With Bartolo Colon and R.A. Dickey, Braves Look to Contend Now

Abstract: ATLANTA — R. A. Dickey chuckled at the idea of not being the Atlanta Braves’ oldest starting pitcher next season. Dickey, 42, must concede that distinction to Bartolo Colon, 43. “I gave myself the nickname ‘Little Ugly,’” Dickey said Friday, playing off Colon’s nickname. “Big Sexy and Little Ugly are going to be leading it on.” Colon and Dickey recently agreed to one-year contracts, each with a team option for 2018. The Braves insist their unorthodox moves show how serious they are about contending again for a postseason spot. The major target of their rebuilding plan was the starting rotation. That’s where Colon and Dickey come in, giving the Braves two players who can eat up innings and mentor younger pitchers without requiring the sort of long-term commitment that might block the path of several top prospects. “These aren’t four- or five-year deals,” General Manager John Coppolella said. “These won’t, theoretically, block any of our kids. It will just give them a little more time. Guys that may have been force-fed up here now have a little more time to get their sea legs under them as they turn into really good big-league pitchers.” In a way, the signings of Dickey and Colon show that the Braves’ timetable for a return to contention has been pushed up a bit. The acceleration in the approach coincides neatly with a move from Turner Field to SunTrust Park, a $622 million suburban stadium nearing completion that will anchor a complex of shops, restaurants, office space, residential areas and a hotel. Dickey was introduced at a news conference in an eighth-floor suite that provided an ideal view of SunTrust Park and the furious construction activity going on below. This is a franchise that has undergone a major overhaul, on and off the field. “It’s a real honor for me to be a part of a very storied franchise that looks like it’s on its way to becoming what it once was,” Dickey said. “I’m happy to be a part of that growth and hoping that I can add to what they did at the end of the year.” Despite a second straight year of more than 90 losses, Atlanta finished strong, indicating that better times may not be far off. A trade for the slugger Matt Kemp and the emergence of players such as Dansby Swanson, Ender Inciarte and Adonis Garcia helped the Braves win 50 of their last 97 games, and they closed the season with a 12-2 spurt. “Our starting eight is really good,” Manager Brian Snitker said. “Everybody feels very confident in what we’ve got going on, and rightly so.” The Braves are still in talks to add another pitcher, perhaps even a top-of-the-rotation starter such as Chris Sale of the Chicago White Sox. But for now, Colon and Dickey provide an aging insurance policy. Colon is coming off an All-Star season with the Mets. He had a record of 15-8 with a 3.43 earned-run average and became the oldest player to hit his first career homer. Dickey, with a 10-15 record and a 4.46 E.R.A., is more of a gamble. He slumped down the stretch with the Toronto Blue Jays and was dropped from the starting rotation. “We didn’t give up any players,” Coppolella said. “It didn’t cost us a draft pick. We’ve been in trade talks for players — pitcher and nonpitchers — but the price of doing business is really expensive right now. So for us to be able to add somebody where it’s only money is really important.”

Baseball
Braves
Bartolo Colon
R A Dickey


Rumors, Merger Talk and Denial by Airlines

Abstract: Long-simmering talk of an inevitable round of airline industry mergers heated up again yesterday. By the end of the day, after a spike in their share prices, the central players in any merger talks, dismissed the rumors as just that. Many airline executives have said they are in favor of consolidation, in theory, to help reduce costs and improve historically meager profits. And they were given a push by Pardus Capital Management — a New York hedge fund that holds big stakes in UAL, parent of United Airlines, and in Delta Air Lines — which sent Delta a letter Tuesday night suggesting that the two carriers merge soon. “We believe it is imperative that you seek to enter into a merger transaction,” Karim Samii, president of Pardus, wrote to Richard Anderson, chief executive of Delta. The topic line of the letter said: “Time is of the essence to announce a transaction with UAL.” Pardus hopes that a merger of the second- and third-largest airlines would capture more business travelers and help the carriers navigate the fuel prices that threaten to snuff out the industry’s nascent recovery. Delta promptly responded that it was, indeed, in favor of industry consolidation, but that it was not involved in merger discussions with United. Delta said the airline’s board had previously appointed a special committee to evaluate, among other strategic options, merger possibilities and that it had retained financial and legal advisers. Thus, after the companies’ shares briefly rallied when an Associated Press report said United and Delta had actually been discussing a combination — a report subsequently denied by both companies — the shares showed only modest gains yesterday. Shares of Delta rose 77 cents, to $19.77. Shares of United rose 67 cents, to $44.17. Both companies are valued at approximately $5 billion. A stock-for-stock deal, with no premium, as Pardus proposed, would create a company with a roughly $10 billion market capitalization, depending on investors’ reaction to the combination. Although most executives acknowledge the need for mergers to reduce costs, the reality of doing so gives them pause. The industry has a long history of difficult mergers. The most recent example is US Airways, the product of a merger two years ago with America West Airlines. There, pilots are battling over how to reconcile union seniority lists, a sticking point that is holding up the company’s ability to operate as a single airline. Combining computer systems has led to severe service disruptions. Shares of US Airways have plunged from their 12-month high of $63.27, reached around the time it made an unsuccessful $10 billion bid for Delta a year ago, to $23.48 late yesterday. Workers at Delta and United would most likely be skittish about any combination that reduced employment or job security, having just made huge pay and benefit concessions to survive separate bankruptcies. To be sure, since the initial US Airways bid for Delta a year ago, big airlines have had tentative discussions with one another about merging. Delta talked to Northwest Airlines at one point. United talked to Continental Airlines. But nothing concrete came of those talks. Pardus said in its letter that it owns 7 million Delta shares, or about 2.6 percent. And Securities and Exchange Commission filings indicate it owns 5.6 million shares in UAL, or about 4.8 percent. The industry has been modestly profitable last year and this year and was building a cash cushion until fuel prices soared in recent weeks. Pardus said in its letter that the rise in fuel costs could hurt Delta’s financial prospects next year. Airlines are trying to raise fares to make up for the higher cost of fuel, which accounts for about one-third of expenses, but with only limited success. Pardus said in its letter that it had consulted with Gordon M. Bethune, a former chief executive of Continental Airlines, and with consultants at Simat, Helliesen & Eichner to conclude that United was the best merger partner for Delta. Combined costs could be reduced by $585 million a year, it said. And the airlines’ complementary strengths would give it the breadth to capture more business travelers. United, after all, has a big presence on Asia routes, in the western United States and at Heathrow Airport, serving London. Delta is strong in the southern United States, at Kennedy International Airport in New York and in Europe and Latin America. A combination of Delta and Northwest Airlines would allow more cost-cutting — $1.5 billion a year because of enormous overlap in domestic hubs — but provide less international breadth, Pardus said. The US Airways takeover proposal for Delta was also mostly aimed at reducing domestic costs and ran into opposition from labor groups and from some politicians, fearful that service would have been reduced in some cities. Pardus mentioned that “the current regulatory environment,” meaning the Bush administration as opposed to a possible Democratic president, is favorable and thus a merger ought to happen soon.

United Airlines
Delta Air Lines Incorporated
Airlines and Airplanes
Mergers Acquisitions and Divestitures
Pardus Capital Management


