TASK DEFINITION: Given a document, generate a short title of the document. The title should convey the main idea/event/topic about which the document is being written. Note that URLs in the text have been replaced with [Link].
PROBLEM: Russian election officials on Monday formally barred  Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny  from running for president  prompting calls from  him  for a boycott of next year's vote.
 Navalny  is implicitly barred from running for office because of a conviction in a fraud case which has been viewed as political retribution.  He  could have run if  he  was given a special dispensation or if  his  conviction was cancelled.
 Incumbent Vladimir Putin  is set to easily win a fourth term in office in the March 18 election  with  his  approval ratings topping 80%.
 Putin  foe clears first step in bid for Russian presidency
Over the past year   Navalny  has mounted a grassroots campaign which reached out to the most remote corners of  Putin 's heartland.
 Navalny   41  is the most serious challenger that  Putin  has faced in all  his  years in power  and the court cases against  him  have been widely seen as a tool to keep  him  from running for office.
In a pre-recorded video message that was released minutes after the Election Commission handed down the decision  Navalny called on  his  supporters to boycott the vote.
"The procedure that we're invited to take part is not an election "  he  said. "Only Putin and the candidates  he  has hand-picked are taking part in it."
Central Election Commission chief Ella Pamfilova told  Navalny  ahead of its vote to bar him that "maybe we would be interested if you were running " but said the conviction doesn't allow the commission to put him on the ballot.
Speaking before the vote   Navalny  told the commission that  their  decision to bar him would be a vote "not against me  but against 16 000 people who have nominated me  against 200 000 volunteers who have been canvassing for me."
The involvement of Ksenia Sobchak  a 36-year-old star TV host  could raise public interest in the race. While Sobchak has denied colluding with the Kremlin  she could attract some of  Navalny 's supporters and help boost attendance.
Sobchak criticized  Navalny 's call for boycotting the vote  saying Monday that the "election is the only way to change something  and boycotting them is inefficient and harmful."

SOLUTION: Russian officials bar Navalny from running for president

PROBLEM: As school leaders try to move on   Joe Paterno  loyalists  including many university trustees  continue to fight over the coachâs role in  his  assistantâs crimes.
In July  Penn Stateâs board of trustees met to discuss the most important issues facing a school system with 99 000 students and a $5.7 billion budget. It took about three hours before someone brought up Jerry Sandusky and  Joe Paterno .
Supporters of  Joe Paterno   right  question the evidence used to conclude  he  ignored or covered up the assaults committed by Jerry Sandusky  left. (1999 photo by Paul Vathis/Associated Press)
Law enforcement officials  victimsâ lawyers and private investigators â including Louis Freeh  the former FBI director who authored a damning 2012 report that asserted  Paterno âs involvement in a coverup â say the dispute results from stubborn âPaterno-deniers â âJoebotsâ and âtruthers â for whom no evidence will be strong enough to condemn the beloved former football coach.
âThe tragedy of all of this is that it is self-perpetuated and self-inflicted â said Tom Kline  an attorney for one victim. âThey have settled on an endless assault on anyone who dares suggest that there was something that happened that was wrong and that the fault lies at the doorstep of either  Paterno  or the football program.â
But alumni trustees and supporters insist  Paterno  and the school were victims of a rush to judgment that spared other  more culpable organizations â most notably the Second Mile  Sanduskyâs charity for at-risk children â from public scorn. They point to conflicting accounts of the assault at the core of the coverup case  evidence the NCAA may have influenced Freehâs report and doubts about claims  Paterno  ignored assaults as far back as the 1970s.
According to Freeh  in 2001   Paterno  and three university administrators â president Graham Spanier  athletic director Tim Curley and senior vice president Gary Schultz â decided to conceal a report of Sandusky assaulting a boy  to avoid bad publicity for the university and its football team. The men displayed a âcallous and shocking disregard for child victims â Freeh said  as they âempowered Sanduskyâ to abuse boys for another decade.
Freehâs verdict capped an unimaginable downfall for  Paterno   who just eight months before seemed poised to retire as the winningest  most respected coach in the history of college football. In 46 years as head coach  heâd piled up 409 wins and two national championships while professing selflessness and education  fielding teams that wore simple jerseys with no names on the back  his players graduating at rates that outpaced competitors. In the venal world of college football   Paterno  built a reputation as a coach who valued integrity over winning â âSuccess with Honorâ was his motto â and now he stood accused of covering up for a pedophile to protect his public image.
In including  Paterno   Freeh had gone further than prosecutors  who would charge the administrators with crimes but said they did not believe  Paterno  participated. In defending his conclusion  Freeh cited âthe most important evidence in the caseâ: a chain of emails between the three administrators from 2001.
A newspaper with the headline rewritten was left near a statue of  Paterno  outside Beaver Stadium on Jan. 23  2012  the day after he died. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press) Freeh conceded his reportâs condemnation of  Paterno  was made without knowledge of what was said in  Paterno âs meeting with Curley. (Matt Rourke/Associated Press)
The emails showed the men planned to report Sandusky to child welfare authorities but changed course after Curley met with  Paterno . Instead  they banned Sandusky from bringing children to Penn State and informed the Second Mile of the incident. Sandusky was convicted of assaulting four boys after this incident.
In an email  one trustee urged then-Penn State president Rod Erickson to tear down the statue of  Paterno  outside the stadium  if it would pacify the NCAA.
Eleven days after Freehâs news conference  the NCAA announced that Penn State had entered into a âconsent decree â accepting a $60 million fine and the erasing of all of Paternoâs wins after 1998  the year Sandusky was investigated â but cleared â by Penn State police and a state child welfare agency. Freeh had concluded  Paterno  should have suspected then his assistant was a pedophile.
Penn State students protested the schoolâs handling of the Sandusky scandal. (2011 photo by Gene J. Puskar/Associated Press) Students also honored the memory of  Paterno  after  his  death at age 85. (2012 photo by Gary Cameron/Reuters)
The lawsuit also produced communications between NCAA staffers and Freehâs team that prompted some alumni to theorize Freeh catered his report â which  by including  Paterno   put the case squarely in the NCAAâs crosshairs â to appeal to a desired client.
The NCAA is only a part of why some alumni feel the school and  Paterno  took a disproportionate share of the blame  Schmidt said  before explaining theories involving a former governor and the Second Mile.

SOLUTION: Penn State six years after Jerry Sandusky scandal remains divided

PROBLEM: Kenneth D. Adams   42  and Anthony Willie  55  pleaded guilty in Alexandria federal court this week to a fraud conspiracy  as did three contractors who paid the bribes.
Until  their  arrests this year  the two were in charge of VDOTâs office in Burke and had the power to decide which contractors were used to plow roads during snowstorms. For at least the past six years  in exchange for those contracts  the two men took a cut of the profits  according to court documents. Sometimes snow-removal-company owners paid them cash outside fast-food restaurants and supermarkets in the area. Other times  they steered money toward a landscaping company owned by  Adams .
 Adams  also admitted to selling cocaine to  his  VDOT co-workers;  his  supplier was the relative of another employee.
Lawyers for Sariri wrote in a court filing that he had contacted law enforcement about âunfair practices and essentially insider tradingâ at VDOT.  Adams  and Willie âhad a chokehold over the snow-removal businessâ in the area  lawyers Peter Greenspun and Mikhail Lopez wrote.

SOLUTION:
Virginia transportation officials plead guilty in bribery drug schemes