Arab Spring Proves a Harsh Test for Obama’s Diplomatic Skill

Abstract: WASHINGTON — President Hosni Mubarak did not even wait for President Obama ’s words to be translated before he shot back. “You don’t understand this part of the world,” the Egyptian leader broke in. “You’re young.” Mr. Obama, during a tense telephone call the evening of Feb. 1, 2011, had just told Mr. Mubarak that his speech, broadcast to hundreds of thousands of protesters in Tahrir Square in Cairo , had not gone far enough. Mr. Mubarak had to step down, the president said. Minutes later, a grim Mr. Obama appeared before hastily summoned cameras in the Grand Foyer of the White House. The end of Mr. Mubarak’s 30-year rule, Mr. Obama said, “must begin now.” With those words , Mr. Obama upended three decades of American relations with its most stalwart ally in the Arab world, putting the weight of the United States squarely on the side of the Arab street. It was a risky move by the American president, flying in the face of advice from elders on his staff at the State Department and at the Pentagon, who had spent decades nursing the autocratic — but staunchly pro-American — Egyptian government. Nineteen months later, Mr. Obama was at the State Department consoling some of the very officials he had overruled. Anti-American protests broke out in Egypt and Libya . In Libya, they led to the deaths of four Americans, including the United States ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens . A new Egyptian government run by the Muslim Brotherhood was dragging its feet about condemning attacks on the American Embassy in Cairo. Television sets in the United States were filled with images of Arabs, angry over an American-made video that ridiculed the Prophet Muhammad, burning American flags and even effigies of Mr. Obama. Speaking privately to grieving State Department workers, the president tried to make sense of the unfolding events. He talked about how he had been a child abroad, taught to appreciate American diplomats who risked their lives for their country. That work, and the outreach to the Arab world, he said, must continue, even in the face of mob violence that called into question what the United States can accomplish in a turbulent region. In many ways, Mr. Obama’s remarks at the State Department two weeks ago — and the ones he will make before the General Assembly on Tuesday morning, when he addresses the anti-American protests — reflected hard lessons the president had learned over almost two years of political turmoil in the Arab world: bold words and support for democratic aspirations are not enough to engender good will in this region, especially not when hampered by America’s own national security interests. In fact, Mr. Obama’s staunch defense of democracy protesters in Egypt last year soon drew him into an upheaval that would test his judgment, his nerve and his diplomatic skill. Even as the uprisings spread to Libya, Yemen , Bahrain and Syria , the president’s sympathy for the protesters infuriated America’s allies in the conservative and oil-rich Gulf states. In mid-March, the Saudis moved decisively to crush the democracy protests in Bahrain, sending a convoy of tanks and heavy artillery across the 16-mile King Fahd Causeway between the two countries. That blunt show of force confronted Mr. Obama with the limits of his ability, or his willingness, to midwife democratic change. Despite a global outcry over the shooting and tear-gassing of peaceful protesters in Bahrain, the president largely turned a blind eye. His realism and reluctance to be drawn into foreign quagmires has held sway ever since, notably in Syria, where many critics continue to call for a more aggressive American response to the brutality of Bashar al-Assad ’s rule. Mr. Obama’s journey from Cairo to the Causeway took just 44 days. In part, it reflected the different circumstances in the countries where protests broke out, despite their common origins and slogans. But his handling of the uprisings also demonstrates the gap between the two poles of his political persona: his sense of himself as a historic bridge-builder who could redeem America’s image abroad, and his more cautious adherence to long-term American interests in security and cheap oil. To some, the stark difference between the outcomes in Cairo and Bahrain illustrates something else, too: his impatience with old-fashioned back-room diplomacy, and his corresponding failure to build close personal relationships with foreign leaders that can, especially in the Middle East , help the White House to influence decisions made abroad. A Focus on Respect In many ways, Mr. Obama’s decision to throw American support behind change in the Arab world was made well before a Tunisian street vendor set himself on fire and ignited the broadest political challenge to the region in decades. Mr. Obama, whose campaign for the presidency was in part set in motion by his early opposition to the Iraq war, came into office in January 2009 determined that he would not repeat what he viewed as the mistakes of his predecessor in pushing a “freedom agenda” in Iraq and other parts of the Arab world, according to senior administration officials. Instead, he focused on mutual respect and understanding. During a speech to the Arab world in 2009 from Cairo, the president did talk about the importance of governments “that reflect the will of the people.” But, he added pointedly, “there is no straight line to realize this promise.” Two weeks later, as large street protests broke out in Iran after disputed presidential elections, Mr. Obama followed a low-key script, criticizing violence but saying he did not want to be seen as meddling in Iranian domestic politics. Months later, administration officials said, Mr. Obama expressed regret about his muted stance on Iran. “There was a feeling of ‘we ain’t gonna be behind the curve on this again,’ ” one senior administration official said. He, like almost two dozen administration officials and Arab and American diplomats interviewed for this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity. By the time the Tunisian protests broke out in January 2011 — an angry Mr. Obama accused his staff of being caught “flat-footed,” officials said — the president publicly backed the protesters. But the real test of the new muscular posture came 11 days later, when thousands of Egyptians converged on Tahrir Square in Cairo for a “day of rage.” Mr. Obama felt keenly, one aide said, the need for the United States, and for he himself, to stand as a moral example. “He knows that the protesters want to hear from the American president, but not just any American president,” a senior aide to Mr. Obama said. “They want to hear from this American president.” In other words, they wanted to hear from the first black president of the United States, a symbol of the possibility of change. If the president felt a kinship with the youthful protesters, he seems to have had little rapport with Egypt’s aging president, or, for that matter, any other Arab leaders. In part, this was a function of time: he was still relatively new to the presidency, and had not built the kind of cozy relationship that the Bush family, for instance, had with the Saudis. But Mr. Obama has struggled with little success to build better relations with key foreign leaders like Hamid Karzai , the Afghan president, and King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia . In any case, after an awkward phone call between the American and Egyptian presidents on Jan. 28, Mr. Obama sent a senior diplomat with long experience in Egypt, Frank G. Wisner , to make a personal appeal to the Egyptian leader. But Mr. Mubarak balked. Meanwhile, the rising anger in Cairo’s streets led to a new moment of reckoning for Mr. Obama: Feb. 1. That afternoon at the White House, top national security officials were meeting in the Situation Room to decide what to do about the deteriorating situation in Egypt. Thirty minutes into it, the door opened and the president walked in, crashing what was supposed to be a principals’ meeting. Attending were Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. ; Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton ; Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates ; the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen ; and the national security adviser, Tom Donilon. Margaret Scobey, the ambassador in Cairo, appeared on the video conference screen. The question on the table would have been unthinkable just a week before. Should Mr. Obama call for Mr. Mubarak to step down? Midway through the meeting, an aide walked in and handed a note to Mr. Donilon. “Mubarak is on,” he read aloud. Every screen in the Situation Room was turned to Al Jazeera , and the Egyptian leader appeared, making a much-anticipated address. He said he would not run again, but did not offer to step down. “This is my country,” he said. “I will die on its soil.” In the Situation Room, there was silence. Then the president spoke. “That’s not going to cut it,” he said. Seeing the Inevitable If this were Hollywood, the story of Barack Obama and the Arab Spring would end there, with the young American president standing with the protesters against the counsel of his own advisers, and hastening the end of the entrenched old guard in Egypt. In the Situation Room, Mr. Gates, Admiral Mullen, Jeffrey D. Feltman, then an assistant secretary of state, and others balked at the inclusion in Mr. Obama’s planned remarks that Mr. Mubarak’s “transition must begin now,” arguing that it was too aggressive. Mr. Mubarak had steadfastly stood by the United States in the face of opposition from his own public, they said. The president, officials said, countered swiftly: “If ‘now’ is not in my remarks, there’s no point in me going out there and talking.” John O. Brennan , chief counterterrorism adviser to Mr. Obama, said the president saw early on what others did not: that the Arab Spring movement had legs. “A lot of people were in a state of denial that this had an inevitability to it,” Mr. Brennan said in an interview. “And I think that’s what the president clearly saw, that there was an inevitability to it that would clearly not be turned back, and it would only be delayed by suppression and bloodshed.” So “now” stayed in Mr. Obama’s statement. Ten days later, Mr. Mubarak was out. Even after the president’s remarks, Mrs. Clinton was still publicly cautioning that removing Mr. Mubarak too hastily could threaten the country’s transition to democracy. In the end, many of the advisers who initially opposed Mr. Obama’s stance now give him credit for prescience. But there were consequences, and they were soon making themselves felt. Angry Reactions On Feb. 14, in the tiny island monarchy of Bahrain, Internet calls for a “day of rage” led to street rallies and bloody clashes with the police. The next day at a news conference in Washington, Mr. Obama seemed to suggest that this revolt was much like the others. His message to Arab allies, he said, was “if you are governing these countries, you’ve got to get out ahead of change.” But in the following weeks, Mr. Obama fell silent. Away from the public eye, he was coming under assault from leaders in Saudi Arabia , the United Arab Emirates , even Israel . Angry at the treatment of Mr. Mubarak, which officials from the Gulf states feared could forecast their own abandonment, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates drew a line in the sand. Some American and Arab diplomats say that response could have been avoided if Mr. Obama had worked quietly to ease Mr. Mubarak out, rather than going public. On March 14, White House officials awoke to a nasty surprise: the Saudis had led a military incursion into Bahrain, followed by a crackdown in which the security forces cleared Pearl Square in the capital, Manama, by force. The moves were widely condemned, but Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton offered only veiled criticisms, calling for “calm and restraint on all sides” and “political dialogue.” The reasons for Mr. Obama’s reticence were clear: Bahrain sits just off the Saudi coast, and the Saudis were never going to allow a sudden flowering of democracy next door, especially in light of the island’s sectarian makeup. Bahrain’s people are mostly Shiite, and they have long been seen as a cat’s paw for Iranian influence by the Sunni rulers of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. In addition, the United States maintains a naval base in Bahrain that is seen as a bulwark against Iran, crucial for maintaining the flow of oil from the region. “We realized that the possibility of anything happening in Saudi Arabia was one that couldn’t become a reality,” said William M. Daley , President Obama’s chief of staff at the time. “For the global economy, this couldn’t happen. Yes, it was treated differently from Egypt. It was a different situation.” Some analysts credit Mr. Obama for recognizing early on that strategic priorities trumped whatever sympathy he had for the protesters. Others say the administration could have more effectively mediated between the Bahraini government and the largely Shiite protesters, and thereby avoided what has become a sectarian standoff in one of the world’s most volatile places. If Mr. Obama had cultivated closer ties to the Saudis, he might have bought time for negotiations between the Bahraini authorities and the chief Shiite opposition party, Al Wefaq, according to one American diplomat who was there at the time. Instead, the Saudis gave virtually no warning when their forces rolled across the causeway linking Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, and the ensuing crackdown destroyed all hopes for a peaceful resolution. The lingering resentment over Mr. Mubarak’s ouster had another apparent consequence. Mrs. Clinton’s criticism of the military intervention in a Paris television interview angered officials of the United Arab Emirates, whose military was also involved in the Bahrain operation and who shared the Saudis’ concern about the Mubarak episode. The Emiratis promptly threatened to withdraw from the coalition then being assembled to support a NATO -led strike against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi , the Libyan leader. The Emiratis knew they were needed to give the coalition legitimacy. They quickly named their price for staying on board, according to Arab and Western diplomats familiar with the episode: Mrs. Clinton must issue a statement that would pull back from any criticism of the Bahrain operation. The statement, hastily drafted and vetted by Emirati and American officials, appeared soon afterward, in the guise of a communiqué on Libya. The tensions between Mr. Obama and the Gulf states, both American and Arab diplomats say, derive from an Obama character trait: he has not built many personal relationships with foreign leaders. “He’s not good with personal relationships; that’s not what interests him,” said one United States diplomat. “But in the Middle East, those relationships are essential. The lack of them deprives D.C. of the ability to influence leadership decisions.” A Lack of Chemistry Arab officials echo that sentiment, describing Mr. Obama as a cool, cerebral man who discounts the importance of personal chemistry in politics. “You can’t fix these problems by remote control,” said one Arab diplomat with long experience in Washington. “He doesn’t have friends who are world leaders. He doesn’t believe in patting anybody on the back, nicknames. “You can’t accomplish what you want to accomplish” with such an impersonal style, the diplomat said. Mr. Obama’s advisers argue that when he does reach out, he is more effective — as in a phone call last week to Mohamed Morsi , the new president of Egypt. After Mr. Morsi’s initial tepid response to the attacks on the embassy in Cairo, a fed-up Mr. Obama demanded a show of support. Within an hour, he had it. “Were he to be calling all the time, it would run counter to our assertion that we won’t dictate the outcome of every decision in every country,” said Benjamin J. Rhodes, a top national security aide. Limiting his outreach, Mr. Rhodes said, “heightens the impact of presidential engagement” when Mr. Obama does get on the phone. Still, there remains concern in the administration that at any moment, events could spiral out of control, leaving the president and his advisers questioning their belief that their early support for the Arab Spring would deflect longstanding public anger toward the United States. For instance, Mr. Feltman, the former assistant secretary of state, said, “the event I find politically most disturbing is the attack on Embassy Tunis.” Angry protesters breached the grounds of the American diplomatic compound there last week — in a country previously known for its moderation and secularism — despite Mr. Obama’s early support for the democracy movement there. “That really shakes me out of complacency about what I thought I knew.”

