Australian Leader Serves an Unsportsmanlike Warning to Putin

Abstract: MOSCOW — Could it be his charm or talent? Or the exaggeratedly macho image? Whatever it is, there is something about the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin , that seems to get under the skin of other world leaders, prompting them to say things they typically do not about other important figures, at least not aloud or in public. On Monday in Australia , Prime Minister Tony Abbott became the latest in a long line when he told reporters that he planned to get in Mr. Putin’s face at a meeting of the Group of 20 economic forum in Brisbane next month over the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 in eastern Ukraine, in which 28 Australian citizens were killed. “I’m going to shirt-front Mr. Putin,” Mr. Abbott told reporters, using a term that in Australian football means charging an opponent to knock him down and in rugby refers to grabbing an opponent’s shirt or collar. “I am going to be saying to Mr. Putin: ‘Australians were murdered. They were murdered by Russian-backed rebels using Russian-supplied equipment. We are very unhappy about this.’ ” Mr. Abbott eased back a bit on Tuesday after criticism in the Australian news media and from a senator from Tasmania, Jaqui Lambie, who said the Australian leader was “just full of testosterone and bad manners.” A Russian Embassy official called Mr. Abbott’s remarks “immature.” When it comes to dealing with Mr. Putin, of course, a little testosterone would hardly seem to hurt. The Russian leader, who has a black belt in judo, is well known for his machismo, as well as for showing it off. Among the iconic images of him are photographs of him bare-chested, including one riding a horse and another fishing. There are other photos of him engaged in an array of physical endeavors — scuba diving, for example, and flying a motorized hang glider. Video Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia pulled back from a vow to “shirt front” President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia but promised a “robust conversation” over the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 downing. Credit Credit Rick Rycroft/Associated Press Mr. Abbott is hardly the only leader to offer sharp-tongued comments about Mr. Putin. In a call with President Obama this year, the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, reportedly said that Mr. Putin appeared to be “in another world.” President George W. Bush famously said he had looked Mr. Putin in the eye during their first meeting in 2001 and gotten “ a sense of his soul ,” calling him “trustworthy,” only to complain later that dealing with Mr. Putin was “like arguing with an eighth grader with his facts wrong.” As secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton was reported to privately mock Mr. Putin’s legs-spread-wide posture. And in a speech in Las Vegas on Monday night, Mrs. Clinton said, “I see a very coldblooded, calculated former K.G.B. agent who is determined to not only enrich himself and his closest colleagues but also to try to revive Russia ’s influence around its border.” Since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March, Mr. Putin has made only a few appearances at major international events, including a World War II commemoration in Normandy in June, where he got a polite, if hardly warm, reception. Another test of Mr. Putin’s standing among his international colleagues will come on Thursday, when he is set to attend a meeting of European and Asian leaders in Milan. As for the encounter next month with Mr. Abbott in Brisbane, although the Russian Embassy in Australia in its response this week noted Mr. Putin’s judo expertise, there are signs that the Russian president may be losing some of his mojo. After a hike in Siberia on his 62nd birthday this month, Mr. Putin said he was in pain. “I did nearly nine kilometers mountain trekking,” a bit over five miles, he said two days later. “And everything aches ever since.”

Australia
Russia
Tony Abbott
Vladimir Putin
Malaysia Airlines 17
Plane Crashes and Missing Planes


Losing Fifth Straight, Steelers May Be Down for the Count

Abstract: The Pittsburgh Steelers lost their fifth straight game Thursday and had their playoff hopes damaged by the Browns, who ended a 12-game losing streak against their bitter rival by beating the Steelers, 13-6, in Cleveland’s subzero wind chills. Ben Roethlisberger was sacked eight times and lost for the first time in 11 games against the Browns, who extended Pittsburgh’s longest losing streak in six years and defeated the Steelers at home for the first time since 2000. “A long time coming,” Browns quarterback Brady Quinn said. Unexpected losses to Kansas City, Oakland and Cleveland — three of the N.F.L.’s worst teams with a combined record of 9-28 — have pushed Pittsburgh to the brink. Chris Jennings, who began the season on Cleveland’s practice squad, scored on a 10-yard run, and Phil Dawson kicked two 29-yard field goals for the Browns, who snapped a seven-game losing streak. Roethlisberger tried to rally the Steelers, but his fourth-down pass to Santonio Holmes with less than two minutes left was knocked down by linebacker David Bowens. When Holmes was tackled on a punt return and the final seconds ticked off the scoreboard clock, Cleveland fans, who were nearly outnumbered by Terrible Towel-waving Pittsburgh fans, danced in the aisles. Several Browns players jumped into the Dawg Pound section to celebrate. Josh Cribbs rushed for 87 yards out of the Wildcat formation, had 104 return yards and caught a pass for 9 yards. He picked up an important first down on a 14-yard run in the fourth quarter when the Browns were trying to run out the clock. Quinn completed just one pass in the second half and finished 6 of 19 for 90 yards. Roethlisberger went 18 of 32 for 201 yards. He had trouble throwing in the swirling winds, and the Steelers were not able to establish their running game against the Browns’ defense, which came in ranked 32nd over all. ADALIUS THOMAS UPSET New England Patriots linebacker Adalius Thomas wasted no time defending himself after Coach Bill Belichick sent him home for being late to a team meeting. Thomas said after returning Thursday that he was “dumbfounded” and “can’t figure out what Bill thinks or knows.” Three other players were also sent away for arriving late Wednesday: wide receiver Randy Moss and linebackers Gary Guyton and Derrick Burgess. Thomas said he called ahead on a snowy Wednesday morning, as players are instructed to do when they are going to be late. But when he showed up about nine minutes late for an 8 o’clock team meeting, he said Belichick told him to leave. “You’re told to call and you call, you get sent home,” Thomas said, adding, “That’s not an excuse, but I could have been in the ditch.” WOMAN SUES RAVENS’ SUGGS A woman filed a $70 million lawsuit against Baltimore Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs, claiming he is the father of her two children and assaulted her multiple times. Candace Williams, 26, is seeking $50 million in punitive damages and $20 million in compensatory damages from Suggs, a three-time Pro Bowler. She filed a separate complaint seeking custody of the children. Both were filed Monday in Baltimore Circuit Court. Williams is also seeking a restraining order against Suggs. Suggs said he had nothing to hide, but declined to discuss the case. “I can’t talk about all that right now,” he said at practice. “When I can address it, I will. I really have nothing to hide.” INJURY SETBACK FOR YOUNG Tennessee Titans quarterback Vince Young aggravated his right knee injury and left practice early in what Coach Jeff Fisher called a setback. After stepping back and throwing a pass, Young went to the sideline, where a trainer and a doctor checked out his knee. With his knee wrapped in ice, Young walked gingerly out of the indoor practice field. Fisher said he expected Young, who originally hurt his knee last weekend in the loss at Indianapolis, to play Sunday against St. Louis. RUSSELL STUNG BY BENCHING Oakland Raiders quarterback JaMarcus Russell said he was embarrassed at being benched and vowed to regain his starting role. Russell, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2007 draft, spoke for the first time since losing his starting job last month to Bruce Gradkowski. He called his demotion a “road bump” and said he believed he was still the quarterback of the future in Oakland. Also Thursday, Coach Tom Cable said left guard Robert Gallery would miss the rest of the season because of a lower back injury sustained in the Raiders’ victory Sunday at Pittsburgh. AROUND THE LEAGUE The Jets placed Larry Izzo, a linebacker and special teams standout, on injured reserve because of a herniated disk in his neck. ... Atlanta Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan sat out another practice because of a toe injury, making it increasingly unlikely he will play Sunday against New Orleans. ... Minnesota Vikings wide receiver Percy Harvin has been held out of practice this week because of migraine headaches, Coach Brad Childress said.

Pittsburgh Steelers
Football
Cleveland Browns
Roethlisberger Ben
Quinn Brady
Dawson Phil


Traveling Overseas to Win Votes at Home

Abstract: Colombia hardly constitutes a general election battleground. Neither does France nor Jordan. But Senators John McCain and Barack Obama are heading to those countries and others because votes can be won there. The votes are the reward that Americans confer for gravitas — the stature and experience that reassures them their would-be president can safeguard them from unforeseen events. What helps the candidates in this effort are the images of them consulting with foreign leaders and giving speeches on the international stage, as well as the knowledge they glean during these travels. Mr. Obama, of Illinois, needs to offer that reassurance to voters to capitalize on the exceptionally favorable tailwinds behind Democratic candidates in 2008. Mr. McCain, of Arizona, needs to preserve advantages accrued from his demonstrated grit as a war prisoner and years of experience on national security issues. The stakes appear highest for Mr. McCain, who otherwise has few political advantages. “ ‘I’ve been tested,’ ” noted Ed Rollins, a veteran Republican strategist, “is the only issue he has.” Shifts on Experience The value of experience in presidential campaigns shifts with the political winds. In the 25 elections over the past century, the older candidate has won roughly two-thirds of the time. In 9 of those 17 victories, the older candidate was the incumbent. President Ronald Reagan disarmed skeptics about his age in 1984 with a joking pledge during a debate not to “exploit for political purposes my opponent’s youth and inexperience,” a reference to his opponent, Walter F. Mondale. But at key moments of national unease, voters have shunned the familiar figure in the White House to embrace a lesser-known candidate who offers change. That dynamic elected Jimmy Carter over President Gerald R. Ford in 1976, Mr. Reagan over President Carter four years later and Bill Clinton over President George Bush in 1992. In all of those cases, the challengers could at least point to the executive experience they had gained from their service as governors. What makes the 2008 contest so unusual is that the major party rivals do not have experience in the Oval Office or as governor. Both are legislators; Mr. McCain has served nearly three decades on Capitol Hill, and Mr. Obama for 12 years in the Illinois Senate and the United States Senate. Political opponents sometimes dismiss the importance of Mr. Obama’s tenure in the Illinois capital, Springfield, but Mr. McCain may not gain much from that contrast given the prevailing public disdain for Washington. “Can we be so sure that the skill set picked up over eight years in a state Capitol is inferior as presidential preparation to two decades in the pompous, cordoned-off environment of the U.S. Senate?” Alan Ehrenhalt, executive editor of Governing magazine, asked recently in Newsweek. “I seriously doubt it.” The clearest difference Mr. McCain can point to is his military service, and opinion surveys suggest that it, along with his familiarity and national security expertise, gives Americans confidence that he is prepared for the presidency. Concerning Mr. Obama, “The question mark for voters is on competency,” the pollsters Peter Hart and Neil Newhouse concluded after conducting a NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey this month. “John McCain’s greatest strength is that voters can perceive him behind the desk in the Oval Office. He has cleared the competency bar.” Credibility in Travel Mr. McCain aims to reinforce that edge with his trip this week to Colombia and Mexico. Mr. Obama hopes to narrow that advantage with his coming travel to Britain, France, Germany, Israel and Jordan. (Details of his plans to visit Afghanistan and Iraq have not been disclosed, for security reasons.) Some Democrats argue that he needn’t do much, since the value of Mr. McCain’s experience remains limited at a time voters are so unhappy. “It’s a card they can play, but it can be trumped by the ‘change’ card,” said James Carville, the Democratic strategist behind Mr. Clinton’s victory in 1992. The biggest potential pitfall for Mr. Obama is an obvious mistake in imagery or rhetoric. Mr. McCain, 71, faced unflattering coverage when he mischaracterized Iran as supporting Sunni Muslim insurgents in Iraq. The 46-year-old Mr. Obama would likely pay a higher and more enduring price for a comparable flub. “He’s young-looking,” said Mr. Rollins, who piloted Mr. Reagan’s victory over Mr. Mondale. If Republicans can “create enough doubt in the minds of voters in a time of war and economic crisis, then it may work,” he added. “But it’s not an easy sell.”

