2 dead, others missing in Cicero fire
BY Georgia Garvey, Randi Belisomo of WGN-TV, and Chuck Berman
February 14, 2010 12:01 PM Y
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tri
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2010/02/2-alarm-fire-breaks-out-in-cicero.html
Firefighters work on the building at 3034 48th Court in Cicero that was wrecked by fire earlier today. (Chuck Berman/Chicago Tribune)
Fire officials said two adults died and others are missing in a 2-alarm fire that tore through several buildings in Cicero this morning.
Three firefighters suffered what were described as non-life-threatening injuries while battling the blaze, including one who was hurt when a chimney collapsed on his head.
The fire was reported to have broke out this morning in a 2½-story building located at 3034 48th Courtt. Cicero town spokesman Ray Hanania said it was one of three buildings that caught fire. Twenty-three occupants from those buildings were transferred to the town's public safety office, he said.
The fire was spotted by a passerby who alerted authorities about 6:30 a.m. A spokesman for the Cook County medical examiner's office said at 11:45 a.m. the bodies remained on the scene and have not been identified. He said their ages and genders also have not been confirmed.
Relatives at the scene said they were looking for a man, a woman and two children who lived in one of the buildings. One of the children is believed to be a newborn.
"They can't find nobody," said Willie Newton, the grandfather of the man who lives in the house with his girlfriend. "They have no information."
Lorraine Santana escaped a burning house with her three children, ages 20, 14, and 7, and with their chihuahua, Tiny.
"We were sleeping," said Santana. "All I heard was screaming -- 'Fire! Fire!.'
"I'm relieved my kids are safe," Santana said.
A chimney collapsed on a firefighter's head, causing "significant but not serious injuries," Hanania said. That firefighter was taken to Mt. Sinai Hospital in Chicago for treatment.
"I understand he's doing well," Hanania said.
Two other firefighters suffered minor injuries during the blaze and have since been treated and released from at least one area hospital, Hanania said.
The American Red Cross of Greater Chicago provided food, clothing, winter coats and shelter to seven adults and 12 children affected by the fire, according to a news release from the organization.
Hanania said city officials will be reviewing the occupancy codes of the 3034 building to see if any of those codes were violated.
The cause of the fire has yet to be determined.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; County must reform property tax system
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; County must reform property tax system
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 11, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2041610,CST-EDT-edit11a.article
The good news is that Cook County homeowners may have to pay only half of their property taxes this year.
The bad news is that's not good news at all.
Nobody is eagerly pronouncing this, but behind the scenes officials are worried that Cook County's perennially late second-half property tax bills will be later than ever this year. In fact, they may not get out until January 2011 -- half a year later than they should.
"It's possible -- but not certain -- that second-installment tax bills will be late this year," a spokesman for Cook County Assessor Jim Houlihan told us Wednesday. This is becoming a theme, with tax bills out later and later each year.
Last year, tax bills went out at the end of October and were due back in December. The Property Tax Code says those bills should go out July 1.
For those who pay their property taxes through escrow bank accounts, the late bills shouldn't be a problem. But it might be a nasty shock to others who find they're asked to pay the second installment of taxes due in 2010 at virtually the same time they must come up with the cash for the first 2011 installment.
The late tax bills also skew the budgets of school districts, municipalities and other government agencies that must scurry to borrow money while they wait for their revenues. The interest on the loans is just another unnecessary expense that in the end falls on the shoulders of taxpayers.
The problem is that the system is just too complicated.
The assessor's office needs data from the recorder of deeds to do assessments, which then go to the Board of Review.
After the board acts on appeals, everything goes back to the assessor's office and then to the state Department of Revenue to set a figure known as the equalizer. Only then can the county clerk calculate the tax rates and forward everything to the treasurer's office to send out the bills.
If everyone is charge, no one is in charge.
It's time to streamline the system, possibly through consolidating some county offices, and get tax bills out on schedule.
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 11, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2041610,CST-EDT-edit11a.article
The good news is that Cook County homeowners may have to pay only half of their property taxes this year.
The bad news is that's not good news at all.
Nobody is eagerly pronouncing this, but behind the scenes officials are worried that Cook County's perennially late second-half property tax bills will be later than ever this year. In fact, they may not get out until January 2011 -- half a year later than they should.
"It's possible -- but not certain -- that second-installment tax bills will be late this year," a spokesman for Cook County Assessor Jim Houlihan told us Wednesday. This is becoming a theme, with tax bills out later and later each year.
Last year, tax bills went out at the end of October and were due back in December. The Property Tax Code says those bills should go out July 1.
For those who pay their property taxes through escrow bank accounts, the late bills shouldn't be a problem. But it might be a nasty shock to others who find they're asked to pay the second installment of taxes due in 2010 at virtually the same time they must come up with the cash for the first 2011 installment.
The late tax bills also skew the budgets of school districts, municipalities and other government agencies that must scurry to borrow money while they wait for their revenues. The interest on the loans is just another unnecessary expense that in the end falls on the shoulders of taxpayers.
The problem is that the system is just too complicated.
The assessor's office needs data from the recorder of deeds to do assessments, which then go to the Board of Review.
After the board acts on appeals, everything goes back to the assessor's office and then to the state Department of Revenue to set a figure known as the equalizer. Only then can the county clerk calculate the tax rates and forward everything to the treasurer's office to send out the bills.
If everyone is charge, no one is in charge.
It's time to streamline the system, possibly through consolidating some county offices, and get tax bills out on schedule.
Palin exposes the partyers
Palin exposes the partyers
By Steve Chapman
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-oped-chapman-0211-20100210,0,5133546.story
The tea party movement started as a welcome protest against the alarming growth of federal spending and federal control. It had a strong anti-statist flavor, or seemed to. But judging from the applause for Sarah Palin at its convention, the movement's suspicion of government power is exceeded only by its worship of government power.
Her keynote address at last week's gathering in Nashville, Tenn., may have been the curtain raiser on a 2012 presidential campaign. "I think that it would be absurd to not consider what it is that I can potentially do to help our country," she told Fox News when asked about that option.
I'm glad it was she and not I who first used the word "absurd" in relation to a possible Palin bid for the White House. Because if her speech made anything clear, it's that the shallow, ill-informed, truth-twisting demagogue seen in the 2008 presidential campaign is all she is and all she wants to be.
When it comes to economic affairs, the tea partyers agree that — as Palin put it — "the government that governs least, governs best." When it comes to war and national security, however, her audience apparently thinks there is no such thing as too much government.
The conventioneers applauded when Palin denounced President Barack Obama for his approach to the war on terrorists. Why? Because he lets himself be too confined by the annoying limits imposed by the Constitution. "To win that war, we need a commander in chief, not a professor of law," she declares.
Is her point that Obama is allergic to the use of military power or can't bear to fulfill his responsibility as head of the armed forces? That would come as a surprise to Iraqis, who have seen Obama stick to President George W. Bush's timetable for withdrawal.
It would come as a surprise to Afghans, who have seen him embark on a massive buildup of U.S. troops in their country. It would come as a surprise to Pakistanis, who have seen an increase in U.S. drone missile attacks on their soil.
Palin accuses Obama of "reaching out to hostile regimes" and "apologizing for America," with pitiful results: nuclear tests in North Korea, repression in Iran. What she doesn't mention — though, to be entirely fair, she may not know it — is that the first North Korean nuclear test came in 2006, and that before Obama arrived, the mullahs in Tehran did not rule with a gentle, loving hand.
Her chief gripe, though, is that federal agents read the alleged Christmas Day bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, his Miranda rights shortly after his arrest, at which point, she claims, he "lawyered up and invoked our U.S. constitutional right to remain silent."
Not for long, he didn't. The FBI says Abdulmutallab provided a wealth of useful information under questioning after he got a lawyer. For that matter, as FBI Director Robert Mueller and National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said last week, he is still being interrogated.
But facts have never been Palin's strong suit. Nor do they matter because what infuriates her is the mere idea that constitutional protections would apply to "a terrorist who hates our Constitution and tries to destroy our Constitution."
This is not some bizarre paradox. Lots of people who despise our Constitution — Nazis, communists, Klansmen, Alaska secessionists — enjoy its protections. Does she think the Bill of Rights should apply only to people who share her views? That would not leave much of the document she and the tea partyers claim to revere.
Besides, Obama didn't invent the heretical notion of accepting limits on the government's latitude with jihadists. The Bush administration turned hundreds of terrorism cases over to the federal courts, without audible complaint from the right. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution extends even to accused foreign terrorists held at Guantanamo.
The advantage of having a former law professor in the Oval Office is that he doesn't have to be tutored in such elementary realities. But Palin evinces a bitter resentment of any information that contradicts her blind faith in a benevolent, all-powerful security regime. She's more than willing to trade liberty for safety.
That went over conspicuously well in Nashville, where tea partyers cheered a leader who places excessive trust in government, disdains constitutional freedoms and promotes a cult of personality. So remind me: What is it they don't like about Barack Obama?
Steve Chapman is a member of the Tribune's editorial board and blogs at chicagotribune.com/chapman.
schapman@tribune.com
By Steve Chapman
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-oped-chapman-0211-20100210,0,5133546.story
The tea party movement started as a welcome protest against the alarming growth of federal spending and federal control. It had a strong anti-statist flavor, or seemed to. But judging from the applause for Sarah Palin at its convention, the movement's suspicion of government power is exceeded only by its worship of government power.
Her keynote address at last week's gathering in Nashville, Tenn., may have been the curtain raiser on a 2012 presidential campaign. "I think that it would be absurd to not consider what it is that I can potentially do to help our country," she told Fox News when asked about that option.
I'm glad it was she and not I who first used the word "absurd" in relation to a possible Palin bid for the White House. Because if her speech made anything clear, it's that the shallow, ill-informed, truth-twisting demagogue seen in the 2008 presidential campaign is all she is and all she wants to be.
When it comes to economic affairs, the tea partyers agree that — as Palin put it — "the government that governs least, governs best." When it comes to war and national security, however, her audience apparently thinks there is no such thing as too much government.
The conventioneers applauded when Palin denounced President Barack Obama for his approach to the war on terrorists. Why? Because he lets himself be too confined by the annoying limits imposed by the Constitution. "To win that war, we need a commander in chief, not a professor of law," she declares.
Is her point that Obama is allergic to the use of military power or can't bear to fulfill his responsibility as head of the armed forces? That would come as a surprise to Iraqis, who have seen Obama stick to President George W. Bush's timetable for withdrawal.
It would come as a surprise to Afghans, who have seen him embark on a massive buildup of U.S. troops in their country. It would come as a surprise to Pakistanis, who have seen an increase in U.S. drone missile attacks on their soil.
Palin accuses Obama of "reaching out to hostile regimes" and "apologizing for America," with pitiful results: nuclear tests in North Korea, repression in Iran. What she doesn't mention — though, to be entirely fair, she may not know it — is that the first North Korean nuclear test came in 2006, and that before Obama arrived, the mullahs in Tehran did not rule with a gentle, loving hand.
Her chief gripe, though, is that federal agents read the alleged Christmas Day bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, his Miranda rights shortly after his arrest, at which point, she claims, he "lawyered up and invoked our U.S. constitutional right to remain silent."
Not for long, he didn't. The FBI says Abdulmutallab provided a wealth of useful information under questioning after he got a lawyer. For that matter, as FBI Director Robert Mueller and National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said last week, he is still being interrogated.
But facts have never been Palin's strong suit. Nor do they matter because what infuriates her is the mere idea that constitutional protections would apply to "a terrorist who hates our Constitution and tries to destroy our Constitution."
This is not some bizarre paradox. Lots of people who despise our Constitution — Nazis, communists, Klansmen, Alaska secessionists — enjoy its protections. Does she think the Bill of Rights should apply only to people who share her views? That would not leave much of the document she and the tea partyers claim to revere.
Besides, Obama didn't invent the heretical notion of accepting limits on the government's latitude with jihadists. The Bush administration turned hundreds of terrorism cases over to the federal courts, without audible complaint from the right. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution extends even to accused foreign terrorists held at Guantanamo.
The advantage of having a former law professor in the Oval Office is that he doesn't have to be tutored in such elementary realities. But Palin evinces a bitter resentment of any information that contradicts her blind faith in a benevolent, all-powerful security regime. She's more than willing to trade liberty for safety.
That went over conspicuously well in Nashville, where tea partyers cheered a leader who places excessive trust in government, disdains constitutional freedoms and promotes a cult of personality. So remind me: What is it they don't like about Barack Obama?
Steve Chapman is a member of the Tribune's editorial board and blogs at chicagotribune.com/chapman.
schapman@tribune.com
When airlines offer to waive fees to rebook flights due to weather, know the rules
When airlines offer to waive fees to rebook flights due to weather, know the rules
By HARRY R. WEBER
Copyright 2010 Associated Press.
1:54 p.m. CST, February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/travel/sns-ap-us-travel-flight-plan-weather-waivers,0,7364719.story
ATLANTA (AP) — A snowstorm is heading for Washington, D.C., and you've got a flight scheduled to see the monuments, do some shopping in trendy Georgetown and visit relatives in the suburbs.
Your departing airline tells you it will waive its fee if you choose to proactively rebook a flight that has yet to be canceled. You're all set. Right? Not necessarily.
You still might get hit with the fee if you booked the ticket on a travel Web site like Orbitz and a leg of your trip is on another airline. Itineraries with different airlines for each leg of your trip aren't unusual on third-party travel Web sites. Some airlines even offer those itineraries. The bottom line is you may need to secure a waiver for each part of your trip.
There are other restrictions for fee waivers, including a requirement that you begin your travel within a certain number of days after the original ticket date — roughly five to 14 days, depending on airline.
These offers are primarily announced just before a major storm to allow customers to change flights before cancellations might become necessary. Such policies may vary from storm to storm.
Here's a primer on airline fee waiver policies for the most recent mid-Atlantic snowstorms and some general guidance.
US AIRWAYS
US Airways recently offered customers the option to change their flight plans to the Washington area following the blizzard that blanketed the nation's capital.
Like most carriers, the offer was for the ability to rebook your flight for travel to and from certain cities that were expected to be affected by the storm.
Travelers were not subject to the airline's $150 change fee as long as the full value of the unused ticket was applied toward a ticket to an alternate destination. Travel also had to begin within seven days of the original date.
There are exceptions. Suppose you were traveling from Philadelphia to Denver with a connection in Chicago. The Philadelphia to Chicago leg was on US Airways, and the Chicago to Denver leg was on United. You may still have been subject to United's change fee if United did not have a fee waiver in place at the time for the Chicago-Denver leg of the trip. (In one of the recent storm advisories that applied only to some East Coast cities, there wasn't a United waiver in place for Chicago to Denver.)
United's fare rules would apply in this instance if its two-digit alphanumeric code was on your ticket. If US Airways' code was on the ticket for the entire itinerary — as might happen in a codesharing arrangement where one airline bears all the costs but another airline might get a share of the revenue for booking a customer on a flight — the waiver would apply to both legs.
Also, when you buy a ticket through a third-party Web site, you are subject to that site's fare rules, so read the fine print to make sure you are eligible for change fee waivers if the airline you are flying on announces one.
DELTA
Delta's fee waiver policy for the Washington snowstorm applied to customers traveling to or from 12 states and the District of Columbia that were expected to be affected by the recent storm.
As the storm approached, Delta announced it would allow customers to make a one-time change to their travel schedule, without incurring a fee, if tickets were changed by a certain date. Passengers who changed their flights were required to travel within five days of the announcement.
For those making connections with other airlines, Delta, like US Airways, would waive its fee if its code was on the flights all the way through to your final destination. If not, you would have to go back to the third-party travel site or individual airline to make a change, and that other airline's fee policies would apply.
AMERICAN
American doesn't charge a change fee if it has a waiver policy in effect, no matter where you purchased your ticket.
UNITED
United says that when it has a waiver in place its $150 change fee is waived for all customers traveling to an area impacted by the weather, regardless of where and how they booked the ticket. It says travel needs to be rebooked within seven days of the original travel date.
SOUTHWEST
No worries on Southwest. It doesn't charge change fees at all. During incidents of inclement weather, its customers are eligible to rebook their flight or travel standby within 14 days of the original travel date of travel without paying any additional charge.
Another thing to remember.
If you keep your flight plans and your airline cancels your flight because of the weather, airlines generally offer passengers refunds or the ability to book another flight without any extra charges.
By HARRY R. WEBER
Copyright 2010 Associated Press.
1:54 p.m. CST, February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/travel/sns-ap-us-travel-flight-plan-weather-waivers,0,7364719.story
ATLANTA (AP) — A snowstorm is heading for Washington, D.C., and you've got a flight scheduled to see the monuments, do some shopping in trendy Georgetown and visit relatives in the suburbs.
Your departing airline tells you it will waive its fee if you choose to proactively rebook a flight that has yet to be canceled. You're all set. Right? Not necessarily.
You still might get hit with the fee if you booked the ticket on a travel Web site like Orbitz and a leg of your trip is on another airline. Itineraries with different airlines for each leg of your trip aren't unusual on third-party travel Web sites. Some airlines even offer those itineraries. The bottom line is you may need to secure a waiver for each part of your trip.
There are other restrictions for fee waivers, including a requirement that you begin your travel within a certain number of days after the original ticket date — roughly five to 14 days, depending on airline.
These offers are primarily announced just before a major storm to allow customers to change flights before cancellations might become necessary. Such policies may vary from storm to storm.
Here's a primer on airline fee waiver policies for the most recent mid-Atlantic snowstorms and some general guidance.
US AIRWAYS
US Airways recently offered customers the option to change their flight plans to the Washington area following the blizzard that blanketed the nation's capital.
Like most carriers, the offer was for the ability to rebook your flight for travel to and from certain cities that were expected to be affected by the storm.
Travelers were not subject to the airline's $150 change fee as long as the full value of the unused ticket was applied toward a ticket to an alternate destination. Travel also had to begin within seven days of the original date.
There are exceptions. Suppose you were traveling from Philadelphia to Denver with a connection in Chicago. The Philadelphia to Chicago leg was on US Airways, and the Chicago to Denver leg was on United. You may still have been subject to United's change fee if United did not have a fee waiver in place at the time for the Chicago-Denver leg of the trip. (In one of the recent storm advisories that applied only to some East Coast cities, there wasn't a United waiver in place for Chicago to Denver.)
United's fare rules would apply in this instance if its two-digit alphanumeric code was on your ticket. If US Airways' code was on the ticket for the entire itinerary — as might happen in a codesharing arrangement where one airline bears all the costs but another airline might get a share of the revenue for booking a customer on a flight — the waiver would apply to both legs.
Also, when you buy a ticket through a third-party Web site, you are subject to that site's fare rules, so read the fine print to make sure you are eligible for change fee waivers if the airline you are flying on announces one.
DELTA
Delta's fee waiver policy for the Washington snowstorm applied to customers traveling to or from 12 states and the District of Columbia that were expected to be affected by the recent storm.
As the storm approached, Delta announced it would allow customers to make a one-time change to their travel schedule, without incurring a fee, if tickets were changed by a certain date. Passengers who changed their flights were required to travel within five days of the announcement.
For those making connections with other airlines, Delta, like US Airways, would waive its fee if its code was on the flights all the way through to your final destination. If not, you would have to go back to the third-party travel site or individual airline to make a change, and that other airline's fee policies would apply.
