Some Evidence in Police-Stops Trial Undermines Racial Profiling Claim

Abstract: One man was stopped and frisked because of his expensive red leather jacket — similar to one that a murder suspect was wearing in a wanted poster. Another man was stopped after a woman complained to the police that he was following her. Still another was stopped by officers who had watched him jostle the door of a home, trying to get in. Recruited by civil rights lawyers, these men and others have testified about their encounters with the police in a federal trial weighing whether the soaring number of stop-and-frisk encounters has resulted in widespread constitutional violations for hundreds of thousands of black and Hispanic men. They were chosen to give voice to the toll that the police’s use of the tactic has inflicted on an entire demographic, their lawyers say. But over the trial’s first month, some of these men’s accounts seemed to veer away from the straightforward narrative of racial profiling — and may have actually undermined the plaintiffs’ efforts to demonstrate that the police routinely disregard the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable police detentions. Whether the circumstances of each case rose to the level of “reasonable suspicion” — the legal standard required for forcible street stops — is a question that the judge, Shira A. Scheindlin of Federal District Court in Manhattan, will ultimately decide. Even if she finds these individual stops fall short of that legal threshold, there is still evidence suggesting the stops were not, as the plaintiffs claim, “suspicionless and race-based.” But the civil rights lawyers bringing the case say they have presented ample evidence of race-based decision-making by police officers. So far nine people have testified about more than a dozen occasions on which they were stopped. (Two more witnesses will testify.) These accounts are the foundation of a trial exploring whether the New York Police Department’s training, supervision and patrol strategies have led to weakened constitutional protections for minority men. The plaintiffs’ lawyers, who are with the Center for Constitutional Rights, are asking Judge Scheindlin to put the department’s stop-and-frisk practices under judicial oversight. But with five million police stops recorded since 2002, it would seem that the civil rights lawyers would be able to find witnesses to present far more conclusive accounts of unconstitutional police stops — an incongruity that lawyers for the city sought to portray during opening arguments as indicative of the case’s weakness. In fact, plaintiffs’ lawyers sent mailings to thousands of people soliciting their involvement in the suit. But relatively few were willing to undergo the loss of time and privacy, in part because there were no monetary damages involved in the case, the lawyers said. Darius Charney, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights , asserted that the witnesses who agreed to testify nonetheless demonstrated a variety of issues with the department’s stop-and-frisk practices, such as how friskings for weapons quickly turn into illegal searches of suspects’ pockets. “This does bring out the issue of training or whether officers understand the Fourth Amendment,” he said. Indeed, the judge has made a point of questioning witnesses about whether some searches went beyond what the police are authorized to conduct without further grounds for suspicion. Lawyers for the plaintiffs also observed that several witnesses testified about being stopped more than once, underscoring the personal toll inflicted as a result of the police practice. But the testimony offered so far has presented a more nuanced picture of police work than the one the plaintiffs had hoped to show. In several of the dozen stops described by witnesses, the police appeared to have specific reasons for suspecting that the men were engaging in criminal activity. Even a police stop of the lead plaintiff in the case, David Floyd, seems open to interpretation. Sgt. James Kelly of the Police Department, one of five witnesses to testify about the stop of Mr. Floyd, said he observed Mr. Floyd and another man standing in front of a door, jostling it. He grew more suspicious, he testified, after watching them unsuccessfully try several keys in the door. “It looked like they were forcibly trying to get into a house,” Sergeant Kelly testified. During the ensuing stop-and-frisk encounter, Sergeant Kelly and the two officers with him eventually accepted that the two men were not burglars but tenants: one had been locked out, and a neighbor, Mr. Floyd, had sought to let him back in. In court, the city’s lead lawyer, Heidi Grossman, observed that several of the stops occurred because an individual matched a physical or “specific clothing description” of a crime suspect. One stop followed an anonymous 911 caller who reported overhearing three black men planning a robbery as they walked up Broadway, near 96th Street. The caller described the men’s clothing and mentioned a disturbing detail: one of the men had a gun. Nearby, officers spotted three black men seated on a bench. They were dressed much the same way as the 911 caller described the robbers. The officers ordered the men to the ground at gunpoint and frisked them before realizing they had the wrong men. One officer, in an apparent bid to explain the police interaction, radioed the dispatcher and requested that the suspects’ description be repeated, so the men could hear for themselves. One of the three men, Nicholas Peart, testified that he could not remember all of what the radio dispatcher said, but he did recall one detail about one of the robbery suspects. “Blue shorts, that’s what I heard that night,” he testified. He acknowledged that he had been wearing blue basketball shorts. Another stop involved similar circumstances. In that instance, Clive Lino, 32, explained that he was detained for 20 minutes because of his red leather Pelle Pelle jacket. “It’s a popular jacket,” Mr. Lino testified. But the two officers who stopped him testified how at the station house that very afternoon, their commander had emphasized a recent unsolved homicide, even distributing a wanted poster . It contained scant description of the suspect, mentioning a “male black” between 5 feet 9 and 6 feet, and a loosefitting, red leather jacket with the brand Pelle Pelle stitched conspicuously across it. The evidence involving another stop illustrated the challenge that police officers often face when called to the scene, where they must try to quickly resolve ambiguity and discern what is happening. A woman accused a man of following her around and demanding money at a big-box pet store in Union Square. The officers stopped a man, Dominique Sindayiganza, who testified he had mistakenly entered the store, thinking it was someplace where he could buy dresses for his daughters. “Upon entering the store, I realized it was a pet store,” he testified. “It was my plan to just walk out.” Instead, Mr. Sindayiganza testified, “I hear a voice saying, ‘This is the guy.’ ” Police officers surrounded him. He denied wrongdoing, and after some back-and-forth, an officer instructed him to go north, apparently the opposite direction of where the woman was heading. But Mr. Sindayiganza wanted to go south, to his train station. He was arrested moments later as he discussed — or, as the officer said, argued — the matter.

Racial profiling
Search and seizure
NYPD
Center for Constitutional Rights
Shira A Scheindlin
NYC
Minorities
Black People,African-Americans
Discrimination
Hispanic Americans


Hit-and-Run Ends Former Actor’s Nightly Appearance

Abstract: Allan Stevenson, a retired actor, had a nightly routine. Every night about 1 a.m., Mr. Stevenson left his Upper East Side apartment for a glass of red wine at Delizia, the restaurant around the corner. Next, he stopped by the S.A.S. deli to pick up a bagel with butter, a newspaper and a steaming cup of coffee with milk and two sugars for a doorman who worked nearby. On Wednesday, Mr. Stevenson’s innocuous ritual came to an abrupt end. A sports car struck and killed him as he crossed First Avenue at 73rd Street, the police said. Witnesses and the police said that a red Mazda Miata hit Mr. Stevenson, 89, about 2:15 a.m. The driver sped off, and yesterday afternoon, an electronic sign at the intersection urged drivers and pedestrians to call the Police Department with information about the accident. There have been no arrests, and the investigation is continuing. “‘I’ll be back shortly.’ That’s the last thing he said to me,” said James R. Quinn, the night doorman at 399 East 72nd Street, down the block from Mr. Stevenson’s building at 413 East 72nd. “Every night, he’d bring me coffee and we’d talk sports. It made my night go fast. We were going to talk about the Giants playing this Sunday.” Mr. Stevenson, a World War II veteran, had lived in a one-bedroom apartment in the undistinguished dark-brick building for more than 40 years. The superintendent, Saset Durakovit, said Mr. Stevenson led a modest life, “nothing fancy.” “He had old posters and a lot of books,” said Mr. Durakovit. “He lived alone. I never saw any family. He used to live with his mother, but she died more than 25 years ago.” According to Mr. Durakovit, Mr. Stevenson never married and had no children. Mr. Stevenson, who walked with a cane, was a familiar face in the neighborhood. “He used to come and use Italian expressions or Spanish expressions,” said Frank Pecora, the owner of Delizia. Before he was known on his block for his late-night errands, Mr. Stevenson was a performer on Broadway, sharing the stage with Rex Harrison, Walter Matthau, Jonelle Allen and others. He and Mr. Harrison both appeared in the drama “Anne of the Thousand Days” at the Shubert Theater in 1948 and 1949. Mr. Stevenson played the character Henry Norris. Mr. Harrison’s performance in the lead role of Henry VIII earned him a Tony Award for best actor. Mr. Stevenson also had bit roles on television until the 1980s, according to the Internet Movie Database Web site. But Mr. Stevenson’s acting career hit a bump after a run-in with an actress, said Luis F. Baird, a porter at the building where Mr. Quinn works. Mr. Baird said he had known Mr. Stevenson for more than 20 years. “He told me that the actress had felt that he had touched her disrespectfully during a rehearsal,” Mr. Baird recounted outside the building. “He told me that had affected his career, that he couldn’t go to Hollywood. But who knows? In those days there were a lot of taboos.” Mr. Baird said he enjoyed talking to Mr. Stevenson about his years on Broadway. “We had this affinity because I did some theater when I was 26 in Ecuador,” Mr. Baird said. He and others said that Mr. Stevenson barely made ends meet on Social Security and city assistance. “He was very poor,” Mr. Baird said. “I used to give him bags of clothes, shoes. He reminded me of a hermit. But he had a picaresque look. He was bright and funny. You could tell he was good-looking years ago. He was tall and had blue eyes.” “Back in the day, he was a probably a galán,” Mr. Baird said after a pause, using a Spanish telenovela term for heartthrob.