Barack Obama
Arab Spring
2012 Presidential Election
US Foreign Policy
Hosni Mubarak
Egypt
Libya
Bahrain


U.C.L.A. Edges S.M.U. With Late Goaltending Call

Abstract: LOUISVILLE, Ky. — U.C.L.A.’s Bryce Alford let his 3-pointer fly and immediately knew the ball was off line. It was veering right, he said. He just hoped a teammate might snatch the rebound and put the ball back in the basket with the Bruins trailing Southern Methodist, 59-57, with 13 seconds to play. Indeed, a hand went up in front of the rim, but it belonged to the 6-foot-11 S.M.U. center Yanick Moreira, who tipped Alford’s shot as it came down from its arc. There was a whistle, and an official rushed to the middle of the floor. Moreira, a senior from Angola, stood with his mouth wide open in the middle of the lane. The official called goaltending, and the N.C.A.A. tournament had an instant controversy. “I thought the ball was short,” Moreira said in the S.M.U. locker room. “I was trying to get the rebound so nobody could go get it. If the official say it’s a goaltend, it’s a goaltend; you can’t argue with the referee.” S.M.U. fumed on the bench, then regrouped and ran a play for the junior guard Nic Moore, who missed a 3-pointer from the right wing with four seconds to play. Moore got the ball back and took another 3-pointer that missed as time expired. So, U.C.L.A., the 11th seed and a maligned tournament selection because of its uneven play this season, escaped with a 60-59 victory in the South Region game in the KFC Yum! Center and reached the round of 32. A pool reporter interviewed Antinio Petty, the referees’ crew chief, who said the goaltending call was based on an interpretation of the rule 9.3, parts 1 and 2. Petty said the ball was on a downward flight, which is part 1 of the rule. He said part 2 states that if the ball is above the level of the ring and has a possibility while in flight of entering the basket and is not touching the cylinder, the ruling is goaltending. Image Moreira, center, after the goaltending call. Credit David Stephenson/Associated Press The officials briefly stopped the game to check the video to make sure Alford, the son of U.C.L.A. Coach Steve Alford, was behind the 3-point line. The goaltending call was not reviewable, said Sam Hull, one of the officials. “I’m sad,” Moreira said. “I worked hard all summer to get here. To end up like this, I don’t think we deserved to end up like this. We had our shots to win the game; we let the referee make that call.” U.C.L.A. will meet 14th-seeded U.A.B. on Saturday. Alford was brilliant, finishing with 27 points on 9-of-11 shooting from behind the arc. He staged a terrific duel with the 5-foot-9 Moore, who scored 24 points and played all 40 minutes. The Bruins (21-13) led by 34-30 at the half and then clamped down on sixth-seeded S.M.U. during the second half, holding the Mustangs to 5 points during a stretch of nearly nine minutes. U.C.L.A. led, 44-35, with 9 minutes 42 seconds to play. The Mustangs (27-7) suddenly came to life on a pair of 3-pointers by Moore. As U.C.L.A. went more than eight minutes without a point, S.M.U. roared ahead and led, 59-52, with 1 minute 26 seconds to play. Alford hit a 3-pointer and Norman Powell hit two free throws with 29 seconds to play to give S.M.U. a 59-57 lead. The Mustangs turned the ball over, setting up the decisive shot by Alford. He came around the left wing with Moore trailing him and launched the fateful 3-pointer. “I’m not saying it wasn’t goaltending,” said S.M.U. Coach Larry Brown. “I have no clue. But it was a five-second judgment. I don’t know. I just — it kind of blew me away. Again, you don’t look at one play. We had our chances to win, and it didn’t happen.”

College basketball
University of California
Los Angeles
Southern Methodist University
NCAA Men's Basketball,March Madness


At Cracovia, a Homemade Taste of Poland

Abstract: In an era of short cuts, high-fructose corn syrup and modified this-and-that, an honest restaurant that makes most items from scratch is an increasingly rare and welcome experience. Cracovia, a landmark Polish eatery, is just such a place. Landmarks come in all guises, and Cracovia, having reached the quarter-century mark, shows its age no less than numerous other forlorn-looking shops of downtown New Britain. No matter. The staff of this diner-style restaurant is uniformly welcoming, and the menu features so much stick-to-your-ribs comfort food that a dockworker from Gdansk might feel right at home. “Everything is homemade and prepared fresh daily,” said Gregory Adamski, the owner. That appears to be true of a wholesome chicken soup ($3.50 a bowl) that is loaded with carrots, noodles and nuggets of white meat. And it’s clearly the case with breakfast staples like French toast, omelets, and eggs with kielbasa ($5.50 to $6.25), as well as the pork chop sandwich ($6.95, with sauerkraut) and other luncheon fare. Among the daily dinner specials rotating throughout the week are goulash with dumplings on Tuesdays, potato pancakes in Hungarian sauce on Fridays and roast pork stuffed with plums on Sundays (from $10 to $12). Soups also rotate, although tripe and red beet ($6.50 and $5.50) are available daily. Salisbury steak is on the menu — along with meatloaf, burgers and hot dogs — but in a place where Polish is more commonly spoken than English, the strength of the kitchen lies in its native cuisine. The highlights include cheese blintzes, pirogi, golabki (cabbage stuffed with ground meat and rice, covered in tomato sauce) and bigos (sauerkraut sautéed with bits of meat and kielbasa). Prices for entrees, averaging $10, are refreshingly Old World, too. Cracovia Restaurant, 60 Broad Street, New Britain, (860) 223-4443. Open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., seven days a week. CHRISTOPHER BROOKS

Restaurants
Cooking and Cookbooks
Connecticut


In 3rd Trial, Conviction in Murders From 1985

Abstract: A soldier acquitted of three murders more than 20 years ago in civilian court was convicted by a military jury on Thursday because of DNA tests that were not available in the earlier trial. The soldier, Master Sgt. Timothy B. Hennis, 52, had been recalled to active service specifically to face the military court at Fort Bragg, N.C. He had initially been convicted of raping and murdering Kathryn Eastburn and killing her two young daughters in 1985 in Fayetteville, N.C. But the North Carolina Supreme Court called for a retrial, saying the testimony had been weak. That second trial, in 1989, ended in acquittal. In the years since then, DNA identification technology improved, and a subsequent test linked Mr. Hennis to Ms. Eastburn’s body. Mr. Hennis could not be tried again in state court under rules of double jeopardy, but could be tried by a military jury for the crime, which occurred while he was stationed at Fort Bragg. The military had taken up the case in 2006 after a cold-case detective at the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office had materials from Ms. Eastburn’s autopsy tested for DNA and there was a match to Mr. Hennis, The Fayetteville Observer reported. The verdict on Thursday prompted claims of vindication by death penalty advocates, who noted that Mr. Hennis had long appeared on the “ innocence list” maintained by the Death Penalty Information Center . The list documents 139 people freed from death row and has been a potent talking point in the death penalty debate. Kent Scheidegger, the legal director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation , a group in Sacramento that favors the death penalty, issued a statement after the verdict in which he said that “the so-called innocence list is nothing of the sort.” In an interview, Mr. Scheidegger said that the Hennis case showed the stark difference between a jury’s not finding guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and actual proof of innocence. In the Hennis case, he said, “we have proof that he was a guilty murderer who got away with it, and yet he was on the innocence list.” Richard C. Dieter, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said in an interview that Mr. Hennis’s name would be removed from the innocence list. But Mr. Dieter defended the list and its name. Being found “not guilty” is not innocence in the sense of “innocent as a newborn babe,” he said, and “we’ve never said that’s what the innocence list is about.” The sentencing hearing for Mr. Hennis will start Friday.

