize that we are one nation, we have one voice, and we just want really similar things to come about."Protesters said they wanted an end to U.S. military action in Iraq and Afghanistan, more government spending on job creation programs, renewable energy initiatives and public education, a new immigration law and more extensive health care reform than what the Democrats have been able to pass.Many wore tee-shirts of the unions they represented.A retired automobile industry worker from Detroit, Al Glaeyck, said he has beentrying to help Democratic candidates in the state of Michigan. "They are afraid. They think they are twenty points down. It will be an interesting thing to see but I think whoever wins, we fight on," he said.Another protester, Kimberly Greene, had some advice for President Obama. "He is trying to be a centrist and make sure the Democrats and Republicans get along," she said. "But I mean when we have the Republicans opposing you on everything you do, and the Democrats are not really proving that people can depend on them, that is why people are running to the Tea Party and back to the Republicans. Basically, in a nutshell he needs to stand up to them and let people know, 'hey, I can run this country, you do not need the Tea Party.'"Artist Gio Andollo sang peace songs under a tree as protesters filed by. He said he was neither a Republican, a Tea Party activist, nor a Democrat.Andollo said he was looking forward to another rally at the end of October, this one called the 'Rally to Restore Sanity'. It is being organized by U.S. televis ion comedian Jon Stewart, who says not just the loudest voices should be the ones being heard as the United States faces lingering war abroad and high unemployment and deficits at home3Middle East peace talks remain in crisis after a decision by the Palestinian leadership.Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gathered leaders of the Palestine Liberation Organization in the West Bank to d iscuss Israel's decision to end a 10-month moratorium on settlement construction. The meeting ended with an ultimatum.Palestinian official Yasser Abed Rabbo said that peace talks cannot resume until Israel freezes all settlement activity. The statement accused Israel of obstructing negotiations that began last month after a 20-month break.The talks were thrown into crisis after Israel ended the building freeze a week ag o. U.S. envoy George Mitchell spent four days shuttling between Jerusalem and the West Bank this week, but failed to convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to extend themoratorium. Mr. Netanyahu is under pressure from his hawkish coalition partners to keep building.Israeli spokesman Mark Regev says the only place to address such disagreements is at the neg otiating table."The moratorium was designed as a confidence building measure to get the talks going," said Regev. "And the ta lks have started, and all the sensitive issues including the issue of settlement are on the ag enda in these talks."The Arab League is due to meet in Libya on Friday to make a final decision on whether the Palestinians should quit the peace talks. Until then, the United States will continue efforts to hammer out a compromise.4A rare performance by renowned A boriginal dancers marked the start of one of Australia's most important festivals of indigenous art. The unique dance of the Gurrir Gurrir people depicts events associated with a devastating tropical cyclone in 1974. The catastrophic event helped create one of Australia's most highly regarded indigenous art movements.The ceremony performed by the Gurrir Gurrir people remembers events surrounding Cyclone Tracy, which devastated Darwin in northern Australia. Aborigines saw the 1974 disaster as a warning from ancient spirits that their culture must not b e allowed to withe r and die in the face of European colonization.The spirits were said to have imparted new songs and dances aimed at maintaining the diversity of indigenous culture and the Warmun artistic tradition was born.It is based in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, home of the Gurrir Gurrir. Its artists a re renowned for their use o f natural ochre and pigments on canvas.For the first time, Warmun rituals have been performed in eastern Australia, at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. The galle ry over the next few days is hosting special events to showcase Aboriginal traditions.Hetty Perkins, a senior curator at the gallery, says the benefits of the Warmum art tradition have been immense."You know, we suffer from some of the worst health statistics, for instance, in any d eveloped nation in the world and art is for many of ourpeople the only form of income that's possible, particula rly in remote area communities," said Perkins. "It is really the only form - aside from welfare - that is coming into those communities, so it is absolutely a vital part of community life. But more than that, it is vital to the spiritual sustenance and well-being of our people."More than 200 years after European colonization began, Aborigines make up less than 2 percent of Australia's population, but suffer disproportionately high rates of ill-health, unemployment and imprisonment.Most Aborigines live in urban areas, where the effects of drugs and alcohol have d evastated families and communities.The government has spent millions of dollars addressing the chronic problems, yet still indigenous communities languish at the bottom of society. Although for some art has reignited cultural pride and provided economic independence5Scientists around the wor ld predict that climate change will have dramatic effects on agriculture in the coming decades. So, too, will pests and pesticides, the loss of species and the need to increase food pr oduction for a gr owing population. Researchers at the International Agr icultural Research Institute in Colombia are among those searching for solutions.Producer Zulima Palacio recently visited the institute, and also spoke to Colombian far mers. This is her second of two r eports from the South American nation.In the tropical mountains in Colombia, long-time coffee grower Nelson Moreno recently started planting cassava, because he says he needed to use expensive chemicals to get a decent harvest of coffee. "The weather has changed too much. It is hard to live with this h eat," Moreno said.Nearby farmer Zoraida Mosquera agrees. She says hotter temperatures damage many harvests, including coffee. "At the cooperative, they buy it as the lowest quality."Not far away, farmer Elias Claros Paz says higher temp eratures are not the only problem. "We used to plant tomatoes, but we s topped because of pests. In order to get a harvest we had to spray seven and eight times with the most toxic chemicals."Scientists say the combination of higher temperatures and single crops over extended periods increases problems with pests. E rickFernandes, an adviser on climate change at the World Bank in Washington, says pests and the growing use of insecticides are not good for the land or for water sources. "Local observation suggests that as p art of the extreme events, p est and invasive species are increasing," he said.?At the International Center for Tropical Ag riculture, or CIAT, in Cali, scientist Andy Jarvis is in charge of the climate change and policy program. He says at CIAT, scientists are working on crop improvement, mostly through genetic modifications "For example, bean s are quite sensitive to heat and drought and so we have been looking at different scenarios of the typ es of gen es that we can be putting into th ose crops so they can adapt to the future challenges."But Erick Fernandes at the World Bank says not everybody likes geneticaly modified crops, and other options must be considered. "Just by management alon e you can probably increase your adapted capacity of that crop, several fold," he said.Fernandes says creating shaded areas, crop rotation and maintaining the environmental balance could g reatly mitigate the effects of climate change.Both Fernandes and Jarvis say increasing population represents the most serious challenge. "The real issue is not if we can p roduce more food but we have to produce 50 to 70% more food to address global population increase." Jarvis said.And both say more needs to be done. "I think agriculture needs to assume a much higher p rofile in the discussions related to climate change. Just tackling forest or just tackling global warming is not going to do it unless we bring together the agricultural dimensions into that," Fernandes said."Every year that we don't address the issue, the issue is getting bigger and more costly to address later," Jarvis said.The International Center for Tropical Agriculture also is conducting research in Af rica and Asia and has begun a large multi-million dollar program to adapt global agriculture to climate change.。