Stevenson Allan
Actors and Actresses
Theater


New York’s Age of Genius

Abstract: David Reid borrows the title of his rambling “interpretive historical essay” about 20th-century New York cultural iconography from an observation Gore Vidal made in The New York Review of Books decades ago. Except for a brief interregnum, Vidal wrote , the United States had been at war from Dec. 7, 1941, until Aug. 15, 1973. “Between 1945 and 1950,” Vidal declared, “the empire turned its attention to peaceful pursuits and enjoyed something of a golden or at least for us not too brazen an age.” Image Sammy Vogel Credit Photographs, via Lyons Press Mr. Reid, an essayist, author and editor (“Sex, Death and God in L.A.”), explores the fulcrum of this age of genius in “The Brazen Age : New York City and the AmericanEmpire: Politics, Art and Bohemia” (Pantheon Books, $30). His book actually opens in 1944, with President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s punishing four-borough campaign motorcade, and his purview extends well beyond the three years, 10 months and 10 days defined by Vidal to encompass the trial of Max Eastman, the socialist editor of The Masses, for sedition during World War I, and the Beat generation in the early 1950s. In between, the author introduces readers to a standing-room-only salon in which Weegee , the photographer, waxes rhapsodic about the newspaper PM (“You could tell PM readers on sight. They looked like people from another planet waiting for someone to take them back to their leader … which, of course, was PM”); C. Wright Mills, the Columbia sociologist, describes militant labor leaders as “the new men of power”; and Simone de Beauvoir writes curiously of “something in New York that makes sleep useless.” Roughly half of Henry Wallace’s 1948 presidential vote was cast in New York, which, Mr. Reid argues, is where the cultural Cold War began, where genius mattered to the public intellectuals and private wannabes and where Louis Simpson, a classmate of Allen Ginsberg at Columbia, tossed his wristwatch out a window “because we are all living in Eternity now.” Image Julie Kogon Credit via Lyons Press Boxing has always been a vehicle for ethnic succession, and Mike Silver focuses on the first half of the 20th century in “Stars in the Ring : Jewish Champions in the Golden Age of Boxing:A Photographic History” (Lyons Press, $29.95). “Getting knocked down and picking yourself up to continue the battle,” Mr. Silver, a sports historian, writes, “can be seen as a metaphor for life’s ups and downs.” From 1901 to 1939, he writes, 29 Jewish boxers were recognized as world champions (about 16 percent of the total) and more than 160 were ranked as top contenders in their divisions. By 1928, he writes, “Jewish boxers comprised the single largest ethnic group among title contenders in the 10 weight divisions.” Mr. Silver affectionately recalls an era when boxing rivaled baseball in popularity, when Benny Leonard was “the first Jewish-American pop culture icon” and about which Philip Roth could write with authority: “In my scheme of things, Slapsie Maxie was a more miraculous Jewish phenomenon by far than Dr. Albert Einstein.”

Stars in the Ring: Jewish Champions in the Golden Age of Boxing: A Photographic History


Deadly Clashes With Police Erupt at Pakistan Protests

Abstract: ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Violent clashes between the police and opponents of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif swept across Pakistan’s Punjab Province on Saturday, leaving at least two people dead and more than 100 injured as Mr. Sharif’s 14-month-old government sought to forestall a series of planned street protests aimed at ousting it. For the second consecutive day, the Pakistani police confronted supporters of Muhammad Tahir-ul Qadri, a firebrand preacher who has vowed to topple Mr. Sharif through a “peaceful revolution.” The cleric’s supporters — some of them armed with staves, others wearing gas masks — overturned police barricades and engaged in street battles in towns across Punjab, Mr. Sharif’s political power base. One of Mr. Qadri’s supporters died during clashes in Bhakkar and one officer died in Sargodha, while 130 people were injured and 22 officers were taken hostage, the police said in a statement. The escalating violence caused Mr. Qadri to cancel a protest against Mr. Sharif that had been scheduled for Lahore on Sunday. During a press conference outside his home in Lahore on Saturday, Mr. Qadri instructed supporters to mount smaller demonstrations in their home cities across the province. The clashes deepened the sense of crisis surrounding Mr. Sharif’s government, whose power has already been undermined by a troubled relationship with the country’s military leadership. The prime minister now faces the prospect of a series of major streets protests led by Mr. Qadri and, more substantively, his rival in the opposition, Imran Khan. Mr. Khan, a former cricket star and leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, has said he will hold a “million man march” in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, on the country’s Independence Day, Aug. 14. The point of the demonstration, Mr. Khan said, is to protest what he has alleged was vote-rigging during the general election in May 2013. Mr. Khan has said he will lead a sit-in outside Parliament until Mr. Sharif accedes to his demand for a new election. Mr. Khan has staked much on the protest. While his party rules the northwestern province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, his goal is to replace Mr. Sharif as the major force in Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous and influential province. Mr. Khan has built pressure on Mr. Sharif this year with a series of rallies. In speeches, he has portrayed the Aug. 14 protest as a decisive moment in his career. Pakistan’s Hot Spots at a Glance Main theaters of conflict in northwestern Pakistan. Mr. Sharif has responded robustly, using the law and security forces to outmaneuver his opponents. He has attempted to stymie Mr. Khan’s plans by invoking a colonial-era public order law that temporarily bans political protests in Islamabad. Analysts have said that Mr. Sharif’s reaction to the challenges has been heavy-handed and disproportionate, and that it has frequently fanned the protests that he has sought to quell. Perhaps in response to those critics, Mr. Sharif on Saturday publicly urged Mr. Khan to call off his protest and to resolve the crisis through political talks. The picture has been further complicated by the return of Mr. Qadri. Normally a resident of Canada, he organized protests against the previous government, which was led by President Asif Ali Zardari, in January 2013. Mr. Qadri returned to Pakistan in June, promising to peacefully overthrow Mr. Sharif, whom he called corrupt and autocratic. But the movement quickly became mired in bloodshed when the police killed nine of Mr. Qadri’s supporters outside his Lahore home in June. Those deaths became a rallying point for Mr. Qadri’s supporters, who have since taken to the streets. “We are here at the call of the leader, and we want a revolution,” said Gulham Datagir, 18, as he held a baton outside Mr. Qadri’s house on Friday. Reports of close ties between Mr. Qadri and the country’s army have caused some Pakistanis to fear that his protests could lead to a military coup. At a news conference outside his Islamabad home on Friday, Mr. Khan suggested that the military could intervene if his Islamabad sit-in was thwarted. “The responsibility will lie squarely on Nawaz Sharif if the army steps in,” he said. Mr. Khan and Mr. Qadri have denied any links to the military, and there is little evidence to support the fears of a military takeover. Still, it is an open secret that the army chief, Gen. Raheel Sharif, is unhappy with Mr. Sharif for his refusal to allow Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the former military leader currently facing trial for treason, to leave Pakistan. The prime minister has the support of several opposition parties, including the Pakistan Peoples Party and the religious Jamaat-e-Islami, whose leaders have tried to mediate between Mr. Sharif and Mr. Khan in recent weeks. But if that fails, Mr. Sharif has said he would physically prevent any protest on Aug. 14. The government has announced plans to seal roads leading to Islamabad and to curtail fuel supplies to vehicles carrying opposition supporters. Paramilitary soldiers have been deployed in Islamabad and Lahore, and army troops are in the capital to deter attacks in retaliation to the military operation in the North Waziristan tribal district, along the border with the Afghanistan, which started in June.

Pakistan
Civil Unrest
Nawaz Sharif
Muhammad Tahir-ul Qadri
Punjab Pakistan


3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution

Abstract: SAN FRANCISCO — Businesses in the South Park district of San Francisco generally sell either Web technology or sandwiches and burritos. Bespoke Innovations plans to sell designer body parts. The company is using advances in a technology known as 3-D printing to create prosthetic limb casings wrapped in embroidered leather, shimmering metal or whatever else someone might want. Scott Summit, a co-founder of Bespoke , and his partner, an orthopedic surgeon, are set to open a studio this fall where they will sell the limb coverings and experiment with printing entire customized limbs that could cost a tenth of comparable artificial limbs made using traditional methods. And they will be dishwasher-safe, too. “I wanted to create a leg that had a level of humanity,” Mr. Summit said. “It’s unfortunate that people have had a product that’s such a major part of their lives that was so underdesigned.” A 3-D printer, which has nothing to do with paper printers, creates an object by stacking one layer of material — typically plastic or metal — on top of another, much the same way a pastry chef makes baklava with sheets of phyllo dough. The technology has been radically transformed from its origins as a tool used by manufacturers and designers to build prototypes. These days it is giving rise to a string of never-before-possible businesses that are selling iPhone cases, lamps, doorknobs, jewelry, handbags, perfume bottles, clothing and architectural models. And while some wonder how successfully the technology will make the transition from manufacturing applications to producing consumer goods, its use is exploding. A California start-up is even working on building houses. Its printer, which would fit on a tractor-trailer, would use patterns delivered by computer, squirt out layers of special concrete and build entire walls that could be connected to form the basis of a house. It is manufacturing with a mouse click instead of hammers, nails and, well, workers. Advocates of the technology say that by doing away with manual labor, 3-D printing could revamp the economics of manufacturing and revive American industry as creativity and ingenuity replace labor costs as the main concern around a variety of goods. “There is nothing to be gained by going overseas except for higher shipping charges,” Mr. Summit said. A wealth of design software programs, from free applications to the more sophisticated offerings of companies including Alibre and Autodesk , allows a person to concoct a product at home, then send the design to a company like Shapeways, which will print it and mail it back. “We are enabling a class of ordinary people to take their ideas and turn those into physical, real products,” said J. Paul Grayson, Alibre’s chief executive. Mr. Grayson said his customers had designed parts for antique cars, yo-yos and even pieces for DNA analysis machines. “We have a lot of individuals going from personal to commercial,” Mr. Grayson said. Manufacturers and designers have used 3-D printing technology for years, experimenting on the spot rather than sending off designs to be built elsewhere, usually in Asia, and then waiting for a model to return. Boeing, for example, might use the technique to make and test air-duct shapes before committing to a final design. Depending on the type of job at hand, a typical 3-D printer can cost from $10,000 to more than $100,000. Stratasys and 3D Systems are among the industry leaders. And MakerBot Industries sells a hobbyist kit for under $1,000. Moving the technology beyond manufacturing does pose challenges. Customized products, for example, may be more expensive than mass-produced ones, and take longer to make. And the concept may seem out of place in a world trained to appreciate the merits of mass consumption. But as 3-D printing machines have improved and fallen in cost along with the materials used to make products, new businesses have cropped up. Freedom of Creation , based in Amsterdam, designs and prints exotic furniture and other fixtures for hotels and restaurants. It also makes iPhone cases for Apple, eye cream bottles for L’Oreal and jewelry and handbags for sale on its Web site. Various designers have turned to the company for clothing that interlaces plastic to create form-hugging blouses, while others have requested spiky coverings for lights that look as if they could be the offspring of a sea urchin and a lamp shade. “The aim was always to bring this to consumers instead of keeping it a secret at NASA and big manufacturers,” said Janne Kyttanen, 36, who founded Freedom of Creation about 10 years ago. “Everyone thought I was a lunatic when we started.” His company can take risks with “out there” designs since it doesn’t need to print an object until it is ordered, Mr. Kyttanen said. Ikea can worry about mass appeal. LGM , based in Minturn, Colo., uses a 3-D printing machine to create models of buildings and resorts for architectural firms. “We used to take two months to build $100,000 models,” said Charles Overy, the founder of LGM. “Well, that type of work is gone because developers aren’t putting up that type of money anymore.” Now, he said, he is building $2,000 models using an architect’s design and homegrown software for a 3-D printer. He can turn around a model in one night. Next, the company plans to design and print doorknobs and other fixtures for buildings, creating unique items. “We are moving from handcraft to digital craft,” Mr. Overy said. But Contour Crafting , based in Los Angeles, has pushed 3-D printing technology to its limits. Based on research done by Dr. Behrokh Khoshnevis, an engineering professor at the University of Southern California, Contour Crafting has created a giant 3-D printing device for building houses. The start-up company is seeking money to commercialize a machine capable of building an entire house in one go using a machine that fits on the back of a tractor-trailer. The 3-D printing wave has caught the attention of some of the world’s biggest technology companies. Hewlett-Packard, the largest paper-printer maker, has started reselling 3-D printing machines made by Stratasys. And Google uses the CADspan software from LGM to help people using its SketchUp design software turn their creations into 3-D printable objects. At Bespoke, Mr. Summit has built a scanning contraption to examine limbs using a camera. After the scan, a detailed image is transmitted to a computer, and Mr. Summit can begin sculpting his limb art. He uses a 3-D printer to create plastic shells that fit around the prosthetic limbs, and then wraps the shells in any flexible material the customer desires, be it an old bomber jacket or a trusty boot. “We can do a midcentury modern or a Harley aesthetic if that’s what someone wants,” Mr. Summit said. “If we can get to flexible wood, I am totally going to cut my own leg off.” Mr. Summit and his partner, Kenneth B. Trauner, the orthopedic surgeon, have built some test models of full legs that have sophisticated features like body symmetry, locking knees and flexing ankles. One artistic design is metal-plated in some areas and leather-wrapped in others. “It costs $5,000 to $6,000 to print one of these legs, and it has features that aren’t even found in legs that cost $60,000 today,” Mr. Summit said. “We want the people to have input and pick out their options,” he added. “It’s about going from the Model T to something like a Mini that has 10 million permutations.”

