Blood Clots in Lung Bring End to Bosh’s Season

Abstract: Not even a week ago, Chris Bosh was talking about how eager he was to get home in an effort to turn the Miami Heat’s season around. Now his season is over. The Heat announced Saturday that as suspected, blood clots were found in one of Bosh’s lungs. The problem, if it had not been discovered, could have killed Bosh, 30, who had been suffering pain in his side and back for several days. “He was able to get in front of it early,” Heat guard Dwyane Wade said, adding that Bosh’s wife, Adrienne, encouraged him to get checked out when the problem would not subside. The team said Bosh “is receiving care under the guidance of Miami Heat team physicians” at a hospital, adding that “his prognosis is good.” Bosh, an All-Star forward, posted a photo on social media accounts Saturday night showing him in bed wearing a hospital gown, with an oxygen tube. “Thank you for all the messages, love and support. It has truly lifted my spirits through this tough process,” Bosh wrote, adding several hashtags, including one that read “Iwillbebacksoon.” Heat Coach Erik Spoelstra sounded upbeat about Bosh’s road to recovery. The team received the news Saturday morning, Spoelstra said, and welcomed the clarity after a frightening couple of days. “His health will be restored,” Spoelstra said. “That’s the most important thing. That’s bigger than basketball.” Spoelstra and Wade visited Bosh on Saturday. “It’s been very emotional for all of us,” Spoelstra said. “I was in constant contact with C.B. But he didn’t know, either, until they were able to go through all the tests and see all the specialists. “ Bosh is the second N.B.A. player whose final game this season was the All-Star Game. The Knicks’ Carmelo Anthony was shut down for knee surgery earlier in the week, a move that was long expected. Bosh averaged 21.1 points and 7 rebounds for the Heat this season, his first in a five-year deal signed this past summer that will pay him $118 million. Bosh was part of the ballyhooed free-agent haul Miami landed in 2010, when he and LeBron James were brought in to play alongside Wade and form one of the most star-studded trios in league history. On Saturday night, Eric Gordon scored 16 of his 24 points in the third quarter, and even after losing Anthony Davis and Ryan Anderson to injuries, visiting New Orleans beat Miami, 105-91. Omer Asik scored 15 points and Tyreke Evans added 13 to help the Pelicans end a four-game slide. Mario Chalmers scored 20 points for the Heat. Wade scored 19 points and Hassan Whiteside finished with 11 points and 16 rebounds for Miami, which retained the No. 7 spot in the Eastern Conference standings despite the loss. Goran Dragic, making his Heat debut after being acquired in a trade from Phoenix, had 12 points. He got a crash-course in the Heat’s playbook about three hours before the game. ROCKETS 98, RAPTORS 76 Corey Brewer had a season-high 26 points, James Harden scored 16 of his 20 in Houston’s big third quarter, and the host Rockets cruised past Toronto. Harden, who leads the N.B.A. in scoring, got off to a tough start and had just 4 points by halftime. The Rockets led by 4 with less than four minutes left in the third quarter before going on a 12-1 run, with 7 points from Harden, to take a 68-53 lead into the fourth and end his night. A night after handling Atlanta, 105-80, the Raptors had a chance to extend their road winning streak to a franchise-record six games. Instead, they were done in by 23 turnovers to end a four-game winning streak over all and to lose on the road for the first time since Jan. 21. James Johnson’s 27 points led Toronto. THUNDER 110, HORNETS 103 Russell Westbrook had 33 points and 10 assists, Serge Ibaka and Enes Kanter also had double-doubles, and visiting Oklahoma City defeated Charlotte for its fifth straight win. With Kevin Durant sidelined with soreness in his right foot, Westbrook carried the Thunder. Westbrook was 12 of 27 from the field and 9 of 9 from the foul line, stretching his streak of consecutive foul shots made to 43. Ibaka had 16 points and 12 rebounds, and Kanter had 10 points and 13 rebounds in his first game with Oklahoma City. Westbrook’s big night overshadowed Mo Williams’s debut for the Hornets. Williams, a veteran point guard, had 24 points and 12 assists after being acquired in a trade with Minnesota. BULLS 112, SUNS 107 Pau Gasol had 22 points and 14 rebounds, and host Chicago topped a revamped Phoenix. Jimmy Butler added 19 points, Derrick Rose had 16, Mike Dunleavy Jr. scored 15, and Taj Gibson and Aaron Brooks came on strong in the fourth quarter to finish with 12 points apiece, helping the Bulls win for the fifth time in six games. P. J. Tucker led the Suns with 20 points, Marcus Morris scored 17, Eric Bledsoe had 13, and so did Brandon Knight in his Suns debut, but Phoenix lost for the seventh time in eight games despite shooting more than 53 percent. TIMBERWOLF’S SEASON DONE Minnesota forward Shabazz Muhammad will have season-ending surgery on the middle finger on his left hand. The Timberwolves said Muhammad would have surgery on a ruptured ligament in his finger. It occurred on Wednesday, when his finger was caught in Andrew Wiggins’s jersey during practice.

Blood Clot
Chris Bosh
Miami Heat
Basketball


Ailing Yom Kippur Fasters Are Helped by IV Drips

Abstract: It will look like a scene out of a hospital ward. In a basement room crowded with medical equipment, about 20 people at one time — sick, pregnant, frail and elderly, or on lifesaving medication — will be hooked up to intravenous drips on Wednesday to receive nutrients they need to get through the day. The unlikely setting will be the main synagogue of the Bobov Hasidic sect, a cavernous house of worship in Borough Park, Brooklyn, that sets up hospital beds and intravenous drips in advance of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur. The patients will be frail Orthodox Jews trying to make it, with a little boost, through a day of religiously required fasting. In recent years, hundreds of frail Jews have turned to intravenous feeding on Yom Kippur, which begins Tuesday at sundown and ends 25 hours later, to avoid violating the prohibition against eating on the holiest days of the Jewish calendar. “It’s not considered eating if it goes through a vein,” said Yitzchok Fleischer, who inaugurated the program 10 years ago and has seen participation rise sharply. “You’re not supposed to take anything through the mouth or stomach. Anything. Even if you’re allowed to, nobody wants to eat.” Though some might see the practice as exploiting a religious loophole, it is actually testimony to the lengths some scrupulously Orthodox Jews are willing to go to make sure they do not violate religious guidelines. Fasting on Yom Kippur is one of those totemic commandments that endure generation after generation when other religious obligations wither away, and even many Jews who do almost nothing Jewish the rest of the year fast. A 2011 study of the New York-area Jewish community sponsored by UJA-Federation of New York found that 61 percent of those surveyed fasted all day on Yom Kippur. Rabbis have traditionally allowed exceptions for those who are frail or ill, encouraging people to eat rather than gamble with their health. Some Jews ignore their cautions, which explains why Yom Kippur is one of the busiest days of the year for Hatzolah, the volunteer ambulance corps located in many Jewish communities; too many elderly or sick people try imprudently to fast. Yet many of those who are rigorously Orthodox say they feel guilty for breaking the tribal taboo against eating. Enter Mr. Fleischer, who is active in the Bobov sect’s communal efforts to aid the sick and homebound. Ten years ago, after a frail friend told him that he needed an intravenous feeding to get through the day, Mr. Fleischer, with the help of Maimonides Medical Center nearby, set up virtual clinics at the Bobov synagogue, five other locations and people’s homes. Medical technicians at the clinics administer IV nutrient drips as worshipers lie on 20 hospital cots for half an hour or so each before returning to prayer. Last year, 200 people used the service. All those participating must orally certify that they have received permission to do so from both a rabbi and a doctor. Healthy Jews are usually excluded. “Everyone is a difficult case,” Mr. Fleischer said. “It’s not a loophole.” Although people have long arranged for such drips on their own and there is a similar program in the Hasidic neighborhood of Williamsburg, the scope of Mr. Fleischer’s synagogue-based program is striking. Mr. Fleischer, a father of nine, said he spoke to three “big rabbis” and all approved the program as complying with Halakha — Jewish law. “It’s very hard for a person who has always fasted to face the reality of a situation where they have to eat,” he said. “This way they still feel they fasted and Halakhically, they didn’t eat. The mouth is still dry.” The Bible commands Jews to “afflict your soul” on Yom Kippur as a sign of atonement, and while it does not specifically mention fasting, the commandment has come down to mean acts of repentance like fasting, the wearing of leatherless shoes and abstinence from sexual relations. Since preservation of life trumps almost any other commandment, rabbis have long held that the frail and those on crucial medications are not only permitted to eat, but also obligated to do so, said Rabbi Menachem Genack, the rabbinical administrator of the Orthodox Union. But because violating a fast is stressful for many observant Jews, some rabbis will, depending on their custom, recommend, for example, eating no more than the size of a large date at intervals of about nine minutes or drinking less than a cheekful of water. Others urge all necessary consumption of food. So important is the accurate application of Jewish law in this matter that the days before Yom Kippur are a busy time for many rabbinical scholars who answer queries from worried Jews. Rabbi Gavriel Zinner, a highly respected posek — the Hebrew word for the equivalent of a legal “decider” who applies Jewish law to specific — often ambiguous, cases, sets aside specific times for queries at his synagogue in Borough Park. At his side are Orthodox Jewish doctors who help him with the information he needs to make a determination on breaking the fast for those who need to eat for medical reasons. Many rabbis have allowed intravenous feeding, even though, according to Web sites on Jewish law, one of the most respected deciders, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, who died in 1986, ruled that eating was preferable to an intravenous drip, partly because it is forbidden to inflict a wound other than for healing. Mr. Fleischer was born in Argentina where his parents, immigrants from Poland, settled after World War II. He operates a jewelry booth in the diamond district, on West 47th Street. In his spare time, he is the founder and executive director of the Bikur Cholim D’Bobov, which provides visits to the homebound, financial assistance with medical bills and food packages. Mr. Fleischer has also organized non-Jewish pediatricians to tend to sick Jewish children on Yom Kippur and other holidays so their parents will not have to wait for hours in hospital emergency rooms. “Life is not just eating, davening and sleeping,” he said, using the Yiddish word for praying. “You’ve got to do something for other people.”

