Trade Surges in Some Countries, Creeps Up in Others

Abstract: WORLD trade is rising rapidly around the world, providing more evidence of a global recovery led by emerging economies. But some European countries are lagging, in part because they are not competitive with their neighbors. The accompanying charts show the changes in exports and imports for 12 countries — four major industrial nations, four troubled members of the euro zone and four emerging economies. In each of the four emerging economies, China, India, South Korea and Brazil, imports are rising at a faster rate than exports, although only India has a trade deficit. China is no longer running the world’s largest trade surplus. In fact, the monthly average surplus for the most recently reported three months — February through April — was only $683 million. For a country that imports and exports $10 billion a month, that is a negligible number. The figures are based on each country’s reported trade in goods, valued in dollars for the sake of consistency. The chart shows the change for each country’s trade for three-month periods ending in the month shown, compared with the same three-month period a year earlier. A year ago, trade appeared to be collapsing around the world, in large part because of the credit crisis and the reactions of both companies and consumers to it. Even with the recent surge in trade, none of the countries shown are exporting goods at the highest rate ever, and only one — China — is importing more goods than it ever did. In the United States, imports are rising a little faster than exports, with both growing around 20 percent in the first quarter, compared with the year-earlier period. It was the first calendar quarter to show year-over-year growth in trade since the third quarter of 2008. It was near the end of that quarter that Lehman Brothers failed and worries of financial crisis grew. German trade is growing more slowly than in the United States, but the country continues to run large trade surpluses, with exports 21 percent higher than imports in the most recent three months available. By contrast, Japanese exports are 12 percent higher than imports, and the figure in China is just 1 percent. Growth in trade is generally more restrained in the so-called Gips countries of Europe — Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain. But their circumstances vary widely. In Ireland, both exports and imports are running lower than they were a year earlier, but the country continues to benefit from a very large trade surplus, with exports 82 percent higher than imports. In terms of growth in trade, the figures are similar in Greece, with imports falling and exports almost level with those of a year ago. But Greece continues to face a large trade deficit, and would need a real surge in exports to cut into that deficit. For the three months through February, exports were 63 percent lower than imports. In the United States, which faces chronic trade deficits, the margin is 31 percent, roughly half as large as the one faced by Greece. Making Greece’s exporters competitive will be a very difficult task while the country remains in the euro zone. If it does, the likelihood is that there will be a prolonged period of deflation , with wages being reduced in an effort to cut costs.

Credit
International Trade and World Market
United States Economy
Subprime Mortgage Crisis
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc


At Advertising Week, the Vital Role of Digital Marketing

Abstract: THE fundamental things apply as time goes by, according to the song. So, too, with each year that goes by, Advertising Week in New York becomes more fundamentally about digital, mobile and social media, underscoring how they have become fundamental ways of selling goods and services. That can be divined from the schedule for the 2012 Advertising Week, which began on Monday and continues through Friday. Scores of the more than 150 panels, speeches and presentations are devoted to newer marketing methods, with companies like Facebook , Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr and Twitter being discussed about as often as parodies of “Call Me Maybe” are uploaded to YouTube. And there are numerous daylong or multiday events focusing on digital, mobile and social, among them O.M.M.A. (Online Media, Marketing and Advertising) Global, sponsored by MediaPost Communications and composed of five conferences in areas like mobile, video and social media; SM2 2012, the Smarter Mobile Marketing conference, sponsored by the Mobile Marketing Association; the Mobile Media Summit 2012; and the Mixx Conference and Expo, sponsored by the Interactive Advertising Bureau. Facebook took the opportunity of a session at the Mixx conference to answer questions about the efficacy of buying advertising on its site — questions that were widespread even before the company’s disappointing initial public offering. Brad Smallwood, director of pricing and measurement at Facebook, discussed the findings of a study the company hoped would change advertisers’ minds about depending on measurements like clicks to determine the success of campaigns on facebook.com . The goal is to have them perceive the social network more as a medium akin to television for branded advertising “If you ran a campaign in the last five years, you focused on clicks,” Mr. Smallwood said, but “demand fulfillment is only one piece of the marketing puzzle.” “We have to provide a solution for the brand marketers of the world,” he added. The study was conducted with a new Facebook partner, Datalogix, a company that measures in-store purchases. Fifty campaigns on Facebook were measured, for brands from giant marketers like Nestlé, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. When purchase data from stores was combined with data about ad impressions on Facebook, the study found that 70 percent of the campaigns enjoyed three times greater return on their budgets, and 99 percent of the sales came from consumers who did not interact with the Facebook ads.  At another Mixx presentation, Joel Lunenfeld, vice president for global brand strategy at Twitter, shared data about the relationships people have with brands on twitter.com . Nine out of 10 people on Twitter follow at least one brand, Mr. Lunenfeld said. Although most said they did so for promotions, coupons and free products, he said that 87 percent said they followed brands for fun and entertainment and 80 percent said they did so for access to exclusive content. Among the examples presented by Mr. Lunenfeld were how brands like Panasonic and Procter & Gamble use Twitter. Perhaps most interesting was Mr. Lunenfeld’s connection between Twitter posts and television commercials. “Twitter is the EKG of action for television,” he said, adding that 50 percent of people who use Twitter do so while watching TV. “Brands that are engaging in conversations are finding really prominent ones and turning those into campaigns,” Mr. Lunenfeld said. For instance, the Audi division of Volkswagen of America noticed that an Audi brand fan had posted a message with the hashtag “#IWantAnR8.” Audi brought the fan an Audi R8 to drive, he said, and turned the test drive into a commercial. Rick Webb, a consultant for marketing and revenue at Tumblr, began the company’s first-ever presentation at an advertising conference by sharing data. Tumblr has 75 million blogs, he said, and visitors spend 18 minutes per visit on tumblr.com . Although Tumblr does not track the behavior of users or their personal details, Mr. Webb said, brands are beginning to take notice of the platform. Tumblr recently opened up to brands a small section of its pages, known as Radar, where outstanding Tumblr content is highlighted. Since May, about 10 percent of the content in the Radar box has been sponsored, Mr. Webb said, offering as an example an animated gif, or image, of a glass Coca-Cola bottle spinning on a floor. Mr. Webb acknowledged the ubiquity on the Web site of all things feline, including cat videos and animated gifs, by describing Tumblr as “a massive amount of technology brought to bear to animate cats.”  A cheeky characterization of the content on another social media site, Instagram, was offered during a breakfast that featured a conversation between Vivian Schiller, senior vice president and chief digital officer at the NBC News division of NBCUniversal, and Alex Wagner, the anchor of “Now With Alex Wagner” on the MSNBC cable channel. “Instagram is mostly a repository for brunch photos,” Ms. Wagner said, laughing. She is also a fan of Twitter, she added, where she had, as of Tuesday afternoon, more than 34,700 followers . When Ms. Wagner asked Ms. Schiller what she believed would be the next big thing in social media, Ms. Schiller replied, “I have no idea, and anybody who says they do is making it up.” Ah, grist for additional discussions at future Advertising Weeks.

Advertising Week
Tumblr
Twitter
Online Advertising
Social Networking (Internet)
Facebook Inc
Instagram Inc
Advertising and Marketing


McKinney, Tex., Police Officer Resigns Over Incident Caught on Video

Abstract: A police officer in McKinney, Tex., who was seen on video pulling his gun on teenagers in swimsuits and shoving a young black girl’s face in the ground at a pool party has resigned, the police said Tuesday. Cpl. David Eric Casebolt, who had been placed on administrative leave after the episode on Friday, remains under investigation, Chief Greg Conley said at a news conference. The corporal will keep his pension and benefits, the police chief said. “Our policies, our training, our practice doesn’t support his actions,” Chief Conley said. “He came into the call out of control, and as the video shows was out of control during the incident.” The video was taken on a cellphone and posted to YouTube, where it set off another in a recent series of debates involving race and police tactics. The police said Corporal Casebolt and other officers were responding to a call about a fight and a disturbance at a community pool in Craig Ranch, a racially diverse subdivision north of Dallas. Corporal Casebolt can be heard shouting profanities at the teenagers, and officers handcuffed several who had followed his orders to sit on the ground. He appeared to grab the girl and pin her to the ground after she did not heed his orders to leave. One adult man was arrested on charges of interfering with the duties of a police officer and evading arrest. Chief Conley said on Tuesday that those charges had been dismissed. At the news conference, Mayor Brian Loughmiller said that officials recognized a need for better training for officers, but that there needed to be expectations for interactions with police. Greg Willis, the district attorney for Collin County, said in a statement on Tuesday that his office had received numerous inquiries about the case. “We share the public’s legitimate interest in a full and fair investigation of this matter,” he said. “We are currently awaiting the results of the McKinney Police Department’s investigation and ask for patience as their investigation continues.”

Police Brutality,Police Misconduct,Police Shootings


Texting Surpasses Calling Among Teenagers

Abstract: OMG, W8 til U read this: one in three teenagers sends more than 100 text messages a day, and 72 percent are now text-messagers, compared with 51 percent in 2006, according to a recent Pew Internet report . Nearly half who take phones to school text at least once a day in class. Texting trumps all other forms of communication, with only 38 percent and 30 percent of teenagers talking daily on a cellphone or landline, respectively. One quarter of teenagers interact daily on social networks, and just 11 percent e-mail each other daily. Teenagers with unlimited texting plans text 14 times as often as those who pay per message. Although accessing the Internet on a cellphone is often expensive, teenagers with black and Hispanic parents are nearly twice as likely as teenagers with white parents to do so, as are teenagers from households making under $30,000 a year. This may be because of lack of Internet access on computers in these households. Even with unlimited plans, “adults aren’t texting in the same way adolescents are,” Amanda Lenhart, senior research specialist at Pew, said. “Teens don’t expect people to call — texting has become the default way to connect.”