Extended Benefits Are a Lifeline for Many Unemployed

Abstract: HUDSON, Fla. — Rick E. Rockwell plopped his large frame down in front of his laptop on Thursday morning, next to a foot-wide sheaf of unpaid bills still in their envelopes, lined up like an accordion on his desk. He logged into his bank account to see if his unemployment check had been deposited yet. His balance, however, remained stuck at $57.17. “That’s amazing to me,” Mr. Rockwell said. “It still hasn’t posted yet.” So Mr. Rockwell began another day as a man of the middle class who is now living on an economic precipice. Mr. Rockwell, 56, who estimates he has sent out more than 400 job applications over the last year and gone to just four interviews, is one of the more than 5.4 million people across the country receiving unemployment benefits. And Mr. Rockwell is part of arguably the hardest-luck group of all — those who have been out of work for so long that they are depending on a second emergency extension of unemployment insurance that Congress passed and President Bush signed last month. In the 21 states and the District of Columbia currently with three-month average unemployment rates above 6 percent that means 20 more weeks of what has become an economic lifeline for many in the midst of one of the deepest recessions in the past century. Florida ’s rate for November was 7.3 percent. (The other states get seven additional weeks.) For Mr. Rockwell, who lost his job in January as a sales manager at a computer store that he and his brother owned, the weekly checks of $275 — the maximum allowed him under Florida law and a little less than half his former take-home pay — have become like a crucial piece in the game Jenga, in which players construct a tower of blocks by removing one at a time from the bottom and moving it to the top. Mr. Rockwell is playing a balancing act so he can keep the edifice of his former life from crumbling, paying off certain bills and letting others lapse, so he can stay just ahead of his creditors. Mr. Rockwell has been without benefits for more than a month after he exhausted the first federal extension, which lasted 13 weeks, on top of the 26 weeks he had received from the State of Florida, back in October. After supporters were unable to get the legislation through Congress before the election, Mr. Bush signed the second extension in late November. Florida, like other states, has been rushing to get checks to so-called gap people like Mr. Rockwell whose benefits had expired. Advocates estimate there are about 800,000 of them nationwide. “States are really overwhelmed in terms of responding to claims,” said Andrew Stettner of the National Employment Law Project. “They were pushed beyond the brink in terms of doing the second extension.” Florida added 50 staff members to its unemployment insurance division in recent weeks, bringing its total to around 870. It also recently added 345 lines to its phone system for a total of just over 1,000, and has extended its call-in hours. There are, of course, people who are much worse off than Mr. Rockwell; but there are also many who have had much more of a financial cushion to get through this crisis. Last year, he was making $31,200 a year as sales manager of a small computer store that he had started 15 years ago with his brother, Rodney. But the rise of big-box stores like Best Buy, along with the recession, combined to drive their store, Comp-U-Save, into the ground. “All of a sudden, the floor came out from underneath it,” said Rodney Rockwell, who closed his old store in October and re-opened under a new name. The brothers agreed that Rick would leave in January because the store, by that point, was depending mostly on its repair business, which was Rodney’s specialty. They also figured that because Rick was younger and had some background managing restaurants, he would be able to find a job relatively easily. He had a little over $5,000 in his bank account, mostly what was left over from a $40,000 second mortgage he took out on his home four years ago for home repairs that never materialized. But Mr. Rockwell has been succumbing to a slow economic death, which accelerated significantly in the last month as his unemployment benefits lapsed. His mortgage lender has begun foreclosure proceedings on his modest two-bedroom home, which he bought in 1998 and still owes $117,000 on. He has begun packing to move into his 84-year-old mother’s two-bedroom condominium nearby. He is in danger of losing his red 2005 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder convertible, a prized possession that he keeps gleaming in his garage, because he is behind in his payments. He has listed for sale both that car and a 1996 Toyota RAV4, which he owns outright and keeps in the driveway, but he is hoping to keep the Spyder. The only reason he can still drive it at all is because his mother, who is mostly living just on Social Security, paid his car insurance for this month. He is two months behind on his electric bill. A partial payment by a local church that he went to recently for help helped him stave off losing his power. His water bill is in arrears as well. Mr. Rockwell was settling into his love seat two weeks ago to watch the teenage drama “One Tree Hill” — an afternoon pleasure he developed while sitting around out of work — when he found his cable had been cut off. Last Wednesday, after returning home from dinner with a reporter, Mr. Rockwell found a note on his door from his neighbor that someone had been looking for him. It turned out to be a collection agency for one of his credit cards. Mr. Rockwell has racked up about $15,000 in bills on various cards, reaching his limit on all but one. In a final indignity, Mr. Rockwell wakes up most mornings flat on his back on the ground because the air mattress he now sleeps on, after his waterbed sprang a leak earlier this year, has a hole in it. Mr. Rockwell now spends most of his days hunched in front of his laptop. He spends several hours going through new job postings in the morning and then devotes himself to several Internet marketing schemes promising riches that he has stumbled upon. Keeping in mind the criticism of those who say expanded unemployment benefits keep people from working, Mr. Rockwell conceded he might appear to be too picky in the jobs he would accept. He has mostly ruled out commuting to Tampa, a much larger city an hour away, because of the distance. He has also tried to confine himself to looking for management-level restaurant jobs. “I’m not going to clean grills, take out the garbage,” Mr. Rockwell said. “I’ve done that before, but I feel I’m beyond that.” His home is overflowing with sports memorabilia — autographed posters, baseballs and cards of every sort that he has collected. He has sold off some but is reluctant to part with others at fire-sale prices. On Thursday, Mr. Rockwell spent several hours plowing through job listings and wound up applying — or re-applying, actually — to just two, one for a restaurant manager at an Arby’s in nearby New Port Richey and one for a shift supervisor job at a Wendy’s in Tampa. He logged into his bank account again the next day and found to his surprise that his unemployment check had finally been deposited. It is a small reprieve for now.

Unemployment Insurance
Unemployment
United States Economy
Foreclosures
Florida


A Digital Library Race, and Playing Catch-Up

Abstract: AMERICA stood at the forefront of the public library movement in 1731, when Benjamin Franklin founded the Library Company of Philadelphia , our first successful lending library. Looking back on the project decades later, Franklin wrote in his autobiography that the growth of lending libraries had played a role not only in educating but also in democratizing American society. “These Libraries,” he wrote, “have improv’d the general Conversation of the Americans, made the common Tradesmen & Farmers as intelligent as most Gentlemen from other countries, and perhaps have contributed to some degree to the Stand so generally made throughout the Colonies in Defence of their Privileges.” Lending libraries may have been the newfangled democratizing factor of their day. Centuries later, though, the United States finds itself trailing Europe and Japan in creating the modern equivalent: a national digital library that would serve as an electronic repository for the nation’s cultural heritage. In other words, there’s a real digital library divide. In contrast to the United States, the National Library of Norway has been a global early adopter. In 2005, it announced a goal of digitizing its entire collection; by now it has scanned some 170,000 books, 250,000 newspapers, 610,000 hours of radio broadcasts, 200,000 hours of TV and 500,000 photographs. And, last year, the National Library of the Netherlands said it planned to scan all Dutch books, newspapers and periodicals from 1470 onward. The libraries of the nearly 50 member states in the Council of Europe, meanwhile, have banded together in a single search engine, theeuropeanlibrary.org . And the European Commission has sponsored Europeana , a portal for digital copies of art, music film and books held by the cultural institutions of member countries. It currently contains scans of about 15 million artifacts. Until recently, however, many American institutions and academic centers have concentrated on making scans of their own special treasures, or collaborating with one another on themed projects, rather than combining their electronic resources into a single online access point. A national digital library is clearly a bigger challenge for the United States, with its vast and disparate library holdings, than for European countries with smaller populations and land masses. But the Library of Congress was already working on the effort in the 1990s when it created a digital collection called “American Memory”; it contains scans of 16 million books, maps, movies, manuscripts and pieces of music. Even so, the library still has more than 100 million other artifacts that are not yet scanned, says James H. Billington, the librarian of Congress. And even though the American Memory project also carries the name “national digital library,” it is not formally connected, for example, to many of the country’s public libraries. “There’s tremendous local activity and national collaboration around specific topics,” says David S. Ferriero, the archivist of the United States . “But there has been no national coordination of all the wonderful disparate projects around the country.” Some of those individual efforts, however, are now beginning to dovetail. Last month, the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard said it would coordinate a planning program for public and private groups interested in creating a “digital public library of America.” The idea, says Robert Darnton, the director of the Harvard University Library and one of the project’s originators , is to link the electronic resources of participating university libraries and cultural institutions like the Library of Congress and make them accessible through a single portal. The hope is to create “a gigantic digital library that would make the cultural heritage of the country available to everyone,” he says. The project would also widen the audience for the kind of historical out-of-print books, manuscripts, letters, images, films and audio clips that have typically been the province of scholars. Of course, practical matters — like cost, copyright issues and technology — would need to be resolved first. “The crucial question in many ways is, ‘How do you find a common technical infrastructure that yields interoperability for the scholar, the casual inquirer or the K-12 student?’” Dr. Billington says. The idea for an American digital public library was prompted in part by the work of Google. In 2004, the company started a digitization project, Google Books, that has since scanned more than 15 million books. Many of these are out-of-print books lent by institutions like Harvard, Cornell and the University of Michigan. “Google came along and woke everyone up and showed the world what could be done in a short period of time,” says Maura Marx, a fellow at the Berkman Center. People can read out-of-print items at no cost on Google Books, if those works are no longer subject to copyright protection. But if a judge approves a settlement between Google and copyright holders, subscription fees to access scans of out-of-print books still covered by copyright will have to be paid by universities and other institutions. An American digital public library would serve as a nonprofit institutional alternative to Google Books, Professor Darnton says. “There’s a conflict between the raison d’être of Google, which is to make money for its shareholders,” he says, “and libraries whose goal is to make books available to readers.” But such a digital public library would have a better chance of success, he says, if it included out-of-copyright books owned by member libraries that Google had digitized. That is already happening in Europe, where the national libraries of the Netherlands and Austria have signed agreements with Google in which their sites can host digital copies of out-of-copyright books in their own holdings that have been scanned by the company. The libraries also have the right to make those scans available on public educational sites like Europeana. A SPOKESWOMAN for Google says the company would be happy to participate in the proposed American project. “Making the world’s books accessible online is something that requires public and private initiatives,” says Annabella Weisl, a Google Book Search executive in Germany, “and so we welcome new efforts in this direction.” But Jill Cousins, the executive director of Europeana, says that the great American research libraries could do much more than simply increase access to scans of scholarly material. “What’s sort of missing is digitization of the accessible literature,” like the popular novels and biographies readers seek at brick-and-mortar public libraries, she says. A few institutions, like the National Library of Norway, are already venturing into this area, via novel arrangements with copyright holders. “It would be nice to conceive of something bigger that has more to do with the public good than with the academic side of the equation,” Ms. Cousins says.

