Motivating the Motivator

Abstract: IT’S an old joke. A visitor is being shown around the office and asks, “How many people work here?” The punch line: “About half.” But it turns out that estimate may be overly optimistic. Surveys, by Gallup and others, reveal that the number of employees who are truly engaged by their work may be as low as 25 percent. Writing in Pink , a magazine for professional women, Karen Benjack Glatzer offers a series of tips aimed at raising that figure. Intriguingly, most of them have to do with changing the boss’s behavior, not the employee’s. “A manager who wants to engage and develop talent must look to her own motivation first, experts say,” Ms. Glatzer writes. “That’s because employees want their managers to be role models for growth and ongoing learning.” She recommends that the manager then speak with every employee. “Each individual has a different set of motivators,” she writes. “One may be motivated by money, another by recognition and another by a challenge. ” One way to find out what works best is to ask, “What can I do to keep you?” “Ironically,” Ms. Glatzer writes, “most managers do eventually ask this question — during the exit interview, when it’s too late.” ON THE OTHER HAND Whether you are quitting in a huff or leaving reluctantly, the best career advice, Pamela Weintraub writes in Psychology Today , “is to part with your employer on the best of terms” to make sure you get good references and keep your contacts in place. Her suggestions for an amiable parting include, give plenty of notice; help find your replacement, if you can; leave complete written records of your work; remain actively involved until your final day; and stay accessible once you leave in case your colleagues have questions. STRESS FREE “The ‘fight or flight’ response has brought us a long way in evolutionary terms, but it doesn’t always play so well at work — stress central for most of us,” Doug Donaldson writes in Men’s Journal . When we can’t fight or flee, that creates stress, Ronald Nathan, a clinical professor at Albany Medical College, tells the magazine. To combat it, the magazine offers these four stress fighting tips: ¶Don’t think in absolutes. Perceiving danger when it doesn’t exist can induce stress, Mr. Nathan says. If you are thinking in all-or-nothing terms, chances are you are blowing a problem all out of proportion. ¶ Breathe. Slow deep breaths will “reset your stress response,” Mr. Donaldson writes. ¶ Give yourself a foot massage. Take off your shoes and roll a tennis ball under each foot for two minutes. “Your feet have reflex points connected to other parts of your nervous system,” said Maureen Moon, former president of the American Massage Therapy Association. “To relieve tension in your lower back, roll the ball on the inside rear part of your instep. To ease shoulder tension, rock the ball in the area near your big toe.” ¶Move. As little as two minutes of physical activity can burn off stress. LAST CALL Here’s something to ponder, with cold and flu season on the way. When asked why they go to work when they’re sick, 57 percent of respondents to a Parenting poll said they saved their days to use when their children were sick or there is a child care emergency. Some 27 percent said they felt that they needed to go in because of office politics, and another 10 percent said they hated to fall behind on their work. Our favorite answer came from the 6 percent who said they don’t stay home because “my kids drive me crazy when I’m home sick.” PAUL B. BROWN

Magazines
Psychology Today
Men's Journal
Executives and Management


Lockout Is Delayed While an Independent Analyst Examines the Met’s Finances

Abstract: The Metropolitan Opera, which had threatened to lock out its workers if it did not reach new deals with its labor unions by Sunday night, said Saturday evening that it would extend its current contracts for about a week while an independent analyst examined its finances. The Met is seeking to cut the pay and benefits of its workers, arguing that expenses have grown in recent years and are putting the company’s future at risk. The unions have resisted the cuts and have questioned whether the company’s finances were in dire shape, noting that recent deficits had been small in the context of an annual budget that has grown to more than $300 million. Since Friday, the Met and two of its biggest unions, representing the orchestra and chorus, have been in talks with a federal mediator. Those talks yielded the idea of calling in an independent analyst to conduct a confidential, nonbinding study of the company’s finances. The parties chose Eugene Keilin, a founder of KPS Capital Partners who has long played a role in New York City’s finances, having served as chairman of both the Municipal Assistance Corporation, which was created to deal with the city’s 1975 fiscal crisis, and the Citizens Budget Commission. The independent analyst could help the unions and management come to an agreement on the scope of the company’s financial troubles. The move represented the second reprieve from a potential lockout in a few days; on Thursday night the Met granted a 72-hour extension to give mediation time to work. Tino Gagliardi, the president of Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians, which represents the orchestra, called the decision “a significant development” in a statement. “We all look forward to a fair and independent analysis of the complex issues we have been contending with for months,” he said. James Odom, the president of the American Guild of Musical Artists, which represents the chorus, stage directors and others, said in a statement that “We are encouraged with this step forward that we believe will address the issues in contention and will ultimately lead to an agreement that is fair to everyone.” The Met, which has reached agreements with three of its smaller unions and still needs to make deals with 12 others, said in a statement that its contracts would be extended for about one week as a result of the decision to call in an independent analyst. The company said that discussions with its other unions, including the one that represents stage hands, Local 1 International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, had been paused. The president of Local 1, James J. Claffey Jr., called the extension a “step in the right direction” in a statement. “It is our intent to bargain in good faith and get a deal done,” he said. “We have been bargaining with management since May and we will continue to do so without a mediator in days to come. We want to see the show go on.”

Lockouts
Finance
Metropolitan Opera
Labor Unions
Budget
American Federation of Musicians
NYC


President Morsi of Egypt Is Undercut by State-Run Media

Abstract: CAIRO — Egypt ’s state news media, the traditionally admiring chronicler of Egypt’s head of state, are at war with the new president. To be sure, state broadcasters and newspapers here still appear to celebrate President Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood as Egypt’s first democratically elected leader. That is also the official position of Egypt’s top generals who took power at the ouster of Hosni Mubarak and now insist that Mr. Morsi’s swearing-in fulfilled their promise of a civilian democracy. But as Mr. Morsi moved this week to challenge the generals, the state media have quickly allied with the generals, persistently undercutting the new president while still ostensibly honoring his position. That apparently contradictory result has made it clear who still holds the real power over the Egyptian bureaucracy. On Tuesday, for example, Mr. Morsi summoned back into session the democratically elected Parliament that the generals had dissolved after a hurried court ruling. But the headline in the newspaper Al Ahram reported only the statement of the ruling generals: “The armed forces belong to the people and will remain on the side of the constitution and legitimacy.” The only front-page article to focus on Mr. Mori’s decision to recall the Parliament blamed it for causing the Egyptian stock market to tank. A front-page photograph depicted the president shoulder to shoulder — and notably shorter — next to the top military officer, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi. While private news channels interviewed defiant lawmakers leaving the Parliament, the main state network switched to documentaries, including an anniversary tribute to Egypt’s secret police. The state media campaign against Mr. Morsi is part of a bewildering power struggle in the streets, the courts and back rooms that has all but paralyzed Egypt’s government. With its economy sputtering and its currency at risk of collapse, Egypt badly needs a stable government that can make credible commitments to the lenders, beginning with the International Monetary Fund. But in the continuing standoff between Mr. Morsi and the generals, almost no one can say for sure who is in charge. “It is like a psychological war in our midst, and no knows what is going on,” said Mohamed Salem, 26, selling cigarettes in the street because he could not find a job. The military council had seemed to be “out of the game” but still seized Parliament, Mr. Salem continued, growing agitated. And then Mr. Morsi had taken his oath before the constitutional court but immediately defied its authority. “Who can understand this?” he complained. The war within the Egyptian state media offensive against the president has extended to coverage of a planned visit by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton this weekend as well. Al Ahram has emphasized all week that Washington is divided and wary about the first president from the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group long critical of Israel and the West. But the front page of its English-language weekly took an opposite tack to undercut the president by portraying him as the pawn of Washington. Although wildly counterintuitive, that conspiracy theory has tapped into the deep popular distrust here of the United States. Mr. Morsi’s decree restoring Parliament “was intended to send a message to the military and other authorities, warning them that the Americans want him to assume full powers and that they are ready to protect him to achieve this objective,” Al Ahram Weekly quoted Diaa Rashwan of Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies as saying. The report noted that Mr. Morsi issued the order not long after meeting with Deputy Secretary of State William J. Burns. The paper even quoted a former leftist presidential candidate, Abul-Ezz El-Hariri, suggesting that the United States hoped to use the establishment of a religious state as a pretext for invasion. Emad Shahin, a political scientist at the American University in Cairo, said the state media’s attacks on the head of state made the situation perfectly clear: Mr. Morsi represented a double threat as the first civilian and the first Islamist to hold the presidency. “This is a deliberate and well-orchestrated campaign to shake Morsi’s image, ensure his failure and frustrate the revolution,” Mr. Shahin said. Ahmed Abu Baraka, a lawyer for the Muslim Brotherhood, said the issue was deeper than bias. “It is an incurable disease in state media that needs surgery,” he said, blaming 60 years of parroting the ideology of secular dictatorship. Taghrid Wafi, a state television producer, said she and her colleagues were in “confusion.” “They don’t know who is in charge,” she said, noting that in some ways the military’s grip on the news media had loosened since Mr. Morsi’s election. For the first time, she said, she could interview activists who criticized the military for court-martialing civilians. “You know we don’t work on our own; we need approval for our guests.” “I think this is like the time right after the revolution, when nobody understood anything and we could present whatever we wanted,” she said. “But when the military took hold of the building, it became forbidden to mention the military. If you did something like that you’d be called ‘an agenda with ulterior motives.’ ” But she also acknowledged that she and many of her colleagues distrust Mr. Morsi’s background in the Muslim Brotherhood, saying, “Maybe in the future a person who says something about the Brothers could be accused of an ‘agenda’ as well!” Others in the state media stuck to the generals’ line that Mr. Morsi was the new boss. “The president is elected by the public, and he is naturally the person with the power,” said Osama Abdel Aziz, a managing editor at Al Ahram, though he acknowledged that Mr. Morsi “didn’t receive all of his powers” because of the military’s recent decree taking over lawmaking and budgetary authority. He insisted that Al Ahram was no longer “the newspaper with one reader” — that was President Mubarak — but now sent its reporters out to truly cover the news. On Wednesday, he promised that Thursday’s front page would feature the photograph of an 84-year-old man who had brought a complaint to President Morsi’s new grievance office — a demonstration of the paper’s new empathy for the common man and fairness to President Morsi. But the picture did not appear; the headline featured a misleading quotation from Mr. Morsi suggesting he had backed down before a new court order again dissolving Parliament. “The media looks to the center of power,” said Hala Mustafa, editor of the state-financed journal Democracy. “I think everybody knows that the military council represents the center of power, the real comprehensive authority in the country.”