McCain John
Obama Barack
Presidential Election of 2008


Texas Legislators Putting Washington to Shame

Abstract: Ross Ramsey, the managing editor of The Texas Tribune, writes a regular column. With 10 days left in the session, Texas legislators have a chance to look like they know what they’re doing. That would contrast nicely with the actions of their counterparts in Washington and perhaps — just maybe — voters would notice the difference. It’s a golden opportunity to show off. The national government appears to be a collection of smart people from all over the country who, when harnessed into a single organization, operate at about 25 percent of their average I.Q.’s. Texas legislators aren’t any smarter, and their accomplishments aren’t huge, but they do get better grades for deportment. At the state level, the 2012 elections weren’t about big programs or big shifts in policy. Voters sent people to Austin to do the regular work, to fix some problems like high-stakes testing in public schools. The session that followed has reflected that. No sweeping anythings have emerged: no big reforms, new programs or personnel changes. A shortage of truly surprising headlines and news. The alert level for drama is green, not orange or red. Here in the last days of the 140-day session, lawmakers are working on a state budget. That’s normal. They are trying to reconcile financial differences over transportation, water, schools and taxes. Normal, more or less. They have their differences and arguments, but few of the confrontations have had that bad-marriage undertow familiar to legislative watchers. It’s a good time to be the sort of government that doesn’t attract attention. The federal races in 2012, from the presidential contests to Texas’ United States Senate race that came down to Ted Cruz and David Dewhurst, were sharp, close and often bitter. Texans seem to hold their governments in what you might call minimum high regard. “Don’t be like the rest of them” seems to be the order of the day. Gov. Rick Perry didn’t give lawmakers a list of things to do at the beginning of the session. The 2011 Legislature came in without enough money to finance continuing programs, with the treacherous issue of legislative and Congressional redistricting on the block, and with a list of divisive issues set down by a governor who was a few months away from entering the race for the Republican presidential nomination. For white-collar types, that’s real action. This time, there is enough money, to the extent that there is ever enough money. Legislative leaders squelched the attorney general’s efforts to reopen redistricting, knowing that the political coalitions holding things together are too fragile for that debate. The issues they decided to tackle are either nonpartisan, like water and transportation financing, or only vaguely partisan, like tax cuts and education spending. The Tea Party engine that propelled the 2011 session is still running. But without a Republican supermajority in either House, it is a less powerful force this year. Just a few days ago, the corridors of the State Capitol were full of talk of an immediate special session that might be needed for lawmakers to settle things that seemed insoluble as time was running out. The talk is a little quieter for the moment, with budget negotiators alternately relaxed and pensive and water plans back on track. It’s too early to say they will work it out, but it appears that they might. Voters, and the people who lead voters to choices in elections, will sort through the results for differences that matter to them. Lawmakers will have voted on gun bills, education spending, whether and how to change what is required for a high school diploma, and whether to raise the pay of state judges — and with it, their own pensions. That is as it ought to be. Legislatures were invented to settle differences, as a polite alternative to brawls. And if they can finish without overshadowing their work with their battles, without ending in partisan snits and intramural melees, maybe the voters will notice. Given the noise level in Washington and the voters’ evident disgust for the workings of the federal government, maybe Texans won’t notice the officeholders in Austin or, if they do, will notice the difference between the two. Even better.

Texas
Budget
Transportation
Water
Tax
Rick Perry
Legislature
Education


The Quotable David Carr

Abstract: David Carr was often more quotable than the personalities he wrote about. His plainspoken style was sometimes blunt, and searingly honest about himself. The effect was both folksy and sophisticated, a voice from a shrewd and well-informed skeptic. Here’s a selection of his writing and public statements: ‘Crickets Chirping in Newsrooms’ Mr. Carr wrote in 2010 about transparency in journalism in one of his Media Equation columns : “If you dumped every reporter who ever sent a snide message or talked smack in private, there would be nothing but crickets chirping in newsrooms all over America.” ‘The Trick of Enjoying New York’ In “The Night of the Gun,” a memoir, Mr. Carr took to the painful task of reporting on his own life. In a 2008 Times review , it was a called a “brave, heartfelt, often funny, often frustrating book.” “The trick of enjoying New York is not to be so busy grinding your way to the center of the earth that you fail to notice the sparkle of the place, a scale and a kind of wonder that puts all human endeavors in their proper place.” Video David Carr talks about an incident recounted in his memoir, “The Night of the Gun.” Credit Credit Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times ‘It Beats Working’ At a commencement address last year at the University of California, Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism, Mr. Carr spoke of the need for decency in the future generation of journalists: “Being a journalist, I never feel bad talking to journalism students because it’s a grand, grand caper. You get to leave, go talk to strangers, ask them anything, come back, type up their stories, edit the tape. That’s not gonna retire your loans as quickly as it should, and it’s not going to turn you into a person who’s worried about what kind of car they should buy, but that’s kind of as it should be. I mean, it beats working.” Corporate Portraiture Mr. Carr was a stand-out star in “ Page One: Inside the New York Times ,” a documentary: “I don’t do corporate portraiture.” Video A scene from “Page One: Inside The New York Times,” a 2011 documentary, shows a tense meeting between the media reporter David Carr and Vice magazine executives. It includes graphic language. Credit Credit Magnolia Pictures ‘Find People More Interesting Than You’ During an interview with Boston University , Mr. Carr discussed the nature of reporting, and how technology is making media more interesting: “The dirty secret: journalism has always been horrible to get in; you always have to eat so much crap to find a place to stand. I waited tables for seven years, did writing on the side. If you’re gonna get a job that’s a little bit of a caper, that isn’t really a job, that under ideal circumstances you get to at least leave the building and leave your desktop, go out, find people more interesting than you, learn about something, come back and tell other people about it — that should be hard to get into. That should be hard to do. No wonder everybody’s lined up, trying to get into it. It beats working.” ‘I'm the Kind of Person Who Showers With His Shirt On’ From his article “ You Are Where You Tan ” about a Memorial Day Weekend with his family: “I’m the kind of person who showers with his shirt on, so walking the beach at Southampton seemed vaguely mysterious — how could so many people have impossibly perfect tans one day into the season? And where did they all stay? Summer shares that cost $20,000 a month?” Remembering David Carr A collection of memories and reactions to the death of Mr. Carr, who The Times’s executive editor, Dean Baquet, called “the finest media reporter of his generation.” A Frantic Kind of Boring From his article “ Me and My Girls ” on drug addiction: “Where does a junkie’s time go? Mostly in 15-minute increments, like a bug-eyed Tarzan, swinging from hit to hit. For months on end in 1988, I sat inside a house in north Minneapolis, doing coke and listening to Tracy Chapman’s ‘Fast Car’ and finding my own pathetic resonance in the lyrics. ‘Any place is better,’ she sang. ‘Starting from zero, got nothing to lose.’ After shooting or smoking a large dose, there would be the tweaking and a vigil at the front window, pulling up the corner of the blinds to look for the squads I was always convinced were on their way. All day. All night. A frantic kind of boring. End-stage addiction is mostly about waiting for the police, or someone, to come and bury you in your shame.” A Golden Age of Journalism From an interview with NPR : “We are entering a golden age of journalism. I do think there has been horrible frictional costs, but I think when we look back at what has happened, I look at my backpack that is sitting here, and it contains more journalistic firepower than the entire newsroom that I walked into 30 to 40 years ago. It’s connected to the cloud, I can make digital recordings of everything that I do, I can check in real time if someone is telling me the truth, I have a still camera that takes video that I can upload quickly and seamlessly.” ‘We All Walk This Earth Feeling We Are Frauds’ From his book, The Night of the Gun : “I now inhabit a life I don’t deserve, but we all walk this earth feeling we are frauds. The trick is to be grateful and hope the caper doesn’t end soon.”


