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ny0187830 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2009/04/21 | Sri Lankan Troops Breach Rebel Haven | HONG KONG — Sri Lankan troops broke through earthen barriers used by Tamil separatist fighters on Monday, opening a breach that the government said was then crossed by some 30,000 people escaping the fighting inside a no-fire zone originally intended as a haven. As the crowds tried to flee the safe zone, in what the Defense Ministry called “the world’s largest hostage rescue mission,” three Tamil Tiger suicide bombers detonated explosive vests, killing dozens of civilians, the government said. A pro-rebel Web portal confirmed Monday that fierce fighting had resumed inside the safety zone — the report called the situation “total chaos” — and that thousands of civilians had fled the area. The report also said that Sri Lankan troops had hit the principal hospital in the zone with rocket-propelled grenades, causing heavy civilian casualties. State television in Sri Lanka broadcast a short video showing hundreds of men, women and children slowly streaming through an open area, some carrying large bundles, which it said showed the migrants’ exodus. The Sri Lankan government later issued an ultimatum to the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, or Tamil Tigers, giving them and their leader 24 hours to surrender, Reuters reported, quoting the government’s defense spokesman, Keheliya Rambukwella. It was not possible to verify the battlefield accounts from either side because the government prevents independent journalists and most relief agencies from reaching the area. But in an apparent acknowledgment of the army’s breakthrough, which occurred Monday morning, the rebels, also known as the L.T.T.E., petitioned the government for a truce on Monday afternoon. “The L.T.T.E. would like to reiterate its commitment to a cease-fire without any preconditions, as urged by the U.S. and other members of the international community,” a statement issued by the movement’s political headquarters said. “The L.T.T.E. urges the Sri Lankan government to stop its military actions, including shelling and bombing civilian areas, and accept the call of the United States and other members of the international community for a cease-fire, which we believe will create a conducive atmosphere for talks on all relevant issues.” Sri Lankan troops, pressing the attack over the past several months, have backed the rebel fighters into a shrinking patch of lagoons, coconut groves, jungle and beachfront along the country’s northeastern coast. The rebel redoubt is reportedly down to about six square miles. Ethnic Tamil separatists have been battling the government for 25 years, and an estimated 75,000 people have been killed in the violence. Most analysts in South Asia now believe the war to be in its endgame. Although the Tamil Tigers have shown great resilience as an insurgency, especially in their use of asymmetric tactics like suicide attacks, they have lost their principal bases of operations and nearly all of their capacity as a conventional military force. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it had been able to extricate about 10,000 people on intermittent boatlifts from the no-fire zone in recent months, while an estimated 35,000 civilians had managed to escape overland to government-held areas where they were being detained in camps. The United Nations has estimated that 100,000 civilians remain trapped inside the no-fire zone, and the Tamil Tigers have been widely accused of holding the civilians to use as human shields. The Tigers, as well as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and others, have criticized the Sri Lankan government for artillery barrages that have taken a heavy toll on the civilian population. The United Nations said at least 4,500 civilians had been killed since the first of the year, with some 12,000 injured. On March 23, Human Rights Watch reported that at least 2,700 civilians had been killed in the no-fire zone this year. After talks on Sunday with Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Lawrence Cannon, the foreign minister of Canada, called for a resumption of the 48-hour cease-fire initiated by the Sri Lankan government last week. The cease-fire has since lapsed. Other governments have issued similar appeals, although Sri Lanka has rejected further pauses in the fighting, saying the Tigers use the truce periods to reinforce their defenses. | Sri Lanka;Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam;Civil War and Guerrilla Warfare |
ny0114792 | [
"sports",
"football"
] | 2012/11/30 | Jets’ Rex Ryan Stresses Holding On to Football | FLORHAM PARK, N.J. — As Mark Sanchez dropped back to pass against the Patriots on Thanksgiving night, safety Steve Gregory darted across the field. He expertly read Sanchez, whose eyes were locked on wide receiver Jeremy Kerley. Kerley cut across the middle, directly into the path of the charging Gregory. Still unaware of the defender’s presence, Sanchez fired a pass that Gregory easily intercepted at the Patriots’ 15-yard line. Another opportunity squandered. Another costly turnover. Another trademark of the Jets ’ 4-7 season. “I thought Gregory made a good play and baited me into it,” Sanchez said. Before the interception, the Jets were in position to take an early lead in the matchup against the Patriots. The game was scoreless and the Jets had second-and-6 at New England’s 23 with six minutes left in the first quarter. The interception was the first of five Jets turnovers in their ignominious 49-19 defeat at the hands of their fiercest rival. “I think our biggest thing that we need to do offensively is protect the football,” Jets Coach Rex Ryan said. “There’s other things we’re making strides in, but obviously we have to protect the football. You turn it over five times, you’re not going to beat anybody.” The Jets have 22 turnovers this season (only three teams have more). Compounding matters, the giveaways have come at critical times. Sanchez has thrown 10 interceptions, fewer than 13 other quarterbacks have thrown, including the former Super Bowl most valuable players Drew Brees and Eli Manning. But Sanchez leads the league with four interceptions in the red zone, and he has lost five fumbles. “It’s easy to say, ‘Just don’t do it,’ ” Ryan said. “I think we’ve said that a bunch. I don’t think that’s going to fix it. I think you look more at why the mistakes are made. I think that’s something that you try to fix.” Solutions have been difficult to come by. Earlier this week, Ryan showed the team videos of how each player holds the football in an attempt to reinforce positive habits and correct flaws. “You name it, we’re trying to find answers and solutions to it,” Ryan said. Sanchez has stressed the need to limit turnovers, only to repeat the same mistakes each Sunday. Despite the unsteady play, Ryan has steadfastly defended his starting quarterback. “To put that blame on one person, I don’t think that’s appropriate,” Ryan said. “If anything, I think it’s more directed at me than anybody else. I have to fix that. I’ve got to get better and get this team to where we don’t turn the ball over. If that was the answer — it’s just one guy — then that’s easy. But it’s not.” Turnovers are not a new concern for Sanchez, who had 18 interceptions and 8 fumbles last season. Sanchez did not exude confidence when asked how he would better protect the ball. “I don’t know,” Sanchez said. “Do my best and we’ll see how these next five games go.” Ryan, Sanchez and the offensive coordinator Tony Sparano maintain that progress is being made. Sparano pointed to the running game, pass protection and Sanchez’s completion percentage in recent weeks as areas of improvement. But the turnovers have prevented the strides from producing results. “It’s frustrating that it doesn’t translate to the scoreboard,” Sparano said. “You’d like to score more points, certainly. Right now, we’re staying the course here, going about our business as if we’re going to go out there and get ourselves prepared to play an outstanding football game.” The Jets will put that preparation to the test when they host the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday at MetLife Stadium. The Cardinals are fifth in the N.F.L. with 23 takeaways. “It just comes from playing and understanding that the ball is the most important,” Sanchez said. “At all costs, protect it. When the opportunities come to make plays, you just let them happen and try not to force them. It’s a thin line. I’ve just got to keep on the right side of it.” EXTRA POINTS Rex Ryan spoke with Bart Scott after Scott made comments on Wednesday that disparaged the fans who heckled the team at halftime of the loss to the Patriots. “I have a tremendous amount of respect for fans and what they do and the sacrifices that they make,” Scott said. “Of course, I’m going to protect my team and protect my organization, but I understand that they paid good money.” | Ryan Rex;New York Jets;Sanchez Mark;Football |
ny0023356 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2013/09/22 | The Mr. Fix-It of Greenwich Village | He is the Famous Greenwich Village Leprechaun Handyman, or so the small sign on Colin Ryan’s toolbox proclaims. “Have tools, will travel,” the sign reads. Sometimes that means lugging his tools into Manhattan walk-ups to hang curtain rods, or hopping the subway to Queens to tile a bathroom, or catching a ride upstate to throw a deck onto a country home. But most work for Mr. Ryan, 62, comes from right here in the Village, where he was born and raised, and where he remains a fixture as a freelance carpenter. This time of year, there is no shortage of work. “All summer, people are out at their summer homes talking about stuff they want done in their apartments, and now they’re back and having it done,” said Mr. Ryan, who is rarely without his heavy toolbox-on-wheels bearing his leprechaun logo sign. “This has always been my neighborhood, so everybody knows me,” he said on Tuesday while refinishing a wooden stairway for a customer on Spring Street. “My customers can just throw me a key and say, ‘O.K., Colin, go to work, I’ll be back later.’ ” But in true leprechaun fashion, he can be tricky to catch. He has no storefront or Web site, and the cellphone number on his fliers is sometimes switched off for nonpayment. Best to try his base of operations: a small stoop across the street from the Blue Note jazz club on West Third Street near Avenue of the Americas, where he can often be found roosting between jobs and scrounging up beer money by laying out an overturned yellow hard hat with a sign reading, “Leprechaun Relief Fund.” “I don’t need no pot of gold — just enough for beer and cigarettes and subway fare,” he said, in his gravelly voice. “I’m happy for every day I’m above ground.” Mr. Ryan stands 5 feet 5 inches above ground, and he is usually dressed in work boots, jeans and a work shirt. He keeps a tape measure on his belt and a flat carpenter’s pencil tucked in his Vietnam Veteran cap. Mr. Ryan, who ran a Navy river patrol boat in the Mekong Delta in 1973, learned firsthand how tough it was to find a job as a service member returning from war. So when the repair jobs are big enough, he shares the work with fellow veterans, including younger ones who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I help out veterans coming home who aren’t immediately hirable, and also older vets,” he said. “Any of them I would trust with my life. They’re reliable and they know how to follow orders, which is important because I’m still the senior officer. No one outranks me on the job site.” Mr. Ryan grew up on Macdougal Street, and even while attending elementary school at St. Anthony of Padua church on Sullivan Street, he was washing beer mugs in local bars around Bleecker Street, where he would later participate in the constant jam sessions, wheeling his Hammond B3 organ from club to club, he said. As a teenager, he worked as a busboy and then a kosher cook in Catskill hotels, and he also did carpentry work on Fire Island. After crewing on the ferries there, he earned his captain’s license, which helped qualify him to become a quartermaster on his gunboat in Vietnam. Enemy fire eventually left him with head and leg wounds, and a Purple Heart, he said. The Spring Street customer, Katya Salkinder, a psychotherapist, said she liked Mr. Ryan’s $25-an-hour rate and his stories. “But the best thing about him is that he’s available,” she said. A grimacing Mr. Ryan struck a pinup girl pose and squealed, “Yes, darling, I’m always available!” Mr. Ryan, who has two grown daughters, has a house and wood shop upstate near Liberty but spends most of his time in the Village, staying with friends. By 9 on Tuesday night, sleeping options in the neighborhood seemed scant, so he wound up reaching an old rabbi buddy in Borough Park, Brooklyn. He would stash his tools at a friendly parking garage and hop the subway out there. No problem for a fellow with the wiles of a fairy and the survival skills of a gunboat quartermaster. “I’m going with Plan B,” he said, in his gravelly voice. “I haven’t survived this long without having a Plan B.” | Greenwich Village Manhattan;Veteran;Carpentry |
ny0107794 | [
"sports",
"golf"
] | 2012/04/22 | On the Champions Tour, Michael Allen Finds Success After 50 | SAVANNAH, Ga. — Michael Allen smoked a drive down the middle, then lighted a victory cigar. He had a three-stroke lead on the final hole of the Encompass Insurance Pro-Am last Sunday in Tampa, Fla. The gesture was brash if not premature, but for Allen, on the verge of his first victory on the Champions Tour since 2009, it was a moment to savor. He has not had many celebrations. Allen, a journeyman professional, has yet to win in 368 starts on the PGA Tour. He once joked that he had reserved parking at qualifying school, where players go to try to keep their tour playing privileges. Disenchanted with his game, he quit for a while. But at 53, as a member of the Champions Tour, the senior circuit, Allen is defeating many of the same players who used to whip him regularly. This year, with four top-three finishes in six starts, he leads the Champions Tour money list and its season-long points race. He has become the latest late bloomer to turn ordinary PGA Tour credentials into senior tour success. Yet even Allen seems unsure how to explain his sudden emergence. “My mother always said I’m a slow learner; I didn’t know how slow,” he said, speaking at Savannah Harbor Golf Resort, where he is teaming with David Frost in the Legends of Golf. Fuzzy Zoeller, a two-time major winner, said Allen’s game was aging like the fine wine he is known to consume. Zoeller likened him to Bruce Fleisher and Dana Quigley, former Champions Tour players of the year for whom tournament success began at 50. “Michael’s a much better player now than what he was when he was younger,” Zoeller said. “Now how do you explain that? It’s crazy, isn’t it? It’s a crazy game.” Zoeller gave Allen valuable advice in Tampa. Allen had never held a five-stroke lead entering the final round. Zoeller told him, “Play like you’re broke.” Allen knew the feeling. After turning pro in 1984, he endured a lengthy apprenticeship in Asia, Europe and South Africa. He made the PGA Tour in 1990 but acknowledged that he was intimidated. As a rookie, he led after two rounds in Los Angeles, then hooked his tee shot on the 10th hole by a tent out of bounds. “Not only did I not hit the tent, I hit it left of the tent,” he said. “That’s how nervous I was.” Allen scratched out a living but struggled to keep his tour card. He survived Q-school a record nine times in 13 attempts. A plaque attached to his locker at his home course, Mesa Country Club in Arizona, reads, “All-time Q-School money leader.” Allen trained with Hank Haney but said he never grasped Haney’s swing concepts. Allen used to hit balls at the practice range for hours after each round. “If I didn’t do it, I’d just be lost,” he said. Allen, saying he “was never that good to start with,” eventually quit. He assessed the state of his game in late 1995 and took a job as an assistant pro at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck, N.Y. Allen opened the shop at 6 a.m. on a hot summer day, he recalled, and volunteered to pressure-wash the driving range mats so he could wear shorts. “It was a long way from the PGA Tour,” he said. The next year, he gave half-hour lessons for $50, then had stints as a stockbroker, in medical sales, and building homes in Scottsdale, Ariz. In those lean years, Allen said, he could not afford health insurance for his family. A friend convinced him he had too much talent not to give professional golf another shot, and 10 members at Mesa Country Club bankrolled his comeback. “This game would frustrate the pope if he played,” Zoeller said. “There are times when I think about putting it down too. There’s something in your gut that tells you ‘I can’t do that.’ You’ve got to come back and see if you can beat it again. That’s what Michael did. He’s a competitor.” Allen returned from adversity with redoubled desire. He worked with the sports psychologist Gary Mack, and hired Michael Maroney as his caddie and Mike Mitchell as his swing instructor. He credits Team Allen for his transformation. Under Mitchell’s tutelage the last eight years, Allen has developed a more repeatable and efficient swing. When his swing deserts him, Allen can spot a problem and fix it on the fly. “That makes life better when you’re not worried about, ‘Am I going to go shank the first ball if I don’t go practice for an hour or so?’ ” Allen said. His confidence continued to rise. He won more than $1 million on the PGA Tour in 2008. The next year, shortly after his 50th birthday, he received a special invitation to compete in the Senior P.G.A. Championship at Canterbury Golf Club in Cleveland. “I thought I forgot to pay my dues on time,” Allen said. Surprised, Allen called to confirm his spot in the field. Even more surprising, he won the senior major in his debut. He smiled as he described the 4-iron he planted safely on the green from 225 yards on the demanding par-3 17th hole in the final round. “I had trained my whole life for that moment, and I finally did it,” he said. Last season, Allen played primarily on the Champions Tour for the first time and registered 10 top-10 finishes in 19 starts. Yet victory remained elusive. He was winless in his last 40 Champions Tour events until Tampa. “These guys have beaten me my whole life, so I don’t expect them not to,” he said. If he continues as the senior circuit’s leading man, his Rodney Dangerfield routine will not work anymore. Allen’s goals are ambitious: winning the Charles Schwab Cup as the Champions Tour points leader and qualifying for this year’s United States Open at Olympic Club in San Francisco, where he learned to play and is a longtime member. And he still harbors a dream of capturing his first title on the PGA Tour. In the meantime, victories on the Champions Tour suit him just fine. “It’s a wonderful place to play,” he said, “and you don’t have to fight it out selling mortgages.” | Golf;Allen Michael;Champions Tour (Golf) |
ny0015945 | [
"sports",
"soccer"
] | 2013/10/10 | Bulgarian Coach Loses Shirt, and Job | The newly appointed coach of the Bulgarian team Levski Sofia, Ivaylo Petev, quit on Wednesday, a day after being undressed and forced out of his first news conference by hostile fans. “What happened yesterday is extremely ugly, and I would not like to work in such an environment,” Petev said. Angry Levski fans burst in shortly after the start of the news conference and made him take off the club’s shirt, contending that he was a supporter of cross-city rival CSKA Sofia, an assertion he denied. ■ Striker Andrej Kramaric broke Croatia’s scoring record with eight goals as top-flight Rijeka thrashed third-division Zmaj Blato, 11-0, in a cup match. | Soccer;Levski Sofia Soccer Team;Ivaylo Petev;Coaches;Bulgaria;Croatia;Andrej Kramaric |
ny0238867 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2010/12/05 | Cardinal Michele Giordano of Italy Dies at 80 | ROME (AP) — Cardinal Michele Giordano, the retired archbishop of Naples who was acquitted in 2000 of charges of loan sharking and supplying $800,000 in church money to an illegal lending operation run by his brother, died on Thursday in Naples. He was 80. Church officials said Cardinal Giordano was admitted to a hospital in Naples a week ago, but they did not give a cause of death. Cardinal Giordano was the highest ranking church official ever to stand trial in Italy. In addition to the charges related to the loan-sharking ring, he was accused of misappropriating an additional $500,000 in church money. He repeatedly proclaimed his innocence. The Vatican steadfastly supported Cardinal Giordano, lodging a formal complaint with the Italian government after prosecutors raided his office. Some Roman Catholics said they believed that the scandal surrounding the case was a factor in a drop in donations to the clergy, but the church rejected that view, saying the decline was part of a historic trend. Cardinal Giordano was born on Sept. 26, 1930. He served as archbishop of Naples from 1987 until 2006, when he retired. | Giordano Michele;Frauds and Swindling;Embezzlement;Deaths (Obituaries);Roman Catholic Church |
ny0073433 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2015/04/02 | Senator Robert Menendez Indicted on Corruption Charges | WASHINGTON — Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey was indicted on bribery charges on Wednesday in what prosecutors said was a scheme to trade political favors for luxury vacations, golf outings, campaign donations and expensive flights. The indictment, the first federal bribery charges against a sitting senator in a generation, puts Mr. Menendez’s political future in jeopardy. He faces a possible sentence of 15 years in prison for each of the eight bribery counts. Mr. Menendez, a Democrat, angrily denied wrongdoing and vowed to fight the charges. “This is not how my career is going to end,” he said at a news conference in Newark, where supporters cheered him. “Today contradicts my public service career and my entire life.” The federal investigation into Mr. Menendez, 61, was well known , and charges had been expected. But the accusations in the 68-page indictment are much broader and more severe than had been publicly known. The senator was also charged with conspiracy and making false statements. The charges revolve around Mr. Menendez’s relationship with Dr. Salomon E. Melgen, a wealthy Florida eye surgeon and political benefactor. Dr. Melgen resisted entreaties by the Justice Department to testify against Mr. Menendez and was ultimately charged alongside him. Prosecutors described Mr. Menendez’s offices on Capitol Hill as a hub of corrupt dealings, a place where the senator used his chief of staff to solicit gifts from Dr. Melgen, find out what he wanted in return and make sure it got done. The indictment also reveals how the rise of super PACs, unleashed by the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and subsequent legal changes, has opened a new channel for the wealthy to trade campaign cash for official favors. Through his company, Vitreo-Retinal Consultants, Dr. Melgen directed $700,000 in corporate contributions to Majority PAC, a super PAC intended to help Democrats retain control of the Senate. Dr. Melgen instructed the group to use those contributions to aid Mr. Menendez’s 2012 re-election campaign. Among the favors for Dr. Melgen, the department said, Mr. Menendez encouraged the Obama administration to change the Medicare reimbursement policy in a way that would make millions for the doctor. Prosecutors said he also tried to push a port security deal that Dr. Melgen was involved in, and helped the surgeon’s foreign girlfriends obtain travel visas to the United States. A bribery charge is among the most serious accusations of corruption the federal government can make. Prosecutors often opt to file a lesser charge of accepting a gratuity, which is easier to prove. A bribe amounts to the purchase of an official act, while a gratuity is seen as a way to curry favor with powerful officials. Mr. Menendez is the first senator to face federal bribery charges since another New Jersey Democrat, Harrison A. Williams Jr., was indicted in 1980 as part of the federal corruption investigation known as Abscam. In 2002, an ethics scandal deterred Senator Robert G. Torricelli, Democrat of New Jersey, from a re-election bid. The Indictment of Senator Robert Menendez Mr. Menendez was charged with eight counts of bribery, which carry up to 15 years in prison on each charge. To prove their case, prosecutors must show that Mr. Menendez’s actions and Dr. Melgen’s gifts were explicitly traded. The two men argue that they were longtime friends and that they exchanged gifts as part of that friendship. “Prosecutors at the Justice Department don’t know the difference between friendship and corruption,” Mr. Menendez said on Wednesday. The senator’s involvement in Dr. Melgen’s dispute with Medicare is the most damning element of the department’s indictment. Prosecutors cite emails showing that Mr. Menendez’s office was deeply involved in the dispute. In 2009, Mr. Menendez sent an email instructing a staff member to call Dr. Melgen immediately regarding “a Medicare problem we need to help him with.” Mr. Menendez argues that he intervened as a policy matter, not to help his friend. But emails show that his staff members conferred with Dr. Melgen regularly. “As you know we’ve been working on the Melgen case every day,” one staff member wrote. At the Department of Health and Human Services, officials regarded the matter as a senator’s pulling strings for a friend. “We have a bit of a situation with Senator Menendez, who is advocating on behalf of a physician friend,” one health official wrote. Lawyers for Dr. Melgen did not respond to messages seeking comment. Dr. Melgen, 61, who is married, had college-age girlfriends who worked as models in Brazil, Ukraine and the Dominican Republic, prosecutors say. Several times, Mr. Menendez helped him resolve visa problems so his girlfriends could come to the United States, prosecutors added. After learning that a visa had been approved, a staff member wrote, “In my view, this is ONLY DUE to the fact that R.M. intervened.” Mr. Menendez accepted free trips on Dr. Melgen’s private jet and stayed at his resort home in the Dominican Republic. In 2010, prosecutors say, Mr. Menendez spent three nights in an executive suite at a five-star hotel in Paris, a stay valued at nearly $5,000. When Mr. Menendez realized how much the room would cost, prosecutors said, he sent an email to Dr. Melgen and asked him to book the room using rewards points. After describing the room, with its limestone bath and enclosed rain shower, Mr. Menendez wrote: “You call American Express Rewards, and they will book it for you. It would need to be in my name.” Dr. Melgen booked the room, prosecutors said. Mr. Menendez’s life story is a parable of political tenacity. The son of Cuban immigrants — a carpenter and a seamstress — he began his political career as a school board member in Union City, N.J. He became mayor, state assemblyman and state senator before being elected to the House in 1992. There, he established a reputation as one of his party’s best fund-raisers. In late 2005, he was appointed to finish the term of Senator Jon S. Corzine, who left Congress to serve as governor of New Jersey. Almost immediately, Mr. Menendez was dogged by questions of financial impropriety. Chris Christie, then the United States attorney in Newark, opened an investigation into a nonprofit group that paid Mr. Menendez more than $300,000 in rent at the same time that he helped it win federal grants. The case ultimately went nowhere, and Mr. Menendez won the election that year. Friends have dismissed it as a politically motivated investigation. His political fate is now unclear, but he has given no indication that he plans to step down. Mr. Menendez said on Wednesday that he would temporarily step down as the ranking member on the Foreign Relations Committee. | Robert Menendez;US;Bribery and Kickbacks;New Jersey;Salomon E Melgen;Senate;Congress |
ny0244100 | [
"world",
"africa"
] | 2011/03/22 | U.S.-Led Assault Nears Goal in Libya | WASHINGTON — An American-led military campaign to destroy Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi ’s air defenses and establish a no-fly zone over Libya has nearly accomplished its initial objectives, and the United States is moving swiftly to hand command to allies in Europe , American officials said Monday. But the firepower of more than 130 Tomahawk cruise missiles and attacks by allied warplanes have not yet succeeded in accomplishing the more ambitious demands by the United States — repeated by President Obama in a letter to Congress on Monday — that Colonel Qaddafi withdraw his forces from embattled cities and cease all attacks against civilians. Libyan government forces continued to engage in scattered fighting on Monday, defying the United Nations resolutions authorizing the allied strikes. The resolution demands an immediate cease-fire by Colonel Qaddafi’s forces and an end to attacks on civilians. Pentagon officials are eager to extract the United States from a third armed conflict in a Muslim country as quickly as possible. But confusion broke out on Monday among the allies in Europe over who exactly would carry the military operation forward once the United States stepped back, and from where. In Washington, lawmakers from both parties argued that Mr. Obama had exceeded his constitutional authority by authorizing the military’s participation without Congressional approval. The president said in a letter to Congress that he had the power to authorize the strikes, which would be limited in duration and scope, and that preventing a humanitarian disaster in Libya was in the national interest. At the United Nations, the Security Council rejected a request from Libya for a meeting to discuss the situation. Qaddafi forces were holding out against the allied military campaign to break their grip. Rebel fighters trying to retake the eastern town of Ajdabiya said their advance was halted on Monday by tank and rocket fire from government loyalists still controlling entrances to the city. Dozens of fighters fell back to a checkpoint about 25 miles north of Ajdabiya, in Zueitina. By the early afternoon, the fighters said at least eight of their confederates had been killed in the day’s fighting, including four who were killed when a tank shell struck their pickup truck. In the western city of Misurata, forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi were still at large and were using civilians as human shields, Reuters reported, but that could not be immediately confirmed. At the Pentagon, officials said that the intensive American-led assault unleashed over the weekend was a classic air campaign, chosen by Mr. Obama among a range of military options, which was intended to have coalition aircraft in the skies above Libya within days and without fear of being shot down. “You don’t do that piecemeal,” a United States military official said. “You do it all at once, and you do it as fast as you can.” The targets included radar installations, fixed and mobile antiaircraft sites, Libyan aircraft and hangars, and other targets intended to make it safe for allied aircraft to impose the no-fly zone. They also included tanks and other ground forces engaged with the rebels around the country, reflecting the broader aim of pushing Colonel Qadaffi’s forces to withdraw from disputed cities. Communications centers and at least one Scud missile site were also struck. Explosions and antiaircraft fire could be heard in and around Tripoli on Monday in a third straight night of attacks there against Colonel Qadaffi’s forces. United States military officials said that there were fewer American and coalition airstrikes in Libya on Sunday night and Monday, and that the number would probably decline further in coming days. But Gen. Carter F. Ham, the head of the United States Africa Command, who is in charge of the coalition effort, said that there would be strikes on Colonel Qaddafi’s mobile air defenses and that some 80 sorties — only half by the United States — were flown on Monday. General Ham also said he had “full authority” to attack the regime’s forces if they refused to comply with President Obama’s demands that they pull back from Ajdabiya, Misurata and Zawiya. By Monday night, explosions and antiaircraft fire could be heard in and around Tripoli in the third straight day of attacks. In Santiago , Chile , Mr. Obama restated that the United States would soon turn over full responsibility to the allies to maintain the no-fly zone. He also sought to distinguish the stated goals of the United Nations-authorized military operation — protecting Libyan civilians, establishing a no-flight zone and forcing Colonel Qaddafi’s withdrawal from the cities — with his own administration’s demand, not included in the United Nations resolution, that Colonel Qaddafi had to leave office. “It is U.S. policy that Qaddafi needs to go,” Mr. Obama said at a news conference with the Chilean president, Sebastián Piñera . “And we’ve got a wide range of tools in addition to our military effort to support that policy.” Mr. Obama cited economic sanctions, the freezing of assets and other measures to isolate the regime in Tripoli. United States military commanders repeated throughout the day that they were not communicating with Libyan rebels, even as a spokesman for the rebel military, Khaled El-Sayeh, asserted that rebel officers had been providing the allies with coordinates for their airstrikes. “We give them the coordinates, and we give them the location that needs to be bombed,” Mr. Sayeh told reporters. On Monday night, a United States military official responded that “we know of no instances where this has occurred.” Earlier in the day, General Ham repeatedly said in answer to questions from reporters that the United States was not working with the rebels. “Our mission is not to support any opposition forces,” General Ham said by video feed to the Pentagon from the headquarters of Africa Command in Stuttgart , Germany . Mr. Sayeh said that there were no Western military trainers advising the rebel fighters, but that he would welcome such help. He added, with evident frustration, that the rebel fighters on the front in Ajdabiya “didn’t take orders from anybody.” Like other rebel military officials, Mr. Sayeh said the rebels had been working to better organize their ranks to include members of specialized units from the Libyan Army that would attack Colonel Qaddafi’s forces when the time was right. But evidence of such a force has yet to materialize. The rebels appeared to have fallen into some disarray as they returned from Ajdabiya, with one commander at the checkpoint trying to marshal them with a barely functioning megaphone. He tried organizing the assembled fighters into columns for an attack, but nearly fell off the truck as he ordered the fighters to move. “I know most of you are civilians,” he said. “But we have to charge.” Only a few trucks inched forward as other fighters stood and argued among themselves. At NATO headquarters in Brussels on Monday, members of the military alliance came to no agreement on who would take the lead on a no-fly zone or how to proceed on enforcing a United Nations arms embargo against Libya. Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain said responsibility for the no-fly zone would be transferred to NATO. But France objected to that, with its foreign minister, Alain Juppé, saying: “The Arab League does not wish the operation to be entirely placed under NATO responsibility. It isn’t NATO which has taken the initiative up to now.” Turkey , a NATO member that has opposed the use of force in Libya and was still seething over being omitted from a planning meeting in Paris on Saturday, refused on Sunday to back a NATO military plan for the no-fly zone. But its prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan , denied that his country was against NATO participation in the operation, saying only that he wanted assurances that it would be brief and not end in an occupation. | Libya;Arab Spring;Military;US Military;Muammar Kaddafi;No-fly zone;Barack Obama |
ny0019372 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2013/07/09 | Pataki Changes Lawyers to Fight Suit by Men Confined After Prison for Sex Crimes | Clients often dismiss their lawyers, but it is not every day that a former New York governor decides to drop the state attorney general as his defense counsel. In this case, the former governor is George E. Pataki, and the dismissal followed his sharp disagreement over how to defend a lawsuit by six men who claimed that under a Pataki administration initiative , they were wrongfully confined to state mental hospitals after they had already served prison sentences for sexually violent crimes. Since the lawsuit was filed in 2008, Mr. Pataki and other former state officials named as defendants have been represented by the attorney general’s office. But last month, on the eve of a trial scheduled to begin on Tuesday in Federal District Court in Manhattan, Mr. Pataki switched lawyers, hiring Abbe D. Lowell, one of the nation’s leading white-collar defense lawyers, to represent him. In a filing to the judge, Jed S. Rakoff, Mr. Lowell said that Mr. Pataki had sought his services after being shocked to learn recently that the attorney general’s office was “not defending the case as he intended.” The defense Mr. Pataki wanted to put forth, Mr. Lowell said, was that when he had his staff develop the so-called sexually violent predator initiative in 2005, he relied on the advice of his counsel and other senior staff members that the policy would “withstand constitutional muster,” as Mr. Pataki put it in a February 2010 deposition. But in May 2010, a lawyer in the office of the attorney general at the time, Andrew M. Cuomo, told Judge Rakoff in court that the office was not raising an “advice of counsel defense,” a transcript shows. The lawyer said that in defending Mr. Pataki and the other former officials, “we’re going to need to show that they acted reasonably, given the law as they understood it.” Mr. Lowell, who works with Mr. Pataki at the law firm Chadbourne & Parke, declined to comment on Monday, as did the office of the current attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, which is defending the other former state officials. Image George E. Pataki, the former governor of New York. Credit Nathaniel Brooks for The New York Times But the dispute over legal strategy spilled into the public record in an exchange of recent court filings before Judge Rakoff, who had earlier held that Mr. Pataki and the other officials did not have immunity from liability, ultimately ruled that the former governor had waived the defense he wanted to put forward. “Governor Pataki seeks nothing more than for the truth to be told as to why he proposed the idea” behind the initiative, Mr. Lowell wrote to the judge. The Pataki administration, after failing to win legislative approval for such a plan, adopted its approach in September 2005 under the state mental hygiene laws. Under the plan, state psychiatrists would review the cases of inmates as they ended their sentences to determine whether they should be confined in psychiatric hospitals. Of the roughly 800 prisoners who were evaluated under the initiative, the state has said, 127 were involuntarily admitted to psychiatric hospitals before the program was ended in late 2006 after the New York State Court of Appeals said that such inmates were entitled to the protections built into the state correction law, which included notice and a court-supervised process. The men who sued in federal court have indisputably sordid backgrounds, the filings show. The lead plaintiff, Kenneth Bailey, 55, had a long history of sexual offenses, including prior convictions. He had also told parole and correction officials that he had “sexually abused in excess of 20 children, all under the age of 11 years old,” one report shows. On Monday, Judge Rakoff rejected a request by the plaintiff’s lawyers to keep details of the men’s histories from the jury. Last month, as the case was approaching trial, Mr. Lowell wrote to the judge and asked that despite the state’s earlier waiver, Mr. Pataki be allowed to assert an “advice of counsel defense.” He said Mr. Pataki had assumed that the state was mounting such a defense on his behalf and had not been told that a waiver had been made. Mr. Lowell said that preventing Mr. Pataki from testifying that he had based his decision to move forward with the initiative upon the advice of counsel “would be untenable.” He added, “It would strip him of a fundamental defense to the claims, and make it virtually impossible for him to testify about why he did what he did.” Ameer Benno, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, responded in court papers that Mr. Pataki’s claim that he was unaware that such a defense was not being asserted was “manifestly incredible,” and even if it were true, he should have known it. “Basic notions of fairness” should prevent him from changing the nature of his defense so close to trial, Mr. Benno said. In an order dated June 28, Judge Rakoff found that Mr. Pataki had “unequivocally waived any advice-of-counsel defense and therefore may not present this defense at trial.” The judge said in a brief opinion on Monday, that allowing Mr. Pataki to rescind his waiver at this late stage “would severely prejudice” the plaintiffs. | George E Pataki;Rape;Prison;Mental Health;New York;Abbe D Lowell |
ny0048363 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2014/11/08 | China and Japan, in Sign of a Thaw, Agree to Disagree on a Disputed Island Group | BEIJING — Signaling a potential thaw in their long-frozen relations, China and Japan announced Friday that they would talk to each other about their competing positions on islands in the East China Sea and would gradually resume diplomatic and security discussions. With that step, the leaders of both countries gave the first public declaration that they are trying to roll back a prolonged standoff that has inflamed nationalist sentiments, damaged economic ties and at times appeared to bring them close to military conflict. The agreement was announced in similarly worded statements by both sides acknowledging that “different positions exist” over the islands known in China as the Diaoyu and in Japan as the Senkaku. Even acknowledging differences counts as something of a breakthrough in the standoff. Japan has long declined to discuss China’s claim to sovereignty over the islands, which Tokyo has controlled for most years since the 1880s. China has grown bolder in asserting its claim by making unilateral declarations about control of airspace and sending fishing boats and other vessels to test Japan’s resolve to defend the remote islands, raising fears of a broader conflict. The adversaries said they had agreed to overcome political obstacles in the spirit of “facing history squarely and looking forward to the future,” while also creating “crisis management mechanisms” to help prevent any future escalation. The diplomatic overture has special significance because of the timing: Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan and President Xi Jinping of China are expected to meet next week in Beijing at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit meeting, which began Wednesday. Before the statements, the question hanging over the event was whether the leaders of the world’s second and third largest economies would simply shake hands. Now, there is hope that the Beijing moment could provide for a breakthrough at the APEC forum for world leaders, which begins Monday. Image There are competing claims to the islands in the East China Sea known in China as the Diaoyu and in Japan as the Senkaku. Tokyo has controlled the islands for most years since the 1880s. Credit Kyodo News, via Associated Press In Tokyo, the director of the China division of Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Atsushi Ueno, said there had been no decision about a meeting between Mr. Abe and Mr. Xi in Beijing. The Chinese state-run news agency Xinhua said in a commentary, “The Chinese Foreign Ministry has yet to offer a definite answer on whether or not Xi will converse with Abe and, if yes, what kind of talks they will have.” Japan’s foreign minister, Fumio Kishida, will meet with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, on Saturday, Mr. Kishida told reporters on Friday in Beijing, where he was attending a gathering of foreign ministers at the APEC summit meeting. The accord, which had been the subject of negotiations for some time, was completed in Beijing on Thursday in a meeting between Japan’s national security adviser, Shotaro Yachi, and China’s chief diplomat, State Councilor Yang Jiechi, according to a Japanese official who spoke on the condition of anonymity in keeping with diplomatic protocol. The tone of the accord showed that China was able to maneuver to prevent mention of Japan’s claim of sovereignty over the islands, said Zhang Baohui, director of the Center for Asian Pacific Studies at Lingnan University in Hong Kong. Two weeks ago, he said, the Japanese reported that the behind-the-scenes negotiations would lead to a statement that would recognize Japan’s sovereignty but would also say that Japan was aware of China’s position. “That the statement doesn’t say Japan has sovereignty is a diplomatic victory for China and allows the Xi-Abe meeting to happen in the next few days,” Mr. Zhang said. The statements on Friday announcing the agreement said that Tokyo and Beijing would gradually resume security and diplomatic dialogue to build mutual trust. But they made no specific mention of one important issue grounded in the countries’ painful World War II history: Mr. Abe’s past visits to the Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo, which honors Japanese war criminals along with the country’s other wartime dead. Chinese officials have bluntly called for Mr. Abe, a conservative, to end his visits to the shrine, a pledge that would be extremely unpopular with his core constituency. Mr. Abe has made no such promise, said the Japanese official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. China and Japan have been in a Cold War-style standoff since 2012, when the Japanese government nationalized the disputed islands in the East China Sea, which Japan controls. Territorial Disputes in the Waters Near China China has recently increased its pursuit of territorial claims in nearby seas, leading to tense exchanges with neighboring countries. A map of some of the most notable disputes. Since then, China has repeatedly dispatched paramilitary ships to the waters near the uninhabited islands, though those patrols have been reduced in the last few months, apparently in an attempt to defuse the situation. China also declared an air defense zone above the islands, setting off an international uproar because it demanded that all aircraft entering the area submit flight plans to China first. The United States, whose most important ally in Asia is Japan, advised its civilian airlines to refrain from doing so. The Obama administration, concerned about the possibility of an altercation near the islands that could explode into a full-blown conflict, had urged Mr. Abe to try to talk to the Chinese. This year, Mr. Obama said in Tokyo that the United States would stand by its commitment to defend Japan in the event of a conflict. China has long demanded that Japan formally acknowledge the existence of a dispute over the sovereignty of the islands, and Japan has long refused, worried that doing so would strengthen Beijing’s position. The careful wording of Friday’s statements appeared intended to enable each side to say it had not backed down and to claim a diplomatic victory. The tensions between China and Japan have had significant economic consequences for both sides, including a drop-off of Japanese investment in China by nearly half in the first six months of this year. The negotiations that led to the agreement announced on Friday appeared to have started in July with the visit to Beijing of a former Japanese prime minister, Yasuo Fukuda, who met with Mr. Xi. Thomas Berger, a professor at Boston University and an expert on Japanese politics, said domestic and international concerns had prompted both countries to agree to disagree and get on with other business. Mr. Abe needed to signal to his domestic audience that his “peace through strength” policy was working, and China, with its economy slowing, needed better economic relations with Japan, he said. “The overwhelming majority of Japanese, especially in the pragmatic wing of his government, have little desire for an actual conflict with Beijing,” Professor Berger said. “Instead, what they hope is that through a policy of strength, they can get China to moderate its policies toward Japan.” Mr. Xi was probably hoping to get credit internationally for moderating his position, while not making substantive concessions to Japan over the islands or other issues, Professor Berger said. | Japan;China;East China Sea;Senkaku Islands Diaoyu Islands;Military;Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation;Shinzo Abe;Xi Jinping |
ny0019337 | [
"sports"
] | 2013/07/07 | New Zealand Skipper Adapts and Thrives in a Multihull World | SAN FRANCISCO — Dean Barker has been the helmsman for Team New Zealand in the America’s Cup. He has been the helmsman for New Zealand in the Louis Vuitton Cup. He has raced in the MedCup, the Congressional Cup, the world match-racing championships, even the Olympics. But until October 2010, Barker, one of the world’s most experienced and successful sailors, had never been at the helm or at any other post during a multihull race. “No, no, no, niver, niver, niver,” said Barker, using the true-blue Kiwi’s pronunciation of never. Until Larry Ellison and Barker’s countryman Russell Coutts of Oracle Team USA determined that the 34th America’s Cup would be contested in 72-foot catamarans, AC72s, Barker had never had need or desire to race in a boat with more than one hull. “I did have a Hobie 16, which I had bought a few years before just as a knock-around boat, just to use for the beach,” he said. “But that was just to go out and muck around in.” That came to an abrupt halt in 2010 as Barker flew to Almería, Spain, to compete with his teammates in an Extreme 40 regatta in a catamaran. “We finished dead last and not by a small amount,” Barker said. “We came away from that knowing what was involved and what we needed to do, but we realized it was a pretty steep mountain to climb.” The final phase of the climb begins Sunday with the first round-robin race of the Louis Vuitton Cup in San Francisco. New Zealand, with Barker still at the helm, is a strong favorite to emerge from the disappointingly small group of three challengers and face Oracle in the America’s Cup in September. If that happens, both Barker and Oracle’s helmsman, Jimmy Spithill, will be tributes to the power of adaptation. Spithill, a high-energy Australian, also had to make the transition from the detail-driven world of monohulls to the more wide-open world of multihulls. He did that from 2007, when he was the helmsman for Luna Rossa in the 32nd Cup, to 2010, when, after joining Coutts and Oracle, he was at the helm of the giant 90-foot trimaran that won the 33rd Cup from the Swiss team Alinghi. As the defender, Oracle had the choice of boats and site. “We were seriously considering the monohull,” Spithill, 34, said in a recent interview. “It was a tough choice, and Russell was really good about the process. We started to really think about trying to jump a few steps ahead and really think, ‘What will the next generation want to do?’ And the answer was: ‘They’ll want to go fast. They’ll want to be tested. They’ll want to be right on the limit.’ ” High-performance catamarans it would be, even if the consensus now is that the carbon-fiber boats, with their huge wing sails, are bigger and more powerful than they should be. Their complexity and, above all, cost have also turned out to be dissuasive to prospective challengers. Eleven competed in the last full-scale Cup, in 2007 in Valencia, Spain. The three this time are Emirates Team New Zealand, Luna Rossa and the Swedish team Artemis, which is still trying to launch a viable boat after its first was destroyed May 9 after capsizing in an accident that killed the British sailor Andrew Simpson. New Zealand is the only challenger that has attempted, with Barker, to convert a star helmsman from the previous class of Cup yachts to the AC72s. Luna Rossa and Artemis have brought in new talent from other yachting classes with no previous America’s Cup experience. After extensive trials, Luna Rossa has chosen Chris Draper, a 35-year-old from Britain. Artemis’s primary helmsman is expected to be Nathan Outteridge, a 27-year-old Australian, even though he was at the helm during Artemis’s accident in its first AC72. Image Dean Barker will be at the helm of New Zealand’s boat in the first race of the Louis Vuitton Cup on Sunday, the round-robin prelude to the 34th America’s Cup series. Credit Robert Galbraith/Reuters Draper and Outteridge have won world championships and Olympic medals in the 49er high-performance skiff dinghy: Draper won the bronze in 2004 with Simon Hiscocks; Outerridge won the gold in 2012 with Iain Jensen. Outerridge also won the world championship in the International Moth Class in 2011, and the fact that the Moths do hydrofoil has made him a particularly attractive contender to drive the much bigger foiling AC72s. “There was sort of a whole generation of sailors who missed out on the America’s Cup, when the old guys hung on through the I.A.C.C. class,” said Iain Murray, the America’s Cup regatta director, referring to the monohull class used from 1992 through 2007. “It was a pretty closed shop, and the old guys could hang in there. “Experience was gold, but now it’s all the guys who are coming out and winning gold medals in 49ers and Moths and all these really high-performance boats; guys in their 20s taking up the posts.” There was also the America’s Cup World Series, preliminary events contested over the past two years in one-design, 45-foot versions of the full-blown Cup yachts. Those events were a proving ground for new talent. Draper was initially with Team Korea, which failed to secure the financing to compete in the Vuitton Cup in AC72s. “Without that circuit, I think it was impossible to see Chris Draper or Outerridge in the Cup,” said Max Sirena, the America’s Cup veteran who is the skipper of Luna Rossa. Barker, once a wunderkind but now 41, said he had never considered not attempting to make the transition. “In the end, we’re all sportsmen and we like to compete,” he said, “and I think that new challenge was at times quite refreshing.” The challenge included extensive time on the water in smaller catamarans and a lot of coaching from Glenn Ashby, an Olympic silver medalist in a catamaran for Australia in the Tornado class, who had helped Oracle prepare for the 2010 America’s Cup. “It’s pretty much apples for apples,” Barker said. “There are a lot of skills that transfer straight across straight away.” But there are still big differences, fear factor included. “Well,” Barker said, “we’ve gone from a boat in which finesse and fine-tuning and detailing has sort of been absolutely paramount to a boat where it’s just raw adrenaline and quite big changes in the speed and the trim and angle, where it’s a lot more seat-of-the-pants sailing. And all that pretty much makes the boats all the more fun to sail.” Barker said he did miss the elaborate, intricate prestarts that were a staple of previous America’s Cups in monohulls. “That was a real skill that you need to develop over the years,” he said. “And I do miss going to all the match-racing events and all that sort of racing, the close boat-on-boat battles, because that certainly in this era does not exist nearly to the same level.” What he also misses, with only two other challengers in San Francisco, is depth of competition. “There are just not enough teams, and the budget is still way too high,” he said. “We need teams back in the Cup, and we need to get the budgets down so we can do that.” | Sailing;America's Cup;Oracle Racing |
ny0230671 | [
"sports",
"cycling"
] | 2010/09/19 | With One Stage to Go, Italian Inches Closer to Title in Vuelta | Vincenzo Nibali of Italy tightened his grip on the Vuelta a España title, finishing second behind his rival Ezequiel Mosquera in the race’s 20th stage, a mountainous 107-mile leg that ended in Puerto de Navacerrada. With a straightforward final leg Sunday, Nibali has all but secured the first victory by an Italian in the race in 20 years. ¶Taylor Phinney edged Levi Leipheimer to win the USA Cycling professional time trial championship in Greenville, S.C.ph inney (AP) | Vuelta a Espana (Bicycle Race);Bicycles and Bicycling;Nibali Vincenzo |
