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http://www.people.com/article/kim-richards-leaves-rehab-daughter-bridal-shower | http://web.archive.org/web/20150518035317id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/kim-richards-leaves-rehab-daughter-bridal-shower | Kim Richards Out of Rehab for Daughter Brooke's Bridal Shower : People.com | 20150518035317 | 05/15/2015 AT 08:25 PM EDT
stepped out for her daughter Brooke Brinson's bridal shower days after police filed charges stemming from her April arrest.
star smiles in an Instagram her sister Kathy Hilton posted to Instagram Thursday. The photo shows the women flanking Brinson, who is set to marry Thayer Wiederhorn.
"Kim is so excited for her daughter's wedding next weekend. She wouldn't miss it," a source close to Richards tells PEOPLE. "As of recently, the plan was for her to go back to rehab afterwards."
– public intoxication, resisting arrest and battery on an officer – on Monday. It all started April 16, when she
at the Beverly Hills Hotel after drinking and driving.
"The family isn't surprised about the charges," the source tells PEOPLE. "They were expecting them. Everyone just wants Kim to be healthy."
Throughout the past season of
, the former child actress insisted she was sober despite her erratic behavior on screen. She fought with costars, including sister
, over the accusations. (The source says Kim and Kyle are still not speaking.)
that aired April 28, Richards admitted she needed help but declined the talk show host's offer to pay for her treatment at a Malibu center. PEOPLE has learned that she | The reality star's sister Kathy Hilton posted an Instagram from the bash | 19.615385 | 0.846154 | 1.923077 | medium | medium | mixed |
http://www.nytimes.com/1964/01/20/new-york-choral-society-gives-17thcentury-work-a-premiere.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150521033933id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1964/01/20/new-york-choral-society-gives-17thcentury-work-a-premiere.html | New York Choral Society Gives 17th'Century Work a Premiere | 20150521033933 | The resurrection of baroque music continues, and last night in Town Hall the New York Choral Society, conducted by Martin Josman, gave the premiere here of Marc'Antoine Charpentier's mass and symphony, “Assumpta est Maria,” 265 years after it was first performed in Paris.
The score was paired with another baroque work, Vivaldi's “Gloria.” This is from the following century and has become fairly well known since its re'vival in modern times in 1939.
The 17th'century Charpentier, whose music was obscured by that of his famous contemporary Lully, is beginning to win recognition in this century with the unearthng of some of his work. He was largely trained in Rome, and that is reflected to I some degree in his music with all its Italianate grace of melody.
The mass and symphony is just that, an alternation of instrumental and vocal sections. The vocal sections, in turn, set off chorus and ensembles for two to six solo voices against aarh nihnr
The work begins soberly and solidly, but it does not assert much individuality untTh it reaches the Credo. Here, the music begins to take on a sweetness and radiance that
By contrast the Vivaldi “Gloria” is a hearty, striking score, bold and bright in its writing for chorus, instruments and two soloists. It makes as strong an impact today as it probably did in its own time.
The performances by the ? voice chorus and a small group of string and wind players (plus the player of a positive organ) were lovely. They were unforced and fresh in tone, clear in texture, flexible in rhythm. Mr. Josman's tempos struck a happy medium, relaxed without being slack or brisk without being pushed.
Crail Conner, soprano, and Joan Caplan, mezzo‐soprano were soloists in both works, with Miss Conner's pretty voice making. a fine effect in her appearances. The male soloists—all satisfactory—in the Charpentier were Earnest Murphy, counter‐tenor; DavidDDodds, tenor; Gene Boucher, baritone, and Norman Riggins, bassbaritone. R. E.
This article can be viewed in its original form. Please send questions and feedback to archive_feedback@nytimes.com | NY Choral Soc | 137.666667 | 0.333333 | 0.333333 | high | low | abstractive |
http://fortune.com/2015/05/19/mini-phone-kickstarter/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150521081027id_/http://fortune.com/2015/05/19/mini-phone-kickstarter/ | The Light Phone: a new option for smart phone haters | 20150521081027 | Smart phones are ubiquitous in modern life. But if you’re the type of person who hates having to carry around a mini-computer in your pocket, a new Kickstarter campaign has a solution.
The Light Phone is a credit card-sized device that does nothing but make phone calls. No games, no texts, and no Twitter that you incessantly check up on (the writer of this article has certainly been guilty of that before.) It can piggyback onto your smartphone service so that you don’t have to go completely cold turkey.
But you can at least leave the house with no access to social media while still being able to make and receive emergency calls.
The phone has its own number. But it also connects to an app that can forward all calls from your pre-existing number. The device also has a simple clock, a touch pad for entering numbers and 20 days of battery life.
In theory, buying a simple flip phone or burner phone could achieve the same goal. The Light Phone, though, is much thinner (seriously, you can fit it in your wallet) and in theory easier to connect to your existing number.
Here’s a video from the Kickstarter:
The Light Phone costs $100 to pre-order. The project has already gotten more than $120,000 in backing, and is looking to raise $200,000 by June 27. The phones are expected to ship in May 2016. The phone comes with a SIM card with 500 minutes and a mini USB charger.
Fore more about Kickstarter, watch this Fortune video: | This new phone is perfect for when you want to mostly disconnect. | 23.846154 | 0.615385 | 0.769231 | medium | low | abstractive |
http://www.people.com/article/dancing-stars-finale-results-winner | http://web.archive.org/web/20150521184245id_/http://www.people.com/article/dancing-stars-finale-results-winner | And the Winner Is ... : People.com | 20150521184245 | Bruno Tonioli, Carrie Ann Inaba and Len Goodman of Dancing with the Stars
05/20/2015 AT 01:25 AM EDT
After 10 weeks, 13 episodes and a two-hour finale highlighting them all,
season 20 is officially in the books, dance fans. And as usual, it was a season filled with countless incredible dances and a handful of painful ones, stars that made us roll our eyes and stars that made us cry, rewarding victories and astonishing exits, medical miracles and plenty of gratuitous Chmerkovskiy chest.
Before we get to the final fusion dances and the last, agonizing three minutes, let's take a look at that jam-packed first hour.
10 Years of Dancing with the Stars
PEOPLE's 10 Years of Dancing with the Stars | The results are in! | 29.2 | 0.4 | 0.4 | medium | low | abstractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/01/us/physician-provides-a-reassuring-voice.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075325id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/01/us/physician-provides-a-reassuring-voice.html | PHYSICIAN PROVIDES A REASSURING VOICE | 20150524075325 | WASHINGTON, March 31— The calm, authoritative voice of Dennis S. O'Leary greeted the nation on television this morning with a report on President Reagan that constituents could appreciate.
''I wouldn't encourage him to put in an 18-hour day,'' the doctor said in a direct and gentle tone, ''but I am sure that he can attend to the important matters of government today.''
In the 24 hours after the attempt on the President's life, Dr. O'Leary provided the dominant voice of reassurance to the nation, offering accurate details in layman's terms that helped calm the situation after a period of misinformation.
''I'm not surprised - that's his natural milieu in a crisis situation,'' said Dr. Margaret O'Leary, his wife, who was working in the emergency room at George Washington University Hospital last night as her husband went on television with the news that Mr. Reagan had ''sailed through'' his operation. Gathering Anecdotes for Nation
This morning Dr. O'Leary was back in the President's tightly guarded room in the fourth-floor intensive care unit, checking with the patient and his attending physicians and gathering anecdotal as well as medical detail for the sudden emergency task of reporting to the nation on the President's competency.
''Dennis is always under control,'' said a friend, Franc Ferraraccio, executive vice president of the Medical Society of the District of Columbia, who said he had been inundated with compliments and inquiries from medical people. ''The callers were impressed by what they saw on TV,'' Mr. Ferraraccio said. ''Dennis was handling a high-powered crowd in a stressful situation. He's a cool, collected and highly intelligent individual.''
Dr. O'Leary was rushed into the limelight because of his position as the hospital's dean for clinical affairs, an administrative job that bridges the concerns of physicians, medical students and patients at the 512-bed institution. Convenient to Travel Route
And the choice of his hospital was not a result of chance but of its proximity to the President's travel route yesterday, according to Secret Service and White House officials.
Once Jerry Parr, the Secret Service agent in charge of the President's detail, pushed Mr. Reagan into his limousine and shouted, ''Take off!'' at the driver, and once Mr. Reagan had indicated he was having difficulty breathing, the destination - the hospital, 10 blocks away -was part of predetermined emergency plans, according to John W. Warner Jr., spokesman for the Secret Service.
By coincidence, White House aides also obtained a medical spokesman pronounced invaluable by officials who had been badly harried by misinformation.
Dr. O'Leary is a 43-year-old teacher and specialist in both internal medicine and hematology, who in recent years has become interested in the administrative and public-policy aspects of medicine. He studied health systems management at Harvard Business School six years ago. Flowers From the President
The hospital staff beamed today when the Secret Service delivered a big bouquet of gladiolas and tulips to the operating room as an expression of the President's gratitude.
Dr. O'Leary, the grandson of a physician and the son of a magazine writer, Theodore O'Leary, received a B.A. from Harvard in 1960 and an M.D. from Cornell University in 1964. He interned at the University of Minnesota Hospital, was chief resident in medicine at Strong Memorial Hospital, and studied hematology at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
Dr. O'Leary has three children -daughters Emily, 16, and Morgan, 9, and son Dennis, 15 - from his first marriage, which ended in divorce. He remarried a year ago, and he and his wife expect their first child any day.
Illustrations: Photo of Donald Riggs and Dennis O'Leary | The calm, authoritative voice of Dennis S. O'Leary greeted the nation on television this morning with a report on President Reagan that constituents could appreciate. ''I wouldn't encourage him to put in an 18-hour day,'' the doctor said in a direct and gentle tone, ''but I am sure that he can attend to the important matters of government today.'' In the 24 hours after the attempt on the President's life, Dr. O'Leary provided the dominant voice of reassurance to the nation, offering accurate details in layman's terms that helped calm the situation after a period of misinformation. | 6.084746 | 0.966102 | 28.79661 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/01/sports/bevy-of-challengers-for-83-cup.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075345id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/01/sports/bevy-of-challengers-for-83-cup.html | BEVY OF CHALLENGERS FOR '83 CUP | 20150524075345 | The lure of breaking the longest winning streak in sports, the United States' 130-year grasp on the America's Cup, is proving increasingly irresistible to foreign sailors. New York Yacht Club officials report that, to date, a record 10 challenges have been received for the next cup series, to be held in 1983 off Newport, R.I.
The challenges, either official in the form of completed applications or unofficial notifications via cables, are from Australia, England, France, Italy and Sweden. The deadline for challenging for 1983 is April 1.
Half of the challenges are from Australia, the country that won the challenger's role with the yacht Australia last year. Although Freedom, skippered by Dennis Conner won the series, four races to one, Australia proved a strong challenger and held the advantage in light air.
This taste of success apparently has spurred on the Australians. They have issued challenges through the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron; Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron; Royal Yacht Club of Victoria; Royal Perth Yacht Squadron, and Poverty Bay Yacht Squadron in Perth.
The other challengers are from the Royal Burnham and Royal London yacht clubs in England; the Yacht Club of France, and the Royal Goteborg Yacht Club of Sweden. The Swedish campaign, their third, again will be under the direction of Pelle Petterson.
Mario Violati, an Italian yacht designer, met with Cup officials recently in New York to confirm that Italy also would challenge. 'They've All Gone Mad'
Reflecting on the surge of Australian challengers, Alan Bond, who headed Australia's campaign, said: ''They've all gone mad down here. Everybody wants to challenge. It's become a national pasttime: How do we win the America's Cup?''
Bond, who is challenging through the Royal Perth club, said he might not build a second 12-Meter for 1983 if there will be other new Australian boats to tune up against. This will be Bond's fourth bid.
But as Ben Lexcen, Bond's designer and Australia's tactician, said: ''it's one thing to send a cable and say you're coming. And it's another thing to get a couple of million dollars and find the 20 or 30 people capable of doing it.''
Peter J. de Savary of England has set his sights higher than a few million dollars in organizing the Victory syndicate through the Royal Burnham Club.
De Savary, a 36-year-old Bahamian-based banker, was a bystander to the humbling defeat of England's yacht Lionheart in the challenger's elimination series last summer. When funds ran so low the boat couldn't even be hauled to have its bottom cleaned for racing, de Savary stepped in with the cash and a determination to go first class the next time.
On a recent trip to New York, Nigel Massey, a Victory syndicate official, said de Savary expected to work with a $5 million to $8 million budget. The syndicate has offered 20 shares at $150,000 apiece and to date eight have been sold, he said. Aside from the $3 million to be raised by the selling of shares, the rest of the money is expected to come largely from de Savary. Plans to Build 2 Twelves
The syndicate has acquired both Lionheart and Australia as well as a 285-foot cruise ship to serve as mobile headquarters for the syndicate, crew and its fleet of 12-Meters. The Savary intends to build two Twelves, the first of which is being designed by Ed du Bois and will be built of fiberglass composite by Kiwi, said Massey.
The schedule, he said, calls for the first boat to be launched next September and the second boat, which will be designed by Ian Howlett, to be launched next spring. For the next two winters, the group plans to run a training camp in the Bahamas and spend summers practicing off Newport.
Connor, who is expected to seek to defend the cup again, noted that ''whomever is selected to defend next time had better be ready or they will be beaten.''
''Last time we had the edge,'' he added, ''but now the barriers are down.'' He was referring to a recent change in rules that no longer limits challengers to the technology and materials available in their country. In the past, these limitations have benefited the Americans.
Considering the remarkable number of challengers, Connor predicted ''the competition will be closer than ever. We can look forward to a truly competitive series where the Americans might not even be the favorites.''
Illustrations: Photo of Peter de Savary | The lure of breaking the longest winning streak in sports, the United States' 130-year grasp on the America's Cup, is proving increasingly irresistible to foreign sailors. New York Yacht Club officials report that, to date, a record 10 challenges have been received for the next cup series, to be held in 1983 off Newport, R.I. The challenges, either official in the form of completed applications or unofficial notifications via cables, are from Australia, England, France, Italy and Sweden. The deadline for challenging for 1983 is April 1. Half of the challenges are from Australia, the country that won the challenger's role with the yacht Australia last year. Although Freedom, skippered by Dennis Conner won the series, four races to one, Australia proved a strong challenger and held the advantage in light air. | 5.687898 | 0.987261 | 53 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/02/opinion/the-us-and-salvador.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075534id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/02/opinion/the-us-and-salvador.html | THE U.S. AND SALVADOR | 20150524075534 | .8,2WASHINGTON - The Senate was at its best when on Sept. 24 it refused to drop an amendment proposed by Christopher J. Dodd, Connecticut Democrat, requiring President Reagan, in advance of any further United States assistance, to certify twice a year that El Salvador is working to put an end to the ''indiscriminate torture and murder'' practiced by its armed forces. This amendment points the way toward a common-sense resolution of the Salvadoran crisis.
Administration policies have completely undermined El Salvador's civilian leadership. President Jose Napoleon Duarte stands for reform, for negotiation, and for an end to the savagery of the armed forces. But the Administration's policy of rejecting negotiation has given final authority to the hardline military of El Salvador. Moderate civilian leaders in Central America fear that the Administration's insistence on military defeat of the Salvadoran insurgents could engulf the entire region in fratricidal war.
These fears have a solid base. The Honduran Army already cooperates with its Salvadoran counterpart in anti-insurgent operations. The Salvadoran military regularly violates Honduran territory and airspace in carrying out search-and-destroy m issions. Now the Reagan Administration has approved the Pentagon plan known as Operation Falcon's Eye, which will send 180 United Stat es officers and troops to Honduras for joint military exercises earl y this month.
The Pentagon's success in gaining approval for these exercises implies that the Administration is ready to give the go-ahead to the revival of a new version of the notorious Central American Defense Council, which traditionally has run the exercises. The United States Southern Command, in Panama, is the founder and overlord of the council, whose mandate is to create a regional milit ary strategy and a common intelligence service to counter ''subversive Communist agents'' who infiltrate Central America.
For a few flickering moments in the last days of the Carter Administration, there was some reason to hope that El Salvador might be saved from further bloodshed. An honest beginning on agrarian reform had been made. The Salvadoran Government publicly pleaded with the Revolutionary Democratic Front to come to the negotiating table. Pressure from the United States combined with threats by the Christian Democrats to bolt the Government unless human rights abuses were curbed resulted in small but real progress. The military published a code of conduct and transferred many hardline military officers out of positions of power. In January, the guerrilla forces' highly touted ''final offensive'' failed. The Salvadoran Government began plans to complete the second and third phases of the agrarian reform. The Front began to talk seriously of entering the negotiations. But within a few weeks, Reagan Administration policy undercut the Government's revolutionary program. Agrarian reform was slowed and the vital second stage of the reform, which decreed the redistribution of the rich coffee lands, was canceled.
The Administration's insistence on a military solution prevented the Christian Democrats from fulfilling its pledge to negotiate with the left. Thus, the Christian Democrats, who have much more in common with the moderate wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front than they do with the oligarchy, were demoted to a subordinate role.
The Reagan policy has diminished to the vanishing point the influence of Mr. Duarte and the Christian Democrats, returned the oligarchy to its formerly dominant position, and associated the good name of the United States with death squads and the massacre of Salvadoran youth.
The Adminstration condemns as ''straight terrorism'' the dynamiting of power lines by insurgents, and remains silent while Salvadoran forces routinely practice torture and assassination.
United States policy in Central America has created a serious rift with our allies. Recently, France and Mexico correctly recognized the revolutionary movement as a ''representative political force'' that must be dealt with if a lasting peace is to be attained. This deft diplomatic initiative calls for the restructuring of the armed forces before the holding of elections. There exists adequate common ground here for the beginnings of a multinational diplomatic effort to bring peace and reconciliation to the Salvadoran family.
While there is still time, the United States should adopt the position that the only unacceptable outcome in El Salvador would be military victory for the insurgents. A negotiated solution to the conflict is the one certain way to prevent that military victory. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Robert E. White, who was Ambassador to El Salvador from February 1980 to last January, is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. | .8,2WASHINGTON - The Senate was at its best when on Sept. 24 it refused to drop an amendment proposed by Christopher J. Dodd, Connecticut Democrat, requiring President Reagan, in advance of any further United States assistance, to certify twice a year that El Salvador is working to put an end to the ''indiscriminate torture and murder'' practiced by its armed forces. This amendment points the way toward a common-sense resolution of the Salvadoran crisis. Administration policies have completely undermined El Salvador's civilian leadership. President Jose Napoleon Duarte stands for reform, for negotiation, and for an end to the savagery of the armed forces. But the Administration's policy of rejecting negotiation has given final authority to the hardline military of El Salvador. Moderate civilian leaders in Central America fear that the Administration's insistence on military defeat of the Salvadoran insurgents could engulf the entire region in fratricidal war. | 4.934911 | 0.988166 | 64.64497 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/03/world/antiterrorist-police-in-italy-assert-the-worst-is-over.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075716id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/03/world/antiterrorist-police-in-italy-assert-the-worst-is-over.html | ANTITERRORIST POLICE IN ITALY ASSERT THE WORST IS OVER | 20150524075716 | ROME, Feb. 2— Italian police officers in charge of the fight against terrorism believe that they have crippled the terrorists as much as is militarily possible and that it is now up to the politicians to create the social and political conditions in which political violence will no longer appeal to the young.
''Operationally speaking, the worst is over,'' Gen. Umberto Capuzzo, the national commander of the Carabinieri, the nation's elite paramilitary police corps, said in an interview at his headquarters.
He said that Prima Linea, the second most powerful terrorist organization in the country, had been virtually liquidated by police operations last year. The same was true of the other smaller groups. The Red Brigades, the most powerful organization, had suffered heavy losses, including several key members arrested or killed, but had been able to ''reconstitute'' their national command at a meeting in Rome last August, he said.
The Red Brigades are now recruiting remnants of Prima Linea and other virtually defunct groups but ''recruitment is not the same as it was two years ago,'' General Capuzzo said. He said he did not want to name a date by which Italian terrorism would be completely suppressed. Police Powers Dispersed
''The Red Brigades can still strike, and strike hard,'' he said. ''It takes only four or five men to carry out an attack.'' He added that the terrorists had the initiative and a choice of targets, and that the security forces had to use a large part of their manpower on such unproductive defensive tasks as escort duties and protection of people and installations rather than on the active hunt for terrorists.
But the terrorists have failed politically and operationally ''because no social class has gone over to them'' and because the number of their sympathizers and helpers in the population is going down, the general said.
The Red Brigades consist of ''several hundred'' active guerrillas, the he said; he declined to be more specific. ''Italian terrorism is sui generis,'' he added. ''There is no great brain abroad.'' He said that members of underground organizations in many countries crossed national borders and maintained links and sporadic cooperation but that the Italian terrorists had no need for training abroad since their operations - killings and kidnappings - were simple and required no skills that were not amply available in the criminal underworld.
He said that in a world riven by international tensions the weaknesses in a country's domestic situation were carefully watched and exploited by foreign powers. Terrorism, he said, is no exception; ''it's like the oil war or the grain war.'' Soviet Disputes Charge
He thus appeared to discount allegations made by several politicians that the Red Brigades might have ''sanctuaries'' outside Italy. President Sandro Pertini touched off a controversy when he hinted in a television interview that the Italian terrorists might be receiving help from the Soviet Union. His remark brought a testy Soviet rejoinder and Mr. Pertini later said he did not mean the Russians. Since then the parties making up the Government coalition of Prime Minister Arnaldo Forlani have come down on opposite sides of the issue, with the Christian Democrats discounting foreign interference and the Socialists and Social Democrats asserting that it exists.
General Capuzzo, a former military attache in Bonn and Moscow, is the highest ranking military figure in the fight against terrorism. The 85,000-man Corps of Carabinieri, which he commands, is the foremost of the six major police organizations in the country and has put a large part of its resources into the antiterrorist drive.
The other Italian police corps are the Public Security Guard, a force of about 80,000 operating in urban centers and comparable to American police departments but operating nationwide; the Finance Guard, a paramilitary force of about 40,000 specializing in border control and antismuggling operations but available also for other police duties; the Municipal Police forces locally organized by the municipalities and dealing mostly with traffic and the enforcement of municipal regulations, and the Secret Services for Intelligence and Counterintelligence. A few years ago a small specialized corps, called Digos, was split off from the Public Security Guard for antiterrorist operations. But, overall, the drive against the terrorists is the responsibility of the Carabinieri.
In the military barracks that is his headquarters in a residential quarter of Rome, General Capuzzo's operations room is a carpeted wood-paneled expanse of half an acre of television consoles and desks where duty officers deal with reports from the corps' three divisional headquarters and some 600 smaller commands. There are 5,000 Carabinieri stations throughout the country. The central command has a research section that monitors and analyzes the shifting patterns of terrorism, the composition of the groups and their internal ideological debates. Two days after Giovanni D'Urso, a Rome magistrate, was kidnapped in December, Carabinieri officers around the country had on their desks a two-inch-thick blue book devoted entirely to an analysis of the Red Brigades' communique announcing the abduction. Alienation of Young Noted
At several points in the interview General Capuzzo stressed that terrorism was not a purely military problem and that police action alone could not defeat it. Young people who had become alienated in the 1960's and 70's had to be brought back into the social system and convinced that social justice existed and that social change by democratic means was possible. ''It is up to the political class to do this,'' he said.
He said that hopeful signs were emerging. In the universities, where social discontent was deepest and the terrorists found most of their recruits nearly a decade ago, the climate was improving and the students were again paying attention to their studies instead of drifting into radical and sometimes violent politics, he said.
He said that the Red Brigades chose their victims - magistrates, police officers, industrialists and newspapermen -with an eye to getting the largest possible headlines. In this way ''the terrorists are able to play on the emotions of the public, and the Italian public is high strung emotionally anyway,'' the general said.
Illustrations: Photo of a roadblock in Italy | Italian police officers in charge of the fight against terrorism believe that they have crippled the terrorists as much as is militarily possible and that it is now up to the politicians to create the social and political conditions in which political violence will no longer appeal to the young. ''Operationally speaking, the worst is over,'' Gen. Umberto Capuzzo, the national commander of the Carabinieri, the nation's elite paramilitary police corps, said in an interview at his headquarters. He said that Prima Linea, the second most powerful terrorist organization in the country, had been virtually liquidated by police operations last year. The same was true of the other smaller groups. The Red Brigades, the most powerful organization, had suffered heavy losses, including several key members arrested or killed, but had been able to ''reconstitute'' their national command at a meeting in Rome last August, he said. | 6.763006 | 0.982659 | 42.578035 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/03/style/rebecca-fox-wed-to-william-green.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075756id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/03/style/rebecca-fox-wed-to-william-green.html | Rebecca Fox Wed To William Green | 20150524075756 | Rebecca MacMillan Fox, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Whiting Fox of Ithaca, N.Y., and Annisquam, Mass., was married in Ithaca yesterday to William Scott Green, son of Mr. and Mrs. William S. Green of Manchester, N.H. Rabbi Jacob Neusner, University Professor and Ungerleider Distinguished Scholar of Judaic Studies at Brown University, performed the garden ceremony at the home of the bride's sister and brother-in-law, Elizabeth Fox-Genovese and Eugene Dominic Genovese.
