| Atlanta | 1 2 0 1—4 |
|---|---|
| Montreal | 1 1 1 0—3 |
First Period_1, Atlanta, Peverley 9 (Enstrom, Bogosian), 6:20. 2, Montreal, Plekanec 12 (Wisniewski, Weber), 17:56 (pp). Penalties_Gomez, Mon (hooking), 1:55; Sopel, Atl (holding stick), 17:36.
Second Period_3, Atlanta, Kane 13 (Cormier, Thorburn), 5:42. 4, Montreal, Subban 3 (Hamrlik, Gomez), 10:25 (pp). 5, Atlanta, Ladd 13 (Enstrom, Bergfors), 19:44. Penalties_Antropov, Atl (roughing), 2:42; …
Government documents obtained by The Associated Press show extensive efforts since 2000 to remove vast amounts of waste and contaminants from Plum Island, site of top-secret Army germ warfare research and decades of studies of dangerous animal diseases.
Yet some environmentalists remain concerned about the secrecy surrounding the 840-acre, pork chop-shaped island off northeastern Long Island _ and they're dubious of any claims that pollution has been remedied.
"We are highly concerned that when the government acts alone they may not be doing the best job," said Adrienne Esposito, executive director of the Citizens Campaign for the Environment. …
In Detail:
Santaris and Enzon To Develop RNA Antagonists
Enzon Pharmaceuticals Inc.and Santaris Pharma A/S have agreed to co-develop and market a series of RNA antagonists based on Santaris's locked nucleic acid technology. Enzon will license two of Santaris's compounds and six other proprietary RNA antagonist candidates to combat oncology targets selected by Enzon. Santaris will have commercialization rights in Europe. Enzon will retain development and commercial rights in the US and other nonEuropean territories.
Nostrum Licenses Protein from Indian Research Institute
Nostrum Pharmaceuticals Inc. has acquired a worldwide license agreement from the Institute …
He was once untouchable.
Eliot Spitzer barreled into the New York governor's office barely 11 months ago riding a record-setting wave of popularity. Time magazine had named him "Crusader of the Year" when he was attorney general and the tabloids proclaimed him "Eliot Ness," after the FBI agent who put mobster Al Capone in prison for tax evasion.
The "Sheriff of Wall Street" who had made corporate titans cower, then pay up for their misdeeds, was going to take the same no-nonsense approach to fixing one of America's worst state governments.
But then he got to work, and has had but a handful of good days since. At the …
It's a D.C. property so exclusive that even the president-elect couldn't reserve it. So who's staying at Blair House, the White House's guest quarters across Pennsylvania Avenue?
Turns out it's former Australian Prime Minister John Howard, according to The Washington Post.
Even Howard is only staying one night: Jan. 12, the night before President George W. Bush will present him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his support in the Iraq war. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe are receiving the honor as …
HENDERSON, Nev. - Michael Tylo Jr., son of soap opera star Hunter Tylo, has died in a swimming pool accident. He was 19.
He was pronounced dead just before midnight Thursday at a home in the Las Vegas suburb of Henderson, authorities said. The cause of death was listed as accidental drowning, according to the Clark County coroner's office.
Hunter Tylo stars on CBS' "The Bold and the Beautiful." The 45-year-old actress was in Los Angeles at …
Serbian authorities are investigating a church-backed drug rehab facility after the publication of a video showing one of the patients being beaten with a shovel and brass knuckles.
The Health Ministry said in a statement Friday that it has dispatched an inspection team to investigate methods used at the Crna Reka (Black River) rehabilitation center in southern Serbia, which is run by Serbian Orthodox Church priests. Government human rights monitor Sasa Jankovic said he has filed torture charges against the facility.
The rehabilitation center _ located on the grounds of the Crna Reka monastery _ has been known for its strict methods, isolated location and …
IRVING, Texas Exxon Corp. said Friday that Rene Dahan, a 29-yearveteran of the company, will become president of Exxon Co.International, following the abduction and slaying of formerpresident, Sidney Reso.
Dahan, 50, has been executive vice president of ExxonInternational since March, 1991. The subsidiary, based in FlorhamPark, N.J., is responsible for oil and gas operations, exceptexploration, outside North America.
Dahan, who was born in Morocco, joined Exxon in 1963 at itsrefinery in Rotterdam, Netherlands. He later became …
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. businesses added to their stockpiles for a 20th consecutive month in August while sales rose for a third straight month. The increase suggests businesses were confident enough in the economy to keep stocking their shelves.
The Commerce Department says business inventories increased 0.5 …
President Nicolas Sarkozy dismissed his labor minister and reshuffled several other Cabinet posts Monday after leftists walloped his conservatives in France's regional elections _ a defeat that exposed his inability to convince the public on his economic reforms.
Labor Minister Xavier Darcos lost his job after being soundly defeated in his election bid in the western Aquitaine region. Twenty of Sarkozy's Cabinet members ran for regional posts, and all lost. Budget Minister Eric Woerth was to step in for Darcos on Tuesday.
The election blowout Sunday could hand a new opening to Sarkozy's potential presidential rivals _ from IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn in …
ALAMOGORDO, N.M. (AP) — An Alamogordo man can keep his controversial billboard along the city's main thoroughfare — for now, a state district judge has ruled.
Judge James Counts wants to schedule a full hearing in the case since it concerns freedom of speech and the right to privacy, the Alamogordo Daily News reported Friday. He made the decision during a hearing Thursday.
Greg Fultz, 35, put up the billboard in May. It shows him holding the outline of an infant. The text reads, "This Would Have Been A Picture Of My 2-Month Old Baby If The Mother Had Decided To Not KILL Our Child!"
The woman has taken Fultz to court for harassment and violation of privacy.
Counts' call for a full hearing comes after Fultz appealed an earlier decision that he immediately take down the billboard.
"The court has to weigh and balance at this point the potential infringement of constitutional rights," Counts said.
"The right to free speech has been generously regarded by the U.S. Supreme Court and other courts. Until we have a full hearing, I don't feel comfortable infringing upon that."
Fultz said he was pleased with the judge's ruling.
While Counts has yet to schedule a hearing, Fultz's contract with the billboard company will expire Aug. 15.
His attorney, Todd Holmes, said there has been some discussion about possibly extending the contract. He added Counts' ruling is a "good victory in our First Amendment battle."
Fultz contends the billboard is about fathers' rights.
"I feel the message has got out," he said. "The only reason it's become viewed as a personal attack is because the other side has made it that way."
The woman's attorney, Ellen Jessen, had no comment after the hearing.
While it was unclear if the woman had an abortion or a miscarriage, Jessen said previously that the central issue was her client's privacy and the fact that the billboard has caused severe emotional distress.
___
Information from: Alamogordo Daily News, http://www.alamogordonews.com
Wheels for the World: Henry Ford, His Company, and a Century of Progress, 1903-2003. By Douglas Brinkley. New York: Viking, 2003. xxii + 858 pp. Photographs, index, notes, bibliography. Cloth, $34.95. ISBN o-oyo-osiSi-X.
By Mira Wilkins
The one hundredth anniversary of the founding of the Ford Motor Company in 2003 has encouraged new studies of the corporation's history. Allan Nevins and Frank Ernest Hill's Ford, a history in three volumes (published in 1954,1957, and 1962), had its genesis in the fiftieth anniversary celebrations. My book, American Business Abroad: Ford on Six Continents, coauthored with Hill, appeared in 1964. While much was written before these studies appeared, and a good deal has been published subsequently, there is clearly a need for a carefully updated history. Indeed, for a number of years, the Ford Motor Company had discussed with various scholars the possibility of a sequel to the Nevins and Hill volumes. The company contributed an immense amount of money for historian David Lewis to prepare such a history, but his book never materialized.
In 1992, Douglas Brinkley, a prolific U.S. historian (who would succeed the late Stephen Ambrose as director of the Eisenhower Center in New Orleans), was approached by the company to take on this project. Brinkley countered with a proposal to prepare a single-volume business and social history of the Ford Motor Company. he received a sizable advance from his publisher to do so. The Ford Motor Company gave Brinkley access to archival data, albeit Brinkley found that the oral history collections "proved to be [his] most indispensable primary source material" (p. 831). And the book is greatly enriched as it draws on these reminiscences.