Libraries and Librarians
Computers and the Internet
Books and Literature
Google Book Search
Library of Congress
Research


Geithner, Rescue-Team Veteran, Has Head Start in Seizing Reins

Abstract: WASHINGTON — For the last year, Timothy F. Geithner has been at the very heart of dealing with the financial crisis , the junior partner with Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. and Ben S. Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve. Together, they scrambled to save Bear Stearns, American International Group and Citigroup, while letting Lehman Brothers fail. Now Mr. Geithner, youthful president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and President-elect Barack Obama ’s choice for Treasury secretary, will be thrust from go-between to the head of the table. He will graduate from team player to team captain, steering the new administration’s economic policies and its plan to rescue the financial system. The two-month wait until Mr. Obama takes office could be awkward, so much so that people who know Mr. Geithner say he may step down from the New York Fed within a few weeks. That would give him an early start in developing a stimulus plan , which Mr. Obama’s aides say they are coordinating with Democratic leaders in Congress and hope to pass before the inauguration. Mr. Geithner’s immersion in the critical events of the crisis and his close ties to Mr. Paulson and Mr. Bernanke, both appointees of President Bush, will provide a vital sense of continuity for the rescue effort, Mr. Obama indicated on Monday in Chicago. “Tim will waste no time getting up to speed,” Mr. Obama said in announcing his intention to nominate Mr. Geithner. “He will start his first day on the job with a unique insight into the failures of today’s markets and a clear vision of the steps we must take to revive them.” Experts said Mr. Geithner would have to make a series of difficult decisions, in quick succession, about how to proceed with a rescue effort that has been marked by political tension, reversals and a growing sense of confusion, as Mr. Paulson appears to be hostage to events. And he will have to do this in the vortex of a deepening economic crisis, at home and abroad, that could limit his options. Though Mr. Geithner, 47, cut his teeth in past crises, most overseas, economists who know him say little could have prepared him for the magnitude of responsibility he is assuming. “It’s hard to think of a moment in history where a new Treasury secretary has started in this position,” said Kenneth S. Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard. “It’s a position of incredible responsibility. He really has to reshape the financial system, on the run.” While the weekend rescue of Citigroup calmed the financial markets, Mr. Rogoff described it as merely a “temporizing measure” that would have to be followed by other steps. Indeed, there were reports Monday of a vast new loan-purchase initiative being readied by the Fed and the Treasury. As the rescue plan has mutated from asset purchases to direct injections of capital, Mr. Geithner has worked hard to maintain a public alliance with Mr. Paulson, who on Monday welcomed his nomination and noted that Mr. Geithner had been “critical to designing and implementing” the financial industry’s rescue. But people familiar with his thinking say Mr. Geithner has had significant differences with Mr. Paulson over how the bailout should proceed. Mr. Geithner has expressed support for the idea of modifying large numbers of loans held by subprime borrowers, a move Mr. Paulson has largely avoided. Such modifications would create a psychological lift for the nation, Mr. Geithner has told others, and would help resolve uncertainty in the financial markets by creating support for home prices. Mr. Geithner has also voiced private support for purchasing distressed assets from banks, which was originally the focus of the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. Mr. Paulson abandoned that strategy this month in favor of direct capital injections into the banks. Asset purchases, Mr. Geithner has told associates, would revive investor confidence in many banks, whereas announcing plans to abandon those purchases introduced more uncertainty, as Citigroup discovered last week. Lobbyists for the financial industry who favor asset purchases are hopeful that Mr. Geithner will move the program back in that direction. The bailout of Citigroup was a positive step, they say, although what the government has agreed to do is absorb most of the losses on $306 billion in home and commercial real estate assets on Citigroup’s balance sheet rather than buying those assets outright. “It’s getting closer to the piece we think is necessary, but it doesn’t quite get us there,” said Timothy Ryan, chief executive of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association. Mr. Ryan, who helped direct the government’s rescue of the savings and loan industry in the 1990s, said Mr. Geithner’s involvement in the current rescue effort would give him an invaluable head start. “He’s one of a core group of government executives who’s been part of every decision,” Mr. Ryan said. Robert S. Nichols, president of the Financial Services Forum, which represents large institutions, said the transition from Mr. Paulson to Mr. Geithner was like “delicate surgery,” adding, “If you have to switch doctors, you don’t want to bring in someone who hasn’t even watched the surgery.” If there is a mystery about Mr. Geithner, industry executives said, it is his views on tax matters. Having spent his career in international economics before becoming a central banker, he has said almost nothing about his views on issues like capital gains taxes and dividends. Whatever substantive change Mr. Geithner makes could well reflect a personal style that is different from Mr. Paulson’s. The current Treasury secretary for decades was a Wall Street deal maker, accustomed to short-term, trigger-quick decisions — and reversals. Some say that accounts for the rescue program’s constant evolution and its stop-and-start tendencies. “Geithner has had a very different upbringing: a much more studious, and sober, professional training,” said a former Treasury official and Wall Street executive who knows both men. Robert Gibbs, Mr. Obama’s press secretary, said that the president-elect spoke with Mr. Bernanke on Monday morning and that the Fed chairman asked that Mr. Geithner remain at the New York Fed until he could be replaced, “to ensure a smooth transition.” Mr. Obama agreed, Mr. Gibbs added. Once Mr. Geithner steps down, it is expected that he will join Lawrence H. Summers, the incoming director of the National Economic Council, in drafting the two-year economic stimulus package of spending and tax cuts Mr. Obama has called for. In addition, he will have to organize his Treasury staff, prepare for his Senate confirmation hearing and continue to oversee the rescue effort. Though Mr. Geithner is expected to be easily confirmed by a Democratic-controlled Senate, he will face questions about the bailout effort at his hearing, before the Senate Finance Committee, given unhappiness in both parties about the way that program has been operated. As secretary, Mr. Geithner will have to juggle his oversight of the financial rescue program, the process of enacting and carrying out the economic stimulus package and the development of annual budgets. Given that, people who know both Mr. Geithner and Mr. Summers see potential for tension between them, should Mr. Summers, given his proximity to the Oval Office and his aggressive style dominate the internal budget and tax debates.

Emergency Economic Stabilization Act (2008)


Like-Minded Russians Visit Occupy Wall Street Inmate at Rikers Island

Abstract: Most people disappear from the headlines into the gray anonymity of Rikers Island after they are found guilty in state court in Manhattan. But for Cecily McMillan, the 25-year-old Occupy Wall Street organizer convicted on Monday of assaulting a police officer, her incarceration has served only to heighten her profile. As her admirers have taken to Twitter in droves to criticize the judge and the district attorney for their handling of the case, Ms. McMillan has gotten sympathetic treatment on “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” and friendly coverage from left-leaning media outlets like Democracy Now! , The Guardian, The Nation and The Village Voice. That trend reached a peak on Friday, when two members of Pussy Riot, the Russian protest group that was incarcerated for staging a political performance against President Vladimir V. Putin, trooped out to Rikers Island in the drizzle to visit Ms. McMillan in a show of support. “It was a very bad decision to put her in jail,” said one member, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 24, as she came through the jail’s hurricane fence, which is topped with razor wire, and lit a cigarette. “She’s a professional revolutionary.” Her colleague Maria Alyokhina, 25, urged Justice Ronald A. Zweibel to sentence Ms. McMillan to probation and community service rather than prison. She said a harsh sentence would lead to unflattering comparisons to Russia, where they served 21 months for playing a raucous protest song in Moscow’s main cathedral. “Society must organize to save Cecily because she’s really a hero,” Ms. Alyokhina said. “She is very similar to us. We also did time and went to prison for our beliefs. We see a lot of parallels.” The groundswell of support for Ms. McMillan includes some of the jurors who convicted her in State Supreme Court in Manhattan. On Thursday, a juror who said he spoke for nine members of the panel took the highly unusual step of writing a letter to Justice Zweibel, asking that he show leniency. “We feel that the felony mark on Cecily’s record is punishment enough for this case and that it serves no purpose to Cecily or to society to incarcerate her for any amount of time,” the juror, Charles Woodard, wrote, according to a defense lawyer, Martin R. Stolar. Juries have no say over sentencing in criminal cases. Justice Zweibel could sentence Ms. McMillan, who was convicted of second-degree assault, to as little as a stint of community service or as much as seven years in prison. The judge remanded her to jail after the conviction until a sentencing hearing on May 19. The jury found that Ms. McMillan had deliberately elbowed a police officer, Grantley Bovell, in the face as he led her out of Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan during a protest on St. Patrick’s Day in 2012. That protest had started as a way to mark six months since the founding of Occupy Wall Street. Though she had taken part in many other protests, Ms. McMillan testified that she had not joined in the civil disobedience that night. She had been out drinking beer with a college friend and went to the park only to pick up another acquaintance, she said. She testified that she did not recall hitting the police officer, though she said she did remember throwing her elbow instinctively when she thought someone had grabbed her right breast, which was bruised during the arrest. A grainy videotape from an onlooker appeared to support the officer’s version of events, showing her hitting him in the eye, then running a few steps before he tackled her. Since their release from prison in December, the members of the Russian protest group have started a nonprofit, Zona Prava, whose mission is to improve conditions in Russian prisons. They have also used their status as global symbols of political freedom to promote feminism, gay rights and more transparency in Russian politics. Earlier this week, they met with senators in Washington to discuss what they view as Russian human-rights abuses, including the long incarceration of several protesters arrested during a May 2012 opposition rally in Bolotnaya Square in Moscow. They were contacted by Ms. McMillan’s supporters on Thursday and then agreed to go to Rikers. Ms. Alyokhina and Ms. Tolokonnikova, who were accompanied by Petya Verzilov, a member of their arts collective, said Ms. McMillan had appeared to be upbeat and thriving, though she said she missed her cigarettes. Ms. Tolokonnikova said Ms. McMillan had kept busy organizing other female inmates to write letters on her behalf to the judge. A Russophile, Ms. McMillan impressed her visitors with her knowledge of Soviet history and poetry, discussing the absurdist poet Daniil Kharms. “It’s really incredible to see someone that positive in prison,” said Mr. Verzilov, who served as a translator. Ms. Alyokhina said Ms. McMillan had talked at length about how she now wanted to start a social revolution in America. “She told us about the revolution maybe 20 times,” her visitor said. “It’s really very important to her.”