The bride, who will retain her name, graduated from the Concord Academy and received bachelor's and master's degrees from Bryn Mawr College, where she is an academic dean, a part-time lecturer in French and a candidate for a Ph.D. in French literature.
Her previous marriage ended in divorce. Her father is a professor emeritus of history at Cornell University. Her grandfather, the late Robert E. Simon of New York, was president of Carnegie Hall Inc. and founder of the United Parents Association.
Mr. Green, associate professor and chairman of the program in religious studies at the University of Rochester, graduated from the Mount Hermon School and Dartmouth College. He received a doctorate from Brown. His father, a partner in the Manchester law firm of Sheehan, Phinney, Bass & Green, was formerly Deputy Attorney General of the State of New Hampshire and chairman of the New Hampshire State Board of Education. His mother is a social worker.
The couple will spend the 1981-82 academic year in Oxford, England, where Mr. Green will be the R.T. French Visiting Fellow at Worcester College, Oxford University, and his bride will complete her dotoral research. | Rebecca MacMillan Fox, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Whiting Fox of Ithaca, N.Y., and Annisquam, Mass., was married in Ithaca yesterday to William Scott Green, son of Mr. and Mrs. William S. Green of Manchester, N.H. Rabbi Jacob Neusner, University Professor and Ungerleider Distinguished Scholar of Judaic Studies at Brown University, performed the garden ceremony at the home of the bride's sister and brother-in-law, Elizabeth Fox-Genovese and Eugene Dominic Genovese. The bride, who will retain her name, graduated from the Concord Academy and received bachelor's and master's degrees from Bryn Mawr College, where she is an academic dean, a part-time lecturer in French and a candidate for a Ph.D. in French literature. | 2.211268 | 0.985915 | 46.633803 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/05/nyregion/politics-the-big-push-is-about-to-begin.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524075837id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/05/nyregion/politics-the-big-push-is-about-to-begin.html | POLITICS - THE BIG PUSH IS ABOUT TO BEGIN - NYTimes.com | 20150524075837 | IF YOU have been ignoring the campaign for Governor of New Jersey because of, or in spite of, the large number of candidates in each major party, chances are that it will be difficult to do so from now on.
That's because the campaigns are entering a new phase. Up to now, the major concerns of the candidates have been raising money, putting together a campaign staff, wooing the party professionals and gauging the strengths, weaknesses and durability of their opponents.
But now the candidates and their consultants are talking about the start of the ''public'' campaign, and they use terms like ''penetration.'' If that sounds painful, it could be.
It means watching political campaign commercials on television during timeouts of the professional basketball playoffs, digging a proliferation of campaign brochures and position papers out of the mailbox and getting campaign appeals at the front door or by telephone.
It could become irritating because of the volume of candidates, but it is also necessary. Polls show that the voters know virtually nothing about the candidates for the state's top executive position, even if they recognize their names.
Thus far, only four candidates have gone on television to get their faces and names before the voters. They are Joseph A. Sullivan of Essex Fells and State Senator James H. Wallwork of Short Hills in the Republican race and Representative James J. Florio of Runnemede and State Senator Joseph P. Merlino of Trenton in the Democratic contest.
Curiously, Representative Robert A. Roe, Democrat of Wayne, the candidate who made the greatest use of television four years ago, has decided to spend his money this time on organization, mailing, targeting likely voters and following up with personal contacts by volunteers.
Mr. Roe also has said that he will not accept public financing. This gives him a political issue to use in these times of tight budgets, but it also requires him to raise $3 for each $1 raised by his opponents.
Some consultants contend that it is impossible to win an election, especially one as crowded as this one, without television. They say that it imparts ''star quality'' to a candidate and reinforces the other aspects of the campaign.
When Mr. Roe ran in 1977, his television commercials made the Democratic primary race look like a contest between him and Governor Byrne, even though there were 10 candidates. He finished second and, on the strength of that, is one of the favorites in the current campaign.
Mr. Roe originally indicated this year that he would pass up television altogether, but now some aides say there will be television commercials later in the campaign.
John J. Degnan, the former Attorney General who is trying to follow his mentor, Mr. Byrne, will rely on David Garth, the New York consultant whose television campaign for Mr. Byrne in 1977 helped the Governor win re-election.
Before the votes are counted on June 2, Mr. Degnan and Mr. Sullivan could become two of the most familiar public figures in New Jersey, especially if they follow through on their plans for television campaigns.
Whether their planned television exposure is enough to win a primary election remains to be seen. Neither man has a recognizable political base to build on, and their success - or lack of it - could serve as a benchmark for measuring the effectiveness of mass marketing in a primary campaign vs. the well-worn path of working through the established party organizations. | IF YOU have been ignoring the campaign for Governor of New Jersey because of, or in spite of, the large number of candidates in each major party, chances are that it will be difficult to do so from now on. That's because the campaigns are entering a new phase. Up to now, the major concerns of the candidates have been raising money, putting together a campaign staff, wooing the party professionals and gauging the strengths, weaknesses and durability of their opponents. | 7.11828 | 0.989247 | 45.591398 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/06/arts/tv-warm-look-back-at-wpa-and-the-arts.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080056id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/06/arts/tv-warm-look-back-at-wpa-and-the-arts.html | TV - WARM LOOK BACK AT W.P.A. AND THE ARTS - NYTimes.com | 20150524080056 | ''THE NEW DEAL FOR ARTISTS,'' a 90-minute documentary on WNET-TV tonight at 10 o'clock, returns to the 30's and examines a unusual project of Federal financing for the arts in this country. This is not a dispassionate treatise. Introduced by Studs Terkel and narrated by Orson Welles, it is a celebration of an experiment that ended only, as Mr. Terkel sees it, ''when the primitives, the Neanderthals, took over.''
The film was produced by Wieland Schulz-Keil and completed under the auspices of the New York Center for Visual History. Mr. Schulz-Keil was a theater director in West Germany and Britain. In 1969, he came to the United States, where, in addition to working in film and documentaries, he founded a publishing company called Urizen Books.
Noting that the Work Projects Administration art projects were developed during the Depression years to ''develop and preserve skills in the arts,'' Mr. Schulz-Keil says that even though some of the work produced was of superior quality, it is important to remember that the program primarily enabled thousands of artists, musicians, writers and theater people to continue working. He believes that ''the tremendous success of American writing and the American visual arts after World War II would probably never have occurred if the Federal Government had not supported so many artists during the prewar years.''
The W.P.A. offered a check, as someone recalls, of $23.80 a week, which at that time could pay a full month's rent. More important, recipients were expected to produce something for the money. John Houseman, the actor, stresses that this was work, not charity. As a result, artists and writers, photographers and theater folk experienced something of a boom, pouring forth everything from Post Office murals to photo documentations of rural poverty.
Given the bleak economic times, there were inevitable tremors of social conscience, of concern for the poor, the minority groups and the disenfranchised. Projects such as Harlem's Lafayette Theater enabled black actors and technicians to get invaluable experience. Richard Wright was able to finish writing ''Native Son.''
At the same time, some segments of American society were increasingly upset by such things as interracial theater casts. There were even complaints about children's shows like ''Revolt of the Beavers,'' in which rich animals were defeated by poor animals. Leading the attack against these and other threatening projects was Martin Dies and the new House Committee on Un-American Activities.
By the end of the decade, a Federal Government nervous about ''red baiting'' and continuing economic woes began to withdraw from some of its commitments. The Writers Project refused to publish ''Civil Liberties in Illinois.'' Theater productions directed by Joseph Losey were constantly being turned down. Ironically, the surprise of Marc Blitzstein's ''The Cradle Will Rock'' stimulated an avalanche of publicitly that helped bring down the Federal Theater Project.
The arts projects were part of a general unemployment program. They were not subsidies. Today, the arts in this country receive support from a broader base consisting of local, state, foundation and corporate money in addition to Federal funds. Nevertheless, the story of the 30's arts projects are particularly valuable at a time when the Government is planning extensive cutbacks. For all of the flaws and biases, the arts projects paid off handsomely. Mr. Terkel understandably sees their demise as ''a diminishing of the vision of possibilities.'' | ''THE NEW DEAL FOR ARTISTS,'' a 90-minute documentary on WNET-TV tonight at 10 o'clock, returns to the 30's and examines a unusual project of Federal financing for the arts in this country. This is not a dispassionate treatise. Introduced by Studs Terkel and narrated by Orson Welles, it is a celebration of an experiment that ended only, as Mr. Terkel sees it, ''when the primitives, the Neanderthals, took over.'' | 7.659091 | 1 | 88 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/07/arts/going-out-guide.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080122id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/07/arts/going-out-guide.html | GOING OUT GUIDE - NYTimes.com | 20150524080122 | The new Chinese year has just begun, and if you are in doubt about which animal in the bestiary succession of calendar years this is, you had better drop by St. John's University's Chung-Cheung Gallery in the attractively colorful pagodalike building on campus at Utopia Parkway and Union Turnpike, in Queens, just north of the Grand Central Parkway.
What you will see is a gallery full of roosters in honor of the Year of the Rooster. Not live roosters, but 59 Chinese paintings by 41 Chinese artists. Among those whose works are represented in these paintings, so delicate, yet so eloquent in their depiction of the lively cock of the roost, are Ren Bonian, a 19th-century master painter from Shanghai; Qi Baishi, an early-20th-century master; and contemporary artists such as Chen Danchen, Zhao Songquan and, of the Cantonese school, Huang Junbe.
The gallery is in a spacious room of the building, which overlooks the campus from a low eminence on the grounds. The exhibition opens today and is open, free, daily, from 10 A.M. to 8 P.M. On weekends, the parking lot is available to the public. By public transportation, the college can be reached by bus from the Union Turnpike IND station or by bus from the 169th Street IND station. Information: 990-6161, ext. 6582. Open through March 22. PAPER BAG
The Paper Bag Players are 23 years old but their age has apparently not caught up with them. With an outlook that is as youthful as ever, this front-runner of children's theater is still presenting fresh material to its audience of youngsters as well as amused adults. Living up to their name, the Paper Bag Players fashion whatever they need on stage from paper or cardboard.
They are now performing at 2 P.M. Saturdays and Sundays, through next weekend, at Town Hall, 123 West 43d Street (840-2824). Admission: $4 and $6. The show, with a cast of four, is entitled ''Hot Feet'' and looks, with humor, at city life. Among its 14 sketches you will be witness to the garbage man enamored of litter and of the tenant who suffers from both an unstoppable leak (the leak is played by a performer) and a plumber.
Under the leadership of Judith Martin, its director and founder, the troupe has garnered a bagful of firsts for children's theater in its time: the first to perform at Lincoln Center, the first to win an Obie, Off Broadway theater award, and the first to get a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. ON THE CARPET
If you raise your hands at this particular Sotheby's session tomorrow, don't worry, you won't be bidding but probably only asking a question. Last month, the auction house began a series, through May, of Sunday 2 P.M. talks by the heads of its various departments designed to stimulate knowledge, awareness and perhaps even interest in buying on the part of the public. Admission is free for the sessions that take place in the cavernous Sotheby's decorative-arts building at 1334 York Avenue, at East 72d Street.
Tomorrow, the expertise will have to do with Oriental rugs and carpets, and it will be supplied by Michael Grogan, who is chief of the department dealing with such things. Mr. Grogan will describe the design elements of the five different types of Oriental floor coverings and will also discuss current market trends and let drop some tips on canny buying. Just by lucky chance, there will be stock of the subject on hand, in anticipation of a sale next Saturday, and you will be able to browse among carpets and rugs until you've had your fill. Information: 794-4691. ANCIENT DIGS
Dr. Yigal Shiloh, who is director of Jerusalem's City of David excavations, is going to spend the next four Sundays at the Jewish Museum, 1109 Fifth Avenue, at 92d Street (860-1888), telling about what he has come up with. This series of slide lectures at 3 P.M. each week will have Dr. Shiloh explaining how the archeologists learned from their work that Jerusalem was founded 5,500 years ago. They also found an underground water system with tunnels 18 feet high and 7 feet wide, the first example of ''monumental'' construction unearthed in Israel. They also uncovered the first archeological evidence of the return of exiled Jews from Babylon.
Admission to each lecture is $5; for students, $3; this includes admission to the museum, and you may visit its other exhibitions before or after the session.
Illustrations: photo of detail from a Chinese painting | RULING THE ROOSTER The new Chinese year has just begun, and if you are in doubt about which animal in the bestiary succession of calendar years this is, you had better drop by St. John's University's Chung-Cheung Gallery in the attractively colorful pagodalike building on campus at Utopia Parkway and Union Turnpike, in Queens, just north of the Grand Central Parkway. What you will see is a gallery full of roosters in honor of the Year of the Rooster. Not live roosters, but 59 Chinese paintings by 41 Chinese artists. Among those whose works are represented in these paintings, so delicate, yet so eloquent in their depiction of the lively cock of the roost, are Ren Bonian, a 19th-century master painter from Shanghai; Qi Baishi, an early-20th-century master; and contemporary artists such as Chen Danchen, Zhao Songquan and, of the Cantonese school, Huang Junbe. | 5.213873 | 0.982659 | 84.936416 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/06/us/study-by-research-group-asserts-mx-missile-is-not-needed.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080159id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/06/us/study-by-research-group-asserts-mx-missile-is-not-needed.html | STUDY BY RESEARCH GROUP ASSERTS MX MISSILE IS NOT NEEDED | 20150524080159 | WASHINGTON, July 5— The Council on Economic Priorities, an independent research organization in New York, has joined a chorus of objections to the proposed MX mobile missile but has gone beyond most of the opposition to argue that the missile is unnecessary.
In a new study, the council, which monitors corporate social policy and is often a critic of the military establishment, contended, ''The United States does not need the MX missile.''
The council's analysis held that the current Minuteman force of intercontinental missiles in silos throughout the Middle West could survive a Soviet attack far better than the Air Force has predicted.
The study also asserted that improving the other legs of the triad of nuclear deterrents, long-range bombers and submarines carrying nuclear missiles, would be less expensive and more effective than building the MX complex. The current plan calls for 200 MX missiles to be shuttled among 4,600 shelters in Nevada and Utah in an effort to keep the Soviet Union from being able to destroy the missiles in a first strike.
As the Reagan Administration nears a decision on the missile program, the level of disapproval has risen steadily. The opposition has mostly fallen into three groups:
- The Mormon Church and many residents of Utah and Nevada, cattle ranchers, Indian tribes and environmentalists contend that the complex would disturb the environment, economy and social order of those two states.
- Critics in the Federal Government who assert that the current plan will not work and that the missiles should be based elsewhere include Senator Paul Laxalt, Republican of Nevada; Senator Jake Garn, Republican of Utah; a subcommittee headed by Representative John F. Seiberling, Democrat of Ohio; the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and advocates of putting the missiles aboard submarines.
- A smaller but vociferous group, including the Council on Economic Priorities, maintains that the system, which would cost upward of $40 billion, should be canceled because it is too expensive and would stimulate an arms race while adding little to national security. Panel Studies Basing Question
Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger, who along with President Reagan advocates building the missiles but who has expressed skepticism about the current basing plan, is awaiting recommendations on the basing issue from a panel of outside specialists.
The Council on Economic Priorities, which originally planned to publish its analysis in August, made a summary available in an effort to have its voice heard before the Administration reached its final decision.
The council's study, which a spokesman said took two years and was based mainly on published sources, attacked the Air Force's contention that the existing force of intercontinental missiles had become vulnerable to a Soviet strike. ''The vulnerability of United States land-based forces depends on the ability of the Soviet Union to mount a surprise attack,'' the study said. But it asserted that there were many uncertainties in such an endeavor.
''There is no way to insure that the accuracies of missiles obtained from test firings could be duplicated with totally new targets and flight paths,'' the study said. The problem of missiles' drifting from flight paths because of unforeseen atmospheric or physical conditions was considered by many scientists to be insurmountable without substantial testing, it said.
The study estimated that 10 percent of the land-based intercontinental missiles ''would survive even the worst Russian strike posited by the Pentagon.'' That would leave a minimum of 105 missiles with 215 warheads to retaliate.
The council, which was established in 1969, receives financial support from the Rockefeller Family Fund and is partly financed by subscriptions to its regular research publications. Alice Tepper Marlin, an economist, is executive director of the council.
A summary of the report can be obtained by writing to the Council on Economic Priorities, 84 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10011. | The Council on Economic Priorities, an independent research organization in New York, has joined a chorus of objections to the proposed MX mobile missile but has gone beyond most of the opposition to argue that the missile is unnecessary. In a new study, the council, which monitors corporate social policy and is often a critic of the military establishment, contended, ''The United States does not need the MX missile.'' The council's analysis held that the current Minuteman force of intercontinental missiles in silos throughout the Middle West could survive a Soviet attack far better than the Air Force has predicted. The study also asserted that improving the other legs of the triad of nuclear deterrents, long-range bombers and submarines carrying nuclear missiles, would be less expensive and more effective than building the MX complex. The current plan calls for 200 MX missiles to be shuttled among 4,600 shelters in Nevada and Utah in an effort to keep the Soviet Union from being able to destroy the missiles in a first strike. | 3.792746 | 0.984456 | 52.984456 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/07/business/credit-markets-interest-rates-decline-slightly-6-month-bills-up-to-14.05.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080223id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/07/business/credit-markets-interest-rates-decline-slightly-6-month-bills-up-to-14.05.html | CREDIT MARKETS - Interest Rates Decline Slightly - 6-Month Bills Up to 14.05% - NYTimes.com | 20150524080223 | Interest rates declined slightly in quiet trading yesterday, with much of the decline occurring after the Federal Reserve announced that the nation's basic money supply was unchanged in the week ended June 24.
''The markets still hope for a contraction in money supply that will force the Fed to let short rates fall,'' commented William V. Sullivan Jr., a money market economist at the Bank of New York. So far the Fed has not encouraged lower rates as many expected and Mr. Sullivan contended that ''this latest money number is not enough to cause any change from the Fed's steady-as-you-go posture, which means overnight rates can continue to fluctuate around 18 and 20 percent.''
While many investors have recently been avoiding the note and bond markets until more is known about the Fed's intentions and the performance of the economy in the second half, analysts said that even the buying of speculators and dealers has waned.
''The Street already has accumulated large inventories in advance of a predicted drop in short-term rates,'' one market participant said, ''and they have little appetite for more securities that must be financed at ruinous overnight rates.''
Yesterday, overnight bank loans in the Federal funds market opened at 21 percent, but declined later in the day to average about 19 7/8 percent. The Fed temporarily added credit to the banking system when it arranged three-day purchases of securities, but dealers said that move was not a sign that the central bank was forcing overnight rates lower. Treasury Bills Steady
Following the money supply announcment, dealers said interest rates on Treasury bills fell less than 10 basis points. In when-issued trading, the new three- and six-month issues auctioned yesterday were bid at 14.28 percent and 13.95 percent, respectively, down from averages at the auction of 14.40 percent and 14.05 percent.
After adding a quarter percentage point to the average six-month rate, banks and savings institutions may offer new six-month money market savings certificates at a top rate of 14.30 percent during the week beginning today, up from 13.87 percent last week.
In the long bond market, prices rose less than half a point following the money supply announcement, with 13 7/8 percent Treasury bonds offered at 105 1/2, its highest price of the day, to yield 13.12 percent. Note prices also increased, and the the 14 5/8 percent Treasury notes due in two years closed at 100 2/32, to yield 14.59 percent, while 14 percent notes due 1988 closed at par.
Investment bankers are uncertain about how many corporate issues will come to market this week. The only issue priced so far is Philadelphia Electric Company's $125 million of 17 5/8 percent, 30-year bonds that a Drexel Burnham Lambert group is offering at a price of 99 to yield 17.8 percent to maturity. The yield in the highest ever for a new issue of 30-year Baa-rated utility bonds, exceeding even the 17.6 percent offered on Long Island Lighting Company's 17 3/8 percent bonds sold June 30. New York Offering
New York City officials announced yesterday plans to sell $75 million of bonds next week. Although the city's ability to raise funds in the public debt market does not match its potential appetite for such borrowings, securities dealers said that demand from individuals is great enough to accomodate small issues such as the three $75 million offerings that are planned for the fiscal year that began July 1.
In fact, securities dealers said demand for the city's bonds has been great enough to keep their yield from rising, even though other state and local goverments have had to pay sharply higher interest rates.
''The city's bonds have withstood the stress of high interest rates and have held up well, even though the market in general has deteriorated,'' said Thomas Coyle, a vice president at Smith Barney, Harris Upham who specializes in New York City debt issues.
In late March, the city sold bonds with yields ranging from 7.9 percent in 1982 to 10 3/4 percent in 1991 and 11 1/2 percent in 1998-2000. Salesmen said yesterday that they were selling small lots of bonds due 10 years or more at a price of par, the same as originally set by underwriters. Elsewhere in the tax-exempt market, prices have declined as yields have increased. The Daily Bond Buyer 20-bond index, which measures yields of A1-rated local governments, has increased to 10.85 percent currently from 10.09 percent in the week ended March 26.
Illustrations: bar graph on 6-month Treasury bill interest rates, March-July 1981 graphs on short- and long-term interest rates, Feb.-June 1981 | Interest rates declined slightly in quiet trading yesterday, with much of the decline occurring after the Federal Reserve announced that the nation's basic money supply was unchanged in the week ended June 24. ''The markets still hope for a contraction in money supply that will force the Fed to let short rates fall,'' commented William V. Sullivan Jr., a money market economist at the Bank of New York. So far the Fed has not encouraged lower rates as many expected and Mr. Sullivan contended that ''this latest money number is not enough to cause any change from the Fed's steady-as-you-go posture, which means overnight rates can continue to fluctuate around 18 and 20 percent.'' While many investors have recently been avoiding the note and bond markets until more is known about the Fed's intentions and the performance of the economy in the second half, analysts said that even the buying of speculators and dealers has waned. | 4.869565 | 0.978261 | 36.793478 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/07/arts/tv-mr-merlin-and-kenny-rogers.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080344id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/07/arts/tv-mr-merlin-and-kenny-rogers.html | TV - 'MR. MERLIN' AND KENNY ROGERS - NYTimes.com | 20150524080344 | CBS— TV'S ''Mr. Merlin,'' a weekly series beginning tonight at 8 o'clock, takes the gifted actor Barnard Hughes and dumps him into a prime-time situation comedy that could just as easily have been scheduled as part of the network's Saturday-morning cartoon lineup. Mr. Hughes plays Max Merlin, who is not only the owner of a dilapidated San Francisco garage but also the very same Merlin who served as sorcerer for the court of King Arthur. Students of the form might refer to ''Mork & Mindy,'' ''The Greatest American Hero'' and other current dabblings in the supernatural.
Max is a crusty geezer who is not especially fond of young people. But when Alexandra (Elaine Joyce), his magical messenger, insists that he has to find an apprentice in 24 hours, Max is forced to recruit and train 15-year-old Zach (Clark Brandon), an incredibly clumsy boy with, as the song says, Bette Davis eyes. Zach travels by skateboard, which sets up the inevitable sequence of his zooming up and down the hills of San Francisco.
Zach is initially skeptical about Max's claims that he can see the future and make things happen. But after getting a glimpse of the special Crystal Door in Max's home, Zach is ready to begin his lessons. He and best friend Leo (Jonathan Prince) immediately set about devising love potions so that on future dates they will never again hear the words ''strike out.'' The plot strains for a certain simplicity.
Max's tricks can be grandly pointless. In the mood for some sushi, he transports himself instantaneously to a restaurant in Japan, oblivious of the fact that Japanese restaurants are now the fad in these United States. But Mr. Hughes manages to retain his dignity, even while supposedly taking a wild turn on a skateboard - a double was obviously used for the occasion.
Mr. Brandon rises to a level of appropriate goofiness, reminiscent of early Henry Aldrich. And Mr. Prince serves nicely as third banana. A press release notes that Mr. Prince is a Harvard graduate and was on his way to law school when offered this part in ''Mr. Merlin.'' If he hurries, maybe they'll reopen the registration books.
At 9 this evening, CBS is offering ''Coward of the County,'' a movie inspired by a hit Kenny Rogers recording. That bit of information is disclosed because ''The Gambler,'' also inspired by a Rogers recording, chalked up the highest audience-popularity ratings for a television movie in the 1979-80 season. Apparently, a lot of people out there like Mr. Rogers and his songs.
Actually, ''Coward of the County'' was originally composed by Roger Bowling and Billy Ed Wheeler. The script devised for television by Clyde Ware and Jim Byrnes constructs a far more elaborate plot but preserves the k ind of artless simplicity that is the hallmark of a good country- and-western ballad. In essence, this is a morality tale, clearly spelled out, simply resolved.