Egypt
News and News Media
Politics and Government
Morsi Mohamed
Defense and Military Forces
Muslim Brotherhood (Egypt)


Jay Berger and Mary Joe Fernandez Chosen as U.S. Tennis Coaches

Abstract: Jay Berger and Mary Joe Fernandez were chosen the men’s and women’s coaches for the 2012 United States Olympic tennis teams. Berger is head of tennis for United States Tennis Association player development. Fernandez is captain of the country’s Fed Cup team and has led it to the final in two of the past three years.

Tennis
United States
Olympic Games
Fernandez Mary Joe
Berger Jay


Fitbit Shares Tumble 18% as Apple Watch Gains Market Share

Abstract: Shares of Fitbit, the maker of popular fitness tracking devices, sank 18 percent on Tuesday as investors worried about its ability to compete with Apple and other makers of wearable technology. The sudden stock drop was hardly in line with the company’s hopes going into this week’s consumer electronics show, the International CES, in Las Vegas. Earlier on Tuesday, Fitbit introduced the Fitbit Blaze, a fitness watch priced at $200, which will be available in March. The device is priced below the Apple Watch, which sells for $350 and up, depending on the features and style. Just six months ago, Fitbit had a strong initial public offering , valuing the company at $4.1 billion at its market debut. Its stock had been trading at nearly $52 a share this summer, but closed at $24.30 on Tuesday. The threat of Apple’s reach has been changing the market. According to the research firm International Data Corporation, Fitbit slipped to 22 percent market share for wearable technology in the third quarter of 2015, compared with 33 percent in the same quarter in 2014. But Apple, which introduced its smart watch in the second quarter of 2015, had already gained 18.6 percent of the market by the third quarter. Robert S. Peck, an analyst at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, said several factors including competitor announcements and a tepid reaction to Fitbit’s new offering could have caused the market reaction. “Over $1 billion of market cap was reduced based on these concerns, which we think is an overreaction,” Mr. Peck said. Fitbit has also been involved in patent disputes with competitors, including Jawbone. While it is too early to say whether the cases will have any merit, Mr. Peck noted that investors did not like the uncertainty. Some analysts said that in the long run, smartwatches will not cannibalize the market for fitness trackers but rather attract new consumers, especially in China and other overseas markets. “The average smartwatch or band came in at just over $400 and the average basic watch/band at $94,” Jitesh Ubrani, a senior research analyst for IDC who tracks mobile and tablet devices, said in a report in December. That leaves room for new, niche companies, like the watchmaker Fossil and start-ups, to attract consumers, he said.

Fitbit
International CES
Wearable Computing
Stocks,Bonds
Watches and Clocks


China Attacks Dalai Lama in Online Burst

Abstract: BEIJING — As the Chinese government’s relationship with the Dalai Lama , the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, has gone from bad to worse over the years, Beijing’s propaganda machine has churned out increasingly florid descriptions of him. He has been called a “jackal,” a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” and, routinely, a “splittist.” On Saturday, the state-run news media sought to equate the Dalai Lama, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, with the Nazis and their genocidal war on European Jews. The commentary, posted on China Tibet Online and carried by the official Xinhua news agency, said the Dalai Lama was advocating policies that would result in the expulsion of ethnic Han Chinese from traditionally Tibetan parts of the country. “The remarks of the Dalai Lama remind us of the cruel Nazis during the Second World War,” it said, adding, “How similar it is to the Holocaust committed by Hitler on the Jews!” It also called him a “tricky liar skilled in double-dealing.” The comments referred to past statements in which the Dalai Lama condemned policies that encouraged Han Chinese migration to Tibetan areas and others that favored Chinese-language instruction over Tibetan in predominately Tibetan schools. The office of the Dalai Lama, in Dharamsala, India, did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Tibetan activists reacted with incredulity. Tsering Tsomo, director of the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy in Dharamsala, said such statements diminished the Chinese government as it sought to play a greater diplomatic role in world affairs. “Many countries depend on Chinese cooperation on important issues, and this kind of behavior does not help their standing,” she said.

China
Dalai Lama
Tibet
Immolation
Politics and Government
Demonstrations Protests and Riots


Supreme Court Ruling on Marijuana and Deportation

Abstract: WASHINGTON — “The social sharing of a small amount of marijuana” by immigrants lawfully in the United States does not require their automatic deportation, the Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday. “Sharing a small amount of marijuana for no remuneration, let alone possession with intent to do so, does not fit easily into the everyday understanding of trafficking, which ordinarily means some sort of commercial dealing,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote for a seven-justice majority, partly quoting from an earlier case. The case arose from a traffic stop in Georgia in 2007 during which Adrian Moncrieffe, a Jamaican citizen, was found with 1.3 grams of marijuana — “the equivalent,” Justice Sotomayor wrote, “of about two or three marijuana cigarettes.” Mr. Moncrieffe pleaded guilty to possession with intent to distribute, a felony under Georgia law, and was sentenced to five years of probation. Saying the conviction established that Mr. Moncrieffe had committed an “aggravated felony,” federal authorities sought to deport him. Tuesday’s decision was the third in a series of Supreme Court cases considering whether a given state drug crime amounted to an aggravated felony under the immigration laws. If it does, the government has no choice but to deport the defendant. If it does not, the attorney general has the discretion to show leniency. The question in all of the cases was how to understand state drug convictions in light of a part of the immigration laws that defines aggravated felonies to include drug offenses that would be punishable by more than a year in prison under the federal Controlled Substances Act. The act generally calls for a maximum term of five years for possessing controlled substances with an intent to distribute them. But it contains an exception for the distribution of “a small amount of marijuana for no remuneration,” which judges may treat as a misdemeanor subject to no more than a year in prison. Justice Sotomayor wrote that it was not clear whether the formal elements of Mr. Moncrieffe’s state conviction fit within the federal exception. The ambiguity, she said, counted in his favor, sparing him from automatic deportation. The federal government said the actual facts of the case mattered and should be determined during immigration proceedings. Justice Sotomayor rejected that approach, saying that “our nation’s overburdened immigration courts” would have difficulty making such determinations based on stale or missing evidence presented by immigrants who may be in detention and have no right to a lawyer. In dissent, Justice Clarence Thomas said the majority’s approach “has the effect of treating a substantial number of state felonies as federal misdemeanors, even when they would result in federal felony convictions.” The only theme that unites the court’s decisions in this area, Justice Thomas added, “appears to be that the government consistently loses.” In a second dissent in the case, Moncrieffe v. Holder, No. 11-702, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said the majority’s approach was “analytically confused.” It will, he said, allow people working for “some of the world’s most dangerous drug cartels” to escape automatic deportation. “The court’s decision,” Justice Alito added, “also means that the consequences of a conviction for illegal possession with intent to distribute will vary radically depending on the state in which the case is prosecuted.” Justice Alito said that Mr. Moncrieffe had had the opportunity to show immigration authorities that he would have been eligible for lenient treatment under the federal drug law. But the “petitioner, for whatever reason, availed himself only of the opportunity to show that his conviction had involved a small amount of marijuana and did not present evidence — or even contend — that his offense had not involved remuneration.”

Supreme Court
Deportation
Immigration
Sonia Sotomayor
Drug Abuse
Marijuana,Pot,Weed