This is an enjoyable, readable, and absorbing book. Roughly twothirds of it covers the era of the first Henry Ford. A mere 150 pages deal with the period that begins where the account by Nevins and Hill (and Wilkins and Hill) leaves off. Thus the bulk of the book tells a familiar story and tells it very, very well. This is a "good read." The importance of Henry Ford and his company emerges, as does the fascination of Henry Ford the man. Ford's role in "originating the universal car, in using productivity as a means of increasing wealth of all, and in letting the assembly line set the pace of a modern economy" (p. 514) is never obscured by details of his personal foibles. The creation of Ford Motor Company "was a reflection of what was essential to the man" (p. 519). Ford's achievement was in "thinking big.... Henry Ford was a futurist.... he brought imagination to the business world" (p. 521). Yet, this is no "powder puff" history; throughout, Brinkley's Henry Ford is a plausible, completely rendered individual, with a dark side as well as a heroic one.
Brinkley also focuses on the personality of Henry Ford's son, Edsel, whom Brinkley greatly respects. Brinkley attempts to analyze Edsel's role in shaping the company. In a chapter entitled "Model Y: The Ford Americans Never Knew," I anticipated an examination of the company's strategies on the international stage; most of the chapter, however, is not on the car model designed for the British (and continental European) markets, but rather contains a digression on the artist Diego Rivera and Edsel Ford.
In 1945, when the twenty-eight-year-old Henry Ford II (grandson of the founder) became president, the company had fallen into an abysmal state. Edsel, Henry II's father, had died two years before; his elderly grandfather would die in 1947. The story of the company's remarkable resurgence under young Henry is, once again, a familiar one, well told by Brinkley, although his presentation contains little new material. Indeed, none of his splendidly written account of events prior to 1960 adds anything substantive to the voluminous literature on this company, which, as Brinkley approvingly points out, was described at the time of its fiftieth anniversary as having had "the greatest influence of all time" (p. 557).
Henry Ford II died in 1987, at the age of seventy. From 1945 to the start of the 19805, he was the dominant figure in the company's history. he and the men to whom he delegated authority transformed the Ford company into a modern corporation. At the time that he took over its corporate leadership, the firm had sunk to number three in the U.S. industry, trailing behind General Motors and Chrysler. Ford brought in experienced executives from GM and set out to replicate his rival's managerial model. GM became the template for Ford Motor Company's strategic policies in all spheres, both domestic and international. By 1960, however, there was a recognition in Dearborn that "Ford could no longer move forward simply by copying the GM model" (p. 565). The company had been reborn and had reclaimed its position as number two in the industry. The top executives who had been hired away from GM were nearing retirement; a new cadre of men, known as the "Whiz Kids," recruited by Henry Ford II and closer to him in age, were assuming leadership positions. From this point, Brinkley takes up the story where Nevins and Hill left off.
The Whiz Kids enjoyed a short period of partial hegemony in the 19605: Robert McNamara, one of this group, was president for less than two months before going to Washington as John F. Kennedy's secretary of defense; next came John Dykstra (not a Whiz Kid), who filled in as president from 1960 to 1963 and in turn was followed by Whiz Kid Arjay Miller. At decade's end, "Bunkie" Knudsen (from GM) spent a brief time in leadership, to be succeeded by Lee Iaccoca, who served as president from 1970 to 1978. By the late 1970s, Philip Caldwell had risen to prominence, and then in the 19803 and 1990s, Donald Petersen, "Red" Poling, and Alex Trotman. In 1999 the company came full circle, when forty-one-year-old William clay ("Bill") Ford Jr. (the great-grandson of Henry Ford and nephew of Henry Ford II) became chairman. all the while, this modern corporation was family controlled. The board chose Jacques "Jac" Nasser as president and chief executive officer, an appointment that lasted two years; in October 2001, Bill Ford Jr. himself assumed the lead position at Ford. The company he took over remained number two in the U.S. automobile industry. By then, however, there were only two domestically owned automobile producers (in 1998 Chrysler had become DaimlerChrysler, part of a German multinational enterprise); Japanese companies that manufactured cars in the United States had become important competitors. In 2003 the American-and indeed the world's-automobile industry was very different from the one that existed in 1960.
The section of the book covering the last forty to fifty years of Ford history is disproportionately, and disappointingly, brief. It is impossible to do justice to the era in the limited space the author has allotted to these decades. Part of the problem may lie simply in Brinkley's decision to prepare a one-volume company history and to devote most of its pages to the well-known aspects of the story, rather than to the new ones. When writing about the post-World War II years, Brinkley continues to focus on personalities, largely through interviews, oral history reminiscences, and journalists' renditions of events. (Brinkley had access to some of the interviews David Lewis had conducted with Henry Ford II in the 19803.) Brinkley's narrative reveals the highs and lows of the company's history, although not in the context of American economic history nor of American, much less global, automotive-industry history. Thus, while carefully attending to the company's attempt to match GM in the 1950s, Brinkley missed significant changes that occurred in the entire industry. Absent from his book are data on American demographics in that decade: on the initial impact of the babyboom generation; on the growing number of American children; on station wagons; and, most important, on the expanding size of American basic car models. American cars had lost their competitive edge in world markets. As Brinkley does point out, in 1957, for the first time since the early twentieth century, U.S. car imports exceeded exports. And this situation persisted. The book features little on the post-World War II revival and expansion of European car output and how this development affected Ford (because its exports were not competitive in world markets, Ford would have to expand its foreign production in order to reach those markets). Brinkley never discusses "captive" imports; indeed the term (which refers to separating out intracompany sales) is not introduced. In 1959, when imports exceeded 10 percent of U.S. sales, American companies responded with compact cars. Ford's entry was the Falcon. Imports plunged. Not until 1968 did imports again exceed 10 percent of the American market. When Brinkley considers the late 19603 and 19705, he fails to appreciate the new role of imports and overlooks the impact of enlarged global production on the domestic industry. Ford's activities as a multinational enterprise are badly shortchanged. And there is no discussion of either the U.S. Trade Expansion Act of 1962 or the strong dollar in the late 19605.
The continuing rise in imports into the United States during the 19705 is only partly explained. Neither Ford nor the rest of the American automobile industry understood the emergence of the Japanese automobile industry, and Brinkley does not analyze the Ford company's reaction. The problems of the 19703, including newly elevated oil prices and the revised regulatory structure, compounded by lax quality control, drove the U.S. domestic automobile industry into retreat. The contracts signed in the 19505 and 19605 with the United Auto Workers (UAW) created special difficulties for Ford, but Brinkley does not elaborate on them. Between 1980 and 1982, Ford showed major losses. Although we are told that the key managers responsible for the company's subsequent recovery had had experience in Ford's European operations, Brinkley's treatment of Ford in. Europe (much less in the rest of the world) continues to be too cursory. There is no discussion, for example, of the impact of the United Kingdom's entry into the European Economic Community (in 1973) and the success of the European Union. The reader is told that by about 1994, "after at least six different incarnations, Ford's 'international' operations disappeared, in effect, to be replaced by one company sending ideas and cars throughout the world" (p. 719). I tried to find an account of these incarnations, in vain. The reader does not have a clue as to what this last change entailed.
In 1989, Americans purchased more Honda Accords than any other car; about 60 percent of them were made in the United States. How did Ford react? We discover only that Ford's new Taurus model was able to bump the Honda Accord to second place in 1992, and the Taurus, as a single model, remained number one through 1996 (p. 727). Obviously, to meet the competition from imports and, more critically, from the Japanese transplants (which are not discussed), the Ford company began to pay attention to product quality improvements. However, Ford's experience with the new manufacturing processes is not discussed. The book refers to EI (employee involvement), but not to PM (participatory management). We do not learn when, where, and to what extent Ford adopted (and adapted) Japanese methods of lean production, just-in-time procedures, team activities, and total quality control-or about their impact on Ford's productivity. Nor are we told how much assistance Ford supplied to Mazda's management in the mid-igcos, when Ford acquired a substantial interest in this Japanese enterprise.