Tommy (Fredric Lehne) has promised his dying father that he will never fight. The father had spent years in prison after killing a man in a brawl. Tommy's pacifism is interpreted by the town toughs as cowardice. Complicating matters, the story opens on Dec. 7, 1941, the day the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, and when Tommy refuses to join the Army, his problems with the entire Southern town multiply. And things only get worse when he takes up seriously with Becky (Largo Woodruff), who is supposed to be the girlfriend of one of the boys, Tommy's arch enemy, who has gone off to fight the war.
At the same time, Tommy's Uncle Matthew (Mr. Rogers), minister of a local church, is trying to be a father to the young man while sneaking off regularly for evenings of drinking and women. Suddenly, Matthew is thrown into a crisis of doubt, wonderi ng if he is really suited to the ministry of God. Tommy's and Ma tthew's problems move inexorably toward solutions that can easily b e anticipated.
Pacifism, of course, is not normally lauded in the generally macho territory of country-and-western music. Despite appearances to the contrary, pacifism is not endorsed in this movie either. The entire production is aimed at the point when Tommy will finally explode and, asserting his manhood, lash out against his tormentors. It is carefully designed to leave the blood-and-guts crowd cheering. Meanwhile, under the direction of Dick Lowry, Mr. Rogers and Mr. Lehne turn in nicely honed performances.
Illustrations: Photo of Barnard Hughes | TV'S ''Mr. Merlin,'' a weekly series beginning tonight at 8 o'clock, takes the gifted actor Barnard Hughes and dumps him into a prime-time situation comedy that could just as easily have been scheduled as part of the network's Saturday-morning cartoon lineup. Mr. Hughes plays Max Merlin, who is not only the owner of a dilapidated San Francisco garage but also the very same Merlin who served as sorcerer for the court of King Arthur. Students of the form might refer to ''Mork & Mindy,'' ''The Greatest American Hero'' and other current dabblings in the supernatural. Max is a crusty geezer who is not especially fond of young people. But when Alexandra (Elaine Joyce), his magical messenger, insists that he has to find an apprentice in 24 hours, Max is forced to recruit and train 15-year-old Zach (Clark Brandon), an incredibly clumsy boy with, as the song says, Bette Davis eyes. Zach travels by skateboard, which sets up the inevitable sequence of his zooming up and down the hills of San Francisco. | 4.258216 | 0.985915 | 62.403756 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/06/business/market-place-utility-spinoff-to-save-cash.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080408id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/06/business/market-place-utility-spinoff-to-save-cash.html | Market Place - Utility Spinoff To Save Cash - NYTimes.com | 20150524080408 | CENTRAL LOUISIANA ENERGY is spinning off its electric utility to become an aggressive regional energy company this month. That is a marked departure. For years, the utility earned modest profits on its gas-fed power plants. The company, critics say, was operated as if that gas, which it bought from outside sources, would always be cheap and plentiful.
This attitude persisted even after the United States began consuming more gas than it was discovering after 1963. As the gas shortfall grew, Central found it increasingly difficult to secure enough gas for its power plants.
Gale L. Galloway arrived in 1975 to seek new gas supplies for the company as director of Central's exploration effort. Mr. Galloway soon became the driving force behind the company and was named chairman and chief executive officer in 1979.
Mr. Galloway lined up considerable long-term gas supplies from producers and eventually had enough gas under contract to sell to outside users. He thus earned money for Central by utilizing the excess capacity of Central's intrastate pipeline.
The exploration effort became successful in 1978. Central and its drilling partners discovered the Irene field, said to be one of the largest gas discoveries in the Southeast's Tuscaloosa Trend.
Richard Lilly follows the company for Raymond, James & Associates in St. Petersburg, Fla. He said that the log data from the eight wells completed to date indicated the Irene field would produce from 320 billion to 575 billion cubic feet of gas. In addition to the gas, Mr. Lilly estimates the eight wells completed to date also contain 8 million to 20 million barrels of oil.
He puts Central's share of the gas at 70 billion to 125 billion cubic feet, and its oil share at 1.75 million barrels to 4.4 million barrels. ''I believe these reserves are worth $9.80 to $18.40 a share to Central Louisiana,'' Mr. Lilly said. (Central closed at 44, off 1/8, yesterday on the New York Stopck Exchange.)
Moreover, a ninth well - 20,000 feet deep, compared with 18,000 for the eight others - ''blew out,'' Mr. Lilly said. He therefore thinks a second reservoir may exist under the primary discovery.
Central spins off its electric utility as an independent entity on Nov. 17. Thereafter, the former will be a pure pipeline and energy company.
Under the spinoff, owners of Central will get the shares of the Central Louisiana Electric Company, a sizable utility generating five billion kilowatt hours of electricity a year. That figure is growing by 3 1/2 percent annually - one of the fastest growth rates in the industry.
Central is spinning off the utility partly because it will require $80 million to $90 million in capital expenditures in each of the next five years. The utility's cash flow has been strained. Even so, the once-lackluster business has enjoyed 20 percent annual earnings growth under Mr. Galloway. Fans of the company believe that, after the utility spinoff, the energy segment will generate a large cash flow for the oil and gas exploration effort.
Consolidating results with the utility, Mr. Lilly expects Central to earn $5.25 a share in 1981, up from $3.95 a share in 1980. In 1982, Mr. Lilly expects earnings of $6.25 a share. Central without the utility would earn an estimated $4.25 a share in 1981 and $5.15 in 1982, he said - an even more impressive rate of growth than the company has experienced with the utility.
Joseph Egan, who follows the company for Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, rates Central ''O.K. to buy'' for the near term. ''I think it is an excellent company with exceptional earnings prospects,'' Mr. Egan said. ''It may be unique in that its main line of business is the intrastate pipeline. Ninety-five percent of pipeline sales are made directly to industry. According to the annual report, the pipeline division earned about 45 percent on average equity in 1980.''
Central has done well in part because industrial gas prices have been deregulated in Louisiana. Thus, the company can price gas at levels high enough to generate high returns against its cost from regulated gas producers.
The company may be more vulnerable than most to decontrol of natural gas at the wellhead. If Central has to pay more for its supplies, it will earn less on its industrial gas business. Further, the deep gas Central produces in the Irene field commands a high $8.40 a million cubic feet. That price could come down with decontrol. | CENTRAL LOUISIANA ENERGY is spinning off its electric utility to become an aggressive regional energy company this month. That is a marked departure. For years, the utility earned modest profits on its gas-fed power plants. The company, critics say, was operated as if that gas, which it bought from outside sources, would always be cheap and plentiful. This attitude persisted even after the United States began consuming more gas than it was discovering after 1963. As the gas shortfall grew, Central found it increasingly difficult to secure enough gas for its power plants. | 8.018349 | 0.981651 | 39.293578 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/08/nyregion/jordan-exhorts-1819-graduates-at-city-college.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080424id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/08/nyregion/jordan-exhorts-1819-graduates-at-city-college.html | JORDAN EXHORTS 1,819 GRADUATES AT CITY COLLEGE | 20150524080424 | Speaking at yesterday's commencement exercises of the City College of the City University of New York, Vernon E. Jordan Jr., president of the National Urban League, challenged New Yorkers, the college and its graduates to continue the institution's tradition of educating the city's disadvantaged.
Mr. Jordan was the main speaker at the college's 135th commencement. A total of 1,819 graduates received bachelor's and master's degrees at the ceremony, held on the South Campus Field of the City College campus in Manhattan.
Shortly after 3 P.M. the procession of graduating students, candidates for honorary degrees, trustees and professors wearing colorful academic hoods entered the field accompanied by a flourish of trumpets. Under a cloudless sky, the graduates were awarded their degrees as more than 3,000 well-wishers cheered from the sidelines. 'Greater Resistance' Ahead
''As the City College system comes to serve larger numbers of black and Hispanic students, it will face greater resistance to granting it the resources it needs,'' Mr. Jordan said, noting the college's reputation as the institution where many of the city's immigrant poor and minorities had been educated.
''That is a fact of life black and brown people have come to know very well,'' he added. ''Public institutions serving the middle class are favored; those serving the poor or minorities are not.''
He urged the students not to ''fall into the pit of hypocrisy by complaining about your taxes subsidizing a new group of City College students.''
He also criticized the Reagan Administration and those members of Congress who, he said, sought to reduce the government programs that in the past helped the middle class itself prosper.
Mr. Jordan received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the college last June but was absent from the ceremony because of the attempt on his life a week earlier,
Honorary degrees were awarded yesterday to: FILOMEN MARIA D'AGOSTINO GREENBERG, a New York City lawyer, Doctor of Humane Letters, for her support of higher education in New York City, philanthropic work and her efforts in the establishment of a City College music department scholarship. FRANCINE DU PLESSIX GRAY, writer, Doctor of Letters, for the social commitment expressed in her careers as a journalist, novelist and teacher. Dr. XIE XIDE, physicist, Doctor of Science, for work in China in the fields of solid-state research, semiconductors and energy band theory.
Illustrations: photo of Vernon E. Jordan Jr. | Speaking at yesterday's commencement exercises of the City College of the City University of New York, Vernon E. Jordan Jr., president of the National Urban League, challenged New Yorkers, the college and its graduates to continue the institution's tradition of educating the city's disadvantaged. Mr. Jordan was the main speaker at the college's 135th commencement. A total of 1,819 graduates received bachelor's and master's degrees at the ceremony, held on the South Campus Field of the City College campus in Manhattan. | 4.9375 | 0.989583 | 47.427083 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/08/nyregion/a-new-president-at-sarah-lawrence.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524080719id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/08/nyregion/a-new-president-at-sarah-lawrence.html | A NEW PRESIDENT AT SARAH LAWRENCE | 20150524080719 | BRONXVILLE WHEN students at Sarah Lawrence College invited their presidentelect to deliver a ''fantasy lecture'' earlier this year in their coffee house, Alice Stone Ilchman responded with a speech entitled, ''The Role of Public Diplomacy in the Conduct of United States Foreign Relations.''
''I had to talk about something I cared about,'' Dr. Ilchman explained, ''and while I love old English silver, I wasn't as prepared to discuss it.''
If the choice of topic revealed something about the college's eighth president, Dr. Ilchman said, the existence of such a fantasy lecture forum revealed much about the atmosphere of the college - an atmosphere that she will encourage as president.
''The coffee house series illustrates that intellectual activity here is also recreation,'' Dr. Ilchman said. ''Sarah Lawrence students appear not to separate school work from what's really on their minds.''
Selected from a field of more than 200 candidates after a yearlong search by a college committee, the new president, who was formally inaugurated Friday, brings an unusual range of experience to her new position.
Dr. Ilchman, the former dean of Wellesley College, served for three years as Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs during the Carter Administration. She is an economist and an educator, a political scientist and an administrator, a wife and the mother of two adolescents. With her inauguration last week, the 46-year-old Dr. Ilchman becomes the leader of one of the country's most innovative liberal arts college.
Sarah Lawrence opened in 1928 as a private women's college and has been a coeducational institution since 1968. Although its student body is small, numbering 1,100, and the $10,500 cost of tuition, room and board is high, Dr. Ilchman is optimistic about the future of the college. Describing the ''student-centered approach to learning'' as a ''national treasure,'' Dr. Ilchman said she has observed that ''Sarah Lawrence students seem to get connected to their course work more quickly than they do at other institutions.''
Conceding initial skepticism, Mrs. Ilchman said she had become convinced that ''there is really something different about the way students are taught here.''
The college employs the don system, in which each student works with a faculty advisor and designs an individual program of study. The don serves as the student's academic and personal adviser throughout the undergraduate years.
''If the students get turned on faster,'' Dr. Ilchman said, ''perhaps it is because they have more responsibility for figuring out what they are interested in.'' Another feature of the Sarah Lawrence educational plan allows both students and faculty to choose with whom they wish to work. ''I'd never seen anything like that before,'' Dr. Ilchman said.
Fostering and expanding that active relationship between faculty and students is a priority for Dr. Ilchman, who has criticized the many educational institutions that ''treat their students as passive objects.'' In too many liberal arts institutions, she said, ''the only performance that students come to expect is the term paper.'' Mrs. Ilchman advises Sarah Lawrence students not to talk about scientific experiments but to perform them; not to simply look at slides of great art but to paint.
Understanding the implications of an increasingly computerized world will also be emphasized during her tenure, Dr. Ilchman said. In her convocation address to the college in September, Dr. Ilchman observed: ''My family has just acquired a home computer, and I eye it warily. I feel like an immigrant in a new land where our children already know the language.'' She added, ''In the larger context, how Sarah Lawrence responds to this pervasive feature of our era requires expert advice and our thoughtful collective judgment.''
In that address, Dr. Ilchman also stressed the need for the college to encourage a ''cosmopolitan curriculum,'' reflecting a ''global perspective, a deliberate incorporating in our intellectual repertoire alternative formulations of experience.''
Dr. Ilchman, who as Under Secretary of State was responsible for managing a number of exchange programs, including the Fulbright program, told the students ''learning about'' international affairs is not sufficient. ''It is,'' she said, ''learning to relate what goes on overseas to one's own life and work, and importantly, vice versa.''
If Dr. Ilchman's career has demonstrated a commitment to fostering greater international understanding, she is also keenly interested professionally and personally in women's issues. ''Tensions between family and career can be supported and reduced,'' she said, ''but they are always there for men and women alike.''
Dr. Ilchman is former chairman of a study group on Women's Employment and Related Social Issues of the National Research Council of the National Academy of Science, and she is also a member of the board of overseers of the Center for Research on Women at Wellesley College.
''I profoundly disagree with those who maintain that anything worth doing must be paid,'' Dr. Ilchman said. ''Volunteer work is appropriate for all caring, moral human beings.''
A major effort for the new president of Sarah Lawrence will be to help students to discover ''how their search for self-fulfillment can incorporate connectedness to others.'' Describing this involvement as a basic human dilemma for men as well as for women, Dr. Ilchman said, ''How to merge who you love with what you love? It's a dilemma we all face. I face it every day.''
Dr. Ilchman is a 1957 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and received her master's degree in public administration from Syracuse University and her Ph.D. from the London School of Economics. She is married to Warren F. Ilchman, vice president for graduate studies and research at the State University of New York at Albany. The Ilchmans have two children, Frederick, 14, and Sarah, 11.
Illustrations: photo of Dr. Alice Stone Ilchman | BRONXVILLE WHEN students at Sarah Lawrence College invited their presidentelect to deliver a ''fantasy lecture'' earlier this year in their coffee house, Alice Stone Ilchman responded with a speech entitled, ''The Role of Public Diplomacy in the Conduct of United States Foreign Relations.'' ''I had to talk about something I cared about,'' Dr. Ilchman explained, ''and while I love old English silver, I wasn't as prepared to discuss it.'' If the choice of topic revealed something about the college's eighth president, Dr. Ilchman said, the existence of such a fantasy lecture forum revealed much about the atmosphere of the college - an atmosphere that she will encourage as president. ''The coffee house series illustrates that intellectual activity here is also recreation,'' Dr. Ilchman said. ''Sarah Lawrence students appear not to separate school work from what's really on their minds.'' | 6.636364 | 0.982955 | 43.232955 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/08/world/mexico-s-refugees-fear-clampdown.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081019id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/08/world/mexico-s-refugees-fear-clampdown.html | MEXICO'S REFUGEES FEAR CLAMPDOWN | 20150524081019 | MEXICO CITY, Nov. 4— The arrest of five Argentine leftist exiles on kidnapping charges here last week has awakened fears of a general clampdown against the thousands of Latin American political refugees who have sought asylum in Mexico in recent years.
After the arrest of the five, all said to be members of the Argentine Revolutionary Workers' Party, at least 20 more Argentine and Uruguayan refugees, including several children, were detained for ''investigation'' by immigration authorities.
Argentine political groups here have been quick to dissociate themselves from the kidnapping incident, taking out newspaper advertisements to reiterate their appreciation for Mexico's ''hospitality'' and their respect for Mexican laws. But exile sources said there was a mood of alarm among foreign refugees, who are estimated to number more than 30,000.
Mexican leftist parties and liberal newspapers have also warned of the dangers of a witch hunt against leftist exiles. ''In these situations, those who are blinded by xenophobia should be reminded that there are also Mexican migrants in other countries,'' the daily Uno Mas Uno noted in a clear allusion to the millions of Mexicans living illegally in the United States. Investigation of Exiles Urged
But conservative groups, which have long opposed Mexico's open-door policy toward political refugees, have used the kidnapping to support their argument that the country has been flooded with terrorists.
''Why do they choose Mexico and not Cuba?'' the rightist newspaper El Heraldo asked in an editorial last Sunday. ''These exiles should be investigated and it will be proved that a high percentage of them should be in the Caribbean island because there they practice Communism, which is, without doubt, what appeals to the majority of the red Chileans, Salvadorans and Nicaraguans who are exiled here.''
Gen. Arturo Durazo Moreno, Mexico City's police chief, said last week that the authorities ''must be permanently on the alert to prevent the illegal entry of foreigners with criminal and subversive records who could provoke terrorist acts such as occur in other countries.''
The kidnapping incident, which took place Oct. 23, involved Beatriz Madero Graza, a 25-year-old niece of Pablo Emilio Madero, the candidate of the conservative National Action Party in the presidential election next July. She was freed unharmed four days later when one of her captors was seized by the police while collecting a $1.6 million ransom. Four Held as Accomplices
Miss Madero subsequently recognized two of her kidnappers among those arrested. Three other people were arrested as accomplices, including a Mexican and Roberto Guevara de la Serna, president of the Revolutionary Workers' Party and brother of the late Argentine-born Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara.
If the charges are upheld in court, this will be the first crime attributable to leftist exiles since large numbers of Latin American political refugees began to arrive here after the military coup against Chile's President, Salvador Allende Gossens, in September 1973.
Mexico's President at the time, Luis Echeverria Alvarez, warmly welcomed thousands of Chilean leftists here, many of whom were given Government jobs. Within a year, many hundreds of Argentine and Uruguayan academics, journalists and politicians who were also fleeing military repression were allowed into Mexico and many of them found work in universities and in the press and broadcasting.
By 1976, though, conservative hostility toward the Echeverria administration spilled over into a rightist press campaign against the exiles, principally the Chileans, who were variously charged with taking jobs from Mexicans and with responsibility for the Government's left-leaning foreign policy. Refugees Slip Across Border
Under President Jose Lopez Portillo, who is completing his fifth year in office, thousands of political refugees have continued to arrive here, but most have been poor peasants and workers escaping civil wars, first in Nicaragua and, more recently, in El Salvador and Guatemala.
While most of the Nicaraguans were given refugee status after having sought asylum in the Mexian Embassy in Managua, Salvadoran and Guatemalan exiles have generally slipped across the border into Mexico illegally and have received no formal assistance from the Mexican Govvernment.
Even before last week's kidnapping incident, leftist and human rights groups here had expressed concern at signs of a toughening of Mexico's refugee policy. The decision this summer to return to Guatemala several Indian communities, totaling some 3,000 people, that had fled to Mexico prompted a protest from the regional office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
In his widely read column in Uno Mas Uno, Miguel-Angel Granados warned last weekend of ''the risk that this grave kidnapping incident result in a rebirth of the xenophobic tendencies that appear among us from time to time, above all when it involves people born outside Mexico who are here for political reasons.''
But the Minister of the Interior, Enrique Olivares Santana, whose office is in charge of immigration questions, has insisted that there has been no change in Mexico's traditional policy of asylum. ''As a country of laws and institutions, Mexico merely demands that the hospitality and security it offers be corresponded by those to whom it gives a refuge and a roof,'' he said. | The arrest of five Argentine leftist exiles on kidnapping charges here last week has awakened fears of a general clampdown against the thousands of Latin American political refugees who have sought asylum in Mexico in recent years. After the arrest of the five, all said to be members of the Argentine Revolutionary Workers' Party, at least 20 more Argentine and Uruguayan refugees, including several children, were detained for ''investigation'' by immigration authorities. Argentine political groups here have been quick to dissociate themselves from the kidnapping incident, taking out newspaper advertisements to reiterate their appreciation for Mexico's ''hospitality'' and their respect for Mexican laws. But exile sources said there was a mood of alarm among foreign refugees, who are estimated to number more than 30,000. | 6.805556 | 0.986111 | 48.472222 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/12/nyregion/new-jersey-housing-making-it-look-easy-in-princeton.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081126id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/12/nyregion/new-jersey-housing-making-it-look-easy-in-princeton.html | New Jersey Housing - MAKING IT LOOK EASY IN PRINCETON - NYTimes.com | 20150524081126 | ONE is reminded of Candide's resolve to cultivate his own garden. The Princeton-based Hillier Group, architects, planners and interior designers, is ranked among the largest concerns of its type in the United States. Its most ambitious current undertaking is the planning and design of a $700 million city on Seddon Island in the heart of Tampa, Fla., a city that will include housing for 14,000 and a mile and a half of waterfront facilities.
Yet, J.Robert Hillier, who founded the company 15 years ago, seems as pleased with its work on two neighboring condominium projects practically in the group's own backyard.
For example, Design Interface, a subsidiary of the Hillier Group, developed Markham Square. Its original plan called for the demolition of a vintage 1888 house on the site and the construction of 12 new town houses.
As it turned out, the proposal was not presented to the Princeton Borough Zoning Board when scheduled, since the board spent the lion's share of that particular meeting considering another developer's plan to convert still another large old house into a multi-family dwelling.
''We reconsidered the historical aspects of the 1888 house,'' Mr. Hillier said, ''and the plan was redesigned in one month.'' The revised plan called for the construction of 10 town houses, plus the conversion of the old house into two condominiums. The house had to be moved 26 feet (at a cost of $1,000 a foot) to accommodate the new plan, a task that was accomplished in two and a half weeks by C.Van Howling and Sons of Wallington.
Although moving a house that weighs 275 tons, including all of the mover's needed steel framework, is not simple, Donald Christie, president of C.Van Howling, referred to it as a ''nice, short move with no unusual problems. It was difficult in the sense that it was an old house and had been moved before, but no special precautions had to be made that we wouldn't have made ordinarily.''
Markham Square opened for occupancy last April. The town houses were priced at $216,000, and the two condiminiums in the restored house, one of which is still unsold, were priced at $245,000.
According to Mr. Hillier, the town houses appeal to young people who may not have amassed a lot of money for down payments, but whose monthly cash flow is nonetheless sub-stantial.
With this project, Mr. Hillier has embarked on what he perceives to be an inevitable march toward ''the developer as joint venturer.'' He has offered a version of a ''shared appreciation mortgage,'' in which he is providing financing at 8.45 percent in return for the right to claim one-third of the town house's appreciation in 10 years or upon its sale.
Five of the town houses have been sold this way. If the town houses appreciate, it would be partly the result of improving a building across the street from them on Markham Road. Originally designed as an office building, the three-story concrete structure, now known as One Markham, had stood partly finished, boarded up and graffiti ridden for about 10 years.
''We had always been concerned about the unfinished building,'' Mr. Hillier recalled, ''and one day our business manager got a call from the owner's attorney asking if we knew of anyone who would be interested in buying a building coming up for a sheriff's sale.''
And so Mr. Hillier and his wife, Susan, bought the building for $415,000 and the Hillier Group set about planning what to do with it. ''People in the borough were nervous about it,'' said Paul Douglas of Stewardson-Dougherty Real Estate Associates, a Princeton brokerage concern, and the marketing manager for One Markham.
''For 10 or 11 years, it was the center of controversy. It was an eyesore, and people were beginning to think that it would be a blight on the neighborhood forever. Personally, I felt that it would be more suitable as a residence than as an office building, and it was a pleasant surprise to see what the Hilliers planned to do.''
With the blessings of borough regulatory agencies, the building was converted into a condominium with 17 two-bedroom units, each of about 1,300 square feet. Five of the apartments on the first floor have private gardens, and prices range from $159,000 to $185,000.
''It's a very nice apartment building,'' Mr. Douglas said. ''There is nothing else like it here; you can drive into a garage that's electronically controlled and take an elevator to your floor.''
Ten of the units have been sold, primarily to older couples whose children no longer live with them and who no longer need large homes. Although the Hilliers have arranged for mortgage financing for their buyers, few are applying for loans.
''These buyers are traders,'' Mr. Douglas said. ''They're selling something to buy something. One or two are applying for mortgages just in case they haven't sold their houses before they close here.''
Initial occupancy of the building is scheduled this summer. One of the important things he has learned, Mr. Hillier said, is that people still have an inherent desire for quality and are willing to pay for it. Moreover, they want smaller housing in downtown areas, as attested to by the fact that some 300 people came to One Markham's open house.
Mrs. Hillier involvement in the marketing and financial facets of One Markham has drawn praise from Mr. Douglas. ''She's really candid,'' he explained. ''People aren't used to hearing something like, 'Look here, we've budgeted so-and-so many dollars for landscaping,' and such. It doesn't hurt. It makes believers out of people.''
Why did Mr. and Mrs. Hillier and their associates choose all the financial risk, legal wrangling, long hours of work and myriad details involved in both projects?
