Indian Point Is New York’s Nuclear Question Mark

Abstract: BUCHANAN, N.Y. Charles Lynch, who traps nuisance raccoons, muskrats and coyotes for a living, remembers when Indian Point was a park with a swimming pool and dance pavilion on the Hudson River that drew people from New York City and beyond on sultry summer evenings. But even as a catastrophe is playing out at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in Japan, he’s fine with Indian Point’s current use as a nuclear plant in the heart of the nation’s most densely populated region, 25 miles from New York City. “Not a bit,” said Mr. Lynch, 70, when asked if the Japanese disaster gave him pause about the plant in his backyard. “I’ve been here too long to worry about whether it’s safe. You have to trust that it is. The only people who complain about it are the people who move here from New York City.” In Buchanan, a quiet, dog-eared village, and in nearby communities, Indian Point provides the jobs and the tax dollars. Elsewhere in the region, the attitude toward it is hardly so benign. And as the nuclear disaster lurches along in Japan, it remains to be seen what effect it will have on the future of Indian Point, whose owner, the Entergy Corporation, has applied for its two reactors to be allowed to remain in operation for another 20 years beyond 2013 and 2015, when their 40-year operating licenses expire. For critics, who have tried for decades to shut down a plant they say could never be built today, it’s a moment of truth about the risks they say have been ignored for way too long. “WHEN you see a tragedy like this unfolding halfway around the world, you can’t help but think: can it happen here?” said Paul Gallay, executive director of the environmental group Riverkeeper . “We understand the world better. We understand the earthquake risks better. When you factor in the impossibility of evacuation and the size of the population around it, this is a 40-year-old plant that shouldn’t have a future.” So could it happen here? An Entergy spokesman, Jim Steets, said no, at least not the same crisis as the one in Japan. First, the earthquake risk and history there are incomparably more serious than in New York. And second, it wasn’t the quake that wrecked the plant. It was the tsunami, hardly an issue here. “The risk that Indian Point could be damaged by an earthquake is extremely low,” he said. But indications are that the earthquake risk is worse than previously thought. A 2008 study by researchers at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory found that Indian Point sits at the previously unidentified intersection of two active seismic zones, and could pose a greater earthquake threat than the plant’s design is expected to meet. Officials with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission say the site is safe and that its earthquake threat is on the lower end nationally and in the Northeast. But it is one of 17 nuclear sites being asked to review and reassess seismic issues. Still, said Scott Burnell, a commission spokesman, “The N.R.C. continues to believe that all U.S. plants are capable of withstanding the strongest earthquakes that can be expected at any given site.” It is almost impossible to watch the horrific images from Japan and not think: That could be us, perhaps from something that is as unforeseen here as this level of tsunami was there. Though Fukushima Daiichi is the ultimate nightmare of technology as sorcerer’s apprentice, we live a quieter version of it every day. We don’t want gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale. We don’t want windmills off Cape Cod. We don’t want anything to do with coal or with a liquefied natural gas project like Broadwater in the Long Island Sound, but we want our infinite genie of infinite energy. Indian Point in meltdown is our worst nightmare. But the plant, says Mr. Steets, has also kept millions of tons of pollutants out of the air over its lifetime. And none of the politicians who have jumped aboard the train to shut it have come up with a concerted plan for conservation and alternatives to replace the energy that accounts for as much as 30 percent of New York City’s electricity. In Japan the brooms are going berserk, a Disney horror movie before our eyes. But we’ve also built a monster at home that has propelled our sublime technological joy ride. The nightmare in Japan should keep us up at night. But the one in front of our eyes should, too. We don’t all live in Buchanan. But we do.

Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant (NY)
Entergy Corp
Hudson River
Nuclear Energy


Angry Workers Storm Air France Meeting on Job Cuts

Abstract: PARIS — Angry workers stormed Air France headquarters on Monday as top managers were meeting to discuss plans to shed more than 2,900 jobs, forcing two executives to flee over a fence and in the process ripping the shirts from their backs. The violence at the Air France offices near Charles de Gaulle Airport broke out shortly after 9:30 a.m. Officials, including the chief executive officer, Frédéric Gagey, had informed the company’s workers council that 900 flight attendants, 1,700 ground crew members and 300 pilots could be laid off as the airline strives to return to profitability. Image Security officers assisted Pierre Plissonnier, an Air France executive in charge of long-haul flights, after Monday’s disturbance. Credit Kenzo Tribouillard/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The talks at the company, which is facing headwinds from an economic downturn and competition from low-cost carriers, had been tense for more than a year. While violence had not marred previous negotiations, the protests Monday were the latest in a series of incidents in France in which workers have held company bosses hostage or damaged property to make their point. As the Air France executives detailed the latest restructuring plan, union activists swarmed into the room, waving flags and chanting protests, prompting Mr. Gagey to make a hasty exit. Air France’s chief of human resources, Xavier Broseta, and another of the company’s executives, Pierre Plissonnier, were ushered outside. Television footage showed the two men being jostled and enveloped by a large crowd that broke open a locked fence to continue their pursuit. Workers surrounded Mr. Broseta and tore his shirt off, leaving him half naked as police officers helped him flee over a tall fence. The police also hoisted Mr. Plissonnier over a fence to help him escape after protesters ripped his shirt and suit jacket. Image Demonstrators at Air France’s headquarters on Monday. Credit Jacques Brinon/Associated Press In a statement, Air France condemned the violence “in the strongest possible terms.” Nonetheless, the company said it was ready to resume negotiations over layoffs, which it maintained were necessary because it had proved “impossible to reach agreements for the implementation of productivity measures leading to a lasting return to profitability.” Air France has some of the highest labor costs of any European airline in Europe, and has fought to compete with low-cost carriers like EasyJet by investing more in low-cost subsidiaries, reducing flights and closing unprofitable routes. The French government, which owns a 15.9 percent stake in Air France, has pressured the company to limit layoffs, prompting the company to seek to achieve staff reductions through voluntary departures, early retirements, attrition and reduced working hours. But in the absence of a deal with Air France’s high-paid pilots, who have been asked to work longer hours for the same pay to help stem financial losses, Air France announced last week it would resort to cutting jobs, a plan managers were reaffirming Monday.

Air France
Layoffs
Civil Unrest
Charles De Gaulle Airport
France


Knicks Changing, With or Without Anthony

Abstract: Phil Jackson is not one to deal in absolutism. He is pragmatic but whimsical. Basketball is his honored career, not his spiritual calling. Under acceptable or ideal conditions, it might not be a reach to say that he would like to keep Carmelo Anthony with the Knicks and that he believes he can help Anthony grow as a player. But all things considered, it is difficult to imagine him losing much sleep if Anthony walks. For Jackson, the Anthony issue is more of a compulsory calculation than a potential catastrophe. Jackson said as much in April when asked if he would consider Anthony’s leaving as a free agent in July a debacle for the Knicks, given how many assets they had surrendered to get him. Most sports executives — and certainly recent Knicks officials under the thumb of James L. Dolan — would have answered such a question by flatly saying that they do not deal in hypotheticals. Not Jackson. With that familiar I-know-something-you-don’t smile, he seemed eager to flaunt at least the perception of ambivalence. “I’m all about moving forward,” he said. “Just deal with what is and move forward. If it’s in the cards, man, are we fortunate. If it’s not in the cards, man, are we fortunate. We’re going forward, anyway.” When was the last time you heard such a thing relative to an N.B.A. franchise player in the middle of his prime? These are athletes who typically make groveling supplicants of front-office folks, whose mere sneeze brings some poor flunky running with a Kleenex. Jackson also said that day that he would expect Anthony to give the Knicks the contractual discount he had previously said he was amenable to as a way to give the team more salary-cap flexibility for its eventual pursuit of free agents. Whatever the savings, it was never going to make that much of a difference. Being able to pay Anthony the most money is the best thing the Knicks have going for them. The savings would be little more than tokenism for the purpose of allowing Anthony to say he had sacrificed for the team. So what was the point of Jackson publicly posturing at the risk of upsetting Anthony and his agent — which he most certainly did — and having them retaliate by whispering that Anthony was edging in the direction of leaving to lend his explosive offensive skills set to a more formidable team? People familiar with the Zen master said it was a longtime Jacksonian tactic of using the news media to impose his will or, at least, to state his terms. Beyond the money, Jackson’s message was to let Anthony know that if he did stay, he had better be clear on the understanding that the organizational culture would be changing. Anthony might still be the core of the offense. No longer would he putatively be in charge. The system designed for the collective — the triangle or some facsimile installed by the new coach, Derek Fisher — would take precedence over Anthony’s personal comfort zone. Jackson’s 11 championship-coached teams were hardly democracies, catering as they did to resident superstars in Chicago and Los Angeles. But Jackson understood that Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant were not selfless and compliant, like Tim Duncan. His team-first doctrines have always been bendable, as long as he believed concessions were made in the best interests of winning. In Anthony’s case, his teams in Denver and New York, while lacking in co-stars, catered to his every whim and were rewarded with the grand total of three playoff series victories in 11 years. To blame him for all or much of that would be the same foolish act of piling on LeBron James for whatever his teams have failed to achieve. But Anthony should be accountable for admittedly not being in the best shape along with not grasping the purity of team play until he had to share with players as good or better during the Olympics. Come to think of it, his apparent need of positive role models is as good a reason as any to tell the Knicks next week that he will opt out of his deal and find a new home. Beyond the money, perhaps the only compelling reason to stay would be if Anthony and his good friend James, in the wake of Miami’s five-game flameout in the finals, have been cooking up a scheme for James to join him in New York after next season. Dolan could be seizing up with fear over the pending loss of his signature acquisition, but let’s presume he does not want to risk being ridiculed for meddling 20 minutes after promising Jackson autonomy in running the basketball operation. Season-ticket renewals were due months ago. Isn’t it possible that Jackson has made a convincing argument to Dolan on the alternative to sinking so much into a 30-year-old gunner so set in his ways? Why not turn the team over for one season to the willing shooters Tim Hardaway Jr., J. R. Smith, Andrea Bargnani and Amar’e Stoudemire? Why not begin to clear out salary for the big purging next summer and maximize the rare first-round draft pick the team has next season? Why not start fresh and have Jackson mix and match the most talented free agents over the next two years? Jackson, remember, has a five-year, $60 million deal as the latest enrollee in the Dolan Super Pension Fund. Man, is he fortunate. He has time. He has leverage in playing the percentages, calculating the future, with the understanding that there are no guarantees and that this isn’t life or death. Not for him. Not for the Knicks.