Yom Kippur
Fasting
Jews and Judaism
Borough Park (NYC)


On ESPN, Bonds Is Shaken, Not Perturbed

Abstract: "Bonds on Bonds," the ESPN vanity series that made its debut last night, shows a Barry Bonds that few of us know: he weeps, he talks to his father at his gravesite, he mops up the mess from a busted aquarium pipe in his house, he wonders why he is not GQ's most-hated athlete. He is, in a production that he sought out and controls, a new man, a man in full who is fully in control of 10 hours of ESPN/ESPN2's time. (The show will, at various times, appear on each network.) He is happy and angry, the recipient of vile hate mail, the lover of fans who love him. He is the son of an alcoholic father, a man in a self-created public cage who finds a measure of peace inside a batting cage. He says he doesn't care, but insists everything ticks him off. He says he doesn't care about money but says he loves his paycheck. He is, as a target of unfair accusations, a fugitive in his own sport, the Richard Kimble of Major League Baseball. But if the cameras from Tollin/Robbins Productions were not there, would we know all this? It's all tree in the forest stuff. He has opened his life -- the door is more ajar than flung open -- to show parts of his personality that he denies to a world that he cannot control. He controls the bat and ball, but not the parasitic, hounding news media, and there is more than a whiff of Richard M. Nixon's paranoia in his anti-news-media behavior. "I won't let anybody take me down," he says, then later adds, "If it makes you happy to destroy me, go ahead." You almost expect him to ask Henry Kissinger to pray with him. A reality series is a celebrity's temporary cure-all to rotten press and to intrusive reporters sticking microphones in his face. Whether the star is Farrah Fawcett or Ozzy Osbourne, reality TV's open-door policy yields an unfiltered view that the celebrity believes will benefit his or her career. But B-list celebrities are not newsmakers, unless Osbourne's bizarro world ramblings counted as front-page fodder. Bonds is major news. He is not Jessica Simpson, yet he has opted to join "The Surreal Life." It is undeniable that ESPN the News Operation would never be invited to follow Bonds to the cemetery to commune with his father, Bobby. Sitting on the grass, he relates the gist of his conversation: "I tell him, 'They're more out to discredit you than appreciate you.' " Then, he says to his father: "I still love you. I'm still here." ESPN the News Operation would not be traveling in his car with him as he compares being chased by paparazzi to the pursuit of Bonnie and Clyde or reacts to excerpts in Sports Illustrated from a book that accuses him of widespread drug use by saying, "I could literally kill somebody." ESPN the News Operation, chiefly Pedro Gomez, gets his clubhouse mantra, "Do you want to talk baseball or do you not want to talk at all?" So Bonds got in bed, or in business, with Tollin and ESPN. HBO refused Tollin's invitation, and if you've watched "Real Sports," you know why. ESPN the Entertainer, through its proxy, Mike Tollin, does not ask Bonds tough questions. Tollin has created a shell of news around him by showing headlines about the accusing book and the investigation initiated by Commissioner Bud Selig. He interviews reporters, commentators, teammates and competitors, like an admiring Dontrelle Willis of Florida. He shows Bonds picking up a syringe thrown at him Monday as he left the field in the eighth inning of the Giants-Padres game at Petco Park. But ESPN the Entertainer does not ask Bonds: Have you taken steroids? Have you taken human growth hormone? Do you know Victor Conte Jr. of Balco? What substances did you receive from your trainer, Greg Anderson? Would you like to clarify or elaborate on the grand jury testimony that was obtained by The San Francisco Chronicle? Bonds was not asked or did not answer. It's his ESPN party, and he'll say what he pleases. It appears doubtful that he will say anything truly newsmaking, unless he and Tollin have concocted a mid-July cliffhanger confessional. The first episode of "Bonds on Bonds" raises anew the question of whether ESPN is practicing checkbook journalism, whether it is paying Tollin, who is paying Bonds, to provide the access he would normally not give. The ethical issues about such an arrangement were the subject of a spirited, sometimes angry debate at an ESPN gathering last week. But George Bodenheimer, the president of ESPN and ABC Sports, put the in-house criticism firmly in its corporate place. "Not all decisions are made to please the newsroom," he said during an interview yesterday before he saw Episode 1. "It's just one part of our puzzle. Business decisions must be made as well." He added: "I'm comfortable with it. We're doing our best to serve our fans." TV SPORTS E-mail: sportsbiz@nytimes.com

ESPN
BASEBALL
SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS
BONDS BARRY
TELEVISION
BONDS ON BONDS (TV PROGRAM)


7 Die in Fire at Factory in Bangladesh

Abstract: DHAKA, Bangladesh — In the latest blow to Bangladesh’s garment industry, seven workers died Saturday after a fire swept through a factory here not long after seamstresses had returned from a lunch break. Workers said supervisors had locked one of the factory exits, forcing some people to jump out of windows to save their lives. The fatal fire comes roughly two months after the blaze at the Tazreen Fashions factory left 112 workers dead and focused global attention on unsafe conditions in Bangladesh’s garment industry. Tazreen Fashions, located just outside Dhaka, the capital, had been making clothing for some of the world’s biggest brands and retailers, including Walmart. Image Relatives mourned beside the bodies of workers killed in the fire at a hospital in Dhaka. Credit Abir Abdullah/European Pressphoto Agency In the aftermath of the Tazreen Fashions fire, political and industrial leaders in Bangladesh pledged to quickly improve fire safety and even conducted high-profile, nationwide inspections of many of the country’s 5,000 clothing factories. And global brands promised they would not buy clothes from unsafe factories. But Saturday’s fire in a densely populated section of Dhaka is a grim reminder that the problems remain. The blaze erupted about 2 p.m. at Smart Garment Export, a small factory that employed about 300 people, most of them young women who were making sweaters and jackets. All seven of the dead workers were women. Masudur Rahman Akand, a supervisor in the fire department, said the factory’s workers were returning from lunch when the blaze erupted in a storage area. The factory was located on the second floor of a building, above a bakery, and it lacked proper exits and fire prevention equipment, Mr. Akand said. Image People sifted through the wreckage at the Smart Fashions factory. Credit Reuters “We did not find fire extinguishers,” he said. “We did not find any safety measures.” With smoke filling the factory floor, workers apparently panicked. Mr. Akand said the seven workers who died either suffocated or were trampled by people trying to escape. Eight other workers were hospitalized with injuries. Some of them told rescuers that many people could not quickly escape because one of the exits was blocked by a locked steel gate. Witnesses said people began jumping out of windows before the gate was unlocked. Azizul Hoque, a police supervisor, said the investigation was continuing. “We do not know the reason or the source or the origin of the fire,” he said. It was unclear whether the Smart Garment factory was making clothing for international brands or retailers. Dhaka’s industrial areas are filled with factories, large and small, that produce clothing for much of the Western world.

Fires
Bangladesh
Manufacturing
Accidents and Safety


Creating Captions on YouTube Videos

Abstract: Q. Some YouTube videos have closed captioning that may be automatically generated by computer, perhaps on the fly. What software is available to caption simple videos with a clearly spoken soundtrack? A. YouTube has offered automatic captions for years on many of the videos it hosts, with text generated by the same speech recognition algorithms used by other services like Google Voice and Google Now . These “auto-caps” are often a help to educators or those with hearing impairments, but YouTube admits that the quality of the captions created by the speech recognition software can vary from video to video — and may not even work on some clips. If you are creating videos and uploading them to the site, you can personally edit the text on any automatically generated captions on your clips. Just log into your YouTube account, go to the Video Manager area and next to the clip you want to fix, click the drop-down menu next to the Edit button. Select Captions and edit the text in the caption fields as you see fit. The Captions page in the YouTube Help online guide has links to several articles about adding your own captions, subtitles and transcripts for videos, as well as a full tutorial in the Creator Academy area of the site. As a video-sharing business, YouTube has a how-to video on adding closed captions and subtitles too. The Caption It Yourself site offers tips and basic guidelines for creating video captions, as well as links to tools for creating captions. If you do not like the automatically generated captions, third-party programs like SynchriMedia’s MovieCaptioner for Windows and Mac OS X give you full control over the text displayed on your videos. Voxcribe is another service for captioning videos and uses speech recognition to transcribe the text. If you use additional software, YouTube has more information about uploading subtitles or closed captions created in other programs with your clips. Getting Specific With the iTunes Equalizer Q. I usually have the equalizer in iTunes set to “Rock” since that applies to most of my music library, but I sometimes listen to classical albums. How much does the equalizer setting really influence the sound? A. Sound quality can be a subjective topic, but the graphic equalizer included with the iTunes program for Windows and Mac OS X contains a number of presets aimed at enhancing listening to popular musical genres. Like a hardware equalizer, the iTunes version lets you adjust the volume of certain audio frequencies to emphasize, say, the bass range in dance music. You can summon the equalizer program by selecting it under the View menu in the Windows version of iTunes, or from the Window menu in the Mac edition . Apple has a general guide to using the iTunes Equalizer and other sites like MethodShop explain how adjusting individual equalizer frequencies can affect your listening experience. If you have an equalizer preset for rock albums that pumps up the drums and bass, your chamber music tracks may sound noticeably different compared with hearing them with the Classical preset turned on. You do not have to adjust the equalizer every time you switch from rock to classical music. Instead, you can assign dedicated equalizer settings to specific albums or songs in your collection. To set an entire album to a certain setting, click the album name in the iTunes window, go to the File menu and select Get Info. When the alert box pops up, confirm that you want to edit multiple items. In the album’s Info box, click the Options tab and choose the setting of your choice from the menu next to Equalizer Preset. You can also assign an equalizer preset to an individual song by selecting the track in the iTunes window and choosing Get Info from the File menu. Click the Options tab in the song’s Info box and pick a style from the Equalizer Preset menu.

