Vivid Canvases of Iraq’s Pain Redo Art but Conjure Resistance

Abstract: BAGHDAD — Inside a crumbling Baghdad apartment building, past spouting drainpipes and up a gloomy staircase, a tiny revolution is playing out in oil and acrylic paint. In a studio lighted by one fluorescent bulb, a 34-year-old artist named Haleem Kasim paints images of war and pain almost unknown in Iraqi art before the American invasion, and seldom seen in the years since. Black streaks slash across his chaotic canvases. Faces howl. Ghostly hands grasp at something unseen. “I used to paint the happy life — nature and things like plants and roses to make me happy,” Mr. Kasim said. “I thought there was a pretty life waiting for me. The environment around you forces you to change.” A new generation of Iraqi artists, one molded by bloodshed and occupation, is finding its voice in a place reshaped by eight years of war. They grew up under Saddam Hussein and stayed in Iraq through the killing and mayhem that scattered hundreds of Iraq’s most prominent artists into exile in Europe, Jordan and America. “Young Iraqis are able to create a new kind of painting to fill this vacuum,” said Mohammed al-Kanani, the head of Iraq’s high committee for the arts. “They are a window.” At least three new art colleges have opened in northern and southern Iraq in the past few years. Applications to Baghdad art schools have risen by 25 percent since 2008. Young artists are setting up studios in neighborhoods where militants once carried out kidnappings and executions. But they are straining against the same forces that stifled a youth-led protest movement earlier this year: a calcified political and social elite that wants to control the country’s narrative. While the fall of Mr. Hussein gave artists a new freedom to paint what they want, including once-forbidden political subjects, the artists say they are still rebuked, even sometimes intimidated, by the artistic and political establishment for expressing a grim vision of Iraq. Their elders would prefer them to avoid uncomfortable subjects like the corruption and violence that continues to plague the country. “Galleries and committees stopped giving me prizes,” said Mr. Kasim, whose art darkened after he saw a double car bombing outside his home in 2006. “They always ask me to make a painting for decoration, that pleases people. They didn’t see what we saw. They don’t have the suffering we have inside.” The pressure to conform only adds to a list of frustrations unsurprising in a country emerging from years of war; artists say they have a hard time finding good-paying work or well-heeled patrons. Basim Shakir, 24, is one of those testing the bounds of free expression in Iraq’s tenuous democracy — so far with limited success. He has won prizes outside the country for his realistic portraits of an Iraqi woman begging in the street and a boy with a prosthetic leg selling cigarettes. In 2008, he decided to make a more pointed statement, and painted a group of children tearing up a campaign poster with the logo of one of Iraq’s leading political alliances. Mr. Shakir said his painting was briefly shown inside Iraq’s Parliament before offended lawmakers demanded that it be taken down. A few weeks later, he said, friends with connections to the police began warning him of threats against his life. Mr. Shakir said he fled to Syria for several months. “I am not afraid,” he said. “I will continue painting what I see.” Even Mr. Kanani, who oversees about 2,000 students in one of Baghdad’s leading art colleges, said he tried to steer his students away from subjects like death and conflict. That kind of art does not help, and it just does not sell, he tells students. Why focus on the killing? Walking through a student gallery recently, he frowned at a haunting relief of screaming ceramic faces molded into the shape of the Iraqi map. This was not good art, he said. He preferred a nearby painting of women celebrating their independence through a trip to a beauty salon. “We need beauty and happiness,” he explained. Earlier this spring, the government and several leading Iraqi art societies sponsored a contest for young artists. It brought a riot of perspectives into a cavernous, white-walled gallery. There were vivid cubist landscapes, desert vistas, abstract color fields and celebrations of women’s sexuality. There were also stark scenes of suffering that implicitly criticized the achievements of Iraq’s leaders as well the American invasion and occupation. In one painting, a young Iraqi girl stands alone and frightened, suffused with color and surrounded by a phalanx of American soldiers in heavy shades of gray. Those works would have been dangerous offerings under Mr. Hussein. He was a generous patron of the arts. He allocated money to museums, art schools and cultural institutions, and littered Baghdad with heroic murals and statues of himself. Under Mr. Hussein, artists shied away from political and figurative art, and dived into the worlds of abstraction, said Nada Shabout, an Iraqi art historian at the University of North Texas. “We Iraqis knew what we could say or do and get away with,” she said in an e-mail. “If one stayed away from any direct involvement, comments or what have you about Saddam and the government, then one can live in relative peace.” With the fall of the Hussein government, the real world came rushing back into the arts. In early June, a women’s art college put on a play that chronicled a boy’s search for love and hope — and his ultimate death — in present-day Baghdad. It was set in front of faux blast walls, and brought to life by a cacophony of staged explosions, whirring helicopter blades and gunfire. Similar scenes played out in the student art competition. A sculpted woman was posed inside a cage. A painted warplane barreled over the scene of a crucifixion. A shadowy figure marched across a canvas with rifle drawn. Hovels sat on a blank white field, beneath disconnected electric poles, a reflection of the crumpling housing and poor basic services throughout the country. “There must be a change,” said Omar Shahabi, 28, whose entry was a portrait of a sullen young Iraqi woman trying fruitlessly to leave the country. “We express the reality we live in. This is very simple. I’m not living in some other place where there is peace. I’m sending a message.” When it came time to name the winners, Mr. Kasim’s vortex of howling Iraqi faces and Mr. Shahabi’s defiant young woman were among those to receive certificates for participating. For the two highest prizes, the judges chose an impressionistic painting of women at home, and a bronze sculpture of a bull contentedly munching grass.

Iraq
Art
Iraq War (2003- )
Hussein Saddam


American Billionaire Makes Risky Bet on Greece Debt Deal

Abstract: FRANKFURT — The contrarian American billionaire Wilbur L. Ross Jr. made a bundle betting on the Irish banking system when it was down and out, and a similar wager on Cyprus now looks promising. But Greece may prove to be the toughest test yet of his knack for cashing in on eurozone crisis spots. Mr. Ross, who built his career investing in distressed assets, is the ringleader of a group of investors who last year pumped 1.3 billion euros, or about $1.47 billion, into Eurobank Ergasias, the third-largest bank in Greece. In the weeks to come, the fate of Mr. Ross’s money — along with the whole Greek financial system — may hinge on whether the country’s leftist government can avoid the chaos that would accompany an exit from the eurozone. In the interim, Greek banks are in a perilous state. The uncertainty about the country’s future means that Greek banks cannot raise cash on the international monetary markets. Without cash, the banks cannot lend. The result is a vicious circle in which businesses cannot get credit, hurting employment and profits and causing tax receipts to decline just when the government in Athens desperately needs cash. No wonder Mr. Ross is rooting for the Greek government to make peace with its creditors — the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the other eurozone countries — and unlock more aid. A debt deal seemed as elusive as ever on Tuesday, when officials in Brussels reacted coolly to revised Greek proposals meant to end a monthslong standoff, saying the proposals backpedaled on fiscal targets recently agreed to by both sides. The Greek prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, had tentative plans to meet in Brussels on Wednesday with Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President François Hollande of France in another effort to break the impasse. Whatever hardships Mr. Tsipras’s government fears under the tough terms its creditors might be demanding, Mr. Ross says Greece could have even more of a struggle trying to go it alone with a bankrupt banking system. “A default and a removal from the euro would provoke even worse austerity than anything being proposed by the institutions,” Mr. Ross said in an interview. On paper, Mr. Ross and the other investors have already lost hundreds of millions of euros. Eurobank shares have fallen by more than half since April 2014, when Mr. Ross and a group he leads bought a stake of a little more than 20 percent. The shares recently traded around 13 euro cents. Before the crisis began in 2010, Eurobank shares traded as high as €60. The other investors allied with Mr. Ross include Fairfax Financial Holdings in Toronto, whose founder and chief executive, Prem Watsa, is known as the Warren E. Buffett of Canada. The private equity firm Mr. Ross oversees, WL Ross & Company, invested €37.5 million of its own money. He and the other investors poured their money into Greece at a time when the country was beginning to show signs of finally returning to growth after a long, deep slump and two international bailouts. But since January, when Mr. Tsipras’s government came to power, promising to relieve Greece of the austerity engendered by those bailout programs, the economy has lapsed back into recession and depositors have been pulling money from the banks. Given Mr. Ross’s record of profiting from badly damaged assets, though, it would be wrong to discount his chances of making a killing this time. In 2011, investors led by Ross & Company invested €1.1 billion in Bank of Ireland, a commercial bank, when the country was in the depths of a banking crisis and recession caused by a housing bubble. But Ireland, and the bank, bounced back. Mr. Ross’s firm and the other investors, including some of the same people who have invested in Eurobank, sold their shares last year for three times what they paid. It is too soon to know whether Mr. Ross’s investment will pay off in the Bank of Cyprus, where he and co-investors own an 18 percent stake. But the economy of Cyprus is recovering from the crisis that nearly destroyed the banking system in 2013. And in April, the country’s Parliament passed a law that would streamline the country’s tortuous foreclosure process and make it easier for banks to collect from delinquent borrowers. The new law will allow banks to restructure problem loans, which amount to more than half of the total. Greece is arguably the toughest case of all. At least on paper, the four largest commercial banks in Greece — National Bank of Greece, Piraeus Bank, Eurobank and Alpha Bank, none of whose officials were willing to comment — are solvent. They all passed tests of their financial health conducted late last year by the European Central Bank. But they passed in part by using a legal but dubious accounting method, in which they counted anticipated tax breaks as capital. That practice, allowed in several other eurozone countries as well, is being phased out by regulators and is considered especially risky in Greece, because a bankrupt government would probably not be able to pay refunds due to taxpayers. “This accounting option has long been viewed with a great deal of skepticism in many quarters,” Andreas Dombret, who is responsible for bank supervision at the German central bank, the Bundesbank, said in an email. “It is a particularly dicey thing to do when the sovereign is struggling financially like in Greece.” Problems at the Greek banks began mounting in the prelude to the election of the left-wing Syriza government in January and have continued ever since. Depositors fearful that Greece would drop out of the euro shipped €30 billion abroad or squirreled it away in their homes from the end of November to the end of April. The government contributed to the deposit outflow when it raided the bank accounts of state entities to meet its basic financial obligations. The banks have been surviving on a drip feed of emergency cash from the European Central Bank. But the central bank would be forced under its rules to cut off the funding if Greece could not reach an accord with its creditors. If there is no agreement between Athens and the creditors, the consequences would be dire and unpredictable. People who have not already sent their money abroad or hidden it under a mattress might storm the A.T.M.s. Desperate to stop the flight of wealth abroad, the government would impose restrictions on money transfers, so-called capital controls. In the worst case, Greece would drop out of the euro; remaining loans and deposits would be forcibly converted into newly printed drachmas which, according to some estimates, would immediately lose about half their value against the euro. If the government defaulted on its debt, Greek banks would suffer disproportionately because they own tens of billions of euros worth of Greek bonds. The country and the banks might then go down together in a fatal embrace of mutual dependency. In other countries that have gone bankrupt, “when banks failed, so did the economy,” said Carl B. Weinberg, chief economist of High Frequency Economics in Valhalla, N.Y., who has advised Latin American countries with debt problems. But Mr. Ross argues that the situation in Greece could take a swift turn for the better if the brinkmanship on display between Athens and the creditors ends in a credible deal that restores the confidence of foreign investors. Greek banks could regain access to international money markets. Their world would start to turn again. And Mr. Ross would look very smart. Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, has already hinted that Greece could benefit from his bank’s stimulus measures if Athens makes a deal. Mr. Ross predicts that, too. “If there is a negotiated settlement quickly, two things will happen,” he said. “I think the E.C.B. will be very supportive and restore liquidity to the banks. Two, it wouldn’t take very long at all for the banks and private sector to regain access to the capital markets.” Michalis Massourakis, chief economist at the Hellenic Federation of Enterprises, a Greek business trade group, said that international investors needed to be convinced that any agreement would bring lasting stability, rather than just postponing the day of reckoning. “Greece is not a basket case,” Mr. Massourakis said. “It is only the political situation that is causing this terrible situation.”