AMERICAN
American doesn't charge a change fee if it has a waiver policy in effect, no matter where you purchased your ticket.
UNITED
United says that when it has a waiver in place its $150 change fee is waived for all customers traveling to an area impacted by the weather, regardless of where and how they booked the ticket. It says travel needs to be rebooked within seven days of the original travel date.
SOUTHWEST
No worries on Southwest. It doesn't charge change fees at all. During incidents of inclement weather, its customers are eligible to rebook their flight or travel standby within 14 days of the original travel date of travel without paying any additional charge.
Another thing to remember.
If you keep your flight plans and your airline cancels your flight because of the weather, airlines generally offer passengers refunds or the ability to book another flight without any extra charges.
Once a cesarean section, always a C-section?
Once a cesarean section, always a C-section?
By Julie Deardroff
Copyright 2010 Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/features_julieshealthclub/2010/02/once-a-cesarean-section-always-a-csection-.html
Once a woman has delivered three or more babies by cesarean section -- a surgical cut in the mother's abdominal wall and uterus -- doctors rarely encourage a subsequent vaginal birth.
But new research suggests that women who deliver vaginally after three or more C-sections have similar rates of success and complications as those who undergo another elective C-section, according to a study in the current issue of the International Journal of Obestetrics and Gynecology.
Of the 860 women with three or more prior cesareans, 89 attempted a vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) and 771 elected for a repeat cesarean. The study sample size was small because it's difficult to find women who try -- or are allowed -- to deliver vaginally after repeated C-sections.
Since 1996, VBAC rates in the U.S. have consistently declined to 8 percent. Repeat C-sections, meanwhile, have climbed by more than 40 percent according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
Currently, women who have had two or more C-sections are only considered viable VBAC candidates if they've previously delivered vaginally, according to guidelines from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
But a VBAC may be a reasonable option in specific cases for women who have previously had more than one C-section, said study author Dr. Alison G. Cahill, an assistant professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine.
"When we looked at the safety of the women, we found none who underwent a VBAC experienced uterine rupture or the other morbidities we worry about," said Cahill, who feels it's time to revisit the current VBAC guidelines. "Given appropriate patient selection, VBAC following two or even three previous cesareans in certain cases may be reasonably safe."
Uterine rupture is a frequent concern about VBAC because a C-section delivery leaves a scar on the wall of the uterus, weakening the tissues at the incision site.
But repeat C-sections may also carry a risk of bleeding or hysterectomy, uterine infections and respiratory problems with the newborn. Multiple C-sections may be associated with placental problems in future pregnancies, according to the National Institutes of Health, which is holding a conference in March to evaluate whether VBACs should be more widely available.
By Julie Deardroff
Copyright 2010 Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/features_julieshealthclub/2010/02/once-a-cesarean-section-always-a-csection-.html
Once a woman has delivered three or more babies by cesarean section -- a surgical cut in the mother's abdominal wall and uterus -- doctors rarely encourage a subsequent vaginal birth.
But new research suggests that women who deliver vaginally after three or more C-sections have similar rates of success and complications as those who undergo another elective C-section, according to a study in the current issue of the International Journal of Obestetrics and Gynecology.
Of the 860 women with three or more prior cesareans, 89 attempted a vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) and 771 elected for a repeat cesarean. The study sample size was small because it's difficult to find women who try -- or are allowed -- to deliver vaginally after repeated C-sections.
Since 1996, VBAC rates in the U.S. have consistently declined to 8 percent. Repeat C-sections, meanwhile, have climbed by more than 40 percent according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
Currently, women who have had two or more C-sections are only considered viable VBAC candidates if they've previously delivered vaginally, according to guidelines from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
But a VBAC may be a reasonable option in specific cases for women who have previously had more than one C-section, said study author Dr. Alison G. Cahill, an assistant professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine.
"When we looked at the safety of the women, we found none who underwent a VBAC experienced uterine rupture or the other morbidities we worry about," said Cahill, who feels it's time to revisit the current VBAC guidelines. "Given appropriate patient selection, VBAC following two or even three previous cesareans in certain cases may be reasonably safe."
Uterine rupture is a frequent concern about VBAC because a C-section delivery leaves a scar on the wall of the uterus, weakening the tissues at the incision site.
But repeat C-sections may also carry a risk of bleeding or hysterectomy, uterine infections and respiratory problems with the newborn. Multiple C-sections may be associated with placental problems in future pregnancies, according to the National Institutes of Health, which is holding a conference in March to evaluate whether VBACs should be more widely available.
Toyota owners wonder what comes next as values drop
Toyota owners wonder what comes next as values drop
Kelley Blue Book has downgraded its assessments of recalled Toyotas and sellers are finding interest has dried up, even for cars not recalled
By Julie Wernau and Kiah Haslett
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-0211-toyota-value--20100210,0,7143375.story
Kevin Duffy is kicking himself. A new dad, the 25-year-old Jefferson Park resident no longer needs his 2005 Toyota Camry Solara convertible; so, several weeks ago, he listed it on Craigslist.
Interested buyers called and he considered offers but didn't accept any. Then came the Toyota recall news, and interest in his car dried up. "The last two weeks, I haven't gotten a call or an e-mail at all."
Although Duffy's car isn't one of the more than 8 million Toyota vehicles being recalled for sticking gas pedals, faulty brakes or concerns about floor mats, it suddenly doesn't seem as hot as it used to be.
"I'm just going to end up keeping it and paying $350 a month on a third vehicle I don't even use," Duffy said.
The Toyota brand has long served owners well at sales or trade-in times. But the Kelley Blue Book, considered the value bible for anyone looking to sell a vehicle on the open market, has downgraded the value of recalled Toyotas multiple times in the last week, including the once-coveted 2010 Toyota Prius, the most popular hybrid on the market.
With newer Corollas now being investigated for steering wheel problems, consumers are steering clear of Toyotas, unsure what models could be next on the recall list. Before the recall, about 18 percent of Kelley Blue Book users requested quotes for new cars from Toyota dealers, according to a KBB analyst. Since then that number has dropped to just 11 to 12 percent despite assurances from Toyota dealerships and eBay that vehicles subject to the recalls have been repaired and inspected before being listed for sale.
"We've made it very clear to our customers that our cars are good to go," said Bob Loquercio, owner of Chicago North Side Toyota Scion. Cars have paper trails showing that the fix has been made, he said.
"Sales have significantly declined, but they haven't dried up to non-existent."
Loquercio said customers have come in expecting deals because of the recalls. And consumer surveys indicate Toyota may have a long road ahead in restoring its brand image.
Jeremy Anwyl, CEO for auto consumer information site Edmunds.com, said Toyota hit a record low on Jan. 28, with only 9.7 percent of new car shoppers saying they intended to purchase a Toyota. That number has since increased to 11.8 percent, he said, and has held steady but is still off 15 percent since before the first recall.
At the same time, Anwyl added, a temporary reduction in the supply of vehicles, which were locked out for repairs, helped stabilize value fluctuations.
And with affected Toyotas' trade-in values down about 10 percent, Anwyl said now is not the time to trade in a Toyota because dealers are trying to nab cars at lower prices.
Chicagoan Jennifer Sampson, an expectant mother, experienced the phenomenon first-hand recently when she tried to trade in her 2008 Prius at CarMax for a larger car to accommodate her expanding family.
"What CarMax is offering is far below Blue Book,'' Sampson said. "They said the demand's not going to be there even though it's not part of the recall. We listed it on Craigslist and hopefully maybe someone would be interested."
She set a sales price of $22,000, a little more than double what CarMax offered.
Some Toyota owners are riding out the recall storm.
Wayne Mitchell, 51, who lives on the Southwest Side and owns a 2010 Prius, said recalls are "the popular thing to do" right now. He has felt the braking sensation people have complained about in the Prius, he said. And, as someone who also owned a 2005 Prius, he said it is just a normal sensation that comes with owning a hybrid.
"I'm not going to worry about it," Mitchell said.
Karam Alani has a used 2009 Toyota Camry LE listed on AutoTrader.com. He plans on getting the car repaired and said if it remains unsold for several more weeks, he'll drop the price by $500.
"I feel like it's safe," Alani said. "People are a little concerned (now), but in a few months everything will be back again (to normal)."
Meanwhile, attorneys have seized on the Toyota recalls to line up lawsuits.
P. Tim Howard, a Northeastern University law professor leading a group of about 20 law firms in 16 states, aims to bring a national class-action lawsuit against Toyota, alleging the vehicle recalls have collectively erased between $2 billion and $4 billion in value for car owners.
Melanie Muhlstock, an attorney with Parker, Waichman and Alonso LLP's New York office and a Loyola University School of Law alumna, is working on suits in four states seeking remedy for economic harm to owners caused by the decreased value of their vehicles.
Several lawsuits seek to expand the recall's scope based on their analyses of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration complaints by Toyota owners.
"Of all the vehicle models and model years for which there are reported sudden acceleration events, only 43 percent of them were included in the recalls," said David Wright, a Redlands, Calif., attorney. He has five clients who claim they experienced similar problems in Toyotas that aren't part of the recall.
The Los Angeles Times contributed to this report.
jwernau@tribune.com
xtxkhaslett@tribune.com
Kelley Blue Book has downgraded its assessments of recalled Toyotas and sellers are finding interest has dried up, even for cars not recalled
By Julie Wernau and Kiah Haslett
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-0211-toyota-value--20100210,0,7143375.story
Kevin Duffy is kicking himself. A new dad, the 25-year-old Jefferson Park resident no longer needs his 2005 Toyota Camry Solara convertible; so, several weeks ago, he listed it on Craigslist.
Interested buyers called and he considered offers but didn't accept any. Then came the Toyota recall news, and interest in his car dried up. "The last two weeks, I haven't gotten a call or an e-mail at all."
Although Duffy's car isn't one of the more than 8 million Toyota vehicles being recalled for sticking gas pedals, faulty brakes or concerns about floor mats, it suddenly doesn't seem as hot as it used to be.
"I'm just going to end up keeping it and paying $350 a month on a third vehicle I don't even use," Duffy said.
The Toyota brand has long served owners well at sales or trade-in times. But the Kelley Blue Book, considered the value bible for anyone looking to sell a vehicle on the open market, has downgraded the value of recalled Toyotas multiple times in the last week, including the once-coveted 2010 Toyota Prius, the most popular hybrid on the market.
With newer Corollas now being investigated for steering wheel problems, consumers are steering clear of Toyotas, unsure what models could be next on the recall list. Before the recall, about 18 percent of Kelley Blue Book users requested quotes for new cars from Toyota dealers, according to a KBB analyst. Since then that number has dropped to just 11 to 12 percent despite assurances from Toyota dealerships and eBay that vehicles subject to the recalls have been repaired and inspected before being listed for sale.
"We've made it very clear to our customers that our cars are good to go," said Bob Loquercio, owner of Chicago North Side Toyota Scion. Cars have paper trails showing that the fix has been made, he said.
"Sales have significantly declined, but they haven't dried up to non-existent."
Loquercio said customers have come in expecting deals because of the recalls. And consumer surveys indicate Toyota may have a long road ahead in restoring its brand image.
Jeremy Anwyl, CEO for auto consumer information site Edmunds.com, said Toyota hit a record low on Jan. 28, with only 9.7 percent of new car shoppers saying they intended to purchase a Toyota. That number has since increased to 11.8 percent, he said, and has held steady but is still off 15 percent since before the first recall.
At the same time, Anwyl added, a temporary reduction in the supply of vehicles, which were locked out for repairs, helped stabilize value fluctuations.
And with affected Toyotas' trade-in values down about 10 percent, Anwyl said now is not the time to trade in a Toyota because dealers are trying to nab cars at lower prices.
Chicagoan Jennifer Sampson, an expectant mother, experienced the phenomenon first-hand recently when she tried to trade in her 2008 Prius at CarMax for a larger car to accommodate her expanding family.
"What CarMax is offering is far below Blue Book,'' Sampson said. "They said the demand's not going to be there even though it's not part of the recall. We listed it on Craigslist and hopefully maybe someone would be interested."
She set a sales price of $22,000, a little more than double what CarMax offered.
Some Toyota owners are riding out the recall storm.
Wayne Mitchell, 51, who lives on the Southwest Side and owns a 2010 Prius, said recalls are "the popular thing to do" right now. He has felt the braking sensation people have complained about in the Prius, he said. And, as someone who also owned a 2005 Prius, he said it is just a normal sensation that comes with owning a hybrid.
"I'm not going to worry about it," Mitchell said.
Karam Alani has a used 2009 Toyota Camry LE listed on AutoTrader.com. He plans on getting the car repaired and said if it remains unsold for several more weeks, he'll drop the price by $500.
"I feel like it's safe," Alani said. "People are a little concerned (now), but in a few months everything will be back again (to normal)."
Meanwhile, attorneys have seized on the Toyota recalls to line up lawsuits.
P. Tim Howard, a Northeastern University law professor leading a group of about 20 law firms in 16 states, aims to bring a national class-action lawsuit against Toyota, alleging the vehicle recalls have collectively erased between $2 billion and $4 billion in value for car owners.
Melanie Muhlstock, an attorney with Parker, Waichman and Alonso LLP's New York office and a Loyola University School of Law alumna, is working on suits in four states seeking remedy for economic harm to owners caused by the decreased value of their vehicles.
Several lawsuits seek to expand the recall's scope based on their analyses of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration complaints by Toyota owners.
"Of all the vehicle models and model years for which there are reported sudden acceleration events, only 43 percent of them were included in the recalls," said David Wright, a Redlands, Calif., attorney. He has five clients who claim they experienced similar problems in Toyotas that aren't part of the recall.
The Los Angeles Times contributed to this report.
jwernau@tribune.com
xtxkhaslett@tribune.com
Technical setbacks cause Iran to falter in push to enrich uranium, report says
Technical setbacks cause Iran to falter in push to enrich uranium, report says
By Joby Warrick and Glenn Kessler
Copyright by The Washington Post
Thursday, February 11, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/10/AR2010021003988.html?hpid=topnews
Iran is experiencing surprising setbacks in its efforts to enrich uranium, according to new assessments that suggest that equipment failures and other difficulties could undermine that nation's plans for dramatically scaling up its nuclear program.
Former U.S. officials and independent nuclear experts say continued technical problems could also delay -- though probably not halt -- Iran's march toward achieving nuclear-weapons capability, giving the United States and its allies more time to press for a diplomatic solution. In recent months, Israeli officials have been less vocal in their demands that Western nations curtail Iran's nuclear program.
Indications of Iran's diminished capacity to enrich uranium arise just as the Obama administration begins to take sterner action to compel Iran to abandon enrichment. On Wednesday, the Treasury Department announced new U.S. sanctions against companies it says are affiliated with Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, a key player in the country's nuclear and missile programs.
While Iran says its nuclear program is entirely peaceful, Western nations suspect that the country is intent on developing an atomic bomb. The program prompts frequent international posturing, such as Iran's announcement last year that it would expand its nuclear facilities tenfold and more recent statements from Western leaders that the time has come to apply tougher international sanctions against the country.
Beneath this rhetoric, U.N. reports over the last year have shown a drop in production at Iran's main uranium enrichment plant, near the city of Natanz. Now a new assessment, based on three years of internal data from U.N. nuclear inspections, suggests that Iran's mechanical woes are deeper than previously known. At least through the end of 2009, the Natanz plant appears to have performed so poorly that sabotage cannot be ruled out as an explanation, according to a draft study by David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS). A copy of the report was provided to The Washington Post.
The ISIS study showed that more than half of the Natanz plant's 8,700 uranium-enriching machines, called centrifuges, were idle at the end of last year and that the number of working machines had steadily dropped -- from 5,000 in May to just over 3,900 in November. Moreover, output from the nominally functioning machines was about half of what was expected, said the report, drawing from data gathered by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
A separate, forthcoming analysis by the Federation of American Scientists also describes Iran's flagging performance and suggests that continued failures may increase Iran's appetite for a deal with the West. Ivan Oelrich, vice president of the federation's Strategic Security Program, said Iranian leaders appear to have raced into large-scale uranium production for political reasons.
"They are really struggling to reproduce what is literally half-century-old European technology and doing a really bad job of it," Oelrich said.
The findings are in line with assessments by numerous former U.S. and European officials and weapons analysts who say that Iran's centrifuges appear to be breaking down at a faster rate than expected, even after factoring in the notoriously unreliable, 1970s-vintage model the Iranians are using. According to several of the officials, the problems have prompted new thinking about the urgency of the Iranian nuclear threat, although the country has demonstrated a growing technical prowess, such as its expanding missile program.
"Whether Iran has deliberately slowed down or been forced to, either way that stretches out the time," said Patrick Clawson, deputy director for research at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a nonpartisan think tank.
But analysts also warned that Iran remains capable of making enough enriched uranium for a small arsenal of nuclear weapons, if it decides to do so. Iran has announced plans to build 10 new uranium plants, and on Monday the government said it would begin increasing the enrichment level of some of its uranium, from a current maximum of 3.5 percent to 20 percent. Enrichment of 90 percent is considered weapons-grade.
Some officials suggested that the apparent drop in output could be a ruse, an attempt by Iran to disguise its true capability until it is ready to test a nuclear device. Iran acknowledged last year that it had built a secret enrichment facility inside a mountain bunker near the ancient city of Qom, leading to suspicions that there could be other hidden sites.
"The IAEA measurements at Natanz are very crude and easily subject to intentional manipulation," said a former U.S. official who has closely monitored Iran's nuclear progress. He predicted that the watchdog agency eventually "will see that Iran is hiding production and is underreporting their success."
The administration's announcement of new sanctions represents stepped-up enforcement of existing punitive measures against Iran as the White House prepares to push for concerted action by the U.N. Security Council, the European Union and a coalition of major trading partners in an effort to force Iran to address international concerns over its nuclear ambitions.
U.S. officials are considering additional sanctions against companies linked to the Revolutionary Guard Corps, as well as finance, insurance and other entities connected to the government elite, but Russian and Chinese acquiescence is not guaranteed.
Russia has warned that it probably would not support economic measures, although Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the Interfax news agency Wednesday that Iran's decision this week to begin producing higher-enriched uranium has given "additional relevance" to a new sanctions resolution. China has remained cool to new sanctions.
This week's action freezes the assets of four companies that Treasury said are owned or controlled by, or act on behalf of, a major contractor known as Khatam al-Anbiya, which has channeled billions of dollars a year to the Guard from its activities in oil, construction, transportation and other industries. The action also targets Guard Gen. Rostam Qasemi, who is the commander of Khatam al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters.
The Guard has received at least $6 billion worth of government contracts in two years, according to state-run media, but the total is likely much higher because many contracts are not disclosed. Working through its private-sector arm, the group operates Tehran's international airport, manages Iran's weapons manufacturing business and is involved in other industries.
"Today's action exposing Khatam al-Anbiya subsidiaries will help firms worldwide avoid business that ultimately benefits the IRGC and its dangerous activities," said Treasury Undersecretary Stuart A. Levey. The subsidiaries are: the Fater Engineering Institute, the Imensazen Consultant Engineers Institute, the Makin Institute and the Rahab Institute.
Also Wednesday, Iran rejected an offer from the United States to help provide it with a steady supply of medical isotopes, meaning that it will stay with its plan to produce uranium enriched to 20 percent in order to feed an aging U.S.-built research reactor that can make the isotopes.