YouTube
iTunes
Computers and the Internet
Tech Industry
Video Recordings
Downloads and Streaming


Critics Root for Espada’s Exit, but He’s Dug In

Abstract: In a former video store turned campaign office along the Grand Concourse in the Bronx, signs denouncing the area’s state senator cover the dingy windows. “Westchester’s Worst Legislator,” one poster proclaims, a dig at the senator, Pedro Espada Jr. , who has been persistently accused of living in a home he owns in Mamaroneck, which is in Westchester and is not part of his district. The man who opened the office is Bill Samuels, a top Democratic donor from Manhattan who has pledged up to $250,000 to defeat Mr. Espada in the Sept. 14 primary. He is part of an army of opponents that has descended on the northwest Bronx to try to topple Mr. Espada, the Senate majority leader, who is facing civil corruption charges. If this longtime political survivor is going down, there are a lot of people who want to help dig his grave. The Working Families Party , which aspires to be the state’s most powerful third party, says it plans to spend $100,000 on the race and has been sending busloads of paid canvassers to climb Bronx high-rises reciting Mr. Espada’s sins. Union officials have knocked on thousands of doors promoting Mr. Espada’s chief rival. Comedians held a fund-raiser in Manhattan called “ Pirates of the Bronx : The Curse of Pedro Espada.” Even Mr. Espada’s tailor is suing him , claiming he has yet to pay for his custom-made suits. To the broad coalition of elected officials, political advocates and labor unions that have joined the battle, Mr. Espada is far more than just another ineffective Albany lawmaker. They consider him the personification of Albany’s dysfunction, and they frame the campaign to unseat him as a crusade to reclaim state government from a swamp of scandal and corruption. Despite the forces lining up against him, the man in the bull’s-eye seems eager to join the fight. From his office on Bainbridge Avenue, the curtains drawn as the air-conditioner hums, Mr. Espada chuckled. He vowed to defeat his opponents, whom, over the course of an interviews, he dismissed as “outsiders,” “bullies” “limousine liberals” and more. “They’re ganging up on me,” he said. “They’re an invading army coming in and leasing someone in the community to do their bidding, and the people of this district see it for what it is.” Mr. Espada, 56, keeps his pinstripe suit buttoned when he steps outside into the 90-degree heat. His cellphone ringtone is the theme from Rocky III, “ Eye of the Tiger .” At a recent campaign event, he challenged a heckler to a fistfight. Winning re-election would offer redemption after perhaps the most difficult year in his two-decade political career. It would also provide a grand opportunity to thumb his nose at those in the political establishment who want him gone. Mr. Espada’s main opponent, Gustavo Rivera , 34, was virtually unknown three months ago, but he has received the endorsement of politicians from the South Bronx to Schenectady. While his supporters laud his experience working as an aide for various Democrats, most recently Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, his main credential, say some of his supporters in the district, is that he is not Pedro Espada. “For Albany to change, the first thing that has to happen is Espada has to go,” Mr. Rivera said. “We need folks who want to represent the people of their district and not themselves.” Mr. Rivera has been working hard to spread his message and his identity across the district. On a recent morning, he greeted commuters on a subway platform alongside Councilman G. Oliver Koppel and a former Bronx borough president, Fernando Ferrer, the three of them repeating Mr. Rivera’s name like a mantra. Mr. Espada, as bombastic and defiant as ever, has staged a campaign straight out of the populist playbook. During his campaign events, many of them invitation only, he often gives away groceries and school supplies. He frames attacks against him as attacks against Latinos, constantly reminding his constituents, most of whom are Hispanic, that he is the highest-ranking Latino in state government. But Mr. Espada does have political liabilities. The Soundview Health Center, the flagship of the network of Bronx health clinics he founded in 1978 and his longtime power base, lies outside the 33rd Senate district. (Mr. Espada had represented another Bronx district in the Senate before winning his current seat in 2008). Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo filed a civil suit in April charging him and others close to him with siphoning $14 million from the Soundview network for personal and political purposes. Mr. Espada is also under investigation by the Bronx district attorney’s office about whether he actually lives in Westchester, and by federal prosecutors over the health care clinics. “He’s a crook, and that covers it,” said Nathalie Lewis, 75, who lives on the Grand Concourse. “I’m not voting for him.” On a recent visit to a senior center, much of the room hailed Mr. Espada as a hero, but one man settling in for lunch refused to shake his hand, muttering, “They’re all crooks.” The senator brushed past him to hug a gray-haired woman. Mr. Espada believes that most voters will see the corruption allegations as part of an ethnic and political witch hunt. “These people that I represent have been vilified and assaulted every day by the mainstream press,” he said. “When you come in from the outside riding a white horse saying, ‘We will choose your leader, we know what is best for you,’ it reinforces this notion that the people don’t know what’s good for them.” “It is,” he added, “the very essence of colonialism.” Despite the controversies surrounding him, Mr. Espada enjoys significant advantages, including name recognition, the potency of incumbency and a well-stocked campaign fund: as of July he had about $323,000 on hand compared with $38,000 for Mr. Rivera. A low voter turnout — in the 2008 primary, only 8,352 out of 102,510 registered voters in the district cast ballots — should also work to his advantage, analysts say. “You’ve got to believe he’s the favorite, and if you don’t, you’re underestimating a guy who should not be underestimated,” said Scott Levenson of the Advance Group, a political consulting firm. Mr. Rivera said he decided to run out of disgust at last summer’s coup in Albany when Mr. Espada defected and helped hand the Republicans the Senate majority. Mr. Espada later rejoined the Democrats , but only after they promised to make him majority leader. Although Mr. Rivera had no experience as a candidate, union leaders and left-leaning organizations quickly tapped him as their best shot at beating Mr. Espada. “If you don’t oust him, the cynicism and negativity towards Albany will continue,” said Mr. Samuels, who has started an effort to reform Albany called the New Roosevelt Initiative . Mr. Espada has made it a point to highlight the robust outside support for Mr. Rivera. One of his political advertisements features a crude cartoon of Mr. Rivera dancing on puppet strings controlled by union leaders, Mr. Samuels and others. While few doubt the zeal of Mr. Espada’s opponents, some see opportunism in their campaign. “They think he’s a vulnerable giant, and what better way to make your bones and become powerful than by killing the giant,” said Hank Sheinkopf, a veteran political consultant who is not involved in the campaign. “The guy who enables them all to do it, if he loses, is Pedro Espada.” Despite all the attention heaped on Mr. Rivera and Mr. Espada, a third candidate, Daniel Padernacht , a lawyer and member of a local community board, may prove the spoiler, since he could take votes away from Mr. Rivera. Mr. Rivera’s campaign has called on Mr. Padernacht, whose family has real-estate interests in the Bronx, to withdraw, something he has refused to do. Mr. Padernacht has little political experience, but he has done pro bono legal work for State Senator Rubén Díaz Sr. , who supports Mr. Espada. As his opponents circle around him, Mr. Espada said he is ready to defend his reputation, and his seat. “I may not have been able to speak the English language when I came here from Puerto Rico,” he said, “but now I’m perfectly comfortable in either language to tell these outsiders to get lost.”