ny0099677 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2015/06/22 | Australia’s Policy on Migrants Questioned After Smuggler Says He Was Bribed to Turn Back | SYDNEY, Australia — If money talks, it was the stacks of crisp $100 bills that spoke loudest. An Indonesian smuggler said the Australian authorities had stopped his boat at sea and given him and his crew the cash , more than $30,000, to take his cargo of 65 migrants to Indonesia. The allegation, which the Australian government has not denied nor explicitly admitted , was the latest indication of a hardening of Australia ’s immigration policy under Prime Minister Tony Abbott, which critics say has at times veered into illegality. If the boat captain’s story is true, the incident may have violated Australian, Indonesian and international laws against smuggling, bribery and the treatment of asylum seekers. “Australia is moving to ever more radical measures to avoid our international obligations,” said Hugh de Kretser, director of the Melbourne-based Human Rights Law Center. “But the world is watching.” Even before the payment allegations, which surfaced last week, international organizations and human rights groups had assailed Australia’s policy of intercepting boats of migrants at sea and turning them to Indonesia, or holding migrants indefinitely at offshore detention centers. There have been reports of abuse and a death at the centers, in Papua New Guinea and Nauru. In March, the United Nations said conditions at Nauru breached an international anti-torture convention . This month, Australia flew four asylum seekers to Cambodia, the first transfer in a $31 million deal to resettle refugees in a country that Human Rights Watch says has been unable to integrate the refugees already there. The Australian government has also expanded its legal authority , passing a law in December giving it the power to hold asylum seekers indefinitely on the high seas and to transfer them to any country the immigration minister chooses, even if the transfer returns a refugee to potential danger. A bill currently in Parliament would give guards at the detention centers the authority to use force to maintain order at the privately run sites, a response to riots over conditions at the center on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea last year. Australia has long been a destination for economic and political migrants looking for better lives in a safe and prosperous country. In the 1970s when the first wave of boat people arrived from Vietnam, Australians were mostly sympathetic. Image Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia, whose authorities are accused of paying smugglers to turn boats back. Credit Lukas Coch/European Pressphoto Agency But attitudes started to shift in the last decade and by 2012, when the number of migrants arriving by sea had risen to more than 17,000, Australians felt under siege. That year, at least 880 migrants were feared drowned at sea when their flimsy boats were dashed on rocks and reefs or sank after running out of fuel, and immigration became an emotional national crisis. “There’s really only one thing to say here,” Mr. Abbott said in defending his policies last week, “and that is that we have stopped the boats. That’s good for Australia, it’s good for Indonesia and it’s particularly good for all of those who want to see a better world, because if the boats start again, the deaths start again.” Pressed on the question of payments to traffickers, Mr. Abbott invoked national security secrecy rules to avoid responding directly. But he said the government was determined to “stop the boats by hook or by crook.” Attorney General George Brandis, asked directly if money had changed hands, told the Senate only that “the Abbott government has taken the necessary measures to succeed.” Indeed, if the current government has tightened the screws, turning away the boat people has been a popular and bipartisan project. It was the previous Labor government that started intercepting migrants at sea to prevent them from reaching Australian soil. The Labor government may have even set the stage for paying smugglers by allocating an extra $16 million to the national spy agency in 2009 to pay for information on people smuggling and to pay smugglers to betray other smugglers. But the former leader of Mr. Abbott’s Liberal Party, John Hewson, now a professor at Australian National University, rejects that argument. “Paying for information and criminal enforcement is one thing,” he said. “Paying people smugglers to take a boat back is quite another.” The minority Greens Party has called for a Senate hearing into the payment allegations in an effort to force the government to provide more information. “You can argue it breaches international laws and conventions, and argue about the legality of what’s happened,” Senator Sarah Hanson-Young of the Greens said. “But it is a question of what is right and wrong. And this is wrong.” A Senate committee is already investigating reports of sexual and physical abuse of women and children at the Nauru detention center. The Flight of Refugees Around the Globe Mapping the migration of millions of people displaced around the world because of violence. Last year alone, about 14 million fled, according to the United Nations. The United Nations special rapporteur on torture, Juan E. Méndez, said in March that the Australian government had violated the right of the asylum seekers there to be “free from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,” and that the government had failed to investigate and prosecute allegations of torture at the center. In response, Mr. Abbott said Australians were “sick of being lectured to by the United Nations.” More than 1,500 migrants are detained at the centers in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Prevented by law from ever coming to Australia, the migrants will remain there until Australia finds a country willing to accept them. The government may have stopped the boats, says Daniel Webb, legal advocacy director at the Human Rights Law Center, “but we have achieved that by being tremendously cruel to those who have come by boat, and by intercepting others and forcing them back, perhaps into danger.” Whether the government broke the law by paying a smuggler, and whether there will be any repercussions if it did, remain to be seen. The Indonesian police are questioning the boat crew and the country’s foreign minister has demanded an explanation from Australia. Senator Hanson-Young has asked the Australian federal police to investigate. “If payments were made, it seems likely that Australian, Indonesian and international laws were broken,” said Mr. de Kretser of the Human Rights Law Center. Australia has agreed to international laws to combat people smuggling, which it may have violated, he said. It is also illegal under Australian law to organize someone’s illegal entry into another country. “There are also serious questions around whether there is any legal authority to make payments like these,” Mr. de Kretser said. As for Australia’s obligations under international laws, Madeline Gleeson, a research associate at the Andrew and Renata Kaldor Center for International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales, said it depends on what happened at sea. “Was anybody given the chance to seek asylum?” she asked. “Was an assessment made as to whether it was safe to turn people around? Were there children, pregnant women, survivors of torture and trauma on board?” Mr. Brandis, the attorney general, would have to approve any prosecutions, which seems unlikely. He told the Senate last week that the government “at all times has complied with the law.” Mr. Hewson warned that if the government was handing out cash to smugglers, it had stepped beyond simply deterring asylum seekers and stopping deaths at sea. “If you start paying them to take the boats back, you are giving them an incentive,” he said. “There are other legal and moral issues. But just in practical terms, the government may have ditched the centerpiece of their argument.” | Australia;Human trafficking;Indonesia;Immigration;Tony Abbott;Smuggling;Right of asylum |
ny0106253 | [
"sports",
"hockey"
] | 2012/04/29 | Rookie Chris Kreider Is in Vital Role for Rangers | When Chris Kreider scored to break a 1-1 tie in the third period on Saturday, he did not just electrify the crowd at Madison Square Garden. At a convention of collegiate hockey coaches in Naples, Fla., Jerry York pumped his fist and smiled. “I was a very proud coach,” said York, Kreider’s coach at Boston College until three weeks ago, when the Eagles defeated Ferris State for the N.C.A.A. championship. “I’m here at a hotel with a bunch of my peers and the Rangers have so many recent college players — Derek Stepan, Ryan McDonagh, Carl Hagelin. My guy Chris scores a goal. How can you not feel incredible about that?” Kreider, who signed with the Rangers three days after winning the college title, has had that effect lately. Ever since Coach John Tortorella called him “an interesting cat” during the Rangers’ first-round series with Ottawa, Kreider has demonstrated what he was talking about. Along with some scratching and clawing, Kreider has used his speed to become a vital factor in the Rangers’ title hopes. On Saturday, Kreider broke a 1-1 tie with a goal seven minutes into the third period and assisted on Brad Richards’s goal 90 seconds later. “He’s showing us something more and more every night,” Richards said of Kreider. In just his sixth game in the N.H.L., Kreider found himself making the interview rounds minutes after the Rangers’ victory. “The entire experience is pretty overwhelming,” said Kreider, who turns 21 on Monday. But he has not been overwhelmed between the singing of the national anthem and the sound of the final horn, which is what Tortorella alluded to. Kreider’s demeanor in the locker room is the same calm he exhibits on the ice. “He didn’t say much when he first got here,” defenseman Dan Girardi said. “I’m sure he wanted to be the quiet kid, just trying to fit in. But we’ve encouraged him to say what’s on his mind, to ask any questions he may have.” As a result, said McDonagh, Kreider “started asking a lot of questions.” Kreider appeared bashful when these comments were relayed to him. He grinned a lot but didn’t say much as he sat in his locker-room stall, wearing the Broadway Hat — given by his teammates to the lunch-pail hero of the game — for the first time. “This was only my sixth game, but I feel like I’ve been around a lot longer,” Kreider said. “I guess it feels that way because of all the help I’ve had.” He regularly exchanges texts with York, who is not as surprised about Kreider’s rapid ascent as just about everyone else. “You have to remember, he didn’t come from the University of Nowhere,” York said. “Chris played in two world junior championships for Team USA and was a part of two N.C.A.A. titles with us. But you do have to give him credit for stepping into the biggest market in the country and not just looking comfortable, but excelling.” York is not alone with his Boston College pride. After Kreider’s third-period star turn, Parker Milner, his goaltender at Boston College, wrote on Twitter: “Are you kidding me, Kreids. Word is they are chanting Kreider at MSG.” The chant could become a custom this spring. In a tight game, Kreider’s ability to create space for himself with speed is crucial. At the end of the second period, there were a total of 45 hits recorded in the game — 25 by the Rangers, 20 by the Capitals. At the same time, there were a combined 21 shots on goal by the teams — 13 by the Capitals and 8 by the Rangers. One play made the difference in the third period. Kreider received a pass in the neutral zone from Stepan, skated into the offensive end and blasted a slap shot by Braden Holtby, the Capitals’ goalie. After the game, Richards was asked if he had any idea Kreider would become so important to the Rangers. “No, not really,” Richards said. “This is a pretty high level he’s jumped into. It shows you his learning curve, shows you his hockey I.Q. I didn’t expect that to happen.” Neither did the Capitals. | Kreider Chris;New York Rangers;Hockey Ice;Boston College |
ny0146052 | [
"business"
] | 2008/07/05 | Investing in Longevity and Security | ON Monday, Theodore A. Mathas left his old office at one end of the 13th floor of the New York Life Building to move into the corner office overlooking Madison Square Park. On Tuesday, Mr. Mathas, 41, became one of the youngest chief executives of a Fortune 100 company and the 18th in the company’s 163-year history. Not far from his new perch, tens of thousands of Wall Streeters have been losing their jobs, and many, the security blanket of life insurance. He spoke recently about this trend and other challenges ahead. Following are excerpts: Q. Every day, it seems, there are layoffs on Wall Street and elsewhere. Are droves of Americans being left without adequate life insurance? A. It exposes a couple of problems. One, people don’t like to talk about life insurance, and the second, people say they have it at work. You need to own an individual life insurance policy that has a fixed premium and is portable. Q. You’re not just saying that to get new customers? A. We’ve had the No. 1 market share for five of the last seven years, and our life insurance is a very strong and profitable business. I feel like we have a responsibility to help people provide for financial protection. As an industry, we’re not meeting the need. It’s hard to create demand for it because people don’t want to focus on it. Today, only 60 percent of the adult population has life insurance protection, and in many cases, it’s not enough to meet their needs. I look at that, regardless of how strong and well we’re doing, as a problem and failure that we need to address. Q. The life insurance industry is an old and staid business. Have there been recent innovations, for example, income annuities? A. Yes. American retirement security. We identified early on, five years ago, a confluence of events. People are living longer, they have less confidence that Social Security will provide a meaningful and secure part of their retirement and they can’t look to companies to provide them with pensionable income. People benefit if we take longevity risk away from them and hold it ourselves. It ensures, for you, that you’ll never run out of money regardless of what happens in the market. Q. There’s a big block of customers who care about longevity. How do you prepare for the baby boomers? A. Inherently with the generation today that is 65-plus, just the concept of security and a paycheck for life has great appeal. But I think with boomers, what they want to know is that they can continue spending the money. They want to know that their lifestyle isn’t going to change. We designed some products, one of which is called longevity insurance, which provide for, as opposed to a steady issuing of income during retirement, a back end stream of income that doesn’t kick in right away, but later in your retirement. Q. You have had success overseas with double-digit growth the last several years? Correct? A. Yes. Q. Is Mexico the hottest country? A. Mexico is the crown jewel from the standpoint it is a well-established operation. The growth rates are in the 15 and 17 percent range. The fastest-growing segment is really in India for us. There, we’ve seen our operation grow in excess of 75 percent a year for two years in a row. Q. Could you explain how your investment arm was nimble enough ahead of the subprime crisis to change course? A. We didn’t change what we did. We stuck to the basics. We’re long-term investors, we take on obligations to policyholders, and we have a $100 billion-plus portfolio backing those up. Primarily what we buy is corporate bonds. We have to have a discipline around doing that. You want to make sure you’re not too loaded up in any one credit risk or sector. One of the things that happened in subprime is far too many companies had way too much exposure to one section of the credit market. Even if a bond had a Triple A rating, the quality underneath wasn’t good. You know what? I don’t actually think that is some unique insight. I think it’s more being willing to look through. Everybody knew that people were getting money on houses where their income was questionable and the house values were overstated. If that ultimately backs up bonds, what do you think? Was that a good risk? You don’t have to be that sophisticated. Q. You also had an advantage of not being publicly traded? A. We are a mutual company, we’re effectively private, we’re not subject to the capital markets, the public markets. That means, if someone came in, which they did, with a proposal and said, “I’m going to cost you some money this year but it’s the right thing in the long run,” I was able to say, “Do it. It’s the right thing.” I didn’t say, go calculate earnings per share and tell me how much my share price might drop and tell me what analysts are going to get on our case, I didn’t have to do that. It made it possible to do the right thing. Our business model permits us to do the things that are in the long-term best interests of our policyholders. It doesn’t mean we aren’t issuing quarter profits. Of course we are. But it means it doesn’t take on undue importance in our calculations. | New York Life Insurance Co;Insurance;Mathas Theodore A.;Executives and Management |
ny0057944 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2014/09/12 | U.S. and Europe Back New Economic Sanctions Against Russia | BRUSSELS — The United States and Europe agreed on Thursday to place additional economic sanctions on Russia over its role in promoting separatist warfare in eastern Ukraine despite a fragile new cease-fire that went into effect last week. European leaders overcame resistance among some of their colleagues who wanted to continue delaying additional measures to see if the shaky truce, negotiated in Minsk, Belarus, holds. President Obama then followed suit shortly afterward by announcing that he would match the new European moves when they take effect on Friday. “We are watching closely developments since the announcement of the cease-fire and agreement in Minsk, but we have yet to see conclusive evidence that Russia has ceased its efforts to destabilize Ukraine,” Mr. Obama said. He added: “If Russia fully implements its commitments, these sanctions can be rolled back. If instead Russia continues its aggressive actions and violations of international law, the costs will continue to rise.” Herman Van Rompuy, the president of the European Council, the body representing the European Union’s leaders, said the sanctions to be put into effect on Friday would be reviewed by diplomats before the end of the month and could be revised swiftly if events warranted. “We have always stressed the reversibility and scalability of our restrictive measures,” he said. Image A line to buy bread at a bakery in Luhansk, Ukraine. Russia is being punished for promoting a separatist war in eastern Ukraine. Credit Philippe Desmazes/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Neither side publicly announced the specific actions to be taken, leaving that until Friday, but officials said they would be aimed at Russia’s financial, energy and defense sectors. Both the United States and Europe will further restrict Russian access to credit markets for loans maturing in more than 30 days, according to officials briefed on the plans. The United States will add Sberbank , Russia’s largest, to its list of institutions subject to the limits, according to the officials. The United States and Europe will both further tighten restrictions first imposed in July on the export of energy technology that would help Russia develop its Arctic, deep sea and shale oil reserves, officials said. Europe will ban 24 more Russian officials from traveling to its member states and freeze any assets held there, according to a diplomat familiar with the plan. The Kremlin lost no time in vowing to retaliate. Although Russian officials did not announce any specifics, they have previously threatened to ban flights by Western airlines over Russian airspace, potentially closing off an enormous stretch of territory and forcing costly detours for long-haul flights between Europe and eastern Asia. How Much Europe Depends on Russian Energy Map of European energy imports that come from Russia. Andrey Belousov, a senior economic aide to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, said Thursday that another response might be to ban imports of automobiles to Russia, which is a huge market for used cars from Europe and Japan. “We have a full series of nonagricultural products, where our, above all European, partners depend more on Russia, than Russia on them,” Mr. Belousov said at an economic forum in the Russian city of Samara, the RIA Novosti news agency reported. “This concerns, for instance, the import of automobiles, above all, used cars.” Russia has already banned a variety of food and agricultural imports, including meat, fruit, vegetables and dairy products from the European Union, the United States, Australia, Canada and Norway, as retaliation for earlier rounds of sanctions. A spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Aleksandr Lukashevich, denounced the new Western sanctions at a briefing in Moscow. He accused Russia’s critics of using the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine as a pretext for inflicting unjustified economic harm on Russia. Video Behind the continuing military conflict in eastern Ukraine lies an economic split. The country is moving toward Europe, straining its longstanding ties with Russia. Credit Credit Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The United States has generally been more aggressive than Europe in seeking to penalize Russia for its role in Ukraine. European nations have tended to move more guardedly, in part because they have closer economic ties to Russia and European businesses have more to lose in the event of retaliation by Moscow. During deliberations among the Europeans on the latest round of sanctions, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany argued vociferously in favor of moving ahead without waiting to see if the cease-fire would hold. American officials said Russia still had 1,000 troops inside Ukraine and that Moscow had made it clear it had no intention of reversing its annexation of Crimea. While Ms. Merkel prevailed, the provisional nature of the European Union’s action was underscored at a news briefing, when a European official detailed how the sanctions would be reviewed for possible revision or repeal almost from the moment they are imposed. “The work will start pretty soon,” the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity before the formal publication of the sanctions. The official would not give an estimate of how long the review would take, but said, “I think that the bulk of the work is expected to be done through the month of September.” All 28 member nations would have to agree on any changes. The official said good news from Ukraine might make the decision easier: “We have seen the first positive steps that could pave the way in what we are hoping could become a sustainable political solution, but at the moment this is still very much a developing situation.” | Ukraine;Russia;Europe;Embargoes Sanctions;US Foreign Policy;EU;Vladimir Putin |
ny0030467 | [
"us"
] | 2013/06/19 | Audit Finds Sexual Abuse Was Topic Decades Ago | A regional province of the Capuchin religious order that had fought allegations of sexual abuse for decades decided last year to open its files dating to the 19th century to three independent auditors, in what the order claimed to be a first in the long-running Roman Catholic Church abuse scandal in the United States. The auditors’ report , released on Tuesday, found that sexual abuse by friars in the St. Joseph Province of the Capuchin Order was discussed at meetings as far back as 1932, the first year for which minutes of meetings were available. After more than a dozen students at the province’s St. Lawrence Seminary in Wisconsin accused nine friars of abuse in 1992, it cost the province’s insurer nearly a million dollars — but 89 percent of that went to lawyers to defend the Capuchins and only 11 percent to victims for settlements and therapy, the report said. “One of the very sobering findings,” the Rev. John Celichowski, the Capuchins’ provincial minister, said Tuesday in a conference call with reporters, “is through much of our history as a province, we have failed victims and survivors.” The audit is unusual because the Capuchin province commissioned it voluntarily, claimed to allow the investigators unfettered access to original files and documents, and included on the panel the Rev. Thomas Doyle, a prominent whistle-blower who has often testified against the church in court cases. Most Catholic dioceses undergo annual audits on abuse, but those are based on self-reporting by the dioceses, and the auditors are usually not given access to internal personnel files. The Capuchin Province of St. Joseph, which is based in Detroit, runs social service programs, schools and parishes in Michigan, Arizona, California, Illinois, Indiana, Montana, Wisconsin, Nicaragua and Panama. The province, which has 169 members, is a regional division of one of several Catholic religious orders that profess to follow the example of St. Francis of Assisi by caring for poor and marginalized people and the environment. In addition to Father Doyle, the panel that investigated the Capuchins included a lawyer and a psychologist with experience handling sexual abuse cases. They concluded that the underlying problems were poor record-keeping and “clericalism,” which they defined as the attitude that priests and friars are “inherently superior to laypeople and entitled to undue special deference.” The auditors said that the files often contained “coded language” and euphemisms to refer to sexual abusers. Friars were said to suffer from “immorality” or “evil actions and speech,” and some documents record friars sent for treatment for alcoholism when sexual abuse was clearly the issue. Peter J. Isely, who was abused by a Capuchin friar at St. Lawrence Seminary in 1970s, praised the province for commissioning the report, but said he suspected that the order had either destroyed documents or withheld them from the auditors. Mr. Isely, the Midwest director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said that he had provided court documents to the auditors that were not in the province’s files. Asked about this discrepancy, Father Celichowski acknowledged that “file management was historically a significant problem.” After reviewing information on 1,101 friars, the auditors found 46 who allegedly sexually abused minors — 23 of those with confirmed, substantiated reports of abuse. The Capuchins failed to follow the church’s own canon law and report the abuse to civil authorities, even though they were mandated to, the audit concluded. “I hope that this report and this process will lead other entities in the church — dioceses and religious orders — to have the courage and the Christian decency to do the same thing,” Father Doyle said. | Priest;Rape;Capuchin Order;Catholic Church;Child Abuse |
ny0042065 | [
"world",
"middleeast"
] | 2014/05/29 | Syria to Miss Deadline On Weapons, Official Says | The United Nations secretary general has for the first time acknowledged that the eradication of Syria’s chemical arms stockpile will not be completed by June 30, the deadline imposed by a diplomatic agreement last September in which President Bashar al-Assad renounced the weapons and avoided a threatened American military strike. In a May 23 letter to the Security Council obtained by The New York Times on Wednesday, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that roughly 8 percent of the stockpile remained in Syria, awaiting shipment for destruction abroad. Mr. Ban also said that one of Syria’s 12 storage facilities had yet to be closed, and that only five of 18 production facilities had been closed. “It is imperative that the Syrian Arab Republic concludes the remaining removal operations as quickly as possible, as the authorities have pledged to do,” he wrote in the letter. “However, it is now evident that some activities related to the elimination of the chemical weapons program of the Syrian Arab Republic will continue beyond 30 June 2014.” Syria’s critics, led by the United States, have repeatedly complained in recent months that Mr. Assad is procrastinating in his promise to dismantle the arsenal. The Syrian government has said that the civil war makes safe transit of all the chemical materials out of the country too difficult to complete quickly. Still, missing the final deadline was likely to further anger the Obama administration, which had trumpeted Syria’s pledge to ban chemical weapons as a victory of diplomacy that avoided a direct American military entanglement in the Syria conflict, now in its fourth year. President Obama, who repeatedly warned he would not abide the use of chemical arms in Syria, had threatened airstrikes after an Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack in the Damascus suburbs. But he withdrew the threat after an agreement was negotiated by the United States and Russia, and later unanimously adopted by the Security Council, obliging Syria to join the international treaty that bans chemical weapons and destroy the arsenal by June 30. It had become increasingly clear that the complete destruction of Syria’s chemical arsenal would probably not be completed by the deadline. But officials from the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons , which have been jointly overseeing the destruction, had been saying the deadline was still possible to meet. Mr. Ban’s letter was the first written admission that the process would extend into July. The letter, first reported Wednesday by Reuters, said that in consultation with Ahmet Uzumcu, the director general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the joint mission would “continue its work for a finite period of time beyond 30 June 2014, during which most of the remaining activities for the elimination of the chemical weapons program of the Syrian Arab Republic should be completed.” Mr. Ban’s letter also said he was “very concerned” about the suspected use of chlorine gas bombs in Syria and was eagerly awaiting the results of a fact-finding mission of experts that he and Mr. Uzumcu had ordered. That mission’s convoy came under attack on Tuesday and had to abort its trip to a village in central Syria where, according to the Syrian opposition, Mr. Assad’s military has dropped barrels filled with poisonous chlorine on civilians. Syria has denied the accusation. Earlier Wednesday, Mr. Uzumcu’s organization stated that the attack on the convoy had been more extensive than first reported. A statement on the group’s website said the experts had been attacked twice, first with a roadside bomb that disabled their lead vehicle, and then in an ambush by gunmen as the experts were retreating in two other vehicles. The episode violated a local cease-fire between the government and insurgents. The gunmen shot up one of the vehicles with automatic weapons and briefly detained the experts, who were released after the interventions of the insurgent group that had negotiated the cease-fire. The experts were unhurt and returned safely to Damascus, but a driver in their convoy suffered minor injuries. It was unclear from the statement who among the antagonists in the war was responsible for foiling the investigators, who were trying to reach Kafr Zeita, a village in Hama Province. The government and opposition each blamed the other. | Syria;Biological and Chemical Warfare;Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons;UN;Ban Ki moon |
ny0191247 | [
"business"
] | 2009/02/03 | What if Watchdogs Got Bonuses? | DAVOS, Switzerland Maybe someone deserves a bonus. Like someone who sniffs out the next Bernie Madoff. Or jousts with tomorrow’s gonzo bankers. Or defuses the Next Big Crisis in whatever Next Big Thing is dreamed up by Wall Street. Someone, in short, who regulates. It is clear that the nation’s financial regulators were no match for Wall Street last time. The financiers were always one step ahead. But maybe that isn’t surprising. The financiers, after all, have a big incentive to outsmart the financial police. It is called a bonus. Wall Street lures a lot of bright minds with money. How can federal agencies compete? They can’t. The numbers are sobering. Mary L. Schapiro, the new head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, will make about $162,000 a year. Timothy F. Geithner, the new Treasury secretary, will pull down about $191,300. Both of them will make less than many 20-somethings made on Wall Street during the boom. And keep in mind that people who work for Ms. Schapiro and Mr. Geithner, and their counterparts at other regulators, make less than their bosses. Wall Street executives champion the idea of incentives to defend their industry’s bonus culture. Those carrots, the bankers argue, make the markets work (at least when incentives are properly aligned). So maybe regulators should embrace the bonus culture too — for themselves. As crazy as that might sound, the idea came up here last week at the annual corporate schmooze-fest in Davos. Tony Tan Keng Yam, deputy chairman and executive director of the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation, suggested that one reason American regulators fell down on the job was that they were paid too little. “You must have as good people working in the government in the regulatory authorities as those that are working in the private sector,” Mr. Tan said. “You do need, particularly in these very difficult times, capable people in central banks, in government, in the Treasury who can effectively supervise.” Mr. Tan knows about this firsthand. He is a former regulator himself, and Singapore has a different view about compensation. “We pay our politicians and our government servants very well,” he said. “We lock remuneration to the market.” While Singapore’s watchdogs aren’t paid enough to afford private planes, some in top positions make seven-figure salaries. Granted, not everyone is motivated by money alone. People become teachers, doctors, engineers and, yes, financial regulators for all sorts of reasons. In the United States, many senior bankers move seamlessly between Wall Street and Washington. But in recent years, with Wall Street so flush, many young people didn’t give much thought to working for the government. The potential rewards on Wall Street were too good to pass up. Paying regulators a lot of money may not go down well with taxpayers, particularly given the outcry over bonuses on Wall Street. But while bankers are taking the brunt of the heat for the financial crisis , regulators may soon be taking blame, too. “God knows, some really stupid things were done by American banks,” Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, said. “To policy makers, I say where were they? They approved all these banks.” His comment may seem self-serving, but many regulators privately acknowledged that they didn’t see the economic crisis coming. Other Wall Street denizens said the problem wasn’t regulators, but the misalignment of interests in their industry. “The government has gotten some very good people,” said Henry Kravis, the private equity king, “to work and do a very good job.” Perhaps the most controversial idea over how to fix the regulatory system was suggested over a private Shabbat dinner hosted by the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, on Friday: why not pay bonuses to regulators for ferreting out frauds like Mr. Madoff’s? The bonuses could be paid with the bounty of fines. Some at Davos thought the bonus idea could work. But anxiety over that approach was palpable. “They already treat us like criminals,” one hedge fund manager said. A few said giving bonuses to regulators would be like giving bonuses to the police for issuing speeding tickets. Maybe the regulators, like Wall Streeters, would start thinking about the money, rather than what is right. But maybe that’s exactly what Wall Street needs to slow down. | Executive Compensation;Regulation and Deregulation of Industry;Subprime Mortgage Crisis;Bonuses |
ny0086585 | [
"business",
"dealbook"
] | 2015/07/21 | First Data I.P.O. Is Likely to Be One of Year’s Largest | First Data Corporation, the object of one of the last big leveraged buyouts struck before the financial crisis of 2008, is finally coming back to the stock markets. The company, a credit card and payments processor, filed on Monday for an initial public offering , paving the way for its majority owner, the private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, to eventually sell off its holdings eight years after buying the company for $29 billion. Should First Data succeed in going public, its stock sale is likely to be one of the biggest of the year, one that has so far been relatively quiet for I.P.O.s. Renaissance Capital on Monday estimated that the company could raise $5 billion or more. First Data said it planned to use proceeds from the stock sale to repay some of its roughly $20 billion in long-term debt. K.K.R. is finally seeking an exit from one of its most debt-laden deals in recent years. The firm and its peers — spurred on by a flood of cheap, available debt — rushed to strike ever-bigger deals, setting records for their industry in the process. But after the financial crisis, many of these deals took years to realize profitable exits. As the stock markets have improved, however, many private equity shops have rushed to stage I.P.O.s for their properties. The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index has nearly doubled over the last five years, while the Nasdaq has risen nearly 140 percent. Another lengthy and tough private equity investment, the Spanish-language broadcaster Univision, filed to go public this month, providing what will be at best a mediocre return for its consortium of owners. Still, some other huge buyouts still remain in the hands of their private equity owners. Among them are Clear Channel Communications, the broadcaster now rebranded as iHeartMedia, and Toys “R” Us, which K.K.R. bought with Bain Capital and Vornado. (The private equity firm has written off its investment in another major portfolio company, the Texas power utility Energy Future Holdings, after it filed for bankruptcy last year.) K.K.R. pursued First Data hard in the spring of 2007, eventually paying a significant premium over the company’s stock price and handing over one of the biggest equity checks in the history of the private equity firm. Now First Data claims some 4,000 financial institutions around the world as clients, processing more than 2,300 transactions a second. “We love the hand that we have — we have millions of clients, we know how to innovate and collaborate, our leadership bench is deep, and being in business with K.K.R. has been great,” Frank Bisignano, First Data’s chief executive, wrote in a letter included in the I.P.O. filing. “We have much work to do, and we know First Data has not yet truly arrived. We know we are on the right path, and we know we will get there.” The company said that it lost $265 million last year, narrowing a multiyear string of losses, even as its revenue climbed to $11.1 billion. Yet as First Data moves beyond processing credit card transactions into a broader array of payment services, it is facing an increasingly crowded field of competitors, including PayPal and a longtime competitor, Total System Services. According to the prospectus, K.K.R. still owns 74 percent of the company. Mr. Bisignano, who before joining First Data was a top executive at JPMorgan Chase, owns 1 percent. Still, Monday’s filing left out main elements of the pending stock sale, including how many shares will be sold and on which exchange they will trade. It also didn’t list which banks will underwrite the I.P.O. Even the amount of money First Data is seeking to raise has yet to be determined. | First Data;IPO;KKR;Private equity |
ny0044257 | [
"sports",
"baseball"
] | 2014/05/22 | Young Met’s Career Line: 2 Solid Starts, 2 Losses | No matter what Jacob deGrom did Wednesday, it would be hard for him to top his major league debut. Last Thursday, he held the Yankees to one run in seven innings. He got a hit, mercifully ending the Mets pitchers’ hitless streak. And he improved as the game went on, showing maturity and poise and guts, keeping the Mets close in a 1-0 game. DeGrom is in the running, along with Rafael Montero, for the Mets’ fifth-starter spot. He has perhaps three starts to audition, until Dillon Gee returns from the disabled list, and he had a chance to assert himself Wednesday night. The Los Angeles Dodgers, with a lineup full of talented and expensive stars, had walloped Montero the night before. In his encore, deGrom pitched well for six innings at Citi Field, but the Dodgers wore him down, smacking three solo home runs to prevail, 4-3, and push the Mets further along their downward slide. The loss was the Mets’ sixth in their last seven games, dropping them to 20-25, a season-worst five games under .500. DeGrom, to his credit, gave the Mets a chance to win. He allowed three runs in six innings and was undone only by those home runs. He even got another hit. But the Mets’ offense could not break through against the Dodgers’ starter, Hyun-Jin Ryu. Just as in his debut, deGrom seemed a tad nervous at the start. In the second inning, Adrian Gonzalez belted a fastball several rows into the upper deck beyond right field for a solo home run, his 12th homer of the season. DeGrom settled down after that. He walked one batter in the third and fourth innings, and Matt Kemp doubled to lead off the fifth, but deGrom escaped unscathed every time. “Impressive kid,” Mets Manager Terry Collins said, adding, “That’s what I like about him: He doesn’t get shook up about stuff and is able to make pitches when he has to.” DeGrom’s counterpart, Ryu, was making his first start in almost a month. Left shoulder inflammation had interrupted a fine start to his season. In his first seven starts, he had posted a 3.00 earned run average, and on the road he had pitched 28 consecutive scoreless innings, dating to last season. At times on Wednesday night, it felt as if the Dodgers were playing a home game in Queens, with many Korean fans turning out to support Ryu. He gave them much to cheer as the Mets kept squandering their chances — most notably in the third inning, when Curtis Granderson struck out with the bases loaded. Ryu extended his road scoreless streak to more than 33 innings, until the Mets’ Eric Campbell, a rookie first baseman, hit a two-run homer, his first home run in the majors, with two outs in the sixth. In all, the Mets collected 13 hits and left nine runners on base. “I wish I had the answer,” Collins said. “We talked a lot about playing in this park. We talked a lot about big chances, big opportunities. We just got to have somebody break loose.” The Mets tacked on a run in the ninth inning, which would have tied the score had the Dodgers not added a crucial insurance run in the eighth. With one out and runners on the corners, Hanley Ramirez hit a ground ball back to Mets reliever Jeurys Familia. But as Familia turned, both Daniel Murphy and Wilmer Flores were running to cover second base. Afraid of throwing the ball away, Familia hesitated and then threw in time to get only one out as a run scored. “It’s part of the game,” Familia said. “Sometimes we make mistakes.” As a backdrop to the game, details surrounding an incident with the Dodgers’ Class AAA team in Albuquerque were still being sorted out. On Tuesday night, Miguel Olivo, a journeyman catcher, got into an altercation with his teammate Alex Guerrero, the Cuban infielder the Dodgers signed for $28 million, and reportedly bit off part of his ear. It was announced Wednesday evening that Olivo had been suspended. Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig, who is Cuban, said through an interpreter that he did not know specifically what had happened and that he supported Guerrero. But Puig added: “We’re not really here to fight each other. We’re here to fight the other team, you know?” Puig lined out and struck out in his first two at-bats, which might have helped deGrom’s confidence, but in Puig’s third at-bat, in the sixth inning, he crushed a 2-0 fastball over the left-center-field wall for a solo home run. The next batter, Ramirez, pulled a flat slider on a 2-2 count for a line-drive solo homer to left. DeGrom was pulled after the inning, having thrown 96 pitches. Through two starts, he had compiled a 2.77 E.R.A. But as he slowly walked to the dugout, he shook his head. INSIDE PITCH Mets catcher Travis d’Arnaud passed initial concussion tests and was expected to be examined Thursday, Manager Terry Collins said. D’Arnaud was hit on the head by a backswing from the Yankees’ Alfonso Soriano on May 13. “He feels a lot better today,” Collins said. ... Juan Lagares returned from the Dominican Republic, where he spent time with his family after the death of his aunt, who helped raise him. “I feel better, to have seen them,” Lagares said. | Baseball;Mets;Jacob deGrom |
ny0031648 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2013/06/12 | New York State Gets $2.5 Million in Medicaid Fraud Case | In life, Helen Sieger was the embattled owner of a Bronx nursing home. Her employees at the Kingsbridge Heights Rehabilitation and Care Center went on strike in 2008 after she stopped paying their health insurance premiums, drawing attention from state lawmakers, labor leaders and even Barack Obama , then a senator from Illinois. Ms. Sieger was arrested a year later on charges of bribing a hospital social worker to steer patients to her nursing home, and of improperly collecting payments from the state’s Medicaid program. She jumped bail, only to be caught in a Miami hotel and returned to New York, where she died in custody in 2011. But now Ms. Sieger is making amends in death. The state attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, said on Tuesday that his office had reached a settlement with the estate of Ms. Sieger to pay a total of $2.5 million to the state’s Medicaid program, which includes $1.2 million in reimbursements, and $1.3 million for damages. “There are few programs as sacred and important to our most vulnerable citizens as Medicaid,” Mr. Schneiderman said in a statement. “So, when we have a case involving a criminal scheme that robs Medicaid, our prosecutors will do whatever it takes to restore those stolen funds — whether that criminal is alive or we’re forced to settle with their estate.” Nicholas Gravante, Jr., a lawyer at Boies, Schiller & Flexner who represented Ms. Sieger’s estate, said that her family was “pleased to have this matter behind it.” Ms. Sieger, who took over the nursing home in the mid-1990s, was removed in 2009 by the State Health Department because of an issue over the nursing home’s lease. The operation of the 400-bed nursing home, one of the largest in the Bronx, was eventually transferred to a state receiver, which still runs it today. Also in 2009, Ms. Sieger was indicted, accused of paying Frank Rivera, a former social worker at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center, $300 for every patient that he referred who was subsequently admitted to her nursing home, plus a bonus of $1,000 for every 10 patients, according to the attorney general’s office. Beginning in 2005, he received more than $19,750 from Ms. Sieger. Mr. Rivera pleaded guilty to felony and misdemeanor violations under a state law, and is awaiting sentencing, according to the attorney general’s office. The attorney general’s office also said that the investigation had found that Ms. Sieger, who lived in Borough Park, Brooklyn, held several bank accounts, including one in Montana with $2 million. Michael Benjamin, a former Bronx assemblyman, praised the settlement, calling it an appropriate way for “the state to recoup her ill-gotten gains.” “It sends a signal that the state will not be cheated,” he said. “And that people who steal from the poor and from the elderly will be pursued whether they’re dead or alive.” | Nursing home;Medicaid;Fraud;Helen Sieger;Bronx;New York;Wills and Estates |
ny0278170 | [
"sports",
"ncaafootball"
] | 2016/11/21 | With Eyes on the Iron Bowl, Top-Ranked Alabama Plays in the Present | TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — In all likelihood, the only title Alabama has on the line this week is of the statewide variety, but that is typically more than enough. The top-ranked Crimson Tide enter Saturday’s Iron Bowl against No. 16 Auburn with their spot in the Southeastern Conference championship game reserved. Because the only other unbeaten team in The Associated Press’s Top 25 poll is No. 14 Western Michigan, a win will probably not be necessary for Alabama to make the College Football Playoff, either. That does not diminish the game’s meaning to the Tide’s players and fans. “It might have been cool to look at from the outside, but from the inside, it’s still going to be a highly contested game and definitely a lot on the line for both teams,” Alabama defensive end Jonathan Allen said. “It’s still an important game for us.” This one seemed destined to have both teams’ SEC West Division title and playoff hopes on the line, just like the 2013 game, which the Tigers won on a 109-yard return of a missed field-goal attempt. But Auburn’s loss to Georgia two weeks ago lowered the big-picture stakes somewhat, and Saturday’s game between No. 2 Ohio State and No. 3 Michigan has clearly usurped the Iron Bowl’s pre-eminence in terms of national title implications. Alabama, which has skated to 23 consecutive wins, is trying to remain above the fray that has swept up every other contender from the so-called Power 5 conferences. Alabama (11-0, 7-0), which also holds the top spot in the College Football Playoff rankings, enters the weekend as a 17 ½-point favorite over the Tigers (8-3, 5-2), who are No. 15 in the playoff rankings but may be missing the injured quarterback Sean White and tailback Kamryn Pettway. Alabama’s next game, against No. 13 Florida in Atlanta, will be for the SEC title. That is for people outside the team to talk about, mostly. “We don’t really worry about hype too much,” Alabama tailback Damien Harris said. “We just worry about doing whatever we have to do to be the better team.” The Tide might have been jolted awake in their game on Saturday against Chattanooga, a Football Championship Subdivision team that trailed by only 14-3 at halftime. (The Tide went on to win, 31-3.) Even a defense that has not given up a touchdown in nine-plus quarters was disappointed with its effort. “It felt like we gave up 21 points last game,” linebacker Ryan Anderson said. “I was embarrassed.” Center Bradley Bozeman called the performance “kind of a wake-up call for us.” That is not typically needed leading up to the Iron Bowl. | College football;University of Alabama;Auburn |
ny0046624 | [
"us"
] | 2014/11/05 | Oklahoma Supreme Court Blocks 2 Abortion Laws | The Oklahoma Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked two new laws that critics say may have made it difficult for women to obtain abortions in the state. The measures, approved by the State Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Mary Fallin, took effect Nov. 1. But in a unanimous decision released Tuesday, the State Supreme Court voted to prevent enforcement of the rules until lawsuits challenging their constitutionality are settled by a lower court. One of the laws requires clinics to have a physician with admitting privileges at a local hospital present during abortion procedures. The other measure prohibits the use of medication to induce abortions after 49 days of pregnancy. The law requiring a physician with admitting privileges was challenged by Dr. Larry A. Burns, who operates a clinic in Norman, Okla., called the Abortion Surgery Center, which opened in 1974. Dr. Burns, who performs more than 40 percent of all abortions in the state, said the law would likely lead to him having to shut his practice, one of three abortion clinics in Oklahoma. He has been unable to obtain admitting privileges at hospitals near his clinic. Supporters say the statute is necessary to protect women who might have complications, such as hemorrhaging, during an abortion procedure, enabling them to have immediate access to hospital care. But abortion rights groups said the law was an attempt to limit women’s access to abortions in the state. Further, women’s organizations said, the statute was unnecessary because medical problems were rare during abortion procedures, and hospital emergency room workers were qualified to handle them. The court’s decision allows Dr. Burns to continue performing abortions until the constitutionality of the law is settled in Oklahoma County District Court in the next several months. Similar laws have been approved by legislatures in at least 10 other states during the past several years. A number of the statutes, including those in Alabama, Texas and Mississippi, have been successfully challenged, as state and federal courts have found that the measures illegally restricted access to abortion. In June, the United States Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Wisconsin to reinstate a similar law in that state. The second measure blocked by the Oklahoma Supreme Court on Tuesday sought to regulate drugs used in abortions. It had been challenged in a lawsuit by the Center for Reproductive Rights , a nonprofit advocacy group based in New York, on behalf of Nova Health Systems, an abortion clinic in Tulsa, and the Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice. The law would have restricted medication abortions, and banned such procedures entirely after seven weeks of pregnancy. Instead, women would have had to undergo surgical abortions. A similar law approved by the Oklahoma Legislature was struck down by a district court judge in 2012 — a ruling that was subsequently upheld by the State Supreme Court. Among other measures approved by the State Legislature in recent years was a 2010 law that required doctors to perform an ultrasound and then provide a verbal description of the fetus before performing an abortion. The law was deemed unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court. | Oklahoma;Abortion;State supreme court;Legislation |
ny0291316 | [
"us"
] | 2016/01/06 | To San Bernardino, Obama’s Gun Plan Goes Too Far or Falls Short | SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — The fear comes up in discussions in line at the movies, where a group of mothers say there are too many guns on the streets for them to feel safe. For others, the mass shooting that killed 14 people here last month has prompted a rush to buy a gun for the first time, suddenly convincing them that only a firearm can protect them. But on one point, many people here seem to be in agreement: President Obama’s latest plan to expand background checks and law enforcement for some gun sales would do little to stop mass shootings of the kind that shattered this city’s sense of security. “I’m now considering getting a gun,” said Dondi Abarca, 43, a county employee. “Times are changing, and there are these situations that are happening.” In a city as diverse as this one, opinions on guns run the gamut. Like many other county employees, Trish Munoz was personally affected by the murders here. She knew one of the victims of the massacre — and one of the attackers, Syed Rizwan Farook, who worked as a county health inspector . Image A makeshift memorial on a chain-link fence outside the Inland Regional Center, where 14 people were killed last month. Credit Monica Almeida/The New York Times But outside a memorial service on Monday commemorating the shooting, Ms. Munoz, 44, scowled at the mention of Mr. Obama’s plan, which includes a requirement that anyone who makes a living selling firearms register as a licensed gun dealer and conduct background checks . “It violates our constitutional rights,” Ms. Munoz said. “And it distracts from what the real problems are.” No gun laws could have stopped the attack, she said, and certainly not the ones the president is proposing. Across town, Catherine Barragan, 49, said gun control had been a frequent topic of discussion with her friends over the last month. She applauded the president’s efforts, adding that she would support getting all guns off the streets. “There are too many loopholes,” Ms. Barragan, an administrator at a car auction, said. But she agreed that the latest measures would not be enough to prevent another major attack. “It won’t prevent something like what happened,” she said. This week, the office where the Dec. 2 shooting took place reopened, a milestone in San Bernardino’s efforts to resume life as normal. But as Mr. Obama spoke on Tuesday and listed the mass shootings during his tenure — suggesting his resolve to try to slow, if not stop, the barrage — reminders of the attack here remained hard to avoid. What Happens After Calls for New Gun Restrictions? Sales Go Up More guns were sold in December than almost any other month in nearly two decades after President Obama called for new gun-buying restrictions. At the corner outside the reopened office, a makeshift memorial of flags and flowers commemorates the victims. And the area where the two attackers — Mr. Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik — were ultimately killed is scarred by bullet holes after a shootout with the police in which hundreds of rounds were fired. Jim Mulvihill, a city councilman, said many in the community were still trying to figure out why the attack had happened here. Mr. Mulvihill said he believed the president’s gun control measures did not go far enough; an outright ban on assault weapons might have made a difference in the attack last month, he said, but there would have been no way to keep legal weapons out of Mr. Farook’s and Ms. Malik’s hands. “It’s a young married couple with a baby, a good job,” he said. “Where’s the tip-off?” But Mr. Mulvihill said this area had responded like much of the country, which has had a surge in firearm sales over the last month. “There has been a run on gun shops here,” he said. One of those considering buying a gun for the first time was Robert Gonzalez. He denounced the president’s executive order as an encroachment on the Second Amendment that would do little to prevent gun violence. Video Shedding tears over the 2012 deaths of children in a Newtown, Conn., elementary school, the president announced executive actions he will take on gun laws. Credit Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times “I want a gun,” Mr. Gonzalez, 34, said, adding that he now felt he needed one to keep his family safe. “I’ll probably have to hurry up and try to get one fast now.” Henry Nickel, another city councilman, said residents’ concerns about security had a number of potential causes. But the surge in demand for guns, he said, reflects a nationwide loss of confidence that the government will protect people. “Our city has endured some very difficult times: We’re going through bankruptcy, escalating crime, dwindling police,” Mr. Nickel said. “People are doing what they can to make sure they are properly defending themselves.” While Ms. Abarca, the county employee, was considering buying a gun, she said she supported the president’s executive order because she did not see it as an infringement on her own right to own a firearm — a testament to just how modest many gun control opponents consider the move. “Those who sell them should definitely be regulated,” she said. She added, however, that more access to guns, not more restrictions, might halt the run of mass shootings in recent years that the president talked about during his speech on Tuesday. Video The Republican presidential candidate said the executive actions on gun control ordered by President Obama were “not worth the paper they’re printed on.” Credit Credit Eric Thayer for The New York Times “It being a gun-free zone may not have been a smart choice,” she said of the Inland Regional Center, where the shooting took place. For advocates of gun control, the prospect of even greater access to guns was frightening. At the city library Tuesday morning, Rose Rangel, 58, said tougher background checks could stop some mass shootings, even if they might not have stopped the one here. “Maybe it would be harder to just go out there and start shooting,” she said. “There are so many guns out there. We don’t even know who they belong to.” Ms. Barragan, the auction administrator, said she did not think more background checks would have much effect. At least as afraid of the day-to-day violence in this city as of another mass shooting, she said she wanted to find a way to get rid of more guns. “If everybody carries a gun, people are still fighting in the street,” Ms. Barragan said. “It’s too easy for the wrong person to get one.” | San Bernardino CA;Gun Control;Legislation |