Iranian officials have told the IAEA that the country will produce its first batch of higher-enriched uranium within a few days, but the officials also disclosed that the effort will be modest, involving a small amount of uranium feedstock and a fraction of Iran's capacities, according to a confidential U.N. document obtained by the Associated Press.
The enrichment program's troubles have been documented by IAEA inspectors who have visited the Natanz plant at scheduled intervals to collect samples and take measurements to ensure that Iran isn't diverting the enriched fuel for a clandestine weapons program.
As the ISIS study notes, the Natanz plant initially exceeded expectations, producing steadily higher amounts of low-enriched fuel. But sometime in late 2008 or early 2009, the output dropped from about 90 to 70 kilograms per month. Overall production improved slightly after that but struggled to return to 2008 levels, even as Iranian scientists installed more centrifuges, the report said. In late 2009, the 3,900 machines listed as functional were generating half the amount of enriched uranium expected, it said.
Neither Iran nor the U.N. watchdog have officially accounted for the slumping output, and U.S. officials have declined to speculate publicly about the reasons. The ISIS report identifies the likely cause as a combination of poor design and Iran's rush to put complex assemblages of centrifuges into production before working out the bugs. The report cites "daily attrition through breakage," as well as a failure to anticipate the difficulty of operating large numbers of machines simultaneously.
"Iran has moved too quickly to install centrifuges, at the expense of developing competence in operating them reliably," said the report, co-authored by Albright and Christina Walrond. "In the process it has made many mistakes."
Also, while there is no hard evidence pointing to sabotage, ISIS acknowledges the possibility that Natanz's problems were caused by outside sources. "It is well known that the United States and European intelligence agencies seek to place defective or bugged equipment into Iran's smuggling networks," it said.
Researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
By Joby Warrick and Glenn Kessler
Copyright by The Washington Post
Thursday, February 11, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/10/AR2010021003988.html?hpid=topnews
Iran is experiencing surprising setbacks in its efforts to enrich uranium, according to new assessments that suggest that equipment failures and other difficulties could undermine that nation's plans for dramatically scaling up its nuclear program.
Former U.S. officials and independent nuclear experts say continued technical problems could also delay -- though probably not halt -- Iran's march toward achieving nuclear-weapons capability, giving the United States and its allies more time to press for a diplomatic solution. In recent months, Israeli officials have been less vocal in their demands that Western nations curtail Iran's nuclear program.
Indications of Iran's diminished capacity to enrich uranium arise just as the Obama administration begins to take sterner action to compel Iran to abandon enrichment. On Wednesday, the Treasury Department announced new U.S. sanctions against companies it says are affiliated with Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, a key player in the country's nuclear and missile programs.
While Iran says its nuclear program is entirely peaceful, Western nations suspect that the country is intent on developing an atomic bomb. The program prompts frequent international posturing, such as Iran's announcement last year that it would expand its nuclear facilities tenfold and more recent statements from Western leaders that the time has come to apply tougher international sanctions against the country.
Beneath this rhetoric, U.N. reports over the last year have shown a drop in production at Iran's main uranium enrichment plant, near the city of Natanz. Now a new assessment, based on three years of internal data from U.N. nuclear inspections, suggests that Iran's mechanical woes are deeper than previously known. At least through the end of 2009, the Natanz plant appears to have performed so poorly that sabotage cannot be ruled out as an explanation, according to a draft study by David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS). A copy of the report was provided to The Washington Post.
The ISIS study showed that more than half of the Natanz plant's 8,700 uranium-enriching machines, called centrifuges, were idle at the end of last year and that the number of working machines had steadily dropped -- from 5,000 in May to just over 3,900 in November. Moreover, output from the nominally functioning machines was about half of what was expected, said the report, drawing from data gathered by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
A separate, forthcoming analysis by the Federation of American Scientists also describes Iran's flagging performance and suggests that continued failures may increase Iran's appetite for a deal with the West. Ivan Oelrich, vice president of the federation's Strategic Security Program, said Iranian leaders appear to have raced into large-scale uranium production for political reasons.
"They are really struggling to reproduce what is literally half-century-old European technology and doing a really bad job of it," Oelrich said.
The findings are in line with assessments by numerous former U.S. and European officials and weapons analysts who say that Iran's centrifuges appear to be breaking down at a faster rate than expected, even after factoring in the notoriously unreliable, 1970s-vintage model the Iranians are using. According to several of the officials, the problems have prompted new thinking about the urgency of the Iranian nuclear threat, although the country has demonstrated a growing technical prowess, such as its expanding missile program.
"Whether Iran has deliberately slowed down or been forced to, either way that stretches out the time," said Patrick Clawson, deputy director for research at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a nonpartisan think tank.
But analysts also warned that Iran remains capable of making enough enriched uranium for a small arsenal of nuclear weapons, if it decides to do so. Iran has announced plans to build 10 new uranium plants, and on Monday the government said it would begin increasing the enrichment level of some of its uranium, from a current maximum of 3.5 percent to 20 percent. Enrichment of 90 percent is considered weapons-grade.
Some officials suggested that the apparent drop in output could be a ruse, an attempt by Iran to disguise its true capability until it is ready to test a nuclear device. Iran acknowledged last year that it had built a secret enrichment facility inside a mountain bunker near the ancient city of Qom, leading to suspicions that there could be other hidden sites.
"The IAEA measurements at Natanz are very crude and easily subject to intentional manipulation," said a former U.S. official who has closely monitored Iran's nuclear progress. He predicted that the watchdog agency eventually "will see that Iran is hiding production and is underreporting their success."
The administration's announcement of new sanctions represents stepped-up enforcement of existing punitive measures against Iran as the White House prepares to push for concerted action by the U.N. Security Council, the European Union and a coalition of major trading partners in an effort to force Iran to address international concerns over its nuclear ambitions.
U.S. officials are considering additional sanctions against companies linked to the Revolutionary Guard Corps, as well as finance, insurance and other entities connected to the government elite, but Russian and Chinese acquiescence is not guaranteed.
Russia has warned that it probably would not support economic measures, although Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the Interfax news agency Wednesday that Iran's decision this week to begin producing higher-enriched uranium has given "additional relevance" to a new sanctions resolution. China has remained cool to new sanctions.
This week's action freezes the assets of four companies that Treasury said are owned or controlled by, or act on behalf of, a major contractor known as Khatam al-Anbiya, which has channeled billions of dollars a year to the Guard from its activities in oil, construction, transportation and other industries. The action also targets Guard Gen. Rostam Qasemi, who is the commander of Khatam al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters.
The Guard has received at least $6 billion worth of government contracts in two years, according to state-run media, but the total is likely much higher because many contracts are not disclosed. Working through its private-sector arm, the group operates Tehran's international airport, manages Iran's weapons manufacturing business and is involved in other industries.
"Today's action exposing Khatam al-Anbiya subsidiaries will help firms worldwide avoid business that ultimately benefits the IRGC and its dangerous activities," said Treasury Undersecretary Stuart A. Levey. The subsidiaries are: the Fater Engineering Institute, the Imensazen Consultant Engineers Institute, the Makin Institute and the Rahab Institute.
Also Wednesday, Iran rejected an offer from the United States to help provide it with a steady supply of medical isotopes, meaning that it will stay with its plan to produce uranium enriched to 20 percent in order to feed an aging U.S.-built research reactor that can make the isotopes.
Iranian officials have told the IAEA that the country will produce its first batch of higher-enriched uranium within a few days, but the officials also disclosed that the effort will be modest, involving a small amount of uranium feedstock and a fraction of Iran's capacities, according to a confidential U.N. document obtained by the Associated Press.
The enrichment program's troubles have been documented by IAEA inspectors who have visited the Natanz plant at scheduled intervals to collect samples and take measurements to ensure that Iran isn't diverting the enriched fuel for a clandestine weapons program.
As the ISIS study notes, the Natanz plant initially exceeded expectations, producing steadily higher amounts of low-enriched fuel. But sometime in late 2008 or early 2009, the output dropped from about 90 to 70 kilograms per month. Overall production improved slightly after that but struggled to return to 2008 levels, even as Iranian scientists installed more centrifuges, the report said. In late 2009, the 3,900 machines listed as functional were generating half the amount of enriched uranium expected, it said.
Neither Iran nor the U.N. watchdog have officially accounted for the slumping output, and U.S. officials have declined to speculate publicly about the reasons. The ISIS report identifies the likely cause as a combination of poor design and Iran's rush to put complex assemblages of centrifuges into production before working out the bugs. The report cites "daily attrition through breakage," as well as a failure to anticipate the difficulty of operating large numbers of machines simultaneously.
"Iran has moved too quickly to install centrifuges, at the expense of developing competence in operating them reliably," said the report, co-authored by Albright and Christina Walrond. "In the process it has made many mistakes."
Also, while there is no hard evidence pointing to sabotage, ISIS acknowledges the possibility that Natanz's problems were caused by outside sources. "It is well known that the United States and European intelligence agencies seek to place defective or bugged equipment into Iran's smuggling networks," it said.
Researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
Poll finds most Americans are unhappy with government
Poll finds most Americans are unhappy with government
By Jon Cohen and Philip Rucker
Copyright by The Washington Post
Thursday, February 11, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/10/AR2010021004708.html?hpid=topnews
Two-thirds of Americans are "dissatisfied" or downright "angry" about the way the federal government is working, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. On average, the public estimates that 53 cents of every tax dollar they send to Washington is "wasted."
Despite the disapproval of government, few Americans say they know much about the "tea party" movement, which emerged last year and attracted voters angry at a government they thought was spending recklessly and overstepping its constitutional powers. And the new poll shows that the political standing of former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, who was the keynote speaker last week at the first National Tea Party Convention, has deteriorated significantly.
The opening is clear: Public dissatisfaction with how Washington operates is at its highest level in Post-ABC polling in more than a decade -- since the months after the Republican-led government shutdown in 1996 -- and negative ratings of the two major parties hover near record highs.
But nearly two-thirds of those polled say they know just some, very little or nothing about what the tea party movement stands for. About one in eight says they know "a great deal" about the positions of tea party groups, but the lack of information does not erase the appeal: About 45 percent of all Americans say they agree at least somewhat with tea partiers on issues, including majorities of Republicans and independents.
Although Palin is a tea party favorite, her potential as a presidential hopeful takes a severe hit in the survey. Fifty-five percent of Americans have unfavorable views of her, while the percentage holding favorable views has dipped to 37, a new low in Post-ABC polling.
There is a growing sense that the former Alaska governor is not qualified to serve as president, with more than seven in 10 Americans now saying she is unqualified, up from 60 percent in a November survey. Even among Republicans, a majority now say Palin lacks the qualifications necessary for the White House.
Palin has lost ground among conservative Republicans, who would be crucial to her hopes if she seeks the party's presidential nomination in 2012. Forty-five percent of conservatives now consider her as qualified for the presidency, down sharply from 66 percent who said so last fall.
Among all Republicans polled, 37 percent now hold a "strongly favorable" opinion of Palin, about half the level recorded when she burst onto the national stage in 2008 as Sen. John McCain's running mate.
Among Democrats and independents, assessments of Palin also have eroded. Six percent of Democrats now consider her qualified for the presidency, a drop from 22 percent in November; the percentage of independents who think she is qualified fell to 29 percent from 37 percent.
In her speech at last week's tea party gathering in Nashville, Palin said she will campaign on behalf of conservative candidates -- some backed by tea party groups -- in contested Republican primaries, even if doing so might split the GOP electorate.
The new poll shows Republicans divided about the tea party movement, which threatens to cause a rift in the lead-up to November's midterm elections. Two-thirds of those calling themselves "strong Republicans" view the movement favorably, compared with 33 percent among "not very strong Republicans."
Overall opinion is about evenly split, with 35 percent of all Americans holding favorable views of the movement and 40 percent unfavorable ones. A quarter expressed no opinion. Nearly six in 10 Democrats have unfavorable views, while independents are split, 39 percent positive and 40 percent negative.
Even after staging a national convention that garnered worldwide media attention, the burgeoning tea party effort remains something of an enigma. Through town hall protests and mass gatherings, it has given voice to those disillusioned with President Obama's economic policies and health-care agenda. But the movement -- made up of hundreds of grass-roots groups -- has no national leadership by design, making it difficult to measure the size or makeup of its following.
The new poll offers a portrait of tea party supporters as overwhelmingly white, mostly conservative and generally disapproving of Obama.
Among those who identify themselves as conservatives, those who are angry about the federal government and those who say they know at least a good amount about the tea party, about two-thirds said they agree with the movement.
Overall, two-thirds of all those polled are dissatisfied with or angry about the way the government works, the highest number to say so in periodic polling since March 1996. Eight in 10 conservative Republicans hold negative views about the way government works, but by contrast, 59 percent of liberal Democrats said they were "enthusiastic" or "satisfied" about the role government was playing.
The poll was conducted by conventional and cellular telephone Feb. 4 to 8, partly overlapping with the tea party convention. The results varied only marginally night to night. The margin of sampling error for the for the full poll of 1,004 randomly selected adults is plus or minus three percentage points.
By Jon Cohen and Philip Rucker
Copyright by The Washington Post
Thursday, February 11, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/10/AR2010021004708.html?hpid=topnews
Two-thirds of Americans are "dissatisfied" or downright "angry" about the way the federal government is working, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. On average, the public estimates that 53 cents of every tax dollar they send to Washington is "wasted."
Despite the disapproval of government, few Americans say they know much about the "tea party" movement, which emerged last year and attracted voters angry at a government they thought was spending recklessly and overstepping its constitutional powers. And the new poll shows that the political standing of former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, who was the keynote speaker last week at the first National Tea Party Convention, has deteriorated significantly.
The opening is clear: Public dissatisfaction with how Washington operates is at its highest level in Post-ABC polling in more than a decade -- since the months after the Republican-led government shutdown in 1996 -- and negative ratings of the two major parties hover near record highs.
But nearly two-thirds of those polled say they know just some, very little or nothing about what the tea party movement stands for. About one in eight says they know "a great deal" about the positions of tea party groups, but the lack of information does not erase the appeal: About 45 percent of all Americans say they agree at least somewhat with tea partiers on issues, including majorities of Republicans and independents.
Although Palin is a tea party favorite, her potential as a presidential hopeful takes a severe hit in the survey. Fifty-five percent of Americans have unfavorable views of her, while the percentage holding favorable views has dipped to 37, a new low in Post-ABC polling.
There is a growing sense that the former Alaska governor is not qualified to serve as president, with more than seven in 10 Americans now saying she is unqualified, up from 60 percent in a November survey. Even among Republicans, a majority now say Palin lacks the qualifications necessary for the White House.
Palin has lost ground among conservative Republicans, who would be crucial to her hopes if she seeks the party's presidential nomination in 2012. Forty-five percent of conservatives now consider her as qualified for the presidency, down sharply from 66 percent who said so last fall.
Among all Republicans polled, 37 percent now hold a "strongly favorable" opinion of Palin, about half the level recorded when she burst onto the national stage in 2008 as Sen. John McCain's running mate.
Among Democrats and independents, assessments of Palin also have eroded. Six percent of Democrats now consider her qualified for the presidency, a drop from 22 percent in November; the percentage of independents who think she is qualified fell to 29 percent from 37 percent.
In her speech at last week's tea party gathering in Nashville, Palin said she will campaign on behalf of conservative candidates -- some backed by tea party groups -- in contested Republican primaries, even if doing so might split the GOP electorate.
The new poll shows Republicans divided about the tea party movement, which threatens to cause a rift in the lead-up to November's midterm elections. Two-thirds of those calling themselves "strong Republicans" view the movement favorably, compared with 33 percent among "not very strong Republicans."
Overall opinion is about evenly split, with 35 percent of all Americans holding favorable views of the movement and 40 percent unfavorable ones. A quarter expressed no opinion. Nearly six in 10 Democrats have unfavorable views, while independents are split, 39 percent positive and 40 percent negative.
Even after staging a national convention that garnered worldwide media attention, the burgeoning tea party effort remains something of an enigma. Through town hall protests and mass gatherings, it has given voice to those disillusioned with President Obama's economic policies and health-care agenda. But the movement -- made up of hundreds of grass-roots groups -- has no national leadership by design, making it difficult to measure the size or makeup of its following.
The new poll offers a portrait of tea party supporters as overwhelmingly white, mostly conservative and generally disapproving of Obama.
Among those who identify themselves as conservatives, those who are angry about the federal government and those who say they know at least a good amount about the tea party, about two-thirds said they agree with the movement.
Overall, two-thirds of all those polled are dissatisfied with or angry about the way the government works, the highest number to say so in periodic polling since March 1996. Eight in 10 conservative Republicans hold negative views about the way government works, but by contrast, 59 percent of liberal Democrats said they were "enthusiastic" or "satisfied" about the role government was playing.
The poll was conducted by conventional and cellular telephone Feb. 4 to 8, partly overlapping with the tea party convention. The results varied only marginally night to night. The margin of sampling error for the for the full poll of 1,004 randomly selected adults is plus or minus three percentage points.
FINancial Times Editorial Comment: Europe decides what union means
FINancial Times Editorial Comment: Europe decides what union means
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 20:06 | Last updated: February 10 2010 20:06
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/64d6c0ba-167a-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
The European Union does not handle every crisis well, but it has at times shown a remarkable ability to grit its teeth and stay on course. Reading the euro’s doom in the entrails of market jitters or hectic meetings over Greece’s fiscal woes is mistaken. The euro will survive, and the spectre of a Greek default may even reignite a long-stalled drive towards greater co-operation.
The fears being peddled about flagging confidence in the euro or a break-up of the eurozone are mostly nonsense. This is an overvalued floating currency; its depreciation would be a good thing for its slow-growing members. As for a break-up, no country can be forced off the euro, nor would one voluntarily opt for the resulting chaos.
Still, a Greek sovereign default would cause Europe-wide harm (beyond bruising but insignificant embarrassment). The repercussions would travel through losses taken by institutions owning Greek assets, most importantly Greek banks. Less inevitable but more damaging would be a panic in other sovereign debt markets.
The ideal outcome would be that markets calm down. But hoping for serenity is no policy. EU leaders must decide – now – what to do in an emergency where Greece cannot refinance its debt. It must do so in ways that make the problem less likely to recur in future.
Part of the bargain to make the single currency a reality were rules designed to reassure Germany it would not have to bail out the likes of Greece. But this discipline was never credible – Greece cheated its way into the euro and even Germany flouted the rules when it suited. The casualty was market discipline: markets see a Europe willing to let countries go to the brink but politically bound to save them from going over.
The EU’s immediate priority is to stave off disaster without undoing the discipline that remains. It must ask the IMF to be prepared to step in should bond markets abandon Greece. While the EU can provide the funding, only the IMF can set conditions as credibly as markets. It is high time for Europe to stop being so prickly on this – after all well-run Poland already enjoys an IMF credit line.
Second, it must prevent contagion to other countries’ debt. An explicit programme for assistance in a refinancing crisis – not for Greece, but for euro members with a good fiscal record – would eliminate self-fulfilling market panics.
Third, such a programme should only be a first step. Until now euro members were not ready for fiscal co-operation. Clinging to a fiction that they would let one of their own fall undermined their credibility. Markets are calling their bluff.