Cuban Exile’s Hope for a Ferry to Cuba Awaits U.S. Approval

Abstract: MIAMI — Imagine a ferry from Miami to Havana that costs far less than a flight. Cuban-Americans, who can now visit the island without restriction, could eat lechón on deck, then deliver a shipping container of food to needy relatives by morning. Armando Ruiz, 72, a Cuban exile and former concert promoter, has dreamed of this for a decade. Now he thinks it might actually happen — if the Obama administration approves his application for a license. “He says he wants to help the Cuban people,” Mr. Ruiz said, referring to President Obama. “How can he do it without a ship?” Until recently, Miami’s community of Cuban exiles was considered far too volatile to handle a ferry cruising from Florida to Cuba for the first time since 1962 . But Mr. Ruiz’s proposal shows how much the political climate here has changed. It is faith in pent-up demand for a new approach that has led Mr. Ruiz to consider chartering a $23 million, 600-cabin cruise-ferry from a dealer in Lithuania. It may also be the dream of riches, which he denies, or family legacy, which he does not. But for the White House, his proposal mainly shows how a shift from policymakers can produce demands that outpace diplomatic deliberation. Ever since the president announced plans in April to encourage contact with Cuba by letting Cuban-Americans travel back whenever they wanted and send more money and gifts, the administration has found itself fending off pressure to move more quickly toward normalized relations. Cuban officials, some members of Congress and travel companies like Orbitz have all demanded that the travel ban be lifted, not just for Cuban exiles but for all Americans. Charter flight operators in Miami , after praising the new approach, spent the summer complaining that the administration took too long to publish regulations that put the policy for Cuban-Americans into effect. And now that the new rules are out — published in the Federal Register this month — entrepreneurs are stepping up with ideas for expanding links with Cuba. Mr. Ruiz’s ferry is one of several proposals that aim to push through the door that Mr. Obama opened just a crack. Direct flights from Los Angeles to Havana started in June. Several other cities, including Tampa and New Orleans, may also soon offer flights to Cuba through charter companies. Cultural exchanges that could grant travel rights to Americans who are not of Cuban descent are in the works with charter operators in Miami — a tactic widely used under President Bill Clinton and severely restricted by President George W. Bush. Eddy Levy, 75, co-owner of Xael Travel , said the entire travel industry, including charter companies like his own, were laying the groundwork for what they hoped would be a more significant opening. “The important thing is the relationship between the two countries,” said Mr. Levy, who has focused on connecting Jewish families in Cuba and the United States. “It’s one very big step toward normalizing relations if the United States opens travel to the non-Cubans.” He said that allowing all Americans to go to Cuba would mean enough travelers to go around — on commercial flights, on ferries and on charters. Tessie Aral, president of ABC Charters , which flew 10,500 passengers to Cuba this summer, up from 6,000 last year, agreed. ”I think all of that will be wonderful when all travel restrictions are lifted,” Ms. Aral said. “But we’re not there yet.” At this point, Mr. Ruiz sees his proposed ferry service mainly as an alternative for those with less money, more gifts or an inability to fly because of illness or fear. He described the seven or so charter companies — the only businesses with landing rights from both the American and Cuban governments — as a monopoly that charges too much (around $500 round trip) because of minimal competition. He said he got the idea for a ferry about 15 years ago on a trip to Cuba. He was buying cigars in a poor section of Havana from a man who said no one in his building could afford a television. “I thought, we have so many televisions that get thrown out,” said Mr. Ruiz, in an interview at his luxury apartment building overlooking the Atlantic. “If I had a ship, I could bring so many and donate them.” Cargo seemed to excite him the most. Mr. Ruiz’s eyes brightened behind his Dolce & Gabbana eyeglasses when he said that someone who could take only 44 pounds of luggage on a plane without paying extra would be able to carry four times as much onto the boat. It would all be part of the ferry ticket price, he said, which would probably run about $100 less than plane fare. The schedule would include at least three overnight round trips a week. Think of the possibilities, he said: bicycles and toys for Christmas; food, medicines and construction materials after hurricanes . He said his company, Florida Ferry International, had interested investors, including Cuban-Americans, and management companies ready to staff the ship. He said the business would cost somewhere from $300,000 to $1 million dollars a month to operate, depending on the boat leased and the partners involved. Critics of greater engagement, like Mauricio Claver-Carone of the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC , said it would never happen “without reciprocity on democratic reforms and human rights by the Cuban regime.” Cuba could also refuse to let Mr. Ruiz dock his boat or — struggling with an economy as bad as it has ever been — try to charge exorbitant fees. But in his eyes, Washington is the source of the holdup. His application notes that the law governing travel allows licenses not just for aircraft but also for vessels. The State Department, where Mr. Ruiz’s lawyer has been told the license request now sits, did not respond to calls or an e-mail message. “How could he deny it if he says he wants to open up Cuba,” said Mr. Ruiz, a Republican who voted for Mr. Obama and carries a photo of him in his Blackberry. “This is not a dream. This is a right.”

Cuba
Cuban-Americans
Travel Restrictions
Miami (Fla)
Travel and Vacations
United States Economy


Those Voices in Your Head May Be Comedy Podcasts

Abstract: What’s funny about podcasting? Quite a lot, actually. Over the last year, the steady flow of comedy podcasts online has turned into a flood. Though the podcasts take different styles and formats — Jimmy Pardo’s loose riffing on his “Never Not Funny,” Marc Maron’s confessional interviews, tightly edited pieces from the Bay Area sketch group Kasper Hauser — comedians have embraced the do-it-yourself medium for similar reasons. For starters, podcasting is easier than writing jokes. This fall, the San Francisco-based comic W. Kamau Bell thought that his phone conversations about race and culture with Vernon Reid, the guitarist with the band Living Colour, would be interesting to a wider audience. He and Mr. Reid, speaking over Skype, merely pressed “record,” and with production help from a volunteer found on Twitter, their podcast was born. And it’s cheap: Cole Stratton, a comedian and co-founder of the annual SF Sketchfest , which began Thursday and will run through Feb. 5, introduced “ Pop My Culture” with his co-host, Vanessa Raglan, in March 2010 with a $100 microphone. Now with 20,000 downloads per episode, they have spent only about $1,000 on equipment in total. There also is no pesky F.C.C. to wag a finger. Mr. Maron, who, like many podcasters, hosts guests on his show, curses freely. His show, which averages 230,000 weekly downloads, is seen as a breakout success in large part because of the intimate atmosphere he creates with his guests. Podcasting as an audio form tends to favor the personal — and what comedian doesn’t like to talk about himself or herself? “This year especially, pretty much every comedian has a podcast,” Mr. Stratton said. “And if they don’t now, I’m sure they’ll have one soon.” Mr. Bell said, “I have two podcasts, and I’m not really trying.” The increased prominence of podcasts figures heavily in this year’s SF Sketchfest lineup, which will feature local practitioners of the form like Kasper Hauser and national figures like Mr. Maron (of “WTF with Marc Maron”), Paul F. Tompkins (“Pod F. Tompkast”), Chris Hardwick (“Nerdist”) and Jamie Kilstein and Allison Kilkenny (“Citizen Radio”). Apple’s iTunes would not release figures on comedy podcasts, but others in the industry say 2010 was a banner year. Rob Walch, vice president of podcaster relations at Wizzard Media, a company that hosts more than 15,000 podcasts, said he saw a definite rise in downloads of comedy podcasts. “In 2009, there was one comedy podcast in the Top 10,” Mr. Walch said. In 2010, there were six. According to Scott Simpson, part of the trio behind a podcast titled “You Look Nice Today” and an employee of Apple who used to work in the iTunes department, comedy has always had “a solid place in podcasting,” thanks to the early efforts of Ricky Gervais and others, but it has been more high-profile recently. “The last year or so has seen, to my eye, a blossoming of comedy podcasting from more professional sources,” Mr. Simpson said, noting that he was not speaking as a representative of iTunes. But even some of the most successful and enduring podcasters say they did not imagine it would be financially viable. Mr. Pardo, who works on Conan O’Brien’s show, began his venture in 2006 on the suggestion of another podcaster who saw his talk show at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Los Angeles. “I saw it, at the time, as something to do while I wasn’t on TV,” Mr. Pardo said. About two years into his podcast, Mr. Pardo made the decision to take it to a subscription model. While he declined to give numbers, Mr. Pardo said he made about a third of his income from the podcasts. “I was the last guy to be on MySpace or Facebook; I’m an old-school show biz guy,” Mr. Pardo said. “But I decided to follow by leading. I didn’t want to hear about how great Patton Oswalt’s podcast was.” Jesse Thorn, a former Bay Area resident who has been recording his podcast, “The Sound of Young America,” since 2004, cites creative freedom as one of the chief appeals. “Until five years or so ago, a comedian’s career was determined exclusively by outside forces,” Mr. Thorn said. “New media means you don’t have to go to the gatekeepers; you can go directly to the consumers.” But those who make money from comedy podcasting — like Mr. Thorn and Mr. Maron, who both rely on donations, and Adam Carolla, who began an advertising-supported podcast when his radio show was canceled in 2009 — are the exceptions. For most working comics, the goal of a podcast is to shore up that all-important personal brand and draw bigger audiences to live shows. As more established comics enter the field, emerging podcasters will have to work even harder to get noticed. Mr. Thorn pointed to the Sklar Brothers, a comedy team, as an example of podcasters who actually write jokes for their show and come well prepared for their podcast interviews. “That’s the only way to distinguish yourself,” Mr. Thorn said. “The only other way is to be famous.”