Computers and the Internet
Three-Dimensional Devices and Effects
Factories and Manufacturing
AutoDesk Inc
Stratasys Incorporated
Design
Computer Printers
Prostheses
Architecture
New Models Design and Products


Muslim Brotherhood May Offer Presidential Candidate in Egypt

Abstract: CAIRO — Muslim Brotherhood officials said on Wednesday that the group was debating whether to field its own candidate in Egypt ’s upcoming presidential contest, after failing to persuade several outside figures to run with the group’s backing. The Brotherhood had previously said it would not nominate a candidate for president, for fear of scaring voters who are wary that it would dominate the political scene or provoke a response by the country’s military rulers. Any candidate chosen by the popular Brotherhood, an Islamist group whose political wing won nearly half the seats in Parliament, could emerge as a front-runner for the presidency. Members of the Shura Council, a policy-making body within the Brotherhood, planned to debate the matter this week, officials with the group said. Mahmoud Hussein, the Brotherhood’s secretary general, said, “The Shura Council was the one that made the decision not to nominate any Muslim Brotherhood member for the presidency, and it is the one that has the power to retract the decision.” He added, “All options are open.” The signals pointing to a possible reversal seemed to reflect a variety of pressures on the Brotherhood before Egypt’s first competitive presidential election, which is scheduled to begin in May. Despite its parliamentary majority, the group is concerned about a loss of influence if a president hostile to the Brotherhood’s interests should win. One candidate, Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh , is a former leader of the Brotherhood who was an advocate of reforming the group and was expelled last year for insisting on running for president. Still, his candidacy has attracted other Brotherhood members, especially younger ones. The Brotherhood has threatened to expel anyone who backs him, and his supporters say that if he succeeds he could seriously damage the group’s credibility and discipline. Another candidate, Amr Moussa, who had served as the country’s foreign minister under President Hosni Mubarak, is seen as the front-runner because of his name recognition, but is considered too secular by the Brotherhood’s leaders. Mr. Hussein said some leaders in the group felt the Brotherhood had no choice but to present a candidate after approaching several people who refused to run with the Brotherhood’s endorsement. Analysts said a decision to run a presidential candidate runs several risks for the group. “Real interests are at stake,” said Samer Shehata, a professor of Arab politics at Georgetown University who specializes in Egypt. “Even though they have reneged on promises in the past, I think this one is more serious.” He said if the group’s candidate lost, it would be “a serious blow to the organization.” Khairat al-Shater, the Brotherhood’s chief financier and political strategist, is considered the group’s leading choice for either prime minister or president. Mr. Shehata said that Mr. Shater had “nowhere near the charisma or eloquence” of Mr. Aboul Fotouh, a bitter rival. Mr. Shater is technically not eligible to run because of a previous conviction, though his lawyer said he expected the conviction, from the Mubarak era, to be annulled. “I don’t think it’s necessarily worth it. They don’t need the presidency,” he said. Issandr El Amrani, an independent journalist and blogger who closely follows Egyptian politics, said the Brotherhood preferred the role of kingmaker instead of the more risky prospect of backing a candidate. “The cost is high,” he said. “It’s a wide-open field, and they would be starting a campaign eight months or so later than the leading candidates.” He said that the signals about reversing course reflected confusion within the Brotherhood about what strategy to pursue as the elections approached. “This is their first big internal test,” Mr. Amrani said. “It’s a difficult puzzle for them to resolve.”

Politics and Government
Elections
Muslim Brotherhood (Egypt)
Egypt


Building a Bridge of Bats and Balls Across a Divide

Abstract: On the day he planned to make baseball history, Luke Salas got a ride in a 1950s-era clunker of a car to a field that was little more than a sandlot, in a small town outside Havana. Salas, a Cuban-American former minor leaguer, had been training for a month with the provincial team there. Now, his father, a Havana native who fled the country with his family after Fidel Castro rose to power, was back in Cuba, watching from the slab of concrete behind home plate that passed for stands. It was the summer of 2012 — more than two years before President Obama would announce the normalization of diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States — and Salas, 27, had set off for Cuba thinking baseball could help the divide between his homeland and that of his ancestors. He intended to be the first American to compete in its baseball leagues since the Cuban Revolution nearly six decades ago. In months of preparation, he had cleared a number of bureaucratic hurdles and secured the permission to make it possible. Or so he thought. Instead, minutes before the first pitch, a coach approached him in the dugout. An official in Cuba’s ministry of the interior had called. Salas could not play. With baseball a key piece of President Obama’s historic visit to Cuba this week — he will attend an exhibition game Tuesday between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuban national team — and as Major League Baseball continues its talks with Cuban sports officials about a new system for players to sign with American teams, Salas is a reminder that the pipeline of ballplayers might one day flow both ways. His story is also instructive of how difficult that might be, as baseball in Cuba remains fraught with politics. “I thought I could play and it would be this great cultural exchange,” Salas, 31, said recently. “But I became a political hot potato.” Still, Salas is a link between baseball on both sides of the Florida Straits. In the years since his attempt to play, he has maintained close contacts with Cuban baseball officials, and he is leading an effort to donate a million baseballs to Cuba. Back home, several major league franchises have reached out to him, curious about the world he infiltrated. Image In an image taken from a soon-to-be-released documentary about Luke Salas’s efforts, called “The Cuban Dream,” Salas discussed baseball strategy. “I can still be a bridge,” Salas said. “And I want to be.” Salas arrived in Havana four years ago with grand plans. He enrolled in a film school in San Antonio de los Baños, a half-hour drive southwest of downtown Havana, to ensure his visa, and his brothers Scott and Jake traveled alongside him to film a documentary, which will be released this year. Salas made connections with several members of Cuba’s sports ministry. One new friend, Alberto Juantorena, a Cuban gold medal winner in track at the 1976 Olympics, helped him navigate the government’s red tape. The initial dream was to play for the Industriales, the Yankees of Cuba and the most visible team in its National Series, the rough equivalent of the major leagues there. But it was suggested that he shoot a bit lower. With the film school located in Artemisa province, a team there became the new target. It was essentially a minor league club, but he could then make the jump to Artemisa’s National Series team for the fall season. Salas was a four-year starter in the outfield at Pepperdine University in Malibu, Calif., and he was blessed with a powerful left-handed swing. At his first practice in Cuba, he swatted several home runs before batting practice was halted. The team said that with equipment shortages, it could not afford to lose any more balls. The town, meanwhile, was riveted by Salas. Residents showed up to the stadium just to watch him practice. They stopped him on the street to introduce themselves. He also made quick friends with teammates — proof, he said, that baseball could be the kind of diplomacy he imagined. “We talked about music and girls,” said Salas, who speaks fluent Spanish. “It was just like my teammates on every other team I ever played on.” Added Osnaldo Garriga, a catcher on the team who has since moved to Florida: “I realized it didn’t matter if we were Cuban or American, we were friends and teammates.” Besides, Garriga said, “Luke was a very good ballplayer.” Players were also intensely interested in Salas’s equipment: shiny sunglasses, metal cleats and the like. “They had a hard time understanding that in the U.S., it was normal to go to a store and buy this stuff,” Salas said. Image Another image from the documentary shows Salas taking a turn at bat on a street in Cuba. Everything was going well until the day of his official debut, when Salas was informed he could not play. Crushed, he frantically tried to meet with government and baseball officials to resolve the problem. He was told he needed to be a permanent Cuban resident, but when he returned in the fall with a residency card, thanks to the film school, he was still not allowed a tryout with Artemisa. The team’s manager explained that he needed the government’s permission. The government said it was the coach’s decision. Salas still does not understand why the two sides could not reconcile — whether it was a bureaucratic mix-up or something more — but he never took the field. “They didn’t know what to do with me,” Salas said. “I think a lot of it was control. If they let me play, they couldn’t control what might happen.” There is a lesson here for Major League Baseball, Salas said. “They call it the cuatro caras, the four faces of Cuba,” he said. “You never quite know who you’re talking to or who is the ultimate decision-maker.” Indeed, even as the Obama administration has paved the way for a new relationship between M.L.B. and the Cuban baseball federation, it remains unclear how the Cubans would structure an agreement to send their players to the major leagues. Despite its outcome, the novelty of Salas’s Cuban adventure brought intrigue from all corners of American life when he returned. State Department officials called him into their offices in Washington and told him that if he continued his efforts, he would violate the United States’ embargo of Cuba, be fined $250,000 and risk jail time. The rules on travel to Cuba and engaging in commerce were much stricter then than they are now, since Obama loosened them, but many regulatory obstacles remain. Production companies approached him about a reality television show if he ever went back to Cuba to play ball. Major league teams, meanwhile, wanted intelligence on talented players on the island, and advice on where to build academies if, and when, they are one day allowed into Cuba. “There was so much interest in the Cuban talent,” Salas said. Salas grew up in Malibu, where his Cuban heritage was part of his childhood. He is a descendant of Cesar Salas, a revolutionary alongside Cuba’s national hero Jose Marti. Both died in the war of independence against Spain at the end of the 19th century. Luke Salas’s father, Hank, left Cuba when he was 9 years old with his parents after Castro assumed power, but he never preached hatred of the regime. He took his family to Cuba in the late 1990s, and his son felt an immediate connection. “I knew I wanted to go back,” Luke Salas said. After Pepperdine, Salas signed with the Texas Rangers in the summer of 2007 and played with their Class A affiliate. He was cut after spring training the next year and returned to Pepperdine to get a graduate degree in public policy. The day after he signed the paperwork to enroll, he got an invitation to join the minor league system of the Seattle Mariners. He declined. “He saw a different path,” Hank Salas said. “He saw a way to use baseball that was much bigger.” The documentary about Luke Salas’s efforts, “The Cuban Dream,” is intended to help bring attention to the baseball donation effort, which he said has the full support of the Cuban baseball federation and sports ministry. He intends to visit Cuba in April to discuss his charity plans, which he thinks are vital to aiding the struggling baseball infrastructure there, and will, in turn, help baseball grow globally. “Baseball needs Cuba, which is double the size of the Dominican Republic, to be a strong baseball country,” he said, noting the growing influence of soccer on the island. “It starts with baseballs, then bats and gloves and spikes, and giving kids an opportunity to go out and practice and play.” Salas no longer daydreams about suiting up for Industriales or even Artemisa. Today, he imagines American equipment reinvigorating the game and leading a baseball renaissance in Cuba — and maybe one day a winter league on the island, and young Cubans earning scholarships to play ball at American colleges. “My playing days are probably over,” he said. “But there are other dreams for Cuba.”