Pussy Riot
Occupy Wall Street
Prison
Attacks on Police
Rikers
Grantley Bovell
Cecily McMillan
Russia
Music


Together on a Park Bench

Abstract: Dear Diary: They say that routine is the death of a relationship. I’m not sure that is entirely true, but I am also not certain it isn’t. He gets up every morning with the sun and comes home beat because hard work is hard. I stay home trying to keep an energetic baby entertained and happy while searching job sites hoping that something will stick. We enjoy our times alone — it is our time to unwind, to remember that we love each other outside the smile of our son. On a seasonably spring night, we walked through Union Square Park, just the two of us. Having ravenously stuffed our bellies with seafood from a quaint restaurant nearby, we sat on benches. Our bench was placed among a row of others, housing other couples and singles talking about their lives and also enjoying the serene landscape in the busy city. “I don’t want to sit here for long,” I said, uncomfortably shifting and feeling full. “I want to spend time with you,” he said. Without skipping a beat, I replied with a twinge of sarcasm: “We always spend time together. I see you every day!” He took another breath of his cigarette and exhaled. “I just want to spend time with you.” At that moment he put his arm around me and we sat in silence, taking in the view and separating ourselves from the bustling city around us. We were disconnected from our worries, problems and cellphones. It was a moment I didn’t appreciate then, but it was one that I will work (not routinely) to create again.


Univision Buys a Stake in The Onion to Reach Millennials

Abstract: The Spanish-language media giant Univision Communications announced Tuesday that it had acquired a large stake in The Onion, the comedy and satirical digital media group, as part of the company’s efforts to extend its digital reach and strengthen its portfolio of comedy outlets. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the transaction was said to be for a 40 percent stake, valued at less than $200 million, according to one person briefed on the deal. “Comedy is playing an expanding role in our culture as a vehicle for audiences to explore, debate and understand the important ideas of our time,” said Isaac Lee, chief news and digital officer of Univision. “It has also proven to be an incredibly engaging format for millennial audiences and is expected to play a key part in the 2016 presidential election process via our robust content offerings in Spanish and English.” Univision’s digital portfolio is undergoing a flurry of changes, part of an effort to build its footprint and reach as diverse a group of millennials as possible. News emerged last month that Univision was in talks with the Walt Disney Company to take full control of their joint venture Fusion, the English-language digital news service and cable channel. In November, Univision named Mr. Lee to a new position with responsibility for overseeing digital functions, leading multicultural efforts and creating a music strategy. He also is chief executive of Fusion. Image The Onion’s home page on Tuesday. At the same time, Univision’s plans for a public offering of stock have been delayed after broader fears about the future of the television business sent the share prices for major media companies on a downward spiral. Univision executives saw The Onion as a complement to Fusion and its other properties, with comedy filling a vital role in culture, political discourse and the discussion of current events, according to the person briefed on the deal. They also saw the deal as helping Univision develop new comedy and satirical offerings in Spanish and English and collaborate with up-and-coming talent. The two groups also could create and distribute new TV programs based on The Onion. The deal gives Univision an immediate expansion of its online presence. In December, Univision’s digital sites attracted 19.5 million unique United States visitors, while Onion sites drew 19.3 million unique United States visitors, according to the media measurement firm comScore. The Onion describes its start — with a wink — as rising from “humble beginnings as a print newspaper in 1765” and now attracting a daily readership of 4.3 trillion as “the single most powerful and influential organization in human history.” The company actually began in 1988 as a weekly publication in Madison, Wis. The Onion Inc. portfolio of sites now includes the satire news publication The Onion; the pop-culture site The A.V. Club; the buzzy ClickHole; a gossip site called StarWipe; and Onion Studios, a digital video network. In a memo to employees, Mike McAvoy, the president and chief executive of Onion Inc., said the deal came after the company had searched for a partner during the last year to help the company grow. He said that after acquiring a “good chunk” of Onion Inc., Univision could acquire the remainder of the company in the future. “As an independent media company, we’ve always been forced to run a tight financial ship, which has made us smart and lean, but not always ready to invest in the great new ideas that we come up with,” Mr. McAvoy said in the memo. “I’m excited to see what we can do with Univision behind us.”

Univision
The Onion
Mergers and Acquisitions


Oddly, Tigers, Yankees and Arizona All Like a 2009 Deal

Abstract: Max Scherzer was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in the first round in 2006. When they traded him after three years, it changed his outlook on his profession. “That’s just the business side of the game,” Scherzer said last month, by his locker in the Detroit Tigers ’ clubhouse. “Trades happen, you never know. Heck, I could get traded next.” Not likely. Scherzer has 14 victories for the Tigers, who are going to the playoffs for the first time in five years. Like the other participants in a three-team, seven-player deal on Dec. 8, 2009, the Tigers would not change a thing. “It doesn’t happen this way that often, but it has worked out well for all clubs, which is good,” said Dave Dombrowski, the Tigers’ president and general manager. “We achieved what we needed to, the Yankees did and so did Arizona.” The Yankees acquired center fielder Curtis Granderson from Detroit. The Diamondbacks acquired two starting pitchers: Edwin Jackson from the Tigers and Ian Kennedy from the Yankees. The Tigers acquired center fielder Austin Jackson and reliever Phil Coke from the Yankees, and Scherzer and reliever Daniel Schlereth from the Diamondbacks. Now all three teams are likely to be in the playoffs, with each player in the deal making an important contribution. Even Edwin Jackson has left his mark; after throwing a no-hitter for Arizona last season, he was traded to the White Sox for Daniel Hudson , who has become a solid No. 2 starter behind Kennedy, the first National League pitcher to 19 victories this season. “It’s extremely unusual,” said Josh Byrnes, the Arizona general manager in 2009. “A couple of years out, all the teams are successful, and each team would not undo the deal.” The Yankees were reshaping their outfield after winning a championship. They moved Brett Gardner to left, replacing Johnny Damon, and aimed for Granderson, who was coming off a down year but was under contractual control through 2013. In Dombrowski, Cashman found another veteran general manager with his sensibilities. “With the new generation of G.M.’s, a lot of them are in the mode of ‘I’ll give nothing but I’ll ask for a lot,’ ” Cashman said. “The guys like Dombrowski, Theo Epstein, Kenny Williams, Kevin Towers, those guys are out there willing to give to get. We give a lot, but it’s in the hopes of getting a lot. The newbies don’t want to deal with the negative publicity.” While Cashman and Dombrowski discussed Granderson, Byrnes was pursuing Edwin Jackson, who was coming off an All-Star season. He was also intrigued by Kennedy, who had spent most of 2009 dealing with an aneurysm under his right armpit but looked sharp in the Arizona Fall League. Byrnes introduced the three-way concept as a way to satisfy all parties. He and Cashman knew the Tigers wanted younger versions of the players they would be trading — and then some. Austin Jackson gave Detroit a younger center fielder than Granderson, and Scherzer a younger starter than Edwin Jackson. Cashman also parted with Coke, a left-hander who could start or relieve, and Byrnes included Schlereth, another lefty, who had been a first-round pick. Because Byrnes was trading Scherzer, too, he needed another young starter in return. So the Yankees gave up Kennedy, a fly-ball pitcher who seemed to be a better fit for the National League West than the American League East. “As much as we liked Scherzer and Schlereth,” Byrnes said, “the notion of getting two starters back was pretty compelling.” Dombrowski tried to pry another left-hander, the Yankees’ Michael Dunn, but Cashman resisted. The general managers met in Cashman’s suite at the winter meetings in Indianapolis and finished the deal without Dunn, who soon went to Atlanta in a deal for Javier Vazquez and Boone Logan. Cashman had reservations about Granderson, who slumped in 2009, hitting just .183 against left-handers and who had no mechanical flaw the Yankees could spot on video. Cashman said he warned his boss, Hal Steinbrenner, that in the worst-case scenario, Granderson would have to sit against lefties, and that he expected Jackson to hit for a higher average. But Granderson had much more power, and Jackson, at the time, had never played in the majors. The hitting coach Kevin Long worked with Granderson, encouraging him to keep both hands on the bat throughout his swing, and Granderson carried over a strong finish to 2010 to emerge as a top candidate for the A.L. Most Valuable Player award. “We didn’t think we were trading for a potential M.V.P.-caliber player,” Cashman said. “We just felt we were trading for one of the best everyday center fielders in the game, and that’s what we got.” Likewise, Byrnes said that as much as he wanted Kennedy, he pictured him fitting into the middle of the Diamondbacks’ rotation, not the front. The Tigers’ haul has not greatly exceeded expectations, but one major concern — Scherzer’s health — has not been an issue, and Jackson has skillfully roamed the vast center field in Detroit while giving the Tigers their only real stolen-base threat. The volume the Tigers received in the deal has helped stock their deepest roster, and their best team, in years. At some point next month, Detroit could face the Yankees, and perhaps, the Diamondbacks, for a close-up look at the deal that worked all around. “You can’t help but notice what those other guys are doing, man,” Austin Jackson said. “Those guys are doing well for the other clubs. It definitely worked out well for everybody.”