Basketball
Knicks
Carmelo Anthony
Phil Jackson


Climate Change - Global Warming - Energy Sources

Abstract: Human progress, Loren Eiseley wrote in 1954, has largely been a climb up “the heat ladder” from one energy source to the next. Each has been more convenient or potent or economical than the last. No one lugs firewood to warm a high-rise apartment building in Chicago. But the climb has stalled. The potential of the atom has been sharply limited by safety and security questions and fusion’s persistent hurdles. Sunlight, identified as far back as Thomas Edison’s time as the ultimate energy source, is still costly to transform into electricity on a large scale. As a result, 21st-century civilization is still stuck on a 19th-century rung — the coal step on that heat ladder — while two billion people in Africa and other struggling regions still cook meals on smoldering dung and sticks, with a million-plus dying young each year from lung ailments as a result. Many in such places would love nothing more than a lump of coal. And now science says we can’t afford to stay where we are much longer. The huge projected expansion in coal burning over the next few decades, mainly in China and India but also in the United States and parts of Europe, will (without new technology) produce a buildup of long-lived carbon dioxide sufficient to warm the atmosphere, erode ice sheets and raise and acidify seas for many centuries. (Burning oil matters too, of course, but that is seen as a more tractable issue by many experts.) It’s no wonder that scientists immersed for decades in this problem are running out of metaphors in pressing the public to act — whether the choice is a surge of research on nonpolluting energy technologies, a rising “tipping fee” for continued greenhouse-gas emissions, or a combination of these and other steps. James E. Hansen, the top NASA climate scientist, has been lauded and criticized in recent days for accusing society of willfully ignoring a tragedy unfolding in plain sight in the same way millions of people did as the Holocaust swept Europe. As I noted last week in a post to the blog Dot Earth, he likened coal trains that serve high-emitting power plants to “death trains.” In response, Dr. Hansen distributed an essay apologizing for, and justifying, his language and calling for better ideas. “It is hard for me to think of a different, equally poignant example of the foreseeable consequence faced by fellow creatures on the planet,” Dr. Hansen wrote. “Suggestions are welcome.” One interesting experiment intended to cast the climate problem in a new way can be found at DeSmogBlog.com , where people are invited to write “100-Year Letters” discussing climate with their great-grandchildren. Keep in mind that sociologists studying global warming don’t hold out much hope that any language — if not accompanied by a big kick from nature — can motivate people to embrace the need to leave the comfort zone of coal. In a 2006 paper in the journal Climatic Change, subtitled “Why Global Warming Does Not Scare Us (Yet),” Elke U. Weber of Columbia University listed various reasons why people fail to absorb messages on long-term risks. The reasons include established sociological concepts like the “finite pool of worry” hypothesis, in which daily struggles swamp even life-threatening long-term risks (not finding the time to replace worn tires) and “single-action bias,” exemplified by a 1991 study finding that radiologists looking for tumors or other problems in X-rays tend to halt their search after discovering the first one, leaving additional problems undetected. As a journalist, of course, it would be hard for me to abandon the notion that language can help society meaningfully address the entwined energy and climate challenges. I’ll be posting some fresh efforts by experts to describe the situation and offer solutions. You can post yours, as well, at nytimes.com/dotearth .

Global Warming
Language and Languages
Science and Technology
Energy and Power
Coal
Energy Efficiency


Yvonne Brill, Rocket Scientist, Dies at 88

Abstract: She was a brilliant rocket scientist who followed her husband from job to job and took eight years off from work to raise three children. “The world’s best mom,” her son Matthew said. Yvonne Brill, who died on Wednesday at 88 in Princeton, N.J., in the early 1970s invented a propulsion system to help keep communications satellites from slipping out of their orbits. The system became the industry standard, and it was the achievement President Obama mentioned in 2011 in presenting her with the National Medal of Technology and Innovation. Her personal and professional balancing act also won notice. In 1980, Harper’s Bazaar magazine and the DeBeers Corporation gave her their Diamond Superwoman award for returning to a successful career after starting a family. Mrs. Brill — she preferred to be called Mrs., her son said — is believed to have been the only woman in the United States who was actually doing rocket science in the mid-1940s, when she worked on the first designs for an American satellite. It was a distinction she earned in the face of obstacles, beginning when the University of Manitoba in Canada refused to let her major in engineering because there were no accommodations for women at an outdoor engineering camp, which students were required to attend. “You just have to be cheerful about it and not get upset when you get insulted,” she once said. Mrs. Brill’s development of a more efficient rocket thruster to keep orbiting satellites in place allowed satellites to carry less fuel and more equipment and to stay in space longer. The thrusters have the delicate task of maneuvering a weightless satellite that can tip the scales at up to 5,000 pounds on Earth. Mrs. Brill contributed to the propulsion systems of Tiros, the first weather satellite; Nova, a series of rocket designs that were used in American moon missions; the Atmosphere Explorer, the first upper-atmosphere satellite; and the Mars Observer, which in 1992 almost entered a Mars orbit before losing communication with Earth. From 1981 to 1983, Mrs. Brill worked for NASA developing the rocket motor for the space shuttle. In a statement after Mrs. Brill’s death, Michael Griffin, president of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, praised her as “a pioneering spirit” who coupled “a clear vision of what the future of an entire area of systems should be with the ingenuity and genius necessary to make that vision a reality.” Yvonne Madelaine Claeys was born on Dec. 30, 1924, in St. Vital, a suburb of Winnipeg, Manitoba. Her parents had separately immigrated from Flanders, in Belgium. Her father was a carpenter. Image Yvonne Brill receiving the National Medal of Technology and Innovation from President Obama at the White House in 2011. Credit Win Mcnamee/Getty Images After the University of Manitoba barred her from the engineering program, she studied mathematics and chemistry instead and graduated at the top of her class. Her lack of an engineering degree did not prevent her from getting a job with Douglas Aircraft in Santa Monica, Calif. “Nobody had the right degrees back then, so it didn’t matter,” she told The Star-Ledger of Newark in 2010. “I didn’t have engineering, but the engineers didn’t have the chemistry and math.” She never received a professional engineer’s license, but did pick up a master’s in chemistry at the University of Southern California while working as a saleswoman for a chemical company. Afterward she went to work for Douglas, whose satellite project became the foundation of the RAND Corporation, an early research center. It was at RAND that she worked on the first American satellite designs, remaining there for three years. While still peddling chemicals, she met William Franklin Brill, a research chemist, at a talk by Linus Pauling, who would win one of his Nobel Prizes in chemistry. At one point Mr. Brill told her about his problems making a particular chemical in his lab. She replied that she could sell it to him by the pound at a very low price. Soon, the couple went square-dancing, only to discover that they both hated it. They found other interests, and married in 1951. He died in 2010. They moved to Connecticut in 1952 when Mr. Brill got a job there. She followed him again when he later got a job in New Jersey. She did not mind the moves, her son Matthew said. She would say, “Good husbands are harder to find than good jobs.” Still, she managed to find jobs that allowed her to continue to work on rockets. One was at Wright Aeronautical in New Jersey. She left the company in 1958, however, to care for her young children, keeping her hand in the field by working part-time as a consultant for the FMC Corporation. In 1966, she went back to work full time, taking a job at RCA’s rocket subsidiary. Soon she doing the work that won international acclaim. Mrs. Brill patented her propulsion system for satellites in 1972, and the first communications satellite using it was launched in 1983. It is still being used by satellites that handle worldwide phone service, long-range television broadcasts and other tasks. Part of Mrs. Brill’s rationale for going into rocket engineering was that virtually no other women were doing so. “I reckoned they would not invent rules to discriminate against one person,” she said in a 1990 interview. Throughout her career Mrs. Brill encouraged women to become engineers and scientists, starting by telling high school girls to stick with math. In her last week of life, she was still writing letters recommending eminent women in engineering for professional awards. Her own many awards include the NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal in 2001 and top honors from several major engineering societies. Matthew Brill said his mother died of complications of breast cancer. She lived in Skillman, N.J. Mrs. Brill is also survived by another son, Joseph; a daughter, Naomi Brill; and four grandchildren. In 2010, when Mrs. Brill was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, The Washington Post began its article about the event by lauding two other honorees, Arthur Fry and Spencer Silver, the inventors of Post-its. The article went on to suggest that it took two men to create an adhesive stationery but only one woman to figure out how to keep satellites in place.