Luke Salas
Baseball
Cuba
US Foreign Policy
Pepperdine


Saudis Begin Public Caning to Punish a Blogger

Abstract: BEIRUT, Lebanon — The authorities in Saudi Arabia on Friday began the public flogging of a blogger who was sentenced to 1,000 blows, 10 years in prison and a large fine for starting a website that featured content critical of the country’s religious establishment, the rights group Amnesty International reported. The floggings are to be administered with a cane over a period of months. The blogger, Raif Badawi, was arrested after starting a website called “Free Saudi Liberals,” and he was later convicted of charges that included cybercrime and parental disobedience. The case has drawn attention to the strict limits on freedom of expression in Saudi Arabia, a close Arab ally of the United States, and prompted unusually direct criticism from the American government. Jen Psaki, a State Department spokeswoman, told reporters on Thursday that the United States was concerned that Mr. Badawi would face “the inhumane punishment of a thousand lashes in addition to serving a 10-year sentence in prison for exercising his rights to freedom of expression and religion.” The United States government called on Saudi Arabia to cancel the flogging and “review Badawi’s case and sentence,” Ms. Psaki said. Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, has used its courts in the past to punish dissidents or those who question the country’s strict interpretation of Islam. Often, these actions face no public rebuke from the United States, which considers Saudi Arabia an important ally in the fight against terrorism and other areas. Besides being the world’s largest oil exporter, the kingdom is one of five Arab countries that have joined an American-led air campaign against the jihadists of the Islamic State. Mr. Badawi was arrested in 2012 and prosecuted in a criminal court for offenses that included cybercrime and disobeying his father, who has denounced his son in the news media. Prosecutors tried and failed to charge him with apostasy and then pressed for a resentencing because they considered his first sentence of seven years in prison and 600 blows too lenient. Last year, Mr. Badawi received his final sentence of 10 years in prison, a fine of more than a quarter-million dollars and 1,000 blows with the cane. An unidentified witness cited by Amnesty said that Mr. Badawi was taken from a bus and flogged 50 times in a public square outside of a mosque in the port city of Jidda after Friday Prayer. About 15 minutes later, he was put back on the bus and taken away. Amnesty said it would not identify the witness because of security concerns. Adam Coogle, a Middle East researcher for Human Rights Watch, said Mr. Badawi was clearly being punished for starting a liberal website and insulting the religious authorities. He said that floggers in Saudi Arabia are supposed to distribute the blows from the top of the back to the back of the legs without breaking the skin. It is not a bloody affair, but it is public and painful.

Raif Badawi
Saudi Arabia
Corporal punishment
Blog
Amnesty International


PepsiCo Faults Weak Sales in West for Dip in Income

Abstract: PepsiCo reported weaker-than-expected quarterly revenue Thursday, hurt by falling North American soft drink sales, and cautioned it did not expect a major revival of consumer spending next year. “Our consumer research shows that the age of thrift that we’re seeing in consumers in the U.S. and Western Europe will continue in 2010, and that consumers will continue to remain very careful about their spending,” the chief executive, Indra Nooyi, said in a conference call. In emerging markets of Asia and South America, Ms. Nooyi said consumer spending should grow, but not at a rate that entirely offsets the slow growth in the West. The company, which is buying the Pepsi Bottling Group and PepsiAmericas for $7.8 billion, also affirmed its 2009 earnings target and set a 2010 goal ahead of analysts’ expectations. Net income rose to $1.72 billion, or $1.09 a share, from $1.58 billion, or 99 cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, PepsiCo earned $1.08 a share, topping analysts’ average estimate of $1.03. The profit surprise was mainly driven by a lower-than-expected tax rate, according to a JPMorgan analyst, John Faucher. Revenue in the period, which ended Sept. 5 and was the third quarter of PepsiCo’s fiscal year, fell 1.5 percent to $11.08 billion, missing analysts’ average expectation for $11.25 billion. Stock in PepsiCo, which is based in Purchase, N.Y., fell 78 cents, to $60.39 a share. A Morningstar analyst, Philip Gorham, said the lower-than-expected revenue probably prompted investor concern over the company’s ability to increase its sales. Sales by volume rose 2 percent in PepsiCo’s snacks business, both in the Americas and internationally. In the drinks business, volume was up 0.5 percent, with a decline of 6 percent in the Americas and a rise of 9 percent internationally.

Soft Drinks
PepsiCo Inc
Company Reports
Sales


A Billionaire Philanthropist in Washington Who’s Big on ‘Patriotic Giving’

Abstract: WASHINGTON — The expansive reach of David M. Rubenstein into the public life of the nation’s capital can be seen during a brief excursion from his downtown office at the Carlyle Group, the private equity firm that he co-founded and that made him a billionaire. Begin across the street at the National Archives, the site of the new gallery, named after him, where Magna Carta, which he bought in 2007 for $23 million, is on permanent loan. Then head to the Library of Congress, and see the first map of the United States, also his, in the Great Hall. Make your way to the earthquake-damaged Washington Monument, which will reopen this spring after a $15 million repair, half paid for by Mr. Rubenstein, then zip to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, where his $75 million has bought, among other things, a new pipe organ. End up at the National Zoo, where baby Bao Bao frolics in the panda habitat Mr. Rubenstein endowed, part of a $7 million Smithsonian gift. Over the years, Mr. Rubenstein, who has a fortune estimated at $3 billion, has made gifts to the usual array of universities, hospitals and cultural organizations beloved by wealthy donors. But he stands nearly alone in shoring up institutions generally under the purview of the federal government. About $200 million of the $300 million he has given away has been what he calls “patriotic giving.” “The United States cannot afford to do the things it used to do,” Mr. Rubenstein said, “and I think it would be a good thing if more people would say: ‘My national zoo needs money, the archives need money. I think we’re going to have to do more for them.’ ” And there is plenty more to do in a city that has not only suffered from cutbacks in federal spending but which historically has lacked both the wealth and the philanthropic traditions of places like New York. While there were wealthy and civic-minded men like Duncan Phillips and Eugene Meyer who left their mark on Washington in the last century, it was the federal government that built and maintained the parks and museums that in other cities donors endowed, according to Steven Pearlstein, a professor of public and international affairs at George Mason University and a columnist for The Washington Post. “The federal government was the sugar daddy,” he said. Image Mr. Rubenstein donated $7.5 million to repair the Washington Monument. Credit Drew Angerer for The New York Times For the most part, according to Mr. Pearlstein, Washington has been a place where the currency has been power more than money. In the past two decades, that has begun to change as government contracting, banking and the law have created a new wealthy class in the city and its suburbs, but no one has given his money away quite like Mr. Rubenstein. “This kind of giving is starting to happen more often because governments are really suffering,” said Stacy Palmer, the editor of The Chronicle of Philanthropy. “But the extent of Rubenstein’s giving sets him apart.” Such giving, she said, is a subject of feverish debate in the philanthropy world, where many believe that private money should not permit government to abdicate responsibilities and in turn drain cash from food banks, hospitals and other services in need. There are “concerns about whether it is a good idea for philanthropy to step in for government,” Ms. Palmer said. Mr. Rubenstein, 64, who first came to Washington to work in government, offers a simple explanation for what he has done: “I felt I owed my country a lot. I also felt I owed the city a lot. I built my company here; I met my wife here.” He grew up in modest means in Baltimore; his father sorted mail for the Postal Service and his mother was a homemaker. After college and law school, he worked in a New York law firm before getting a job on Capitol Hill for the Senate Judiciary Committee. In 1977, he joined the Carter administration, where he spent his days toiling over domestic policy as a White House aide, and met his wife, Alice Rogoff, who worked at the Office of Management and Budget. Newsweek once called him “the White House workaholic.” After his stint ended, Mr. Rubenstein took another corporate law job but reassessed and concluded that he was “a mediocre lawyer.” With some partners, he set out to found Carlyle, named after the hotel in New York City, quickly accruing a fortune in the world of leveraged buyouts. Ten years ago, Mr. Rubenstein said, he began to consider his legacy, and after learning from some actuarial tables that white Jewish males were likely to live to 81, decided to start plowing a lot of his money — and his time — into philanthropic causes. “There are other wonderful donors in Washington,” said Michael M. Kaiser, president of the Kennedy Center, “but it’s the range of his giving and his collection of interests that is staggering.” Image He also endowed the National Zoo’s panda habitat. Credit Drew Angerer for The New York Times In choosing his beneficiaries, Mr. Rubenstein relies on his interests and his gut. He has a passion for American history and can lecture extemporaneously and at length about presidents, historic documents, the civil rights movement and beyond — and has no staff or foundation to vet requests. He spends little time agonizing over a donation. “To some extent when you’ve made the money, you feel you can give it away more rapidly,” he said. In January 2013, Curt Viebranz, the president of George Washington’s Mount Vernon, took Mr. Rubenstein around the museum to show him how it had displayed some of his documents. Over lunch, Mr. Viebranz recalled: “I felt emboldened to ask him for a large gift, and much to my surprise and happiness, he made that $10 million gift in February. It was a remarkably efficient process.” He added, “It can take years of cultivating a donor to get a gift of that size.” If you don’t call Mr. Rubenstein, he might call you. If you do “make the ask,” expect to get an answer in weeks. While Mr. Rubenstein likes to see results — and despite his unassuming manner, is not averse to seeing his name on the doors of his beneficiaries — he does not use the complex success metrics of philanthropists like Eli Broad in Los Angeles. He tends not to check in, but if beneficiaries send an update, they hear back from him, no matter his time zone (he travels roughly 250 days a year). The donations can be transformative. Mr. Rubenstein will endow the expansion of the Kennedy Center, which otherwise would have had to go to Congress for an appropriation. At Monticello, his $10 million gift allowed Leslie Greene Bowman, president of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, as she puts it, “to return the mountaintop of Monticello to something Jefferson would have recognized in just a few years what I would venture to say would have taken at least a decade to accomplish.” Mr. Rubenstein says he likes to apply the “mother standard” to giving. “When I built Carlyle, my mother didn’t call to say, ‘I’m so proud,’ ” he said. “When I give a gift to some place of importance, she calls and says, ‘I’m proud.’ ”