Decisions and Verdicts
Crime and Criminals
Forensic Science
Capital Punishment
Fort Bragg (NC)


United in Premier League Lead

Abstract: Dimitar Berbatov scored five goals to lead Manchester United into the Premier League lead with a 7-1 rout of Blackburn. United helped the Premier League set a single-day scoring record with 36 goals, according to Sky Sports.

Soccer
English Premier League
Manchester United


China Announces Inquiry Into Company Trading With North Korea

Abstract: The police in northeastern China have announced a criminal investigation into a Chinese conglomerate that does extensive trade with North Korea, which researchers in South Korea and the United States say included materials that can be used in the production of nuclear weapons. The Public Security Department of Liaoning Province said on a government website last week that the Hongxiang conglomerate, based in Dandong, a major trading center with North Korea, was suspected of “serious economic crimes.” “During their work, the Liaoning public security authorities discovered that for a long time the Dandong Hongxiang Industrial Development Company Ltd. and a relevant responsible individual engaged in suspected grave economic crimes during trading activities,” the department said. The police did not specify whether the company’s prominent chairwoman, Ma Xiaohong, was under investigation, nor did it say whether the company was the object of scrutiny for its North Korean business, which makes up the bulk of its trade. The action was compelled by two recent visits to Beijing by officials from the Justice Department to warn the Chinese of the illegal activities of the Dandong company, according to an American law enforcement official who asked not to be identified before a pending announcement of charges against the company by the United States. The information provided to the Chinese included allegations that the company was helping North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, the official said. The statement by Liaoning Province came just days before a report issued on Tuesday by a South Korean think tank and a Washington research group that singled out the Hongxiang group for dealing in products that can be used to make nuclear weapons. Ms. Ma has avidly supported stronger economic ties with North Korea and has called the Hongxiang group a “golden bridge” between China and the North. One of the targets of the Chinese investigations appears to be aluminum products that Hongxiang is said to have sold to North Korea. A division of the Hongxiang conglomerate sent two shipments of aluminum oxide worth $253,219 to North Korea last September, the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in South Korea and the C4ADS research group in Washington said in their report. According to the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, aluminum oxide is used to avert corrosion in gas centrifuges during uranium enrichment. The report listed three other products — aluminum ingots, ammonium paratungstate and tungsten trioxide — that Hongxiang sold to North Korea and that the United States Commerce Department considers to have possible civilian and nuclear uses. Aluminum oxide is among a long list of items issued in 2013 by China’s Ministry of Commerce that are banned for sale to North Korea. The unusual action by China follows congressional legislation passed this year aimed at forcing Beijing to penalize its companies that do business with North Korea. And Ms. Ma’s Hongxiang group has been an especially energetic player in such business. “Be thankful that we were born in this great era and were born in Dandong, this beautiful city on the frontier of China and North Korea,” Ms. Ma, 44, wrote in an introduction to herself on the Hongxiang conglomerate’s website . “Be even more thankful that we have chosen this business of doing trade and serving as a shipping agent with North Korea. North Korea’s resumed resurgence and unlimited needs can make all our dreams became possible.” According to the Hongxiang website, where Ms. Ma appears in photographs as a philanthropist with boundless enthusiasm for trade between China and North Korea, the conglomerate’s business interests include chemicals, minerals, metals and coal, the latter one of North Korea’s most valuable exports. After North Korea held its first nuclear test in 2006, Ms. Ma told a Chinese newspaper that she was “not too surprised.” She said, “I think the groundwork has been prepared for a long time.” The company also owns hotels, travel agencies and a shipping fleet of 10 vessels that link Chinese and North Korean ports and apparently carry coal out of the North, the report said. Washington and Beijing have had mounting difficulty in agreeing on how to deal with North Korea’s expanding nuclear weapons program. The North conducted its fifth underground nuclear test less than two weeks ago, its most powerful so far. The Chinese government criticized the test but has strongly protested the decision by the Obama administration this summer to deploy an advanced missile defense system in South Korea intended to give the country protection against the North’s weapons. During a meeting in Hangzhou, China, this month, China’s leader, Xi Jinping, raised the issue of the missile system with President Obama. The two sides failed to resolve the issue, Mr. Obama said later. The investigation by the Chinese authorities was not surprising, said an expert on North Korea, Cheng Xiaohe, an assistant professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing. The action did not suggest a sweeping inquiry into Chinese trade with North Korea, he said. “If the United States makes concrete allegations, China has to oblige,” he said. The Chinese government may use the inquiry to concentrate on one relatively small company while warning bigger entities like banks of the consequences of continuing to do business with the North, he said. After protracted negotiations with the United States, China agreed this year to tougher United Nations sanctions on the North. But enforcement by the Chinese has been lax, analysts say. Coal is North Korea’s major export and foreign currency earner, and most of North Korea’s coal is shipped through China. Recent figures showed that coal sales were down 12 percent since the sanctions were put into effect, a marginal amount, said Stephan Haggard, a Korea specialist at the University of California, San Diego. Until now, Ms. Ma has enjoyed support from the Chinese authorities, especially the Dandong government. As recently as June, the Ministry of Commerce gave Hongxiang a license to import oil products , something private Chinese businesses can do only with special permission. But a spreading political scandal also implicated Ms. Ma and may have been another sign that she has lost her political protection. Ms. Ma was among 452 delegates of the Liaoning Province People’s Congress who were stripped of their membership this month after investigators found that they had bribed their way onto the legislature. Membership brings little power but creates opportunities to mingle, and make deals with, powerful officials and entrepreneurs. People who answered telephone calls to Ms. Ma’s offices said they could not speak to journalists or did not know where she was. The Liaoning police also declined to comment. In 2006, Ms. Ma told the newspaper Southern Weekly that doing business with North Korea could be perilous. “If the political winds really change, our business will be smashed to smithereens,” she said.


Brazil’s Navy Defends Its Response to a Capsizing

Abstract: SÃO PAULO, Brazil (AP) — The Brazilian Navy on Sunday defended its response to a shipwreck that left dozens of teenage students from around the world adrift on the ocean for two nights. It took about 19 hours for the navy to deploy a search aircraft after it received a distress signal from the S. V. Concordia on Wednesday, but officials said that was in line with standard procedure. All 48 students and 16 crew members were safely rescued Friday, nearly 40 hours after the sailing ship capsized in the Atlantic several hundred miles off the Brazilian coast. The students were participating in the Class Afloat program , based in Canada. A navy spokeswoman, Maria Padilha, said that naval responders received a distress signal about 10 p.m. local time on Wednesday and immediately tried to make radio contact with the vessel. They also communicated with nearby ships and aircraft to see if they could spot anything wrong in the area, Ms. Padilha said. When efforts to communicate with the ship failed, the navy reached out to school officials in Canada, but not until about 10 a.m. Thursday. The naval officials also had no luck getting the ship’s captain and crew members on the radio or through e-mail messages, prompting the navy to ask for an air force search operation in the general location of the distress signal. An aircraft left about 5 p.m. local time and about three hours later spotted the students and crew on rafts 300 miles off the coast.


Signs of Growing Inflation in Consumer Price Survey

Abstract: WASHINGTON — Consumer prices in the United States were unchanged in January as the rising costs of housing and health care were largely offset by cheaper oil. But the annual pace of inflation showed signs of acceleration. The Labor Department said Friday that prices rose 1.4 percent over the last 12 months, compared with a year ago, when annual inflation was close to zero. Consumer prices climbed at the fastest annual rate since October 2014. Core inflation, which excludes the volatile energy and food costs, rose 0.3 percent in January. Over the last 12 months, this category, which is closely watched by the Federal Reserve, has climbed 2.2 percent. The rising tempo for inflation follows a Fed decision in December to raise a crucial short-term interest rate for the first time in nearly a decade. But the turmoil in the stock and bond markets after the rate increase suggested to many investors that inflation might barely budge in a slowing global economy . Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, said January’s report on consumer prices affirmed the Fed’s decision and raised the potential for further rate increases this year. “In a way, this justifies the December rate hike and keeps the Fed at the rate hike table,” Ms. Lee said. The combination of a strong dollar and cheaper oil has suppressed inflation across much of the economy. Gasoline prices at the pump have dropped 24 percent over the last year to a national average of $1.72 a gallon. At the same time, economic growth struggles worldwide have pushed up the value of the dollar, making imports cheaper. But the rate at which gasoline prices were declining slowed in January. Housing expenses — which account for a third of the Consumer Price Index — have risen 3.2 percent from a year ago. Medical services are up 3.3 percent. In January, prices also rose on a monthly basis for airfare, clothing and autos, while food expenses were flat. The Fed is closely following inflation, looking for assurance that it will accelerate to 2 percent in its preferred measure. That particular measure of personal consumption places less emphasis on housing. It posted a modest annual increase of 0.6 percent in December. Policy makers at the Fed have concerns about threats to American economic growth coming from lower oil prices and slowing growth in China and other emerging markets, according to the minutes of their January meeting released Wednesday. The officials said these global pressures made it harder to forecast growth and inflation, two crucial factors for deciding the pace of additional rate increases. "Most participants indicated that it was difficult to judge at this point whether the outlook for inflation and economic growth had changed materially, but they thought that uncertainty surrounding the outlook had increased as a result of recent financial and economic developments,” the minutes said.