Elections
Espada Pedro Jr
State Legislatures
Politics and Government
New York State


Campaign Promises on Ending the War in Iraq Now Muted by Reality

Abstract: WASHINGTON — On the campaign trail, Senator Barack Obama offered a pledge that electrified and motivated his liberal base, vowing to “end the war” in Iraq . But as he moves closer to the White House, President-elect Obama is making clearer than ever that tens of thousands of American troops will be left behind in Iraq, even if he can make good on his campaign promise to pull all combat forces out within 16 months. “I said that I would remove our combat troops from Iraq in 16 months, with the understanding that it might be necessary — likely to be necessary — to maintain a residual force to provide potential training, logistical support, to protect our civilians in Iraq,” Mr. Obama said this week as he introduced his national security team. Publicly at least, Mr. Obama has not set a firm number for that “residual force,” a phrase certain to become central to the debate on the way ahead in Iraq, though one of his national security advisers, Richard Danzig, said during the campaign that it could amount to 30,000 to 55,000 troops. Nor has Mr. Obama laid out any timetable beyond 16 months for troop drawdowns, or suggested when he believes a time might come for a declaration that the war is over. In the meantime, military planners are drawing up tentative schedules aimed at meeting both Mr. Obama’s goal for withdrawing combat troops, with a target of May 2010, and the Dec. 31, 2011, date for sending the rest of American troops home that is spelled out in the new agreement between the United States and the Iraqi government. That status-of-forces agreement remains subject to change, by mutual agreement, and Army planners acknowledge privately that they are examining projections that could see the number of Americans hovering between 30,000 and 50,000 — and some say as high as 70,000 — for a substantial time even beyond 2011. As American combat forces decline in numbers and more provinces are turned over to Iraqi control, these military planners say, Iraqi security forces will remain reliant on significant numbers of Americans for training, supplies, logistics, intelligence and transportation for a long time to come. There always was a tension, if not a bit of a contradiction, in the two parts of Mr. Obama’s campaign platform to “end the war” by withdrawing all combat troops by May 2010. To be sure, Mr. Obama was careful to say that the drawdowns he was promising included only combat troops. But supporters who keyed on the language of ending the war might be forgiven if they thought that would mean bringing home all of the troops. Pentagon planners say that it is possible that Mr. Obama’s goal could be accomplished at least in part by relabeling some units, so that those currently counted as combat troops could be “re-missioned,” their efforts redefined as training and support for the Iraqis. In Iraq today, there are 15 brigades defined as combat forces in this debate, with one on its way home. But the overall number of troops on the ground is more than 50 brigade equivalents, for a total of 146,000 troops, including service and support personnel. Even now, after the departure of the five “surge” brigades that President Bush sent to Iraq in January 2006, the overall number of troops in Iraq remains higher than when Mr. Bush ordered the troop increase, owing to the number of support and service personnel remaining. At his news conference in Chicago on Monday, Mr. Obama emphasized his willingness to listen to the advice from senior officers and that of his new national security team, which includes Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates , the first Pentagon chief in history to continue serving under a newly elected president; Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and, as national security adviser, Gen. James L. Jones, the retired four-star Marine officer who served as NATO’s supreme commander. Since the election, Mr. Obama has held unannounced consultations with both Mr. Gates and Admiral Mullen, described by Obama aides and Pentagon officials as having focused less on tactics and operations and more on broad, strategic views for American national security. On Wednesday, he made a telephone call to Nuri Kamal al-Maliki , Iraq’s prime minister, according to the Obama transition office . To date, there has been no significant criticism from the antiwar left of the Democratic Party of the prospect that Mr. Obama will keep tens of thousands of troops in Iraq for at least several years to come. At the Pentagon and the military headquarters in Iraq, the response to the statements this week from Mr. Obama and his national security team has been akin to the senior officer corps’ letting out its collective breath; the words sounded to them like the new president would take a measured approach on the question of troop levels. “I believe that 16 months is the right time frame, but, as I’ve said consistently, I will listen to the recommendations of my commanders,” Mr. Obama said at that news conference on Monday. “And my No. 1 priority is making sure that our troops remain safe in this transition phase, and that the Iraqi people are well served by a government that is taking on increased responsibility for its own security.” An apparent evolution of Mr. Obama’s thinking can be heard in contrast to comments he made in July, when he called a news conference to lay out his Iraq policy in unambiguous terms. “I intend to end this war,” he said then. “My first day in office I will bring the Joint Chiefs of Staff in, and I will give them a new mission, and that is to end this war — responsibly, deliberately, but decisively.” And in a news conference that month in Amman, Jordan, Mr. Obama acknowledged that the American troop increase had bolstered Iraqi security but declared that he would not hesitate to overrule American commanders and redirect troops in Afghanistan. Mr. Gates, speaking at the Pentagon on Tuesday, a day after he appeared with Mr. Obama to announce the new national security team, made clear that the direction of troop levels now had been decided, with the only decisions remaining on how fast and how low. “And so the question is, How do we do this in a responsible way?” Mr. Gates said. “And nobody wants to put at risk the gains that have been achieved, with so much sacrifice, on the part of our soldiers and the Iraqis, at this point.”

Iraq
Obama Barack
Iraq War (2003- )
United States Armament and Defense
Presidential Election of 2008
Military Personnel
Bush George W
Gates Robert M
Maliki Nuri Kamal al-
Defense Department


Hillary Clinton Selects Tim Kaine, a Popular Senator From a Swing State, as Running Mate

Abstract: TAMPA, Fla. — Follow along with our coverage of the Democratic National Conv ention . Hillary Clinton named Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia to be her running mate Friday, selecting a battleground-state politician with working-class roots and a fluency in Spanish, traits that she believes can bolster her chances to defeat Donald J. Trump in November. Mrs. Clinton’s choice, which she announced via text message to supporters, came after her advisers spent months poring over potential vice-presidential candidates who could lift the Democratic ticket in an unpredictable race against Mr. Trump. In the end, Mrs. Clinton decided that Mr. Kaine, 58, a former governor of Virginia who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had the qualifications and background , and the personal chemistry with her, to make the ticket a success. Mrs. Clinton had entertained more daring choices. She considered Thomas E. Perez, the secretary of labor, who would have been the first Hispanic on a major party ticket; Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, who would have been the first African-American to seek the vice presidency; and James G. Stavridis, a retired four-star Navy admiral who served as the supreme allied commander at NATO but had never held elected office. Ultimately, Mrs. Clinton, who told PBS that she was “afflicted with the responsibility gene,” avoided taking a chance with a less experienced vice-presidential candidate and declined to push the historic nature of her candidacy by adding another woman or a minority to the ticket. Instead, the campaign, which had become concerned about its deficit with white men, focused on Mr. Kaine and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, and looked more closely at Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado. At a campaign stop with Mrs. Clinton in Annandale, Va., last week, Mr. Kaine tried out for the role. “Do you want a ‘You’re fired’ president or a ‘You’re hired’ president?” he asked the crowd. “Do you want a trash-talker president or a bridge-builder president?” He compared Mrs. Clinton’s record of public service to that of his wife, Anne Holton, Virginia’s secretary of education. In recent days, former President Bill Clinton and the White House had expressed support for Mr. Kaine. Mrs. Clinton will formally introduce Mr. Kaine as her running mate at a campaign stop on Saturday at Florida International University in Miami, which has a large number of Hispanic students. Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine: Analysis Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Kaine are making their debut after she named him her running mate. Times reporters provided real-time analysis. The announcement came after a day of campaign events in Orlando and Tampa in which Mrs. Clinton tried to offer a rebuke, both in actions and in words, to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. In Orlando, she laid flowers on a makeshift memorial outside the Pulse nightclub, where a gunman who expressed sympathy with the Islamic State killed 49 people last month. At an earlier round-table discussion with emergency medical workers and elected officials, Mrs. Clinton nodded solemnly and hardly spoke, an implicit contrast with Mr. Trump’s 75-minute speech on Thursday night. At a rally in Tampa on Friday evening, Mrs. Clinton blasted the bleak vision of America presented by her Republican rival. “The last thing that we need is somebody who is running for president who talks trash about America,” Mrs. Clinton said. She showed solidarity with Mr. Trump’s top primary rival, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. “I mean, I never thought I’d say these words, but Ted Cruz was right,” she said, and then quoted Mr. Cruz’s despondent Wednesday night speech . “Vote your conscience.” Now some of the job of discrediting Mr. Trump will fall to Mr. Kaine, who wrote on Twitter that he was eager to hit the campaign trail. “Just got off the phone with Hillary,” he said. “I’m honored to be her running mate.” Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Kaine have similar positions on many issues , and they are said to share an easy rapport and an interest in policy details. “I do have a fondness for wonks,” Mrs. Clinton said in the PBS interview. Asked whether Mr. Kaine was boring, Mrs. Clinton said, “I love that about him.” She added, “He’s never lost an election.” Republicans seized on the selection and tried to sow discord among Democrats, arguing that the pick was evidence that Mrs. Clinton had been dishonest with her party’s liberal base. Latest Election Polls 2016 Get the latest national and state polls on the presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump. “Hillary Clinton’s choice of Tim Kaine does nothing to unify a fractured Democrat base which is repelled by her dishonesty and cronyism,” Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, said in a statement. “After spending last week pandering to grass-roots Democrats with Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton has chosen someone who holds positions that she’s spent the entire primary trying to get to the left of.” The Trump campaign quickly labeled Mrs. Clinton’s new running mate “Corrupt Kaine,” pointing to lavish gifts he had received during his years as governor and lieutenant governor of Virginia. “It’s only fitting that Hillary Clinton would select an ethically challenged insider like Tim Kaine who’s personally benefited from the rigged system,” said Jason Miller, a spokesman for Mr. Trump. While many Democrats swiftly praised the move, some in the party’s liberal wing expressed dismay, claiming that Mr. Kaine was out of step with it on some of its core issues, like trade. “As we saw in Donald Trump’s speech last night, Republicans will run hard against Democrats on trade this year,” said Stephanie Taylor, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Unfortunately, since Tim Kaine voted to fast-track the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Republicans now have a new opening to attack Democrats on this economic populist issue.” She added, “The mood of the country is a populist one.” The son of a welder who owned a small metalworking shop, Mr. Kaine, a Roman Catholic, grew up around Kansas City, Mo. He attended a Jesuit school and took a break from law school at Harvard to spend time as a Catholic missionary in Honduras, an experience that his family has said shaped him and helped him become fluent in Spanish. Early in his career, Mr. Kaine worked on fair housing and civil rights issues as a lawyer. He was elected to the City Council in Richmond, Va., in 1994, and proceeded to climb the ranks of elected office in the state. He became the city’s mayor in 1998, the state’s lieutenant governor in 2002 and the governor in 2006. He also served as chairman of the Democratic National Committee. As governor, Mr. Kaine drew some support from rural parts of the state as well as strong backing in the state’s Democratic-leaning suburban areas. He led the state through one of its darkest times, the shooting at Virginia Tech that killed 32 people in 2007. In 2013, Mr. Kaine implored the United States Senate to find a “small measure of courage” to fight the gun lobby and impose tougher background checks on gun ownership. Mr. Kaine was an early endorser of Senator Barack Obama’s presidential bid in the 2008 nominating fight against Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Kaine was also considered on Mr. Obama’s shortlist of vice-presidential candidates before Mr. Obama selected Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware. In 2012, Mr. Kaine defeated George Allen, a Republican, to take the Senate seat being vacated by the Democrat Jim Webb. Mrs. Clinton’s choice of Mr. Kaine underscores the rising political importance of Virginia, a state with a significant suburban and minority population. Mr. Obama defeated John McCain in the state by more than six percentage points, the first time since Lyndon B. Johnson’s victory in 1964 that the state had voted for a Democratic presidential nominee. An NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll from July 15 shows Mrs. Clinton ahead of Mr. Trump for the state’s 13 electoral votes by nine percentage points. The search for a running mate began in April, after Mrs. Clinton had decisively won the New York primary, with a number of candidates. Mrs. Clinton came to the process with a unique vantage point, having been closely involved in her husband’s selection of Senator Al Gore of Tennessee in 1992, a choice that brought youth and Southern charm to a ticket already overflowing with it. With just days remaining before her announcement of a running mate, Mrs. Clinton had not yet made up her mind as her advisers debated what attributes voters might want in a vice president. As the search narrowed, Mrs. Clinton wanted to test her chemistry on the campaign trail with Mr. Kaine. After their Virginia rally last week, she invited him to her home in Washington for a meeting that lasted until 10:30 p.m. Last Saturday, the day after meeting with other candidates in Washington, she invited Mr. Kaine and his wife to lunch at her home in Chappaqua, N.Y., with her family. At 7:30 p.m. Friday, just after her fiery speech in Tampa, Mrs. Clinton called Mr. Kaine to give him the news, before calling President Obama to let him know that she had chosen his friend.

