Saudi King Promises Help in Delicate Effort to Unite Factions in Iraq

Abstract: JIDDA, Saudi Arabia — King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia assured American officials on Friday that he would use his influence with Sunni leaders in Iraq to try to speed the formation of a multisect government there, a senior State Department official said. The king’s assurance is a shift in the Sunni monarchy’s stance and was conveyed to Secretary of State John Kerry in a meeting that lasted three and a half hours here. The Saudis had been reluctant to support the formation of a new Iraqi government until it became clear that Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki would not be given a third term. The failing security situation in Iraq, which has brought militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria to within striking distance of the Saudi border in western Iraq, appeared to have led to a change in Saudi calculations. The Saudis also appeared to be calculating that Mr. Maliki’s ability to secure a third term was in jeopardy and that the best way to block him was to encourage Sunni parties to join Kurdish parties and Mr. Maliki’s Shiite rivals in backing an alternative. In Iraq Crisis, a Tangle of Alliances and Enmities The major players in the Iraq and Syria crisis are often both allies and antagonists, working together on one front on one day and at cross-purposes the next. “Both the secretary and the king believe that the security challenges that Iraq faces require a new government,” said the State Department official, referring to the government formation process underway in Baghdad. “The two shared a view that all of Iraq’s communities should be participating on an urgent basis in the political process to allow it to move forward, and that both the secretary and King Abdullah in their conversations with Iraqi leaders would convey that message directly to them,” added the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity under State Department protocol. The Iraqi Parliament is scheduled to begin the process of forming a new government on Tuesday. To keep the political process on track, American officials would like the Sunnis to settle on their choice for Parliament speaker by then. For some time, in an informal understanding, a Shiite Arab has been prime minister, an ethnic Kurd president and a Sunni Arab speaker. Mr. Kerry underscored in his meeting with the king that Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s top Shiite cleric, had urged the selection of a Shiite prime minister by then. The Saudis’ disdain for Mr. Maliki is longstanding. “I don’t trust this man,” King Abdullah told John O. Brennan, the C.I.A. director who was then Mr. Obama’s counterterrorism director, in a March 15, 2009, meeting, according to a classified cable that was made public by WikiLeaks. “He is an Iranian agent.” Mr. Kerry’s meeting with King Abdullah was their first of the Iraq crisis and was held at an ornate palace that featured a marble map of the world with Muslim countries colored in green. Iraqi Army Retakes Government Complex in Central Ramadi Efforts to stem the rise of the Islamic State. It followed a Thursday meeting in Paris in which there were indications of a shift in the Saudi stance on Iraq. During the meeting here, the king discussed security measures the kingdom was taking to deal with the potential threat from ISIS in neighboring Iraq. Mr. Kerry also noted approving a public statement earlier this week from a Saudi official that the kingdom would increase its oil production to make up for any disruption of supply from Iraq. Mr. Kerry also met separately here with Ahmad Assi al-Jarba, the president of the moderate Syrian opposition coalition. That meeting came one day after the White House announced it was seeking $500 million from Congress so that the Pentagon could train and arm “vetted elements” of the Syrian opposition. A leader of the Shammar tribe, which has branches in Saudi Arabia and Iraq, Mr. Jarba has had strong backing from the Saudis. And Mr. Kerry described him as a leader who could help the United States counter militants from ISIS, and who might also be able to play a role in influencing Sunni politics in Iraq. “President Jarba represents a tribe that reaches right into Iraq,” Mr. Kerry said at their meeting at the airport here. “He knows people there.” Just before Mr. Kerry left Saudi Arabia he called Massoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdish autonomous region. Mr. Kerry had met with Mr. Barzani in Erbil on Tuesday and urged the Kurds to put aside their dreams of statehood and join the government formation process in Iraq.

Iraq
US Foreign Policy
ISIS,ISIL,Islamic State
John Kerry
King of Saudi Arabia Abdullah
Ahmad Assi al-Jarba
Saudi Arabia


Mayor’s Race Offers Varied Twists in Last Push

Abstract: Inside a cramped Brooklyn loft, everyone was talking at once, but not to one another. Two dozen neighbors of Bill de Blasio in Park Slope, leafing through sheets filled with hundreds of phone numbers, were ringing up New York City voters with their own cellphones and pleading with them to cast ballots on Tuesday for Mr. de Blasio. Some squatted on the floor. Others squeezed into the kitchen as the owners’ French bulldog, Chachi, scampered across the hardwood floor. “He’s the only one raising taxes on the wealthy,” an older volunteer offered to a wavering voter on the other end of the line. Another volunteer, an old friend of Mr. de Blasio’s, told the voter he reached: “He’s a really good guy.” With just 48 hours to go before the primary election for mayor, the leading candidates are immersed in the final, frantic and most adrenaline-fueled phase of the race: getting people to the polls to vote. Their task is complicated by a public distracted by the buildup to possible United States strikes against Syria and an election season that has at times been defined by spectacle. In an interview published on Saturday, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg added to the drama by accusing Mr. de Blasio of waging a “racist” campaign. But the campaigns also confront a city that has undergone significant demographic shifts — especially in the boroughs beyond Manhattan — since the last time a competitive primary for an open mayor’s seat occurred 12 years ago. A majority of New Yorkers are now nonwhite, and old party machines have been replaced by a more diverse patchwork of interest groups, activists, new voters and immigrant blocs. “Each one of the candidates is trying to figure out which demographic and geographic pieces go together,” said Jefrey Pollock, a Democratic consultant who is not aligned with any candidate this year. “We’re light years from where we were in 2001. It doesn’t feel like a decade ago; it feels like 50 years ago.” Some 700,000 people are expected to cast ballots in the Democratic primary, the main event in this heavily Democratic city. (Only 50,000 to 75,000 Republicans are projected to turn out.) A candidate who can attract 40 percent of primary voters can avoid a runoff and move on to the general election. The three Democrats’ turnout strategies reflect their experience and the makeup of their inner circles. Mr. de Blasio, whose staff features many veterans of President Obama’s campaigns, has relied heavily on Facebook and Twitter to spread his message, and, in what may be a first for a major city campaign, has not spent any money sending traditional mailings to voters. Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker, has a highly organized, numbers-driven operation overseen by veterans of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s campaigns and national Democratic races, and energized by some 2,000 interns from nearby high schools and colleges. Image Camilo Zamora, left, and Luis Pena-Barrero went to Queens to rally voters for Christine Quinn. Credit Yana Paskova for The New York Times And William C. Thompson Jr. is relying on the muscle of the United Federation of Teachers and pushing for big numbers beyond Manhattan, especially central Brooklyn, which is home to many highly engaged black voters, and the swath of Queens from Queens Village to Jamaica and down to the Rockaways. Ms. Quinn’s field operation appears the most advanced, judging by the number of volunteers and technological sophistication. To reach voters, the campaign relies on specialized software that automatically dials phone numbers, saving volunteers time, and provides them with several scripts to use, depending on how voters are reacting to their pitch for Ms. Quinn. The volunteers, working out of the campaign’s Lower Manhattan headquarters, wear headsets, like ragtag telemarketers, and work in a cramped office featuring a banner evoking the University of Notre Dame’s Fighting Irish motto, “DIAL LIKE A CHAMPION TODAY.” With its corporate-style efficiency, the Quinn campaign is on track to make 1 million phone calls and knock on 1.5 million doors. The team’s efforts are being boosted by two unions known for their ability to turn out voters: the Hotel Trades Council and Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union, which represents the city’s doormen and handymen. The campaign is counting on high turnout in Manhattan, including Ms. Quinn’s Chelsea and Greenwich Village base. But, as the election has grown nearer, she has targeted female voters more directly and has pushed to win over Latinos, especially in the South Bronx, Washington Heights and northeast Queens. On Thursday night, several volunteers, pumped up after Ms. Quinn’s appearance at a pep rally in Queens, fanned out to Latino neighborhoods in Elmhurst, politely knocking on the doors of single-family homes as daylight faded into night. One volunteer, Camilo Zamora, of Jackson Heights, was buoyed when a young man in a one-story redbrick house on Ireland Street opened the door, and said: “I’m interested in your issues.” Mr. Zamora told the young man, in Spanish and English, that Ms. Quinn had helped to keep senior centers and firehouses open. “Overall, she’s gotten things done,” Mr. Zamora said. A woman entered the hallway, and joined the conversation. “Yo estoy con ella,” she said, saying that yes, she was with Ms. Quinn. Unlike Ms. Quinn’s operation, Mr. de Blasio’s feels a bit old-school and locally brewed. At the phone-banking session Thursday night in Park Slope, no one was reading from a script; instead, each person spoke passionately about Mr. de Blasio’s stands on everything from education to housing to the stop-and-frisk policing tactic. The volunteers’ goal is to engage those they reach on the phone in extended conversations that the de Blasio campaign says can have greater impact than a more rote pitch. Mr. de Blasio, the public advocate, learned politics as a labor organizer and a political operative, and remains, at heart, a tactician. He has built his field operation with a few trusted aides of similar inclinations, including Emma Wolfe, a Barnard College graduate from Massachusetts who worked for the labor-backed Working Families Party, and his campaign manager, Bill Hyers, who was President Obama’s state director in Pennsylvania. They have developed their get-out-the-vote operation by establishing tiny teams of ardent de Blasio backers, neighborhood by neighborhood, often first through social media and e-mail contacts and then in person. Image Carol Harrison, left, and Frances Cobain campaigning for William C. Thompson Jr. in the Bronx. Credit Michael Kirby Smith for The New York Times The campaign has even come up with its own get-out-the-vote mixed tape on Spotify, featuring songs by Jay-Z and Florence and the Machine. “We want to bring them in online and then organize them to take action off-line,” said Jessica Singleton, the campaign’s digital director. For the final stretch, the campaign has scheduled 5,000 three-hour shifts for volunteers who will make phone calls or knock on doors of likely supporters. They will be aided by 1199 S.E.I.U, a union of health care workers that has endorsed Mr. de Blasio. From Sunday through Primary Day, at least 75 phone-banking and canvassing events are planned for Manhattan. That is no accident: the de Blasio team, already strong in brownstone Brooklyn, is now concentrating on the Upper West Side, and areas like Stuyvesant Town that are seen as receptive to his liberal message. For his part, Mr. Thompson has attracted impressive endorsements beyond the United Federation of Teachers: Ruben Diaz Jr., the Bronx borough president; Hakeem Jeffries, a congressman from Brooklyn; and State Senator Adriano Espaillat of Manhattan have backed him. The question on Tuesday will be, can they deliver for him? It is an especially important challenge for the teachers’ union, which is eager to prove its clout after years battling Mr. Bloomberg. The teachers have already spent $2.6 million on Mr. Thompson’s behalf, through phone banks, canvassing and other efforts. Advisers to Mr. Thompson are extremely attentive to the demographic shifts that the city has undergone in recent years, and obsessive about the arithmetic that will lead them to winning a spot in the runoff. Of the 700,000 people they believe will vote on Tuesday, they are targeting 180,000. Their mobilization strategy is focused on 19 State Assembly districts, selected because of their high concentrations of blacks and Latinos and because voters there had previously pulled the lever for Mr. Thompson, a former city comptroller who has run for citywide office three times. Eight of those districts are in Brooklyn; others are in southeast Queens. The campaign is also targeting the South Bronx, northern Manhattan and Staten Island’s North Shore. “Whatever the polls say, that doesn’t affect my team,” said Will Leaverton, Mr. Thompson’s field director. “We have a program. We know what we need to do.” In the Bronx on Friday, teachers’ union troops tried to spread enthusiasm for Mr. Thompson at the Kingsbridge Road subway station. When one man, Victor Guzman, who is from the Dominican Republic, said he wanted to hear more, Raymond Mena, a teacher at nearby Public School 86, obliged. Mr. Thompson, Mr. Mena explained, has Caribbean roots (“Tiene descendencia del Caribe”) and therefore shared the same background as Mr. Guzman (“Viene de nuestra gente”). Mr. Mena seemed to have an effect on him. “I’m going to vote for the candidate he told me about,” Mr. Guzman said.