''We're not making any money to speak of, but it's fun,'' Mr. Hillier said, ''and there is definitely a need for housing here.'' George E. Olexa, who wears a number of hats, including that of Borough Engineer, said that Princeton was, indeed, pleased with the improvements the Hilliers had wrought.
''The borough encourages housing, and it enjoys ratables,'' he said. ''I would say yes, the borough is happy with Markham Square and One Markham.'' Little Silver 61 Chesire Square 3-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath town house $122,000 Atrium, washer-dryer. Taxes: $2,786 Long Branch 58 South Bath Avenue 5-bedroom, 3-bath, 2-family duplex $69,000 One and a half blocks from the beach, full basement. Taxes: $1,743 Manalapan 310 Union Hill Road 4-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath Colonial $97,000 Situated on a wooded half-acre. Taxes: Estimated at $2,000 (house is new). Middletown 11 Clairidge Drive 4-bedroom, 2-bath split-level $80,000 New roof, wall-to-wall carpeting. Taxes: $1,453 Oceanport 34 Brookview Avenue 4-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath Colonial $109,000 Central air-conditioning, fireplace. Taxes: Not available (house is new). Sales in Other Areas New Milford, Conn. 12 Archers Lane 3-bedroom, 1 1/2-bath raised ranch $73,000 House is 4 1/2 years old, occupies a half acre. Taxes: $700 Woodbridge, Conn. 17 Brightwood Road 4-bedroom, 3 1/2-bath Cape Cod $152,000 Occupies two acres, pool, greenhouse. Taxes: $2,225 | ONE is reminded of Candide's resolve to cultivate his own garden. The Princeton-based Hillier Group, architects, planners and interior designers, is ranked among the largest concerns of its type in the United States. Its most ambitious current undertaking is the planning and design of a $700 million city on Seddon Island in the heart of Tampa, Fla., a city that will include housing for 14,000 and a mile and a half of waterfront facilities. Yet, J.Robert Hillier, who founded the company 15 years ago, seems as pleased with its work on two neighboring condominium projects practically in the group's own backyard. | 12.341667 | 0.983333 | 54.35 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/09/13/nyregion/a-guide-to-connecticut-s-fall-cooking-classes.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081247id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/09/13/nyregion/a-guide-to-connecticut-s-fall-cooking-classes.html | A GUIDE TO CONNECTICUT'S FALL COOKING CLASSES | 20150524081247 | IT'S back-to-school time for adults as well as children. During the summer, many cooking school instructors - and their students - can't stand the heat, so they temporarily get out of the kitchen.
Now they are back, and fall and winter courses are beginning to be signed up for. Chinese, French and baking continue to be high on the list of Connecticut's cooking school offerings. But there are other appetizing courses available as well. New trends seem to be for pasta-making and for hors d'oeuvre courses, as well as elegant dining and dessert.
The following is a partial listing of schools and classes available and is not intended as an endorsement by this reviewer. Facilities that have been visited are noted in the description capsules under each specific heading. The classes are listed alphabetically by town, and then by class within each town.
COS COB Cooking With Shiu-min, 8 Loughlin Avenue. 629-2990 or 869-4448. Courses: The different regions of Chinese cooking - Sichuan, Hunan, Cantonese, Peking, Mandarin. Instructor: Shiu-min Lin Block. Cost: $90 for a three-lesson series. Starting date: Third week of September. Time: Morning or evening can be arranged. Type: Demonstration and participation. Maximum in class: 6.
Mrs. Block has an amiable, informal style, and emphasizes that she wants to make her students comfortable enough with various aspects of the Chinese cuisine to adapt it to their own home cooking. She keeps her classes small because her kitchen is small, with limited work space. Even so, students learn how to chop and arrange food, how to use Oriental spices and ''enjoy the process.'' A self-taught cook, former owner of a Chinese restaurant, and trained artist, Mrs. Block has been teaching Chinese cooking for 14 years. DARIEN The Complete Kitchen, 865 Boston Post Road. 655-4055. Courses: Food processor, bread-making, hors d'oeuvres, Chinese, microwave cooking, pasta workshop, introduction to French sauces, Swedish coffee bread-making, autumn wine tasting. Also a series of three dinners with wine and cooking demonstrations (Sept. 25 - Pasta Party; Oct. 2 - French; Nov. 13 - Mexican). Instructors: Mary Murray (proprietor ), Anne Brown; and special guest instructors : Abby Mandel, Karen Lee, others. Cost: $20 to $30 a class, $65 for the three-part Chinese series, $55 a couple fo r the dinner-demonstrations. Starting date : Sept. 22. Time: Tuesday , Wednesday, Thursday, 10 A.M. to 12:30 P.M.; 7:30 to 10 P.M. Type: Demonst ration, but full participation in such classes as breador pastr y-making. Maximum in cl ass: 20 in demonstration classes, eight in participati on.
Classes are held in a large, airy, specially constructed kitchen in the rear of a well-equipped kitchenware shop. Although we did not see a class in session, we were impressed with the layout and space in the room and the quality of equipment. A long, large demonstration table with wide overhead mirror, good lighting and two skylights make observation easy. Mary Murray, who studied at La Varenne, has been conducting classes for one year. Anne Brown, who teaches bread-making, hors d'oeuvre and food processor cooking, has five years of teaching experience and formerly had a catering business. Special instructors teach particular courses from time to time. FARMINGTON The Ann Howard Cookery Ltd., Brick Walk Lane. 678-9486. Courses: Seafood, French, breads, food processor, Northern Italian, French pastries, hors d'oeuvres, soups. Instructors: Ann Howard (proprietor) and guest lecturers - Guiliano Bugialli, Perla Meyers, Jacques Pepin, Martha Stewart. Cost: $18 to $20 for a single three-hour class by Mrs. Howard; $35 for a three-hour class taught by a guest instructor; $55 to $75 for a series of three classes. Starting date: Continuing courses, year-round. Time: 10 A.M. to 1 P.M.; 7 to 10 P.M. Type: Combination demonstration and participation. Maximum in class: 25.
Ann Howard, who studied at Cordon Bleu in Paris and London, at La Varenne and with Simone Beck, has been teaching cooking for five years. Informal in style, but informative and knowledgeable, she teaches on the second floor of a building that also houses her baker and gourmet cookware shop. An mirror over a long work table is an advantage during observation classes. A considerable range of threehour classes are taught throughout the year - useful for people who want to advance their skills or learn aspects of a new cuisine. GREENWICH Ron Buebendorf Chinese Cooking Classes, 44 West Putnam Avenue. 869-7139. Courses: Chinese regional cooking - Cantonese, Sichuan, Fukien, Peking; canapes, dinners, desserts. Instructor: Ron Buebendorf. Cost: $200 for six lessons. Starting date: Mid-October. Time: Evenings. Type: Demonstration with limited participation. Maximum in class: 8.
A student of Virginia Lee in New York, Mr. Buebendorf has catered private and corporate dinners, and has been conducting classes for eight years. A sample menu at one leson might include instruction in preparing soy sauce chicken, bean curd casserole, Eight Precious Pudding; another menu - Shanghai duck, stir-fry vegetables, pancakes with apricot filling; a third - Sichuan shrimp, cucumber salad, walnut and date soup. Cook's Corner Inc., 70 East Putnam Avenue. 869-2653. Courses: French, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, food processor, hors d'oeuvres, Moroccan. Instructors: Nancy Mott (proprietor), Joanne Griffin, Elizabeth Andoh, Paula Wolfert. Cost: $30 to $125, depending on instructor and whether it is a single session or part of a series. Starting Date: Sept. 27. Time: 10 A.M., 6 P.M. Type: Full particiption in Japanese and French courses, demonstration in others. Maximum in class: 8 for participation, 20 for demonstration. | IT'S back-to-school time for adults as well as children. During the summer, many cooking school instructors - and their students - can't stand the heat, so they temporarily get out of the kitchen. Now they are back, and fall and winter courses are beginning to be signed up for. Chinese, French and baking continue to be high on the list of Connecticut's cooking school offerings. But there are other appetizing courses available as well. New trends seem to be for pasta-making and for hors d'oeuvre courses, as well as elegant dining and dessert. The following is a partial listing of schools and classes available and is not intended as an endorsement by this reviewer. Facilities that have been visited are noted in the description capsules under each specific heading. The classes are listed alphabetically by town, and then by class within each town. | 7.017751 | 0.988166 | 57.189349 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/15/world/haig-say-us-hopes-to-begin-arms-talk-soon.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081813id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/15/world/haig-say-us-hopes-to-begin-arms-talk-soon.html | HAIG SAY U.S. HOPES TO BEGIN ARMS TALK SOON | 20150524081813 | Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. said yesterday that the Reagan Administration hoped to begin ''formal talks'' with the Soviet Union between mid-November and mid-December on limiting medium-range nuclear weapons in the European area.
But Mr. Haig gave no hint when negotiations would start on longrange strategic weapons. Moreover, he said Excerpts from Haig speech, page A10. talks must not inhibit Washington's decisions on modernizing its ''vulnerable'' land-based missiles and on developing a new strategic bomber and must not block technological advance in weaponry.
In his speech, Mr. Haig responded to critics who contend the Administration has minimized efforts to restrict nuclear weapons. ''The charge that we are not interested in arms control or that we have cut off communications with the Soviets on these issues is simply not true,'' he said. Cannot Be 'Centerpiece'
The Secretary of State delivered his speech on arms control at a luncheon here of the Foreign Policy Association, a private group. Limiting weapons, Mr. Haig said, ''cannot be the political centerpiece or the crucial barometer of U.S.-Soviet relations'' but merely ''one element in a full range of political, economic and military efforts to promote peace and security.''
The talks on European area weapons, he said, must be ''matched by a clear determination'' by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to put in place both cruise and Pershing missiles. They are required, he said, to offset an ''alarming buildup'' in Soviet medium-range and short-range nuclear missiles.
Moscow must understand, he said, that its ''propaganda campaign intended to intimidate our allies cannot succeed.'' The Soviet Union ''should soon tire of the proposals that seek to freeze NATO's modernization of theater nuclear weapons while reserving for themselves the advantages of hundreds of SS-20's already deployed.''
Mr. Haig is to meet with Andrei A. Gromyko, the Soviet Foreign Minister, in September at the United Nations General Assembly. ''We would like to see U.S. and Soviet negotiators meet to begin formal talks between mid-November and mid-December,'' the Secretary of State said. A senior American official, whom Mr. Haig did not name, will conduct the bargaining with the rank of ambassador.
Mr. Haig made clear that the Administration was in no hurry to begin negotiations on the larger question of strategic weapons. Eugene V. Rostow, who has been designated to head of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, said last month that these talks probably could not begin until next March.
Today, the Secretary of State said only that ''our approach must be prudent, paced and measured.'' A Series of Principles
He put forth a series of principles or guidelines to govern these talks that suggested they must not interfere with the Administration's planned military buildup.
Arms control, he said, ''should complement military programs'' designed for ''our defense strategy.'' An agreement with the Soviet Union won't ''solve such a basic security problem as the vulnerability of our land-based missiles.'' The U.S., he said, must ''have the will and capacity'' to safeguard these missiles from destruction by Moscow even ''without arms control, should that be necessary.''
Any pact ''must truly enhance security,'' Mr. Haig went on. ''Valuable agreements can be envisioned that do not save money and do not eliminate arms.'' An agreement must be ''flexible'' and ''not try simply to restrict the advance of technology.'' He suggested that the Administration's plans to move missiles from place to place increases security by reducing any Soviet temptation to strike first. 'Linkage Is a Fact of Life'
Strategic arms negotiations must be linked to Soviet conduct, Mr. Haig said. ''Such linkage is a fact of life.'' To deny it is to ''tolerate Soviet aggression'' for the sake of preserving arms control. ''This Administration will never accept such an appalling conclusion,'' he said.
The United States will also insist that it must determine whether the Soviet Union is complying with an agreement. ''As much as any other single factor, whether the Soviets are forthcoming on this question, will determine the degree of progress in arms control in the 1980s,'' he said.
Moreover, any agreement on nuclear weapons will affect defense systems not covered in a pact. If curbs are placed on missiles in Europe, the Secretary said, conventional forces there will have to be strengthened.
In what appears to be a shift in Administration thinking, Mr. Haig promised ''more vigorous policies for inhibiting nuclear proliferation,'' the spread of nuclear weapons to nations that now lack them.
He warned that ''volatile and developing regions'' were acquiring arms of ''unparalleled destructiveness.'' No commercial gain from the sale of reactors abroad or ''regional prestige can be worth such risks,'' Mr. Haig said. Arms Sales to Latins Defended
Responding to questions after his speech, the Secretary warmly defended the Administration's new policy of supporting development loans to Chile, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. President Carter had blocked aid to these nations on the grounds that they violated human rights.
Mr. Haig insisted that ''the improvement'' in each of the four ''has been dramatic.'' The Secretary also predicted that Egypt, Israel and the United States would initial, ''perhaps early this week,'' an agreement to create a multinational force in Sinai after Israel completes its scheduled withdrawal from the peninsula in 1982.
Mr. Haig declined to forecast whether the Soviet Union would invade Poland. If Soviet troops move in, however, the ''price and consequences would be grave and long lasting,'' he said. However, he said he ''would not envisage a military reaction to such an outcome,'' a sentiment shared by the European allies.
As the Secretary of State rose to speak, several demonstrators in the Hilton Hotel ballroom balcony threw down leaflets and shouted: ''You're a war criminal!'' and ''U.S.A., stop the war in El Salvador!''
Mr. Haig stood unruffled at the microphone and traded barbs with his hecklers. He called them ''people who espouse social justice and can't cope with a reasoned, logical exposition.''
As the demonstrators were led away by guards, Mr. Haig said, ''It's a shame.'' | Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. said yesterday that the Reagan Administration hoped to begin ''formal talks'' with the Soviet Union between mid-November and mid-December on limiting medium-range nuclear weapons in the European area. But Mr. Haig gave no hint when negotiations would start on longrange strategic weapons. Moreover, he said Excerpts from Haig speech, page A10. talks must not inhibit Washington's decisions on modernizing its ''vulnerable'' land-based missiles and on developing a new strategic bomber and must not block technological advance in weaponry. | 11.813084 | 0.990654 | 53.700935 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/17/books/publishing-orwell-s-simple-secret.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081817id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/17/books/publishing-orwell-s-simple-secret.html | PUBLISHING - ORWELL'S SIMPLE SECRET - NYTimes.com | 20150524081817 | GEORGE ORWELL has been dead for 31 years, yet in many countries his books are more popular today than ever. ''He's very widely read in Italian, German and Spanish translations, and there are thousands of Japanese Orwellians,'' said Bernard Crick, author of ''George Orwell'' (Atlantic-Little, Brown), the recent biography about the essayist, novelist and social critic.
''People read him a lot in Spain even in Franco's day,'' said Mr. Crick. ''In fact, about the only place he is not openly read is in the Soviet Union. But one way to define a dissident intellectual there is by whether he has read the samizdat'' - underground - ''translations of '1984' and 'Animal Farm.' ''
The main reason for Orwell's popularity is probably his intellectual probity, his principled stand against what he described as ''the smelly little orthodoxies'' of left-wing and right-wing ideology. Yet his appeal is broader even than that. ''He was a prince of journalists, and he made the essay almost an art form,'' said Mr. Crick, a professor of politics at Birbeck College of the University of London. ''He had a very good effect on British journalists by his simplification of style.''
That simplification of style has had other effects as well. '' 'Animal Farm,' because it's short and stylistically simple, is widely used in language teaching at an advanced level,'' said Professor Crick. ''Because of that it gets into some countries where it would normally be censored if the authorities knew what it was all about.''
But simplification also has its drawbacks. ''The French don't seem all that keen on Orwell,'' said Mr. Crick, who was granted access to all the Orwell papers by the writer's widow, the late Sonia Orwell. ''They're rather puzzled by this kind of simplicity and common sense. They're interested in something more intellectually pretentious. And Japanese left-wing intellectuals are mystified by this man who could write so well in a colloquial way, because though they're always going on about the need to talk to the working man, in fact they, like the left-wing intellectuals in New York, London and Frankfurt, write at such a level that the man in the street can't understand a word.''
The Guinness Book of World Records lists him as the world's bestselling author, and his publisher maintains that he outsells Agatha Christie, Harold Robbins, Barbara Cartland and Louis L'Amour combined. He is the late Erle Stanley Gardner, who wrote 143 books, including 120 mystery novels that have sold some 315 million copies in 23 languages. Eighty-two of those novels featured Perry Mason, the Los Angeles criminal lawyer who made his debut in Gardner's first book, ''The Case of the Velvet Claws,'' published in 1933. Twentynine other Gardner books were published under the pseudonym, A.A. Fair. In the Pocket Books editions they were for years a staple of the paperback racks.
''But for the last few years his mysteries have been virtually unobtainable in the United States, because Pocket Books had not reprinted any of them. While outside the United States his sales are getting bigger and bigger and bigger,'' said Lawrence Hughes, president of William Morrow & Company, which published the hard-cover edition of every novel Gardner wrote.
But Ballantine Books recently bought the paperback rights to the Gardner mysteries from Morrow. ''We're publishing two this month and one a month for each of the next four months,'' said Katie Sheehan, an editor at Ballantine. How many others the house publishes depends on the reception given the first six, but Ballantine says it expects the books to do well because of the Gardner name and because of a renewed interest in mysteries. ''Mysteries are said to be the second biggest sellers in category books, after historical romance,'' Miss Sheehan said.
For a decade before publication of his first novel, Gardner wrote stories for the pulp magazines at night and practiced law in Ventura, Calif., by day. According to Dorothy B. Hughes, author of a 1978 biography of Gardner (also published by Morrow), he set himself a quota of 1.2 million words a year, or a 10,000-word novelette every three days.
Yet between law and the pulps, Gardner could never find time to write a novel until it occurred to him to dictate one, as he dictated the real-life cases in his office. His first effort required only four days, including half a day to think up the plot. Before long he was earning more than $20,000 a year, or 20 times what he earned from writing during his first year, 1921.
''Money Dynamics for the 80's,'' a book by Venita Van Caspel, has hopped on and off The New York Times best-seller list several times in recent months. The book, published by the relatively unknown Reston Publishing Company of Reston, Va., was first issued in 1975, has been updated twice - each time getting a different title -and has sold almost 500,000 copies. A 52-page chapter on life insurance, carved out of the book and published separately in a $1.50 paperback, has sold more than 800,000 copies.
''We turned 10 years old on April 1,'' said Victor Erickson, marketing director of Reston, a subsidiary of Prentice-Hall. ''We were essentially a technical-book publisher, but now our biggest line is electronics, then computer science, business and real estate, agriculture and nursing.'' Reston has published 677 titles, with 156 more scheduled for this year.
Mrs. Van Caspel, who owns a financial planning company in Houston, was signed up after a Reston editor saw her on television and attended one of her seminars. Her book began life as ''Money Dynamics'' in 1975, became ''New Money Dynamics'' three years later and ''Money Dynamics for the 80's'' last September. The author has promoted it in dozens of television and radio interviews.
How does the Van Caspel book differ from other recent investment and financial books? Said Mr. Erickson: ''Maybe because she's spent most of her life in Oklahoma and Texas, she takes a folksy approach rather than trying to scare readers to death.''
Illustrations: photo of George Orwell | GEORGE ORWELL has been dead for 31 years, yet in many countries his books are more popular today than ever. ''He's very widely read in Italian, German and Spanish translations, and there are thousands of Japanese Orwellians,'' said Bernard Crick, author of ''George Orwell'' (Atlantic-Little, Brown), the recent biography about the essayist, novelist and social critic. ''People read him a lot in Spain even in Franco's day,'' said Mr. Crick. ''In fact, about the only place he is not openly read is in the Soviet Union. But one way to define a dissident intellectual there is by whether he has read the samizdat'' - underground - ''translations of '1984' and 'Animal Farm.' '' | 8.142857 | 0.987013 | 61.701299 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/16/style/the-childhood-industry-conflicting-advice.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081838id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/16/style/the-childhood-industry-conflicting-advice.html | THE CHILDHOOD 'INDUSTRY' - CONFLICTING ADVICE - NYTimes.com | 20150524081838 | Peter Bergson, father of two, described his immense frustration as he found himself hurling the book on how to be a parent across the bedroom one night awhile ago. He said, ''I was thinking, 'It's impossible! I just can't remember all this stuff!' Sure, I felt better for throwing it, but it's still confusing for a parent to separate the fads from the valid approaches.
''Now I try not to buy the hype -and I don't think I should know all the answers anymore,'' said Mr. Bergson, who directs a preschool center in Bryn Mawr, Pa.
There were 79 other child-care professionals sitting on conference chairs in the Renaissance Ballroom of the Holiday Inn on West 57th Street, and they had come to absorb and evaluate knowledge about the developing child. Researchers and Doers
''You see, there are the researchers and there are the doers, and I'm a doer,'' said Anne Vonick, director of a child-studies center in New Rochelle, N.Y., who is also a mother of five. ''But as a doer, the question is, what do the researchers say to do?''
The participants - childhood-learning specialists, parent educators, preschool teachers and day-care coordinators - had come from as far away as Grand Junction, Colo., and spent $125 each to attend two days of lectures and exhibits last week, directed by Dr. Burton L. White, the educational psychologist and founder of the Center for Parent Education in Newton, Mass.
''There is a hunger, a tremendous desire on the part of parents, educators and professionals for information about child development,'' said Dr. White. ''Unfortunately, the field is fraught with confusion and misinformation. As yet, ours is a feeble science, and as a result, in such a situation, you get a lot of quackery and horse manure.''
The conference was one manifestation of what Dr. White has called the early-childhood ''industry'' in America. A network of experts with varying credentials offer lectures and address conferences of parents and educators throughout the country, and some of them appear on television shows and write for magazines and newspapers. 600 Child-Development Books
A multimillion-dollar business centers on toys, games and gadgets for infants and preschoolers. Currently, publishers offer volumes on subjects ranging from descriptions of toddlers' development to improving babies' intelligence, temperament and ''spiritual sensitivity,'' and have sold books on early education in the millions of copies. There are now more than 600 books in print on the subject of child development, according to the listings of the R.R. Bowker Company, the reference publishers.
The information so dispensed, the experts say, affects parental decisions and government policy on a range of issues such as day care or ''surrogate care,'' the methods of coping with dyslexia and hyperactivity, educational questions involving the degree to which intelligence is inherited, and assumptions about intelligence and race or class.
''Some of this stuff tries to create guilt in parents - if you don't buy that particular book or game or toy or crib or gadget, you'll fail your children and hurt their development,'' said Dr. White. ''But the number of people who are qualified to give advice on the subject is comparatively small, compared to the number of people who purport to be experts in the field.'' A Member of the Industry
The 51-year-old Dr. White qualifies as a member of the industry himself, as author of books such as ''The First Three Years of Life'' and as a frequent guest on television shows. After 13 years as director of the Harvard Preschool Project, he left to found his nonprofit parent education center in 1978. So far, more than 1,000 professionals have paid to attend his institutes, and last year he spoke at 30 conferences for parents and educators.
The center has a $125,000 operating budget, and was founded, Dr. White said, ''because I believe in providing a better education for children in the first three years of life.''
''I think that my field is central to society, to the family and to the way in which people can make the most of themselves,'' he said. During the conference he held forth on the whys and the hows of parent education, on the stages of infant growth, his view of children's developmental experience before the age of 3 (''crucial,'' he said) and his opinions on ''surrogate care'' (he is concerned by the trend toward placing very young children in full-time day care - a position that has drawn disagreement from some well-known investigators in child development). 'I Sleep Well at Night'
Dr. White's critics call him an ''entrepreneur,'' although they decline to do so for publication. Dr. White replies that ''I long ago decided that I'm only partly modeled after St. Francis of Assisi. I sleep well at night - the center performs a public service. I believe it's at the interface between the academics and the people who want this information. Often the academics are interested in what they do - and not so much in educating parents or professionals. The problem is, if you don't have a research background, how do you evaluate all this information?''
When interviewed separately, some of the leading scientists in the field offered expressions ranging from concern to resignation at the state of the dissemination of child-development information. | Peter Bergson, father of two, described his immense frustration as he found himself hurling the book on how to be a parent across the bedroom one night awhile ago. He said, ''I was thinking, 'It's impossible! I just can't remember all this stuff!' Sure, I felt better for throwing it, but it's still confusing for a parent to separate the fads from the valid approaches. ''Now I try not to buy the hype -and I don't think I should know all the answers anymore,'' said Mr. Bergson, who directs a preschool center in Bryn Mawr, Pa. There were 79 other child-care professionals sitting on conference chairs in the Renaissance Ballroom of the Holiday Inn on West 57th Street, and they had come to absorb and evaluate knowledge about the developing child. Researchers and Doers ''You see, there are the researchers and there are the doers, and I'm a doer,'' said Anne Vonick, director of a child-studies center in New Rochelle, N.Y., who is also a mother of five. ''But as a doer, the question is, what do the researchers say to do?'' | 4.681034 | 0.987069 | 62.159483 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/17/theater/stage-an-absurdist-s-mary-stuart.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524081936id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/17/theater/stage-an-absurdist-s-mary-stuart.html | STAGE - AN ABSURDIST'S 'MARY STUART' - NYTimes.com | 20150524081936 | IN the program for the Dodger Theater production of ''Mary Stuart'' at the Public Theater, there is an elaborate genealogical chart titled ''The English Succession, showing the position of Mary Queen of Scots and Lord Darnley, in relation to the English throne.'' It's an intimidating chart whose calligraphic lettering and profusion of dates promise a windy evening of historical theater. It is also, one eventually and happily discovers, a red herring. The play at the Public isn't about royal family trees. Nor does it have much truck with Lord Darnley, Friedrich von Schiller's ''Mary Stuart,'' or, for that matter, English civilization as we ever knew it. This is Wolfgang Hildesheimer's ''Mary Stuart,'' and it looks very much like the work of a madman.