David M Rubenstein
Philanthropy
Carlyle Group
US Politics
Washington DC


For ‘Fox & Friends’ Weekend Anchor Alisyn Camerota, Morning Arrives Early

Abstract: Sundays start early for Alisyn Camerota , the weekend co-host and news anchor on the morning program “Fox & Friends.” She began at Fox as a reporter in 1998 and went on to cover the terrorist attacks of 2001, the Beltway sniper case and the 2004 Democratic National Convention and presidential election. Ms. Camerota, 41, lives in an Upper West Side brownstone with her husband, Tim Lewis, 43, and their twin girls, Alessandra and Francesca, 4, and their son, Nathaniel, 2. MICHAEL WILSON SHOCKED AWAKE My alarm goes off at 3 a.m., and every single Sunday, I’m shocked and surprised by that — like I don’t know what the racket is in my bedroom. PREDAWN MEETING The car comes to get me at 3:30, and I’m in my first morning meeting at 4 a.m., where the producers, anchors and I figure out what we’re going to do with our four-hour marathon show. We figure out what we like, what our talking points are going to be. UNIFORM From 4:15 to 5, I go into hair and makeup, where they attempt to make me look presentable at that hour. I go in, in, basically, my pajamas. I’m, like, transformed in the next hour to being presentable on television. I wear whatever dress and jewelry and heels, and they do my hair and makeup. LIGHTS, CAMERA At 6 a.m. the show starts, and for the next four hours I’m basically on the set virtually without moving. FUEL It’s hard to find any food or coffee at that hour. At 7 a.m., the place next door opens, and one of the cameramen orders breakfast for me. He sits down next to me at 6:45 and goes, “What are we having?” We go through this whole thing. I say, “Oh, God, what are you having?” He says, “I’m having a B.L.T.” I’m like, “You can’t eat that with makeup.” “You want an omelet?” “They get cold.” We do this whole routine, and at the end I always say, “Just get me the cottage cheese with fruit.” Which I then nosh on for the next four hours straight. I’ve been caught on camera, like, sticking the fork in my mouth. BRING ON THE KIDS At 11, I hop in a taxi, race home. That’s when I dive into child care. We have full-on child day, family day. If it’s a beautiful day we love to go to the Museum of Natural History. They have sprinklers. It’s what passes for a water park on the Upper West Side. It’s the best-kept secret in the city. The kids love it. Or we take them to a playground that has sprinklers. Just kind of keep them in motion basically until dinnertime. WINDING DOWN We come home and throw together some dinner. Occasionally, we will not want to come home, and go out for pizza. We wrestle them into the bath after their day of running around the city, playing. We have reading-book time from 7 to 7:30. Then it’s bedtime for the little one, and the girls go to bed at 8. FINALLY, CRASH Then I collapse onto the sofa and exhale and turn to my husband and say: “How are you? What’s new?”

Television
News and News Media
Camerota Alisyn


Treasury Auctions Set for This Week

Abstract: The Treasury’s schedule of financing this week includes Monday’s regular weekly auction of new three- and six-month bills and an auction of four-week bills on Tuesday. At the close of the New York cash market on Friday, the rate on the outstanding three-month bill was 0.07 percent. The rate on the six-month issue was 0.11 percent, and the rate on the four-week issue was 0.03 percent. The following tax-exempt fixed-income issues are scheduled for pricing this week: TUESDAY Knoxville, Tenn., $114.3 million of wastewater systems revenue bonds. Competitive. Los Angeles, $152.4 million of solid waste resources revenue bonds. Competitive. San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, $335.3 million of revenue bonds. Competitive. Virginia Housing Development Authority, $80 million of revenue bonds. Competitive. WEDNESDAY Maryland Department of Transportation, $180 million of revenue bonds. Competitive. Virginia, $219.5 million of general obligation bonds. Competitive. THURSDAY Northeast Maryland Waste Disposal Authority, $79 million of revenue bonds. Competitive. ONE DAY DURING THE WEEK Colorado Housing and Finance Authority, $56.4 million of single-family project bonds. RBC Capital Markets. Fairfax County, Va., Water Authority, $93.2 million of water refinancing revenue bonds. Morgan Stanley. Hilliard City, Ohio, School District, $66.4 million of school improvement refinancing bonds. Stifel, Nicolaus. Illinois Finance Authority, $108 million of revenue bonds. J.P. Morgan Securities. Indiana Finance Authority, $64.2 million of health system debt securities. Bank of America. Lewisville, Tex., Independent School District, $211.5 million of unlimited tax refinancing bonds. Raymond James. Monroe County, N.Y., Industrial Development Corporation, $101 million of tax-exempt revenue bonds. J.P. Morgan Securities. New York Mortgage Agency, $111.6 million of homeowner mortgage revenue bonds. Morgan Stanley. North Carolina State University, $275.6 million of debt securities. Wells Fargo Securities. Oklahoma City Water Utilities Trust, $158.5 million of water and sewer system revenue refinancing bonds. Bank of America. Oregon, $160 million of general obligation bonds. Citigroup Global Markets. San Diego County Water Authority, $289.8 million of water revenue refinancing bonds. J.P. Morgan Securities. University of Chicago, $60 million of educational revenue debt securities. Wells Fargo Securities. Wisconsin, $111.9 million of clean water refinancing bonds. Morgan Stanley.

Tax Credits Tax Deductions Tax Exemptions


In Long-Term American Treasury Securities They Trust

Abstract: GUESS who's financing the budget deficit of the United States? Hint: Very few Treasury securities are being purchased by American consumers or businesses. The federal government released its calculations this week on net investments in United States long-term securities, and found that foreigners had invested $350.8 billion in Treasury bonds and notes in 2005. They were net sellers of short-term Treasury bills, so their total Treasury holdings grew by just $290.9 billion. Even so, the United States Treasury says that Treasury securities held by the public -- that is, by everyone except the Federal Reserve System and other arms of the government -- rose by $306.4 billion. That means that 95 percent of the deficit was financed overseas. Actually, foreigners are becoming a little less generous. In 2004, they bought $357.8 billion of Treasuries, 98 percent of the growth in outstanding Treasury securities. Over all, foreign investors bought a net $1.05 trillion in long-term American securities in 2005, the first time the number had gone to 13 figures. That was up 14 percent from 2004. The gain last year showed increasing foreign trust in American corporations. While United States government and agency securities got most of the money, the increase largely came from a greater willingness to buy corporate bonds and stocks. Foreigners put a net $391.7 billion into corporate bonds, 27 percent more than they had invested the previous year and the largest amount for any year on record. And they put a net $79.1 billion into American stocks, up 178 percent from the previous year. That investment was, however, less than half the record flow of $174.9 billion of foreign money that went into American stocks in 2000, just in time for the foreigners to lose money as the stock market tumbled. Skeptics have been warning for years that foreign central banks would eventually lose their appetite for Treasury securities, leading to a plunge in the value of the dollar. But the figures show that in 2005 central banks played only a minor role in buying Treasuries. The government said they added just $61.2 billion in long-term Treasury securities to their portfolios, well below the $201.1 billion they invested in 2004. The vast majority of foreign Treasury purchases came from private foreign investors, who presumably were attracted by the yields and by the fact that the dollar gained in 2005 against the Japanese yen, the euro and the British pound, while falling less than 3 percent against the Chinese yuan. That exchange rate is administered by the Chinese government, and the purchases may show confidence that it will not let the dollar tumble. It may or may not be significant that the only three years in the last decade that the Standard & Poor's 500 fell were the three years that followed net foreign investments of more than $100 billion in American stocks. The market rose after all other years. The 2005 figure, of $79.1 billion, is the fourth-largest figure. Will it herald a decline? So far, the index is up for 2006, indicating that investors do not see last year's foreign purchases as a bad omen.