Greece
Eurobank Ergasias
European Central Bank
Wilbur L Ross Jr
Euro Crisis
Banking and Finance


Coil Extends Bob Baffert’s Domination of the Haskell

Abstract: OCEANPORT, N.J. — Bob Baffert likes this little race on the Jersey Shore. It is worth a cool million dollars, and eight times over the past decade the winner of the Haskell Invitational has gone on to be named 3-year-old champion. And three of them came from Baffert’s barn: Point Given, War Emblem and Lookin at Lucky. In the paddock Sunday, Baffert was anything but confident that Coil belonged with his previous big-time horses. Sure, Coil, the son of Point Given, was fast, but he was a late bloomer with enough holes in his résumé to make Baffert believe he might be overreaching. Until Sunday, Coil had never tried the dirt or Grade I company and had captured two of his three victories sprinting. Baffert was also rolling the dice on tactics. Jockey Martin Garcia had suggested that Baffert take the blinkers off the colt and try to relax him from behind the frontrunners in order to gear up for a big final run. “I didn’t think he needed the lead to win, even though that’s how he had been running,” Garcia said. Jimmy Barnes, Baffert’s longtime assistant, agreed. “My whole team wanted to take him back,” Baffert said. “It made me nervous, but I had to listen.” When the gates opened for the 44th running of the Haskell, it appeared all of Baffert’s strategy and angst was for naught: Coil stumbled at the break and was last in eighth place. “I thought the race was over for us,” Baffert said. So perhaps did the crowd of 38,895, who came to see the Jersey-based horses, the Belmont champion Ruler on Ice and the Louisiana Derby victor Pants on Fire, take on the wicked quick and Preakness -winning Shackleford, who looked every bit like the 3-2 favorite as he galloped past the grandstand and around the first turn. His rider, Jesus Castanon, looked frozen as they shadowed the pacesetter Joe Vann through a half-mile of 47.02 and three-quarters of a mile in a brisk 1:10.68. “This is the way he likes to run,” said Castanon, who had a similar trip aboard Shackleford in the Preakness. “We were in a perfect spot.” Garcia was loping Coil down the backstretch, feeling the power gathering beneath him, not worried at all that he remained dead last. When the field hit the far turn, the real running began. Jose Valdivia Jr. gunned Ruler on Ice past his stablemate Pants on Fire and took aim at Shackleford. Behind them, Garcia swung Coil five-wide and found an explosive turn of foot in his colt. “I was sitting on a ton of horse when I turned for home,” Garcia said. Ahead of them, Shackleford hit the stretch first, but Garcia and Coil were roaring like a jet ski. Valdivia knew Ruler on Ice was a little short of fitness and distance. This was the gelding’s first race since winning the mile-and-a-half Belmont on June 11, and Valdivia felt Ruler on Ice needed more ground than the Haskell’s mile-and-an-eighth. “When everybody stepped on the gas, I saw Coil and he was being ridden,” he said. “They quickened and just left us flat-footed.” Coil inhaled Shackleford next, but Garcia felt his colt dawdle beneath him. “He tends to do that when he makes the lead,” Garcia said. “My horse made it interesting.” Castanon and Shackleford dug in. “My horse felt him and was fighting back,” Castanon said. The two colts pounded several strides in tandem, prompting Baffert to blink a couple times behind his sunglasses. “I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, especially after how we had taken the long way around the track,” he said. Garcia coaxed one final burst out of Coil to best Shackleford by a neck, with Ruler on Ice closing to within two and a quarter lengths in third. Those who believed in Coil more than Baffert were rewarded with $8.40 for a $2 bet. Coil’s gutty performance and final running time of 1:48.20 earned his owners — Karl Watson, Paul Weitman and Mike Pegram — $600,000. It earned the colt a trip to the Travers Stakes at the end of the month in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., where he is likely to meet Shackleford, Ruler on Ice, and the Jim Dandy winner, Stay Thirsty. In the winner’s circle, Baffert bounced from Garcia to his owners, trying to wrangle them for the photos and trophy presentation. “You know the drill,” he bellowed. This was the same bunch that had won here last year with Lookin at Lucky. It was Baffert, however, who was most familiar with this lucrative real estate. It was his fifth Haskell victory in eight trips. Why is he so successful here? “I bring really good horses,” he said. He did so once more with Coil. He just did not know for sure until the race was run.

Coil
Haskell Invitational
Horse Racing
Baffert Bob
Garcia Martin


For Giants’ Top Pick, Talent Outweighs Nerves and Nausea

Abstract: EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Justin Pugh, the Giants’ right tackle, expects to feel extremely nauseated minutes before the season opener at the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday night. The awful feeling in the pit of his stomach will have nothing to do with his status as a rookie making his N.F.L. debut on a shuffled offensive line entrusted with keeping the franchise quarterback Eli Manning intact. It will have nothing to do with the star on the opponent’s helmet, representing one of the Giants’ fiercest rivals. Anxiety and nervousness have combined to make Pugh’s stomach turn somersaults for as long as he can remember strapping on football pads. And there is no quick fix. “I’m a dry-heave guy,” he said. Fortunately for Pugh, the feeling vanishes as quickly as it overtakes him, he said. With the first few snaps and the first few hits, it is gone. The Giants are counting on Pugh to be at full strength. He is set to be their first opening-round selection to start the first game since Jeremy Shockey, a tight end, cracked the lineup in 2002. The Giants have enough problems on the offensive line with injuries to David Baas, a ninth-year center, and David Diehl, a right tackle in his 11th year. Baas continues to be sidelined by a sprained medial collateral ligament in his left knee that he sustained in the team’s 20-12 preseason loss to the visiting Indianapolis Colts on Aug. 18. Diehl also injured his right thumb in the midst of a poor performance in that game. He needed surgery, and he is expected to sit out several more weeks. Pat Flaherty, the Giants’ highly regarded offensive line coach, emphasizes versatility. The Giants used the last two preseason games to experiment with different combinations. Their alignment for the opener, an immediate N.F.C. East test, is expected to include Pugh stepping in for Diehl at right tackle; Kevin Boothe replacing Baas at center; and James Brewer, in his third season, making his first start at left guard, in place of Boothe. Only Chris Snee, the right guard, and Will Beatty, the left tackle, remain in their accustomed places. Kevin Gilbride, the offensive coordinator, acknowledges that the shuffling up front complicates his game plan because he does not know what level of performance he can expect from certain players. “You’d like to say it’s not influencing at all what you’re doing,” he said. “But I don’t think that’s realistic.” Complicating matters, the Giants will be facing Dallas for the first time since the Cowboys used the off-season to shift to a 4-3 defense. Gilbride may have to make more in-game adjustments than usual. The emphasis, though, will primarily be on protecting Manning, the first Giants quarterback to throw for at least 3,000 yards in eight straight seasons. “We may have to slide a certain way,” Gilbridge said. “We may have to put a back somewhere.” Coach Tom Coughlin typically makes first-year players earn his trust over time by the way they conduct themselves in meetings and practices. He did not have that luxury with Pugh, drafted 19th over all to bolster an aging line. “No doubt, he’s had an opportunity like very few have,” Coughlin said. “He’s a young guy. He does some good. He does some bad. Certainly, he’s out there giving it all he has. He’ll get better.” Pugh (6-foot-4, 301 pounds) appeared in 34 games at Syracuse, starting all of them at left tackle and often dominating as an athletic, intelligent big man. The coaching staff credited him with 40 blocks leading to touchdowns and 288 knockdowns, blocks that leveled his opponent. Snee, a four-time Pro Bowl performer, is impressed. “I think he’s done a great job,” Snee said. “The key is you have to approach it as your job, and he’s done that. It can only benefit him.” Pugh emphasizes daily improvement. “I definitely don’t like to make mistakes,” he said. “Obviously, that’s part of the growing process. If you make mistakes and learn from them and don’t repeat them, you will be a heck of a player.” EXTRA POINTS JASON PIERRE-PAUL, a defensive end returning from lower back surgery, and HENRY HYNOSKI, a fullback recovering from an injury to his left knee, continue to increase their workloads in practice. A determination on their status for the opener is expected Friday. ... The players elected five captains, retaining ELI MANNING, defensive end JUSTIN TUCK and long snapper ZAK DeOSSIE, and adding safety ANTREL ROLLE and guard CHRIS SNEE.