In the Epilogue, which reviews the events of 2002 and looks into the future, Brinkley indicates that, following the lead of Toyota and Honda, Ford "is also on the verge of creating a revolutionizing new flexible vehicle assembly system for its North American operations" (p. 763). The "flexible plants" will have "modules, built from a select group of components." This is described as a completely new system. Does this represent the first such Ford venture in this direction, or the "next generation" of flexible manufacturing systems? Surely, Ford had experimented with these "newer" manufacturing methods in prior years. If not, why not? A book about Ford, published in 2003, ought to include a discussion of the application of statistical quality control to manufacturing. It ought to tell the reader about "modules" and "platforms," and it should describe the appropriate software applications for design, purchasing, production, and distribution. It certainly ought to explain "cost centers."
In my view, Brinkley does not adequately cover the application of modern management methods as a response to the Japanese competition. he is okay on products, but not on processes. Nor is his treatment of the Ford-UAW relationship adequate. What was the impact of Walter Reuther's death in a plane crash in 1970? UAW contracts are not discussed, nor are job-classification rules; similarly, the cost implications of Ford's pension obligations are never spelled out. Despite Brinkley's attention to personalities, I came away with little sense of Henry Ford IFs contribution; a recent history of the company's activities in Europe, by contrast, shows that that he was very involved in Ford's European plans (see Hubert Bonin, Yannick Lung, and Steven Tolliday, eds., Ford, 1903-2003: The European History].
Brinkley never mentions the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) and its profound influence on the Ford company's strategies. Likewise, no reference is made to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the breakup of the Soviet Union, or the entry of China into the World Trade Organization (WTO). Brinkley does document some of the Ford company's strategies for diversifying, both domestically and internationally, in response to the new global competition during the 19805 and 19903: in 1985, Ford bought First Nationwide Bank; in 1987, Hertz became a partially owned affiliate, and in 1994, a fully owned one (Brinkley is silent about Hertz's international business); in 1987, Ford acquired the British car company, Aston Martin; in 1989, Jaguar was brought into the fold; in 1996, Ford enlarged its earlier interest in Mazda (expanding its holding in the company enough so that it could make a difference in the company's management); in 1999, Ford purchased the passenger-car division of Volvo; and in 2000, Ford took over Land Rover. And then, in 1999-2000, the company entered into a range of Internet-related joint ventures. These were dramatic acquisitions, calling for new strategies. At the same time, from 1999 to 2000, following a pattern that GM had adopted, Ford spun off its automotive-parts business, renaming it Visteon. The new Visteon, at origin, was an international business (it was the second largest radio manufacturer in the world and the largest in Europe).
The material on Ford Motor Company in the decades since 1960 has not been presented by other authors as a unit and thus is new, but the rendition of these years is too thin. Worse still, it is unfortunate that Brinkley, who has written on diplomatic history, fails to place Ford's business in a global context. he recognizes the importance of international business to the firm, yet, just as in the earlier parts of the book, so in this segment on the past forty years, the treatment of Ford's role as a multinational enterprise is scant. Aside from the omissions I have already noted, there is nothing at all, for example, on the company's activities in post-World War II Brazil or Argentina.
When I put down Brinkley's volume, I wondered about the next one hundred years. While Bill Ford Jr. is seen by some as young and inexperienced, one must keep in mind that his uncle took over when he was only twenty-eight. Bill Ford appears to have vision. Who knows, he may preside over the age of hydrogen fuel cells. he does not appear to be resistant to change. And, if history is any guide, he will make mistakes, but he will survive and keep the company intact. There will be revitalized product lines and innovative manufacturing processes that offer new flexibility, lower changeover costs, and, ideally, renewed attention to quality control. Ups and downs notwithstanding, undoubtedly the Ford company has a future.
[Author Affiliation]
Mira Wilkins is professor of economics at Florida International University in Miami. Her field of expertise is the history of multinational enterprise. Her most recent book, The History of Foreign Investment in the United States, 1914-1945, will be published in the spring of 2004 by Harvard University Press. In 2003 she published a retrospective on her 1964 book about Ford Motor Company abroad in Ford, 1903-2003: The European History (edited by Hubert Bonin, Yannick Lung, and Steven Tolliday).
When Jon Stoner opens the blinds to a front window in his home "it's a piece of heaven," he says. Acres of ponderosa pine trees stretch into the distance, staggering up a mountain and bringing a sense of calmness to the area northeast of Flagstaff.
With an 10,000-acre (4,047-hectare) wildfire burning nearby, Stoner is unsure how much of that scenery will remain in tact. As he evacuated his home Sunday, he looked out that same window and saw flames shooting up above the trees.
"That's scary," he said from a shelter where a community briefing was held a day later. "It moves fast."
The combination of high temperatures, low humidity and strong winds have challenged firefighters on the ground and in the air. Sustained winds of up to 20 mph (32 kph) with gusts of more than 30 mph (48 kph) grounded heavy air tankers Monday.
Fire crews battling the so-called Schultz fire were focused Monday on protecting homes in the fire's path by digging trenches, clearing out dry brush and spraying them down. The flames reached the back yards of some homes while coming within a few hundred feet (meters) of others, said incident commander Dugger Hughes. No structures have burned.
"The homes are looking very secure right now," he said.
Residents of several hundred homes remained under evacuation orders.
The fire is believed to have been started by an abandoned campfire, and authorities were looking for anyone who might have more information. The fire is burning in rough terrain, consuming ponderosa pine, mixed conifer and dry brush.
Hughes said crews would fly over the area early Tuesday morning to get a better idea of the perimeter and of spot fires.
Flagstaff, a mountain town of about 60,000, is a popular place for tourists and home to Northern Arizona University. A ski resort and snowfall lure visitors during the winter. Moderate summer temperatures provide an escape from more intense desert heat during the summer.
Areas just north of Flagstaff that are under evacuation orders are a mix of upscale, manufactured, ranch-style and second homes that sit at the foot of the mountains and beyond.
Summaries Saturday from the English Premier League football games (home team listed first):
Aston Villa 4, Bolton 2
Aston Villa: Gabriel Agbonlahor (25 67), Kevin Davies (40 o.g.), Ashley Young (78).
Bolton: Johan Elmander 17, Kevin Davies 86.
Attendance: 35,134.
Liverpool 2, Hull 2
Liverpool: Steven Gerrard (24, 32).
Hull: Paul McShane (12), Jamie Carragher (22 o.g.).
Attendance: 43,835.
Manchester City 0, Everton 1
Everton: Tim Cahill (90).
Attendance: 41,344.
Middlesbrough 1, Arsenal 1
Middlesbrough: Jeremie Aliadiere (29).
Arsenal: Emmanuel Adebayor (17).
Attendance: 27,320.
Stoke 0, Fulham 0
Attendance: 25,287.
Sunderland 4, West Bromwich Albion 0
Sunderland: Kenwyne Jones (22, 24), Andy Reid (40), Djibril Cisse (47).
Attendance: 36,280.
Tottenham 0, Manchester United 0
Attendance: 35,882.
Wigan 3, Blackburn 0
Wigan: Emile Heskey (10), Antonio Valencia (12), Lee Cattermole (77).
Attendance: 18,003.
Frederick B. Friestedt, 86, a construction manager and a memberof the Sons of the American Revolution, died Tuesday in the VeteransAffairs Hospital in North Chicago.
He was an Illinois state president and national vice presidentof the organization.
Mr. Friestedt was involved in building projects including MarinaCity, the University of Illinois at Chicago and the NorthwesternMedical Center.
He was born in Chicago, attended the Latin School and graduatedfrom Colgate University in New York. He served in the Army in WorldWar II and was a volunteer at the VA hospital in North Chicago. Heresided in Lake Forest.
He is survived by a son, Bradford; two daughters, Lynn Steffenand Christina; 10 grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren.
Private services and burial will be today.
VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday lamented the deaths and humanitarian crisis caused by the fighting in Libya between forces loyal to longtime strongman Moammar Gadhafi and those demanding his ouster.
"My heartfelt thoughts go out to Libya, where recent clashes have caused many deaths and a growing humanitarian crisis," Benedict said in his first public comments on the fighting in the north African country.
"To all the victims and to those who find themselves in situations of anguish, I assure my prayers and my closeness, while I call for aid and help for the stricken populations," the pope said.
Last week, the pope was briefed at the Vatican by the head of the U.N. World Food Program on the crisis on the Libyan-Tunisian border, where tens of thousands of Egyptian and other immigrant workers have been massing after fleeing Libya.