Euro members must start to build an explicit framework to govern their fiscal interdependence. This crisis is a result of failed policies – but it presents an opportunity for setting them right.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 20:06 | Last updated: February 10 2010 20:06
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/64d6c0ba-167a-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
The European Union does not handle every crisis well, but it has at times shown a remarkable ability to grit its teeth and stay on course. Reading the euro’s doom in the entrails of market jitters or hectic meetings over Greece’s fiscal woes is mistaken. The euro will survive, and the spectre of a Greek default may even reignite a long-stalled drive towards greater co-operation.
The fears being peddled about flagging confidence in the euro or a break-up of the eurozone are mostly nonsense. This is an overvalued floating currency; its depreciation would be a good thing for its slow-growing members. As for a break-up, no country can be forced off the euro, nor would one voluntarily opt for the resulting chaos.
Still, a Greek sovereign default would cause Europe-wide harm (beyond bruising but insignificant embarrassment). The repercussions would travel through losses taken by institutions owning Greek assets, most importantly Greek banks. Less inevitable but more damaging would be a panic in other sovereign debt markets.
The ideal outcome would be that markets calm down. But hoping for serenity is no policy. EU leaders must decide – now – what to do in an emergency where Greece cannot refinance its debt. It must do so in ways that make the problem less likely to recur in future.
Part of the bargain to make the single currency a reality were rules designed to reassure Germany it would not have to bail out the likes of Greece. But this discipline was never credible – Greece cheated its way into the euro and even Germany flouted the rules when it suited. The casualty was market discipline: markets see a Europe willing to let countries go to the brink but politically bound to save them from going over.
The EU’s immediate priority is to stave off disaster without undoing the discipline that remains. It must ask the IMF to be prepared to step in should bond markets abandon Greece. While the EU can provide the funding, only the IMF can set conditions as credibly as markets. It is high time for Europe to stop being so prickly on this – after all well-run Poland already enjoys an IMF credit line.
Second, it must prevent contagion to other countries’ debt. An explicit programme for assistance in a refinancing crisis – not for Greece, but for euro members with a good fiscal record – would eliminate self-fulfilling market panics.
Third, such a programme should only be a first step. Until now euro members were not ready for fiscal co-operation. Clinging to a fiction that they would let one of their own fall undermined their credibility. Markets are calling their bluff.
Euro members must start to build an explicit framework to govern their fiscal interdependence. This crisis is a result of failed policies – but it presents an opportunity for setting them right.
US attacks UK court over torture claim case
US attacks UK court over torture claim case
By Daniel Dombey in Washington and James Blitz in London
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 21:46 | Last updated: February 11 2010 00:35
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0c591402-168d-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
The White House has criticised a British court decision to publish secret information about allegations of torture by US officials, stating that the move “will complicate the confidentiality of the intelligence sharing relationship between the UK and US”.
In a defeat for the British government, the Court of Appeal on Wednesday ruled that a seven-paragraph account of the alleged torture of Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian national, in Pakistan in 2002 should be published.
The summary, put on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website on Wednesday, details how Mr Mohamed was shackled, threatened and subjected to sleep deprivation by his interrogators. The description of Mr Mohamed’s treatment was drawn up by British judges in August 2008 after they were given access to more than 40 US intelligence documents.
The documents had been passed to the UK intelligence agencies MI5 and MI6, which were concerned about whether Mr Mohamed was a threat to national security.
It also emerged on Wednesday that the Court of Appeal’s judgment was altered after a top Government lawyer protested over the strength of a judge’s “exceptionally damaging” criticism of MI5 in the Mohamed case.
Jonathan Sumption, counsel for the foreign secretary, wrote a letter to the Appeal Court on Monday after seeing a draft copy of the judgment. He said the draft would be read as a court statement “that the Security Service [MI5] does not in fact operate a culture that respects human rights or abjures participation in coercive interrogation techniques”, that MI5 officials had “misled the Intelligence and Security Committee” and had a “culture of suppression”.
The judgment published on Wednesday did not contain the passages objected to by Mr Sumption, leading to accusations that it had been watered down.
Intelligence sharing between the US and the UK, along with nations such as Canada and Australia, has been vital to the alliance between English-speaking developed countries since the second world war.
The White House said it was “deeply disappointed with the court’s judgment” and that the move could affect relations between British and US intelligence agencies. A spokesman for President Barack Obama added: “We shared this information in confidence and with certain expectations.
“As we warned, the court’s judgment will complicate the confidentiality of our intelligence-sharing relationship with the UK.”
By Daniel Dombey in Washington and James Blitz in London
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 21:46 | Last updated: February 11 2010 00:35
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0c591402-168d-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
The White House has criticised a British court decision to publish secret information about allegations of torture by US officials, stating that the move “will complicate the confidentiality of the intelligence sharing relationship between the UK and US”.
In a defeat for the British government, the Court of Appeal on Wednesday ruled that a seven-paragraph account of the alleged torture of Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian national, in Pakistan in 2002 should be published.
The summary, put on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website on Wednesday, details how Mr Mohamed was shackled, threatened and subjected to sleep deprivation by his interrogators. The description of Mr Mohamed’s treatment was drawn up by British judges in August 2008 after they were given access to more than 40 US intelligence documents.
The documents had been passed to the UK intelligence agencies MI5 and MI6, which were concerned about whether Mr Mohamed was a threat to national security.
It also emerged on Wednesday that the Court of Appeal’s judgment was altered after a top Government lawyer protested over the strength of a judge’s “exceptionally damaging” criticism of MI5 in the Mohamed case.
Jonathan Sumption, counsel for the foreign secretary, wrote a letter to the Appeal Court on Monday after seeing a draft copy of the judgment. He said the draft would be read as a court statement “that the Security Service [MI5] does not in fact operate a culture that respects human rights or abjures participation in coercive interrogation techniques”, that MI5 officials had “misled the Intelligence and Security Committee” and had a “culture of suppression”.
The judgment published on Wednesday did not contain the passages objected to by Mr Sumption, leading to accusations that it had been watered down.
Intelligence sharing between the US and the UK, along with nations such as Canada and Australia, has been vital to the alliance between English-speaking developed countries since the second world war.
The White House said it was “deeply disappointed with the court’s judgment” and that the move could affect relations between British and US intelligence agencies. A spokesman for President Barack Obama added: “We shared this information in confidence and with certain expectations.
“As we warned, the court’s judgment will complicate the confidentiality of our intelligence-sharing relationship with the UK.”
Apple move to sell US TV shows for $1
Apple move to sell US TV shows for $1
By Kenneth Li in New York
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 23:00 | Last updated: February 10 2010 23:00
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/14856f08-168e-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
Apple could begin selling US television shows for $1, half of its charge on its iTunes digital media store, when the computer maker’s iPad tablet computer hits the stores.
The test, expected to coincide with the April consumer debut of the iPad, will offer some shows at the lower price as a way to test whether reducing the cost of video programming will ignite sales, people familiar with the discussions said.
Some television networks agreed to the lower prices after months of negotiations, and having initially resisted Apple’s push. Media executives are under pressure from declining DVD sales and cut-rate rental services such as Redbox, that offer rental DVDs for $1.
It is not yet clear which or how many of the US free-to-air and pay-television networks have agreed to the lower pricing. Some media executives said they have not been approached with the new prices.
Apple declined to comment.
“If you move five times the volume [of sales] at half the price, it’s a good idea,” one digital media strategist at a big US media conglomerate said. “The argument for holding the line gets bad quickly.”
One executive said iTunes’s 120m active customer accounts with credit cards on file provides a ripe ground for experimenting with changing the economics of digital media.
“It’s a good time to do it,” another senior media executive said.
Since iPad was unveiled in January, Apple has focused on improving its business of selling TV shows, said one media executive briefed on the talks.
The computer maker has not given up on earlier discussions with some potential partners about creating a “best of TV” subscription service for $30 a month that media companies fear would destroy traditional distribution relationships.
Those relationships with US pay-TV services such as cable and satellite TV companies reaped $25.3bn in fees in 2009, according to estimates by SNL Kagan, a data company.
Apple executives have been careful to avoid linking new TV services to its Apple TV device, a set-top box which connects to a television and is seen as a threat to traditional pay-television services, said media executives briefed on the talks last year.
That is partly why discussions so far have focused on iTunes’s $1.99 TV shows in standard-definition formats that would work on the iPad, rather than the higher resolution $2.99 TV shows in high-definition format that would fill up a large screen television.
By Kenneth Li in New York
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: February 10 2010 23:00 | Last updated: February 10 2010 23:00
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/14856f08-168e-11df-bf44-00144feab49a.html
Apple could begin selling US television shows for $1, half of its charge on its iTunes digital media store, when the computer maker’s iPad tablet computer hits the stores.
The test, expected to coincide with the April consumer debut of the iPad, will offer some shows at the lower price as a way to test whether reducing the cost of video programming will ignite sales, people familiar with the discussions said.
Some television networks agreed to the lower prices after months of negotiations, and having initially resisted Apple’s push. Media executives are under pressure from declining DVD sales and cut-rate rental services such as Redbox, that offer rental DVDs for $1.
It is not yet clear which or how many of the US free-to-air and pay-television networks have agreed to the lower pricing. Some media executives said they have not been approached with the new prices.
Apple declined to comment.
“If you move five times the volume [of sales] at half the price, it’s a good idea,” one digital media strategist at a big US media conglomerate said. “The argument for holding the line gets bad quickly.”
One executive said iTunes’s 120m active customer accounts with credit cards on file provides a ripe ground for experimenting with changing the economics of digital media.
“It’s a good time to do it,” another senior media executive said.
Since iPad was unveiled in January, Apple has focused on improving its business of selling TV shows, said one media executive briefed on the talks.
The computer maker has not given up on earlier discussions with some potential partners about creating a “best of TV” subscription service for $30 a month that media companies fear would destroy traditional distribution relationships.
Those relationships with US pay-TV services such as cable and satellite TV companies reaped $25.3bn in fees in 2009, according to estimates by SNL Kagan, a data company.
Apple executives have been careful to avoid linking new TV services to its Apple TV device, a set-top box which connects to a television and is seen as a threat to traditional pay-television services, said media executives briefed on the talks last year.
That is partly why discussions so far have focused on iTunes’s $1.99 TV shows in standard-definition formats that would work on the iPad, rather than the higher resolution $2.99 TV shows in high-definition format that would fill up a large screen television.
Climate Fight Is Heating Up in Deep Freeze
Climate Fight Is Heating Up in Deep Freeze
By JOHN M. BRODER
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/science/earth/11climate.html?hpw
WASHINGTON — As millions of people along the East Coast hole up in their snowbound homes, the two sides in the climate-change debate are seizing on the mounting drifts to bolster their arguments.
Skeptics of global warming are using the record-setting snows to mock those who warn of dangerous human-driven climate change — this looks more like global cooling, they taunt.
Most climate scientists respond that the ferocious storms are consistent with forecasts that a heating planet will produce more frequent and more intense weather events.
But some independent climate experts say the blizzards in the Northeast no more prove that the planet is cooling than the lack of snow in Vancouver or the downpours in Southern California prove that it is warming.
As an illustration of their point of view, the family of Senator James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, a leading climate skeptic in Congress, built a six-foot-tall igloo on Capitol Hill and put a cardboard sign on top that read “Al Gore’s New Home.”
The extreme weather, Mr. Inhofe said by e-mail, reinforced doubts about scientists’ conclusion that global warming was “unequivocal” and most likely caused by human activity.
Nonsense, responded Joseph Romm, a climate-change expert and former Energy Department official who writes about climate issues at the liberal Center for American Progress.
“Ideologues in the Senate keep pushing the anti-scientific disinformation that big snowstorms are evidence against human-caused global warming,” Mr. Romm wrote on Wednesday.
It is perhaps not coincidental that the snowstorm scuffle is playing out against a background of recent climate controversies: In recent months, global-warming critics have assailed a 2007 report by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and have claimed that e-mail messages and documents plucked from a server at a climate research center in Britain raise doubts about the academic integrity of some climate scientists. Earlier this week, Rush Limbaugh and other conservative commentators made light of the fact that the announcement of the creation of a new federal climate service on Monday had to be conducted by conference call, rather than news conference, because the federal government was shuttered by the storm.
Matt Drudge, who delights in tweaking climate-change enthusiasts, noted on his Web sitethat a Senate hearing on global warming this week was canceled because of the weather.
As the first blizzard howled last weekend, the Virginia Republican Party put up an advertisement on the Web — titled “12 Inches of Global Warming” — criticizing two Virginia Democrats, Representatives Rick Boucher and Tom Perriello, who voted for the federal cap-and-trade legislation last year. The advertisement urges voters to call Mr. Boucher and Mr. Perriello to ask if they will help with the shoveling.
Speculating on the meaning of severe weather events is not new. Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and a deadly heat wave in Europe in the summer of 2003 incited similar arguments about what such extremes might — or might not — say about the planet’s climate.
But climate scientists say that no single episode of severe weather can be blamed for global climate trends while noting evidence that such events will probably become more frequent as global temperatures rise.
Jeff Masters, a meteorologist who writes on the Weather Underground blog, said that the recent snows do not, by themselves, demonstrate anything about the long-term trajectory of the planet. Climate is, by definition, a measure of decades and centuries, not months or years.
But Dr. Masters also said that government and academic studies had consistently predicted an increasing frequency of just these kinds of record-setting storms because warmer air carries more moisture.
“Of course,” he wrote on his blog Wednesday as new snows produced white-out conditions in much of the Eastern half of the country, “both climate-change contrarians and climate-change scientists agree that no single weather event can be blamed on climate change.
“However,” he continued, “one can ‘load the dice’ in favor of events that used to be rare — or unheard of — if the climate is changing to a new state.”
A federal government report issued last year, intended to be the authoritative statement of known climate trends in the United States, pointed to the likelihood of more frequent snowstorms in the Northeast and less frequent snow in the South and Southeast as a result of long-term temperature and precipitation patterns. The Climate Impacts report, from the multiagency United States Global Change Research Program, also projected more intense drought in the Southwest and more powerful Gulf Coast hurricanes because of warming.
In other words, if the government scientists are correct, look for more snow.
By JOHN M. BRODER
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/science/earth/11climate.html?hpw
WASHINGTON — As millions of people along the East Coast hole up in their snowbound homes, the two sides in the climate-change debate are seizing on the mounting drifts to bolster their arguments.
Skeptics of global warming are using the record-setting snows to mock those who warn of dangerous human-driven climate change — this looks more like global cooling, they taunt.
Most climate scientists respond that the ferocious storms are consistent with forecasts that a heating planet will produce more frequent and more intense weather events.
But some independent climate experts say the blizzards in the Northeast no more prove that the planet is cooling than the lack of snow in Vancouver or the downpours in Southern California prove that it is warming.
As an illustration of their point of view, the family of Senator James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, a leading climate skeptic in Congress, built a six-foot-tall igloo on Capitol Hill and put a cardboard sign on top that read “Al Gore’s New Home.”
The extreme weather, Mr. Inhofe said by e-mail, reinforced doubts about scientists’ conclusion that global warming was “unequivocal” and most likely caused by human activity.
Nonsense, responded Joseph Romm, a climate-change expert and former Energy Department official who writes about climate issues at the liberal Center for American Progress.
“Ideologues in the Senate keep pushing the anti-scientific disinformation that big snowstorms are evidence against human-caused global warming,” Mr. Romm wrote on Wednesday.
It is perhaps not coincidental that the snowstorm scuffle is playing out against a background of recent climate controversies: In recent months, global-warming critics have assailed a 2007 report by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and have claimed that e-mail messages and documents plucked from a server at a climate research center in Britain raise doubts about the academic integrity of some climate scientists. Earlier this week, Rush Limbaugh and other conservative commentators made light of the fact that the announcement of the creation of a new federal climate service on Monday had to be conducted by conference call, rather than news conference, because the federal government was shuttered by the storm.
Matt Drudge, who delights in tweaking climate-change enthusiasts, noted on his Web sitethat a Senate hearing on global warming this week was canceled because of the weather.
As the first blizzard howled last weekend, the Virginia Republican Party put up an advertisement on the Web — titled “12 Inches of Global Warming” — criticizing two Virginia Democrats, Representatives Rick Boucher and Tom Perriello, who voted for the federal cap-and-trade legislation last year. The advertisement urges voters to call Mr. Boucher and Mr. Perriello to ask if they will help with the shoveling.
Speculating on the meaning of severe weather events is not new. Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and a deadly heat wave in Europe in the summer of 2003 incited similar arguments about what such extremes might — or might not — say about the planet’s climate.
But climate scientists say that no single episode of severe weather can be blamed for global climate trends while noting evidence that such events will probably become more frequent as global temperatures rise.
Jeff Masters, a meteorologist who writes on the Weather Underground blog, said that the recent snows do not, by themselves, demonstrate anything about the long-term trajectory of the planet. Climate is, by definition, a measure of decades and centuries, not months or years.
But Dr. Masters also said that government and academic studies had consistently predicted an increasing frequency of just these kinds of record-setting storms because warmer air carries more moisture.
“Of course,” he wrote on his blog Wednesday as new snows produced white-out conditions in much of the Eastern half of the country, “both climate-change contrarians and climate-change scientists agree that no single weather event can be blamed on climate change.
“However,” he continued, “one can ‘load the dice’ in favor of events that used to be rare — or unheard of — if the climate is changing to a new state.”
A federal government report issued last year, intended to be the authoritative statement of known climate trends in the United States, pointed to the likelihood of more frequent snowstorms in the Northeast and less frequent snow in the South and Southeast as a result of long-term temperature and precipitation patterns. The Climate Impacts report, from the multiagency United States Global Change Research Program, also projected more intense drought in the Southwest and more powerful Gulf Coast hurricanes because of warming.
In other words, if the government scientists are correct, look for more snow.
Mayors Grow Attuned to the Politics of Snow Removal
Mayors Grow Attuned to the Politics of Snow Removal
By SEWELL CHAN and LIZ ROBBINS
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/us/11district.html?hpw
WASHINGTON — Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, whose city has been overwhelmed by record snowfall, knows the clock is ticking. While residents have been relatively understanding — so far — about delays in plowing roads and clearing sidewalks, he recognizes the perils for politicians who do not get their cities cleaned up quickly.
“Snow will test people’s patience,” the mayor, who faces a tough re-election fight in November, said in a telephone interview Wednesday. “A government official who’s in tune with his residents knows that you’ve got to move fast.”
One of his predecessors, Marion S. Barry, was criticized for attending the Super Bowl while a storm buried the capital in January 1987. After flying over the paralyzed city in a helicopter, Mr. Barry defended his leadership by saying, “We’re not a snow town.”
Other mayors have even been turned out of office for their dithering response to severe weather, including Michael A. Bilandic, who lost his job in Chicago after a January 1979 blizzard became a symbol of ineptitude, and William H. McNichols Jr. in Denver, ousted four months after a Christmas Eve storm in 1982.
Mr. Fenty has been criticized for trying to keep city offices and schools open after two feet of snow fell over the weekend. As a second storm headed for the city on Tuesday, he finally gave in.
“He was hellbent on having the government and the schools open, but enough e-mails went through to stop him,” said Sandra Seegars, 59, a community activist in the Congress Heights section of Southeast Washington, one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods.