Text Messaging
Teenagers and Adolescence
Wireless Communications
Cellular Telephones


Reconciling a Sport’s Violent Appeal as a Fighter Lies in a Coma

Abstract: Three men sat inside a Manhattan diner. Their fighter, the Russian heavyweight Magomed Abdusalamov, remained in a medically induced coma at Roosevelt Hospital, across the street. “One week ago, the doctors say he has 100 percent chance to die,” his manager, Boris Grinberg, said 10 days after Abdusalamov entered the ring. Since then, his condition has improved, and there is talk of bringing him out of the coma, his representatives said. Abdusalamov fought Mike Perez at the Theater at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 2. He expected a tough bout, perhaps even a bloody one, the kind of televised fight that could propel him to greater heights. The fight lasted 10 rounds, and Abdusalamov took the worst of the exchanges. Blood dripped from his nose and from cuts above his left eyelid. He fought most of the match with a broken hand. He kept asking his team, in Russian, how his face looked. His promoter, Sampson Lewkowicz, said in the diner that he considered trying to stop the fight in the eighth round. Security stopped him. After the fight, sportswriters and promoters gathered at a nearby bar and recounted the match. I was among them. The consensus: great, action-packed fight. At around the same time, Abdusalamov left the arena and vomited on the curb. A cab dropped Abdusalamov at the hospital. Doctors asked his brother to sign off on surgery. Abdusalamov, they said, had a half-hour to live. A brain scan showed swelling and a blood clot. Doctors induced a coma and removed a portion of his skull. While in the coma, Abdusalamov had a stroke. His family set up in the intensive-care unit, where they have remained since. His brother slept on two chairs pushed together in a corner. His wife flew up from Florida with their three daughters, ages 8, 4 and 11 months. “Da-Da,” the youngest kept saying. Abdusalamov’s manager described him as a quiet man, “always thinking about his future, about his goals.” He added, “He is dying to be champion of the world.” Image Bernard Hopkins, 48, after winning a title in October. He says networks and promoters should use revenue to help fighters. Credit Tim Larsen/Associated Press During the fight, I sat 10 feet from the boxers, in the first row of the news media section. I saw Abdusalamov’s face, swollen and disfigured. What a warrior, I thought. What a fight. In the weeks since, I have wrestled with questions over why we cover this brutal sport, in which so many combatants end up dead or neurologically impaired. Bernard Hopkins, a boxer known as The Executioner, talked it over with me. He discussed the opportunities boxing offered, the prospect for the kind of fortune and fame that he had enjoyed. He elaborated on the risks involved, and gladiatorial sacrifice made for the entertainment of others. He could not explain to an outsider why boxers box, or why a Russian heavyweight lay unconscious in a Manhattan hospital. But he tried. Hopkins remembered visiting a fellow boxer, Leavander Johnson, as he lay in a coma after emergency brain surgery after a title fight gone wrong. Hopkins stood on one side of the bed. Oscar De La Hoya, a man Hopkins once leveled with a devastating body blow, stood on the other. They prayed, and when they lifted their heads, their eyes met. “Man,” Hopkins said he told De La Hoya, “see what we put our bodies through.” Johnson died, and yet neither man considered retirement. Hopkins, 48, fought last month. Boxing, Hopkins says, saved his life. “I don’t expect you to understand,” he said. “I mean, how many people go to work and say, literally say, ‘I might die tonight.’ But that’s boxing. Whenever there’s a fight, there’s a possibility of death.” Hopkins could not explain why boxers box, but since they do, he wants to help. He tells fighters to take out insurance, above what promoters are required to by commissions, which varies from state to state. He says that networks and promoters should take 3 percent of the gross revenue for televised and pay-per-view events and start a fund for boxers who incur severe injuries or worse. “I may have an eighth-grade education, but I’m around more lawyers, more Harvard and Yale guys in boxing that never take a punch and make plenty of money,” he said. “I can’t understand that.” Hopkins says that the culture of boxing has grown even coarser in recent years, celebrating savage blood baths over technical skill. He described the mind-set as, “if you don’t duck, you might get back on TV, you might get a bigger fight, and we’ll enhance your purse.” He added, “The great Sugar Ray Robinson, the greatest fighter that ever wore gloves, would be seen as boring today in the mentality of the string pullers.” Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini knows what it is like to kill a man in the ring. In 1982, outside Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, he fought a South Korean named Duk-koo Kim on network television. The action was fast, the blows numerous and fierce. Kim died days later, and Mancini became depressed. He continued to box and made peace with what happened, but people frequently ask him how it felt to bludgeon a man to death in the ring. He never wanted that moment to define him. Image Ray Mancini knocked Duk-koo Kim of South Korea to the canvas in the 14th round of their W.B.A. lightweight title bout in Las Vegas in 1982. Kim died four days later. Credit Associated Press “Look, nobody comes away unscathed,” Mancini said. “It’s just to what extent.” Boxers die — not as often as they used to, thanks to more stringent safety regulations and medical supervision, and shorter careers and fewer rounds. But they die nonetheless. More than 230 boxers died in the 1920s, and 103 died in the 2000s, according to Joseph Svinth’s 2011 study in the Journal of Combative Sport’s Manuel Velazquez Collection. Six boxers died in 2010 and three in 2011, the study said. Since the 1890s, some 1,865 boxers have died — more than half in the United States, according to the study. Joyce Carol Oates once described boxing as a metaphor for life, with its “beauty, vulnerability, despair, incalculable and often self-destructive courage.” Those involved — promoters, managers, trainers, television executives — must ignore or rationalize or reconcile the conflict between the beauty and the violence. They point to other dangerous pursuits, to football and hockey and auto racing. Such arguments circle around an unassailable truth. Violence is not simply a part of boxing, it is the best part, the most visceral part, the backbone of the sport. It is what people pay to see. Part of the reason I watch boxing is for the excitement that accompanies the violence. But it is less about blood lust than about willpower. About enduring. Boxing is unlike any other sport in that way. It is more individualized than football: two people with nowhere to go. Spectators cannot understand what that feels like, but when they watch they can at least attempt to. I have covered sports all over the world, and I always say the best, most electrifying 30 seconds are right before a big prizefight. The Super Bowl feels like a game. A boxing match feels like something more. At the diner, members of Abdusalamov’s team were careful about what they said. They still did not understand why Abdusalamov did not leave the Garden in an ambulance. Grinberg, his manager, blamed the New York State Athletic Commission in an interview with New York magazine. (The commission did not respond to requests for comment.) Lewkowicz, the promoter, said a doctor told him that if Abdusalamov had arrived at a hospital an hour earlier he would have had a far greater chance “to survive and have a good life.” Nevertheless, they shrugged off talk of cracking down on boxing. “This sport is from the time of the Greeks,” Lewkowicz said. “It will never die.” Grinberg added that he enjoyed watching New York’s local newscasts. “Every day, somebody shoot, somebody kill,” he said in his Russian accent. “What, we have to close New York maybe? It’s life.”

Coma
Magomed Abdusalamov
Mike Perez
Bernard Hopkins
Boxing
Concussion
Violence in Media
Sports injury


New Boeing 787 Jetliner Faces Another Delay

Abstract: The Boeing 787 Dreamliner is facing yet another delay, and the first plane will not be delivered until 2010 at the earliest, nearly two years behind the original schedule, according to senior airline executives. The completion date of the Dreamliner, an innovative and high-profile project, has already been pushed back three times. All Nippon Airways, the Japanese airline, will receive its planes first, with other customers not able to take delivery until 2011 or beyond. This would be nearly two years after the company had expected to begin delivering the planes to airlines, which have rushed to place orders for the fuel-efficient jet. Their enthusiasm had made the Dreamliner the most popular program in Boeing history, with more than 60 airlines placing orders for more than 800 planes. But high expectations for the aircraft have met with some hard realities, mainly the difficulty of producing a plane that relies on technological breakthroughs, like an airframe made from lightweight composite material instead of aluminum. It also relies on a supply chain that stretches across the globe, as multiple suppliers in many countries are producing the more than four million parts that will go into the plane. Boeing said it would neither confirm nor deny a setback, which was reported on Friday in The Wall Street Journal. But the senior airline executives, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak for Boeing, confirmed the delay. It is expected that the Dreamliner’s first test flight will not take place until well into 2009. Yvonne Leach, a spokeswoman for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, declined to comment on the reports of the delay, adding Friday that she would neither confirm nor deny them. “We’re currently conducting the assessment and it’s not complete yet,” Ms. Leach said. Asked when any decision might be announced, she said: “We don’t have a firm date. We truly have not decided when we are going to announce.” She added that Boeing would try to notify customers and suppliers 24 hours in advance of a public announcement, although she said that any notification “could come earlier” than that. News of the possible delay was not unexpected. At first it caused Boeing’s shares to fall in early trading on Friday, but the stock recovered and closed at $39.53, up 34 cents. The shares have fallen by 55 percent since the beginning of the year, hurt by the Dreamliner delays, a two-month strike by machinists and the weakening stock market. “There has been a lot of buzz out there for some time about the 787,” said Howard A. Rubel, an analyst at Jefferies & Company. “So it is not a revelation that there will be delays with the 787. It’s been clear for a while that a slippage had developed.” The next-generation jet had faced a number of production setbacks, including the strike by 27,000 assembly workers that shut down Boeing’s commercial aircraft factories for two months earlier this fall. But the larger issues looming over the program are linked to an optimistic timetable promised by Boeing when it first announced the plane, and a series of complicated production problems that the company is seeking to fix. The Dreamliner, a midsize twin-engine plane, was an instant hit among airlines, which lined up to buy it because of its fuel-sipping engine and lightweight airframe, both of which save on fuel consumption and bills. Since then, however, engineering and production problems have presented one challenge after another. Many of these issues are chronicled in an internal study by Boeing’s main rival, Airbus. The study, titled “Boeing 787 Lessons Learnt,” was posted Wednesday on Flightblogger, a widely followed aviation Web site. The problems, some of which have been resolved, concern software glitches, the plane’s titanium wings and the use of low-wage foreign workers in other countries with little aerospace experience. There have been shortages of parts, especially fasteners, and the plane still remains overweight. “It is very easy not to get everything right,” Mr. Rubel said. “The human challenges in putting this together are beyond belief. What’s causing the delay? It’s just been a lot of little things.” Mr. Rubel added, however, that given the current slowdown in aviation, the fact that the Dreamliner is delayed may be a blessing in disguise because an on-time delivery would have added capacity in an airline system that already has too many planes.