UNITED STATES
FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM
TREASURY DEPARTMENT
FOREIGN INVESTMENTS
UNITED STATES ECONOMY
FINANCES
STOCKS AND BONDS
BUDGETS AND BUDGETING
GOVERNMENT BONDS
BANKS AND BANKING


Before Princeton Instructor’s Suicide, a Suspension

Abstract: In the three weeks since a Spanish instructor at Princeton University killed himself, questions have been raised by students and professors there and on other campuses about the university’s handling of the episode. Princeton officials have said that the instructor, Antonio Calvo , was on leave at the time he died, but declined to provide other details, citing employees’ privacy rights. Now, documents obtained by The New York Times, including a letter to Dr. Calvo from Princeton and an entry in his notebook, indicate that the university suspended him on April 8, four days before his death, while it investigated serious complaints against him — and that the news threw him into despair. “We have received information from multiple sources that you have been engaging in extremely troubling and inappropriate behavior in the workplace,” the chairman of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Cultures , Gabriela Nouzeilles, wrote to Dr. Calvo, a senior lecturer who taught Spanish to undergraduates and supervised graduate students. The letter did not elaborate on the complaints, but it informed Dr. Calvo that he was suspended with pay, pending an investigation, and barred him from campus, instructing him to leave his Princeton ID and keys on his desk. Because he was in the United States on a temporary work visa, he faced a forced return to his native Spain. Dr. Calvo’s appointment was up for renewal, and the suspension came in the midst of his evaluation. Marco Aponte-Moreno, a friend and former lecturer in Spanish at Princeton, said a faculty member and a few graduate students had campaigned to block the reappointment. On April 9, the day after his suspension, Dr. Calvo made a notebook entry in Spanish that revealed his growing turmoil. “The emotional torture of the months-long wait has become unbearable in my job,” said the entry, which was translated by a friend, Celia Pérez-Ventura, a former director of the Spanish-language program at Princeton. “It is better to leave it here instead of continuing this road toward a greater torture, left exposed as if I were guilty of a crime when in reality the committee refused to see the merit of my work, focusing instead only on the fact that I raised my voice at my subordinates.” Friends and former colleagues of Dr. Calvo, 45, a popular figure on campus for more than a decade, say he had long had conflicts with graduate students. He oversaw their teaching of undergraduates and criticized some as not working hard enough. The students, in turn, complained that he was overly harsh. With a loud voice and an occasional temper, Dr. Calvo did not fit the buttoned-down norm of American higher education, his friends said. He may also have felt looser around graduate students, viewing them as colleagues because they also taught. Friends say the complaints about Dr. Calvo stem from two incidents. In one, they said, Dr. Calvo told a graduate student that she deserved a slap on the face; in the other, he sent an e-mail with a joking reference to a male student’s testicles, using a Spanish expression that exhorts someone to get to work. Dr. Aponte said that because Dr. Calvo was gay, the e-mail was presented as evidence of sexual harassment. “Those are the only two incidents that we know of, and they were completely misinterpreted and taken out of proportion,” Dr. Aponte said. “They should have given him a warning of some kind.” The letter from Princeton relieved Dr. Calvo of his teaching responsibilities, and told him to expect a call from an associate dean the next Monday to schedule an interview in which he could respond to the allegations. It is unclear whether Dr. Calvo spoke to anyone from Princeton that Monday. But the letter indicates that he was given a chance to defend himself, contrary to assertions by some supporters. The next day, April 12, he was found dead of slash wounds in his Manhattan apartment. In a letter to “the Princeton community” last week, the university president, Shirley M. Tilghman, described the process for reviewing faculty appointments, but said the content of Dr. Calvo’s review could not be disclosed without “an unprecedented breach” of confidentiality. She lamented that, as a result, misleading rumors had spread on campus and the Internet. “Most problematically,” she said, “innocent individuals on campus have been identified and fingers pointed in a manner that is deeply unfair, hurtful and unworthy of this university community.” Twenty-three professors and students at Princeton and other campuses released a letter on Friday asking the university to issue a full report on how and why it suspended Dr. Calvo.

Princeton University
Calvo Antonio
Suicides and Suicide Attempts
Suspensions Dismissals and Resignations


U.S. Women Lose for First Time in 2 Years

Abstract: The two-year unbeaten streak of the American women’s soccer team ended at 43 games Friday with a 1-0 loss to Sweden at the Algarve Cup in Albufiera, Portugal. Sweden is coached by Pia Sundhage, the former United States coach. Lotta Schelin beat goalkeeper Hope Solo with a header in the 24th minute. The United States (0-1-1), which had won the tournament nine times in 18 previous trips, was eliminated with one game to go. The United States had been 36-0-7 since a 1-0 loss to Japan at the Algarve Cup on March 5, 2012. ■ Something is “not right” with Lionel Messi, Barcelona Coach Gerardo Martino said, after Messi appeared to vomit during Argentina’s 0-0 draw against Romania on Wednesday. Martino said Messi had seen a specialist; the results were inconclusive. (AP)

United States Women's National Soccer Team


Al Jazeera America Chief Is Ousted After Turmoil

Abstract: Al Jazeera America announced on Wednesday that it was replacing its chief executive, Ehab Al Shihabi, who had held that position since the network’s founding two years ago. It was the latest move in what had already been a tumultuous week for the network. Since last week, three top officials have announced their departures from the company and another former employee has sued the network, claiming wrongful termination. One of the executives who departed, Marcy McGinnis, told The New York Times in an article published on Tuesday that Mr. Al Shihabi had meddled with news decisions and fostered a “culture of fear” in the newsroom. Mr. Al Shihabi told employees in a subsequent email that he would remain as chief operating officer. However, an Al Jazeera executive, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters, said Mr. Al Shihabi’s departure from the network was “imminent.” The network declined to comment. The decision to remove Mr. Al Shihabi from the chief executive position appears to have been a sudden one. He conducted a regular meeting with senior executive producers at 11 a.m. on Wednesday in which he gave no hint of personnel changes, according to an employee who was present but spoke on the condition of anonymity. Newsroom members said the announcement of his ouster, which came in a companywide email sent Wednesday afternoon, caught them off guard. Mr. Al Shihabi will be succeeded as chief executive by Al Anstey, who has been managing director of Al Jazeera English since 2010. “Having started my career with CBS News, and lived in the U.S. later in my career, I’m very pleased to be returning to the U.S. to continue to uphold the highest standards of organizational excellence at the channel, with an absolute commitment to the very best in journalism and storytelling,” Mr. Anstey said in a statement. Ms. McGinnis, who resigned on Monday and was a former executive at CBS News, said she supported the change in leadership. “This was the right thing to do for the employees and for the company,” she said. “This was a necessary step, and it’s time to put this chapter behind them.” She said she worked with Mr. Anstey two decades ago at CBS, when she said he was a “smart up-and-coming journalist.” She added, “The good thing about Al is that he’s a journalist.” Before joining Al Jazeera, Mr. Al Shihabi worked as a management consultant. He did not have a background in journalism. In a statement, Mostefa Souag, the acting director general of the Al Jazeera Media Network, said he was “confident Al’s leadership will transform the channel’s ability to lead in the U.S. marketplace. His demonstrated success leading Al Jazeera English and his passion for the Al Jazeera brand positions him with the unique ability to undertake the strategic changes needed for the success of the channel.” Al Jazeera America has had a difficult time gaining any traction in the United States, drawing about 30,000 viewers a night. At times, it has struggled to match the low ratings of its predecessor, Current TV. Additionally, Al Jazeera America employees said its newsroom was dysfunctional and that morale was low under Mr. Al Shihabi’s leadership. In a newsroomwide meeting last week, employees complained that they feared retaliation if they were critical of the network. In an interview on Tuesday, Mr. Al Shihabi defended the network’s journalism and said he was “committed to raise the morale” of his staff. “If people are not happy, we will make them happy,” he said. In addition to Ms. McGinnis, two other executives, Diana Lee and Dawn Bridges, also left the company in the last week. Another former employee, Matthew Luke, filed a lawsuit last week that claimed, among other things, that his boss at Al Jazeera America, Osman Mahmud, was anti-Semitic and sexist. In a statement on Wednesday, Mr. Luke’s lawyer, Jeffrey A. Kimmel, said, “Those, including my client, who have courageously taken stands against the conduct of this company should be proud of what they have accomplished.” Mr. Al Shihabi had lost the confidence of a many of the newsroom, and workers said they were cautiously optimistic that the change would be a good one. “They were decisive, and there’s a sense that they did the right thing,” said the employee who was at Wednesday morning’s meeting. “But there’s also a little bit of a sense of, now what?”