DAILY MAIL STAFF
"I never expected to do this," said Carrie Newcomer.
"At junior high school career day, itinerant folk singer wasnever on the list." But a folk singer she is, booked Saturday atthe Cultural Center Theater for Friends of Old-Time Music and Dance(FOOTMAD).
And where does she live? Not New York or Boston or Nashville, butBloomington, Ind., a "wonderful little jewel."
Newcomer, raised in northern Indiana, moved to Bloomington in1990 to be closer to her mother, "just for a year."
"I just fell in love with this musical community, and I'm stillhere," she said during a phone interview from her home.
"When people ask, 'Why aren't you in one of the music meccas?' Itell them that when you come right down to it, this is a wonderfullittle jewel. I've come to appreciate the voice that comes out ofthose places that aren't the music meccas. It has a voice all itsown, a very strong, powerful voice."
Newcomer grew up in Elkhart, Ind., where most of America's bandinstruments are made. "As a result, the public school had a greatmusic program. I played the flute and thought, 'Wow, I really likethis, this is cool.'
"Then I picked up the guitar in high school and fell in love withthe singing poets such as Joni Mitchell and Bruce Coburn. And Istarted singing in coffee houses, restaurants and bars while I wasin college."
But visual arts, not music, was her major at several Indianacolleges and at Purdue University, where she received her visualarts degree.
"But music was really calling louder," said Newcomer, whocontinued to tour regionally while raising a young daughter, Amelia.
"You follow your heart, it takes you where you need to go."
Also a poet, Newcomer writes both lyrics and music.
"I am a personal writer," she said, "but there is a line betweenpersonal and self indulgence which I try to never cross. I've triedto write about something very human, with honesty and respect. Iwrite about relationships, romantic, or maybe a family relationship,or spiritual or political. I write about things I'm happy about,things I grieve over, things I'm not proud of, or things I'm veryproud of.
"I don't censor it, which probably connects me to the folkworld," she said, quoting Ani DeFranko: "Folk is an attitude."
"The great thing about this genre of music is that you can end upanywhere - folk clubs, intimate coffeehouses, halls, wonderful oldtheaters, art centers or Carnegie Hall. Six years ago I played theRoyal Festival Theater in London, and a few months later I was inSan Antonio in a place where they push over the couch and you play.
"You're in very close contact with people, there's no insulationthat way. It can be exhausting, but incredibly energizing.
"This country is an amazing place. Every area has its ownpersonality and you really experience that when you travel. WestVirginia is not like Arizona.
"I did Mountain Stage in West Virginia a couple of months ago,"she said of her October appearance at Concord College in Athens.
While Newcomer usually writes alone, she averages onecollaboration per album.
"Collaborating is like kissing. With some people it really worksand some people it doesn't."
The latest collaboration, "When It's Gone It's Gone," is with herhusband, Robert Meitus, both a musician and a lawyer specializing inInternet and music law.
Saturday's program is billed as "The Bloomington Women" and alsowill feature Vida, an all-woman a capella quartet.
Vida began seven years ago on Indiana University's Bloomingtoncampus as a class project and has become a career for its fourmembers - Moira Smiley, Sarah Ferrell, Jessica Lewis and StephanieHerdman.
"We haven't performed together in a long time, except for abenefit last year," said Newcomer.
"It will be fun. Vida is just wonderful."
Concert time is 7:30 p.m., with tickets available at the doorbeginning at 6:30 p.m. Cost is $12 for adults, $10 for seniors andstudents, and free to those under 13. Free child care also will beavailable.
Advance tickets are on sale at Ellen's Ice Cream on CapitolStreet or at Fret 'n Fiddle in St. Albans.
Writer Julianne Kemp can be reached at 348-4806 or by e-mail atjuliek@dailymail.com.
(This is not a legal transcript. Bloomberg LP cannot guarantee its accuracy.)
JAMES CARON, HEAD OF INTEREST RATE STRATEGY, MORGAN STANLEY, TALKS ABOUT THE ECONOMY AT BLOOMBERG SURVEILLANCE
APRIL 29, 2011
SPEAKERS: TOM KEENE, BLOOMBERG SURVEILLANCE HOST
KEN PREWITT, BLOOMBERG SURVEILLANCE CO-HOST
JAMES CARON, HEAD OF INTEREST RATE STRATEGY, MORGAN STANLEY
9:07
TOM KEENE, BLOOMBERG SURVEILLANCE HOST: Jim Caron from Morgan Stanley, just had Byron Wien on. Jim, good morning.
JAMES CARON, HEAD OF INTEREST RATE STRATEGY, MORGAN STANLEY: Good morning.
KEENE: Just had Byron Wien on and he is talking like you are about a higher rate regime. You've been right. We've got inflation. We've got core inflation coming up, certainly the rate of change of core inflation gets your attention. When do we see that filter into the ten year yield?
CARON: Well, I think right now what we have to start to see is the growth start to manifest. And the second quarter and the third quarter is where we expect to see the payback from a very, very disappointing and weak first quarter, first quarter growth coming in at about 1.8 percent. Most Street consensus had it coming in at around four percent, so definitely a big miss for the Street.
So what that means is that we've got to make it up in the following quarter. So while we do have a higher yield forecast - we are right on consensus with a four percent ten year yield forecast by the end of the year, I think there is a lot of risk around that call. And the risk is that we don't get the growth to manifest itself in the second quarter and the third quarter, in which case the market could start to downgrade its growth expectations and yields just might stay in a low range around these levels.
KEN PREWITT, BLOOMBERG SURVEILLANCE CO-HOST: Well, if the ten year goes to four percent by the end of the year, then what do we buy instead right now?
CARON: Well, I mean actually if the ten year note is just going to go to four percent, then what I would argue is that if yields were to start to tick a little bit higher that with the carry that you would get in the ten year note that that would be about your break even. So owning the ten year point on the curve on a slight backup would make sense to us. Currently right now in the front end, we don't expect there to be any fed rate hike any time soon.
When I look at the futures market, we don't see rate hikes until probably May or June of next year, so the front end actually starts to look reasonably attractive, especially if you believe still that rates in the back end can creep a little bit higher. I would rather be in the front end of the two year note and the three year point on the curve.
KEENE: Jim, you look at the swirl of data out there. My data check I go equities, bonds, currencies, commodities. How correlated are we right now?
You guys run fancy correlation exercise to see how in sequence the markets are. How correlated are we right now?
CARON: Well, we are becoming less correlated, which is actually somewhat of a good thing. In fact, if you look at the recent data over the past couple of days, we've seen - based on Bernanke's comments - interest rates have fallen and equities have risen. I mean, you know, look at the Russell. The Russell is the only index out there to make new highs post the crisis, which is very interesting to us.
So I would say that correlations, yields are starting to break down a little bit and at least show some stability, which is actually giving us a risk on signal. So in that sense, I think risky assets look like they could do pretty well based on the interest rate outlook.
KEENE: Where is the most attractive risky asset?
CARON: Well, you know, that is definitely hard to say. It depends on a personal risk -
KEENE: That's why we asked.
CARON: Yes, exactly. Well, what I think that we are supposed to be doing right now is (inaudible). So the areas that I like to carry right now would probably come in in the high yield sector, the investment grade corporate sector as well. I think those yields have a nice spread over treasuries. I think we are in a range of our market.
I think it is time to clip some coupons. I don't think that yields will run away higher. I also don't think that they are going to drop extraordinarily fast. So any place where you can get a bit of a juicy coupon, like in high yield or in investment grade, that that yield is above treasuries, I think that makes a lot of sense.
PREWITT: Of course, you can get 25 percent in Greece.
CARON: You could, yes. But that would be a lot of risk though.
PREWITT: For a two year, that is way too much risk?
CARON: Yes, I think so.
PREWITT: Well, if the fed doesn't reverse course for over a year, then how many rate hikes can we get by the European Central Bank and then what is the result?
CARON: Well, I would argue that the central bank in Europe is going to hike a 100 basis points total from start to end. But the real question is is it really tightening financial conditions in Europe.
Does a 100 basis points higher in rate really tighten financial conditions? Our models say that it doesn't. It says that financial conditions, even though rates have been moving higher, have tightened - small. It's been a small bit. But it really hasn't - it hasn't really derailed the equity markets or the other risky asset classes in Europe.