In Iowa, Democrats Focus on Economy and Experience

Abstract: KNOXVILLE, Iowa, Nov. 19 — Gloomy news about the economy formed a backdrop for the leading Democratic presidential candidates Monday as they intensified their fight over which one had the best experience to lead the nation. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton argued that she would be the most capable steward of the economy and suggested that a rival, Senator Barack Obama , would need “on-the-job training” that the nation could not afford after “eight years of neglect.” Mr. Obama pushed back swiftly and with humor, minimizing Mrs. Clinton’s experience level by pointing out that being first lady was not akin to being Treasury secretary. And the third leading candidate in Iowa, John Edwards of North Carolina, joined the fray. He tweaked Mrs. Clinton’s assertion that she is an agent of change, saying she had not fought hard enough to change lobbying rules or the Bush administration’s policy on Iraq and Iran. Six weeks remain until the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 3. Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards were among the Democratic candidates who campaigned across the state Monday, working to win over an unusually large share of undecided voters. After weeks of sparring about foreign policy, health care and leadership vision, Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama turned to the economy as a new proxy for their fight over experience. Mrs. Clinton, of New York, filled her speech with downbeat economic statistics and warnings about rising heating bills as winter approached. Mr. Obama, of Illinois, zeroed in on ways to lower the costs of attending a community college, which have a strong presence in Iowa. The two of them, along with Mr. Edwards, are in a near-daily battle to find an issue or message that allows them to break ahead of the Democratic pack in the state. Mrs. Clinton did not criticize Mr. Obama by name; she rarely does. But aides said she was referring to him when she said that Americans need “a president who understands the magnitude and complexity of the challenges we face.” “There is one job we can’t afford on-the-job training for — that’s the job of our next president,” Mrs. Clinton said in Knoxville, Iowa. “That could be the costliest job training in history. Every day that’s spent learning the ropes is another day of rising costs, mounting deficits and growing anxiety for our families. And they cannot afford to keep waiting.” Another economic flash point was Social Security. Mrs. Clinton accused Mr. Obama, Mr. Edwards and other rivals of committing themselves — and, by extension, the Democratic Party — to huge tax increases by pressing for ways to ensure the solvency of the program. While Mr. Obama has offered specifics, like raising the level of income subject to Social Security taxes, Mrs. Clinton has proposed a bipartisan commission to study the issue and to spare either party the blame for any changes in benefits. “We don’t need more Republican scare tactics about a Social Security crisis,” Mrs. Clinton said Monday in Iowa, “and we don’t need a trillion dollar tax increase.” Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards have dismissed suggestions that they are trying to scare the public and have criticized Mrs. Clinton for not explaining how she would shore up the program. At a news conference before his community college event in Fort Dodge, Mr. Obama was asked to respond to Mrs. Clinton’s comments about how the next president could not afford to receive on-the-job training. Mr. Obama said he was “happy to compare my experiences to hers when it comes to the economy.” “My understanding was that she wasn’t Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, so I don’t know exactly what experiences she’s claiming,” Mr. Obama said. “I think she’s a capable person. She’s been a senator, like I have. But rather than just assert experience, if she has specific differences with me with respect to economic policy, I’m happy to have those debates.” Beyond warning about the unsteady state of the economy, Mrs. Clinton also called for doubling the amount of federal housing aid for counseling people who face foreclosures and mortgage crises, and increasing emergency energy assistance to help an additional one million families pay their bills. Mr. Obama, meanwhile, called for creating a $4,000 tax credit for low- and middle-class Americans to attend community colleges, which he said would essentially make the education free. He also said he would simplify the application process for financial aid by replacing complicated forms with a box to check on tax forms. Mrs. Clinton also criticized the Republican presidential field but not by name. “In short, they see eight years of Bush economics and say, ‘Why not eight more?’ ” Mrs. Clinton said. “Well, here’s my response to that: You’ve got until Jan. 20, 2009, and not another day more,” referring to Inauguration Day. The Republican National Committee responded by suggesting that Mrs. Clinton supported huge increases in the federal budget . “We are still waiting to hear how much she is going to raise taxes on hard-working families to subsidize over $770 billion in new government spending,” said Danny Diaz, a Republican National Committee spokesman.

Presidential Election of 2008
Economic Conditions and Trends
Clinton Hillary Rodham
Obama Barack
Edwards John


Amnesty by Russians Includes Greenpeace Case

Abstract: MOSCOW — A sweeping amnesty that is underway in Russia was extended on Tuesday to a member of the crew of the Arctic Sunrise, the Greenpeace International ship seized on the open seas three months ago. If the amnesty covers the rest, as expected, it will draw to a close one of the more contentious chapters in Greenpeace’s history, in which Russian commandos boarded a ship, imprisoned the crew members and charged them, for a time, with piracy . The Russians later amended the charges against the 28 crew members, and two freelance journalists on board, to hooliganism , a lesser offense that qualified them for amnesty. Two members of the punk protest band Pussy Riot who were charged under the same law have gone free . A separate presidential pardon released Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky , a long-imprisoned business executive who once was Russia’s wealthiest man. Neither the members of Pussy Riot nor Mr. Khodorkovsky emerged from the penal colony system, once known as the gulag, showing signs of gratitude, or even contrition. One member of Pussy Riot, Maria Alyokhina, stepped out of the penitentiary to say she would have preferred to stay than to accept an amnesty from President Vladimir V. Putin. The amnesty, she said, had been intended only to bolster the image of Mr. Putin and Russia before the Winter Olympics in Sochi, which start in February. Guards ejected her from the prison, she said. The one Greenpeace activist granted amnesty so far, Anthony Perrett, a Welsh crew member, who had faced up to seven years in prison on the hooliganism charge, also struck a defiant note in a statement released through Greenpeace. Video Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, a member of the punk band Pussy Riot, was pardoned and released from prison. She said the amnesty was a show and called for a boycott of the coming Olympics in Russia. Credit Credit Alexander Roslyakov/Associated Press Unlike the Russian dissident figures, however, he directed defiance not at the Russian authorities but rather at the big oil companies that, he said, had been the organization’s target all along. “It’s time to go home. It’s time to get back to Wales,” Mr. Perrett said . He described what he called an unjust imprisonment and said, “This is not over yet.” “The Arctic is melting before our eyes, and yet the oil companies are lining up to profit from its destruction,” he said. “This is why I took action, to expose them and mobilize people to demand Arctic protection. I am proud of what I did.” Greenpeace International sent the ship to the Pechora Sea to draw attention to the potential environmental threats caused by a rush to exploit natural resources in the Arctic. The activists wanted to hang banners on a drilling platform operated by Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled energy giant. Greenpeace said its action had never been directed at the Russian state. For Greenpeace, what ensued was the worst crisis since the 1985 sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in a New Zealand harbor. One crew member was killed in that attack. Peter Willcox, the captain of the Arctic Sunrise, was also the captain of the Rainbow Warrior. Had the Greenpeace activists, the members of Pussy Riot and Mr. Khodorkovsky not been released, there was little doubt that Western governments and rights groups would have used the Olympics as an opportunity to draw attention to the plight of such high-profile prisoners. The Greenpeace activists, though, were released on bail pending trial; for them, the amnesty would close their case before it went to court, and allow non-Russian crew members to leave the country. Greenpeace lawyers say they hope to have them out of Russia before Tuesday.

Russia
Greenpeace
Arctic
Amnesties Commutations and Pardons
Vladimir Putin
Offshore drilling


Drowning in Parking Garage During Hurricane Sandy Is to Be Investigated

Abstract: Federal agents have opened an investigation into the death of a man who drowned during Hurricane Sandy at the underground garage in Manhattan where he worked. The investigation, by the Manhattan office of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration , is examining possible violations of federal safety standards at the garage and, if any exist, what connection they may have to the death of Anthony Narh , a 58-year-old immigrant from Ghana who worked overnights there, a Labor Department spokesman said. Among the 43 victims of the storm in New York City, Mr. Narh appeared to be the only one to have died while at his place of work. The garage’s front gate had been shut, sandbagged and locked before the storm hit, but a manager said he had left an interior stair door propped open, and instructed Mr. Narh and another garage worker to leave that way if the water rose too high. The investigation would most likely focus on how that door was kept open, whether the prop had been displaced by the rushing water, and if it had, whether the exit door would have locked. That door, which leads to the lobby of a luxury condominium, was ordinarily kept locked, according to residents. The agency has six months to issue a report on its findings. “If violations are identified, citations could be issued and fines proposed for the employer,” said Ted Fitzgerald, the Labor Department spokesman.


In Cablevision-Fox Feud, Giants Fans Watch in Bars

Abstract: On most game-day afternoons, identifying the enemy of a New York Giants fan is rather simple: Look for the guy in the opposing jersey. But on Sunday, fans found themselves up against a different villain: a pair of gargantuan corporations whose dispute over retransmission fees meant that the Giants faithful could not watch their team’s home game against the Detroit Lions from the comfort of a living-room couch. The feud between Cablevision and the News Corporation, owner of Fox, led to the disappearance of local Fox stations, including WNYW Channel 5, from televisions across Long Island and parts of the Bronx and Brooklyn early Saturday morning. With the squabble unresolved by Sunday, a flood of grumpy, uprooted fans infiltrated the region’s restaurants, bars, and even homes of old high school buddies with a DirecTV subscription. The home team won, 28-20, but that lazy ritual of a Sunday at home was the loser. “I don’t care who said what; I don’t have time for that he-said-she-said; we’re missing the game!” said an agitated Zach Meyers, 26, who was packed into Mulholland’s, a sports bar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with several dozen other disgruntled Cablevision customers. Mr. Meyers, who recently had a Giants logo tattooed on his arm, added that he planned to take his cable television business elsewhere. By the time the game kicked off at 1 p.m., the pub at Mulcahy’s, in Wantagh on Long Island, had about 25 percent more patrons than usual. A few families brought along young children, most of whom had toys to keep them busy. “We’re too old to be in this place,” said Marilyn Odell, 67, who had given up a quiet afternoon at home with her husband. She shouted to be heard above the boisterous crowd. “We tried to get in other bars closer to home, but they didn’t have DirecTV,” said Ms. Odell, who was wearing a red-and-blue Giants sweatshirt. She said that despite the inconvenience, she would stick with Cablevision, “unless, of course, I can’t get ‘Glee.’ ” Her husband, Spenser Odell, a retired salesman, chirped up: “Yeah, ‘Glee’ is great. Fox only is pulling this now because they have decent programming on.” The prospect of a weekend without football — and perhaps much longer without the National League baseball playoffs and even the World Series, which are also being broadcast on Fox — had long been a sticking point in the propaganda war between the battling corporations. Cablevision had a full-page newspaper advertisement this month that portrayed a frowning, slumped man in a Giants jersey with the headline: “Hey News Corp., you negotiate by taking my football away?” Fox officials, in turn, have tried to cast the cable provider as the greedy, sports-depriving villain. The result, it seemed, is that no one is winning the public’s support. Cablevision, whose headquarters are in Bethpage, about seven miles north of Mulcahy’s, is the type of local business that Long Islanders love to hate. “Believe it or not, I feel for Cablevision,” said Matthew Zajac of nearby Plainview. “Fox is asking for a lot of money. I have a lot of friends who work for Cablevision, and it really isn’t a bad company.” In Manhattan, where Time Warner Cable is the dominant (and similarly maligned) cable provider, residents remained unaffected by the blackout. But some Brooklynites were not as lucky. “I usually brag about not having to deal with Time Warner problems,” said Patrick Lydon, 24, of Bedford-Stuyvesant, a Cablevision subscriber who was watching at Mulholland’s, which has been described by New York magazine as “Williamsburg’s first unironic sports bar.” Mr. Lydon’s roommate, Michael Martella, said he stayed at home until a half-hour before kickoff, hoping that the Fox signal on his television would suddenly spurt back to life. No dice. “On a normal Sunday you sit at home and watch the football game,” he said with a frown, sipping a beer. “Now you have to come here and spend money. I was pretty upset.”