A Review of 'The God Game' in Armonk

Abstract: Everybody has secrets. But Tom, the protagonist of Suzanne Bradbeer ’s invigorating “ The God Game ,” doesn’t have many. No sex tapes, no history of electroshock therapy, no unfortunate Internet indiscretions. Unfortunately, Tom, whom a presidential candidate is considering as his running mate, harbors the doubt that dare not speak its name in American politics: He doesn’t quite, exactly, really believe in God. And people would like him to keep quiet about that. “The God Game,” Hudson Stage ’s first offering of the season, is an unusual play in several ways. It takes the point of view that the Republican Party can be saved from itself. And although the play clearly argues for freedom of religion — in this case, the freedom to have none — its one churchgoing, Bible-verse-quoting character is also the only one who seems determined to stick to her principles. One of the joys of Ms. Bradbeer’s script is that although it seems awfully familiar (Robert Redford in “ The Candidate ,” from 42 years ago, may be the prototype), the audience can never be sure what’s going to happen next, even in the very last seconds. The script’s other strength is its wonderfully on-target contemporary use of language. “Sprinkle around a few ‘I love Jesuses,’ ” one character suggests. Another, after a discussion of Apollo 11, shakes his head and says, “I don’t know how people can be so blasé about the moon.” The action takes place on Tom and Lisa’s wedding anniversary, which they traditionally celebrate by taking the day off. Tom (Robert Farrior) is a junior United States senator with high approval ratings. Lisa (Yvonne Perry) is the perfect political wife, who also runs a shelter for abused women and girls. Their daughter is away at an arts camp in Michigan, so they have their lovely Virginia home to themselves, until their old friend Matt (Michael Frederic) drops by for what appears to be a surprise visit. These three have major shared history. Matt was involved in a long-term romantic relationship with Tom’s brother, Jay, who died in a car accident shortly after the two broke up. Guilt, blame and past flirtations, going back as far as college days and transcending sexual orientation, provide plenty of material for verbal battle. But Matt’s visit is strictly business. He’s working for the current Republican presidential candidate and is on a mission from the top. Matt swears that the candidate is a great guy, even though the man once referred to homosexuality as an abomination. (“Ten years ago,” Matt says in the man’s defense.) The Hudson Stage casting seems flawless. Seated at a big mahogany desk, concentrating on his MacBook screen, Mr. Farrior looks a little like Superman in a suit — as if Clark Kent had decided to reveal his cool confidence and secret superpowers without bothering to change out of Clark Kent’s clothes. Mr. Frederic is excellent (and very funny), establishing once and for all that no actor has to “play gay” in terms of physicality. Ms. Perry looks the part, from her salon-perfect blondness to her toned upper arms and calves, and she seems completely at ease when her character talks the way Matt wishes Tom talked. When a young girl from the shelter makes a gesture that touches her heart, Ms. Perry’s Lisa expresses her happiness by commenting that just when things seem darkest, “the good Lord shines a light.” When the subject of climate change comes up (and both Tom and Matt are in favor of fighting it aggressively), Lisa agrees, saying, “It’s right there in Scripture.” At some points, though, Ms. Perry seems oddly uncomfortable with the characters’ back-and-forth, as if she has just time-traveled forward a few decades and doesn’t quite understand the way people talk and joke these days. It’s as if the director, Giovanna Sardelli, and the playwright see the characters as different people. Most of the time, Ms. Sardelli’s direction is sophisticated and visibly imaginative. David Arsenault’s scenic design, the senator’s book-lined home office, is tastefully elegant. The books themselves are the only off note, all multivolume sets, all a little too shiny and new, which is funny, since Hudson Stage’s handsome new theater (this is the company’s first production there) is inside a library.

The God Game
Suzanne Bradbeer
Hudson Stage
Robert Farrior
Yvonne Perry
Giovanna Sardelli
Theater
Armonk NY


Escape His Caricature? Donald Trump Passes Up the Chance

Abstract: CLEVELAND — It was Donald J. Trump’s best chance to escape his own caricature. He did not. After 40 years in the public eye, Mr. Trump decided on Thursday night that he was not interested in revealing himself to America with disarming tales of his upbringing, hard-earned lessons from his tumultuous career or the inner struggles masked by his outward pomposity. In the most consequential speech of his life, delivered 401 days into his improbable run for the White House, Mr. Trump sounded much like the unreflective man who had started it with an escalator ride in the lobby of Trump Tower: He conjured up chaos and promised overnight solutions. To an electorate that remains anxious about his demeanor, his honesty and his character, Mr. Trump offered no acknowledgment, no rebuttal, no explanation. It was a speech that might be remembered, ultimately, as much for what it lacked as for what it contained — and for the message those absences seemed to convey: He is content with the angry voters he has won, who thunderously cheered him on here, and indifferent about wooing those he has not. Video Donald J. Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination in Cleveland on Thursday, presenting himself as the savior needed for a doomed nation. Credit Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times For those grasping for new signs of humility, generosity and depth, Mr. Trump offered the thinnest of reeds. Inside the Quicken Loans Arena, a thicket of American flags behind him, he portrayed himself, over and over, as an almost messianic figure prepared to rescue the country from the ills of urban crime, illegal immigration and global terrorism. “I alone,” he said, “can fix it.” But Mr. Trump made no real case for his qualifications to lead the world’s largest economy and strongest military. He is, he said, a very successful man who knows how to make it all better. Campaign speechwriters from both parties were stupefied. “It’s a lost opportunity,” said Matt Latimer, who wrote speeches for President George W. Bush. He said he had expected Mr. Trump to plumb his personal life and career for the kind of anecdotes that would turn him, in the eyes of his doubters, from a cartoon into a flesh-and-blood human being. Republican Convention Night 4: Analysis How we analyzed the last night of the Republican National Convention, which featured Ivanka Trump, Peter Thiel, Donald J. Trump and more. “A little humanity and self-reflection,” Mr. Latimer said, “is usually very powerful in a speech.” After reading the speech, Paul Begala, a longtime Democratic strategist and speechwriter, called the missing personal details “an enormous mistake.” “The American people,” he said, “need to know their president’s mythic arc.” But Mr. Trump, even at 70, seems constitutionally incapable of, or stubbornly averse to, capturing and conveying the complexities of his existence. At every turn on Thursday night, he avoided turning a colorful and remarkable biography — populated by a volcanic father, a self-destructive brother, his own dizzying career highs and mortifying lows — into vivid, poignant storytelling. His childhood? He learned “to respect the dignity of work,” he said. His parents? His father liked the company of the carpenters and electricians he employed. His mother was a “great judge of character.” Photographs From the Final Day of the Republican Convention 31 Photos View Slide Show › Image Doug Mills/The New York Times His storied career? “I have had a truly great life in business,” he said. And that was that. His wife, Melania? “Lucky to have at my side,” he said. The most powerful convention speeches have long relied on verbal Polaroids from the past, intimate glimpses into an unseen and unknowable personal journey. In 2012, Mitt Romney defied his reputation for stultifying oratory by extolling the romantic bond between his parents, recalling the rose his father, George, left on the pillow every morning for his wife, Lenore. “That’s how she found out what happened on the day my father died,” Mr. Romney recalled. “She went looking for him, because that morning, there was no rose.” Image In his speech, Mr. Trump conjured up chaos and promised overnight solutions. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times The elder George Bush undertook an earnest examination of his best-known vulnerabilities, confronting his reputation for out-of-touch elitism and a lack of charisma and casting them as strengths. “I am a quiet man,” he said in 1988, “but I hear the quiet people others don’t.” Richard M. Nixon pleaded with voters who knew him as a bitter political outcast in 1968 to think of him instead as the boy who had grown up poor on a lemon ranch and dreamed “of faraway places where he’d like to go.” Mr. Trump, aides said, took inspiration from that famous Nixon speech. But he left out Nixon’s uplifting message and sentimental tone, said David Gergen, an adviser to four presidents, including three Republicans. “Trump puts forward the same iron fist as Nixon,” Mr. Gergen said after the speech, “but Nixon clothed his in a velvet glove.” Video As Donald J. Trump seeks to position himself as a “law and order” candidate, there are echoes of Richard Nixon, a candidate who sought to do the same in 1968. Credit Credit Eddie Hausner/The New York Times “Trump,” he said, “threw away the glove.” Instead, Mr. Trump projected unbending self-confidence, authority and strength. He lacerated his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, as thoroughly untrustworthy and unethical. He did not present an entirely unfeeling figure: He promised to give a voice to laid-off factory workers, “the forgotten men and women of our country.” And he offered compassion for the parents of people killed by undocumented immigrants — and outrage on their behalf. “These families have no special interests to represent them,” he said. “There are no demonstrators to protest on their behalf. My opponent will never meet with them, or share in their pain.” “These wounded American families have been alone,” he added. “But they are alone no longer.” He had enlisted his children to make him three-dimensional, a task they carried out with just a handful of personal memories: of the encouraging notes he scribbled across their report cards, and of playing at the foot of his desk with Legos or Erector Sets while their father worked in concrete and steel. Of course, turning a polarizing candidate into a likable leader is not Mrs. Clinton’s talent, either. For much of the past two years, she has emerged as an awkward and reluctant storyteller of her life, more comfortable with 10-point plans than with providing fresh glimpses into her formative years or candid accounts of her professional struggles. But Mrs. Clinton, whose convention next week will extensively mine her biography, has started to undertake the humbling repair work that many Republicans had hoped Mr. Trump would begin on Thursday. She has admitted some mistakes, conceded that many Americans do not trust her, and acknowledged her role in the partisan warfare that has alienated many voters. On Thursday night, Mr. Trump reveled in that warfare, made no concessions and admitted no mistakes. His America, he said, would be “bigger, and better and stronger than ever before.” Just like him.