Mayoral races
NYC
Bill de Blasio
Christine C Quinn
William C Thompson Jr
Primaries


Kyle Busch Dominates to Finally Conquer Bristol

Abstract: BRISTOL, Tenn. (AP) — Kyle Busch was furious when his pit crew cost him a win at Bristol Motor Speedway, where he angrily ditched his car on the racetrack and headed to his motor home on foot. A day later, he drove it to victory lane. Busch bounced back from one of his many Bristol heartbreaks with a dominating win Sunday, leading 378 of 503 laps for his second Sprint Cup Series victory of the season. This time, it was his crew that deserved much of the credit. His Joe Gibbs Racing team got him out front and ahead of his teammate Denny Hamlin and Jimmie Johnson on the final pit stop — critical track position that helped him hang on. “I told the ladies to man up, get the job done on the last stop — which they did,” Busch said. “I’m proud of them for doing that. When the time mattered most, they got the job done.” Many of those team members were on his crew Saturday in the Nationwide Series race, which Busch also dominated before a pit road miscue took him out of contention. He led a race-high 157 laps and went into the pits on the final stop, only to be penalized by Nascar when his crew let a tire slip away. He finished sixth and showed his displeasure by refusing to drive his car back to his team truck after the race. His crew had to retrieve it from Turn 3. But if there were any lingering hard feelings, no one noticed. “They appreciate what I do behind the wheel,” Busch said. “I appreciate what they do on pit road. That’s a given in any team.” He added: “There’s ways to get better in this sport, and the only way to do that is to jump back out there. It’s basically reviewing your fear. You just get back out there and do it over again.” The win was also rewarding for Busch because he has had so many slip away on the .533-mile bullring. Two of his near misses were last season, when he lost his power steering while leading last spring and was bumped from the front in August by Carl Edwards after leading 415 laps. “We should have won here last fall, we should have won here yesterday,” Busch said. “This place probably owes me a few. But you can never ask a racetrack to pay you back. You just have to just keep working on it.” Busch has now won a race in at least one of Nascar’s top three series every weekend this season. It started with a victory in the nonpoints qualifying race at Daytona and followed with wins in the truck and Nationwide series at California, the Cup race at Las Vegas, and the Nationwide race at Atlanta. Track position was critical as the race wound down, and Hamlin’s best chance at catching Busch was on pit road. Although his crew moved him to second from third on the final stop, it was not enough and he had to settle for a second-place finish. “He just has a way of taking off really, really good on the short run,” Hamlin said. “I knew unless we got out on pit road ahead of him on that last pit stop, it was going to be tough.” Hamlin has had his own heartbreak at Bristol — he led 98 laps last spring and was headed to the win when a fuel pickup problem cost him the victory. In August he finished third, again behind Busch.

Busch Kyle
Automobile Racing
Gibbs Joe Racing
National Assn of Stock Car Auto Racing


Virginia Gunman Said He Hated Police, Ex-Girlfriend Says

Abstract: RICHMOND, Va. — A former girlfriend of the gunman who killed a trooper at a Virginia bus station said that he frequently expressed his hatred toward the police and once nearly choked her to death after she broke up with him. The gunman, James Brown III, was killed Thursday by two Virginia state troopers after the authorities say he fatally shot Trooper Chad P. Dermyer at a Greyhound station here. Mr. Brown, 34, who had a lengthy criminal record, previously said he would rather die fighting the police than return to prison, the ex-girlfriend said. “He wanted to be one of those guys that just died killing police officers because they are not taking him back to jail,” she said. She spoke to The Associated Press on Friday on the condition of anonymity because she said she feared for her safety. The authorities said Friday that they are still trying to determine what exactly happened at the busy bus terminal and what Mr. Brown’s motive was. Trooper Dermyer had been participating in a counterterrorism training exercise at the bus station with about a dozen other troopers, special agents and supervisors when he was shot. Two women, both of them civilians, were also shot but are expected to recover. Col. W. Steven Flaherty, superintendent of the Virginia State Police, said surveillance footage from the bus station helped the authorities pull together what happened moments before the shooting. Mr. Brown, at the terminal for a stop on his way to Chicago, was seated in a restaurant. He walked toward his bags near the front entrance of the station and encountered Trooper Dermyer, who may have made some small talk. Then, Mr. Brown pulled a handgun and started firing, the authorities said. Colonel Flaherty said the gun Mr. Brown used was legally purchased more than a year ago, but not by Mr. Brown. The gunman had more than 140 rounds with him. Mr. Brown was from Aurora, Ill., a suburb of Chicago, and had an extensive criminal record in his home state, including charges of attempted murder, unlawful possession of a firearm and body armor as a felon and for making a death threat during a telephone conversation. He often pleaded guilty to lesser charges or a single charge after being charged with several crimes. Mr. Brown’s most recent conviction there was from 2012, when he pleaded guilty to domestic battery and aggravated battery of a pregnant woman and was sentenced to two and a half years in prison. The names of the two women wounded during Thursday’s shooting have not been released, but a spokesman for Binghamton University in New York said that one of them was a member of the school’s track team. The team was headed on Thursday to a meet at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, about 50 miles from Richmond. The Binghamton student was released from the hospital on Friday. The police identified the student as a 21-year-old woman from Wingdale, N.Y., and the other woman as a 47-year-old from Jacksonville, N.C. Trooper Dermyer is survived by his wife and two children. He was a former Marine who previously served on police forces in Jackson, Mich., and Newport News, Va. More than a 100 people gathered Friday evening at Virginia Commonwealth University to honor Trooper Dermyer with a prayer vigil. Earlier this year, Trooper Dermyer and another trooper became minor celebrities when they helped rescue a lost dog running through interstate traffic in Hampton. He also made one of the department’s most high-profile recent arrests after he pulled over a woman last year on Interstate 64 for expired license plates. Trooper Dermyer called a former partner and said the driver was acting normal but he could not shake a strange feeling. He eventually searched the car’s trunk and found the remains of the driver’s son, who had been reported missing for some time, the authorities said. The driver has since been charged with murder.

Attacks on Police
Murders and Homicides
Richmond VA


Fernando Torres Goals Give Benitez First Victory at Chelsea

Abstract: Fernando Torres scored twice as third-place Chelsea won, 3-1, at Sunderland to record its first Premier League victory under the interim manager Rafael Benitez on Saturday. Elsewhere in England, Queens Park Rangers set an unwanted league record when a 2-2 draw at Wigan Athletic meant they have failed to win any of their first 16 matches. Two Mikel Arteta penalties helped Arsenal to a 2-0 home win over West Bromwich Albion. Norwich City is unbeaten in 10 matches in all competitions after a 4-3 victory at Swansea City. BAYERN EXTENDS LEAD Bayern Munich won, 2-0, at Augsburg to extend its lead in Germany’s Bundesliga as defending champion Borussia Dortmund lost, 3-2, at home against Wolfsburg. Goals from Thomas Müller and Mario Gomez helped to lift Bayern 14 points ahead of Dortmund. Bayern is also 11 points ahead of Bayer Leverkusen, which plays on Sunday in Hannover. Vedad Ibisevic scored a hat trick for Stuttgart in a 3-1 win over Schalke. Freiburg beat Greuther Fürth, 1-0, and Nuremberg blanked Fortuna Düsseldorf, 2-0. (AP) MESSI IS READY Barcelona forward Lionel Messi appears ready to try to surpass Gerd Müller’s 40-year-old record for most goals in a calendar year after recovering from a bruised left knee. Coach Tito Vilanova has included Messi on his squad for the Spanish league match at Real Betis on Sunday. On Saturday, Vilanova said Messi felt fine and was not bothered by the knee. Messi was carried off the field Wednesday after a late collision with the opposing goalkeeper in Barcelona’s 0-0 draw against Benfica in the Champions League. He has not missed a game because of injury since September 2010. Messi, 25, is trying to match Müller’s record of 85 goals for Bayern Munich and West Germany in 1972. Messi has 84 goals this year, playing for Barcelona and Argentina. (AP)

Soccer
English Premier League
Torres Fernando
Chelsea (Soccer Team)
Benitez Rafa
Sunderland (Soccer Team)
Bayern Munich (Soccer Team)
German Bundesliga
Messi Lionel


International Paper’s Profit Falls 31%

Abstract: International Paper ’s quarterly profit slid 31 percent, hit by one-time charges and higher costs, and the company warned that weaker demand resulting from the global slowdown would hurt results for the rest of the year. Falling demand for its paper and packaging products in North America and declining prices for pulp in both North America and Europe will combine to lower fourth-quarter results, the company said. During the third quarter, net income fell to $149 million, or 35 cents a share, from $217 million, or 51 cents a share, a year earlier. Sales rose to $6.8 billion, from $5.8 billion. Before one-time charges that totaled $207 million, the company earned 84 cents a share, beating Wall Street predictions, which typically exclude special items. Stock in International Paper, which is based in Memphis, fell 79 cents, to $17.07 a share.