As Bernie Fine Case Widens, So Do Concerns for Syracuse

Abstract: Nearly everything about the investigation into child sexual abuse allegations against Bernie Fine, a former assistant men’s basketball coach at Syracuse, took a more serious turn over the weekend. Fine was fired by the university after another accuser came forward and Coach Jim Boeheim quickly retracted his previous unconditional support of Fine. But the legal issues involved also became more complex, with Syracuse possibly reacting because of a sense of potential legal exposure, and the expansion of the investigation into a federal as well as a local one. The United States attorney’s office for the Northern District of New York and the Secret Service stepped into active roles, including searching Fine’s house and removing filing cabinets and a computer. Fine has not been charged with any crime and has said he is not guilty of the accusations, but after initially placing Fine on administrative leave Nov. 17, the university fired him Sunday. “Syracuse moved very quickly once someone else came out,” said Michael Dowd, a New York lawyer who has represented many victims of child and sexual abuse. “Boeheim was doing everything he could to back Fine when it was just two, but now it’s three.” The importance of the third accuser — 23-year-old Zach Tomaselli of Lewiston, Me. — Dowd said, is that he alleges abuse in 2002, which may fall within state and federal statutes of limitations, whereas the abuse alleged by the first two accusers, Bobby Davis and Mike Lang, would have happened too long ago to prosecute. Syracuse’s response to the initial accusations brought by Davis to the university in 2005 will also be under a spotlight, several legal experts said. Officials said no action was taken at the time because they could not corroborate Davis’s claims. “But why do you have to have corroboration for rape?” said Cynthia Bowman, a professor at the Cornell University School of Law. “One of the unusual things about the Penn State case was you actually had someone walking through the locker room who saw this. Usually, how would you get corroboration? I would think they would need to determine it just hadn’t happened for some reason — like, they were in different places when the alleged crime took place — and not just a lack of corroboration.” Referring to Syracuse, she said, “They could be in a bad place because they did have notice.” Unlike Penn State, Syracuse is a private university and is not shielded by the sovereign immunity that could possibly keep Penn State from being liable as a state entity. “I think the university could have enormous liability, including Boeheim, who was in a supervisory capacity,” Dowd said. “It comes down to who knew what, or who should have known. And you have to ask, because Boeheim’s defense of Fine was so complete after the initial allegations, would he have been at all open to look into anything suspicious?” The involvement of the Secret Service indicates there is an element of the case dealing with computers. According to the Columbia University law professor Daniel C. Richman, a recent emphasis on prosecuting child pornography and exploitation has moved the Secret Service to offer help to local investigations that might involve those issues. It also has expertise in computer forensics, which could explain the removal of a computer from Fine’s house after the search. If such searches revealed crimes that happened more recently than the current allegations, the statute-of-limitations question could no longer be an issue. John Duncan, a spokesman for the United States attorney’s office, said his office would not discuss which statutes were involved in the investigation, so he could not talk about what the statute of limitations on any of those would be. Because the investigation is in such an early stage, the local and federal investigators are being vague about details. In cases like this, there is the possibility of other accusers coming forward, as has happened in the case at Penn State against Jerry Sandusky, a former assistant football coach. Tomaselli came forward in the Syracuse case after seeing Davis and Lang make their accusations on ESPN. “What we know about predators is, you might as well put them on an island and build a fence around it, because they are not going to stop,” Dowd said. “The fear of being caught does not stop them. “This could end up being a huge case.”

Basketball
Fine Bernie
Boeheim Jim
Syracuse University
Child Abuse and Neglect
Lang Mike
Coaches and Managers
Colleges and Universities
Sex Crimes
Basketball (College)


Saving a Kashmiri Village After Remaking His Life

Abstract: CHIKAR, Pakistan — The lone hospital in this Kashmiri mountain town was on the eve of hosting one of the year’s biggest social gatherings, a health fair for several hundred villagers, and Todd Shea was not happy. The hospital’s founder, Mr. Shea, an American who resembles a football coach more than a health worker, was outraged because one of the employees had failed to purchase enough hygiene kits — freebies the villagers had come to expect at the fair. “This is a problem, and there is a solution,” Mr. Shea, strident but good-natured, yelled to a staffer on the phone from the field. “Let’s see how good you are. I know there are kits lurking in the walls. I guarantee you that if I come there, I will find them. You know me!” Seven hours later, at midnight, the employee returned from a nearby city with a sheepish smile and 100 kits he had managed to round up. Mr. Shea hugged him, “I believe in you,” he said. If Mr. Shea, 42, had a résumé, it would by his own admission reveal far more experience as a cocaine addict than as a medical professional. But with his take-charge demeanor, he has transformed primary health care here in this mountain town in Kashmir, where government services are mostly invisible. “Others are more qualified, but I’m the one who’s here,” he said. Most recently, he has focused on the millions of people who have been uprooted by the army’s campaign against the Taliban, in the northwest. But it is here that Mr. Shea spends his time and learned years ago that, as far as health care is concerned, every day is a crisis for Pakistanis. He arrived as a volunteer rescue worker immediately after the 2005 earthquake that killed 80,000 Pakistanis. Overwhelmed by the community’s long-term needs Mr. Shea never left, and in 2006 he set up a nonprofit charity hospital called Comprehensive Disaster Relief Services , or C.D.R.S. Humanitarian aid flooded the region in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, but the tide of aid and government support ebbed within months, leaving 25,000 wounded residents without doctors, medical supplies and an actual health outpost. That is, life returned to normal. In Pakistan, less than one percent of the national budget is devoted to the health of its citizens, and the nation’s health care crisis is especially acute in remote communities. “It’s frustrating and sad that’s the way it is,” Mr. Shea said. “But if I screamed from the mountaintop, it wouldn’t change a thing.” So he does what he can. His hospital, with 38 employees and nearly $200,000 in financing from Americans and Unicef, highlights not only the needs of Pakistan’s rural health system but also a glaring vulnerability for a government trying to brand itself an alternative to the Taliban. “The Taliban terrorize people, but they put forth logical arguments about the state’s failures,” said Shandana Khan, the chief operating officer of the Rural Support Program Network . “It’s very common to see primary health care facilities without doctors, or medicines,” she added. “Doctors don’t want to be posted there. Or they’ll sign up and get paid, but sit in cities and no one monitors them.” Chikar is only 85 miles from the capital, Islamabad, but it takes six hours up a switchback road to reach the hospital. Here, the government provides only 10 percent of the community’s medicine needs. C.D.R.S. picks up the rest. Last year Mr. Shea recruited a doctor by doubling his government salary and offering him the only private room in the 20-room hospital, which he rents for $250 a month. Mr. Shea himself sleeps on a mattress in a room he shares with staff members. “The things you see here are only because of C.D.R.S.,” said the doctor, Rizwan Shabir, 27, who had come from a practice in Muzaffarabad, a city of 300,000. “Frankly, without Todd, there would be no proper medicine, and patients would be dead.” Still, C.D.R.S. is more makeshift than miracle. On a recent morning, Dr. Shabir treated 140 patients in five hours. Without blood-testing laboratories, he diagnoses common illnesses like hepatitis and tuberculosis through clinical evaluations. Outside of Chikar, C.D.R.S. supplements 10 other regional government health outposts by paying salaries and purchasing medicines. Over all, it treats about 100,000 patients annually, and 70 percent are women and children. With the global economic crisis, Mr. Shea says he fears that his group’s $200,000 annual budget may be difficult to raise for 2010. So he has proposed a community insurance program that would require a contribution of 31 cents per person per month, which would net $20,000 a month. He estimates that 65 percent of the town can afford it, and he hopes the government and private donors will pick up the rest. Mr. Shea is an unlikely person to reform Chikar’s decades of medical neglect. When he was 12, his mother died of a Valium overdose. By 18, he was addicted to crack cocaine. In 1992, he moved from his native Maryland to Nashville to pursue a music career, he said, and spent the next decade playing in bars and restaurants around the country. At one point, he was forced to sell his own blood plasma for $40 a week to pay the bills. He moved to New York City in 1998, and had a gig booked at CBGB, the famed music club, on Sept. 12, 2001. As he watched the World Trade Center burn and fall, he said, he promptly emptied his band van and used it over the next week to ferry meals to firefighters at Ground Zero. He soon became addicted to rescue efforts, and volunteered in Sri Lanka after the 2004 tsunami. It was his first time overseas. After Hurricane Katrina , he said, he volunteered with another rescue organization. Then the earthquake hit Pakistan, and he left for a country he knew nothing about. Once in Chikar, he met a local M.B.A. student, Afzel Makhdoom, who had just dragged his aunt out from under the rubble of his home. As soon as he could scrape together the money, Mr. Shea hired him. “I had never met an American before,” said Mr. Makhdoom, now 24. “My first impression was: They just want to kill Muslims; it’s an invasion, and they’ll never go back home. But now we want to keep this American here.”

Pakistan
Hospitals
Medicine and Health
Shea Todd
Disasters and Emergencies


Dominican Republic: Fearful Haitians Deported or Voluntarily Flee

Abstract: At least 350 Haitians and people of Haitian descent have either been expelled from the Dominican Republic or left on their own accord in recent days after two Dominicans were killed, said Lolo Sterne, coordinator for Haiti’s Office of Migration, on Monday. The two Dominicans were killed last week in the town of Neiba during what appeared to be a burglary, and a Dominican mob retaliated by killing a Haitian man. Migrant advocates said that many of those who were deported had gone to a police station seeking refuge, and that some volunteered to leave the country because they feared being victims of mob violence. Others left because the Dominican authorities rounded them up in the streets, migrant advocates added. The Dominican police said the people were not expelled from the country, but rather went to the police station because they feared reprisals and asked the authorities to escort them to the border so they could cross it themselves. Haiti and the Dominican Republic have had a volatile relationship as neighbors on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola.