Yvonne Brill
Rocket
Obituary
Women and Girls


Microsoft to License Part of Key Code to European Rivals

Abstract: BRUSSELS, Jan. 25 - Facing daily fines from European regulators, Microsoft said on Wednesday that it would license some of the source code for its Windows operating system to competitors. The move is an attempt to comply with a ruling by the European Commission in March 2004 that Microsoft had violated antitrust laws. The company was fined 497 million euros (about $600 million) at that time and ordered to share details of its operating system with rival software makers. The company generated 12,000 pages of technical documentation, but the commission was not satisfied and filed a new lawsuit against Microsoft in December, accusing it of failing to supply the information the commission had demanded and of charging too much for the data it was offering. Microsoft has until Feb. 15 to reply to the objections. Under European antitrust rules, regulators were threatening to fine Microsoft up to 2 million euros a day if it failed to comply with the ruling. The decision to allow access to some Windows source code aims to address "categorically" all of the issues raised by the commission last month, Microsoft said in a statement. "Today we are putting our most valuable intellectual property on the table so we can put technical compliance issues to rest," Bradford L. Smith, Microsoft's general counsel, said at a news conference in Brussels. The company will offer licenses to examine the code that controls communications between servers, which rivals could use to develop Windows-compatible software. The rivals will not be allowed to copy the code and it will not be available for open-source platforms, like Linux. "We're not open-sourcing Windows," Mr. Smith said. The office of the spokesman for the European Union's competition commissioner, Neelie Kroes, said it would study the announcement once it received the full details. The European Union said it still required a response to the objections raised in December. At his news conference, Mr. Smith acknowledged that the offer to license some Windows source code "doesn't lay to rest all the issues," referring to the pricing of licenses. The source code would be offered in addition to the other technical information the company has already agreed to supply at no extra cost, he said. "There will be no impact on the price, but the value of the information will be greater," he said. Microsoft would be open to negotiating prices for the package of technical information and the source code details with companies or developers interested in buying the license, he added. Rival software developers contended that access to the code would not restore competition to the market. John Loiacono, executive vice president for software at Sun Microsystems, which has in recent years been promoting a strategy of open-sourced software, called Microsoft's decision a small improvement but one that does not go far enough. Two years ago, Sun settled antitrust and patent lawsuits against Microsoft for $1.6 billion, after trying for years to get access to its underlying technology. "This is Microsoft fighting, kicking and screaming, to deliver the bare minimum," Mr. Loiacono said. Far from restoring competition, disclosing the source code could make life even harder for free software developers, said Joaquim Jakobs, head of media relations at the Free Software Foundation, a grass-roots group that is supporting the European commission in its fight with Microsoft. Developers want access to protocols hidden within Windows, not the source code, Mr. Jacobs said. "Source code is like a completed university thesis, whereas the protocols are like grammar and vocabulary books you need in order to understand the thesis," he said. "Because that source code is under Microsoft copyright, developers who have seen the source code could not reimplement it in free software for fear of copyright violation." Microsoft has appealed the overall antitrust ruling, and the Court of First Instance, Europe's second-highest court, said on Wednesday that it would hold a public hearing on the case from April 24 to April 28.

EUROPEAN UNION
MICROSOFT CORP
COMPUTER SOFTWARE


Justices Hear a Drama Straight From Tabloids

Abstract: Correction Appended WASHINGTON, Feb. 28 - The case before the Supreme Court on Tuesday seemed to have a little of everything: a May-December romance between a former Playboy model and a Texas oil tycoon, elements of jealousy and charges of deception and, for scholars, even some serious legal issues. But the pre-argument scuffle outside the court building, in which several photographers were knocked down in their eagerness to get a picture of Anna Nicole Smith, was probably not ignited by any burning interest in the proper role of federal courts in state probate proceedings. Ms. Smith was dressed in black and appeared somber as lawyers argued over what should become of the estate of her husband, J. Howard Marshall II, who died in 1995 at age 90. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said "a substantial amount of assets" was at stake, a safe enough observation given that Mr. Marshall's estate has been estimated as high as $1.6 billion. And Justice Stephen G. Breyer seemed on equally safe ground when he remarked that the case made up "quite a story." Mr. Marshall was 89 and Ms. Smith 26 when they married in 1994 after a two-year courtship. It was his third marriage and her second. Court records say Mr. Marshall encouraged his mate's career before and during their marriage and paid for her acting lessons. Ms. Smith was Playboy's Playmate of the Year in 1992 and modeled for jeans commercials and advertisements. Mr. Marshall died 14 months after the wedding, setting the stage for a battle between his widow and his son E. Pierce Marshall, who, according to court papers, had feared that his father would be as generous to his young wife as he was to a longtime mistress who had died in 1990. The elder Mr. Marshall was generous, showering his wife with clothes and jewelry. She has also maintained that he repeatedly promised her half his estate as an inducement to marry him. In 1982, Mr. Marshall had established his "estate plan," consisting of a will and a living trust. Lawyers for his son have insisted that Ms. Smith got all she was entitled to while her husband was alive. A Texas state probate court sided with the son. Ms. Smith, who is also known as Vickie Lynn Marshall, sued in a federal bankruptcy court in California, setting up a showdown over jurisdiction. She accused her husband's son of scheming to deny her an inheritance. That court agreed with her, awarding her $475 million and declaring that E. Pierce Marshall had "adopted a scorched-earth approach" to the case. E. Pierce Marshall gave no hint of softening his stance after the Supreme Court arguments, telling reporters his side still has issues that "will be pursued vigorously," no matter what the Supreme Court does. One question that may go unanswered is how J. Howard Marshall II left his affairs in such apparent confusion. He was not just an oilman. He was a lawyer -- a professor of trusts and estates at Yale Law School. The case is Marshall v. Marshall, 04-1544. Correction: March 10, 2006, Friday An article on March 1 about arguments before the Supreme Court over the estate of the Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II omitted credit for the reported comments of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., Justice Stephen G. Breyer and E. Pierce Marshall, a son involved in the lawsuit. The article also omitted credit for a description of Anna Nicole Smith, a former Playboy model who married Mr. Marshall 14 months before he died. The quotations and the physical description were all supplied by The Associated Press.


Efforts to Curb Foreign Bribery Lack Vigor, Report Finds

Abstract: PARIS — Patchy enforcement is jeopardizing the success of international anti-bribery accords that were reached more than a decade ago, according to a report published Tuesday by an advocacy group. The group, Transparency International, evaluated 36 countries and found that only four — Germany, Norway, Switzerland and the United States — actively enforced the O.E.C.D.’s anti-bribery convention, which they have all signed. “Whether through antiquated bribery laws, outright political obstruction of investigations, lack of adequate funding for prosecutors or curtailing the powers of investigative magistrates the O.E.C.D. convention is facing grave challenges,” the group said. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s anti-bribery convention was signed in 1997 and entered into force in 1999. It represents a collective commitment to ban foreign bribery by the leading industrialized countries, which account for the majority of global exports and foreign investment. It has been adopted by 38 countries and has helped bring changes in national legislation. For example, until a few years ago, many European governments let companies deduct “commissions” paid to win foreign contracts from their taxes. France outlawed such practices in 2000 and Germany followed suit in 2003. One major obstacle to further progress is the use national security considerations as a reason for not prosecuting foreign bribery, the group said. In 2006, for example, the British government ordered the Serious Fraud Office to drop an investigation into BAE’s Al-Yamamah contract with Saudi Arabia. Britain’s highest court of appeal upheld that decision based on national security grounds. “It needs to be said there is an area where we are really struggling, fighting, and that’s in my view the defense industry,” said Mark Pieth, chairman of the O.E.C.D. working group on bribery. Over all, the situation in Britain has improved, as it has concluded four foreign bribery cases in the past year, and about 20 investigations are under way, Transparency International said. Britain was identified along with 10 other countries, including France, Japan, South Korea, Spain and Sweden, as “moderately” enforcing the pledges. The report said 21 countries had little or no enforcement, including Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Israel, Poland, South Africa and Turkey. In Germany, there are more than 150 ongoing investigations into foreign bribery, the report said, while there have been 16 convictions under laws enacted since the convention entered into force. In the United States, 21 cases were opened last year and 120 have been initiated since the convention entered into force. Israel and South Africa joined the convention during the past year. China, India and Russia also need to be brought into the fold to make it more effective, it said.