Podcasts
iTunes
Comedy and Humor
San Francisco Bay Area (Calif)


Fire Cripples Long Island Rail Road

Abstract: A short in a pair of waterlogged track cables in Queens on Monday led to the near-total shutdown of the Long Island Rail Road and hours of waiting for thousands of stranded commuters, a frustrating reminder of the fragility of a rail network still dependent on antiquated equipment. Embedded along the railroad tracks by Jamaica Station, and soaked by rain from the night before, two or more cables shorted out around 11 a.m., the authorities said, sending a pulse of electricity into a nearby train control tower and setting fire to the century-old equipment inside. It seems improbable that a piece of ancient machinery, a contraption of levers and pulleys designed in 1913, would be critical to the successful operation of one of the nation’s largest commuter railroads. But the machinery, which remained on fire for about an hour, controls the 155 track switches at a crucial choke point: Jamaica Station, which 10 of the railroad’s 11 branches must travel through to get in and out of New York City. With no way to direct trains onto their proper routes, railroad workers scrambled onto the tracks, spikes and mallets in hand, to lock the switches into place manually so that trains could travel by, a practice known in railroad parlance as “block and spike.” For several hours, nearly the entire railroad ground to a halt. By Monday evening, about 60 percent of service was restored, but about 120,000 commuters faced delays, shuttle buses and altered routes on their journey home. “They have us waiting forever,” Racquel Humphrey, 22, who was leaning against a pole in Pennsylvania Station with her 10-month-old baby, said after waiting four hours for a train to Hempstead. “I’m frustrated.” Her train was later canceled. Seventy-five percent of service was expected to be restored for the Tuesday morning rush, but officials could not say how long it would be until full service would be restored. “We have significant damage to the tower switching system, and we are expecting delays for Tuesday as well,” said Joe Calderone, a railroad spokesman. The fire was a gloomy reminder to New Yorkers that the region’s mass transit network, although it serves more passengers than any system in the nation, still functions very much as it did decades ago. In 2005, a blaze in an underground relay room destroyed ancient equipment, snarling two of the city’s largest subway lines. A 2004 fire in a tunnel leading to Penn Station halted commuter train service for hours. “We are an older infrastructure; we know that we need infrastructure renewal,” said Helena E. Williams, the president of the Long Island Rail Road, at a news conference. “Commuter rail is facing that throughout the United States.” Officials were still investigating the precise cause of the power surge, but they thought the heavy rainstorms early Monday morning could be a possible culprit. The cables that malfunctioned are less than a decade old, but the complex switching equipment was last updated in the 1930s. It was scheduled to be replaced in October with a modern computerized system. Ms. Williams said she believed the railroad had replacement parts on hand for the antiquated equipment. Until the repairs are fully completed, Ms. Williams said, passengers will manage to make their way from home and back. “Even if it means less service, it’s still train service,” she said. At Jamaica Station on Monday evening, commuters seemed calm, and the beverage cart did a brisk business on the platform. Ludlow St. John, 49, a Verizon technician, was waiting for a transfer to a Hempstead train that was running a few minutes late. He had already faced an accumulated delay of about an hour, but the wait, he said, did not rank among the worst holdups he had experienced on the railroad. “It’s a slight delay,” he said. George Rodriguez, a telephone technician trying to get home to Huntington, was similarly unruffled, despite a 45-minute delay. Whenever there are problems on the Long Island Rail Road, he said with a shrug, “we just kind of wing it.”

Commuting
Railroads
New York City
Long Island Rail Road Co
Delays (Transportation)
Fires and Firefighters
Transit Systems


Nassau Gets Reprieve on Imposition of Fiscal Controls

Abstract: UNIONDALE, N.Y. — A state oversight board on Thursday gave Nassau County a three-week reprieve before deciding whether to impose a fiscal control period, after a last-ditch appeal by county leaders that pointed to millions of dollars in potential savings and other contingencies to close a $350 million budget gap. The oversight board, the Nassau Interim Finance Authority , demanded that the county executive, Edward P. Mangano, back up his claims of added savings with specifics by Jan. 20. “We’re giving the county one final opportunity here,” said the authority’s chairman, Ronald A. Stack, after emerging from a three-hour closed meeting into an auditorium packed with union leaders, lawmakers and county workers. Nassau’s fiscal year begins on Saturday, and the oversight board called the meeting on Thursday intending to impose a control period for the first time, which would leave one of the nation’s wealthiest and highest taxed suburban areas stripped of its checkbook and credit cards, the power to negotiate labor contracts and other major commitments, and the freedom to chart its own financial course. But Mr. Mangano, a Republican who took office a year ago, sent the board members a letter on Thursday spelling out tens of millions of dollars in new contingencies to offset the more than $200 million in risks that NIFA has warned against. The authority’s board members complained about the 11th-hour effort, but agreed to hold off out of “an abundance of caution,” Mr. Stack said. Before the board’s lengthy private session, Mr. Mangano followed up his letter with a personal plea for more time to negotiate givebacks from Nassau’s labor unions and other improvements to the county’s financial position. “There may come a time when I ask for your help,” he said. “That time is not now. We ask that we be permitted to govern.” But one member of the oversight board, George Marlin, a former municipal banker who was chairman of the group Conservatives for Mangano, said the county executive faced not only a budget deficit but also a “credibility deficit” because of his “lack of candor.” He faulted Mr. Mangano for what he described as a series of “promises made but not kept,” like $61 million in labor givebacks never granted, a sales tax increase never enacted and a “taxpayer relief act” that Mr. Mangano never introduced. “This tale of two deficits,” Mr. Marlin warned, in a florid touch, “will not end with the best of times but with the worst of times if the county is not candid with the public, the media, elected officials and NIFA.”

Nassau County (NY)
Budgets and Budgeting
Nassau County Interim Finance Authority
Mangano Edward P


Clinton Says Opponents of Penalties Can Still Aid Diplomacy

Abstract: BOGOTÁ, Colombia — Reaching out to the two countries that voted against new sanctions on Iran , Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday that she thought Brazil and Turkey would continue to play an important role in diplomatic efforts with the Iranian government. “We disagreed with their vote,” Mrs. Clinton said to reporters in Colombia, where she was on a four-day swing through Latin America. “But I can understand from a diplomatic perspective why they might be able to make a convincing case for how they voted today.” Brazil and Turkey, she said, wanted to keep “the door open between themselves and Iran,” having tried to strike a deal with Tehran on enriching its stockpile of uranium. The United States and its allies brushed aside that proposal, saying it did not address the broader Iranian nuclear threat. Mrs. Clinton defended the sanctions resolution, saying that it had been approved by an “overwhelming majority” in the United Nations Security Council , and that it vindicated the Obama administration’s strategy of trying to engage Tehran diplomatically while also gradually building support for pressure. “When we started this effort, there was no appetite in the international community for further pressure in the form of sanctions,” Mrs. Clinton said, laying out how the United States used the disclosure of a secret Iranian enrichment facility outside the city of Qum as a way to win over a skeptical China and Russia. Iran’s announcement that it would begin enriching uranium to 20 percent purity, Mrs. Clinton said, further broke down the resistance of the skeptics. “We have tools now that are sanctioned by the international community that we will be using,” she said of the sanctions. “We can, we believe, slow down and certainly interfere with, and make much more difficult their continuing nuclear program.” The final push toward an Iran vote has shadowed Mrs. Clinton at every stop of her tour of Peru, Ecuador and Colombia. On Wednesday morning, shortly before the Security Council began voting, she telephoned Lebanon’s president, Michel Suleiman, to try to persuade his country, which holds a rotating seat on the Security Council, not to vote against the resolution. Lebanon ended up abstaining. In Lima on Monday, she huddled with China’s ambassador to the United States, Zhang Yesui, to get Beijing to sign off on adding another Iranian company to the list of those to be sanctioned. Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Zhang were in Peru to attend a meeting of the Organization of American States. The Obama administration plans to appoint Robert J. Einhorn , a special adviser on nonproliferation issues, to head a group overseeing the implementation of the sanctions, Mrs. Clinton said. Congress is expected to pass a much tougher package of unilateral American sanctions on Iran. Nuclear negotiations with Iran are currently handled by the five permanent members of the Security Council — the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China — along with Germany. But Mrs. Clinton left open the door to broadening that group to include other countries, perhaps Brazil and Turkey. “We’re open to effective diplomacy,” she said. Speaking of Iran, she added, “We do want them back at the negotiating table.” Mrs. Clinton said the United States expected Brazil and Turkey to “abide by the resolutions, as all other member states of the United Nations will be expected to, and we have every reason to believe they will.” She also said she believed that the resolution could further stimulate debate within the Iranian leadership about whether to take even more aggressive steps toward developing a nuclear-weapons technology. There is a “diversity of opinion” within those circles over that question, she said. Even as she promoted ties with Latin America, Mrs. Clinton was doing last-minute Iran lobbying. On Monday, she met briefly with Brazil’s deputy foreign minister, Antônio de Aguiar Patriota, but failed to make any headway on pushing Brazil to abstain. Her efforts with the Lebanese president, Mr. Suleiman, appear to have been more successful. Mrs. Clinton played up the importance of the United Nations, pointing out that one of its founders was Lebanese. And she argued that while a “vocal minority” of people in the Arab world supported the Iranian government and its nuclear ambitions, most Arabs did not. Lebanon, as the only Arab country now on the Security Council, should speak for that majority, she told Mr. Suleiman. “Our goal is not to punish Iran; our goal is not to sanction Iran; our goal is to end any doubts or questions about the purpose of Iran’s nuclear program , and to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons ,” she said. “That is a goal that is widely embraced in the international community.”

Iran
Brazil
Turkey
Embargoes and Economic Sanctions
Security Council (UN)
Clinton Hillary Rodham