Ms. Seegars said the second storm — which brought the total snowfall this winter to 54 inches, breaking the record set in 1898-99 — might actually have worked to Mr. Fenty’s advantage.
“My neighbors now aren’t blaming him anymore, just the weather,” she acknowledged.
The new storm obliterated the halting progress that had been made on cleaning up from the earlier one. Major roads into the District had barely been cleared; just blocks from the White House, streets and sidewalks were impassable four days later. Nearly 750 workers, including some pulled from office duties, operated snowplows to tackle the latest snowfall. The city reacted quickly to replenish its inventory of salt, arranging for 3,000 tons that arrived in Baltimore by ship to be trucked to the capital.
Mr. Fenty said Washington had far exceeded its $6.2 million budget for winter snow removal, a sum that had not been depleted in previous years.
“Any city would be severely challenged by this type of deluge,” said Jim Graham, a City Council member who leads the committee overseeing public works. “That said, I think we could have done a whole lot better.”
Mr. Graham said of Mr. Fenty: “People don’t doubt his efforts, but they’re angry. They’re not pleased with the side streets, or with the main streets. But I haven’t spoken to anybody who’s said the type of thing that was being said about Marion Barry in 1987.”
Councilwoman Mary M. Cheh, who represents the most affluent of the city’s eight wards, said her constituents’ main complaint was the erratic plowing.
“Some streets have been plowed over and over again while people in adjoining areas have been waving their arms, pleading, ‘Please bring the plows here,’ ” she said.
Anthony J. Hood, 46, president of the Woodridge Civic Association in Northeast Washington, understood the difficulties.
“We’re not like Michigan or Chicago,” he said Wednesday. “We’re not adapted to it.”
He added, “If it happened more frequently, we would find some kind of way to deal with it.”
Other Washingtonians were less forgiving.
“It was inappropriate to force nonessential governmental employees to work, given that there was no above-ground Metro and limited buses operating,” said Russell A. Smith, 56, who works for Chartered Health Plan, a city contractor, and said he would rate the city’s response a D.
And Ms. Cheh, the councilwoman, said the initial insistence on keeping offices open reflected “arrogance and maybe a little bit of immaturity” on the part of Mr. Fenty, 39.
“It just reinforces an impression that has been settling in anyway,” she said.
Mr. Fenty has compared notes with Baltimore’s new mayor, Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake. In a phone interview, she said they had exchanged text messages with updates on emergency plans — as well as encouragement. Mayor Fenty’s most recent text? “He said, ‘Get back to work,’ ” she said with a laugh.
Ms. Rawlings-Blake, whose predecessor resigned after a corruption conviction, took office last Thursday, the eve of the first storm. On Wednesday, she ordered the city’s streets closed to all but emergency vehicles.
“This morning, the National Weather Service advised of life-threatening blizzard conditions, so we had to pull our trucks to the side of the road,” she said. “I want to get the city streets clear, but I’m not going to risk safety of our employees just to get an A grade on snow removal.”
Ms. Rawlings-Blake defended the city’s snow-removal operation, which has been so overloaded that trucks have been dumping tons of plowed-up snow into the Inner Harbor.
Baltimore’s snow broke a 1995-96 record.
Ms. Rawlings-Blake said Maryland’s governor, Martin O’Malley, had called the situation “a trial by blizzard,” and added that she agreed.
Mr. O’Malley, for his part, sounded a bit exasperated with residents who complained about the quality of the plowing. Officials were focused, he told reporters, on clearing the way for Humvees and ambulances to get into neighborhoods for emergency purposes. “So stop already with the ‘Scrape my street down to the pavement,’ ” he said. “That cannot happen for the next 72 hours.”
Mr. Fenty appeared to take a measure of comfort in the fact that the District’s adjacent suburbs in Maryland and Virginia have been equally crippled by the precipitation.
“We’re doing at least as well as our suburban counterparts, and on many occasions doing even better,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean we don’t have a lot more to do.”
Sewell Chan reported from Washington, and Liz Robbins from New York. Scott Shane contributed reporting from Baltimore, and John H. Cushman Jr. from Bethesda, Md.
By SEWELL CHAN and LIZ ROBBINS
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/us/11district.html?hpw
WASHINGTON — Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, whose city has been overwhelmed by record snowfall, knows the clock is ticking. While residents have been relatively understanding — so far — about delays in plowing roads and clearing sidewalks, he recognizes the perils for politicians who do not get their cities cleaned up quickly.
“Snow will test people’s patience,” the mayor, who faces a tough re-election fight in November, said in a telephone interview Wednesday. “A government official who’s in tune with his residents knows that you’ve got to move fast.”
One of his predecessors, Marion S. Barry, was criticized for attending the Super Bowl while a storm buried the capital in January 1987. After flying over the paralyzed city in a helicopter, Mr. Barry defended his leadership by saying, “We’re not a snow town.”
Other mayors have even been turned out of office for their dithering response to severe weather, including Michael A. Bilandic, who lost his job in Chicago after a January 1979 blizzard became a symbol of ineptitude, and William H. McNichols Jr. in Denver, ousted four months after a Christmas Eve storm in 1982.
Mr. Fenty has been criticized for trying to keep city offices and schools open after two feet of snow fell over the weekend. As a second storm headed for the city on Tuesday, he finally gave in.
“He was hellbent on having the government and the schools open, but enough e-mails went through to stop him,” said Sandra Seegars, 59, a community activist in the Congress Heights section of Southeast Washington, one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods.
Ms. Seegars said the second storm — which brought the total snowfall this winter to 54 inches, breaking the record set in 1898-99 — might actually have worked to Mr. Fenty’s advantage.
“My neighbors now aren’t blaming him anymore, just the weather,” she acknowledged.
The new storm obliterated the halting progress that had been made on cleaning up from the earlier one. Major roads into the District had barely been cleared; just blocks from the White House, streets and sidewalks were impassable four days later. Nearly 750 workers, including some pulled from office duties, operated snowplows to tackle the latest snowfall. The city reacted quickly to replenish its inventory of salt, arranging for 3,000 tons that arrived in Baltimore by ship to be trucked to the capital.
Mr. Fenty said Washington had far exceeded its $6.2 million budget for winter snow removal, a sum that had not been depleted in previous years.
“Any city would be severely challenged by this type of deluge,” said Jim Graham, a City Council member who leads the committee overseeing public works. “That said, I think we could have done a whole lot better.”
Mr. Graham said of Mr. Fenty: “People don’t doubt his efforts, but they’re angry. They’re not pleased with the side streets, or with the main streets. But I haven’t spoken to anybody who’s said the type of thing that was being said about Marion Barry in 1987.”
Councilwoman Mary M. Cheh, who represents the most affluent of the city’s eight wards, said her constituents’ main complaint was the erratic plowing.
“Some streets have been plowed over and over again while people in adjoining areas have been waving their arms, pleading, ‘Please bring the plows here,’ ” she said.
Anthony J. Hood, 46, president of the Woodridge Civic Association in Northeast Washington, understood the difficulties.
“We’re not like Michigan or Chicago,” he said Wednesday. “We’re not adapted to it.”
He added, “If it happened more frequently, we would find some kind of way to deal with it.”
Other Washingtonians were less forgiving.
“It was inappropriate to force nonessential governmental employees to work, given that there was no above-ground Metro and limited buses operating,” said Russell A. Smith, 56, who works for Chartered Health Plan, a city contractor, and said he would rate the city’s response a D.
And Ms. Cheh, the councilwoman, said the initial insistence on keeping offices open reflected “arrogance and maybe a little bit of immaturity” on the part of Mr. Fenty, 39.
“It just reinforces an impression that has been settling in anyway,” she said.
Mr. Fenty has compared notes with Baltimore’s new mayor, Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake. In a phone interview, she said they had exchanged text messages with updates on emergency plans — as well as encouragement. Mayor Fenty’s most recent text? “He said, ‘Get back to work,’ ” she said with a laugh.
Ms. Rawlings-Blake, whose predecessor resigned after a corruption conviction, took office last Thursday, the eve of the first storm. On Wednesday, she ordered the city’s streets closed to all but emergency vehicles.
“This morning, the National Weather Service advised of life-threatening blizzard conditions, so we had to pull our trucks to the side of the road,” she said. “I want to get the city streets clear, but I’m not going to risk safety of our employees just to get an A grade on snow removal.”
Ms. Rawlings-Blake defended the city’s snow-removal operation, which has been so overloaded that trucks have been dumping tons of plowed-up snow into the Inner Harbor.
Baltimore’s snow broke a 1995-96 record.
Ms. Rawlings-Blake said Maryland’s governor, Martin O’Malley, had called the situation “a trial by blizzard,” and added that she agreed.
Mr. O’Malley, for his part, sounded a bit exasperated with residents who complained about the quality of the plowing. Officials were focused, he told reporters, on clearing the way for Humvees and ambulances to get into neighborhoods for emergency purposes. “So stop already with the ‘Scrape my street down to the pavement,’ ” he said. “That cannot happen for the next 72 hours.”
Mr. Fenty appeared to take a measure of comfort in the fact that the District’s adjacent suburbs in Maryland and Virginia have been equally crippled by the precipitation.
“We’re doing at least as well as our suburban counterparts, and on many occasions doing even better,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean we don’t have a lot more to do.”
Sewell Chan reported from Washington, and Liz Robbins from New York. Scott Shane contributed reporting from Baltimore, and John H. Cushman Jr. from Bethesda, Md.
Touring the Prado at Warp Speed
Touring the Prado at Warp Speed
By ANDREW FERREN
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 14, 2010
http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/travel/14culture.html?hpw
HOW much time do you need for a museum visit? Some might say that they could spend an entire day at any of the world’s great museums, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Louvre in Paris or the Prado in Madrid, without even coming close to experiencing all their riches. Others, like those museumgoers with short attention spans, get itchy after a half-hour or so, and just make a mad dash to see a few favorites and maybe peek in at a new exhibition before heading back out into the sunlight and away from the crowds.
Well, how about 45 minutes? Can you really do a major museum justice in that amount of time? Surprisingly, one museum official seems to think so: Gabriele Finaldi, the Prado’s deputy director for conservation and research, and the one usually tapped to show visiting heads of state and other dignitaries the museum’s remarkable collection of paintings. “Forty-five minutes is the perfect amount of time to get to know the Prado,” said Mr. Finaldi.
So he wasn’t fazed when I asked him to plot an itinerary for the Prado that would have me in and out in less than an hour.
Mr. Finaldi said the key was to set priorities. “Obviously you’re not going to see the whole collection, so let some things — like English and Dutch painting, of which there are better collections elsewhere — drop by the wayside,” he explained. The Prado houses more works by Titian, Rubens, Velázquez and Goya than any other museum in the world, he said, so these pivotal artists ought not to be missed.
“The Prado is an especially sensuous collection,” Mr. Finaldi noted. “The kings of Spain who acquired it loved the lush, painterly qualities of Venetian painting, so it’s always worth just moving through the galleries for a few minutes, allowing yourself to be seduced by the sensual nature of the collection.”
Before any seduction can get under way, one has to get through the door, and the lines to do so could easily use up your 45 minutes. Fortunately, the Prado’s Web site (www.museoprado.es) offers timed-entry tickets, though these must be bought in advance. Print out the tickets, which contain a bar code, and go to the museum’s Velázquez entrance (the central entrance in the middle of the museum’s grand facade) and you’re in. A bonus: the online tickets, which sell for 7 euros, about $9.50, at $1.36 to the euro, are 1 euro cheaper than those bought in person.
To avoid bottlenecks and crowds, Mr. Finaldi suggests going when the museum opens at 9 a.m. There is also usually a lull in visitors between 3:30 and 5:30 p.m., when many Spaniards eat lunch. Admission is free after 6 p.m., and the museum is open until 8 most days. It is closed on Mondays.
Since opening a vast new wing in 2007, the nearly 200-year-old Prado has been stretching into its new space by reorganizing and expanding its permanent displays. Last spring, the prized collection of Venetian paintings, including many of the museum’s 35 canvases by Titian, were reinstalled in new galleries. In the fall, the museum’s collection of 19th-century paintings and sculptures — which had been shown only offsite (if at all) over the last 30 years — was unveiled in a suite of 12 galleries in the main building.
These 19th-century galleries now constitute the finish line of the Prado’s nearly 1,000-year run through the history of art. To compress all of that into my recent 45-minute tour, Mr. Finaldi focused on a few key works that highlight the strengths and unique character of Spain’s premier picture gallery.
Skipping right to the Renaissance, he singled out “Death of the Virgin” by Andrea Mantegna, circa 1462. Hanging in Gallery 56B on the ground floor, just to the left of the museum entrance, the small, luminous painting on panel — surrounded by works by Raphael, Fra Angelico and Botticelli — provides a good point for taking in the Prado’s collection of Italian Renaissance painting.
Flemish paintings were also highly prized by the Spanish kings, who ruled over much of the Low Countries. Through the doorway opposite the Mantegna, the galleries of Flemish painting include iconic works like Rogier van der Weyden’s achingly beautiful “Descent From the Cross” from about 1435 (in Gallery 58). The delicately painted details, like the translucent tears streaming down several faces and the potent gestures of grief, convey a most poignant depiction of sorrow.
Three galleries away in room 56A is Hieronymous Bosch’s famous triptych “The Garden of Earthly Delights” (circa 1500), with its detailed and highly imaginative rendering of the passage from the Garden of Eden to Hell.
Turn right out of this gallery to take the elevators just outside of Gallery 55 up to the first floor. Make another right out of the elevator and into the spectacular long gallery that forms the spine of the building. Lined with paintings by masters of the Spanish golden age like José de Ribera and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, this is definitely a spot where Mr. Finaldi’s just-take-it-all-in approach is greatly rewarded.
At the gallery’s north end, the new Venetian display (Galleries 40 to 44) offers a sumptuous selection of works by Bellini, Titian and Tintoretto and provides a crash course in the dramatic action, jewel-like colors and lushly painted surfaces that captivated the first Hapsburg rulers of Spain, Charles V and his son Philip II.
The Spanish master Velázquez (1599-1660) is the undisputed headliner of the Prado’s collection. As court painter to King Philip IV, Velázquez painted portraits of the royal family as well as scenes of important military victories and classical allegories that boldly proclaimed the majesty and refinement of the Spanish court. However, the subject of his best-loved painting, “Las Meninas,” remains an open question.
Ostensibly a scene of everyday life inside the palace, the painting has layers of meaning that scholars still debate. Usually it hangs in the basilica-like Gallery 12, but until June it is on view in the center of the long gallery. “Las Meninas” is to the Prado what the Mona Lisa is to the Louvre. It’s unlikely ever to travel to see you, so do not miss it here.
The other great pillar of Spanish art is Goya (1746-1828). Make your way to the south end of the Central Gallery where Goya’s portraits of King Carlos IV dominate the small octagonal pavilion (Gallery 32). Much of the museum’s southern flank is dedicated to Goya, with 125 works currently on view, but Mr. Finaldi typically selects two large canvases portraying an uprising in Madrid against Napoleon’s forces to show visitors.
Called simply the “Second of May, 1808” and “Third of May, 1808,” the works depict a brutal street fight one day and the even more brutal repercussions, with a firing squad, the next. Emblems of both Spanish history and Western art, the paintings amply reveal Goya’s unrivaled skills as a master of dramatic action, textures and atmospheric effects, the painterly attributes that unite much of the Prado’s collection.
Walk past Goya’s portrait of King Ferdinand VII, the man who opened the Prado as a public museum in 1819, and into the museum’s 19th-century galleries where works by Federico de Madrazo, JoaquÃn Sorolla and Mariano Fortuny fill in the blanks on what happened in Spanish painting between Goya and Picasso.
These galleries leave you at the doorway through which you entered the museum — turn right and you’ll find the new shop and cafe or turn left and retake the street, having seen much of the Prado and with a whole day still ahead of you.
By ANDREW FERREN
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 14, 2010
http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/travel/14culture.html?hpw
HOW much time do you need for a museum visit? Some might say that they could spend an entire day at any of the world’s great museums, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Louvre in Paris or the Prado in Madrid, without even coming close to experiencing all their riches. Others, like those museumgoers with short attention spans, get itchy after a half-hour or so, and just make a mad dash to see a few favorites and maybe peek in at a new exhibition before heading back out into the sunlight and away from the crowds.
Well, how about 45 minutes? Can you really do a major museum justice in that amount of time? Surprisingly, one museum official seems to think so: Gabriele Finaldi, the Prado’s deputy director for conservation and research, and the one usually tapped to show visiting heads of state and other dignitaries the museum’s remarkable collection of paintings. “Forty-five minutes is the perfect amount of time to get to know the Prado,” said Mr. Finaldi.
So he wasn’t fazed when I asked him to plot an itinerary for the Prado that would have me in and out in less than an hour.
Mr. Finaldi said the key was to set priorities. “Obviously you’re not going to see the whole collection, so let some things — like English and Dutch painting, of which there are better collections elsewhere — drop by the wayside,” he explained. The Prado houses more works by Titian, Rubens, Velázquez and Goya than any other museum in the world, he said, so these pivotal artists ought not to be missed.
“The Prado is an especially sensuous collection,” Mr. Finaldi noted. “The kings of Spain who acquired it loved the lush, painterly qualities of Venetian painting, so it’s always worth just moving through the galleries for a few minutes, allowing yourself to be seduced by the sensual nature of the collection.”
Before any seduction can get under way, one has to get through the door, and the lines to do so could easily use up your 45 minutes. Fortunately, the Prado’s Web site (www.museoprado.es) offers timed-entry tickets, though these must be bought in advance. Print out the tickets, which contain a bar code, and go to the museum’s Velázquez entrance (the central entrance in the middle of the museum’s grand facade) and you’re in. A bonus: the online tickets, which sell for 7 euros, about $9.50, at $1.36 to the euro, are 1 euro cheaper than those bought in person.
To avoid bottlenecks and crowds, Mr. Finaldi suggests going when the museum opens at 9 a.m. There is also usually a lull in visitors between 3:30 and 5:30 p.m., when many Spaniards eat lunch. Admission is free after 6 p.m., and the museum is open until 8 most days. It is closed on Mondays.
Since opening a vast new wing in 2007, the nearly 200-year-old Prado has been stretching into its new space by reorganizing and expanding its permanent displays. Last spring, the prized collection of Venetian paintings, including many of the museum’s 35 canvases by Titian, were reinstalled in new galleries. In the fall, the museum’s collection of 19th-century paintings and sculptures — which had been shown only offsite (if at all) over the last 30 years — was unveiled in a suite of 12 galleries in the main building.
These 19th-century galleries now constitute the finish line of the Prado’s nearly 1,000-year run through the history of art. To compress all of that into my recent 45-minute tour, Mr. Finaldi focused on a few key works that highlight the strengths and unique character of Spain’s premier picture gallery.
Skipping right to the Renaissance, he singled out “Death of the Virgin” by Andrea Mantegna, circa 1462. Hanging in Gallery 56B on the ground floor, just to the left of the museum entrance, the small, luminous painting on panel — surrounded by works by Raphael, Fra Angelico and Botticelli — provides a good point for taking in the Prado’s collection of Italian Renaissance painting.