Actually, Mr. Hildesheimer is an obscure postwar absurdist playwright, and he's perhaps a little too devious to be certifiably bananas. For about half its length, his play misleadingly does resemble a traditional historical drama about Mary's execution in 16th-century England. When we enter the Public's LuEsther Hall, we find a realistic dungeon set (nicely designed by Jim Clayburgh) and are invited to sit in its upper reaches. Soon Mary - in the form of a feverish Roberta Maxwell - appears and bursts into some tedious, actressy speeches that defend her reign and boast of her forthcoming martyrdom. This queen has an advanced Joan of Arc complex: She keeps listening, in vain, for the angels' voices that will announce her sainthood. As she babbles on, we begin to long for the more entertaining Marys of Schiller, Maxwell Anderson and Robert Bolt.
But then the dawn of execution day arrives, and so does the insanity. When the heroine's royal retainers show up to bid their final farewells, we start to realize that something is wrong with Mr. Hildesheimer's picture. Why is Mary's French manservant suddenly sneaking in and out of the shadows to make homosexual advances to the mute assistant executioner? Why is Mary's otherwise obsequious doctor making snide remarks about his queen's lute playing? And why, when Mary makes a last request to see her beloved royal lap dogs, does an obliging toady fill her prison with enough stuffed canine friends to decorate a taxidermist's shop?
Don't ask me why; I'm just reporting what I saw. And I can report as well that the second half of this ''Mary Stuart'' is rudely - no, obscenely -funny. Mary's last rites look like a cross between the Marx Brothers' stateroom scene in ''A Night at the Opera'' and some filthy, suppressed canvas by Hieronymous Bosch. No sooner does the queen look the other way than her servants engage in slapstick fist fights over the loot in her jewelry box. One of the royal maids tends to her employer's final coiffure while simultaneously raising her skirt for amorous advances from any man who approaches from the rear. Meanwhile, Mary gets sloshed on an apothecary's potion and starts careening between nonsensical rages and advanced catatonia. One minute she's lunging about caressing her dead pets; the next she's frozen in place, her deranged mouth wide open, as if she, too, has been stuffed.
Des McAnuff, the director, has choreographed these shenanigans like a dizzy circus, complete with overlapping action and dialogue. His cast - all dressed in full Elizabethan garb by Patricia McGourty - is terrific. I particularly enjoyed Roy Cooper's jaded civil servant of an executioner, John Bottom's two-faced doctor, and George Lloyd as an ancient, bespectacled clerk whose ''very sharp knees'' discomforted Mary in her childhood.
As for Miss Maxwell, she raises daffiness to an art. At first the actress comes off as a road-company tragedian - almost a conventional, sympathetic Mary Stuart, but just enough off the mark to make us suspect the strange direction the play will later take. Once she goes bonkers, she becomes a rubber-faced comic monster, deliriously clinging to her haughty regal manner and prerogatives in the face of every indignity known to God and England.
By the time she loses her head literally as well as figuratively, we're in tears - of laughter, not sorrow. And we also see the method behind Mr. Hildesheimer's madness. The playwright, a one-time Nazi refugee, is limning the absurdities of power and the moral bankruptcy of those who crave it. His contempt quickly spreads from the despotic Mary to the hypocritical peons around her. Throughout the play, the queen's opportunistic employees jockey for future employment, even to the point of promising to abandon their Catholic faith if that will gain them a good job in Protestant England. As a maid mournfully assures Mary at one point, ''We're faithful unto death -unto your death, madam, not ours.''
One only wishes that Mr. Hildesheimer were not quite so slow in setting up his big comic whammy. The first 45 minutes of his ''Mary Stuart'' are only fitfully amusing, and even the ensuing hilarity doesn't entirely obliterate one's memory of the earlier boredom. As there's no intermission, you can't arrive at the show gracefully late. Maybe you should just kill the time studying that chart in the program - it may come in handy some other night -and relax in the certainty that slaphappy joy is on its way. Royal Succession? MARY STUART, by Wolfgang Hildesheimer; English Version by Christopher Holmes; directed by Des McAnuff; scenery by Jim Clayburgh; costumes by Patricia McGourty; lighting by Fred Buchholz; stage managed by Bill McComb. Presented by Joseph Papp, a Dodger Theater Production. At the Public Theater, LuEsther Hall, 425 Lafayette Street. Executioner ................................Roy Cooper Mate ...................................Donald Vanhorn Mary Stuart ...........................Roberta Maxwell Didier ...................................George Lloyd Guard .....................................Todd Waring Gervais ................................Stephen Markle Raoul .....................................John Bottom Symmons .....................................Ron Faber Jane ...................................Rebecca Schull Anne ....................................Cecile Callan Andrew ....................................Brad O'Hare John ...................................Philip Casnoff Paulet ....................................Herb Foster Kent ......................................George Hall Dean of Peterborough ..................Wyman Pendleton
Illustrations: Photo of Roberta Maxwell | IN the program for the Dodger Theater production of ''Mary Stuart'' at the Public Theater, there is an elaborate genealogical chart titled ''The English Succession, showing the position of Mary Queen of Scots and Lord Darnley, in relation to the English throne.'' It's an intimidating chart whose calligraphic lettering and profusion of dates promise a windy evening of historical theater. It is also, one eventually and happily discovers, a red herring. The play at the Public isn't about royal family trees. Nor does it have much truck with Lord Darnley, Friedrich von Schiller's ''Mary Stuart,'' or, for that matter, English civilization as we ever knew it. This is Wolfgang Hildesheimer's ''Mary Stuart,'' and it looks very much like the work of a madman. | 7.574194 | 1 | 155 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/17/magazine/design-an-artful-retreat-by-the-mediterranean.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082336id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/17/magazine/design-an-artful-retreat-by-the-mediterranean.html | Design - AN ARTFUL RETREAT BY THE MEDITERRANEAN - NYTimes.com | 20150524082336 | One fine, sunny day in 1930, an elderly gentleman wearing a pincenez and a small mustache burst into a printer's small shop in Cannes, France. ''Maurice Chevalier is singing at a gala and no one can print my program,'' excitedly said the man, an artist.
The printer produced the program with the artist's lithograph, and then asked what would be done with the original. ''I'll probably give it away,'' the artist replied vaguely. The printer promptly offered to sell it for him. He called Bernheim, then the top Paris gallery, for an idea of the price, put it in his window and sold it immediately. The delighted artist gave him a second picture.
Aime Maeght, the art dealer who transformed a small printing business on the Mediterranean into a multimillion-dollar international art empire, tells this anecdote with relish, for it at once illustrates his youthful brashness and Pierre Bonnard's perspicacity in trusting the young printer.
The story will probably be retold dozens of times this year as Maeght (pronounced ''mahg'') celebrates his 75th birthday, for he is the last of his generation of art dealers who, in their dogged support of unknown and often controversial artists, have themselves become part of art history. Further, by prodding artists to create graphics that could be reproduced by the hundreds and sold at far lower prices than paintings, he, in effect, democratized art. ''Maeght has, without doubt, a personality that will leave its mark on the artistic world of the 20th century,'' said Joan Miro in Barcelona.
The Maeght empire comprises galleries in Paris, Zurich Barcelona and New York, a Paris publishing house and the Fondation Marguerite et Aime Maeght at Saint-Paul-de-Vence, a vigorous, spectacular museum that is the premier cultural attraction of the Cote d'Azur.
Maeght's stable of artists reads like a ''Who's Who'' of contemporary giants: Miro, Chagall, Braque, Giacometti, Steinberg, Ubac, Tapies, Tal-Coat, Lindner, to name just a few. Among the artists in the foundation's collection are Arp, Braque, Bonnard, Chagall, Sam Francis, Giacometti, Hartung, Kandinsky, Ellsworth Kelly, Leger, Matisse, Matta, Miro, Steinberg, Tapies and Ubac, all represented by many works. Picasso is absent.
''I had the choice of Picasso or Braque; I chose Braque,'' Maeght said flatly. ''Picasso wanted exclusivity and he was demanding. But I knew him well; we remained friends.'' Rather than represent Picasso he chose everybody else.
He runs his empire as befits an autocrat, from atop a mountain at Saint-Paul-de-Vence, where he can look down and see the museum, and, in the distance, the sea. In a forest, he cleared trees and underbrush and planted exotic flowers, an orchard with figs, citrus trees and two varieties of avocado, and an immense collection of cactus. When dusk falls they are silhouetted against the sky in living counterpoint to the thrusting sculptures of Calder and Miro. A glass house shelters more than 1,000 orchid plants.
He lives in a rather ordinary-looking home, with the white stucco walls and red-tiled roofs that modern houses affect in this region. Inside is a mass of contradictions: White slip-covered sofas sit in a living room decorated with a stained-glass window and lintel by Braque, a wall-hanging by Miro and a chandelier by Giacometti. Walls are hung with paintings by Kandinsky, Braque, Chagall and Bonnard and tables strewn with the latest gadgets -tape recorders, video and sound equipment, several expensive cameras, including a Hasselblad.
On the stairway, the bannister and carpet holders are by Diego Giacometti, the sculptor's brother who cast Alberto's works and is himself a artist of impressive talents. In recent years an elevator has been installed to the second story, and a flight of stairs leads to a small attic room and a sundeck. The upstairs guest room boasts a Leger rug and a small Kandinsky oil painting. In the master bathroom the fittings - faucets, medicine cabinet, mirror and light fixtures - are by Giacometti, as is the ladder in the swimming pool and a bronze lizard lurking by the edge spewing water.
The billiard room has a drawing by Calder of a man playing billiards. A collection of ceramics is signed ''Miro'' and ''Leger.'' A chocolate-colored Rolls-Royce gleams in the driveway.
Maeght is about as far as he can get, in both position and geography, from his childhood in Hazebrouck, in northern France near the Belgian border. His father, a train conductor, was killed in the World War I and his mother remarried a peasant. Before the war ended, Maeght fell ill and was evacuated by the Red Cross to Nimes, near Avignon in the Rhone Valley, where he studied art and music at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. To earn extra money, he designed and printed posters, winning a competition that landed him a job with a local printer in Avignon.
After a stint in the army he moved to Cannes, met his wife and mingled with the large colony of artists living on the coast. ''Braque, Picasso, van Dongen, Dufy, Matisse, Chagall - everyone came to Cannes in 1927,'' he said. Their ranks included the Ballets Russes, based in Monte Carlo where Diaghilev regularly engaged the artists to design sets and costumes. | One fine, sunny day in 1930, an elderly gentleman wearing a pincenez and a small mustache burst into a printer's small shop in Cannes, France. ''Maurice Chevalier is singing at a gala and no one can print my program,'' excitedly said the man, an artist. The printer produced the program with the artist's lithograph, and then asked what would be done with the original. ''I'll probably give it away,'' the artist replied vaguely. The printer promptly offered to sell it for him. He called Bernheim, then the top Paris gallery, for an idea of the price, put it in his window and sold it immediately. The delighted artist gave him a second picture. Aime Maeght, the art dealer who transformed a small printing business on the Mediterranean into a multimillion-dollar international art empire, tells this anecdote with relish, for it at once illustrates his youthful brashness and Pierre Bonnard's perspicacity in trusting the young printer. | 5.668421 | 0.989474 | 65.4 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/20/business/company-news-049039.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082340id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/03/20/business/company-news-049039.html | COMPANY NEWS - NYTimes.com | 20150524082340 | Federated Department Stores Inc., parent of Bloomingdale's and Abraham & Straus, reported yesterday that earnings in the fourth fiscal quarter rose 16.9 percent on a sales increase of 9.4 percent.
Federated said that earnings in the three months ended Jan. 31 increased to $121.9 million, or $2.52 a share, from $104.3 milion, or $2.16 a share, in the fiscal fourth quarter of the preceding year. Sales rose to $2.1 billion, from $1.92 billion.
For the full fiscal year ended Jan. 31, 1981 net income increased 36.7 percent, to $277.7 million, or $5.74 a share, from $203.2 million, or $4.21 a share, in the preceding fiscal year that ended Feb. 2, 1980. Sales increased 8.4 percent, to $6.3 billion, from $5.81 billion.
The Cincinnati-based company said that several unsusual items increased after-tax net income by $58.1 million, or $1.20 a share. These unusual items included the equity in the gain on the sale of shopping centers - the Broward Mall in Plantation, Fla., and the Greenspoint Mall in Houston, by Federated Stores Realty, an unconsolidated subsidiary.
The second item was the write-off of investment in fixed assets at downtown stores in Brooklyn, Atlanta and Dayton, Ohio, which is not expected to be recovered from earnings of operations at those locations. The third item was a special payment of $15 million, before taxes, to a charitable foundation.
''For most of our department store divisions the quarter was marked by sales somewhat stronger than anticipated and improved expense and gross margin performance,'' observed Howard Goldfeder, Federated's president.
Federated's 20 divisions also include Burdines in Miami, Bullock's in Los Angeles and Foley's in Houston, and Ralph's supermarkets in Los Angeles, the company's largest division. Marshall Field
Marshall Field & Company, Chicago's leading department store chain, reported that earnings in the fourth quarter ended Jan. 31 soared 49.1 percent, to $16.1 million, or $1.33 a share, from $10.8 million, or $1.06 a share, in the fourth quarter of the preceding year. Sales rose 27.5 percent, to $365.4 million, from $286.7 million.
For the full year, the company said, net income increased 9.5 percent, to $20.7 million, or $1.93 a share, from $18.9 million, or $1.85 a share, in the preceding fiscal year.
Marshall Field said that results for the latest year included an after-tax gain of $843,000, or 8 cents a share, from the sale of land. Results for the latest quarter, the company said, included a nonrecurring tax credit gain of $1 million, or 10 cents a share.
Retail industry analysts note that Marshall Field has embarked on a nationwide expansion program, and that new management is increasing fashion orientation and tightening inventory and cost controls. | Federated Department Stores Inc., parent of Bloomingdale's and Abraham & Straus, reported yesterday that earnings in the fourth fiscal quarter rose 16.9 percent on a sales increase of 9.4 percent. Federated said that earnings in the three months ended Jan. 31 increased to $121.9 million, or $2.52 a share, from $104.3 milion, or $2.16 a share, in the fiscal fourth quarter of the preceding year. Sales rose to $2.1 billion, from $1.92 billion. | 6.241758 | 0.989011 | 47.164835 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/15/travel/travel-advisory-dickens-birthday-migrating-birds-week-for-waterfowl-virginia.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082451id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/15/travel/travel-advisory-dickens-birthday-migrating-birds-week-for-waterfowl-virginia.html | TRAVEL ADVISORY - DICKENS, A BIRTHDAY AND MIGRATING BIRDS - A Week for Waterfowl In Virginia - NYTimes.com | 20150524082451 | It is early morning, and the autumn sky is cloudless and deep blue. Breakers thunder onto the beaches, a cold wind sighs over dunes cloaked with scrub pine. Suddenly, the vanguard of the migrating flocks appears in the distance, dark against the sky, moving swiftly south in V-formation, fluttering softly overhead, then down the beachfront, moving away, honking the pale song of late November.
Canada geese, whistling swans, snow geese, mallards - thousands of waterfowl bound for winter grounds at Chincoteague's National Wildlife Refuge may be viewed during Waterfowl Week, Nov. 21 to 29, from a seven-and-a-half-mile road in the National Wildlife Refuge on Virginia's Eastern Shore.
Special programs, including films and walks, will be offered, and exhibits on guns, boats, decoy carving and other subjects will be open daily from 9 A.M. to 4 P.M. The refuge is in Chincoteague, Va., just off Route 13. More information is available from the Virginia State Travel Service, 6 North Sixth Street, Richmond, Va. 23219 (804-786-4484). New Attraction On the Skyline In Sydney
Australia's latest tourist attraction stands like a huge, golden exclamation point on the skyline of Sydney. Detractors have called it things ranging from a pigeon coop on stilts to a $34.5 million swizzle stick. Admirers and its owners say that, whatever its appearance, it will provide a needed economic transfusion for downtown Sydney.
In any case, after six years' construction and many a wisecrack from sidewalk engineers, the new turret-topped, 1,000-foot-high Sydney Tower is one thing for sure: the tallest man-made structure in the Southern Hemisphere. It is not a building, exactly. It is rather like a building atop a pole, and there are many skyscrapers that are higher. But Sydney's new extravaganza is taller than all but two similar structures, Toronto's Communication Tower and the Moscow Tower.
More than 2.5 million visitors a year are expected to shop in and around the tower, to drink and dine in its lofty restaurants and, from its observation decks, to enjoy striking views of Sydney, its harbor and the Blue Mountains to the west. There are also convention facilities and other amenities.
The wasp-waisted tower is a series of prefabricated barrel-shaped cylinders, anchored by 56 giant cables and topped by the nine-story, gold-anodized aluminum turret, which contains all of the commercial and visitors' facilities. Elevators whiz to the top in an earpopping 40 seconds. Donald Crone, the architect, said the tower would withstand the most intense winds and earthquakes.
Miscellania: Admission is $4. Some 220 diners may be seated in the restaurants. Besides telescopes, the observation decks offer viewers with zoom lenses so good that even a myopic tourist may read a car's license plate on the street below. Calendar Date: May 1, 1982
It is the opening day of the 1982 World's Fair in Knoxville, Tenn., and if you're interested, the time to act is now, because the scramble for accommodations and campsites has already begun.
Two agencies may be helpful: For hotel rooms, the 1982 World's Fair Area-Wide Housing Bureau, Box 15012-Z, Knoxville, Tenn. 37901 (615-971-1000). For rooms in private homes and dormitories, Lodging Services, Box 2229, Knoxville, Tenn. 37901 (615-971-4000).
There are several sites for campers in the Knoxville area, but bookings are heavy, and facilities are already becoming hard to get. Try Camper 800, which makes nationwide campground reservations, at these tollfree numbers: 800-828-9280 or, in New York State, 800-462-9220. A Fiesta In Taxco
Adobe haciendas cling to the hillsides, and townspeople still cling to the old ways. Taxco, an old silver-mining town whose heritage dates to pre-Columbian times and the conquistador Cortes, is for most of the year a quiet spot on the road between Mexico City and Acapulco.
But for one week a year since 1929 - this year from Nov. 28 to Dec. 6 - Taxco explodes in a dazzle of fireworks, mariachi bands, whirling dancers and all the other uproar of a fiesta called the Silver Festival.
On a stage erected in the town square, the nightly entertainment includes ballet, orchestra concerts, vocal and instrumental soloists and popular groups.
Taxco (elevation 5,089, population 10,000) is a hilly landscape of whitewashed adobe houses and small shops offering silver products, bark paintings, Indian blankets, jewelry and pottery. The town has a wide range of hacienda-style inns and hotels, many of them deluxe and first-class.
Restaurants abound. The climate is mild throughout the year, with warm days and cool evenings requiring a sweater at most. Because of the hills, driving is difficult, and many visitors use taxis or small buses called ''burritos.'' Books And Booklets
The ''Official Guide to Greater Boston'' and the ''Official Boston Map'' are available for $2 to cover postage. Write the Greater Boston Convention and Visitors Bureau, Box 490, Suite 1944, Prudential Tower, Boston, Mass. 02199.
An updated ''Newark International Airport Map/Guide'' is available free from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, Aviation Public Services Division, 1 World Trade Center, Room 65N, New York, N.Y. 10048.
A ''Guide to the Private Historic Houses of France,'' describing 331 private chateaus open to visitors, is available for $3.50, plus $1 for postage and handling, from the Librairie de France, 610 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10020.
A booklet on auto tours in northeastern Pennsylvania, highlighting its mountains, farms, orchards and covered bridges, is available free from the Luzerne County Tourist Agency, 301 Market Street, Kingston, Pa. 18704 (717-288-6784).
A 62-page booklet on Korean tourist attractions is available from the Korean National Tourism Corporation, 460 Park Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10022. Robert D. McFadden Robert J. Dunphy Dickens Festivals: A Tale of Two Cities
It is a street scene out of Victorian England: darting ragamuffins, shouting hawkers, squawking geese, rattling horse carts and bustling crowds; a cacophony of caroling troupes, wandering minstrels, mimes, jugglers and whirling dancers; wafting aromas of plum pudding, steaming meat pies, ale and stout. It's the stuff of Charles Dickens, of course, and a tale of two cities - Galveston, Tex., and Westerly, R.I.
Riding the Dickensian wave that has made ''Nicholas Nickleby'' a triumph on Broadway, the cities are each sponsoring festivals to turn the dreary days of December into lively evocations of Old England in the best of times, the worst of times.
In Galveston, a 14-block downtown area will be transformed into a London lookalike on Dec. 4 and 5 for ''A Dickens Evening on the Tim, Bob Cratchit, Scrooge, Fagin and Oliver Twist. Amid the dancing, singing and hullabaloo, 90 shops, restaurants and pubs will offer antiques, food and drinks.
Admission will be $3 for adults and $1 for children and those over 65. Hours are 7 to 11 P.M. Friday and 2 to 10 P.M. Saturday. Further information is available from the Galveston Historical Foundation, 2016 the Strand, Galveston, Tex. 77553 (713-765-7834).
In Rhode Island, the Westerly Center for the Arts will become an English village square from noon to 8 P.M. on Dec. 3 to 9 for a potpourri of jugglers, dancers, music and storytellers under the heading of ''A Dickens Christmas Eve.'' Admission will be $1.50 for adults and $1 for children under 12. For more information: the Center for the Arts, 119 High Street, Westerly, R.I. 02891 (401-596-2031).
Illustrations: Photo of an engraving of George Washington Photo of actors in 'Oliver' | It is early morning, and the autumn sky is cloudless and deep blue. Breakers thunder onto the beaches, a cold wind sighs over dunes cloaked with scrub pine. Suddenly, the vanguard of the migrating flocks appears in the distance, dark against the sky, moving swiftly south in V-formation, fluttering softly overhead, then down the beachfront, moving away, honking the pale song of late November. Canada geese, whistling swans, snow geese, mallards - thousands of waterfowl bound for winter grounds at Chincoteague's National Wildlife Refuge may be viewed during Waterfowl Week, Nov. 21 to 29, from a seven-and-a-half-mile road in the National Wildlife Refuge on Virginia's Eastern Shore. | 11.347826 | 0.992754 | 69.311594 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/22/us/suffocation-apparently-caused-atlanta-black-s-death.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082706id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/22/us/suffocation-apparently-caused-atlanta-black-s-death.html | SUFFOCATION APPARENTLY CAUSED ATLANTA BLACK'S DEATH | 20150524082706 | ATLANTA, April 21— The nude body of a young black man, found yesterday at the edge of the Chattahoochee River southwest of downtown Atlanta, was identified early today as that of 23-year-old Michael C. McIntosh, a small, slightly built former convict who, like 13 other young blacks here in the last 21 months, apparently died of suffocation.
He was the 25th young black person to be found dead in a mysterious series of deaths and disappearances that date to July 20, 1979. Another person, a 10-year-old boy, has been missing since last September and is the only child for whom the special task force assigned to investigate the crimes continues to search.
Latest Victim Is the Oldest
The victim whose body was found yesterday was the oldest to be placed on the task force list for investigation. But the discovery of his body followed that of two 21-year-old mentally retarded black men who also were short and slightly built. Their bodies, too, were found in rivers near the city.
Lee P. Brown, Atlanta's Public Safety Commissioner, said that investigators did not know whether a new killer was at work using the same methods used in killing the children or whether the small size of the recent victims caused the killer to confuse them with children.
All of the victims except the last three ranged in age from 7 to 16, and all but two were males. Although Mr. McIntosh was older than the others, his case is similar to a number of them in several ways. As with six of the other victims, his body was nude, and it was found within a mile of where two other bodies were found in the Chattahoochee River. Seven victims have been found in either the Chattahoochee or the South River.
In addition, an autopsy found that Mr. McIntosh, like 13 previous victims, died of asphyxiation. The body was in an advanced state of decomposition, however, and the finding of the medical examiner was not conclusive.
''We're not totally excluding drowning and intoxication,'' said Dr. John Feegel, associate medical examiner for Fulton County. He added that the body had been in the river at least two weeks and that there were no visible wounds and no evidence of sexual molestation or abuse. Wanted for Parole Violation
The victim had not been reported missing to any of the local police jurisdictions, the authorities said, but was wanted for parole violation when his body was found.