Donald Trump
Speeches
2016 Presidential Election
Republican National Convention,RNC


Cory Booker, After Touring a Prison, Renews Call for Criminal Justice Overhaul

Abstract: After touring a federal prison on Thursday, Senator Cory Booker, Democrat of New Jersey, said he was more determined than ever to push through comprehensive criminal justice legislation that would cut mandatory minimum sentences and create new programs to ease prisoners’ re-entry into their communities. “This visit today continued to fuel my sense of urgency,” Mr. Booker said in an interview after a 90-minute stop at the medium-security Federal Correctional Institution in Fairton, N.J. He said that he was particularly impressed with job training and drug treatment programs, and that even prison officials and workers were adamant that some inmates were being incarcerated far beyond the time necessary. But Mr. Booker, one of the chief backers of the Senate criminal justice package, said he was beginning to lose hope that the legislation could move this year. Senator Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican and majority leader, has refused to put a bill on the floor despite strong bipartisan support. Some Senate Republicans have dug in against it, and opposition intensified this week when President Obama commuted the sentences of more than 200 federal prisoners, including 67 serving life sentences. Senator David Perdue, Republican of Georgia, released a statement on Thursday criticizing the president’s actions. “Law abiding Americans are apoplectic with the lack of law and order we have seen during President Obama’s tenure,” he said. Speaker Paul D. Ryan has indicated he will schedule votes on House criminal justice bills next month, leaving open the possibility that Congress could still act this year. If that does not happen, Mr. Booker said it would act in 2017 if Hillary Clinton won the White House and Democrats took over the Senate, making Senator Chuck Schumer of New York the majority leader. “If Mitch McConnell doesn’t want to get this done on his watch,” Mr. Booker said, “I really believe that Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer and Paul Ryan can get it done on theirs.”

Prison
Legislation
US Politics
Cory A Booker


American Davis Cup Team Warms to Clay Courts

Abstract: PARIS — To beat back the British, the United States Davis Cup team is prepared to get dirty. John Isner, the highest-ranked American man at No. 16, said team members and their captain, Jim Courier, had been discussing hosting their February Davis Cup match against Britain on clay, a surface that American players in recent generations had considered Kryptonite. The United States has not hosted a Davis Cup series on clay since 1992, a streak of 28 home series played on hardcourts, grass or carpet. “There’s a bit of a chain email going on between captain Courier, myself, Sam and the Bryan brothers,” said Isner, referring to Sam Querrey, Mike Bryan and Bob Bryan. “We’ve brought that up. I, for one, would actually like that.” Recent top American men, including Pete Sampras, Andy Roddick, James Blake and Mardy Fish, have been at their least comfortable on clay, which has made it a natural choice for European and South American countries that host the American squad. But the 6-foot-10-inch Isner, who prefers slower, higher-bouncing surfaces, said the current American lineup, which features four players taller than 6-3, was suited for clay-court play. “We’re not a typical tennis team,” he said. “We look more like a basketball team.” Isner won his first clay-court title last April in Houston; he had reached the final of two other clay-court events. Querrey has also won a title on clay, beating Isner in a final in Belgrade in 2010. The Bryans have played some of their best tennis on clay, winning 21 titles on the surface, including the French Open twice. Clay is also by far the weakest surface for the British team. Andy Murray has made it to 42 singles finals in his career, but none on clay. Other probable singles players for Britain like Daniel Evans and James Ward play on the surface sparingly. “You’ve sort of got to take Murray out of the equation,” said Isner, who lost, 6-7 (5), 6-1, 6-2, to Novak Djokovic in the third round of the Paris Masters on Thursday. “You know he’s going to be tough on any surface. And then you sort of go from there.” Isner led the Americans to the Davis Cup semifinals through heroics on foreign soil in 2012, beating Roger Federer on indoor clay in Switzerland and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga on outdoor clay in France. Isner added that he and the Bryans also prefer to play outdoors, but choices for hosting an outdoor event in February would be limited. Isner mentioned the tennis-rich regions of Florida, Southern California and Arizona. Another option would be Hawaii, which would be a geographically convenient place for players to travel to after the Australian Open, which immediately precedes the first round of Davis Cup. Tim Curry, director of communications for the United States Tennis Association, said that the host city for the event, which will be held Jan. 31 through Feb. 2, would be announced Tuesday.

Davis Cup
John Isner
Mike Bryan
Bob Bryan
Mardy Fish
Tennis


WikiLeaks Archive - U.S. Helps Yemen Defy Al Qaeda

Abstract: WASHINGTON — One Obama administration security official after another was visiting to talk about terrorism, and Yemen ’s redoubtable president, Ali Abdullah Saleh , seemed to be savoring his newfound leverage. The Americans are “hot-blooded and hasty when you need us,” Mr. Saleh chided one visitor, Daniel Benjamin, the State Department’s counterterrorism chief, but “cold-blooded and British when we need you.” It was Jan. 31, just a few weeks after a young Nigerian trained and equipped in Yemen had tried to blow up an airliner as it approached Detroit. The wave of attention to Al Qaeda’s Yemen branch and its American-born propagandist, Anwar al-Awlaki, might not do much for tourism, but paradoxically it did give the Yemeni leader more influence. Mr. Saleh said coyly that while he was “satisfied” with the military equipment the United States was supplying, he “would like to be more satisfied in the future,” according to an account of the meeting sent to Washington. Diplomatic cables obtained by WikiLeaks and made available to several news organizations offer the most intimate view to date of the wily, irreverent and sometimes erratic Yemeni autocrat, who over the past year has become steadily more aggressive against Al Qaeda. But he appears determined to join the fight on his own terms, sometimes accommodating and other times rebuffing American requests on counterterrrorism. The cables do not substantially alter the public picture of Mr. Saleh (pronounced SAH-leh), 68, a former military officer who has led Yemen for three decades. But with direct quotations from private meetings, the cables are like crisp color photographs of what was previously in fuzzy black and white. Yemen, long an arid, impoverished afterthought for the United States, now draws high-level American attention far out of proportion to its size. In October, militants in Yemen sent off printer cartridges packed with explosives to Chicago addresses. The bombs were intercepted, but the plot set off a furor and prompted the latest in a series of phone calls between President Obama and his Yemeni counterpart about counterterrorism and aid. At times, the cables show, Mr. Saleh has not hesitated to use his country’s daunting problems as a kind of threat. “Referencing the high poverty rate and illicit arms flows into both Yemen and Somalia, Saleh concluded by saying, ‘If you don’t help, this country will become worse than Somalia,’ ” said a September 2009 cable from the American ambassador, Stephen A. Seche, describing Mr. Saleh as being in “vintage form.” The cables portray Yemen, a land of 23 million people that is nearly the size of Texas, as a beleaguered, often baffling place, bristling with arms and riven by tribal conflict, where shoulder-launched missiles go missing and the jihad-curious arrive from all over the world. The Americans are seen coaxing the Yemenis to go after Al Qaeda, working out the rules for American missile strikes, seeking a safe way to send Yemeni prisoners home from the Guantánamo Bay prison and sizing up Americans caught in Yemeni security sweeps. Always at the center of the diplomatic traffic is Mr. Saleh, who first appears seeking a half-million tons of wheat in a 1990 meeting with James A. Baker III, then the secretary of state. These days, his most pressing requests are for heavy weapons and military training. But he also has become more cooperative with the American campaign against Al Qaeda. In a 2009 meeting with John O. Brennan, President Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser, Mr. Saleh offered an unusual bargain. He “insisted that Yemen’s national territory is available for unilateral CT operations by the U.S.” — but with a catch. If there were to be an attack on a Western target, Mr. Saleh said, it would not be his fault. “I have given you an open door on terrorism,” he said, “so I am not responsible.” In fact, despite such rhetoric, Mr. Saleh has imposed strict limits over American operations in his country, even as he has helped disguise them as his own. When the first two American missile strikes against Qaeda camps in Yemen took place in December 2009, Mr. Saleh publicly claimed that they were Yemeni strikes to avert any anti-American backlash. Gen. David H. Petraeus flew to Yemen to thank the president, who promised to keep up the ruse. “We’ll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours,” Mr. Saleh said, according to a cable. A deputy prime minister, Rashad al-Alimi, had already assured the Americans that “U.S. munitions found at the sites” of strikes “could be explained away as equipment purchased from the U.S.” Moreover, Mr. Alimi implied that Yemeni officials accepted as inevitable that the missiles had killed civilians along with militants. They were Bedouin families — “poor people selling food and supplies to the terrorists” and thus “acting in collusion with the terrorists and benefiting financially,” he said. Still, Mr. Saleh told General Petraeus that “mistakes were made” in the killing of civilians. He agreed to the American commander’s proposal that to improve accuracy, future strikes would be carried out by American aircraft rather than by cruise missiles fired from distant ships. But he firmly denied General Petraeus’s request to send American advisers along on Yemeni counterterrorism operations. For his part, General Petraeus put off Mr. Saleh’s request for 12 armed helicopters, even though the president promised to use them “only against Al Qaeda.” The United States has been wary of fueling the Yemeni government’s long-running conflicts with the so-called Houthi rebels in the north and secessionists in the south. The two sides also sparred over Yemen’s restrictions on material the United States shipped to its embassy in the diplomatic pouch, which the Yemenis evidently suspected was being used to import eavesdropping equipment. The Americans have complained about poor security at the airport in Sana, Yemen’s capital, including X-ray screeners who do not watch their monitors, and also security officers who “harass” American diplomats. Beyond such testy bargaining, emptying the Guantánamo Bay prison, where Yemenis are the single largest group remaining, has been a regular source of tension. When Mr. Saleh rejected an American plan to send the Yemenis to a Saudi rehabilitation program in March 2009, a cable described him as “dismissive, bored and impatient” and said he had “missed a good chance to engage the new administration on one of its key foreign policy priorities.” At the same time, the embassy was tracking the growing number of Yemeni arrests of expatriate Americans suspected of having links to militants. By last February, such arrests were occurring about once a week, and Mr. Seche wrote to Washington that the embassy’s “sharply increased workload” urgently required more personnel. “In the past two years, the Muslim convert community of Amcits living in Yemen,” Mr. Seche wrote, using shorthand for American citizens, “has been increasingly linked to extremist activities.” Sorting out such cases was difficult, a February cable said, citing an American woman who had reported the midnight arrest of her husband but appeared to be “omitting or manipulating critical details.” Yemen had become a magnet for would-be jihadists from around the globe, and a January cable listed 23 Australian citizens and residents to be added to terrorism watch lists because of activities in Yemen or connections to Mr. Awlaki, the radical cleric hiding there. Many of the Australians were women, and Qaeda operatives in Yemen were seeking “to identify a female for a future attack,” the cable said. The cables report on American and Yemeni attempts to track down and destroy stocks of the shoulder-fired missiles known as “manpads,” for man-portable air-defense systems. Their lethality against aircraft make them a major counterterrorism concern. Yemen’s Defense Ministry insisted that it had no stocks of such missiles, but Yemen’s National Security Bureau — a newer agency that works closely with the United States — told the Americans that the Defense Ministry “does indeed have MANPADS, but would never speak of them because they are considered a state secret.” A close ally in the counterterrorism efforts, the cables make clear, is Prince Muhammad bin Nayef, the deputy interior minister in neighboring Saudi Arabia, who in October tipped off American officials about the parcel bomb plot. Shortly after the attempted bombing of the airliner bound for Detroit, Prince Nayef told Gen. James L. Jones, then President Obama’s national security adviser, that the only way to combat Al Qaeda in Yemen was to “keep them on the run” and that Yemeni and American strikes on Al Qaeda were proving effective. Saudi authorities “have been monitoring conversations of Al Qaeda operatives in Yemen very closely, and whereas before the attack they were hearing relaxed 20-minute phone conversations over cellphones, after the attack the phones went virtually silent,” Prince Nayef said, according to a cable. That showed that Qaeda operatives “are more focused on their own security rather than on planning operations,” he said.