Report Offers a Mixed View of Health Care Law Costs

Abstract: WASHINGTON — More people will be enrolled in Medicaid than predicted a year ago, fewer will be covered through the new public insurance marketplaces and the overall cost of insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act will be higher than expected last year, the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday. But the cost of insuring people will be substantially lower than the budget agency expected when the law was passed, on party-line votes, in 2010. It now estimates that the cost will total $465 billion in 2016-19, which is 25 percent less than its original estimate. The law slashed the number of uninsured by expanding Medicaid eligibility and by offering subsidies for private insurance sold in the new marketplaces, or exchanges. Those provisions of the law “are estimated to reduce the number of uninsured people by 22 million and to result in a net cost to the federal government of $110 billion” this year, the budget agency said in a new report. The cost of those provisions from 2016 through 2025 is $136 billion higher than projected in last year’s report, climbing by 11 percent to a total of more than $1.3 trillion. Keith Hall, the director of the Congressional Budget Office, said the biggest reason for the changes was an increase in projected spending for Medicaid. More people who qualify for Medicaid under the health care law are expected to enroll, he said. Projections by the nonpartisan budget office influenced members of Congress who wrote the health law in 2009-10, and its updated estimates continue to shape the debate over health care. Its numbers are used by the White House and by lawmakers of both parties as a benchmark against which to measure the success of the law. When the law was passed, the budget office predicted that 21 million people would have coverage this year through federal and state insurance exchanges. It reiterated that estimate last March. Now the budget office says just 12 million people will be covered this year by insurance purchased through the exchanges, and it sees enrollment climbing to 15 million next year and an average of 18 million to 19 million each year from 2018 to 2026. By contrast, when President Obama signed the health care law, the budget office estimated that 52 million people younger than 65 would have coverage this year through Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program. It now estimates that an average of 68 million people under 65 will be covered by those programs in a given month this year. The difference is striking because the budget office’s earlier estimate assumed that all states would expand Medicaid. In fact, as a result of a Supreme Court decision, the expansion became optional, and 19 states have refused to participate. The budget office says that 11 million people who became eligible under the Affordable Care Act are now enrolled in Medicaid, and the White House says that another four million uninsured people could gain coverage if all states expanded eligibility. Medicaid provides more generous, more comprehensive coverage than many of the health insurance policies purchased by consumers on the exchanges. Major health programs now account for 29 percent of federal spending, according to the budget office, and their share will grow to 32 percent in a decade. If current tax and spending policies remain, it said, the federal budget deficit will total $534 billion this year, nearly $100 billion more than last year. Moreover, it said, “this year is likely to be the first since 2009 in which the federal deficit will increase as a share of the nation’s output — from 2.5 percent of gross domestic product in 2015 to 2.9 percent in 2016.” This year, for the first time, the budget office tried to provide a full picture of federal health insurance subsidies for people under 65, and it found that they totaled $660 billion this year. That includes $32 billion in tax credits to help people pay premiums for insurance on the exchanges; $7 billion in “cost-sharing reductions,” which lower their deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs; $64 billion for people who became eligible for Medicaid because of the health law; and $203 billion for people who would have been eligible anyway. One of the largest subsidies, the budget office said, is a tax break for insurance that people receive through their jobs. What employers pay for such coverage is a form of compensation to employees, but, unlike wages, it is generally not subject to income or payroll taxes. This tax break amounts to a federal subsidy of $266 billion this year, the budget office said. The report predicts a modest decline in the number of people under 65 with employment-based coverage, to 152 million in 2019, from 155 million today. Most of the change is attributable to the Affordable Care Act, as workers now have other sources of coverage, the budget office said. It still expects some employers to stop offering coverage, but it acknowledges that “there is little evidence” that any substantial number of employers have done so — a point often made by Obama administration officials in response to critics of the law.

Health Insurance
Obamacare,Affordable Care Act
Congressional Budget Office
Medicaid
Barack Obama
Keith Hall


Damon Will, and Does, Run Into Walls for Yanks

Abstract: Johnny Damon puts himself on the line. He did it the night the Red Sox fell behind, three games to none, in 2004. He did it Thursday night after Joe Girardi went off. Damon is his own man, as well as a good teammate. Some of the Red Sox will come over to say hello to him before a series, ignoring the old nonfraternizing concept. The Yankees understand that Damon will also run into a fence, which is exactly what he did Friday. Chasing a long drive by Kevin Youkilis, who chatted with him a day earlier, Damon sustained a bruise and a sprain of his left shoulder before the ball sat freakishly on top of the fence, then fell into play. Youkilis got a triple, and Damon may have to go on the disabled list for the first time in his career. “He had a ton of treatment today,” Manager Joe Girardi reported after the Yankees held on for a 2-1 victory over the Red Sox on Saturday afternoon. Girardi said the Yankees would probably make a decision on Damon before the Sunday night game. Damon said he was still sore and added, “I don’t want to hurt the team.” The Yankees need Damon because he is hitting .319, but also because of what he brings to the clubhouse. “Nice stereo system,” the captain Derek Jeter said, referring to the source of loud, clear sounds from Damon’s locker next to the shower area. Then Jeter elaborated: “Johnny plays hard, he grinds out the at-bats, he does a good job at what he does.” Damon is still formidable, although he cannot throw from the outfield anymore. The Yankees cannot afford to lose him, or Hideki Matsui, who is also ailing. They both became Yankees just by signing their contracts. For all that, Damon remains, in the eyes of some fans, outside the nucleus of sainted players from the farm system who helped make the Yankees a dynasty from 1996 through 2000 — Jeter, Mo, Bernie, Jorge and Andy.  Damon took the Yankees’ money and cut his locks, giving up his persona as a road-show version of “Hair,” but he never gave up his sense of self. He will show up in front of his locker, win or lose, and will speak from the point of view of a professional. After Girardi let the players have it for their lackadaisical performance Thursday, Jorge Posada and Andy Pettitte and Jeter stood up and said Girardi was right. Damon expounded on it. That’s his style. “Joe’s right,” Damon said. “We’re not playing up to our expectations.” Then he added, “The Steinbrenners spent $200 million on us and we haven’t showed what we’re worth.” Actually, it’s $209 million, highest in the majors. By always including himself among the “we,” Damon is following some other imported old pros like Don Baylor, Bob Watson and Chili Davis who brought integrity and intelligence to the clubhouse. Occasionally one of the expensive new Yankees will suck the oxygen out of the clubhouse. Alex Rodriguez was making snide remarks about Jeter before even joining the club, and Roger Clemens was solipsistic even before his public image took a dive recently. The Yanks have not appeared in a World Series since Damon arrived in 2006, but then again they haven’t won a Series with Rodriguez, either, and he’s been here two years longer. Damon doesn’t have to apologize for appearing like a carpetbagger just because he was worth more to the Yankees than to the Red Sox after 2005. He was a class act when in Boston: ¶The Red Sox occasionally stage photo day, allowing fans to ring the field and take pictures of the Sox players up close, albeit from across a rope. I watched him one day, pressing the flesh of grannies and sandlot players, hugging and smiling for the camera, making small talk. ¶During the 2004 American League championship series, the night the Yankees won their third straight game, Damon stood in front of his locker and calmly told reporters, “Unless I’m mistaken, we’ve won four straight before.” I looked up the statistics and discovered the Sox had winning streaks of 6, 4, 5, 5, 6, 10, 4 and 4 during the season. Damon added that he saw no reason they could not do it again. Which they did. Damon does speak his mind, most recently when he questioned whether the Yankees were on the right track by making Joba Chamberlain a starter. He’s not a loose cannon, but he is open with his opinions, right or wrong.  Is he a true Yankee? Jeter waved his hand, the way he does in the car commercials when he tries to convince a little kid that he is a salesman and not a shortstop. “That’s up to you guys,” Jeter said, meaning the news media. “He’s a guy who understands that we have a responsibility. We have a lot of guys like that.” Maybe so, but the other night Damon was the most eloquent disciple of Girardi’s anger. He’s irreplaceable at the top of the order, and in the clubhouse, too.