Flemish paintings were also highly prized by the Spanish kings, who ruled over much of the Low Countries. Through the doorway opposite the Mantegna, the galleries of Flemish painting include iconic works like Rogier van der Weyden’s achingly beautiful “Descent From the Cross” from about 1435 (in Gallery 58). The delicately painted details, like the translucent tears streaming down several faces and the potent gestures of grief, convey a most poignant depiction of sorrow.
Three galleries away in room 56A is Hieronymous Bosch’s famous triptych “The Garden of Earthly Delights” (circa 1500), with its detailed and highly imaginative rendering of the passage from the Garden of Eden to Hell.
Turn right out of this gallery to take the elevators just outside of Gallery 55 up to the first floor. Make another right out of the elevator and into the spectacular long gallery that forms the spine of the building. Lined with paintings by masters of the Spanish golden age like José de Ribera and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, this is definitely a spot where Mr. Finaldi’s just-take-it-all-in approach is greatly rewarded.
At the gallery’s north end, the new Venetian display (Galleries 40 to 44) offers a sumptuous selection of works by Bellini, Titian and Tintoretto and provides a crash course in the dramatic action, jewel-like colors and lushly painted surfaces that captivated the first Hapsburg rulers of Spain, Charles V and his son Philip II.
The Spanish master Velázquez (1599-1660) is the undisputed headliner of the Prado’s collection. As court painter to King Philip IV, Velázquez painted portraits of the royal family as well as scenes of important military victories and classical allegories that boldly proclaimed the majesty and refinement of the Spanish court. However, the subject of his best-loved painting, “Las Meninas,” remains an open question.
Ostensibly a scene of everyday life inside the palace, the painting has layers of meaning that scholars still debate. Usually it hangs in the basilica-like Gallery 12, but until June it is on view in the center of the long gallery. “Las Meninas” is to the Prado what the Mona Lisa is to the Louvre. It’s unlikely ever to travel to see you, so do not miss it here.
The other great pillar of Spanish art is Goya (1746-1828). Make your way to the south end of the Central Gallery where Goya’s portraits of King Carlos IV dominate the small octagonal pavilion (Gallery 32). Much of the museum’s southern flank is dedicated to Goya, with 125 works currently on view, but Mr. Finaldi typically selects two large canvases portraying an uprising in Madrid against Napoleon’s forces to show visitors.
Called simply the “Second of May, 1808” and “Third of May, 1808,” the works depict a brutal street fight one day and the even more brutal repercussions, with a firing squad, the next. Emblems of both Spanish history and Western art, the paintings amply reveal Goya’s unrivaled skills as a master of dramatic action, textures and atmospheric effects, the painterly attributes that unite much of the Prado’s collection.
Walk past Goya’s portrait of King Ferdinand VII, the man who opened the Prado as a public museum in 1819, and into the museum’s 19th-century galleries where works by Federico de Madrazo, JoaquÃn Sorolla and Mariano Fortuny fill in the blanks on what happened in Spanish painting between Goya and Picasso.
These galleries leave you at the doorway through which you entered the museum — turn right and you’ll find the new shop and cafe or turn left and retake the street, having seen much of the Prado and with a whole day still ahead of you.
Europe Agrees to Aid Greece, but Is Unsure of How to Help
Europe Agrees to Aid Greece, but Is Unsure of How to Help
By STEPHEN CASTLE
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/business/global/11union.html?hpw
BRUSSELS — The crisis in Greece brought Europe’s leaders together on one issue Wednesday: The need for emergency action to keep the problem from infecting Europe’s other weak economies. But an accord on who will take the lead — and how — appeared uncertain.
European officials face greater urgency to devise a bailout for Greece after fears its government might default caused a recent slump in financial markets worldwide.
A phalanx of European leaders put on a unified show of support ahead of a summit meeting Thursday in Brussels, where the heads of all European Union governments and the finance ministers of the 16 countries that use the euro are scheduled to appear. Together with the president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, the officials agreed Wednesday that they could no longer allow uncertainty about the future of Greece — and the euro zone — to disturb global investors.
Some officials said the meeting might achieve little more than a political statement, leaving details to be worked out later by finance ministers.
German officials also insisted that no formal decision had been made.
A crucial point in the discussions is whether the government in Athens should be offered loan guarantees or given additional loans to help meet a looming debt payment, or whether there should be a pledge to buy Greek government bonds should the need arise. Investors like the concept of having one or several creditworthy nations, like Germany, guaranteeing the debts of a poorer nation, although such a move would be largely without precedent.
Germany and France are expected to have to take the lead on any emergency solution, especially after European officials rejected allowing Greece to go the International Monetary Fund — which often provides financial aid to emerging markets — for help. Going to the fund is considered a highly undesirable option for any of the 16 countries that use the euro currency.
Officials are worried about the “moral hazard” of any Europe-backed solution for Greece: If one country is bailed out by the others, investors will expect a similar response should other weak economies that use the euro, including Portugal and Spain, fall into serious trouble.
There are also questions about how to apply any commitments so that the weaker governments would be pressured to deliver painful economic overhauls.
The talks, which included a discussion of what steps Greece might be required or even forced to take to deal with its own financial problems, came as Greek citizens demonstrated in protest against austerity measures so far announced by the government, which many market participants think are far from adequate.
“At this junction they will have to support Greece,” Simon Tilford, chief economist at the Center for European Reform, said of Europe’s politicians. “If you have encouraged the markets to believe that support is forthcoming and then it is not, we will see a backlash” in financial markets.
Though Mr. Tilford said the markets would ideally like to see some form of guarantee extended to Greek loans, he added that this would probably be too much for the government in Berlin. The most likely outcome was a loan facility extended on condition that changes were undertaken by the government in Athens. It would also need to apply to other countries facing similar ills.
The summit meeting Thursday was called by Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, to try to draw up a longer-term economic strategy for the European Union to modernize its economy by 2020, an agenda that has been overshadowed by the euro zone debt crisis.
Stocks rose across most of Europe on Wednesday, with the euro-zone benchmark Dow Jones Euro Stoxx 50 index gaining 1.2 percent. The euro slipped as conflicting comments from European leaders showed the bloc was still moving hesitantly toward concrete measures. The 16-nation currency traded at $1.3733 late Wednesday in Europe.
Greek government debt rallied for a second consecutive day, with the yield on the government’s benchmark 10-year bond — which spiked as high as 7.2 percent on Jan. 28 — dropping at one point below 6 percent for the first time in a month. Italian, Irish, Spanish and Portuguese bonds also gained. The cost of insuring government debts against default also fell.
Nicholas Kulish contributed reporting from Berlin.
By STEPHEN CASTLE
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/business/global/11union.html?hpw
BRUSSELS — The crisis in Greece brought Europe’s leaders together on one issue Wednesday: The need for emergency action to keep the problem from infecting Europe’s other weak economies. But an accord on who will take the lead — and how — appeared uncertain.
European officials face greater urgency to devise a bailout for Greece after fears its government might default caused a recent slump in financial markets worldwide.
A phalanx of European leaders put on a unified show of support ahead of a summit meeting Thursday in Brussels, where the heads of all European Union governments and the finance ministers of the 16 countries that use the euro are scheduled to appear. Together with the president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, the officials agreed Wednesday that they could no longer allow uncertainty about the future of Greece — and the euro zone — to disturb global investors.
Some officials said the meeting might achieve little more than a political statement, leaving details to be worked out later by finance ministers.
German officials also insisted that no formal decision had been made.
A crucial point in the discussions is whether the government in Athens should be offered loan guarantees or given additional loans to help meet a looming debt payment, or whether there should be a pledge to buy Greek government bonds should the need arise. Investors like the concept of having one or several creditworthy nations, like Germany, guaranteeing the debts of a poorer nation, although such a move would be largely without precedent.
Germany and France are expected to have to take the lead on any emergency solution, especially after European officials rejected allowing Greece to go the International Monetary Fund — which often provides financial aid to emerging markets — for help. Going to the fund is considered a highly undesirable option for any of the 16 countries that use the euro currency.
Officials are worried about the “moral hazard” of any Europe-backed solution for Greece: If one country is bailed out by the others, investors will expect a similar response should other weak economies that use the euro, including Portugal and Spain, fall into serious trouble.
There are also questions about how to apply any commitments so that the weaker governments would be pressured to deliver painful economic overhauls.
The talks, which included a discussion of what steps Greece might be required or even forced to take to deal with its own financial problems, came as Greek citizens demonstrated in protest against austerity measures so far announced by the government, which many market participants think are far from adequate.
“At this junction they will have to support Greece,” Simon Tilford, chief economist at the Center for European Reform, said of Europe’s politicians. “If you have encouraged the markets to believe that support is forthcoming and then it is not, we will see a backlash” in financial markets.
Though Mr. Tilford said the markets would ideally like to see some form of guarantee extended to Greek loans, he added that this would probably be too much for the government in Berlin. The most likely outcome was a loan facility extended on condition that changes were undertaken by the government in Athens. It would also need to apply to other countries facing similar ills.
The summit meeting Thursday was called by Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, to try to draw up a longer-term economic strategy for the European Union to modernize its economy by 2020, an agenda that has been overshadowed by the euro zone debt crisis.
Stocks rose across most of Europe on Wednesday, with the euro-zone benchmark Dow Jones Euro Stoxx 50 index gaining 1.2 percent. The euro slipped as conflicting comments from European leaders showed the bloc was still moving hesitantly toward concrete measures. The 16-nation currency traded at $1.3733 late Wednesday in Europe.
Greek government debt rallied for a second consecutive day, with the yield on the government’s benchmark 10-year bond — which spiked as high as 7.2 percent on Jan. 28 — dropping at one point below 6 percent for the first time in a month. Italian, Irish, Spanish and Portuguese bonds also gained. The cost of insuring government debts against default also fell.
Nicholas Kulish contributed reporting from Berlin.
With Toyota in Trouble, Rivals Gain
With Toyota in Trouble, Rivals Gain
By NICK BUNKLEY
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/business/11toyota.html?ref=global-home
DETROIT — With Toyota stumbling as it recalls more than eight million vehicles for problems, its rivals are seeing a rare opportunity to take back some market share.
General Motors and the Ford Motor Company are continuing to offer discounts of up to $1,000 to people who trade in a Toyota this month. (Ford’s offer is good on other foreign brands, too.) But the companies are not widely advertising the deals.
For example, Mark Reuss, president of G.M.’s North American business, did not mention the discounts in an interview Wednesday with CNBC from the Chicago auto show, despite being asked repeatedly about how the Toyota recalls would affect G.M.
“We are going to treat people and our competitors as we would like to be treated,” he said. Executives at Honda and Volkswagen have criticized discounts aimed at Toyota owners. Analysts said that Honda in particular did not need to offer such deals because its models were a natural alternative to Toyota’s.
“Our dealers are independent, but we have asked them to please restrain any urges to try to take a predatory stance in this type of environment,” said a Honda spokesman, Chris Martin. “We would like them to follow our example and pursue sales based on the merits of the vehicles.”
Mr. Martin said it was too early to tell whether the company would gain sales from customers who wanted an alternative to Toyota or be hurt by consumers associating Toyota’s troubles with other Japanese automakers.
“I don’t think anything that causes consumers to distrust automakers is a good thing,” Mr. Martin added.
The Korean automaker Hyundai also is expected to pick up some market share from Toyota, whose sales fell 16 percent in January.
Hyundai, which is about to start selling a redesigned Sonata sedan that it hopes will challenge the best-selling Toyota Camry, matched the G.M. and Ford discounts, but only for a few days.
Richard Lipsey, the general manager of Van Hyundai near Dallas, said he chose not to advertise the offer.
“I don’t think I’m going to entice people who have been loyal to Toyota for years by trashing them, just because one thing went wrong,” Mr. Lipsey said. “I wouldn’t want someone doing that to my franchise.”
In Sunday’s Detroit Free Press, ads for at least 12 dealerships, including a Nissan store, highlighted discounts for people who own or lease Toyotas. Across the country, dealers say the offers are bringing in more customers.
“Trade in your Toyota here,” proclaims a banner at Super Ford-Lincoln-Mercury near Los Angeles. The dealership’s general manager, Adrian Fargeat Jr., said showroom traffic had risen 15 percent since Toyota suspended sales and production of eight models last month.
He said seven people had taken advantage of the deal so far, including a few who gave up models that were not being recalled.
“People sometimes don’t buy, but they’re curious,” Mr. Fargeat said. “People that haven’t driven Ford in a while, when they get in they say, ‘Wow, I didn’t know Ford was like this.’ ”
More than a quarter of shoppers who were considering a Toyota before the recalls no longer are, according to a survey released on Wednesday by Kelley Blue Book.
The survey, of 691 consumers who used the company’s Web site, said many of those consumers were now considering brands that were not on shopping lists before the recall, including Ford, Chevrolet, Hyundai and Honda.
“There’s been such a perception gap between Toyota and other brands that were in many cases unfair,” said James Bell, Kelley’s executive market analyst. “This situation has sort of put a chink in that armor. The 800-pound gorilla is maybe a 700-pound gorilla now.”
Toyota, of course, is trying to resolve its quality problems quickly. It faced another setback this week, however, with the addition of more than 400,000 Prius hybrids to the list of models being recalled.
At the Chicago auto show, an American sales executive with Toyota, Robert S. Carter, said Wednesday that dealers had repaired accelerator pedals on 220,000 vehicles since last week. About 50,000 are being fixed each day, he said.
Dealers have received the software upgrade that is needed for the 2010 Prius, Mr. Carter said, and Toyota will begin mailing letters with instructions for owners of those cars this week.
By NICK BUNKLEY
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/business/11toyota.html?ref=global-home
DETROIT — With Toyota stumbling as it recalls more than eight million vehicles for problems, its rivals are seeing a rare opportunity to take back some market share.
General Motors and the Ford Motor Company are continuing to offer discounts of up to $1,000 to people who trade in a Toyota this month. (Ford’s offer is good on other foreign brands, too.) But the companies are not widely advertising the deals.
For example, Mark Reuss, president of G.M.’s North American business, did not mention the discounts in an interview Wednesday with CNBC from the Chicago auto show, despite being asked repeatedly about how the Toyota recalls would affect G.M.
“We are going to treat people and our competitors as we would like to be treated,” he said. Executives at Honda and Volkswagen have criticized discounts aimed at Toyota owners. Analysts said that Honda in particular did not need to offer such deals because its models were a natural alternative to Toyota’s.
“Our dealers are independent, but we have asked them to please restrain any urges to try to take a predatory stance in this type of environment,” said a Honda spokesman, Chris Martin. “We would like them to follow our example and pursue sales based on the merits of the vehicles.”
Mr. Martin said it was too early to tell whether the company would gain sales from customers who wanted an alternative to Toyota or be hurt by consumers associating Toyota’s troubles with other Japanese automakers.
“I don’t think anything that causes consumers to distrust automakers is a good thing,” Mr. Martin added.
The Korean automaker Hyundai also is expected to pick up some market share from Toyota, whose sales fell 16 percent in January.
Hyundai, which is about to start selling a redesigned Sonata sedan that it hopes will challenge the best-selling Toyota Camry, matched the G.M. and Ford discounts, but only for a few days.
Richard Lipsey, the general manager of Van Hyundai near Dallas, said he chose not to advertise the offer.
“I don’t think I’m going to entice people who have been loyal to Toyota for years by trashing them, just because one thing went wrong,” Mr. Lipsey said. “I wouldn’t want someone doing that to my franchise.”
In Sunday’s Detroit Free Press, ads for at least 12 dealerships, including a Nissan store, highlighted discounts for people who own or lease Toyotas. Across the country, dealers say the offers are bringing in more customers.
“Trade in your Toyota here,” proclaims a banner at Super Ford-Lincoln-Mercury near Los Angeles. The dealership’s general manager, Adrian Fargeat Jr., said showroom traffic had risen 15 percent since Toyota suspended sales and production of eight models last month.
He said seven people had taken advantage of the deal so far, including a few who gave up models that were not being recalled.
“People sometimes don’t buy, but they’re curious,” Mr. Fargeat said. “People that haven’t driven Ford in a while, when they get in they say, ‘Wow, I didn’t know Ford was like this.’ ”
More than a quarter of shoppers who were considering a Toyota before the recalls no longer are, according to a survey released on Wednesday by Kelley Blue Book.
The survey, of 691 consumers who used the company’s Web site, said many of those consumers were now considering brands that were not on shopping lists before the recall, including Ford, Chevrolet, Hyundai and Honda.
“There’s been such a perception gap between Toyota and other brands that were in many cases unfair,” said James Bell, Kelley’s executive market analyst. “This situation has sort of put a chink in that armor. The 800-pound gorilla is maybe a 700-pound gorilla now.”
Toyota, of course, is trying to resolve its quality problems quickly. It faced another setback this week, however, with the addition of more than 400,000 Prius hybrids to the list of models being recalled.
At the Chicago auto show, an American sales executive with Toyota, Robert S. Carter, said Wednesday that dealers had repaired accelerator pedals on 220,000 vehicles since last week. About 50,000 are being fixed each day, he said.
Dealers have received the software upgrade that is needed for the 2010 Prius, Mr. Carter said, and Toyota will begin mailing letters with instructions for owners of those cars this week.
Once Stigmatized, Food Stamps Find Acceptance
Once Stigmatized, Food Stamps Find Acceptance
By JASON DEPARLE and ROBERT GEBELOFF
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/us/11foodstamps.html?th&emc=th
A decade ago, New York City officials were so reluctant to give out food stamps, they made people register one day and return the next just to get an application. The welfare commissioner said the program caused dependency and the poor were “better off” without it.
Now the city urges the needy to seek aid (in languages from Albanian to Yiddish). Neighborhood groups recruit clients at churches and grocery stores, with materials that all but proclaim a civic duty to apply — to “help New York farmers, grocers, and businesses.” There is even a program on Rikers Island to enroll inmates leaving the jail.
“Applying for food stamps is easier than ever,” city posters say.
The same is true nationwide. After a U-turn in the politics of poverty, food stamps, a program once scorned as “welfare,” enjoys broad new support. Following deep cuts in the 1990s, Congress reversed course to expand eligibility, cut red tape and burnish the program’s image, with a special effort to enroll the working poor. These changes, combined with soaring unemployment, have pushed enrollment to record highs, with one in eight Americans now getting aid.
“I’ve seen a remarkable shift,” said Senator Richard G. Lugar, an Indiana Republican and prominent food stamp supporter. “People now see that it’s necessary to have a strong food stamp program.”
The revival began a decade ago, after tough welfare laws chased millions of people from the cash rolls, many into low-wage jobs as fast-food workers, maids, and nursing aides. Newly sympathetic officials saw food stamps as a way to help them. For states, the program had another appeal: the benefits are federally paid.
But support also turned on chance developments, including natural disasters (which showed the program’s value in emergencies) and the rise of plastic benefit cards (which eased stigma and fraud). The program has commercial allies, in farmers and grocery stores, and it got an unexpected boost from President George W. Bush, whose food stamp administrator, Eric Bost, proved an ardent supporter.
“I assure you, food stamps is not welfare,” Mr. Bost said in a recent interview.
Still, some critics see it as welfare in disguise and advocate more restraints.
So far their voices have been muted, unlike in the 1990s when members of Congress likened permissive welfare laws to feeding alligators and wolves. But last month, a Republican candidate for governor in South Carolina, Andre Bauer, criticized food stamps by saying his grandmother “told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed.”