Classified Information and State Secrets


Karl Rove Is Back With a Republican Election Strategy

Abstract: WASHINGTON — In 2004, the Republican master strategist Karl Rove led weekly sessions at his Washington residence where, over big plates of his butter-smothered “eggies” and bacon slabs, he planned the re-election of President George W. Bush — and what he hoped would be lasting Republican dominion over Democrats. In April, Mr. Rove summoned several of the important players behind Mr. Bush’s ascendance to his home once again, this time to draw up plans to push a Republican resurgence. Over takeout chicken pot pies, the group — the Republican fund-raiser Fred Malek, the onetime lobbyist and Bush White House counselor Ed Gillespie, and former Vice President Dick Cheney’s daughter Mary Cheney, among others — agreed on plans for an ambitious new political machine that would marshal the resources of disparate business, nonprofit and interest groups to bring Republicans back to power this fall. When Mr. Rove left the White House in 2007, Democrats rejoiced at what they believed would be the end of his political career and the brand of Republicanism he espoused. This election season is proving that he is back — if he ever really left at all. The landscape has changed, with Mr. Rove at times clashing with potent new Tea Party -style activists, some of whom view him as a face of the old party establishment they want to upend. Already a prominent presence as an analyst on Fox News Channel and a columnist at The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Rove is also playing a leading role in building what amounts to a shadow Republican Party , a network of donors and operatives that is among the most aggressive in the Republican effort to capture control of the House and the Senate. He has had a major hand in helping to summon the old coalition of millionaires and billionaires who supported Mr. Bush and have huge financial stakes in regulatory and tax policy, like Harold C. Simmons, a Texas billionaire whose holdings include a major waste management company that handles some radioactive materials; Carl H. Lindner Jr., a Cincinnati businessman whose American Financial Group includes several property and casualty insurance concerns; and Robert B. Rowling, whose TRT Holdings owns Omni Hotels and Gold’s Gym. Their personal and corporate money — as well as that of other donors who have not been identified — has gone to a collection of outside groups Mr. Rove helped form with Mr. Gillespie, including American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, which in turn are loosely affiliated with similar groups staffed or backed by other operatives and donors with ties to Mr. Rove. With $32 million and counting, they are now filling the void created by the diminished condition of the Republican National Committee, which has faced fund-raising difficulties under its embattled chairman, Michael Steele. “A lot of what we’re doing would normally be done with the R.N.C.,” said Ms. Cheney, who is part of a group, the Alliance for America’s Future, that is working with the organizations Mr. Rove helped start on encouraging early voting in House races this fall. “There’s no money there.” Crossroads officials say they are seeking to supplement party activities, not replace them. In a brief interview, Mr. Rove said he was trying to help build something that would remain in place beyond November. “We want this to be durable,” he said. Already, plans at American Crossroads include an anti-Democratic barrage of attack ads that will be run tens of thousands of times, a final get-out-the-vote push with some 40 million negative mail pieces, and 20 million automated phone calls, officials there say. “They’re running a very proficient party operation funded by millions of dollars of undisclosed special-interest dollars,” said David Axelrod, a special adviser to President Obama. Referring to Mr. Rove and Mr. Gillespie, he added, “These guys are great political operatives, and they will have an impact in this election.” But if Mr. Rove and his colleagues remain prime movers of the Republican establishment, it is less clear that their influence extends into — and will not be diminished by — the grass-roots conservative movement that has energized and somewhat reordered the party this year. Mr. Rove has at times warned against insurgent candidates who in his view would reduce Republican chances of winning a seat. And as the embodiment of the inside-Washington power structure, he and his associates are viewed with some suspicion by the new forces driving the party, in particular former Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska and the Tea Party activists who eschew the sort of big-tent, top-down party order Mr. Rove stands for. Tensions boiled over recently when Mr. Rove publicly criticized as unelectable the Tea Party-backed candidate who won the Republican Senate primary in Delaware, Christine O’Donnell. His stance prompted blistering criticism from activists and Ms. Palin, who, in a “woodshed moment” clearly directed at least in part at Mr. Rove during a recent speech in Iowa, called for party unity, asking, “Did you ever lose a big game growing up?” Richard Viguerie, a longtime conservative strategist who has allied with Tea Party activists, said, “We’re all on the same page until the polls close Nov. 2.” But, referring to Mr. Rove and Mr. Gillespie as part of the “ruling class,” he added, “Then a massive, almost historic battle for the heart and soul of the Republican Party begins.” The longstanding descriptions of Mr. Rove as an all-powerful Republican puppeteer exaggerate and oversimplify his role. And he has no paid, official position with the Crossroads groups, serving instead as an informal adviser alongside Mr. Gillespie. Operations are overseen by the chairman, Robert M. Duncan, a former Republican National Committee chairman and 40-year Rove associate, and the chief executive, Steven Law, a former general counsel to the United States Chamber of Commerce and a onetime chief of staff to Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Last year, Mr. Rove and Mr. Gillespie began reviewing the new landscape of groups Democrats had formed when they were out of power, asking themselves, Mr. Gillespie said, “What do they have that we don’t have?” Mr. Law recalled first hearing of plans to form a more ambitious entity supporting conservative candidates and causes from Mr. Gillespie last October, when, he said, “I could just see the political atmosphere changing dramatically in the Republicans’ favor, and there really needed to be a professionally run, full-service political operation built up.” Mr. Rove set out to raise money to build just such an operation at the same time he was trying to help unify the party behind the candidates he viewed as having the best chances to win in the midterm elections. But he encountered early resistance from the party’s new crop of activists. At a meeting in Delaware, Tea Party-style leaders rebuffed Mr. Rove’s case for Representative Michael N. Castle as the party favorite for the Senate seat there. “He started talking about the possibility of votes being split and the work we were doing could cost candidates the election,” said Russ Murphy, a retired electric company worker and executive director of a new group called the 9-12 Delaware Patriots, who also shared his story on Ms. O’Donnell’s victory stage. “I interrupted him and said, ‘With all due respect, we don’t endorse the party and won’t endorse the party; that’s not what this is about.’ ” But Mr. Rove, along with Mr. Gillespie and Mr. Duncan, was having better luck on the fund-raising circuit. American Crossroads formally registered with the Internal Revenue Service in March with an initial reported donation of $250,000 from B. Wayne Hughes of Kentucky, the chairman of Public Storage Inc. That was followed by a donation of $1 million in April from Trevor Rees-Jones of Texas, the chief executive of Chief Oil and Gas. Around the same time, Mr. Rove came up with the idea of gathering other like-minded outside groups at his home on Weaver Terrace in Northwest Washington. Calling themselves the Weaver Terrace Group in honor of that first meeting, the participants now regularly reconvene at the Crossroads offices downtown to ensure that they work in tandem and avoid overlap. Central to the effort is the development of a sophisticated list of voters that several of the groups share and contribute to, helping organizations like Ms. Cheney’s, for instance, to identify people likely to vote by early absentee ballot in House races. Officials at American Crossroads later started a new entity, Crossroads GPS. Registered under section 501(c)(4) of the tax code — a designation that in theory requires it to focus primarily on issues rather than candidates — it has raised roughly half of the $32 million the Crossroads groups have reported raising between them. At least until recently, Crossroads GPS had served as the dominant conduit for advertisements. It has not shied away from running commercials helpful to Tea Party-backed Senate candidates like Rand Paul of Kentucky, and, in a large way, Sharron Angle in Nevada. (Several of its ads have been criticized for “badly misleading claims” by FactCheck.org, the political advertising monitoring service of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.) Whatever battle Mr. Viguerie predicts, Mr. Duncan said the group would have staying power. “We’re going to be involved in 2012,” he said. “That’s what we’re gearing for.”