Ford Pays a High Price for Plant Closing in Belgium

Abstract: GENK, Belgium — Rumors of job cuts at the big Ford plant in this scruffy former coal mining town had been circulating for months. But on a clear morning a year ago, almost nobody in Genk expected what came next. Worker representatives, summoned to a meeting room inside the factory, started tapping out text messages even before Ford executives had finished reading a terse statement. Ford had decided to shut down Genk for good. The factory, which employed 4,300 people, would produce its last car at the end of 2014. The battle of Genk had begun. And the struggle would become a case study in just how difficult it can be for an automaker to cut its manufacturing capacity in Europe, even as the car market in this part of the world is the weakest in two decades. Union stewards used megaphones to spread the grim news to workers on duty at the time of the announcement. Some people wept. Others barricaded factory gates, penning up about 6,000 newly built Mondeo cars, S-Max minivans and Galaxy vans that had already been promised to customers — creating a traffic jam that would effectively shut down production for months. The workers were not going to make things easy for Ford. “Now they had to talk,” recalled Jean Vranken, regional head of the ACV union that represents Ford workers in Genk. Ford is one of the few companies to brave the fierce resistance of politicians and Europe’s powerful unions as it tries to emulate the brutal downsizing that carmakers in the United States have done — and that subsequently helped make possible the rebound now under way in the American car market. But in Genk, a year after the announcement, the measure of calm that has returned has come at a high price for the company, its workers and the community. To be sure, Ford has succeeded in reaching a labor settlement that will allow it to close the factory, as scheduled, at the end of next year. The closure of Genk and two smaller factories in Britain will cut Ford’s capacity in Europe by 18 percent and, the company says, make it possible to return to profitability in Europe, compared with losses this year that have already reached $1 billion. But the accord came only after a long, bitter struggle that cost Ford $750 million merely to settle with about 4,000 blue-collar workers in Genk, or about $190,000 per worker. And the total cost of Ford’s European overhaul is likely to end up much higher because of additional payments to white-collar workers in Genk and the expense of closing plants in Southampton and Dagenham in England. Ford has estimated the severance costs for all three plants at $1 billion. That cost of layoffs is substantially higher than in the United States, where Ford set aside $374 million in 2009 to cover severance costs for 2,400 workers, or about $155,000 each. Moreover, European labor law is much more favorable to unions than in the United States and tends to support workers in their tradition of militancy. In Genk, workers prevented the plant from operating normally for more than four months and received unemployment benefits for some of the time they did so. By some estimates, factories in Western and Eastern Europe are capable of producing seven million or eight million more cars and light trucks than the market can absorb. Many factories are operating at only 60 percent or less. That glut is the main reason that companies including Ford, Fiat, General Motors’ Opel unit and PSA Peugeot Citroën have already lost billions of euros in Europe in recent years. “Ford did not take this decision lightly,” Stephen Odell, chief executive of Ford of Europe, said in a telephone interview Monday. “We understand that it affects people and their families.” But, he said, “we had to do it to positively influence the company going forward.” Even though the auto industry has been much slower to close plants in Europe than in the United States, wary of the sort of struggle Ford has encountered, Ford is far from the only carmaker acutely aware of the excess capacity issue. “You need a plant to run at full capacity to be profitable in the volume segment,” said Pietro Boggia, a former Fiat executive who now works in the London office of Frost & Sullivan, a consulting firm. “If the current level of market demand does not improve dramatically, plant closings will have to continue, unfortunately.” Yet for every factory that the industry might consider an albatross, there is a community that faces economic devastation if production shuts down. Nowhere is that more true than in Genk, at the eastern end of Belgium in the province of Limburg, the least prosperous region of the country’s Dutch-speaking north. In Genk, a city of 65,000 people, many of them descendants of Italians, Turks or Moroccans who came decades ago to dig coal, an estimated 10,000 jobs will be lost at the end of next year when Ford closes the factory. That number includes not only Ford workers but also the businesses that depend on the plant, from big parts suppliers to the mom-and-pop shops. Marianna Musolino, co-owner of a French fry restaurant in a neighborhood where many Ford workers live, said customers had begun scrimping on orders. “They didn’t take mayonnaise, which is rare, but it saved them 50 cents,” Ms. Musolino said. “Weird things like that.” Another business already feeling the pain is Bewel, a nonprofit organization in the neighboring town of Diepenbeek that provides paid employment to mentally handicapped people. Until recently, Bewel operated a laundry that cleaned truckloads of protective clothing used by Ford. But, realizing the work would soon dry up, Patrick Nelissen, managing director of Bewel, gave the Ford concession to a commercial laundry less dependent on Ford. That firm agreed to hire some of the handicapped workers. Last week, Mr. Nelissen showed a visitor around a deserted building containing rows of idle commercial washers and driers. Stepping around a puddle, he wondered aloud how he was going to recover the 1 million euros, or $1.35 million, he had invested in machines shortly before Ford announced the shutdown. “Nobody needs this kind of machinery,” he said. Mr. Nelissen said he understood Ford’s predicament. But the prevailing view in Genk is that Ford reneged on promises to build the next generation of Mondeos in the city. Residents knew there would be job cuts, but not a closing of the plant. “A year ago they gave their word” that Genk would build the next Mondeo, said Wim Dries, the mayor. “Then they said, ‘The economy has changed. We have to close it.’ It was like a bomb going off.” While Ford had indeed announced plans to build the new Mondeo in Genk, the company says it had also signaled that cost-cutting was imminent and all options were open. The shift to a new model was, from Ford’s point of view, a logical time to move production elsewhere. And Genk was among the European factories with the most excess capacity. “We don’t believe we could have reacted any earlier,” Mr. Odell said. In any case, Ford could not continue piling up the losses it has had in Europe. Even though Ford cut them by more than half in the most recent quarter compared with a year ago, to $228 million, the year’s running total was still more than $1 billion in losses for the first nine months. In 2012, Ford lost $1.8 billion in Europe for the full year. Closing Genk will allow Ford to consolidate production at a factory in Valencia, Spain. The relocation of some production to Spain has already created 1,300 new jobs in a region that is in far worse economic shape than the area around Genk, although Ford said labor costs in Valencia are not significantly lower. As for the workers in Genk, the prospect of a jobless future is rapidly approaching. “You have to find something else, and quickly,” said Sandro Maurina, 36, a mechanic in the Ford plant who has worked there since he was 18. Like many in Genk, Mr. Maurina and his wife, Sabrina Gattanella, who have two young boys, are descendants of Italians who migrated to the region decades ago to work in the coal mines. But the last mine closed in the 1980s. Mr. Maurina is studying nights to become a nurse. But union leaders and local officials say they worry that many Ford workers are still in shock, and unsure what to do in December 2014. City and provincial officials are working on ways to encourage entrepreneurship and they hope the government in Brussels will situate a new prison in the area, providing 500 jobs. But there is no way to immediately absorb all the new jobless people. “If you know a big company that would like to come to Limburg, please let them come,” said Herman Reynders, governor of Limburg Province. “But I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Closings
Belgium
Cars
Manufacturing
Layoffs
Ford Motor


Egyptian General Moves to Formalize Presidential Bid

Abstract: CAIRO — Field Marshal Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi edged closer on Tuesday to formalizing his all-but-declared candidacy for president, telling a military academy audience that “procedures will be finalized over the coming days.” “I cannot turn my back when the majority wants me to run for president,” he said, according to the official news media. Field Marshal Sisi, the defense minister, led the ouster on July 3 of President Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s first fairly elected head of state and a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. Although he was little known previously, Field Marshal Sisi has ridden a surge of popularity since the takeover and is now universally expected to seek and win the presidency, in elections set to take place this spring. Many Egyptians have embraced him as the embodiment of a promise of stability and progress after three years of turmoil since the ouster of former President Hosni Mubarak. But the field marshal has also led a brutal crackdown on his predecessors’ Islamist supporters, and the suppression of dissent has increasingly extended to liberal activists and intellectuals as well. Almost nothing is known of Field Marshal Sisi’s views on any other matters of public policy, including the make-or-break question of how to revive and restructure Egypt’s dysfunctional economy. But so far only one other candidate, Hamdeen Sabahi, who also supported the military takeover, has expressed an intention to run, and Field Marshal Sisi is by far the favorite.

Egypt
Election
Hosni Mubarak
Arab Spring
Muslim Brotherhood Egypt


New York City Will Provide Free Space for a Dozen Charter Schools

Abstract: Mayor Bill de Blasio ’s administration said Tuesday that it would provide free space in public school buildings to a dozen new or expanding charter schools , including 10 run by Eva S. Moskowitz, one of the mayor’s fiercest rivals on the issue. The city announced its decision on space requests for 24 schools, and while Success Academy, Ms. Moskowitz’s charter network, agreed to delay its request for space to house six schools, none of the standing requests were rejected. Specific locations have not yet been chosen for the 10 new or expanding Success Academies, which will open in the 2016-17 school year, and many of the districts may change, as well. But even for many schools that received a “no” on Tuesday, the process of finding space is most likely to continue. Charter schools flourished and multiplied during the Bloomberg administration, which eagerly handed many charter schools — which are publicly financed but privately run — space in public school buildings free of charge. Mr. de Blasio, however, was critical of the addition of charter schools during his mayoral campaign, saying they siphoned resources from traditional schools. Shortly after taking office, Mr. de Blasio denied three requests for space from Ms. Moskowitz, and was treated to a barrage of television advertisements in response, as well as a rally in Albany, in which Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo pledged his support to charter schools. In March, the State Legislature passed a law granting broad protection to the growth of charter schools. It said that the city must provide them with free space or the schools can appeal to the state. If the schools win, the city has to help pay for the schools to rent private space, which can be an expensive proposition, especially in New York City. Success Academy received the bulk of the good news on Tuesday, but two Icahn Charter Schools were approved for expansion, as well. The list of schools that were rejected included three from Achievement First, a large charter network, and Voice Charter School, a small school in Queens that has been praised by Chancellor Carmen Fariña . “Our objective is to lift up every child, no matter the neighborhood they live in or the school they attend,” Ms. Fariña said in a statement on Tuesday. “These decisions reflect our focus on ensuring there is necessary space for school children to thrive while continuing to provide an equitable education for all students no matter of the ZIP code they live in.” James Merriman, chief executive of the New York City Charter School Center, said that because the law requires charter schools to request space first, getting a “no” can actually be good news for those that would prefer money to help pay the rent. Some schools that were rejected Tuesday fall into that category, Mr. Merriman said, and over all, he welcomed the city’s announcement. “It’s good to see that clearly the moratorium on charter school co-location has ended,” Mr. Merriman said. On Friday, the state Education Department issued its first decision on a space appeal since the new law passed, saying the city must help the Rosalyn Yalow School pay for private space.

Charter school
Bill de Blasio
Success Academy Charter Schools
K-12 Education
Eva S Moskowitz
NYC


Obama Moving Toward ‘Greater Equality’ on Gay Marriage

Abstract: WASHINGTON — After months of saying his position on same-sex marriage is “evolving,” President Obama traded that language on Wednesday for comments that stopped just short of endorsing the notion that gay people have the right to marry. But if his personal evolution is complete, Mr. Obama, who has previously opposed same-sex marriage, is not saying so. “I think what you’re seeing is a profound recognition on the part of the American people that gays and lesbians and transgender persons are our brothers, our sisters, our children, our cousins, our friends, our co-workers, and that they’ve got to be treated like every other American,” Mr. Obama said at a news conference. “And I think that principle will win out.” The president went on: “I think we’re moving in a direction of greater equality and — and I think that’s a good thing.” Mr. Obama used those same words — “a good thing” — to describe the debate that led to last week’s passage of a law making same-sex marriage legal in New York. But when asked if he personally supported such marriages, the president demurred. “I’m not going to make news on that today,” he said. Mr. Obama later held a Gay Pride reception at the White House on Wednesday evening, where he did not address the issue directly. Dan Savage, a columnist who arrived with his husband, wore a button that said “evolve already.” Mr. Obama has been under pressure from gay rights advocates to clarify his position in the wake of the vote in Albany and his own comments at a Manhattan fund-raiser last week, in which he suggested the marriage question should be left to the states. The remarks infuriated some close allies, who said Mr. Obama, a former constitutional law professor and the child of an interracial marriage, was invoking arguments once used to defend segregation. On Wednesday, reaction to the news conference was mixed. Some faulted the president for remaining “in the closet,” as The Christian Science Monitor said. Richard Socarides, a former adviser to President Bill Clinton on gay rights, said he sensed Mr. Obama’s “evolution is complete — only the announcement awaits.” But Mr. Obama himself made clear that there would be no announcements. “I think this has been asked and answered,” he said when pressed for a second time to state his personal views. “I’ll keep on giving you the same answer until I give you a different one, all right?”