New York Yankees
Detroit Tigers
Arizona Diamondbacks
Baseball
Jackson Austin
Granderson Curtis


Congo’s Death Rate Unchanged Since War Ended

Abstract: DAKAR, Senegal — Five years after Congo’s catastrophic war officially ended, the rate at which people are dying in the country remains virtually unchanged, according to a new survey, despite the efforts of the world’s largest peacekeeping force, billions of dollars in international aid and a historic election that revived democracy after decades of violence and despotism. The survey, released Tuesday, estimated that 45,000 people continue to die every month, about the same pace as in 2004, when the international push to rebuild the country had scarcely begun. Almost all the deaths come from hunger and disease, signs that the country is still grappling with the aftermath of a war that gutted its infrastructure, forced millions to flee and flattened its economy. In all, more than 5.4 million people have died in Congo since the war began in 1998, according to the most recent survey’s estimate, the latest in a series completed by the International Rescue Committee, an American aid organization. Nearly half of the dead were children younger than 5 years old. Perhaps most alarming, while the death rate has slightly decreased in eastern Congo, the last festering node of conflict, it has actually increased in some parts of central Congo, though the area has not seen combat in several years. The study’s authors and other aid organizations said the focus of aid dollars on the east and neglect of the region by government were the most likely explanations for the changes. These surprising findings demonstrate the depth and complexity of Congo’s continuing crisis, said Richard Brennan, health director for the International Rescue Committee and one of the survey’s authors. “The Congo is still enduring a crisis of huge proportions,” Dr. Brennan said. “Protracted elevations of mortality more than four years after the end of the war demonstrates that recovery from this kind of crisis is itself a protracted process. The international engagement has to be sustained and committed for years to come.” The survey was based on a sample of 14,000 households surveyed in 700 villages and towns across Congo from January 2006 to April 2007. Its authors emphasized that the figures in the report are estimates, based on widely accepted statistical methods for estimating death tolls in disasters, but the cumulative figure for how many have died since the war began has a wide margin of error given the difficulty of the terrain in Congo and the lack of precision in basic demographic information, like the prewar mortality rate or even Congo’s current population. Still, improvements in security since 2004, when the last survey was completed, meant that researchers were able to visit many areas that were off limits last time, and as a result, its authors said, the current survey provides the most complete picture yet of the toll of Congo’s slide into despair. That picture is not encouraging. The mortality rate in Congo is 57 percent higher than the rest of sub-Saharan Africa, the survey found. Particularly hard hit were young children, who are especially susceptible to diseases like malaria , measles , dysentery and typhoid , which can kill when medicine is not available. In one village in North Kivu Province, a hot spot of continued fighting, three women of the 20 households surveyed had lost two children each in the 16 months covered by the survey period, Dr. Brennan said. Less than half a percentage point of the deaths were caused by violence, illustrating how the aftermath of war can be more deadly than combat itself. Much of the emergency aid is focused on the eastern part of the country, where militia battles with Congolese troops have chased nearly half a million people from their homes in the last year. A peace agreement to end that conflict was reached Monday. But the increased mortality in areas outside of the volatile east is particularly worrying because it points to longer-term problems that endure long after the bullets have stopped flying. “Given the nature of this country, the vast differences in terrain, the broken infrastructure, I am not surprised,” said Alan Doss, the newly appointed chief of the United Nations ’ vast peace operation in Congo. “This will take a long time to turn around.” The Congolese government spends just $15 per person each year on health care, according to the World Health Organization , less than half of what is recommended to provide the most basic but lifesaving care, like immunizations, malaria-fighting mosquito nets and hydration salts. “The past two years, we can say the health situation has not improved at all,” said Brice de le Vingne, operations coordinator for the region that includes Congo for the aid group Doctors Without Borders. “The only thing that improved a bit is mobile phone coverage. We now are in contact with more people to know that the situation is not good.” Mortality surveys are crucial tools for aid agencies, United Nations peacekeepers and even historians, but the methods used to compile them have come under attack. For example, a 2006 survey by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health that concluded that 600,000 Iraqi civilians had died since the American invasion — far above the estimates given by the Iraqi government and other sources — was attacked as “not credible” by President Bush and the Pentagon, and criticized by other scientists as well. For the current survey, teams of workers fanned out across Congo, a nation as big as the United States east of the Mississippi, but with rivers instead of roads, canoes and bicycles instead of airplanes and cars. Debarati Guha-Sapir, director of the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters, a research institution in Belgium, said that the Congo survey was methodologically sound. Still, extrapolating from clusters of data over an area as vast and with as many unknowns as Congo presents particular problems, she said. “The fact is that you have a high mortality rate in Congo altogether by any standard,” Dr. Guha-Sapir said. “Of which some is the result of conflict, some is governance, some is that no heath services are available in many areas, some is just pure poverty and the horrible legacy of what colonialism and Western greed did to Congo.” A number of variables make the survey results inevitably imprecise, particularly when trying to turn an abstract death rate into a number of actual deaths. The population of Congo, for example, is essentially unknown: the United Nations estimated it to be 56.8 million; the Congolese Ministry of Health says it is 69.9 million. If the United Nations figure is right, for example, the actual number of deaths in the most recent survey period would be 522,000, but if the government figures are right, the figure would be 1.05 million, the study found. The number of deaths attributed to the conflict and its aftermath is based on how many people would be expected to die under normal circumstances. Because Congo’s prewar mortality rate is disputed by different sources, it is also a source of imprecision. According to various United Nations estimates, the prewar rate was below that of sub-Saharan Africa as a whole, but the survey’s authors said they chose to use the higher rate of the continent to be conservative. Still, even the death rate for sub-Saharan Africa could be a problematic baseline, said Dr. Guha-Sapir, because in many countries the most basic kinds of censuses are carried out rarely, and not always with precision. Ultimately, using the most conservative and least conservative assumptions, the data show with 95 percent certainty that 3.5 to 7.8 million people have died since 1998, according to the survey’s authors. An earlier survey by the International Rescue Committee, completed in 2004, was published in 2006 in The Lancet, a British medical journal, but the most recent survey was declined for publication by The Lancet. Other experts said such a rejection did not necessarily undercut the scientific validity of the findings. Dr. Brennan said that despite inevitable imprecision, the data point to a vast crisis. “Is it possible that as few as five million people died?” he said. “It’s much more likely that 5.4 million died. But the exact number isn’t as critical. These data can help us understand the scale of the problem and target our solutions to save lives.”

Medicine and Health
Congo (Formerly Zaire)
Foreign Aid
Food Contamination and Poisoning
World Health Organization
United Nations
Brennan Richard


A Second Day, a Second Massing of Grief for a Lost Firefighter

Abstract: Amid the somber majesty of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, thousands of firefighters, friends and relatives paid tribute yesterday to Robert Beddia, a 23-year veteran of the New York Fire Department, evoking his professionalism and the simple pleasures in his life, from poker and paddle ball to the many nieces and nephews he doted on. It was the second time in two days that firefighters gathered to mourn a colleague. On Thursday, a funeral was held in Brooklyn for Joseph Graffagnino, 33, who, along with Firefighter Beddia, 53, was assigned to Engine 24 and Ladder 5, based in a firehouse in SoHo. They were among scores of firefighters who helped fight the blaze last Saturday at the former Deutsche Bank building at ground zero. On Thursday, two more firefighters were injured at the building, at 130 Liberty Street, when a worker lost control of a small forklift on the 23rd floor and it plummeted 200 feet to the ground. Yesterday, as the ceremony went on inside the cathedral, outside along Fifth Avenue thousands of firefighters stood in formation, their rows of white and black caps visible for blocks as American flags moved softly in a slight breeze. The handling of the fire in the empty contaminant-ridden tower, which was damaged on 9/11 and was finally being dismantled, has come under scrutiny, as officials investigate the two deaths and the problems the firefighters encountered, chiefly the broken standpipe that left them without enough water. There were expressions of anger yesterday in the eulogies and among onlookers outside, but the service did not let the events of last week’s fire overshadow the memory of Firefighter Beddia’s life. Standing before the flag-draped coffin and framed by the cathedral’s soaring bronze altar canopy, Msgr. John Delendick, a Fire Department chaplain, acknowledged the tensions that have emerged over the logistics at the fire. “There’s been an awful lot of finger-pointing,” he said, and added, “A lot of people have been laying blame all over the place, but I’m not here to talk about that.” He and others, including Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, Gov. Eliot Spitzer, a firefighter and a sister, went on to describe Firefighter Beddia’s contributions to the city and, as the middle of five siblings, to his large family. “He was the senior man,” Monsignor Delendick said of Firefighter Beddia’s role in the firehouse. “Young guys talked about how good of a teacher he was, how he was patient and never got angry at them.” Together, the eulogies portrayed a man who was a fixture in SoHo and Greenwich Village, who was equal parts humble and hip, who knew by heart the interiors of many of the buildings in the neighborhood and who, as a bartender, had presided over Chumley’s, an old and popular Village tavern. Though he was divorced and never had children of his own, Firefighter Beddia was close to his 16 nieces and nephews, teaching some of them how to swim and drive, and others how to play poker. “He always gravitated towards the kids in the family,” Monsignor Delendick said. Mayor Bloomberg called him a “quiet hero” who had turned down offers to recommend him for department honors. “He was a man of few words, but when he spoke, others listened,” he said. An avid golfer and the proud owner of an Alfa Romeo, Firefighter Beddia came across in the eulogies as a man’s man. His friend and colleague, Lt. Raymond O’Hanlon, caused ripples of laughter by describing what he called Firefighter Beddia’s sixth sense: the ability to “spot a beautiful woman 1,000 yards out in a fog at night.” The two would be relaxing outside on the street at night, Lieutenant O’Hanlon recalled, when out of nowhere Firefighter Beddia would say, ‘2 o’clock,’ and I’d look at my watch and say, ‘What are you talking about? It’s 11:30.’ ” Firefighter Beddia would nod toward the approaching woman who, by then, was “at 3:30,” Lieutenant O’Hanlon said. Mr. Bloomberg contributed his own anecdote, relating a story he had been told about the time Firefighter Beddia traveled to Italy and decided to buy a car because it was somehow cheaper than renting one. When he pulled into the airport at the end of the trip, he simply left the car behind, the keys still in the ignition. “He exuded the kind of cool that eludes most of us,” Mr. Bloomberg said. There were solemn moments. Governor Spitzer, whose more formal eulogy quoted from Theodore Roosevelt and Shakespeare, vowed to uncover the “truth about what happened on Aug. 18.” Nicholas Scoppetta, the fire commissioner, promised an “aggressive, comprehensive investigation.” As others did, Mr. Scoppetta spoke about the firehouse’s painful past, which included the loss of three firefighters in 1994 after they became trapped in a burning empty apartment building, and then 11 more fatalities on Sept. 11. “You have paid an astonishingly high price, more than any house should have to bear,” he said. Firefighter Beddia’s sister, Susan Beddia Olson, closed the service with the most personal eulogy of all, calling on one memory after another and bringing many in the congregation to tears. “Dear Bobby,” she began in a soft voice. “Do you remember when you and Jimmy bought me my first nine-inch TV for my bedroom, and it was so cool?” She went on to ask if he remembered taking her to the Jersey Shore, making wine with Uncle Mike, rescuing her in the pool, vacationing with their family in Myrtle Beach, playing badminton in the backyard, teaching her how to drive, going to the Who concert with her when she was 16 and walking her down the aisle at her wedding. Hundreds of firefighters and mourners continued on to Moravian Cemetery in the New Dorp section of Staten Island. There, an honor guard gently carried the mahogany coffin. Not 100 yards from where the mourners were gathered, a light wind rustled a cluster of Mylar balloons atop the grave of Russel Timoshenko, the New York City police officer who was shot last month when he and his partner stopped a suspicious vehicle in Brooklyn. In a show of solidarity with the Beddia family, Officer Timoshenko’s parents had attended Firefighter Beddia’s wake two nights earlier. A Fire Department chaplain read Scripture, and then the assembled firefighters passed by Firefighter Beddia’s grave in formation, pausing to salute in pairs. At the end of the graveside service, each mourner placed a red rose on the coffin. Earlier, at the wake, relatives had put a golf club and a paddle ball racquet in the coffin.