ny0048786 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2014/11/23 | Earthquake in Western China Kills at Least One Person and Injures 15 | BEIJING — A strong earthquake struck a lightly populated, mountainous area of western China on Saturday, killing at least one person, injuring 15 others and causing at least two homes to collapse, officials and state media said. The United States Geological Survey said the magnitude-5.9 quake had a depth of nine miles. It struck in the late afternoon about 20 miles from the town of Kangding in Sichuan Province. China’s seismological agency said the quake’s magnitude was 6.3. A woman in her 70s died after being struck by a falling window pane, said the official Xinhua News Agency and the state broadcaster CCTV, citing Chen Yunbing, a doctor at the region’s Ganzi People’s Hospital. No additional information was given about the 15 injured. A duty officer at the Kangding County government officers, who gave his surname as Xia, said that the quake lasted only a few seconds, and that there had been some reports of cracks in buildings and toppled walls. The area is frequently struck by earthquakes, and Mr. Xia said newly constructed buildings in the town of Kangding must be able to withstand quakes with a magnitude of up to 8, although requirements are less strict in the surrounding rural area. Along with the two collapsed homes, Kangding’s regional airport sustained some damage, though flights were not disrupted, Xinhua said. Wang Dan, a spokeswoman for the government of Ganzi Prefecture, which includes Kangding County, said rescue teams had been sent to the quake’s epicenter. Xinhua said workers were restoring the electricity supply to Tagong, the town closest to the epicenter, where a statue of Buddha in a local temple was also damaged. About 100 vehicles were trapped by a landslide on a highway connecting Sichuan and Tibet, and railway service was also halted in the area while workers checked on damage to the line, Xinhua said. No major damage was reported in the town of Kangding, where CCTV video showed residents strolling the town’s streets, looking up at the steep surrounding hillsides and talking on their cellphones. Kangding and the surrounding county have a population of 129,320 people, about 70 percent of them Tibetan. Western China is regularly hit by earthquakes, and reports said Saturday’s quake could be felt in the Sichuan provincial capital, Chengdu, on the plains below the Himalayan foothills. Sichuan was struck by a magnitude-7.9 quake in May 2008 that left nearly 90,000 people dead, many of them in collapsed schools and other poorly constructed buildings. Construction standards have been significantly tightened since then, and the country’s disaster response capacity has improved with better equipment and trained rescue teams. | Earthquake;Sichuan;China;Buildings |
ny0123453 | [
"us",
"politics"
] | 2012/09/06 | Romney Focus Is on Preparing for the Debates | WEST WINDSOR, Vt. — The sessions begin at 9 a.m. in the living room of a friend’s mountainside getaway here in Vermont’s verdant interior. There are three folding tables: one for Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, who plays President Obama; one for Peter Flaherty, a senior aide who plays the moderator; and one for Mitt Romney , who plays himself. Time limits are strictly enforced. Two minutes per answer — just as the official rules call for. The audience, spread out on couches and chairs, includes some of the Romney campaign’s most senior staff. And after Mr. Romney has run through a morning’s worth of questions on foreign and domestic matters, they all stop to assess his performance. “I’m just glad I won’t be debating Rob Portman in the final debates,” Mr. Romney said Wednesday as he took a break from preparations to greet patrons at a nearby pizza parlor. “He’s good.” As the Democrats begin the third and last day of their convention in Charlotte, N.C., on Thursday, Mr. Romney will be holed up here, where he has yet to switch on a television, finishing his third and final day of mock debate sessions in anticipation of the next critical phase of the presidential campaign. Aides said the secluded setting had been chosen with one major objective in mind: to minimize interruptions so Mr. Romney can remain focused on what they believe will be a decisive moment for their campaign. There will be three presidential debates in October, the first just four weeks away. “We chose this location because it’s quiet, and there are no distractions,” said Eric Fehrnstrom, a top aide. “This is intensive preparation.” To enhance their focus, Mr. Romney and some of his advisers are even sleeping at the home, which belongs to his former lieutenant governor in Massachusetts, Kerry Healey, and her husband. The presence of Mr. Romney and his entourage of Secret Service agents, advisers and news media has been major news here, making the front page of The Valley News, which described the opulent retreat as a six-bedroom, five-bath, 6,500-square-foot mansion “with unmarred views of the surrounding Green Mountains.” All that was visible of the property on Wednesday from a narrow gravel road were woods, rolling meadows and a caravan of vehicles for the Secret Service, the Vermont State Police and the news media. As big a deal as the visit seemed here, Mr. Romney still found himself competing with another major story. The Valley News topped its front page on Wednesday not with an article about him, but instead one that carried the headline “Wild Boar Strolls Into Downtown Lebanon, Snacks on Apples.” | Presidential Election of 2012;Democratic National Convention;Romney Mitt;Debates (Political) |
ny0004620 | [
"sports",
"autoracing"
] | 2013/04/21 | Among Drag Racing’s Challenges Are G-Forces and Getting Your Feet to Reach the Pedals | CONCORD, N.C. — Mash the gas pedal the moment the light changes, race to the next signal and hit the brakes. That’s a typical commute for some drivers. How different could drag racing be? I found out last month during a one-day session with Doug Foley’s Drag Racing Experience here at zMAX Dragway, the site of this weekend’s Dollar General National Hot Rod Association 4-Wide Nationals . All it required was driving in a straight line as fast as I could for 1,000 feet, then slowing down. I do that all the time in Charlotte, N.C., where the traffic signals are only occasionally synchronized, exasperating anyone who actually needs to go somewhere. For encouragement, I could look to the many women in drag racing over the years, from Shirley Muldowney in the 1970s to today’s Forces — Ashley, Brittany and Courtney, daughters of the 15-time funny car champion John Force. Courtney Force won the funny car event at the N.H.R.A. Winternationals at Pomona, Calif., on Feb. 17, the same day Nascar’s Danica Patrick captured the pole for the Daytona 500. Brittany and Courtney, the youngest members of the Force family racing franchise, were in Concord to promote this weekend’s races and to help train my group of novices from the news media. Brittany, 26, competes in the top fuel category that features classic open-wheel dragsters with high wings and rear engines. Courtney, 24, is in the funny car division, whose dragsters look marginally more like cars with fenders and forward engines. Their engines can reach speeds greater than 300 miles per hour and can create 140 decibels of sound, louder than being near a jet engine. “I love driving these cars,” Brittany said. “They’re so much fun. I’ve gone close to 320 miles an hour in 3.79 seconds. So it’s really exciting.” It also can be nerve-racking, even for professionals. “It is a dangerous sport,” said Brittany, who once sustained a concussion in a crash. A recent wreck was fatal. The super gas racer Derek Sanchez, 47, of Yuma, Ariz., crashed April 6 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and died five days later. “Things can go wrong,” Brittany said. “But being aware of that, I think, makes you a stronger driver. You never want to be too overconfident as a driver. So I think being nervous is always a good thing.” I ignored the fear that had gripped me for days, grabbed a fireproof jacket and helmet and climbed into the No. 2 sportsman dragster. It was an open-wheel car with an open cockpit and a single seat a few inches off the ground. The narrow body was supported by two spoked front wheels that looked as if they belonged on a bicycle. I was supposed to race on them? Image Dragsters can go 300 miles per hour or more, but those used by a novice group that included Viv Bernstein, above, could only reach 140. Credit Charlotte Motor Speedway/Harold Hinson Photography At first, my foot did not reach the gas pedal, the same problem I had driving a Nascar-style stock car years ago. What does racing have against short people, anyway? No matter. Foley stuffed padding behind me so I could push the pedal to the floor. Then he tethered my arms so they would not fly out of the cockpit and buckled me in to the point of immobility. Now what? “It’s a lot that happens in a really short amount of time,” said Courtney, whose funny car reaches 100 m.p.h. in one second, “and you really have to be alert and you have to be prepared to handle the car if anything goes wrong. “Hitting 300 m.p.h. and pushing your body to 3 or 4 G’s is a lot to handle and a lot to take,” she said, referring to G-force, which measures stress on the body. “And you have to be mentally and physically ready.” The sportsman dragsters we drove could reach only 140 m.p.h. That was fast enough to feel some of the G-forces and get a sense of the precision needed to guide a roaring dragster down a track. To motivate our class and add some lead to our feet, the fastest driver would receive a tall trophy. I knew immediately who wasn’t going to win it. As I discovered years ago in the stock car, I’m an embarrassingly slow driver unless I’m on a highway and the state police are nearby. But I had no idea what to expect when I eased up to the starting line and waited for the starting lights — called Christmas tree lights — to flash on the panel next to my lane. I was told to push the pedal to the floor when the third light turned yellow. No need to even wait for green. So I floored it at the last yellow — for about a second. I don’t know how fast I was going, but it was fast enough to leave my brain at the starting line. Sadly, it never did catch up. Drag racing while dizzy? Not advisable. In the end, the trophy was awarded to the racing broadcaster Wendy Venturini, who hit 140 m.p.h. But you might say she had a head start. Her family has been racing for decades, and she showed up at the track in her own custom purple fire suit. Doug Foley’s Drag Racing Experience travels to tracks around the country, offering individual ride-alongs for $149 and driving packages that begin at $349. I am probably not the only one who never gets close to 140 in three attempts down the track. I’m sure I didn’t even break 100, but the kind people with Foley never told me how slow I really was. As if I needed more proof of my athletic ineptitude — in softball, swimming, basketball, tennis and stock-car racing — I can now put a check mark next to drag racing as well. Can’t do that, either. But I manage to drive around Charlotte. I think I deserve a medal for that. | Drag racing;Car Racing |
ny0064178 | [
"us"
] | 2014/06/05 | Delaware: Contractor’s Action Is Said to Force Bridge’s Closing | State transportation officials said Wednesday that they believed a contractor had dumped a massive mound of dirt suspected of shifting the ground beneath an Interstate 495 bridge in Wilmington and forcing its closing. The state’s transportation secretary, Shailen P. Bhatt, said the contractor, Jim Thomas, was working with the department to remove the dirt, which officials believe was dumped over years. The dirt appeared to rise about two stories and stretch nearly the length of a football field. The bridge was closed on Monday after four pairs of support pillars were found to be tilting. | Wilmington Delaware;Soil;Bridges,Tunnels;Transportation;Jim Thomas;Waste management |
ny0266611 | [
"business",
"energy-environment"
] | 2016/03/26 | Japanese Inflation Is Flat in Year to February | Japan’s consumer inflation was flat in the year to February as low energy costs and weak consumption put a lid on price growth, government data showed on Friday. A separate index calculated by Japan’s central bank to strip out the effects of energy and fresh food prices showed consumer inflation at 1.1 percent in the year to February, unchanged from January. The data reinforces a dominant view that the Bank of Japan will be forced to cut its inflation forecasts and push back the timing for hitting its 2 percent price target. Koya Miyamae, senior economist at SMBC Nikko Securities, said, “The B.O.J. is falling into a vicious cycle in which it remains under pressure for further easing even as it has few effective policy means available.” | Japan;Inflation;Nikko Japan;Economy |
ny0019863 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2013/07/06 | With Surf Like Turf, Huge Algae Bloom Befouls China Coast | BEIJING — In what has become an annual summer scourge, the coastal Chinese city of Qingdao has been hit by a near-record algae bloom that has left its popular beaches fouled with a green, stringy muck. The State Oceanic Administration said an area larger than Connecticut had been affected by the mat of “sea lettuce,” as it is known in Chinese, which is generally harmless to humans but chokes off marine life and invariably chases away tourists as it begins to rot. Image An algae-covered public beach in Qingdao, China, on Thursday. Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Some beachgoers appeared to be amused by the outbreak, at least according to the Chinese news media, which in recent days have featured images of swimmers lounging on bright green beds of algae, tossing it around with glee or piling it atop of one another as if it were sand. Local officials, however, are less enthusiastic. Last month, they declared a “large-scale algae disaster,” sending hundreds of boats and bulldozers to clean up the waters off Qingdao, a former German concession in Shandong Province that is famous for its beer and beaches. As of Monday, about 19,800 tons of the algae had been cleared, the Qingdao government said. While valued for its nutrition — or as an ingredient in fertilizers and biomass energy production — algae in large quantities can prove dangerous as it decomposes, producing toxic hydrogen sulfide gas. It also smells like rotten eggs. The green tide, spread over 7,500 square miles, is thought to be twice the size of an outbreak in 2008 that threatened sailing events during the Beijing Olympics, which took place near Qingdao. Officials deployed boats, helicopters and 10,000 workers to keep the waters clear for the competition. Image Qingdao’s algae is generally harmless to humans, but not marine life. Credit The New York Times The cleanup costs were later estimated at more than $30 million. Abalone, clam and sea cucumber farms suffered more than $100 million in damage, according to a 2011 study by researchers from the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences. A 2009 outbreak was bigger. Although biologists are at a loss to explain the most recent algae bloom, scientists suspect it is connected to pollution and increased seaweed farming in the province just south of Shandong. While similar green tides have been reported around the world, the annual bloom in the Yellow Sea is considered the largest, growing to an estimated million tons of biomass each year. The green tides were first reported in Qingdao in 2007. A central factor is the high supply of nutrients from agricultural runoff and wastewater. But those pollutants have been in the Yellow Sea for decades, leading scientists to look for new triggers. Video Green algae has turned the coastal Chinese city of Qingdao into an emerald garden. Credit Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images A group of researchers believe that the algae that washes up around Qingdao originates farther south in seaweed farms along the coast of Jiangsu Province. The farms grow porphyra, known as nori in Japanese cuisine, on large rafts in coastal waters. The rafts attract a kind of algae called Ulva prolifera, and when the farmers clean them off each spring they spread the algae out into the Yellow Sea, where it finds nutrients and warm conditions ideal for blooming. “It feeds off those nutrients and grows bigger and bigger, and eventually you can see it from satellites,” said John Keesing, a scientist at the Csiro Division of Marine and Atmospheric Research in Australia who is studying the green tide with Chinese researchers. “The currents gently move the algae in a northeastern direction out into the center of the Yellow Sea. You get a huge amount, and eventually it starts to wash on shore.” While farmers have long grown seaweed along the Jiangsu coast, the rafts expanded much farther offshore starting in 2006, which may have contributed to the recent blooms, according to an article published by Dr. Keesing and his colleagues. The answer to curtailing the blooms may lie in disposing of the algae that clogs the nori rafts on land. “We haven’t suggested people stop growing porphyra, but proper husbandry methods to prevent much of the waste algae from going into sea, that’s probably the only preventive measure that could be deployed,” he said. | Algae;China;Qingdao;Beach |
ny0087994 | [
"business",
"dealbook"
] | 2015/07/22 | Citigroup Ordered to Refund $700 Million in Credit-Card Case | Citigroup was ordered to refund $700 million to consumers and pay $70 million in fines for illegal and deceptive credit card practices, the bank and federal regulators said on Tuesday. The order, coming from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is the latest multimillion-dollar settlement against the largest credit card issuers for their role in selling add-on products to customers, such as credit score monitoring or rush processing of payments. Bank of America reached a similar, slightly larger settlement with regulators in 2014, and JPMorgan Chase was fined in 2013. Under its agreement with the consumer agency, Citi will issue refunds to 8.8 million consumers, and will pay separate $35 million fines to the bureau and to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Some of the illegal activity by Citi goes back to 2000, the agency said, and covers a range of products sold by Citi and third-party affiliates. For example, Citi telemarketers were said to have sold consumers identity theft protection services with a 30-day free trial when no such free trial existed. Others reportedly signed up consumers for add-on services when it was ambiguous whether consumers actually said they wanted them. Citi also was said to have sold credit monitoring services when it was not performing such services. Citi also reportedly misrepresented a $14.95 expedited payment fee to customers who paid by phone and did not tell them about no-fee options. Credit card add-on services were a lucrative source of revenue for banks. But marketing of such services largely ended after increased regulatory scrutiny. “Add-on services, for the most part, provide no benefit to consumers and people should be very careful to sign up for them,” said Nick Bourke, who specializes in consumer lending issues at the Pew Charitable Trusts. In a statement, Citi said it stopped the practices and had been issuing statement credits since 2013 to affected customers. | Citigroup;Credit card;Consumer Financial Protection Bureau;Fines;Banking and Finance |
ny0005185 | [
"sports"
] | 2013/04/06 | Edith Bosch, a World Champion, Is Set to Retire | Edith Bosch, a judo world champion, is retiring later this month. Bosch drew attention at the London Olympics when she shoved a man who had tossed a bottle on the track and shouted abuse at Usain Bolt before the 100 meters. | Judo;2012 Summer Olympics;Edith Bosch |
ny0069971 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2015/03/03 | Safety Advocates Want Harsher Penalties for New York’s Drivers | After Allison Liao, 3, was killed by a car in Queens, the man who was behind the wheel, Ahmad Abu-Zayedeh, was not charged. But last month, his driver’s license was revoked by the state, after a long campaign by the girl’s parents, Amy Tam-Liao and Hsi-Pei Liao. The news was a relief to the Liaos, who were intent on finding a way to hold Mr. Abu-Zayedeh accountable for the 2013 crash, which killed their daughter as she crossed Main Street with her grandmother. Then they learned that Mr. Abu-Zayedeh could reapply for his license in 30 days, and they found themselves once again feeling frustrated and powerless. “No amount of time would be satisfactory to me,” Ms. Tam-Liao said in an interview. “We lost our child. To hear that it was 30 days was beyond upsetting.” The Queens district attorney’s office said that it did not charge Mr. Abu-Zayedeh because its investigation with the police determined that the death was “not the result of criminality on the part of the driver.” A lawyer for Mr. Abu-Zayedeh, Frank Scahill, said the crash appeared to be a “horribly tragic accident.” Most drivers in New York City do not face felony criminal charges in traffic fatalities, unless they were intoxicated or left the scene. The courts have interpreted state law as setting a high bar for criminally negligent homicide convictions in these cases, and prosecutors have generally heeded the courts’ direction. Image Mohammad Naiem Uddin was a high school freshman when he was killed last fall. In recent years, the state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, has reversed some convictions, saying a driver’s actions must be not only negligent but also “morally blameworthy.” A year after Mayor Bill de Blasio announced his Vision Zero plan to eliminate traffic deaths, safety advocates are calling for increased prosecution of drivers who violate traffic laws, including a new one that makes failure to yield a misdemeanor, instead of a traffic violation, if a pedestrian is killed or injured. They are also asking the State Department of Motor Vehicles to suspend a driver’s license after serious offenses as a way of deterring dangerous driving. The push, and the pushback, show some of the challenges facing the mayor as he seeks to bring the number of traffic fatalities — 248 last year — to zero by 2024. Under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the city began to reimagine and remake the way people move about the city, including the proliferation of bike lanes and major street redesigns that allowed for large plazas. Now under Mr. de Blasio, the city is trying to make it safer to walk, bike and, yes, drive around the city. But just as Mr. Bloomberg’s transportation agenda faced headwinds, Mr. de Blasio’s is too, not least over the effort to punish dangerous driving more severely. After a bus driver was charged this year, under the new failure-to-yield law for striking a pedestrian, the drivers’ union denounced the arrest , saying the city was trying to criminalize accidents. Last month, a Brooklyn man, Julio Acevedo, was convicted of criminally negligent homicide and second-degree manslaughter for the 2013 deaths of a couple and their baby who were riding in a livery cab struck by Mr. Acevedo’s vehicle. But if the punishment was notably tough, Mr. Acevedo’s actions had been particularly callous. Not only was he was traveling at about twice the speed limit, prosecutors said, but he also looked inside the cab after the crash and then fled the scene and the area. “It should not require such extreme behavior in order for drivers to be held accountable,” said Caroline Samponaro, deputy director of Transportation Alternatives, the bicycle and pedestrian advocacy group. Image Mohammad Salah Uddin, and his daughter, Rabia Sultana, at the intersection where the high schooler was struck. Credit Victor J. Blue for The New York Times Safety advocates aim to take a page from the campaign in the 1980s to stigmatize drunken driving, which was for generations viewed as socially acceptable, and to likewise bring attention to dangerous driving , said Brad Lander, a city councilman in Brooklyn. “It became a very shameful thing when it really hadn’t been before, and there was real enforcement to go along with it, and as a result, many fewer people were killed,” Councilman Lander said. He said drivers should be more thoughtful on the road, despite the city’s aggressive driving culture, which sometimes means “not driving like a New Yorker.” After a 14-year-old boy in his district was killed by a car in November, Mr. Lander started a new effort with the Brooklyn district attorney, Kenneth P. Thompson, to focus on driver accountability. Their task force, which met with safety advocates and a victims group for the first time in January, is the first of its kind in the country, they said. Mr. Thompson met with the family of the boy who was killed, Mohammad Naiem Uddin. He had been a freshman at Brooklyn Technical High School, and he was killed a few blocks from his family’s apartment in Kensington as he walked home from school. The driver, Lynn Reynolds, 78, was charged with a felony for leaving the scene of the crash and with failure to yield because Naiem was in a crosswalk with a walk signal. In an interview, Mr. Thompson said he was moved to do more to prevent traffic fatalities after meeting the boy’s father, who was inconsolable. “As prosecutors, we can make sure that we take these cases seriously,” Mr. Thompson said. In recent years, Brooklyn has had the most pedestrian deaths of any borough — on average, about 46 each year, according to the city’s Transportation Department. In February, the department released safety action plans for each borough, including one for Brooklyn that identifies where there have been crashes, to be the focus of engineering and enforcement plans. Image Allison Liao, 3, was killed by a car in Queens while she was crossing the street with her grandmother. Mr. Thompson’s office has charged six drivers under the new failure-to-yield law since it went into effect in August, including Ms. Reynolds, said Lupe Todd, a spokeswoman for Mr. Thompson. Proponents of Vision Zero say the punishment for the misdemeanor crime — a fine of up to $250 or 30 days in jail — is fair. Traffic violations for failure to yield, which are still issued if no one is injured, are handled by the Department of Motor Vehicles and carry lesser penalties. The agency holds safety hearings to investigate traffic fatalities. At a hearing in January for the Liao case, the girl’s grandmother and two police officers testified before an administrative law judge. The judge, Sidney Fuchs, found that the pair were in the crosswalk and had the walk signal, and revoked Mr. Abu-Zayedeh’s license because he failed to yield or to use due care to avoid colliding with a pedestrian. Mr. Abu-Zayedeh can reapply to get his license back, but his “entire driving history” will be reviewed before the department decides whether to approve or deny his application, said Jackie McGinnis, a spokeswoman for the Department of Motor Vehicles. All drivers who have a license revoked can apply to have it reinstated, she said, and the earliest they can begin that process is 30 days after the date of the revocation. Victims’ families have different ideas of what justice looks like in these cases. For Rabia Sultana, Naiem’s older sister, the driver would remain off the streets so she cannot hurt anyone else. The Brooklyn task force will consider restorative justice measures, in which drivers meet with the families of victims. Ms. Sultana said she would want to speak with Ms. Reynolds to better understand what happened in her brother’s final moments. “Even if it’s not an apology,” she said, “she could sit down and tell us anything she can.” | Car Crash;NYC;Driver's license;NYC Transportation Dept;Department of Motor Vehicles;Bill de Blasio;Allison Liao;Driving Under the Influence DUI |
ny0207630 | [
"world",
"americas"
] | 2009/06/07 | 9 Hostage Officers Killed at Peruvian Oil Facility | LIMA, Peru — Nine police officers were killed Saturday as security forces regained control of a petroleum facility from indigenous protesters in a remote jungle region, raising the death toll related to protests by indigenous activists since Friday above 30, Peruvian government officials here said. Prime Minister Yehude Simon said the officers were killed in the events surrounding a push to retake a pumping station belonging to Petroperú, the national oil company, in the northern Bagua Province, where indigenous protesters had kidnapped 38 police officers. Twenty-two of the abducted officers were freed, but seven were still missing, officials said. The killings came amid reports by indigenous groups that security forces killed as many as 25 protesters Friday in clashes at a different location in Bagua, where Indians had blocked a highway. Mr. Simon confirmed that at least 9 Indians had been killed and 155 wounded, and that a total of 22 police officers had been killed, intensifying the most acute crisis faced by President Alan García since he took office in 2006. The bloodshed comes after two months of slow-burning protests, which spread from rain forests in Peru’s north to the country’s south, and have focused on interrupting petroleum production and transportation. In an increasingly well-coordinated movement, the lowland Indians are demanding that Mr. García withdraw decrees that ease the way for companies to carry out major energy and logging projects in the Peruvian Amazon. After the operation at the Petroperú facility, officials said they were planning to re-establish the supply of oil to remote provinces that had been hit with fuel shortages and blackouts. Still, it was unclear how successful they would be when protesters were still blocking routes on important highways and rivers. Officials also said Saturday that they were seeking to enforce an arrest warrant on charges of sedition for Alberto Pizango, a Shawi Indian and the leader of Aidesep , an umbrella organization of indigenous groups that had organized many of the protests. But Mr. Pizango apparently went into hiding and was replaced by another leader, Champion Nonimgo. “Our protests will go on until our demands are met,” Mr. Nonimgo said. A maneuver here in Congress sparked the clashes between protesters and the police, after lawmakers blocked an effort Thursday to allow debate on one of Mr. García’s most polemical decrees, which would open as much as 60 percent of Peru’s jungles to oil exploration and other extractive investments. Ollanta Humala, a nationalist political leader and a former lieutenant colonel in Peru’s army who was defeated by Mr. García in the most recent presidential elections, has sided with the protesters, lambasting the use of use of force against the Indians and raising his profile ahead of the next elections in 2011. Meanwhile, the climbing body count in the rain forest, along with unconfirmed reports that the number of Indians killed could be higher, threatens to deplete the legitimacy of Mr. García’s government. Mr. García, 60, is still hounded by claims of human rights violations from his first term as president in the 1980s, when soldiers suppressed a prison rebellion in 1986, killing more than 100 inmates suspected of being Maoist guerrillas. | Peru;Demonstrations and Riots;Indigenous People |
ny0277019 | [
"technology"
] | 2016/11/04 | Google Rebuts Antitrust Claims in Europe | To many Europeans, Google represents Silicon Valley’s perceived stranglehold on the digital world. But on Thursday, the American search giant tried to portray itself as a stalwart of online competition as it responded to European antitrust charges that it had restricted consumers’ choices and hamstrung its competitors. The back-and-forth between Google and Margrethe Vestager, Europe’s top antitrust official , highlights the increasing stakes in three competition cases against the search giant, the earliest of which dates to 2010. The standoff is likely to define Europe’s often weary relationship with American technology companies like Amazon, Apple and Facebook for years to come. Google responded on Thursday to two European antitrust charges, saying that its services helped consumers, advertisers and even some competitors find the digital information they seek online. The company said that the strength in Europe of other American technology companies, like Amazon, showed that Google had not restricted the local digital market. How Europe Is Going After Apple, Google and Other U.S. Tech Giants The biggest American tech companies face intensifying scrutiny by European regulators, with — pressure that could potentially curb their sizable profits in the region and affect how they operate around the world. The rebuttals relate to years-old accusations that Google unfairly diverted traffic from competitors to favor its own comparison-shopping site , and that the company abused its dominant market position when offering some search products on other companies’ websites. “We can’t agree with a case that lacks evidence and would limit our ability to serve our users,” Kent Walker, Google’s general counsel, wrote in a blog post on Thursday. “We’re confident these cases will ultimately be decided based on the facts,” he wrote, adding that Google’s products “benefited consumers and merchants, and expanded competition.” In the third case, Google has until Nov. 11 to respond to European Union charges that it used Android, its popular mobile operating system, to promote its own services — like mobile search — over those of its rivals. The company denies any wrongdoing. Google worries that Europe’s antitrust efforts may eventually hurt its lucrative business model, particularly if it is forced to open up some of its dominant digital services to rivals. For the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, the standoff with Google has become a litmus test for its ability to rein in a dominant technology company, one that has a roughly 90 percent market share in online search in the region. A spokesman for the European Commission declined to comment on Google’s antitrust response. The end to the back and forth will not come overnight. The European authorities must now review Google’s rebuttals, and decisions in the cases are not expected until early next summer. The company can then appeal, prolonging the legal wrangling. But for Paulo Trezentos, chief executive of Aptoide, an online marketplace for Android smartphone apps, who has filed a complaint against Google, the antitrust cases are necessary to give European companies the space to compete against their much larger American rival. “Our growth is being slowed down because of Google’s dominant position,” he said. “We know what’s at stake. There needs to be innovation in the European market.” | Google;Search Engines;Competition law;European Commission;Europe;EU |
ny0151549 | [
"sports",
"baseball"
] | 2008/08/10 | Rays’ Manager Joe Maddon Is Having Fun, and Success | ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — That bike. Of all the items that teammates would watch Joe Maddon lug on trips with the Angels — books without pictures, wine magazines, an iPod pulsing with Springsteen and Green Day and Pavarotti — none made them smile and shake their heads more than his beloved mountain bike. The Angels’ bench coach from 1996 to 2005, Maddon would, before most every trip, take it apart — wheels, chains, from seat to nuts — so that he could pop it on the plane. Upon arrival, he would lay the pieces out on his hotel room floor and, quite happily, put it all back together again. Then bike to the ballpark. “I can still see him doing that,” Angels Manager Mike Scioscia said. “He just loved that bicycle.” Maddon has retired his wrenches because he now can afford to rent bikes on the road for his 80 or so miles of weekly riding. But he still loves to put machines together. Perhaps you have heard of one — the first-place Tampa Bay Rays . The Rays ’ third-year manager, known as one of baseball’s more purely intelligent men in uniform, Maddon has helped transform what had been a laughably disjointed bunch of rookies and castoffs into a vibrant collection of up-and-arriving talent that has made the Boston Red Sox and the Yankees look brittle and worn. A 14-7 record since the All-Star break left the Rays with a three-and-a-half-game lead over Boston and a six-and-a-half-game cushion over the Yankees entering Saturday. The Rays never won more than 70 games in their first 10 seasons of existence and went 66-96 last year, the worst record in the American League. They had 69 wins through Friday, on pace for 97. Fans who once stayed away from Tropicana Field, a dreary dome that looks less like a ballpark than a sagging soufflé, have been roused to attend. More than 27,000 fans came for an afternoon game last Wednesday, and were rewarded with a 10-7, bottom-of-the-ninth thriller over Cleveland that almost raised the roof to almost level. The Rays, filled with young talent like third baseman Evan Longoria, center fielder B. J. Upton and a rotation manned by Scott Kazmir, James Shields and Matt Garza, are led by a 54-year-old manager who players insist is younger than they are. Sure, Maddon has adorned the clubhouse with inspirational quotes from the likes of Albert Camus. (“I don’t think he ever played here,” Upton said.) But players know they have the only manager in the big leagues with a cooler music collection than theirs, and he infuses them with the same free spirit he has carried through three decades in professional baseball. “He’s very calm, quiet and trusting,” said Shields, 10-7 with a 3.65 earned run average. “He allows us to police ourselves. Sometimes, you have a manager who yells at you every night, but he doesn’t do that. He’ll sit you down and talk to you and teach you.” A former economics major at Lafayette College and a briefly professional catcher, Maddon revels in looking at baseball through his own eyes. (And through his now-trademark, black-rimmed glasses that are less Harry Caray than Elvis Costello, he eagerly notes.) The man who never travels without a book does not always go by baseball’s. True to his Angels roots, Maddon encourages his players to take extra bases aggressively — even at the risk of making the first or third out at third, a longtime baseball no-no. “It’s a positive risk,” Maddon said. “I don’t want my players afraid of making mistakes.” He encourages his players to steal — the Rays led the majors with 116 stolen bases through Friday — and eschews conservative moves like bunting runners over and issuing intentional walks, preferring to let players get the job done with as little managerial intervention as possible. “He’s a young team’s manager,” said Upton, obliquely comparing Maddon with his predecessor, the volatile and veteran-disposed Lou Piniella. “He allows us to have fun.” Maddon conducts a somewhat bizarre hitting drill in which balls the size of plums are winged at batters from 33 feet and at an upward angle, to encourage hand quickness and discourage uppercuts. Beyond the drastic pull shift he deployed against David Ortiz of the Red Sox, Maddon also placed three infielders on the left side of the infield to defend against the Florida Marlins slugger Dan Uggla, a right-hander. “He got a base hit to the right side, so people asked why then not move your second baseman back over,” Maddon said. “I want him to try to hit a ground ball to second base as opposed to trying to hit the ball 15 rows up in left field.” For a bright guy who understands numbers — he was recruited by Ivy League universities like Princeton and Penn before taking a full ride to Lafayette — Maddon chose an odd T-shirt slogan for this year, “9=8”. He wanted not just to dismiss conventional thought but also emphasize that nine players playing nine innings could mean one of eight postseason berths. A quaint idea, Tampa Bay in the playoffs, but the young Rays jelled a year or two earlier than expected as the Red Sox and the Yankees aged. The Rays’ October hopes were threatened by a seven-game losing streak heading into the All-Star break. Then, after a win in Kansas City in late July, Maddon lit into his team for breaking just about his only team rule: continuous effort. Several Rays players said the meeting was a sign both that their one-of-the-guys manager was no pushover, and that this postseason business was real. “The message was, basically, we’re in a position right now that’s actually very special and needs to be treated with respect,” said Maddon, whose team responded by winning three straight series. “To think that this situation’s going to come along on an annual basis, we’re foolish to think that.” Maddon’s lack of pretension owes to his roots in Hazleton, Pa., where his mother, Beanie, is still a waitress at the Third Base Luncheonette. He grew up the oldest of three children in a tiny apartment atop the business started by his Italian immigrant grandfather, C. Maddon & Sons Plumbing and Heating. (The family name was originally Maddoninni.) An excellent high school quarterback — nicknamed Broad Street Joe after a main Hazleton thoroughfare — Maddon fiddled with the idea of running his own restaurant before pursuing sports at Lafayette. Maddon still indulges his inner restaurateur every December by serving his renowned spaghetti and meatballs (and pirogis — he’s part Polish) at homeless shelters. He scouts cabernets as carefully as he does opposing relievers, often opting for a trusty 2002 Silver Oak. That was a fine year, indeed — Maddon helped the Angels win their only World Series after serving the organization in various minor league and major league coaching capacities for almost a quarter-century. Maddon played an integral role in identifying which young players had the skill and verve to grow into a championship club. “I’m not surprised at what’s happening over there, because Joe has done this before,” Scioscia said of Maddon’s work with Tampa Bay. “Even though he wasn’t managing with us, he was always an organizational builder.” Tampa Bay’s road to this year’s playoffs is by no means downhill. The Rays, who just started a 10-game trip out west, then play series against the first-place Angels and the Chicago White Sox — and open September with 12 of 15 games against the Yankees and the Red Sox. Furthermore, Maddon’s lineup, which could have been bolstered by trading for a right-handed batter like Jason Bay or Manny Ramírez, is still below average. As he did with his mountain bike in Anaheim, Maddon will continue to piece his team together from what to others may appear to be disparate parts. The analogy is less strained than it sounds. Milwaukee Brewers Manager Ned Yost, whose young-and-jelling team is the National League’s reflection of the Rays, builds computers from scratch in his spare time. Although many of the game’s most intelligent managers love to tinker, Maddon prefers to put his tools down and let those of his Rays take over. “I’m so not into controlling this,” Maddon said with a smile. Hands off the handlebars, he’s enjoying the ride. | Baseball;Tampa Bay Rays;Maddon Joe |
ny0008471 | [
"us"
] | 2013/05/15 | New Orleans Parades: Celebrating in Spite of the Risk | NEW ORLEANS — Each year in the weeks leading up to Mother’s Day, when the members of the Original Big 7 Social Aid and Pleasure Club drew up the sheet outlining their parade’s route through the back streets of town, they would include a warning: “Leave your guns and foolishness at home.” Each year, that is, until this year. Things seemed to have gotten better, they figured. Maybe the warning was no longer necessary. Only 20 minutes into the parade, as legs had begun to loosen and the members in their cream-colored suits danced before a brass band, it became terrifyingly clear that it still was. A young man, identified by the police as 19-year-old Akein Scott, stepped away from a street corner and fired with seeming indifference into the crowd, leaving 19 people on the ground with gunshot wounds, 3 of them in critical condition. Image Akein Scott Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The police have released no motive, but people here by and large figured that it was the same old story: a young man with gun and a complaint spotted a rival and attacked. When shootings like this happened in the past — and they have, sometimes deadly but almost never as brazenly — they often prompted a debate about street culture and violence, about the rolling crowds that form on such occasions and how much they may be to blame for what goes on in their orbit. Several years ago, prompted by one of those shootings, the New Orleans police raised security fees for marching clubs so high that it seemed the tradition of these parades, put on for more than a century by black working-class New Orleanians, might be seriously curtailed, or end for good. This time seems as if it will be different. Since Sunday afternoon, the mayor and the police chief have repeatedly and emphatically divorced the shooting from the occasion that it ruined. They have called the parades a crucial part of the city’s culture and even a bulwark against its seemingly ceaseless violence, an argument marchers have been making for years. Image In this image taken from video, a young man in a white shirt is seen shooting into a crowd of people at the Sunday parade, injuring 19, 3 of them critically. Credit New Orleans Police Department “The layers of this thing are really important, and that’s to understand what the origin of the violence is, what it’s connected to and what it’s not connected to,” said Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who has long made a case for what he calls the city’s cultural economy. “This didn’t have anything to do with second lines, and it didn’t have anything to do with the rich cultural heritage of New Orleans.” Sunday’s event was a so-called second line parade, the “second line” referring to all those who join in along the route and follow behind the band, making more of a rolling party than the kind of parade one simply watches. They take place nearly every Sunday between September and May, in the poor and working-class back streets of the city. Such parades are put on by social aid and pleasure clubs, which function as inner-city relief societies, delivering groceries to shut-ins, buying football uniforms and pooling resources to pay for life’s unexpected invoices, like medical emergencies and funeral costs. They also put on parades once a year in the neighborhood they represent, with the brass bands, Technicolor suits and stops at drinking holes along the way. The parades can cost thousands of dollars, even tens of thousands. For decades, they happened off the bureaucratic radar, without permits and largely unknown to anyone not directly attached to the marchers. For many New Orleanians — black and white — the parades were, and still are, surrounded by an air of menace. Image A local musician, Kenneth Terry, with his arm around Jason McMaster, a member of the Original Big 7, at a rally on Tuesday protesting against violence. Credit William Widmer for The New York Times “I never got involved in second lines,” said Willie Green, the drummer for the Neville Brothers, who grew up just outside New Orleans. “It was always too scary for me.” But club members, who mostly live in the neighborhoods they parade in, are intimately familiar with how dangerous New Orleans can be. Edward Buckner, the president of the Original Big 7, lost a 26-year-old son to gun violence four years ago. Joe Henry, who started the Original Pigeontown Steppers, parades in a wheelchair, having been shot on Mardi Gras Day when he was 12. A cousin of his was murdered. “The list goes on and on,” said Tamara Jackson, the president of the city’s Social Aid and Pleasure Club Task Force, who lost her father to gun violence. Neither Ms. Jackson nor others deny that violence has marred the parades, but they say this is a function of where the parades take place. “We try to nurture our neighborhoods, but that’s also where drugs and crime exist,” she said. Before her club’s given Sunday, she walks the route with a plea: “If anyone has scores to settle, please don’t settle them around our parade.” Image Mayor Mitch Landrieu spoke to local residents on Tuesday near the site of Sunday’s parade violence. Credit William Widmer for The New York Times In the first years after Hurricane Katrina, when the city was reconstituting itself and violence was spiking, the police and the clubs tangled. After shootings near or at two processions in 2006, the police raised fees to 5 and in some cases 10 times the $750 charged for Mardi Gras parades. The second line clubs sued. While this battle went on, however, the city was changing. Outsiders moved here with an appetite for an amorphous thing one might call “authentic New Orleans,” and they met residents newly appreciative of traditions that, without effort, could have died out. The HBO series “Treme” gave a primer to people who had no idea what a second line was. Parade routes were publicized online, so outsiders no longer needed to rely on luck or inside connections to know where they were happening. Journalists also championed second line culture, among the most ardent of them a woman named Deborah Cotton, who arrived from Los Angeles months before the storm but began diligently chronicling the city’s street traditions, mostly for The Gambit, the city’s alternative weekly. She also has fought claims that violence is tied to second lines, pointing out that shootings have happened at Mardi Gras parades with few people making a similar connection. The second line clubs themselves, which had reached an agreement with the city over the fees, began banding together more closely. In a post-Katrina survey conducted by Frederick Weil, a professor of sociology at Louisiana State University, members of social aid clubs were found to be “more civically active, service oriented, and trusting than even the rich or well educated.” Image A look at part of the route of the 2011 parade. Credit William Widmer Negotiations with the city and the police began to go more smoothly under the Landrieu administration, club members said. “We actually sit down with the members and we negotiate,” said Cmdr. Bob Bardy of the Police Department’s Sixth District, a part of town where relationships with parade promoters had historically been tense. Richard Anderson, president of the Single Men social aid club, said that Commander Bardy had suggested that his club’s parade avoid certain bad spots altogether or that it keep moving in dangerous places where they might have planned a stop. The strategy has largely worked. “We hadn’t had a shooting in a while,” Mr. Anderson said. Then Sunday. One of the most seriously injured in the shooting, Ms. Cotton remains in the hospital in critical but stable condition. Mr. Buckner, for his part, wants to march again, after some time for healing. “It breaks your heart, man,” he said. | New Orleans;Parade;Assault;Police;Hurricane Katrina;Mardi Gras;Murders |
ny0257152 | [
"us"
] | 2011/01/05 | Preliminary Hearing for Michael Jackson’s Doctor Begins | LOS ANGELES — Prosecutors on Tuesday began laying out the case that they say will show the personal private doctor for the pop star Michael Jackson caused his death in 2009 by giving him a powerful anesthetic meant only for surgery and not telling the emergency doctors who eventually arrived that he had done so. Beyond that, they said in a preliminary hearing in criminal court Tuesday, Dr. Conrad Murray failed to call 911 quickly and performed inadequate CPR, using just one hand while Mr. Jackson was lying on a soft bed rather than a hard surface. The lead prosecutor in the case, Deputy District Attorney David Walgren, said he would call dozens of witnesses over the next several days to show that there was more than enough evidence to try Dr. Murray on involuntary manslaughter charges in connection with Mr. Jackson’s death on June 25, 2009. If convicted, Dr. Murray could face up to four years in prison. In his opening statement, Mr. Walgren said Mr. Jackson was dead in his home even before an ambulance arrived that afternoon. “Michael Jackson was preparing for one of the most important tours of his life,” Mr. Walgren said. “He had begun serious rehearsals, and this was going to be a major world event, not only in the eyes of the public but also in the eyes of Michael Jackson.” Several of Mr. Jackson’s family members, including his mother, Katherine, and his sister LaToya, crowded into the courtroom along with dozens of fans who had lined up early to enter a lottery for the few public spots. Mr. Walgren said Dr. Murray had made it clear that he was administering the anesthetic propofol for two months, arriving at Mr. Jackson’s home around midnight and often staying through the night. Lawyers for Dr. Murray declined to make an opening statement. After a rehearsal for his final tour, called “This Is It,” Mr. Jackson returned home on June 24, and Dr. Murray gave him several medications, including Valium, prosecutors said. Early the next morning, he also gave him propofol and apparently realized about an hour later that something was seriously wrong with Mr. Jackson. Rather than calling 911, Mr. Walgren said, Dr. Murray called Mr. Jackson’s private security officials. And when one arrived in the bedroom several minutes later, Dr. Murray instructed him to remove several vials from the bedroom before he eventually called for paramedics. At best, prosecutors said, Dr. Murray waited nine minutes before calling 911. In a less favorable scenario, they said, it took him more than 20 minutes after first learning that Mr. Jackson was not breathing to instruct someone to make the call. “There were a number of actions displayed by Dr. Murray that showed an extreme deviation from standard medical care,” Mr. Walgren said. Michael Amir Williams, a personal assistant to Mr. Jackson for more than two years, said he received a “frantic” voice mail message from Dr. Murray at 12:13 p.m. on June 25. When Mr. Williams called back a minute later, he said, Dr. Murray — who had been hired for $150,000 a month — told him that Mr. Jackson had had a “bad reaction” and that immediate help was needed, although he did not instruct him to call 911. Mr. Williams then called two security guards on duty at Mr. Jackson’s home. Kenny Ortega, a director and photographer who produced a documentary film based on rehearsals for the 2009 tour, was the first witness called by prosecutors. He told Judge Michael E. Pastor that Mr. Jackson had not seemed well enough to rehearse several days before his death. “He appeared really lost,” Mr. Ortega said, adding that Mr. Jackson was withdrawn and had the chills. “It was scary. I couldn’t put my finger on it. I said, ‘Michael, is this the best place for you to be or do you want to go home and be with your family?’ ” Mr. Jackson left soon after. The next day, Mr. Ortega was summoned to a meeting at Mr. Jackson’s home with several other top executives involved in the tour. Mr. Ortega testified that Dr. Murray scolded him for suggesting that Mr. Jackson return home. “He asked me not to act like a doctor or a psychologist and leave it to him,” Mr. Ortega said. But a few days later, just hours before he died, Mr. Jackson was back to “the Michael we all knew and loved,” Mr. Ortega said. “He was in a delightful mood, and we had an absolutely fantastic day.” | Jackson Michael;Murray Conrad;Murders and Attempted Murders;Anesthesia and Anesthetics |
ny0040445 | [
"business",
"economy"