Taliban Extending Reach Across Pakistan

Abstract: KARACHI, Pakistan — This seaside metropolis is no stranger to gangland violence, driven for years by a motley collection of armed groups who battle over money, turf and votes. But there is a new gang in town. Hundreds of miles from their homeland in the mountainous northwest, Pakistani Taliban fighters have started to flex their muscles more forcefully in parts of this vast city, and they are openly taking ground. Taliban gunmen have mounted guerrilla assaults on police stations, killing scores of officers. They have stepped up extortion rackets that target rich businessmen and traders, and shot dead public health workers engaged in polio vaccination efforts. In some neighborhoods, Taliban clerics have started to mediate disputes through a parallel judicial system. The grab for influence and power in Karachi shows that the Taliban have been able to extend their reach across Pakistan, even here in the country’s most populous city, with about 20 million inhabitants. No longer can they be written off as endemic only to the country’s frontier regions. In joining Karachi’s street wars, the Taliban are upending a long-established network of competing criminal, ethnic and political armed groups in this combustible city. The difference is that the Taliban’s agenda is more expansive — it seeks to overthrow the Pakistani state — and their operations are run by remote control from the tribal belt along the Afghan border. Already, the militants have reshaped the city’s political balance by squeezing one of the most prominent political machines, the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party, off its home turf. They have scared Awami operatives out of town and destroyed offices, gravely undercutting the party’s chances in national elections scheduled for May. “We are the Taliban’s first enemy,” said Shahi Syed, the party’s provincial head, at his newly fortified office. “They burn my offices, they tear down my flags and they kill our people.” The Taliban drift into Karachi actually began years ago, though much more quietly. Many fled here after a concerted Pakistani military operation in the Swat Valley in 2009. The influx has gradually continued, officials here say, with Taliban fighters able to easily melt into the city’s population of fellow ethnic Pashtuns, estimated to number at least five million people. Until recently, the militants saw Karachi as a kind of rear base, using the city to lie low or seek medical treatment, and limiting their armed activities to criminal fund-raising, like kidnapping and bank robberies. But for at least six months now, there have been signs that their timidity is disappearing. The Taliban have become a force on the street, aggressively exerting their influence in the ethnic Pashtun quarters of the city. Taliban tactics are most evident in Manghopir, an impoverished neighborhood of rough, cinder-block houses clustered around marble quarries on the northern edge of the city, where illegal housing settlements spill into the surrounding desert. In recent months, Taliban militants have attacked the Manghopir police station three times, killing eight officers, said Muhammad Aadil Khan, a local member of Parliament. In interviews, residents describe Taliban militants who roam on motorbikes or in jeeps with tinted windows, delivering extortion demands in the shape of two bullets wrapped in a piece of paper. A factory owner in Manghopir, speaking on the condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety, said that several Pashtun businessmen had received demands for $10,000 to $50,000. The figure was negotiable, he said, but payment was not: resistance could result in an assault on the victim’s house or, in the worst case, a bullet to the head. Mr. Khan said he had not dared to visit his constituency in months. “There is a personal threat against me,” he said, speaking at the headquarters of his party, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, which represents ethnic Mohajirs, in the city center. The militant drive has even distressed Manghopir’s most revered residents: the dozens of crocodiles who inhabit a pool near a Sufi shrine here. The Muslim pilgrims who come here to pay homage to the shrine’s saint have long also brought scraps of meat for his reptile charges. But lately, as visitor numbers have dwindled from hundreds per day to barely a few dozen, the roughly 120 crocodiles here have grown hungry, according to the animals’ elderly caretaker. Police officials, militant sources and Pashtun residents say that three major Taliban factions operate in Karachi — the most powerful one, which is rooted in South Waziristan and dominated by the Mehsud tribe, and two others from the Swat and Mohmand areas. A senior city police officer, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that militant commanders with those factions send operational orders to Karachi from the tribal belt; while some captured militants have tried to justify their activities by citing the authorization of religious clerics in the northwest. In cases, he added, regular criminal groups have posed as Taliban fighters in a bid to increase their power of intimidation. Just why the Taliban are adopting such an aggressive profile in Karachi right now is unclear. Some cite the greater number of militants fleeing Pakistani military operations in the northwest; others say it may be the product of dwindling funds, as jihadi donors in the Persian Gulf states turn to the Middle East. In any event, it has shaken the city’s bloody ethnic politics. Since the 1980s, armed supporters of the Mohajir-dominated Muttahida Qaumi Movement have engaged in tit-for-tat violence with those of the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party. In the worst periods, dozens of people have died in a day. Now, faced with a common enemy, figures in both parties say they have declared an uneasy, unofficial truce. As well as the attack on the Awami party — which have seen it close 44 of its district offices across the city — the Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility for two attacks on the Muttahida Qaumi Movement — first, a bombing that killed four people, then the assassination of a party parliamentarian. In a recent interview with The New York Times in North Waziristan, the Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said the group was targeting both parties — as well as President Asif Ali Zardari’s Pakistan Peoples Party — for their “liberal” policies. The security forces, shaken out of complacency, have begun a number of major anti-Taliban operations. The latest of those occurred on March 23 when hundreds of paramilitary Rangers raided a residential area in Manghopir, near the crocodile shrine, confiscating a cache of more than 50 weapons and rounding up 200 people, 16 of whom were later identified as militants and detained. “I don’t think the Taliban would like to set Karachi aflame, because they fear the reaction against them,” said Ikram Seghal, a security consultant in Karachi. “The police and intelligence agencies have very good information about them.” Other factors limit the Pakistani Taliban’s ingress into Karachi. One of the more provocative ones is that allied militants — particularly the Afghan Taliban — might not like the added publicity. The Afghan wing has long used the city as place to rest and resupply. There are longstanding rumors that the movement’s leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar, is taking shelter here, and that his leadership council, known as the Quetta Shura, has met in Karachi. In such a vast and turbulent city, the Taliban may become just another turf-driven gang. But without a determined response from the security forces, experts say, they could also seek to become much more.

Taliban
Pakistan
Karachi
Pashtun
Awami National Party
Muttahida Qaumi Movement
Terrorism


New York State Court of Appeals Upholds Ruling That Lap Dancing Can Be Taxed

Abstract: Nite Moves, a strip club in Latham, N.Y., may have mastered the moves needed to extract dollar bills from its customers. But it had trouble with the moves that would block state tax officials from extracting dollar bills from its own bank account. A lot of dollar bills — 124,921, to be exact. The state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, ruled on Tuesday that the lap dances performed at Nite Moves were not “dramatic or musical arts performances,” as Nite Moves had argued. The 4-to-3 decision said that Nite Moves did not qualify for the kind of tax exemption that ballet companies and Broadway producers are allowed to claim. The case began in 2005, when the state Department of Taxation and Finance audited the club and demanded sales taxes on cover charges and “performance fees” collected. The majority on Tuesday upheld a ruling by the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court that said Nite Moves had failed to prove that what took place in its “so-called ‘private rooms’ ” were “choreographed performances.” Geoffrey Gloak, a state tax department spokesman, said he was “pleased” with the ruling “because it gives similar businesses clear guidance on the issue of sales tax when it comes to live exotic dance establishments.” Stephen Dick Jr., an owner of the club, called the decision “disappointing” and said that the judges had opened a “constitutional can of worms.” The club’s lawyer, W. Andrew McCullough, said he would probably ask the United States Supreme Court to hear the case. But he said there was a more immediate concern: another tax audit, this time with $400,000 at stake. Judge Robert S. Smith, in a dissenting opinion, said the majority had “implicitly defined ‘choreographic performance’ to mean ‘highbrow dance’ or ‘dance worthy of a five-syllable adjective.’ ” He countered that the state regulation in question “assumes that ‘choreography’ includes all ‘dance routines’ — it does not matter what kind of dancing is being done.” The judge also said that he himself was “stuffy enough” to find exotic dancing “distasteful.” “Perhaps for similar reasons,” he wrote, “I do not read Hustler magazine; I would rather read The New Yorker. I would be appalled, however, if the state were to exact from Hustler a tax that The New Yorker did not have to pay, on the ground that what appears in Hustler is insufficiently ‘cultural and artistic.’ That sort of discrimination on the basis of content would surely be unconstitutional.”

New York State
Dancing
Strip Clubs and Strippers
Decisions and Verdicts
Tax Credits Deductions and Exemptions
Sales and Excise Taxes
Nite Moves (Latham NY)