Kwame Kilpatrick, Ex-Detroit Mayor, Guilty in Corruption Case

Abstract: DETROIT — Kwame M. Kilpatrick, a former mayor of Detroit, was found guilty on Monday of a raft of charges, including racketeering, fraud and extortion, capping a five-month public corruption trial against him and two co-defendants. The jury found Mr. Kilpatrick guilty of 24 of the 30 charges against him, including the most serious charges of racketeering and extortion, which each carry maximum sentences of 20 years. At an afternoon bond hearing, Mr. Kilpatrick and Bobby W. Ferguson, a city contractor, appeared stunned after being ordered to prison pending sentencing. Judge Nancy G. Edmunds cited the possible risk of fleeing and danger to the community. No sentencing date was set. Lawyers for Mr. Kilpatrick, 40, said they were considering an appeal and a reduction of the ex-mayor’s presentencing time. The verdicts brought to a close a trial in which prosecutors laid out a complex case against Mr. Kilpatrick and his co-defendants — including his father, Bernard, and Mr. Ferguson — arguing that they had used the mayor’s office to enrich themselves for years through shakedowns, kickbacks and bid-rigging schemes. Mr. Ferguson, the ex-mayor’s friend and construction contractor, was found guilty of 9 of 11 counts, including racketeering. Mr. Kilpatrick’s father, who faced four charges, was found guilty of filing a false tax return, a crime punishable by up to three years in prison. The jury did not reach a verdict on racketeering in the case against Mr. Kilpatrick’s father. The indictment contained 45 charges. As verdicts were read Mr. Kilpatrick was, by turns, dismayed and stoic, shaking his head and muttering, and glancing at his lawyer. Most of the jurors looked away from the defendants. All but one member of the jury panel returned to the courtroom after the verdict to speak with reporters about their two-week deliberations, described as respectful but sometimes contentious. “There was no one piece of evidence that sealed the deal,” said one juror, who like the other members declined to be quoted by name. “We weighed all the evidence as a whole.” Image Bobby W. Ferguson, center, a contractor, was also convicted in the corruption trial in Detroit. Credit Bill Pugliano/Getty Images Another juror said she had voted for Mr. Kilpatrick twice in elections. “I was disappointed having done that,” she said. “Sitting on this trial for the last six months, I really, really saw a lot that turned my stomach.” In an indictment filed in 2010, the defendants were charged with operating a criminal enterprise out of the mayor’s office. In a case that featured about 80 witnesses, the prosecution accused the former mayor of promulgating fear among contractors to steer $84 million in work to Mr. Ferguson, who would share proceeds with him. Prosecutors also said he illegally used nonprofit funds and state grants for personal expenses. In his closing argument, Michael Bullotta, an assistant United States attorney, had said the defendants’ enrichment formula was simple: “No deal without me.” James C. Thomas, Mr. Kilpatrick’s lawyer, had argued that the federal case was founded on weak circumstantial evidence and lying witnesses. Barbara McQuade, United States attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, said the case was about the future. “This verdict has sent a powerful message that corruption will not be tolerated in this community,” she said in a news conference. “Candidates should seek office to make a difference, not to make money for themselves.” Mayor Dave Bing said in a statement, “It is time for all of us to move forward with a renewed commitment to transparency and high ethical standards in our city government.” A resident of Detroit, Joan Manchester, 56, said she was happy the trial was over. “Maybe we can go on and do something good in this city now,” she said during a meal in a nearby restaurant. “That was a mess, right there. But you can’t just take office and do what you want.” The convictions culminate a long fall for Mr. Kilpatrick, who had been elected mayor at 31, the youngest person to hold that position. He had been viewed by many as a future star in the Democratic Party. But his tenure, from 2002 to 2008, was marked by scandal and queries into possible misuse of city finances. In 2008, text messages were discovered by The Detroit Free Press that revealed an affair with his chief of staff . Mr. Kilpatrick resigned after being charged with perjury and obstruction of justice. “I’m relieved that the basic premise that public service is an honorable profession that needs to be held to the highest standards has been affirmed,” said Sheila Cockrel, who served on Detroit’s City Council from 1994 until 2009. “But there’s a sense of sadness that this once bright son of Detroit, who once held such promise, used all that talent to run a criminal enterprise.” She added: “It’s just a tragedy, a Detroit tragedy.”

Decisions and Verdicts
Kwame M Kilpatrick
Detroit
Fraud
Racketeering
Extortion and Blackmail


At Pattycakes in Queens, Recreating Pastries From Around the Globe

Abstract: The vanilla in the extract sold at Pattycakes, a cake-supply store in Queens, originates in Madagascar, but it is when the tiny bottles leave the shop that the spice truly becomes multinational. Colombian patrons who descend the stairs to the tiny store buy it to make a darkly hued cake called pastel negro. Customers from the Dominican Republic take home bottles for pastel Dominicano, a yellow cake capped with meringue. Jamaican shoppers use it for the dense, nearly black fruitcake they favor for weddings, and Mexicans employ it to spice up their light tres leches cakes. Pattycakes is not the most expansive baking-supply shop in Jackson Heights. Nor is it even the only one on Junction Boulevard, where it has been for 17 years. But tucked in the shelves, between items like paint buckets of Bavarian chocolate filling, the wares offer a remarkable account of how the ever-shifting immigrant population of Queens has shaped the taste of the city. The store’s location, in one of the most ethnically diverse areas in the city, has turned the owner, Patricia Zoll, into a culinary translator of sorts. Ms. Zoll and her employees Fermin and Karen Gil, a brother and a sister whose father is a baker at Barranquilla bakery down the street, spend many evenings testing products and techniques. Much of the work at Pattycakes, they say, is in figuring out which icing sugar, fondant or food coloring will work to recreate pastries from a planet’s worth of traditions. Jackson Heights is bounded on the east by Corona, one of the city’s largest Latin American neighborhoods, which Mr. Gil, 20, who has worked here since he was 14, estimates is 70 percent of their clientele. Accordingly, the shop is stuffed with paraphernalia for quinceañeras — sweet-15 parties commonly held for girls in Latin American countries — including phalanxes of plastic dolls. Traditional quinceañera confections use 14 plastic dolls ascending a staircase on a tiered wedding-style cake. The over-the-top cakes often feature a fountain of colored water. Selling those, for Mr. Gil, became a lesson in the area’s diversity. Mexican customers ask for the fountain as a “fuente,” and Guatemalans want a “hontanar.” When a customer came in asking for a “pila,” Mr. Gil said they did not carry such a thing. Only later did he discover it was the Ecuadorean term for the product. “I lost a sale because of that,” said Mr. Gil, who will be studying advertising at Baruch College this winter. “You have to keep up-to-date with all different linguistics.” Jackson Heights also has a large South Asian community, many of whom come to Pattycakes to buy bottles of caramel flavoring used in steamed caramel pudding. For the area’s small Jewish population, Ms. Zoll has added kosher fondant and dreidel-shape lollipop molds. The plastic babies that adorn cakes for baby showers, christenings or brit milahs are sold in a variety of skin tones — but not enough, Mr. Gil said. More than 40 percent of the population of nearby Elmhurst is Chinese, according to the 2010 census. Ms. Zoll, who has owned the store since 1998, found that many of her Chinese customers specialized in custard confections topped with fresh fruits, preserved under a veneer of apricot glaze. The Chinese method was so good, the Pattycakes crew recommended it to others. It is now the go-to method for the store’s Mexican customers when making fruit-topped tres leches. One of Ms. Zoll’s favorite parts about running this type of store is that most customers are celebrating a joyful occasion: a marriage, birth or other milestone. One exception, she said, was among many Haitian bakers. “Funeral cake,” she said. “That’s part of their culture.” Dark purple and black are now among the food-coloring options. Ms. Zoll’s parents were shopkeepers in Mexico City, and she spent her girlhood hanging around their store, chatting with customers. Pattycakes was born when she bought the cake-supply division of a party store where she worked; but the business, she said, resulted from a love of commerce, not cake. “I don’t bake,” Ms. Zoll said. “I love people.” Ethnicity is only one type of diversity reflected in the little, cramped shop. Last year, Mr. Gil fielded his first request from a gay couple for a wedding-cake topper featuring two men — an item the couple had had difficulty finding. “They told me a story that they went to another store and they looked at them differently,” Mr. Gil said. He spent an hour hot-gluing chintz and roses in the couple’s wedding colors — burgundy and white — into a custom two-groom cake topper. “Looking at their faces, it was like, all right, that’s a payoff,” he said. He charged the usual price: $21.99.

Pattycakes (Queens NY Retail Store)
Cakes
Queens (NYC)
Immigration and Emigration