Inflation
Consumer price index
US Economy


New Zealand, Cameroon and Nigeria Claim World Cup Berths

Abstract: New Zealand reached the World Cup for the first time since 1982 , and Cameroon and Nigeria also qualified Saturday for next year’s tournament in South Africa. Algeria was seconds from qualifying in Cairo, but Emad Meteab headed in a goal in the fifth minute of second-half injury time to give Egypt a 2-0 victory. The teams will play a tie-breaker playoff on Wednesday in Sudan. Egyptian fans met the Algerian team at the airport on Thursday and pelted its bus with stones ; Algerian officials said two team members were injured. On Saturday, the players, Khaled Lemmouchia and Rafik Halliche, wore head bandages in the game. “We played under warlike conditions,” the Algerian Football Association president, Mohammad Rawrawa, said. “It was difficult to perform well, but we will win on Wednesday in Sudan because the atmosphere will be calmer.” In the first leg of European playoffs, France won, 1-0, at Ireland on a deflected goal by Nicolas Anelka; Portugal beat visiting Bosnia-Herzegovina, 1-0, on a goal by Bruno Alves; Russia won, 2-1, at home against Slovenia as Diniyar Bilyaletdinov scored twice; and Greece was held to a 0-0 tie by visiting Ukraine. “We have seen that the Irish team are a very difficult team to beat,” said the French forward Thierry Henry, who is bidding to play at his fourth World Cup. “They didn’t lose a game in qualification, so what we did tonight is nice. But it’s still 90 minutes to go, and it’s going to be a tough game for us in Paris.” In the first leg of the South American-North and Central American and Caribbean playoff, Diego Lugano scored in the 23nd minute, to give visiting Uruguay a 1-0 victory over Costa Rica in San Jose. The second leg will be Wednesday in Montevideo. Twenty-six of the 32 World Cup berths are set, with the rest to be settled Wednesday. The draw dividing the teams into eight first-round groups is Dec. 4. In Wellington, Rory Fallon scored on a header off a corner kick in the 44th minute, and New Zealand held on to beat Bahrain, 1-0. The teams had played a scoreless tie Oct. 10 in Manama in the first leg of the home-and-home, total-goals playoff. Bahrain, which has never appeared in the World Cup, lost a playoff to Trinidad and Tobago in 2005. It could have tied the aggregate score in the 50th minute Saturday — and moved ahead on away goals — but Sayed Adnan took a weak penalty kick that was saved by Mark Paston. “I basically just guessed which way he’d go, and the ball ended up in my hands,” Paston said. Cameroon qualified for its sixth World Cup, beating host Morocco, 2-0, on goals by Achille Webo in the 18th minute and by Samuel Eto’o in the 52nd. The six World Cup appearances for Cameroon are the most for an African team. Nigeria overtook Tunisia on the final day of its World Cup qualifying campaign by rallying to beat Kenya, 3-2, in Nairobi. Obafemi Martins scored twice for the Super Eagles. SLOVAKIA 1, U.S. 0 Marek Hamsik converted a penalty kick in the 26th minute in a World Cup warm-up in Bratislava. Slovakia, preparing for its first World Cup appearance as an independent nation, was awarded the penalty kick by the Austrian referee Stefan Messner after the American defender Jonathan Bornstein pushed down Vladimir Weiss in the penalty area. Hamsik sent a low shot to the right corner as goalkeeper Brad Guzan dived in the opposite direction. M.L.S. PLAYOFFS Real Salt Lake advanced to its first M.L.S. Cup final by beating the Chicago Fire, 5-4 on penalty kicks, after 120 scoreless minutes in the Eastern Conference final in Bridgeview, Ill. Ned Grabavoy, who entered as a substitute in the final minute of overtime, scored the winning penalty kick in the seventh round as his shot went off the fingertips of Fire goalkeeper Jon Busch. Real Salt Lake will play the Los Angeles Galaxy for the championship on Nov. 22 at Qwest Field in Seattle. The Galaxy reached the title game with a 2-0 overtime win against Houston on Friday. Gregg Berhalter and Landon Donovan scored for the Galaxy. IN OTHER GAMES Brazil beat England, 1-0, in Doha, Qatar, on Nilmar’s headed goal early in the second half. ... Xabi Alonso scored twice to lead Spain, the European champion, over Argentina, 2-1, in Madrid. ... Giampaolo Pazzini had a goal disallowed for a hand ball in the 82nd minute, and Italy played the Netherlands to a scoreless tie in Pescara.

Soccer
World Cup (Soccer)
New Zealand
Cameroon
Algeria


Germany: Frankfurt Strike Stalls Flights

Abstract: A strike by the security staff at Frankfurt Airport caused dozens of flight cancellations and delayed thousands of passengers, creating chaos at Europe’s third-largest airport on Friday. Union leaders had called on about 5,000 workers who carry out security checks on passengers, baggage and freight at the airport to strike for a day to demand that their wages be raised to the levels of their counterparts at other German airports. The Frankfurt airport handles 150,000 passengers on a typical Friday. About 90 flights were canceled, with Lufthansa scrapping nearly 40. The strike was called after four rounds of talks between the union, Verdi, and the employers’ association BDSW, which represents about 185,000 workers employed by private companies, ended without agreement. The BDSW is offering a two-stage increase to 14 euros an hour, or $19.24, but Verdi wants hourly pay for its members to be increased to €16, or $21.99, immediately.

Frankfurt
Strikes Labor
Airport
Airlines,airplanes
Labor Unions
Deutsche Lufthansa
Germany


Millrose Games to Move From Madison Square Garden

Abstract: The Millrose Games will be broken into two sessions and held on a Saturday when the meet moves next year to the Armory Track and Field Center in Upper Manhattan. The Armory Foundation, which owns the rights to the meet, said in a statement Friday that it was trying reinvigorate the meet, which has been held for nearly a century at Madison Square Garden. In recent years, the Millrose Games have suffered from declining attendance and growing costs. “We just want to breathe some fresh air into this,” said Norbert Sander Jr., the executive director of the Armory Foundation. However, USA Track and Field, the sport’s governing body in the United States, opposes the move and said it would not pay for the money-losing event, as it has for years, if the Millrose Games were held at the Armory. Jill Geer, a spokeswoman for USA Track and Field, said that “elite professional track and field in New York belongs at the Garden.” Sander said his group was interested in working with USA Track and Field but that the next Millrose Games would be held on Jan. 28 at the Armory. The meet will include a session from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. for high school, collegiate and masters runners, and an evening session for the elite runners from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. The meet will conclude with the Wanamaker Mile. If the Armory sells out its roughly 4,000 seats for the both sessions, total attendance would approach 9,000, roughly the number of fans who attended the meet at the Garden this year, Sander said. Tickets would cost $20 for high school students and $30 for general admission seats; tickets for reserved seats would cost $50; and a few hundred exclusive seats near the track would be priced at about $100, Sander said. The prices were roughly in line with those at the Garden. The cost of running the event would fall significantly, though, primarily because it costs roughly $400,000 to rent the Garden, which seats about 16,500. Still, to find the money to pay top athletes, the Armory Foundation will have to find additional financial support. Talks are under way with several banks and other companies about potential sponsorships. “We don’t have the big budget like they do,” Sander said, referring to USA Track and Field, which spent about $1 million a year to put on the Millrose Games. “The pros are very expensive, but they don’t have many places to go. So if we have reasonable prize money, at least they feel they are getting respect.” Sander said that the Millrose Games, which were first held in 1908 at an armory, would be televised next year. It is possible that USA Track and Field could hold a rival meet at the Garden, which would complicate efforts to recruit top athletes, some of whom ran in the Millrose Games only because they were held in such a famous arena. The Armory’s 200-meter track is considered one of the fastest in the country, something that will appeal to some runners. But the Garden’s quirky 180-yard track gave the meet a unique feeling, not unlike playing baseball in Fenway Park or Wrigley Field. Howard Schmertz, who was the race director for nearly three decades, succeeding his father, who ran the event for more than four decades, said he had “mixed emotions about the event moving.” The track, at 11 laps to the mile, was short, but it had a “long history,” Schmertz said. “I’m going to have pangs not going to the Garden. It won’t be the games as we know it.”

Track and Field
Millrose Games
Madison Square Garden
Manhattan (NYC)


Military Path Opened for Young Immigrants

Abstract: A small number of young immigrants who grew up in the United States without legal status will be allowed to join the military and have a fast-track pathway to citizenship, Pentagon officials announced Thursday, the first time those young people have been able to enlist. Undocumented young people who have been granted deportation deferrals by the Obama administration will be eligible to apply for the military under a recruitment program for immigrants with special language and medical skills, according to a memo issued Thursday by Jessica L. Wright, under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness. But administration officials emphasized that the number who would succeed in enlisting would be very small, probably not more than a few dozen. The requirements are stringent and the program is currently limited to 1,500 recruits each year, and already has a huge backlog of applicants. Advocates for the young people, who call themselves Dreamers, have been pressing the administration to allow all of them with deferrals to enlist, and they were both heartened and sharply disappointed by the Pentagon decision. “This is a first step, and we commend the administration for recognizing the skills and talents a lot of us do have,” said Cesar Vargas, a leader of the Dream Action Coalition, who has said he would like to join the military. “But it definitely needs to be expanded.” Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, who has urged President Obama to allow far broader enlistment of young people with deferrals, called the decision a “missed opportunity.” Last spring Pentagon officials were considering whether to open recruitment to the young people with deferrals under a two-year-old program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. The deferrals do not confer any resident status, but they do allow the young people to remain in the country legally. More than 580,000 young people have received them. The White House instructed military officials to hold off, saying the president was waiting to see if House Republicans would move forward on immigration overhaul legislation. That legislation died over the summer, and the president is now weighing executive action he could take to halt deportations for more immigrants who are here illegally. But administration officials said the Pentagon’s decision was separate from the president’s deliberations and was not a preview of the measures he might take, which he has said will come after the November midterm elections. Pentagon officials said they acted to change the recruitment rules because the immigrant program, known as Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest, or Mavni, was set to expire next Wednesday. It was renewed on Thursday for two years. The Pentagon program was created for temporary immigrants who speak one of about three dozen languages including Arabic, Hindi, Korean, Pashto, Nepalese, Russian, Uzbek and Swahili — but not Spanish, the language of the majority of the undocumented young people. It also accepts licensed doctors and dentists in certain specialties. Immigrants must pass rigorous security checks to be accepted. Those who enter the program can apply for citizenship within months after they enlist. In general, immigrants must be legal permanent residents or American citizens to be eligible to enlist. Jeh C. Johnson, who is now secretary of Homeland Security, made a determination in 2012 when he was legal counsel at the Pentagon that it would be problematic to expand the immigrant recruitment program to large numbers of young people with deferrals. Now, in his new role, Mr. Johnson is charged with figuring out how the president can offer deportation protections to many more illegal immigrants, including perhaps expanding military enlistment for Dreamers.