Hillary Clinton
Democrats
2016 Presidential Election
Timothy M Kaine
Vice President US


Escape the Web and Get Things Done

Abstract: Q. I’m going to take up the NaNoWriMo challenge, but am worried about giving in to internet distractions and not finishing the novel by the end of November. I only need discipline for a month, so what free or cheap software would work to temporarily lock me out of the Facebook and other time-sapping sites? Image Free or inexpensive programs like Cold Turkey for the Mac can remove temptation by temporarily shutting down your time-wasting browsing habits. Credit The New York Times A. Along with generally cooler temperatures and the traditional start of the holiday eating season, November also brings the annual National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) creativity contest. For those who have not heard of it, NaNoWriMo participants sign up on the event’s website and in 30 days, try to complete a 50,000-word novel — about the length of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby.” This means completing an average of 1,667 words a day to finish the novel by 11:59 p.m. on Nov. 30, so time-wasting distractions can really derail productivity. If you want to cut out the temptation to fiddle about on social media, one free approach is to just unplug your home network router during your writing session. If howls from other family members prevent you from doing that — and just disabling the Wi-Fi or Ethernet connection on your own computer is not enough to keep you offline — you have plenty of voluntary lockout software to choose from. Subscription services like Freedom ($7 a month) or FocusMe ($9 a month) let you block apps and websites on Windows and Mac systems on a scheduled basis. Your web browser may also support free or cheap add-on programs for blocking those tempting websites. StayFocusd for Google Chrome and LeechBlock for Firefox are two examples. If you have a Mac, SelfControl and Cold Turkey and are two free (or inexpensive) apps for shutting out online distractions; Cold Turkey has Windows and Android versions as well. Focal Filter is another option for Windows systems.

National Novel Writing Month
Social Media
Computers and the Internet
Tech Industry


Romil Bahl of PRGX, on the Emergence of Great Ideas

Abstract: This interview with Romil Bahl , president and C.E.O. of PRGX, a data mining and audit recovery firm, was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant.  Q. In reading some of your company’s materials, I came across this phrase: “tactful audacity.” Can you talk about what that means? A. I heard it from one of our senior executives in Europe. But it was so powerful to me because it said in two words what I have found to be very effective in 20 years of client work — that you can’t give feedback to clients in anything but a constructive fashion. You can’t sort of just push back willy-nilly, and you don’t win arguments with clients, period. Now, having said that, if you aren’t being audacious, if you aren’t challenging, if you aren’t pushing back, you’re on your way out the door, right? You’re done as the trusted adviser and partner. So now it’s in our value set. It’s about tone and how you pass along a difficult message. You sort of flip that around and say, “How do I like to hear advice and how do I not like to hear it?” You’re doing it because you’re trying to help. Q. Can you talk about the culture you try to create, and how you do it? A. It probably sounds like an exaggeration, but in some way, shape or form, I spend about 50 percent of my time communicating, whether that’s externally or internally. You’ve got to be able to do it consistently, and with passion. On my first day with the company, I wrote an e-mail, and put “From Romil’s Desk” in the subject line. Almost two years later, once a month, a “From Romil’s Desk” e-mail goes out. If it’s a day later than it’s supposed to be, I’ll actually get a couple of e-mails from people saying, “Was there one this time? Because I might not have received it.” It’s expected. Q. What did you want to change about the culture when you took over? A. A little over two years ago, I entered a pretty siloed and not very happy place, and so I had to break those things down. And so I stressed collaboration and teamwork. I stressed that the power of information is in sharing it and not hoarding it. In my leadership meetings, I ask my team to do what I try to do, which is lead from the front. And I say: “It starts with you challenging me in this room, challenging each other in this room. When we leave the room, we’ve got the one way we do things, but in this room, let’s get it out and please go encourage your people to do the same.” It’s the best of the company that has to be brought to bear for everything we do. And the best idea has to win. It’s not a sign of weakness to ask for help or to bring other people in. It’s a sign of strength. Q. How do you make sure everyone contributes in a meeting? A. I will absolutely say something right then and there. People are used to it. People are used to me saying things like: “O.K., for 25 minutes I haven’t heard anything from you. What’s going on over there? Are you with us? Are you looking at your BlackBerry? What’s going on?” So it’s a little bit provocative, as well, and you have to be careful about how many times you do that. But I’ll do it because I have this fundamental belief that these are successful, great people around you who are here for a reason and they have something smart to say. At least on the most important things that we’re going to do, until I feel like we’ve really hit upon that best idea, I’ll keep pushing people to get it done. Q. Doesn’t calling somebody out like that embarrass them? A. If it’s a new executive, I won’t do it, because they have to get to know me a little bit. They have to be part of the team long enough to know that there’s no malicious intent. I’m not going to remember this in the next hour, far less next week and write it down in some performance evaluation. That’s not what I do, and it’s not what we’re all about. I think everybody has to find a way to get there, because otherwise you’re not having the most authentic conversation. On a related point, the people who have helped me the most in my career told me things I didn’t like hearing the first time I heard them. And that night I might have tossed and turned a little bit. I probably didn’t even like them much the next morning. But three weeks and three months and three years later, that’s the person I would list as one of those who made a big impact. So in the spirit of “life’s not a popularity contest,” I’ll do some things that maybe others might not. But it’s not an uncommon story even in our personal lives, right? I mean, the most influential person in my life is my father, and I did not get along with him for a long time. Now, I’ll have moments and say to myself: “That’s what he meant. That’s what he was saying.” Like the time he said, “If the road isn’t getting steeper every minute, watch out, because you’ve already started to head downhill.” I wish I’d listened to him 20 years ago. Q. What were some of his other sayings? A. “Shoot for the moon,” he would say, “So you’ll miss and you’ll hit the second floor or maybe the third. You’ll still get a heck of a lot higher than what you’re trying to do today.” He would also say, “We must learn to walk with beggars and with kings.” Q. What’s the story behind that? A. We weren’t affluent when I was growing up. He was in the army. Like every army, the Indian army doesn’t pay much. He was a colonel. But the flip side of that is we were very fortunate because we got to do some really cool things. And then he took early retirement from the army and went into business for himself. It took him a while to get going but once he was doing very well, my mom and dad’s lives were Rotary Club meetings and embassy parties four days a week. So every now and then, we’d make some comment about, “Why are we eating at this place again?” or something like that, and, boy, he would bring us right back down to earth. Q. So how does that saying manifest itself in the way you lead? A. It’s this great idea of equality. It means the best idea can come from anyone, and let’s open up our minds to getting thinking from cross-functional areas. That’s something that comes from that notion of equality and diversity — that comes from that notion of walk with beggars and kings. You have to get good people around you and then make sure they feel comfortable putting their ideas out there, because somewhere in there, there’s a gem. And let me give you another example. We’ll be running a big board meeting or something and somebody will say, “There’s no water.” So we can sit around and we can call assistants or we can just get up and get some water. Is that the culture we’re trying to set — one of sitting around waiting and being high and mighty — or is it the culture where we’re going to get things done. I’ll get you a glass of water. Let’s get on with it. It’s hard to extrapolate a whole lot from that one sentence, but it influences just about everything we do. Q. Was it an easy transition for you to become a manager in the first place? A. It has come pretty naturally, having watched my father in action, as a commanding officer, and how he handled his officers, and when they and their wives would be over at our house for parties. He was director of the Rotary Club for Delhi, so I was involved in all sorts of community projects, and seeing how that side of things was done. I also captained the school’s cricket teams as I was growing up. I don’t know that I ever really struggled. But there are all sorts of issues that are challenging, like that first performance evaluation that you give. Q. Such as? A. I’m pretty sure I’ve made every mistake there was to make in how that message was delivered. But again, I think that as long as you’re trying to do the right thing and act with integrity, a lot is forgiven. That’s sort of how I live my life and how I like to ask people to live their life — just keep trying to do the right thing, and you’ll almost never get into trouble. Q. How do you hire? A. I’m disciplined about reviewing a résumé before the person comes in, but it’s not a sort of rote, “let’s go through every line and tell me what this meant.” I’ll say: “What have you done? What are the things you’re proudest of?” And I love to turn the conversation very quickly from their background into what they know about us. It tells me a lot. How much time they have taken to understand what we’re trying to do is an important indicator. And it’s even better if they’ve got some ideas of what could be done or at least connect back to where they’ve faced a similar circumstance and what they’ve done with that. I have to tell you, 90 percent of it is trusting your instincts about someone, and believing that even though all of the skills may not be there, this is going to work. Q. What are the intangible qualities you’re looking for? A. The word I like to use is “attitude.” I say this almost in an exaggerated fashion, but just to make the point, I almost want to take attitude before skill — the right attitude, the right desire to get it done and never give in. I feel like good, smart people in the neighborhood of the skill set we need will do better every time than the expert that may have done it four times before but is showing up with sort of a laissez-faire attitude. Are you going to make an effort to fit and to be part of the winning team and to help us win?