So perhaps the ECB is on the right track to regaining credibility, to taking back some accommodation. At the same time, it is also not hurting its equity market. So maybe that is a lesson that the fed could take a look at.
KEENE: What are you going to be writing about or thinking about this weekend? Such a swirl and back and forth on various predictions. What is the Jim Caron focus as we go to Monday morning?
CARON: Look, I think that the absolute focus has to be that starting on Monday, we start to get the first look at second quarter data. All the data that we've got so far in April has everything to do with the first quarter, which we know was weak.
KEENE: Right.
CARON: So we get ISM on Monday, and then obviously we get payrolls at the end of the week, which is the ultimate data point that we're going to look at.
The key point to focus on there is going to be the household survey. The household data has shown that jobs have been growing quite a bit and at a very fast clip, more so than the establishment survey and the non-farm payrolls. The market is going to need to see that household survey continue to add jobs. If it sees that it is starting to waiver, I think that could be a very negative sign for bonds. Bond yields could start to go lower.
The second thing I'm going to focus on is the second week of May, where we have retail sales, CPI, and PPI. So essentially this is going to be - the first two weeks of May is going to be the first real look at the second quarter.
Going back to what I said earlier, that the second quarter is going to be the time where we test the growth thesis for 2011, if we had a bad first quarter, we need to see strength in the second quarter. And the next two weeks, tells us that we're going to see those initial data points start to come in. The market is going to focus on it, and I think it is absolutely critical.
KEENE: Just a beautiful summary there. Thank you so much. Jim Caron, of course, fixed income at Morgan Stanley. Ken, that really sets up the next 14 days, and, as Jim said, the beginning of that data for the quarter we are in now.
9:13
***END OF TRANSCRIPT***
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A federal judge has refused to toss out a bribery indictment against a Louisiana congressman who argued that his alleged misdeeds were technically more akin to influence peddling than bribery.
In an order made public Tuesday, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III denied a motion filed by U.S. Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., seeking dismissal of 15 of the 16 counts against him.
Prosecutors allege that Jefferson received hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for using his influence to broker business deals in Africa.
Jefferson's lawyers argued unsuccessfully that federal bribery laws apply to a congressman only if he takes a bribe in exchange for official action like taking votes or sponsoring legislation.
Ellis wrote in his ruling that prosecutors can broadly interpret what constitutes an "official act" under the law, but they will have to prove at trial that a congressman's customary duties include using his influence to lobby federal agencies.
The trial against Jefferson is on hold while a federal appeals court considers a separate legal argument made by the congressman _ that prosecutors obtained the indictment by unconstitutionally infringing on his privileges as a congressman.
The indictment against Jefferson alleges he received more than $500,000 in bribes and demanded millions more between 2000 and 2005, including $90,000 he received from an FBI informant that was later found in the freezer of his Washington home.
Prosecutors said he used his influence as chairman of the congressional Africa Investment and Trade Caucus to broker deals in Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon and other African nations on behalf of those who paid bribes to him.
Jefferson's lawyer, Robert Trout, declined comment Tuesday. Jefferson has denied wrongdoing.
According to a federal appeals court, "There were multiple mentally deranged prisoners near him who would yell and scream at all hours and throw human waste at the guards."
Thompson, whose execution was scheduled half a dozen times, was a few weeks away from death by lethal injection when his life was saved by a bloody scrap of cloth.
Although four prosecutors in the Orleans Parish district attorney's office were aware of this evidence, Thompson didn't learn about it until 14 years after his death sentence, when an investigator hired by his pro bono lawyers discovered a crucial crime lab report.
In a case the Supreme Court agreed to hear last week, the prosecutors' boss, former District Attorney Harry Connick, argues that his office should not be held responsible for the egregious misconduct that led to Thompson's 18-year ordeal. But if it isn't, no one will be, an outcome that would not only deprive Thompson of compensation but endanger every American's due process rights.
In 1985, Thompson, then 22, was arrested for the murder of a hotel executive who was robbed and shot outside his New Orleans home. After Thompson's picture appeared in a local newspaper, three people who were victims of an armed robbery a few weeks after the murder thought they recognized their assailant.
Unbeknownst to Thompson or his attorney, the robber was cut while scuffling with one of his victims, leaving blood on the man's pants. The blood was type B; Thompson's blood type is O. He never got a chance to present this exculpatory evidence because his prosecutors never turned it over, even though they were constitutionally required to do so.
The prosecutors decided to try Thompson for the robbery first, hoping to prevent him from taking the stand at his murder trial (since that would allow them to impeach his credibility by mentioning the earlier conviction) and to enhance the likelihood of a death sentence. They succeeded on both counts.
After the concealed evidence came to light, Thompson's robbery conviction was thrown out, and he won a new murder trial, during which he presented 13 pieces of evidence that, like the blood test, had been withheld by prosecutors. The jury acquitted him after deliberating for half an hour.
In 2003, Thompson won a $14 million award from a federal jury that concluded Connick had acted with "deliberate indifference" by failing to train his underlings in their constitutional obligations. An appeals court upheld that award in 2008.
It's hard to say which would be more appalling: If prosecutors intentionally hid the blood test, or if they did not know they were required to share it. There is evidence to support both theories.
In 1994, after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, one prosecutor told a former colleague (who kept this information to himself for five years) that he had deliberately withheld the blood evidence. But it's not clear he knew that was illegal at the time of Thompson's robbery trial, and testimony in Thompson's civil case indicated that other prosecutors in the D.A.'s office, including Connick, did not know they were legally required to share the crime lab report.
Thompson's lawyers note one prosecutor's "misunderstanding" of the relevant Supreme Court ruling "was so fundamental that the district judge visibly registered surprise," prompting him to change his testimony.
The Supreme Court has ruled that local governments can be held liable for failing to train officials in their constitutional responsibilities when the need is "obvious," as with teaching police officers the proper use of deadly force. The need for prosecutors to respect defendants' due process rights is no less obvious. And since prosecutors themselves have absolute immunity for their trial-related misconduct, the threat of lawsuits against their employers is an important safeguard to prevent the pursuit of victory from trumping the pursuit of justice.
Hundreds of Du Page County residents last night asked forchanges in the proposed North-South Tollway.
Speaking at a public hearing in Downers Grove held by the U.S.Army Corps of Engineers, County Board Chairman Jack T. Knuepfer said,"County government is looking forward to the completion of thisproject."
But other local officials and residents voiced concern about theenvironmental impact of the proposed 17.5-mile tollroad.
"Severe and irreparable harm will be done to high-qualitynatural areas," said Marion T. Hall, director of the MortonArboretum. Hall called for a second, more comprehensive draft of theCorps' environmental-impact statement.
Like other critical statements made during the evening, Hall'sdrew enthusiastic applause.
Woodridge Mayor William Murphy said, "We believe these(environmental) impacts are substantial and the draft environmentalimpact statement is sorely deficient."
Thomas H. Morsch Jr., executive director of the Illinois StateToll Highway Authority, said his agency had already made numerouschanges in its plans to satisfy such concerns.
"I think our sensitivity of planning around the Morton Arboretumis just one example of this approach," Morsch said.
Many local officials said they still have serious concerns aboutthe road, which would extend Illinois 53 south to Interstate 55.
The concerns they cited included traffic problems caused bytemporary or permanent closings of local streets, roadway elevation,noise, water and air pollution, and damage to natural areas.
"We encourage the Corps not to sign off on this proj-ect untilmore is known," said Gary Webster, Glen Ellyn village administrator.
Addison Village Engineer John Verzal asked that a toll plazaplanned in his village be moved farther south. Addison officialshave said the current site will cause traffic jams if the White Soxbuild a stadium in their village.
The Corps will review statements made at the hearing inpreparing its final environmental impact statement. It must issue apermit before the toll highway authority can build bridges acrossstreams or build on wetlands.
Construction is scheduled to begin this fall.
Since we speak more or less the same language, shopping iseasier in England than on the continent. Many top London shops are apiece of history in themselves, so you can justify the expedition toany history-buff traveling companions. Rain or shine, shopping isone activity to fit into your London trip, even if you are only abrowser.