US Military
Illegal Immigration
Military Recruiting and Draft
Pentagon


Ford Posts Third Straight Annual Profit

Abstract: DEARBORN, Mich. — The Ford Motor Company reported its third consecutive full-year profit on Friday and its largest in 13 years, ensuring its hourly workers one of the biggest profit-sharing bonuses in the company’s history. Ford said strong sales in North America overshadowed higher commodity costs and losses in other parts of the world. The North American results mean 41,600 hourly workers in the United States will receive $6,200 in profit-sharing bonuses for 2011, up from $5,000 the year before. Ford made an unusual accounting adjustment in the fourth quarter worth $12.4 billion that increased its 2011 earnings to $20.2 billion, the second-highest total ever for the carmaker. But excluding that one-time gain, Ford’s fourth-quarter operating profit declined. The accounting change eliminated most of a tax allowance created when the company was bleeding billions of dollars in 2006 and saw little likelihood of making a profit in the coming years. By making the adjustment, Ford is now signaling that it expects to continue earning substantial profits. “It’s a very positive signal,” said the company’s chief financial officer, Lewis W. K. Booth. “In our judgment, we’re going to be profitable enough in the foreseeable future to use up the deferred assets.” The hourly workers received a $3,750 advance on the 2011 bonus after signing a new four-year labor agreement last fall and will receive the remaining $2,450 in March. The largest profit-sharing bonus at Ford came for the year 1999, when workers received an average of $8,000. The accounting gain means that, on paper, Ford has recovered nearly all of the $30.1 billion it lost from 2006 through 2008. In the three years since, the company’s profit totaled $29.5 billion. Ford created the tax allowance in 2006, when Alan R. Mulally, the chief executive, joined the company as its performance was in a downward spiral and it mortgaged most assets to raise money. The losses meant Ford could no longer keep many deferred tax assets on its books, but after posting 11 consecutive profitable quarters, it was able to release nearly all of that allowance. Doing so lets Ford offset taxes on about $35 billion of future profits, said James Hines, a law and economics professor at the University of Michigan. “You would only do that if you were expecting a lot of pretax profits,” Professor Hines said. “It’s not a shock, given how well they’ve been doing.” By region, the company earned a pretax operating profit in North America in 2011 of $6.2 billion but lost a total of $119 million in its Europe and Asia-Pacific-Africa regions. Its fourth-quarter loss in Europe nearly quadrupled to $190 million, from $51 million in 2010, and Mr. Booth conceded that Europe “may stay challenging for some time.” In contrast, North America, the epicenter of Ford’s past troubles, has become “the engine for supporting our growth worldwide,” Mr. Mulally said. The net profit was equal to $4.94 a share, up from $1.66 a share a year earlier, when Ford earned $6.6 billion . Excluding the accounting change and other special items, Ford earned an operating profit of $8.8 billion for the year, or $1.51 a share, 6 percent more than its 2010 operating profit of $8.3 billion, or $1.91 a share. Revenue increased 13 percent to $136.3 billion, but profit margins declined to 5.4 percent, from 6.1 percent in 2010. In the fourth quarter, Ford reported an operating profit of $1.1 billion, or 20 cents a share, down from $1.3 billion, or 30 cents a share, a year ago. Analysts were expecting earnings of 25 cents a share, and consequently, Ford shares fell 4 percent on Friday to close at $12.21. Including the accounting gain, Ford had net income of $13.6 billion. Revenue for the quarter rose 6 percent to $34.6 billion. Ford ended 2011 with $13.1 billion in automotive debt, $400 million more than at the end of the third quarter but $6 billion less than it had a year earlier. It had $22.9 billion in automotive cash, up $2.4 billion for the year. Mr. Booth said the challenging economy in Europe and flooding in Thailand hurt fourth-quarter earnings. Commodity costs also ended up being higher than expected, he said. With the auto market in the United States improving, Ford said it expected operating profit to increase in 2012 and for profit margins to be equal to or better than in 2011. The company said it planned to contribute $3.5 billion to its underfunded pension plans, including $2 billion in the United States. The projections are “encouraging to us given all the industry headwinds,” Adam Jonas, an analyst with Morgan Stanley, wrote in a note to clients Friday. He added, “2012 may be shaping up to be a very good year for Ford.” Ford sold 17 percent more cars and trucks at American dealerships in 2011, with big gains for its redesigned Explorer sport utility vehicle and year-old Fiesta subcompact car. This year, it is bringing out revamped versions of the Fusion midsize sedan and Escape crossover vehicle, along with several plug-in vehicles and hybrids. Mr. Booth said Ford would be able to improve its performance in the years ahead by increasing sales and by operating more efficiently, which is a central focus of its turnaround plan, known as One Ford. “We’re really only at the beginning of getting the benefits of One Ford,” Mr. Booth said.

Ford Motor Company
Company Reports
Automobiles


Gene Savoy, Flamboyant Explorer of Ruins, Dies at 80

Abstract: Gene Savoy, an amateur archaeologist whose success in finding some 40 Incan and pre-Incan ruins in Peru was matched by a flair for self-promotion that drew on his tales of peril in the jungle, his bandito mustache and Stetson hat, and a retinue of would-be explorers who paid to accompany him, died on Sept. 11 at his home in Reno, Nev. He was 80. His son Sean said that he did not know the cause of death but that Mr. Savoy had suffered from vascular disease. Mr. Savoy, who even founded his own religion, was a larger-than-life character and did not care who knew it. His quests were larger still: He sought the Fountain of Youth, the Treasure of El Dorado, proof that Solomon’s gold had come from South America and what his son called “the answers to life.” His actual discoveries included Vilcabamba, the Incas’ last refuge from the Spanish, the place Hiram Bingham thought he had found with his discovery of Machu Picchu in 1911. He is also credited with finding Gran Pajatén, a pre-Incan stone city. And his discovery of Gran Vilaya, an intricate network of 24,000 stone structures covering 100 square miles of dense jungle, helped establish that a high civilization had existed in Peru apart from the coast and the Andes. “He was a great adventurer and explorer,” Tom D. Dillehay, an anthropology professor at Vanderbilt University, said in an interview Monday. Warren B. Church, an archaeologist at Columbus State University in Georgia, particularly applauded Mr. Savoy’s discovery of Vilcabamba. But as for Gran Pajatén, he said, Mr. Savoy’s claim of discovery in 1965 was not the first. He said a local mayor had reported that his townspeople had found the ruins a year earlier but that they had been ignored by the authorities in Lima. That episode became further complicated when a University of Colorado team was given credit for the find in 1985 and Mr. Savoy objected that his own discovery had been widely reported 20 years earlier. (He neglected to mention the claim made by the local villagers still earlier, even though the mayor who had reported it was among those with him at Gran Pajatén.) When People magazine reported on the controversy between Mr. Savoy and the University of Colorado team, it likened Mr. Savoy to Indiana Jones, an image he assiduously polished in ensuing years. Scientists have also questioned Mr. Savoy’s tendency to use his explorations to pursue unusual theories, his lack of scientific expertise and his ballyhooing of discoveries. Keith Muscutt, an archaeologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said in an interview with The Los Angeles Times in 2004 that finding ruins in the region where Mr. Savoy prowled “is about as hard as finding elephants in a zoo.” Others wondered if Mr. Savoy’s practice of allowing would-be explorers to pay to accompany him might have embellished his characterization of what they found. In 1967, the charge for a 21-day expedition for two was $10,160, The New York Times reported at the time. Douglas Eugene Savoy was born in Bellingham, Wash., on May 11, 1927, and grew up fascinated with local Indians and archaeology. At 17, he joined the Navy and became an aircraft gunner. He attended the University of Portland, a Roman Catholic institution, but dropped out to pursue his broadening captivation with religion. For a decade, he studied subjects including philosophy and folklore, both on his own and with private tutors. Then, in 1959, he founded the International Community of Christ, Church of the Second Advent, which claims thousands of followers around the world. Its theology, which is said to emerge from the teachings of the Essenes of Jesus’ time, includes elements of many world religions and holds that the Second Coming is already occurring. Mr. Savoy went on his first archaeological mission in 1957, to Peru. It was canceled for lack of financing, but he stayed on. In addition to pursuing terrestrial archaeology, he organized missions in an effort to prove that ancient civilizations had been connected by sea travel. The first such mission involved a voyage on a raft from northern Peru to Mexico. Another attempted a round-the-world trip intended to prove that the ancient Egyptians, Japanese, Incas and Jews could have been in touch. Mr. Savoy married the former Sylvia Ontaneda in 1971; they divorced in 1992. His other marriages, to Carmel Cervetto and Elvira Clark, also ended in divorce. He is survived by the children of his first marriage, Gene Jr., Sean and Sylvia Jamila Savoy, all of Reno; three brothers, Bill Dailey of Reno, Jack Dailey of Medford, Ore., and Douglas Leon Dailey of Talent, Ore.; and three granddaughters. Sean Savoy said that two additional sons had been born of his father’s marriage to Ms. Cervetto but that the family had lost touch with them. Mr. Savoy wrote 60 books on religion and four on his explorations. His penchant for colorful recollections never abated in interviews, even as his health worsened. He spoke of friends’ being kidnapped by pirates, of a nearly fatal bite of a pit viper, of the utter loneliness of the sea. But he could also be downright practical about the worth of his accomplishments: he said his discoveries, based on hunch and chutzpah, had paved the way for serious scientists. Professor Dillehay agreed, and said the process was not over. “Some of the sites that he discovered and examined have not been fully explored by others,” the professor said. “In some ways, his heyday has not yet come.”