Bars
New York Giants
Detroit Lions
WNYW
Cable Television
Football
Cablevision Systems Corp
Fox Broadcasting Co
Long Island (NY)


2011 U.S. Open: Over Time, Tantrums Become Tamer

Abstract: During his second-set meltdown Sunday against Rafael Nadal, the Argentine veteran David Nalbandian raised his racket in disgust and despair, brandishing it above his head at Arthur Ashe Stadium. Soon, it appeared, the racket would be smashed to pieces. The chair umpire, Pascal Maria of France, watched closely in anticipation. But it did not happen. Suddenly, Nalbandian pulled back from the abyss, lowered his racket and walked to the sideline, his moment of fury defused. For tennis fans with long memories, it was a chance to ponder the ebb and flow of anger management between players and officials in the last 30 years. Not everyone has adopted the Nalbandian style: feel it, cool it, move on. On opening day, Ryan Harrison, who was fined $2,100 at the French Open for flinging his racket over a fence, lost his temper on the Louis Armstrong court. Venting his frustration, Harrison slammed his racket and kicked a ball into the crowd during his first-round loss to Marin Cilic. But the chair umpire, Louise Engzell of Sweden, kept her cool. Later that afternoon, Maria Sharapova grew contentious and challenged no fewer than five calls. The chair umpire, Lynn Welch of the United States, calmly acceded to her repeated requests for video replays. The next night, Andrey Golubev of Kazakhstan disputed several decisions in his first-round loss to Nadal, gesturing and glaring at his opponent, the crowd and the chair umpire, Carlos Ramos of Portugal. Ramos ignored him. None of the players’ behavior was deemed disruptive or excessive. Even so, by Tuesday night, United States Open umpires had cited 30 players for 33 code violations that drew $44,600 in fines. The offenses included audible obscenities, abuse of rackets and equipment and unsportsmanlike conduct. What is different from the bad old days? Paid professional umpires have replaced unpaid volunteers, and players can resort to electronic replays to verify a call they think is wrong. As a result, gone are the towering tantrums of Ilie Nastase, the umpire baiting of John McEnroe and the crude gestures of Jimmy Connors. “It was dreadful,” said Dick Roberson, a World Team Tennis supervisor of officials who was hired by the ATP in 1979 and became the chief Grand Prix supervisor. “Nobody wanted to sit courtside because of the vulgar language,” he said. Roberson’s mandate from the Men’s International Professional Tennis Council was to conduct training, devise evaluations and certify professional chair umpires who could stand up to misbehaving players. One of Roberson’s early recruits was Rich Kaufman, now the Open’s chief umpire. Another recruit was Jim Tunney, who refereed three Super Bowls and was put to work in World Team Tennis matches in California. “You know why I got him?” Roberson said of Tunney. “So he could handle Nastase.” The most notorious outburst of that era came from McEnroe, who repeatedly screamed at a Wimbledon chair umpire in 1981, including, “You cannot be serious!” It became the title of McEnroe’s autobiography. It is unlikely that McEnroe would now choose to say, “Are you, sir, perhaps, not serious?” But in the different atmosphere today, players are often more respectful toward officials. Some are downright sympathetic. “I think it’s a tough job being an umpire,” Roger Federer said last week. “I think players know that, too.” One umpire who might have been pleased to hear Federer’s remarks is Dr. Charles F. Beck, who faced a fellow New Yorker’s ire in the late 1970s and the 1980s. “As I drove along, I examined the match that I had done with John McEnroe,” he wrote in his 1988 memoir, “A View From the Tall Chair: Ten Years With the Men’s Pro Tour.” “Why did he behave so badly? Why did I put myself in a position to listen to him? Is it worth that to an umpire? No one, in my whole life, had ever yelled at me like that. In all of my participation in sports, no player had ever behaved that way.” Beck, who spent a decade on the road working at tournaments, found himself questioning his competence in the wake of McEnroe’s tongue-lashing. “Should I stop?” he wrote. “Is it possible that he is right? Maybe I am not a good official.” Maybe, with his restraint and self-examination, Beck was a better official than he realized. Today, some top players still cannot control their anger. At the French Open in May, Fernando Verdasco of Spain drew a $5,000 fine for repeated audible obscenities. Still, some others have managed to curb their enthusiasm for even mild tantrums. At Wimbledon in July, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France missed a pop volley that could have pulled him out of a downward spiral against Novak Djokovic in the semifinals. As his shot landed long, Tsonga raised his racket and appeared ready to slam it into the Center Court turf. Then he checked his motion, gingerly placed the racket in his mouth and sank his teeth into the frame. Tennis anger managed, released — and left behind.

David Nalbandian
Tennis
Ryan Harrison
Maria Sharapova
Ilie Nastase
John McEnroe


U.S. Labor Market Remains Healthy but Exports Weaken, Reports Show

Abstract: A drop in United States exports last month pushed the country’s trade deficit in goods higher, while the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits fell last week in a positive sign for the labor market. The two reports were released on Thursday and suggested that when Donald J. Trump becomes president next month, the labor market will probably be at roughly full strength and international trade could weigh on the economy. In an initial estimate that did not include trade in services, the Commerce Department said the United States exported $1.2 billion less in November than in October. Imports rose by $2.2 billion during the month. The full trade report for November is due on Jan. 6. Michael Gapen, an economist at Barclays in New York, said it appeared that “net trade will again be a drag” on fourth-quarter economic growth. The report also showed an increase in retail and wholesale inventories in November, which could temporarily bolster economic growth. Mr. Trump campaigned on promises to reduce America’s trade deficit and bring back jobs that had moved abroad to countries with lower manufacturing costs. Working against him could be a stronger United States dollar weighing on American exporters. The trade deficit for goods widened by $3.4 billion in November to $65.3 billion. The dollar has surged about 5 percent since Mr. Trump won the Nov. 8 presidential election, as investors bet that wider budget deficits under his presidency could cause higher inflation and more interest-rate increases by the Federal Reserve. On Thursday, the dollar eased. Separately, initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 265,000 for the week ended Dec. 24, the Labor Department said. It was the 95th straight week claims were below 300,000, a threshold associated with a healthy labor market. That is the longest stretch since 1970, when the labor market was much smaller. The department said in a statement that there were no special factors affecting claims last week, although estimating the data can be more difficult around holidays. The claims report also showed that the number of people still receiving benefits after an initial week of aid rose 63,000 to 2.10 million in the week ended Dec. 17, the highest since September.

Unemployment benefits
International trade
Commerce Department
Jobs
Labor Department
US Economy


Jet Plot Demonstrates Growing Ability of Qaeda Affiliates

Abstract: WASHINGTON — The plot to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight over American soil on Christmas Day represents an ominously new and lethal ability by a branch of Al Qaeda to attack the United States directly, according to government and independent counterterrorism specialists. Until now, American officials had expressed concern over the capability of Qaeda affiliates in North Africa, Yemen and Iraq, and a militant Islamist group in Somalia closely tied to Al Qaeda, to attack American and other Western targets in their regions. But they remained confident that these groups — unlike Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda in Pakistan — could not threaten the United States itself. That assessment has changed, as American intelligence officials say Qaeda operatives in Yemen trained and equipped a 23-year-old Nigerian man to evade airport security measures and ignite a powerful explosive on a commercial airliner. Four months ago, a suicide bomber from the same group, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, using a similar explosive, nearly killed a top Saudi counterterrorism minister . “Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has grown in confidence and seems to be developing a capability beyond the other Al Qaeda nodes,” said Richard Barrett, a British former intelligence officer now monitoring Al Qaeda and the Taliban for the United Nations, who visited Yemen two weeks ago. Even as the United States pours 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan and increases pressure on Pakistan to eliminate Al Qaeda’s top leaders and sanctuary in Pakistan’s tribal areas, the thwarted attack on an Amsterdam-to-Detroit flight underscores how the Obama administration must now defend the United States from attacks conceived in multiple havens abroad. “This is the canary in the coal mine,” said Juan Carlos Zarate, a top counterterrorism official under President George W. Bush. “Al Qaeda’s regional satellites are seen as platforms for Al Qaeda’s global agenda.” Last month, federal officials unsealed terrorism-related charges against men they say were important actors in a recruitment effort that led roughly 20 young Americans to join the Shabab, a violent insurgent group in Somalia with ties to Al Qaeda. Law enforcement officials fear that the recruits, who hold American passports, could be tapped to return to the United States to carry out attacks here, though so far there is no evidence of such plots. Al Qaeda’s affiliate in North Africa has carried out a string of killings, bombings and kidnappings against Westerners and African security forces in recent months that have raised fears that the Algerian-based group may be taking a deadlier turn. “We think of core Al Qaeda in Pakistan as a very potent group, but not huge,” said Daniel L. Byman, a former intelligence analyst now at Georgetown University. “But if you add the affiliates that are actively targeting us, it becomes a much bigger number.” Al Qaeda’s ties with its affiliates play out at different levels. This year, American officials began seeing the first evidence that dozens of fighters from Pakistan, along with a handful of the terrorist group’s midlevel leaders, were moving to Somalia and Yemen. The terrorist groups in all three locations are now communicating more frequently, and apparently are trying to coordinate their actions, the officials said. “Al Qaeda in the tribal areas — Al Qaeda central — gives strategic guidance to its regional affiliates,” said an American counterterrorism official, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to discuss the group publicly. “It’s not a hands-on, day-to-day, tactical relationship.” To be sure, American and European counterterrorism experts say the ability and expertise of the Qaeda satellites are still limited. A report by Dutch counterterrorism specialists issued Wednesday, for example, concluded that the planning and preparation for the failed attack against the Northwest Airlines flight was “fairly professional, but its execution was amateurish.” And the groups’ effectiveness often hinges greatly on the personalities of their leaders. The death in 2006 of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia , coincided with the decline of that group’s influence in Iraq. By design as well as necessity, the plots hatched by Al Qaeda’s regional affiliates are typically smaller and less spectacular than, say, Al Qaeda’s failed plans to blow up several airliners over the Atlantic in 2006. But in setting their sights lower and relying on lone suicide bombers, rather than complicated plots with several confederates, these Qaeda affiliates may also pose a threat that is harder to thwart, as the Christmas Day incident demonstrated. The threat from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula — the combination of Yemeni and Saudi operatives announced in January — has drawn increasing attention from American officials. The group has carried out several attacks against foreign embassies and Yemeni officials in the past two years, adding to security threats in Yemen that include an armed rebellion in the north and a secessionist movement in the south. As the United States and Yemen have increased their counterterrorism cooperation in recent months, the Qaeda affiliate sharpened its rhetorical attacks against the United States. In the latest issue of Sada al-Malahim, the Internet magazine of the Qaeda affiliate in Yemen, the group’s leader, Nasser al-Wuhayshi, urged his followers to use small bombs “in airports in the Western crusade countries that participated in the war against Muslims; or on their planes, or in their residential complexes or their subways.” A Qaeda operative in Yemen eulogized fellow militants killed in a Dec. 17 airstrike against an insurgent training camp in Abyan Province in southern Yemen. In a video recording of the speech several days after the strike, the speaker said his fight was not against Yemeni soldiers, only Americans: “We are carrying a bomb to hit the enemies of God. O soldiers, you should learn that we do not want to fight you, nor do we have an issue with you,” according to a translation by IntelCenter, a terrorism research company. “We only have an issue with America and its agents. So, be careful not to side with America.” In airstrikes facilitated by the United States this month, Yemeni officials said they had made targets of the leader, Mr. Wuhayshi, and his deputy, Said Ali al-Shihri, who were believed to be meeting with Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born radical cleric linked to the suspect in the November shooting at Fort Hood in Texas. Relatives of the cleric say he is still alive, and senior American officials said Wednesday that they were still trying to determine which, if any, of the top Yemeni militant leaders were killed or wounded in that attack.