PRGX
Hiring and Promotion
Executives and Management
Bahl Romil


Finding Utility in the Jumble of Tweeted Thoughts

Abstract: SAN FRANCISCO — The first reaction many people have to Twitter is befuddlement. Why would they want to read short messages about what someone ate for breakfast? It’s a reasonable question. Twitter unleashes the diarist in its 14 million users, who visited its site 99 million times last month to read posts tapped out with cellphones and computers. Individually, many of those 140-character “tweets” seem inane. But taken collectively, the stream of messages can turn Twitter into a surprisingly useful tool for solving problems and providing insights into the digital mood. By tapping into the world’s collective brain, researchers of all kinds have found that if they make the effort to dig through the mundane comments, the live conversations offer an early glimpse into public sentiment — and even help them shape it. Companies like Starbucks , Whole Foods and Dell can see what their customers are thinking as they use a product, and the companies can adapt their marketing accordingly. Last week in Moldova , protesters used Twitter as a rallying tool while outsiders peered at their tweets to help them understand what was happening in that little-known country. And over the weekend, Amazon.com learned how important it was to respond to the Twitter audience. After one author noticed that Amazon had reclassified books with gay and lesbian themes as “adult” and removed them from the main search and sales rankings, a protest broke out on blogs and Twitter. The company felt compelled to respond despite the Easter holiday, initially saying the problem was due to a “glitch in our system” but later blaming a “ham-fisted cataloging error” that affected more than 57,000 books dealing with health and sex. Soon, machines could twitter as much as people. Corey Menscher, a graduate student at New York University , developed the Kickbee, an elastic band with vibration sensors that his pregnant wife wore to alert Twitter each time the baby kicked: “I kicked Mommy at 08:52 PM on Fri, Jan 2!” Mr. Menscher is now considering selling the product. Pairing sensors with Twitter leads some to think Twitter could be used to send home security alerts or tell doctors when a patient’s blood sugar or heart rate climbs too high. In the aggregate, such real-time data streams could aid medical researchers. Already doctors use Twitter to ask for help and share information about procedures. At Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit , surgeons and residents twittered throughout a recent operation to remove a brain tumor from a 47-year-old man who has seizures . “A portion of the skull is being removed to allow access to the dura, the lining of the brain,” an early tweet said. Medical residents and curious laymen following online asked the doctors what music they were listening to (Loreena McKennitt, a Celtic singer), whether the patient felt pain in the brain (no, just pressure) and how big the tumor was (the size of a golf ball). As is convention on Twitter, they tagged all their tweets with a keyword so anyone could search for the keyword and read the stream of posts. “Twitter lets people know what’s going on about things they care about instantly, as it happens,” said Evan Williams, Twitter’s chief executive and co-founder. “In the best cases, Twitter makes people smarter and faster and more efficient.” Mr. Williams, along with the other founders, Biz Stone and Jack Dorsey, first envisioned Twitter as an easy way to stay in touch with people you already know. In 2006, when Twitter was just starting, the three men felt a small earthquake in San Francisco. They each reached for their phones to twitter about it and discovered tweets from others in the city. At that moment, it dawned on them that Twitter might be most useful for something else — a frontline news report, not just for friends, but for anyone reading. Indeed, the news-gathering promise of Twitter was most evident during the terrorist attacks in Mumbai last November and when a jetliner landed in the Hudson River in January. People were twittering from the scenes before reporters arrived. The attention the service received helped it nearly double the number of new users in the last month, making Twitter the third-largest online social network, behind Facebook and MySpace , according to Compete, a Web analytics company. “Twitter reverses the notion of the group,” said Paul Saffo, the Silicon Valley futurist. “Instead of creating the group you want, you send it and the group self-assembles.” Martin Stoll first discovered this on a visit to New York, where he was searching for a comedy show. Minutes after posting a query on Twitter, five people he did not know had recommended shows. People who had signed up to follow Mr. Stoll’s tweets had his question delivered to their Twitter page or cellphone, and others reading the live Twitter stream could also see it. Mr. Stoll, the founder of GoSeeTell Network, an online travel company, realized Twitter could be an on-the-go, living guidebook for tourists. He created the Portland Twisitor Center , where thousands of people ask where to find the best brunch spot or coffee house and receive instant responses from the center’s officials and anyone else who wants to answer them. Corporations often use Twitter for sales pitches. Intuit , the maker of QuickBooks and TurboTax, monitors Twitter for people writing about Mint, a personal finance Web site that competes with its Quicken Online. Intuit then writes to them and offers its service. Even small businesses find Twitter useful. For example, Mary F. Jenn, of True Massage and Wellness in San Francisco, twitters when masseuses have same-day openings in their schedules and offers discounts. The spa is often fully booked within several hours. But Twitter’s most productive use has been for businesses that want to peer into the minds of their customers, reading their immediate reactions to a product. Dell noticed customers complaining on Twitter that the apostrophe and return keys were too close together on the Dell Mini 9 laptop. So Dell fixed the problem on the Dell Mini 10. At Starbucks, customers used to complain by leaving notes in suggestion boxes. Now they can also post their complaints or suggestions on Twitter, where Brad Nelson, who writes the company’s Twitter updates , tracks what people are saying about Starbucks online. Last month, rumors surfaced that Starbucks would not send coffee to troops in Iraq in protest of the war. Mr. Nelson shot them down, twittering, “This is not true. Get the facts here,” with a link to Starbucks’s refutation of the rumor . Some developers are creating tools to help companies keep an eye on the buzz. Akshay Java, a scientist at Microsoft , is trying to figure out a way to identify which experts are most influential on given topics by automatically analyzing the content of their tweets and who is in their Twitter network. Companies like Microsoft could use that information to figure out which twitterers they should contact to create buzz about a new product. However, for Twitter to be truly useful as a research tool, more people will have to start using it. If it collected a more representative slice of what the world is thinking, Twitter could enable academics and scientists to track epidemics, for instance. To make that easier, Twitter will soon add a search box to the home page so users can search for terms like “earthquake” or “ flu ” and get any tweets about those topics in their Twitter feeds. To continue growing, Twitter will also need to earn meaningful revenue, which the two-year-old company has yet to do. Twitter hopes to charge companies like Starbucks for features that help them communicate with and learn more about their customers, the founders said. As the company taps into the $35 million it recently raised from two venture capital firms in Silicon Valley — on top of the $20 million it previously raised — Mr. Williams sees evidence that his service has started to find a more utility-minded, mainstream audience. He points to people using it to find gasoline in Atlanta during a gas shortage last fall. “It was so far from sharing what you had for breakfast — yet it only works because it’s the same place where people talk about breakfast,” he said.