Mr. Bauer, the lieutenant governor, apologized for his phrasing but said, “somebody has to have the gumption to talk about the cycle of dependency.”
The drive to enroll the needy can be seen in the case of Monica Bostick-Thomas, 45, a Harlem widow who works part-time as a school crossing guard. Since her husband died three years ago, she has scraped by on an annual income of about $15,000.
But she did not seek help until she got a call from the Food Bank of New York City, one of the city’s outreach partners. Last year, she balked, doubting she qualified. This year, when the group called again, she agreed to apply. A big woman with a broad smile, Ms. Bostick-Thomas swept into the group’s office a few days later, talking up her daughters’ college degrees and bemoaning the cost of oxtail meat.
“I’m not saying I go hungry,” Ms. Bostick-Thomas said. “But I can’t always eat what I want.”
The worker projected a benefit of $147 a month. “That’s going to help!” she said. “I wouldn’t have gone and applied on my own.”
Since its founding in 1964, the food stamp program has swung between seasons of bipartisan support and conservative attack. George McGovern, a Democrat, and Bob Dole, a Republican, were prominent Senate backers. But Ronald Reagan told stories about the “strapping young buck” who used food stamps to buy a “T-bone steak.”
By the 1990s, the program was swept up in President Bill Clinton’s pledge to “end welfare.” While he meant cash aid, Congressional Republicans labeled food stamps welfare, too. The 1996 law that restricted cash benefits included major cuts in food stamps benefits and eligibility. Some states went further and pushed eligible people away.
But as attention shifted to poor workers, food stamps won new support. Wisconsin’s former governor, Tommy G. Thompson, a Republican, boasted of cutting the cash rolls, but advertised the food stamp rise. “Leading the Way to Make Work Pay,” a 2000 news release said.
States eased limits on people with cars and required fewer office visits from people with jobs. The federal government now gives bonuses to states that enroll the most eligible people.
A self-reinforcing cycle kicked in: outreach attracted more workers, and workers built support for outreach. In a given month, nearly 90 percent of food stamp recipients still have incomes below the federal poverty line, according to the Department of Agriculture. But among families with children, the share working rose to 47 percent in 2008, from 26 percent in the mid-1990s, and the share getting cash welfare fell by two-thirds.
In 2008, the program got an upbeat new name: the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — SNAP. By contrast, cash welfare remains stigmatized, and the rolls have scarcely budged.
Nowhere have attitudes swung as far as in New York City, where Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and his welfare commissioner, Jason A. Turner, laid siege in the late 1990s to what they called the welfare capital of the world. After bitter fights, a federal judge made the city end delays in handing out food stamp applications. But attitudes remained stern.
Skip to next paragraph
The Safety Net
A Reversal on Poverty
With millions of jobs lost and major industries on the ropes, America’s array of government aid — including unemployment insurance, food stamps and cash welfare — is being tested as never before. This series examines how the safety net is holding up under the worst economic crisis in decades.
“I count food stamps as being part of welfare,” Mr. Turner said at the time. “You’re better off without either one.”
Since Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg took office eight years ago, the rolls have doubled, to 1.6 million people, with most of the increase coming in his second term after critics accused him of neglecting the poor.
He intensified outreach. He reduced paperwork. He hired a new welfare commissioner, Robert Doar, with orders to improve service for the working poor.
“If you’re working, I want to help you, and that’s how the mayor feels,” Mr. Doar said.
Albany made a parallel push to enroll the working poor, setting an explicit goal for caseload growth. “This is all federal money — it drives dollars to local economies,” said Russell Sykes, a senior program official.
But Mr. Turner, now a consultant in Milwaukee, warns that the aid encourages the poor to work less and therefore remain in need. “It’s going to be very difficult with large swaths of the lower middle class tasting the fruits of dependency to be weaned from this,” he said.
The tension between self-reliance and relief can be seen at the food bank’s office in Harlem, where the city lets outreach workers file applications.
Juan Diego Castro, 24, is a college graduate and Americorps volunteer whose immigrant parents warned him “not to be a burden on this country.” He has a monthly stipend of about $2,500 and initially thought food stamps should go to needier people, like the tenants he organizes. “My concern was if I’m taking food stamps and I have a job, is it morally correct?” he said.
But federal law eases eligibility for Americorps members, and a food bank worker urged him and fellow volunteers to apply, arguing that there was enough aid to go around and that use would demonstrate continuing need. “That meeting definitely turned us around,” Mr. Castro said.
While Mr. Castro seemed contemplative, Alba Catano, 44, appeared dejected. A Colombian immigrant, she has spent a dozen years on a night janitorial crew but fell and missed three months of work after knee surgery.
Last November, she limped into a storefront church in Queens, where a food bank worker was taking applications beside the pews.
About her lost wages, she struck a stoic pose, saying her san cocho — Colombian soup — had less meat and more plantains. But her composure cracked when she talked of the effect on her 10-year-old daughter.
“My refrigerator is empty,” Ms. Catano said.
Last month, Ms. Catano was back at work, with a benefit of $170 a month and no qualms about joining 38 million Americans eating with government aid. “I had the feeling that working people were not eligible,” she said. “But then they told me, ‘No, no, the program has improved.’ ”
By JASON DEPARLE and ROBERT GEBELOFF
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: February 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/us/11foodstamps.html?th&emc=th
A decade ago, New York City officials were so reluctant to give out food stamps, they made people register one day and return the next just to get an application. The welfare commissioner said the program caused dependency and the poor were “better off” without it.
Now the city urges the needy to seek aid (in languages from Albanian to Yiddish). Neighborhood groups recruit clients at churches and grocery stores, with materials that all but proclaim a civic duty to apply — to “help New York farmers, grocers, and businesses.” There is even a program on Rikers Island to enroll inmates leaving the jail.
“Applying for food stamps is easier than ever,” city posters say.
The same is true nationwide. After a U-turn in the politics of poverty, food stamps, a program once scorned as “welfare,” enjoys broad new support. Following deep cuts in the 1990s, Congress reversed course to expand eligibility, cut red tape and burnish the program’s image, with a special effort to enroll the working poor. These changes, combined with soaring unemployment, have pushed enrollment to record highs, with one in eight Americans now getting aid.
“I’ve seen a remarkable shift,” said Senator Richard G. Lugar, an Indiana Republican and prominent food stamp supporter. “People now see that it’s necessary to have a strong food stamp program.”
The revival began a decade ago, after tough welfare laws chased millions of people from the cash rolls, many into low-wage jobs as fast-food workers, maids, and nursing aides. Newly sympathetic officials saw food stamps as a way to help them. For states, the program had another appeal: the benefits are federally paid.
But support also turned on chance developments, including natural disasters (which showed the program’s value in emergencies) and the rise of plastic benefit cards (which eased stigma and fraud). The program has commercial allies, in farmers and grocery stores, and it got an unexpected boost from President George W. Bush, whose food stamp administrator, Eric Bost, proved an ardent supporter.
“I assure you, food stamps is not welfare,” Mr. Bost said in a recent interview.
Still, some critics see it as welfare in disguise and advocate more restraints.
So far their voices have been muted, unlike in the 1990s when members of Congress likened permissive welfare laws to feeding alligators and wolves. But last month, a Republican candidate for governor in South Carolina, Andre Bauer, criticized food stamps by saying his grandmother “told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed.”
Mr. Bauer, the lieutenant governor, apologized for his phrasing but said, “somebody has to have the gumption to talk about the cycle of dependency.”
The drive to enroll the needy can be seen in the case of Monica Bostick-Thomas, 45, a Harlem widow who works part-time as a school crossing guard. Since her husband died three years ago, she has scraped by on an annual income of about $15,000.
But she did not seek help until she got a call from the Food Bank of New York City, one of the city’s outreach partners. Last year, she balked, doubting she qualified. This year, when the group called again, she agreed to apply. A big woman with a broad smile, Ms. Bostick-Thomas swept into the group’s office a few days later, talking up her daughters’ college degrees and bemoaning the cost of oxtail meat.
“I’m not saying I go hungry,” Ms. Bostick-Thomas said. “But I can’t always eat what I want.”
The worker projected a benefit of $147 a month. “That’s going to help!” she said. “I wouldn’t have gone and applied on my own.”
Since its founding in 1964, the food stamp program has swung between seasons of bipartisan support and conservative attack. George McGovern, a Democrat, and Bob Dole, a Republican, were prominent Senate backers. But Ronald Reagan told stories about the “strapping young buck” who used food stamps to buy a “T-bone steak.”
By the 1990s, the program was swept up in President Bill Clinton’s pledge to “end welfare.” While he meant cash aid, Congressional Republicans labeled food stamps welfare, too. The 1996 law that restricted cash benefits included major cuts in food stamps benefits and eligibility. Some states went further and pushed eligible people away.
But as attention shifted to poor workers, food stamps won new support. Wisconsin’s former governor, Tommy G. Thompson, a Republican, boasted of cutting the cash rolls, but advertised the food stamp rise. “Leading the Way to Make Work Pay,” a 2000 news release said.
States eased limits on people with cars and required fewer office visits from people with jobs. The federal government now gives bonuses to states that enroll the most eligible people.
A self-reinforcing cycle kicked in: outreach attracted more workers, and workers built support for outreach. In a given month, nearly 90 percent of food stamp recipients still have incomes below the federal poverty line, according to the Department of Agriculture. But among families with children, the share working rose to 47 percent in 2008, from 26 percent in the mid-1990s, and the share getting cash welfare fell by two-thirds.
In 2008, the program got an upbeat new name: the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — SNAP. By contrast, cash welfare remains stigmatized, and the rolls have scarcely budged.
Nowhere have attitudes swung as far as in New York City, where Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and his welfare commissioner, Jason A. Turner, laid siege in the late 1990s to what they called the welfare capital of the world. After bitter fights, a federal judge made the city end delays in handing out food stamp applications. But attitudes remained stern.
Skip to next paragraph
The Safety Net
A Reversal on Poverty
With millions of jobs lost and major industries on the ropes, America’s array of government aid — including unemployment insurance, food stamps and cash welfare — is being tested as never before. This series examines how the safety net is holding up under the worst economic crisis in decades.
“I count food stamps as being part of welfare,” Mr. Turner said at the time. “You’re better off without either one.”
Since Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg took office eight years ago, the rolls have doubled, to 1.6 million people, with most of the increase coming in his second term after critics accused him of neglecting the poor.
He intensified outreach. He reduced paperwork. He hired a new welfare commissioner, Robert Doar, with orders to improve service for the working poor.
“If you’re working, I want to help you, and that’s how the mayor feels,” Mr. Doar said.
Albany made a parallel push to enroll the working poor, setting an explicit goal for caseload growth. “This is all federal money — it drives dollars to local economies,” said Russell Sykes, a senior program official.
But Mr. Turner, now a consultant in Milwaukee, warns that the aid encourages the poor to work less and therefore remain in need. “It’s going to be very difficult with large swaths of the lower middle class tasting the fruits of dependency to be weaned from this,” he said.
The tension between self-reliance and relief can be seen at the food bank’s office in Harlem, where the city lets outreach workers file applications.
Juan Diego Castro, 24, is a college graduate and Americorps volunteer whose immigrant parents warned him “not to be a burden on this country.” He has a monthly stipend of about $2,500 and initially thought food stamps should go to needier people, like the tenants he organizes. “My concern was if I’m taking food stamps and I have a job, is it morally correct?” he said.
But federal law eases eligibility for Americorps members, and a food bank worker urged him and fellow volunteers to apply, arguing that there was enough aid to go around and that use would demonstrate continuing need. “That meeting definitely turned us around,” Mr. Castro said.
While Mr. Castro seemed contemplative, Alba Catano, 44, appeared dejected. A Colombian immigrant, she has spent a dozen years on a night janitorial crew but fell and missed three months of work after knee surgery.
Last November, she limped into a storefront church in Queens, where a food bank worker was taking applications beside the pews.
About her lost wages, she struck a stoic pose, saying her san cocho — Colombian soup — had less meat and more plantains. But her composure cracked when she talked of the effect on her 10-year-old daughter.
“My refrigerator is empty,” Ms. Catano said.
Last month, Ms. Catano was back at work, with a benefit of $170 a month and no qualms about joining 38 million Americans eating with government aid. “I had the feeling that working people were not eligible,” she said. “But then they told me, ‘No, no, the program has improved.’ ”
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Google Broadband Does Not Compute
Google Broadband Does Not Compute
By Matt Phillips
Copyright by The Wall Street Journal
February 10, 2010, 6:00 PM ET
http://blogs.wsj.com/marketbeat/2010/02/10/google-broadband-does-not-compute/?mod=yahoo_hs
Google is a wonder to behold.
Its iconic brand took advertising by storm and its business model churns out cash — $25 billion on hand right now. Even so, shareholders should still ask themselves if Google is losing focus.
Wednesday’s news that Google plans to build a broadband network and start selling super-fast internet services is just the latest example.
We wondered how much it would cost to supply super-fast broadband to some 50,000 to 500,000 people — or between 20,000 and 200,000 homes. So did Benjamin Schachter, an analyst at Broadpoint AmTech, who eyeballed the total cost in a note Wednesday:
If we assume 20k-200k homes at $3k-$8k per home, this test could cost anywhere from $60mil to $1.6bil. At a rough mid-point of 100k homes at $5k per home, it will cost $500mil. While these are not small numbers, they will hardly dent GOOG’s cash reserves of ~$25bil.
Fine. Google clearly has the scratch to pull this off.
But, since it is their money, Google shareholders have a right to question exactly why broadband is good for GOOG. Here’s Schachter’s thoughts:
Despite GOOG’s claims that this is an experimental test, we believe this will be negative for sentiment, as investors definitely do NOT want to see GOOG going in this direction … The bottom line: While we do not fully understand the rationale, for now it is just a test. Additionally, this is not out of character for GOOG, in that the company constantly discusses big ideas. As long as it remains a relatively small test, it should not impact the financial model meaningfully, but investors continue to be concerned about GOOG’s focus.
That focus, of course, is Google’s near-godlike dominance in the search business.
Still, we couldn’t help but notice the latest comScore search numbers for January out Wednesday show that — while Google remains the behemoth of search — its market share slipped slightly last month as Microsoft’s Bing — stop laughing! — posted its eight-straight month of modest gains.
Google’s shares fell 0.37% on Thursday and are down 14% since the Jan. 5 introduction of the Nexus One, its last big step into a new business.
By Matt Phillips
Copyright by The Wall Street Journal
February 10, 2010, 6:00 PM ET
http://blogs.wsj.com/marketbeat/2010/02/10/google-broadband-does-not-compute/?mod=yahoo_hs
Google is a wonder to behold.
Its iconic brand took advertising by storm and its business model churns out cash — $25 billion on hand right now. Even so, shareholders should still ask themselves if Google is losing focus.
Wednesday’s news that Google plans to build a broadband network and start selling super-fast internet services is just the latest example.
We wondered how much it would cost to supply super-fast broadband to some 50,000 to 500,000 people — or between 20,000 and 200,000 homes. So did Benjamin Schachter, an analyst at Broadpoint AmTech, who eyeballed the total cost in a note Wednesday:
If we assume 20k-200k homes at $3k-$8k per home, this test could cost anywhere from $60mil to $1.6bil. At a rough mid-point of 100k homes at $5k per home, it will cost $500mil. While these are not small numbers, they will hardly dent GOOG’s cash reserves of ~$25bil.
Fine. Google clearly has the scratch to pull this off.
But, since it is their money, Google shareholders have a right to question exactly why broadband is good for GOOG. Here’s Schachter’s thoughts:
Despite GOOG’s claims that this is an experimental test, we believe this will be negative for sentiment, as investors definitely do NOT want to see GOOG going in this direction … The bottom line: While we do not fully understand the rationale, for now it is just a test. Additionally, this is not out of character for GOOG, in that the company constantly discusses big ideas. As long as it remains a relatively small test, it should not impact the financial model meaningfully, but investors continue to be concerned about GOOG’s focus.
That focus, of course, is Google’s near-godlike dominance in the search business.
Still, we couldn’t help but notice the latest comScore search numbers for January out Wednesday show that — while Google remains the behemoth of search — its market share slipped slightly last month as Microsoft’s Bing — stop laughing! — posted its eight-straight month of modest gains.
Google’s shares fell 0.37% on Thursday and are down 14% since the Jan. 5 introduction of the Nexus One, its last big step into a new business.
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; Common sense on Asian carp
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; Common sense on Asian carp
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 10, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2038732,CST-EDT-edit10b.article
Like two boats on a collision course, opposing philosophies over how to deal with the threat of invasive Asian carp in the Great Lakes surfaced this week.
Officials of Michigan and other Great Lakes states chose the simplistic course, advocating for permanent closure of the locks on Illinois waterways linking Lake Michigan to the Illinois River.
Alternatively, the Obama administration on Monday announced a more sophisticated, multi-tiered effort to keep the carp at bay.
The Obama administration's $78.5 million approach, which includes 25 actions that would slow the advance of the carp, is sensible. It contains various control techniques while spending money to research ways to keep carp from spawning and developing a carp-only poison that wouldn't affect other fish. That plan now is before the House Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment.
Simply closing the locks would devastate the region's shipping while failing to stop the carp. If the fish make it through existing electric barriers near Romeoville, they could use other, still-open routes to bypass the locks.
Everyone agrees the species of giant carp are a serious threat, but no one knows for sure what would happen if they got into the lakes.
The carp can reach four feet in length and weigh as much as 100 pounds. By feasting on plankton, they could threaten the region's $7 billion-a-year fishing industry.
We need a solution to the carp and other invasive species. The Obama administration is on the right path.
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 10, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2038732,CST-EDT-edit10b.article
Like two boats on a collision course, opposing philosophies over how to deal with the threat of invasive Asian carp in the Great Lakes surfaced this week.
Officials of Michigan and other Great Lakes states chose the simplistic course, advocating for permanent closure of the locks on Illinois waterways linking Lake Michigan to the Illinois River.
Alternatively, the Obama administration on Monday announced a more sophisticated, multi-tiered effort to keep the carp at bay.
The Obama administration's $78.5 million approach, which includes 25 actions that would slow the advance of the carp, is sensible. It contains various control techniques while spending money to research ways to keep carp from spawning and developing a carp-only poison that wouldn't affect other fish. That plan now is before the House Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment.
Simply closing the locks would devastate the region's shipping while failing to stop the carp. If the fish make it through existing electric barriers near Romeoville, they could use other, still-open routes to bypass the locks.
Everyone agrees the species of giant carp are a serious threat, but no one knows for sure what would happen if they got into the lakes.
The carp can reach four feet in length and weigh as much as 100 pounds. By feasting on plankton, they could threaten the region's $7 billion-a-year fishing industry.
We need a solution to the carp and other invasive species. The Obama administration is on the right path.
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; Beyond doomsday: End most of CTA's free rides
Chicago Sun-Times Editorial; Beyond doomsday: End most of CTA's free rides
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 10, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2038735,CST-EDT-edit10a.article
The CTA's doomsday has come and gone. More than 1,000 bus and rail workers are now unemployed, leaving our city frustrated by diminished service and extra-crowded buses and trains.
Is there any way to turn back the clock?
Yes, but it means more sacrifice by beleaguered CTA workers and a big dose of political courage by our elected leaders.
The first step is union concessions.