United States Defense and Military Forces


Fiercest Fighting in Years Near Georgian Border

Abstract: MOSCOW — Fighting in the border region between the former Soviet republic of Georgia and a breakaway Georgian enclave escalated sharply Friday morning to its highest level in years. Georgian officials said their troops had made a significant incursion into the breakaway region, South Ossetia, in response to what the officials contended were provocations from over the border, including shelling. The Georgian officials said they had taken up positions outside the capital of the enclave, Tskhinvali. At least 25 civilians and troops were killed in the fighting that started Thursday, officials from both sides said. The move by the Georgian troops followed a day of attacks by both sides, as well as an offer from the Georgian president to agree to a cease-fire. The Georgian side suggested that its troop movements were not intended as the beginning of an all-out push to retake the enclave, but were rather a defensive effort to prevent shelling from the other side. The deaths were part of an intense, new round of fighting that has continued sporadically since last weekend, when six people in South Ossetia, the breakaway enclave, were killed and more than 20 were wounded on both sides. South Ossetia has reported evacuating women, children and the elderly from the conflict zone, sending them north into Russia. The United Nations Security Council called an extremely rare nighttime emergency session Thursday to discuss the situation after a request from Russia, according to Peter Van Kemseke, a spokesman for the Belgium mission, which holds the rotating presidency of the Security Council this month. The recent violence has been the worst in the region since June 2004, shortly after President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia came to power vowing to reassert the country’s control over South Ossetia and another rebel region, Abkhazia. The regions are internationally unrecognized but gained de facto independence from Georgia after wars in the 1990s. The regions settled into a tenuous peace monitored by Russian peacekeepers. Upon taking power, Mr. Saakashvili challenged Russian pre-eminence in the region by seeking NATO membership and stronger ties with the West. His government has accused Russia of training and supplying separatist forces in South Ossetia and Abkhazia under the auspices of its peacekeeping mission — accusations Moscow has denied. Tensions escalated when Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in February and was subsequently recognized by several Western countries. Russia, an ally of Serbia, had vowed to increase its support for Abkhazia and South Ossetia — a poor, mountainous territory between Georgia and Russia’s southern border — in retaliation. Georgia and South Ossetia blame each other for starting the current violence. “It does give off the appearance that the violence is linked to strategic moves by one or both sides to improve their positions,” said Ana Jelenkovic, an associate at the Eurasia Group, a political risk analysis consultancy. In the violence this week, separatist fighters from South Ossetia used rocket-propelled grenades to blow up a Georgian armored personnel carrier, killing two soldiers and wounding six others, said Shota Utiashvili, a Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman. As many as eight Georgian civilians were killed Thursday in a mortar attack on Avnevi, a village in the border region, he said. On the South Ossetian side, about 15 people were killed, according to the South Ossetian separatist government Web site. Another 20 were wounded when villages came under fire from Georgian positions, said Tamara Keleksayeva, a spokeswoman for the separatist government. Potentially complicating matters, about 300 volunteers from Russia have arrived in South Ossetia to aid in the fight, she said. A Russian diplomat on Thursday said envoys for Georgia and South Ossetia would negotiate on Friday to seek an end to the violence, the Interfax news agency reported.

Georgia (Georgian Republic)
South Ossetia (Georgian Republic)
Saakashvili Mikheil
Civil War and Guerrilla Warfare


Jobless Claims Rise Slightly

Abstract: WASHINGTON (Reuters) — The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits rose last week, the Labor Department said on Thursday, but details of the report suggested that the jobs market was continuing to grow at a moderate pace. Other data suggested that the economy remained on a steady growth path, with sales at wholesalers rising by the most in more than 18 months in November, keeping inventories balanced. Initial claims for state jobless benefits increased 4,000 to a seasonally adjusted 371,000. The prior week’s figure was revised to show 5,000 fewer applications than previously reported. Image Credit The New York Times “Jobless claims data continue to suggest steady but modest U.S. employment gains,” said Robert Kavcic, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets. The four-week moving average for new claims, a better measure of labor market trends, increased 6,750 to 365,750, still at a level consistent with steady job gains. The labor market has been gradually improving, with job gains last year averaging 153,000 a month, little changed from 2011. The unemployment rate ended the year at 7.8 percent. A separate report from the Commerce Department showed that sales at wholesalers rebounded 2.3 percent in November, the largest gain since March 2011, after falling 0.9 percent in October. Wholesale inventories rose 0.6 percent after advancing 0.3 percent in October.

Unemployment benefits
Unemployment
US Economy


Guardrail Maker Trinity Industries Conducts More Tests for Malfunction

Abstract: Trinity Industries on Tuesday conducted the second of eight crash tests of a potentially dangerous guardrail system, as questions grew over whether some of the units being evaluated were different than those previously installed. The testing in San Antonio, overseen by the Federal Highway Administration, continued Tuesday with a pickup driven squarely into one of the suspect guardrails, known as the ET-Plus, which is made by Trinity. Tony Furst, the federal agency’s associate administrator for safety, told reporters afterward that “there was nothing remarkable” about the results, which appeared to indicate the unit functioned normally. Critics have said that crash tests should be done from an angle of about five degrees, instead of zero, which they say better represents the types of crashes in which the guardrail malfunctioned. Mr. Furst has said that the tests were instead intended to confirm results from 2005, and that further tests could come later. Guardrail systems work by collapsing when hit from the front, absorbing the impact of the crash and pushing the metal rail away from the vehicle. Because of design changes introduced in 2005, but not reported to the federal government, Trinity’s ET-Plus can malfunction, sending the rail into a vehicle and potentially injuring occupants. Other questions have been raised about the tests, including whether the guardrails have been modified a second time. Joshua Harman, the federal whistle-blower who prevailed in a False Claims Act lawsuit against Trinity, told Bloomberg News that the company had made another recent design change that has not been reported to the safety agency: enlarging the so-called exit gap on the ET-Plus in order to avoid the jamming at the heart of the suspected malfunction. Trinity denied Mr. Harman’s claims. Jeff Eller, a company spokesman, said on Tuesday that “the heads being tested are within production tolerance.” Nicholas A. Gravante Jr. of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, one of the lawyers representing Mr. Harman, said on Tuesday that Trinity’s employees had testified about the manufacturing tolerance for the ET-Plus exit gap, and that several of the guardrail units being tested in San Antonio exceed that limit. “What is the point if they’re not testing the same thing as the actual guardrails that were on the road?” Mr. Gravante said. Court records reviewed by The New York Times from a Virginia patent case brought by Trinity against Mr. Harman in 2013 — which in turn led to the False Claims Act lawsuit — show that a top executive for Trinity’s highway products business, Brian Smith, testified that the manufacturing tolerance for the “exit gap” on the ET-Plus was 0.15 inches, meaning that it was within limits if it was between 1 inch and 1.15 inches. However, out of eight guardrail units being tested in San Antonio, four have a gap of 1.25 inches, according to measurements provided by the Federal Highway Administration. Mr. Gravante said that even small changes in the exit gap could have a profound effect on whether the guardrails jammed. The guardrail units being used for the tests came from the California Department of Transportation, which purchased them in June but had not yet installed them. Suzanne Emmerling, a spokeswoman for the Federal Highway Administration, said that federal officials were looking into whether certain ET-Plus units installed on highways had larger exit gaps. She said the federal agency already had workers in the field in three states taking measurements.