Damon Johnny
Baseball
New York Yankees
Boston Red Sox


N.F.L. Schedule: Here’s Who We Think Will Win in Week 6

Abstract: Ezekiel Elliott of the Dallas Cowboys takes on the mighty Green Bay Packers’ run defense in a game of strength versus strength; Colin Kaepernick will finally take the field for the San Francisco 49ers; and the Tom Brady Revenge Tour continues. But Week 6 will not include the Minnesota Vikings, the league’s last unbeaten team. Here is a look at Sunday’s matchups and who we think will win them. Follow our live coverage of N.F.L. Week 6 here. Cowboys (4-1) at Packers (3-1) 4:25 p.m. Line: Packers by 4 ½ Ezekiel Elliott, the electrifying Cowboys rookie, is doing his part to make running backs cool again. Dallas seems to be enjoying the ride, but things may get bumpy this week when Elliott is tested against the stingiest run defense in the N.F.L. “Always excited for a challenge,” Elliott told reporters. “That’s what competitors love: to go out there and be challenged.” Selected with the No. 4 overall pick in this year’s draft, Elliott is leading the N.F.L. in rushing yards with 546. At least part of that success is owed to the offensive line, which helped DeMarco Murray lead the league in rushing two seasons ago. Last year, it bulldozed the way for the Cowboys to rank ninth in the league in rushing despite the underwhelming duo of Darren McFadden and Joseph Randle splitting starts at running back. But Elliott deserves credit for showing a veteran’s ability to take full advantage of the opportunities the line affords him. Here’s the scary part: This year’s success has come with Dallas’s offensive line struggling to stay healthy. For the last two weeks, the Cowboys have been without Tyron Smith, who, according to Pro Football Focus, was the best run-blocking left tackle in the game last season. Smith is expected back this week. He will have to be at the top of his game because the Packers have allowed a league-low 42.8 yards a game on the ground, on an ugly 2.0 yards a carry. The longest run against Green Bay this season was 14 yards, by Bobby Rainey of the Giants, last week, one of only two runs of 10-plus yards the Packers have allowed. But if there is an offensive line to break through Green Bay’s 3-4 defense, it’s Dallas’s. And if there is a back to take advantage, it is Elliott. If he succeeds, the Cowboys will go into a bye week on an incredible high. They can then begin the hand-wringing over whether Tony Romo should displace Dak Prescott at quarterback for Week 8. Pick: Cowboys Image The Niners’ Colin Kaepernick, who lost his job as starting quarterback midway through last season, will return to the position on Sunday against the Bills. Credit Denis Poroy/Associated Press 49ers (1-4) at Bills (3-2) 1 p.m. Line: Bills by 7 ½ Colin Kaepernick’s critics have been writing him off as the irrelevant backup quarterback of a struggling team. His supporters have pointed out that it was just a few seasons ago that he led his team to a Super Bowl appearance — nearly winning it all — and that at 28 he may be ready to thrive in Coach Chip Kelly’s offense. Now that his contract has been reworked and he has been declared the team’s starting quarterback, Kaepernick will have a chance to prove one of the two camps correct. (The 49ers have insisted his benching had nothing to do with his contract, but it is worth pointing out that the new deal eliminates their liability in the case of injury.) Athletically, few players can match Kaepernick’s size, speed and arm strength, but his flaws are many and include a poor ability to work in hostile environments, struggles with getting past his first read in the passing game and an extreme reliance on his running to get him out of trouble. Buffalo’s defense has been playing great football for the last three weeks, and Coach Rex Ryan will undoubtedly try to fluster Kaepernick, who has not thrown a regular-season pass since last November. Pick: Bills Eagles (3-1) at Redskins (3-2) 1 p.m. Line: Eagles by 2 ½ Carson Wentz would like a do-over for his last pass in a Week 5 loss to Detroit. Wentz, a rookie quarterback, had not thrown an interception this season when he heaved a ball more than 50 yards downfield in hope of catching the Lions sleeping. The Lions were not asleep, and Wentz’s impressive turnover-free run ended, as did Philadelphia’s undefeated season. If Wentz can turn that into a learning experience, the loss will hardly matter, and he should get right back to winning this week. Pick: Eagles Falcons (4-1) at Seahawks (3-1) 4:25 p.m. Line: Seahawks by 6 ½ Richard Sherman, writing in The Players’ Tribune , recently delved into what makes great cornerbacks great and heaped praise on his rival Darrelle Revis, among others. He also wrote that he would discuss, at a later date, which wide receivers were the most difficult to cover. Perhaps he wanted an up-close look at the Falcons’ Julio Jones first. Jones has piled up 345 receiving yards over the last three weeks, but that number is misleading because his totals by game were 16, 300 and 29. With Sherman shadowing him, it could be another down week. Pick: Seahawks Bengals (2-3) at Patriots (4-1) 1 p.m. Line: Patriots by 8 ½ Martellus Bennett is a 6-foot-6, 275-pound tight end who runs and catches like a wide receiver. Last week he scored three touchdowns, including one in which he outraced a defensive back down the sideline and then jumped over another one into the end zone. All three touchdowns came after he had sustained an ankle injury that nearly forced him to leave the game. Asked how he did it, Bennett said he thought about the Marvel superhero Luke Cage and realized leaving the game on the back of a cart would look weak. “I’m like, What would Luke Cage do right now?” Bennett told reporters. “He’d get up and keep bouncing around.” In troubling news for the Bengals, Bennett is New England’s second-best tight end. Pick: Patriots Chiefs (2-2) at Raiders (4-1) 4:05 p.m. Line: Even After a 15-sack season last year, Khalil Mack of the Raiders seemed primed to become one of the league’s biggest stars. But switching from outside linebacker in a 3-4 defense to defensive end in a 4-3 has apparently not agreed with him; through five games, he has only one sack, and Oakland’s defense, expected to be competitive, has been awful. Quarterback Derek Carr, with help from his tremendous wide receivers, has put up enough offense to deliver a 4-1 record, but if the Raiders are to be serious contenders, they will need Mack and the defense to start pulling their weight. Pick: Raiders Steelers (4-1) at Dolphins (1-4) 1 p.m. Line: Steelers by 7 ½ Le’Veon Bell’s three-game suspension gave the Steelers a chance to make sure the offense worked without him. Now that he is back, the team is clearly comfortable putting the ball in his hands and letting him carry it to victory. The only difference from past seasons is how much he is being used in the passing game. Through two games, he has 38 carries for 210 yards and 14 receptions for 122 yards. If he kept up those numbers, he would set career per-game highs in rushing yards, receptions and receiving yards. Bell may want to focus on carrying the ball, as the Dolphins have allowed 150.8 rushing yards per game, worst in the league. Pick: Steelers Rams (3-2) at Lions (2-3) 1 p.m. Line: Lions by 3 ½ If not for two tremendous plays by cornerback Darius Slay, the Lions would be 1-4 and coming off a disastrous second-half collapse. Instead, Slay’s forced fumble and interception gave a win to a deeply flawed team that may have a false sense of security. With Aaron Donald, the Rams’ dominant defensive lineman, disrupting Detroit’s attack and running back Todd Gurley overdue for a big game, this could be an upset on the road for Los Angeles. Pick: Rams Ravens (3-2) at Giants (2-3) 1 p.m. Line: Giants by 3 Jason Pierre-Paul, Olivier Vernon, Landon Collins and Leon Hall have one sack each, yet they are the co-leaders in that category for the Giants’ defense. So much for the days when Michael Strahan, Osi Umenyiora and Justin Tuck terrorized opposing quarterbacks. The lack of pressure is troubling, but it may not matter this week against a Baltimore offense that is trying to find a new identity. Through five games, the Ravens have heavily favored the pass. But after struggling to score, they have turned to Marty Mornhinweg to be their new offensive coordinator. Even a mistake-prone Giants offense should be able to outscore a team in transition. Pick: Giants Colts (2-3) at Texans (3-2) 8:30 p.m. Line: Texans by 3 Lamar Miller averaged 4.6 yards a carry in his four seasons with the Miami Dolphins and seemed capable of thriving if given more opportunity. (He averaged 10.5 carries a game for the Dolphins.) Signing with Houston got him the carries he wanted, but he has not been up to the challenge thus far. Through five games, he has carried the ball 101 times for 371 yards, an unacceptable average of 3.7 yards per carry. If Miller cannot find some open field and quarterback Brock Osweiler continues to struggle, the Colts will be back to .500 after looking lost during an 0-2 start. Pick: Colts Panthers (1-4) at Saints (1-3) 1 p.m. Line: Panthers by 3 Last year, two teams (Houston and Kansas City) made the playoffs after starting the season 1-4, so the Panthers should not be ruled out just yet. But a defense that two weeks ago allowed more than 500 yards passing will be going up against Drew Brees, one of the most productive quarterbacks in N.F.L. history. Even if Cam Newton is fully recovered from a concussion he sustained two weeks ago — he was able to practice and is expected to start — he may not be able generate the offense to keep up with Brees. Pick: Saints Image Cody Kessler, the Browns’ rookie quarterback, was injured last week against the Patriots and could not return to the game. Credit Scott Galvin/USA Today Sports, via Reuters Browns (0-5) at Titans (2-3) 1 p.m. Line: Titans by 7 The Browns’ identity will understandably always be tied up in tales of the dominance of a young Jim Brown. But the modern team was perhaps best summed up in a single play in last week’s blowout loss to New England. The rookie Cody Kessler, one of five players to take snaps at quarterback for the team this season, dropped back and was immediately under pressure. He tossed the ball away just as he was about to be crushed into the turf. As he lay on the ground, injured seriously enough that he was unable to continue, the ball that he had tossed away rolled out of the end zone for a safety, giving the Patriots 2 more points and putting the ball back in Tom Brady’s hands. It was perfect. Pick: Titans Jaguars (1-3) at Bears (1-4) 1 p.m. Line: Bears by 2 ½ Asked about his streak of three consecutive games in which he had passed for 300 or more yards without throwing an interception, Brian Hoyer of the Bears bordered on self-deprecating while also making a solid point. He told reporters: “It hasn’t translated to points or victories. I think passing yards is kind of an overrated stat, when it comes down to it.” Pick: Jaguars