In other developments relating to the killings, the City Council extended the curfew ordinance until Aug. 4. The law had been scheduled to expire in May. The hours of the curfew run from 7 P.M to 6 A.M., but will begin at 9 P.M. when daylight savings time begins this Sunday.
Mayor Maynard Jackson said that the investigation of the killings had harmed overall law enforcement in Atlanta. Nearly 100 police officers have been assigned to the investigation, according to Police Chief George Napper. The city's police department has 1,264 officers on its rolls, about 400 less than the number the city says it needs to control crime.
When the special task force was formed last summer to investigate the child slayings, it was a five-man unit. Today there are 92 members, including 21 detectives and 11 undercover agents. Also in the task force are 33 Atlanta police recruits, 11 agents of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, nine investigators from police departments of surrounding counties and the Fulton County District Attorney's office, and seven civilians. | The nude body of a young black man, found yesterday at the edge of the Chattahoochee River southwest of downtown Atlanta, was identified early today as that of 23-year-old Michael C. McIntosh, a small, slightly built former convict who, like 13 other young blacks here in the last 21 months, apparently died of suffocation. He was the 25th young black person to be found dead in a mysterious series of deaths and disappearances that date to July 20, 1979. Another person, a 10-year-old boy, has been missing since last September and is the only child for whom the special task force assigned to investigate the crimes continues to search. | 5.291339 | 0.984252 | 46.637795 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/20/books/book-packagers-come-of-age.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082711id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/20/books/book-packagers-come-of-age.html | BOOK PACKAGERS COME OF AGE | 20150524082711 | WHILE book sales have generally been sluggish for months, with the notable exception of self-help guides and blockbuster novels, a number of other books are also doing well.
Among them are the Rev. Andrew Greeley's best-selling novel, ''The Cardinal Sins''; Nelson DeMille's novel ''Cathedral'' (a Literary Guild selection), ''The Hite Report on Male Sexuality'' (a Book-ofthe-Month Club selection) and ''Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the IRS'' (a nonfiction best seller this year and last).
It is a disparate group of books, but what they have in common is that each was conceived, written and largely edited independently of the publishing houses whose imprint they bear. They are products of independent book producers, or ''packagers,'' a growing force in publishing that is beginning to have broad impact on everything from the relationship between editor and publisher to that between editor and writer. Editors Are Worried
''What used to be a hallowed publisher-author relationship is being forfeited to packagers, and I think to the detriment of publishing,'' said Dan Okrent, a packager who has six books coming out this fall with five publishers. Meanwhile, editors worry that packaging could reduce them to little more than literary midwives.
But packaging is clearly a boon to many publishers - for example, those that have small editorial staffs yet must still produce enough titles to fill their catalogues and satisfy their sales forces, or those that lack the in-house expertise to produce the heavily illustrated books at which many packagers excel. ''We've gotten into the art-book field through packagers,'' said Lawrence Hughes, president of William Morrow & Company. ''They allow a house like ours to compete with the good art-book publishers.''
''A few years ago there were maybe three or four packagers who would stand up and admit to it. Now there are over 100,'' said C. Carter Smith, president of Media Projects. About 30 packagers belong to the American Book Producers Association.
''A year ago we used to meet over small lunches, now we're a trade association,'' said Sarah Lazin, association president and director of Rolling Stone Press. Almost 100 books packaged by association members are on the 1981 fall lists of such publishers as Alfred A. Knopf, E.P. Dutton & Company, Harry N. Abrams, Bantam Books, W.W. Norton & Company, Doubleday & Company, Holt, Rinehart & Winston Little, Brown & Company, McGraw-Hill, Simon & Schuster and Macmillan. A Pejorative Term?
Some book producers consider the term ''packager'' pejorative, but it is the one most commonly applied. ''Packager just doesn't seem to reflect the amount of work we put into producing books,'' said Andrew Fluegelman, former managing editor of the ''Whole Earth Catalogue,'' who is now a packager in Tiburon, Calif.
But even the amount of work packagers do varies widely. Some are matchmakers who simply come up with an idea, hire writers and sign a contract to deliver the manuscript to an interested publisher. Others also edit the books before turning them over. Packagers of photo or art books also provide illustrations and design. And some packagers deliver a fully finished book to the publisher.
Part of packaging's appeal is its relative ease of entry. It would cost a small fortune these days to start a book company, ''but it requires very little front money to become a packager, because the publisher finances the package,'' said Edward Davis of Random House, whose wife, Nancy, has packaged guidebooks for business travelers for Franklin Watts Inc.
''Packaging is the last refuge of the publishing entrepreneur,'' said Richard Gallen, who likens it to the separate imprint within publishing houses. ''We share the same philosophy that the individual can get things done better than a bureaucratic structure.'' The Other Reasons
But trade publishers turn to packagers for other reasons. ''We do books that require the talents of designers, photographers, editors and line artists,'' said Bruce Michel, whose Tree Communications has packaged series for Time-Life Books. ''We have about 40 people. Most trade publishers don't have that talent in-house, and they don't want to add those people to their permanent staff, so they go to an outside resource.''
That ''outside resource,'' packagers, consists of many former trade-book editors. ''Packaging, like agenting, is like an industry home for unwed mothers,'' quipped Mr. Okrent, who had been an editor at Knopf, the Viking Press and Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. When Paul Fargis, president of Stonesong Press and formerly publisher at Thomas Y. Crowell and Funk & Wagnalls, started packaging books about a year ago, ''I found out I'd been doing it for a decade for the publishers I worked for,'' he said.
Before Regina Ryan quit Macmillan, where she had been editor in chief, she worked with Shere Hite on the 1979 best-selling ''The Hite Report'' on female sexuality. Later, the two decided on a sequel. ''I worked with her on its presentation, introduced her to several publishers, and when Knopf bought it I was hired as the outof-house editor,'' Miss Ryan said. ''I edited it first, shaping it and cutting it, and then Bob Gottlieb went to work on it.'' Robert Gottlieb is president of Knopf, which takes a direct editorial hand in every book bearing its imprint. | WHILE book sales have generally been sluggish for months, with the notable exception of self-help guides and blockbuster novels, a number of other books are also doing well. Among them are the Rev. Andrew Greeley's best-selling novel, ''The Cardinal Sins''; Nelson DeMille's novel ''Cathedral'' (a Literary Guild selection), ''The Hite Report on Male Sexuality'' (a Book-ofthe-Month Club selection) and ''Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the IRS'' (a nonfiction best seller this year and last). It is a disparate group of books, but what they have in common is that each was conceived, written and largely edited independently of the publishing houses whose imprint they bear. They are products of independent book producers, or ''packagers,'' a growing force in publishing that is beginning to have broad impact on everything from the relationship between editor and publisher to that between editor and writer. Editors Are Worried ''What used to be a hallowed publisher-author relationship is being forfeited to packagers, and I think to the detriment of publishing,'' said Dan Okrent, a packager who has six books coming out this fall with five publishers. Meanwhile, editors worry that packaging could reduce them to little more than literary midwives. | 4.298039 | 0.988235 | 67.678431 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/12/20/arts/tv-view-rona-barrett-s-downhill-ride.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524082847id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/12/20/arts/tv-view-rona-barrett-s-downhill-ride.html | TV View - RONA BARRETT'S DOWNHILL RIDE - NYTimes.com | 20150524082847 | If a single image had to be chosen this year to represent the glorious lunacy of show business - television or otherwise - a top candidate would be the sight of Rona Barrett leaning out of her studio chair, into a position almost of genuflection, and raising the hand of Rock Hudson to her lips for a kiss of oozing sincerity. The gossip columnist who would be a star was paying heartfelt homage to the kind of star who made her a name in the first place. The entertainment whirligig can sometimes be dizzying.
Unfortunately, the rest of ''Television: Inside and Out,'' the new Rona Barrett ''magazine'' series on NBC Saturdays at 10 P.M., has been largely a downhill experience. Miss Rona, as she insists on being called, has not been having a smooth career ride at NBC since she was wooed away from ABC's ''Good Morning, America.'' The petite dynamo, whose devotion to trivia is second to no one's, was immediately placed on the ''Today'' show, ABC's early-morning competition, and she probably did help firm up the NBC program's sagging ratings.
But Miss Rona's ambitions clearly go beyond brief morning reports stuffed with big names. She has been given an occasional prime-time special, a celebrity interview format in the style long associated with Barbara Walters. Her major showcase was supposed to be the late-night ''Tomorrow'' show, on which she would be co-host with Tom Snyder. But the Snyder and Barrett personalities refused to mesh, on-camera and off, and the subsequent headlines quickly signaled the end of the collaboration. Recently asked if Miss Rona or Mr. Tom was more responsible for the breakup, an NBC executive, understandably asking for anonymity, responded, ''That's like asking if you'd rather die of a heart attack or cancer.'' Things are obviously a bit tense at the network these days.
It's not, certainly, that NBC doesn't have scheduling space for a new show such as ''Television: Inside and Out.'' Until Grant Tinker, the network's new president, can clearly show his programming hand next fall, the network will have what is gingerly labeled a ''flexible schedule,'' as executives start cleaning out much of the old Fred Silverman shop. The temporary result may be a pronounced unevenness, but, at least occasionally, viewers might find an unexpected treat. A few weeks ago, for instance, ''Steve Martin's Best Show Ever,'' broadcast live from New York, turned out to be a zany delight, from its depiction of a game show called ''Billion-Dollar Giveaway for Suckers,'' offering all sorts of wonderful prizes for gullibility and naivete, to Mr. Martin joining Gregory Hines for a superbly accomplished display of tap dancing. A parody of ''The Elephant Man'' had the comedian lifting his protective hood to reveal the cutest little elephant trunk attached to his nose and framed by flapping Dumbo-like ears. ''If you have an Elephant Man, a Human Pincushion, a Sinatra,'' somebody gushed, ''that's show business!'' Mr. Martin's creature was properly modest: ''I'm not a human being. I'm despicable and disgusting - but that's where the money is.''
''Television: Inside and Out'' is not that kind of special treat, although it is crammed with the kind of unbelievable moments that true television addicts tend to find memorably absurd. The premiere show, three Saturdays ago, featured a hyperkinetic set throbbing with the kind of flashing lights that normally serve to distinguish a music show like ''Soul Train.'' Miss Rona seemed to spend most of her time describing what was coming up after the commercials. A piece on actresses whose husbands perform as their managers was hawked with ''a few men and women who make their deals by day and live with them by night.'' An interview with Mick Jagger, being pitched as the highlight of the hour, was breathlessly anticipated as a look at ''the sexiest man in rock-and-roll.''
Miss Rona cheerfully introduced some of the weekly regulars. Sylvester L. (Pat) Weaver, an NBC chairman in the mid-1950's and creator of the ''Today'' show, is presumably on hand to bring an element of depth to the proceedings. He manages to look distinguished even as he nods agreement with Miss Rona's non sequiturs. Wil Shriner, son of the late Herb Shriner, is presented as a humorist and, just so the audience won't forget, he keeps smiling bravely through decidedly unfunny routines.
The premiere show also included the appearance of a Chicago newspaper's television reporter noted for his scathing attacks on such television personalities as Tom Snyder. Oddly enough, he somewhat resembled Mr. Snyder, right down to affecting one of those haircuts designed to hide the ears. He said something innocuous, and Miss Rona assured him that ''as always, Gary, your tongue is terrible.'' The rest of his act wasn't so hot either.
Not surprisingly, given the overall content, the magazine's essays turned out to be noticeably slight. The piece on actresses and their husband-managers touched on some sensitive points but never really exposed some of the more disastrous business decisions that a good many of these relationships have generated. Miss Rona and her producer-director, Lawrence Einhorn, seemed much more interested in providing cute, at-home glimpses of the stars, including Suzanne Somers, Lynn Redgrave, Lynda Carter and Helen Reddy. This was indeed Miss Rona country. The Mick Jagger interview consisted of a few minutes' recording in a Michigan stadium's dressing room during the recent tour by the Rolling Stones. Looking curiously bemused, Mr. Jagger responded politely to such Rona Barrett questions as, ''This is so grueling, what makes you work so hard?'' Supplemented heavily with film shots of the group's equipment being set up in the arena, and with clips from the actual performance, the piece was stretched out for about five or six minutes, revealing far more about the intentions of the program than about Mr. Jagger.
By the second edition of ''Television: Inside and Out,'' the original set's pulsating lights had been replaced with a relatively simple desk at which Miss Rona sat and chatted with Mr. Weaver and Mr. Shriner. Announcing that ''we're going to explode the secrecy,'' she began with a report on one of the 1,200 households that constitute the Nielsen ''family'' used in the compilation of audience ratings. The subject and the gimmick of finding one of the families are not exactly new. A long piece on ''docu-dramas,'' those special television films ''based on a true story,'' came close to dealing with genuine substance, but, once again, the lure of gossip proved irresistible. It had to be noted, for instance, that the character of the film director in the recent ''Death of a Centerfold'' was really Peter Bogdanovich, who refused to allow the use of his name. A long interview with Richard Dreyfuss, the actor, revealed, among other things, that he had had some alchohol and drug problems. Getting a bit edgy, Miss Rona reverted to reviewing her own show, telling the producer of the docu-drama segment that it was ''extremely perceptive,'' and assuring Mr. Shriner that his limp contribution was ''wonderful.''
Finally, she even abandoned the subject of television to offer some last-minute movie reviews. On ''Pennies From Heaven,'' the new Steve Martin film, she advised ''go see it with an open mind,'' perhaps a warning to all of us who rush to the movies with closed minds. At fade-out, Miss Rona was flashing one of her coy smiles and reminding her audience to ''keep thinking the good thoughts.'' With a show like ''Television: Inside and Out,'' it's not easy. | If a single image had to be chosen this year to represent the glorious lunacy of show business - television or otherwise - a top candidate would be the sight of Rona Barrett leaning out of her studio chair, into a position almost of genuflection, and raising the hand of Rock Hudson to her lips for a kiss of oozing sincerity. The gossip columnist who would be a star was paying heartfelt homage to the kind of star who made her a name in the first place. The entertainment whirligig can sometimes be dizzying. Unfortunately, the rest of ''Television: Inside and Out,'' the new Rona Barrett ''magazine'' series on NBC Saturdays at 10 P.M., has been largely a downhill experience. Miss Rona, as she insists on being called, has not been having a smooth career ride at NBC since she was wooed away from ABC's ''Good Morning, America.'' The petite dynamo, whose devotion to trivia is second to no one's, was immediately placed on the ''Today'' show, ABC's early-morning competition, and she probably did help firm up the NBC program's sagging ratings. | 7.104545 | 0.995455 | 110.004545 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/23/arts/musical-freedom-and-why-dictators-fear-it.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524083002id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/23/arts/musical-freedom-and-why-dictators-fear-it.html | MUSICAL FREEDOM AND WHY DICTATORS FEAR IT | 20150524083002 | In the mid-1930's, according to Dmitri Shostakovich's memoirs, a convention was called in the Soviet Union for Ukrainian folk poets - blind musicians who wandered around the countryside singing of the past. From tiny villages all over the Ukraine, these Lirniki and Banduristy, as they were called, gathered at the First All-Ukrainian Congress to discuss their future in the Soviet Union under Stalin's guidance. ''It was a living museum,'' Shostakovich says, ''the country's living history. All its songs, all its music and poetry.'' There, at the Congress, the blind poets were subjected to ''highest measure of punishment'' for their singing -they were executed.
This sort of cultural atrocity should be quite familiar to us through the activities of contemporary ''revolutionary'' movements. But as we sit in plush velvet seats in spacious concert halls listening to virtuosos present their versions of the masterworks, it is hard to understand how music could ever be considered so dangerous or be dealt with so ruthlessly.
In our liberal democratic culture, all forms of music can be freely written, freely performed and freely written about. Why shouldn't they be? The individual work carries no threat; for most of us it carries no more than casual significance. Music's meaning lies only in the pleasure it gives. How can it be dangerous?
Yet recent totalitarian regimes have found all sorts of dangers in music we think of as totally harmless. Totalitarianism extends, by definition, in toto, to every aspect of human life, including music. Treason is heard in a musical dissonance, sedition in a harmonic modulation. The more tyrannical a regime, the more it seems to fear music. China had, until recently, outlawed such Western composers as Beethoven; the Soviet Union has forbidden works by ''bourgeois formalists;'' Nazi Germany condemned ''Jewish music.'' As far as I know, there has never been a tyranny that did not take music very seriously, that did not insist that music expresses meanings and that those meanings have effects on society.
Dmitri Shostakovich, whose son Maxim and grandson Dmitri defected from the Soviet Union last Spring, provides a compelling example of a musician writing under the restrictions of totalitarianism. During his lifetime, he was the most respected court composer for the Soviet regime. But with the 1979 publication of his memoirs, ''Testimony'' (edited from reportedly extensive conversations with Shostakovich by Solomon Volkov), that reputation began to change; the book declares that image of loyal devotion to the Party to be a lie. The memoirs are almost spit out. The composer bitterly tells of assasinations, of denunciations, of men soiling their pants in fear of Stalin; he asserts that his music was often a coded protest against the very society it was taken to support. ''Sometimes you feel like screaming, but you control yourself and just babble some nonsense.'' ''Do you not think,'' he asks - thinking of generations of Soviet oppression - ''that history is a whore?''
But when ''Testimony'' was published, it was dismissed by the composer's son Maxim, while he was in the Soviet Union. ''It is apparent,'' he said, ''that the book contains much material gathered from rumors.'' Surprisingly, last April, after defecting to the West with his own son, Maxim was equally dismissive of the book. ''These are not my father's memoirs,'' he said in a West German interview, ''This is a book by Solomon Volkov. Mr. Volkov should reveal how the book was written.''
But in a recent interview with this writer, Maxim Shostakovich affirmed the validity of the political picture presented in ''Testimony.'' In the book, he said, ''the attitude of Shostakovich toward the regime is correct.'' Though he still denied that the Volkov book was his father's memoirs or that it provided a complete picture of his father's character, and though he denied the validity of many comments attributed to his father about colleagues, Maxim Shostakovich confirmed the political attitudes attributed to his father - the constant and vigilant opposition to the Soviet regime - along with many of the composer's comments about his artistic reactions to the regime. He said: ''My father hated the tyranny. If this book changed in any way the attitude of the public toward Shostakovich as a court musician of the Soviet government, it's very good. If it proved that Shostakovich wasn't a servant of the Communist party, then thank God.''
Stalin is at the dark center of the book, representing totalitarianism at its most complete, his shadow falling over Shostakovich's career. Shostakovich's opera, ''Lady Macbeth,'' condemned in Pravda in 1936, provided the first hint of Stalin's musical acuteness. ''This is playing at abstruse things, which could end very badly.'' the article said. In 1948, a Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party attacked Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Khachaturian and other composers, whose ''formalist perversions and antidemocratic tendencies in music, alien to the Soviet people and its artistic tastes, were particularly glaring.'' | In the mid-1930's, according to Dmitri Shostakovich's memoirs, a convention was called in the Soviet Union for Ukrainian folk poets - blind musicians who wandered around the countryside singing of the past. From tiny villages all over the Ukraine, these Lirniki and Banduristy, as they were called, gathered at the First All-Ukrainian Congress to discuss their future in the Soviet Union under Stalin's guidance. ''It was a living museum,'' Shostakovich says, ''the country's living history. All its songs, all its music and poetry.'' There, at the Congress, the blind poets were subjected to ''highest measure of punishment'' for their singing -they were executed. This sort of cultural atrocity should be quite familiar to us through the activities of contemporary ''revolutionary'' movements. But as we sit in plush velvet seats in spacious concert halls listening to virtuosos present their versions of the masterworks, it is hard to understand how music could ever be considered so dangerous or be dealt with so ruthlessly. In our liberal democratic culture, all forms of music can be freely written, freely performed and freely written about. Why shouldn't they be? The individual work carries no threat; for most of us it carries no more than casual significance. Music's meaning lies only in the pleasure it gives. How can it be dangerous? | 3.82197 | 0.988636 | 91.034091 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/12/20/us/california-given-new-voting-plan.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524083118id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/12/20/us/california-given-new-voting-plan.html | CALIFORNIA GIVEN NEW VOTING PLAN | 20150524083118 | SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 19— The political warfare over redrawing boundaries for California's legislative and Congressional districts has taken a new turn with a proposal by Republican state leaders and Common Cause, the public affairs lobby, for a commission to oversee reapportionment
The Democrats, who usually find themselves allied with Common Cause, had no part in the discussions that led to the plan, which calls for a statewide vote on revising the reapportionment laws at the general election next November. An ealier voter-initiated challenge to the latest redistricting legislation is tied up in the courts.
At present, the Legislature and Governor control reapportionment, which generally is done in a partisan manner to maximize the election chances of candidates of the party controlling the process.
''Our door has been open to Democrats but not very many have walked in,'' said Walter Zelman, executive director of Common Cause of California, referring to the sessions where the voter-initiated referendum was written.
But Assemblyman Douglas H. Bosco of Eureka, chairman of the Democratic caucus in the Assembly, said he had learned of the plan by rumor. He said he had asked Susan Rouder, state chairman of Common Cause, about it and had been invited to examine the finished product. Democratic Request Rejected
Mr. Bosco and two other Democratic members of the Assembly made that examination Monday and rejected a request to support the vote plan, Mr. Bosco said, adding that the Democrats asked for amendments that they were told were unacceptable.
Mervin D. Field, operator of the California Poll, reported last month that he had uncovered a deep-seated voter dissatisfaction with the present system. On the basis of the poll, Mr. Field said, 80 percent of the voters disapproved of the way districts now are established and only 12 percent approved.
Behind all this is the pitched battle between Republicans and Democrats over the apportionment packages voted by the Legislature in September and quickly signed by Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr., a Democrat. Mr. Field said his poll showed that 51 percent of the voters disapproved of the new districts and only 28 percent approved.
New district lines for the Assembly and Senate seats were decided by the Democratic members of those bodies. The lines for the state's Congressional districts, which next year rise by two seats to 45, were drawn up by Representative Philip Burton of San Francisco, and then were voted into law by Democratic majorities in both legislative houses. G.O.P. Cry of 'Gerrymander'
Republicans immediately began to cry ''gerrymander'' and started a campaign for a referendum. After the 1980 elections, Republicans held 21 Congressional seats to 22 for Democrats, 17 State Senate seats to 23 for Democrats and 31 Assembly seats to 49 for Democrats. Republican strategists have insisted that the Democratic redistricting will cost Republicans five or six seats in the United States House, three in the Assembly and two in the State Senate if the plan goes into effect.
At first Democrats seemed to believe that the Republican referendum would fail. It required getting 346,119 signatures of registered voters in about 60 days. But the Republicans easily gathered 775,000 signatures.
As the Republican effort gathered momentum, the Democrats filed a half-dozen suits in the California Supreme Court challenging the petition drive on technical grounds. Some of the arguments challenge the legality of the signature-gathering process. Court-Imposed Plan
In 1972, after Ronald Reagan, then the Governor, vetoed a reapportionment package passed by a Democratic Legislature, the problem was solved when the California Supreme Court imposed a redistricting plan of its own. Now the Supreme Court has consolidated the Democratic suits for a hearing Jan. 11. Republicans are uneasy about the Supreme Court, four of whose seven justices were appointed by Governor Brown.
That is one reason that on Monday the 21 Republicans holding United States House seats from California filed suit in Federal District Court in Los Angeles. They asked that a three-judge panel redesign the state's Congressional districts for this year's elections and that Governor Brown and Secretary of State March Fong Eu, a Democrat, be ordered to use those districts in running the elections.
The suit is based on the premise that when the Republican referendum petitions were signed by the required number of voters the success of the referendum would be certified. This certification would keep the new apportionment laws from going into effect until voters passed on them at the June primary election.
But this week Secretary of State Eu announced that, while the Republicans had been successful, she would not certify their success until the California Supreme Court ruled that the signatures had been gathered legally. She notified the 58 county clerks, who must run the elections, and the Republicans of what she called a ''contingent certification.''
The commission plan for reapportionment proposed by the Republicans and Common Cause is set up to insure that either major party can veto a plan. Party membership is exactly equal. The California Supreme Court would impose a plan if the commission could not agree. | The political warfare over redrawing boundaries for California's legislative and Congressional districts has taken a new turn with a proposal by Republican state leaders and Common Cause, the public affairs lobby, for a commission to oversee reapportionment The Democrats, who usually find themselves allied with Common Cause, had no part in the discussions that led to the plan, which calls for a statewide vote on revising the reapportionment laws at the general election next November. An ealier voter-initiated challenge to the latest redistricting legislation is tied up in the courts. At present, the Legislature and Governor control reapportionment, which generally is done in a partisan manner to maximize the election chances of candidates of the party controlling the process. ''Our door has been open to Democrats but not very many have walked in,'' said Walter Zelman, executive director of Common Cause of California, referring to the sessions where the voter-initiated referendum was written. | 5.353933 | 0.983146 | 45.353933 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/26/nyregion/parents-guide-to-visiting-day-at-camp.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524083703id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/26/nyregion/parents-guide-to-visiting-day-at-camp.html | PARENTS' GUIDE TO VISITING DAY AT CAMP | 20150524083703 | THERE is a short but special season of the year that fits neatly between the beginning of July and the end of August. It is the time when parents of children away at summer camp have finally adjusted to tiny loads of laundry, sinfully small grocery bills and plenty of peace and quiet, and it precedes the period when they start dashing off to concert halls, R-rated movies, getaway weekends for two and other ''adult'' activities - before the kids come home.