] | 2014/04/24 | New-Home Sales Fall to 8-Month Low, in Blow to Housing Recovery | WASHINGTON — Sales of new single-family homes tumbled in March to their lowest level in eight months, a setback to the housing market recovery. The Commerce Department said on Wednesday that sales dropped 14.5 percent, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 384,000 units, declining for a second consecutive month. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast new-home sales for last month at 450,000 units. Compared with March 2013, sales were down 13.3 percent, the largest such decline since April 2011. The housing market has been hurt by an unusually cold and snowy winter, higher mortgage interest rates and a shortage of properties that is limiting options for potential buyers. House prices, which have increased more than wages, are also weighing on the sector. Sales plunged in the Midwest and South. They also fell in the West, but rose in the Northeast. Although sales of new homes are volatile month-on-month and account for less than 10 percent of the overall market, the drop last month confirmed that housing would again be a drag on gross domestic product in the first quarter. Sales of new homes are counted when contracts are signed. Last month’s decline could still reflect some of the impact from the cold weather. In another report on Wednesday, the Mortgage Bankers Association said applications for home loans fell last week. While housing is struggling, other sectors of the economy, like manufacturing, are regaining momentum as the weather improves. In a separate report, Markit, the financial data company, said its preliminary manufacturing purchasing managers index for the United States was little changed in April. The survey’s measure of output, however, hit its highest level since March 2011, while new orders increased. “With manufacturing acting as a good bellwether of the rest of the economy, the survey bodes well for further robust economic growth in the second quarter,” said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit. | Real Estate; Housing;US Economy;Mortgage Bankers Assn of America;US |
ny0107358 | [
"business"
] | 2012/04/23 | Aiming for Clarity, Fed Falls Short in Some Eyes | WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke , has tried to speak more clearly and more frequently than his predecessors. He has lectured college students, met with members of the military and, since last April, held quarterly news conferences . But as Mr. Bernanke prepares to meet the press for the fifth time Wednesday afternoon, after a scheduled meeting of the Fed’s policy-making committee on Tuesday and Wednesday, there are reasons to doubt that the efforts are increasing public understanding of monetary policy. Experts and investors have continued to disagree about the plain meaning of the Fed’s recent policy statements. Some say the increased volume of communication is creating cacophony rather than clarity. Political criticism of the Fed has continued unabated. And the economists and analysts who are paid to predict and translate the Fed’s actions and pronouncements for investors say that demand for their services has only increased. “It’s been one of the most amazing things,” said Diane Swonk, chief economist at Mesirow Financial, a Chicago investment firm. “Over time I would have expected increased transparency to diminish my role in translating monetary policy for the markets.” Mr. Bernanke and other Fed officials have said that they view the news conferences and other changes as a success. They point to the stability of asset prices tied to the future level of interest rates as evidence that the markets understand the Fed’s commitment to hold down rates. The central bank has held short-term interest rates near zero since late 2008, and it has sought to further reduce long-term rates through the purchase of Treasury securities and mortgage bonds. It has said that it plans to continue those policies at least until late 2014. Its policy-making arm, the Federal Open Market Committee, is expected to affirm that course this week, according to Ms. Swonk and other analysts. The economy is growing, reducing the need for new stimulus, and there is little slack in the rate of inflation, sapping support for new steps. At the same time, there are no indications that Mr. Bernanke is ready to consider doing less. A dissident minority of Fed officials has pressed loudly and publicly for the Fed to curtail this aid campaign, suggesting that interest rates should be raised as soon as the end of this year. But the public profile of these Fed officials significantly exceeds their internal influence. The Fed’s vice chairwoman, Janet L. Yellen, said this month that if anything, the Fed’s existing efforts are insufficient, and that it might need to maintain rates near zero beyond 2014. Mr. Bernanke has long argued that central banks can increase the potency of their policies through clear communication, because convincing investors that you will do something is tantamount to doing it. The current effort also is politically expedient, in light of attacks from conservative politicians over the Fed’s response to the financial crisis and subsequent efforts to revive the pace of growth. By increasing public understanding of its goals and methods, the central bank hopes to defuse political efforts to circumscribe its powers. In addition to becoming the first Fed chairman to hold regular news conferences, Mr. Bernanke has carried this message to a wide range of other public forums, including a series of lectures at George Washington University last month, an interview shown on ABC’s evening news program , and a “town hall” meeting with military personnel at a base in Texas. The Fed also has expanded its formal statements. In January it began to release the predictions of its senior officials about the level of short-term interest rates over the next several years. “A consensus has developed on the necessity and value of greater disclosure, accountability and candor,” John C. Williams, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, wrote in a recent essay . “When the public better understands what the Fed is trying to do, uncertainty about its policies is reduced, and households and businesses are able to make spending and investment decisions with greater confidence.” The Fed remains opaque compared with other parts of the government. For example, a spokeswoman declined to comment for this article on the effect of increased transparency, citing a policy against public comment in the week preceding a meeting of the policy-making committee. But those who watch the Fed closely say that the changes have significantly improved their understanding of the Fed’s policies. Several offered particular praise for Mr. Bernanke’s news conferences, which he holds after four of the committee’s scheduled meetings. “You can imagine that the effectiveness would depend on the chairman, but Bernanke is excellent,” said Laurence H. Meyer, senior managing director at Macroeconomic Advisers and a former Fed governor. “He uses them well to provide color and clarification.” But when the Fed said last August that it intended to hold short-term rates near zero at least through the middle of 2013, confusion ensued. Some experts said it meant only that the Fed intended to keep rates near zero as long as the recovery did not outpace its expectations. Others described the language as something close to a commitment. Since then, Mr. Bernanke and his lieutenants have sought to make clear that the language was indeed conditional. But when the Fed said in January that it intended to hold short-term rates near zero until late 2014, the same debate sprang back to life. Indeed, a member of the Federal Open Market Committee, Charles Evans, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, published a paper describing the language as ambiguous. Confusion also has surrounded another Fed initiative, the publication of predictions by its senior officials regarding the future level of short-term interest rates. The Fed also releases predictions by those officials of the pace of economic growth and inflation, and the level of unemployment. But the predictions are published anonymously, so it is impossible to determine, for example, whether the person with the most optimistic view about unemployment is also the person who sees the most urgent need to raise interest rates. Also, the predictions include the views of the 12 presidents of the regional Fed banks, but only five hold votes on the policy-making committee at any given time. The other votes are held by Mr. Bernanke and the other members of the Fed’s board of governors; there are currently two vacancies on the seven-member board. Some Fed officials want to publish additional information about the forecasts. Others want to wait. They say it is not yet clear whether the Fed is being sufficiently clear. | Bernanke Ben S;Federal Reserve System;United States Economy;Banking and Financial Institutions;Interest Rates |
ny0245613 | [
"world",
"middleeast"
] | 2011/04/07 | Oman Offers Some Lessons to a Region Embroiled in Protest | MUSCAT — More than half of Oman ’s 2.8 million people are under the age of 20, and 83 percent are under 35. It is not surprising then that a chief complaint of Omani citizens is a lack of jobs and training for the sultanate’s young population. Yet when the wave of unrest sweeping the Arab world led to violent protests in late February in the port town of Sohar, they quickly fizzled out. Sultan Qaboos bin Said, who has ruled Oman for 40 years, eventually replaced two-thirds of his government and gave pay increases to civil servants and government pensioners. He also raised the minimum wage to 200 Omani rials a month, or $520, from 150 rials; introduced unemployment allocations of 150 rials a month; and announced plans to create 50,000 jobs in various areas of the public sector. Other autocratic regimes in the region faced with uprisings have offered similar concessions, but with less success. That raises the question: Is Oman’s apparent stability, compared with some of its more turbulent neighbors, real? And if so, why, and what lessons could it offer governments in the region seeking a way forward? Officials and business executives at an investment conference in Muscat last week offered some partial answers. Anwar Ali Sultan, director of W.J. Towell, a trading company in Muscat, said that the violence in Sohar was “a spillover effect from what happened in other countries,” but that it had “not affected the local industries or potential for future investment in this country.” Sridhar Sridharan, managing partner at Ernst & Young in Oman, agreed. “What happened in Sohar, particularly, was an aberration,” he said. “It is not a standard for this country.” About 50 government officials and business leaders at the conference generally shared that view. But away from the conference some business leaders were more skeptical. “Investments coming to Oman are on hold until conditions become clearer across the region,” said Al Harith al-Khalili, managing director of Rasmala Investments in Oman, who was not at the conference. “The protests in Oman itself have died down, but other investors continue to look at this part of the world as one spot.” He added: “We need time to rebuild confidence now, but confidence was never completely wiped out. There was no panic. People weren’t fired from companies and projects were not canceled due to protests. Investors are cautious, but still willing to invest.” Some nervousness remains, with Standard & Poor’s placing its ratings on the sultanate and some Omani companies, including Oman Power & Water Procurement, on CreditWatch on March 17 with negative implications, since “possible repercussions of regional conflicts could increase political risks in Oman, which might also negatively affect economic growth and public finances.” Oman’s solid AA ratings remained unchanged, however, because S.&P. said that “if the government is able to address public grievances without putting too much burden on public finances and external investor confidence, then ratings could stabilize at current levels.” Foreign investor confidence appears to be holding up. On the sidelines of the conference, a representative from the U.S. Embassy said investments by American companies like Bechtel in a slew of infrastructure projects, including airports, rail projects and sea ports, were on track. Singapore’s ambassador to Oman, Theng Dar Teng, also said that even though risk appetite might be lower in the short term because of the uncertain political climate, “Singaporean companies see tremendous opportunities for business collaboration going forward.” The Omani economy has been mainly driven by oil production and has shown slow and steady growth over the years, even during the global financial crisis. Mr. Khalili said: “Before the financial crisis, people used to look at Oman as an economy that needs to accelerate and catch up to its neighbors. But being conservative and small actually made it one of the least affected economies in the region at the end of the day.” Oman is one of the poorest of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries in terms of G.D.P. per capita, said Philippe Dauba-Pantanacce, senior regional economist at Standard Chartered Bank in Dubai, but it has weathered the financial crisis better than some of its neighbors. He said that since Oman was not an OPEC member, it had been unconstrained by the cartel’s quotas on oil production and exports. Higher production, exports and prices sustained real G.D.P. growth of 4.5 percent last year. But some fundamental structural problems have to be resolved for the economy to flourish. “The government is really coming to terms with how necessary it is to be more efficient with job creation,” said Mohammed Ali al-Said, general manager of Value Engineering Center, which provides design and consulting services to oil and natural gas companies. “We need to encourage the local industries to be more proactive in absorbing the young.” Aside from driving innovation and competition in developing economies, small and midsize enterprises, or S.M.E.’s, are considered high employers, typically employing four times as many people as larger companies, according to the Oxford Business Group. Small businesses are defined as having fewer than 50 employees. At the conference, Mr. Teng, the Singaporean ambassador, noted that up to 99 percent of companies in Singapore were S.M.E.’s and that reliance on small businesses should be a main objective for Oman as well. “The economy in Singapore is small, but it is talked about because of its connectivity and market access, its ability to be a part of the global supply chain, and that is what should happen in Oman,” Mr. Teng said. “There needs to be more support for entrepreneurs.” Oman Development Bank conducted a study in December 2010 that indicated there were more than 48,000 S.M.E.’s in the sultanate. The study was based on a government initiative to examine the bank’s lending practices to small businesses, and the bank agreed to “maximize the economic returns of the funding and supporting it provides.” To some experts, that is precisely the problem. “The main issues with funds established and with the Oman Development Bank was that all of them don’t have the right vision to deal with entrepreneurs, and they end up treating them the same way banks do,” said Abdullah Salem al-Salmi, executive vice president of the Capital Market Authority in Oman. “What they care about is how to get their money back.” Mr. Salmi did say that there was a new directorate established by the Commerce and Industry Ministry to look after S.M.E.’s. But for now, it remains a challenge for owners of small businesses to secure lines of credit from banks. Job creation is one of the objectives of Oman’s “2020 Vision,” a set of development plans mapped out for the next decade. Another aim is diversification away from the reliance on oil and gas sales, particularly since Oman’s resources are dwindling compared with those of its neighbors. | Oman;Finances;Labor and Jobs;Middle East;Middle East and North Africa Unrest (2010- );Oil (Petroleum) and Gasoline |
ny0083291 | [
"sports",
"basketball"
] | 2015/10/19 | Lopez Lifts Nets Past 76ers | Brook Lopez scored 24 points, leading the host Nets to a 92-91 preseason victory over the Philadelphia 76ers. | Basketball;Brooklyn Nets;76ers |
ny0284283 | [
"us",
"politics"
] | 2016/07/25 | Party Leader’s Resignation a Sign of Bernie Sanders’s Influence, His Backers Say | PHILADELPHIA — The announcement that Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz would step down as the Democratic National Committee chairwoman not only rocked the party on the eve of its convention , but also energized Senator Bernie Sanders and his supporters, who have long argued that Ms. Wasserman Schultz and others tried to undermine his campaign. Moments after Ms. Wasserman Schultz said in a statement that she would step down, Mr. Sanders and others welcomed the change in interviews and statements, saying her resignation would help the party unify after a tough primary campaign. Many also said that Ms. Wasserman Schultz’s decision illustrates that Mr. Sanders’s campaign, and the platform he pushed, has had a lasting effect on the progressive direction of the party. Mr. Sanders had called on Ms. Wasserman Schultz to resign after a breach of the committee’s internal email system revealed that she and some of her top aides had actively tried to undermine Mr. Sanders’s presidential bid. On Sunday, he said he looked forward to the party being under new leadership. “Debbie Wasserman Schultz has made the right decision for the future of the Democratic Party,” Mr. Sanders said in a statement. “While she deserves thanks for her years of service, the party now needs new leadership that will open the doors of the party and welcome in working people and young people. The party leadership must also always remain impartial in the presidential nominating process, something which did not occur in the 2016 race.” Throughout the primaries, Mr. Sanders argued that Ms. Wasserman Schultz and the national committee were biased toward Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, and pointed to a number of examples — including a debate schedule his campaign said favored Mrs. Clinton; a fund-raising arrangement between the party and Mrs. Clinton’s campaign; the appointments of staunch Clinton supporters to leadership positions on important convention committees; and the party’s rebuke of Mr. Sanders in May for not clearly condemning a melee at the Nevada Democratic convention . Mr. Sanders had said, if he had won the nomination, that he would replace Ms. Wasserman Schultz. The senator from Vermont also endorsed Tim Canova , a law professor who is running against Ms. Wasserman Schultz for her Florida congressional seat. Moments after Ms. Wasserman Schultz said she planned to resign, Mr. Canova said in an interview that Mr. Sanders was transforming the party, and that the move was “a sign of the times, that things are really changing.” “Bernie Sanders accomplished an awful lot in this campaign, and the movement only continues to grow around the country and in down ballot races,” Mr. Canova said. “The grass-roots base has had it with corporate dominated politics of triangulation. The grass-roots base is very hungry for a return to genuine progressive values and agendas.” Benjamin T. Jealous, who was a frequent surrogate for Mr. Sanders and a former president of the N.A.A.C.P., added that the move would help the party push forward in its fight to defeat Donald J. Trump, the Republican nominee. “This allows us to heal and move on,” he said in an interview. Yet, not every Sanders supporter saw Ms. Wasserman Schultz’s move as significant. Cornel West, a scholar and a frequent surrogate for Mr. Sanders, said the resignation was a “very small step.” He also lamented that, while Mr. Sanders had won some victories with the party platform, the document does not include a ban on fracking, a push for Medicare for all, a change in the country’s stance on Israeli-Palestinian politics, or a condemnation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership — all issues that Mr. Sanders made important parts of his campaign. “The resignation of one Wall Street Democrat doesn’t mean a transformation of the party. It’s still a Wall Street party,” said Mr. West, who is now supporting Jill Stein, the Green Party nominee. “The problem is whether, in fact, the Democratic Party can ever be a vehicle for the kind of progressive politics we really need in the country, so I’m not that excited.” | 2016 Presidential Election;Democratic National Convention,DNC;US Politics;DNC;Democrats;Bernard Sanders,Bernie Sanders;Debbie Wasserman Schultz;Timothy A Canova;Florida;Philadelphia |
ny0191335 | [
"business",
"worldbusiness"
] | 2009/02/04 | Australia and Japan Announce New Stimulus Plans | HONG KONG — Australia announced a $26.5 billion stimulus plan and an interest rate cut on Tuesday and the Japanese central bank said it would start buying shares held by beleaguered banks, the latest examples of stimulus measures in response to a deepening recession. In Japan alone, tens of thousands of job cuts have been announced in the last two weeks, and in China some 20 million of the country’s 120 million migrant workers are thought to have lost their jobs. The export-driven economies of Asia countries have been hit particularly hard in recent weeks as demand from Europe and the United States has collapsed. “Things will remain very challenging for some time,” said Patrick Bennett, foreign exchange and rate strategist with Société Générale in Hong Kong. “Recent trade figures from South Korea, for example, are evidence of a marked slowdown in global activity,” Mr. Bennett said. “The old consensus that there might be some improvement in the second half of this year is looking increasingly optimistic.” Just like much of the industrialized western world, “the Asian region is also going into serious recession,” said Steve Keen, a professor for economics at the University of Western Sydney. More stimulus add-ons are widely expected as the recession drags on. China, which announced a package of infrastructure spending and other measures last November, is widely expected to announce fresh steps to bolster growth and safeguard jobs in the weeks ahead. And central banks in the euro zone and Britain are expected to continue their string of interest rate cuts in a bid to pull those economies out of recession. In Japan, where rates are already near zero, the Bank of Japan is relying on other tools — like buying commercial paper , a type of short-term debt — in an effort to ease credit conditions and get banks lending again. On Tuesday, the central bank announced that it would deploy yet another tool in its arsenal: it plans to buy up to 1 trillion yen, or $11.1 billion, of the shares that Japanese banks hold in other corporations. The plan, similar to purchases the central bank made from 2002 though 2004, is intended to shore up banks’ capital and reduce their exposure to the stock market. Over all, the Japanese financial system has remained stable, mainly because Japanese lenders had little exposure to the mortgage-related troubles that set off the current global woes. But many Japanese banks own a large number of shares in other companies. Last year’s stock market rout sharply reduced the value of those portfolios, and thus the capital base of the banks themselves. Many have now reported “massive realized and unrealized losses,” the Bank of Japan said in a statement, adding that the risk of market fluctuations now remained “their critical business challenge.” Analysts welcomed the move, saying it could help ease tightening financing ahead of March 31, the end of the fiscal year for most Japanese companies. If the Bank of Japan, “is stepping in as a buffer, that is clearly a good thing,” said Jesper Koll, president of Tantallon Research Japan in Tokyo. “But what would be really good would be to force banks to sell all their cross-shareholdings and thus get rid of that risk altogether.” Meanwhile, Australia still has plenty of conventional policy tools to deploy in its effort to prop an economy whose main driver — mining — is fizzling. The Australian central bank lowered its benchmark cash rate by a full percentage point on Tuesday, to a record low of 3.25 percent. Altogether, the bank has lowered the rate by 4 percentage points in five steps since Sept. 3. Also Tuesday, the government outlined a new stimulus plan, which complements measures announced last year. “The weight of the global recession is now bearing down on the Australian economy,” said Wayne Swan, the Australian treasurer. “In the midst of this global recession it would be irresponsible not to act swiftly and decisively to support jobs.” The measures comprise 42 billion Australian dollars, or $26.5 billion, in spending on infrastructure, schools and housing, as well as payments for low-income earners. Mr. Swan said they would allow Australia to stave off recession, though at the expense of causing the budget deficit to swell to 1.9 percent of gross domestic product. Australia’s economy has benefited from a commodity boom, but as global growth grinds to a halt, raw materials prices have dropped off sharply, with oil now hovering just above $40. Craig James, chief economist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, called the new measures “very positive.” “We’ve got both arms of the Australian economy, both monetary and fiscal policy, working in unison,” Mr. James said, and the combined stimulus measures “should prevent the economy from notching up two consecutive quarters of negative growth, which is the technical definition of a recession.” Economists say a priority for the Asia-Pacific region in the longer term is to reduce its reliance on exports and to stimulate domestic consumption — a shift that will take years to accomplish. The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, on Tuesday held out some hope of recovery for the region in 2010, but stressed that it was “impossible for Asia to have a recovery while the rest of the world is in bad shape.” Mr. James of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia said the impact of the regional stimulus packages depended on what happens in the United States. “Once the U.S. authorities start to improve the functioning of the credit system, the financial system, then we’ll start to see confidence return,” he said. ”Once we do get improvement in the health of the U.S. financial system, there will be less need in places like Australia to go down this path of stimulus packages.” | Subprime Mortgage Crisis;Australia;Japan;Economic Conditions and Trends;Banks and Banking |
ny0013987 | [
"business",
"international"
] | 2013/11/23 | Central Bank Chief Urges European Unity | FRANKFURT — Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, issued a plea for European unity on Friday and criticized what he said was a “nationalistic tone” in the reaction to recent central bank policy moves. Speaking to an audience of bankers in Frankfurt, Mr. Draghi beseeched European leaders to overcome their differences and keep making progress to address the flaws in the design of the euro zone. He also defended the decision by the E.C.B. to cut interest rates earlier this month against criticism from Germany. In particular, Mr. Draghi called on political leaders to create a mechanism for closing down sick banks, a so-called resolution authority. Such an authority is essential for the E.C.B. to carry out its new role as central bank supervisor for the euro zone, Mr. Draghi said. Political leaders meeting in Brussels have been struggling, so far unsuccessfully, to agree on how a resolution authority should be structured. “It is essential we do not retreat into purely national perspectives with a narrow view of our interests,” Mr. Draghi said. Mr. Draghi’s comments before a well-attended gathering of bankers came amid increased concern that European leaders, now that they are no longer under intense market pressure, have lost the will to address underlying flaws in the euro zone. Instead, they have blamed each other for economic stagnation in Europe. The Germans accuse the French and Italians of not doing enough to make their economies competitive, while the others attack Germany for focusing too much on exports and not enough on stimulating demand within Europe. On Friday, official statistics showed that German growth in the most recent quarter was due to increased domestic demand rather than foreign trade, supporting the German argument that the economy is already achieving a better balance between imports and exports. Two weeks after the E.C.B. cut its main interest rate to a record low of 0.25 percent, Mr. Draghi answered criticism from Germany, including the president of the country’s central bank, that ultralow official interest rates penalize savers. While it is true that low interest rates are hard on pensioners, Mr. Draghi said, a weak economy is worse because it prevents people from building up savings in the first place. “Rates are low because the economy is weak,” he said. In recent speeches, Jens Weidmann, president of the German Bundesbank, has called attention to the disadvantages of low interest rates. Mr. Weidmann, a member of the E.C.B.'s rate-setting governing council, is believed to have argued against a cut earlier this month but has avoided criticizing the decision directly. Mr. Draghi did not say where he thought nationalistic commentary he referred to was coming from. But he appeared to be reacting to suggestions in the German press that the E.C.B. is pursuing policies designed to bail out trouble countries like Italy. Mr. Draghi insisted that members of the E.C.B. governing council, which includes the heads of all 17 national central banks in the euro zone, act in the interest of Europe as a whole. “In their deliberations and decisions governing council members are neither German, nor French, nor Spanish, nor Italian,” said Mr. Draghi, who is Italian. “They are European.” Mr. Draghi also called on bankers in the audience to cooperate fully with an in-depth review that the E.C.B. is conducting during the next year of bank assets, in an attempt to identify which banks are weak and must be recapitalized or closed. “For banks, it offers a unique opportunity to restore confidence and attract private investors,” Mr. Draghi said. Jürgen Fitschen, co-chief executive of Deutsche Bank, said that banks understood the importance of the E.C.B. review. “We understand that the next 12 months might be the most decisive since the crisis broke in 2008,” Mr. Fitschen said in brief remarks to the gathering. | Mario Draghi;European Central Bank;EU;Banking and Finance;Economy |
ny0076948 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2015/05/07 | Port Authority Police Union Sues Over Searches of Officers’ Cellphones | An internal investigation by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey led to the dismissal in November of nine probationary police officers and the suspension of three others for their conduct at a graduation party at a bar in Hoboken, N.J. Now, the Port Authority’s police union has sued the agency, charging that investigators improperly demanded that probationary officers grant them access to their personal cellphones, making it clear that if they did not cooperate, they would be fired. The lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in Federal District Court in Manhattan, argues that the cellphone searches violated the officers’ constitutional rights against unreasonable search and seizure. The lawsuit by the Port Authority Police Benevolent Association cites a unanimous 2014 Supreme Court decision written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. that said the police needed a warrant to search the cellphones of people they were arresting. “We lock people up for a living,” Paul Nunziato, the president of the police union, said in an interview this week. “If we’re conducting a criminal investigation and we have someone’s cellphone, if we don’t have a warrant, we’re not going into that cellphone. “Police officers are entitled to the same rights as every American citizen,” he added. According to the lawsuit, the authority conducted a widespread investigation into allegations that off-duty members of the police graduating class had engaged in theft, trespass, sexual assault and other potential criminal activity at the bar in Hoboken on Aug. 23, 2014. The Port Authority, in a news release in November, said its inspector general’s office had interviewed more than 100 police officers, customers and staff members of the bar, local police officials and others, and reviewed “videotapes, social media communications and other electronic messages.” The lawsuit says the authority, in demanding that probationary officers grant investigators access to their phones, made it clear “that they had no choice but to comply.” As many of the cellphones were locked, the investigators told the probationary officers to unlock them, the suit says. “At the heart of this investigation,” the lawsuit says, “was a profound incursion into the privacy of the Port Authority’s probationary officers.” The suit says that one Port Authority lieutenant, asked whether a probationary officer could refuse to agree to the cellphone search, told Mr. Nunziato, the president of the police union, “If they don’t cooperate, I mean they are at-will employees.” Mr. Nunziato recalled what he understood the lieutenant to be saying. “That was the overt threat of termination, without a doubt,” he said. The Port Authority said in a statement that it strongly disputed the lawsuit’s allegations concerning the inquiry into “the egregious behavior” at the party by newly sworn officers and some supervisors. “The conduct displayed by these individuals was appalling, deeply troubling and did not meet the high standards that all of our sworn police officers vow to uphold,” the Port Authority said, adding that its police agency “has a long tradition of honor, valor and sacrifice, and we will vigorously defend the appropriateness of the inspector general’s investigation into this matter.” The lawsuit notes that Port Authority officers are considered probationary in their first year of service after graduating from the Police Academy, and have fewer job protections than nonprobationary employees. Richard D. Emery, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said he believed the authority wanted to search the officers’ phones to determine whether they “were conspiring with one another to somehow undermine the investigation.” “It had solely to do with the Port Authority’s paranoia that they were talking to each other about the questions the investigators were asking” when the officers were brought in for interviews, Mr. Emery said. The lawsuit says that one dismissed officer, Kathleen Howard, who is also a plaintiff, was told to open her cellphone and then to open a group texting app on the phone, which the investigators reviewed. Other officers whose phones were searched (and who are not plaintiffs) are identified only by letters in the lawsuit. One such officer, a recent veteran of the Iraq war, came close to tears when he was told to produce his phone, the suit says. “He was furious that upon returning home to his country, he was being forced to turn over private property to law enforcement despite no suspicion he had committed any wrongdoing,” the suit said. His probationary period was extended for one year and he was suspended without pay for 30 days, the suit says. | Port Authority;Police;Search and seizure;Mobile phone;Lawsuits;Paul Nunziato;Hoboken NJ |
ny0052005 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2014/10/15 | After Contest, One Chair Is Left Standing | The Battery, the 25-acre park at the southern tip of Manhattan, wanted a signature park chair. It had to be light enough to move and heavy enough to withstand winds off New York Harbor. It needed to be stackable. And it had to have a fabulous design, since one of the goals, said Warrie Price, president of the Battery Conservancy , the nonprofit that supports the park, was to foster “aesthetic literacy.” So in 2012, it announced a chair competition , which over the months has narrowed 679 entries from 15 countries down to 50 entries, then to five and, now, one. On Wednesday, the conservancy will announce the winner, a chair called Fleurt. The powder-coated steel chair, by Andrew Jones Design , looks like a pale blue flower, its curving petals forming the outlines of the seat, back and arms. Its smooth surface is perforated with tiny, seemingly random holes that will allow the seat to dry quickly after it rains. Mr. Jones, 47, a furniture designer from Toronto, said he developed the idea after visiting the Battery. “I needed to see how big the oval was,” he said, referring to a new lawn that is a centerpiece of a major renovation underway in the park. “I tried to find a poetic response to how hundreds of chairs could make a special place, rather than just designing an object.” The conservancy will award Mr. Jones $10,000 and will fabricate 300 chairs based on his design, which also calls for four hues of blue. Since July, tens of thousands of people have sat on and studied prototypes of the five chair finalists, which included two from the United States, one from Brazil and one from Mexico. Some 3,600 people cast their vote, putting a check mark next to a photo of their favorite on a small ballot. Image Plans call for 300 copies of Fleurt. “I tried to find a poetic response to how hundreds of chairs could make a special place, rather than just designing an object,” Mr. Jones said. Credit Andrew Jones Design The crowd favorite, by far, Ms. Price said, was Fleurt. The five-member jury assembled by the conservancy also voted for the design. On Tuesday, members of the public were still testing the chairs, which were arrayed on artificial turf in the courtyard of Castle Clinton, the historic fort in the park. “That one is more comfortable,” said Alan Colquhoun, a tourist from Scotland, pointing at Fleurt. But the petal arms, he said, were awkward. “I don’t like the way it forces you to make a decision with your arms,” he said. His wife, Angela, disagreed. “I’m not bothered by the arm rests,” she said. “It’s the most comfortable, and I like its more organic design.” The voting proved so popular that when ballots occasionally ran out, people wrote their selection on random scraps of cardboard, business cards, even a piece of bark from a London plane tree. One voter, using a felt-tip pen on a restaurant business card, urged: “Only ‘Fleurt.’ The others are physically painful.” Mr. Jones, who studied furniture design at the Royal College of Art in London, has taught at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Toronto. While he usually does not enter contests, he found the one for the so-called Battery Chair irresistible. “There aren’t many competitions where you get the opportunity to design one piece of furniture for such a high-profile space,” he said. He had reservations about the flower motif. “This is the most fun or pop idea I’ve ever done, but it felt right for the space,” he said. “I thought: ‘O.K., I’m going to design a flower. It sounds a little corny, but I’m going to make it elegant and execute it perfectly.’ ” Ms. Price, who had remained neutral throughout the competition, said she liked the way the winning design echoed the gardens in the park, including one planted in remembrance of the victims of Sept. 11. “That nature and flora would inspire a designer to take that as a theme was gratifying to us,” she said. | Chair;Battery Conservancy;Battery Park City Manhattan;Andrew Jones |
ny0169979 | [
"business",
"media"
] | 2007/05/18 | WPP Group to Acquire Online Ad Company | In an effort to catch up with Google’s fast-growing online advertising business, the WPP Group, the advertising holding company that owns traditional ad agencies like JWT and the Grey Global Group, agreed yesterday to pay about $649 million to acquire 24/7 Real Media, an advertising network and technology company. WPP’s chief executive, Martin Sorrell, who called Google a “frenemy” last fall, has publicly expressed concern in recent weeks about Google’s plan to pay $3.1 billion to acquire DoubleClick, another online advertising company that has a strong presence in display advertising. Antitrust regulators are evaluating that purchase. “Martin Sorrell has said that he views Google as a ‘frenemy,’ ” said Dave Morgan, chairman of Tacoda, an online ad network, and former chief executive at a company that became part of 24/7 Real Media. “He wants Google to view him as a frenemy, too. He has now given his response, which is that he’s not going to just sit and wait and see what happens. He’s going to take an aggressive position against a world where Google and Yahoo will dominate.” Big brand advertisers like Procter & Gamble and Johnson & Johnson are increasingly shifting their advertising budgets away from traditional media like television and newspapers to digital advertising on the Internet. As that money moves online, the WPP Group and other traditional advertising companies are at risk of losing their grip over the creation and sales of ads. “This really heightens the tension between ad agencies and technology companies as they both try to go after the ad dollars that are migrating online,” said Youssef Squali, the Internet analyst at Jefferies & Company. The WPP Group and other ad holding companies make most of their money by creating ads and planning where they should appear. Now, WPP plans to develop a third major line of business in the online technology space using 24/7 Real Media as its foundation, Mr. Sorrell said in a conference call. “You can call it a tipping point if you want, but I think there has been a tipping point in terms of the realization of the impact of these technologies,” Mr. Sorrell said. WPP is paying $11.75 a share for 24/7 Real Media, which manages a search optimization business, a network of Web sites that display ads and a business that delivers ads online. WPP will now move beyond creating ads into the technology business that underlies the invisible infrastructure that delivers ads to Web users based on their interests and demographics. Shares of 24/7 Real Media rose 39 cents, to $11.65. Shares of WPP rose 11 cents, to $75.14. WPP is also trying to catch up with one of its main competitors, the Publicis Groupe, a holding company based in France. In December, Publicis paid $1.3 billion to buy Digitas, a leading online agency. At that time, analysts said that Publicis was the strongest ad holding company in online advertising. Over the last year, WPP has invested in several digital companies like VideoEgg and Wild Tangent, bought interactive agencies like Bridge Worldwide and Zaaz and invested in Spot Runner, a company that provides technology to automate the production of ads. 24/7 Real Media will operate as a standalone company within WPP and continue to serve ad agencies that are not part of WPP, said Dave Moore, the chairman and chief executive of 24/7 Real Media. It will also work with all of WPP’s agencies to update their technologies and practices for the digital future, said Mark Read, chief executive of WPP Digital. “I think in five years it’s going to be hard to tell what’s digital and what’s not digital,” Mr. Read said in an interview. “The lines are blurring and all media is becoming digital.” Speculation about a purchase of 24/7 Real Media has been swirling since Google’s announcement of its DoubleClick deal. Microsoft and AT&T, which deliver online television services through the Internet, have also expressed concerns about a Google-DoubleClick combination. “In the marketplace there will be an increasing need for an alternative given the shifts that have taken place recently,” Mr. Sorrell said in the conference call. “Our acquisition of Real Media will bring a little, a small amount, of balance into the marketplace.” 24/7 Real Media was formed in 2001 from the merger of two pioneering Internet companies, 24/7 Media and Real Media. The company, based in New York, generated $200 million in revenue last year and has substantial operations in Europe and Asia, including a joint venture in Japan with Dentsu, the largest ad agency there. | WPP Group Plc;Mergers Acquisitions and Divestitures;Computers and the Internet;Advertising and Marketing |
ny0080599 | [
"sports"
] | 2015/02/15 | Letters to the Editor | Smith Shone On Court and Off To the Sports Editor: I once played golf in a fivesome with Dean Smith at Quaker Ridge in Scarsdale, N.Y. Afterward, we repaired to the lounge. All of us, except Coach Smith. He remained outside talking to our caddies. He finally came inside, and I went outside. One of the caddies told me Smith was going to send them sneakers. “He took down all our sizes,” the caddie said. That action typified what made Smith great as a person at least as much as his .776 winning percentage as a coach at North Carolina. His winning percentage at Quaker Ridge that day was 1.000. DONALD KURTZ Stacked Teams vs. Fair Play To the Sports Editor: Re: “ After Auriemma’s Reign, UConn Could Lose Clout ,” Feb. 8: Jeré Longman zeros in on the sad reality of big-time college sports. As Louisiana Tech’s coach, Tyler Summitt, put it, referring to the ability to sustain a winning program, “Money inevitably is the driver behind a lot of this.” Is sports really interesting when there isn’t a level playing field? Where is the satisfaction in winning if you can stack your team with all the best players? It’s sad that the institutions that are supposed to be providing the basis for fair competition in life (an education) instead are promoting the doctrine of moneyed privilege. DICK SCHWARTZ, Bellevue, Wash. Of Jenner, and Gender Bias To the Sports Editor: Re “ The Transition of Bruce Jenner: A Shock to Some, Visible to All ,” Feb. 6: As a transgender woman, I thought your article was fairly respectful and appropriate, while understandably foregrounding the circus of publicity and curiosity that surrounds Mr. (or is it Ms.?) Jenner’s changing appearance. However, I feel it included a needless expression of disrespect to several figures who have transitioned in the public eye. The article listed “Chastity (now Chaz) Bono“ and several others. I am extremely proud of these brave trans people, but not of The Times for choosing to refer to them by their pretransition names, with their actual names in parentheses. HELEN HOLLAND BRONSTON, Burlingame, Calif. Little League Chicanery To the Sports Editor: Re “ Hearts Won, Title Lost ,” Feb. 12: I was taken aback by the reversal of fortunes for Chicago’s Little League championship team named after Jackie Robinson — a pioneer of the game. Chicago is not without its chicanery over the years. But to deprive young boys of such a cherished victory and national acclaim, over a boundary advantage, is a true travesty. American sports has become tainted by deflated footballs, elevator fisticuffs, drugs and beatings, and now boundary violations have turned boys from Chicago’s mean streets from heroes into defeated children. Was it worth the cost? VINCENT KAMIN, Chicago To the Sports Editor: Shame on Darold Butler, the manager of the Jackie Robinson West Team of Chicago. You, sir, have ruined the hope and pride of this team’s accomplishment. And you, Stephen D. Keener, the Little League International president and chief executive, have misdirected your punishment by including the players. How can you in good conscience penalize these young boys? Punish the culprits, not the innocents. MARY MCCORMICK, East Northport, N.Y. A Yankees Double Standard To the Sports Editor: Re “Alex Rodriguez Offers Apology in Meeting With Yankees ,” Feb. 10: The Yankee view is that bonuses for milestone home runs should not be paid, because of steroid use. This would sit more comfortably if the team felt it should also return money to the fans who came to cheer on Alex Rodriguez, and enrich the Yankees, while unaware of Rodriguez’s steroid usage. JERRY LUTZER, Setauket, N.Y. | Baseball;University of Connecticut;Gender;Dean Smith |
ny0072740 | [
"business"
] | 2015/03/12 | Dealing With the Dreaded Bereavement Trip | Dealing with bereavement travel can mean grief in more ways than one. Just ask William Shatner. This month, the 83-year-old actor had to fend off people who criticized his decision not to attend the Los Angeles funeral of his “Star Trek” co-star, Leonard Nimoy, so he could keep a charity fund-raising commitment in Florida. “ Captain Jerk! ” was how The Daily News of New York described the actor, who once played Capt. James T. Kirk in the 1960s TV show. But many people, celebrities or not, can relate to Mr. Shatner’s situation, especially older adults like him. Traveling for funerals and memorial services, or for health emergencies, can become a major concern as people live longer and, in turn, watch friends and family members die. “I see so many seniors trying to cope with bereavement travel,” said Sherry Saturno, executive director of the Hudson Valley Care Coalition in Tarrytown, N.Y. “Making a last-minute trip can be enormously stressful for an older person.” But not being able to attend a funeral or memorial, whether for financial, health, emotional or other reasons, can also be agonizing. The logistics can be daunting. Last-minute airline travel often can be unaffordable for a retiree on a fixed income, said Mila Tecala, an independent social worker who runs the Center for Grief and Loss in Washington. Most major airlines have discontinued the practice of offering bereavement or compassion discounts for emergency travel. In many cases, the family member or friend may be too ill to travel. As head of St. Philomena’s parish in Detroit for more than 60 years, Msgr. Peter Lentine, 95, has counseled countless churchgoers who have lost loved ones. But that does not necessarily make his current personal experience any easier. His niece is in a hospice in Florida with a brain tumor that has left her unable to speak. Monsignor Lentine is in failing health and knows he will not be able to attend the funeral when the time comes. “This is such a difficult situation for me, knowing I cannot say goodbye and that I will not be there for the funeral,” he said. Carol Carlson, 70, of Sarasota, Fla., is another example. She has severe fibromyalgia and was physically unable to attend her mother’s interment service in Grosse Pointe, Mich., six months ago. “I was feeling guilty about not being able to travel and feeling very alone here in Florida, because I hadn’t known anyone who had been in this situation before,” she said. Even when retirees are healthy, emotional issues may make a trip impossible. Ms. Tecala said one of her clients, a fit and active 70-year-old woman, had attended 10 funerals in the last year and simply could not face the prospect of traveling to another. “In the past couple of years, all of her six siblings have died, as well as many close friends,” Ms. Tecala said. There are ways to help ease the burden of bereavement travel, according to grief counselors and other experts. On the practical side, steps can be taken to cut expenses. What few bereavement fares do exist are usually only small discounts on the highest last-minute ticket prices. George Hobica, president of Airfarewatchdog.com, said it was better to use a discount travel site to make last-minute bookings, check air-and-hotel packages that might be cheaper than last-minute fares and see if one-day advance purchase fares might be the best deal. For those within driving distance of a funeral or memorial who cannot or do not want to drive, Ms. Saturno suggested contacting the local agency on aging or local groups that help the elderly. Such organizations often have a list of volunteers who will drive the elderly to services. While funerals and memorial services are an important part of the grieving process, people can “come up with their own rituals as well, whether or not they can attend an official service,” said Florence Isaacs, the author of “My Deepest Sympathies,” a book on condolences. In some cases, that may mean an alternative service at a different time and place. Monsignor Lentine, for example, has already planned a service for his niece, who is also his goddaughter, at his parish in Detroit, after the service in Florida. His niece’s husband and other family members will attend. Ms. Tecala said it was becoming more common for faraway loved ones to plan alternative services in their own places of worship. Many funeral homes, churches and other providers now use technology to allow distant relatives and friends to be part of the ceremonies. “I recently held a memorial service for my mother and videotaped it,” said Marilyn Dion, a certified celebrant in Ontario, Canada. (Celebrants conduct ceremonies signaling life’s various passages.) “This way my mother’s sister and other family members who could not attend could still take part in the ceremony.” Of course, such technologies also make it much easier to stay in touch with ill loved ones before they die. Ms. Carlson of Sarasota and her family used technology to make sure she was part of the ceremony. Ms. Carlson said her mother’s last wishes were clear: She wanted to be cremated and interred next to her husband at a church in Grosse Pointe. Ms. Carlson sent the ashes to her cousin in Michigan, who planned a small ceremony at the church with a minister officiating. The cousin called Ms. Carlson and left the phone on so she could hear the service and even speak with the minister. “I’m so grateful to my cousin, and I really did feel part of it,” Ms. Carlson said. “It turned out to be a very special event.” Those people who cannot attend a funeral or memorial service need to communicate clearly with other survivors about why they must be absent, experts suggest. Ms. Tecala said one client was ostracized by his family when he did not attend his sister’s funeral. “He had made the effort to visit and say his goodbyes while his sister was still alive,” she said. “He thought that was enough. But now he tells me that he has lost a sister — and the rest of his family, too. He needs to make it clear to his family members why saying goodbye was more important to him than the funeral.” Ms. Saturno observed: “Everyone grieves differently. The important thing is to attempt to cope with your feelings of loss in a way that’s comfortable for you.” | Funerals;Old age,elderly,senior citizens;Price |
ny0051929 | [
"technology",
"personaltech"
] | 2014/10/23 | IPad Air 2 and Mini 3 Review: Fantastic, but Largely Unnecessary, Tablets | Let’s get this out of the way first: Apple ’s new iPads are the best tablets on the market today. The iPad Air 2 , the company’s new top-of-the-line device, is substantially faster than its predecessor, which was already more powerful than just about every rival. It sports a terrific minimalist design, almost a millimeter and a half thinner than last year’s pretty skinny iPad Air. And both the new Air and the iPad Mini 3 , Apple’s latest small tablet, include TouchID and Apple Pay, Apple’s fingerprint scanner and payment system, which are handy innovations that make signing into apps and shopping for goods online much easier than in the past. So these are fantastic tablets. The question is: Do you need a fantastic tablet? Apple’s new machines are expensive. The iPad Air 2 starts at $499, and the iPad Mini 3 starts at $399, but both entry-level models have only 16 gigabytes of storage space. To get the most out of either device you really should pay the $100 upgrade to 64 gigabytes. But is it wise to spend $500 or $600 or more for a tablet, or can you get by with a marginal device that costs hundreds of dollars less? For that matter, do you need a tablet at all? If you’re at all like me, you’re already swimming in computers, from a desktop to a laptop to a smartphone to an e-reader. Where does the iPad fit in that world? And even if you’re not like me and have only a couple of machines, you may still be confused by the choice between an iPad and, say, a light and powerful laptop or a large smartphone. For all types of device users, then, the iPad presents a quandary. Are Apple’s premium tablets still worth their lofty prices? Image The iPad Air 2 in profile. It’s 1.5 millimeters thinner than the iPad Air. Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times After using the iPad Air 2 for the last few days, my answer is: Yes, with reservations. Whether you should take a leap on Apple’s new Air depends entirely on how you use your other devices. If you’re not a big fan of personal computers and you don’t really like having your nose stuck in your phone all day, the iPad Air 2 might be for you. The iPad Air 2 is powerful enough to use as your main or secondary computer, after your phone, especially if you use your tablet as a replacement PC on the go, and if you’re looking to play processor-intensive games or run media-editing software. But if that advice weren’t confusing enough, I’ll add one more caveat. If you’re mainly interested in a tablet for surfing the Web or watching movies — for “consuming media,” as the techies say — then the iPad Air 2 is probably overkill. Go instead with last year’s iPad Air, which is slightly slower, thicker and lacks TouchID, but starts at $399 and will prove pretty capable for many users. Even a bargain-basement machine like Amazon’s $99 Kindle Fire HD is a pretty good media device. It doesn’t look as good as the iPad, but if your needs are slight, it will get the job done. As for the iPad Mini 3, Apple’s other new tablet, I’d advocate skipping it. Unlike the Air 2, the new Mini has not been upgraded with Apple’s latest processor. This means that internally, it is almost identical to last year’s iPad Mini 2, which Apple is still selling for $299 and up. The primary difference is that the iPad Mini 3 has a TouchID fingerprint scanner and has one more color option, gold. (The 2 comes in just silver and black.) Unless you’re going to be doing a lot of Apple Pay shopping or you’re gaga for gold, it’s best to save the $100 and go with the Mini 2. The iPad Air 2, by comparison, has been given some hefty internal upgrades. It now has a rear-facing camera that takes pretty good shots, though not nearly as stunning as the pictures you’ll get from the latest iPhones. It also has an iPad-specific version of the A8 chip found in Apple’s new iPhones, and that makes for off-the-charts performance. I noticed the speed immediately. Everything I did — from loading and switching between apps to surfing the web to playing games — was more fluid and responsive than anything I’ve experienced on another tablet. I performed a test of tech benchmarks — Geekbench 3 — on the device , and I got a single-processor performance score of 1,812 on the Air 2, and a multi-core score of 4,530. Don’t worry if those numbers are Greek to you. What they mean, technically, is that the iPad Air 2 is faster than any other iOS or Android device ever sold. It’s about as fast as the Macs that Apple was selling as recently as 2011 . This gets to what is perhaps the main reason to choose an iPad Air 2. All that power will last a long while; you could get four or five years of use out of this tablet before you’ll need to upgrade. Of course, you’ll pay a pretty penny for that longevity. | iPad;Apple |