Elections
Republican Party
Rove Karl
United States Politics and Government


China Reports Falling Prices and Low Demand

Abstract: HONG KONG — Most economists still do not expect the Chinese economy to suffer a broad decline in prices this year, but statistics released on Tuesday did provide disturbing whiffs of possible deflation . Consumer prices were 1.6 percent lower last month than a year earlier, the first decline since December 2002, the National Bureau of Statistics announced in Beijing. February’s result represented a precipitous drop from an inflation rate of 8.7 percent in February of last year, when rising prices were a top priority for the Chinese government. Producer prices are falling even faster, dragged down mainly by lower prices for oil and other commodities, but also by a glut of factory capacity and a shortage of demand from exporters and Chinese buyers alike. Producer prices were 4.5 percent lower last month than a year earlier, after having shown annual increases of as much as 10 percent as recently as last summer. There are few signs yet that demand is returning. Chen Deming, the commerce minister, warned at a news conference in Beijing on Tuesday that China’s trade had continued to shrink in February — exact figures are scheduled for release this week. And he cautioned that, “It’s fair to say in coming months we will see quite a grim picture.” In yet another possible hint of deflation, an index of real estate prices in 70 Chinese cities also fell in February, inching down 0.3 percent from January and down 1.2 percent from a year ago. For now, few economists are predicting that deflation will prove a chronic problem. For starters, the Chinese government has been very aggressively expanding the country’s money supply — and China’s state-controlled banks, having suffered few of the losses of their Western counterparts, have been following regulators’ instructions to step up their lending. Deflation can be a severe threat for any economy because consumers and businesses faced with falling prices see an incentive to delay spending, which in turn can make prices fall even faster and slow economic growth. The Chinese government also plays a greater role in the market and in prices than many governments in the West. The government is moving to increase by 18 percent the prices at which it buys rice and wheat, for example, which should help peasants’ incomes and halt a decline in food prices that helped to drag down broader indexes in February. The National Bureau of Statistics took the unusual step of issuing a statement on Tuesday that denied China faced possible deflation. The government agency noted that raw material prices had plunged around the world, a drop that may not be repeated this year, and that the timing of Chinese New Year may have had an effect — it fell in late January this year instead of in February. Prices were also particularly high for many foods in February of last year because of severe snowstorms, which were not repeated this year. “The fact that the Consumer Price Index and Producer Price Index both declined in February cannot be used to come to a conclusion that deflation has appeared,” the National Bureau of Statistics said. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao set a target last week of 4 percent inflation this year. Yet there are many signs that supply exceeds demand for a wide range of goods and services. Hong Kong business leaders warn that most of their mainland factories are not running at full capacity, although only a few percent of 65,000 Hong Kong-owned factories in nearby areas of mainland China have actually closed. “They may be operating at one-third or half of production” capacity, said Clement Chen, the chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries, while adding that, “We haven’t seen a large number of closures.” In a possible sign that real estate developers are running into financial difficulty and having to unload new houses and apartments at a faster pace, the real estate index of 70 cities was led down by a drop of 1.8 percent in new home prices compared with a year ago. Prices of previously owned homes fell 0.7 percent. Moody’s Economy.com predicted that consumers, aware of the recent decline in values, would be reluctant to buy homes and that real estate prices would continue to fall through this year in China.

China
Statistics
Economic Conditions and Trends
Inflation (Economics)


Oil Spill Donations Are Small, but Some Companies Step Up

Abstract: CORPORATE and individual donations after the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico have paled in comparison to responses to other disasters. The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported that six weeks after the April 20 explosion that caused the disaster, about $4 million had been donated to relief efforts, compared with more than $580 million within eight days of Hurricane Katrina and more than $560 million within 17 days of the earthquake in Haiti . Now Pepsi is donating $1.3 million through its Pepsi Refresh Project, which uses a Web site, refresheverything.com , to determine grant winners by popular vote. That sum is in addition to $20 million that Pepsi has vowed to give away in 2010 in the cause marketing effort, the term for collaborating with nonprofit organizations to bolster both charities and the reputations of companies. The company will award 32 Do Good for the Gulf grants: two for $250,000 and 10 each for $50,000, $25,000 and $5,000. Drew Brees, the New Orleans Saints quarterback, has signed on as a spokesman to promote the effort. To qualify, grants must not overlap with official cleanup efforts. Voting on about 300 submissions will continue through Aug. 31, with winners announced on Sept. 22. “Most Americans have been sitting back and seeing the gulf and feeling upset and a little helpless about how to help, and the Pepsi Refresh Project gives them a vehicle to put their ideas into action and make a difference,” said Lauren Hobart, chief marketing officer for sparkling brands at PepsiCo. Nicole Wallace, a senior writer at The Chronicle of Philanthropy, who tracks disaster relief efforts, said, “What I’m hearing from folks is that companies are looking at the disaster in the gulf and thinking, ‘This is BP’s responsibility — why should I be making charitable contributions toward that?’ ” BP has vowed to compensate victims through a $20 billion fund, but beyond the fact that some would-be donors figure the company will make everyone whole, disasters caused by humans tend to draw subdued responses. “Since the BP crisis is a manmade disaster versus a natural disaster, it’s easy for people to point fingers at BP and the government, and for the government and BP to point fingers at each other,” said Alison DaSilva, executive vice president of Cone L.L.C., which helps companies with philanthropic marketing. “So it’s a little bit of the blame game, and that hardens the compassions of both consumers and companies to help out,” Ms. DaSilva said.  Still, some companies are stepping up, like Chevron, which donated $750,000 to the Audubon Society for a volunteer response center in Moss Point, Miss. The dishwashing liquid Dawn, a Procter & Gamble brand, has for three decades donated products and money to the International Bird Rescue Research Center, which cleans soiled wildlife with diluted Dawn. It shipped 2,000 bottles to bird-rescue sites in the gulf region. Teva, the shoe company that makes waterproof sports sandals, gave $100,000 to the Waterkeeper Alliance, an advocacy group for clean water, a cause of concern for many Teva-wearing kayakers. “There’s a consumer belief that BP is going to take care of the cleanup and there’s not a need for other organizations to take care of this, but we were just afraid that it was just going to take too long for all the money to funnel out regardless of who was responding,” said Joel Heath, marketing director at Teva, part of Deckers Outdoor Corporation. S.C. Johnson distributed 5,000 units of its Off! insect repellent to volunteers in cleanup areas that are rife with mosquitoes, and donated $25,000 to the National Wildlife Refuge Association, which operates refuges in the area of the spill. Borders, the book chain, gave almost $38,000, part of its receipts for a week in June, to the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana for oil spill relief efforts.  Regional companies also are helping. Abita Brewing Company of Abita Springs, La., is selling what it calls a “charitable brew,” named S.O.S., which was first bottled on July 16. It will donate 75 cents for every 22-ounce bottle sold. Hooters of America, the Atlanta-based chain of more than 450 restaurants, issued a press release on June 11 that said, “Hooters Girls Donate Their Pantyhose to Create Booms and Absorb up to 1 Million Gallons of Oil in the Gulf of Mexico.” Waitresses, who wear pantyhose as part of their skimpy uniforms, donated more than 100,000 torn pairs, which were sent to two organizations that collect hair and fur from salons and pet groomers and stuff it into the legs of pantyhose to make booms that absorb oil. But on May 21, three weeks before Hooters’ announcement, cleanup officials announced that they would not use hair booms, which absorb more water and less oil than widely available commercial booms — and tend to sink. “Individuals and organizations are asked to discontinue collection of hair for the hair boom,” said the Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center. “Regardless, we still made the donation,” said Alexis Aleshire, a Hooters spokeswoman. She said Hooters “hadn’t really talked to” Matter of Trust, the organization that collects hair and stockings, since then. The group’s Web site, matteroftrust.org , says that all 19 donated warehouses in the gulf are full and that it is not accepting more hair. Ms. DaSilva, of Cone, says such confusion underscores the fact that the philanthropic responses to the spill have not been as well choreographed as those to other disasters. “All those barbershops donated hair and others donated pantyhose because there was no real compelling call to action,” she said. “With natural disasters you can donate to international relief organizations and you know the money is going to help people in need. But there wasn’t a clear ask. There wasn’t an Oxfam or Red Cross to stand up and say, ‘Here’s what we need, and here’s what you can do.’ ”

Gulf of Mexico
Philanthropy
Oil (Petroleum) and Gasoline
Computers and the Internet
BP Plc