Al Jazeera
Ehab Al Shihabi
Al Anstey
News media,journalism
Appointments and Executive Changes


Selling Nursing Bras and Emotional Support

Abstract: BRAVADO DESIGNS specializes in breast-feeding bras, which feature cups that unfasten singly and stretchable fabrics that accommodate size fluctuations during pregnancy and nursing. But when it comes to marketing, the bra company emphasizes another type of support: emotional. An information section on the Bravado Web site features dozens of suggestions from Heather Kelly, described as a certified lactation consultant, from hand positioning while nursing (“Imagine you’re holding a sandwich for your baby to bite”) to how long it should take (from 20 to 50 minutes, including “ burping , diaper changes, waking a sleepy baby, etc.”). The company, which started in 1992, has advertised in the past, but now its primary marketing strategy is to be an online destination for new mothers. “This is where women get their information these days,” said Kathryn From, chief executive of Bravado, in a telephone interview from Toronto, where the company is based. “They’re not picking up the books and magazines at 2 in the morning — it’s important to engage the woman where she is, and where she is these days is online.” In November, the company formed the Bravado Breast-feeding Information Council, which has an advisory board of parenting specialists and bloggers, including Ms. Kelly. A new Web site, breastfeedinginformation.org , includes survey results from Bravado’s database of more than 80,000 women and advocates for breast-feeding-friendly workplaces and stores. “We want to promote that women can and should feel great when they’re pregnant and nursing and shouldn’t be forced to hide in a room until the baby is 1 or 2 years old or whatever age that a women chooses to stop breast-feeding,” Ms. From said. Gaining such acceptance can be difficult, though, as Bravado recently learned firsthand. • Since 2007, CURVExpo, which is based in Riverside, Conn., has produced lingerie and swimwear trade shows in New York and Las Vegas. Bravado, which once focused exclusively on maternity retailers, has attended the show since 2008 as part of an effort to expand into lingerie stores. While many exhibitors hire women to model their lines in their booths, the models hired by Bravado cut a decidedly different profile because they represent typical customers: women in their third trimester whose pre-pregnancy bras may have become uncomfortably snug and who have switched to breast-feeding bras. Likewise, at runway shows organized by CURVExpo in conjunction with trade shows, Bravado has in previous years provided pregnant models. “When we have had a pregnant woman on the runway at Curve, she tends to get applause because we’re really showing women at a time of life when women don’t feel attractive,” Ms. From said. But while reaction to such models both on runways and in trade show booths is overwhelmingly positive, “there’s always going to be that 5 percent who are offended or uncomfortable with seeing a woman who is pregnant,” she said. Laurence Teinturier, executive vice president of CURVExpo, said that while runway shows were held at convention centers in previous years, recent shows in Las Vegas and New York were staged at what she called “private venues,” which balked at pregnant models. “We have to bend with the locations’ rules,” said Ms. Teinturier, who also said that pregnant models were still permitted in Bravado’s booth. Bravado was prohibited from using a pregnant model at a CURVExpo runway show on Feb. 16 in Las Vegas at Blush Boutique Nightclub, owned by Wynn Las Vegas. “We did not feel it appropriate to feature a very pregnant model in a nightclub, at midnight, where alcohol was being served,” Jennifer Dunne, a Wynn spokeswoman, wrote in a statement responding to questions. “Our team made a judgment call which we feel was correct given the environment and circumstance.” • Concerning the runway show at the Edison Ballroom in New York on Feb. 22, however, Ms. From said that she thought that Ms. Teinturier was responding not to squeamishness on the part of the site, but rather from a few disapproving exhibitors. Ms. Teinturier said she was “not aware” of any complaints from other exhibitors about pregnant models. The New York location that she said had shunned the women said it did not prohibit pregnant models. Bill Kaelblein, general manager of the Edison Ballroom, said: “There could be nothing further from the truth. It wasn’t our call.” At Bravado, “we’re hesitant to make a big stink about it because we have a great relationship with Curve,” Ms. From said. “But frankly we’re disappointed because we don’t see why it should be an issue.” At the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center on Feb. 22, it seemed to be a typical garment trade show, consisting of booths with racks of clothing and folding tables with candy dishes where company representatives sat down with buyers. Less typical were dozens of models on the showroom floor wearing skimpy lingerie. Near the booth for something called the Shibue Strapless Panty, which is essentially a G-string without the string because it is held in place with reusable silicone adhesive strips, two models in high heels wore the tiny hourglass-shaped garments with the company’s pasties. At the Bravado booth, Jessica McDonald, 26, a model from Baltimore, was bundled up by comparison, wearing the company’s Allure bra with black pants and sensible shoes. She was eight months pregnant, which some buyers found unfathomable. “People keep asking, ‘Is that real?’ ” she said. “I say, ‘Absolutely,’ and that the nausea is real, and the backache is real, too.” A woman off to the side snapped photographs of her and beamed. “That’s my mom,” Ms. McDonald said, explaining that her mother had also traveled from Maryland. “She fixed my hair this morning, and she loves this. She says, ‘Back in my day, everyone would cover up their bodies.’ ”

breast-feeding
Advertising and Marketing
Computers and the Internet
Bravado Designs
Pregnancy and Obstetrics
Lingerie and Underwear


Once Again, Islanders Handle the Rangers

Abstract: For everything the Rangers have done right in climbing to the top of the Atlantic Division this season, they seem at a loss when they play the Islanders . The teams have met three times so far. And even though the Rangers’ season has taken on a different complexion since the first meeting, the Islanders have not changed a bit. They dig in and play hard, and when they get an edge, they do not let up. That strategy worked like a charm for the third time last night, their first time using at Madison Square Garden. The Islanders pounced on Rangers mistakes to score twice early in the second period, then held on for a 2-1 victory. The Rangers admit they have become frustrated trying to shake a pesky nemesis, but the Islanders have treated the victories coolly, as if beating the Rangers were not such a big deal. “The imperative word for us is smart,” Islanders goalie Rick DiPietro said. “When we play smart and make the right decisions, we’re a successful team.” The Rangers (12-8-1) were the team that came into this game with a load of momentum. They had won five straight, including four on the road, and had 10 victories in their last 12 games. Their last loss was Nov. 6, against the Islanders at Nassau Coliseum. But they remain in first place with 25 points, 2 ahead of Philadelphia and 3 ahead of the Islanders (11-6-0), who seem to hold the secret to frustrating them. “I think we want to win so bad against them, sometimes I think we get a little too white-knuckled,” Rangers center Chris Drury said. “We’ve played them three times now, and in two out of the three, we haven’t played our system, our structure. Ultimately it’s cost us.” The Islanders grabbed control in the first minutes of the second period, by pouncing on Rangers errors. With the Islanders on a power play to start the period, the Rangers won the opening face-off. But forward Marcel Hossa did not back up to retrieve the puck and Islanders forward Ruslan Fedotenko raced toward it and scored only eight seconds into the period. The Islanders jumped on another lapsed defensive assignment when Josef Vasicek grabbed a puck in his zone, skated up ice with no one in his way and rifled a shot over the shoulder of Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist 5 minutes 51 seconds into the second. The Rangers seemed to be digging themselves a deeper hole just after the next face-off. Center Blair Betts was called for tripping after he lost the draw, but the Rangers used the Islanders’ power play to put themselves back into the game. Forward Brendan Shanahan skated the puck out of his zone, and when no Islanders came to meet him, he dished it to defenseman Michal Rozsival, who had joined the rush. Rozsival fired a shot over DiPietro’s shoulder for a short-handed goal at 6:37. But that was all the offense the Rangers could muster. They had five power plays and could not manage a shot on the first three. “I’m going to assume if we were set up, we would have shot,” Shanahan said sarcastically. Instead, the Islanders pressured every pass, sensing the Rangers’ frustration. When the Rangers went on a power play with 1:12 left in the game, they did not get a shot until 13 seconds remained. The Garden crowd gave them a derisive cheer. But the Rangers did not need any reminders of how badly they were playing. They were held to 19 shots, 6 in the third period. “We allowed them to frustrate us and we got away from our structure that’s been successful,” Shanahan said. “We kind of got on our own individual pages, and when that happens, five guys on the same page are going to make you look stupid.” The Islanders, meanwhile, took the smart route. Again. SLAP SHOTS Rangers forward Sean Avery had his usual busy game. He took three penalties — although when he was called for high-sticking Islanders defenseman Andy Sutton, it was actually Sutton’s stick that hit him in the face. He also drew three, including a roughing call on Islanders goalie Rick DiPietro, when DiPietro threw several punches at him in the crease. “I don’t even want to talk about that,” DiPietro said. ... Rangers defenseman Michal Rozsival scored short-handed for the second straight game.

New York Islanders
New York Rangers
Hockey Ice


Jay Cutler’s Strong Return Leads Bears over Raiders

Abstract: It was unclear all week if Jay Cutler would be active for the Chicago Bears, but he decided to play and made a dramatic statement by driving the team 80 yards for a touchdown on the opening drive against the upstart Oakland Raiders. The previously winless Bears went on to a 22-20 victory. Cutler has been working his way back from an injured hamstring, and though his movement was limited, he represented a large upgrade over Jimmy Clausen, who started for Chicago last week and completed just 9 passes for 63 yards in an embarrassing loss to the Seattle Seahawks. On the opening touchdown drive, Cutler was 3 for 4, finishing it with a short pass to wide receiver Eddie Royal, who took it 7 yards for an easy touchdown. Cutler’s success continued, as he completed 28 of 43 passes for 281 yards and two touchdowns. A late interception nearly cost his team the game, but the embattled Cutler drove the team down the field to set up a game-winning field goal by Robbie Gould. The loss had to come as a shock to the Raiders, who came into the game as favorites after winning on the road last week. A revitalized offense looked pedestrian against Chicago with just 243 total yards The strong defensive effort by Chicago was surprising since the focus for much of this week was on the trades the team made, sending defensive end Jared Allen to the Carolina Panthers and linebacker Jonathan Bostic to the New England Patriots. Speculation has been rampant, with pundits wondering if the Bears would consider trading Matt Forte as well, but winning for the first time this season may quiet the rumors.

Football
Chicago Bears
Jay Cutler
Raiders


Protests Brew Over Attempt to Deport a Woman

Abstract: The treatment of a pregnant Chinese woman who miscarried twins last week after federal immigration officers in Philadelphia forcibly tried to deport her from New York has become a flash point for planned protest in the Chinese-American communities of both cities, lawyers and immigrant advocates said yesterday. Richard Bortnick, a lawyer with the Philadelphia law firm of Cozen O'Connor, which is handling the woman's case without fee, said that protest rallies would be held today. He said he had appealed to senators in Pennsylvania and New York to help investigate the treatment of the woman, Zhenxing Jiang, 32, who has said that the officers manhandled her and ridiculed her pleas for medical help until it was too late. While her husband and sons, 4 and 7, waited in the lobby of an immigration office, unaware of what was happening, Mr. Bortnick said, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers pushed Ms. Jiang into a minivan, bruised her and bumped her abdomen against the backseat and drove her to Kennedy Airport. He said the officers stopped to eat lunch themselves but gave the pregnant woman nothing to eat during her eight-hour ordeal and cursed her when she cried and told them she was in pain. By the time they reached the airport, Ms. Jiang was suffering severe abdominal cramps and begging for help in a public waiting area, said John C. Liu, a New York city council member, who called the woman's treatment un-American. Someone called an ambulance, Mr. Liu said, and she was taken to Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, where Mr. Liu visited her after doctors found that the two fetuses she was carrying had died. No one disputes that under immigration law, Ms. Jiang could have been deported at any time after 2002, when she exhausted her appeals on the denial of her application for political asylum on the ground of China's one-child policy. But her husband's political asylum case is still pending on appeal, Mr. Bortnick said, and the couple, whose sons were born in the United States and are citizens, have worked legally and paid taxes as Chinese restaurant operators in Philadelphia for a decade. Ms. Jiang had been allowed to report routinely for years to an immigration office in Philadelphia until last Tuesday, he added. Ms. Jiang and many of the family's Chinese supporters say the authorities decided to deport her when they learned she was pregnant, to prevent her from giving birth to another United States citizen. In a statement issued last week in response to a news release from Mr. Liu, immigration officials said Ms. Jiang's "arranged departure to China from J.F.K. International Airport was delayed for medical reasons that were addressed immediately by New York Fire Department emergency medical technicians." It added: "Following her treatment at a New York hospital, Jiang was released from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody so she could further address her medical needs. Once she is cleared medically, efforts to effectuate her repatriation will resume." Mr. Bortnick, who is filing a petition to delay her removal, said that when Ms. Jiang's husband, Tien Xiao Zhang, finally learned what had happened and went to the hospital, officers instructed him that his wife should report to immigration headquarters the next Monday, which was yesterday. Instead, "she has gone missing," Mr. Bortnick said.