Fires and Firefighters
Deutsche Bank Building (NYC)
Brooklyn (NYC)


Nur Khan's Party at the Hiro Ballroom

Abstract: Here’s the funny thing about inviting a nightlife columnist to write about your party: She’s there to write about your party. So when we received a special invitation from a publicist to cover Nur Khan and Harry Josh’s private shindig at Hiro Ballroom in the meatpacking district on Saturday night, the e-mail splashed with the names of interesting guests, we eagerly R.S.V.P.’d. We looked forward to spending a long night interviewing guests like Gisele Bündchen, Tom Brady, Helena Christensen and more. Thanks for coming to cover this celebrity-packed party, organizers told us when we got to the event, a pre-party for the Costume Institute gala on Monday night. Just don’t talk to any celebrities. The celebrities “thought this was a private party,” said Mr. Josh, who organized the event. Revised orders: Talk if you must (We must; funny that, it’s only our job) — just not to anyone too famous. We were very upset. But who better to comfort us than a familiar face? Hi, Leonardo DiCaprio! our correspondent ventured, we’re not allowed to talk to anyone famous! Mr. DiCaprio proceeded to laugh so hard that we were afraid his drink might come out of his nose. We continued bemoaning our fate, conscious suddenly of a publicist who, we feared, was encircling us the way a hyena might a celebrity-bothering impala that he wanted to rip limb from limb. “Have a drink,” Mr. DiCaprio said. We would have preferred a Kevlar vest. “Have fun tonight.” Right. Across the dance floor we spotted a Furby-fluffy coat. Maybe we would buy it tomorrow to console ourselves for failing to do our job. Who is the designer? We couldn’t hear Ashley Olsen’s response over the loud music as she fielded bear hugs (appropriate given her hirsute outfit) from people who either had a pass from the publicists — or a death wish. All this not talking to celebrities, our spirits sagged. Are you going to dance, Mickey Rourke? “Not when I’m this exhausted,” he said, describing the workout he had just had for his new rugby movie. Also, he’s a house music guy, he said amid blasting hip-hop. As we spoke, Mr. DiCaprio waved goodbye to him, and, we think, us. Strong-Arming At a party celebrating National Football League rookies on Wall Street earlier that same night, two arcade games were set up at the two ends of Cipriani, inviting guests like top rookies Nick Fairley, Blaine Gabbert and Mark Ingram to toss minifootballs into holes for points. Though the event was in their honor, when we tried the game (and missed — a lot), our dismal score insulted more than our throwing arm: “Rookie,” flashed across the screen. But the rookies had to be thick-skinned. “I was hazed,” said Felix Jones, the Dallas Cowboys running back. “These guys did me good. I want to get back at the guys who got me.” The rookies were safe. “I’m looking at veterans — but not tonight.” Rima Fakih, Miss U.S.A. 2010, arrived in a bright pink minidress and, of course, her sash. We wondered if she was at the wrong event, since the boyfriend on her arm was Ricky Romero, a Toronto Blue Jay. That’s baseball. “In high school, I tried to start a girls’ football team,” Miss Fakih said. “It didn’t work out very well because none of the girls wanted to play football.” There was a happy ending. “I played with the boys.” Fraternizing Miss Fakih and Mr. Romero seemed similarly out of place the next night at the hall of fame induction ceremony for The Players club, a sort of actors fraternity on Gramercy Park. New stars, like Jimmy Fallon, were being added to the celestial portrait gallery that hangs around the club, many painted by Everett Raymond Kinstler. (Katharine Hepburn, he said, was “difficult.”) “In a couple of minutes, my friend from high school will be here,” said Mr. Kinstler. “Only back then, his name was Anthony Benedetto.” Tony Bennett, who attended Manhattan’s High School of Industrial Art with him, soon arrived. Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, who have been married for 56 years, posed for photos. “Our marriage probably ended 35, 36 times,” Mr. Stiller joked. “But somewhere along the line, we said, ‘This is it.’ We never ran off with anyone — though we wanted to.” We told his wife what he said. “He lives in another reality,” said Ms. Meara, who is currently starring in the play “Love, Loss and What I Wore.” “We’ve been in therapy for 30 years,” she added. And their son, Ben Stiller, is he so devoted? “He lives at home,” Mr. Stiller cracked. “We still give him his allowance.”

Celebrities
Parties (Social)
Hiro Ballroom
Manhattan (NYC)


A Deadly Car’s Winding Road

Abstract: The Honda Civic whose airbag killed Delia Robles was resold three times at used-car auctions before it was bought by her son. JANUARY 2001 The 2001 Honda Civic that will eventually kill Ms. Robles is sold new. JANUARY 2006 The car is resold for the first time at a used-car auction. JUNE 2007 The car rear-ends another vehicle; its airbags do not deploy. NOVEMBER 2008 Honda recalls the car, saying its driver-side airbag is defective and can rupture. MAY 2010 The car is resold for the second time at a used-car auction. AUGUST 2012 A mechanical issue is reported; the car is towed. MAY 2015 The car is resold for the third time at a used-car auction, then sold yet again to Delia Robles’s son, who registers it in her name. SEPTEMBER 2016 Ms. Robles is killed when her airbag explodes; her son says he did not know the car had defective airbags.

Automobile safety
Car Crash
Used Cars
Auction
Honda
Recalls and Bans
Takata


A Cold and Flu Risk That’s a Real Eye-Opener

Abstract: Q. As I commute by train and subway during the cold and flu season, can I cut my risk of infections by breathing through my mouth rather than through my nose? A. Just possibly, but only if you can figure out a way to travel with your eyes closed as well, and if you wash your hands frequently, too . A small but frequently cited 1981 study in the journal Infection and Immunity, published by the American Society for Microbiology, compared the risks of contracting a respiratory infection by way of transferring it to the nose, eye or mouth. The results suggested that the eyes and the nose were equally sensitive to infection, while the mouth was comparatively insensitive. Viruses like the common cold and influenza can take different routes to the next victim. They are spread by sneezes and coughs, which produce medium-size droplets that can be carried though the air to the nose and pharynx of nearby people. Protective masks can help cut off such transfers. The droplets can also land on hands, which can transfer them to sensitive mucus membranes, or on inanimate objects, from which they can be picked up by hands and once again transferred to the membranes of the eyes, nose or mouth. Diligent handwashing and avoidance of touching the target membranes can help head off such transfers. Even smaller and lighter virus-contaminated droplets, called droplet nuclei, can travel by air from room to room and even go around the edges of standard paper masks. They can be inhaled, causing lung infections. A frequently recommended precaution is avoiding crowds of possibly infected people during the cold and flu season. question@nytimes.com

Hygiene
Flu
American Society for Microbiology
Common cold


The Writing’s on the Wall. (The Writing’s Off the Wall.)