There's a staggering abundance of shops in London, in five majorareas. If you're limited to just one day, as I was, you can hit thehigh points in three areas, with a few diversions along the way.
Outfitted with a good pair of walking shoes and umbrella, wewere able to make the grand shopping tour with time out for lunch andeven a short visit to the National Gallery.
Plot your trek on a city map before you set out. Or invest ina shopping guidebook like Born to Shop, London. Here are some mainstores to hit: Selfridges: When you're homesick for Marshall Field's or CarsonPirie Scott, a trip to Selfridges on Oxford Street will lift yourspirits.
If you think it has the look and feel of an American departmentstore, you're right. That's because it was founded by Harry GordonSelfridge, who worked for Marshall Field's in Chicago before foundinghis own store in London in 1909. Covering an entire city block, thiscomplete department store is for one-stop shoppers andLondon-shopping initiates. Debenhams: Visit Debenhams if you start getting depressed by highprices. A real-people store, it has women's and children's clothing,home furnishings and cosmetics, jewelry and ever-necessary umbrellas.
The store's lively spirit also brightens the trip for anyfoot-draggers you might have with you. The in-store disc jockey notonly plays music but also promotes sale items and the store's creditcards. Marks & Spencer: Marks & Spencer blends a quasi-department storewith the atmosphere of Woolworth's. The racks and racks of sweaters,blouses, dresses and jackets go on and on. There's clothing foreveryone in your family and the prospect of bargains if you have theenergy to wade into the racks. Liberty: One of my favorites, this a major expansion of the smallLiberty shop in Chicago's Water Tower Place. With its mock-Tudorbuilding and galleried floors, it seduces shoppers who love silks,leather, exotic presents and the lovely Liberty prints. Those whosew shouldn't miss Liberty's fabric department, which takes up anentire floor. Fortnum & Mason: Fortnum & Mason has come a long way from its startin 1707 as a grocery store. Yet the famous food halls still set itapart from anything American stores have developed, including thefancy deli arrangements in Neiman Marcus.
Here you'll find the finest in caviar, foie gras, teas,chocolates, jellies, coffee and wines - all in elegant surroundings.Schedule your lunch or tea break at the famous Fountain Restaurant. Harrods: Another former grocery store, Harrods has arguably the bestof everything. Although some snobs might not be impressed, don'tavoid a visit here. We stopped by late in the afternoon; otherwise,I might have stayed the entire day.
Are there any bargains in London? Yes - if you hunt for them,take advantage of sales and shop for items made in the British Isles.
And unless you plan to do a lot of shopping, don't expect to geta break on the VAT - Value-Added Tax. This 15 percent retail tax canbe refunded or partially refunded if the goods are taken out of thecountry.
Here are some London-Chicago comparisons at the current exchangerate of about $1.60 to a British pound:
Swatch watch: 24 pounds ($38.40) at Selfridges; $35 at MarshallField's in Chicago.
Bennetton women's cotton sweatshirt: 17.90 pounds ($28.65) atDebenhams; $29 at Bennetton's in Chicago.
Laura Ashley cotton sleeveless dress, made in Ireland: 34.95pounds ($55.90) in London; $100 in Chicago.
Liberty print makeup bag: 9.95 pounds ($15.90) in London; $18in Chicago.
Burberry men's trenchcoat: 325 pounds ($520) in London; $460 inChicago.
Wedgwood's Peter Rabbit children's dining set: 12.95 pounds($20.65) in London; $28 in Chicago.
Fortnum & Mason tea (25 bags): 1.80 pounds ($2.90) in London;$3.75 at Marshall Field's.
U.S. Navy helicopters touched down on the grounds of Haiti's damaged presidential palace on Tuesday bringing reinforcements in the struggle for security and earthquake disaster relief _ several dozen U.S. troops.
Haitians jammed the fence of the palace grounds to gawk, some cheering as the soldiers emerged.
"We are happy that they are coming, because we have so many problems," said Fede Felissaint, a hairdresser.
Given the circumstances, he did not even mind the troops taking up positions at the presidential palace. "If they want, they can stay longer than in 1915," he said, a reference to the start of a 19-year U.S. military presence in Haiti _ something U.S. officials have repeatedly insisted they have no intention of repeating.
A week after the magnitude-7.0 quake struck, killing an estimated 200,000 people, the U.N. Security Council also was expected to approve additional peacekeeping forces and some 2,000 U.S. Marines who arrived in the region a day earlier were parked offshore on ships.
The port remains blocked. Distribution of food, water and supplies from the city's lone airport to the needy are increasing but still remained a work in progress, frustrating many survivors who sleep in the streets and outdoor camps of tens of thousands.
Pockets of looting and violence in Haiti's devastated capital are hindering a slow improvement in much-needed aid delivery, and with local and foreign police still thin, some residents have banded together to protect the few possessions they have left.
People in one hillside Port-au-Prince district blocked off access to their street with cars and asked local young men to patrol for looters.
"We never count on the government here," said Tatony Vieux, 29. "Never."
European Commission analysts estimate 250,000 were injured and 1.5 million were made homeless and many are exasperated by the delays in getting aid.
"I simply don't understand what is taking the foreigners so long," said Raymond Saintfort, a pharmacist who brought two suitcases of aspirin and antiseptics to the ruins of a nursing home where dozens of residents suffered.
The U.N. humanitarian chief, John Holmes, said not all 15 planned U.N. food distribution points were up and running yet. The U.N. World Food Program said it expected to boost operations to feeding 97,000 on Monday. But it needs 100 million prepared meals over the next 30 days, and it appealed for more government donations.
The U.S. military says it can now get 100 flights a day through the airport, up from 60 last week, but still could use more. Troops parachuted pallets of supplies to a secured area outside the city on Monday rather than further clog the airport.
Meanwhile, rescuers continued finding survivors.
International rescue teams working together pulled two Haitian women from a collapsed university building, using machinery commonly nicknamed "jaws of life" to cut away debris and allow rescuers to pull them out on stretchers. A sister of one of the survivors shouted praises to God when the women emerged.
In the city's Bourdon area, a large team of French, Dominican and Panamanian rescuers using high-tech detection equipment said they heard heartbeats underneath the rubble of a bank building and worked into the night to try and rescue a survivor. The husband of a missing woman watched from a crowd of onlookers,
"I'm going to be here until I find my wife, I'll keep it up until I find her, dead or alive," said Witchar Longfosse.
Elsewhere, overwhelmed surgeons appealed for anesthetics, scalpels, and saws for cutting off crushed limbs. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, visiting one hospital, reported its staff had to use vodka to sterilize equipment. "It's astonishing what the Haitians have been able to accomplish," he said.
Violence added to complications in places. Medical relief workers said they were treating gunshot wounds in addition to broken bones and other quake-related injuries. Nighttime was especially perilous and locals were forming night brigades and machete-armed mobs to fight bandits across the capital.
"It gets too dangerous," said Remi Rollin, an armed private security guard hired by a shopkeeper to ward off looters. "After sunset, police shoot on sight."
In the sprawling Cite Soleil slum, gangsters are reassuming control after escaping from the city's notorious main penitentiary and police urge citizens to take justice into their own hands.
"If you don't kill the criminals, they will all come back," a Haitian police officer shouted over a loudspeaker.
Alain Le Roy, the U.N. peacekeeping chief, said there are often unruly crowds at points where food and water is being distributed and said Haitian police had returned to the streets in only "limited numbers."
A Security Council vote was expected to add 1,500 more U.N. police and 2,000 more peacekeepers to join the 9,000 or so U.N. security personnel in Haiti.
Thousands are streaming out of Port-au-Prince, crowding aboard buses headed toward countryside villages. Charlemagne Ulrick planned to stay behind after putting his three children on a truck for an all-day journey to Haiti's northwestern peninsula.
"They have to go and save themselves," said Ulrick, a dentist. "I don't know when they're coming back."
U.S. and Haitian officials also warned any efforts of Haitians to reach the United States by boat would be thwarted. Haiti's ambassador in Washington, Raymond Joseph, recorded a message in Creole to his countrymen, urging them not to leave.
"If you think you will reach the U.S. and all the doors will be wide open to you, that's not at all the case," Joseph said, according to a transcript on America.gov, a State Department Web site. "And they will intercept you right on the water and send you back home where you came from."