Vanderbilt Rape Convictions Stir Dismay and Denial

Abstract: NASHVILLE — The crime was horrific and the verdict stunningly swift. Two former Vanderbilt University football players are facing the possibility of decades in prison after it took a jury less than four hours to convict them for their roles in a 2013 sexual assault of an unconscious woman. Two more former football players await trial. At a time of widespread alarm and almost daily news reports about sexual assaults on college campuses, it is hard to imagine a case more likely than this one, captured on video by the assailants, to mobilize a campus. As if to underscore how pervasive the concerns have become nationally, representatives from 76 Tennessee colleges and universities were holding a conference on the subject here, not far from the courthouse where Tuesday’s verdict played out. But transformative moments are hard to come by when a community’s population turns over every four years and its members have a deep investment in its reputation. So interviews Tuesday and Wednesday at Vanderbilt brought out horror at what had happened and a distinct distance from it. Until the trial began more than two weeks ago, the episode seemed to elicit little sense of urgency — in fact, the student newspaper, The Vanderbilt Hustler, found that many students were not even aware of it. Over the past two weeks, lurid testimony about the gang rape, and the revelation that several people knew of the assault but failed to report it, drew attention throughout Nashville. Still, many students, more than a quarter of them not on campus when the rape occurred, find it hard to square what happened with their views of this elite university as an oasis from a harder world. In interviews, reactions mostly clustered around two poles: This is not the sort of place where such things happen, or they happen everywhere — and either way, no one should point a finger at Vanderbilt. “After the first few weeks at school, I felt like I knew everyone,” said Rebecca Bendheim, a sophomore from Barrington, R.I. “I didn’t feel in danger at all of any type of weird sexual advance.” Andrew Walther, a senior, expressed dismay that the assault had happened at Vanderbilt and said that “it becomes a reflection on us now.” And those who study sexual assault said that for all the national concern, changing behavior and culture on college campuses is likely to be a long, difficult process, no matter how dramatic and convulsive individual cases may be. Image Brandon Vandenburg, left, a former Vanderbilt football player, with his lawyer, Albert Perez Jr., after being found guilty on Tuesday. Credit Pool photo by John Partipilo “At a lot of institutions, there’s an intense effort to protect the reputation of the place,” said John D. Foubert, a professor of higher education at Oklahoma State University. “What’s different at really elite institutions is that the students will also do most anything to protect the reputation of the institution, because they think it reflects on them.” At many colleges, “people still have the ‘Oh my God, I’m so shocked that it could happen here’ reaction,” said Jane Stapleton, a co-director of the violence prevention program at the University of New Hampshire. People need to understand that no place is immune, she said, “but not use that as an excuse, either.” Sarah O’Brien, now a graduate student at Vanderbilt, was sexually assaulted while she was an undergraduate there, and said there was a powerful element of denial on the campus. “When you’re in a setting with a bunch of people who are primarily privileged, they don’t feel a need to talk about this,” she said. “They feel they have the privilege that this probably won’t happen to them.” She filed a complaint against the university with the federal government and alleged that Vanderbilt discouraged victims from reporting such crimes. Vanderbilt is one of roughly 100 colleges and universities under investigation by the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights for their handling of sexual assaults and harassment. But in the case of the football players, it was the university that first discovered evidence pointing to an assault — security camera images of men carrying an unconscious woman into a dormitory room — and referred it to the police. To this day, the victim says she has no memory of what happened in Gillette House in the early morning of June 23, 2013. Long before the case went to trial, the university expelled the men. “The safety and security of our students is Vanderbilt’s top priority,” Beth Fortune, the vice chancellor for public affairs, said in a prepared statement that was the university’s only comment on the verdict. “Sexual violence will never be tolerated.” The university has said that in the last few years, it has improved its sexual assault prevention and response in several ways, including mandatory sessions on sex and alcohol for incoming students, a website that collects a range of resources in one place, and an expanded program on the role of bystanders. Image Cory Batey in court on Tuesday. Credit Pool photo by John Partipilo During the trial, a lawyer for one of the defendants, Cory Batey, attributed his client’s behavior to the university’s culture of hard drinking and easy hookups. On the witness stand, Mr. Batey said he had been too drunk to remember what happened. “That argument infuriated a lot of Vanderbilt students,” said Tyler Bishop, the editor in chief of the student newspaper. “Party culture is very big here,” and many people want to defend it. The prosecutor in the case, Thomas Thurman, said in an interview on Thursday that alcohol was just one of the excuses the football players had fallen back on. “These young men appeared to think they were entitled because they were athletes and rules didn’t apply,” he said. Mr. Batey and Brandon Vandenburg, both 21, were convicted of multiple counts of aggravated rape and lesser charges. There was testimony that Mr. Batey had violated the woman in multiple ways and urinated on her. Mr. Vandenburg, who had briefly dated the woman, was not accused of touching her sexually that night — he told the others he could not achieve an erection — but was found guilty for being the ringleader. Witnesses testified that he had given condoms to the other men and egged them on, and that it was his voice heard on a video, instructing them and laughing. Three of the men recorded images of the assault on their phones. Mr. Vandenburg’s roommate said he had been awakened by the commotion, seen the woman lying motionless on the floor and heard one of the men say he would have sex with her. Other students say they saw the woman lying unconscious in the hallway where the men had deposited her. At least two of Mr. Vandenburg’s friends received images of the assault from him. Yet none of those people went to the police, just as no one had intervened earlier after seeing Mr. Vandenburg giving drinks to the woman and then, with the help of the other three, carrying her after she passed out. Experts say the programs that are most effective at reducing sexual assault are those that persuade people that bystanders have an obligation to intervene, and teach them how to do it. In fact, a large part of the conference held this week in Nashville was about such programs.

Rape
Nashville
Vanderbilt University
College
Brandon Vandenburg
Cory Batey
College football


Albany: Pataki to Visit Hungary

Abstract: Gov. George E. Pataki will lead a United States delegation to Budapest next month to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution, the White House announced yesterday. Mr. Pataki, whose ethnic background is Hungarian, will head a group that includes Peter Gogolak, a former New York Giants football player; Steven Udvar-Hazy, chairman of the International Lease Finance Corporation; and April H. Foley, the United States ambassador to Hungary . In 1956, Hungary became a symbol of struggle against Communist rule when it revolted against Soviet domination. The Soviet Union sent in tanks to crush the uprising, and Soviet-backed leaders retained power for 30 more years.

Hungary
Pataki George E
International Relations


New Hampshire Republicans Get a Preview of 2016

Abstract: MANCHESTER, N.H. — Here in a state where presidential politics are never far from anyone’s mind, three Republicans who are considering a run for the White House — Senators Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky, and Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor — pitched their views on Saturday for how conservatives can retake power in Washington. It was an unusually early event for such an overt discussion of 2016, even by today’s accelerated electoral calendar. Not only is the next presidential election still more than two and a half years away, most states have not even held their primary elections for the midterm elections this year. The event was the Freedom Summit, a gathering of several hundred put together by two of the most influential groups on the right, the Americans for Prosperity Foundation and Citizens United . And what unfolded on stage in a conference center next to the regional airport was a display of today’s Republican Party in all its dynamism, division and sometimes strange spectacle. Mr. Paul offered up his message of making the Republican Party more ecumenical by reaching out to Americans who feel conservatives do not look out for them. And in doing so, he offered some blunt advice. “The door’s not going to open up to the African-American community, to the Hispanic community, until we have something to offer,” he said, adding that Republicans should care more that minorities are so overrepresented in the prison population. “But your kids and grandkids aren’t perfect either” Mr. Paul said. “The police don’t come to your neighborhoods. You get a better lawyer. These are some injustices. We’ve got to be concerned about people who may not be part of our group, who may not be here today.” Mr. Cruz gave a more traditional view of conservatism, but with the caustic delivery that has earned him few friends in Washington. “I think every Republican should have two words tattooed on their hands: growth and opportunity,” he said, before disparaging the people he works with every day. “I’m spending my time not focusing on Washington, not trying to convince Washington of anything, because they ain’t listening. What I’m trying to do instead is help energize and mobilize the American people.” Mr. Huckabee went for guaranteed applause lines, mentioning the Benghazi attacks, the Internal Revenue Service and the need for photo ID at the polls. The names on the Freedom Summit marquee — some who have run for president, some who might run, and some who have been teasing people for years with the possibility — reflected the crossroads at which the Republican Party finds itself. Image Senator Ted Cruz of Texas spoke at the Freedom Summit in Manchester, N.H., on Saturday. Credit Darren McCollester/Getty Images On the one hand were the dynamic, new politicians like Mr. Paul and Mr. Cruz who are energizing many disillusioned conservatives but arouse skepticism in some corners of the party for different reasons. On the other hand were those like Newt Gingrich, Mr. Huckabee and Donald Trump, who have been speaking at events like the Freedom Summit for years and have loyal followers but are not likely to bring with them any constituencies that will expand the party’s reach. Mr. Trump, who reminded the audience that he had been in Republican politics for “a long time,” sounded more passionate about his new developments in Florida than about politics. “I’m a builder; I build great buildings,” he told the crowd. Then he talked up his new golf course near Miami. “It’s going to be the most beautiful resort in the country,” he said. He also spoke about his work for wounded military veterans. “I meet so many of them — with the legs, the arms and the trauma.” Mr. Trump tossed out a few one-liners that lighted up an otherwise sedate crowd, such as telling them that he would use his building prowess to construct a border fence “like you’ve never seen.” His mentioning of Jeb Bush’s remarks last week that crossing the border illegally is for many families “an act of love” drew disgusted sighs and boos. Mr. Gingrich used his speech to promote some of his own business endeavors, mentioning two of his films, a book and a podcast, which he noted is free. He also threw the crowd some red meat, mocking Kathleen Sebelius, who resigned last week as secretary of health and human services. And he declared the Obama administration “the worst administration since Buchanan, which is really quite a record.” Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who at 42 is one of the youngest Tea Party favorites, took a jab at the advancing age of many of his fellow senators in a story he told about being yelled at by a Capitol police officer for leaning on one of the Senate’s 200-year-old desks. Those desks, he noted, are “as old as some of my colleagues.” Ryan Bernier, 24, a recent college graduate in the audience on Saturday, said he wanted to see the party embrace fresher ideas. He felt himself drawn most to Mr. Paul, whose speeches he has watched online. “He’s principled, and we need principle in this country right now,” Mr. Bernier said. “He’s Republican, but he’s willing to call out Republicans. He says, ‘You think I’m talking about electing Republicans, but I’m talking about electing lovers of liberty.’ He’s got some courage.” But not everyone, even some of the younger people, were so sold on Mr. Paul. “He’s a loose cannon,” said Lauren Rumpler, a 25-year-old who lives in Manchester. In the other state that will matter in 2016, Iowa, another possible Republican candidate offered his thoughts on mending the party’s divides. Speaking in Cedar Rapids on Friday night, Representative Paul Ryan said, “This is the Lenten season. Here’s what I say: we give up infighting, tunnel vision, acrimony.” He added: “We need to unite the clans.”