Savoy Gene
Deaths (Obituaries)
Archaeology and Anthropology


Worst Spill in 6 Months Is Reported at Fukushima

Abstract: TOKYO — About 100 tons of highly radioactive water leaked from one of the hundreds of storage tanks at the devastated Fukushima nuclear plant, its operator said Thursday, calling the leak the worst spill at the plant in six months. The operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, said the leak, discovered on Wednesday and stopped on Thursday, happened far enough from the plant’s waterfront that none of the radioactive water was likely to reach the Pacific Ocean, as has happened during some previous spills. Still, the leak was an uncomfortable reminder of the many mishaps that have plagued the containment and cleanup efforts at the plant, as well as the hundreds of tons of contaminated groundwater that still flow unchecked into the Pacific every day. The company, known as Tepco, said it had traced the latest leak to a pair of valves that were left open by mistake. Image The Tokyo Electric Power Company said it had traced the latest leak to a pair of valves that were left open by mistake. Credit Tokyo Electric Power Co., via Associated Press The leaked water was among the most severely contaminated that Tepco has reported in the aftermath of the March 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, when damage caused by an earthquake and a tsunami led to meltdowns in three of the plant’s reactors. Each liter of the water contained, on average, 230 million becquerels of particles giving off beta radiation, the company said. About half of the particles were likely to be strontium 90, which is readily taken up by the human body in the same way that calcium is, and can cause bone cancer and leukemia. That means the water was about 3.8 million times as contaminated with strontium 90 as the maximum allowed under Japan’s safety standards for drinking water. It also showed levels much more radioactive than a worrisome groundwater reading that Tepco announced earlier this month. That reading — five million becquerels of strontium 90 per liter — which was detected at a location closer to the ocean than the latest spill, prompted criticism of Tepco because the company waited five months to report it publicly. Critics have assailed the company since the accident, saying that it has been slow to acknowledge problems at the stricken plant and that it has disclosed too little information about the conditions inside. Even so, the government has left the company largely in charge of the cleanup work there. Tepco has struggled to deal with the hundreds of tons of groundwater seeping each day into the plant’s damaged reactor buildings, where it is contaminated by the melted nuclear reactor cores. To keep the radioactive water from running into the Pacific, the company must pump it out of the reactor buildings and store it in rows of huge tanks it has erected on the plant’s grounds. So far, Tepco said, about 340,000 tons of water have accumulated in the tanks, enough to fill more than 135 Olympic-size swimming pools. A ton of water is equivalent to about 240 gallons.

Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster
Water pollution
Japan


Tide Gauges Needed for Research Are Often Victims of Storms

Abstract: As the waters of Hurricane Sandy rose higher and higher on Oct. 29, 2012, an instrument on a pier at Sandy Hook, N.J., recorded the ominous tidal surge. The reading hit eight feet above sea level, then nine, then 10 – and every few minutes, the gauge faithfully transmitted its readings to a satellite flying overhead. The reading was closing in on 11 feet above mean sea level when the transmissions suddenly stopped. The waves of the mighty storm had smashed the government-owned instrument to bits at the moment it was needed most, with the mid-Atlantic shoreline being slammed by a record tidal surge. That was the latest example of a problem that had been plaguing oceanographers and climate scientists for the better part of a decade. Accurate tidal readings are crucial to understanding individual storms, as well as the long-term risks associated with the rise of the sea. Yet in 2005, when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the Gulf Coast, and again in 2012 with Sandy, the tide gauges that are supposed to record storm surges proved vulnerable themselves. Rising Sea, Sinking Land Tide gauges along the East Coast show a long-term increase in relative sea levels. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which maintains the gauges, said that nine were destroyed or severely damaged by Katrina and Rita. An astonishing 73 tide stations were damaged or destroyed as Sandy swept across the North Atlantic basin, including ones in Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands. Ten of the 73 needed reconstruction or major repairs, but the one at Sandy Hook, a long spit of land enclosing Lower New York Bay, took the worst hit. “We were surprised that the station got washed off the face of the earth,” said Stephen K. Gill, senior scientist of the NOAA division that measures tides and currents. “The wave action tore everything apart.” Climate scientists say they need precise readings from storm surges if they are to predict how much those will worsen with climate change, and to specify risks to nearby coastal areas. They say the vulnerability of the gauges comes in part from the continuing rise of the sea, which is believed to be caused largely by human emissions of greenhouse gases. “We know our stations are at increasing risk, because the storm surges ride upon sea level,” Mr. Gill said. So the government has embarked on a long-term program of hardening the instruments against future storms. During a recent visit to the tide gauge at the Battery, at the lower tip of Manhattan, Mr. Gill noted that the surge of water from Sandy exceeded the measurement limits of the main instrument there. Fortunately, NOAA had a backup system in place that took accurate readings throughout the storm. It pegged the storm tide at the Battery at about 11½ feet above mean sea level, higher than any other storm tide since record-keeping began at the Battery in the 1850s. Surveys of building damage and the like suggested that the storm tide at Sandy Hook, 15 miles due south of the Battery, was almost exactly the same. But federal scientists would rather have real-time readings, instead of having to rely solely on after-the-fact estimates. A temporary gauge is providing readings at Sandy Hook now, but a permanent, much sturdier tide gauge is in the offing. At the Battery, too, the government plans to abandon the shack behind a Coast Guard building that houses the tide gauge now, driving its own pilings next to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal to install an instrument that will be able to withstand stronger storms. And on the Gulf Coast, NOAA has built four superstrong tide stations that it calls Sentinels of the Coast. They are mounted on tough steel pilings driven as much as 80 feet into the seabed, and are designed to stand up to Category 4 hurricanes. But tide stations that strong can cost $500,000 apiece or more, depending on location, which limits how many the agency can build.

Climate Change
Global Warming
Oceans and Seas
Hurricane Sandy
Flood


A Test Track for Tuning Up Supreme Court Arguments

Abstract: WASHINGTON — On a Friday afternoon in April, a lawyer from California took his Supreme Court argument for a test drive, trying out themes and soliciting advice from five lawyers and law professors pretending to be justices. Such moot courts are a crucial feature of modern Supreme Court advocacy. The argument took place in a fake courtroom at Georgetown Law School. It looked like the real one, down to the columns and the big clock looming over the bench. But the participants were dressed informally, and about a dozen students looked on. Lawyers in every case that was argued this term, including the ones on same-sex marriage, affirmative action and voting rights expected to be decided this week, first honed their arguments in the Georgetown courtroom. The proceedings are secret, as most lawyers are not eager to muse on the weaknesses of their cases in public or to preview their arguments for their adversaries. After more than a little negotiation, the law school let me attend the moot court in April on the condition that I not write about it until the case was decided. The moot court program, sponsored by the law school’s Supreme Court Institute , is popular with members of the Supreme Court bar, who scramble to make arrangements as soon as they learn the court has agreed to hear one of their cases. They have to act fast because the institute will help only one lawyer in a case, from whichever side asks first. (There is an exception. A coin toss settles the matter when both sides contact the institute in the first 24 hours. “Petitioner is ‘heads,’ ” the institute’s Web site says, firmly, “and respondent is ‘tails.’ ”) The program is also popular with the justices, who like their cases well presented. Last year, at a reception for the institute attended by four justices, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said it provided “a tremendous service to the court.” Image Jeffrey L. Fisher, with his Stanford Law School students, practiced his argument at Georgetown moot court. Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times The California lawyer, Jeffrey L. Fisher , was a Stanford law professor with 20 Supreme Court arguments to his credit. He had persuaded the court to resolve an issue that had divided the lower courts: Do criminal suspects have a right to remain silent during police questioning before they are taken into custody? Mr. Fisher’s client, Genovevo Salinas, had answered many questions from the police during a murder investigation but balked when asked about whether shell casings from the lethal bullets would match his shotgun. At his trial, a prosecutor cited that silence as evidence of guilt, and he was convicted. The Fifth Amendment says that no one “shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” The Texas courts had said there had been no compulsion in Mr. Salinas’s case and thus no constitutional problem. At the moot court in April, Irving L. Gornstein , the institute’s executive director, acted as chief justice. He has argued 36 cases before the Supreme Court, and his questions were crisp and hard. “There is nothing compulsive about this situation,” Mr. Gornstein said. “It’s a voluntary interview.” Mr. Fisher explained that his client had been subjected to an impossible choice. Speaking would be used against him, and silence would be used against him. “No matter what you do, you are a witness against yourself,” he said. So far, so good. If all Mr. Fisher had to refute was the reasoning of the Texas courts, he would have a fighting chance in the Supreme Court. But he had a second problem. The United States solicitor general’s office had submitted a brief supporting the prosecution , and it proposed a different theory. It acknowledged a right to remain silent even before a suspect is taken into custody, but it said the suspect had to assert it. Image Georgetown Law School's moot court is popular with members of the Supreme Court bar. Credit Christopher Gregory/The New York Times “What is the problem with just requiring the person to invoke?” Mr. Gornstein asked. That proved a harder question. Mr. Fisher had answers, but he struggled to compress them into a phrase short enough to survive rapid-fire questioning from the justices. After about 45 minutes of argument, Mr. Fisher and his five questioners conferred about the strengths and pitfalls of his argument. Mr. Gornstein said that “there is a point to be made on practical administration,” meaning that an invocation requirement may sound fine in theory but would not work in practice. Five days later, Mr. Fisher faced the justices . His presentation was polished, and his answers were clear. Most important, he had boiled down his objections to the solicitor general’s argument to a checklist. Requiring suspects to invoke a constitutional right by mouthing “magic words,” he said, is “unnecessary, unfair, and a rule like that would be unadministrable.” That part of his argument was important, he told me the next day, because he had come to realize that the solicitor general’s new theory was far more dangerous for his client than the one the lower courts had accepted. “The Georgetown moot helped me understand that this is now a different case,” he said. Last week in the actual Supreme Court decision, Mr. Fisher lost by a 5-to-4 vote along ideological lines. Three of the justices in the majority accepted the solicitor general’s argument and two said Mr. Salinas had not been compelled to do anything. The four dissenters repeated Mr. Fisher’s arguments. The day after the decision, the first one Mr. Fisher had lost by a 5-to-4 vote, he was mulling the lessons he had learned. He had been beaten, he said, “on a theory that wasn’t even scratched at below.” When the Supreme Court agrees to hear a case, he said, the attention it receives, through moot courts and other preparation, can alter its very nature. “Once you actually put a case under a microscope,” he said, “it shows you how much a case can change.”