The CTA is $96 million in the hole, prompting Sunday's 18 percent cut in bus service and 9 percent cut in rail service. CTA workers can't be expected to fill that hole on their own -- they just began paying more toward their health-care and pension costs in 2008 -- but they must play a part.
The CTA has proposed a 2010 wage freeze and a series of furloughs and unpaid days. Though painful, these concessions are in line with what's commonplace across the public and private sector in these extraordinary times.
Non-union CTA employees didn't get raises this year or last and are slated to take up to 18 furlough days.
Consider the CTA workers idling at home. A job with less pay is better than no job at all.
We also want sacrifice -- the political kind -- from our leaders in Springfield.
As we've said time and time again, former Gov. Rod Blagojevich's ill-conceived free rides for seniors program must go.
That hare-brained idea cost the CTA, Metra and Pace $37 million in lost revenue last year. The free rides should be for low-income seniors only, and Gov. Quinn -- the general election be damned -- needs to stand up and demand a rollback of this fiscally irresponsible boondoggle.
Lastly, we're looking for some help from Washington.
The federal transportation bill, the main source of the CTA's capital dollars, has expired and a full reauthorization looks to be at least six months away. An early version of it by House Transportation Committee Chair Jim Oberstar (D-Minn.) tilts the funding formula away from roads and bridges, giving more to mass transit.
More dollars to modernize public transit is hugely important to Chicago, which has billions in unmet capital needs, placing constant stress on its operating budget.
We urge the Illinois congressional delegation to push for quick action on this reauthorization.
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
February 10, 2010
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/2038735,CST-EDT-edit10a.article
The CTA's doomsday has come and gone. More than 1,000 bus and rail workers are now unemployed, leaving our city frustrated by diminished service and extra-crowded buses and trains.
Is there any way to turn back the clock?
Yes, but it means more sacrifice by beleaguered CTA workers and a big dose of political courage by our elected leaders.
The first step is union concessions.
The CTA is $96 million in the hole, prompting Sunday's 18 percent cut in bus service and 9 percent cut in rail service. CTA workers can't be expected to fill that hole on their own -- they just began paying more toward their health-care and pension costs in 2008 -- but they must play a part.
The CTA has proposed a 2010 wage freeze and a series of furloughs and unpaid days. Though painful, these concessions are in line with what's commonplace across the public and private sector in these extraordinary times.
Non-union CTA employees didn't get raises this year or last and are slated to take up to 18 furlough days.
Consider the CTA workers idling at home. A job with less pay is better than no job at all.
We also want sacrifice -- the political kind -- from our leaders in Springfield.
As we've said time and time again, former Gov. Rod Blagojevich's ill-conceived free rides for seniors program must go.
That hare-brained idea cost the CTA, Metra and Pace $37 million in lost revenue last year. The free rides should be for low-income seniors only, and Gov. Quinn -- the general election be damned -- needs to stand up and demand a rollback of this fiscally irresponsible boondoggle.
Lastly, we're looking for some help from Washington.
The federal transportation bill, the main source of the CTA's capital dollars, has expired and a full reauthorization looks to be at least six months away. An early version of it by House Transportation Committee Chair Jim Oberstar (D-Minn.) tilts the funding formula away from roads and bridges, giving more to mass transit.
More dollars to modernize public transit is hugely important to Chicago, which has billions in unmet capital needs, placing constant stress on its operating budget.
We urge the Illinois congressional delegation to push for quick action on this reauthorization.
Be not afraid of Palin
Be not afraid of Palin
By Clarence Page
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 9, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-oped-0210-page-20100209,0,7042088.column
Sarah Palin's conservative fans ask me why "the liberal media" are "so afraid" of the former governor of Alaska. I, for one, am unafraid. And I am delighted that the former Republican vice presidential candidate refuses to rule out running for the presidency. I am also relieved that, so far, she does not appear to have a ghost's chance of winning.
As food for commentary, her recent weekend foray through Facebook, Fox News and the National Tea Party Convention leaves me with more choices than the proverbial mosquito in a nudist colony.
Let's see: Shall I take on her sarcastic dig during her $100,000 tea party speech in Nashville, Tenn., at President Barack Obama for using a teleprompter during his speeches, as if there is something wrong with using a teleprompter? Shall I compare it to her scribbling topic notes that high definition TV cameras caught on her left palm and sarcastically praise, say, her apparent effort to save electricity? Nah, too easy.
How about her recent condemnation of the slur "retarded"? I would applaud her unconditionally on that one had she not put her own partisan conditions on it. On her Facebook page, Palin called on Obama to fire his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, for calling some liberal Democrats "f---ing retarded" because they threatened to launch attack ads against conservative Democrats over health care reform. Palin was outraged enough to shun Machiavelli's advice against interrupting your enemies while they are destroying themselves.
"Rahm's slur on all God's children with cognitive and developmental disabilities — and the people who love them — is unacceptable," she wrote on her Facebook page, "and it's heartbreaking."
Who could argue with Palin's call for "decency," especially when it comes from the mother of a developmentally disabled child? As the world knows, Palin's son, Trig, has Down syndrome. Emanuel properly apologized for using the R-word in the private meeting, just as Obama apologized last year for comparing his bad bowling to the Special Olympics.
But, how to explain conservative radio star Rush Limbaugh repeatedly calling liberal Democrats "retards" on the air as he mocked Emanuel? Check out the twists, turns and curly Q's that Palin takes as she shoots through an Olympic luge of logic, trying to slam Emanuel without stepping on the toes of her political ally. "Rush Limbaugh was using satire," she said in a Super Bowl Sunday interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News, " ... I didn't hear Rush Limbaugh calling a group of people whom he did not agree with effing 'retards.' "
She should listen again. Limbaugh lambasted our "politically correct society" for "acting like some giant insult has taken place by calling a bunch of people who are retards, retards."
"I'm not going to apologize for it," Limbaugh said, "I'm just quoting Emanuel. It's in the news. … So now there's going to be a meeting. There's going to be a retard summit at the White House …"
But, hey, Palin says, it's only "satire."
As headline-making news goes, Palin's palm-piloting and R-word outrage pales in comparison to her foray during the Fox interview on national defense. She did not quite suggest that Obama invade Iran, as some news reports seemed to indicate, but she did bring up an Iran invasion as something that could calm his opposition and help Obama's re-election.
Where did she pick up that notion? From a Pat Buchanan column, she said, which did little to reassure those of us who were relieved to see "Pitchfork Pat" lose both of his presidential bids.
Ironically, I do not entirely disagree with Palin fans who say her rise is Obama's fault. In their first year in the Oval Office, Team Obama may have misread the need to reassure swing voters in these uncertain times.
A big mad-as-hell, throw-the-bums-out segment of the electorate hungers for some red-meat rhetoric in the way that Huey Long or William Jennings Bryan gave voice to grass-root frustrations back in their day.
With Obama's cool technocratic style and his stubborn concern for facts and compromise, he does not do that kind of "anger" well.
"Sarah Barracuda," as Palin's high school basketball teammates called her, does it with a smile. And she does it now as a commentator for Fox News.
Welcome to the pantheon of punditry, governor. It's more fun than being president.
Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune's editorial board and blogs at chicagotribune.com/pagespage
cpage@tribune.com
By Clarence Page
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
February 9, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-oped-0210-page-20100209,0,7042088.column
Sarah Palin's conservative fans ask me why "the liberal media" are "so afraid" of the former governor of Alaska. I, for one, am unafraid. And I am delighted that the former Republican vice presidential candidate refuses to rule out running for the presidency. I am also relieved that, so far, she does not appear to have a ghost's chance of winning.
As food for commentary, her recent weekend foray through Facebook, Fox News and the National Tea Party Convention leaves me with more choices than the proverbial mosquito in a nudist colony.
Let's see: Shall I take on her sarcastic dig during her $100,000 tea party speech in Nashville, Tenn., at President Barack Obama for using a teleprompter during his speeches, as if there is something wrong with using a teleprompter? Shall I compare it to her scribbling topic notes that high definition TV cameras caught on her left palm and sarcastically praise, say, her apparent effort to save electricity? Nah, too easy.
How about her recent condemnation of the slur "retarded"? I would applaud her unconditionally on that one had she not put her own partisan conditions on it. On her Facebook page, Palin called on Obama to fire his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, for calling some liberal Democrats "f---ing retarded" because they threatened to launch attack ads against conservative Democrats over health care reform. Palin was outraged enough to shun Machiavelli's advice against interrupting your enemies while they are destroying themselves.
"Rahm's slur on all God's children with cognitive and developmental disabilities — and the people who love them — is unacceptable," she wrote on her Facebook page, "and it's heartbreaking."
Who could argue with Palin's call for "decency," especially when it comes from the mother of a developmentally disabled child? As the world knows, Palin's son, Trig, has Down syndrome. Emanuel properly apologized for using the R-word in the private meeting, just as Obama apologized last year for comparing his bad bowling to the Special Olympics.
But, how to explain conservative radio star Rush Limbaugh repeatedly calling liberal Democrats "retards" on the air as he mocked Emanuel? Check out the twists, turns and curly Q's that Palin takes as she shoots through an Olympic luge of logic, trying to slam Emanuel without stepping on the toes of her political ally. "Rush Limbaugh was using satire," she said in a Super Bowl Sunday interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News, " ... I didn't hear Rush Limbaugh calling a group of people whom he did not agree with effing 'retards.' "
She should listen again. Limbaugh lambasted our "politically correct society" for "acting like some giant insult has taken place by calling a bunch of people who are retards, retards."
"I'm not going to apologize for it," Limbaugh said, "I'm just quoting Emanuel. It's in the news. … So now there's going to be a meeting. There's going to be a retard summit at the White House …"
But, hey, Palin says, it's only "satire."
As headline-making news goes, Palin's palm-piloting and R-word outrage pales in comparison to her foray during the Fox interview on national defense. She did not quite suggest that Obama invade Iran, as some news reports seemed to indicate, but she did bring up an Iran invasion as something that could calm his opposition and help Obama's re-election.
Where did she pick up that notion? From a Pat Buchanan column, she said, which did little to reassure those of us who were relieved to see "Pitchfork Pat" lose both of his presidential bids.
Ironically, I do not entirely disagree with Palin fans who say her rise is Obama's fault. In their first year in the Oval Office, Team Obama may have misread the need to reassure swing voters in these uncertain times.
A big mad-as-hell, throw-the-bums-out segment of the electorate hungers for some red-meat rhetoric in the way that Huey Long or William Jennings Bryan gave voice to grass-root frustrations back in their day.
With Obama's cool technocratic style and his stubborn concern for facts and compromise, he does not do that kind of "anger" well.
"Sarah Barracuda," as Palin's high school basketball teammates called her, does it with a smile. And she does it now as a commentator for Fox News.
Welcome to the pantheon of punditry, governor. It's more fun than being president.
Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune's editorial board and blogs at chicagotribune.com/pagespage
cpage@tribune.com
United, American threaten to call off O'Hare expansion talks
United, American threaten to call off O'Hare expansion talks
By Julie Johnsson and John Hilkevitch
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
10:22 a.m. CST, February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-biz-ohare-feb09,0,780656.story
An elusive deal on funding the final new runways at O'Hare International Airport finally appeared to be close at hand after years of negotiations, until city officials undermined the agreement, airline officials said Tuesday.
Representatives of United and American airlines said city aviation officials caught the carriers off-guard with demands that they consider unreasonable: They planned to hike O'Hare rents and landing fees by millions of dollars, despite the recession and a struggling airline industry.
In addition, the city intends to use the money to repay bonds, which carry a 4 percent variable interest rate and aren't due for another 20 years.
The carriers balked, and in a scorching Feb. 3 letter to City Aviation Commissioner Rosemarie Andolino, they said that all talks are off until the city rethinks its financing strategy.
"We think that it's fiscally irresponsible to prepay debt that already has a coupon of 4 percent, especially when that debt is not due until 2030," said Michael Trevino, a spokesman for United Airlines. "Obviously, the airline industry continues to have its financial challenges."
The city should tap other funding sources, including fees charged passengers, said the International Air Transport Association in a Feb. 9 letter to Andolino. The trade group said it stepped into the dispute on behalf of foreign and domestic carriers at O'Hare because of the "unprecedented increase" in airport fees.
"Chicago O'Hare could have not chosen a worse moment to burden its carriers," said Douglas Lavin, IATA regional vice-president, given the $11-billion loss and $80 billion year-over-year drop in revenues that airlines saw in 2009.
It's a rare public dispute between the parties and comes at a time when the city scored a crucial legal victory that would have paved the way for the second phase of the $15 billion O'Hare expansion. A DuPage County judge Monday awarded the city possession of St. Johannes Cemetery, which lies in the path of a proposed runway.
The city and airlines were close to an agreement in late December to move ahead with the last runways on the south end of O'Hare, which the city contends would deliver the greatest results of any of the runways planned. They would substantially boost capacity for additional flights, while slashing the airport's legendary delays.
The two sides also agreed, sources said, to table the most contentious issue: the city's insistence on building a $3 billion western terminal that the airlines say they can't afford and don't need.
But the city backtracked last week and insisted that the terminal be part of any discussion. City officials also said they planned to retroactively raise the airlines' 2010 airport usage fees, as of Jan. 1. Rents would rise 15 percent to 17 percent, while landing fees would jump 38 percent.
About three-fourths of the landing-fee hike, or $63 million, would go to prepay bonds issued in 2005.
"We are uncertain what has triggered this change in direction, but find it quite troubling and inconsistent with our past dealings," wrote United and American officials. "If [city aviation] is going to intentionally and unnecessarily increase the airlines' costs, we cannot consider any projects that will only exacerbate the situation."
Andolino wasn't available for comment. In a statement, first deputy commissioner Michael Boland said the city wouldn't negotiate through the press but that it "remains willing to reach an agreement with its airline partners."
The airlines are furious because they thought they had a solid agreement with the Daley administration to keep down the costs of operating at O'Hare until the $15 billion airfield expansion project is completed. Andolino has said the project still can be done by 2014, which was the deadline Mayor Richard Daley set when Chicago was vying to host the 2016 Olympics.
But without airline support, or private investors, O'Hare expansion critics say the project will run out of money and stop midstream.
From the airlines' perspective, the centerpiece of financing the project was a concept called "pavement before payment."
Conceived in 2003, the idea went as follows: Since the financially struggling carriers could not provide significant upfront money for runway construction, the city borrowed heavily to raise funds. Then, the airlines were supposed to pay back their share years later, through increased landing fees and other charges, when a wealth of flights were operating on the new runways and the industry was again profitable.
But the airlines should have known that the city expected them to shoulder more of the costs, Boland said.
"It is unfortunate that the 2010 O'Hare debt service increases have occurred during difficult economic times; however, they were anticipated as part of the (O'Hare modernization) funding agreement reached with the airlines in 2003."
Chicago's intention to pay off long-term debt now, as referred to in the letter, suggests that the city may seek to dramatically increase future borrowing to finance the rest of the expansion project, experts said.
"Money is cheap right now and the city thinks it can do better" than the current interest rate it is paying on bonds, said an aviation consultant who has done work at O'Hare.
jjohnsson@tribune.com jhilkevitch@tribune.com
By Julie Johnsson and John Hilkevitch
Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune
10:22 a.m. CST, February 10, 2010
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-biz-ohare-feb09,0,780656.story
An elusive deal on funding the final new runways at O'Hare International Airport finally appeared to be close at hand after years of negotiations, until city officials undermined the agreement, airline officials said Tuesday.
Representatives of United and American airlines said city aviation officials caught the carriers off-guard with demands that they consider unreasonable: They planned to hike O'Hare rents and landing fees by millions of dollars, despite the recession and a struggling airline industry.
In addition, the city intends to use the money to repay bonds, which carry a 4 percent variable interest rate and aren't due for another 20 years.
The carriers balked, and in a scorching Feb. 3 letter to City Aviation Commissioner Rosemarie Andolino, they said that all talks are off until the city rethinks its financing strategy.
"We think that it's fiscally irresponsible to prepay debt that already has a coupon of 4 percent, especially when that debt is not due until 2030," said Michael Trevino, a spokesman for United Airlines. "Obviously, the airline industry continues to have its financial challenges."
The city should tap other funding sources, including fees charged passengers, said the International Air Transport Association in a Feb. 9 letter to Andolino. The trade group said it stepped into the dispute on behalf of foreign and domestic carriers at O'Hare because of the "unprecedented increase" in airport fees.
"Chicago O'Hare could have not chosen a worse moment to burden its carriers," said Douglas Lavin, IATA regional vice-president, given the $11-billion loss and $80 billion year-over-year drop in revenues that airlines saw in 2009.
It's a rare public dispute between the parties and comes at a time when the city scored a crucial legal victory that would have paved the way for the second phase of the $15 billion O'Hare expansion. A DuPage County judge Monday awarded the city possession of St. Johannes Cemetery, which lies in the path of a proposed runway.
The city and airlines were close to an agreement in late December to move ahead with the last runways on the south end of O'Hare, which the city contends would deliver the greatest results of any of the runways planned. They would substantially boost capacity for additional flights, while slashing the airport's legendary delays.
The two sides also agreed, sources said, to table the most contentious issue: the city's insistence on building a $3 billion western terminal that the airlines say they can't afford and don't need.
But the city backtracked last week and insisted that the terminal be part of any discussion. City officials also said they planned to retroactively raise the airlines' 2010 airport usage fees, as of Jan. 1. Rents would rise 15 percent to 17 percent, while landing fees would jump 38 percent.
About three-fourths of the landing-fee hike, or $63 million, would go to prepay bonds issued in 2005.
"We are uncertain what has triggered this change in direction, but find it quite troubling and inconsistent with our past dealings," wrote United and American officials. "If [city aviation] is going to intentionally and unnecessarily increase the airlines' costs, we cannot consider any projects that will only exacerbate the situation."
Andolino wasn't available for comment. In a statement, first deputy commissioner Michael Boland said the city wouldn't negotiate through the press but that it "remains willing to reach an agreement with its airline partners."
The airlines are furious because they thought they had a solid agreement with the Daley administration to keep down the costs of operating at O'Hare until the $15 billion airfield expansion project is completed. Andolino has said the project still can be done by 2014, which was the deadline Mayor Richard Daley set when Chicago was vying to host the 2016 Olympics.
But without airline support, or private investors, O'Hare expansion critics say the project will run out of money and stop midstream.
From the airlines' perspective, the centerpiece of financing the project was a concept called "pavement before payment."
Conceived in 2003, the idea went as follows: Since the financially struggling carriers could not provide significant upfront money for runway construction, the city borrowed heavily to raise funds. Then, the airlines were supposed to pay back their share years later, through increased landing fees and other charges, when a wealth of flights were operating on the new runways and the industry was again profitable.
But the airlines should have known that the city expected them to shoulder more of the costs, Boland said.
"It is unfortunate that the 2010 O'Hare debt service increases have occurred during difficult economic times; however, they were anticipated as part of the (O'Hare modernization) funding agreement reached with the airlines in 2003."
Chicago's intention to pay off long-term debt now, as referred to in the letter, suggests that the city may seek to dramatically increase future borrowing to finance the rest of the expansion project, experts said.
"Money is cheap right now and the city thinks it can do better" than the current interest rate it is paying on bonds, said an aviation consultant who has done work at O'Hare.
jjohnsson@tribune.com jhilkevitch@tribune.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