New Hampshire
Republicans
Ted Cruz
Rand Paul
Mike Huckabee
Americans for Prosperity
Citizens United
US Politics
2016 Presidential Election


Amtrak Trying to Determine if Workers Were Authorized to Be on Tracks

Abstract: The Amtrak train that slammed into a backhoe on Sunday morning in Chester, Pa., leaving two workers dead on the tracks, was barreling along at 106 miles an hour seconds before the crash, federal investigators said on Monday. But the investigators said they did not know whether the work crew was authorized to be on the track at the time. Determining who was at fault in the deadly accident will require further study of Amtrak’s records, said Ryan Frigo, the lead investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board, at a news conference Monday evening in Philadelphia. “We’re still gathering information as to who had the authority to be on that track,” Mr. Frigo said. The Delaware County medical examiner’s office identified the two dead men as Joseph Carter Jr., 61, of Wilmington, Del., and Peter Adamovich, 59, of Chester County, Pa. The office’s report said that Mr. Carter was the backhoe operator; Mr. Adamovich was a supervisor. It placed the time of the accident at 7:49 a.m. The limited details shared by Mr. Frigo and Amtrak indicated that the train’s engineer had not expected the work crew to be in the way. The train was traveling near the speed limit of 110 miles an hour, Mr. Frigo said. And the engineer did not apply the emergency brakes until five seconds before impact, he said, citing an analysis of video from a camera on the train. Amtrak’s chief executive, Joseph Boardman, declined to discuss any details of the accident, but did say that a collision-prevention system known as positive train control was operating on the train and along the stretch of tracks where the crash happened. That system would have automatically slowed the train if it had run through red signals as it approached the work site. Under normal circumstances, a maintenance crew must obtain permission from the railroad’s dispatchers before going to work on a track, railroad safety experts said. When they have that permission, the stretch of track they occupy is taken out of service, so that all signal lights approaching it are red. The crew had been replacing ballast, the rocks that fill the rail bed and help to keep the tracks stable. The work involved using the backhoe to remove gravel and replace it with ballast distributed by a nearby work train. Mr. Frigo said the backhoe was on the track on which the train was traveling, and the work train was on an adjacent track. He did not say where the two men who were killed were at the time of the crash. Neither Mr. Frigo nor Amtrak officials would discuss what safety protocols had been established for the crew working in Chester over the weekend. It was not clear how many were on the crew, or if anyone was designated to watch for oncoming trains. Beyond clearing the use of the tracks over hand-held radios, maintenance workers usually take additional precautions because oral communication can be misunderstood, and equipment can malfunction, safety experts said. “Federal safety rules require that before any work crew goes onto any track, they must get a safety briefing from the employee in charge of that site,” including what tracks they have access to, said Allan M. Zarembski, director of the railroad engineering and safety program at the University of Delaware. “And if you have possession of a track and there’s a live adjacent track,” he added, the Federal Railroad Administration’s rules require “that you have a flagman, a lookout, positioned down the track with an air horn to warn the track crew that a train is coming.” “There’s supposed to be a visible and audible warning,” Mr. Zarembski said. The air horn is essential, experts said, because workers operating noisy equipment might not hear a train approaching. N.T.S.B. officials on Monday did not address whether these precautions were used by the work crew in Chester. Though the accident Sunday came less than a year after a speeding Amtrak train derailed in Philadelphia, killing eight passengers, Mr. Boardman rejected the notion that Amtrak has a safety problem. “It is a safe railroad, and this was a very unfortunate situation,” he said. “A very unfortunate and sad situation.”

Amtrak
Philadelphia
Federal Railroad Administration
Train wreck
Pennsylvania
Fatalities,casualties
Joseph H Boardman


India Takes Steps to Counter Threats of Violence Over Movie Release

Abstract: NEW DELHI — India moved on Thursday to intervene in a nationalist furor that has swept Bollywood since an army base was attacked last month and that has threatened to derail the release of major movies starring Pakistani actors. Relations between India and Pakistan have deteriorated since the attack in September by militants who India says were from Pakistan. One of India’s biggest groups of cinema owners has said that it will not show films featuring Pakistani actors, partly targeting the planned release of a film this month by Karan Johar, one of Bollywood’s most successful directors. The movie stars a Pakistani actor, Fawad Khan. A far-right political party based in the state of Maharashtra has also warned all Pakistani performers working in India to leave within 48 hours or “risk being beaten up.” Image The Pakistani actor Fawad Khan stars in an Indian film to be released later this month. Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The Indian minister of home affairs, Rajnath Singh, met Thursday morning with a delegation led by the president of a major movie producers’ group and said that steps would be taken to ensure that the film by Mr. Johar would not be disrupted by violence. The movie group’s president, Mukesh Bhatt, of the Film & Television Producers Guild of India, said after the meeting that the minister “gave me his assurance, his 100 percent assurance, that he will speak to every single chief minister, of every state, to see that law and order is maintained.” An official for the home affairs department added that the minister told the delegation that he would personally speak to the chief minister of Maharashtra. Mr. Johar released a video this week pleading for support for the release of the film , “Ae Dil Hai Mushkil,” saying he would not cast Pakistani actors in the future. A member of Mr. Johar’s company, Dharma Productions, was part of the delegation that met with the home minister.

India
Movies
Pakistan
Karan Johar
Fawad Khan


All Eyes on the Elephant

Abstract: In his work “Topsy: The Startling Story of the Crooked-Tailed Elephant, P. T. Barnum and the American Wizard, Thomas Edison” (Atlantic Monthly Press, $27), Michael Daly vividly revives a rollicking pachydermal tale that riveted New Yorkers a century ago and still survives in a gruesome YouTube video . Mr. Daly, author of “The Book of Mychal” and a columnist for The Daily Beast, provides perceptive insights into circus and sideshow elephants and their huckster handlers. He focuses on an animal named Topsy, who, like the character in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” she was named for, was “snatched by ‘speculators’ so soon after her birth that she has no memory of her mother.” Topsy was mythologized from the beginning. Hailed as America’s first native-born elephant, she was actually smuggled into the country from Asia around 1875, and eventually wound up in Coney Island. Mr. Daly leads readers on mesmerizing detours that reveal everything from the origins of pink lemonade to a brazen pickpocket’s trick. And he recreates the War of the Elephants, fought between the circus magnates P. T. Barnum and Adam Forepaugh, and the War of the Currents, the struggle between Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse over the competing standards of alternating and direct current for electrical power distribution. The story lines converge after Topsy kills a man who jabs her with a lit cigar (in some accounts, he tosses a lit cigarette in her mouth). Her owner sentences her to death, a public spectacle filmed by Edison: electrocution by alternating current (the Westinghouse variety). Even this dark episode does not dampen the book’s exuberance. It is, as Mr. Daly says of the circus itself, a summery escape “from grinding drudgery into the fabulous.” Image “One Out of Three.” ● Nancy Foner, a professor of sociology at Hunter College, has assembled an impressive group of scholars to contribute to “One Out of Three: Immigrant New York in the Twenty-First Century” (Columbia University Press, $35, paperback). They examine how Chinese, Dominicans, Jews from the former Soviet Union, Jamaicans, Koreans and others have reshaped the city and have themselves been assimilated. Along the way, we learn of Liberian refugees who established an enclave on Staten Island’s North Shore and of the growing number of undocumented Mexicans surviving in a legal limbo. Professor Foner notes that immigrants comprise about 37 percent of the city’s population (they topped 3 million in 2010 for the first time, according to the census). And when their American-born children are included, they now constitute a majority, around 55 percent. Immigration, she concludes, “has brought about a dramatic demographic transformation; it is a major factor fueling population growth and has led to remarkable ethnoracial diversity.” The influx also makes New York the local paradigm of the “permanently unfinished country,” which is how Nathan Glazer, the Harvard sociologist, once described the United States. ● The city offers prospects as beautiful and sublime as any in nature, as Robin Lynn and Francis Morrone amply demonstrate in their “Guide to New York City Urban Landscapes” (Norton, $29.95), a helpful and insightful pathfinder to 38 inviting sites. Their tour of places both familiar and not so, including Four Freedoms Park, Green-Wood Cemetery, the East River waterfront, Governors Island and Grand Army Plaza, is introduced by Pete Hamill, who invokes our longing for: “The beauty of nature. Of space at ground level. Of lovely vistas carved from ugliness by human beings.” The guide is accompanied by photographs, maps and details about each site.

Michael Daly
Books
Nancy Foner
Robin Lynn
Francis Morrone
NYC