Trinity Industries
Federal Highway Administration
Joshua Harman
Lawsuits
Car Crash


Geoffrey Marcy to Resign From Berkeley Astronomy Department

Abstract: Geoffrey Marcy, the renowned astronomer who was found guilty in a campus investigation of sexually harassing students, is resigning from the faculty of the University of California, Berkeley , where he has been a professor for 16 years. In an email to members of the astronomy department on Wednesday, the interim chairman of the department, Gibor Basri, wrote, “This is to inform our community that Geoff has initiated the process that will lead to his no longer being a faculty member at U.C. Berkeley.” In a statement announcing Dr. Marcy’s resignation, the university’s chancellor, Nicholas B. Dirks, and the executive vice chancellor and provost, Claude Steele, said they had accepted Dr. Marcy’s resignation and added: “We want to state unequivocally that Professor Marcy’s conduct, as determined by the investigation, was contemptible and inexcusable. We also want to express our sympathy to the women who were victimized, and we deeply regret the pain they have suffered.” Dr. Marcy did not respond to a request for comment. The university placed Dr. Marcy on probation over the summer after the investigation but did not announce the decision. It became widely known only last week. The announcement of Dr. Marcy’s resignation came two days after some two dozen colleagues — an overwhelming majority of the astronomy department — issued a vote of no confidence in a letter saying they believed that he could no longer “perform the functions of a faculty member.” In separate statements, the department’s graduate students and postdoctoral fellows concurred. “This should put sexual harassers on notice: No one is too big to fail,” Joan Schmelz, a former chairwoman of the American Astronomical Society’s Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy, said on Wednesday. Dr. Marcy and Paul Butler, now of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, became famous 20 years ago as the leading American hunters and discoverers of planets around other stars, known as exoplanets. Dr. Marcy was mentioned only a few weeks ago as a potential Nobel Prize honoree. But he also left a trail of complaints and rumors about inappropriate behavior over the years. This summer, in response to a formal complaint by four former students, the University of California concluded that Dr. Marcy had violated its policies on sexual harassment. The violations, spanning 2001 to 2010, included groping students, kissing them and touching or massaging them inside their clothes. Dr. Marcy was informed that another harassment violation would leave him subject to immediate suspension or dismissal — a decision that was not widely known until BuzzFeed News reported it last week. On the eve of the report’s release, Dr. Marcy posted an apology on his website, disagreeing with some aspects of the harassment complaints but saying he took responsibility. “It is difficult to express how painful it is for me to realize that I was a source of distress for any of my women colleagues, however unintentional,” he said. But his apology and the university’s response were widely seen as not enough and lacking in sensitivity to the victims of his actions, some of whom have since left astronomy. The Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy declined his request that the apology be published in its newsletter, according to the Women in Astronomy blog . More than 2,500 astronomers and others signed an online petition expressing support for Dr. Marcy’s victims and admiration for their courage in speaking out. Dr. Marcy stepped down from the organizing committee of a major astronomy meeting to be held in December, commemorating 20 years since the discovery of the first exoplanet by Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz of the University of Geneva, followed by the discovery of two more by Dr. Marcy and Dr. Butler. This week, Dr. Marcy also resigned his appointment as a principal investigator of the Breakthrough Listen project, a $100 million endeavor sponsored by the philanthropist Yuri Milner to detect radio signals from alien civilizations, according to an announcement on the project’s website .

Berkeley
Sexual harassment
University of California
College
Geoffrey W Marcy
Space


For Bob McDonnell, a Miscalculation at the Scene of a Blunder

Abstract: WASHINGTON — On Aug. 15, 2013, Bob McDonnell visited the site of one of Virginia’s great tactical blunders. As part of his final official tour of the state as its governor, Mr. McDonnell went to Ball’s Bluff State Park in Leesburg, where more than 150 years ago a Union army scout crossed the Potomac River and mistook a row of trees for an unguarded Confederate camp. The next morning, Union soldiers approached the trunks and branches and soon found themselves surrounded by well-armed Mississippi infantrymen. By the end of the skirmish, Confederate soldiers had killed nearly half of the Union troops, many of them pushed off the bluff and into the Potomac. Even by the time of his visit, Mr. McDonnell seemed likely to enter the state’s history books for his own bad judgment — accepting extravagant gifts and generous loans from a Richmond businessman seeking favor from the governor’s office. On Thursday, the ink dried when a federal jury found him guilty on 11 counts of conspiracy, bribery and extortion. At Ball’s Bluff last year, Mr. McDonnell announced $2.2 million in grants for battlefield preservation. As he sat in sunglasses on a white folding chair, James Lighthizer, the president of the Civil War Trust , said that ultimately Mr. McDonnell would be most remembered for conserving Civil War battlefields. “He has done more for battlefield preservation than any other governor in the United States of America,” Mr. Lighthizer said. The governor, wearing a dark suit, yellow tie and perfectly parted hair, gave a short speech, posed for photos and fired a cannon. As a woman from The Civil War News interviewed Civil War re-enactors, Mr. McDonnell answered questions from reporters about whether he would be remembered more for his acceptance of Rolex watches. “Listen,” he said. “I think people are forgiving and I’ve made an apology for the distraction that this has caused the people of Virginia. And the decisions that have accounted for that. I’ve paid back all the loans, my counsel has informed me, all the tangible gifts now have been given back. But I think people are fair and they know that over these four years Virginia is a leader in so many areas and people really evaluate things over all about how does it feel for me and my family at the kitchen table. You know, I have got five kids. I grew up a normal average middle-class guy here in Fairfax County and I just had the extraordinary fortune to have the same job as Jefferson and Henry so I consider myself pretty normal.” He was referring to Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, both of whom were Virginia governors. As he was about to get back into his S.U.V., he was asked whether he had any ambitions for the future. “You know,” he said. “I’m the kind of person who believes you do one thing at a time. I learned in the army as a lieutenant you take one hill at a time, you take the one in front of you, not the one behind you. And I have immense faith in God that if you do something well now you will have lot of opportunities later on, so I’m not worried about it right now.” But how did he actually intend to spend the hours out of office? He talked about working out and watching his waistline, and then his eyes lit up. “I would love to spend about a month on a beach,” he said. “Just reading books. I’ve got 25 books on my night stand. Actually 26. I just got the battle of Ball’s Bluff now. I got a bunch of them there I’d like to read. But that, honestly, a little R and R and a lot of pleasure reading is what I’d like to do.”

Virginia
Governors
Robert F McDonnell
Gifts to Public Officials
Bribery and Kickbacks
American Civil War


Wilson Chandler and Knicks to Wait on Extension

Abstract: GREENBURGH, N.Y. — Wilson Chandler’s value is rising with every game, but he will have to wait until next summer to get a precise measurement in dollars. The Knicks declined to offer Chandler a contract extension by Monday’s deadline, preferring to wait for clarity in the league’s labor picture. The decision was not surprising: most teams declined to offer extensions to the 2007 draft class because of expected changes to the collective bargaining agreement. “It was more a policy decision — keep it open,” said Donnie Walsh, the Knicks’ president. “We like Wilson a lot. We just think we’ll have a better picture at the end of the year.” The collective bargaining agreement is set to expire in July, and there has been little progress on a new deal. Owners want a hard salary cap and a 40 percent reduction in salaries, among other concessions. Any significant changes to the system will affect how players are valued. The Knicks also want to maintain salary-cap flexibility to chase free agents next year. Although he spoke several times with Chandler’s agent, Chris Luchey, Walsh said contract terms were never discussed. Chandler was eligible for a five-year extension. Instead, he will become a restricted free agent next summer. Chandler has been the Knicks’ second-best player through three games, averaging 21 points and 10 rebounds while shooting 45 percent from the field. “He’s obviously not dwelling on it,” Walsh, referring to the contract talks, said with a chuckle. STOUDEMIRE’S STATS Amar’e Stoudemire is leading the Knicks in scoring , which is expected and welcome, and in turnovers, which is not. He has 17 in three games. “I think he’s trying to do a little bit too much,” Coach Mike D’Antoni said. “We talked about it today, just slowing down a little bit, just taking your time, knowing that guys are going to converge on you and become a little bit more of a playmaker.” Stoudemire has been forcing shots, especially late in games, in part to compensate for a lack of production by his teammates. “Other teams are going to key on him,” D’Antoni said, “and we have to get guys to knock down shots like crazy and that will alleviate a lot of the pressure that he’s getting. Right now, they don’t have a whole lot of fear leaving some of our wings. And we’ve got to instill that fear in them.” INJURY UPDATES Anthony Randolph returned to practice Monday, about a week ahead of schedule, and said his sprained ankle was 100 percent healed. Mike D’Antoni said Randolph would be in the rotation Tuesday, when the Knicks host the Orlando Magic. ... Ronny Turiaf rested his sore back on Monday but is expected to play against Orlando.

Chandler Wilson
Basketball
Free Agents (Sports)
Wages and Salaries
New York Knicks
National Basketball Assn