Stanford’s Offense Is Built on Rock-Solid Linemen

Abstract: PALO ALTO, Calif. — The play that best encapsulates the revival of Stanford’s football team, which has gone from 1-11 in 2006 to a national title contender in 2011, is called 97 Power. Right guard David DeCastro pulls hard to his left to bulldoze a linebacker, and left tackle Jonathan Martin, known as Moose, blocks a defensive end to clear the way for a simple inside running play. Quarterback Andrew Luck, the front-runner to win the Heisman Trophy, does nothing more than hand off the ball, allowing the play to showcase the power and toughness of DeCastro and Martin, two other Stanford stars who project as high picks in the next N.F.L. draft. “You know it’s coming,” Shannon Turley, Stanford’s strength coach, said. “If you don’t like it, do something about it. That’s the mind-set we’ve tried to instill in our players.” Perhaps the most fascinating part of Stanford’s transformation is the manner in which the program has ascended from the Pac-10 outhouse to the Pac-12 penthouse. Unlike with so many revivals of the past 10 years — Utah, Oregon and Texas Tech come to mind — Stanford has not spread the field to even the playing field. Instead, it has jammed the line of scrimmage with tight ends in a pro-style offense and run a metaphorical fullback dive behind DeCastro and Martin into the national elite. Coach David Shaw fancies Stanford a power running team that happens to have the country’s best quarterback. While Luck receives a majority of the credit and adulation for Stanford’s 6-0 start and No. 7 ranking, he is one of nine potential draft picks among the fourth- and fifth-year players on the team’s roster, according to N.F.L. evaluators. That does not include a handful of third-year juniors and redshirt sophomores who have also emerged as prospects. Martin and DeCastro are not far behind Luck, the presumptive No. 1 pick in the 2012 draft. Martin is considered the top tackle prospect in the country and is projected to be taken in the top 10, and DeCastro is expected to be selected late in the first round or in the second. Despite having three first-year starters on the offensive line, Stanford leads the country with just two sacks allowed. “There’s so much more talent here than people realize,” Luck said. “Look at David and Moose. There’s a reason we’ve had a good running game. Look at how many games they’ve played the last three years.” There is also a banner group of tight ends, with the 6-foot-6 redshirt sophomore Zach Ertz, the 6-6 fifth-year senior Coby Fleener and the 6-8 redshirt sophomore Levine Toilolo making up what is considered the country’s best unit. They have combined for 12 touchdown catches, six by Fleener. “We have a better tight end group than a lot of N.F.L. teams right now,” Shaw said. Martin’s journey to Stanford came after he committed to U.C.L.A. and resisted strong overtures from Harvard, the alma mater of his parents, Gus Martin and Jane Howard-Martin. Gus Martin said the family was told by Harvard’s admissions office that his son would have been the university’s first fourth-generation African-American student. Martin’s great-grandfather on his mother’s side, John Fitzgerald, graduated from Harvard in 1924 and knew W. E. B. DuBois. When Harvard Coach Tim Murphy came to the Martin house on a recruiting visit, Gus Martin said his son candidly told Murphy that he would most likely go to Stanford if he was accepted. There was little resistance from his parents. “It took us one night of sleep, and after about 24 hours we finally figured it out,” Gus Martin said of Stanford with a laugh. “Frankly, it’s the full package. You cannot avoid becoming an educated young man or woman there.” There is still a chance he could end up at Harvard; after his N.F.L. career, Martin plans to attend law school. Gus Martin said his son came up with that himself. “He wants to be a trial lawyer,” said Vic Eumont, Martin’s coach at Harvard-Westlake School in the Los Angeles area. “And he’ll be the biggest around.” Shaw joked that the quiet DeCastro “arrived in a bad mood” and had not changed. “David speaks when something needs to be said,” Shaw said. “When he speaks, you better listen.” Luck unleashes his trademark goofy laugh when recalling that DeCastro often will not reciprocate high-fives in practice and that his on-field intensity carries over to their living quarters. “He’ll yell at us if we don’t clean up,” Luck said before mocking DeCastro’s deep voice. “At first it’s a gentle reminder, then it’s like, ‘Get it done.’ ” DeCastro is from the Seattle area but his parents are South African and his father and grandfather were rugby stars in that country. His mother, Jennifer DeCastro, said she is 6-1 and took partial credit for her son’s height, which is 6-6. But his father, Colin DeCastro, said that David’s penchant for numbers — he is majoring in management science and engineering, and acknowledges he “hates to read” — comes from Jennifer, who has three degrees, including a Ph.D. in audiology from Florida. David DeCastro never played rugby, but he also did not play football until ninth grade. Still, Colin tried to channel a rugby-like intensity into David while coaching his youth teams. Among the keepsakes that Colin DeCastro has from his rugby career are the loss of two front teeth and a scar from a cut on his right eyebrow that required 19 stitches. “A lot of the pieces of American football fit into the matrix of rugby,” Colin DeCastro said. “Except that football is more specialized.” DeCastro and Martin arrived at Stanford as what Shaw called “cookie cutouts for N.F.L. football players.” They both credit Turley for maximizing their potential by transforming them physically. Both redshirted as freshmen and have been mainstays the past three seasons, with DeCastro starting every game and Martin starting all but two games, both when he was a redshirt freshman. They said Turley’s nuanced training approach was the reason they had missed fewer than 10 practices combined during their careers and never needed surgery. “Knock on wood,” Martin said with a smile. Turley does not emphasize lifting a maximum amount of weight, instead focusing on repetitions and core strength that will help a lineman move the man in front of him. Turley often says that players only bench-press someone on the field if someone is on top of them, not a good thing for a lineman. There are no weight lifting records posted in the Stanford weight room, only the final scores of games Stanford has won. “I don’t care about how much guys bench, squat and clean,” Turley said, referring to traditional lifting benchmarks in football programs. “Until they start giving us points for it on Saturdays; then maybe I’ll care.” Do not mistake nontraditional for soft, however. Martin came to Stanford at 261 pounds with 19 percent body fat and is now 303 pounds with 23 percent body fat. He has improved his vertical jump to 32 inches from 30 ½, despite the weight gain. DeCastro’s transformation has been just as drastic. His weight has jumped from 295 to 315 while his body fat has decreased more than 4 percent to 17.3. His vertical jump increased a remarkable seven inches to 29 ½. DeCastro can bench 225 pounds 35 times, which would have been first among offensive linemen at the scouting combine last year. “Iron sharpens iron,” Turley said of Martin and DeCastro. “They want to push with and compete with each other.” Martin and DeCastro both have black ski caps from the Tunnel Workers Union, a name tabbed by the former Stanford lineman Chris Marinelli, whose father, Jim, worked on the Big Dig in Boston. In tech-rich Palo Alto, the tunnels do not just involve broadband anymore. Led by two linchpin linemen, Stanford is bulling its way toward another celebrated season.

Football
College Athletics
Draft and Recruitment (Sports)
Stanford University
Luck Andrew
Football (College)
DeCastro David
Martin Jonathan (1989- )


NBC Will Televise Major Triple Crown Prep Races

Abstract: Churchill Downs and NBC Sports are expected to announce Monday an agreement to broadcast six major prep races leading to the Kentucky Derby as part of a plan to attract casual fans as well as horseplayers. The move comes as NBC positions itself to win back the three legs of the Triple Crown in 2011. NBC had broadcast the Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes from 2001 to 2005. The network has kept the first two legs, but ESPN-ABC has shown the Belmont since 2006 and is in the last year of a five year-contract. The three one-hour broadcasts, two on NBC and one on USA Network, will include the Louisiana Derby, the Lane’s End Stakes, the Santa Anita Derby, the Wood Memorial, the Blue Grass Stakes and the Arkansas Derby. Last year, Churchill Downs and NBC Sports used a big-event strategy in its marketing, and the 2009 race wound up being the most-viewed Derby in two decades with a 26 percent increase in viewers. As part of the strategy, NBC tried to appeal to women on its Bravo channel with race-related promos and a telecast of the Kentucky Oaks, the premier race for 3-year-old fillies, on the eve of the Derby. Each of the three one-hour “Road to the Kentucky Derby” broadcasts will feature the races along with the handicapping and lifestyle segments, a strategy designed to broaden the audience for these races and to drive viewership of the Kentucky Derby and the Triple Crown. “This approach has been effective in bringing new fans to racing, and we hope to see similar success with the ‘Road to the Kentucky Derby’ series,” said Bob Evans, the president and chief executive of Churchill Downs Inc. “The key difference is that we promote racing to both men and women by focusing on the fan’s entire experience of racing, not just the race itself. This includes food, fashion and celebrity.” The series leading to the May 1 Derby will begin March 27 on USA Network with the Louisiana Derby from New Orleans, and will also include the Lane’s End Stakes from Turfway Park in Florence, Ky. On April 3, the Santa Anita Derby from California will be shown along with the Wood Memorial from Aqueduct. An April 10 broadcast will be headlined by the Blue Grass Stakes from Lexington, Ky., and the Arkansas Derby from Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark. Ken Schanzer, the president of NBC Sports, said, “Adding the broadcasts of these important Derby prep races allows us to introduce key story lines that continue to build the broadest possible audience for the Kentucky Derby and the sport of thoroughbred racing.”

Triple Crown (Horse Racing)
Television
National Broadcasting Co
Kentucky Derby
USA Network


A Youzhny-Haase Final at the Swiss Open

Abstract: Mikhail Youzhny will play unseeded Robin Haase in the Swiss Open final in Gstaad. Haase rallied to beat fifth-seeded Feliciano López, 4-6, 6-1, 6-4. The sixth-seeded Youzhny broke Victor Hanescu’s serve twice in each set to beat him, 6-3, 6-3. ■ Third-seeded Fabio Fognini saved three match points before reaching the final of the Croatia Open in Umag, beating Gaël Monfils, 6-0, 3-6, 7-6 (3). Fognini will face fifth-seeded Tommy Robredo, a 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 winner over second-seeded Andreas Seppi. ■ Top-seeded John Isner beat No. 7 Lleyton Hewitt, 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (5), to reach the Atlanta Open final. Isner will play second-seeded Kevin Anderson, a 6-3, 7-6 (3) winner over Ryan Harrison. ■ Dominika Cibulkova reached her second WTA Tour final this year, coasting past Sorana Cirstea, 6-4, 6-0, in the Bank of the West Classic in Stanford, Calif. Cibulkova will face top-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska, who overcame a shaky start to beat the American Jamie Hampton, 6-3, 6-2, with relative ease.