Football
Dallas Cowboys
Packers
Ezekiel Elliott
49ers
Bills
Colin Kaepernick


Eike Batista, Once Brazil’s Richest Man, Is Sought in Corruption Inquiry

Abstract: RIO DE JANEIRO — The Brazilian police announced on Thursday that they were seeking the arrest of Eike Batista, the oil and mining tycoon who was once the country’s richest man , in an expansion of the vast corruption investigation that has ensnarled dozens of politicians and business leaders. Police officers went to Mr. Batista’s mansion in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday morning but did not find him there. Sérgio Bermudes, a lawyer for Mr. Batista, said his client was out of the country, either in the United States or the Cayman Islands, to seek access to blocked bank accounts. The arrest warrant could signal a new phase in the downfall of Mr. Batista, 60, whose global prominence had long been associated with Brazil’s booming economy. His personal wealth reached $34.5 billion as recently as 2012, but his fortunes, and those of Brazil, crashed amid falling global commodities prices. “Eike was a symbol of that moment of nationalist exaltation when the stars seemed to be aligning for Brazil,” said Gerson Moraes, a professor of ethics at Mackenzie Presbyterian University in the Brazilian city of Campinas. “But it turns out he was involved in the same old rotten schemes involving large corporations and the Brazilian state.” The brash industrialist, who had publicly proclaimed that he would become the world’s richest man, assembled a sprawling empire including mines, offshore oil fields, a port complex and even Rio’s landmark Hotel Glória. Mr. Batista cultivated close ties with government officials, and he received more than $4 billion in loans and investments from the national development bank. In 2008, Mr. Batista raised more than $3.6 billion in a public offering for his oil company, OGX, at a time when Brazil’s economic prospects looked bright. But the company sought bankruptcy protection in 2013 after producing a small fraction of the oil it had promised. This is not the first time Mr. Batista has faced legal troubles. In 2014, he went on trial on charges of insider trading and stock market manipulation, but the case was suspended in February 2015 after the judge presiding over his trial was filmed driving Mr. Batista’s seized Porsche. The judge was removed from the case. In November 2015, regulators barred Mr. Batista from serving as a corporate officer for five years. The new arrest warrant for Mr. Batista is an outgrowth of a multiyear inquiry into graft involving Petrobras, the state-owned oil company. Investigators are focusing on bribes paid to Sérgio Cabral , the former governor of Rio de Janeiro, where Petrobras is based. Mr. Cabral, who governed the state from 2007 to 2014, was arrested in November on suspicion that he and his wife pocketed millions of dollars in bribes from public works contracts. Federal prosecutors said in a statement that Mr. Batista had paid $16.5 million to Mr. Cabral in 2011 through offshore accounts in Panama and Uruguay. The tycoon sought to disguise the bribe as a deal involving the sale of a gold mine, the prosecutors said. “In a sophisticated way, Eike Batista repeatedly used the simulation of legal dealings for the payment and concealment of illicit amounts of money,” they said. The Federal Police, Brazil’s equivalent of the F.B.I., said in a statement that 80 officers had carried out nine arrest warrants, taken four people in for questioning and performed 22 searches in Thursday’s operation. Among those arrested was Flávio Godinho, a former executive at one of Mr. Batista’s companies who now holds a senior executive post at Flamengo, a soccer club in Rio. The police also said that they had discovered on Thursday that Mr. Batista, who holds dual citizenship in Brazil and Germany, may have traveled to New York on the evening of Jan. 24 on an American Airlines flight using his German passport. Mr. Bermudes said that a judge in Rio had issued a request for his client’s arrest on Jan. 13, raising questions as to how Mr. Batista had been able to leave the country if the authorities were planning to apprehend him. “The police are in full contact with Interpol to locate him, to verify if he effectively arrived in New York,” Tacio Muzzi, an officer with the Federal Police, told journalists. “It still can’t be categorically affirmed that there was the intention to flee. This is being rigorously investigated.” José Vagos, a federal prosecutor, said investigators had yet to determine why Mr. Batista had bribed Mr. Cabral, who held sway for years over important decisions regarding infrastructure projects in Rio, where much of Brazil’s oil industry is based. Mr. Batista was already known to shower attention and privileges on Mr. Cabral. In 2011, the tycoon came under scrutiny for granting the former governor and members of Mr. Cabral’s family the use of a private jet for jaunts around and outside Brazil. Another prosecutor, Eduardo El Hage, said Mr. Batista was suspected of crimes including bribery and money laundering. The effort to arrest Mr. Batista comes at a time when the entrepreneur was seeking to revive his fortune through a venture aimed at selling an upscale brand of toothpaste called Elysium .

Eike Batista
Corruption
Petrobras
Brazil


Iran Raises Its Enriching Capability

Abstract: TEHRAN — Iran said Wednesday its main uranium-enrichment plant was now equipped with 5,000 centrifuges — a sharp increase from the 4,000 it announced in August. machines that spin incredibly fast to enrich the element into nuclear fuel. The announcement came amid growing international concern over Iran’s nuclear program , which it says is for energy production but the West fears is intended to produce weapons. Uranium, which can be used a fuel for a nuclear power plant, can serve in making bombs if enriched to high levels. The United Nations Security Council has demanded that Iran suspend enrichment and has already passed three sets of sanctions against the country. The head of the United Nations nuclear agency, Mohammad ElBaradei, said in his latest report that because of a lack of cooperation from Iran had prevented progress on serious issues related to its nuclear program.. The Iranian official who announced the increase in centrifuges, Gholam Reza Aghazadeh, head of the Atomic Organization, brushed off the demands that Iran suspend enriching uranium, saying “suspension has no meaning at all in Iran’s culture, and no such thing exists,” ISNA news agency quoted him as saying. He spoke at Tehran University, at an exhibition showcasing Iranian nuclear achievements, where Iran for the first time put on public display one of its P-1 model centrifuges, The Associated Press reported. In what appeared to be a display of its ballistic capability, Iran also said Wednesday that it had test-fired a rocket, called “Kavosh 2,” that was expected to transmit environmental data, state-run television reported. The name means “Explorer 2.”

Iran
Atomic Energy
Uranium
Atomic Weapons


Given a Third Chance, Beltran’s Bat Falls Silent

Abstract: SAN FRANCISCO — Before his team took the field Monday against the Giants in the decisive game of the National League Championship Series, Cardinals Manager Mike Matheny described Carlos Beltran as “one laid-back guy” and added, “Not that the effort is not there.” “That’s just how he is,” Matheny said. “That’s his makeup.” In that respect, Matheny said, Beltran personified a St. Louis team that had won its past six elimination games before its 9-0 loss Monday night. “I just think that’s part of the magic of this club,” he said. “They just show up the same every day.” The Cardinals did not have a clubhouse inspirator like Giants right fielder Hunter Pence, whose private speaking inspired his teammates. They had a roster filled with strong, silent types like Beltran, who speaks up so rarely that it was a big deal when he shared with his teammates his desire to play in a World Series in the aftermath of the Cardinals’ come-from-behind win over the Washington Nationals in the deciding game of the teams’ division series. “We don’t have one guy that lights up the room,” is how the injured first baseman Lance Berkman put it. In their final three games against the Giants, they also did not have one guy who lit up the scoreboard. The Cardinals were outscored, 20-1, by a Giants team that seemed to feed off Pence’s passion, their pitchers’ steely resolve and the understated excellence of their second baseman, Marco Scutaro. Beltran’s bid to play in the World Series fell one victory short for the third time with three teams. He lost in the seventh game of the N.L.C.S. as a Houston Astro in 2004 and as a Met in 2006. The futility of Beltran’s quest was capsulized in his at-bat in the fifth inning against the Giants’ starter, Matt Cain. He hit a ball to right that the wind knocked down, as if some supernatural force was working against him. Pence was able to get under the ball and make the catch for the third out. “When you play right field in this ballpark, you don’t know what the ball is going to do,” said Beltran, who had a couple of fielding misadventures during the series and also was playing on a hurt left knee. In the aftermath of the Cardinals’ 6-1 loss on Sunday in Game 6, Beltran, who ended up batting .300 in the N.L.C.S., was asked if his window to play in the World Series was closing. “Only God knows that,” he said. On Monday, that window closed on the season. The last time Beltran played in a Game 7 for a World Series berth opposite the American League champions, the Detroit Tigers, he was at Shea Stadium, where he had starred nightly throughout the 2006 season. Beltran hit 41 homers and drove in 116 runs, both career highs, that year. So when he came to bat in the bottom of the ninth with the bases loaded and two out and the Mets trailing the Cardinals by two, it seemed as if Martha Stewart could not have set the table more beautifully for the Mets. Facing Adam Wainwright, Beltran looked at a changeup for a first-pitch strike. Wainwright’s second pitch was a curve that Beltran swung at and missed. His third offering was a curve on the outside of the plate that froze Beltran. He struck out looking, ushering in the Mets’ nuclear winter. The Mets have not been back to the postseason and before this month, neither had Beltran, who joined the Cardinals after finishing the 2011 season with the Giants, who acquired him from the Mets near the trading deadline for Zack Wheeler, a pitching prospect, and cash. Before the season, Beltran told The St. Louis Post-Dispatch that he watched the replay of his at-bat against Wainwright the day after the series clincher and then never again. On Sunday, he talked about turning the page. Twenty-four hours later, he was digesting the same old story.

Beltran Carlos
St Louis Cardinals
Baseball
Playoff Games
World Series
San Francisco Giants