ny0058476 | [
"business",
"international"
] | 2014/08/04 | Florian Homm, Toppled Financier, Finds Safe Harbor in Germany | FRANKFURT — Florian Homm had long maintained that he was not guilty of charges that he defrauded investors of more than $200 million. Still, he wasted no time when word reached him in an Italian jail late on the afternoon of June 3 that Italy’s supreme court had — much to the consternation of United States authorities — set him free. Mr. Homm walked outside, threw away almost all of the possessions he had with him during his 14 months in detention and walked to the city’s train station as fast as possible for someone who has multiple sclerosis. “I wanted to get out of there,” Mr. Homm, 54, recalled this week, looking gaunt but relaxed in his first interview since his release. He used a debit card to buy a ticket to Florence. There, Mr. Homm contacted his Italian lawyers, who quickly arranged for a car to whisk him to Germany. Soon after dawn the next day, Mr. Homm crossed into Germany and let out a whoop of joy. Germany does not extradite its citizens, and Mr. Homm was apparently safe from the United States authorities who had been eager to bring him to Los Angeles to face fraud charges there. Mr. Homm said he could not believe “how lucky I was.” He added, “They weren’t looking for a six-month penalty, you know.” German banks were big buyers of subprime mortgage loans and helped cause the eurozone crisis, but the country did not generally produce individual financiers who stood out to the public as faces of the economic crisis. Mr. Homm, with a flamboyant style — he once shared a multimillion-euro home on the Mediterranean island of Majorca with a Russian table dancer — and vast personal wealth, filled that void. In a 10-count grand jury indictment, Mr. Homm is accused of buying and selling lightly traded shares among entities he controlled in a practice known as portfolio pumping. Authorities say his goal was to artificially inflate the value of the hedge fund he managed, Absolute Capital Management Holdings Ltd., and thus increase the fees paid to Mr. Homm and others, who are accused of earning an illicit profit of at least $53 million. A brokerage firm in Los Angeles partly owned by Mr. Homm was central to the scheme, prosecutors say, and they had planned to try him there. The most serious charges carry maximum sentences of 25 years in prison. For federal law enforcement authorities, Mr. Homm’s release was another frustrating example of how difficult it has been to prosecute the financiers whose high-risk behavior helped precipitate the financial crisis, and who could also afford the best lawyers. In Mr. Homm’s case, the same Italian court that ordered his release had earlier upheld his extradition. But Mr. Homm’s legal team was able to take advantage of Italy’s convoluted legal system, filing appeals in both criminal and administrative courts as well as the European Court of Human Rights. None of the appeals succeeded. Still, the case was delayed long enough to initiate Italian rules on how long a defendant could be held pending extradition, forcing his release. Florian Homm Wanted by the F.B.I. Mr. Homm is accused of buying and selling lightly traded shares among entities he controlled in a practice known as portfolio pumping. Authorities say his goal was to artificially inflate the value of the hedge fund he managed, Absolute Capital Management Holdings Ltd. “This is a huge problem with our justice system,” said Federico Lenzerini, who teaches international law at the University of Siena. “When you say that this system in the end rewards a defendant for delaying as long as possible, sometimes it’s true.” The Italian Ministry of Justice declined to comment. Mr. Homm’s legal and personal problems are not necessarily over now that he is back in Germany. United States authorities still consider him a fugitive. The F.B.I. plans to issue a wanted poster for Mr. Homm on Monday, according to Laura Eimiller, a spokeswoman for the agency. Mr. Homm and former employees and associates of Absolute Capital Management Holdings, which was publicly traded in London, have been questioned as part of a money laundering investigation in Switzerland. Swiss authorities are looking at whether Mr. Homm and others hid millions before the hedge fund lost almost all its value in 2007. Swiss investigators have compiled a thick dossier of testimony from former employees and associates of Mr. Homm or the hedge fund he founded. According to some of the statements, which have been reviewed by The New York Times, Mr. Homm distributed millions of euros among various trusted friends or business partners in the weeks before he fled Majorca in 2007 aboard his private plane. According to Mr. Homm, he lived incognito in Colombia before resurfacing in 2012. “I was trying to protect my money, so what?” Mr. Homm said, speaking last week at a borrowed office in Frankfurt in the presence of Jan L. Handzlik, his Los Angeles lawyer. He added, “If anybody doubts I had enemies, they should maybe retire to the moon.” In the view of Mr. Homm and Mr. Handzlik, evidence collected by the Swiss investigators exonerates Mr. Homm by failing to show any involvement by him in the questionable trades. Some witnesses portray him as distant from the hedge fund’s day-to-day operations in 2007, the same period he was in the midst of a bitter divorce. Mr. Handzlik and Mr. Homm acknowledge that evidence gathered by the Swiss does not always portray him in a flattering light. According to one witness, in 2007 Mr. Homm lent 600,000 euros to the owner of a brothel in Berlin. Mr. Homm said he had earlier invested in the brothel. Prostitution is legal in Germany. “It was a superprofitable investment and it was a legal investment,” Mr. Homm said, adding, “Today I certainly wouldn’t do it.” Swiss authorities have frozen assets belonging to Mr. Homm worth millions, he said. But Mr. Homm is apparently safe from extradition and imprisonment as long as he stays in Germany. It was only after he left Germany last year to visit his former wife and son in Florence that he was tracked by American and Italian law enforcement authorities and arrested at the Uffizi Gallery. Mr. Homm is accustomed to traveling the world, but he said being confined to his home country was far better than jail in Italy, which he described as violent and unsanitary, with almost no treatment for his multiple sclerosis. “If you lived in two square meters of space and the biggest joy in your life is watering a little plant in a cement courtyard,” Mr. Homm said, “this is fantastic.” Mr. Homm said he had changed since the days when he owned a castle in Luxembourg and a villa and private zoo on Majorca, and was worth as much as 600 million euros. All his money is gone, Mr. Homm said, either taken in the divorce, spent on lawyers, frozen by the Swiss or lost. Mr. Homm said he was living in a tiny apartment in the Frankfurt area and driving a borrowed car. “My life is so modest it’s hilarious,” Mr. Homm said. He said he had renewed his religious faith while in jail and he wore a wristband acquired during his detention embroidered with the words “faith,” “hope” and “love.” “I have zero interest in the world of money or finance at this point,” Mr. Homm said. “I will work entirely charitably. My life is consecrated to the holy mother.” | Florian Homm;Absolute Capital Management Holdings;Germany;Fraud;US;Italy;Fugitive;Hedge fund;Banking and Finance;FBI |
ny0055627 | [
"us"
] | 2014/09/05 | GTT ★ | Our quirky, discerning picks for the most interesting things to do around the state this week. AUSTIN Strong Start With apologies to North Texas — who Texas handled 38-7 in last weekend’s college football opener — the Longhorns’ season, and the era of Charlie Strong, the new head coach, really begins this Saturday with Brigham Young. Last year’s game against B.Y.U. was the beginning of the end for Mack Brown, the outgoing coach. B.Y.U. rushed for a whopping 550 yards en route to a 40-21 upset of Texas, who was ranked number 15. Texas promptly fired its defensive coordinator and still managed to win a string of games. But three big losses to end the season sealed Coach Brown’s fate. Enter Coach Strong, whose no-nonsense style was evident at training camp where he reportedly stripped players of the longhorn logo on their helmets, saying it had to be earned. He instituted a code of conduct that prohibits drugs, guns and stealing and mandates honesty and the respectful treatment of women. A handful of players who could not abide by Coach Strong’s rules were suspended or dismissed. So far this approach seems to appeal to fans. The question is, how will it translate on the field against a formidable opponent — and without David Ash, the starting quarterback who suffered yet another, possibly career-ending concussion against North Texas. Image The grape stomp at last year’s GrapeFest. Texas is the fifth-largest wine grape producer in the United States. Credit Grapevine Convention and Visitors Bureau Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, Sept. 6, 6:30 p.m., texassports.com DALLAS Free At Last Billy Smith served almost 20 years for a rape he did not commit, and after being granted a DNA test, he was exonerated in 2006. Christopher Scott served 12 years for a murder that he did not commit, and after college students in Texas demonstrated that his was a case of mistaken identity, he was exonerated in 2009. Richard Miles served 14 years for a murder and an attempted murder that he did not commit, and after passing a polygraph test showing his innocence, he was exonerated in 2012. These three Dallasites have already told their stories in the book “Tested: How Twelve Wrongly Imprisoned Men Held Onto Hope,” by Dorothy Budd, a former prosecutor for the Dallas County district attorney’s office turned Episcopal deacon, and her daughter and co-writer, Peyton Budd. But on Tuesday, they will rejoin Ms. Budd as part of the Upstander Speaker Series . The discussion will show how Dallas has become the exoneree capital of the nation under Craig Watkins, the Dallas County district attorney, and will no doubt give the audience a fresh perspective on freedom. Dallas Holocaust Museum, Sept. 9, 7:00 p.m., dallasholocaustmuseum.org GALVESTON The View The Texas singer-songwriters Hayes Carll and Carrie Rodriguez are among 12 musicians who have taken their experience with being the frequent subject of photographs and turned it around, zeroing in on subjects to document themselves. Their exchange of a mike for a camera will culminate in an auction in October, featuring one photograph from each musician — including other Texans Ian Moore, Little Joe Washington and Walt Wilkins — as part of the Twelve project, benefiting Galveston-area youth interested in the arts and in need of financial assistance. To get potential bidders primed, concerts with the musicians will take place in the lead-up to the auction, with Mr. Carll, whose chosen photograph is of a turquoise pick-up truck, and Ms. Rodriguez, whose photo features a smiley face, getting things started with Saturday’s show. The Grand 1894 Opera House, Sept. 6, 7 p.m., twelvepeople.org SAN ANTONIO Jazz Stacks A prized find is the ultimate for the discerning collector, but part of the thrill of the pursuit is meeting other collectors. At the International Association of Jazz Record Collectors’ annual convention , audiophiles, academics and writers, among others, will bond over two and a half days’ worth of music and expert presentations. The subjects range from Benny Goodman , the clarinet-playing bandleader known as the “King of Swing,” to Sippie Wallace , the pianist and blues singer known as the “Texas Nightingale.” San Antonio’s history as a recording hub in the 1930s for the labels Victor and Vocalion will also be explored. Sheraton Gunter Hotel, Sept. 4-6, iajrc.org AUSTIN 75 Years Gone The exhibit “ The Making of Gone with the Wind ,” commemorating the movie’s 75th anniversary, draws exclusively from the archive of the film’s producer, David O. Selznick, which, at 5,000 boxes, is the largest at the Harry Ransom Center. Around 300 rare and never-before-exhibited items will provide viewers with a closer look at how the film, set during the Civil War and Reconstruction, influenced the race relations of its day. Harry Ransom Center, Sept. 9-Jan. 4, hrc.utexas.edu GRAPEVINE Wine Enthusiasts The first vineyard in Texas dates to the mid-1600s; today there are around 310, making the state the fifth-largest wine producer in America. The fruits of this growth will be on display at the 28th annual GrapeFest, a four-day affair of tastings, food pairings and grape stomping, with an emphasis on wines from Washington and Italy. Downtown, Sept. 11-14, grapevinetexasusa.com | College Sports;Wine;Auction;False arrest;Texas |
ny0109895 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2012/05/01 | For Newport in Jersey City, Last Phase of Development Begins | In 1981, the developer Richard S. LeFrak got a call from his father, who was exploring a broad swath of land in Jersey City. “You’d better come over and look at this,” Samuel J. LeFrak told his son. It was a rusting railroad yard and some sagging warehouses on the decaying west bank of the Hudson River. The LeFraks started building there in 1986. Now, Richard LeFrak and his sons — his father died in 2003 at 85 — are embarking on the last phase of what has become known as Newport, a 600-acre neighborhood that already has 8 office buildings, 13 apartment towers, 2 hotels, a marina, schools, a retail mall and parks. To put Newport in perspective, it has six times as much land as Battery Park City in Lower Manhattan does, and dwarfs the 26-acre development planned for the rail yards on the West Side of Manhattan. Over the past quarter-century, the LeFraks and their partners have invested billions of dollars in Newport. It is not easy to imagine a single real estate family ever building anything so ambitious again in the United States. “Newport is truly extraordinary,” said Vishaan Chakrabarti, director of the Center for Urban Real Estate at Columbia University. “It’s getting harder and harder to do something this big. But this is the right kind of dense, transit-oriented development.” On Thursday, the LeFraks and Gov. Chris Christie are to formally open a gently sloping 4.5-acre park at the north end of Newport, near Hoboken Terminal . The first of what will be seven more apartment towers surrounding the park is rising quickly. And there are plans for one or two more office buildings on a pier about a mile away, at the south end of Newport. “I originally thought it would take 20 years, not 35 or 40,” Mr. LeFrak, 66 , said. “It’s changed so dramatically since we started. At this point, the project is successful. What you’re really doing now is ensuring that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.” With Jersey City only one mile from Lower Manhattan, the Newport development, as well as other office towers on the waterfront, have often been viewed by New York officials as a threat to New York’s hold on the financial services industry. Lured by lower real estate costs and tax breaks, JPMorgan Chase, UBS, Cigna and other companies moved parts of their operations to Jersey City. But it has also become apparent that New York retains its allure, at least for high-powered executives. In 2004, traders at Goldman Sachs revolted against plans to move them to the company’s new $1.3 billion tower in Jersey City. Still, New Jersey continues to offer generous tax incentives to companies willing to cross the Hudson. For many years, Newport was a series of isolated residential and commercial towers looming over a lot of vacant land. The buildings were unremarkable, and the apartments filled with tenants looking for a cheaper alternative to Manhattan, or a way station before heading to the suburbs. Today, residents and visitors dodge baby carriages along Newport’s pathways, and at the large playground that is part of the newly built park, which includes a playing field and a sandy beach. In recent years, the LeFraks say they have focused on better architecture and filling in gaps between buildings with schools and shops. “It was a real estate investment, and now it’s a neighborhood,” said Mr. LeFrak’s son, Harrison, who has worked at the family business since 1997. The LeFraks have had some missteps. After a jury trial last year, they were ordered to pay millions of dollars in compensation to 16 residents of the Shore Club tower. The tenants, who argued that they had been promised “breathtaking” views of the Hudson, sued after the LeFraks erected a 32-story apartment tower in front of their building. Like many developers, the LeFraks have often criticized elected officials who, in their view, can impede progress with zoning or environmental regulations. Even so, Newport has enjoyed government support in the form of a $40 million federal grant in 1983 for sewers and streets, a 15-year tax abatement for the shopping mall, and tens of millions of dollars in tax breaks from the state to help lure financial companies from Lower Manhattan to Newport’s office buildings. | Family Business;LeFrak Organization;Jersey City (NJ);Real Estate (Commercial) |
ny0194838 | [
"us"
] | 2009/11/06 | Discovery of Bodies Has Neighbors Angry at the Police | CLEVELAND — After the third police station in a row refused to take a missing-person report about her niece two years ago, Sandy Drain took matters into her own hands. She organized search parties to comb abandoned houses. She got neighborhood children to help post fliers on light poles. She recruited a national advocacy group for missing persons to host a rally. She even hired a psychic to look for clues in her niece’s apartment. “It was pretty obvious the police weren’t going to help us,” said Ms. Drain, 65, who added that the police began seriously investigating the case of her niece, Gloria Walker, only after Ms. Drain’s initial efforts prompted the news media to begin asking questions. “If you’re from this neighborhood, you come to expect that,” Ms. Drain said. Her desperation and anger have grown here on Cleveland’s gritty east side since the police last week arrested Anthony Sowell , a convicted sex offender who has been charged with multiple counts of murder after 11 decomposing bodies were discovered in his house and backyard. Despite being accustomed to drugs and violence, residents said they were shocked by the case’s gruesomeness and appalled that a man convicted of attempted rape had apparently been able to hide such heinous crimes, even as the authorities were regularly checking up on him. Community activists added that in recent years they had received dozens of reports from residents in this largely poor and black neighborhood who told of encountering similar frustrations in getting the police to investigate cases of missing adults. “They belittled it and made jokes,” said Barbara Carmichael about her repeated and failed efforts to file a missing-person report about her daughter Tonia, whose body was the first of the 11 found in Mr. Sowell’s house to be identified this week. “They told me to wait a while because she would return once all the drugs were gone.” Law enforcement officials insist, however, that they had done everything they could. “We take these cases seriously,” said Lt. Thomas Stacho, a spokesman for the Cleveland Police Department, who added that Ms. Carmichael’s case had occurred out of Cleveland’s jurisdiction. In the case of Ms. Drain’s niece, “certainly our records show that we spent a significant amount of time investigating the disappearance,” Lieutenant Stacho said, including checking leads, looking up license plates and obtaining Ms. Walker’s dental records. Experts on crime also point out that unlike cases involving missing children, where the police typically react quickly, cases involving missing adults are more complicated. With adults, the police tend to investigate only when there is clear evidence of foul play, rather than just signs of a family feud or the disappearance of a drug addict who, perhaps, has chosen to remain out of touch while on a binge. Many of the women from the neighborhood who were reported missing were known drug users, according to neighbors and the police. But as a crowd gathered to stare at the cream-colored duplex where Mr. Sowell lived — one of the better-maintained homes in a neighborhood filled with abandoned houses — many people said it should not matter whether a person was a drug user for the police to investigate. Many also wondered aloud whether they knew anyone among the dead. “She has been missing since April,” Fawcett Bess, owner of the pizza shop across the street from Mr. Sowell’s house, said of a former girlfriend of Mr. Sowell. “But nobody really paid any attention because she was into the dope. It’s crazy.” “I just feel sad,” Mr. Bess added. “All these girls missing, and nobody did anything.” In 2005, Mr. Sowell moved back into this neighborhood of crumbling streets and vacant two-story walk-ups interspersed with a few tidy homes. He had spent the previous 15 years in state prison for luring a 21-year-old woman into his home, then choking and raping her, according to the county prosecutor’s office. Mr. Sowell pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted rape. (Earlier reports on the county court’s Web site that he had been convicted of rape were incorrect.) On the corner of Imperial Avenue and East 123rd Street, just feet from Mr. Sowell’s house, many people said Thursday that the only thing they remembered about the place was the stench. “People thought the stink was me,” said Ray Cash, the owner of Ray’s Sausage, a meat-processing plant next to Mr. Sowell’s house. To eliminate the smell, Mr. Cash said he had the plant’s gutters cleaned, drain pipes flushed and sewage drain cleaned with bleach. It made no difference. The smell was so bad, Mr. Cash said, that his workers preferred the pungent air inside the meat factory to the foul odor outside, so much so that they kept the windows shut, even in the summer heat. Last Thursday, the police finally discovered the cause of the smell. While serving a search warrant on Mr. Sowell’s house in response to an accusation of rape, the police found two bodies. By Wednesday, the count had risen to 11. Councilman Zack Reed, who represents the neighborhood, said the smell should have been the first clue to the authorities that something was awry. “Clearly, something could have been done differently,” Mr. Reed said, adding that he did not understand why the police and sheriff’s officers who had visited Mr. Sowell’s home weeks ago did not investigate the smell further. On Sept. 22, two county sheriff’s deputies appeared at Mr. Sowell’s door to make sure he was obeying the reporting requirements imposed on sex offenders. Hours later, according to a police report, Mr. Sowell tried to drag a woman into his house to rape her. Experts say that while local law enforcement is required to track sex offenders when they are released from prison, the authorities are usually given limited legal leeway or extra resources to do this. “The system that we have to do monitoring and supervision follow-up once they return to the community is just overwhelmed,” said Ernie Allen of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Mary Mason rejected the notion that the police had done all they could to find her sister, Michelle Mason, after she disappeared on Oct. 8, 2008. Mr. Sowell was not caught sooner, she said, because the police ignored complaints from residents about missing persons, much as they ignored the stench from Mr. Sowell’s house. “The police are still in the mindset that some people don’t matter,” said Ms. Mason, adding that while her sister had a police record involving drug use, she had stopped using drugs 10 years ago. “Shouldn’t the police have noticed that we had so many black women missing before this?” Police logs show that officers worked virtually every day for months trying to find Michelle Mason, Lieutenant Stacho said. Similar steps were taken in other missing-persons cases, he said. The reason it took 36 days from the time the police received a rape complaint against Mr. Sowell to the day they finally obtained a search warrant, Lieutenant Stacho added, was that the victim avoided repeated efforts by the police to interview her. But Ms. Drain, who still does not know what happened to her niece, said she was tired of waiting for answers. “I’m looking at 10 bodies and a skull, and I’m hoping one of them is Gloria,” Ms. Drain said, “because it would be closure for my family.” | Murders and Attempted Murders;Sowell Anthony;Cleveland (Ohio);Missing Persons;Sex Crimes;Search and Seizure;Police |
ny0237683 | [
"business",
"media"
] | 2010/06/09 | Drinking Game Poses Query, Who’s ‘Icing’ Whom? | NO sooner had Alex Rospos arrived from Los Angeles for a Memorial Day weekend on the Jersey Shore than he witnessed, and fell victim to, his first prolonged session playing what has become the nation’s biggest viral drinking game, otherwise known as “icing.” It began six hours after he arrived — “I iced a friend at lunch,” he said — but really took off at a barbecue around the family pool in Belmar the next day. “There have been over 20 icings so far,” Mr. Rospos, a 25-year-old aerospace engineer said, a beer cozy carrying a warm bottle of Smirnoff Ice clipped to the back of his belt with a carabiner. “You have to watch yourself.” The premise of the game is simple: hand a friend a sugary Smirnoff Ice malt beverage and he (most participants have been men) has to drink it on one knee, all at once — unless he is carrying a bottle himself, in which case the attacker must drink both bottles of what Mr. Rospos described as a “pretty terrible” drink. Amid suspicion that the trend is an elaborate viral marketing campaign by Smirnoff, which the company has denied, new icing photos are posted daily on various blogs, Twitter and Facebook — including scenes from graduations and weddings — and sent directly to a Web site, BrosIcingBros.com . The speed with which Mr. Rospos and a group of his friends from high school adopted the game mirrors the rapid spread of Bros Icing Bros from the Web to backyards, living rooms and cubicles around the country, exploding from obscurity in May into a bizarre pastime of college students, young professionals and minor celebrities that counts among its targets the rapper Coolio , the actor Dustin Diamond and members of the rock band The National . A campaign online aims to ice Ashton Kutcher , who often serves as a kind of Kevin Bacon of Web memes, linking disparate areas of the Internet in fewer than six degrees. • The game has exposed the mercurial line between guerrilla advertising and genuine social media trends, raising questions about how young consumers can know when they have co-opted a brand for their own purposes, and when that brand has co-opted them. “Guys who would never buy Smirnoff before are even buying it now to shield against attacks,” said Kevin Wolkenfeld, a junior at the University of Central Florida in Orlando who documented the phenomenon on a student news Web site called knightnews.com . (According to the rules, the only way to block an attack — besides simply refusing to participate — is by carrying a bottle.) Most players — a widening swath of the campus, he said — would probably stop “if it turns out they’re being used to market a drink they really don’t like.” The rapid spread of what is, essentially, a binge drinking game puts Smirnoff and its parent company, Diageo, which is based in London, in an awkward position, marketing specialists said. “Beyond the implicit slur on the beverage’s taste, I doubt any alcoholic beverage company would want to be associated with a drinking game that stretches the boundaries of good taste and common sense like this one does,” said Dick Martin, a former executive vice president of AT&T and the author of several books on branding. “It’s too obviously a self-destruct button on all their ‘drink responsibly’ advertising.” A company spokesman denied any involvement, but would not comment on whether any action would be taken. In 2006, one of the company’s campaigns, a preppy rap video for Smirnoff Raw Tea created by Bartle Bogle Hegarty, went viral, attracting more than five million hits. “Icing is consumer-generated, and some people think it is fun,” a company statement read. “We never want under-age ‘icing’ and we always want responsible drinking.” Such hijacking of a brand is not uncommon, and in this case, it has produced a short-term benefit for Smirnoff, raising awareness of the brand and extending it to young male consumers who formerly shunned the drink as one aimed at women. Sales of Ice products have taken off in some southern college towns, including Sewanee, Tenn., and Charleston, S.C., where “icing” took early root. “It started last week. People buying Smirnoff Ice like crazy,” said El Sayed Hayed, who has owned the King Street Grocery in downtown Charleston for six years. “This is the first year this happens.” • While its exact origins are murky — some say Vermont, others Saint Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y. — the game gained early traction among fraternity brothers in the South. Members of Pi Kappa Alpha at the College of Charleston said they were the first to put the rules online, posting to BroBible.com in early April. “I didn’t expect it to be crazy like this,” said one fraternity brother, a business administration major who asked to remain anonymous because he did not want his name connected with the game. He said that his blog post was then taken without his knowledge or permission and republished as the core of BrosIcingBros.com . That site went online a week later, in early April, according to Whois.net , a kind of White Pages for Internet domains. From there, the game spread quickly, especially in New York , where a wide cross section of young men and women, as varied as Wall Street bankers and rock musicians, has taken part, including indie bands like Frightened Rabbit and Deer Tick, said Jay Belin, a talent booker for the Mercury Lounge who created You Got Iced , a blog, in May to document icings. “It sounded like a perfect way for my friends and me to burn each other all summer long,” he said, adding that Mr. Diamond, who played Screech on the television show “Saved By the Bell,” was recently iced. “I think Bros Icing Bros is a nearly perfect meme,” said Josh Heller, 26, who tracks Internet trends for Current TV and made a short video about his efforts to bring icing to Los Angeles . “You’re taking a game and playing it in real life.” But Mr. Rospos, the aerospace engineer from New Jersey, doubted it would continue for long. “Part of it is that it’s Smirnoff Ice,” he said. “If you did it with beer, you’d want to get iced.” He said he could see his friends surprising each other next year, but added that he thought that their current exuberance would not last through the summer. Nevertheless, he was enjoying himself over the Memorial Day weekend, hiding bottles around his parents’ backyard, including in the pool skimmer. Lukewarm traps, he said, for his unwitting friends. | Smirnoff;Advertising and Marketing;Vodka;Smirnoff Ice;Online Advertising;Social Networking (Internet);Bros. Icing Bros. |
ny0208478 | [
"sports",
"tennis"
] | 2009/06/22 | Federer Focuses on Reclaiming Wimbledon | WIMBLEDON, England — It was the day before the start of another Wimbledon, and young people toting bulky racket bags occasionally climbed the Centre Court staircases and stepped inside with their eyes turned upward. They were players, prominent and obscure, coming to take a peek at the newest roof in tennis . It was fully retracted on Sunday, its folds of translucent material bunched together between the arches of solid white superstructure. “A powerful thing,” said Neuza Silva, a qualifier who will become the first Portuguese woman to play singles on Centre Court when she faces Serena Williams on Monday. Roger Federer , a five-time champion here, has already played plenty on Centre Court and made his reconnaissance mission last week. “It didn’t lose anything of the whole history part,” Federer said. “It still remains, you know, the best court in the world. I’m excited to be going out there on Monday.” In normal circumstances, Federer would not be stepping on to his favorite patch of grass until Tuesday. For a change, however, he is not the defending champion, after losing to Rafael Nadal last year in a final that will remain part of the Wimbledon conversation for decades. But with the top-seeded Nadal back in Majorca after withdrawing Friday because of tendinitis in his knees, Federer — as a finalist last year — will have the honor of playing the first match of the tournament on the most famous court in tennis. The match, against Lu Yen-Hsun of Taipei, will be his first on grass this year. He decided to take a break after winning his first French Open two weeks ago. Federer has skipped the short grass-court circuit before. He did so in 2007 and went on to win his fifth straight title at Wimbledon. Bjorn Borg won Wimbledon from 1976 to 1980 without playing a warm-up event. But it is not the usual formula for success. Only four others have managed it since the Open era began 41 years ago: Stan Smith in 1972, Jan Kodes in 1973, Boris Becker in 1989 and Andre Agassi in 1992. “It’s been easy to digest winning in Paris; not hard,” Federer said. “For me, it did me an enormous amount of good to be in Switzerland for a week, to do nothing except a bit of physical training and to see my family, my friends and everyone.” Federer said he had still not been able to answer all the congratulatory text and e-mail messages he had received. He also said that he had not yet succeeded in speaking directly with Pete Sampras; Federer tied Sampras’s record of 14 Grand Slam singles titles with his victory at Roland Garros. For now, Federer said he was more focused on regaining his Wimbledon title than breaking his tie with Sampras. “We still haven’t managed to talk to each other,” he said. “But I’ll try again, and he’ll keep trying, too.” Federer is not the only man whose unexpected success in Paris has made his life more hectic. Robin Soderling , the Swede who upset Nadal in the fourth round and lost to Federer in the final, has been busy reliving the tournament. He has given news conferences and appeared on television and radio programs in Sweden, which had not had a Grand Slam finalist since Thomas Johansson won the Australian Open in 2002. Soderling, ranked 12th in the world , is the only Swede in the top 100 now. “We needed this,” Soderling told Swedish reporters. “Because if we want to bring back the interest in our sport, and create a new generation of players, we needed a leader.” Soderling, who will start on Court 1 on Monday against Gilles Muller of Luxembourg, is the only Swede in the singles draw at Wimbledon, but there was another positive sign for the future of Swedish tennis at the French Open, where Daniel Berta won the boys singles title. Soderling, seeded 13th, and Federer could meet in the Round of 16. Other dangerous grass-court players in Federer’s quarter are Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France, Fernando Verdasco and Feliciano López of Spain and the Croatian ace machine, Ivo Karlovic. But there can be no doubt about who the favorite is to win the tournament, even if Andy Murray of Britain, now the top seed in the other half of the draw , has beaten Federer in their last four matches. Murray will face Robert Kendrick of the United States in the first round Tuesday. “Federer’s made the last six finals of Wimbledon,” Murray said. “He’s obviously the big favorite going into the tournament. I’ve never won a Grand Slam before. I think I’ve got a chance of doing it here. But I need to play my best tennis ever to do it. It’s not like it’s going to come easily. Slams don’t come easily, and I’m sure the guys that have won them will tell you that. I understand how big a challenge it is.” Federer actually won the 2005 and 2006 Wimbledon titles with little apparent difficulty , losing only one set each year in sweeping through the draw. But in Nadal’s absence, Murray may be the only man who could turn a final against Federer into a match that could transcend — at least in Britain — the best rivalry in sports. The last British man to win a Wimbledon singles title was Fred Perry, in 1936. “You can either deal with that stuff or you can’t,” Murray said of the intense interest he generates at home. “I think that I don’t get caught up in the whole, you know, hype thing, getting involved in reading all the papers, listening to what everyone else is saying. Because at the end of the day, it makes no difference if some guy thinks I can win the tournament. “The guys that I work with and myself, it’s important what they think about my game and how we approach all of the matches. But I think I can deal with it.” | Wimbledon Tennis Tournament;Federer Roger |
ny0182912 | [
"world",
"middleeast"
] | 2007/12/26 | Iranian Students Will Be Released Soon, Lawyer Says | TEHRAN — Three politically active students who had been sentenced to two to three years in prison for crimes including insulting the nation’s supreme leader are expected to be released this week on bail, their lawyer said Tuesday. The three were part of the pro-democracy movement at Amir Kabir University, a center of political activity and dissent. Students there chanted, “Down with the dictator,” when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited last year, forcing him to cut short a speech. They protested again when he visited this year. The students’ lawyer, Muhammad Ali Dadkhah, said an appeals court technically overturned their convictions on the insult charges last week. But each student must post bail of $85,000 to be freed because all are awaiting a ruling on a separate appeal of convictions over jeopardizing national security. All the charges stemmed from the publication of a student newsletter last spring that carried articles that violated a law against “insulting religious sanctities.” One article raised what were seen as offensive questions about the return of the 12th Imam, the messiah in Shiite Islam. The three students charged, Ahmad Ghassaban, Majid Tavakoli and Ehsan Mansouri, acknowledged that the newsletter was offensive, but said that they had not published it, arguing that people opposed to their political activity had forged it to defame them. Five other students arrested on the same charges were released on bail months ago. The three have been in jail since May, and their families have said they were being kept under harsh conditions in the notorious Evin prison in Tehran, student Web sites reported. Last week, the appeals court dismissed a ruling by a lower court two months ago that sentenced Mr. Tavakoli to three years in jail, Mr. Ghassaban to two and a half years, and Mr. Mansouri to two years, their lawyer said. He said that they were expected to be released Saturday, but that Mr. Tavakoli’s family had not raised the bail. “The other two are waiting to post their bail at the same time with Mr. Tavakoli in a sign of unity,” he said. “Mr. Tavakoli’s family will hopefully bring the money tomorrow.” | Iran;Prisons and Prisoners |
ny0279617 | [
"sports",
"basketball"
] | 2016/10/20 | Sparks’ Candace Parker Ignores Slights, Heeding Pat Summitt’s Lessons | Los Angeles Sparks forward Candace Parker has attained almost every accolade possible during her career. Without much rhyme or reason, the individual honors did not come Parker’s way this season, though. She was surprisingly left off the United States roster for the Rio de Janeiro Olympics. On Friday, when the league announced its all-W.N.B.A. first and second teams, Parker’s name was absent. But Parker said that did not stress her out, displaying an attitude she cultivated while in college at Tennessee under the tutelage of the Hall of Fame coach Pat Summitt. Together, they led the Lady Volunteers to two national championships. Because she has heeded Summitt’s lessons, Parker has had a more important goal come into focus: With a Sparks victory in Thursday’s decisive Game 5 of the W.N.B.A. finals, Parker would capture her first title. “It’s always trying to put your team in a position to win,” Parker said Wednesday as the Sparks prepared to face the Minnesota Lynx. “Of course, Coach never wanted us to focus on individual awards.” Parker, 30, remains one of the world’s best players, continually exceeding expectations that have shadowed her for almost half her life. At 18, Parker became the only two-time girls’ high school basketball player of the year as named by USA Today. In college, aside from the championships, she won multiple national player of the year honors. After being selected first over all in the W.N.B.A. draft by the Sparks in 2008, Parker was named the league’s rookie of the year and most valuable player, becoming the only player to have won both awards in one season. Despite dealing with injuries and taking time off to give birth to her daughter, Parker continued to pile up laurels, winning another M.V.P. Award in 2013 and Olympic gold medals in 2008 and 2012. But in April, just before the W.N.B.A. season started, Parker was left off the roster for the American team for the Rio Games. There were no reasons supplied for her omission. And after Parker was left off the all-W.N.B.A. teams, the ESPN analyst Rebecca Lobo called her absence “ absurd ” in a Twitter post. Parker has not complained, and she publicly supported the United States team in Rio. For Parker, a more trying moment came when Summitt died on June 28 , five years after a diagnosis of early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Before the Sparks’ game that night against the Dallas Wings, Parker shared on Twitter a handwritten letter Summitt had sent shortly before Parker committed to Tennessee. The note detailed a sliver of a personal relationship that evolved over more than a decade. Parker’s mother keeps many similar mementos at home, and Parker can still reel off memories of Summitt from her teenage years, when they sat in Parker’s living room in the Chicago suburbs. “I think Candace has probably had as emotional a year as anybody has ever gone through,” Sparks Coach Brian Agler said. “None of it’s been positive. Those three things have been the rug taken out underneath her, both in regard to basketball and her personal life with Coach Summit. I can’t tell you that I’ve seen anybody go through this and handle it as well as she has.” Just hours after learning of Summitt’s death, Parker posted 31 points, 13 rebounds and 7 assists in an 89-84 victory over the Wings. Interviewed by Holly Rowe of ESPN after the game, a visibly emotional Parker said , “From here on out, I’m playing for her.” On Wednesday, Parker said: “I think just with her passing and everything that she accomplished through her life and the amount of respect everyone in the game of basketball has for her, that day was very emotional. As Lady Vols, we always play for her. We always carry her with us, her teaching, her values she taught us.” Parker has extended those lessons to her Sparks teammates. She averaged 15.3 points and 7.4 rebounds per game in the regular season, the second-lowest totals of her career, but Parker was vital in her teammate Nneka Ogwumike’s flourishing into the league’s most valuable player. Agler said Parker’s floor vision might be her strongest attribute, and Ogwumike has been a prime beneficiary. Although he has coached Parker for only two seasons, Agler said he understood the source of her unselfishness. “Her relationship with Coach Summitt was probably as important as almost anything in her life,” Agler said. “It was someone that I think really mentored her, taught her a lot of how to be successful, probably challenged her quite a bit, helped her achieve at a high level. “My relationship doesn’t have the depth that she had with Coach Summit. But Candace with me is very coachable. She’s a good person and a great teammate. She’s been a very good leader for our team. It’s an honor to get to coach her.” For Parker, missing the chance to win a third Olympic gold medal stung, but entering this season, her top priority was to win a W.N.B.A. title. With one game left, Parker is drawing on another Summitt tenet as motivation. In each of the Sparks’ two victories, Parker grabbed nine rebounds. In Los Angeles’s two finals losses, Parker had seven rebounds combined. “Offense sells tickets; defense wins games; rebounding wins championships,” said Parker, who wrote “rebound” on her Tennessee-orange sneakers for the game on June 28. “There’s never been a clearer picture than in this series, the way things have gone.” | Basketball;WNBA;Candace Parker;Los Angeles Sparks;Pat Summitt |
ny0045805 | [
"business",
"media"
] | 2014/02/24 | Piers Morgan and CNN Plan End to His Prime-Time Show | There have been times when the CNN host Piers Morgan didn’t seem to like America very much — and American audiences have been more than willing to return the favor. Three years after taking over for Larry King, Mr. Morgan has seen the ratings for “Piers Morgan Live” hit some new lows, drawing a fraction of viewers compared with competitors at Fox News and MSNBC. It’s been an unhappy collision between a British television personality who refuses to assimilate — the only football he cares about is round and his lectures on guns were rife with contempt — and a CNN audience that is intrinsically provincial. After all, the people who tune into a cable news network are, by their nature, deeply interested in America. CNN’s president, Jeffrey Zucker, has other problems, but none bigger than Mr. Morgan and his plum 9 p.m. time slot. Mr. Morgan said last week that he and Mr. Zucker had been talking about the show’s failure to connect and had decided to pull the plug, probably in March. Crossing an ocean for a replacement for Larry King, who had ratings problems of his own near the end, was probably not a great idea to begin with. For a cable news station like CNN, major stories are like oxygen. When something important or scary happens in America, many of us have an immediate reflex to turn on CNN. When I find Mr. Morgan telling me what it all means, I have a similar reflex to dismiss what he is saying. It is difficult for him to speak credibly on significant American events because, after all, he just got here. I received a return call from Mr. Morgan and was prepared for an endless argument over my assumptions. Not so. His show, he conceded, was not performing as he had hoped and was nearing its end. “It’s been a painful period and lately we have taken a bath in the ratings,” he said, adding that although there had been times when the show connected in terms of audience, slow news days were problematic. “Look, I am a British guy debating American cultural issues, including guns, which has been very polarizing, and there is no doubt that there are many in the audience who are tired of me banging on about it,” he said. “That’s run its course and Jeff and I have been talking for some time about different ways of using me.” Mr. Morgan said that his show, along with much of the rest of CNN, had been imprisoned by the news cycle and that he was interested in doing fewer appearances to greater effect — big, major interviews that would be events in themselves. Although a change has long been rumored, it was the first time that both he, and the CNN executives I talked to, acknowledged that his nightly show was on the way out. Plans for a replacement at the 9 o’clock hour are still underway, but Mr. Morgan and the network are in talks about him remaining at CNN in a different role. Mr. Zucker, the former chief of NBC, inherited Mr. Morgan from Jonathan Klein, his predecessor, but it is now his problem to fix. In the year he has been there, CNN has introduced promising shows around the edges and will be unveiling documentaries along the lines of the very successful “Blackfish” to run on Thursday in the 10 p.m. hour. But the chronic troubles of prime-time remain. Sometime before the network “upfront” events in April, when advertisers buy commercial time for the fall season, Mr. Zucker needs to signal how he will fix CNN’s prime-time problem, and that begins with Mr. Morgan, whose contract ends in September. Mr. Morgan has some significant skills that do translate across platforms and cultures. While working as a newspaper editor and television personality in Britain, he was involved in a number of controversies, but he developed a reputation as a talented, probing interviewer. In his current role, he has shown an ability not only to book big guests — former President Bill Clinton, Warren Buffett, the real Wolf of Wall Street among them — but also to dig in once they are on set. “I think I can credibly do news and the ratings reflect that, but it is not really the show that I set out to do,” he told me. “There are all kinds of people who can do news here. I’d like to do work — interviews with big celebrities and powerful people — that is better suited to what I do well and fit with what Jeff is trying to do with the network.” Old hands in the television news business suggest that there are two things a presenter cannot have: an accent or a beard. Mr. Morgan is clean shaven and handsome enough, but there are tells in his speech — the way he says the president’s name for one thing (Ob-AA-ma) — that suggest that he is not from around here. There are other tells as well. On Friday morning, criticizing the decision to dismiss a cricket player, he tweeted , “I’m sure @StuartBroad8 is right and KP’s sacking will ‘improve performance’ of the England team. Look forward to seeing this at T20 WC.” Mr. Morgan might want to lay off the steady cricket references if he is worried about his credibility with American audiences. (His endless trolling of his critics on Twitter did not exactly help, either.) People might point to Simon Cowell as a man with an accent and a penchant for slashing discourse that Americans loved, but Mr. Cowell is dealing with less-than-spontaneous musical performances, not signal events in the American news narrative. There was, of course, the counterexample of David Frost , who did important work in news, but Mr. Frost did popular special reports and was not a chronic presence in American living rooms. Mr. Morgan, who was chosen in spite of that fact that he had never done a live show, had the misfortune of sliding into the loafers of Mr. King, who, for all his limitations, was a decent and reliable stand-in for the average Joe. In a sense, Mr. Morgan is a prisoner of two islands: Britain and Manhattan. While I may share his feelings about the need for additional strictures on guns, having grown up in the Midwest, I know that many people come by their guns honestly and hold onto them dearly for sincere reasons. Mr. Morgan’s approach to gun regulation was more akin to King George III, peering down his nose at the unruly colonies and wondering how to bring the savages to heel. He might have wanted to recall that part of the reason the right to bear arms is codified in the Constitution is that Britain was trying to disarm the citizenry at the time. He regrets none of it, but clearly understands his scolding of “stupid” opponents of gun laws was not everyone’s cup of tea. “I’m in danger of being the guy down at the end of the bar who is always going on about the same thing,” he said. He added that he was sure there were plenty of people in the heartland angry “about this British guy telling them how to lead their lives and what they should do with their guns.” In the current media age, no one is expected to be a eunuch, without values or beliefs, but Mr. Morgan’s lecturing on the evils of guns have clanked hard against the CNN brand, which, for good or ill, is built on the middle way. We don’t look for moral leadership from CNN, or from a British host on a rampage. Guns, along with many other great and horrible things, are knit into the fabric of this country. There are folkways peculiar to America that Mr. Morgan is just learning, including the fact that if you want to stick out, you first have to work on fitting in. | Piers Morgan;CNN;Cable television;Jeff Zucker;News media,journalism;US;TV;Piers Morgan Live |
ny0163500 | [
"business"
] | 2006/02/24 | Keeper of the BlackRock Way | Laurence D. Fink remembers the moment as if it were yesterday. It was the spring of 1986 and he was then a nervy 33-year-old bond trader at Credit Suisse First Boston with only pretensions of being a master of the universe. Coming back from vacation, he was hit with the news that his division had lost $100 million on a series of risky bets on the volatile mortgage market. The loss was all the more jangling in that his team had made an "obscene" amount of money the quarter before. "What I learned is that you have to understand your risk in good times and bad times," said Mr. Fink, now chief executive of BlackRock, the rapidly growing asset management company, "and that the pain of losing money is far greater than the glory of making money." Twenty years later, almost to the date, Mr. Fink has ascended to a career and personal mountaintop: last week, he clinched an industry-rattling $9.8 billion merger with Merrill Lynch's asset management unit. With BlackRock's stock soaring, he is worth more than $230 million, and, it seems, just about everyone on Wall Street wants to take him out to lunch. Nevertheless, Mr. Fink still shivers from the ague of that 1986 reversal. The lessons he has learned from it have informed a core aspect of what he calls the BlackRock way, which is that a portfolio of assets scrubbed well enough for risk can appeal to both sophisticated institutions aching for flashy returns as well as more risk-averse retail investors. While not necessarily an unheard-of notion, it was enough to attract the attention of two of Wall Street's most aggressive chief executives, John J. Mack of Morgan Stanley and E. Stanley O'Neal of Merrill Lynch, both of whom were looking for a fund company with assets that could draw in their institutional and retail clients. Despite his close friendship with Mr. Mack, Mr. Fink chose Mr. O'Neal and Merrill Lynch. Mr. Fink concedes that the lure of being a chief executive-in-waiting at Morgan Stanley was tempting. But after much soul-searching, the prospect of having to leave the firm he built from scratch gave Mr. Fink pause. "The grass is not greener elsewhere," Mr. Fink said. While Mr. Fink declined to go into more detail, people involved in the deal say that he was in the end swayed by his partners and a number of BlackRock clients, who were reluctant to see Mr. Fink go and were concerned about possible conflicts arising from the controlling stake that Morgan Stanley was insisting upon. In the end, it was the high price of BlackRock's stock that dissuaded Morgan Stanley from doing the deal. And as Mr. Fink sees it, there are no hard feelings between the two men. "My life with John is as friendly now as it was a month ago," Mr. Fink said. "He called me last Friday at home. Just to talk." On Wall Street, where the durability of personal relationships can easily fray, especially when deals sour, Mr. Fink has had more success than most in not letting business get in the way of friendships. Despite a parting from the Blackstone Group in 1994 that was less than amicable, he remains on friendly terms with Stephen A. Schwarzman, the private equity giant's co-founder, and attended his recent birthday lunch at the Four Seasons. And as a central player in the civil war surrounding the $139 million pay package to Richard A. Grasso, the former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, he stands in good stead with Mr. Grasso, as well as the attorney general. "Both sides talk to me," he said. Then, speaking with a bond traders' equanimity, he added: "I don't take any strong positions. I see both sides. You don't get personal." Unlike many Wall Street chief executives, who tend to prefer the sanctity of their private dining rooms to the less predictable outside world, Mr. Fink is an inveterate lunch and dinnertime schmoozer. He maintains his own private table at San Pietro, a favorite eating spot for Wall Street power brokers, where he can be seen breaking bread or trading back slaps with, to name just a few, Mr. Mack; Joseph R. Perella, the former Morgan Stanley mergers and acquisitions banker; Martin Lipton, the takeover lawyer; and Mr. Grasso. In the coming months, however, Mr. Fink will need to devote more attention to the nitty-gritty work of integration. In one fell swoop, his asset base has almost doubled, to $1 trillion, and 2,569 Merrill Lynch employees have all of a sudden become BlackRock employees. Merging the two cultures could well be a difficult task. At BlackRock, Mr. Fink's portfolio managers sit and brainstorm in an open arena just outside his glassed-in office. At Merrill, the firm's portfolio managers occupy a warren of small offices in the firm's labyrinthine Plainsboro, N.J., campus, many miles away, literally and philosophically, from the BlackRock mother ship. Mr. Fink scoffs at the idea that Merrill Lynch's more persnickety stock pickers may not embrace the BlackRock way. "I believe there is very little difference between the psyche of the commodities trader and the equity trader," he said. And while he mentions the possibility of combining all his investment talent inside one unified building, such an alternative lies far off in the distance. As for second thoughts about, in effect, twice walking way from the possibility of being chief executive of Morgan Stanley, there appear to be none. "I have always invested best by investing in myself," he said. | MERRILL LYNCH & CO INC;MORGAN STANLEY;BLACKROCK INC;FINK LAURENCE D;MACK JOHN J;MERGERS ACQUISITIONS AND DIVESTITURES;COMPANY AND ORGANIZATION PROFILES;EXECUTIVES AND MANAGEMENT;BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION;STOCKS AND BONDS |