E.P.A. Seeks Stricter Rules to Curb Smog

Abstract: WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday proposed a stricter standard for smog-causing pollutants that would bring substantial health benefits to millions of Americans while imposing large costs on industry and local governments. The standard would replace one set by the Bush administration in March 2008, which has been challenged in court by state officials and environmental advocates as too weak to adequately protect human health and the environment. The Obama administration’s proposal sets a primary standard for ground-level ozone of no more than 0.060 to 0.070 parts per million, to be phased in over two decades. Regions with the worst smog pollution, including much of the Northeast, Southern and Central California and the Chicago and Houston areas, would have more time than other areas to come into compliance. The new rule would replace the standard of 0.075 parts per million imposed by the Bush administration over the objection of an E.P.A. scientific panel, which wanted a tighter limit. The previous standard of 0.084 parts per million was set in 1997 by the Clinton administration. The Obama administration is also proposing a secondary smog standard that would vary with the seasons to protect plants and trees from repeated exposure. The agency estimated that complying with the new standard would cost $19 billion to $90 billion a year by 2020, to be largely borne by manufacturers, oil refiners and utilities. But the agency said that those costs would be offset by the benefits to human health, which it valued at $13 billion to $100 billion a year in the same period. The new standard would force hundreds of counties that meet the current law to take costly steps to get back into compliance. Under the current standard of 0.075 parts per million, 322 counties of the 675 that monitor ozone levels are out of compliance. If the 0.070 limit is adopted, 515 counties would be out of compliance. Only 15 of the 675 monitored counties now meet the 0.060 standard. In areas that do not meet the new standards, state and local governments will have to impose regulations to reduce the pollutants that produce smog, using technologies that have already cut such emissions from smokestacks, tailpipes and manufacturing plants, or new technology as yet uninvented. The nearly 40-year history of the Clean Air Act has shown that science — and the threat of costly penalties — have given industry the tools and incentive to find ways to cut ozone-producing gases. Penalties for noncompliance include fines and loss of federal highway financing. Agency analysts project that if the stricter standard is adopted, as many as 12,000 premature deaths per year from heart or lung diseases could be avoided, along with thousands of cases of bronchitis , asthma and nonfatal heart attacks. “E.P.A. is stepping up to protect Americans from one of the most persistent and widespread pollutants we face,” Lisa P. Jackson , the agency’s administrator, said in a statement. “Smog in the air we breathe poses a very serious health threat, especially to children and individuals suffering from asthma and lung disease . It dirties our air, clouds our cities and drives up our health care costs across the country.” Smog or ground-level ozone is not emitted by a single source, but is, according to the E.P.A., formed by a reaction of nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide and methane in the presence of sunlight. The main sources of these pollutants are power plants and factories, fumes from volatile solvents, vehicles emissions and gasoline vapors. Smog is worse in the summer because of heat and sunlight, and can travel hundreds of miles from its source and affect small towns, rural communities and wilderness areas. The leader of an association of air-quality enforcement agencies welcomed the proposal. “This is exactly what states and localities have advocated for 30 years,” said S. William Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies. “This will not be easy to achieve, whichever number the E.P.A. ultimately chooses, but it’s a decision that will ensure that public health is protected with an adequate margin of safety.” Mr. Becker also said that the projected costs of compliance were likely to be lower than the agency’s estimate. “And the benefits will likely trump the costs many times over,” he said. The American Petroleum Institute , the oil companies’ chief lobby, criticized the proposal as costly and likely to be ineffective. The group said there was no new scientific basis for changing the standard set at the end of the Bush administration. “To do so is an obvious politicization of the air-quality standard-setting process that could mean unnecessary energy cost increases, job losses and less domestic oil and natural gas development and energy security,” the group said in a statement issued minutes after the agency’s announcement. The trade association for electric utilities, the Edison Electric Institute, reacted warily. “We probably won’t know for a couple of years just what utilities and other emissions sources will be required to do in response to a tighter ozone standard,” said John Kinsman, the institute’s senior director for the environment. “States will have to cast a very wide net when targeting sources for emissions cuts, in part because utilities already have made substantial reductions in ozone-related emissions.” The E.P.A. will take public comment on the proposal for 60 days and expects to issue a final rule in August with a single standard between 0.060 and 0.070 parts per million. By the end of 2013, states must submit plans showing how areas that do not attain the new standard will be brought into compliance. The new rules would be phased in between 2014 and 2031, with deadlines depending on how dirty the air is in a given region. Frank O’Donnell of Clean Air Watch, an advocacy group, said that the ozone rule was the most significant environmental action the Obama administration was likely to take this year. “This will ultimately mean cleaner air all across America,” Mr. O’Donnell said. “This is going to drive pollution control into the next decade and beyond.”


‘Alternative Facts’ and the Costs of Trump-Branded Reality

Abstract: When Donald J. Trump swore the presidential oath on Friday, he assumed responsibility not only for the levers of government but also for one of the United States’ most valuable assets, battered though it may be: its credibility. The country’s sentimental reverence for truth and its jealously guarded press freedoms, while never perfect, have been as important to its global standing as the strength of its military and the reliability of its currency. It’s the bedrock of that “American exceptionalism” we’ve heard so much about for so long. Disinformation was for dictatorships, banana republics and failed states. Yet there it was on Saturday, emanating from the lectern of the White House briefing room — the official microphone of the United States — as Mr. Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, used his first appearance there to put forth easily debunked statistics¹ that questioned the news media’s reporting on the size of the president’s inaugural audience (of all things). Video President Trump and his press secretary disputed estimates of attendance at his inauguration, but footage from Friday’s event, compared with those from President Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration, showed a different story. Credit Credit Left, Lucas Jackson, Right, Stelios Varias/Reuters Mr. Spicer was picking up on the message from his boss, who made false claims² about news coverage earlier that day as he declared a “running war” with the news media during a visit to the Central Intelligence Agency, whose most solemn duty is to feed vital and true information to presidents as they run actual wars. It was chilling when Mr. Trump’s assertion that reporters were “among the most dishonest people on earth” became an applause line for the crowd gathered to hear him speak in front of the memorial to fallen agents at C.I.A. headquarters. Still more chilling was when the White House senior adviser Kellyanne Conway appeared on “Meet the Press” on Sunday to assert that Mr. Spicer’s falsehoods were simply “alternative facts.” Ms. Conway made no bones about what she thought of the news media’s ability to debunk those “alternative facts” in a way Americans — especially Trump-loving Americans — would believe. “You want to talk provable facts?” she said to the moderator, Chuck Todd. “Look — you’ve got a 14 percent approval rating in the media, that you’ve earned. You want to push back on us?” (She appeared to be referring to a Gallup poll figure related to Republicans’ views.) And really, there it was: an apparent animating principle of Mr. Trump’s news media strategy since he first began campaigning. That strategy has consistently presumed that low public opinion of mainstream journalism (which Mr. Trump has been only too happy to help stoke) creates an opening to sell the Trump version of reality, no matter its adherence to the facts. As Mr. Trump and his supporters regularly note, whatever he did during the campaign, it was successful: He won. His most ardent supporters loved the news media bashing. And the complaints and aggressive fact-checking by the news media played right into his hands. He portrayed it as just so much whining and opposition from yet another overprivileged constituency of the Washington establishment. But will tactics that worked in the campaign work in the White House? History is littered with examples of new administrations that quickly found that the techniques that served them well in campaigns did not work well in government. And if they do work, what are the long-term costs to government credibility from tactical “wins” that are achieved through the aggressive use of falsehoods? Whatever they are, Mr. Trump should realize that it could hurt his agenda more than anything else. Image Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, leaving a briefing on Saturday. He used his first appearance to put forth easily debunked facts. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times There’s a reason George W. Bush’s adviser Karen Hughes told the newly promoted Bush press secretary, Scott McClellan, in 2003, “Your most important job, in my view, will be to make sure the president maintains his credibility with the American people.” “‘It’s one of his greatest strengths,”’ Mr. McClellan quoted Ms. Hughes as saying in his autobiography, “What Happened.’’ Mr. McClellan’s book chronicles how Mr. Bush staked that credibility on the false rationale for the Iraq invasion — that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction — and ultimately lost the confidence of Americans, hobbling him for the rest of his presidency. But the damage wasn’t isolated to Mr. Bush’s political standing. To this day, the American intelligence community must contend with lingering questions about its own credibility — to wit, taunts from Moscow (not to mention from Mr. Trump ) that assessments pointing to Russian meddling in the presidential election are questionable. After all, wasn’t it wrong about Iraq? There’s a big difference in importance between the size of Mr. Trump’s inaugural audience and the intelligence that led to war, no question. And, as the former Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer noted in a conversation with me on Sunday, it’s way too early to say whether Mr. Spicer’s weekend performance will be the norm. The Trump team’s emotions were raw over the weekend, Mr. Fleischer noted, after a mistaken pool report was sent to the rest of the White House press corps, claiming that Mr. Trump had removed a bust of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office. Zeke Miller , the Time magazine journalist who had written the report, quickly corrected it and apologized when the White House alerted him to the error. “It rightly leaves the people inside feeling that ‘reporters were opposed to us all along for being racist and the first thing they did was imply we were,’” Mr. Fleischer said. Still, the weekend’s events did not arrive in a vacuum. There was the report last week in The Washington Post that the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, known for high standards of accuracy, was selling a commemorative book about Mr. Trump riddled with questionable notions, such as that Hillary Clinton deserved more blame than Mr. Trump did for the so-called birther campaign questioning Mr. Obama’s citizenship. (After that report, the museum said it was removing the book pending an investigation into whether it met standards for accuracy.) The administration’s decision to eradicate nearly any reference to “climate change” on the White House website could be expected given Mr. Trump’s promises to overturn his predecessors’ climate policies. But it set off concerns among climate scientists that it would extend to valuable government data — fears that also apply to the sanctity of other administration-controlled data . (Mr. Fleischer, for one, noted that career bureaucrats would blow the whistle on any moves to manipulate government data.) Then there is the central information center of any White House: the pressroom. On Thursday, Jim Hoft, the founder of The Gateway Pundit, said the White House was giving his site an official press credential . The Gateway Pundit promoted hoaxes such as one alleging that protesters in Austin, Tex., were bused in by the liberal donor George Soros. (The originator of that story told The New York Times that his assertions were not supported by fact.) The White House has not confirmed that it will credential Gateway Pundit, but Mr. Hoft’s announcement stoked anxiety among traditional reporters that the new administration will pack the pressroom with sympathetic organizations willing to promote falsehoods — or, perhaps, “alternative facts.” It’s one thing if that creates a false feedback loop about the size of an inauguration crowd — and quite another if it does so about a more important national security matter, as the CNN chief national security correspondent, Jim Sciutto , said over the weekend. Mr. McClellan, the Bush press secretary, warned in an interview with me on Sunday that Mr. Spicer might come to regret it if reporters started to doubt the veracity of what he told them. “There will be tough times ahead — there are for every White House — and that’s when that credibility and trust is most important,” Mr. McClellan said. But more important, he said, when you’re at the White House lectern, “you’re speaking for the free world to some extent, and what ideals are you holding up for that free world?” There’s nothing exceptional about the ones that aren’t true.