Supreme Court Institute Georgetown University Law Center


As Scripted Shows Dry Up, Reality Sets In

Abstract: As original episodes of scripted comedies and dramas dry up because of the Writers Guild of America strike, reality competitions and game shows are likely to reach record prominence on broadcast television in early 2008. Yesterday, two broadcast networks, CBS and NBC, gave the clearest indication to date of how their programming schedules were being affected by the four-week strike. CBS said it would introduce several new reality shows and midseason replacements beginning in January, including the first winter season ever of the reality show “Big Brother.” As the writers’ strike halts much scripted television production — the last original episode of “Desperate Housewives” on ABC was shown on Sunday and of “Heroes” on NBC last night — networks are increasingly relying on unscripted fare to fill the programming gaps. “Big Brother,” featuring isolated house guests who compete for a prize of half a million dollars, has served as a reliable summer reality show for eight years, but has never been shown during the traditional September-to-May television season. Casting is already well under way, and it will fill three hours of CBS’s prime-time schedule starting in February. New episodes of the game show “Power of 10,” the reality competition “Survivor” and the newsmagazine “48 Hours Mystery” will also be shown early next year on CBS. CBS will also present new episodes of two scripted comedies early in the year. Also returning to the schedule are seven episodes of the apocalyptic drama “Jericho,” which was canceled and then, amid protests by fans, resurrected last summer. Because the programs were originally intended as midseason replacements, months’ worth of episodes were completed before the strike commenced. Also yesterday, NBC said it would replace two underperforming dramas with episodes of “Law & Order” and the spinoff series “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” on Wednesdays beginning Jan. 2. The “Criminal Intent” episodes were originally shown this fall on the cable channel USA. Last week, NBC announced a winter schedule weighted with reality programming, including four unscripted premieres in January: an updated version of the athletic challenge “American Gladiators,” a celebrity version of “The Apprentice,” and new seasons of the game show “1 vs. 100” and the weight-loss competition “The Biggest Loser.” Fox announced a revised spring schedule last month, including the introductions of two reality series and a new season of “American Idol.” ABC has yet to announce any strike-related scheduling moves. The writers’ guild and the alliance of studios are expected to resume negotiations today.

Television
Reality Television
Writers Guild of America
National Broadcasting Co
CBS Corp


Syrian Forces Strike Rebel Stronghold in Aleppo

Abstract: BEIRUT, Lebanon — With tanks and artillery, the Syrian Army pounded opposition strongholds in Aleppo on Saturday, stepping up its barrage on a city that for days has been steeling for an assault, residents and activists said. It was not clear whether the attack, which activists said was focused on the Salaheddiin neighborhood, was a limited foray by government troops or the beginning of a broader campaign. Activists and residents said that the opposition had at least partly repelled the assault, killing soldiers and destroying several tanks, but those claims could not be immediately verified. The clashes came after days of warnings from the international community about the human toll in Aleppo, Syria ’s largest city and its commercial center, as President Bashar al-Assad ’s forces massed on the outskirts of the city. For days, rebel fighters have been pouring into Salaheddiin and other neighborhoods in Aleppo, which had remained quiet for much of the uprising that started in March 2011. On Saturday, Russia , Mr. Assad’s most important ally, joined the chorus, warning of tragedy as it chastised the rebels’ foreign backers for failing to pressure the opposition to end the violence. In Aleppo, a Salaheddiin resident named Mohammed, who did not want to give his last name for fear of retaliation, said that the government’s assault began at dawn as helicopters flew overhead and a warplane circled. The shelling began soon afterward and lasted for hours, far heavier and fired from closer to the city than in recent days. “Huge sounds of explosions,” he said by telephone. “Three or four bombs at once. Those who didn’t leave are hiding in lower floors. Others fled to schools or mosques.” A BBC reporter in Aleppo, Ian Pannell, spoke in a broadcast about skirmishes and explosions and said that Salaheddiin had come under a “sustained attack.” Activist groups reported more than 20 deaths in the fighting, including civilians, opposition fighters and government soldiers. A video posted on the Internet by activists showed scenes of chaotic urban combat, with militiamen firing wildly around corners as families fled the other way. Another video purportedly depicting the aftermath of clashes showed bodies in a street and a smoldering tank. A narrator asserted that they were government soldiers, calling them “Bashar’s dogs.” A dentist in Aleppo who was supervising an effort to shelter people displaced by the fighting said 900 were crammed into five schools in Salaheddiin and another neighborhood. There was not enough food to feed them all, she said, adding, “The shelling around us never stops.” On Saturday, diplomatic skirmishing over how to stop the conflict continued outside Syria. Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, called on Mr. Assad’s government to “make the first moves” in ceasing military action. But he also blamed Western countries and some of Syria’s neighbors for not putting enough pressure on the armed opposition to stop fighting. Speaking in Sochi, Russia, Mr. Lavrov said that those countries “encourage, support and direct the armed fight against the regime.” Although he did not name any countries, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been helping the Syrian rebels obtain weapons and American officials say United States intelligence officers are operating in southern Turkey to help decide which groups receive the arms. Russia said this month that it would halt any weapons shipments to the government of Mr. Assad. On Saturday, though, the Russian Foreign Ministry said it would not cooperate with a European Union effort to block such shipments by searching ships suspected of carrying weapons to Syria. A ministry spokesman said Russia considered the plan to inspect ships a violation of other countries’ sovereignty. In comments to the Interfax news service, Mr. Lavrov dismissed the notion that Russia would grant Mr. Assad asylum, saying it was a rumor started to make Russia look bad. “There is no such agreement, we are not even thinking about this matter,” he said. “It’s a provocation by those who want to put all the blame for what’s happening in Syria on us and on China, because supposedly we’re blocking someone there. “We are blocking only one thing: an attempt to allow people to support one side in an internal conflict through a U.N. Security Council resolution.”

Middle East and North Africa Unrest (2010- )


Now Wearing No. 13 for the Mets, Another Mazzilli

Abstract: PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — When L. J. Mazzilli arrived at the Mets’ minor league complex for spring training last week, his blue jersey was already hanging in his locker. Mazzilli, No. 13, it read. He had not known that his name would be on it. And that he would be wearing one of his father’s old numbers, for one of his father’s old teams. And that it would be a real number, not some absurdly high one, like 75 or 63, that rarely shows up in the regular season. Ecstatic, he snapped a photo and sent it to his parents. He imagined wearing the jersey across the way at Tradition Field, where the regular spring training games are played, where David Wright and the other Mets regulars slowly but surely get ready for the regular season. Would he eventually make it over there and pick up where his father, Lee, a Mets hero of the 1986 World Series, left off? All he really knew was that this was his first spring training and that even though he was the son of a former major leaguer, and really, almost Mets royalty, he was not sure what to expect. Last June, the Mets drafted him in the fourth round of the amateur draft, impressed by his play as a second baseman at the University of Connecticut. After signing, he played for Class A Brooklyn for about two and a half months (he hit .278), spent three weeks here at a fall instructional league and started training again in early November. Image Lee Mazzilli scored against the Red Sox in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series. The Mets won in a comeback and then took Game 7. Credit Susan Ragan/Associated Press For months, he was looking forward to this. At age 23, he was excited and nervous. All he could think about was somehow making it over to the major league camp, even if he was nowhere ready to be a big-leaguer. He had asked his friend J. R. Murphy, a Yankees prospect, for advice. Murphy told him not to focus on it and to avoid comparing himself to everyone else. Mazzilli’s father, a first-round pick by the Mets in 1973 straight out of high school in Brooklyn, told him to be himself, that that was good enough. The Mets brought the younger Mazzilli to Port St. Lucie about a week before the reporting date for minor leaguers as part of their STEP Camp, a program the team has developed to give its higher-ranked prospects a head start on spring training. This year, about 45 players were invited, although few with the cachet that Mazzilli’s last name bestows. For Mazzilli, the program gave him a chance to quickly meet teammates, to develop routines and to perfect his form at second base. On a typical day, he wakes up at about 6:30 a.m. so he can get to the complex at about 7, well before most of the others. He eats breakfast — maybe egg whites, potatoes and fruit — then stretches, and then hits in the batting cage. After that, he goes out back and throws a ball against a wall to practice keeping his hands down and ready on ground balls. A Mets coach had told him to work on it. Defensively, Mazzilli is indeed a work in progress, having spent only about four years playing second base. He had played shortstop until he was shifted to second before his sophomore season at Connecticut. The Huskies had Nick Ahmed, a future second-round pick, at shortstop, but still wanted Mazzilli’s bat in the lineup. So he moved over. He did well enough that the Minnesota Twins drafted him in the ninth round after his junior year, but Mazzilli decided to stay in school for his senior year and work on his defense. Focusing in the field has always been challenging for him because he has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. He can lose his concentration at times just by seeing something in the stands, or noticing a bee buzzing by. His mind-set now is to stay alert for five seconds, for each pitch, and then clear his mind. After Mazzilli takes grounders, he may gather with other minor leaguers for a 20- to 30-minute classroom session with Dickey Scott, the Mets’ director of player development. Scott calls it Baseball 101. His aim is to teach the young players how to develop a routine and be a good teammate. He discusses general baseball etiquette: what to do, and what not to do, when in uniform. Image L. J. Mazzilli usually gets to the Mets’ minor league complex by 7 a.m., well before most of the others. Credit Brett Carlsen for The New York Times After Scott’s tutorial, Mazzilli and the other players do various drills — fielding, conditioning, base running — then take batting practice. On the adjacent fields, the major leaguers are working out, just out of reach. When his day is over, Mazzilli relaxes in his hotel room, playing Xbox One or watching something on Netflix. He also has his guitar with him and is thinking about taking lessons while he is here. And most every day, his father calls to see how things are going. Mazzilli mostly hangs out with the people he knows from last summer in Brooklyn or from the instructional league. When he first arrived in Port St. Lucie, he was struck by how diverse the locker room was. Mazzilli figures he will meet everyone in due time, as camp goes on. “I’m not shy,” he said, “but I don’t want to step on any toes.” Every night, Mazzilli tries to fall asleep by 9:30, to get nine hours of rest. The days have started to blend together. STEP Camp is technically over now, and the first full workout for the entire minor league camp is scheduled for Thursday. But Mazzilli still has about four more weeks of spring training before he reports to whatever team will be his next rung on the minor league ladder. There have been a few highlights so far. One came on the night that Wally Backman, the Mets’ manager at Class AAA Las Vegas and a former teammate of his father’s, took him to dinner. Another came when he did make it to the big-league camp. The major leaguers were doing defensive drills and needed base runners, so Mazzilli was summoned. Wright went over and introduced himself, and told Mazzilli he could still recall his first spring training, and seeing Mike Piazza on the field throwing at 9 a.m. They chatted for a moment or two. It was a moment for Mazzilli to store away, one tiny milestone on the long road to the majors.