When the Dollar Zigs, These Mutual Funds May Zag

Abstract: THE dollar's sharp slide in 2004 helped catapult foreign stock and bond funds to the top of the charts. Although the dollar rallied last year, it has fallen more than 6 percent against the euro so far in 2006, giving investments in that currency another boost -- and providing another reminder that the tides of the currency markets can shake up a global portfolio. Those who follow a buy-and-hold strategy but want to buffer their holdings against currency shifts may be interested in a small but growing category of investments: foreign currency mutual funds. Until last year, there was only one: the Franklin Templeton Hard Currency fund, which has been around since 1989. But in the wake of the dollar's big decline in 2004, a few more foreign currency funds began trading last year, and mutual fund analysts predict that more are likely to follow. Franklin Templeton Hard Currency is the largest in the field, with $214 million in assets. It essentially bets against the dollar, with holdings in short-term foreign-denominated fixed-income securities from a variety of countries. It is generally designed to rise sharply when the dollar takes a big fall -- but it is likely to decline in periods when the dollar is surging. At other times, it should return money market rates. So far this year, it has gained about 6.4 percent. A fund with a similar strategy, the Merk Hard Currency fund, began trading last May and has garnered about $11 million in assets. It has returned 6.6 percent this year. While these returns are substantial for just four months, some mutual fund analysts say that the main reason to invest in the funds would be for diversification in portfolios that don't already have a big stake in foreign stock or bond funds. "Someone with most of their investments in domestic assets has a lot of their risk concentrated in the dollar," said Jeet Dutta, a fund analyst at Morningstar, who likened investing in foreign currency funds to buying insurance against a big decline in the dollar. But Mr. Dutta said he could not see a reason for buying shares of one of these funds if you also owned a longer-duration foreign bond fund. Axel Merk, the manager of the Merk Hard Currency fund, described it as a stepping stone to international investing. "It's diversification with less risk," Mr. Merk said. "Because you're just taking on the currency risk rather than also the business risk with foreign stocks or the interest-rate risk with foreign bond markets." Both the Franklin Templeton and the Merk funds primarily buy bonds denominated in so-called hard currencies -- those like the euro, the British pound and the Canadian dollar, from countries where the economics and politics are widely viewed as stable. But there are differences in the funds' approaches. The Franklin fund emphasizes Asian currencies, for example; the Merk fund holds none of them. Recently, about 45 percent of the Franklin fund was in Asian currencies, but none of that was in the Japanese yen. "We're primarily looking at currencies we think have the best value versus the dollar, but within that space, we're trying to pick the currencies we think have the best yield," said Michael Hasenstab, who has been a manager of the fund since 2001. He said that the yen was unlikely to appreciate much against the dollar, and that the yield on Japan's short-term bonds was practically zero. The fund does have some Asian holdings that Mr. Hasenstab said he would not classify as hard currencies. In December, slightly more than 8 percent of the portfolio was in the South Korean won, while just over 5 percent was in the Thai baht. For his part, Mr. Merk said that he was avoiding Asian currencies because "they're for the speculator, whereas the hard currencies that I pursue are more for the people who are concerned about the dollar." More than 63 percent of the Merk fund is invested in four European currencies: the euro, the British pound, the Swiss franc and the Swedish krona. Most of the rest is divided between the Australian and Canadian dollars, with a small portion in the New Zealand dollar. Finally, a little more than 9 percent of the Merk fund is invested in a gold exchange-traded fund, because gold has often fared well when the dollar has been under duress; the Franklin Templeton fund has no commodities exposure. The Franklin fund has an initial sales charge of 2.25 percent and charges 1.19 percent a year for expenses. The Merk fund has no sales charge and has annual expenses of 1.3 percent. OTHER currency mutual funds introduced last year by ProFunds and Rydex make wagers on the dollar. ProFunds Falling Dollar and Rydex Weakening Dollar both bet against the currency; the Rydex fund uses leverage to rise twice as much as the dollar falls. (If the dollar rises, that fund will lose twice as much as the dollar gains, while the ProFunds version is designed to mirror the dollar's movements.) Two other funds -- the ProFunds Rising Dollar and Rydex Strengthening Dollar --aim to rise when the dollar is rising. Andrew Clark, a senior fund analyst at Lipper, said he thought that the Rydex funds were appropriate only for speculators, because the use of leverage meant that losses could be drastic. This year, the ProFunds Rising Dollar fund has lost 3.6 percent, while the Rydex Strengthening Dollar fund has lost 8.2 percent. On the other hand, Mr. Clark said he saw a lot of potential in yet another alternative for investing in foreign currencies that was introduced last year: the Euro Currency Trust, an exchange-traded fund that began trading on the New York Stock Exchange in December. Unlike mutual funds, E.T.F.'s can be traded throughout the day, and Mr. Clark said that this could be an advantage in a fast-changing monetary crisis. Another distinction of E.T.F.'s is that investors can short -- or bet against -- them. That way, Mr. Clark said, investors who thought that the dollar might rise could bet against the euro without taking on the two-for-one leverage of the Rydex funds. Shorting the E.T.F. may also be a way for investors to hedge their currency risk if they have a lot of money in foreign stock or bond funds that do not already hedge, Mr. Clark said. But he pointed out that it could be tough for investors to know whether their foreign stock or bond funds hedged their currency risk, or by how much. Mr. Dutta of Morningstar said that the Franklin Templeton or Merk funds might be useful for some individual investors, but cautioned that most people would be wise to keep such holdings as a small part of their portfolios and to treat them as long-term assets, rather than to jump in and out of them to place quick bets against the dollar. "It's difficult to get currencies right," Mr. Dutta said. Even if, for example, "you can see that there's a clear macroeconomic case for the dollar to go down," he said that such arguments were more likely to hold true for the long term. No one gets short-term currency moves right all the time, he said. "In the short term," he said, "it might well go against what the experts say."

FOREIGN INVESTMENTS
INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND WORLD MARKET
CURRENCY
MUTUAL FUNDS
STOCKS AND BONDS


Michigan: Same-Sex Marriages Won’t Be Recognized

Abstract: Michigan will not recognize more than 300 same-sex marriages performed last weekend before a court halted a decision that opened the door for them, Gov. Rick Snyder said Wednesday. The announcement came a day after an appeals court indefinitely stopped additional same-sex marriages. It will most likely take months for the court to make its own judgment about whether a Michigan constitutional amendment that says marriage only is between a man and a woman violates the United States Constitution. Judge Bernard A. Friedman of Federal District Court struck down the same-sex marriage ban on Friday. Four counties granted licenses on Saturday before the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ordered a temporary halt. The stay was extended indefinitely on Tuesday. Mr. Snyder, a Republican, acknowledged that the couples “had a legal marriage,” but added that because of the stay, the ban has been restored. The governor’s move closes the door to certain benefits reserved solely for married couples.

Same-Sex Marriage,Gay Marriage
Michigan
Rick Snyder
Bernard A Friedman


Affordable Housing Program in New York Hits a Rough Patch

Abstract: For all the booms and busts he has lived through, Vincent Riso never thought it would come to this: Offering free 42-inch, flat-screen televisions to lure buyers into government-subsidized homes. Historically, such homes have sold quickly. But not at Waters Edge at Arverne , a stretch of 130 town house condominiums Mr. Riso’s company, the Briarwood Organization, built between Far Rockaway’s boardwalk and the A train’s rust-streaked overpass in Queens. So last spring, Briarwood, which got $12.8 million in city and state subsidies for Waters Edge, began throwing in as much as seven months’ free maintenance on some units, along with the TV. Still, as of mid-February, roughly three years after the units began arriving on the market, 22 of them had yet to sell. The city has received accolades nationwide for its efforts to provide housing affordable to middle- and lower-income households. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has pledged to build, save or restore 165,000 such housing units by 2014. But while the city is still filling up low-income rentals, the housing program is struggling on the ownership front. Sales are sluggish at some projects, particularly ones in poorer neighborhoods aimed at middle-income buyers. Few units will be built any time soon: since July 2008, the city has made only two deals with developers for new home ownership projects, down from two dozen deals in the 12 months before that. Last summer, Mr. Bloomberg and the City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn , unveiled the city’s Housing Asset Renewal Program , or HARP, setting aside $20 million for developers who agreed to drop the prices of unsold market-rate condos. But the program drew far fewer applications than the city had expected — just five by the Dec. 31 cutoff — so the deadline was extended. City housing officials and developers said the reasons for the slowdown were clear. Financing for new buildings has dried up. The HARP program has yet to catch on because developers and lenders were unwilling to cut into profits they were expecting to make. Would-be homebuyers remained hesitant to make the leap, and, crucially, mortgages were harder to get. Developers of higher-priced affordable housing were especially hurt by the housing crash, which caused price differences between their units and market-rate homes to narrow. In addition, market-rate homes do not have the resale restrictions that the affordable homes often have. Rafael E. Cestero , the city’s housing commissioner, said that during the housing boom, when financing for many projects was lined up, higher-priced units like those at Waters Edge “were deeply affordable” compared with what was then on the market. “We had no idea what was going to happen,” he said. Denise Scott , managing director for New York’s Local Initiatives Support Corporation , said her agency’s nonprofit partners were struggling to sell 95 refurbished houses and condos in Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn, Jamaica in Queens, and Morrisania in the Bronx, all city subsidized and costing $250,000 to $350,000. Some have been sitting on the market for 18 months, she said, even though their prices were cut from 15 percent to 30 percent. Ms. Scott said that demand was down but that the biggest impediment was banks’ unwillingness to issue mortgages. Samuel G. Gaccione, executive vice president for the TNS Development Group , said his group planned upgrades at the Shelton , a subsidized building under construction in Bedford-Stuyvesant — granite countertops, stainless-steel appliances, hardwood floors — to prepare for a bad market and buyer trepidation. But the fact that some homes are standing vacant in struggling neighborhoods has caused some to question the wisdom of putting them there in the first place. Waters Edge occupies the highest strata of what the city defined as affordable: Three-bedroom units are going for up to $344,000 in a neighborhood where the median income is $45,221, according to census data. Javier Valdés, deputy director of the community advocacy group Make the Road New York , based in Bushwick, Brooklyn, said the city should change how it calculated affordable income limits. Generally, people eligible for low-income subsidized units can earn up to 80 percent of what is known as the region’s “area median income,” which in 2009 was $76,800. Moderate-income housing is open to people earning from 80 percent to 120 percent, and middle-income housing is open to people earning 120 percent to 175 percent. But those income figures are based on a broad region that includes Long Island and Putnam, Rockland and Westchester Counties. Mr. Valdés said affordability should be determined by neighborhood. In Bushwick, the median income is $32,328, according to census figures. “We understand the difficulty and the balancing act the city has to play, to provide affordable housing to middle and lower income,” Mr. Valdés said. “But if condos are sitting unsold, we do want them given to people who are from the community.” Mr. Cestero, the housing commissioner, said the city had long worked to create economically diverse neighborhoods and could not have anticipated the housing bust. He said only a few hundred homes remained unsold and noted that the foreclosure rate among city-subsidized homes was just 0.06 percent. “I don’t look back and think our strategy was wrong,” he said. “I think our strategy was exactly right.” Some projects are doing well, especially lower-priced ones. At the Solara , which Briarwood put up in the South Bronx, 151 of the 160 units are under contract, after a year and a half on the market. Prices there range from $108,815 for a one-bedroom apartment to $202,217 for a three-bedroom. Seeing this trend, one development switched midstream. The Atlantic Terrace , an 80-unit building in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, built by the Fifth Avenue Committee , a community development group, was originally going to sell 59 units to families earning up to 165 percent of the area median income. After the market collapsed, the group lined up an additional $2 million in subsidies to make the homes affordable to people earning far less. The lottery for the units drew 4,881 applicants. “We read the tea leaves,” said Michelle de la Uz, the group’s executive director. Despite the troubles, the city said that it was nearing the 100,000 mark in the number of affordable units created or preserved and that it was having little difficulty creating and filling rentals, which tend to be aimed at lower-income families and constitute two-thirds of the total. Given the market, Mr. Cestero said, the city plans to concentrate on preservation and building mixed-income rentals. In Arverne, Mr. Riso said he was almost certain that the last 22 condos at Waters Edge would sell by summer. On a recent day, with an Arctic wind whipping off the Atlantic, a rare sight came into view: a new buyer. Ronald Fields, 46, his wife, Naomi, and their 4-year-old son, Taiga, dropped by to see the three-bedroom home they were expecting to close on this month. Mr. Fields, who works at the cable channel truTV, could not quite believe he was about to become a homeowner, after saving for a down payment for many years. “Two blocks from the beach, a new development, you can’t beat it!” Mr. Fields said. And, he added, he was looking forward to that free TV.