Economy Cuts Into Obama’s Youth Support

Abstract: Maria Verdugo, a 20-year-old graduate of the University of California, Santa Cruz , barely remembers the presidential election of 2008 — the one that spawned a youth movement that was singular in its scope and political effectiveness — except for “something about Obama saying we needed a change.” These days, Ms. Verdugo is so busy working to pay off her student loans that she has not decided whether to register “as a Democrat, a Republican or what,” she said. Chad Tevlin, 19, a student trying to pay for college by cleaning portable toilets in South Bend, Ind., cannot recall if he registered to vote at all. “Pointless” is how he describes politics. And Kristen Klenke, a music student in central Michigan , has decided to skip this election altogether. “I know it sounds horrible,” said Ms. Klenke, 20. “But there’s a lot of discouragement going around.” In the four years since President Obama swept into office in large part with the support of a vast army of young people, a new corps of men and women have come of voting age with views shaped largely by the recession . And unlike their counterparts in the millennial generation who showed high levels of enthusiasm for Mr. Obama at this point in 2008, the nation’s first-time voters are less enthusiastic about him, are significantly more likely to identify as conservative and cite a growing lack of faith in government in general, according to interviews, experts and recent polls. Polls show that Americans under 30 are still inclined to support Mr. Obama by a wide margin. But the president may face a particular challenge among voters ages 18 to 24. In that group, his lead over Mitt Romney — 12 points — is about half of what it is among 25- to 29-year-olds, according to an online survey this spring by the Harvard Institute of Politics. And among whites in the younger group, Mr. Obama’s lead vanishes altogether. Among all 18- to 29-year-olds, the poll found a high level of undecided voters; 30 percent indicated that they had not yet made up their mind. And turnout among this group is expected to be significantly lower than for older voters. “The concern for Obama, and the opportunity for Romney, is in the 18- to 24-year-olds who don’t have the historical or direct connection to the campaign or the movement of four years ago,” said John Della Volpe, director of polling at the Harvard Institute of Politics . “We’re also seeing that these younger members of this generation are beginning to show some more conservative traits. It doesn’t mean they are Republican. It means Republicans have an opportunity.” Experts say the impact of the recession and the slow recovery should not be underestimated. The newest potential voters — some 17 million people — have been shaped more by harsh economic times in their formative years than by anything else, and that force does not tend to be galvanizing in a positive way. For 18- and 19-year-olds, the unemployment rate as of May was 23.5 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics . For those ages 20 to 24, the rate falls to 12.9 percent, compared with the national unemployment rate of 8.2 percent for all ages. The impact of the recession on the young has created a disillusionment about politics in general, several experts suggested. “I think the lack of excitement right now is palpable enough to be a challenge to the re-election campaign” of Mr. Obama, said Peter Levine, director of the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University . The Romney campaign intends to seize the moment, with new online and campus-based initiatives rolling out in the next few weeks, said Joshua Baca, the campaign’s national coalition director. He said the message would be simple: Mr. Obama’s economic policies are not working for young people. The strategy? “Dorm room to dorm room” or “parent’s basement to parent’s basement, wherever they are because of the economy, that’s where we’ll be going,” Mr. Baca said. “The key to this is having a very strong volunteer base to knock on doors.” For its part, the Obama campaign has already started outreach efforts focusing on teenagers in high school. It has organized youth rallies in swing states over the last few months and plans to be a force on college campuses in the fall. Campaign officials expressed confidence. “Young people know what’s at stake,” said Clo Ewing, an Obama campaign spokeswoman. “So just as they came out in huge numbers to organize and lead a movement in 2008, their energy and commitment will help build this campaign again in 2012.” In 2008, Mr. Obama was the first to recognize the full power of the youth vote as a game changer, and his timing coincided with a political awakening among young Americans after a tumultuous period that included the Sept. 11 attacks, the beginning of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars and the government failures during Hurricane Katrina . But since then, the mood of the country has changed. Beyond that, Republicans in several states have recently passed more restrictive election laws, which they say will fight fraud; Democrats say they will make it harder for some of their main constituencies — youths, for instance — to vote. Mr. Tevlin, the Indiana student, said his exhaustive search for meaningful summer employment was so futile that he took a job cleaning toilets and septic tanks. “I think we’re in pretty deep trouble, and the future, as far as jobs, is not looking good at all,” he said. A political science major, Mr. Tevlin has become more cynical over recent years. “I see lies and I hear lies, nothing gets past partisanship, and I don’t believe anything,” he said. “I think the party system is stupid.” In the last three general elections, young voters have given Democrats a majority of their votes, according to exit polls. Today, specifically, the youngest potential voters are more likely than their older peers to think it is important to protect individual liberties from government, the Harvard data suggest, and less likely to think it is important to tackle things like climate change , health care or immigration . Mr. Tevlin, for instance, found the Supreme Court ruling upholding Mr. Obama’s health care law troubling. “I don’t think the government should force you to buy anything,” he said. Brandon Dennis is one voter who says he is open to someone new. Mr. Dennis, 20, comes from a black family of Obama supporters. But when he came of age to vote, he registered as an independent. He is listening to Mr. Romney’s appeals. “This time, it’s more about what you’re going to do for the economy,” said Mr. Dennis, a chemistry major at Clark Atlanta University. Vanessa Espinoza, 19, who lives in eastern Iowa , says she does care about this election but has been unable to commit to a political party. As a conservative Catholic, she sides with Republicans on issues like abortion . As a full-time factory worker without health insurance , she favors the president’s health care law, which may have finally swayed her. Still, her endorsement is less than resounding. “I lean a little toward Obama,” she said. “I guess.”

Youth
Voting
Mitt Romney
2012 Presidential Election
Barack Obama
US Economy


Southwest to Be Fined Over Repairs

Abstract: The Federal Aviation Administration said on Monday that it planned to fine Southwest Airlines $12 million for repair violations on some of its Boeing 737 jets, citing some faulty repairs it said the airline made since 2006. Southwest has 30 days to respond to the F.A.A.’s complaint and can negotiate to reduce the fine. In one longstanding case, the F.A.A. alleges that Southwest conducted “extreme makeover” alterations to eliminate cracking on the aluminum skin of 44 of its jets. The agency said it found that a contractor, Aviation Technical Service, based in Everett, Wash., had not followed the proper repair procedures for replacing fuselage skins. The airline responded on Monday that the complaint included repairs that were fully resolved some years ago and did not affect airplanes currently in operation, according to a statement by Brandy King, an airline spokeswoman. “We always strive for full compliance with established and approved processes and procedures,” the statement said. The F.A.A. contends that contractors under the airline’s supervision had failed to install fasteners in all of the rivet holes after they had applied sealant under new skin panels. This “could have resulted in gaps between the skin and the surface to which it was being mounted, the F.A.A. said. “Such gaps could allow moisture to penetrate the skin and lead to corrosion,” it added. The fine stems from a period in 2009 when the airline flew those planes even after the agency put Southwest on notice that the planes were not in compliance with approved repair methods. The agency, however, said that it had “later approved the repairs after the airline provided proper documentation that the repairs met safety standards.” The F.A.A. also claims that workers did not properly shore the airplanes while the work was being performed. If a plane is shored improperly during skin replacement, the airframe could shift and lead to subsequent problems with the new skin, according to the F.A.A. In a separate case, the F.A.A. said it found that Southwest failed to properly install a ground wire on water drain masts on two Boeing 737s in response to a federal directive addressing lightning strikes on these components. The airline operated those airplanes on more than 20 flights before correcting the problem. The largest penalty imposed by the F.A.A. on an airline was against American Airlines and three of its subsidiaries, which agreed in May 2013 to pay $24.9 million in fines related to the forced grounding of the airline’s MD-80 fleet in 2008 after inspections found that some wiring modifications had been improperly done. The F.A.A. had initially sought $162 million against the companies.

Fines
Southwest Airlines
Boeing
FAA
Airlines,airplanes


In New Tack in Gun Debate, a Call to Investigate Smith & Wesson’s Disclosures

Abstract: The New York City public advocate on Monday asked federal regulators to investigate whether the gun manufacturer Smith & Wesson had made adequate disclosures in its financial statements. In an eight-page letter, the public advocate, Letitia James, said the Securities and Exchange Commission should examine whether Smith & Wesson misrepresented or omitted information about how often its products are involved in crimes and what it has done to keep its guns out of the hands of criminals. Shareholders would want to know whether Smith & Wesson faced heightened regulatory scrutiny or significant litigation risk, Ms. James said in the letter. Nearly two weeks ago, a terrorist attack in San Bernardino, Calif., left 14 people dead and provoked a fresh outcry about gun violence in America. It also is the third anniversary of the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., where a gunman killed 20 children and six adults. “With the increase in mass shootings, public concern about the proliferation of firearms has animated a national dialogue about gun control measures, interstate gun trafficking, and whether gun manufacturers should take additional steps to ensure that their products do not end up in the hands of criminals,” the letter says. “Smith & Wesson knows that it is at risk of grave reputational harm.” Ms. James is opening a new avenue in her fight against gun sellers and makers. Earlier this month, she called on TD Bank, a big lender, to stop financing Smith & Wesson. This summer, she convinced the New York City Employee Retirement System, the city’s largest pension fund, to explore divesting itself of its holdings of gun retailers like Walmart and Dick’s Sporting Goods. Smith & Wesson, based in Springfield, Mass., is one of the country’s largest gun makers, and in a securities filing says it makes 50 percent of all the revolvers owned in the United States. The company did not respond to a request for comment. Large United States pension funds have used similar tactics to push big energy companies to disclose more about their climate change -related risks, including spending on Arctic drilling and Canadian oil sands projects. Exxon Mobil is facing new legal challenges by those who argue it should have acted earlier to address the risks of climate change. Guns could be the next focus of such shareholder efforts, though there were no new gun-related proposals submitted for the 2015 annual shareholder proxies last spring, nor any yet for 2016, according to Institutional Shareholder Services. A 2014 proposal for the Walmart annual proxy submitted by Trinity Church of New York focused on the retailer’s sale of semiautomatic weapons and high-capacity magazines. The S.E.C. allowed Walmart to keep it off its proxy that year. The church sued to keep it in, but lost on appeal and recently withdrew a request to the United States Supreme Court to hear the matter.