Tennis
Mikhail Youzhny
Fabio Fognini
John Isner
Dominika Cibulkova
Tommy Robredo
Swiss Open


When the Splurge Takes Its Toll

Abstract: ON the way up, financial toxic waste was sold as “a new paradigm.” Now, on the long way down, the response is “Help, the sky is falling!” Two angry new books attempt to explain what happened. In “ The Trillion Dollar Meltdown” (PublicAffairs, $22.95), Charles R. Morris offers a persuasive diagnosis of the long-building credit crash, with a regulatory prescription. In “Bad Money” (Viking, $25.95), Kevin Phillips decries the “debt-gorged and negligent financial sector” and its clout, reflected in bailouts. Mr. Morris, a former banker and an especially graceful writer, recognizes the benefits of high finance. In his telling, American industry and post-World War II Keynesianism got their comeuppance in the 1970s. Paul Volcker at the Federal Reserve cleaned up the horrific mess — “one of the great episodes of American public service” — but in the view of Mr. Morris, this opened the way for a new excess: the market religion of Chicago School economics and the helium Fed of Alan Greenspan. The scary trillion dollars of Mr. Morris’s title is his estimate for the great unwinding now just beginning. He calls out for a new Volcker to save us from the limbo suffered by post-bubble Japan, even as he suggests that the Fed lacks the power it once had (a point now being debated). Nor is he sure if only another 25-year cycle is ending, this one of deregulatory dogma, or if the United States is in relative global decline. Mr. Morris accessibly explains Wall Street’s arcane instruments, and spikes his narrative with aphorisms. (“As a general rule, only the very smartest people can make truly catastrophic mistakes.”) He lays bare today’s mess by tracing the 1980s leveraged-buyout boom, precursor to the 2000s private-equity ball, as well as the “scams” of the savings-and-loan crisis and “the staggering fatuity of portfolio insurance.” This is a smart layperson’s guide. Conservative policies, Mr. Morris writes, produced not just excess but a great market restructuring, while government can become bloated. Even so, he stumps for a return to what he calls high-quality government, which builds infrastructure and exercises “effective oversight over the finance industry.” Events have rocketed most of Mr. Morris’s suggestions from nonstarter status and into the glare of suddenly worried lobbyists: for example, having loans to superleveraged parties carry penalty capital charges, or moving now secretive trades in high-volume credit derivatives into public exchanges. On the slog to regulatory revision much bruising politicking looms, but the current framework has become indefensible. Mr. Phillips, who worked for the Nixon administration and published “The Emerging Republican Majority” back in 1969, presaged a rightward realignment around the South and the western Sun Belt. As this conservative ascendancy wore on, however, he took to denouncing Wall Street, American oil gluttony, Christian theocracy and the House of Bush, which he saw as all interlinked. In his new book, he writes that maybe the end is nigh — not just for Republicanism, but for American predominance. Nobody planned it, Mr. Phillips argues, but the financial sector has taken over, assuming top rank in the economy at more than 20 percent of gross domestic product. (He adds that in 2004, financial services’ share of all corporate profits reached 44 percent, compared with 10 percent for manufacturing.) To his eye, this was possible because debt — which he likens to crack cocaine — was turned into a profit machine. The indignation runs deep: powerful interests elbow and shove to get the financial system they want. In their minds, they help first-time home buyers realize their dreams and spread the risk by securitizing it and releasing it to the marketplace. But in the process, they privatize profits while socializing costs, and put all of us in jeopardy. The democratic political system, driven by money, colludes. Mr. Phillips practices his own mild form of securitization, slicing and packaging ideas of his previous works in this new product. And chunks are thrown in from Financial Times columnists, Austrian School economists and the theory that global oil production has peaked. Putting energy profligacy on a par with indebtedness, Mr. Phillips tries to bundle it all into a theory of history. Changeovers in energy regimes, he asserts, induce shifts in dominant world powers. The Netherlands, which so long ago mastered wind and water energy, yielded to Britain when coal rose to prominence. And Britain was displaced by the United States with the rise of oil, he writes. But a separate argument blames the absence of industrial policy. “Money is ‘bad,’ ” Mr. Phillips speculates, “when a leading world economic power passing its zenith” indulges “in finance at the expense of harvesting, manufacturing, or transporting things.” Never mind that finance aided the rise of the 17th-century Netherlands and 18th-century Britain, or that each is exceptionally well off today. Even though no new energy regime appears in the offing, Mr. Phillips hints at the eclipse of America by “Asian state capitalism.” As the new joke goes, he writes, “Shanghai, Dubai, Mumbai or goodbye.” Of course, those are all financial centers. Competition from them, as well as from London, is a big reason the design challenge for new regulation in the United States will be mighty. Another is that any American regulatory framework would need to remain effective even if enforcement became lax. Mr. Morris can berate Mr. Greenspan for having refused to exercise the Fed’s oversight over the mortgage market, but his critique cannot eradicate the deep antiregulatory sentiment that pervades the corporate culture and produces people like Mr. Greenspan in the first place. In the end, Mr. Phillips and Mr. Morris agree on a great deal: after the gargantuan write-downs, foreclosure fights, possible punishments, rescues and regulatory overhaul, someone will still need to blow the whistle on America’s oil-and-debt toga party.

Books and Literature
Finances
Credit
Federal Reserve System
Foreclosures


Zuccarello Scores Twice as Rangers Edge Maple Leafs

Abstract: Mats Zuccarello scored his second goal of the game with 5 minutes 56 seconds left, breaking a tie and sending the visiting Rangers to a 5-4 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Tuesday night. Rick Nash had three assists, including a backhanded pass that set up Zuccarello’s game winner after the Rangers squandered a two-goal lead in the third period. Dominic Moore added a goal and an assist, and Cam Talbot made 29 saves in his fourth straight start for the injured Henrik Lundqvist. Dan Boyle and Kevin Hayes also scored for the Rangers, who had lost two in a row. Morgan Rielly scored twice, and Daniel Winnik and Stephane Robidas each had a goal for the Maple Leafs. James Reimer stopped 34 shots in his third consecutive start. It was the 12th loss in 13 games for Toronto, which has earned 3 points during that span. ISLANDERS 3, OILERS 2 Casey Cizikas broke a third-period tie with 4:37 seconds left, and the host Islanders defeated Edmonton. The Oilers, who have the fewest victories in the N.H.L., appeared poised to win for the second straight night as they dominated the third period. But Jaroslav Halak stood tall in the Islanders’ net. Cizikas fired a shot past Viktor Fasth to give the Islanders their third win in four games. Colin McDonald, who assisted on the winning goal, and Josh Bailey also scored for the Islanders. Halak made 34 saves. Ryan Hamilton and Anton Lander had power-play goals for Edmonton, which held a 15-5 advantage in shots during the third period. Fasth made 25 stops. The Islanders have won eight straight home games against the Oilers dating to 1999. SENATORS 2, SABRES 1 Milan Michalek scored at 12:15 of the third period, Robin Lehner made 35 saves, and visiting Ottawa edged Buffalo. Erik Karlsson also scored for the Senators, who ended a three-game skid. Tyler Myers scored the Sabres’ goal as they dropped to 1-8 in their past nine home games. PANTHERS 6, DUCKS 2 Roberto Luongo made 31 saves, and host Florida got goals from six players to top Anaheim. Jimmy Hayes, Dave Bolland, Aleksander Barkov, Aaron Ekblad, Nick Bjugstad and Dmitry Kulikov scored for the Panthers. CANADIENS 2, FLYERS 1 David Desharnais scored at 3:27 of overtime, and host Montreal knocked off Philadelphia. Carey Price made 23 saves for his 30th win of the season. PREDATORS 3, LIGHTNING 2 James Neal scored at 4:27 of overtime to help host Nashville top Tampa Bay. Seth Jones and Taylor Beck also scored for the Predators. BLUES 2, COYOTES 1 Dmitrij Jaskin scored the go-ahead goal for the second time in four games, and host St. Louis beat Arizona. JETS 2, WILD 1 Dustin Byfuglien scored on a breakaway at 4:00 of overtime, and host Winnipeg ended Minnesota’s six-game winning streak. STARS 5, BRUINS 3 Jamie Benn and Trevor Daley scored two goals apiece, and Kari Lehtonen stopped 41 shots for visiting Dallas in a victory over Boston.