Affordable Housing
Housing and Real Estate
New York City
City Council (New York City)
Bloomberg Michael R
Quinn Christine C
Sales
Foreclosures


Eugene R. Anderson, Trial Lawyer, Dies at 82

Abstract: Eugene R. Anderson, a leading New York trial lawyer who found innovative ways to make insurance companies cover costly asbestos and toxic-spill claims, died on Friday in Manhattan. He was 82. In a message to the staff of Mr. Anderson’s firm, Anderson Kill & Olick, Robert M. Horkovich, the managing partner, said the cause of death was a rare form of double pneumonia. Mr. Anderson, who lived in Manhattan, died at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. Mr. Anderson grew up poor during the Great Depression , lived in foster homes and an orphanage and started working early to put himself through high school and college. He was eventually admitted to Harvard Law School, with the help of a lawyer who had stopped to give him a ride while Mr. Anderson was hitchhiking cross-country from the West Coast. He formed his law practice in 1969 after working as an assistant United States attorney. In the 1970s, the discovery of toxic waste dumps in places like Love Canal in New York led to a proliferation of lawsuits by people sickened by exposure to dangerous substances. Much of the blame was placed on the companies that had caused the illnesses and injuries, but Mr. Anderson made his mark by focusing on the insurers that had sold those companies their business insurance policies, then avoided paying the large claims. In his signature case, Mr. Anderson represented the Keene Corporation of Rockville Centre on Long Island as it faced millions of dollars of personal-injury claims from power plant workers who said they had been exposed, over many years, to asbestos in thermal insulation. Keene had taken on the problem when it acquired another company, Baldwin-Ehret-Hill, which sold insulation made with asbestos until 1972. Keene had turned to three insurance companies for help. But because the workers’ illnesses had taken years to develop, each insurer denied responsibility and pointed fingers at the others. One said the problem belonged to the carrier whose name was on the policies when the workers were first exposed. Another said it belonged to the insurer bearing the risk when the plaintiffs first learned that they were ill. The third looked to the insurer standing behind the company when the first plaintiff demanded insurance relief. Mr. Anderson’s solution looked a little like that of a parent breaking up a children’s dispute over who was to blame when a baseball broke a window. Each of the insurers, he argued, was correct in what it said about the others. A federal appellate court accepted his thinking, giving rise to the legal doctrine of the “triple trigger” for insurance coverage. Under the doctrine, a claim can be brought when the damage occurs, at the time it becomes apparent or when the plaintiff seeks redress, as long as a carrier insured the company at one of those times. After insurers began thwarting corporate claimants by writing “pollution exclusions” into their liability policies, Mr. Anderson found a chink in their armor. In a case in which he represented the Central Illinois Public Service Company, he convinced an appellate court that the words “sudden and accidental” in a pollution exclusion were ambiguous. That forced the insurer, Allianz Underwriters Insurance Company, to help pay for a cleanup. Mr. Anderson wrote a two-volume treatise, “Insurance Coverage Litigation.” Eugene Robert Anderson was born on Oct. 24, 1927, in Portland, Ore., and as an orphan and foster child moved from place to place, often to farms. He graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles, began thumbing his way across the country and wound up at Harvard with the help of the lawyer who had given him a ride. After law school, he worked at the New York firm of Chadbourne & Parke, becoming a partner, but later left to work for Robert M. Morgenthau when Mr. Morgenthau was the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. In 1986, Mr. Anderson married Mr. Morgenthau’s daughter, Jenny, who is executive director of the Fresh Air Fund. A previous marriage, to Hildegard Bleibreu, had ended in divorce. Besides his wife, Mr. Anderson is survived by his son, Matthew, and three grandsons.

Anderson Eugene R
Anderson Kill & Olick
Deaths (Obituaries)
Hazardous and Toxic Substances


Royals Win Seventh Straight

Abstract: James Shields (8-3) won his fifth straight decision, and Salvador Perez hit a three-run homer Sunday as the Kansas City Royals completed a three-game road sweep of the Chicago White Sox with a 6-3 win. The Royals extended their season-high win streak to seven games. CARDINALS 5, NATIONALS 2 Matt Adams homered for the third time in three games and Matt Holliday also went deep, helping host St. Louis to a series sweep over Washington. BLUE JAYS 5, ORIOLES 2 Host Baltimore couldn’t produce behind Chris Tillman (5-4), who allowed three runs in eight innings, leaving the Orioles with a split of a four-game series. MARLINS 3, PIRATES 2 Casey McGehee tied the game in the eighth inning two-run double, then drove home the winning run with a sacrifice fly in the 10th, and host Miami averted a series sweep by Pittsburgh. INDIANS 3, RED SOX 2 Nick Swisher led off the 11th inning with a homer, and Cleveland beat host Boston to split a four-game series. For the second straight day, the Indians won after trailing by 2-1 in the seventh. REDS 13, BREWERS 4 Billy Hamilton led off the game with a home run, Brandon Phillips added a two-run shot in the first inning and Todd Frazier later hit his team-high 15th homer as part of Cincinnati’s season-high 19 hits at Milwaukee. TIGERS 4, TWINS 3 Minnesota right fielder Oswaldo Arcia dropped a fly ball in the bottom of the ninth. J. D. Martinez followed with a sacrifice fly to center field, scoring Torii Hunter with the winning run. MARINERS 5, RANGERS 1 Kyle Seager had four hits and three runs batted in, and host Seattle stopped a five-game losing streak. Hisashi Iwakuma (5-3) pitched eight innings for the Mariners, allowing one run. CUBS 3, PHILLIES 0 Host Philadelphia was held to three hits while being shut out for the ninth time. Chicago’s Travis Wood (7-5) didn’t allow a hit until Ben Revere’s one-out single in the sixth. RAYS 4, ASTROS 3 David Price (5-6) struck out 10, and pinch-hitter Jerry Sands singled home the go-ahead run in the eighth inning for visiting Tampa Bay. ROCKIES 8, GIANTS 7 Justin Morneau hit a two-run double in the eighth inning at San Francisco as Colorado completed a three-game sweep with its third straight comeback victory. DIAMONDBACKS 6, DODGERS 3 Bronson Arroyo (7-4) of visiting Arizona won his third straight start, allowing one run in five innings. BRAVES 7, ANGELS 3 Tommy La Stella had three hits, including a two-run double in Atlanta’s four-run sixth, and the Braves beat Hector Santiago (0-7) and visiting Los Angeles.

Baseball
Kansas City Royals
White Sox
James Shields


As Perry Exits, His Appointees Look for Havens

Abstract: Ross Ramsey, the executive editor of The Texas Tribune, writes a regular column for The Tribune. Rick Perry’s people are starting to burrow into nonpolitical jobs in other corners of government. A former chief of staff is now a public utility commissioner. A former spokeswoman is now with the Texas Department of Insurance, another on his way to Parks and Wildlife. A former aide who heads the Texas Department of Transportation is off to one of the state’s big river authorities, insulated by one step from state politics. The end times are coming. The governor announced last summer that he would not seek re-election to the job he has held since December 2000. The campaign to replace him has begun. Unless the Legislature has a special session, it will not meet again while he is in office. Mr. Perry, the longest-serving governor in the history of the state, is slowly and surely becoming a lame duck. Why not wait for the next governor and see what he or she wants to do? The governor’s appointees are off the leash, too, if they feel like being off the leash. Mr. Perry recently lost a tug of war with Chancellor John Sharp of the Texas A&M University System over an interim president for that system’s flagship university. The Board of Regents, 100 percent of whose members were appointed by Mr. Perry, voted 100 percent with Mr. Sharp. Another round is coming — that same board will vote for a permanent president after a search — but most of those regents will still be working with Mr. Sharp after Mr. Perry is gone. The power is shifting, there and all over state government. (The Texas A&M University System is a corporate sponsor of The Texas Tribune.) This is normal, but Mr. Perry has been in office for so long that it does not seem normal. And as lame ducks go, he probably will retain more power for a longer period than most. It takes six years for a Texas governor to cycle through all of the various appointments to boards and commissions and so on. Mr. Perry has cycled through it twice. The agencies headed by his appointees have hired steadily from his staff and from the ranks of people trained by and loyal to his people. No one has had this much control over state government since Bob Bullock, the former comptroller and lieutenant governor, left office in 1999. Mr. Bullock’s influence seeped into every facet of state government as people who worked for him steadily moved into other agencies and offices. Mr. Perry, who started as a state legislator when Mr. Bullock was comptroller, watched and learned. Time on the budget-writing House Appropriations Committee in part helped form Mr. Perry’s real understanding of state government. As he moved through the agriculture commission, the lieutenant governorship and then his current office, he has replicated the network. There are Perry people everywhere you turn in Texas government, from the appointees to the top two or three layers of government agency organization charts. That network will not shrivel in a day — there are still functioning vestiges of Mr. Bullock’s network around, and he’s been dead for longer than Mr. Perry has been governor. The appointees are still Perry people, even though he is leaving. They and the legion of former aides and sympathizers are still, well, sympathetic. Part of this appointment and employment arrangement is that a like-minded group of people end up running things. They’re still in charge, and will be, for several years. It will take the next governor four years — all of a first term — to replace two-thirds of Mr. Perry’s appointees. If his successor is a Republican, the changes in philosophy could be minor. At the staff level, as with Mr. Bullock’s backers, Mr. Perry’s influence could outlast a couple of future governors. Politically, it’s a different deal. The attention of the big supporters — donors and activists — is moving to others. Even Mr. Perry’s closest political allies will transfer their affections as power shifts, and the start of his last year and the noise of the 2014 elections will mark the change. This is normal. This transfer of power happens all the time in politics and government. If it seems weird, it’s just because it has not happened in Texas for a long time.