NEW YORK CITY
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
JIANG ZHENXING
ASYLUM (POLITICAL)
DEPORTATION
KENNEDY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT (NYC)
IMMIGRATION AND REFUGEES
MISSING PERSONS
CHINESE-AMERICANS
DEMONSTRATIONS AND RIOTS


Let LeBron James and Others Bail From Rio. These Women? Not a Chance.

Abstract: The most credentialed backcourt mates in women’s basketball history are back, and of course they are. Certified gym rats do not abandon ship, even one that might be unsinkable without them. “It’s such a rewarding experience,” Sue Bird said before the United States women’s national team tuned up for the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro with a 104-89 victory over Australia on Sunday at Madison Square Garden. “Why wouldn’t you come back?” “If they ask and you’re hopefully playing at that level, and you get a chance to play for the U.S., you just do it because it’s bigger than you,” said Diana Taurasi, a two-season teammate of Bird’s during a storied era at Connecticut at the turn of the century. In the run-up to Rio, the athletes getting much of the attention have been those bailing on the Games, making personal judgment calls, committing no ethical crimes. Now it is time to forget those who are abstaining and to focus on the folks going without fear or complaint. In the cases of Taurasi, Bird and their Olympic teammate Tamika Catchings, it is those who have heard the tales of certain woe and potential mayhem for the last dozen years and responded by asking, When do we leave? “There’s always something leading up to the Olympics — it’s always something,” Bird said. Taurasi nodded when reminded of her and Bird’s first Olympics, Athens in 2004. In the aftermath of the Iraq invasion, she said, “There were moments where it was nasty. We’d ask for directions, and they would say, ‘We don’t speak Bush.’” Taurasi being Taurasi, sardonically forthcoming, added: “I certainly don’t — I speak Clinton.” She wasn’t ready to endorse Rio as a model for preparation and execution and — given the raging drug controversy enveloping the Russians — a global love-in. But hoping for the best, she has decided after all these years, is the point of it all. “I always say the Olympics are a way to put problems aside for two weeks, galvanize each other,” she said. On the men’s basketball side, there has been abundant praise for Carmelo Anthony for not following his good friend LeBron James and others who decided they had contributed enough and would sit Rio out. Like Taurasi, Bird and Catchings, this will be Anthony’s fourth Olympics. Unlike the women — bidding to equal Teresa Edwards’s and Lisa Leslie’s record of four Olympic gold medals — Anthony and the men won only bronze in Athens, the last time either United States team failed to deliver on what most Americans see as their manifest right. As much as the men, what might be the most talented American women’s team yet carries the burden of metronomic expectation, just without the fanfare. The United States women have won five straight Olympic gold medals, have a 41-game winning streak and have become a premier dynasty of Olympic team sports. Coach Geno Auriemma explained that nothing was guaranteed against the likes of a tall and talented Australian team that led the Americans by 4 points at halftime in their 2012 semifinal in London. “I don’t know why I keep putting myself in this situation,” he said, sparing no sarcasm. “It’s not bad enough that we’ve got to win every game at UConn. Now you got a job where after we beat France in the gold medal game in London, they had a parade when they got back to Paris. We won the gold medal, and people said, ‘Hey, good job, what do you got going for dinner?’” He shrugged and said: “That’s who we are. That’s what we do. What are you going to do?” For starters, he will trust in a roster that has five of his former Connecticut stars, with Maya Moore and Tina Charles joining Taurasi and Bird in the starting lineup. On Sunday, Elena Delle Donne carried the first-half offense with 17 points, but Taurasi heated up and finished with 20. Bird, the pass-first point guard Auriemma needed for this high-octane team, took one shot, did not score but was conspicuously in control with six assists and no turnovers in 24-plus minutes. Auriemma said he had to be prodded into coaching again after winning in London in 2012. No doubt, having the endearing and occasionally confounding players he often refers to in tandem — “D and Sue” — made it easier to say yes. “There was no weakness in either one,” he said. “Both could handle the ball. Both could shoot it. Both were great passers and incredible competitors. And they’re always the two smartest guys on the floor. The only time they get in trouble is when they argue with each other — who is smarter, because neither of them has ever been wrong in their lives. Ever. Ever. If you ever catch Sue or D going, ‘Listen, I was wrong,’ get it on tape, because it’ll be the first time.” At 35, Bird has the scars from six knee operations to show for the miles and minutes logged with Seattle in the W.N.B.A. and in Europe. Taurasi is 34, back with Phoenix in the W.N.B.A. after a one-summer hiatus to placate her winter-season employers in Russia. As Auriemma said, these women have plenty to do, paychecks to earn, and yet they always make time. None of three four-time Olympians — Catchings is the oldest at 37 — may get to equal the five Olympic appearances by Edwards and Leslie, who were both courtside Sunday. With the talent pool growing every cycle, this could be the last run — at least together — for Taurasi and Bird. Last word on “D and Sue,” as usual, to Auriemma: “I just wish the people who covered my team back home when they were playing were old enough to understand when I said, ‘Yeah, our backcourt is Jerry West and Gail Goodrich,’ and they didn’t look at me, like, ‘Yeah, Gail Goodrich, who’d she play for?’”

2016 Summer Olympics
Basketball
Sue Bird
Diana Taurasi
Geno Auriemma


IPhone Attracts Customers, but Sprint Loses $863 Million

Abstract: Sprint Nextel on Wednesday reported a loss of $863 million in its first quarter, twice the size of its loss in the same quarter last year, but the company was encouraged by the new customers the iPhone was bringing it. The company said its $863 million loss, or 29 cents a share, was primarily because of accelerated depreciation from the expected shutdown of the Nextel platform, the smaller carrier it merged with in 2005. The company’s revenue climbed 5 percent to $8.73 billion. The loss was smaller than analysts had expected. They had projected a loss of 42 cents a share, according to a poll by FactSet. Sprint is the No. 3 carrier after Verizon Wireless and AT&T. The company, based in Overland Park, Kan., was optimistic about its growth in subscribers. It reported that it added 1.1 million net subscribers, down from a gain of 1.6 million in the previous quarter. It said that it sold 1.5 million iPhones in the quarter — fewer than the 3.2 million iPhones that Verizon reported selling or the 4.3 million iPhones that AT&T said it activated in the quarter. Sprint began selling the iPhone in October 2011. Daniel R. Hesse, chief executive of Sprint, said 44 percent of the people buying iPhones were new customers, evidence that Sprint was luring subscribers from its competitors, perhaps with its unlimited data plans, which AT&T and Verizon do not offer. “The value and simplicity of our unlimited data, talk and text plans, combined with an unsurpassed customer experience and our increasingly robust device portfolio make for a strong combination,” Mr. Hesse said in a statement . In an interview, he said that the company was pleased with the increase in the amount of money it was getting from each customer: average revenue per user, or A.R.P.U., grew 6.9 percent. He said that this number was increasing because 69 percent of Sprint’s customers now owned smartphones, and they were paying for bundled plans, which include phone calls, text messages and data in one package. Overall wireless services made $7.2 billion in revenue for Sprint over the quarter, up 7 percent compared with last year. Unlike AT&T and Verizon, Sprint does not report how much it is earning from wireless data plans specifically, because it sells its data plan as part of bundles. To get consumers to use data more — by browsing the Web, watching videos or listening to streaming music on their phones — carriers are racing to build fourth-generation networks. Those networks use a faster technology called Long Term Evolution, or LTE. Sprint said it planned to begin its 4G LTE in six cities by midyear. Verizon leads the LTE race, with the network deployed in 230 markets, and AT&T is in a distant second with LTE in 35 markets. Building the LTE network is crucial for Sprint, which is placing a bet on the iPhone to reverse its declining fortunes. The carrier currently does not sell the new iPad , which is compatible with LTE networks, whereas Verizon and AT&T do. Because the iPad is compatible with LTE, analysts expect the next iPhone to also be compatible with the faster network. This raises questions about whether Sprint’s LTE network will be ready in time to sell the next iPhone. Mr. Hesse expressed confidence that this would not be an issue. “We don’t think there’s risk of us not getting the next iPhone,” he said. Sprint said it expected to deploy 12,000 more LTE cell sites, which will cover 120 million more people, by the end of the year. Chetan Sharma, an independent telecom analyst, said that Sprint’s deployment of its fourth-generation network and its growth because of the iPhone were positive signs for the company. However, he said that the shutdown of Nextel would continue to hurt its financials in the coming year. “It’s kind of a two-sided story,” he said. “LTE and the iPhone will represent the growth part of the story, but Nextel will continue to drag down the financials.” Sprint suffered after its $70 billion merger with Nextel Communications, a smaller carrier, in 2005, because the companies struggled to combine their cultures and network technologies. To shut down Nextel, Sprint has to finish deactivating or repurposing its Nextel cell towers, Mr. Sharma said. Sprint has said it does not expect the business generated by the iPhone to be profitable until 2014. By then the company should be closer to recovering, if all goes according to plan, Mr. Sharma said.

Company Reports
Sprint Nextel Corporation
Wireless Communications
Cellular Telephones