Ice hockey
Rangers Soccer Team
Maple Leafs
Mats Zuccarello
Rick Nash
Islanders


New Criticism Over the S.E.C.’s Use of In-House Judges

Abstract: New challenges are being made about whether the Securities and Exchange Commission has too much of a “home court” advantage when it pursues cases before its own in-house judges rather than in federal court. It was the Dodd-Frank Act — passed by Congress five years ago in the wake of the financial crisis — that gave the S.E.C. the option to file cases in which it sought monetary penalties in its own internal administrative proceeding rather than going to a Federal District Court. More cases that would have been filed in a Federal District Court, like insider trading and investor fraud charges, are now being pursued in administrative proceedings. On the public relations front, however, the S.E.C. may not be faring as well over its use of administrative hearings. Last November, Judge Jed S. Rakoff of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York said in a speech that “while a claim to greater efficiency by any federal bureaucracy suggests a certain chutzpah, it is hard to find a better example of what is sometimes disparagingly called ‘administrative creep’ than this expansion of the S.E.C.’s internal enforcement power.” The latest criticism comes from the United States Chamber of Commerce, which issued a report last week that included calling for a number of changes to how administrative cases are pursued. The main recommendation is to provide so-called discovery rights — which allow a defendant to obtain documents and compel witnesses to give pretrial testimony — in administrative proceedings to more closely resemble those provided in a federal-court case. In addition, the chamber called for giving defendants the right to move a case to a federal court if they wanted to have a jury decide their fate. The response from the S.E.C., as you might expect, was hostile. Andrew J. Ceresney, the director of the enforcement division, who has been the most vocal proponent of using administrative proceedings for a wide range of cases, responded that the Chamber of Commerce’s suggestions “would significantly weaken the commission’s ability to protect investors through strong and effective enforcement of the federal securities laws.” Adding to the furor is that the S.E.C. does quite well in its administrative proceedings, winning almost all contested cases over the last few years. The Wall Street Journal reported that the S.E.C. won more than 90 percent of its administrative cases over a five-year period, compared with a 69 percent success rate in federal district courts. Do those statistics prove the deck is stacked against defendants accused of violations? The answer is maybe not, because the S.E.C. began a shift to filing complex administrative cases in just the past three years for matters taking place after the enactment of the Dodd-Frank Act. Thus, the numbers may not reflect more recent win-loss trends. But this battle is more about the perception that the administrative process is flawed, not whether there is actually a significant home court advantage. The administrative process is quite different from federal court cases because there are no broad discovery rights. In addition, the initial decision is made by a judge hired by the S.E.C., not by a jury. Any appeal is initially heard by the five commissioners who authorized the case before it can go to a federal appeals court, which is required to defer to the S.E.C.’s expertise in reviewing the matter. The structure has fueled the perception that this is a closed system in which the agency acts as both prosecutor and judge over the case. Administrative cases rely largely on the information gathered by the S.E.C. during its investigation, with little opportunity for a defendant to require witnesses to give depositions or to compel the production of records. The time frame for a case is quite limited, usually requiring an initial decision in less than a year from when it was filed. William E. Gladstone, the onetime British prime minister, once observed that “justice delayed is justice denied,” but the accelerated pace of an administrative proceeding seems to be closer to a rush to judgment for a defendant. So far, the S.E.C. has won a number of legal challenges to its authority to pursue administrative cases. However, one Federal District Court judge in Atlanta recently ruled that the process for appointing the in-house judges violated the Constitution. As a result of that decision, more defendants are trying claim that their constitutional rights are being violated in an attempt to stop in-house cases that would have been filed in a federal court before the Dodd-Frank Act. So far, though, the prospects for any judicial overhaul of the process look to be fairly low. Still, the S.E.C. may want to look at its procedures for administrative cases if it wants to respond to some of the criticism. The Chamber of Commerce’s suggestion that defendants be allowed to take a case to federal court is unlikely to gain any support from the S.E.C. Virtually every defendant facing potential administrative charges would threaten to use that option as a lever to gain a more favorable settlement. Cases filed in federal court are much more complicated because of the extensive rights afforded to the parties to obtain evidence. That means that there is a greater strain on the S.E.C.’s resources when it has to pursue cases in that forum. Even the Chamber of Commerce has been critical of the broad discovery afforded in federal courts, with its Institute for Legal Reform once arguing that they allow for “open-ended fishing expeditions in search of a quick settlement.” A modest expansion of discovery rights in administrative cases looks like a much more attractive option for blunting claims of unfairness. Defense lawyers are naturally suspicious when the only evidence they can use in a case is what their opponent provided. The notion that the S.E.C. has gathered all the relevant information, and that a defendant cannot question witnesses in advance of a trial, goes against the view that the each side should have the same opportunity to put on its case. The S.E.C. controls the procedures for administrative cases through its rules of practice , so changes could be put in place fairly easily. Most of the prominent defense lawyers for securities cases worked at the agency at one time, so obtaining their input on how to broaden discovery rights is certainly a possibility. If the S.E.C. is unwilling to compromise by altering how an administrative case will unfold, the danger is that the steady drumbeat of criticism will lead Congress to rethink the agency’s authority in this regard. There is already growing pressure from Republicans on Capitol Hill to roll back parts of the Dodd-Frank Act. So what Congress giveth, it can easily taketh away — if the perception grows that the S.E.C. is unfairly using its authority to pick a favorable legal forum for its proceedings.

Securities fraud
Judiciary
SEC
United States Chamber of Commerce
Dodd Frank


2 Polio Workers Killed in Pakistan

Abstract: PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Two volunteers in a polio immunization campaign were shot to death on Sunday in the Swabi district of northeastern Pakistan, the police said. The shootings occurred in the hilly village of Pebani, in the northeastern fringes of the district. The two volunteers, one a local schoolteacher, were killed by two gunmen, the district police chief, Mian Saeed, said. “The gunmen were on foot,” he said. “They shot dead the two workers from close range and escaped. Four suspects have been rounded up for questioning.” It was the second attack on polio workers in the district. A police constable accompanying a polio team was killed in January. Militants believe that polio vaccination is against Islamic law. The attacks escalated after it was revealed that the Central Intelligence Agency had used fake teams to collect blood samples and gather information at the compound in the Abbottabad district where Al Qaeda’s leader, Osama bin Laden, was living. The government began providing police escorts for polio teams as the attacks increased , but there is no evidence that the extra security has worked. Health workers are increasingly refusing to accept the police escort, fearing that the presence of the officers could expose them to danger. Pakistan, which is one of three countries in the world where polio remains endemic. “We asked the health workers to take police escort, but they refused,” Mr. Saeed said. “Since they were locals, probably they were confident that they could carry out their task without police escort.” “We are considering to ask health workers to carry weapons with them,” he said. “We can issue them weapon permits.” The immunization program’s district director, Dr. Muhammad Yaqub, said he was not aware that the police had provided security escorts for the polio teams. “I don’t know if there was police escort, but I do think it would be impossible to carry out vaccination in such circumstances,” Dr. Yaqub said.


Philadelphia Eagles Hire Chiefs’ Doug Pederson as Head Coach

Abstract: Doug Pederson, who helped groom Donovan McNabb for the Eagles ’ starting quarterback job and a successful playoff run, was hired Monday to be Philadelphia’s head coach. Pederson was Kansas City’s offensive coordinator under Andy Reid for the past three seasons. “Doug is a strategic thinker, a compelling leader and communicator, and someone who truly knows how to get the best out of his players,” said Jeffrey Lurie, the Eagles’ owner. “All of these factors were what initially attracted us to Doug, and we believe that he is the right man to help us achieve our ultimate goal.” Pederson accepted the offer to become Philadelphia’s coach last week. The team had to wait for the Chiefs to be eliminated from the N.F.L. playoffs before making it official. Pederson started nine games at quarterback for the Eagles in 1999, when Reid was a first-year coach and McNabb was a rookie. He prepared McNabb to take over later in the season, and the Eagles started a string of playoff appearances the next year. Pederson returned to Philadelphia a decade later as an assistant under Reid and helped Michael Vick have his best season in 2010. Pederson followed Reid to Kansas City in 2013 and was promoted to offensive coordinator. Pederson replaces Chip Kelly, who was fired with a game remaining in his third season. The Eagles interviewed six candidates, including Tom Coughlin, who recently resigned his Giants job. As the Chiefs’ offensive coordinator from 2013 to 2015, Pederson helped guide Kansas City to a 31-17 regular-season record and playoff appearances in 2013 and 2015. PANTHER IS DOUBTFUL Carolina Coach Ron Rivera said defensive end Jared Allen had broken a bone in his foot and was doubtful for Sunday’s N.F.C. championship game against the Cardinals. Rivera did not specify which of Allen’s feet was injured. Allen sustained the injury in the fourth quarter of the Panthers’ 31-24 win over the Seahawks on Sunday, but he finished the game. Allen, 33, has 136 career sacks — tied for most among active players — but a career-low two sacks since being acquired in an early-season trade with the Bears. Rivera said the team had not decided whether to put Allen on injured reserve. If it does, Rivera said Carolina could promote the former starter Wes Horton from the practice squad. If Allen does not play, Kony Ealy will get the start against Arizona. COLTS HIRE SCHOTTENHEIMER Indianapolis hired Brian Schottenheimer as its quarterbacks coach. Schottenheimer replaces Clyde Christensen, who was expected to be hired as offensive coordinator of the Dolphins. Christensen joined the Colts in 2002 and was the longest-tenured coach on the team’s staff. Schottenheimer has been coaching for 19 years — 16 in the N.F.L. He was Georgia’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach last season and spent the previous three seasons as the offensive coordinator of the Rams. Schottenheimer held the same position with the Jets for six seasons. Schottenheimer has also coached with the Chargers, the Redskins and the Chiefs. The Colts also hired Shawn Terlecky as their defensive quality-control coach. RAMS ACCEPTING DEPOSITS The Rams began taking deposits for season tickets in their return to Los Angeles. The team reported heavy traffic Monday on a website set up to take $100 refundable deposits for the chance to buy tickets when they become available. The Rams said their first deposit came from the former Laker Magic Johnson, an owner of the Dodgers. The Rams will play next season at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Season-ticket holders will have priority at a lavish new stadium in Inglewood, which is expected to open in 2019. After 21 years in St. Louis, the team gained the league’s approval to return to Los Angeles last week. The Rams were expected to play seven regular-season home games next season, with an eighth in London.

Football
Doug Pederson
Coaches
Kansas City Chiefs
Philadelphia Eagles


Mexican General and Troops Charged in Border Town Atrocities

Abstract: MEXICO CITY — An army general and soldiers under his command sent to fight drug cartels in a border town have been charged in military court with carrying out killings, torture, drug dealing and other crimes, government officials confirmed this week. The case, stemming from events in 2008 and 2009, appears to be one of the most serious reports of human rights abuse to surface publicly since Mexico began its fight against warring drug gangs in 2006, an effort that has led to 47,500 deaths, according to government data. Human rights groups have tallied thousands of complaints of unexplained killings, disappearances, torture and physical abuse at the hands of federal forces, particularly the army and increasingly the marines , but the circumstances of this case, first reported this week by the newspaper Reforma, stood out. The general, Manuel de Jesús Moreno Aviña, and his subordinates have been charged with systematically ordering the killings of at least seven civilians in Chihuahua State, according to Reforma, which cited statements in the investigation and an interview with a military prosecutor. The victims included a police officer who had stopped General Moreno on suspicion of drunken driving and a businessman who complained to human rights officials after a raid on his house. One victim died tied to a post on a military base after receiving repeated electric shocks. The officers and soldiers in Ojinaga, a town across from Presidio, Tex., also tortured civilians at will and participated in drug and arms trafficking, the report said. The interior secretary, Alejandro Poire, confirmed the investigation on Tuesday during a news conference on an unrelated matter, when he was asked his reaction to the news report. “Undoubtedly, it is a deplorable case, a reprehensible case,” Mr. Poire said. Thirty people are on trial, he added, and “they will pay for their crimes in the framework of the military justice system.” That, human rights workers said, is part of the problem. In a report released in November , Human Rights Watch said that in more than 3,671 investigations opened in the military justice system between 2007 and 2011, only 29 soldiers have been convicted of crimes. Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled last year that soldiers should be tried in civilian courts for human rights violations, and President Felipe Calderón has promised steps toward that , but not for murder charges. “Calderón seems to be far more concerned with doing damage control than addressing the real issue,” said José Miguel Vivanco, director of Human Rights Watch’s division for the Americas.