Abstract: A FEW minutes into the opening reception for an exhibit on the intersection of design and technology at the Chelsea Art Museum, one of the pieces caught fire. The installation, called “Saws,” accidentally ignited when one of the work’s three chainsaws became caught on a stripped extension cord that dangled over a metal sheet on the floor. Propelled by smoke and dust, the crowd emptied out onto West 22nd Street, where they were met with another curious sight. An oversize tricycle was rounding the corner, weighed down with a video camera, a laptop computer, a digital projector and, attached to its frame with bungee cords, two loudspeakers playing “Doobie Ashtray” by the Houston rapper Devin the Dude. The cyclist was a 30-year-old robotics engineer named James Powderly, who, among other projects, once helped develop a remote-controlled arm for NASA’s Mars rover program. Alongside the cycle walked Evan Roth, a 28-year-old artist whose graduate thesis at Parsons the New School for Design analyzed graffiti tags as a source of mathematical data. In the fall of 2005, the two formed an entity called the Graffiti Research Lab, a nonprofit design studio with the mission of producing tools for urban communication. The cycle is their latest invention, and its appearance in Chelsea was its official New York debut. As Mr. Powderly neared the museum’s entrance, he jumped off the cycle and pointed it toward a bare stretch on a garage door across the street. Mr. Roth pulled a laser pointer from his pocket, and as he moved the laser’s green dot across the wall, a line of what looked like thick, drippy paint lit up its surface, roughly following the motion of his hand. But what seemed like an illegal tag was in fact a projection, an ephemeral splash of digital graffiti that would vanish with a flick of a switch on the cycle’s gas-powered generator. “You want to try?” Mr. Roth asked the growing crowd behind him. He handed the laser pointer to a young woman standing nearby. She nodded, hesitant but curious. The cycle is designed to be an accessible, almost playful simulacrum of street tagging, giving passers-by a whiff of the thrill of posting a message in places they’re not supposed to. It is what its creators call a gateway graffiti experience. The idea is to put the tools for unfiltered, unsanctioned public expression in the hands of those who might otherwise shy away from grabbing a spray can or a paint marker. By night’s end, several dozen people had used the laser to scribble personal messages, squealing with amazement each time the projected beam of light appeared on the wall. The first request to use the bike came a week later from Critical Mass, the bicycle activist group, which wanted to use the device for one of its rides through Brooklyn. On a Friday night in spring, Mr. Powderly found himself pedaling the hulking cycle across the Williamsburg Bridge and onto South Fifth Street, to the Williamsburg park where the biking group starts its monthly ride. Joining the crowd of cyclists, Mr. Powderly followed them as they moved through the honking streets of Brooklyn. In search of a spot to project their graffiti, they settled on the handball courts of McCarren Park in Greenpoint. Mr. Powderly positioned the cycle to face the court’s gray concrete wall. Within a few minutes, someone had drawn a detailed sketch of a bicycle, and another person had traced an outline of an American flag. “These people really get it,” Mr. Powderly said. “It’s not just about getting a message up — there are plenty of ways to do that. This is really about getting a community together.” In the months since, Mr. Powderly and Mr. Roth have used the tricycle to write graffiti for a hip-hop music video and handed it over for a night to an organization that is calling for the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney. They have also gone out with people from the New York graffiti collective All City Crew, several of whose members have been arrested in recent months on charges of criminal trespassing and vandalism. Last Sunday, Mr. Powderly and Mr. Roth took the cycle to the Brooklyn Bridge, where 2esae, a member of All City Crew who is facing trial in the fall, used the laser to write on the base of the bridge for several hours. Many of the cycle’s projecting missions are documented in videos posted on the Graffiti Research Lab Web site. At the end of the video from the Critical Mass ride, a typed message flashes brightly across the screen. “Do you need to say something really big and really loud?” it asks in bold, all-capital letters. “Then borrow my bike.”


Sheldon Silver, Unbowed by Charges, Adjusts to Life After the Speakership

Abstract: ALBANY — The last five months have not been kind to Sheldon Silver . Arrested in January, indicted in February and forced out as Assembly speaker in between, Mr. Silver has seen his influence in the Capitol wane. Some luxuries have been lost, like the office just off the Assembly floor. He now sits in the chamber, next to a freshman Democrat who was 14 years old when Mr. Silver was first elected to the Assembly. Yet in many ways, Mr. Silver remains a presence unbowed, tackling favored causes and displaying no obvious reluctance about appearing in public at the Capitol or elsewhere. At the Celebrate Israel parade in Manhattan last month, for instance, he marched up Fifth Avenue wearing a blue sash and holding up an Israeli flag. Outside City Hall in March, he voiced support for making the Lunar New Year a school holiday. At an April meeting of a task force he formed to address the issue of school overcrowding, those on hand greeted him with applause. “These are my friends,” Mr. Silver said last week, recalling the warm reception. “I’ve been doing this with them for 30 years. As far as they’re concerned, nothing’s changed.” He is even taking small, principled stands, voting against bills that strike him as unwise — including a proposal to allow dogs within the outdoor dining areas of restaurants. Last week, Mr. Silver mounted a campaign against a move to hold New York’s 2016 presidential primary on a date that falls during Passover , recruiting colleagues to sign a letter to the Democratic National Committee stating their opposition. “I’m here doing my work,” he said. “My constituents elected me to do a job, and I’m going to do that job as long as I’m representing them. And if I wasn’t going to do that job, then I would leave.” Mr. Silver, 71, began the year as the most powerful Democrat in the State Legislature and one of Albany’s “three men in a room.” But after his arrest , his fellow Democrats decided he could no longer continue as the speaker. Mr. Silver stepped down , ending a reign as leader that spanned more than two decades. “He’s no longer a man in power, but in terms of his demeanor, there doesn’t appear to be any major anger or bitterness,” said Assemblyman James F. Brennan, a Brooklyn Democrat. “I’m sure he would rather be speaker, but his demeanor is not a disgruntled, embittered man.” Mr. Silver, who is charged with obtaining illicit payments disguised as legitimate income from working as a lawyer, maintains his innocence and is scheduled to go on trial in November. “I’ve hired lawyers, paid them, and they will do their job,” Mr. Silver said. “They, as I, am pretty convinced I’ll be vindicated at the end of the process. And in the interim, I am doing my job. And if they need me, they call me.” Mr. Silver still must contend with the inevitable stares and snickers when he walks through the Capitol. Like other politicians indicted before him, he has become an Albany punch line: This year, at the annual satire show staged by the Capitol press corps, Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” was given a Silver-themed rewrite (with lyrics including “I’ll plead it, plead it, bet your tuchis I will plead it”). There is also this simple fact of life: Some people, especially politicians loath to be associated with scandal, do not enjoy being in the presence of, or photographed with, a person under federal indictment. Mr. Silver did offer one upside to his exile from leadership: The news media, he said, no longer seeks to scrutinize his every move. “I’m glad not to be in the headlines,” he said. “It’s the one thing I don’t miss.” The awkwardness arising from the charges against him has not driven Mr. Silver to stay out of sight. When the Assembly worked late into the night to approve the state budget, he gamely chatted with reporters at the side of the chamber. He even turned up in the background of photos of Sawyer Fredericks, a winner of NBC’s “The Voice” who was honored by the Assembly this month. “I see him at more receptions during the session as a regular member than he was as speaker,” Assemblyman David I. Weprin, a Queens Democrat, said. “He comes to everything.” Mr. Weprin, whose father, Saul, preceded Mr. Silver as speaker, said Mr. Silver had been a useful sounding board for members. “Most people would just say, after being speaker, ‘I’m just going to give up,’” he said. Assemblywoman Rebecca A. Seawright of the Upper East Side of Manhattan, the freshman member who sits next to Mr. Silver, said he had helped her find her bearings. “Few know process and procedure better,” she said. “I have many questions and he has much patience.” As speaker, Mr. Silver was notoriously hard to read. As former speaker, that has not changed, including when it comes to his feelings about his diminished position. “I don’t see him going on ‘Oprah’ and talking about it, let’s put it that way,” Assemblywoman Catherine T. Nolan, a Queens Democrat, said. Mr. Silver has good reason to remain active, especially in his Lower Manhattan district. If convicted, he would lose his seat; if acquitted, he would be up for re-election next year, and face the prospect of a primary challenge. Mr. Silver said he planned to seek another term. Since stepping down as speaker, he has become a member of the Assembly’s Education Committee. He introduced a bill to provide a tax credit to families that pay private school tuition , and fielded questions on the Assembly floor about another bill he sponsored that would require food-inspection violations to be posted on a state website . The Assembly approved the legislation. As speaker, Mr. Silver controlled which bills the Assembly considered, so there was never a question about where he stood on those that came before it. Now, as a rank-and-file member, Mr. Silver must decide how to vote. He has developed a bit of a contrarian streak in a chamber where bills usually pass overwhelmingly. He voted, for instance, against allowing the extension of temporary increases to some local sales tax rates, calling the sales tax regressive. He voted in favor of a constitutional amendment that would allow legislators and other officials convicted on corruption charges to be stripped of their pensions . He abstained from voting on a bill to temporarily extend rent regulations and a housing program that gives tax breaks to developers; he said he did so because the tax-break program figured in the criminal case against him. Of his opposition to the so-called dining with dogs bill , Mr. Silver said he had deferred to the concerns of the city’s health department, but he also cited personal experience. “I have a grandson who’s petrified of dogs,” he explained, while noting that some children are bitten by dogs at young ages and are fearful of them as a result. “To put them in that position of having to confront a dog, even though the dog lies quietly on the floor, I don’t think is appropriate,” he said, suggesting, perhaps, that dogs be restricted to only a portion of outdoor dining areas. In two interviews last week, Mr. Silver seemed more at ease discussing legislative matters than his own circumstances. Asked if he thought he had been treated fairly since his arrest, he responded: “Do I really think so? No. But that’s O.K.” He offered a positive but terse assessment of the performance of his successor, Carl E. Heastie, a Bronx Democrat: “I think he’s done a great job.” Mr. Silver acknowledged that his life was different these days. When he was speaker, he said he was well aware that many of his friends would fade away once he was no longer among the state’s most powerful politicians. “I’ve even said it to Carl,” he said. “You come into this job with 10 friends. Maybe you’ll leave with 11.” “But while you’re in the job,” he continued, “you’ll have 500.”