Drone Registration, a Fight for Movie Screens and New-Home Sales

Abstract: Here’s what to expect in the coming week in business news. Drone Registration Begins Image Credit Rick Bowmer/Associated Press Drone pilots, start your web browsers. The Federal Aviation Administration plans to open a website Monday for its mandatory registration program, aimed at improving safety by making people more accountable for their use of remote-control flying machines. Owners will be required to submit their names, home addresses and email addresses to a national database, and to put a registration number on drones weighing from half a pound to 55 pounds. An owner of a drone before Monday will have until Feb. 19 to register. Anyone who gets a drone after the website opens will have to register before its first flight. — Cecilia Kang _____ Third-Quarter Growth The Department of Commerce will release its third and final estimate of economic growth in the third quarter at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday. Wall Street is expecting a slight downward revision in the pace of expansion for the period of July, August and September. Reported growth is expected to fall to 1.9 percent from an earlier estimate of 2.1 percent. The downshift is most likely because of inventory adjustments on the part of businesses as well as fewer services purchases by consumers. — Nelson D. Schwartz _____ Nike’s Earnings Nike, one of a shrinking number of star performers in the world of retailing, is expected to report earnings on Tuesday, and analysts expect another solid quarter of growth. Nike is not entirely immune from the slumping mall traffic and sluggish holiday sales afflicting its peers. But high demand for its athletic shoes and clothes, and a strong e-commerce business, have helped set Nike apart. Analysts expect Nike’s earnings to be about 85 cents per share, compared with 74 cents for the same quarter last year. — Hiroko Tabuchi _____ New-Home Sales Report Image Home construction in San Marcos, Calif. Credit Mike Blake/Reuters The Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development are scheduled to report the latest data on November new-home sales at 10 a.m. on Wednesday. Economists are expecting a slight increase in sales, which are running at an annual rate of about 500,000. New-home purchases tend to be volatile, and economists are watching for any sign that the recent rate increase by the Federal Reserve will eventually affect the real estate market. But with unemployment still falling and wages beginning to rise in some sectors, the real estate business is expected to remain fairly robust. — Nelson D. Schwartz _____ Closing Early for Christmas Traders around the world will wrap up business early on Thursday, ahead of the Christmas holiday. In the United States, major stock markets will close at 1 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, and bond trading is expected to shut down at 2 p.m. Eastern time. Many markets in Europe also close early for Christmas Eve. — Jesse Pesta _____ Battling for Theater Screens Image Will Smith at the New York premiere of the film "Concussion" on Dec. 16. Credit Mike Segar/Reuters With most schools on holiday break and families looking for activities to entertain themselves, Hollywood kicks into overdrive. Seven major movies will arrive in theaters in the coming days or expand into wide release: “Concussion,” with Will Smith, above, “Daddy’s Home,” “Joy,” “Point Break,” “The Hateful Eight,” “The Revenant” and “The Big Short.” Last year at this time, “American Sniper” became a juggernaut. But a year ago, there was no “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” taking up theater space. As a result, a brawl has broken out among studios and directors over screens because there will not be room for everything. Movies like “Concussion,” a drama about football-related brain injuries, and “Point Break,” a remake of the 1991 crime thriller, may have to prove their appeal quickly or lose screens. — Brooks Barnes _____ Data on Japanese Economy Image Shoppers this month in Tokyo. Credit Yuya Shino/Reuters Japan’s economy has been known to throw feints at statisticians. Last month, the country appeared to be in recession, until new data caused government analysts to change their minds a few weeks later. Fresh numbers are due on Friday, but it is unlikely that they will make the economy’s direction much clearer. The unemployment rate, now at a two-decade low of 3.1 percent, is expected to remain at or near that level. An unwelcome three-month decline in core consumer prices most likely came to an end in November, with prices flat or up slightly, according to predictions by private sector economists. But consumers still seem defensive: Household spending is expected to have dropped by more than 2 percent in November, the third consecutive month of decline. — Jonathan Soble

Drones
Movies
Nike
Housing
Economy
Real Estate
Japan
Stocks,Bonds


Swarm of Rivals Seeking Share of Social Media Pie

Abstract: Twitter, poised to make its splashy entrance on Wall Street, has helped define modern social networking. But while seeking to establish itself as an Internet powerhouse, it must also prove it can fend off a rising threat from a younger generation of nimble social outlets that offer clever new ways for people to connect and share content. Among these up-and-comers are Snapchat, WhatsApp, Line, Tumblr, Instagram, Pinterest, Kakao and Reddit. Each has a different take on what social networking should look like — inventive ways of private messaging and creating content with a rich infusion of images and videos. These contenders, some from overseas, are attracting millions of followers, some at a greater rate than Twitter, which has been relatively slow to adapt to these newer forms of communication. And most of these services have something that is harder to pinpoint and that money can’t buy — an element of cool, an intangible factor that makes them more appealing than their predecessors. Although most of the upstarts are not bringing in significant revenue — and Twitter has been losing money — for investors the question is which services will attract the most users and the most advertisers. “Twitter is unsurpassed as far as text is concerned,” said S. Shyam Sundar, a director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory at Pennsylvania State University. “But you see a lot of other social media going into pictures and video, and in that sense, they are behind.” Snapchat, for example, lets people send photos and videos that disappear after they are viewed. On Thursday, the same day Twitter revealed its filing for an initial public offering, Snapchat added a “stories” feature that resembles an ephemeral news feed, letting users stitch together visual narratives and post them publicly, where they can be viewed for just 24 hours. Snapchat already processes 350 million photos a day, not too far behind Twitter’s daily rate of 500 million posts each day, even though Twitter is used by three times the number of Americans as Snapchat, according to data from Nielsen. WhatsApp, a messaging service founded less than five years ago, says it already has more than 300 million active users, compared with Twitter’s 218 million. And Pinterest, which lets people collect and share images of items they like with their friends, is also gaining in popularity. According to comScore, another measuring service, 43 million people in the United States visited Pinterest in August, compared with 62 million for Twitter. Even as Twitter faces challenges from these younger rivals, it has to compete with Facebook, the largest social network, and other, more established Internet companies. Twitter declined to discuss its competitors, citing rules limiting what companies can say beyond official filings while a stock offering is pending. But in its filing, it acknowledged that it competes “against many companies to attract and engage users including companies which have greater financial resources and substantially larger user bases, such as Facebook (including Instagram), Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft and Yahoo!” Still, the filing promoted what Twitter said was its unique position as a platform for public, real-time conversation, with information that can easily be shared beyond its service. And the company boasted that it was the next step in the Internet’s evolution — a service superior to Netscape’s Web browser, Yahoo’s portal, Google’s search engine and Facebook’s closed social network. Since its founding in 2006 — a long time ago, in the tech world — Twitter has essentially stuck to its main vision of letting people share text messages no longer than 140 characters. In its early days, it spent a lot of time tackling engineering problems that kept crashing its service and so, analysts said, it did not spend as much time on creating new products. Image Up-and-coming social networking tools like Instagram are attracting millions of followers. Credit Karly Domb Sadof/Associated Press But recently the company has been making changes to its service, and some of those changes seem to be responses to what competitors are doing. For example, it recently modified how it displays photos, making them bigger, so they stand out more in the stream of messages — more like Facebook. Although Twitter lost its bid to buy Instagram, a photo-sharing service that Facebook paid $1 billion for, it bought Vine, a start-up that lets people create and upload short bursts of video to their Twitter feed. Vine, a stand-alone app that is integrated into Twitter, has been widely considered a success and has helped Twitter battle Instagram. In fact, Instagram later integrated video-sharing into its own service. Twitter is also introducing features that deliver information to users automatically, like safety and news alerts and suggestions about people to follow. Building on its lead as the online hub for conversation about television shows, the company may soon suggest shows to watch based on a user’s previous interests and activity. Twitter has also sought to fight competitors through acquisitions. For example, it bought We Are Hunted, a music service, to add new features for users to find music. Since its start, Twitter has struggled with how to explain itself to new users. Many people sign up but cannot figure out what to post or why. In comparison, sending a photo to your friend or creating a collection of your favorite desserts on Pinterest appears to be more natural and intuitive. “It’s pretty innately easy to figure out what to do with Snapchat or what to do with Pinterest,” said Debra Aho Williamson, a principal analyst at eMarketer. “With Twitter, it’s not simple to figure out what to do with the service.” Twitter’s value over Facebook, said Susan Etlinger, an analyst at the Altimeter Group, is its simple nature. People feel compelled to share their thoughts and reactions to movies, political events and anything else they encounter, forming a kind of “real-time consumer research feed.” “It’s quick and immediate and short,” she said. But Twitter does not collect as much demographic or personal information about its users compared with a service like Facebook or LinkedIn. Analysts say that could present challenges down the road as the company competes to send its users relevant advertisements and potentially offer e-commerce. In its filing, Twitter also mentioned as possible competition the messaging companies Sina Weibo, Line and Kakao, all based in Asia. These pose threats because it will be crucial for Twitter to keep expanding in international markets. “Twitter is always going to have international competition,” said Brian Blau, an analyst with Gartner. “They are already a global player, but there will always be a local incumbent in foreign countries that uses the local language and already has a purpose there.” Twitter still has many aces in its pocket that will help usher the company through its coming trials. For starters, the company has a strong grasp on mobile, which is crucial to staying relevant in a world where smart devices reign supreme. And it has aligned itself with partners like Apple to embed the service in iPad and iPhone software to bolster its popularity. It also helps that, despite the allure of the competitors’ services, they do not yet have much significant revenue, whereas Twitter seems to be figuring out moneymaking strategies, albeit slowly. Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, cautioned against counting Twitter out too soon. He said that Twitter provided something very different from Snapchat or Line and that there was potentially room for many services. “The future of social is not going to be a winner-takes-all scenario,” he said. “No service can be all things to all people.” He added: “Twitter has found something they’re good at, built a brand around it and fortified it. The real question for the future of the company and their part in social is whether or not they can figure out how to successfully monetize it.”