___
Associated Press writers contributing to this story included Tamara Lush, Jonathan M. Katz, Michelle Faul, Kevin Maurer in Port-au-Prince; Ramon Almanzar in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations; Raf Casert in Brussels; Larry Margasak and Pauline Jelinek in Washington.
In the long, loud argument about President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, opponents contend it would point toward a government takeover of the system. Democrats deny that. Now there's evidence that it's already happening, inexorably, whatever the outcome on the stalled health care bill.
For the first time, government programs will account for more than half of U.S. health care spending by 2012, and that share will keep creeping upward, according to federal actuaries.
Federal and state government programs now cover an estimated 42 percent of health care costs. That is likely to reach 52 percent before the end of the decade.
So after all the months of wrangling about the public option for health care coverage, it turns out not to be optional in the current system.
"I don't know if anybody noticed that, for the first time this year, you saw more people getting health care from government than you did from the private sector; not because of anything we did, but because more and more people are losing their health care from their employers. It's becoming unaffordable," Obama told reporters Tuesday _ with a bit of hyperbole.
The numbers make a compelling case for change and Obama is making another push for it. He's called Republican and Democratic leaders to discuss health care with him on Feb. 25, all on television. It amounts to a compromise offer built into a challenge to the Republicans, who held the party line against his health care bill with unanimous opposition in the Senate and only one Republican vote in the House.
Obama said he wants to "look at the Republican ideas that are out there." But he is not offering to do what Republican leaders demand, as they have all along _ scrap the current bill and start from scratch. The White House said he wants "comprehensive reform similar to the bills passed by the House and the Senate."
That was at hand before the Democrats lost their 60-seat supermajority in the Senate that had blocked Republican stalling tactics, after losing a key seat in Massachusetts last month. Now they've got to find another way if health care changes are to pass.
Hence the president's call for a conference with both sides plus health care experts to compare "their ideas, our ideas ... in a methodical way so the American people can see and compare."
They also can see and compare the cost of doing nothing in the projections published this month by the journal Health Affairs, covering the increasing share of government spending on health care. That's based on the impact of the recession and unemployment, spending on the Medicaid government health insurance program for the indigent and the aging baby boomers who will turn 65 and become eligible for Medicare, the government health insurance program for the elderly.
The report estimated national health care spending at $2.5 trillion in 2009, or 17.3 percent of the economy after the sharpest one-year increase in 50 years.
By 2020, health spending is expected to reach $4.5 trillion a year and account for about 20 percent of the economy.
Add to that the biggest tax break the government offers, $155 billion in taxes spared on employer-paid health insurance premiums. That exemption benefits 162 million Americans, and even a hint of changing that stirs a political firestorm, as it has in the current debate about limiting the deduction so as to tax part of the premium on the highest-cost, so-called Cadillac health insurance plans.
Overall, those trends point to higher health care expenses than any national budget can afford. But the case for change collides with the hard political lines already drawn on the issue.
Obama's effort to bend them "and arrive at some agreements" to get bipartisan action on health care is a long shot. He told supporters that he never underestimated the problems and political risks of pushing health care reform.
"I knew this was hard," he said. "You don't think I got warnings?"
President Bill Clinton tried it, and paid. He couldn't even get a vote on his bill, in a Democratic Congress. And the failed drive for universal health care hurt Democrats in the 1994 midterm elections in which Republicans won control of Congress.
Anything approaching a replay in the 2010 elections would push the issue off the table, despite the need for change to ward off unsustainable costs. About 30 years ago, House Speaker Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill pronounced Social Security, the government's pension program, to be "the third rail of American politics" _ perilous to touch. Eventually it was changed to control costs but only when the alternative was crisis.
Short of some kind of action this time, health care could become the new third rail.
___
EDITOR'S NOTE _ Walter R. Mears reported on government and politics for The Associated Press for more than 40 years. He is retired and lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
The head of Britain's tax and customs service resigned Tuesday amid claims his department lost confidential personal data for millions of people.
Paul Gray, chairman of HM Revenue & Customs, left his post ahead of an emergency statement to Parliament being made by Treasury chief Alistair Darling.
The British Broadcasting Corp. claimed records, including bank details, of 15 million child benefit claimants, have been lost by his department.
The Treasury refused to give any details in advance of Darling's statement to lawmakers at the House of Commons later Tuesday.
A report Monday carried on BBC TV's "Watchdog" consumer affairs program alleged the department had lost a CD containing sensitive details of 15,500 people.
Gray told the program his service had apologized and written to people affected by the problem.
BBC News 24 TV reported that records related to up to 15 million child benefit claims had been lost.
The service is responsible for collecting taxes, distributing some welfare payments and carrying out border checks.
DALLAS (AP) — A state commission that planned last year to review a report finding fault with an arson investigation that led to a Texas man's execution — until Gov. Rick Perry reshuffled the panel — is now considering a report with a much different conclusion.
A revamped Texas Forensic Science Commission, led by a Perry appointee, meets Friday in Dallas to debate a report that finds fire investigators did not commit professional negligence or misconduct. The Associated Press obtained a copy of the report through an open records request.
If approved, the report would end the commission's inquiry into the Cameron Todd Willingham case. Willingham was put to death in 2004 on Perry's watch 12 years after being convicted of deliberately setting a fire that killed his three young children.
The new report concludes Texas fire investigators adhered to professional standards that existed at the time, while acknowledging standards have evolved. The report also says the state fire marshal's office should adopt standards published by the National Fire Protection Association for all current fire investigations.
The commission "concludes that the fire investigators met the standard of practice that an ordinary fire investigator would have exercised at the time the original Willingham investigation and trial took place," according to the report.
Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley, selected by Perry to replace Austin defense attorney Sam Bassett as head of the commission, was one of four commission members who wrote the report.
"This is a proposed draft, but no one should assume that the contents of it are in any way something the commission as a whole is predisposed to adopt," Bradley said in a telephone interview. "My expectation is we will have a long, intensive discussion about its contents all day long ... with the goal of trying to adopt something."
The report contradicts one written for the commission last year by fire expert Craig Beyler, chairman of the International Association of Fire Safety Science. He wrote that the investigators didn't follow standards in place at the time.
"I would characterize their interest in my opinion as next to zero," Beyler said of the current commission.
Beyler also said the opinions of a state fire official in the case were "nothing more than a collection of personal beliefs that have nothing to do with science-based fire investigation" and that the deputy state fire marshal appeared "wholly without any realistic understanding of fires and how fire injuries are created."
The testimony of fire investigators was the primary evidence against Willingham, who was convicted by a jury in Corsicana, south of Dallas, in 1992. They said they found pour patterns and puddling on the floor, signs someone had poured a liquid accelerant throughout Willingham's home. The defense didn't present a fire expert of its own, because he also concluded the fire was caused by arson.
Willingham's conviction was upheld nine times.
The report to be considered Friday says Beyler failed to show how he concluded investigators didn't follow the professional standards of their day. It also says Beyler declined to elaborate when asked to be more specific.
"His answer was disappointing in that he did not take the opportunity to provide any details or explanation, but just referenced his previous work," Bradley said.
Beyler, however, said he cited 15 textbooks referring to professional standards of the time and specifically pointed out how those standards weren't met in the Willingham case.
"If they didn't read how I backed up how they didn't follow the standards, then they didn't read very closely," Beyler said. Beyler maintains there is not enough evidence for an arson finding.
The Innocence Project, a New York group that specializes in wrongful conviction cases, has argued Willingham was wrongly executed.
The state commission was to question Beyler about his report last year, but that meeting was canceled when Perry removed Bassett and two others, saying their terms were up. The re-examination of Willingham's case has since slowed as the commission questioned whether it had jurisdiction to proceed and focused on policies and procedures in how it handles future cases.
Perry says the commission under Bradley is "moving at the appropriate pace."
"I feel confident that they're going to have the right answers," Perry said. "At the end of this, I think what you will find, that an absolute monster who killed his own kids and the science is going to be there to back it up. ... And I think at the end of the day, this is what Texans will see and agree with, that this was a very, very bad man who killed his kids."
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Associated Press Writer Jamie Stengle contributed to this report.