ny0282821 | [
"sports",
"baseball"
] | 2016/07/19 | Roger Clemens to Play in an Amateur World Series | Now pitching for the Kansas Stars … Roger Clemens? Yes, Roger Clemens, one of the greatest pitchers in baseball history, will be returning to the mound in a few weeks for competitive baseball at age 53. Clemens is expected to take part in the National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kan., an annual event for amateur teams. Clemens’s Stars team will comprise 24 former major leaguers, plus Kody Clemens, Roger’s son, 29, who played in the minor leagues. The N.B.C. Series normally matches teams of amateur players, often college students. But two former major leaguers, Adam LaRoche and Nate Robertson, had the idea to enter a team of former pros this year. They said finding players was not a problem. “I was blown away at the response,” LaRoche told The Wichita Eagle . “Right away, guys responding and were really excited about it.” Aside from the two Clemenses, the players are all in their 30s and 40s. Of course, there is a concern about the durability of older players, especially pitchers. “We’re kind of getting guys prepped to go three innings, max,” Robertson told The Eagle. “I’ve heard Roger is going to come in here and try to throw five. I guess he’s still a machine.” On paper, the team may very well be competitive. Although the other teams have youth on their side, few of their players have accomplished anything at the higher levels of the game. Geoff Brown, the ace of last year’s winners, the Seattle Studs, had been released by a Dodgers Class A affiliate. The Stars lineup looks like a fine major league team from the 2000s: The pitching staff includes Josh Beckett, Tim Hudson, Jason Isringhausen and Roy Oswalt. Hitters include Rick Ankiel, Carl Everett, J. D. Drew and Dan Uggla. Clemens retired in 2007 after a storied career with the Boston Red Sox, the Toronto Blue Jays, the Yankees and the Houston Astros. His numbers are undoubtedly worthy of the Hall of Fame, but questions about steroid use have kept him to about 45 percent of the vote in balloting so far. Clemens has fiercely denied using steroids and was found not guilty of lying to Congress about it. The tournament begins July 29 and runs through Aug. 13. | Baseball;Roger Clemens |
ny0238232 | [
"us"
] | 2010/06/12 | Grief Connects Members of Long-Persecuted Muslim Sect | GLEN ELLYN, Ill. — The phone rang early on the morning of May 28 in Tariq Malik’s home outside Chicago, the suburban sky still night-dark. From the hour alone, Mr. Malik and his wife, Riffat Jariullah, knew something was wrong. The voice of her brother, all the way from Pakistan, told them as much with his breathless instructions. “Go turn on the TV,” Mrs. Jariullah, 47, remembers him saying. “See what happened.” So, still in their bed clothes, the couple switched on the Pakistani cable station, Geo. There they saw a man with a rifle firing from a minaret. It was a minaret they recognized, at a mosque in Lahore known as Dar-ul-Zakir, where so many of their friends and family members worshiped. Mr. Malik and Mrs. Jariullah went straight to their cellphones, calling every relative in Lahore; not one answered. From the television, they heard gunfire crackling, grenades exploding, sirens, screams. The screen showed bodies streaked with blood. At some point, Mrs. Jariullah realized she was quaking, and yet unable to take her eyes off the screen. Eight hours later, the couple’s worst fears were confirmed. An uncle, a nephew and a cousin were dead, another cousin wounded. And when they drove from their home in Plainfield, Ill., to their mosque in Glen Ellyn, Bait-ul-Jamaay, they discovered their anguish had company. Of the 120 families who belong to the mosque, a dozen or more had lost relatives in the Lahore attacks. All told, 94 people were killed in the assaults by the Punjabi Taliban on Dar-ul-Zakir and another mosque, Bait-ul-Noor, during Friday Prayer. The thread of grief connecting Lahore to Glen Ellyn was not some ghastly anomaly. At both ends, the afflicted Muslims were members of the Ahmadi (or Ahmadiyya ) sect, which claims 10 million worshipers worldwide. Moderate and peaceful in their precepts, the Ahmadis are reviled by fundamentalist Muslims, especially in Pakistan, for their belief that their 19th-century founder, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, was the messiah predicted by the Prophet Muhammad. “In the beginning, it was a shock, a sense of ‘How can you do this?’ ” Mr. Malik, 53, a management consultant, said this week, recalling the Lahore attacks. “Then you rewind your memories, and your feeling is, “Yes, it can happen.’ ” Sitting beside him, Mrs. Jariullah added, “The last thing you imagine someone could do is murder someone who is praying.” The attack, however horrific, came as no surprise. It follows nearly 40 years of escalating persecution in Pakistan against Ahmadi Muslims by both governmental and vigilante means. While extremists commit terrorist acts, the political leaders of Pakistan have tacitly allowed the violence by stigmatizing the nation’s two million Ahmadis under the law, much in the way that segregation laws in the American South created a climate amenable to lynching. In 1974, amid riots against Ahmadis, Pakistan amended its constitution to declare the sect non-Muslim. A decade later, under the military dictatorship of Mohammad Zia ul-Haq, Parliament enacted a blasphemy law with a death penalty. The measure singled out Ahmadis for prosecution for “indirectly or directly posing as a Muslim.” Practically speaking, the measure meant that Ahmadis could be arrested for giving the Muslim greeting of “salaam aleikum,” issuing the call to prayer from a minaret, or even calling their house of worship a mosque. Emboldened by such official decisions, Sunni extremists desecrated Ahmadi cemeteries, burned Ahmadi homes and stores, and in 2005 gunned down Ahmadi worshipers in a mosque. Most recently, the Punjabi provincial government, led by a former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, allowed Muslim militants to hang banners throughout Lahore calling it religiously compulsory to kill Ahmadis. Other extremists have delivered letters to Ahmadi homes announcing their intent to slay the residents. The United Nations , the State Department, Human Rights Watch , Pakistani human-rights groups — all had been sounding the alarm about the plight of Ahmadi Muslims for years before May 28. The unpunished atrocities of that day, then, were only the predictable outcome of decades of animosity. And the tepid response to the deaths just goes to show that Muslim lives apparently can be taken with impunity as long as the killers are other Muslims. The mourning and outrage can be found only in Ahmadi communities in places like Glen Ellyn and mosques like Bait-ul-Jamaay. Mirza Muzaffar lost his cousin. Amer Fahim Ahmed lost his uncle. Yasser Malik lost his uncle. And that uncle, Nasir Chaudry, was apparently one of the first worshipers killed, sought out because of his stature as a retired major general in the army. General Chaudry, his nephew recalled, thought of himself as a Pakistani patriot. He fought for the nation in three wars and carried shrapnel from one of them in his knee. Then again, as Yasser Malik added, his uncle once was invited to a Sunni mosque on Ramadan because of his military ranking, only to find out that the whole sanctuary was washed after his departure because, as an Ahmadi, he was an infidel. So many members of Bait-ul-Jamaay had stories like that about life in Pakistan — jobs denied, college admissions withdrawn, homes vandalized, insults endured. They are now the fortunate ones, living in America, prospering as executives or engineers or doctors, not risking prison by identifying themselves as Muslim. Here, halfway around the globe, they can console one another with the traditional prayer for the dead: “Surely we belong to Allah, and to him we shall return.” As for Tariq Malik and Riffat Jariullah, they keep returning to memories. They remember their trip to Lahore in 1986, the way Riffat’s cousin, Nasir Ahmed, brought kebabs and sweets from the market for their three daughters. They remember the way Tariq’s uncle, Ansar ul-Haq, served tea with such a formal flourish, as if they were guests in a five-star hotel. And Mr. Malik and Mrs. Jariullah remember, too, the cellphone images taken by Ahmadi hostages the afternoon Nasir and Ansar and all the rest were killed. One video shows a boy hiding under a table, calling out the prophet’s name amid the bullets and grenades. Now it is that image, not a brother’s phone call, that wakes Mrs. Jariullah in the quiet suburban midnight. | Islam;Fringe Groups and Movements;Mosques;Murders and Attempted Murders |
ny0242571 | [
"world",
"africa"
] | 2011/03/19 | Libya May Lash Out With Terrorist Attacks, U.S. Official Says | The United States is bracing for possible Libyan-backed terrorist attacks, President Obama’s top counterterrorism official said on Friday. The official, John O. Brennan , said that the military attacks on civilians ordered in recent days by Libya ’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi , coupled with his track record as a sponsor of terrorism, had heightened worries within the administration as an international coalition threatens military action against Libya. Asked if American officials feared whether Colonel Qaddafi could open a new terrorism front, Mr. Brennan said: “Qaddafi has the penchant to do things of a very concerning nature. We have to anticipate and be prepared for things he might try to do to flout the will of the international community.” Among the threats the United States is focusing on is Libya’s stockpile of deadly mustard gas, he said. Mr. Brennan spoke to reporters after addressing the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School in Manhattan. The center is named for Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr., who died in 1997 and was no relation to Mr. Brennan. After renouncing its nascent nuclear weapons program in 2003, and enjoying a brief interlude as Washington’s partner in combating Al Qaeda’s branch in North Africa, Libya has reverted to its status as a pariah government whose intelligence operatives blew up Pan Am Flight 103 above Scotland in 1988. Mr. Brennan acknowledged that the political turmoil in the Middle East in the past three months had breached or weakened counterterrorism cooperation among some Arab countries. But he added that the United States had taken unspecified steps in recent months to offset its losses in that area. Among those steps may be more electronic eavesdropping, spy satellite coverage and more informants on the ground, independent intelligence specialists said. “We’ve been able to weather some of these storms, but clearly there have been effects,” he said. “We need to work hard to ensure that the cooperation that existed before with certain countries continues.” Mr. Brennan declined to provide details of what the United States was doing or which countries it was focusing on, but it is no secret that American spy agencies have worked closely with counterparts in countries like Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen. “When politics change, frequently security and intelligence services that are dedicated to thwarting transnational terrorist groups, they remain largely unaffected because their focus is on those elements that are trying to undermine the security and stability of the country,” Mr. Brennan said. He said American spy services and law enforcement agencies had worked with some Arab counterparts in recent weeks to disrupt terrorist plots that allied officials had been tracking even before the political tumult in the region boiled over. He said a number of jailed terrorism suspects or sympathizers in those countries who had been released or escaped in the recent chaos had been “rounded up and brought back.” But not all. Egypt’s governing military council released the younger brother of Ayman al-Zawahri, Al Qaeda’s second in command, from prison on Thursday after holding him for a decade on charges of conspiracy to overthrow the government. Asked about the release of this prominent prisoner, Mr. Brennan barely disguised his frustration with Egyptian military officials. “I’m concerned if any individual who is involved in terrorism is released either intentionally or as a result of the lack of security,” he said. Any terrorism threat from Colonel Qaddafi would join a regional roster that includes affiliates of Al Qaeda in Yemen and North Africa, which may seek to carve out a safe haven in Libya’s south. “Al Qaeda has a demonstrated track record of trying to exploit political vacuums, political change or uncertainty in a number of countries,” Mr. Brennan said. “The situation in Libya now will be no exception.” | Terrorism;Qaddafi Muammar el-;Middle East and North Africa Unrest (2010- );Libya;Brennan John O |
ny0272239 | [
"us"
] | 2016/05/17 | Scandals Embroil Alabama Governor, Speaker and Chief Justice | MONTGOMERY, Ala. — In the state capital these days, anybody who is anybody is either being investigated or being questioned about someone who is. The chief justice of the state’s Supreme Court has been hit with ethics charges for defying federal courts on same-sex marriage, and could be removed from his seat. The governor, caught on tape engaging in salacious banter, apparently with his powerful chief adviser, is facing criminal investigations and calls for impeachment. That the governor’s racy phone calls became public at all is because of what may be the most significant and sweeping crisis of the lot: the impending trial of the Alabama House speaker, Michael G. Hubbard, described by friends and foes as the most powerful man in state politics. Of the trifecta of calamities plaguing Alabama’s branches of government, it is Mr. Hubbard’s felony corruption trial starting this week that may rattle the state the most. The potential witness list, reflecting Mr. Hubbard’s business-friendly approach to politics, is a lineup of the state’s power elite, including bank executives, construction magnates, legislators, lobbyists, former Gov. Bob Riley and, promising a must-watch day of testimony, the current governor, Robert Bentley . Mr. Hubbard and Mr. Bentley have vigorously denied wrongdoing, and Chief Justice Roy S. Moore, who was removed from the same position in 2003 for refusing to move a two-ton monument of the Ten Commandments from the state judicial building, insists that the ethics charges he is facing are without merit. “Start with Lord Acton and the famous axiom that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” said Wayne Flynt, a retired professor of history at Auburn University. “Alabama has had a seamless transition from Democratic one-party rule and synonymous corruption to Republican one-party rule and synonymous corruption.” Power in Alabama is centralized by design. The state Constitution requires legislatively approved amendments for matters as trivial as local traffic laws, resulting in what has been described as the longest constitution in the world. Consolidating things further, Alabama has nearly always been a one-party state. For more than a century, that party was the Democrats and major political decisions were hashed out among the party’s leaders and its major donors. “When I first moved here, an older lawyer friend told me there were 4,000 people in Alabama and four million extras,” said David Mowery, a political consultant in Montgomery. Image Gov. Robert Bentley in March. Mr. Bentley was caught on tape making sexually charged remarks to one of his closest aides and is facing criminal investigations and calls for impeachment. Credit Kevin D. Liles for The New York Times Republicans railed against the Democratic leadership as a patronage-ridden, good-old-boy network, and few did so more vehemently than Mr. Hubbard, an executive in the broadcasting and media business. Denouncing “corruption, crime and cronyism at the highest levels of state government,” Mr. Hubbard created a sophisticated — some have said legally questionable — fund-raising machine to win control of the State House in 2010. Chairman of both the State Republican Party and the House caucus, he conscripted candidates — bank employees, foresters, waste haulers — and determined where campaign money should be spent. In November 2010, the Republicans not only took over the State House for the first time in 136 years, they won a supermajority, winning every court race on the ballot and every statewide office. Mr. Bentley, a dermatologist and low-profile legislator, was elected governor. Mr. Hubbard was unanimously elected speaker of the House, where his first priority was to pass an ethics law described as among the strongest in the country. Four years later, Mr. Hubbard was indicted on a charge of violating that ethics law, accused of using his positions as speaker and party chairman to solicit work and investments for his own financial interest by steering campaign work to his business interests and pushing bills that helped his consulting clients. That his moneymaking plans were running into the ethics law he helped pass is something he is shown lamenting in private emails released by prosecutors. “Who proposed those things?!” he wrote , apparently jokingly, to Mr. Riley, the former governor. “What were we thinking?” He would eventually argue in court that the ethics law was unconstitutional. Still, Mr. Hubbard remains the speaker and enjoys steadfast support in the House. This is in part because Democrats and their backers have been almost completely frozen out of state politics. But Mr. Flynt and others say there is more to it than the lack of competition. The speed and scale of the Republican takeover brought into power a class of politicians inexperienced with total control, some with no political experience at all. There was little candidate-grooming infrastructure in the party beyond what Mr. Hubbard and his allies put together; at one point, he suggested the creation of a “shadow party,” something that would be effectively achieved by way of political action committees. “Hubbard’s problems permeated the whole Legislature,” said Arthur Payne, a former Republican state representative. “The majority felt like they owed their allegiance to him rather than the people of Alabama.” Mr. Hubbard’s partisans say it is not the speaker who has had Alabama under his sway, but the deputy state attorney general who is prosecuting him: Matt Hart, a hulking man with a background in military intelligence and a reputation for a bludgeoning approach. Even some critics of Mr. Hubbard have denounced Mr. Hart’s tactics, though almost no one wants to do so publicly. Image Chief Justice Roy S. Moore in 2015. He faces ethics charges for defying federal courts on same-sex marriage, and could be removed from his seat. Credit Jeff Haller for The New York Times “He knows bullying,” said Sonny Reagan, a former deputy attorney general. “Matt Hart approaches his cases like the U.S. military approaches ISIS.” Mr. Reagan serves as a good example of the breadth of disarray in Montgomery, which has spread even to the watchdogs. A dispute with Mr. Hart over office space blew up into formal complaints about his methods and motivations in the Hubbard case; this led ultimately to the resignation of Mr. Reagan, a former adviser in the Riley administration, who was accused of trying to sabotage the prosecution. Such disorders have been a regular feature of the year and a half leading to Mr. Hubbard’s trial. The latest was in February, when a political operative in Montgomery asserted that Mr. Hart had been leaking apparent grand jury details to create a “whisper campaign” against Mr. Hubbard. Mr. Hart, who referred to the operative as a “now-former confidential informant,” produced an affidavit from Spencer Collier, the former head of the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, saying that agents had looked into the accusations of grand jury leaks and found no basis for an investigation. But the governor, according to Mr. Collier, had not approved of this affidavit. When Mr. Collier provided it to prosecutors anyway, Mr. Bentley ordered him to take a leave of absence and soon after fired him, citing “possible misuse of state dollars.” Mr. Collier then came forward with a public announcement: Mr. Bentley had been having an affair with Rebekah Caldwell Mason, his principal adviser. And with that, the state immediately had not one, but two blockbuster scandals. Jury selection in Mr. Hubbard’s trial begins Monday. Impeachment proceedings against Mr. Bentley have gone slowly, though scrutiny is intensifying of nonprofits and businesses connected with Ms. Mason, a powerful figure in the administration. Federal investigators have been conducting interviews around Montgomery, and Mr. Bentley has acknowledged that the attorney general’s office is also at work. The attorney general might also prosecute Judge Moore at his ethics hearing, further winding an already tortuous vortex. Mr. Bentley could be called on to replace Judge Moore, who could preside over the impeachment of Mr. Bentley, which could be recommended by the House under Mr. Hubbard, who if found guilty, could eventually have an appeal before Judge Moore’s court. Allen Farley , a Republican state representative, is skeptical that much will change in Montgomery, saying that special interests have always been the power behind both parties. But there is a chance, he believes, that over the next few weeks all of it will blow up. “When the prosecution starts,” said Mr. Farley, “there could be a meltdown of enormous proportions in Alabama politics.” | Alabama;Ethics Misconduct Malfeasance;Michael G. Hubbard;Robert J Bentley;Roy S Moore;Corruption |
ny0295685 | [
"business",
"dealbook"
] | 2016/12/19 | Platinum Hedge Fund Executives Charged With $1 Billion Fraud | For years, the little-known New York hedge fund Platinum Partners stood out for double-digit investment returns that rivaled some of the biggest names in the industry. It turned out that those returns were too good to be true, according to federal prosecutors. Federal agents on Monday arrested Mark Nordlicht, a founder and the chief investment officer of Platinum, and six others on charges related to a $1 billion fraud that led the firm to be operated “like a Ponzi scheme,” prosecutors said. It is one of the largest such fraud cases since Bernard L. Madoff’s investment firm unraveled in 2008. David Levy, the firm’s co-chief investment officer, was also among those arrested in the morning by agents in Texas, Manhattan and New Rochelle, a suburb of New York City. The men were charged with securities fraud and investment adviser fraud, according to an unsealed indictment filed in Federal District Court in Brooklyn. The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a parallel civil case . Platinum tapped prominent families and foundations within the Orthodox Jewish community in New York to fuel high-stake bets on payday lenders, oil companies and even the terminally ill. But prosecutors said these investments and the firm’s performance were misrepresented by its executives. Ultimately, Platinum took in new money in order to pay longtime investors who wanted their money back, something the firm’s executives called among themselves “Hail Mary time.” “As investors sought redemptions, the defendants engaged in numerous improper measures in an attempt to meet redemption requests, including taking out high-interest rate loans, commingling monies among funds and raising money from new investors through fraudulent misrepresentations,” said Andrew J. Ceresney, the director of the S.E.C.’s enforcement division. Located a few blocks from Central Park, Platinum, founded in 2003, made a splash early on with some of its investments. In one bet, the firm sought to profit from the death of terminally ill patients by investing in variable insurance payouts. As part of the scheme, a rabbi in Los Angeles sought out hospice patients to get their personal details that could be used to buy insurance payouts in their names. A company that Platinum set up to make the investments was fined by the S.E.C. in January 2015. “We definitely were exploiting a loophole, but it was fully vetted by legal counsel,” Mr. Nordlicht said in an interview with Bloomberg later that year. In other bets, Platinum misled both investors and auditors — sometimes brazenly. In December 2012, for example, executives misrepresented to auditors the value of Black Elk Energy, an oil and gas company controlled by Platinum, valuing it at $283 million, prosecutors said. In fact, there had been an explosion on a Black Elk platform in the Gulf of Mexico the month before that had caused the deaths of three workers, injuries to other employees and an oil spill . Black Elk no longer exists. Jeffrey Shulse, who worked at Black Elk and is named in the government’s indictment, denied the charges. “Mr. Shulse’s indictment is a clear case of overreaching,” said F. Andino Reynal, Mr. Shulse’s lawyer, adding that his client was “confident that once a jury has had a chance to hear all the facts, it will exonerate him of any wrongdoing.” Lawyers for the defendants Mr. Nordlicht, Daniel Small, Uri Landesman, Joseph Mann and Joseph San Filippo did not respond to a request for comment. Michael Sommer, a lawyer for Mr. Levy, said he looked forward to “clearing David Levy’s good name.” Image Murray Huberfeld, right, a former executive of the hedge fund Platinum Partners, leaving Manhattan Federal District Court after his arraignment on federal corruption charges in June. Credit Bryan R. Smith for The New York Times As recently as March, Platinum had $1.7 billion of investor money, as of a March regulatory filing. For years it reported a strong performance — with annual average returns of 17 percent. As recent as last year, Platinum said it made gains of 8 percent, a strong performance in a year when the average hedge fund lost 0.85 percent, according to the Hedge Fund Research Composite Index, a gauge of industry performance. Platinum began to have trouble extracting investor money when some of its obscure investments started to sour, according to prosecutors. From 2013 to 2016, the firm could not stanch the losses in certain funds and the investor requests to withdraw money, so it began to move money between funds in what Mr. Nordlicht called a “big stew,” the indictment said. Things seemed to reach a crisis point in June 2014, prosecutors said. “It can’t go on like this or practically we will need to wind down....this is code red,” Mr. Nordlicht wrote to Mr. Landesman, a managing director at Platinum, at the time. Yet investors remained in the dark about the firm’s precarious liquidity position. A month later, when an investor emailed to ask about the reliability of Platinum’s reported performance figures, Mr. Landesman replied, “The numbers are all kosher, they have had verbal input every month.” Investors grew restless. By March 2015, the total amount they requested to withdraw from the firm exceeded $83 million. Eventually, executives decided to pay some ahead of others, prosecutors said. “Platinum Partners purported to be a standard-bearer in the hedge fund industry,” said Robert L. Capers, the United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York. “In reality, their returns were the result of the overvaluation of their largest assets.” This inflation led to Mr. Nordlicht and others “operating Platinum like a Ponzi scheme, where they used loans and new investor funds to pay off existing investors,” Mr. Capers added. The arrests on Monday were part of an investigation among several government agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the United States Postal Inspection Service. In June, Murray Huberfeld, a former Platinum executive, was arrested. He has pleaded not guilty to conspiracy and wire fraud. Soon after Mr. Huberfeld’s arrest , agents from the F.B.I. and the Postal Inspection Service raided Platinum’s New York offices. Faced with mounting pressure from federal investigators, as well as an investigation by the S.E.C., Platinum liquidated its main hedge fund. For some at Platinum, there was already a sense late last year that government investigators were closing in on the firm. In an email exchange, Mr. Nordlicht, Mr. Landesman and an unnamed principal partner in Platinum discussed fleeing to Israel, according to prosecutors. “Don’t forget the books,” the unnamed partner wrote. “Assume we are not coming back to ny.” | Hedge fund;Platinum Partners;Securities fraud;Mark Nordlicht;David Levy;FBI;Fraud;Ponzi and Pyramid Schemes;United States Postal Inspection Service |
ny0225351 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2010/10/11 | Fears of More Red Sludge in Hungary | DEVECSER, Hungary — In this small agricultural town, nestled along the front line of the environmental catastrophe shaking this proud central European nation, Otto Kovacs, like many residents, said he was determined not to join the growing ranks of the “sludge refugees.” As panic spread over the weekend that another part of the wall of a reservoir filled with caustic red sludge could collapse and produce a new, lethal torrent, Mr. Kovacs and his family defiantly went about harvesting their grapes to make wine. The ritual lasted through Sunday, even though it meant wearing gas masks and braving red mud, or worse, a second potentially deadly deluge from the reservoir, about two miles away. “We are afraid that the reservoir can burst again,” said Mr. Kovacs, a pharmacist and winemaker, making his way past a police barricade erected at the entrance to Devecser. “We just harvested our wine and we don’t know if it is too toxic to drink. But we are determined to stay here and get on with our lives. Nobody knows what kind of toxins are in this ugly mud.” Nearly 200 million gallons of red mud poured into three villages on Monday after part of the wall around the concrete-lined reservoir collapsed, killing seven people and injuring hundreds more. On Sunday, senior government officials continued to sound the alarm about the possibility of another onslaught of red sludge after discovering that cracks in the reservoir’s northern wall had widened even more overnight. The sun was temporarily stopping the cracks on the northern wall from widening, but nightfall brought the threat of continued expansion. The bursting of the northern wall “is becoming a bigger risk,” Environmental State Secretary Zoltan Illes said Sunday from a firehouse near the disaster area. “The damaged reservoir cannot be saved.” Gyorgi Tottos, spokeswoman for Hungary ’s Catastrophe Protection Unit, said she was hopeful that the concrete barrier nearly 1,970 feet long and some 16 feet high, built by emergency workers to contain the sludge, would stave off catastrophe if the reservoir’s wall collapsed anew. “There is a risk and we are preparing for the worst,” Ms. Tottos said, “but thank God, so far the wall appears to be holding.” In case the wall’s resiliency proves short-lived, 800 residents of Kolontar, in the shadow of the industrial reservoir, were evacuated over the weekend while 300 soldiers, 130 police vehicles and four railway trains were on standby on Sunday in case Devecser’s 6,000 residents needed to follow. A sports center in the nearby town of Ajka, a safe area about three miles from the disaster zone, has been converted into a makeshift refugee center, where dozens of the newly homeless were arriving. The reservoir, owned by MAL Rt., the Hungarian Aluminum Production and Trade Company, contains an industrial waste called “red mud,” a byproduct of the process that converts bauxite to alumina, which is used to make aluminum. The government has begun a criminal investigation into the reservoir collapse, and Mr. Illes, the environmental secretary, said Sunday that the government was considering filing criminal charges against the company. He said the company had already accumulated $97.3 million in fines because of water damage from the mud. “The company is responsible for what is the biggest environmental disaster in the history of Hungary,” he said. “So far they have been underplaying the crisis and someone has to pay for what has happened.” An MAL Rt. spokeswoman, Andrea Nemeth, said by phone on Sunday that she was hopeful that the company could resume aluminum production soon. The company expressed condolences to the families of those killed by the sludge and said it was willing to pay compensation “in proportion to its responsibility.” Mr. Illes was adamant that the company would not be allowed to resume production in the immediate future, even if that was likely to undermine a local economy where aluminum production is a financial lifeline. He also faulted “weak” European Union regulations, which he said did not classify red mud as a toxic substance and had allowed the MAL Rt. to process the material. Hungary’s environmental laws had designated the red mud as toxic, Mr. Illes said, but those rules were relaxed after Hungary joined the European Union in 2004. The European Union’s environmental spokesman, Joe Hennon, insisted that it enforced strict environmental regulations, but he acknowledged that Hungary’s laws may have been more stringent. | Hungary;Hazardous and Toxic Substances;Refugees and Displaced Persons;Environment |
ny0276365 | [
"us",
"politics"
] | 2016/02/15 | Jeb Bush Adds a Weapon (His Brother) Despite Worries It Could Misfire | CHARLESTON, S.C. — The brother who was never expected to become president — but did — will be trotted out Monday as a lifeline to the brother who was always expected to become president, but now may not. Former President George W. Bush will take the stage Monday evening alongside Jeb Bush for a highly anticipated rally in North Charleston, S.C., part of the Bush team’s effort to use the primary next Saturday in South Carolina — a state long favorable to the Bush family — to help reinvigorate Mr. Bush’s stalled presidential bid. The Bush campaign is also hoping the rally can seize on what was regarded as a strong debate performance on Saturday night. But the appearance by the brothers — one the 43rd president, the other fighting to become the 45th — also offers a glimpse into the complicated dynamics of a family dynasty, as well as striking parallels with George Bush’s 2000 campaign here. It was when South Carolina was similarly emerging as a critical state for him, and where the race took a darkly negative turn. “I’m proud of the fact he’s coming, and honored,” Jeb Bush, a former governor of Florida, told reporters on Thursday. “This is the first that he’s really kind of stepped out in the political realm since he was president.” He added, “For him to come do this warms my heart.” But the decision to deploy Mr. Bush’s older brother was a complicated one. The president led the nation into an unpopular war in Iraq, and Jeb Bush struggled early in his campaign to answer if he would have made the same decision, with the intelligence now available. There was also concern that George Bush, a more natural and charismatic politician, would upstage his brother, the more cerebral of the two, who can be awkward and gaffe-prone in person. And the campaign also worried about the political reality: Some voters are hesitant to vote a third Bush into the White House, especially with an electorate craving an angry Washington outsider. Along the way, several moments have highlighted Mr. Bush’s challenges as he tries to both embrace his family — and the establishment politics it seems to represent — and distinguish himself. Introducing Mr. Bush at a rally in New Hampshire, Tom Ridge, who served as secretary of Homeland Security under his brother, slipped up and called him “George Bush,” before quickly correcting his mistake. And on Thursday in Columbia, S.C., Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a Bush supporter, inadvertently highlighted Mr. Bush’s balancing act when he told a crowd, “George W. Bush, I miss you, W., and he’s coming back,” before adding in the very next breath: “Jeb is his own man who comes from one of the great families of America.” The visit reflects how Jeb Bush is increasingly relying on his famous family to help lift his fortunes, particularly after an abysmal showing in Iowa and a more respectable fourth-place finish in New Hampshire. His mother, Barbara Bush, campaigned for him in New Hampshire, taking the stage at a rally to the Beach Boys’ “Barbara Ann.” Her enlistment led Donald J. Trump to taunt his rival for turning to “Mommy,” and even to say during the debate on Saturday that she should be running for president. The Bush campaign has released a radio ad featuring his brother, and the “ super PAC ” backing him used the elder Bush in a television spot. Image Jeb Bush visited Florence, S.C., on Thursday. Credit Travis Dove for The New York Times “He’s got to do well here, and this is still somewhat friendly terrain,” said Tucker Eskew, a native of the state who worked on George Bush’s 2000 campaign. “The Bush family is still held in high regard by most South Carolinians, and the Bush presidency is still held in high regard — and maybe even higher regard — than in most places.” But, Mr. Eskew added, George Bush had some advantages here that his brother does not. “We were coming out of New Hampshire reeling in a sense, and reeling suggests you’ve been on your feet,” he said. “I think he’s still looking for footing.” The former president may be the most high-risk — and high-reward — Bush family campaigner yet. A New York Times/CBS News poll from October found that 67 percent of Republicans have a favorable view of him. And his appeal has always been strong in South Carolina; a January 2008 Mason-Dixon/NBC News/McClatchy poll of Republican primary voters in the state found that only 3 percent emphasized finding a candidate who “represents a different approach from President Bush” — even though his approval rating nationwide was only 29 percent, according to a Times/CBS News poll that same month. In the run-up to the early nominating contests, Jeb Bush increasingly began mentioning his family unprompted, often to applause. He now talks about how he is proud to be a Bush, proud to be a son of the 41st president — whom he often calls the “greatest man alive” — and proud to be the brother of another. Recently, a young woman in New Hampshire outlined his challenge in stark terms: “Millennials don’t tend to support a third Bush in office,” she said, “so I’m wondering how you are working to distinguish yourself from being the third Bush.” His response was equally blunt. “People are just going to have to get over it, all right?” he said. “I am who I am.” He continued, “I’ve got no problems with this, and people that do, they either need to get therapy themselves, or realize that we can change the course of this country working together to solve problems.” But the presence of Mr. Bush’s brother in South Carolina also offers a reminder of another kind of politics in which the famously competitive clan is willing to engage — tough and negative . South Carolina, after all, gave rise to Lee Atwater, the first President George Bush’s self-proclaimed “bad boy” of American politics. And in 2000, coming off a New Hampshire drubbing by Senator John McCain of Arizona, George W. Bush’s campaign viewed the state as crucial. Then, the campaign employed push-poll phone calls to remind voters of Mr. McCain’s role in the savings and loan crisis and the so-called Keating Five scandal. Now, the state looms similarly large for Jeb Bush. The super PAC supporting him is expected to spend roughly $12 million here, including some to decimate his opponents. One television ad on the air features a ticking stopwatch as a narrator asks the viewer to name “any accomplishments” of Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. The group will also go after Gov. John Kasich of Ohio. The Bush team has already come under scrutiny here for its bare-knuckled tactics. Arriving in South Carolina, Mr. Kasich said he worried about Mr. Bush’s “negativity” and what it might do to “the family legacy.” And some Republicans have for months complained that Mr. Bush’s operation is simply paving the way for a Trump victory. “I think it’s insane,” said Stuart Stevens, a top strategist on Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. “I think the super PAC has turned into this sort of killing machine that no one controls and it’s just out there with $100 million, and the degree to which the Bush people and the Marco people are obsessed with each other is like the Bosnian civil war.” But feisty, muddy politics may be just what the voters here want. “Negative campaigning, regardless of what anyone is going to say — it works,” said Katon Dawson, a former chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party. “We’re one of the 13 original colonies. We’ve been throwing punches since the country started, and what they reward you for in South Carolina is how you take that punch.” | 2016 Presidential Election;Jeb Bush;George W Bush;South Carolina;Primaries;Republicans |
ny0281950 | [
"sports",
"baseball"
] | 2016/07/02 | Rob Refsnyder Finds His Place in the Yankees’ Shuffle | With a pack of veterans holding expensive contracts at the top of the roster, Rob Refsnyder, the Yankees’ perpetual prospect, has had to remake himself as a player while the club searches for ways to work him into its future. “I have told him, ‘Just be who you are,’” Manager Joe Girardi said. “Don’t try to be someone different. ‘Be who you are, and that’s the reason you’re here,’ and I think that’s what you’re seeing from him.” Refsnyder’s canvas as a player is still largely blank. The edges have been colored with hints of a player who uses his speed and intelligence to his advantage while impressing teammates with his work ethic, even as the Yankees move him around the field. Last year, his minor league hitting statistics had become too good to ignore, but the Yankees had no room in the outfield, where Refsnyder had played in college at Arizona. So the team tried to make him a second baseman, a position it has struggled to fill ever since Robinson Cano’s departure after the 2013 season. Refsnyder hit .302 in 16 games with the Yankees last season, but the team did not appear sold on him at second. In December, the Yankees traded for Starlin Castro, and Refsnyder, 25, once again became a nomad. Starting the current season with Class AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, Refsnyder played second base. And outfield. And third base. But when injuries sidelined Mark Teixeira, the Yankees had a position in mind that Refsnyder had never played before at any professional level: first base. Refsnyder did not even own a proper first baseman’s glove. He has been using a glove belonging to his teammate Dustin Ackley while breaking in his own. Refsnyder has been out before batting practice almost every day, fielding one-hoppers and corralling throws with a flattened training mitt — a crash course in playing first base. “I think any time you get more games under your belt, you’re going to mature as a player,” Girardi said. “He did a pretty nice job for us last year when he was up here. But I think there’s probably more of a sense of confidence. This kid’s had to adapt to a lot, a couple of different position changes. But he’s really pushed himself on here, because he’s made himself more versatile and he gives us really good at-bats and runs the bases well. We’ve really liked what he’s done.” This season, Refsnyder has batted .295 with a .362 on-base percentage. His fielding at first base has been adequate, although there is still a collective holding of breath when throws in the dirt come his way. Image Rob Refsnyder hitting a run-scoring single. He has batted .295 with a .362 on-base percentage this season. Credit Anthony Gruppuso/USA Today Sports, via Reuters Wednesday’s game against the Texas Rangers was emblematic of where Refsnyder stands as a player. In the first inning, Texas’s Nomar Mazara hit a dribbler along the first-base line that was fielded by Masahiro Tanaka. Refsnyder dropped the throw and was charged with an error. The Yankees escaped the inning unscathed, but when Refsnyder returned to the dugout, Girardi took him over to Teixeira, who has left the disabled list but will be rested every few games because of the torn cartilage in his right knee. Girardi wanted the error to be a learning moment for Refsnyder, but it turned out that he had not done much wrong. “I asked Tex, ‘What do you do in that situation?’” Girardi said. “Tex says: ‘That’s probably the hardest play that we have to deal with, because when Tanaka throws it from behind the runner, you don’t see it. You pick up the ball extremely late and it’s probably almost like a panic in a sense, because you’re always used to seeing the baseball, and all of a sudden you don’t see the baseball and here it is — it appears.’” Girardi added: “So I am comfortable. I don’t look at that as that’s a play that he definitely should have made, because it’s such a difficult play. I think he’s doing well over there. He is adjusting on the fly. It’s just continuing to teach, and for him, he has to get the reps and see certain things. He’s probably never seen that.” The Yankees ended up trailing, 7-3, entering the ninth inning, before staging a six-run comeback that culminated with home runs by Brian McCann and Didi Gregorius. The rally began with a leadoff single by Refsnyder. “I figured they wouldn’t mess around with me too much,” Refsnyder said. “First two pitches, I’d probably get a fastball, so I was looking to be aggressive.” Girardi has noted Refsnyder’s acumen in key situations. “He understands the game,” Girardi said. “To me, he’s a smart player and makes adjustments fairly quickly.” Refsnyder is still in a precarious position. Teixeira will make most of the starts at first as long as he is healthy. Carlos Beltran has battled a sore right hamstring, but Aaron Hicks is the favored option in right field. At 39-39, the Yankees occupy the gray area between contenders and also-rans a month before the trading deadline. But around the Yankees’ clubhouse, Refsnyder’s development has become hard to ignore. “I think he’s getting more comfortable,” McCann said. “What he’s done throughout his whole life is hit. He can flat-out hit. But I don’t think he gets the credit for his defense. He can play multiple positions at a high level. He’s comfortable playing outfield. He looks great at second. You can throw him at first base. “He brings a lot of value to the team.” | Baseball;Yankees;Robert Refsnyder;Joe Girardi |
ny0175236 | [
"sports",
"othersports"
] | 2007/10/08 | With the Formula One Title in Sight, Hamilton Falters | SHANGHAI, Oct. 7 (AP) — The Formula One season will come down to the final race with three drivers chasing the title. Lewis Hamilton missed his chance to clinch by gambling on one lap too many on bad tires. Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari won the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday, and Hamilton’s chances of becoming the first rookie to capture the title were put in jeopardy as he ran off the track in slippery conditions. Fernando Alonso finished second to close to 4 points behind his McLaren teammate Hamilton, who has 107 points. Raikkonen has 100. It will be the first time since 1986 that three drivers will enter the final race, the Brazilian Grand Prix on Oct. 21 in São Paulo, with a chance to take the series championship. Hamilton and his McLaren team took a chance with his wet-weather tires deteriorating in drying conditions. They chose to wait through another lap of light rain before pitting. At the end of Lap 31, Hamilton — nearly faultless all season — slid off into a gravel trap at the top of the pit lane. “Although my tires were in poor condition, we took a joint decision to get through the last rain shower before changing to dry tires,” Hamilton said. “I was trying to be careful and as a result was not really fighting aggressively with Kimi. It would have worked out perfectly, but I then made a mistake coming into the pit lane and that was it.” With Hamilton out of the race, Raikkonen continued in the lead, followed by Alonso. It was the fifth victory of the season for Raikkonen. Alonso and Hamilton have four each. If there is a tie, the number of victories will break the tie. After that, the number of second-place finishes will be counted. | Automobile Racing;Formula One;Hamilton Lewis |
ny0233229 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2010/08/30 | Chechen Leader’s Village Is Attacked | MOSCOW — Insurgents in Chechnya , in southern Russia, attacked the home village of the region’s leader Sunday, touching off a battle in which over a dozen people were killed, officials said. It was not immediately clear whether the Chechen leader, Ramzan A. Kadyrov , was in the village at the time or whether he was the intended target. But Mr. Kadyrov said on Russian television that he had commanded the security forces that responded. His men, he said in televised remarks, “destroyed 12 people immediately on the spot.” He said two officers also had been killed in the village, Tsentoroi. Russian news media reported that five civilians had died, though Mr. Kadyrov disputed that account. Long shaken by an Islamic and separatist insurgency , Chechnya has been the site of two wars since the Soviet Union’s collapse. With tacit approval from Russian leaders, human rights groups say, Mr. Kadyrov has participated in the kidnappings, torture and killings of suspected insurgents and critics. But he has never been formally implicated in those deaths and has always denied involvement in them. | Chechnya (Russia);Kadyrov Ramzan;Civil War and Guerrilla Warfare;Terrorism |
ny0248689 | [
"sports",
"football"
] | 2011/05/01 | Army’s Mooney Aims for N.F.L. | LAWTON, Okla. — It was 5:30 a.m., too early even for the birds in this southwest Oklahoma town, when the former Army running back Collin Mooney walked to an open field, lighted by a lone streetlight, about 100 steps from his home. In a ragged gym bag held together by duct tape, he carried equipment like weights and plastic cones. Mooney was soon running 20-yard sprints. Another drill had him lunging backward as fast as he could for 40 yards, looking like a gazelle going in reverse. A few minutes after he started, the birds began to chirp. Since he arrived at Fort Sill last fall, Mooney’s job as a second lieutenant for an artillery battery unit has involved training hundreds of privates in preparation for deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. In the early morning and evening, he has been the one training, putting himself through various football drills in the hope that with his mandatory two-year service requirement fulfilled, he can find a spot on an N.F.L. roster. The 5-foot-10, 243-pound Mooney, who holds the single-season rushing record at Army, was not selected in the N.F.L. draft, but he said he hoped to catch on as a free agent and give football one final shot. “This year is really make or break for me,” he said. Mooney, a 2009 graduate of West Point with a Texas high school football coach for a father and a grandfather who is a retired United States Army colonel, has long weighed his desire to serve against his wish to play. About 20 of his friends and former teammates from West Point are deployed in Iraq or Afghanistan, he said. His brother-in-law is serving in Afghanistan. On Mooney’s wedding day last July, his best man, Mark Faldowski, was deployed for another year in Iraq. “He’s juggling a lot of things and he’s fulfilling all his obligations,” Faldowski said in a phone interview from Iraq. “I’m sure that he doesn’t tell his soldiers about what he’s doing.” Last April, Chris Nichols, Mooney’s former roommate, was injured in an explosion in northeast Baghdad, and a chunk of steel the size and shape of a Reese’s peanut butter cup was lodged in his right knee. Nichols’s kneecap was shattered, his tibia split vertically, his fibula and femur broken, an artery severed in his right knee and his patellar tendon destroyed. He has undergone 25 operations since being injured. He walks with a cane and is hoping to regain flexibility in his right leg. “It definitely made me think a lot about it as far as the whole situation,” Mooney said, referring to his decision to pursue the N.F.L. “It’s definitely a tough struggle in my mind. Things like that kind of get to me once in a while.” Mooney attributes much of his motivation to succeed in football and in the military to the former N.F.L. player Pat Tillman , who died seven years ago this month in Afghanistan. Throughout high school and college, Mooney kept two pictures in his locker. One was of the former Tampa Bay Buccaneers fullback Mike Alstott. The other was of Tillman, in his Army Ranger uniform. When Mooney played in the East-West Shrine Game in college, he received the Pat Tillman Award. “He was always there,” Mooney said. “It was one of those God-intervention moments. I had it in my locker as my motivation, and it turned into something more than that.” Mooney’s family and friends tell a number of stories that show how that motivation manifested itself: how he trained during the hot summer in the Texas sun by pushing pickup trucks in a parking lot, how he broke West Point’s physical-fitness test-bike record days after his arrival on campus; how he carried a female soldier on his shoulders for nearly a mile after she had passed out from heat exhaustion. Reaching the N.F.L. may be more daunting than any of those feats. There were two players, Philadelphia’s Chad Hall and Detroit’s Caleb Campbell, from the service academies on active N.F.L. rosters last season. A third, Denver’s Kyle Eckel, was on injured reserve. Campbell was drafted out of Army in 2008 by Matt Millen, then the Lions’ general manager and now Mooney’s father-in-law. “I know Collin is not counting on anything,” Millen said. “I think he’ll take it as it comes because that’s the situation he’s in.” Mooney has visited Green Bay to talk with the Packers and he recently worked out in front of scouts during Oklahoma’s pro day. He ran a 4.6 40 and bench-pressed 225 pounds 28 times. If he finds a spot on an N.F.L. roster, it will probably be as a backup fullback or a special teams contributor. If he does not, he will head back to Fort Sill, with the knowledge that he could soon join his friends and former teammates in Iraq or Afghanistan. Whatever happens, Mooney is right where he always wanted to be: choosing between the military and the N.F.L. “If football doesn’t work out, I’m still doing what I’ve always wanted to do,” he said. “Yeah, being deployed, that’s just part of the job. That’s the reality of being in the Army. I’m not worried about that.” | United States Army;Football;Mooney Collin;National Football League;Tillman Pat;Draft and Recruitment (Sports);United States Military Academy;Football (College) |
ny0225826 | [
"sports"
] | 2010/10/10 | O’meara Has Two-Shot Lead | Mark O’Meara , looking for his first individual victory on the Champions Tour, shot a one-under-par 69 for a two-stroke lead entering the final round of the Senior Players Championship in Potomac, Md. ¶Cristie Kerr moved into position for her third victory of the year, shooting a five-under 67 to take a three-stroke lead in the Navistar L.P.G.A. Classic in Prattville, Ala. lpga | O'Meara Mark;Golf;Kerr Cristie |
ny0024898 | [
"us"