Social Media
IPO
Computers and the Internet
Tech Industry


Adam Yates Wins Clásica San Sebastián

Abstract: Adam Yates of Britain claimed the biggest victory of his career, winning the one-day Clásica San Sebastián. Yates, an OricaGreenEDGE rider, whose twin, Simon, also rides for the team, moved clear of the pack on the final climb, a steep ascent about four miles from the finish. He held off a group of riders to cross the finish line of the 136-mile race in first place. Philippe Gilbert of Belgium was second, and Alejandro Valverde was third of Spain.


Senate Leaders Agree on Housing Aid

Abstract: WASHINGTON — Senate negotiators on Monday said they had reached a deal on legislation aimed at helping hundreds of thousands of homeowners in danger of foreclosure by expanding the availability of government-insured mortgages. The Bush administration, which previously said it would oppose legislation to rescue troubled homeowners, suggested that it was willing to consider the Senate deal because lawmakers had found a way to eliminate any direct cost to taxpayers. The Senate bill would create an affordable housing fund, financed by the government-sponsored mortgage-finance companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and that fund would be used in its first year to provide about $500 million for the foreclosure rescue effort. Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and chairman of the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, who announced the agreement, said his goal was to create a solid foundation underneath the nation’s depressed housing market. “The primary goal here is to keep people in their homes, but also to establish a floor, a bottom to all this,” Mr. Dodd said. The foreclosure aid is tied to legislation creating a new regulatory agency to tighten oversight of the government-sponsored mortgage financiers. The House this month approved a similar foreclosure rescue bill by a vote of 266 to 154, which was cast mostly along party lines. Only 39 Republicans joined Democrats in supporting the bill, many of them from states hit hard by foreclosures. Under both the House and Senate plans, lenders could limit their losses from potential foreclosures by agreeing to reduce the principal balances of loans at risk of default. The borrowers, many with expensive adjustable-rate loans, could then apply to refinance with a more stable, 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage insured by the government through the Federal Housing Administration. In addition to paying interest and principal, the lender would pay a monthly insurance fee, which would go into a fund to protect taxpayers from losses. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that under the House bill, up to 500,000 mortgages would be refinanced over the next five years, at a cost to taxpayers of about $2.7 billion. Mr. Dodd said that his bill included several changes, including shortening the life of the foreclosure assistance plan to three years, which would reduce the cost to about $500 million. He said that roughly the same number of mortgages could be refinanced. That $500 million would be taken from a new affordable housing fund, which would collect slightly less than half a cent on every dollar of mortgages purchased by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. That fund, proposed by Senator Jack Reed, Democrat of Rhode Island, would continue to exist after the foreclosure assistance plan ended, with the money directed to creating affordable housing, including low-income rental housing. Rhode Island has one of the highest foreclosure rates on subprime mortgages in the country. A day before the House approved its foreclosure rescue plan, President Bush had flatly threatened to veto the bill, saying it would put taxpayer money at risk and “reward speculators and lenders.” Many lawmakers interpreted the president’s remarks as a signal to Senate Republicans to kill the housing legislation before it could reach Mr. Bush’s desk. But the White House reacted with a more agreeable tone to news of the deal between Mr. Dodd and Senator Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the banking committee. Tony Fratto, a spokesman for the White House, said the administration still needed to review the specific language in the bill. But, he said: “We appreciate and encourage the efforts to create a strong, independent regulator” for the government-sponsored companies. “We’ll look forward to seeing the details of the bill,” he added, “especially provisions to expand programs of the Federal Housing Administration.” A spokesman for Mr. Shelby said the senator was “optimistic that the White House will support what we’re doing.” In a statement, Mr. Shelby said: “My primary consideration during negotiations on this package has been to protect the American taxpayer, and I believe we’ve made significant progress toward that goal on each component.” Mr. Shelby had been particularly intent on tightening regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the deal with Mr. Dodd would create a new Federal Housing Finance Agency. The agency would oversee the companies, which are private but are virtually assured of government assistance should they experience financial difficulty. The regulator would be empowered to order an increase in capital in the event that the “safety and soundness” of the institutions were somehow at risk. In addition, the bill would set a new limit on so-called conforming loans, up to about $550,000 in the most expensive markets. The current conforming loan limit is $417,000, but was raised temporarily to $729,250 in the most expensive housing markets under the economic stimulus plan approved by Congress and signed by the president in February.

Senate
Housing
Foreclosures
Mortgages
Law and Legislation
House of Representatives


With the Big East Teetering, Rutgers Stumbles

Abstract: PISCATAWAY, N.J. — The snow-globe conditions for West Virginia’s 41-31 victory over Rutgers on Saturday afternoon provided a fitting backdrop for two Big East programs caught in the disorienting swirl of conference realignment. The Big 12 announced on Friday that West Virginia would join the conference. Its departure, following Pittsburgh and Syracuse out of the Big East, has left that league on unstable footing. Officials from Rutgers, meanwhile, have maintained contact with other conferences. On Saturday, at least, Rutgers and No. 25 West Virginia were both still angling for positioning in the Big East standings. No. 24 Cincinnati (6-1, 2-0) is in first place. Playing in a steady snowfall, the Mountaineers (6-2, 2-1) outlasted Rutgers in the fourth quarter, taking the lead for good with 6 minutes 18 seconds left on a 1-yard touchdown scramble by the junior quarterback Geno Smith, who also threw two touchdown passes. On the ensuing possession, the freshman Rutgers quarterback Gary Nova fumbled the slippery football while trying to pass, effectively ending the game. The Scarlet Knights (5-3, 2-2) have lost 17 straight times against West Virginia. “It’s a tough one,” Rutgers Coach Greg Schiano said. “It hurts. No excuses.” About two hours before kickoff, three pick-up trucks, two small utility vehicles and a tractor plowed up and down the field at High Point Solutions Stadium, moving like Zambonis at a hockey rink until strips of artificial turf were revealed from under the snow. Neither team moved the ball particularly smoothly, but the wet snow contributed to that. There were fumbled snaps, dropped passes and a botched hold on a field-goal attempt. Players also had trouble staying on their feet, requiring them to make cuts with short, careful steps. “This is as bad of conditions as I’ve ever played in or coached in my whole career,” West Virginia Coach Dana Holgorsen said. “The first half especially because the field was covered in ice and slush.” The conditions contributed to Nova’s fumble while dropping back to pass in the fourth quarter. It was also continued a troubling trend: Nova has turned the ball over eight times in the past three games. On Saturday, he threw two interceptions to go with two touchdown passes. “The ball slipped out of my hand, but I’ve got to have two hands on the ball,” said Nova, who threw for 235 yards but completed only 18 of his 46 passes. “I’ve got to make those plays. I don’t use the excuse that I’m a freshman.” Leading by 31-28 at the start of the fourth quarter, Rutgers tried a fake field goal after driving to West Virginia’s 11. The Mountaineers’ Darwin Cook broke up the pass from the holder, Patrick Kivlehan, to receiver Brandon Coleman. That set up West Virginia’s decisive 11-play, 89-yard scoring drive. Smith ended it on fourth-and-goal, attempting to hit Tyler Urban on a slant out of a shotgun formation before rushing to the right corner and diving into the end zone. “In that situation, you’ve got to go all out,” said Smith, who passed for 218 yards and completed 20 of 31 attempts. “There’s 11 guys out there battling for you, and I wanted to be the guy battling for that touchdown.” For Rutgers, it was a crushing conclusion to a day that started emotionally. The former defensive tackle Eric LeGrand, paralyzed from the neck down in a game against Army last year, led the team onto the field in his wheelchair. The Rutgers players walked behind him in an arm-in-arm chain. “It was very emotional and exciting,” Coleman said. “I wish we could have pulled this out for Eric and this program.” The loss left Rutgers in difficult position, and bolstered the case that West Virginia is the class of the Big East. The Mountaineers, the first ranked opponent the Scarlet Knights faced this season, rebounded from a 49-23 loss to Syracuse last Saturday. The game was partly overshadowed by the news of West Virginia’s plan to leave the Big East, in part because of the uncertainty about when that will happen. The university has said it intends to join the Big 12 in July 2012, but the Big East does not plan to allow it to leave before its 27-month exit period is over — the same timetable being followed by Pittsburgh and Syracuse, who will both join the Atlantic Coast Conference. That would mean that Mountaineers could not join the Big 12 until January 2014. The Big East is having its annual meeting of the conference’s presidents and athletic directors on Tuesday in Philadelphia. The meeting will focus on the league’s future in the ever-shifting college sports landscape. The off-field machinations will play out in due time, but even as falling snow obscured the view Saturday, the Big East gained some clarity about the state of its standings entering the final month of the regular season.

Rutgers The State University of New Jersey