Sean Spicer
Kellyanne Conway
Ari Fleischer
US Politics
News media,journalism
2016 Presidential Election
George W Bush
Donald Trump


Workers at Chrysler Approve Contract

Abstract: DETROIT, Oct. 27 — Members of the United Automobile Workers union narrowly approved a four-year contract with Chrysler , the union said Saturday, clearing the way for talks to move forward at the Ford Motor Company . Approval of the Chrysler contract came after one of the most tumultuous votes in recent memory. Some local union officials opposed the agreement, reached on Oct. 10 after a six-hour strike. It looked to be in danger when workers at four assembly plants rejected the contract in votes last weekend. Opponents voiced concerns that the contract did not provide as many guarantees of future work as a similar contract approved by workers at General Motors earlier this month, after a two-day strike. Still, the Chrysler contract gained support at smaller plants as well as four big factories in Detroit. On Saturday, the union said 56 percent of hourly workers and 51 percent of skilled trades workers approved the agreement. The last plant to vote on the contract was Chrysler’s factory in Belvidere, Ill., which defeated the agreement by a vote of 55 percent no to 45 percent yes. But the contract’s margin of victory before the Belvidere vote was enough for it to pass. Union leaders acknowledged the close vote. “Our members had to face some tough choices, and we had a solid, democratic debate about this contract,” the union’s president, Ron Gettelfinger, said in a statement. In a statement, Chrysler’s co-president, Thomas W. LaSorda, said the company was “pleased that our U.A.W. employees recognize that the new agreement meets the needs of the company and its employees by providing a framework to improve our long-term manufacturing competitiveness.” Mr. Gettelfinger and the union’s vice president for Chrysler, General Holiefield, made an intense push for ratification over the last few days. Several local leaders credited Mr. Holiefield’s efforts, in particular, for the contract’s approval. There has not been a defeat of a contract at a Detroit auto company since 1982, when Chrysler workers rejected a deal that did not fully restore concessions they granted when the company was close to bankruptcy in 1979. “There’s no question this was a difficult set of negotiations during difficult times for the U.S. auto industry,” Mr. Holiefield said in the union’s statement. The most difficult times, however, may be at Ford, the last company that will negotiate a new deal with the union. Ford had pushed hard to go first in the negotiations, which would have given it the most leverage to devise a contract according to its needs. Instead, the company will now face pressure to accept the terms of the agreements at G.M. and Chrysler, a practice called “pattern bargaining.” Ford is expected to follow the “essence of the pattern,” said David L. Gregory, a professor of labor law at St. John’s University in Queens. However, “there’s going to have to be more flexibility because of Ford’s predicament,” he said. Ford is in the worst shape of the Detroit auto companies. It lost $12.6 billion in 2006 and does not expect to earn money in North America until 2009. It is in the midst of a revamping plan called the Way Forward, which will include closing plants and eliminating 30,000 jobs. Last year, Ford borrowed $23 billion by pledging virtually all of its assets, including plants, divisions and even its blue-oval logo as collateral. It has also put its Jaguar and Land Rover divisions up for sale, and is expected to receive bids for them by Tuesday. That money is meant to pay for its reorganization as well as the development of new products. Even so, Ford officials say they can afford the contract’s primary feature, a health care trust that will assume responsibility for the company’s liability for current and retired workers’ benefits. However, Ford officials are said to be reluctant to make the same guarantees for future investments that G.M. made in its contract, especially since it has not named all the plants it will shut as part of its makeover. Chrysler also was reluctant to give specific assurances, and it saw its contract voted down at plants like its St. Louis South factory, where no decision has been made about future work. In order to avoid the same turbulence, “the company may have to make extravagant promises that it really can’t fulfill,” Mr. Gregory said. Still, the union goes to Ford on familiar terms. Mr. Gettelfinger came up through Ford’s ranks, starting with his first job at the company’s Louisville truck plant. He ran the union’s Ford department before becoming the union’s president. The union’s chief bargainer, Bob King, was president of its biggest local in Dearborn, Mich., which includes the sprawling Rouge complex as well as the Dearborn assembly plant. Given what happened at Chrysler, the leaders will move quickly to persuade Ford workers to support a deal, said Richard Block, acting director of the School of Labor and Industrial Relations at Michigan State University. “They won’t make the same mistake twice,” he said.

United Automobile Workers
Automobiles
Strikes
Chrysler LLC
Organized Labor
Ford Motor Co


New Yorkers Offer the State Ideas to Save Cash

Abstract: Week to week. That’s how the great state of New York is making do during these sorry days of fiscal ridiculousness. Since the state has seen fit to get along without an annual budget, an emergency spending bill gets approved every week authorizing just enough money to enable New York to squeeze through the next seven days. One of these weeks, well, who knows, it could get close. There might not be enough cash to do the wash or feed the dog. Millions of people, though, live week to week — and most have at some point in their life — covering the bills they must, putting off others until next week or until they can get on a plane to Bulgaria. Let’s face it, some people on really thin incomes live hour to hour. So there must be plenty of ripe ideas out there that could help the state in these ticklish times. Sure, there are the obvious ones. Skip some meals. Sit in the dark as much as possible. Play the French horn on the subway. The state almost certainly has tried these. But what else? Well, you wring revenue from every conceivable inch of space. For instance, a 31-year-old advertising man rents out the closet in his one-bedroom apartment in Downtown Brooklyn. He didn’t want to be identified, because he figured it was illegal. It’s a nice size for a closet: 54 square feet. But the rent is $850. People don’t necessarily enjoy living in closets for lengthy periods for $850 a month, but there are always replacements. “In the past year, I’ve had six different roommates,” he said. “Most of them were nice.” Josh Intrator, 25, who does layout for a financial magazine and lives in Bushwick, Brooklyn, pilfers toilet paper from bars and restaurants. He and his roommates use paper towels as coffee filters. “For a while, I didn’t want to spend money on food and all I had in the house was old spaghetti,” he said. “So every morning I’d make spaghetti omelets. Man, it was gross.” The other day, the City Room blog invited readers to submit money-saving tips, and some promising ones were put forth. One notion from a graduate student was to doctor the checks you send by poking tiny holes with a pin where the account numbers appear. Then the check-reading machines won’t be able to read the check, delaying the processing time. The same person also mentioned “a friend who lives in a very expensive city, with high fees to register cars and high insurance . But he has kept his cars registered at a rural address many hundreds of miles away.” Maybe the state can pretend it’s actually Oklahoma and get its insurance rates reduced a lot. A few people who were pressed for workable concepts mentioned trying to pass bills on surreptitiously. When the cable bill comes, for instance, you mix it with the neighbor’s mail, hope they don’t notice and then they wind up paying it. Perhaps New York could palm off a few bills on Rhode Island. Then there’s the old routine of borrowing a cup of sugar from the lady next door. No harm in New York asking if it could borrow Connecticut’s state police. Bartering makes a lot of sense. A freelance tattoo artist in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, does tattoos in exchange for goods, and it all works out nicely. “I tattooed the waiter in one of my favorite restaurants for occasional free meals,” he said. He’s also done tattoos in exchange for comic books, electric guitar pedals and a copy of “Moby-Dick.” A 41-year-old man in Queens is getting married in two weeks, and you know how costly weddings get. So he scheduled it for a Thursday, saving $10,000. But there was a drawback. Many of his family and friends can’t afford to take a day off from work and come. Sam Cate-Gumpert, 23, who works at a grocery store and lives in Bushwick, suggests hiding some cash so you forget you have it. Right after he gets paid, he stuffs $40 in his coat pockets. For the state to go on living week to week, even if it starts making use of these helpful ideas, is not something government observers consider especially praiseworthy. “It’s no way to run a state government with as proud a history as New York,” said Dick Dadey, the executive director of Citizens Union , the government watchdog group. “It has the sad consequence of people shaking their heads and tuning out, which is terrible for democracy. It creates an atmosphere of disgust and hopelessness,” he said. Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York , said, “It’s certainly better than having the state fall off a cliff,” but, she added, “It’s extremely unwise.” She pointed out how it becomes impossible for projects — a film, a new building, a road overhaul — to make any progress when the people involved do not know if they will be paid. As for the essential personnel whose salary gets approved only on a weekly basis, she said, “It absolutely saps the morale of people.” She was asked if she had indulged in any money-pinching maneuvers at some juncture in her life. “I would make different food choices,” she said. “I’d do more cooking, I’d bag my lunch. I suspect a lot of people are bagging their lunches in Albany.”