] | 2013/08/07 | Deployment Factors Are Not Related to Rise in Military Suicides, Study Finds | In the largest study of its kind, military medical researchers have concluded that deployments to war zones and exposure to combat were not major factors behind a significant increase in suicides among military personnel from 2001 to 2008, according to a paper published on Tuesday. The study, published online by The Journal of the American Medical Association, corroborates what many military medical experts have been saying for years: that the forces underlying the spike in military suicides are similar to those in the civilian world. They include mental illness, substance abuse, and financial and relationship problems. “The findings from this study are not consistent with the assumption that specific deployment-related characteristics, such as length of deployment, number of deployments, or combat experiences, are directly associated with increased suicide risk,” the authors, based at the Naval Health Research Center in San Diego, wrote. “Instead, the risk factors associated with suicide in this military population are consistent with civilian populations, including male sex and mental disorders.” But even as it points to nondeployment factors as paramount, the study underscores the complex interplay of war and the mental health of troops, even those who never left the United States. It suggests that the stresses of 12 years of war may have worn on all service members, creating work and travel demands far outstripping those borne by peacetime troops. “Perhaps it’s not being deployed so much as being in a war during a high-stress time period,” Dr. Nancy Crum-Cianflone, the principal investigator for the Millennium Cohort Study, which provided much of the raw data for the study, said in an interview. Critics of the study said that because its analysis ended with data from 2008, it might underestimate the impact of multiple deployments and traumatic brain injuries caused by roadside bombs. “Why would the authors repeatedly insist that there is no association between combat and suicide?” asked Dr. Stephen N. Xenakis, a psychiatrist and a retired Army brigadier general. “The careful analysis of bad data generates poor evidence.” Cynthia LeardMann, the lead author on the study, said the research team planned to update the study to include data through 2012. But she expressed confidence that its bottom line conclusions would remain the same. “The current study includes information from when we saw a sharp increase in suicides, between 2005 and 2008,” Ms. LeardMann said. “So it’s demonstrating that even in that period, we don’t see association with deployment.” Yet even providers of mental health care and advocates for veterans who praised the quality of the study cautioned that its findings should not be oversimplified to suggest that deployment has nothing to do with suicide. Those providers and advocates say that deployment can prompt or intensify problems that are direct causes of suicidal behavior, including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and substance abuse. “I’m concerned that some might take this and say: It’s not deployments. We don’t need to worry about this,” said Barbara Van Dahlen, a psychologist who is the founder of Give an Hour, a group that provides mental health counseling to service members and veterans. “This is telling us one important bit of the story. But there are many other factors involved.” Before the recent wars, the military suicide rate was well below the civilian rate. But the gap began narrowing shortly after 2001 , a time when the civilian rate was also climbing. The sharpest increases were in the Army and the Marine Corps, the services most involved in combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2012, suicides among active-duty troops hit a record 350, twice as many as a decade before and more than the number of American troops killed in either combat operations or transportation accidents that year. Today, the military suicide rate is almost the same as the one for civilians, when the civilian rate is adjusted to match the high percentage of young white men in the military. The study, which was financed by the Defense Department, used surveys conducted for the Millennium Cohort Study, which is tracking the health of thousands of service members over six decades. The researchers studied data for more than 150,000 current and former service members from all the armed services. Using data from the National Death Index and Defense Department personnel records, the researchers found among the group 83 service members who committed suicide, of whom 58 percent had never deployed. After correlating those suicides with data from the surveys, the researchers found that suicide rates were highest among men and among people with manic-depressive disorder, depression and alcohol problems. The authors said their findings could point to more effective approaches to reducing suicide, citing in particular programs that focus on depression and alcohol abuse. Craig J. Bryan, the associate director of the National Center for Veterans Studies at the University of Utah, said the study’s large sample gave it added significance. “It lines up with what many of us have been finding and talking about for the last several years,” he said. “But they have been able to address the limitations of previous research.” Several advocacy groups, including Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America and Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors , or TAPS, also said the findings confirmed what they had been seeing on the ground. “We so often just link military suicide to combat trauma,” said Kim Ruocco, the director of postvention for TAPS. “But there are many others: long hours, separation from supports systems, sleeplessness. All are stressors. All add to increases in mental health issues.” | Suicide;US Military;Veteran;Naval Health Research Center;Iraq War;Afghanistan War;Mental Health;Journal of the American Medical Assn |
ny0133340 | [
"us",
"politics"
] | 2008/03/04 | Want to Trade? An Obama Will Cost You | While Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton duke it out in Texas and Ohio on Tuesday, Mr. Obama has trounced his Democratic rival in another arena: trading cards. Presidential trading cards, released by the Topps Company on Feb. 6 and featuring the candidates’ likenesses and autographs, are fetching high prices on eBay this week. An Obama card, one of 15 made by Topps, sold for $3,122, and a Clinton card, one of 18, sold for $1,325. Bids for a card featuring an embedded autograph by Senator John McCain , the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, were holding steady at $1,200 in an auction on Monday evening. The cards are a bonus tucked into packs of Topps Baseball Series 1 for 2008, which retail for $1.99, said Clay Luraschi, the company’s baseball brand manager. The cards are not actually signed by the candidates. Instead, they display signatures cut from items already autographed by the candidates, like baseballs by Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain, or books by Mrs. Clinton. Unsigned cards, which are drawing bids of $1 to $13 on eBay, can be found in one out of every nine packs, Mr. Luraschi said. Topps was surprised at the prices the signed cards had garnered, Mr. Luraschi said. “A lot of times when you have a card that’s the only one in existence, they don’t even get that high,” he said. The campaigns did not respond to requests for comment. Mr. Luraschi said the price on Mr. Obama’s card was particularly startling. “That’s like Babe Ruth,” he said. CATE DOTY | Trading Cards;Topps Company Incorporated;Obama Barack;Clinton Hillary Rodham;Presidential Election of 2008;eBay Inc;McCain John;Presidential Elections (US) |
ny0179785 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2007/08/26 | Greece Declares Emergency as Forest Fires Rage | ATHENS, Aug. 25 — Greece declared a national state of emergency on Saturday as scores of forest fires that have killed at least 46 people continued to burn out of control, leaving some villages trapped within walls of flames, cut off from firefighters and, in some cases, from firefighting aircraft grounded because of high winds. Desperate people called television and radio stations pleading for help that they feared would not arrive in time. “I can hear the flames outside my door,” one caller from the village of Andritsena told a Greek television station, according to Reuters news service. “There is no water anywhere. There is no help. We are alone.” Although most of the fires have been on the Peloponnesian Peninsula, some broke out on the outskirts of Athens on Saturday, forcing the evacuation of homes and a monastery and closing a major road linking the capital to the main airport for several hours. The national fire brigade said that by evening it had brought those blazes under control, including one that came within about six miles of the city. The government response to the fires, Greece’s worst in decades, is leading to renewed criticism of Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis less than a month before parliamentary elections. Mr. Karamanlis had already been heavily criticized for his government’s handling of fires earlier this summer. The country has been vulnerable to fire this summer because of drought and three consecutive heat waves that sent temperatures soaring over 100 degrees. More than 3,000 forest fires have razed thousands of acres of wooded areas since June; the earlier fires killed nine people. The latest spate of fires on the peninsula started Friday. Strong, hot winds have spread the flames. “The situation is unbelievable,” said Yiannis Stamoulis, a spokesman for the Greek Fire Brigade. “We’re dealing with savage forces of nature and it’s humanly impossible to effectively take them on, however strong and well prepared we may be.” He added, “We’re fighting an asymmetrical war.” Firefighters expect the death toll to rise, because they have not yet been able to search some areas that had been overrun by flames. Hardest hit by the fires were a dozen hamlets tucked into the rural highlands around the town of Zaharo in the western peninsula, where at least 12 people, including some who may have been trying to flee by car, were killed. Charred bodies were found in cars, houses and fields in areas around Zaharo, firefighters said. At least some of the people there were believed to have been killed or trapped after a collision between a fire truck and a convoy of cars apparently trying to flee the flames. Scores of other residents, including elderly and disabled people, remained trapped in their homes, phoning in to local television and radio stations, crying for help. “Help! Help! Help!” wailed one resident as he spoke with Mega television from the town of Artemida. “Get some one here fast. We’re losing everything.” Minutes later, another caller pleaded for authorities to help save her two children, one of whom she feared was in shock after having seen their home go up in flames. South of Zaharo, rescue teams confirmed at least six deaths in the seaside town of Areopolis, in the Mani region, a popular tourist destination known for its rugged cliffs and ravines. Among the victims in the area were a pair of French hikers who were trapped in a flaming ravine. Their charred bodies were found locked in an embrace, the authorities said. Hotels and dozens of surrounding villages have been evacuated. With national elections set for Sept. 16, Mr. Karamanlis suspended campaigning over the weekend to oversee the national response to the fires. Late Saturday, Mr. Karamanlis appeared on national television and declared that he was mobilizing all of the country’s resources to tackle the blazes to “prevail in a battle that must be won.” Mr. Karamanlis also suggested that the recent fires might have been purposely set. “So many fires sparked simultaneously in so many regions is no coincidence,” he said, wearing a black tie and suit in a show of mourning. “We will get to the bottom of this and punish those responsible.” But political opponents accused the prime minister of shunning responsibility for what the authorities have called a “national tragedy.” “Rather than deflect attention and lay blame on some anonymous arsonist, the prime minister should take blame for the government’s failure to effectively handle this crisis,” said Nikos Bistis, a opposition socialist lawmaker, on local television. The overstretched national fire services are being helped by an estimated 6,000 soldiers mobilized for the operation. The national teams take control of forest fires from community brigades. A fleet of water-dumping aircraft was expected from France, Germany and Norway, after Greece appealed to the European Union for “urgent assistance.” | Greece;Forest and Brush Fires;Fires and Firefighters |
ny0229757 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2010/09/02 | Remembering the Long Island Express, the 1938 Storm | WESTHAMPTON BEACH, N.Y. For those few who still remember, the images are seared into their brains: the corpses floating down Main Street or propped up on chairs in the temporary morgue at the Westhampton County Club; the boats that drifted into the living rooms of flooded houses; the dead dogs and featherless chickens; the muck and fish stink; the moonscape of flattened houses on Dune Road; the residue of the last great hurricane to hit Long Island, the storm of 1938. On a gorgeous end-of-summer afternoon, with those Weather Channel tracking maps likely more worrisome because of rain and wind or imperiled Labor Day parties than for anything more ominous close to home, it’s almost impossible to wrap your brain around a major hurricane hitting Long Island . But as Hurricane Earl churns haphazardly north, and as we begin our seasonal dance of voyeurism, alarm and indifference, there are still people around who remember the last really big one: the Long Island Express of Sept. 21, 1938, which killed more than 50 people on Long Island, 29 of them here, and more than 600 over all. It’s a different world, much safer for people because of better communications and evacuation and rescue plans, but infinitely riskier for property damage, with so much having been built since then. A storm like the one in 1938 would surely be one of the costliest in American history if it hit Long Island. Lest we forget, a few reminders of what happened in the past and what will happen again, sooner or later. “In our family, we always remembered two things: the Depression and the hurricane,” said Jackie Bennett, 76, who still lives about half a mile from the ocean here. “You talk to people today buying property on Dune Road, and they have no clue. No clue. They all think it’s something that happens somewhere else.” So she remembers the way her father, a car dealer, went off in his wrecker to rescue a stranded car in the lull when the eye passed over. Before long, he saw a tidal wave of water roaring toward him in a great gray mass. He turned his truck around, trying to outrun it, until he abandoned the truck on Main Street. Now it is a stretch of ice cream shops, cafes and expensive boutiques; then it was a roiling sea of floating cars and boats, dead animals and people swimming for their lives. He eventually made it home, where a friend’s yacht had crashed through the glass front door and lodged in the hedge between his yard and the Episcopal church next door. The family’s grand piano, which took six men to lift, had sailed across the room like a cork; the prized tropical-fish tanks were smashed to bits; and an entire house from across the creek was resting on the sidewalk by the back door. Conrad Teller, now the mayor, then a fourth grader, remembers being in music class, a window flying off and breaking apart on the piano as his teacher played on without missing a beat. His father was the police chief, who watched as his patrol cars washed away. He was later lifted by the tide onto the arms of a telephone pole and then onto the top of a house until the storm finally moved on. Mr. Teller figures that people today have more information, but not necessarily more sense. “All the publicity and hype,” he said, “I think it just dulls people after a while. After a while, they just tune it out.” The progress of the 1938 storm was unusual. After meandering toward Cape Hatteras, it accelerated forward at 60 to 70 miles per hour, as if racing toward Long Island. It hit land as a Category 3 storm with sustained winds of 121 m.p.h., gusts of 183 m.p.h. and 15-foot storm surges. There have been other hurricanes since then — Hurricane Bob, which mostly missed Long Island, in 1991; Hurricane Gloria in 1985, a Category 1 storm that was the last one to hit Long Island; good-size storms like Hurricane Donna in 1960, and Carol and Edna in 1954. But going back in the imperfect historic record of coastal storms, there are believed to have been at least five epic hurricanes — in 1938, 1893, 1821, 1815 and 1635. One theory is that they repeat every 70 to 80 years. It likely won’t be this storm. It might not be this year. But it will almost certainly happen again, no matter how many masters of the universe build seaside monuments on terrain where nothing will last forever. | Hurricanes and Tropical Storms;Westhampton (NY) |
ny0217724 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2010/05/05 | Top N.Y. Court Expands Gays’ Parental Rights | ALBANY — New York State’s highest court somewhat expanded the rights of gay and lesbian parents on Tuesday in a narrow ruling that said nonbiological parents in same-sex relationships should be treated the same as biological parents. But the high court, the Court of Appeals, declined to resolve two cases involving lesbian parents and instead sent both back to lower courts, saying that the question of whether nonbiological parents should be given full parental rights was up to the State Legislature. In one case, the court found that a lesbian who had given birth while in a committed relationship was entitled to seek child support in Family Court from her former partner. The ruling was 4 to 3. In the other case, which legal experts said had broader implications, the court ruled that a woman seeking visitation rights from her former partner, who gave birth to a child conceived by artificial insemination after the two had entered into a civil union in Vermont, was a legal parent of that child. The decision , by a 7-to-0 vote, said the woman, identified in court documents as Debra H., could ask a court for visitation and custody rights because New York confers parental rights to both parents in a same-sex relationship if the couple has a civil union. Though the court did not specifically address the parental rights of gays and lesbians who are not birth parents but have other legally sanctioned unions, like a marriage performed in a jurisdiction that allows same-sex couples to wed, the case provides them a legal claim to parenthood. “In many ways this is a real breakthrough in New York,” said Susan L. Sommer, who argued the case before the Court of Appeals and is senior counsel and director of constitutional litigation for Lambda Legal , a gay-rights advocacy group. “But there’s also a lot more work that needs to be done, because the decision stops short of bringing New York into line with the growing trend in other jurisdictions,” Ms. Sommer added. Some legal experts said they were dismayed by the ruling because it effectively established two sets of standards for children of same-sex couples: one set for those born to couples with a legally recognized relationship, and another for those born to couples without legal recognition. “A distinction between whether one is a parent or is not a parent based on whether a couple is in a civil union or not in a civil union — that should not matter,” said Nancy Polikoff , a law professor at American University. “From the child’s point of view, he or she has two parents.” The court declined to establish criteria for parenthood in relationships in which one partner or spouse is not the biological parent, saying a more flexible standard could invite claims of parental rights by people who have no business raising them. “Parents could not possibly know when another adult’s level of involvement in family life might reach the tipping point and jeopardize their right to bring up their children without the unwanted participation of a third party,” Judge Susan P. Read wrote in the opinion. Other jurisdictions have amended their laws to grant nonbiological parents broad legal rights. Colorado, Indiana, Minnesota, Texas and the District of Columbia have all established criteria under which people other than biological parents can claim to have parental rights. The Court of Appeals said nothing prevented the Legislature from following that lead. Sherri L. Eisenpress, the lawyer for the biological mother involved in the case stemming from the Vermont civil union, who is identified only as Janice R., said the case was never about broader issues. Instead, Ms. Eisenpress said it was about following established family law in New York, which states that anyone who is not a biological or adoptive parent lacks standing to seek custody or visitation rights. “Her goal in this case was never to establish some precedent or to make any broader statement other than that she expressly declined to allow this woman to adopt her son because she did not want to co-parent with this person,” Ms. Eisenpress said. Though the case presents a twist on the traditional American family, in one sense it is conventional. Explaining why she entered into a civil union, Janice R., according to the decision, said, “to put an end to (Debra H.’s) nagging.” | Same-Sex Marriage Civil Unions and Domestic Partnerships;New York State;Child Custody and Support |
ny0279292 | [
"sports",
"football"
] | 2016/10/03 | A Dominant Defense Fuels the Vikings’ Surge | EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. — In a three-week span beginning late in training camp, the Minnesota Vikings lost three key offensive starters: quarterback Teddy Bridgewater (dislocated knee), the three-time N.F.L. rushing champion Adrian Peterson (meniscus tear) and left tackle Matt Kalil (hip surgery). Yet the Vikings stand 3-0, the team’s best start since 2009, entering Monday night’s game against the Giants. Quarterback Sam Bradford, acquired from Philadelphia for two draft choices, excelled in his two starts, completing 67.8 percent of his passes without an interception. But the main reason for Minnesota’s surge is the defense, nurtured by the head coach, Mike Zimmer, who is a defensive savant. Minnesota led the league with 15 sacks and a plus-8 turnover margin entering Week 4 while allowing the fewest yards per play on first down (3.38). The defense sacked Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers five times in Week 2, and Carolina’s Cam Newton eight times in Week 3. Defensive end Danielle Hunter already has a safety and a fumble return for a touchdown, and linebacker Eric Kendricks returned an interception for another score. Over all, the Vikings rank sixth in yardage allowed. They were 31st in 2013, the season before Zimmer arrived. “From the first day I came in here, we always met as a defense,” Zimmer said recently at Winter Park, where the team practices. “They’ve heard the same things over and over for three years. I think that helps.” So does continuity. Starters like defensive end Everson Griffen — who had three sacks last week — safety Harrison Smith and defensive end Brian Robison were here when Zimmer took over. The former Giants nose tackle Linval Joseph, a run stopper, signed as a free agent that season. “You can point at a lot of things,” Smith said. “The continuity is obviously big, and the depth. Every player contributes. It’s not like there’s one or two players making all the plays. “Zim is one of those guys who can see all 11 players on the field,” Smith said of his coach. “He will make multiple corrections to multiple guys after plays. He understands so much and puts us in position to win.” ANEMIC RUSHING GAME On Friday, the injured Adrian Peterson watched the morning Ryder Cup matches at Hazeltine National Golf Club in Chaska, Minn., about 13 miles from Winter Park, where the team practices. While Peterson enjoyed himself, Vikings coaches worked on trying to revive the N.F.L.’s worst running game, one that was not particularly effective even when Peterson was healthy. Peterson, a seven-time Pro Bowl player, gained 50 yards on 31 carries before tearing his right meniscus in Week 2 against Green Bay. That is 1.6 yards per carry, far below his career mark of 4.9 entering this season. Two years ago, when a suspension and a stint on the commissioner’s exempt list sidelined Peterson for the final 15 games, the backups Jerick McKinnon and Matt Asiata combined for more than 1,000 yards. McKinnon and Asiata are again filling in, but so far have not done much. The Vikings are averaging 51 yards rushing per game and 2.1 yards per attempt, both last in the league. MISSED EXTRA POINTS At a Vikings minicamp last May, kicker Blair Walsh told reporters that the 27-yard field-goal attempt he had missed in a 10-9 wild-card loss to Seattle four months earlier would not define him. Instead, something else threatens to: his struggle on extra points. Walsh has missed two in five attempts. He missed four last season, when the N.F.L. lengthened the distance from 20 to 35 yards. He was 108 for 109 in his first three seasons. “I think it’s between the ears right now, and it’s something that we’ve talked about again this week,” the special teams coach, Mike Priefer, said. “I feel very confident with him going forward. He’s just got to go out and make those kicks.” | Football;Minnesota Vikings;Adrian Peterson;Blair Walsh;Coaches;Mike Zimmer |
ny0196987 | [
"technology",
"personaltech"
] | 2009/10/01 | Music Apps Blur the Gap Between You and Clapton | There’s something about an iPhone music app. For musicians, it’s like having an instrument in your pocket. For nonmusicians, it’s a way to coax sounds -- often programmed to stay on key no matter what note one actually plays -- out of what may be the only instrumentlike device they ever pick up. A main goal for many of these apps’ developers is to introduce nonmusical people to music, and musical people to different kinds of music. And when taken less as a serious instrument and more as a sampler for the wide world of music, these devices are wildly successful. For those dying to shred, however, they leave something to be desired. The majority of apps in this category try to cram a fully functioning instrument into an interface that, while touch-sensitive, is still only three inches wide. It’s about the same width as a guitar neck, so six strings fit reasonably well. Still, only a few frets can be covered at once, and even the simple acts of plucking a string and forming chords take a significant degree of finger wrangling. Similarly, while many apps offer recording features, synching up separate apps without external recording software is difficult, unless you spend a lot of time behind a mixing console. So the essential question becomes, are music apps real tools for artistic expression, or are they in the same league as, say, Bejeweled or other time-killing games? “When it all comes down to it, these are all games, pretty much,” said Turner Kirk, community marketing manager for Smule, whose Ocarina is one of the simplest yet most inventive musical apps on the market. “We’d like to think of them as expressive musical instruments, even though we might be limited by hardware. But really, it’s like a toy.” Ocarina proves that simplicity works in this environment. An actual ocarina -- a simple wind instrument, frequently found with only four holes -- is among the simplest music makers, and its virtual version is perfect for the iPhone interface. One has only to blow into the device’s microphone to control the instrument -- almost identically to the way one would an actual ocarina. Because it’s an iPhone, of course, users can take the experience to different levels, with the ability to change pitch, upload their recordings and span the globe to listen to others’ tunes. An online songbook lets even a beginner ocarinist play Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” Other simple apps that have been successful include Normalware’s Bebot, where one can make a tuxedoed cartoon robot sing electronic notes by dragging a finger across the screen. Tones and settings are customizable; one option places strings across the interface. It’s always perfectly in tune and is incredibly diverting. “Because apps like this handle the difficult part of making music -- producing a good sound and playing the right notes -- they free the user for the fun part of the process: getting expressive,” said David Battino, co-author of “The Art of Digital Music.” Even real musicians use Bebot; a recent San Francisco Chronicle article on musical applications led with Dream Theater’s keyboardist, Jordan Rudess, playing it on the iPhone during a performance in San Jose, Calif. Sheer simplicity, however, isn’t the only route to success. Moocow Music, which offers apps for bass, guitar, piano and organ, suggests on its Web site that its creations can be used “as a ‘musical notepad’ for working out riffs to play back in the studio on a real (instrument).” This is true. It’s also a tacit admission that the apps are not meant to replace real instruments. Still, the care that goes into these apps’ creation is obvious. Rather than simply offering one sound per note, Moocow has loaded multiple guitar and bass samples for each fret and string, which are played randomly when that note is struck. Because real guitar strings are plucked or strummed slightly differently each time, this lends a subtle air of authenticity to the sound. Several guitar apps feature preloaded scales, chord forms and tablature features for those looking to work out ideas. They make for terrific notation tools for pros and theory tools for novices. But as for actual instrumentality, well, there aren’t many people who say an iPhone feels better in the hand than a guitar. Or a drumstick. Or a cowbell. And this is where it gets back to being like a video game. Many musical apps offer the ability to record a track, then add layers on top of it. Doing this between disparate apps is impossible without external recording software, but a multi-instrumental app like Moocow’s Band gives novices the opportunity to record and edit tracks with drums, bass and guitar, and make sure it all sounds pretty good (even if one doesn’t know how to play a lick of music). It’s as much a game as Guitar Hero, only instead of trying to keep up with prerecorded music, the goal is to make music of one’s own. If there’s gray area, it’s with the synth mixing and sound creation programs. The BeatMaker from Intua, for example, combines drum machines, samplers and sequencers. It allows users to layer tracks, then loop them as one would in a full-fledged studio. It’s a powerful application (and, at $19.99, one of the most expensive musical apps on the market), but it’s all too easy for a novice to become lost in its features within moments of loading it up. For companies like Sound Trends, whose Looptastic series allows for the creation of multilayered beats via mixing and matching of audio samples, there’s little pretense of being a studio replacement. “We wanted to capture something that’s in the moment and fun,” said Sound Trends’ president, Aaron Higgins. “There are a few apps out there that are intimidating and lack the fun. You can play around with them, but once you open up the control panel it’s like opening the hood of a car. We made a conscious decision that that wasn’t the direction we wanted to go.” Reasons for that decision are plentiful, but one stands above the others: the casual novice market is a whole lot bigger than the hard-core musician one. The user who would just as soon loop a few beats together as blow up a virtual Russian army while taking the train to work is key to Mr. Higgins’s reasoning. The beautiful thing about these iPhone apps, however, is that even when it comes to the pros, it doesn’t matter. What guitar player doesn’t spend hours noodling until the moment inspiration strikes? Hardly an inspiration deterrent, the iPhone is actually just the opposite; it might not make for optimal musicality, but it opens up the possibility for one’s muse to come calling in pretty much any setting. | Music;iPhone;Computers and the Internet;Guitars;Musical Instruments;Dream Theater |
ny0003616 | [
"sports",
"basketball"
] | 2013/04/18 | In Synopsis of Season, Knicks Win Brings New Injury | Hours before the season’s final game, 198 days after they opened camp, the Knicks gathered for another round of introductions, farewells and welcome-backs. They said goodbye to Rasheed Wallace, who announced his retirement Wednesday, after an aborted comeback from foot surgery. They said hello to Earl Barron, a 31-year-old journeyman, who took Wallace’s roster spot and will serve as an emergency center in the playoffs. And they welcomed back Quentin Richardson — a Knick for four seasons in a less glorious era — who returned to fill the vacancy left by Kurt Thomas last week. Then the Knicks sent a cast of backups onto the court for a 98-92 victory over the Atlanta Hawks, who also rested all of their starters. It was not your average Game 82 at Madison Square Garden. The Knicks’ priority was to rest their stars and get healthy for their first-round series against the Boston Celtics, which opens Saturday at 3 p.m. at the Garden. Even that goal proved elusive. Pablo Prigioni, their starting off guard, sprained his right ankle in the final minute of the first quarter and did not return. Iman Shumpert left the game with leg cramps in the fourth quarter. Chris Copeland hurt his left shoulder. Copeland said he felt the shoulder pop out and back in but assured, “I’ll be all right.” Image Quentin Richardson, signed by the Knicks on Tuesday, scored 5 points but shot 1 for 11 in his debut. Credit Jason Szenes for The New York Times Although Shumpert is apparently fine, Prigioni’s status is unclear. He left without speaking to reporters. After all the Knicks have gone through this season — losing Wallace and Thomas, playing long stretches without Carmelo Anthony, Raymond Felton and Tyson Chandler — every twinge was heightened. “It’s great that we all came out of there walking,” Shumpert said with a smile. It was a meaningless game for the Knicks (54-28), who had already locked up the second seed in the Eastern Conference. The Hawks (44-38) slipped to sixth, behind Chicago, and will open the playoffs against the Indiana Pacers. The Knicks’ attention now turns to the Celtics, whom they beat three out of four times this season. Both Chandler and Kenyon Martin are expected back for Game 1, after recovering from injuries. Chandler missed the final six games, and 16 of the last 20, because of a bulging disk in his neck. Martin missed the final five games after spraining his left ankle. Anthony, Felton and Jason Kidd were given the night off Wednesday. Prigioni and Shumpert were the only regulars in the starting lineup, with Barron, Copeland and James White. The night was more interesting for who was missing than who was in uniform. Anthony, Chandler, Kidd, Martin, Amar’e Stoudemire and Marcus Camby were nowhere to be seen — all of them presumably watching from the training room. Of the resting rotation players, only J. R. Smith (wearing a suit) and Felton (in uniform) sat courtside. Otherwise, the bench was nearly empty. Wallace, however, sat behind the bench and could be a fixture there during the postseason, despite his retirement. He is a trusted confidant of Coach Mike Woodson, who lured him out of a two-year retirement last fall. Woodson still wants Wallace around, for his wisdom and his locker-room influence. Image Chris Copeland led the Knicks, who used only seven players against the Hawks, with 33 points. Credit Jason Szenes for The New York Times “I like him around me,” Woodson said. “I like Rasheed, man.” The decision to retire was not entirely surprising. Wallace missed nearly the entire season because of a broken foot, and he lasted only 3 minutes 50 seconds in his attempted return Monday. Yet, in typical Knicks fashion, Wallace’s retirement was shrouded in mystery and misdirection. At the morning shootaround, Woodson told reporters Wallace was “day-to-day.” An hour later, the team issued a statement saying he had retired. Barron was already at the team’s headquarters in Westchester County, signing his new contract, a clear indication that team officials had planned for both transactions. Woodson declined to explain the discrepancy. “I’m not going to go into all of that,” he said before the game. “I mean, the bottom line is: He’s retiring. It doesn’t matter when it happened.” Neither Richardson nor Barron is likely to make the postseason rotation, although Richardson — a skilled 3-point shooter and defender — could be valuable as a spot player. The Knicks have been thin at shooting guard and small forward all season. Richardson, 33, had been out of the league since being cut by the Orlando Magic during camp. He was both surprised and thrilled to get the call from the Knicks, who signed him Tuesday. “It’s very exciting,” said Richardson, who played here from 2005 through 2009, when the Knicks averaged 28 wins. “I always knew this was the mecca of basketball. They have the greatest fans, even when I was here. We didn’t play that well, but when we played all right it got crazy. I’ve always been watching. They’re at the level they need to be in competing for a title.” REBOUNDS While sitting out, Carmelo Anthony clinched his first N.B.A. scoring title, with a final average of 28.7 points per game, ending Kevin Durant’s three-year streak as the league leader. Durant sat out Oklahoma City’s season finale, finishing with an average of 28.1 points per game. Anthony is just the second Knick to win a scoring title, joining Bernard King in 1984-85. ... The Knicks finished with their best overall record since the 1996-97 season, when they won 57 games. | Basketball;Knicks;Atlanta Hawks;Sports injury;Pablo Prigioni |
ny0195610 | [
"business",
"media"
] | 2009/10/05 | Style Magazines Like Arise Spring Up for African Women | Sub-Saharan Africa does not bring to mind an image of a woman with perfectly manicured nails flipping through glossy magazines in search of the latest handbag or celebrity haircut. Yet such women are there, and in far greater numbers than the news media’s portrayal of Africa might suggest. In the wealthy neighborhoods of Lagos, Nigeria; Nairobi, Kenya; Luanda, Angola; Dakar, Senegal; and the like, ladies of leisure, successful businesswomen and middle-income housewives make up an attractive demographic that, in the past, relied on international fashion magazines for style and beauty information. But in the last few years, while Condé Nast , Hearst and Hachette Filipacchi were expanding throughout Asia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East, a handful of African publishers were busy staking claims to this publishing territory. A result has been a series of new glossies, like Arise, HauTe, Helm and True Love, that put an African spin on fashion. “Honestly, upwardly mobile African readers are crying out for this magazine,” said Helen Jennings, editor of Arise, a monthly style publication started late last year by the Nigerian media tycoon Nduka Obaigbena, who also owns the country’s leading newspaper, ThisDay. “Because the local magazines aren’t as high-end or progressive, and no other international titles speak directly to an African readership, Arise has really caused a stir.” Among magazines in English-speaking Africa, Arise alone packages both pan-African and global content, producing a blend that Ms. Jennings calls “afropolitan.” With a reported circulation of about 60,000 and averaging about 140 pages a month, the magazine is distributed in seven other African countries and around Europe and North America. In its no-expense-spared fashion shoots, clothes by African designers are paired with global brands like Yves Saint Laurent, Loewe and Ralph Lauren using popular black international models like Oluchi Onweagba and Rahma Mohamed. Interviews with prominent black celebrities, like the singer-songwriters Akon and V. V. Brown, appeal to global advertisers. Tommy Hilfiger, Juicy Couture, Graff, L’Oréal and Lacoste are all represented in the magazine’s pages. And their prestige has helped pull in ads from fashion brands based in Nigeria, Ghana and Tanzania. But Arise’s embrace of glamour and celebrity is tempered by a nod to the underground and an appreciation of irreverent reporting. A recent issue included a saucy exposé of African WAGs (the British acronym for wives and girlfriends of soccer players) that appeared alongside quirky items about Ugandan skateboarders, a multimedia prodigy from Ivory Coast and the leather-wearing biker subculture that grew up in Soweto after apartheid. African publishing has progressed in recent decades, but some major obstacles to success still exist, including isolation from important business partners and underdeveloped distribution networks. Several of the African magazines have opened editorial headquarters in Europe or the United States to be closer to brand samples, top models, talent agencies, photo facilities and printing companies of a higher standard than most in Africa. Arise, for example, operates out of London, and Helm, an Ethiopian quarterly edited by Rahewa Yemane, is based in Washington. Although these locations help editors produce quality content, they also drive up prices, as the finished magazines must be shipped to African newsstands. (The cover price for Arise in global distribution is about $8.) While a financier’s deep pockets can be all that is needed to start a magazine, several factors, including market size, literacy and wealth, are needed to sustain it. Most of sub-Saharan Africa’s statistics in these categories are poor, but they sometimes belie the real potential. Literacy rates are low in many sub-Saharan countries, but parts of the population with enough disposable income to afford magazines have much better literacy rates than the national averages. Nigeria’s rate is higher than 70 percent, and Kenya’s is above 80 percent; both have become regional centers for publishing. Africa’s pockets of wealth also are often buried in gloomy macrostatistics. “In most sub-Saharan African countries, only 5 percent to 10 percent of the population is at the top of the income pyramid,” said Sakina Balde, an analyst for Africa and the Middle East at the market research firm Euromonitor International. “While this might seem insignificant, in highly populated countries like Nigeria, for example, it represents a large number of individuals.” According to 2008 data, 110,200 households in Nigeria had an annual disposable income of more than $75,000. And last year the country’s 150 million residents spent $750.4 million on newspapers, magazines, books and stationery. “Nigeria and Angola are both oil producers, and many people made a fortune in the oil industry or through various businesses,” Ms. Balde said. “High- and middle-income earners in these countries have an insatiable desire for luxury products, and this is not waning with the economic slowdown.” The continent’s wealth, though disproportionately concentrated, already is being spent by affluent Africans who shop in cities like London, Paris, Johannesburg and Dubai for luxury goods. Several luxury retailers and stores in London, for example, already count Nigerians among their top five spenders, trailing only Chinese, Russians, Americans and Arabs from the Persian Gulf. And in Lagos, new boutiques like Temple Muse and Leila Fowler are catering to the elite locally by stocking both international and African designer labels. “Some established designers like Deola Sagoe and the like have even been able to open flagship stores for their clients,” said Wadami Amolegbe, chief editor of HauTe, an independently published Nigerian fashion quarterly, and its sibling site Fashionafrica.com , which serves as a pan-African designer directory. Though Ms. Amolegbe says HauTe began as just a “pet project” after she returned to Lagos from New York three years ago, she said its combination of in-depth designer interviews and catwalk reports had been embraced by a loyal readership who are clued into international style and supportive of African labels, as well as understand that “fashion is more than just following trends.” She declined to disclose the magazine’s circulation; there is no central circulation audit service in Africa. The emergence of niche publications like HauTe and Helm does not presume that a fashion magazine sector in Africa will be big business just yet. Apart from South Africa, where editions of Elle, Marie Claire, Glamour and Cosmopolitan have been around for the better part of a decade, major international publishers continue to shy away from Africa. A Kenyan Cosmopolitan was tested in 2005, said Julia Raphaely, managing director of Associated Magazines, the Hearst partner in South Africa. But the company discontinued it, she said, “to focus our energy and efforts on our brands in this market.” Still, “certain African countries are starting to become interesting for international publishers,” according to Christine Scott, general manager of the International Federation of the Periodical Press, based in London. While Asia and Eastern Europe remain the most popular destination for the expansion of fashion magazine brands, several industry executives agreed that the current global downturn and the changing media landscape worldwide might make a wide open market like sub-Saharan Africa attractive after all. | Fashion and Apparel;Magazines;Shopping and Retail;International Relations;Africa;Conde Nast Publications Inc |
ny0251057 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2011/02/08 | J. Paul Getty III, 54, Dies; Had Ear Cut Off by Captors | J. Paul Getty III, who was a grandson of the oil baron once believed to be the richest man in the world and who achieved tragic notoriety in 1973 when he was kidnapped by Italian gangsters, died Saturday at his home near London . He was 54. His son, the actor Balthazar Getty, confirmed the death in a statement relayed in an e-mail from Laura Hozempa, one of his agents. Mr. Getty had been wheelchair-bound since 1981, when a drug overdose caused him to have a stroke that left him severely paralyzed, unable to speak and partly blind. At the time of his abduction, Mr. Getty was just 16 and living on his own in Rome, where his father, J. Paul Getty II, had, for a time, helped oversee the family’s Italian business interests. Expelled from a private school, the young Mr. Getty was living a bohemian life, frequenting nightclubs, taking part in left-wing demonstrations and reportedly earning a living making jewelry, selling paintings and acting as an extra in movies. He disappeared on July 10, 1973, and two days later his mother, Gail Harris, received a ransom request. No longer married, she said she had little money. [ ALSO READ: New Trailer: ‘All the Money in the World,’ Now With Christopher Plummer ] “Get it from London,” she was reportedly told over the phone, a reference either to her former father-in-law, J. Paul Getty, the billionaire founder of the Getty Oil Company, or her former husband, who lived in England . The amount demanded was about $17 million, but the police were initially skeptical of the kidnapping claim, even after Ms. Harris received a plaintive letter from her son, and a phone call in which a man saying he was a kidnapper offered to send her a severed finger as proof he was still alive. Investigators suspected a possible hoax or an attempt by the young Mr. Getty to squeeze some money from his notoriously penurious relatives. “Dear Mummy,” his note began, “Since Monday I have fallen into the hands of kidnappers. Don’t let me be killed.” The eldest Mr. Getty refused to pay the kidnappers anything, declaring that he had 14 grandchildren and “If I pay one penny now, I’ll have 14 kidnapped grandchildren.” His son said he could not afford to pay. Three months after the abduction, the kidnappers, who turned out to be Calabrian bandits with a possible connection to organized crime, cut off Mr. Getty’s ear and mailed it, along with a lock of his hair, to a Roman newspaper. Photographs of the maimed Mr. Getty, along with a letter in which he pleaded with his family to pay his captors, subsequently appeared in another newspaper. Eventually the kidnappers reduced their demands to around $3 million. According to the 1995 book “Painfully Rich: The Outrageous Fortune and Misfortunes of the Heirs of J. Paul Getty,” by John Pearson, the eldest Mr. Getty paid $2.2 million, the maximum that his accountants said would be tax -deductible. The boy’s father paid the rest, though he had borrow it from his father — at 4 percent interest. The teenager, malnourished, bruised and missing an ear, was released on Dec. 15; he was found at an abandoned service station, shivering in a driving rainstorm. Nine men eventually were arrested. Two were convicted and sent to prison; the others, including the man prosecutors said was the head of the Calabrian Mafia and the mastermind behind the abduction, were acquitted for lack of evidence. [ ALSO READ: Kevin Spacey Cut From ‘All the Money in the World,’ With Role Recast ] The aftermath of the ordeal left Mr. Getty as a reckless personality; the year after his release he married a German photographer whose name has been variously reported as Gisela Zacher and Martine Zacher. They lived for a time in New York, where they consorted with the art crowd of Andy Warhol . Mr. Getty became a drug user and a heavy drinker. His grandfather had died in 1976, and after his overdose, he sued his father for $28,000 a month to pay for his medical needs. Mr. Getty’s marriage ended in divorce. Beside his son, survivors include his mother, who cared for him after his stroke; a brother, Mark; two sisters, Aileen and Ariadne; a stepdaughter, Anna Getty; and six grandchildren and stepgrandchildren. Some time after Mr. Getty’s release, his mother suggested that he call his grandfather to thank him for paying the ransom, which he did. The eldest Mr. Getty declined to come to the phone. [ Subscribe to our Watching Newsletter for the Web’s Best TV and Film Recommendations ] | J Paul Getty III;Kidnapping;Balthazar Getty;Obituary |
ny0245801 | [
"business"
] | 2011/04/08 | Sarbanes-Oxley Audit Reforms Undermined by Secrecy | For the auditing industry, the financial crisis was really not that bad. While nearly every other group involved in the financial system — banks, mortgage brokers, bond rating agencies, derivatives dealers and regulators — faced severe criticism and new legislation, auditors largely escaped unscathed. There were, to be sure, a few discordant notes. The Lehman Brothers bankruptcy trustee blasted Ernst & Young for allowing Lehman to use a dubious accounting method to hide its leverage in the months leading to its demise, and the attorney general of New York filed fraud charges against Ernst. Robert Herz, then the chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, complained that auditors had allowed banks to violate the rules on off-balance sheet entities in order to hide assets and liabilities. But the Dodd-Frank law did nothing to the auditors. That was in sharp contrast to the previous round of scandals — the Enron and WorldCom accounting frauds that led to the enactment in 2002 of the Sarbanes-Oxley law. That law established the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to audit the auditors. With a second set of eyes looking over their shoulders, it was hoped, auditors would do a better job. While auditors may be doing a better job, that does not necessarily mean they are doing a good one. This week James R. Doty, the new chairman of the P.C.A.O.B., let loose a blast at the job the profession had done — and was doing. In a speech to the Council of Institutional Investors , Mr. Doty said the board had gone back and inspected the audits of many companies that later failed or were bailed out. “In several cases — including audits involving substantial financial institutions — P.C.A.O.B. inspection teams found audit failures that were of such significance that our inspectors concluded the firm had failed to support its opinion,” he said. That is, it should be noted, not the same as saying the financial statements were wrong. It is possible that the audit firm did not do enough work to know if the statements were accurate but that they would have been acceptable even to a proper audit. Moreover, as Mr. Doty noted, “Auditors were not charged with enforcing good risk management practices at financial institutions.” But they were supposed to make sure the statements reflected the conditions at the time. That appears not to have happened at Lehman Brothers, at least when it came to leverage, and it might not have happened at other banks. What’s worse, the problems seem to be continuing. In the wake of the financial crisis, no accounting issue has been more critical than the valuation of financial assets. In some cases, banks are now required to report the fair value — normally the market value — of securities they own. That is not easy for securities that rarely trade, and it was made all the harder by the complexity of some securities that Wall Street invented during the boom years. Banks claim, with some justification, that markets became unduly fearful at the height of the crisis, and that market values fell too low. Investors and regulators could, if they chose, make allowances for depressed markets. But they need to be able to compare banks with one another, and to do that they need to have confidence that financial statements are comparable. But the accounting oversight board does not think that has happened. In the board’s report of its 2009 inspection of PricewaterhouseCoopers, which concerns 2008 audits conducted at the height of the financial crisis, the board wrote that “in four audits, due to deficiencies in its testing of fair values of investment securities and/or derivatives, the firm failed to obtain sufficient competent evidential matter to support its audit opinion.” It had similar complaints about each of the other members of the Big Four — KPMG , Ernst & Young and Deloitte & Touche . Unfortunately for investors, the board has not revealed the names of any clients involved. Nor do the auditors appear to have gotten everything right in later audits, at least in Mr. Doty’s view. “Although the 2010 reporting cycle is not yet complete, so far P.C.A.O.B. inspectors have continued to identify significant issues related to the valuation of complex financial instruments, among other areas,” he said, adding that the “inspectors have also identified more issues than in prior years.” In 2002, when the auditing firms had been humiliated by audit failures, their efforts to prevent any regulation failed, but they did win one crucial victory in the details of the Sarbanes-Oxley law. The oversight board must keep secret its most critical assessments of audits unless a firm fails to respond to the criticism. And the board’s disciplinary actions remain secret until they are resolved by the board and the Securities and Exchange Commission has ruled on any appeal. It is as if the fact a man was suspected of robbing a bank had to be kept secret until after he was not only convicted but failed in his appeal. That secrecy was justified as necessary to protect reputations that could be tarnished by charges that might later be disproved. In practice, board officials complain, it has led to stalling tactics by firms that figure they can avoid negative publicity indefinitely. The board has asked Congress to change the law, but that seems unlikely. In his speech this week, Mr. Doty said that several precrisis audits were “the subject of pending P.C.A.O.B. investigations and may lead to disciplinary actions against firms or individuals,” but he of course gave no details. As a result, all firms are tarred, not just those the board thinks acted irresponsibly. To be fair, the accounting rules give the firms a difficult job in evaluating a bank’s estimate of fair value of securities that rarely trade. Banks have some flexibility in determining how to make those estimates, and the auditor is supposed to satisfy itself that the methods used are reasonable. The board makes it clear in the publicly released sections of inspection reports that banks use varying methods. As a result, even if every audit were done properly, there would be no assurance that the results would be comparable. One reason the board exists is that investors were shocked by disclosures in the Enron scandal that local auditors for Arthur Andersen — the fifth member, now defunct, of what was then the Big Five — had felt free to ignore advice on accounting standards from the firm’s technical experts, who worked in what is known in the industry as the national office. Other firms assured me at the time that nothing comparable could happen in their operations. But perhaps it can. In his speech, Mr. Doty quoted from two assurances given by auditors to clients, and discovered by board inspectors. He did not name either firm involved. One firm promised that the auditors on the scene would “support the desired outcome where the audit team may be confronted with an issue that merits consultation with our national office.” At least that firm seemed to leave open the possibility that the national office would prevail. Another pitch for audit work went further. It promised, Mr. Doty said, that audit decisions would be “made by the global engagement partner with no second guessing or national office reversals.” Abraham Briloff, a longtime professor of accounting at Baruch College and a critic of misleading accounting practices — and a man whose articles I had the honor of editing many years ago when I worked at Barron’s — used to tell a joke about a chief executive interviewing prospective auditors and asking, “What is two plus two?” The winner, he said, responded, “What number were you looking for?” Now it is board audit committees, not chief executives, who are supposed to hire auditors. But the fact that accounting firms thought such promises would help — and were willing to put the pitches in writing — is evidence that too little has changed since the accounting oversight board was established. One can hope most firms would never stoop that low to win business, and that most audit committees would summarily reject any firm that pursued such a course. But because board disciplinary actions can remain secret for years, we have no way of knowing which firm or firms have partners willing to make such offers, or which companies accepted them. | Accounting and Accountants;Sarbanes-Oxley Act;Public Company Accounting Oversight Board |
ny0251017 | [
"business"