Lyle Kenyon Engel, who produced books the way film producersturn out motion pictures, employing dozens of writers in a fictionfactory that churned out dozens of novels designed for mass appeal,is dead of leukemia.
He was 71 when he died Sunday at a Miami, Fla., hospital.
Mr. Engel was an anomaly in the publishing world - a visionarywith a firm grasp of popular taste who did not want to give birth towhat he had conceived.
In 1973 he formed Book Creations Inc., a "novel factory" in hishome in Canaan, N.Y., and there concocted plot lines designed for thelucrative paperback market.
Perhaps his most popular series was the "Kent FamilyChronicles," …
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Ohio State coach Jim Foster spent 11 years at Vanderbilt battling the women's basketball juggernaut just 160 or so miles away that is mighty Tennessee.
He gets to renew old acquaintances again on Saturday when his Buckeyes meet the Lady Vols and coach Pat Summitt in a regional semifinal game in Dayton, Ohio.
It doesn't sound as if he's missed bumping heads with his old nemesis.
Asked this week what his relationship with Tennessee and its legendary coach was during his tenure at Vandy, he hesitated a full 12 seconds before finally saying, "No love lost."
When a reporter wondered aloud if he had any of Tennessee's bright orange clothing in his …
AN investigation was under way last night after a nine-year-oldboy was electrocuted when he apparently touched live electricitycables while climbing a tree.
Joseph Lewsley, of Taig Road, Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow, wasplaying with two friends in a field near his home in the Watersidearea of the town when the accident happened yesterday afternoon.
The two boys, aged 10 and 12, called the emergency services afterfailing to get any response from Joseph. He was brought down fromthe tree by firefighters and taken to Stobhill Hospital in Glasgowwhere he was found to be dead on arrival.Last night, a close relative said the family was "shattered" bythe tragedy. …
Boy electrocuted climbing a treeAN investigation was under way last night after a nine-year-oldboy was electrocuted when he apparently touched live electricitycables while climbing a tree.
Joseph Lewsley, of Taig Road, Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow, wasplaying with two friends in a field near his home in the Watersidearea of the town when the accident happened yesterday afternoon.
The two boys, aged 10 and 12, called the emergency services afterfailing to get any response from Joseph. He was brought down fromthe tree by firefighters and taken to Stobhill Hospital in Glasgowwhere he was found to be dead on arrival.Last night, a close relative said the family was "shattered" bythe tragedy. …
Boy electrocuted climbing a treeAN investigation was under way last night after a nine-year-oldboy was electrocuted when he apparently touched live electricitycables while climbing a tree.
Joseph Lewsley, of Taig Road, Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow, wasplaying with two friends in a field near his home in the Watersidearea of the town when the accident happened yesterday afternoon.
The two boys, aged 10 and 12, called the emergency services afterfailing to get any response from Joseph. He was brought down fromthe tree by firefighters and taken to Stobhill Hospital in Glasgowwhere he was found to be dead on arrival.Last night, a close relative said the family was "shattered" bythe tragedy. …
Boy electrocuted climbing a treeAN investigation was under way last night after a nine-year-oldboy was electrocuted when he apparently touched live electricitycables while climbing a tree.
Joseph Lewsley, of Taig Road, Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow, wasplaying with two friends in a field near his home in the Watersidearea of the town when the accident happened yesterday afternoon.
The two boys, aged 10 and 12, called the emergency services afterfailing to get any response from Joseph. He was brought down fromthe tree by firefighters and taken to Stobhill Hospital in Glasgowwhere he was found to be dead on arrival.Last night, a close relative said the family was "shattered" bythe tragedy. …
Hollywood writers take their act from print to screen, and vice versa by Lisa Kennedy
The book was fine, but it wasn't as good as the movie." How often have you heard that? Exactly. On the other hand, the book-to-movie lament is by now so familiar that it's a wonder studios return to the literary well at all. Among screen versions of black fiction, Native Son, The Color Purple and Beloved come to mind as novels that tower over their movie adaptations. Teased by a fine work of fiction, the great expectations of an audience nearly always go unmet once those tales are cast on the big screen. But Hollywood is a hungry machine constantly in need of stories.
Post-Oscars, …
Orlando, Fla. - Most women are infected with human papillomavirus (HPV), which can cause cervical cancer - yet few develop the cancer. Now researchers at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, a part of Georgetown University Medical Center, believe they have found the missing link explaining why: activation of the beta-catenin oncogene (see also Genetics and Cervical Cancer).
At the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) 102nd Annual Meeting 2011, the researchers say that a new mouse model they developed demonstrates that switching the oncogene on in the cervix of HPV infected mice promoted development of aggressive cervical cancer.
These early …
Byline: DAVID BAUDER Associated Press
If someone at Fox News Channel wishes you well, watch your back. The seemingly benign sentiment is a creative signature of Fox's public relations, usually accompanied by a kneecapping. It's something like a kiss from a Mafia don.
MSNBC host Keith Olbermann was the latest to visit the wishing well. When The New York Times recently asked Fox its opinion of Olbermann, who has repeatedly used Bill O'Reilly as a pinata on his nightly news countdown, spokeswoman Irena Briganti replied:
"Because of his personal demons, Keith has imploded everywhere he's worked. From lashing out at co-workers to personally attacking Bill O'Reilly and all things Fox, it's obvious Keith is a train wreck waiting to happen. And like all train wrecks, …
Byline: Gerald M. Gay
Aug. 10--Ani DiFranco might want to consider changing the name of her Buffalo, N.Y.-based record label from Righteous to Invincible Babe records. It doesn't seem like much can stop her. Severe tendinitis grounded her busy touring schedule in 2005, but she sprang back, recording her latest album, "Reprieve," late last year. And even as Hurricane Katrina swept through her part-time home in New Orleans -- forcing her to leave midproduction -- the popular singer/songwriter soldiered on, finishing the release in her native upstate New York. All this drama, and the talented folksinger still managed to knock out a quality album, just one in …
MALONE, New York (AP) — A New York man who plotted to make his ex-girlfriend's death look like a bear mauling is going to prison for trying to hire someone to kill her in a staged car crash.
Prosecutors say Clyde Gardner gave up on his first plan: He'd kill a bear, skin it and wear the pelt while using its claws to kill the woman as she was taking …
A Joliet expatriate is expected in Chicago today on the firstleg of a two-week, 10-city tour to stir support for President Reaganfrom the "Silent Majority."
Sal Dileo, a 32-year-old business consultant from Bloomington,Minn., said his Come on, America organization is promoting aletter-writing campaign to counter "negative criticism" Reagan hasreceived for the Iran-contra affair. "Most of us feel like he's donea good job," Dileo said yesterday. "The Silent Majority wants tospeak."
Dileo, who received his elementary education at St. Raymond'sCathedral School in Joliet, said the organization takes its name froma song he wrote and had recorded in 1984 in honor of …
(ADPnews) - Feb 23, 2011 - Brazilian federal oil and gas giant Petrobras (SAO:PETR3; NYSE:PBR) produced a total 2.662 million barrels of oil equivalent (boepd) in January 2011, up 5.4% year-on-year, the company said yesterday.
Considering only the fields in Brazil, the company's average oil and gas output reached 2.443 million boepd, a rise of 6% in annual terms.
As a result of scheduled stopps of platforms, the output was 2.7% lower than the volume produced in December 2010.
The oil output in domestic fields totalled 2.069 million barrels per day (bpd). The figure shows a 4.9% rise compared to January 2010 and a 2.5% drop compared to December 2010, when …
BIC: What new opportunities are opening up in your territory?
Argites: Microsoft is here and it hires a lot of people from overseas. Half of my clients are non-U.S. citizens; they want to invest, but they're unfamiliar with how things work. Specializing in this demographic has helped my business.
Christin: My territory consists of a lot of retirees, so I'm looking to expand into long-term-care insurance. I'm already licensed to sell LTC, and hopefully I'll start having those client conversations in January.
Vasishth: It's a healthy economy here and real estate is selling at greatly appreciated prices. People are selling their properties and …
Byline: -- Bloomberg News
HARTFORD -- United Technologies Corp., maker of Pratt & Whitney jet engines, will buy aerospace and industrial parts maker Sundstrand Corp. for about $4.3 billion and combine it with its Hamilton Standard controls unit.
United Technologies will pay a minimum …