Human Rights and Human Rights Violations


For Rivera, an Ending to Savor

Abstract: Matt Harvey’s All-Star debut in front of his home fans provided all the theater the Mets and Major League Baseball had hoped it would Tuesday night. But eight innings later, it was overshadowed by the arrival of Mariano Rivera. Rivera, the 43-year-old Yankees closer playing in his 13th and final All-Star Game, was called upon in the bottom of the eighth inning to help preserve the American League’s 3-0 lead over the National League in front of a record Citi Field crowd of 45,186. As Rivera trotted in from the bullpen and began taking his warm-ups, his teammates remained in the dugout instead of taking the field, waving their caps and cheering along with the fans. Rivera, who usually comes on in the ninth, stood alone on the mound and saluted both dugouts and everyone in the stands. “When I got to the mound, I see both sides, both teams in the dugout, and it was amazing,” he said. “It almost made me cry, too. I was close. It was amazing, a scene that I will never forget.” Image In his final All-Star appearance, the Yankees’ Mariano Rivera pitched a scoreless eighth inning. He was the game’s most valuable player. Credit Barton Silverman/The New York Times Rivera rewarded his teammates with a 1-2-3 inning. Even Mets fans stood and cheered when he was done. It was his ninth appearance in an All-Star Game, and he has never allowed an earned run. Joe Nathan of the Texas Rangers closed out the game in the ninth as the frustrated N.L. hitters went down without much fuss. It was A.L. Manager Jim Leyland who arranged to have Rivera enter in the eighth rather than risk saving him for his usual role in the bottom of the ninth. Leyland’s fear was that if the N.L. rallied in the bottom of the eighth, took the lead and closed out the game in the top of the ninth, Rivera would never get in.“This was one of the toughest games I ever had to manage,” said Leyland, who had choked up at one point describing how the event unfolded, “because you have all these different scenarios that might happen. But this was really about trying to manipulate it so that we got Mariano in at the right time.” The right time came in the bottom of the eighth inning, after Neil Diamond had sung “Sweet Caroline.” The music suddenly changed to Metallica’s “Enter Sandman,” Rivera’s theme song for the ninth innings at Yankee Stadium, and out he came from the bullpen. But as Rivera approached the mound, his A.L. teammates remained in the dugout. As Rivera waved his cap to them and the fans, one by one his teammates hopped over the railing and stood in front of the dugout, clapping along with the fans. Image The N.L. starter, the Mets’ Matt Harvey, hit the Yankees’ Robinson Cano with a pitch in the first inning. Credit Frank Franklin Ii/Associated Press Rivera seemed to wait for his teammates to take the field, but they held fast. So Rivera turned to catcher Salvador Perez of the Kansas City Royals, and began throwing warm-up pitches. In the nearly 1,200 times Rivera has warmed up in a game, he had never experienced such a sensation of being on the field alone with the entire baseball world looking on admiringly. “That’s not baseball,” he said, laughing afterward. “You’re supposed to know your team is behind you. It felt so weird. Basically, I was there alone with my catcher and I didn’t know how to act. “At that moment I didn’t know what to do, just keep throwing the ball, I guess, because it felt so weird. But at the same time, I definitely appreciate that, what they did for me.” If warming up felt strange, pitching did not. After the players jumped onto the field, Rivera needed just 16 pitches to work set the side down in order. As Rivera headed off the field, he received congratulations from Perez and Prince Fielder and then he blew kisses toward the crowd. All-Star Game Replay 17 Photos View Slide Show › Image Barton Silverman/The New York Times Before the game, Leyland spoke first to the players and told them he wanted a lead going into the late innings. Then veteran outfielder Torii Hunter of the Tigers gave a pep talk, which was followed by a brief speech from Rivera. “He told us to enjoy every moment while we are here,” Minnesota Twins closer Glen Perkins said. “Then he told us how honored he is to play with us. I mean, come on. The guy is so humble. I think 10 years from now, I’ll look back and say, I’m proud I was a part of that.” The salute to Rivera stood in stark contrast to how the game began. On just the third pitch of the 84th All-Star Game, the first at Citi Field, Harvey, who gave up a leadoff double to Mike Trout, drilled Robinson Cano in the right leg just above the knee with a 96-mile-per-hour fastball. Cano stayed in the game as Miguel Cabrera struck out, but then was taken out, walking slowly to the dugout. As he walked off the field, Cano passed in front of the mound. He and Harvey had a brief but civil exchange — a far cry from the bitterness that ensued after another famous hit-by-pitch incident, between Roger Clemens of the Yankees and the Mets’ Mike Piazza in a regular-season game in 2000. “He said, ‘My bad,’ ” Cano explained. “I said, ‘No problem.’” X-rays taken at Citi Field were negative, and Cano said he sustained a contusion. He said he did not think it was very serious but was not definitive about playing Friday against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. Video The Mets pitcher Matt Harvey talked about starting his first All-Star game for the National League. Credit Credit Barton Silverman/The New York Times “Hopefully, yeah,” he said. On a warm night in which the N.L. batters managed only three hits — one by the Mets’ David Wright — Harvey’s bruising pitch was one of their hardest hits of the night. The Yankees, already reeling from a series of injuries, were now facing the possibility that their best player had been taken down by the Mets captivating 24-year-old ace in what is essentially an exhibition event. Harvey’s second inning was smoother. He started off David Ortiz with two breaking balls and then got him to pop up on a fastball. Then he struck out the Orioles’ Adam Jones on a fastball that registered 98 m.p.h., and got Minnesota’s Joe Mauer to line out to left field. For a while it seemed as if Harvey would dominate the show. But even here at Citi Field, it turned into a night for Rivera, who said he just wanted to pitch. “The rest of it was a plus,” he said. “It was indescribable.”

Matt Harvey
Baseball
Mariano Rivera
All-star game
National League
American League
Yankees
Mets
Citi Field NYC


Air Products Is Said to Offer $5.1 Billion for Rival Airgas

Abstract: Air Products and Chemicals , a producer of industrial gases, has made an unsolicited $5.1 billion offer for a rival, Airgas , after having been rebuffed for months, people briefed on the matter said Thursday. If Air Products’ latest offer is rejected, the company is prepared to wage a hostile bid, including by staging a proxy fight, the people briefed on the matter said. The offer, worth about $60 a share, is expected to be made public Friday morning, these people said. It represents a 38 percent premium to Airgas’s closing share price of $43.53 on Thursday and an 18 percent premium over its 52-week high of $51. Including debt, the Air Products’ offer is valued at about $7 billion. As the stock and credit markets recover, deal makers expect an upswing in merger activity and in hostile offers, as companies jump off the sidelines and pursue long-sought targets. One of the biggest deals so far this year, Kraft’s planned acquisition of Cadbury, began as an often-bitter struggle between the two companies, before they reached an agreement last month. By making its offer now, Air Products is hoping to seize upon some current weakness in Airgas’s financial health. Last week, Airgas issued earnings guidance for its 2010 fiscal year that was below analyst expectations. A deal between Air Products and Airgas would create one of the biggest players in the industrial gases market. Air Products, based in Allentown, Pa., specializes in liquid bulk gases like oxygen, nitrogen and argon for industries like semiconductors and the National Aeronautic and Space Administration. Airgas has a strong market share in packaged gases, including nitrous oxide and dry ice, for the North American market. Air Products’ competing packaged gases business is rooted largely in international markets like Europe. An Airgas representative declined to immediately comment. Air Products’ chief executive, John E. McGlade, wrote in a letter to Peter McCausland, chief executive of Airgas, that he was “disappointed” that two previous offers were rebuffed over the last four months. The two held a meeting several months ago in which they agreed on the merits of a merger, but Airgas has since refused to consider any approach from Air Products, the people briefed on the matter said. “In our prior correspondence, we clearly and repeatedly stated our flexibility as to both value and form of consideration, yet you have continued to refuse even to discuss our offers,” Mr. McGlade wrote in the letter. “Your unwillingness to engage has delayed the ability of your shareholders to receive a substantial premium.” While Air Products believes it can entice enough Airgas shareholders — the latter’s stock has fallen about 5 percent in the last six months — it must win over the company’s biggest stakeholder: Mr. McCausland, who founded Airgas’ in 1982 and owns about a 10 percent stake. He is one of the directors up for re-election this year. In a letter sent last month rejecting a previous — and higher — offer from Air Products, Mr. McCausland wrote that Airgas had outperformed its competitor over the past decade, with the exception of 2009, and that a merger would destroy value. Air Products contends that the deal would save the companies up to $250 million a year in costs and preserve jobs in Pennsylvania, where both are based. The two companies have a fairly large common investor base: 34 percent of Air Products shareholders hold stakes in both companies, compared with 39 percent of Airgas shareholders. Air Products has secured committed debt financing from its financial adviser, JPMorgan Chase . It has also hired the law firms Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Arnold & Porter.

Airgas Incorporated
Air Products and Chemicals Inc
Mergers Acquisitions and Divestitures
JPMorgan Chase & Co