Guns
Letitia James
SEC
Regulation and Deregulation
School Shootings and Attacks
Murders and Homicides


How Do You Say ‘Welcome to Europe’ in Maltese? Check an Arabic Dictionary

Abstract: When Christians in Malta go to church, they pray to “Alla.” Their period of Lent is known as “Randan,” a close linguistic relative of “Ramadan,” the Muslim holy month . It turns out that about one-third of the words in the Maltese language, not to mention its grammar, are derived from the Arabic that was spoken by Muslim settlers of the Mediterranean islands in the mid-11th century. When Malta, an archipelago between Sicily and the North African coast, joined the European Union in 2004 , Maltese became an official language of the bloc, meaning that important documents and Brussels paperwork are now available in Maltese translations. Pierre Clive Agius , Malta’s ambassador to the United States, said the language’s similarity to Arabic “personifies all that is Malta: a fusion of our neighborhood, an organic bridge between the north and the south of the Mediterranean.” Maltese is very much a living language. More than 90 percent of the nation’s 425,000 citizens speak it at home. Authors writing in Maltese won the European Prize for Literature in 2011 and 2014 . Over the centuries, other languages and dialects have been layered on top of Maltese’s Arabic core, to the point that Sicilian and Italian words account for about half the vocabulary today, and English, Malta’s other official language, around 10 percent. Since 1934, Maltese has been written in a Latinate alphabet; before then, no standard existed, and people sometimes wrote in a mix of Latin and Arabic letters. Some phrases in Maltese use all Arabic-based words, like “il-foqra ssibuhum dejjem maghkom” (pronounced il-FO-ra ssibu-hom DEY-yem MAA-kom), which means “the poor will always be with you.” Image Credit Zach Lieberman Others employ a heavy mix of all the country’s linguistic influences. For example, consider the sentence “Aggornata: il-Gvern se jappella d-deciżjoni dwar żewg siggijiet ohra lill-Partit Nazzjionalista.” (It’s pronounced aj-jor-NA-ta: il-gvern se yap-PEL-la d-de-chiz-YO-ni dwar zewj sij-ji-YET OH-ra lill-par-TIT na-tsyo-na-LIS-ta, and it means “Updated: the government will appeal the decision on two more seats for the Nationalist Party.”) Seven out of the 12 words in that Maltese sentence are from Italian or Sicilian. “For me,” said Michael D. Cooperson, a professor of Arabic language and literature at the University of California, Los Angeles, “the fascination of it is that every sentence seems to sum up the history of the Mediterranean.”

Arabic
Malta
Language
EU
Mediterranean Sea


Hit Hard Again, Brown Stays in the Ring

Abstract: LONDON — Staggered by European parliamentary election returns that gave the governing Labor Party its worst-ever results in a nationwide election, Prime Minister Gordon Brown plowed ahead on Monday, heedless of warnings that he might be dooming the party by clinging to office. Mr. Brown survived a closed-door meeting on Monday with Labor Party members of Parliament, including 350 from the House of Commons. Although those attending said a handful of lawmakers had spoken harshly against the prime minister, with some demanding he resign, they described participants as applauding vigorously when Mr. Brown admitted personal but undefined “flaws” and pledged to change his governing style, in particular by listening more carefully to the demands of Labor backbenchers. How long Mr. Brown would keep his pledge to abandon the “bunker mentality” and bullying cited by many of his Labor critics seemed open to question. One of his principal cabinet allies, Ed Balls, emerged from the meeting to tell the BBC that the rebellious faction should “just shut up and get on with doing our job for the British people.” But what seemed certain was that Mr. Brown had faced down his foes, again, by a combination of restatement of his belief in his own “moral compass” and duty to remain in office, and the disorganized and headless character of his would-be usurpers . Political commentators here have depicted it as the most dismal chapter in British politics in a generation, and one, many fear, that goes beyond the personal story of a leader who has seemed incapable of rescuing his own reputation and dignity from events that seem likely to doom Labor to defeat by the Conservatives in a general election that must be held within the next 12 months. Gloomier critics have said Mr. Brown’s clinging to office may be an allegory of something broader about British society and politics, a symptom of a malaise that puts personal gratification above the public good, and of a disregard for traditions of accountability and self-denial that many in Britain have seen as integral to the country’s history as the fount of parliamentary democracy. The broader debate has been spurred by the abuse of parliamentary expenses that set off the scrambling within Labor to dump Mr. Brown. Little in living memory has shocked Britain as much as revelations over the past month about members of Parliament of all parties who treated the public purse as a private piggy-bank. Mr. Brown has said that “cleaning up politics” is part of the reason he has resolved to stay in office. And for the moment, like a boxer rebounding from a succession of knockdowns, he has shrugged off the one-two combination of Labor’s defeat in the European elections , which gave the party less than 16 percent of the nationwide vote in results that became known on Monday, and dismal local election results last week, which gave Labor only 23 percent, another record low. Political leaders acknowledge that the crisis goes far beyond the expense abuses . All of the major party leaders have shifted into populist mode, promising a top-to-bottom overhaul of Britain’s parliamentary system, with reforms to make the government more accountable to Parliament, and Parliament more responsive to the public will. There has even been discussion of adopting a written constitution, a step that could abruptly curb the powers of government here, because a prime minister with a large parliamentary majority — Mr. Brown, for the past two years — is essentially in the position of an elected dictator, free of many of the constraints that face American presidents. But the question haunting politics here is why it took so long for the expenses scandal to awaken the political establishment. The major political leaders have all been unable to explain how they tolerated abuses that were so widespread, and why they reacted with blustering dismay only when the abuses became public in three weeks of exposés in The Daily Telegraph. The answer seems to be that the abuses involved many of the party leaders’ most powerful political allies, and touched them personally, though the decisions by Mr. Brown and David Cameron, the Conservatives’ leader, to claim so-called second-home expenses appear to have been lawful. Still, they are left with a scandal that has exposed the political class here in much the same way that the novels of Charles Dickens exposed the moral decay of Victorian England. It is partly because of the plague-on-all-your houses public mood that Mr. Brown is thought capable of hanging on until the general election. He has said that Labor’s meltdown at the polls is a symptom of a broad public disenchantment with traditional politics, not a repudiation of him personally, and that the party will recover in the polls when the fury over expenses recedes. But he continues to endure defections. After 10 of 33 ministers who can attend cabinet meetings quit in staged succession over the previous week, Jane Kennedy, the environment minister, resigned Monday, saying she could no longer support Mr. Brown because of a culture at 10 Downing Street of “orchestrated undermining” and “smears” of his Labor foes. Yet an analysis of the weekend’s election results left the prime minister with at least some ammunition. Dismal as Labor’s showing was in the European Parliament voting, there was not much in the results for the Conservatives to crow about, either. They received 29 percent of the vote, only one percentage point more than in the last European vote, in 2004, with the 7 percent fall in Labor’s vote going mainly to splinter parties. That suggested, British political commentators said, that the Conservatives’ political fortunes hung on more than the public disillusionment with Mr. Brown.


In Kate Spade Wedges, Blazing Campaign Trails

Abstract: Reshma Saujani has a lot to say about her bid to challenge Representative Carolyn B. Maloney in the Sept. 14 Democratic primary, and I listened carefully as I accompanied her while she canvassed in Astoria, Queens , on Saturday afternoon. But as Ms. Saujani, a 34-year-old lawyer, described some of her passions — a public-private partnership to finance start-up costs for worthy entrepreneurs, the passage of the Dream Act for talented illegal immigrants aspiring to college — I found myself increasingly, and in spite of myself, wondering about her shoes. Despite the three-inch wedge heels on her black patent leather shoes, after hours of walking, Ms. Saujani, a former hedge-fund general counsel and a successful political fund-raiser, seemed as calmly cheerful as she did at the outset of the day. Finally, as we returned to her office, I asked: About those shoes? “They’re the Kate Spade wedges,” she said, sagging slightly, as if she had only just then been reminded that she had feet. “They’re these politician-woman shoes.” She had gotten the tip from someone who worked for Hillary Rodham Clinton . They are apparently something of an “it” shoe right now for women in politics: Ms. Saujani said that Kathleen M. Rice , who is running for attorney general, also wore them (a photograph on Ms. Rice’s Facebook page bears that out). The chief of staff for a prominent woman in Congress told me that she, too, religiously relied on her Kate Spade wedge heels (though she spoke on the condition of anonymity because she preferred not to be known for her brand of footwear). “They’re very comfy,” said Annie Mullaly, Ms. Saujani’s finance director. “They’re like Crocs . You’ll see them everywhere once you’ve identified them.” I know. We, the news media, are not supposed to ask female candidates about their hairstyle or their choice of pantsuits over skirts or their shoes. It is irrelevant. It is trivializing. It is sexist. “You would never write about Chuck Schumer ’s shoes,” Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand said in a New York magazine article in response to a question about her flats. But the Kate Spade wedge heels are not just one candidate’s shoes. They seem to be the shoes of a circle of younger women aspiring to power or already in it, women directly and indirectly passing on to one another ways of navigating the particular challenges of being a woman in the public eye. A woman must look put-together, but not as if she is a slave to fashion; she must look groomed, but never be spotted grooming. How to do everything Fred Thompson did, only backward and in heels? Ask other women how they did it. At Ms. Saujani’s office, “we made a bulk order,” said Ms. Mullaly: a pair for Ms. Saujani, and pairs for two campaign workers. Ms. Mullaly said she had a friend in the State Department who raced around airports and bought several pairs. The shoes: the Halle, which sells for around $300, has a round-toed front that speaks of 1970s-era barrier-breakers’ pumps, and a high wedged back that looks expensive and chic, appropriate for drinks at a new hotel lounge with tech entrepreneurs hungry to see their kind in politics. (Ms. Saujani, whose boyfriend is a tech entrepreneur, has the support of a Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey, and a Facebook marketing executive, Randi Zuckerberg.) A $300 price tag is no small thing for Ms. Saujani, who said she had $80,000 in student loans from Yale Law School and the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard . Perhaps she sees the shoes as an investment , surely less expensive than podiatry down the road. There was something distinctly next-generation about the sight of Ms. Saujani, in a red dress just above the knee, legs bare atop her three-inch wedges. Ms. Saujani’s comfort level with fashion, with showing off her own good looks, could be considered progress — the latest evolution for female candidates, who first wore versions of male drag, then graduated to the salmon or aqua skirt suits that seemed sold out of a catalog distributed exclusively to female members of Congress. Ms. Maloney, who declined to name her footwear of choice, has tried to draw a contrast between her own track record in Congress and Ms. Saujani’s lack of experience in an elected position. Those hip heels run the risk of undercutting Ms. Saujani’s credibility with the people she needs to convince of her gravitas (a wedge issue, even?). It is a concern no man has to consider when choosing loafers or lace-ups. Whether the news media discuss it or not, women running for office still walk a fine line when deciding what to wear. Their shoes had better be comfortable.

Kate Spade
Reshma Saujani
Shoes
Politics
Women and Girls
NYC