Baseball
Lee Mazzilli
Mets
Minor league
L J Mazzilli


Microsoft Sends Engineers to Schools to Encourage the Next Generation

Abstract: SEATTLE — Leandre Nsabi, a senior at Rainier Beach High School here, received some bluntly practical advice from an instructor recently. “My teacher said there’s a lot of money to be made in computer science,” Leandre said. “It could be really helpful in the future.” That teacher, Steven Edouard, knows a few things about the subject. When he is not volunteering as a computer science instructor four days a week, Mr. Edouard works at Microsoft . He is one of 110 engineers from high-tech companies who are part of a Microsoft program aimed at getting high school students hooked on computer science, so they go on to pursue careers in the field. In doing so, Microsoft is taking an unusual approach to tackling a shortage of computer science graduates — one of the most serious issues facing the technology industry, and a broader challenge for the nation’s economy. There are likely to be 150,000 computing jobs opening up each year through 2020, according to an analysis of federal forecasts by the Association for Computing Machinery, a professional society for computing researchers. But despite the hoopla around start-up celebrities like Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook , fewer than 40,000 American students received bachelor’s degrees in computer science during 2010, the National Center for Education Statistics estimates. And the wider job market remains weak. “People can’t get jobs, and we have jobs that can’t be filled,” Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel who oversees its philanthropic efforts, said in a recent interview. Big technology companies have complained for years about a dearth of technical talent, a problem they have tried to solve by lobbying for looser immigration rules to accommodate more foreign engineers and sponsoring tech competitions to encourage student interest in the industry. Google , for one, holds a programming summer camp for incoming ninth graders and underwrites an effort called CS4HS, in which high school teachers sharpen their computer science skills in workshops at local universities. But Microsoft is sending its employees to the front lines, encouraging them to commit to teaching a high school computer science class for a full school year. Its engineers, who earn a small stipend for their classroom time, are in at least two hourlong classes a week and sometimes as many as five. Schools arrange the classes for first thing in the day to avoid interfering with the schedules of the engineers, who often do not arrive at Microsoft until the late morning. The program started as a grass-roots effort by Kevin Wang, a Microsoft engineer with a master’s degree in education from Harvard . In 2009, he began volunteering as a computer science teacher at a Seattle public high school on his way to work. After executives at Microsoft caught wind of what he was doing, they put financial support behind the effort — which is known as Technology Education and Literacy in Schools, or Teals — and let Mr. Wang run it full time. The program is now in 22 schools in the Seattle area and has expanded to more than a dozen other schools in Washington , Utah , North Dakota , California and other states this academic year. Microsoft wants other big technology companies to back the effort so it can broaden the number of outside engineers involved. This year, only 19 of the 110 teachers in the program are not Microsoft employees. In some cases, the program has thrown together volunteers from companies that spend a lot of their time beating each other up in the marketplace. “I think education and bringing more people into the field is something all technology companies agree on,” said Alyssa Caulley, a Google software engineer, who, along with a Microsoft volunteer, is teaching a computer science class at Woodside High School in Woodside, Calif. While computer science can be an intimidating subject, Microsoft has sought to connect it to the technologies most students use in their everyday lives. At Rainier Beach High recently, Peli de Halleux, a Microsoft software engineer, taught a class on making software for mobile phones. The students buried their faces in the phones, supplied by Microsoft. They were asked to create programs that performed simple functions, like playing a random song when the phones were shaken. Leandre, who took Mr. de Halleux’s mobile programming class last year and is in Mr. Edouard’s Advanced Placement computer science class this year, proudly showed off a simple game he had created, Sun Collector, in which players tilt the phone to dodge black balls and hit big yellow ones. “I never really understood what was behind these games,” he said. “Once you start getting it, it’s pretty easy to understand.” One of the most alarming trends for the technology industry has been students’ declining interest in computer science over the last decade. While the number of bachelor’s degrees granted in computer science has been growing for the last several years, 2010’s figure, the most recent available, was still 33 percent lower than at the peak in 2004, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Student interest in the field began to fade after the dot-com implosion a decade ago. It has picked up again in recent years, but slowly. Most educators believe that for students to be excited about computer science, it is critical to introduce them to it at an early age. Yet support for the subject at cash-short K-12 schools has faded. In almost every state, computer science is taught as an elective, rather than a core requirement. The percentage of graduates who earned credits in high school computer science classes fell to 19 percent in 2009 from 25 percent in 1990, making it the only subject among science, technology, engineering and mathematics courses to experience such a drop, according to a report by the Education Department. Those numbers are all the more surprising considering how attached teenagers are to their smartphones, tablet computers and Facebook accounts. But that fascination in most cases is with social communications and media, rather than the technology itself. Today’s easy-to-use gadgets have also concealed programming tools from users that were once far more prominent in computers. Finding capable computer science teachers is also hard. Few other industries are as good as the technology business in its ability to divert would-be educators into far more lucrative corporate jobs. Mr. Edouard graduated from the University of Florida in 2011 and considered enlisting in Teach for America , but he also had multiple offers from technology employers. “In today’s day and age, with so many college loans , it’s tough to go into teaching,” he said. One of the biggest concerns about Microsoft’s effort is that most of its volunteers have little teaching experience. To comply with district licensing requirements and to help engineers with classroom challenges like managing unruly teenagers, a professional teacher is also in the room during lessons. One of the program’s tenets is that Microsoft engineers need to teach the teachers, alongside students, so that those instructors can eventually run an engaging computer science class on their own. “We are taking the kids farther than I could do,” said Michael Braun, a teacher at Rainier Beach High who is working with Microsoft volunteers. There are still hiccups , including tensions between some of the professional teachers and the Microsoft engineers assigned to work with them, according to several people involved in the program, who did not want to be named for fear of seeming critical of Microsoft. Sarah Filman, a program manager at Microsoft, completed the intensive summer training that the company offers volunteers, preparing a lengthy PowerPoint presentation for the class she taught at a Seattle high school last year. “That’s the Microsoft way,” she said. But as soon as she dimmed the lights in her classroom at the start of the year, her students had trouble focusing on the slide show, forcing Ms. Filman to change her methods. “I had to throw away a lot of what I had done,” she said. For students in the Seattle area, Microsoft tries to drum up excitement in technology by organizing field trips to its campus and discussing the lucrative careers that await them. The students from Rainier Beach High who visited Microsoft last year were buzzing about their trips for days afterward. “To me, that was an ‘aha’ moment,” said Dwane Chappelle, the principal of Rainier Beach High. “I said, we’ve got to find a way to get more kids involved.” Mr. Wang, the program’s founder, said a professional from the tech industry who stands at the head of a class for a full year can be a powerful role model. “Kids can see themselves in their shoes,” Mr. Wang said. After all, he added, “their chances of going to college and majoring in computer science are exponentially better than getting into the N.F.L. ”


3 Tons of Marijuana Seized in Sullivan County Raid

Abstract: Federal drug officials have helped break up an upstate drug ring and seized more than 6,000 pounds of marijuana worth nearly $20 million, they announced on Wednesday. The drug ring, based in Sullivan County, was distributing marijuana across the Northeast, including New York City. The authorities said the operation was spread across a number of homes in Mamakating, a town of 11,000 about an hour and a half from Manhattan. On Tuesday night, federal drug enforcement agents and Sullivan County Sheriff’s officers raided the homes, seized more than 6,300 marijuana plants and arrested 16 people, Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in court documents. The federal Drug Enforcement Administration called it the largest breakup of an indoor marijuana-growing operation in New York’s history. “Hidden in houses located within the suburban communities of Sullivan County, these individuals were responsible for farming the most abused illicit drug in our nation,” John P. Gilbridge, Drug Enforcement Administration special agent in charge, said in a statement. The authorities said they were initially led to the operation after federal agents pulled over a car in the area that smelled of marijuana. Lawyers for the arrested people could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday night. They were all detained without bail. If convicted, each faces a minimum sentence of 10 years, and a maximum of life in prison.

Marijuana
Organized Crime
Drug Enforcement Administration


West Islip: Man Accused of Hitting Woman While Driving Drunk

Abstract: A Medford man was charged yesterday with driving while intoxicated after he apparently accidentally backed his car into his female companion’s mother, the Suffolk County police said. The man, Kenneth Gonzalez, 30, left a party at his companion’s house in West Islip after fighting with several of her family members, the police said. Several people had surrounded his Chevrolet Lumina, which was in the driveway, and when Mr. Gonzalez backed up, he struck the woman, Denise Stark, 49, the police said. Ms. Stark was taken to Stony Brook University Medical Center, where she was in critical condition yesterday with a broken neck and head injuries.

Accidents and Safety
Alcoholic Beverages
Long Island (NY)