] | 2011/02/08 | A Booked Hotel Room Is No Guarantee | ALLEN STEWART, a Dallas trial lawyer, says he is fed up with hotels that overbook and then turn away people who show up with guaranteed reservations. So he’s been collecting stories like this one: “Guy goes to a Web site to book a hotel across the street from where he has a conference over the next two days. His flight was delayed so he doesn’t get to the hotel till 11 p.m., and they tell him, ‘We’re sorry, we’re overbooked, but there’s a hotel six miles down the road where we’ll put you up.’ Guy says, ‘That’s a big problem because my early morning conference is right across the street.’ ” Resigned, the weary traveler arranges transportation to the hotel six miles down the road, where, Mr. Stewart says, he expects to stay both nights. “But no, they tell him he has to come back to the original hotel for the next night because they’re not overbooked then. “Man, was he hot.” Hot enough, evidently, to contact Mr. Stewart, who specializes in personal-injury law but has taken a special interest in hotel overbookings after being turned away at least a dozen times, by his own accounting, over the years. “That really bugged me,” he said. “Then, since it happened to me that much, I figured that chances are it’s systemic. And I found out that it is systemic.” He said he hoped that the stories he had collected might eventually become a class-action lawsuit against various hotel chains. Hotels that turn away guests with guaranteed reservations “claim to be in the hospitality business,” he said. “But where I come from, that’s not hospitality, that’s just good old-fashioned lying.” Hotel overbooking is common enough that most business travelers I know have encountered it. And with business travel picking up and the hotel business improving this year, we’re likely to be hearing more on the subject. “I travel a lot, and when I show up at a hotel with a guaranteed reservation, meaning they have my credit card, and I get, ‘Gee, Mr. Stewart, we’re overbooked,’ that hotel is not doing what I contracted for them to do — which is, I show up, you give me the room,” he said. I last wrote about overbooking in December, after hearing from disgruntled travelers who were turned away over the busy Thanksgiving week from the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in Manhattan. The Waldorf had offered alternative accommodations at nearby hotels to about 100 people who were “walked,” which is the industry term for the process. The Waldorf was overbooked because of an unforeseen, and probably unique, situation: it had to accommodate a contingent of Saudi Arabian officials who came to New York on short notice to accompany King Abdullah, who was seeking medical treatment. Among the turned-away guests were Linda and Michael Morgan, longtime Waldorf visitors who had reservations for four rooms, including three suites, for a family gathering that week. Instead of the Waldorf, they were offered rooms at the Hilton New York. “They assured us the Hilton was just as nice, but come on, there were people in the elevators at the Hilton carrying pizza boxes,” Mrs. Morgan told me in December. The Morgans wrote letters. Hilton Worldwide, which manages both the Waldorf and the Hilton New York, wouldn’t discuss the matter. But Mrs. Morgan recently contacted me to say that a Waldorf manager called after the column appeared to make amends. The hotel offered her and her husband four nights in the Waldorf Towers, the swankiest boutique section of the Waldorf-Astoria. She credits the Waldorf for the gesture. “At least they reached out,” she said. Many of the reader responses to that column were from people who, like the Morgans, spoke of the inconvenience of being walked and who did not think the alternate accommodations they were offered them were equal to the hotels they originally booked. “I realize that things happen and sometimes it is beyond the hotel’s control,” Peter Hoagland wrote. He recalled an occasion years ago when an overbooked major chain hotel in Midtown Manhattan turned him away and offered as an alternative, “a flophouse near Times Square that looked like something I had seen on ‘Cops.’ ” Since then, he said, “I have developed the habit of calling ahead,” to reduce the possibility of arrival surprises. Still, he added, hotels should immediately make things right and “not force the guest to mud-wrestle to get satisfactory compensation.” Mr. Stewart agreed. A hotel reservation that’s guaranteed with a credit card or otherwise prepaid is “an enforceable contract,” he said. Individually, the sums of money are relatively small. “It’s $100 here or $150 there.” But cumulatively, it adds up to a lot of money and a lot of inconvenienced travelers, he said. Hotels need to acknowledge that guaranteed reservations are contracts, just as airlines do when they overbook flights. “To me as a business traveler, the frustration of being turned away from a hotel is significant,” he said. “When you get to your hotel on a business trip, mentally, you are home in a way. Except when you get to an overbooked hotel, you are not home. You’re back on the road.” | Overbooking;Hotels and Motels;Business Travel;Waldorf-Astoria Hotel |
ny0250386 | [
"sports"
] | 2011/02/28 | For Girls on Wrestling Mat, an Uphill Struggle to Compete | BENNINGTON, Vt. — Holding the narrowest of leads, Rachel Hale kept the boy subdued on his hands and knees, then on his belly. Both wrestlers were 103 pounds of leverage and intent. She hooked her leg tightly around his, flattening his hips toward the mat, trying to turn him on his back and pin his shoulders, careful not to let him score decisive points by escaping or reversing positions or pinning her. The tiny gym was packed Saturday night, and the fans grew loud, as if the volume of their voices could hurry the clock toward history. Finally, the referee tapped Hale, a 15-year-old freshman, on the shoulder. She got to her feet and leapt jubilantly, and the referee raised her right arm. By a gripping 10-9 decision, Hale became the first girl in Vermont and the third girl in the nation ever to win a state wrestling championship while competing against boys, according to the United States Girls Wrestling Association . Her brother, Zak, a 17-year-old junior, won the 119-pound class after winning the 125-pound title last year. The school the Hales attend, Mount Anthony Union High, won its 23rd consecutive state championship. Vermont is a small state; only about 200 athletes from 25 high schools compete in wrestling. Still, Rachel Hale’s victory illustrated the growing success of girls, who have qualified for state tournaments in as many as 49 states and have placed among the top finishers in at least 10, said Kent Bailo, the director of the United States Girls Wrestling Association. Two Alaskan girls previously won state high school titles at 103 pounds while competing against boys: Michaela Hutchison in 2006 and Hope Steffensen in December . “Any girl could do this, too, if they’ve tried as hard as they could and stuck to their goal and worked at it every single day,” said Hale, who is also a varsity soccer player. “I wanted this so bad.” During the 2009-10 school year, more than 6,000 girls competed in high school wrestling , a 20 percent increase in four years, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations. The preciseness of the statistics depends on self-reporting, but, “I think literally every state but Pennsylvania has had a girl qualify for state,” Bailo said. Still, the number of female wrestlers remains comparatively small. In most states, high school girls compete against boys, who far outnumber them with more than 270,000 national participants. The issue of gender differences is a subtext in the rough contact of these matches. And one recent episode fostered widespread public debate. Hale’s victory came a week after a boy in the Iowa state tournament refused to wrestle against a girl, citing religious reasons. Cassy Herkelman and Megan Black became the first two girls to qualify for the state tournament in Iowa, where wrestling has a passionate following. The boy, Joel Northrup, forfeited to Herkelman rather than compete against her in the first round of the 112-pound weight class. “I have a tremendous amount of respect for Cassy and Megan and their accomplishments,” Northrup, the son of a minister, said in a statement. “However, wrestling is a combat sport and it can get violent at times. As a matter of conscience and my faith, I do not believe that it is appropriate for a boy to engage a girl in this manner. It is unfortunate that I have been placed in a situation not seen in most high school sports in Iowa.” Some criticized Northrup for being sexist or afraid of losing. But Cody Jolley, 16, a sophomore from Spaulding High in Barre, Vt., who was Hale’s opponent in Saturday’s championship match, said he respected Northrup’s decision. “I take my religion very seriously,” Jolley said. “I don’t blame him.” Jolley’s mother had mixed feelings about his competing against girls, and his grandfather was opposed, he said. He wrestled anyway, saying: “It’s my state championship. I’m not going to give it up.” Of Hale, he said: “She deserves to wrestle. It’s not like she didn’t earn it.” The United States Girls Wrestling Association said it was urging more states to join California, Hawaii, Tennessee, Texas and Washington in offering separate high school teams and championships for girls. This would help defuse gender conflicts, Bailo said, and would allow girls to successfully compete in upper weight classes, where they are at a greater disadvantage against boys because of differences in upper body strength. At the Vermont championships, 6 of the 144 competitors were girls, none above 119 pounds. If Hale were to gain 10 or 15 pounds, she might risk not reaching the state tournament again or even making her school’s varsity team, Bailo said. “I don’t know any girls competing over 160 and not many over 140,” Bailo said. “The boys beat them up; they get clobbered. It’s no fun.” Ann Goolman, 16, a wrestler from St. Johnsbury, Vt., said she might like a chance to compete in a girls division. “The focus would be more on moves,” she said. “You don’t like to lose just because someone is stronger than you.” But it is highly unlikely that separate teams will be offered in Vermont, wrestling officials said. “The numbers aren’t there,” said Mike Baker, the president of the Vermont Wrestling Coaches Association. “We have a hard time filling boys teams.” That is just as well with Rachel Hale, who said she preferred competing against boys . “The guys are a lot better wrestlers,” she said. She began wrestling at age 6, following Zak. By sixth grade, Rachel’s interest began to wane, but her father, Jon, who had wrestled in high school in Massachusetts, persuaded her to give the sport one more shot. Last year, as an eighth grader, Rachel won a New England middle-school championship and finished third in a national competition. This season, Hale reached the state high school tournament with a record of 44-8, and was the top seed at 103 pounds, not having lost to a wrestler from Vermont. In Friday’s quarterfinals, she pinned Goolman in 26 seconds. “She’s very aggressive and not intimidated,” Goolman said. In Saturday morning’s semifinals, Hale pinned Aaron Roucoulet, 17, of Rutland High School in 4 minutes 19 seconds. “I respect her more because she’s dominant in a male sport,” said Roucoulet, who lost to Hale several times this season. “She has the best technique of anyone I’ve wrestled at 103.” For Saturday night’s championship matches, about 1,100 spectators filled the gym at Mount Anthony Union. Banners and posters covered the walls. One said, “Rachel Hale 103, You Can’t Touch Her.” Lights dimmed except for four spotlights above the wrestling mat. During the season, Hale had pinned Jolley in less than a minute. As Saturday’s match opened, she dominated again. Her ponytail tucked inside her headgear, Hale quickly took down Jolley and rolled him on his back to take a 5-0 lead. Then she was careless on a cradle move , looping one arm around Jolley’s neck and the other between his legs but failing to properly lock her hands. He reversed positions and put her on her back, nearly pinning her shoulders to the mat, to tie the score at 5-5. In the second two-minute period, Hale was almost pinned again. She fell behind but executed a reversal move to go ahead, 10-9. Her mother closed her eyes, unable to watch parts of the match. Her brother said later that he seemed to sweat more for Rachel’s match than for his own. The final period became an edgy stalemate, Hale riding Jolley’s legs, skillfully avoiding any reprimand for stalling, trying to turn Jolley and pin him with a half nelson and an arm bar. Desperately, he tried to break free, needing only 1 point to force overtime, 2 to win. “I wanted to get up so bad, but she rides hard,” Jolley said. “I couldn’t catch a break.” Finally, time expired and Hale jumped into the arms of her coach, Scott Legacy, himself a former state champion at Mount Anthony Union. “I’m old school,” Legacy, 47, said of having a girl on his wrestling team. “This is new to me. But she’s a great kid. I see her as a wrestler, not a female.” | Wrestling;Women and Girls;Interscholastic Athletics;National Federation of State High School Assns;Hale Rachel;Vermont |
ny0106407 | [
"nyregion"
] | 2012/04/17 | In Schools Cut By New York City’s Ax, Students Bleed | New York City is filled with schools marked twice over for death. The Bloomberg administration long ago determined that its education revolution would occur at the edge of an ax. So far, officials have closed 140 schools, which they routinely describe as failing, and replaced them with smaller schools and charters, which they routinely describe as making “historic gains.” Perhaps this is so. But for tens of thousands of children who live in the purgatory of schools marked for closing, boasts of an education revolution bring little comfort. Last week, I talked with Juan Pagan, the parent association president at Legacy High School for Integrated Studies in Manhattan . This year, the city’s Panel for Education Policy, a public board as obedient to mayoral desire as any in the city, voted to begin the shutdown of Legacy, a process that takes years. Mr. Pagan described a school slowly bleeding out. Elective classes and after-school programs falling away. Favorite teachers seeking new jobs. But for his daughter, a 19-year-old senior in special education without enough credits to graduate, the most grievous recent loss was the social worker. “They say the school is shrinking, and the social worker was excessed,” he said. “The teachers are great, but, I mean, oh my God, that social worker was keeping her in school.” He talked faster. “I’m sorry; let me take a deep breath,” he said. “I want to know how you can shrink a school while so many kids are still inside of it.” Bloomberg officials can point to genuine accomplishments: more small schools, some beautiful new campuses and good principals freed to hire new staffs. They have usefully challenged the teachers’ union. But as the Working Group on School Transformation, a coalition of reform advocates, points out in a paper to be released Tuesday, the Bloomberg education record remains littered with failure, including startlingly low rates of graduation for black and Latino students, and the need for 50 percent of graduates to take remedial courses at four-year colleges. Asked about these problems, officials often pick up the war club. “Contrary to these misleading reports, a major study showed in January that because the city replaced large, failing high schools with new, small schools, our students have seen historic gains in graduation and college enrollment rates since 2002,” an Education Department spokesman, Matthew Mittenthal, said in a statement. “We refuse to go back on a strategy that has changed thousands of lives and given families better options simply because of a report with inaccurate data.” Education officials in fact pointed to few inaccuracies in the Working Group report, in no small measure because it draws on publicly available department data. And this is not a reflexively anti-Bloomberg band; one Working Group member, Carmen Fariña, served as a deputy chancellor under the former Chancellor Joel I. Klein . More to the point, the statistics tend to speak in their own grim language. The 23 schools marked for closing began this year weighed down with higher percentages of special education and over-age students than other public schools in New York. In there are strong students, but many more arrive at the front door with pitifully low math and reading scores. Many of these schools will, in their last years of existence, become gathering places for the forgotten. Homeless children, teenage parents, those struggling with English: it’s as if the department channeled the most troubled students to the most troubled schools. The administration decided to close Paul Robeson High School in Crown Heights, Brooklyn ; fully 13 percent of its students live in homeless shelters or in homes with more than one family. To live this reality is to feel the weight of impossibility weighing down. Joanne Frank, once the principal at Norman Thomas High School in Manhattan, retired 10 years ago. But she recalled when a previous administration closed two high schools. Within weeks, waves of students from those failed schools began washing up at her door. “The administration is depressed and angry, the teachers are depressed and angry, and the kids feel they failed,” she said. Back at Legacy High School, Keyla Marte of East Harlem has battled that fate. She’s fought to save her school. She plans to go to college and perhaps become a teacher. I listened to her bubble over with ideas. But in the end, even her hope sounds strained. “Our school,” she said, “is slowly fading away. You can say that, and it’s very sad.” | K-12 Education;Closings;NYC Department of Education |
ny0134901 | [
"business",
"worldbusiness"
] | 2008/04/29 | Europeans See Inflation Penalizing the Poorest | FRANKFURT — Europe is facing a “very strong inflationary shock” as a result of rising energy and food costs, the top European Union official for economic affairs said on Monday as the price of oil traded not far from $120 a barrel. The official, Joaquín Almunia, commissioner for economic and monetary affairs, said higher inflation was emerging as “a big punishment to the weakest sectors of society” eating away at the purchasing power of consumers who are struggling with stagnant incomes. His remarks came as the European Commission, the European Union’s year-round executive agency, revised its forecast for inflation this year to 3.2 percent, from 2.1 percent in 2007, well above the target of slightly under 2 percent that the European Central Bank aims for. In response, Mr. Almunia said that governments should change laws and regulations that keep prices high. European officials have said that these measures include fostering greater competition in services and keeping down administrative fees and sales taxes. “We need to be concerned not only because of economic reasons but also because of social reasons,” Mr. Almunia said, “and we need to ask the governments to step up their efforts of adopting structural reforms that can counter these inflation risks.” Commodity price increases, amplified by rising demand from fast-growing Asian economies, have contributed to higher inflation. On Monday, oil touched a high in New York trading of $119.40 a barrel, settling at $118.75, after a weekend strike closed a pipeline that delivers crude oil to British refineries from the North Sea and violence reduced production in Nigeria. Mr. Almunia acknowledged that inflation was biting hard in Europe because many incomes had not risen as much in the current economic upswing as in past expansions, amplifying a feeling of being squeezed. “The disposable income of households is not increasing as much as in previous recoveries,” he said, “and this means wage increases have not increased so far as much as in previous recoveries.” The European Central Bank has inflation, which reached a 3.6 percent annual pace in March, firmly in view, as required by its mandate. The bank’s president, Jean-Claude Trichet, said Monday in Vienna that it would set interest rates based on “no other considerations than the delivery of price stability in the medium term.” In recent weeks, the tough stances of several senior bank policy makers on inflation has contributed to a broad impression that at least some officials are itching to raise interest rates as soon as tension eases in the financial markets. Many economists say that the strength of the euro, which helps keep import prices down, has probably helped curb any rush by the bank to increase borrowing costs. “There is no doubt in my mind that without the financial crisis, and maybe the strong euro, they would have long since hiked rates,” said Erik Nielsen, chief Europe economist at Goldman Sachs in London. Like central bankers, Mr. Almunia has frequently cautioned against wage settlements that incorporate these price rises into pay scales because they increase the chances that companies will pass the costs along to consumers, fueling an inflation cycle. But he cited Germany as one country where rising wages should bolster consumer spending after years of relying on exports for growth, a development that would help spur growth across Europe. The commission predicted Monday that European economic growth would cool somewhat this year, to 1.7 percent in the 15-nation euro zone, down from the 2.2 percent it forecast in the autumn. The euro zone economy grew 2.6 percent in 2007. Mr. Almunia also said that the strong euro, which so far has shown little sign of pinching European growth, would eventually affect, and be amplified by, a weaker world economy. The euro settled in New York Monday at $1.5645, below its record just over $1.60, but is probably still overvalued, he said. | European Union;Prices (Fares Fees and Rates);Economic Conditions and Trends;Almunia Joaquin |
ny0049683 | [
"world"
] | 2014/10/05 | In Golan, Imagined Risks Become All Too Real | EIN ZIVAN, Golan Heights — The updates poured in by two-way radio and cellphone as Tomer Lahav’s pickup sped around this kibbutz near Israel’s cease-fire line with Syria one recent evening. Mortar shells were falling on Ein Zivan. A car broke through the nearby Quneitra border crossing. Two armed infiltrators killed, 20 residents injured, a child — or was it two? — missing. Mr. Lahav, head of the kibbutz’s civilian security team, dragged his 14-year-old son across a grassy plaza, though his knee wound, like the rest of it, was imagined, as part of a training exercise. “Razi, climb into the back,” his father told him. “I have to take you to the ambulance.” The drill was the most intense anyone here could recall, after weeks in which real fighting in Syria had repeatedly spilled across the fortified fence. A worker at a winery on the kibbutz was nearly paralyzed by a tank shell, Ein Zivan’s orchards were hit several times and seven recent alarms ordered the 300 residents to seek shelter from incoming fire. Israel’s quietest frontier for four decades, the Golan Heights is now seen by some experts as its most volatile and unpredictable. Syrian insurgents, some aligned with Al Qaeda, have seized border villages, along with the crossing at Quneitra, and the United Nations forces that patrolled the demilitarized zone have mostly evacuated their posts . Late last month, Israel shot down a Syrian plane that entered its airspace. As an American-led coalition targets the Islamic State with airstrikes, Israelis are waiting, warily, for what seems like an inevitable escalation near, if not on, their turf. The military at the end of 2013 added a new division focused on the growing threat. Now, local tourism is in trouble and people are increasingly on edge. “The sky has become cloudy, more black or gray,” said Eyal Ben-Reuven, a retired major general with experience in the area. “It’s like a huge bottle with gas surrounded by candles. You just need to push one candle and everything can blow up in a minute.” The military would not provide details about the events it calls “zligah” — Hebrew for “spillover” — other than to say there have not been more than 100. A senior official in the new division, speaking on the condition of anonymity under military protocol, said the chief concern is how Israel’s 1974 cease-fire agreement with Syria would be upheld “if there’s no sovereign military on the other side.” “Now we’re planning for a different type of threat,” he explained, “the terror and Islamic extremist threat.” Analysts here believe that the myriad fighting forces in Syria are, at this point, uninterested in engaging Israel. But they also know that the Nusra Front, the Qaeda-affiliated group controlling towns in sight of Israeli territory; Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militia backing the Syrian Army; and the Islamic State, also called ISIS, all consider Israel an illegal occupier of the Golan. Even a mistake — an errant shell that kills a family on a hike — could set off a conflagration. “I can’t say that I am afraid 24 hours a day, but today I don’t have any security of what the other side can decide to do against me,” said Udi Arnon, who has been living in Ein Zivan since 1972 and lately keeps a flashlight by his bed. “This is a crazy paradox: You have a big wall; on one side they fight and kill each other, and the other side you have the flowers and the birds and the children laugh. I can’t sleep quietly.” Israel captured the Golan, a strategic plateau of lush hills, from Syria in 1967. After the 1973 war, it returned a small section, which became the United Nations-patrolled zone. Israel and Syria remain technically at war, and the world does not recognize Israel’s 1981 annexation of the 444-square-mile area. The Jewish population has doubled to 30,000 in the past 20 years, most people drawn not by ideology but by financial incentives, stunning landscapes and rural quiet — the last two now punctured by an imposing high-tech border fence and the soundtrack of steady shooting beyond. There are also about 22,000 Druze, a native sect that mostly shuns Israeli citizenship. For the Druze, the developments in Syria have direct repercussions. Apple farmers are unlikely to be able to export to Syria through Quneitra this year, which Asaad Safadi, a warehouse manager, estimated would reduce the annual $100 million market by about $7 million. Hundreds of Druze usually attend university in Damascus; this year it is “tens,” according to Salman Fakhreldin, a local activist. At the Valley of Tears, a 1973 battle site, two middle-aged men stood on an old Israeli bunker with binoculars trained on the billows of bomb smoke. They declined to give their names for fear it could hurt their relatives on the Syrian side, but said they come every day to watch the war. The latest fighting, the men said, has been in a government-controlled village at 1 o’clock from the lookout point; the insurgents have the villages at 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock. Recently, the men added, the opposition seemed to have replaced its pickup trucks with motorbikes to race along the road by the fence. At another lookout, atop Mount Bental, a group of Christians from Norway held hands in a circle and prayed for the destruction of the Islamic State. (“Stop them, Lord; stop them and crush them.”) Nearby, other tourists practically tripped over two members of the United Nations Truce Supervision Office, who have planted their telescope on Bental since abandoning their post on the Syrian side after Nusra insurgents kidnapped other international observers . For Israeli Jews, the situation has all but erased the debate over giving back the Golan to make peace with Syria, something that came close to happening as recently as 2010 . Imagine, people said over and over in interviews, if that deal had gone through, and Nusra or Islamic State insurgents were near the Sea of Galilee rather than across a deep valley in the Golan. Golan residents are steadfast about staying, but unease is seeping in. Giora Chepelinski said visitors to his chocolate factory, who provide 40 percent of its revenue, were down about 75 percent this September from last. On Monday night, only one of Ein Zivan’s 48 guest rooms was occupied.Many spoke of the situation as surreal: The August day the winery here was hit, a midwife from Ein Zivan helped deliver the baby of a Syrian woman, one of more than 1,300 refugees treated in Israel since April 2013. Mr. Lahav, the kibbutz security chief, said his budget was doubled this year, and that Ein Zivan and the state spent another $50,000 to turn an old bomb shelter into a modern “war room” with closed-circuit cameras, cots and a closet full of machine guns. Israeli soldiers regularly join Ein Zivan’s apple-pickers now to boost confidence, and Mr. Lahav does three to five patrols daily rather than one. It is hard to be a bystander to someone else’s war, said Mr. Lahav, who dismissed the word “zligah” — spillover — as “political.” “It hurts exactly the same if somebody meant to shoot at you or didn’t mean it,” he said. “But our response is not the same.” Last week’s drill started with live-ammunition sharpshooting for the 22-man security team, including a 58-year-old poultry worker, a man who makes insoles and the driver of a tour jeep who said he had a single client in the past two months. Hours later, they were combing the kibbutz alongside soldiers to mock-ensure all the residents were accounted for. As they huddled over maps between houses, the familiar sound of shooting erupted not far away. “That’s real,” Mr. Lahav said. “That’s not training.” | Golan Heights;Israel;Syria;ISIS,ISIL,Islamic State;Hezbollah;Military |
ny0145572 | [
"business",
"mutfund"
] | 2008/10/12 | Finding Depth in Small Rosters | A DEBATE rages among mutual fund managers about concentration. The dispute has nothing to do with orange juice or the ability to focus the mind. Instead, it turns on the right number of stocks to put in a portfolio. A fund with few stocks is considered concentrated and may be able to deliver higher returns than a more diversified competitor. But the performance of a concentrated fund may be dragged down by a big drop in any one stock or a handful of them. With few holdings, the fund sacrifices some of its risk protection; a few bad bets can sink it. There is some safety in numbers. Three top-performing funds in the third quarter favored a concentrated approach, and it served them well in a whirligig market. For the quarter, they beat not only many of their peers but also the Standard & Poor’s 500 index, which lost 8.4 percent, including reinvested dividends. But as the fourth quarter began, the entire market remained highly volatile. Domestic or Offshore William C. Nygren and David G. Herro usually hold about 20 stocks in Oakmark Global Select I , which invests about half of its assets in the United States and half abroad. The average mutual fund holds about six times as many stocks. Global Select is only two years old, but Mr. Nygren and Mr. Herro have managed other Oakmark funds for at least a decade each. Managers who pick stocks, rather than mirror indexes, need to concentrate their funds to raise returns and justify their fees, Mr. Nygren said. Index-fund investors get the market’s return, minus a few tenths of a percentage point, and pay low fees. If people pony up more for a fund, they should have the potential to make more money, he said. His and Mr. Herro’s fund aims to offer that partly through its small number of holdings. “If you think you can add value, then the more names you add, the more you potentially dilute that value,” he said. Mr. Nygren cautioned that the fund, because of its concentration, makes sense only for investors who have made efforts to diversify their total portfolios by, say, holding stakes in several different funds. “This shouldn’t be the only fund you own,” he said. The fund’s approach means it necessarily bets big on each holding. One that powered its return in the quarter — Capital One Financial, the credit-card giant — accounted for 3.7 percent of the portfolio on June 30, the most recent data available. The company’s shares returned about 35 percent in the third quarter and were spared the battering that much of the financial sector has endured. This year through Sept. 30, they returned about 10 percent, versus losses by other consumer financial companies. “One of the things we’re seeing in the market’s decline is the separation of longer-term winners and losers,” Mr. Nygren said. “As investors think ahead, Capital One is one of the main players in the credit-card market,” which so far hasn’t seen the losses that the mortgage business has. Oakmark Global Select I lost money for the quarter, down 3.7 percent. But because many funds were swooning, that return still put it on the list of top performers among international stock funds. Branching Out Samuel D. Isaly, manager of Eaton Vance Worldwide Health Sciences, had the good luck to specialize in a sector — health care — that to some extent resists a tough economy. For many years, Mr. Isaly, who has run this fund since 1989, invested almost exclusively in pharmaceuticals and biotech. But he branched out after seeing weak returns in those sectors for several years. About two years ago, he began adding medical device makers to the fund, which held 37 stocks as of June 30. “We’d suffered in drugs and biotech, and this gave us some expanded capacity,” he said. Device makers like Covidien and LifeCell aided the fund’s third-quarter return, which was 7.4 percent. Investor interest in mergers and acquisitions also contributed to the gain. Mr. Isaly held big stakes in Genentech and ImClone Systems, and both rose after becoming acquisition targets. Roche Holding bid for Genentech, while Eli Lilly agreed to buy ImClone. Takeover activity ticked up in July, with more deals that month than in the first six months of the year, he said. A Bet on Home-Building Chuck L. Myers, manager of Fidelity Small Cap Value , doesn’t concentrate his portfolio as much as Mr. Isaly or Mr. Nygren and Mr. Herro do — the fund held 78 stocks at the end of June. Even so, that was about half as many as it had when Mr. Myers took over the fund in May. The fund returned 6.9 percent in the third quarter. To thrive amid the market’s recent chaos, he made counterintuitive calls, investing in home-building and, indirectly, commercial real estate. Both sectors have slumped of late. His largest holding at the end of June was HNI , a maker of office furniture and fireplaces. Meritage Homes, a builder, stood in his top 20. “If you go back to June of this year, many of the home builders were trading as if they were going to go bankrupt,” he said. Despite hard times, that seemed unlikely for the ones with sturdier balance sheets. “Home builders’ assets are land, homes under construction and homes built,” he said. “To get to the share prices they were trading at, you had to rate their land values at zero.” Later, some of the stocks returned to the more reasonable levels that Mr. Myers expected. “Meritage Homes was a stellar performer,” he said. “It’s gotten back to a value where the land isn’t at zero.” Portfolio concentration can hurt as much as it helps, as Mr. Myers learned last year at the other Fidelity fund he oversees, Small Cap Retirement. There, he bet heavily on American Reprographics , a document manager for the construction industry, committing about 10 percent of the fund’s assets to the stock. A drop in the shares sapped the overall return of that fund, which lagged behind its index last year. He said the experience taught him to temper risk-taking. These days he shies away from pouring too much money into a single stock. “My biggest bets are now about 3 percent of the fund, and the smallest are about 1 percent,” he said. “That 3-to-1 ratio is a great insight that I got out of that experience. It’s about how much more confident you are in your best idea versus your worst idea; 10-to-1 was overconfident on my part.” | Mutual Funds;Stocks and Bonds;Finances;Economic Conditions and Trends |
ny0170524 | [
"us"
] | 2007/02/16 | Maryland: Woman Sentenced in Prostitution Conspiracy | A Germantown woman was sentenced in federal court in Baltimore to two years in prison for her role in transporting several hundred prostitutes from New York and New Jersey to work in Maryland . From April 2003 to November 2005, federal prosecutors said, the woman, Rosibel Aparicio Jandres, 45, and others picked up the prostitutes on Monday mornings and dropped them off at 15 apartments and houses in Gaithersburg, Langley Park and Wheaton, where they worked as prostitutes for a week at a time. Six co-defendants, including Mrs. Jandres’s husband, Manuel Jandres, and her sister, Olinda Aparicio, have also pleaded guilty. Another defendant, Jair Francis of Langley Park, was convicted in December of conspiracy to transport women for prostitution and other charges. | Prostitution;Sentences (Criminal);Maryland |
ny0183732 | [
"business"
] | 2007/12/23 | How to Avoid Recession? Let the Fed Work | THE economy is teetering on the edge. Many economists, as well as online betting sites, put the risk of recession next year at about 50 percent. Once we get the final numbers, we might even learn that a recession has already begun. The question on the minds of many in Congress and in the White House is this: What they should be doing now to keep the economy on track? The right answer: absolutely nothing. This advice isn’t easy for politicians to follow. Because economic downturns mean fewer jobs and falling incomes, they are painful for many families. Voters can confuse inaction with nonchalance and send incumbents packing. But just as patients should avoid doctors who recommend radical surgery for every ailment, voters should be wary of politicians eager to treat every economic ill. Sometimes, bed rest and wait-and-see are the best we can do. Congress made its most important contribution to taming the business cycle back in 1913, when it created the Federal Reserve System . Today, the Fed remains the first line of defense against recession. The Fed’s control over the money supply is a powerful lever to move overall demand for goods and services. When its trading desk buys bonds and expands the money supply, it lowers interest rates and encourages the private sector to borrow and spend more. The influence of interest rates on the economy is particularly strong in housing, where buyers are rate-sensitive. Because housing woes are the source of the current slowdown, the Fed’s tool kit is well suited for the task at hand. The recession-fighting effects of monetary expansion, however, are not limited to the housing market. When lower interest rates make fixed-income investments less attractive, investors turn to the equity market and bid up stock prices. Higher stock prices, in turn, make consumers wealthier and more eager to spend. They also make it easier for corporations to expand their businesses with equity financing. By making United States bonds less attractive to world investors, lower interest rates from a monetary expansion also weaken the dollar in currency markets. A depreciation of the currency is not in itself to be feared. Treasury secretaries often repeat the mantra of favoring a strong dollar, but these pronouncements are based more on public relations than hard-headed analysis. A weak currency is a problem if it results from investors losing confidence in an economy. The most damaging cases are the episodes of sudden capital flight, as occurred in Mexico in 1994 and several Asian countries in 1997. This outcome is unlikely for the fundamentally sound American economy, but fear of it is one reason that Treasury secretaries maintain public fealty to a strong dollar. But if a weakened currency comes about because the central bank is trying to stimulate a lackluster economy, the story is very different. In that case, depreciation is not a malady but just what the doctor ordered. A weaker currency makes domestic goods more competitive in world markets, promoting exports and bolstering the economy. The dollar’s falling value is one reason exports of goods and services have grown more than 10 percent in the past year. The Fed constantly monitors all these developments to ensure that the economy has the stimulus it needs, but not too much. William McChesney Martin, the Fed chairman in the 1950s and 1960s, famously joked that the Fed’s job is “to take away the punch bowl just as the party gets going.” As the economy flirts with recession, we need to remember that this aphorism has a flip side. The Fed also has the job of spiking the punch with grain alcohol when the party starts to flag, and that is exactly what it has been doing. The Fed has cut its target for the benchmark federal fund rates to 4.25 percent from 5.25 percent last summer. It is a good bet that we will see further cuts over the next few months. And if the chance of a recession turns into a real recession, you can count on it. Admittedly, monetary policy can sometimes use an assist from fiscal policy. If an economic downturn is deep, if a recovery is anemic or if the Fed is running out of ammunition, Congress can help raise aggregate demand for goods and services. In 2003, the Fed had cut its target interest rate all the way to 1 percent, the economy was still suffering from the lingering effects of recession, and there were increasing worries about deflation. A tax cut was a good complement to monetary expansion to get the economy going again, even though it increased the budget deficit. Today’s situation is different. The Fed has plenty of room to cut rates further, if it deems such cuts necessary. At the moment, recession is only a possibility, and inflation is a bigger worry than deflation. In this environment, there is no need for a short-run fiscal stimulus. Congress is better off focusing on longer-term problems, like the looming entitlement crunch or fundamental tax reform. (But don’t hold your breath.) IN creating the Fed, Congress wisely made it a technocratic institution free of many of the political pressures that accompany other policy decisions in Washington. Subsequent experience in the United States and abroad confirms that more independent central banks lead to better economic outcomes. That’s why, in recent years, many nations have passed reforms to insulate central banks from politics. The Fed’s independence was created by statute and could just as easily be taken away. The Fed is now coming under heat for not having prevented the subprime crisis, for not fully anticipating it once it was inevitable, and for not responding more vigorously now that it has occurred. Daniel Gross, a financial journalist writing for Slate, has gone so far as to liken the Fed and its chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, to FEMA and its erstwhile head Michael Brown. The truth is that the current Fed governors, together with their crack staff of Ph.D. economists and market analysts, are as close to an economic dream team as we are ever likely to see. They will make their share of mistakes, but it is too easy to find flaws when judging with the benefit of hindsight. The best Congress can do now is to let the Bernanke bunch do its job. | Recession and Depression;United States Economy;Federal Reserve System;Economic Conditions and Trends |
ny0067894 | [
"sports",
"football"
] | 2014/12/29 | The Best of Week 17 in the N.F.L. | J. J. Watt strengthened his candidacy for the N.F.L.'s Most Valuable Player award in helping the Texans finish a winning season by topping the Jaguars. Watt had three sacks and a safety and forced a fumble. Watt, a defensive end who scored five touchdowns this season, smiled as the sellout crowd in Houston chanted: “M.V.P.! M.V.P.!” Watt would be the first defensive player to be named the M.V.P. since the Giants’ Lawrence Taylor in 1986. DeMarco Murray and Dez Bryant broke franchise records as the Cowboys routed the Redskins. Murray ran for 100 yards on 20 carries, passing Emmitt Smith for the team’s single-season rushing mark. Murray’s 1,845 yards bettered Smith’s 1,773 from 1995. Bryant caught scoring passes of 65 and 23 yards to give him 16 touchdown receptions on the season, breaking Terrell Owens’s team record of 15, set in 2007. Chiefs linebacker Justin Houston had four sacks in a win over the Chargers to break Derrick Thomas’s franchise record, finishing the season with 22. Thomas had 20 in 1990, his second season in the N.F.L. The Bills earned their first winning record in 10 seasons, at 9-7, by beating the Patriots. The victory came with an asterisk, however: New England used quarterback Tom Brady only during the first half and held out six other starters. Playoff Schedule: Wild-Card Round All times Eastern • Arizona at Carolina, 4:35 p.m. Saturday, ESPN • Baltimore at Pittsburgh, 8:15 p.m. Saturday, NBC • Cincinnati at Indianapolis, 1:05 p.m. Sunday, CBS • Detroit at Dallas, 4:40 p.m. Sunday, Fox | Football;Houston Texans;Dez Bryant;DeMarco Murray;J. J. Watt;Dallas Cowboys |
ny0232170 | [
"world",
"americas"
] | 2010/08/02 | Brazil’s President Offers Asylum to Woman Facing Stoning in Iran | SÃO PAULO, Brazil — President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has called on Iran ’s president to send an Iranian woman facing execution by stoning to Brazil , where she would be granted asylum. “If my friendship and affection for the president of Iran matters, and if this woman is causing problems there, we will welcome her here in Brazil,” Mr. da Silva said on Saturday in Curitiba while campaigning for his former chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff. “Nothing justifies the state taking someone’s life,” he added. “Only God can do that.” His statement was an about-face. National and international campaigns on the Internet and via Twitter had failed to convince Mr. da Silva to intervene in the case of the woman, Sakineh Ashtiani, 43, who was convicted of adultery although she denied having had an “illicit relationship” with two men. The Brazilian president, who has forged a close relationship with his Iranian counterpart, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, over the past year, said earlier last week that Iran’s laws needed to be respected. But an adviser said Sunday that Mr. da Silva had a change of heart after reflecting more on Ms. Ashtiani’s case. “He listened to his conscience and was moved by her story,” the adviser said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. Still, the adviser said, Mr. da Silva was wading into “turbulent waters,” since this marked the first time he has risked appearing to be meddling in Iran’s domestic affairs. Previously, the Brazilian president had pressured Mr. Ahmadinejad to free foreigners whose human rights treatment was in question, but he had never sought to interfere in cases in which Iran’s laws were applied to its own citizens. Ms. Ashtiani’s case has attracted international attention from many people concerned about Iran’s human rights record. In Brazil, Mr. da Silva was subjected to almost a month of public protests with slogans like “And Now, Lula?” and a document that drew 114,000 signatures, including those of Brazilian celebrities like the musician Chico Buarque and former President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Folha newspaper reported. Many people have expressed concerns about the country’s warming ties with Iran . In May Mr. da Silva spearheaded an unsuccessful effort to head off more United Nations sanctions against Iran when he helped negotiate a deal to send parts of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium abroad for further processing. | Iran;Brazil;Da Silva Luiz Inacio Lula;Rousseff Dilma |
ny0003099 | [
"world",
"europe"
] | 2013/04/03 | Britain: Critics Challenge Official to Try Living on Welfare | Opponents of a raft of welfare changes that took effect this week want a government minister to put his money where his mouth is, and live on £53, about $80, a week, the amount one welfare recipient said he had left after paying for housing and heat. Asked on national radio on Monday whether he could get by on so little, Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith replied, “If I had to, I would.” By late Tuesday afternoon, about 300,000 people had signed a petition urging him to prove it. | Great Britain;Iain Duncan Smith |
ny0183808 | [
"business"
] | 2007/12/15 | Report Says That the Rich Are Getting Richer Faster, Much Faster | The increase in incomes of the top 1 percent of Americans from 2003 to 2005 exceeded the total income of the poorest 20 percent of Americans, data in a new report by the Congressional Budget Office shows. The poorest fifth of households had total income of $383.4 billion in 2005, while just the increase in income for the top 1 percent came to $524.8 billion, a figure 37 percent higher. The total income of the top 1.1 million households was $1.8 trillion, or 18.1 percent of the total income of all Americans, up from 14.3 percent of all income in 2003. The total 2005 income of the three million individual Americans at the top was roughly equal to that of the bottom 166 million Americans, analysis of the report showed. The report is the latest to document the growing concentration of income at the top, a trend that President Bush said last January had been under way for more than 25 years. Earlier reports, based on tax returns, showed that in 2005 the top 10 percent, top 1 percent and fractions of the top 1 percent enjoyed their greatest share of income since 1928 and 1929. The budget office report takes into account a broader definition of income than tax returns that is known as comprehensive income. It includes untaxed Social Security benefits, welfare, food stamps and part of the value of Medicare benefits, giving a fuller picture of incomes at the bottom than tax data. Much of the increase at the top reflected the rebound of the stock market after its sharp drop in 2000, economists from across the political spectrum said. About half of the income going to the top 1 percent comes from investments and business. In addition, Congress in 2003 cut taxes on long-term capital gains and most dividends, which advocates said would encourage people to turn untaxed wealth into taxable income. Some economists have said that the increase in incomes at the top is illusory and is in good part simply converting untaxed assets into taxed income to take advantage of reduced tax rates. The Congressional Budget Office report made no attempt to explain the increases in income in its annual report on effective federal tax rates paid by people at different income levels. Asked how much of the increase at the top was from the tax cuts rather than market gains, Peter R. Orszag, the budget office director, said, “I can’t give you an answer to that because we just don’t know.” Chris Frenze, Republican staff director for the Congressional Joint Economic Committee, said the increase in top incomes is much more modest if viewed over longer time periods. Since 2000, he said, the average income of the top 1 percent has risen $97,900, or 6.7 percent, the same percentage increase this group had from 1992 to 1997. Jared Bernstein , an economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington who characterizes the Bush administration’s policies as YOYO economics, based on You (Are) On Your Own, said the differences in income growth explained why so many Americans have told pollsters that they are feeling squeezed. “A lot of people justifiably feel they are working harder and smarter, they are baking a bigger and better pie, and yet their slice is not growing much at all,” Mr. Bernstein said. “It is meaningless to middle- and low-income families to say we have a great economy because their economy looks so much different than folks at the top of the scale because this is an economy that is working, but not working for everyone.” At every income level Americans had more income, after adjusting for inflation in 2005 than in 2003, but the increases ranged from almost imperceptible for the poor to modest for the middle class and largest for those at the top. On average, incomes for the top 1 percent of households rose by $465,700 each, or 42.6 percent after adjusting for inflation. The incomes of the poorest fifth rose by $200, or 1.3 percent, and the middle fifth increased by $2,400 or 4.3 percent. The share of all federal taxes paid by the top 1 percent grew, but only slightly more than half the rate of their growth in incomes because of the tax rate cuts. The top 1 percent paid 27.6 percent of all federal taxes in 2005, up from 22.9 percent in 2003, while the share paid by the middle fifth of taxpayers declined to 9.3 percent from 10 percent in 2003. The share of their income that the top 1 percent paid in all federal taxes and in income taxes fell. The total tax rate dropped 1.8 percentage points, to 31.2 percent, from 2003 to 2005 while their average income tax rate declined one percentage point, to 19.4 percent, largely because of the cuts in taxes on capital gains and dividends. | Income;Economic Conditions and Trends;United States Politics and Government;Taxation;Congressional Budget Office;Economic Policy Institute;Bush George W;Bernstein Jared |
ny0129496 | [
"sports",
"basketball"
] | 2012/06/09 | Liberty Win Third Straight With Victory Over Washington | Cappie Pondexter scored 25 points, and the visiting Liberty took control with a 30-5 first-half run and survived a frantic fourth quarter to beat Washington for their first road victory of the season. Leilani Mitchell hit four 3-pointers and scored 16 points for the Liberty, winners of three straight after opening the season 0-5. Crystal Langhorne led the Mystics (1-5) with 24 points. | New York Liberty;Basketball;Washington Mystics;Women's National Basketball Assn |
ny0236506 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2010/06/05 | Deng Was Said to Have Approved Bloodshed at Tiananmen | BEIJING — The former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping ordered the military to try to limit injuries when it moved against Tiananmen Square protesters 21 years ago, but told it to be ready to “shed some blood” if necessary, according to an unpublished diary said to document internal decisions that led to the violent crackdown. The death toll from the military action against the protesters, which occurred on June 4, 1989, remains in dispute. Official estimates at the time said 200 protesters had died; some rights activists place the toll at 1,000 or more and say 70 to 300 Tiananmen protesters remain in prison. The diary, covering about nine weeks before and after the military action, is said to have been written by Li Peng, China’s prime minister at the time and an ally of conservatives in the Chinese leadership. A Hong Kong publisher, New Century Press, plans to release the 279-page manuscript as a Chinese-language book on June 22. The same publisher caused a sensation in May 2009 by issuing the secret memoirs of Zhao Ziyang , the Chinese Communist Party leader who opposed using force against the Tiananmen protesters and was ousted by his rivals after the military crushed the protests. Mr. Zhao, who spent the rest of his life under house arrest, secretly recorded his memoirs on cassettes that were later smuggled out of China. Mr. Li, who is today a retired but influential party elder, was said to have wanted to publish his work in 2004, on the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen protests, but was discouraged by Chinese leaders. Bao Pu, the Hong Kong publisher of both works, said in a telephone interview on Friday that he had received the diary attributed to Mr. Li from an unidentified source, and so could not guarantee its authenticity. The diary and 34 accompanying photographs appeared to have been photocopied from a printer’s galley, he said. Mr. Bao said he was unable to contact Mr. Li, now 81 and reportedly in ill health, to verify the contents. But he said a detailed study of the work convinced him and other experts that Mr. Li was the author. A Hong Kong magazine, Asia Weekly, reported the existence of a Li Peng memoir with identical details in 2004, one year after Mr. Li retired from his last official posts. “I still think it’s real, and it’s really presentable,” Mr. Bao said. A complete copy of the manuscript was not immediately available. But The South China Morning Post, based in Hong Kong, which reported Friday that it had obtained a copy of the manuscript, said Mr. Li wrote in a foreword dated Dec. 6, 2003, that he felt bound to record what had happened “to serve as the most important historical testimony” about Tiananmen. The diary appears to hold no major surprises. Mr. Deng publicly supported military action to end the protests at the time. But it provides a glimpse of the thinking of one of the leaders at the center of the decision-making. The newspaper said Mr. Li wrote that the protesters had threatened to send China into a new era of political upheaval akin to the chaos into which Mao periodically plunged the nation. “From the beginning of the turmoil, I have prepared for the worst,” the newspaper wrote, quoting an entry dated May 2, 1989. “I would rather sacrifice my own life and that of my family to prevent China from going through a tragedy like the Cultural Revolution.” That comparison ignores the fact that the Cultural Revolution was orchestrated by Mao to undermine rival leaders he felt were insufficiently devoted to his revolutionary agenda. The analysis attributed to Mr. Li is also at odds with that of Mr. Zhao, who contended that the students wanted reform, not revolution. In the diary, the newspaper reported, Mr. Li states that he began to take issue with Mr. Zhao days after the protests began in April 1989. But according to a prologue by Wu Guoguang, a scholar at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, the diary makes clear that Mr. Deng, not Mr. Li, led the drive to crush the demonstrations and oust Mr. Zhao. “This book has clearly revealed that Deng was the proposer and decision maker of enacting martial law in parts of Beijing in 1989,” Mr. Wu wrote. “And he gave the final approval to the ‘ground clearing’ operation in Tiananmen Square on June 3.” Mr. Deng, who died in 1997, never detailed his role in the decision-making in 1989. Other historical accounts have said that he, Mr. Li and several other hard-line leaders pressed for tougher action to put down the protests. Bao Tong, a senior aide to Mr. Zhao who was imprisoned after the Tiananmen protests, said Friday that he welcomed publication of the diary, although Mr. Li’s view of the crisis was at sharp odds with his own. “There’s an old saying in China: If you hear widely from all the sources, your doubts of the situation will very soon clear up,” he said. Most Chinese will not have that opportunity because Mr. Zhao’s memoir is not legally available on the mainland, and the diary attributed to Mr. Li also seems certain to be banned. “But the world has entered into an era of information,” said Mr. Bao, the father of Bao Pu, “and with the spread of the Internet, there can be no monopoly on the truth.” | Tiananmen Square (Beijing);Deng Xiaoping;Demonstrations and Riots |
ny0041855 | [
"world",
"asia"
] | 2014/05/27 | India: Train Crash Kills at Least 40 | An express train plowed into a parked freight train in northern India on Monday, killing at least 40 people and reducing cars to heaps of torn and twisted metal, officials said. The Gorakhpur Express passenger train was traveling at high speed and slammed on its brakes in an attempt to stop but hit the train sitting on the tracks near a railway station in the state of Uttar Pradesh, a district official said. The Indian authorities said that it was too early to say what had gone wrong and that they were investigating every possibility, from mechanical failure to human error. | Train wreck;India |
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