By the middle of summer, the family dog has reluctantly left his post at the kitchen door, having given up hope of seeing his favorite people trooping in at 3 o'clock. Even the family car has accepted the new routine; it has stopped turning automatically onto its old routes - the roads to school, the orthodontist, barbershop, soccer field, dancing lessons and birthday parties. It now knows the way to art museums, antique shows and Japanese restaurants that specialize in sushi. And it appreciates taking a nice, relaxing drive without having its back seat battered by juvenile wrestling and rioting.
At this special time, when the eight weeks of summer camp so beautifully balance - four weeks gone and four more weeks to go - parents jump into cars, planes, trains and buses and run off to the country, eager to be the first adults their children will see at camp on Visiting Day.
The kids are encouraged by the camping staff to play catch, clean their bunks or ''just play quietly'' while waiting for Visiting Day to begin, but soon after breakfast, they all start drifting toward the main gate. A glimpse of one's parents - or the parents of a friend - can give instant status to someone with sharp eyes.
Many things should be considered by parents as they make their way from the parking lot, lugging lawn chairs, blankets and shopping bags filled with ''goodies.'' The following information is presented as a guide to these parents:
1. Be prepared for some changes in your child's appearance. Do not cry, ''Good grief! They're starving you! You must have lost at least 10 pounds!'' Even if your daughter (on whom you have spent close to $2,000 for this summer in the sun) looks like an inner-city advertisement for ''send this poor child to camp,'' don't admit it in front of her. Also, don't comment on other peculiarities; try to ignore tattoo marks (they'll probably wash right off with nail polish remover), experimental hair-dos and recently pierced ears.
2. Remember, you are at camp only for one day. Control the urge to speak your mind. Lay off the scolding. Do not say, ''You needn't call home collect every time you get a stomach ache. This camp has two competent nurses,'' even if you're bursting to do so. Within a week, you'll be swearing they have acute appendicitis and are afraid to let you - or anybody else -know.
Do say, ''Things are very quiet at home. Most of the time we just sit around the house and say how glad we are that you're out of the hot city.''
3. When you visit your child's cabin, studiously avoid any close examination of his or her toilet kit. The toothpaste, soap and shampoo you assiduously purchased in June may still be unwrapped. Furthermore, delving into a dirt-encrusted clothes cubby might excite a field mouse or other country creature that may have made a home for itself in some warm, wet socks.
4. If you must take food, don't take anything perishable. Aunt Helen's chopped liver may be a family treat at home, but it will quickly turn to moldy paste in summer heat. If you buy candy or other snack items, don't buy more than the amount your child will be able to stuff into his or her mouth that night. It is an unwritten custom among campers to gorge themselves on as many food treats as possible within 24 hours after Visiting Day.
5. Do not attempt to give your son a midsummer haircut. He probably thinks he was already scalped in June and his hair is just beginning to ''grow in.'' Also, do not tell him his kid sister stuck her hands into his fish tank ''just to pet them, Mommy,'' and three swordtails died from shock. The bad news can wait until he comes home from camp.
6. You may have received one or two frantic letters written the week before Visiting Day, with outrageous requests such as ''please bring the dog. We can smuggle her into my bunk during General Swim,'' and ''You've got to get me out of here! This is the third night I've had to sleep under the bunk!'' Don't let these pleas get to you on Visiting Day. It's normal to expect some dissatisfactions.
One mother spent an entire visit listening to a litany of complaints from her 10-year old daughter. The food was horrid. The other kids hated her. The camp director was always yelling and the head waterfront counselor had threatened to drown her if she didn't master the Australian crawl. By the end of the day, the mother was reduced to jelly. Wondering if she should tell the child to hurry and pack her bags, she tremblingly hugged her and kissed her on the cheek. Before she could speak, her daughter was off, running down the camp trail back to her bunk. Over her shoulder, she called, ''when I come back next year, I want to be in Bunk 8!''
7. Do not bring any treasured possessions from home. You will immediately hear, ''Let me see it, let me see it,'' from his bunkmates, and the next words may regretfully be, ''Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to break it...''
8. Be sure to wear comfortable, closed-toe shoes. One mother wearing high-heeled pumps speared as much grass and litter with her stiletto spikes as an overzealous sanitation worker in Central Park. One father, all decked out in new, imported sandals, spent half the car ride home picking gravel and tar off the soles of his feet.
9. Do not leave the camp grounds, especially if you're not familiar with the territory. At one camp in Massachusetts, picnic lunches were offered to campers and their families. A 12-year-old boy invited his folks to eat with him at a ''special place'' he had discovered in the woods. ''Look at the grass,'' he told them, ''it's so warm and moss-like.'' They spread his jelly-roll blanket down on the ground and rubbed their hands on the soft, furry surface. Lunch was eaten and while everyone was relaxing, the head counselor appeared. ''Hi,'' he said, and then he paused nervously. They could tell bad news was coming. ''I hate to tell you this,'' he fidgeted, ''but you're sitting on top of the camp cesspool.''
10. At departure time, don't be surprised if, having seen what all the other parents brought their children, your child has made a new list of ''must-haves'' for you to send by mail.
11. Make your goodbyes short. Nobody likes to pry his own kid's fingers off the car fender, or shut the car door on a forlorn face. One family drove three miles before they discovered what the ''extra weight'' was in the trunk. Your best bet is to leave a half-hour before Visiting Day concludes, so you and your kids aren't stimulated by the tearful separations around you. Besides, by leaving early you'll beat the other parents back to the city and have more time to enjoy your remaining weeks alone! --------------------------------------------------------------------- Susan J. Gordon lives in White Plains. | THERE is a short but special season of the year that fits neatly between the beginning of July and the end of August. It is the time when parents of children away at summer camp have finally adjusted to tiny loads of laundry, sinfully small grocery bills and plenty of peace and quiet, and it precedes the period when they start dashing off to concert halls, R-rated movies, getaway weekends for two and other ''adult'' activities - before the kids come home. By the middle of summer, the family dog has reluctantly left his post at the kitchen door, having given up hope of seeing his favorite people trooping in at 3 o'clock. Even the family car has accepted the new routine; it has stopped turning automatically onto its old routes - the roads to school, the orthodontist, barbershop, soccer field, dancing lessons and birthday parties. It now knows the way to art museums, antique shows and Japanese restaurants that specialize in sushi. And it appreciates taking a nice, relaxing drive without having its back seat battered by juvenile wrestling and rioting. At this special time, when the eight weeks of summer camp so beautifully balance - four weeks gone and four more weeks to go - parents jump into cars, planes, trains and buses and run off to the country, eager to be the first adults their children will see at camp on Visiting Day. | 5.88015 | 0.992509 | 93.254682 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/25/opinion/l-keep-the-ma-bell-case-judicial-not-political-132311.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524083938id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/25/opinion/l-keep-the-ma-bell-case-judicial-not-political-132311.html | KEEP THE MA BELL CASE JUDICIAL, NOT POLITICAL | 20150524083938 | In an April 22 editorial, you recommend a change of venue - to Capitol Hill - for the Government's antitrust suit against A.T.& T. You argue that the court would be wielding ''legislative power'' in restructuring Bell and letting ''the antitrust tail wag the telecommunications dog.''
Congress used its legislative authority in outlawing the deliberate abuse of monopoly power and in providing the courts the remedies, including restructuring. The issue in U.S. v. A.T.& T. is the application of the law, not the attitude of Congress toward technology. We should no more have Congress take over this case, and turn it into a ''telecommunications policy'' debate, than we should drop murder cases in favor of a gun-control bill.
You point to the expertise required of the court to restructure A.T.& T. Think of the expertise that can be developed by a judge attending to the evidence, as contrasted with that available to legislators with a thousand other fish to fry.
What you advise is the replacement of a judicial decision with a political one - taking A.T.& T. out of one forum, in which it may present its evidence, and putting it in another, in which it may make good use of its awesome political force. That is an avenue closed to other defendants, and no idea of justice suggests it should be opened for A.T.& T. WILLIAM G. MCGOWAN, Chmn., MCI Telecommunications Corp., Washington, May 5, 1981 | To the Editor: In an April 22 editorial, you recommend a change of venue - to Capitol Hill - for the Government's antitrust suit against A.T.& T. You argue that the court would be wielding ''legislative power'' in restructuring Bell and letting ''the antitrust tail wag the telecommunications dog.'' Not at all. | 4.179104 | 0.895522 | 23.522388 | low | medium | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/26/sports/by-sports-of-the-times-the-mets-tolerant-approach.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084107id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/26/sports/by-sports-of-the-times-the-mets-tolerant-approach.html | By Sports of The Times | 20150524084107 | OVER in the Bronx, volcanic ash was still falling after another eruption by Mount Steinbrenner even though the Yankees were a game and a half out of first place going into last night's game in Baltimore. But in Flushing, all was serene even though the Mets already were 12 games out of first place before yesterday's 13-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies.
Perhaps George Steinbrenner, the Yankees' principal owner, is too impetuous; perhaps the Mets' new owners are too tolerant. But a team can win with either approach - if it has good players.
That's the Mets' real problem -not enough good players. Say this for the Mets' new owners; they're not about to make Joe Torre the scapegoat for the residue from the M. Donald Grant regime and the patchwork that the new general manager, Frank Cashen, has had to do, especially with the absence of the ailing Craig Swan and Tim Leary from the starting rotation.
It's one thing to discharge a bad manager with a good team. Or even a bad manager with a bad team. But it's quite another to get rid of a good manager just because he has a bad team.
Obviously, the Mets' owners believe that Joe Torre is a good manager. But they don't know for sure. Neither does anybody else in baseball, including Joe Torre himself. He won't know until he has a good team. Up to now, he has indicated only that he would be a good manager if he had a good team. In an almost continual crisis, he has been calm, sensible and patient.
Joe Torre is fortunate to have owners who believe in him and who believe in their patient philosophy. Fred Wilpon, the Mets' president, made that clear yesterday as he stood behind the batting cage.
''For all the trouble we've had this season, we're still cautiously optimistic,'' Fred Wilpon was saying. ''If you look for a scapegoat without looking for the cause, you're only fooling yourself. That's the way Nelson Doubleday runs his publishing business and that's the way I run my real estate business. Why should we change just because we're in the baseball business?''
Nelson Doubleday, the Mets' chairman, prefers to remain in the background. That's why Fred Wilpon is the Mets' president. ''And when I voiced my support of Joe Torre in St. Louis last Friday,'' Fred Wilpon said, ''I didn't make a special trip to do it. I had intended to be there anyway on business. Joe was aware of that even before the club left on the two-week road trip.''
In his manager's office off the clubhouse, Joe Torre had talked about how Fred Wilpon had avoided giving him a vote of confidence as such.
''Fred was supportive, that's all,'' Joe Torre said. ''He's aware that a vote of confidence is the kiss of death. Or it seems that way.''
Approaching the fourth anniversary of his takeover of the Mets on May 31, 1977, Joe Torre has survived despite a 257-384 record, a .401 percentage. During that span there have been 41 other managerial changes in the major leagues, not including interim appointees - 12 in the National League, 29 in the American League (four on the Yankees alone).
Only five managers predate Joe Torre with their current teams -Earl Weaver with Baltimore, Bill Virdon with Houston, Tom Lasorda with Los Angeles, Chuck Tanner with Pittsburgh and Dick Williams with Montreal.
''The thing about Joe that most people on the street don't understand,'' Fred Wilpon said, ''is that he's an outstanding guy with a combination of street smarts and intellect that few people have in any business.''
Maybe the people on the street do understand. In the years since Joe Torre succeeded Joe Frazier, the Mets finished last in the National League East in 1977, last in 1978, last in 1979, next-tolast in 1980 and now they are next-to-last this season, thanks to the Chicago Cubs, baseball's worst team. But the loyalists at Shea Stadium have never demanded Joe Torre's head. They know where the blame belongs.
Over the last week, however, some local headlines have suggested that Joe Torre should be dismissed. ''That's happened before,'' Joe Torre was saying now. ''It's always an eventuality. But it's not necessarily going to happen because you read about it happening. It might happen when you don't read about it.''
If it was going to happen, it would have happened last week after the Mets had lost nine consecutive games and 23 of 27 games. ''The toughest thing during a streak like that,'' Joe Torre said, ''is to show the players that you're not panicking yourself.'' Whatever trade conversations the Mets have had lately have been inconclusive because of the possible baseball strike. ''I think ball clubs are lying low until after they see if there's a strike or not this week,'' Joe Torre said. ''When that's settled, you might see something happen. But the big thing is for our good players to start playing good, like Dave Kingman and Lee Mazzilli. Unless you're too old or you're hurt, over 162 games you're going to hit. It's only people who have not played the game who overreact and let one day change their mind.''
Joe Torre is fortunate that he does not work for people like that.
Illustrations: Photo of Joe Torre | OVER in the Bronx, volcanic ash was still falling after another eruption by Mount Steinbrenner even though the Yankees were a game and a half out of first place going into last night's game in Baltimore. But in Flushing, all was serene even though the Mets already were 12 games out of first place before yesterday's 13-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies. Perhaps George Steinbrenner, the Yankees' principal owner, is too impetuous; perhaps the Mets' new owners are too tolerant. But a team can win with either approach - if it has good players. | 10.081818 | 0.990909 | 58.372727 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/18/movies/napoleon-rescuing-an-epic-film.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084131id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/18/movies/napoleon-rescuing-an-epic-film.html | 'NAPOLEON'- RESCUING AN EPIC FILM | 20150524084131 | -------------------------------------------------------------------- Annette Insdorf, who teaches film at Yale University, was Abel Gance's translator at the Telluride Film Festival. By ANNETTE INSDORF
The provocative combination of Napoleon Bonaparte, a pioneering filmmaker, an indefatigable film scholar and an enthusiastic advocate named Francis Ford Coppola requires an appropriate stage on which the dramatic history of nations as well as films can be played out. These individuals - Corsican, French, British, and American respectively - have found their site: Radio City Music Hall, where the reconstructed version of Abel Gance's groundbreaking 1927 ''Napoleon'' will have its New York premiere Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
The film, prized by scholars and other filmmakers for its innovative techniques, traces the career of Napoleon from his school days to his military triumphs. It is also a love story in which the hero of the battlefield is reduced to a fumbling swain.
Accompanying the silent classic will be a new score by Mr. Coppola's father, Carmine Coppola, who won an Academy Award in 1975 with Nino Rota for their original dramatic score for ''Godfather II.'' The senior Coppola will all also conduct the 60-piece American Symphony Orchestra. Radio City's orchestra pit is not the only space that will be crowded, as the projection of this 4 1/2-hour film - now acclaimed a masterpiece - requires a number of hands: the last reel of ''Napoleon'' is in Polyvision, a three-camera, threeprojection, three-screen process invented by Mr. Gance in the 1920's (anticipating Cinerama by 30 years) to accommodate his sweeping vision of both history and cinema.
In the opinion of film historians, the boldness, scale and influence of ''Napoleon'' in film art rival those of its central character on the battlefield. Filmmakers from various countries and generations will be attending the screenings, as ''Napoleon'' makes use of an immense cinematic vocabulary: by 1927, Mr. Gance had taken superimposition, rapid cutting and camera mobility to a new level of development.
These very factors made - and continue to make -''Napoleon'' a difficult film to distribute, and for more than 50 years existing copies were ineptly shortened, mutilated, or merely ignored. Bad timing was part of the problem: six months after the film's premiere, ''The Jazz Singer'' sounded the death knell for purely visual storytelling. Talkies were in; Mr. Gance's swirling camera and rapid-fire editing were out.
Even before ''Napoleon,'' Abel Gance had established himself as an inventor and visionary. He began his film career as an actor (he plays Saint-Just in ''Napoleon'') and then scriptwriter before directing such ambitious films as ''J'Accuse'' (1919) - an antiwar statement which Mr. Gance remade as a sound film in 1938 - and ''La Roue'' (1922), where his vigorous experimentation with montage rivals Soviet attempts of the 20's.
Mr. Gance tried to accommodate the new priority in motion pictures by putting together a shorter sound version of ''Napoleon'' in 1934. Never content to simply use a technique when he could invent one, Mr. Gance experimented here with stereophonic sound effects for film. In the meantime, the original silent version simply disappeared.
Enter Kevin Brownlow, the British author of such critical studies as ''The Parade's Gone By,'' ''The War, The West and the Wilderness,'' director of ''Winstanley,'' and producer of the acclaimed 13-part ''Hollywood'' series for Thames Television in Britain. ''I first came upon 'Napoleon' in the early 50's when I was a kid,'' he said in London a few weeks ago. ''I found these two reels on 9.5mm - the Marseillaise and Corsican sequences - and they changed my life. What struck me on that first screening - apart from the breathtaking photography - were the faces: Marat (played by Antonin Artaud), Danton, Robespierre, the faces of the crowd, faces chosen with such uncanny skill that the film blazed into life like a masterly newsreel of the 18th century.
''I tracked down more reels on 9.5 and 16 millimeter. Then in the late 60's, the French Cinematheque sent over their second best 35 millimeter print which was shown at the National Film Theatre. It was so excruciating that I had to leave the theater. I felt sick as a dog, realizing how many scenes were missing. And I knew that someone had to reconstruct the picture.''
Mr. Brownlow assumed this responsibility himself, and thus began an 13-year task (about which he quipped that he may have spent more time on ''Napoleon'' than the director). ''The Cinematheque sent their best copy to me,'' he continued, ''but some reels had almost no sprocket holes! Then we gained access to all the negatives when Gance started 'Bonaparte and the Revolution.''' (This was a new version commissioned in 1971 by Andre Malraux, and produced by Claude Lelouch, to celebrate the bicentennial of Bonaparte's birth. It blends scenes from 1927 with new footage of the same actors, now old men.) Nearly every film archive in the world was contacted, and Mr. Brownlow ''sat for 12 weeks in the National Film Archive, piecing it all together.'' | -------------------------------------------------------------------- Annette Insdorf, who teaches film at Yale University, was Abel Gance's translator at the Telluride Film Festival. By ANNETTE INSDORF The provocative combination of Napoleon Bonaparte, a pioneering filmmaker, an indefatigable film scholar and an enthusiastic advocate named Francis Ford Coppola requires an appropriate stage on which the dramatic history of nations as well as films can be played out. These individuals - Corsican, French, British, and American respectively - have found their site: Radio City Music Hall, where the reconstructed version of Abel Gance's groundbreaking 1927 ''Napoleon'' will have its New York premiere Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The film, prized by scholars and other filmmakers for its innovative techniques, traces the career of Napoleon from his school days to his military triumphs. It is also a love story in which the hero of the battlefield is reduced to a fumbling swain. | 6.08284 | 0.976331 | 42.195266 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/28/arts/metropolitan-promotes-four-to-full-curatorship.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084132id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/28/arts/metropolitan-promotes-four-to-full-curatorship.html | METROPOLITAN PROMOTES FOUR TO FULL CURATORSHIP | 20150524084132 | In a move that emphasizes the achievements of younger staff members, four associate curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose ages range from 34 to 40, have been promoted to full curatorship. They are Weston Naef, curator in the department of prints and photographs; Joan Mertens, curator in the department of Greek and Roman art, and Katharine Baetjer and Charles Moffett, curators in the department of European paintings.
The appointments mark the first time in years that a number of curatorial staff members have been promoted at once, and to the position of full curator.
''We are recognizing the accomplishments and maturation of another curatorial generation at the Met,'' James Pilgrim, acting director of the Met in the absence of its director, Philippe de Montebello, said. ''They are people who in their fields have accomplished a lot, not only personally but also in relation to their departments and to the museum in general, working hard and in some cases with little reward.'' Backgrounds of Apointees
Mr. Naef has played a strong role in developing the photographic collections and was involved in the organization of such innovative exhibitions as ''Era of Exploration: The Rise of Landscape Photography in the American West'' in 1975; ''The Collection of Alfred Stieglitz: 50 Pioneers of Modern Photography'' in 1978, for which he also wrote the catalogue, and the recent ''After Daguerre: Masterworks of French Photography from the Bibliotheque Nationale.''
Miss Baetjer, who will continue to be administrator of the European department, was curator of ''Russian and Soviet Paintings'' in 1977, one in a series of exchange shows with the Soviet Union, and recently published a much-praised summary catalogue in three volumes of the museum's European paintings.
Mr. Moffett has been curator for ''Degas in the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum'' in 1977, ''Monet's Years at Giverny: Beyond Impressionism'' in 1978 and the current ''German Masters of the 19th Century: Paintings and Drawings From the Federal Republic of Germany.'' He has also written articles on 19th-century French painting.
Miss Mertens has written a wide range of articles on classical art, from Greek vases to Hellenistic bronzes, and is preparing a volume in the Corpus Basorum, a series of scholarly publications on aspects of Greek vase painting. She also helped organize the ''Under the Classical Heritage,'' objects from the Met's collection sent to Greece last year in exchange for ''Greek Art of the Aegean Islands.'' | In a move that emphasizes the achievements of younger staff members, four associate curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose ages range from 34 to 40, have been promoted to full curatorship. They are Weston Naef, curator in the department of prints and photographs; Joan Mertens, curator in the department of Greek and Roman art, and Katharine Baetjer and Charles Moffett, curators in the department of European paintings. The appointments mark the first time in years that a number of curatorial staff members have been promoted at once, and to the position of full curator. | 4.477064 | 0.990826 | 64.972477 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/28/arts/tv-view-apply-the-recognition-factor-and-watch-the-product-grow.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084144id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/28/arts/tv-view-apply-the-recognition-factor-and-watch-the-product-grow.html | TV View - APPLY THE 'RECOGNITION FACTOR' AND WATCH THE 'PRODUCT' GROW - NYTimes.com | 20150524084144 | Consider for a moment something called the ''multimedia merchandising program.'' It is examined in absorbing detail in ''The Blockbuster Complex: Conglomerates, Show Business and Book Publishing,'' written by Thomas Whiteside and published by Wesleyan University Press after appearing as a series in The New Yorker magazine last year.
Mr. Whiteside describes how the publishing industry has evolved to the point of idolizing the few big moneymakers - the Judith Krantzes, the Robert Ludlums, the Harold Robbinses, and so forth - that are produced every season. The danger, of course, is that less commercial, more artistically worthy books will increasingly be forced out of the marketplace.
Needless to say, the key player in the usual multimedia blitz is television. The big-name authors are invited to appear on the bigname talk shows. A TV adaptation can be translated into hefty book sales. The paperback edition of John Steinbeck's ''East of Eden'' is still on the best-seller lists following a TV miniseries several months ago. That was one of television's classier achievements.
The ''recognition factor'' inherent in television exposure is awesome. For just one example, there is the case of Phil Donohue, the talk-show host. After years of peddling his special brand of sincerity on syndicated TV, Mr. Donohue and his show gained the kind of extremely loyal following that led to regular appearances on the NBC network's ''Today'' show in addition to an occasional prime-time special.
Mr. Donohue became ''hot.'' His face appeared on the cover of a national newsweekly magazine, not to mention innumerable gossipy publications. The time had arrived, obviously, for the celebrity to write his autobiography. There was nothing terribly exceptional about his life but, armed with that recognition factor, his book leapt onto the best-seller lists and was serialized in various papers and magazines across the land.
A more current creation of the same infernal machine is a young man named Richard Simmons. Beginning his professional career as a Hollywood television personality, Mr. Simmons now has a nationally syndicated show, which can be seen in the New York area Mondays through Fridays at 10 A.M. on WABC/Channel 7. ''The Richard Simmons Show'' offers tips on dieting and exercise to a mass public whose appetite for such fare is apparently insatiable. Not surprisingly, many of his insights and recommendations have been compiled in a book. The ''Never-Say-Diet Book'' has been on the nonfiction bestseller lists for more than 20 weeks.
As it happens, I first caught Mr. Simmons's act when he appeared as a guest on ''The Phil Donohue Show.'' The world of the multimedia merchandising program is very tight indeed. Mr. Simmons was telling the delighted studio audience, mostly women, how he once was terribly fat, almost to the point of being grotesque, but that innate pride and self-respect forced him to develop a sleek physique. He was now ready and clearly willing to share his slimming secrets with a world that was bound to be grateful. With curled hair and unflagging energy, the boyish Mr. Simmons projects an image of the spoiled kid brother who always manages to get his own way, no matter how outrageous his behavior. He just keeps smiling winningly. On the Donohue show, he explained, perhaps seriously, how he once entered a seminary because basic black suited his girth.