Texas
Republicans
Appointments and Executive Changes
Rick Perry
Gubernatorial races


I.M.F. Urges Europe to Shoulder Economic Burdens of Troubled Bloc

Abstract: LUXEMBOURG — Euro area countries must share debt and use rescue funds to recapitalize troubled banks directly to ensure the survival of the currency union, Christine Lagarde , the managing director of the International Monetary Fund , said late Thursday. Ms. Lagarde’s call is likely to receive a frosty reception in Germany, where its chancellor, Angela Merkel , has staunchly resisted measures like debt-sharing until more robust structures are in place to ensure that euro nations manage their economies better in the future. “We are clearly seeing additional tension and acute stress applying to both banks and sovereigns in the euro area,” Ms. Lagarde said. “With that mind, the I.M.F. believes that a determined and forceful move toward complete European Monetary Union should be reaffirmed in order to restore faith in the system, because as we see it at the moment, the viability of the European monetary system is questioned,” she said. Ms. Lagarde’s comments came at the conclusion of a meeting of European finance ministers in Luxembourg. The ministers agreed to send financial authorities to Greece next week to find out whether to ease the terms of its bailout program. They also agreed to use an existing temporary bailout fund to help the Spanish banking sector. The Greek economy declined recent months, and Athens has struggled to carry out an austerity program that would yield billions of euros in savings. Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minister of Luxembourg, who leads the group of countries using the euro, said at the news conference that no decisions about relaxing the terms of the Greek bailout package had been made. Instead, as a first step, officials from the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the I.M.F. — together known as the troika — will go on a fact-finding trip to Athens on Monday to assess whether Greeks should be afforded more time to right their finances. A decision to grant Greece more time to reach its targets will face resistance from Germany, Finland and other countries who fear they will have to kick in even more money to keep Greece afloat if Greece does not return to the financial markets in 2014 as planned. Earlier Thursday, Maria Fekter, the Austrian finance minister, suggested that “Greece will have to work even harder,” even if its progress was delayed by its inability to form a government over the last few weeks. The Dutch finance minister, Jan Kees de Jager, noted that there was no “alternative to hard, painful reform.” The meeting in Luxembourg coincided with the release of two independent assessments that suggested Spanish banks need as much as 62 billion euros ($78 billion) of fresh capital. Euro zone members have already offered up to 100 billion euros. Mr. Juncker said he expected the Spanish authorities to put forward a formal request for financial assistance by Monday. Spain could draw support from an existing temporary bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility , until a new, permanent fund called the European Stability Mechanism becomes available, Mr. Juncker said. That could ease concerns that the debt issued by the stability mechanism must be repaid first in case of a Spanish default, which could scare away private investors and keep borrowing costs high. The stability facility would not place private creditors at such a disadvantage. “We will present the request in the next few days,” Luis de Guindos, the Spanish economy minister, said earlier on Thursday in Luxembourg. “I think that before the end of July we will have an idea, a very clear, detailed idea” of the bailout’s structure. Mr. de Guindos said that troika officials were already talking about the structure of the deal. Ms. Lagarde called for a gradual sharing of debt that could be initially restricted to shorter maturities. In a nod to sensitivities in member states like Germany, where political leaders and bankers are wary of jeopardizing their nations’ creditworthiness by sharing more debt with struggling economies, Ms. Lagarde was careful to say such steps should be gradual and that debt-sharing should be conditional on more centralized control over fiscal policy in Europe. Ms. Lagarde said troubled banks needed direct help to break what she called a “negative feedback loop” that occurs when governments take on more debt to bail out lenders. “Our preference is that this recapitalization of financing be done without the intermediary of the sovereign,” said Ms. Lagarde. “We certainly hope wisdom can prevail and that the best solution can be at least looked at,” she said. She said her comments applied to any European Union member with troubled lenders. She declined to discuss Spain specifically. Ms. Merkel may come under pressure to revisit the idea when she meets Prime Minister Mario Monti of Italy, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of Spain and President François Hollande of France in Rome on Friday.

European Union
European Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010- )
International Monetary Fund
Lagarde Christine
Greece
Banking and Financial Institutions
European Financial Stability Facility
Merkel Angela
Germany


Slowdown Begins to Show at Stalwart Disney

Abstract: LOS ANGELES — Dark days have finally come to the Magic Kingdom. Even as the weakening economy was hammering rival media conglomerates over the last year, the Walt Disney Company reported surprisingly robust results across its theme parks, consumer products and television networks. Disney shares have fallen about 33 percent since May — a sharp drop, but one that looks almost respectable considering that shares in companies like CBS have plummeted more like 70 percent. But Disney on Thursday reported a 13 percent decline in quarterly earnings on weakness in nearly every part of its empire. Movie earnings in the company’s fiscal fourth quarter, ended Sept. 27, plunged 42 percent because movies like “Swing Vote” and “Miracle at St. Anna” were virtually ignored at the box office. Advertising declines hurt two Disney properties, ABC and ESPN, leading to a 4 percent drop in income at the media networks unit. Income at the theme parks dropped 4 percent because of lower bookings at Disneyland and higher costs at Walt Disney World. Over all, Disney reported net income of $760 million, or 40 cents a share, for the quarter, compared with $877 million, or 44 cents a share, a year earlier. For 2008, net income dropped to $4.4 billion from $4.7 billion. Robert A. Iger, Disney’s chief executive, and Thomas O. Staggs, Disney’s chief financial officer, offered a bleak assessment of the impact of the global economic crisis on the company’s business prospects. Phrases like “acute softness” and “a very, very challenging time” peppered their comments on a call with analysts. “Even the best product out there is feeling the effect,” Mr. Iger said. Disney’s theme parks, an $11.5 billion annual business, have been vulnerable in past downturns. This time, the company is emphasizing that it has learned to minimize damage by pulling promotional and cost-saving levers. The company also has built more discount hotels since the last slowdown, in 2001. Attendance at Walt Disney World over the last month held up well — Mr. Iger said visits were down just 1 percent — but the company warned that “bookings in the last month have fallen off considerably.” To improve bookings, the company on Thursday introduced hefty discounts, including free park tickets and three nights in a hotel for guests who book four-day vacations by the end of the year. At the media networks unit, ABC is emerging as a trouble spot. The network climbed out of the ratings basement in 2004 on the backs of several hit dramas but has not introduced new hits, stalling growth in television DVD sales and syndication revenue. ABC’s audience in prime time has fallen about 20 percent among young adults this season compared with last. Notably, ABC’s heavily promoted Wednesday, with “Private Practice,” is on life support. (One bright spot is ABC News, which was No. 1 in viewers on election night.) ABC plans “numerous midseason programs,” Mr. Iger said. “I realize this is a sobering outlook,” he said. “This is a strong company with great assets, great brands, great people,” he added, “which will help us surmount the challenges we face today.”

Disney Walt Co
Company Reports
Amusement and Theme Parks
Motion Pictures


Tunnel Found From Gaza Into Israel, Military Says

Abstract: JERUSALEM — The Israeli military announced on Sunday that it had discovered a tunnel leading from Gaza into Israel that it said could have been used for an attack against Israeli soldiers or civilians. In response to the discovery, the military said it had suspended the flow of building materials to the private sector in Gaza, a Palestinian coastal enclave. Maj. Gen. Sami Turgeman, Israel’s Southern Command chief, said the freeze was ordered because Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, had been using construction materials approved by Israel for civilian purposes to build tunnels like the one discovered recently. Officials said Israel would continue to allow the transfer of construction materials for projects overseen by international organizations. Military officials said the tunnel, discovered last week, was about a mile long and built at a depth of nearly 60 feet. They added that it had probably been constructed more than a year ago. It was the third such tunnel discovered this year, they said. The mouth of the tunnel is near Ein Hashlosha, an Israeli communal farm near the border with Gaza. In 2006, Hamas and other militant groups used a smuggling tunnel for a cross-border raid in which they killed two Israeli soldiers and seized a third, Gilad Shalit , who was whisked into Gaza and held captive for five years before being released in a prisoner exchange. Image An entrance to the tunnel near Kibbutz Ein Hashlosha, just outside the southern Gaza Strip. Credit Amir Cohen/Reuters Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel praised the security forces in remarks at the beginning of a weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday. “This is part of our policy — an aggressive policy against terrorism, including preventive action, intelligence, initiated action, responsive action and, of course, Operation Pillar of Defense,” Mr. Netanyahu said, referring to a military offensive in Gaza in November 2012 that Israel said was aimed at halting rocket fire against southern Israel. As a result of these measures, he said, Israel has enjoyed its quietest year in more than a decade, although he also pointed to what he said was a rise in terrorist actions in recent weeks. Hamas has largely observed a cease-fire with Israel, brokered by Egypt, that ended the fighting in November. But the discovery of the tunnel east of Gaza was portrayed locally by Hamas as evidence that it had not dropped armed resistance and that it continued to prepare for the next round of fighting against Israel. “The determination that rests in the minds and hearts of the resistance fighters is more important than tunnels dug in the mud,” said a spokesman for Hamas’s military wing who goes by the nom de guerre Abu Obaida. “Out of the first, you can make thousands of the second.” In the past month, Palestinians killed two Israeli soldiers in the West Bank, and a 9-year-old girl was lightly wounded in a shooting outside her home in a West Bank settlement. On Friday, an Israeli man was bludgeoned to death in an isolated area of the West Bank’s Jordan Valley. The Shin Bet security agency said Sunday that with the help of the military and the police, it had arrested three Palestinians from the Hebron area on suspicion of involvement in that killing. It said that two of the suspects, one 18 and the other 21, had confessed to carrying out the killing and that it was investigating whether it was an act of terrorism or a criminal attack.

Gaza Strip
Bridges,Tunnels
Military
Israel
Hamas
Palestinians