Same-Sex Marriage,Gay Marriage
Barack Obama


Senator Rubio Follows the N.F.L. Like a Regular Fan

Abstract: MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — You can learn a lot about a politician by watching him watch football. Or can you? “I’ve never psychoanalyzed it, man,” Senator Marco Rubio says. “I just like football. We all like something, right?” Well, yes, we do, but we all don’t watch N.F.L. coaches’ film or study long-snapping techniques and binders full of predraft player data. Rubio, the rookie Republican senator from Florida, is standing on the sideline at Sun Life Stadium 30 minutes before a Dolphins game against the New England Patriots in early December. As a young Latino star in a demographically challenged party, Rubio is a man in a great hurry and big national demand. But he is also ever-humble and quick to abide by a golden rule at home. Respect must always be paid to Don Shula. “I’m a big Coach Shula guy,” Rubio says. “That’s what we call him here, always Coach Shula.” Shula, the Hall of Fame former Dolphins coach, is sitting in one of those carts that old dignitaries ride around in before games. “You want to meet Coach Shula?” Rubio asks me. I demur, fearful of looking directly at the Supreme Being without sunglasses. (I am also a Patriots fan.) “Well, I’m going to say hi to Coach Shula,” Rubio says with hushed reverence. He has not seen Coach since he was elected to the Senate in 2010. Rubio shakes Shula’s hand and bows his head — respect is paid. The two of them go way back, sort of. As a child, Rubio wore braces on his legs to correct a knee problem; he hated the braces, so his father would call home from work claiming to be Coach Shula and saying that Marco needed to wear them if he ever wanted to play for the Dolphins. “I always wondered why Shula had a Cuban accent,” Rubio says. Rubio’s N.F.L. dreams died at Tarkio College in northwest Missouri, where he played wide receiver and defensive back for one season. A coach showed him a laminated grid indicating how fast a player of his height (5 feet 9 inches) had to be to play in the league. “For my height you had to run a 4.3,” Rubio says, referring to the 40-yard dash. “The fastest I ever ran was a 4.65.” After transferring to the University of Florida, Rubio envisioned working in the football program for Coach Steve Spurrier but missed a deadline to apply. This would ultimately land him in his current contact sport, politics. Nearly every politician claims to love sports. Doing so makes for an easy point of “just-folks” legitimacy and home-team good will. In many cases, the claim is a pose — or exaggeration — and can lead to embarrassing episodes, like John Kerry’s trying to impress Packer fans in Wisconsin but fumbling the name of Lambeau Field (calling it “Lambert Field”). But Rubio, 41, is legitimate, a serious fan who not only can name the Dolphins’ long snapper (John Denny) but can also tell you that an N.F.L. long-snapper must get the ball to the holder in seven-tenths of a second. “You are two-tenths of a second from getting every kicked blocked in the N.F.L.,” he says. Rubio learned this from reading a Web site devoted to long snapping. He also says he is not related to Chris Rubio, one of the nation’s leading gurus of long snapping, in case anyone was wondering. Rubio’s passion for football is such that he agreed to attend a Dolphins game with me during a period in which he had been resisting a blitz of news media interest, including speculation about whether he might run for president in 2016. I agreed not to ask Rubio about any of this today. Only football. I keep to my word, for the most part, except when I decide it would be funny to blurt out, “So, are you running for president?” as the Dolphins break their huddle on a key third down. “Not today,” Rubio says, which is either throwing a penalty flag at me for violating ground rules, or saying he will not discuss that question “today,” but maybe tomorrow.  After his pregame visit with Coach Shula, Rubio picks up a conversation he was having on the field with the Dolphins’ general manager, Jeff Ireland. Rubio will occasionally call Ireland to discuss vital matters of policy, like whether the team should draft a wide receiver. “I can be scouting at Alabama, and he’ll be on the phone, like, ‘O.K., they’ve got this guy and that guy and whatever,’ ” Ireland tells me. “And I know he’s not Googling it up, because it’s immediate.” I ask Rubio if he would switch jobs with Ireland if given the chance. Yes, he says instantly. “Not me,” Ireland says, just as instantly. He adds that when they talk about football, Rubio is never intrusive and always supportive. “He knows what we go through,” Ireland says of Rubio, meaning that Rubio can identify with having his moves scrutinized and speculated upon. Football is one of the few things in Rubio’s life that allow him to take his mind off everything else, he says. But only so much escape is possible for a politician in a packed football stadium, especially with a reporter along and, also, his two young sons, Dominick (5) and Anthony (7). Rubio coaches Anthony in youth football. We rode to the stadium from Rubio’s West Miami home in a rental car driven by the senator’s spokesman, Alex Conant. I was curious about whether the ambitious senator would answer questions the way a real fan would — with biases, dislikes — and without political calculation. I figured that he might since Rubio has never pretended to care about the non-Dolphin N.F.L. teams in Florida (Tampa Bay and Jacksonville). Likewise, the former Florida Gator has not refrained at all from taunting Florida State fans via Twitter. “I was mocking them just last week,” he says, boasting that one particular anti-F.S.U. posting — something about the fat lady singing — was “one of my most retweeted tweets ever.” Rubio has an unusual familiarity with his own Twitter activity. After the Patriots signed the free-agent wide receiver Donte Stallworth on Dec. 4, Rubio mentioned to me that Stallworth followed him on Twitter. How did he know this? “Because he once retweeted something of mine,” Rubio said. The senator then welcomed @DonteStallworth back to the N.F.L. in another tweet, to which @DonteStallworth replied: “Florida is gracious to have you represent in the senate. Best of luck and blessings!” I try to ask Rubio football questions that might be politically delicate. Which is his least favorite N.F.L. team? “Jets,” he says without hesitation. “That’s the team I hate to lose to the most. They could be 1-15, and if they beat the Dolphins, their fans get obnoxious.” It is worth noting that the Jets’ owner, Woody Johnson, is a major Republican donor. (It’s also worth noting that I later receive an e-mail from Conant, the spokesman, emphasizing that the senator and Johnson “have a good relationship.”) Rubio attended his first Dolphins game at age 6, a victory over the Seattle Seahawks at the Orange Bowl. By fifth grade, he was watching games with a notepad on his lap, diagraming plays. His sister started paying him to wash her seven Samoyed dogs every Saturday — $10 a dog — which Rubio would use to buy Dolphins tickets. He attended every Dolphins home game in the 1985 season, including the team’s loss to New England in the A.F.C. championship game. His sister and his wife, Jeanette, did stints as Dolphins cheerleaders (Jeanette was also featured in the team’s first swimsuit calendar). Friends in the Florida Legislature gave Rubio two years of Dolphins season tickets after he stepped down as House speaker in 2008. While serving in the Legislature, Rubio caught passes on the floor during separate visits from Dan Marino and Tim Tebow. Rubio described both episodes as career highlights. Colleagues once discovered Rubio studying a binder of pre-N.F.L. draft scouting reports during an important debate, according to a biography by the Washington Post reporter Manuel Roig-Franzia. Rubio shows easy recall of seemingly every significant Dolphins game in recent memory. He takes big losses hard. “Remember when President Bush passed out eating a pretzel?” Rubio says in what seems to be a non sequitur as we pull into the stadium parking lot. “He was watching a Dolphins-Ravens playoff game at the time. I don’t know why I remember that.” Indeed, the Dolphins lost that January 2002 game, 20-3. “I felt like passing out,” Rubio says. Rubio watches this day’s game from the 50-yard-line suite belonging to the Dolphins’ owner, Stephen Ross. The suite smells of roast beef, beer and Sterno and is full of guests with shapely haircuts and golf tans. It is a sweet arrangement, to be certain, but hardly an authentic fan experience. Rubio prefers sitting in the stands — which you would expect any politician to say, though this rings true. Rubio, however, has decided the owner’s box will be easier, given the needs of his kids, and his desire to talk uninterrupted to me about the game. At least theoretically.  “Dad, can I have some Pepsi?” Anthony is saying as we enter the suite. “Mom doesn’t let you drink Pepsi,” the senator says, firmly. Then he flip-flops: “O.K., maybe today.” A few minutes later, 5-year old Dominick announces that he has to go to the bathroom. “Anthony, take Dominick to the bathroom,” Rubio says, the first of a half-dozen times Rubio will command his older son to do this today. (The owner’s suite has its own restroom.) Rubio settles in next to me in the suite, one row behind Ross. He keeps shifting his attention between the field and the boys, who are semi-situated a few seats to his left. “Don’t bother him, Dominick,” he says, pointing to a man the 5-year-old keeps leaning into. The senator does not like the Dolphins’ chances in this game. “The Patriots’ defense has really improved since they moved McCourty to safety,” he says, referring to defensive back Devin McCourty. “Bad matchup for us today.” The crowd of 72,114 is flavored heavily with Patriots fans — about 20,000 of them, and disproportionately loud. Within minutes, the Patriots go up, 7-0, after the Dolphins’ punter fumbles a snap. Rubio shakes his head. He chews gum, harder during the action and furiously during key moments. One of Rubio’s children asks if he can buy an app on Rubio’s phone. “You’re not buying anything,” he says curtly. “Hey, you’re killing my battery — come on.” Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is sacked by Cameron Wake, and Rubio pounds the marble table three times with his fist. The Dolphins’ mascot walks over — someone dressed not surprisingly in a big dolphin suit, high-fiving everyone. Other dignitaries mill through, including Juwan Howard of the Miami Heat and Desmond Howard, the Heisman Trophy winner and Super Bowl most valuable player. Early in the second quarter, Brady attempts a long pass to tight end Daniel Fells that produces a questionable pass-interference call against safety Reshad Jones. “No way, no way,” Rubio yells, and then buries his head in his hands. “That’s terrible. It’s just demoralizing to watch.” He thinks N.F.L. rules have become ridiculously advantageous to the offense. “You can’t even nip the guy,” he says. The Patriots go up, 14-3. As he works his gum, Rubio’s jawbones could generate electricity. Rubio watches most of the second quarter next to Ross, who is also a big Republican donor. Dominick and Anthony are perfect angels. They stay still and seated, for the most part. As Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill drives the team for a late second-quarter touchdown, Rubio thinks that the boys’ positioning might be good luck and that they perhaps should stay put for the rest of the game. “I have to go to the bathroom,” a child’s voice cries out.  The Patriots lead, 17-10, at halftime, which Rubio spends in Ireland’s box discussing, among other things, a serious-looking first-half triceps injury to offensive tackle Jake Long (it would end Long’s season). Back in the owner’s box, Rubio glad-hands for a few minutes, chatting briefly with Howard by a shrimp bowl. At one point, I ask Rubio what would have made him happier, a Mitt Romney victory in the November presidential election or the Dolphins’ winning the Super Bowl this season. He shakes his head. “Don’t make me choose,” he says. “I want both.” O.K., O.K. “The country is more important,” he finally acknowledges. Early in the fourth quarter, Tannehill completes a 22-yard pass to receiver Brian Hartline, which sets Rubio off on a riff about how the young quarterback must improve at “throwing between the hash marks” — something he has mentioned nearly every time Tannehill has tried to throw the ball into the middle of the field today. “You have icing on your nose, Dominick,” Rubio tells his child, who has been eating a cupcake frosted with the Dolphins’ logo. New England leads, 20-10, but Tannehill has the Dolphins inside the 10. “Right here, icing,” Rubio says again, pointing to his nose. Tannehill is promptly flattened by Patriots linebacker Jerod Mayo on a delayed blitz; the Dolphins settle for a field goal, and Dominick has to go to the bathroom again. “You’re not having any more Pepsi,” Rubio tells the boys with three minutes left in the game. With less than a minute remaining, Miami kicks a field goal to make it 23-16 and lines up for an onside kick. “Get the ball! Get the ball!” chants Anthony. But New England recovers, ending the game and pretty much the Dolphins’ playoff chances. Rubio gathers the boys, shakes a few hands and heads out. Several fans wave to the senator in the concourse, and at least two of them suggest he should run for president. Conant, the spokesman, inches the rental car through the parking lot, fans zigzagging in front of him, not all of them sober. It is a harrowing few minutes, especially for the press aide/driver, who knows that any mishap would be reported in the press as “an incident involving Senator Rubio’s car.” Conant succeeds, heroically, and is on the highway a few minutes later with Dominick now fast asleep in the back. We arrive back at Rubio’s home at 5:30 p.m., six hours after we left. His wife, Jeanette, who has been running errands with their two older daughters, pulls into the driveway behind us. She asks me how her husband behaved in the Dolphins’ loss. Fine, I assure her. Good, she says. “Now I get the aftermath.”