Sheldon Silver
New York
Corruption
State legislature


Vatican Defends Move Toward Sainthood for Wartime Pope

Abstract: ROME — In an effort to calm growing tensions with Jewish groups, the Vatican said Wednesday that Pope Benedict XVI ’s decision moving the wartime pope Pius XII closer to sainthood was not a “hostile act” against those who believe Pius did not do enough to stop the Holocaust. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, issued a statement saying that the beatification process evaluated the “Christian life” of Pius, who reigned from 1939 to 1958, and not “the historical impact of all his operative decisions.” Moving Pius toward sainthood “is in no way to be read as a hostile act towards the Jewish people, and it is to be hoped that it will not be considered as an obstacle on the path of dialogue between Judaism and the Catholic Church,” Father Lombardi wrote. Benedict confirmed the “heroic virtues” of Pius — along with those of John Paul II — on Saturday, opening the door to beatification once a miracle is attributed to each. A second miracle would be required for sainthood. The move created anger among many Jewish groups, which have argued that Pius did not speak out vocally enough against the Nazis or intervene to save Jews during World War II, and that the Vatican helped many former Nazis escape to South America after World War II. The decision by Benedict — a German who was an unwilling member of the Hitler Youth — to move Pius closer to sainthood was the latest in a series of controversies. It came less than a year after he revoked the excommunication of a schismatic bishop who had denied the scope of the Holocaust, an act that caused the pope and the Vatican to issue a series of extensive clarifications. Benedict also upset many Jews when he did not directly mention the Nazis or Germany during a visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Israel in May, as John Paul II had done, although Benedict has denounced the Holocaust on many other occasions. Even as the Vatican sought to separate the religious aspects of the beatification process from Pius’s historical record, observers said that Benedict’s decision to move Pius toward sainthood sent a strong message, effectively endorsing his actions. Jewish groups had asked Benedict to delay Pius’s beatification process until the Vatican opened the archives from his papacy to scholarly scrutiny . Father Lombardi said that the Vatican “understood” the request to open the archives, and that the copious number of documents from Pius’s papacy were expected to take several more years to process. Defenders of Pius, who was the Vatican secretary of state in the 1930s, say that his reticence was sound diplomacy, and that speaking out more directly against the Nazis would have caused more deaths in Rome and beyond. Benedict has said that Pius worked “secretly and silently” to save Jews. In his statement, Father Lombardi said that confirming Pius’s “heroic virtues” was not intended “to limit discussion concerning the concrete choices made by Pius XII in the situation in which he lived.” He added that the Vatican hoped the pope’s expected visit to the Rome synagogue next month would reaffirm ties between Judaism and the Roman Catholic Church. After days of tension, Roman Jewish leaders said that the visit was still expected to take place. The legacy of Pius is particularly sensitive for the Jewish community in Rome. More than 1,000 of its members were rounded up in 1943 and deported to Auschwitz. Documents in the Vatican archives indicate that Pius knew of the deportation and did not act to stop it. In a statement, the chief rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, said he welcomed the Vatican’s statement. “Certainly the historical evaluation remains open and controversial,” Rabbi Di Segni said. “But the Vatican’s understanding of requests to open all paths to research is significant.”

Pius XII
Roman Catholic Church
Holocaust and the Nazi Era
Benedict XVI
Beatifications and Canonizations


I.M.F. Planning to Sell Bonds to Finance New Loans

Abstract: WASHINGTON — Hoping to raise money quickly for a new $500 billion emergency loan program, the International Monetary Fund is in the advanced stages of a plan to sell bonds for the first time in its history, officials for the group said Saturday. The bonds’ buyers are expected to be the governments of fast-growing emerging economic powers like China, Russia, Brazil and India. Though the fund has been authorized for decades to raise cash by selling bonds, officials have never done so because they wanted to avoid what amounts to short-term borrowing. But the new plan is a response to the growing political clout of countries like China and Brazil, which have become important economic powers and potentially major contributors to the fund, but which are frustrated by their small share of voting power. As the United States and the European Union have pushed to raise money for the $500 billion lending program to help countries weather the global financial crisis, the big emerging-market countries have demanded that they obtain a bigger voting stake in the fund in exchange for big new financial contributions. The United States has generally supported an overhaul of the organization’s voting structure, but many European countries oppose a dramatic shift, because it would dilute their own voting power. To get around the roadblock, fund officials said they are close to agreeing on a plan to sell bonds to countries including China, Russia, Brazil and India. The bonds would have to be repaid after one or two years, so they would not increase the fund’s permanent resources. But they would provide the fund with a way to raise the entire $500 billion quickly enough to help countries trapped in cash squeezes because of the frozen credit markets. “There was a lot of discussion that the fund would use the possibility to issue notes that could be bought by central banks, which could be a vehicle for some countries to provide resources to the fund,” said Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the I.M.F.’s managing director, after a meeting with officials from member countries here on Saturday. Other officials said the plans were serious and in an advanced stage, though they stopped short of saying that a bond offering was ready to be started. “What this signifies is that the emerging markets are drawing a line in the sand,” said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics at Cornell University and a former senior economist for the I.M.F. “From the perspective of the key emerging countries, they are being asked to contribute a very substantial amount of resources in exchange for a very uncertain promise of reform.” China, for example, has only 3.78 percent of the voting power at the I.M.F. But the United States and other wealthy nations are hoping that it contributes $40 billion, or 8 percent, of the new emergency fund. American officials said they supported the proposed bond issue, adding that the most important priority was to raise the necessary money as quickly as possible. The United States, Europe and Japan have each pledged to contribute $100 billion to the new lending facility. Though finance ministers attending the I.M.F.’s annual meeting here have expressed increased optimism that the global financial crisis is easing, American officials and fund officials have also warned that a recovery is still months away and that it will be even longer before unemployment stops climbing and begins to recede. The idea for the new lending program is to provide flexible credit lines to poorer countries that found themselves blindsided by the sudden inability to borrow in global capital markets. Poland, Mexico and Colombia have signed up to borrow from the program, and more countries are expected to do so as well.

International Monetary Fund
Economic Conditions and Trends


Investigation of Spitzer Heats Up

Abstract: ALBANY — Gov. Eliot Spitzer ’s administration has received a second subpoena from the Albany County district attorney, P. David Soares, reflecting what appears to be a more aggressive approach in his investigation of the administration. The subpoena, issued last week, seeks both public and private e-mail records from the administration. The subpoena was reported on Monday by The Daily News and was confirmed by the governor during a testy appearance at the Capitol on Monday. Mr. Soares’s investigation is his second in the wake of a damaging July report from Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo’s office, which found that members of the Democratic administration had misused the State Police in an effort to discredit Joseph L. Bruno, the Republican Senate majority leader. Mr. Soares’s first investigation, completed in September, backed up Mr. Cuomo’s finding that no laws had been broken, but was criticized because administration officials, including the governor, had not been interviewed under oath. Unlike Mr. Cuomo, Mr. Soares has the jurisdiction to issue subpoenas and compel sworn testimony in this particular case. Mr. Soares began a new investigation last month after the Commission on Public Integrity, a state ethics panel conducting its own inquiry, referred a potential perjury case to his office relating to testimony offered to the commission by Darren Dopp, the governor’s former communications director. In recent weeks he issued a subpoena seeking notes kept by Mr. Dopp. But Mr. Soares held off on bringing charges against Mr. Dopp amid complications in that case earlier this month; the latest subpoena suggests that he is broadening his inquiry. His office declined to comment. The governor made a rare appearance at the Capitol to discuss the recommendations of a commission on higher education — he has been mostly absent from Albany since the Cuomo report was issued — but he became tense when questions turned to the latest developments in the lingering case. “I’ve answered all these questions at length, and obviously we have cooperated fully, take it very seriously, wish it were getting to a conclusion quickly, so we could move on,” the governor said when asked if he had hired a personal lawyer. “We just sit and wait,” he added. “It is their job to do what they have to do. It is our job, and my job to cooperate, which is exactly what I’ve done. I’ve answered all the questions over and over.” Asked whether he had received a subpoena, he said yes, but declined to say what it sought, saying, “I’m not sure what the rules are with respect to that.” A reporter pointed out that the governor, a former prosecutor, did in fact know the rules, adding, “You can disclose whatever you want to disclose.” Responding to the broad subpoena will probably take time, further drawing out what has already been a spate of investigations lasting more than five months. In addition to Mr. Soares and the integrity commission, a Republican-led Senate committee is investigating the matter and currently battling the administration in court for documents and e-mail messages. “He has the chutzpah to say he’s cooperated fully when his lawyer is fighting me tooth and nail on every subpoena,” said Senator George H. Winner Jr., an upstate Republican leading the Senate inquiry, when asked about the governor’s comments on Monday. Republicans have been skeptical of Mr. Soares, a Democrat, like the governor, because he did not conduct interviews under oath in his first inquiry. “He has tried to make it look like he was doing something and did nothing,” Mr. Winner said of Mr. Soares. “I’m hopeful that’s not still the case.” Heather Orth, a spokeswoman for Mr. Soares, said, “As with all cases involving public integrity, we cannot comment.”

Spitzer Eliot L
Ethics
Soares P David
United States Politics and Government
District Attorneys