Led Zeppelin’s ‘Stairway to Heaven’ to Be Scrutinized in Court in Copyright Case

Abstract: Beyoncé is on tour , Drake is setting streaming records and Taylor Swift has split up with her boyfriend. But next week, the most gripping news for the music industry may come out of a federal courtroom in Los Angeles. There, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin will be defending themselves against a lawsuit claiming that parts of “Stairway to Heaven” — the band’s signature hit and a pillar of rock radio since the song’s release in 1971 — were copied from “Taurus,” an instrumental tune by the lesser-known group Spirit. The trial, set to start on June 14 with Mr. Page and Mr. Plant expected to be in attendance, may prove fascinating legal theater for fans. But it will also be closely watched by a music business that is grappling with a series of recent copyright decisions. Last year, a federal jury found that Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams had copied Marvin Gaye in Mr. Thicke’s 2013 hit song “Blurred Lines,” and ordered Mr. Thicke and Mr. Williams to pay $7.4 million (later reduced to $5.3 million). Industry commentators said the decision penalized elements of songs long thought of as being fair game, like the generic “feel” of a recording, and warned of a chilling effect on creativity. That case and others like it, lawyers and music executives say, have raised new questions about songwriting and copyright — issues long a part of the background of litigation in the industry. They have also led to increased scrutiny whenever a song’s credits are challenged or changed, as they were a year ago when co-writers were quietly added to Mark Ronson’s retro hit “Uptown Funk.” “It used to be that melody and lyrics were the basis of all infringement claims, but now that’s fuzzier,” said Jay Rosenthal, a music industry lawyer and the former general counsel of the National Music Publishers’ Association. “‘Blurred Lines’ has opened the door and made rhythm and beats and ‘feel’ perhaps proprietary, where before it was not the case.” The Led Zeppelin case was filed two years ago by a trustee representing the songs of Randy Wolfe, also known as Randy California, one of Spirit’s main songwriters, who died in 1997. But the dispute has echoes of “Blurred Lines” and is being watched as a test of the limits of copyright. The case focuses on the famous opening of “Stairway to Heaven,” in which an acoustic guitar plays arpeggiated chords in a descending pattern. That part, the suit contends, copied Spirit’s “Taurus,” released in 1968. In the suit’s complaint, Francis Malofiy, the lead lawyer representing the plaintiff, said that Led Zeppelin’s members heard Spirit’s song when the bands crossed paths on the road early in their careers. The suit, filed on behalf of Michael Skidmore, the trustee, accused Led Zeppelin of copyright infringement and the novel claim (duly struck down by the judge) of “falsification of rock ’n’ roll history.” Mr. Malofiy has said that he is seeking as much as $40 million in damages. Mr. Wolfe never pursued a lawsuit during his lifetime. But Mr. Skidmore, a customs consultant and former music journalist who has controlled Mr. Wolfe’s trust since 2009, filed the case in 2014, shortly after a Supreme Court ruling that said that copyright infringement cases could proceed even after long delays. Mr. Page and Mr. Plant deny ever having heard “Taurus” before the case came to light and say that “Stairway to Heaven” was written independently. Yet over the years, the band has settled numerous challenges of plagiarism by adding other songwriters’ credits to its albums. In 2012, for example, the band settled a suit by Jake Holmes over “Dazed and Confused,” and subsequent releases of the song on Led Zeppelin’s albums list it as being written by Mr. Page and “inspired by Jake Holmes.” Whatever happens with the Led Zeppelin trial, the industry is still trying to understand the effects of the “Blurred Lines” case, which is under appeal. Matt Pincus, the chief executive of Songs Music Publishing, an independent publisher that works with current pop and hip-hop acts like the Weeknd and Desiigner, said his company was seeing far more claims of infringement now — most made privately, outside of court — than ever before. But the reasons were not clear, he said. “It could be opportunism, because lawyers are smelling blood,” Mr. Pincus said. “But it could also be because we have moved to a real collaboration economy now, where pop records have multiple collaborators in a way that they didn’t five or six years ago.” Those collaborators may dispute credits or royalties after the fact. Richard S. Busch, the lawyer who represented the Gaye family in the “Blurred Lines” case, said that each copyright case succeeded or failed on its own merits, and he disputed the idea that his case has had any negative impact on the music industry. “The fact that maybe some people are being caught now that wouldn’t be, or are being pursued now that wouldn’t be, is not a bad thing,” Mr. Busch said. “But the idea that ‘Blurred Lines’ has opened up the floodgates is absurd, and I would suspect that those who are claiming this may have an agenda to take that position.” Donald S. Passman, a top music lawyer who wrote the book “All You Need to Know About the Music Business,” called the “Blurred Lines” case “aberrational” and suggested that its long-term impact may be minimal. “To me, it’s like you’re driving along the highway at 65 miles an hour at night,” Mr. Passman said. “You see an accident, slow down, and 15 minutes later, you’re back at full speed. It’s more like that.” The judge in the Led Zeppelin case, R. Gary Klausner of United States District Court, has ruled that the band’s past problems with copyright cannot be presented at trial, and Mr. Malofiy, the plaintiff’s lawyer, may face other challenges as well. Since the case focuses on songwriting, rather than on the recording of the song, the jury must base its decision on the written version of “Taurus” that was used to register its copyright. As in the “Blurred Lines” trial, the jury may hear versions of the two songs as presented by music experts retained by both sides. In a sideshow to the trial itself, the lawyers have been battling in public and through filings with the court. In the most recent volley, Mr. Malofiy accused Mr. Page and Mr. Plant of “refusing to appear” at the trial. But in a filing, Led Zeppelin’s lawyers, Peter J. Anderson and Helene Freeman, called Mr. Malofiy’s claims “a P.R. stunt in the hope of tainting the jury pool,” and said that Mr. Page and Mr. Plant would be present. Mr. Anderson and Ms. Freeman declined to comment. But in a brief interview, Mr. Malofiy called their most recent filing “100 percent bluster.” Led Zeppelin also argues that the commonalities between the songs are generic elements in musical composition that go back decades, and the core of the pieces in question are little more than a basic chord progression. But in denying the band’s request for summary judgment, Judge Klausner found that there was enough similarity to warrant a test at trial, in a phrase that could almost be an excerpt from a musicology textbook: “While it is true that a descending chromatic four-chord progression is a common convention that abounds in the music industry, the similarities here transcend the core structure.” A jury will decide just how similar they are.

Led Zeppelin
Stairway to Heaven
Copyrights
Music
Spirit Music Group


Japan Finds High Radioactive Materials in Spinach and Milk

Abstract: TOKYO — As Japan edged forward in its battle to contain the damage at its ravaged nuclear power plants on Saturday, the government said it had found higher than normal levels of radioactivity in spinach and milk at farms up to 90 miles away from the plants, the first confirmation that the unfolding nuclear crisis has affected the nation’s food supply. While officials played down the immediate risks to consumers, the findings further unsettled a nation worried about the long-term effects of the hobbled reactors. The Tokyo Electric Power Company , with help from the Japan Self-Defense Forces, police officers and firefighters, continued efforts to cool the damaged reactors on Saturday to try to stave off a full-scale fuel meltdown and contain the fallout. The latest plan involved running a mile-long electrical transmission line to Reactor No. 2 at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station to try to restore power to its cooling system. About 500 workers from the utility connected the power line on Saturday. They were checking the cooling system, which has been disabled since the earthquake and tsunami hit more than a week ago, and hoped to restart it on Sunday. Rescue workers using fire hoses doused Reactor No. 3 for almost 14 hours, stretching into early Sunday morning, spraying about 2,400 tons of water. Radiation levels appeared to fall at the reactors, where a pool of spent fuel rods was feared to be overheating, a Tokyo Fire Department official said Sunday. The spraying there resumed later Sunday, and 11 fire trucks began spraying Reactor No. 4 as well. The apparent progress offered a glimmer of hope after days of increasingly dire news that now includes contaminated food. Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, said that spinach and milk were the only products found to have abnormally high radiation levels. The level of radioactivity found in the spinach would, if consumed for a year, equal the radiation received in a single CAT scan, he said, while that detected in milk would amount to just a fraction of a CAT scan. “These levels do not pose an immediate threat to your health,” Mr. Edano said. “Please stay calm.” Still, Fukushima Prefecture asked all dairy farms within 18 miles of the nuclear plant on Saturday to halt all milk shipments. Officials also halted shipments of spinach from the entire prefecture. The milk with the elevated radiation levels was found in Fukushima Prefecture on farms about 19 miles from the nuclear plants. The contaminated spinach was found one prefecture to the south, in Ibaraki Prefecture, on farms 60 to 90 miles from the plants. Food safety inspectors said the iodine 131 in the tested milk was up to five times the level the government deems safe, and the spinach had levels more than seven times the safe level. The spinach also contained slightly higher than allowable amounts of cesium 137. Minuscule amounts of radioactive iodine were also detected in the water supply in Tokyo and its five surrounding prefectures. In Tokyo, about 170 miles from the Fukushima Daiichi plant, the level was less than 1 percent of that considered dangerous by the government. In Fukushima city, about 50 miles from the power plant, the levels were still below half of the legal limit. Iodine 131 and cesium 137 are two of the more dangerous elements that are feared to have been released from the plants in Fukushima. Iodine 131 can be dangerous to human health, especially if absorbed through milk and milk products, because it can accumulate in the thyroid and cause cancer. Cesium 137 can damage cells and lead to an increased risk of cancer. The iodine levels are well beyond what the Food and Drug Administration in the United States considers a cause for concern. But experts say Japan’s reassurances about food safety were probably accurate. Dr. Harold M. Swartz, a professor of medicine at Dartmouth who studies radiation exposure in people, said that the contamination levels were low and that the government’s advice was “probably reasonable.” But, he added, because people are so afraid of radiation, they are likely to avoid these foods altogether. Another expert, David J. Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University, said it “seems unnecessary to eat these” foods. “I wouldn’t,” Dr. Brenner said. That judgment was shared by Katsuko Sato, 76, who was shopping at a supermarket in central Tokyo on Saturday evening. She said she would stop buying spinach and, after watching Mr. Edano’s news conference, she called her family and friends to urge them not to, either. “I’m not going to believe the government because I don’t think only spinach from Ibaraki will be affected,” she said. A handful of vegetable-shop owners in Tokyo said they were concerned about the report, but continued to sell vegetables from Fukushima and Ibaraki because they had not been told to stop. Dr. Swartz said people consuming milk and produce, particularly children and pregnant women, should be taking potassium iodide, which saturates the thyroid gland with nonradioactive iodine, and prevents it from taking in the radioactive form. Children and fetuses have the highest risk of thyroid cancer from exposure to radioactive iodine. The Japanese authorities recommended Wednesday that people fleeing the 12-mile-radius evacuation zone start taking iodine pills. Dr. Swartz said the radiation levels detected so far were still much lower than those at Chernobyl, the nuclear plant that exploded in Ukraine in 1986 and is still the world’s worst nuclear accident. He said that in the United States food with similar levels of radiation would probably be taken off the market, but more for political and public relations reasons than for scientific or medical ones. The Japanese government is considering conducting more comprehensive tests of agricultural products from areas farther from the damaged reactors to address public anxiety about the food supply, Mr. Edano said. Health inspectors are still trying to determine whether any spinach had been shipped from the six farms in Ibaraki Prefecture, where the contaminated produce was found, said Taku Ohara, an official in the food safety division of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry. The tests were conducted Saturday. No contaminated milk had been shipped from the farm where higher than normal radioactive levels were detected. Mr. Ohara said Japan was particularly strict in determining what constituted safe radioactive levels. Leafy spinach is especially susceptible to absorbing radioactive material, he said. Asparagus, cucumbers, radishes, tomatoes and other vegetables are also grown in Fukushima, but have not been found to be contaminated. But only a small number of farms have been tested because officials have been overwhelmed in the wake of the earthquake, the tsunami and the nuclear crisis that followed, Mr. Ohara said. Though land-poor Japan imports much of its fruit, grain and soybeans, 79 percent of the vegetables eaten here are grown domestically. Japan is the largest net importer of food in the world. There have been no reports of contaminated fish or meat. Many of the ports, fleets and processing facilities in Tohoku, the area most affected by the tsunami and nuclear crisis, are so badly damaged that no fish or seafood from there has reached Tsukiji market in central Tokyo, according to the market’s general manager, Tsutomo Kosaka. The market handles 90 percent of the seafood for about 40 million consumers in the greater Tokyo area. Japan’s leading producers of premium beef, including the world-famous Kobe brand, said Saturday that they had not yet tested their cattle or feed. But they were nervous about the possible spread of radiation from Fukushima, and just as concerned that fear of radiation, even if it is unfounded, could damage the market for high-quality beef. While only spinach and milk were found to have elevated radiation levels, some countries have been testing food imports from Japan since the day after the quake and tsunami. In Hong Kong, for instance, 216 Japanese products passed food quality screenings, including meat, fish, fruits and vegetables. In Japan, consumers were also grappling with rolling blackouts ordered after damage to the reactors reduced the electricity supply in the greater Tokyo region. At the Fukushima plant, temperatures outside the four damaged reactors were lower than expected, Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa said Saturday, raising hopes that the nuclear fuel could be kept cool by spraying the reactors with water, while technicians worked on restoring power to the cooling systems. But Mr. Kitazawa was unable to confirm how hot it was inside the buildings, leaving open the possibility that nuclear fuel may still be overheating. Mr. Edano, the cabinet secretary, said, “Currently, we have a level of stabilization, but the situation remains volatile.” The National Police Agency said Sunday that there were 7,700 confirmed deaths so far because of the earthquake and tsunami on March 11, and more than 11,600 people remained missing. The authorities have said they expect the death toll to exceed 10,000.

Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (Japan)


Millrose Games Move Into New Era

Abstract: An event called the Millrose Games is being held in a 5,000-seat armory in Upper Manhattan on Saturday. Does that mean it is really the Millrose Games? “At first, I was thinking, ‘This is a joke,’ ” Eamonn Coghlan said in his Irish lilt. “But after I talked to people, I realized you have to keep the tradition going.” The Millrose Games were once the center of indoor track and field, and Coghlan was the most gloried name. He won the Wanamaker Mile — even that name comes tumbling out fast and euphonically — seven times, earning himself the nickname the Chairman of the Boards, for the steeped wooden oval track that circled cacophonous Madison Square Garden, where officials in tuxedos clicked their stopwatches. No tuxedos will be worn in Washington Heights on Saturday, but Coghlan will be there, honoring the current generation that runs around ovals in the middle of the winter. The Armory , west of Broadway at 168th Street, has become the shelter, the haven , for American indoor track, for the high school kids who take the subway, for the college kids who come by van. And it is kosher: while the track at the Garden is 11 laps to the mile, turning runners into hamsters on a wheel, the banked track at the Armory is eight laps to the mile, making it possible for world-level athletes to turn in times that reflect their ability. Plenty of them will be at the Armory on Saturday night. There is something to be said for modest-size places — like noisy, intimate Red Bull Arena in Harrison, N.J., with its 25,000 seats, where Major League Soccer is being carefully nurtured. Nothing looks worse than gaping empty seats. Coghlan goes back to the good times, when the Millrose Games packed the Garden, with bands blaring and celebrities preening. The Chairman of the Boards became a prince of the city with its green Irish streak. Now he is a senator , appointed last year as an at-large member of the Irish parliament, or Seanad . He is also active with the Children’s Memorial Research Foundation in Dublin, which will hold a fund-raising dinner Wednesday at the New York Athletic Club. At 59, Coghlan has enough aches and pains that he cycles and swims more than he runs — an occupational hazard for athletes. His son, John, who ran a sub-four-minute mile indoors in Boston in late January, will be running anchor for Dublin City University in the distance medley relay Saturday, which would be enough to draw Coghlan back from Ireland. But he has another reason: Bernard Lagat , an American originally from Kenya, who has won the Wanamaker Mile eight times, eclipsing Coghlan’s record. “I have to show my respect for Bernard,” Coghlan said the other day, adding: “I’ve no choice. They’re going to run the Wanamaker Mile.” In recent years, Coghlan and track fans watched as the Millrose Games failed to fill the Garden or draw television audiences, and the corporations stopped sponsoring the hallowed meet. “It was on life support,” said Dr. Norbert Sander , the internist and winner of the 1974 New York City Marathon , still the only resident of the city to win that event. He had helped upgrade the Armory after it fell upon hard times, trying to save the sport for high school and college athletes. The Armory also provides tutoring for athletes considering college. The Millrose Games were losing close to $500,000 per year, drawing only 9,611 fans in 2011, and after 98 years at the Garden, the Millrose board passed the event over to the Armory foundation . “It’s been really sad to see track deteriorate,” Coghlan said the other day. “It just died a death in front of your own very face.” USA Track and Field , the national federation, wanted the Millrose Games to remain at the Garden, and it held the U.S. Open Track and Field meet there on Jan. 28. The attendance was listed at 5,844 , but federation officials said they were pleased with the new start. Does big-time indoor track have a future? Sander said the model for indoor track and field in much of the world is a short season in arenas with approximately 5,000 seats. He and Ray Flynn, the great miler and now the meet director, have arranged a schedule packed with current stars capable of breaking records. “This sport is driven by performance,” Sander said Wednesday during lunch at Coogan’s , around the corner from the Armory, where jerseys from fabled track schools hang from the ceiling. Like any track buff, Sander is enthusiastic about the possibility of records on Saturday night, when current stars like LaShawn Merritt, Jenny Simpson, Sanya Richards-Ross and Matt Centrowitz will be competing. In keeping with the changing times, the meet will be streamed live starting at 4 p.m. — on YouTube. It’s what the younger generation is watching, Sander said. The uptown Millrose Games are also honoring the athletes who once made the Garden crowds roar. The high jumper John Thomas will be there. The Fordham star Tom Courtney will be there. And the Chairman of the Boards will be there, to see his son run but also to honor the Millrose Games themselves. “At first, it was very disappointing to hear the sad news,” Coghlan said of the shift uptown. “It will never be the same — never,” he added. “But you have to separate yourself from the nostalgia.” Some of the nostalgia is for the tuxedos. Sander thought they would be presumptuous in the new setting, but Howard Schmertz, the venerable meet director who will be in attendance, joked that tuxedos were pretentious in the Garden, too. Instead, officials will wear blue blazers and white shirts and special bright blue Millrose ties, picked out by Rita Finkel, the Armory’s director of business development. New Millrose traditions are being created, uptown.

Millrose Games
Armories
Track and Field
Madison Square Garden
USA Track and Field
Coghlan Eamonn
Lagat Bernard


Cameraman for British Network Is Killed in Cairo

Abstract: A veteran cameraman for the Britain-based news network Sky News was among the hundreds of people killed in Cairo on Wednesday. Other journalists described close calls in the streets, and several were detained by local authorities. The Sky News cameraman, Mick Deane, was working with a correspondent in Cairo, Sam Kiley, when he was shot. “Despite receiving medical treatment for his injuries, he died shortly afterward,” the network said in a statement. Sky News declined to elaborate on the circumstances, saying that an investigation was under way. Image Mick Deane, a cameraman for the Britain-based network Sky News, died Wednesday. Credit Sky News, via European Pressphoto Agency “In our attempt to show the world the horror at Rabaa today, we lost the heart of our team,” Tom Rayner, the Middle East news editor for Sky News, wrote on Twitter , making a reference to the site of a sit-in. He added: “I can’t find more words now. We love you Mick.” Mr. Deane was the first Western reporter to die on assignment in Egypt since the Committee to Protect Journalists started keeping such records in the early 1990s. This summer two local reporters — Salah al-Din Hassan of a news Web site called Shaab Masr and Ahmed Assem el-Senousy of a Muslim Brotherhood newspaper — died there. On Wednesday, Habiba Ahmed Abd Elaziz, a reporter for Xpress, a newspaper based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, was also killed ; the newspaper said she “was not on any official assignment and had gone to her home country on annual leave.” Late Wednesday, The Associated Press reported that Ahmed Abdel Gawad of the state-run newspaper Al Akhbar was also killed. Several other journalists were wounded by gunfire during the crackdown, including an unidentified A.P. photographer, who was able to resume work, and a Reuters photographer, Asmaa Waguih, who was shot in the foot. Reuters said Ms. Waguih was receiving treatment; a spokesman had no further details on her condition. In an e-mail, Stephen J. Adler, the editor in chief of Reuters, said, “We have the utmost respect for all the journalists who put themselves in harm’s way to bring us the news, video and pictures we see every day.” Video As Egyptian security forces in Cairo moved to end sit-ins by supporters of the ousted president, Mohamed Morsi, the international community urged all parties to exercise restraint. It was not immediately clear whether the reporters were targeted. Several others, including the Cairo bureau chief of The Washington Post, Abigail Hauslohner, suggested that the security forces disregarded their status as witnesses, not protesters. In a first-person account published on The Post’s Web site, Ms. Hauslohner said she and two of her colleagues were told by a police officer, “If I see you again, I’ll shoot you in the leg.” Mike Giglio, a reporter for Newsweek and The Daily Beast in Cairo, said he was assaulted and arrested by the police despite it being evident to them he was a working journalist; once at a detention center, other officers apologized to him and insisted it must have been an accident. “I think a big part of this is the product of the rabid information wars going on right now: Western journalists, and America in general, are being portrayed as enemies — by politicians, by anti-Morsi activists and in the state and private media,” Mr. Giglio said, referring to the ousted leader Mohamed Morsi. “People are being told not to trust the international press, because what it’s reporting doesn’t always fit with the government’s media narrative, and that narrative is extremely important to them right now. I think this is fueling intense paranoia and anger toward the international media in Egypt, and I think I saw an effect of that today, whatever else may have also been at play.”

Cairo
Sky News
Mick Deane
Egypt
Arab Spring
Fatalities,casualties
News media,journalism