Warrants Say North Carolina College Student Was Kidnapped, Robbed and Shot

Abstract: HILLSBOROUGH, N.C. (AP) — Search warrants unsealed Friday describe what may have been the final terrifying moments in the life of a promising college student: kidnapped after choosing to stay home and study, taken in her own vehicle to be robbed at an A.T.M., and shot multiple times. Despite strong objections by defense lawyers, Judge R. Allen Baddour of Superior Court released six warrants that helped the police arrest Laurence Lovette, 17, and Demario Atwater, 22, both of Durham, N.C. Both are charged with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of the victim, Eve Carson , the former student body president at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Mr. Lovette’s lawyer, Karen Bethea-Shields, said the warrants largely relied on hearsay from a confidential informant that could unfairly taint potential jurors. “Things that you get,” Ms. Bethea-Shields said, “you must make sure that you understand these are just allegations, and evidence will come from the courtroom.” Jonathan Brown, a lawyer for Mr. Atwater, said: “This is obviously a terrible tragedy, and we have great sympathy for the family and friends of Eve Carson. At this time, we just want to have the legal system do its job and avoid any rush to judgment.” The warrants contradict the original accounts of the killing, which first appeared to be a random carjacking in Chapel Hill. One warrant said a confidential informant told the police that Mr. Lovette and Mr. Atwater entered Ms. Carson’s home through an open door, took her and her vehicle to an A.T.M. and used her personal identification number to withdraw money from her bank account, totaling $1,400 over two days. Investigators found a Bank of America receipt from Ms. Carson’s account during a search of her vehicle when it was found a day after she was killed. There was a partial shoe print on the receipt, and investigators said they had seized several pairs of gym shoes from the suspects’ homes, the warrants said. The informant said Ms. Carson was shot multiple times by Mr. Lovette and was later shot by Mr. Atwater. An affidavit signed by Brian Fleming, a special agent for the State Bureau of Investigation, said the informant’s statements were corroborated because two separate weapons were used in the shootings. A warrant also says the police took blood, hair and saliva samples from the suspects to investigate if a sexual assault took place. Jim Woodall, the district attorney for Orange County, said Friday that the tests were standard and that there was no reason to believe Ms. Carson was sexually assaulted. She was found dead about 5 a.m. on March 5, laying in a residential street in Chapel Hill. The police have said that Ms. Carson, a native of Athens, Ga., had been shot multiple times. She was last seen alive earlier that morning, around 1:30 a.m., when she stayed home to do schoolwork while her roommates went out, the authorities said. The police received hundreds of tips after releasing surveillance photographs from an A.T.M. and a convenience store. Mr. Atwater and Mr. Lovette were arrested within a week of Ms. Carson’s death. Mr. Lovette is also charged with first-degree murder in the death of a Duke University graduate student who was found dead on Jan. 18 in Durham.

North Carolina
Carson Eve M
Colleges and Universities
Murders and Attempted Murders
Lovette Laurence
Atwater Demario


China Leads in Executions, Amnesty Report Says

Abstract: HONG KONG — China executed more people last year than the rest of the world combined, according to a report published Tuesday by Amnesty International. Amnesty said there were “thousands” of Chinese executions in 2009 — the precise number is considered a state secret — and the rights group called on Beijing to divulge how many it carries out. The report said that at least 714 people were executed in 17 other countries, led by Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the United States. Methods of execution included beheading, stoning, electrocution, hanging, firing squads and lethal injection. Amnesty said in its report last year that China had executed at least 1,718 people in 2008, nearly three-fourths of the 2,390 executions worldwide that year. “The Chinese authorities claim that fewer executions are taking place,” said Claudio Cordone, Amnesty’s interim secretary general. “If this is true, why won’t they tell the world how many people the state put to death?” Although admittedly incomplete, the figures from Amnesty are widely accepted. The State Department, for example, has cited the group’s findings in its reports on human rights. Iran put at least 388 people to death last year, according to the latest Amnesty report, with about a third of the executions coming in the seven weeks of protests and turmoil that followed the country’s disputed presidential election in June. In Europe in 2009, for the first time since Amnesty International began keeping records, there were no executions. Belarus is the only European nation with the death penalty still on its books; the former Soviet republic reportedly executed two men two weeks ago. The Constitutional Court in Russia also renewed a moratorium on death sentences in November, and the Amnesty report cited the court ruling saying that the “path towards full abolition of the death penalty is irreversible.” The United States was the only country in the Americas to execute anyone in 2009, according to the report, which said the 52 executions constituted the nation’s highest total in three years. Nearly half the executions, 24, came in Texas, while New Mexico officially banned the death penalty. Amnesty, which has long opposed the death penalty, said death sentences and executions continued to be used for political purposes, often after unfair trials, and were used “disproportionately against the poor, minorities and members of racial, ethnic and religious communities.” The report said at least 2,001 people were sentenced to death in 56 countries in 2009. In addition to China, seven other Asian countries were reported to have carried out a total of 26 executions last year — Bangladesh, Japan, North Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Indonesia had no executions. Two executions in Thailand were the nation’s first since 2003, the report said, as two men found guilty of drug crimes were executed by lethal injection. Botswana and Sudan were the only countries in sub-Saharan Africa to execute criminals in 2009, while Kenya carried out what Amnesty called “the largest mass commutation of death sentences ever known.” More than 4,000 condemned prisoners in Kenya had their sentences reduced to imprisonment. Burundi and Togo abolished the death penalty in 2009, Amnesty International said, joining 95 countries that had banned capital punishment.


Prices Rise for Cubs, but Loyalty Wins Out

Abstract: Dan McGrath is a columnist for the Chicago News Cooperative. Chicagoans felt as if the worst of another hard winter was finally over when last Friday dawned sunny and mild and single-game tickets to 2010 Cubs games went on sale. Pitchers and catchers had reported to Arizona for spring training earlier in the week, and a game-day-like sense of anticipation boosted the spirits of fans standing patiently in lines at Wrigley Field. Tom Ricketts, the Cubs’ new owner, contributed to the cheerful ambience, arriving at the park before 8 a.m. with coffee and donuts and chatting up the customers as they awaited an opportunity to buy seats that cost, on average, 10 percent more than last year. Ricketts’s amiable presence seemed to offset any grumbling over higher prices for a disappointing team — no one in line could recall anyone from the Tribune Company, the Cubs’ corporate, faceless former owner, showing up with refreshments for the masses. Neither could anyone recall the previous owner offering a pricey presale enticement that provided access to the most desirable games and — for ticket buyers willing to pay 20 percent more than face value and then “save” 5 percent by using a certain credit card — eliminated the need to stand in line. Friday’s buyers found most of the seats for the games with the White Sox, Cardinals and Brewers gone in the online presale, which ended Thursday and which provoked some grumbling and underscored a major challenge facing the Ricketts family: How do you maximize Wrigley Field revenues without alienating a restless fan base that would like some emotional return on its financial investment before it is tapped out? Based on last week’s sales and on recent history, the Cubs expect to draw three million fans for the seventh straight season. Their ticket prices remain third highest in baseball behind the Yankees and the Red Sox, who can justify the cost — between them they have won 7 of the last 14 World Series. The Cubs, as we know, have not won a World Series in 101 years or played in one in 65. Yet the team keeps asking its fans to invest in hope and dig deeper while they are stretched to cover the necessities of real life. Ricketts, a Cubs fan long before he was an owner, said that his own ticket-buying experience involved plying his brother with beer and pizza to get him to stand in line for bleacher seats. But as the sons of a billionaire, they never had to sweat the cost. He has said all the right things about respecting Cubs history and tradition and honoring the almost sacred trust. He hears from fans who wistfully recall when they were 8 years old, attending their first game with their grandfathers, mesmerized by the lush green setting and the majestic scoreboard and getting hooked on the Cubs forever. Ricketts understands that the ballpark experience is essential to cultivating loyalty. But beer and sunshine and socializing are no longer enough — not at these prices. For all their success at the gate, the Cubs are chronic underachievers on the field, and it’s no longer cute or funny. Not at these prices. Marc Whitney, 44, is a Chicago native, a lifelong Cubs fan who indulged his youthful passion by working as an Andy Frain usher at Wrigley Field and seeing 40-plus games a year. Now living in Milwaukee, he is trying to raise his son in the religion and has been making two or three Cubs trips a year. But, after paying $215.67 online for three right-field-corner, upper-deck box seats to a Friday afternoon game against the Phillies in July, the Whitney family will be making only one Wrigley trip this year. The face value of those tickets is $156; the additional cost comes from taxes and the “convenience fee” the Cubs charged in the pre-sale. Similar seats would also cost $156 at a Fenway Park ticket booth, and no wonder — the Red Sox are the Ricketts’s role model for their baseball business. There are similarities between the Cubs and the Red Sox, beginning with their cozy, neighborhood ballparks, each a shrine-like attraction unto itself as a symbol of history, of baseball as it was meant to be played. There are also significant differences, beginning with on-field performance. The Red Sox have been to the playoffs in seven of the last eight years and won the World Series in 2004 and 2007. The Cubs are poster guys for baseball futility, with a 1-6 record in postseason series since their last pennant in 1945 and with a nine-game playoff losing streak. And they have a thriving, less expensive rival just eight miles to the south that would be primed to steal market share if baseball loyalty weren’t so deeply ingrained in Chicago. “This has always mystified me: The White Sox play in a newer, nicer park with better amenities, more parking and frequently a better team,” said Marc Ganis, a sports marketing consultant. “Yet they draw, on average, 40 percent fewer fans. That’s the power of Wrigley Field.” That power comes at an increasingly steep price. Maybe too steep.

Baseball
Chicago Cubs
Prices (Fares Fees and Rates)
Chicago (Ill)


Jailed Russian Opposition Leader Was Abused, Groups Say

Abstract: MOSCOW — Human rights officials said Tuesday that a jailed political opposition leader was held in a basement and denied food and water for more than two days and was forced to confess to charges of plotting mass riots in Russia , after being kidnapped from the streets of Kiev, Ukraine, where he had fled to avoid arrest. The opposition leader, Leonid Razvozzhayev, had visited a United Nations office in Kiev for advice on seeking political asylum. He disappeared on Friday while on a lunch break from a meeting with a lawyer and reappeared briefly on Sunday night outside a Moscow courthouse, where he shouted to a reporter that he had been tortured. Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for Russia’s top federal investigator, has said that Mr. Razvozzhayev turned himself in and was in his “right mind” when he signed a lengthy confession. Russian authorities have accused Mr. Razvozzhayev and other opposition leaders of plotting mass riots and of seeking financing from Georgia to help topple the government of President Vladimir V. Putin, based on a documentary that was shown on the pro-Kremlin NTV channel this month. In an appearance on Tuesday evening on another channel, TV-Dozhd, human rights advocates who had visited Mr. Razvozzhayev in a Moscow detention center on Tuesday said that he told them the confession was coerced, and that he was handcuffed in a basement without food or water or use of a toilet. They said he was not beaten but was subjected to “psychological torture.” Valery V. Borshchev, the head of the Public Oversight Commission and a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group, a human rights organization, said Mr. Razvozzhayev described being forced into a van in Kiev by four men and having a hood pulled over his head. Members of the Public Oversight Commission are supposed to have unrestricted access to prisons in Moscow, but officials said they had to argue for hours to see Mr. Razvozzhayev. On Monday, the Russian political opposition announced the results of three days of voting for a new leadership council; Mr. Razvozzhayev was among the 45 people elected to the new body.

Human Rights and Human Rights Violations


The Rise of Conferences on Women’s Empowerment

Abstract: Lia Zneimer, a 27-year-old employee at the publisher Scholastic, joined 250 other attendees at a Midtown hotel last Wednesday for a Time Inc. event called Women & Success. In two panels moderated by editors of Time and Real Simple magazines, Ms. Zneimer heard Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, the songwriter behind the “Frozen” song “Let It Go,” share their personal experiences with success and failure. Ms. Zneimer said she walked away inspired by Ms. Gillibrand’s thoughts about “having it all versus doing it all.” After the panels, Ms. Zneimer sipped wine, chatted with other women and then left with a copy of Ms. Gillibrand’s book, “Off the Sidelines: Raise Your Voice, Change the World.” The event left her wanting more, she said. Conferences promoting women’s empowerment are on the rise and haven’t had this kind of cachet since the feminist movement encouraged consciousness-raising groups in the 1970s. This time, however, the booster sessions are not being run by friends in their living rooms, but by media companies looking to align themselves with a generation of working women — and corporate sponsors — eager to celebrate their achievements and push for new career heights. Among those that have added women-focused events in recent years are National Journal (Women in Washington), The Atlantic (Women of Washington), More magazine (How to Command a Room) and Cosmopolitan (Cosmo’s Fun Fearless Life). Other prominent media personalities continue to expand their conference businesses, like Arianna Huffington (Thrive) and Tina Brown (Women in the World). While no one tracks exactly how many conferences there are, those who both attend and produce them recognize that something of a bubble has formed in recent years. The space has become very crowded, they say, and they could spend nearly every week attending an event focused on women. Based on the number of invitations she receives, Moira Forbes, president of Forbes Women, estimates that the number of these events has nearly tripled in the last two years. Forbes Women holds two annual conferences called Forbes Women’s Summit: Power Redefined in the United States and Asia. “I feel like we’re reaching kind of a saturation point,” said Lesley Jane Seymour, editor in chief of More. “I feel like it’s everywhere. Everybody’s doing it; everybody’s trying to get in on this.” The companies involved in organizing these conferences suggest several reasons for the increasing popularity of the events. One is that there are more women in positions of power than ever before. Pattie Sellers, a co-chairwoman and co-founder of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women conference, said that when it started 16 years ago, there was one female C.E.O. of a Fortune 500 company; today, there are 25. “In hindsight,” she said, “we were going after a growing market.” But the major driver for the expanding women’s conference scene is that as magazine companies struggle with problems in their core print businesses — declining newsstand sales and soft advertising — these events bring in additional revenue. Ken Doctor, a media analyst, said there had been a shift to more conferences because companies hesitant to spend on print advertising see more value in sponsoring events. Image Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York, left, and Nancy Gibbs, editor of Time, speaking at the Women & Success event. Credit Yana Paskova for The New York Times Consider the continued growth of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women franchise. On Monday, a three-day gathering got underway, with 400 attendees at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Laguna Niguel, Calif. Sponsors include Citigroup, Cadillac and Pfizer; scheduled speakers include Mary T. Barra, the chief executive of General Motors, and Melinda Gates, the co-head of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This year, Fortune raised the cost of its main conference by a thousand dollars to $8,500 (and it still had a waiting list of 250 people) and also started distributing a daily e-newsletter focused on women. On Monday, it introduced a women-focused channel on Fortune’s website and is also starting MPW Next Gen, a new conference aimed at up-and-coming female business leaders. Ms. Sellers said that women had also become less hesitant about flaunting their status. “At first, leaders like Carly Fiorina and Oprah Winfrey were extremely uncomfortable with the word ‘power’ and worried about being segregated onto a women’s list,” she said. The shift, said Ms. Sellers and others, is partly a result of several recent women-centric books, mostly notably “Lean In,” by the Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg. “We are having a moment,” said Debora L. Spar, the president of Barnard College and the author of “Wonder Women: Sex, Power and the Quest for Perfection.” Ms. Spar added: “Young women are identifying as feminist at levels and in ways that haven’t been seen since the 1970s. And these are young women who grew up saying feminism wasn’t for them, but for a range of strange reasons have come to identify with.” Balancing family and career advancement is an issue that invariably becomes a focus at these events. Poppy MacDonald, the president and publisher of National Journal, said that even though work-life balance was not explicitly on the agenda of recent conferences, it came up all the time anyway. “It is usually the first question from the audience,” said Ms. MacDonald. Women’s events that are attention-grabbing enough can raise a magazine’s stature with news organizations and others the publications want to impress. Cindi Leive, Glamour’s editor in chief, remembers the magazine’s first Women of the Year Awards in 1990, an event for 250 women at the Rainbow Room. It has now grown to 3,000 attendees and is held at Carnegie Hall. The event draws media coverage, and for Glamour, Ms. Leive said, it helps its relations with Hollywood, where the magazine seeks many of its cover models. “The visibility of Women of the Year helps the women, the actors, the singers know that they’re not going to be duped when they do a deal with Glamour,” said Ms. Leive. Sponsors seem to have a strong appetite for these conferences. Michelle Peranteau, director of marketing communications for the luxury watch company Baume & Mercier North America, one of the sponsors of last week’s Time Inc. event, said the panels and cocktail party were a chance to promote Promesse, the company’s new ladies’ watch collection. She said that after the panels, she enjoyed chatting with the female guests. “It was nice to have an opportunity to network with these women,” said Ms. Peranteau. “It wasn’t a pushy sales message. It was just an opportunity to promote the brand.”

Magazine
Women and Girls
advertising,marketing