On his own show, Mr. Simmons enters to the kind of adoring audience shrieks usually associated with ''The John Davidson Show.'' At the outset, he establishes a theme. In a recent installment, he played a ''Mr. Nerd,'' hooked up to several monitoring wires in an effort to demonstrate compulsion-gratification therapy. The brief skit was silly but his cheering audience couldn't have cared less.
Sitting on the edge of the stage, Mr. Simmons explained that the bouquet of flowers next to him was sent by fans in Illinois. He would eventually throw several of the flowers into the audience. Meanwhile, he began formulating his observations on compulsions such as constant snacking or nail-biting. At times, the jolly host can become disconcertingly blood-thirsty. Referring to the way some people habitually punctuate their sentences with ''you know,'' he announced that ''you just want to punch their hearts out.''
Mr. Simmons's tips are not overly profound. In coping with compulsions, he confided, ''first try to deal with your inner needs and feelings.'' Moving to the elaborately constructed kitchen area of the set, he recruited a woman from the audience for assistance in the cooking segment of the show. The recipes on this particular day were considerably less than mouth-watering. A paste of pureed apples and lemon juice, which had been dried for a couple of days, was served as ''leather enchiladas.'' A sesame-seed sauce was mixed with raw oats and other goodies to be baked into ''tutti-frutti bars.''
However low in calories these snack treats might have been, they looked incredibly unappetizing under the merciless glare of a TV closeup. The thoroughly unfazed Mr. Simmons announced that the recipes could be obtained by writing to a post-office box in Hollywood. Then, playing the role of a compulsively clean housekeeper, he had his assistant washing and rewashing his dishes in a routine that quickly wore thin. She quite noticeably began losing her sense of humor as he kept treating her like a maid. Even the normal delirium level of the audience slipped a few notches. Mr. Simmons saved the half-hour, however, by finally smothering his assistant in a big hug and several kisses.
The show's final minutes are reserved for exercises, with Mr. Simmons exhorting his indefatigable audience to inhale and exhale vigorously in assorted positions. He cajoles, reprimands and inspires. He also manages to mention his current tour. Tomorrow evening, for instance, he will be appearing at one of Manhattan's East Side discotheques for a cocktail reception and exercise demonstration. A press release notes that he will blend his ''contagious energy and zany humor with sound advice about diet, exercise and beauty.'' Presumably, the menu will not include leather enchiladas. In any case, multimedia merchandising marches relentlessly on. | Consider for a moment something called the ''multimedia merchandising program.'' It is examined in absorbing detail in ''The Blockbuster Complex: Conglomerates, Show Business and Book Publishing,'' written by Thomas Whiteside and published by Wesleyan University Press after appearing as a series in The New Yorker magazine last year. Mr. Whiteside describes how the publishing industry has evolved to the point of idolizing the few big moneymakers - the Judith Krantzes, the Robert Ludlums, the Harold Robbinses, and so forth - that are produced every season. The danger, of course, is that less commercial, more artistically worthy books will increasingly be forced out of the marketplace. | 9.736 | 0.992 | 61.648 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/30/education/ibm-a-giant-among-giants-in-the-classroom-as-well.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084407id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/30/education/ibm-a-giant-among-giants-in-the-classroom-as-well.html | I.B.M. - A GIANT AMONG GIANTS IN THE CLASSROOM AS WELL - NYTimes.com | 20150524084407 | THE catalogue listings look like those for any university computer science department: Introduction to Computer Architecture; Data Logic and Set Theory; Man and Machine. Each course is listed with its prerequisites, meeting times, instructor and textbooks. But the Systems Research Institute is not an academic place. ''It's all business,'' said its associate director, Joseph E. Flanagan.
The institute is a school in New York City run by the International Business Machines Corporation for its employees, and offers courses geared to I.B.M. Although restricted to one company, Systems Research has a faculty, a student body and a budget that would be the envy of many university departments of computer science.
Systems Research is just one aspect of corporate education at I.B.M., a company that has a reputation for stressing employee education. I.B.M. will not say how much it spends on education for its 340,000 employees, but Robert Craig, vice president of the American Society for Training & Development, said it is not unusual for a company like I.B.M. to spend between $1,000 and $2,000 per employee.
Some corporate education is purely functional, in which new employees are taught job-related skills. Other education - and I.B.M. seems to emphasize this more than many companies - is designed to instill the company's credo in employees.
This dates back more than 60 years to the time Thomas J. Watson was trying to mold a sales force for what was then the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Corporation. Today, each of I.B.M.'s 40,000 managers must have one week of management training each year. That is done around the world at various locations. In addition, the company opened a special campus near its Armonk, N.Y., headquarters for this purpose in 1979.
For technical education, like other corporations, I.B.M. will support employees taking graduate-level courses. It has set up a cooperative program with the University of Vermont, to which it sends about 30 engineers a year for a master's level program in advanced integrated circuit technology. Other I.B.M. laboratories around the country also have programs with local colleges in which faculty members will teach graduate-level courses at I.B.M., in effect making the I.B.M. laboratory an extension of their campuses.
In fact, a spokesman for the company said, virtually all I.B.M. employees receive some kind of company-financed education or training each year beyond basic job training. The education might range from attendance at special lectures to full-fledged courses, inside or outside corporate facilities.
Despite its other programs, I.B.M. believes it needs a graduatelevel school for its own use. The Systems Research Institute, founded in 1960, is the closest thing to an academic center at I.B.M.. It is designed to enable engineers to keep up with rapidly changing technology in areas in which they do not directly work, to broaden their perspective, according to Jerrier A. Haddad, who is retiring this month as vice president for technical personnel development.
The institute enables I.B.M. to educate far more engineers than it can send to a university, Mr. Haddad said; it stresses I.B.M. products and can use proprietary information, and it can be more upto-date than universities.
Tucked inconspicuously on two floors of an office building on East 42d Street in New York, the institute is physically unimpressive. The five classrooms are in nooks and crannies so that the place seems empty when classes are in session. There are many computer terminals for students, all linked to a computer in Yorktown Heights, N.Y.
Only the most promising engineers and computer programmers can attend. The institute has a budget of more than $5 million a year, with $10,000 spent on each of its 135 students for each of its three 10-week sessions. (There are also several three-week sessions.) Applicants are carefully screened on the basis of their accomplishments at I.B.M., an essay they write, recommendations of their superiors and other data.
The work, Mr. Flanagan said, is grueling. Students can choose their own curriculum, with the typical student taking eight courses in the regular sessions and spending an average of 25 hours in class each week. Homework requires another 25 hours.
While that might sound like a university, there are major differences. Students, for instance, may be experts in their own right and put pressure on the faculty members to remain extremely current.
''One of the ways the faculty stays up-to-date is to interrogate the students,'' said Mr. Flanagan, who joined I.B.M. in 1954 and holds a doctorate in mathematics. Students are not graded, he added, and can drop a course at any time, with no record kept to show that they took it.
Skill in teaching rather than research is stressed on The faculty, which is drawn from I.B.M.'s staff and from universities. Some outside professors familiar with the institute insist this faculty provides top-notch instruction.
''For a living I teach at CUNY and for a life I go to S.R.I.,'' said Louis J. Gerstman, a psychology professor at City College who has been an adjunct professor at Systems Research since 1967.
He said that since students there were not graded and were older and more experienced than university students, their relations with the faculty were warmer and more on a peer basis.
''There is no deadwood at S.R.I.,'' said Walter Lowen, a professor in the School of Advanced Technology at the State University Center at Binghamton. ''What takes us three weeks to teach they teach in a week, but we don't have that kind of money.''
The School of Advanced Technology at Binghamton, in fact, is modeled on the curriculum and approach at the institute, Professor Lowen said, and the Binghamton center grants graduate credit for some courses taught at Systems Research.
Not everyone gives the institute such high marks. ''I don't think it makes you as competent in an area that a graduate school would,'' said Murray Turoff, a professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology who also teaches at the institute.
Without exams, he noted, there is no penalty for not being highly motivated. In addition, while Systems Research gets experts from other companies to lecture, there is not as much exposure to non-I.B.M. approaches as there would be at a university.
Professor Turoff also said that commitments by I.B.M. and other companies to their own educational programs might limit their contributions to universities, which are suffering from inadequate equipment and faculty shortages.
I.B.M., Mr. Flanagan said, has no pretensions of emulating a university. ''Our mission is to make them better I.B.M. professionals when they leave here,'' he asserted. He said company evaluations showed that such was the case with the institute's 6,600 alumni.
In fact, Mr. Haddad said, I.B.M. is pleased enough with Systems Research that it has similar programs in Belgium and Brazil and is starting one in New York City next month that will stress manufacturing technology and will have an initial
Illustrations: photo of classes conducted by I.B.M. | THE catalogue listings look like those for any university computer science department: Introduction to Computer Architecture; Data Logic and Set Theory; Man and Machine. Each course is listed with its prerequisites, meeting times, instructor and textbooks. But the Systems Research Institute is not an academic place. ''It's all business,'' said its associate director, Joseph E. Flanagan. The institute is a school in New York City run by the International Business Machines Corporation for its employees, and offers courses geared to I.B.M. Although restricted to one company, Systems Research has a faculty, a student body and a budget that would be the envy of many university departments of computer science. | 10.48062 | 0.992248 | 64.263566 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/26/books/did-castro-double-cross-oscar-lewis.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084631id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/26/books/did-castro-double-cross-oscar-lewis.html | DID CASTRO DOUBLE-CROSS OSCAR LEWIS? | 20150524084631 | THE anthropologist Oscar Lewis died of a heart attack at 55 in December 1970 while he was in New York doing research on poor Puerto Ricans and Cubans. Mr. Lewis, who wrote ''The Children of Sanchez'' and other well-known studies of slum families, had been ill with heart trouble earlier that year. But a recent book by an American professor in Canada, Maurice Halperin, contends that the government of Fidel Castro contributed to Mr. Lewis's death when it ''doublecrossed'' him by closing Project Cuba, his research into the transformation of Cuban society under a revolutionary government, and confiscating the project's files in June 1970.
Ruth Lewis, Mr. Lewis's widow, said, ''I wouldn't go so far as to say that Fidel Castro caused my husband's death.'' However, she added that she generally agrees with Professor Halperin's account, including his charge that Mr. Castro ''doublecrossed'' her husband.
''Of the several Western scholars and journalists who at one time or another had a personal relationship with Fidel Castro, none paid a greater penalty than Oscar Lewis,'' Professor Halperin writes in ''The Taming of Fidel Castro,'' published recently by the University of California Press. Most of the book offers a critical analysis of Cuba and of Mr. Castro, whom it accuses of evolving from a charismatic revolutionary to a Soviet-dependent head of state. But one chapter is devoted to Mr. Lewis and to Project Cuba, which was terminated after about one and a half years of work.
Professor Halperin, professor emeritus of political science at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, B. C., knew Mr. Lewis and had first-hand knowledge of the Castro Government. From 1962 to 1968, he lectured at the University of Havana and was a consultant to the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Trade. He went to Cuba at the invitation of Che Guevara, whom he met in Moscow. Professor Halperin, who fled the United States in 1953 after he was accused by Attorney General Herbert Brownell Jr. of having been a member of the Communist Party and having passed secrets to Soviet agents, was a visiting professor at the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences for three years before going to Cuba. Matter of Interpretation
It is all a matter of interpretation, said Mrs. Lewis, a research associate in anthropology at the University of Illinois who assisted her husband in much of his field work in Cuba and elsewhere. ''The whole incident in Cuba affected my husband very deeply,'' she said in a telephone conversation. ''He took it personally and was brokenhearted, and I don't believe he was ever the same again. I would say the circumstances aggravated his condition.'' She added that when she and her husband departed Cuba a few days later, a concerned Fidel Castro sent a doctor to the airport to check on his condition.
Mrs. Lewis also disputed Professor Halperin's account of what happened when Mr. Lewis was summoned on June 25, 1970, to appear before Dr. Raul Roa, Cuba's Foreign Minister, in Havana. At that meeting Mr. Lewis was formally notified that Project Cuba had been suspended. (Two years later Raul Castro Ruz, Minister of the Armed Forces and Fidel's brother, portrayed Mr. Lewis as having been an American secret agent.)
''At the moment when Roa finished reading the indictment,'' Professor Halperin wrote, ''Oscar suffered a heart attack and collapsed.'' He added that Mrs. Lewis failed to mention the heart attack in her foreword to ''Four Men,'' the first of three volumes based on some 20,000 pages of transcripts collected by the Lewises that had been taken out of Cuba before Project Cuba was halted. ''Ruth's efforts to account for their misfortune are less than satisfactory - in part, it would appear, because of an unwillingness to shed some of the naivete about socialism in general, and Castro in particular, that had led Oscar into the fatal trap,'' he wrote.
''His chest pain was not a heart attack but angina, from which my husband had suffered for five years,'' Mrs. Lewis said. ''He did not have his nitroglycerin with him and they had to send out for some, but he did not need hospitalization.'' She said that she originally put that incident in ''Four Men'' but then removed it when she decided it was irrelevant. ''It seemed to be making a bid for sympathy,'' she said.
As for their alleged naivete toward socialism, Mrs. Lewis said: ''I don't know if it was naivete at the time. We felt hopeful and sympathetic about possibilities of improved life in Cuba. We went with an open mind, we wanted to believe the best. We hoped it would work out for the good of the Cuban people. But in the research we took a totally social-science position, and in writing up the material I tried not to inject personal views.'' Scholarly Integrity
Professor Halperin likewise praises Mr. Lewis's scholarliness, saying that when the anthropologist began to accumulate critical data about the Castro Government, ''his integrity as a scholar prevailed over any other consideration'' and ''he continued to do whatever was possible to meet his commitment to professional probity.'' | THE anthropologist Oscar Lewis died of a heart attack at 55 in December 1970 while he was in New York doing research on poor Puerto Ricans and Cubans. Mr. Lewis, who wrote ''The Children of Sanchez'' and other well-known studies of slum families, had been ill with heart trouble earlier that year. But a recent book by an American professor in Canada, Maurice Halperin, contends that the government of Fidel Castro contributed to Mr. Lewis's death when it ''doublecrossed'' him by closing Project Cuba, his research into the transformation of Cuban society under a revolutionary government, and confiscating the project's files in June 1970. Ruth Lewis, Mr. Lewis's widow, said, ''I wouldn't go so far as to say that Fidel Castro caused my husband's death.'' However, she added that she generally agrees with Professor Halperin's account, including his charge that Mr. Castro ''doublecrossed'' her husband. | 5.604396 | 0.994505 | 101.60989 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/27/sports/nfl-games-closer-statistics-say-no.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084820id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/27/sports/nfl-games-closer-statistics-say-no.html | N.F.L. Games Closer? - Statistics Say No - NYTimes.com | 20150524084820 | Two pro football games were decided by 1 point last weekend, the Jets' 16-15 victory over Miami Sunday and Atlanta's 31-30 decision over Minnesota Monday night. Those were the 41st and 42d games decided by 3 points or fewer this season, or one-fourth of the total played to date.
Is this a newly defined trend reflecting the closeness of the teams? Not according to National Football League statisticians. Last year, 48.2 percent of the 224 regular-season games were decided by 7 points or fewer and the margin was 3 points or fewer for 25.9 percent of the total.
Comparable percentages two seasons ago were 46.4 for 7 points or less and 22.7 or 3 or less. This year there has been one tie (the first game between Miami and the Jets); four 1-point decisions; 10 by 2 points and 27 by 3. Monday Night Showdown
In the 13th week of the season the select game will come Monday night when the Philadelphia Eagles and the Dolphins meet in Miami (Channel 7, 9 P.M.). The Eagles will need to win to keep pace with the Dallas Cowboys, who beat Chicago Thursday. The Dolphins could be in second place by Monday if the Jets, with whom they are now tied in the American Conference East, beat Baltimore Sunday (Channel 4, 1 P.M.) and go half a game ahead.
The Jets are favored by 12 points against a team that has lost 11 games in a row. The Giants play the 49ers, a team that has won eight of its last nine games, in San Francisco (Channel 2, 4 P.M.) in a game that is the fifth straight home sellout for the 49ers.
Previews of all games (records in parentheses; betting lines from Harrah's Reno Race and Sports Book.) Local Teams
Giants (6-6) at San Francisco (9-3) - The 49ers' home field, a grass surface, is badly damaged, and only 95 points have been scored there in the last three games. (The league average this season is 42.4, the highest ever.) That may be an advantgage to the Giants, who rely so much on their defense. Freddy Solomon and Dwight Clark of the 49ers have caught 116 passes, more than any other pair of wide receivers. Betting line: San Francisco by 5 1/2 points.
Baltimore (1-11) at Jets (7-4-1) -The Colts have lost their last seven games by margins ranging from 11 to 29 points. Of the Jets' future opponents - Baltimore, followed by Seattle, Cleveland and Green Bay - not one has a winning record. Their combined record is 15-33. Should the Jets fail to make the playoffs now they would have to invent many excuses. Betting line: Jets by 12. American Conference
Denver (8-4) at San Diego (7-5) -The Broncos beat the Chargers in their first game Sept. 27 by 18 points. These teams could be going in opposite directions. The Denver defense gave up 571 yards to Cincinnati, losing for the third time in its last four games, while San Diego was scoring 55 points against Oakland. The Broncos may have to start Steve DeBerg at quarterback if Craig Morton is not ready. Morton, who has a sore shoulder and did not play last Sunday, remains questionable. Betting line: San Diego by 4.
Cincinnati (9-3) at Cleveland (5-7) -In winning their last four games, the Bengals outscored their opponents, 136-69, and in 12 games they have had only 15 turnovers. The Browns' season may as well have ended with the latest defeat, to Pittsburgh. Could the loss of the center, Tom DeLeone, have been the cause of the team's collapse? Betting line: Cincinnati by 2.
Oakland (5-7) at Seattle (4-8) - The 55 points scored by the Chargers were the most any Raider team had given up in 20 years. This squad's other low point this season was failing to score in three straight games in October. The Seahawks have rallied a bit, winning three of their last five games. Betting line: Even. National Conference
Green Bay (5-7) at Minnesota (7-5) - The Vikings' record in their division is 4-1 with three games remaining. The Packers have only one healthy quarterback, the rookie Rich Campbell, whose debut in the last game was a near-disaster. It is hoped that David Whitehurst will be able to start instead. Betting line: Minnesota by 7.
Tampa Bay (6-6) at New Orleans (4-8) - The Buccaneers are very much in the playoff picture with a team not even the coach, John McKay, views pridefully. The Saints' rookie, George Rogers, continues to average more than 100 yards rushing a game. Betting line: Tampa Bay by 1. Interconference
Atlanta (6-6) at Houston (5-7) - The breaks at last began to go the Falcons' way in the second half of their Monday night victory over Minnesota. Their realistic goal is to be the N.F.C.'s second wildcard team in the playoffs. It is difficult now for Coach Ed Biles to hold the Oiler team together while everyone awaits the next move of the owner, Bud Adams. He has always been quick to discharge his coaches. The other day Adams said Biles would return next year, but who knows? Betting line: Atlanta By 3.
Los Angeles (5-7) at Pittsburgh (7-5) - The Ram coach, Ray Malavasi, has said that Pat Haden will start at quarterback. The Steelers are one of six teams in contention for the two A.F.C. wildcard playoff berths and Terry Bradshaw has been playing well lately. Betting line: Pittsburgh by 6 1/2.
St. Louis (5-7) at New England (2-10) - The Cardinals think they have found their quarterback of the future in Neil Lomax, who will play every minute of the remaining games, barring injury. The team has won two straight, something new and different. The Patriots started a rebuilding campaign by claiming John Lee, a defensive end whom the Chargers had hoped to slide through the waiver process. Lee made 11 tackles last Sunday. Betting line: New England by 4.
Washington (5-7) at Buffalo (7-5) -The Bills are only half a game out of first place but they have not been playing well lately. Joe Washington of the Redskins is hurt and will not play. With him goes a large part of the team's offense. Betting line: Buffalo by 5. Monday Night
Philadelphia (9-3) at Miami (7-4-1) - Both teams are staggering a little and lost their last games because their offenses produced so few yards. Depth will now be a factor. The Eagles are thin in pass receivers and the Dolphins in offensive linemen. Betting line: Philadelphia by 2. | Two pro football games were decided by 1 point last weekend, the Jets' 16-15 victory over Miami Sunday and Atlanta's 31-30 decision over Minnesota Monday night. Those were the 41st and 42d games decided by 3 points or fewer this season, or one-fourth of the total played to date. Is this a newly defined trend reflecting the closeness of the teams? Not according to National Football League statisticians. Last year, 48.2 percent of the 224 regular-season games were decided by 7 points or fewer and the margin was 3 points or fewer for 25.9 percent of the total. | 11.769231 | 0.991453 | 57.65812 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/30/world/west-s-unity-a-trump-card-at-talks-news-analysis.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084849id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/06/30/world/west-s-unity-a-trump-card-at-talks-news-analysis.html | WEST'S UNITY - A TRUMP CARD AT TALKS - News Analysis - NYTimes.com | 20150524084849 | MADRID, Nov. 18— Several months ago, a Spanish diplomat involved in organizing the East-West conference here on human rights and cooperation in Europe argued that the 35-nation gathering would be a useful barometer of a stormy international situation.
With the conference nearly wrecked by a procedural dispute last week, the forecast seems to point toward a chill in East-West relations, not surprising, perhaps, with Soviet troops camped in Afghanistan and a new, determined Republican administration about to take over in Washington.
But the Madrid meeting, to date, has confounded other predictions. One was that the United States, sounding shrill and self-righteous on human rights and Afghanistan, would alienate its Western European allies, more concerned about salvaging concrete elements of the five-year-old Helsinki accords that are under review here. The Soviet Union would exploit this breach, according to the forecast, sowing further dissension in the Atlantic alliance.
Something like the opposite has happened. By taking a hard line on the Madrid agenda, the Soviet Union isolated itself to the point that, in the corridors of the airy Palacio de Congresos, Hungarians, Poles and Rumanians anxiously expressed their private disagreement to Western diplomats. When the foreign ministers of Sweden, Austria, Yugoslavia and Cyprus proposed a take-it-or-leave-it compromise agenda last Thursday night, it gave the Soviet side very little in return for the embittering procedural battle it had waged for two months.
This encouraging picture of a steadfast, united North Atlantic Treaty Organization facing down a wavering and divided Warsaw Pact does not conform with the harsher realities in Europe, where several Atlantic alliance countries, notably West Germany, have lately turned indecisive or reneged on promises to increase military budgets in coordination with the United States.
The West's togetherness in Madrid has quite a bit to do with a conscious strategy by the American delegation to consult assiduously with its allies. Western caucuses went on around the clock during the tedious wrangling over the agenda last week. And on human rights and Afghanistan, both Britain and the Netherlands have at times been tougher than the United States, blurring any impression that the Americans were leading reluctant allies into a confrontation with the Russians. France has sounded no discordant notes.
Another factor is that Spain, with the bureaucratic advantages of the host nation, has virtually joined the NATO caucus. Its able delegation chief, Javier Ruperez, is a Helsinki veteran and not inclined to a misty variety of nonalignment that is fashionable in Spain. Only a year ago Mr. Ruperez was held captive for a month by Basque terrorists. Difficult Dossier to Defend
Finally, the Soviet Union has a difficult dossier to defend in Madrid. Leonid F. Ilyichev, its top diplomat here, provoked guffaws and suppressed giggling when he characterized Western attacks on the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan as interference in the ''internal affairs'' of that embattled nation. The harassment, banishment and jailing of Soviet dissidents, overt violations of the Helsinki accords, have afforded American and other Western speechmakers moments of eloquence.
Last week, a few edgy European diplomats from East and West were convinced that the Soviet Union wanted to torpedo the Madrid conference to have its hands free to move into Poland should the situation there veer out of control. But specialists on Soviet affairs insisted that the Helsinki accords remained a cornerstone of Leonid I. Brezhnev's foreign policy -''peace-loving,'' as Mr. Ilyichev says repeatedly. To repudiate the agreements now would be a hostile signal to a Reagan administration; scuttling the Madrid meeting might also be interpreted as undoing the recognition of Europe's post-World War II boundaries, which from the Soviet viewpoint was the main achievement of Helsinki.
Both the Soviet Foreign Minister, Andrei A. Gromyko, and Mr. Ilyichev have served notice that Moscow is not prepared to suffer through ''a verbal bullfight'' in Madrid. The Russians have repeatedly urged a ''businesslike'' atmosphere. The possibility of convening a post-Madrid meeting on European desarmament is ''the $64 question'' here, according to Mr. Ilyichev. The United States has retorted that it is ''ludicrous'' to talk of another disarmament forum while Soviet troops are in Afghanistan.
The Madrid meeting could still break up acrimoniously. Western diplomats are adamant that a Soviet military ''solution'' in Poland would finish off the conference, the Helsinki process and the tattered fabric of detente.
''There wouldn't be anything to do,'' said a ranking American. ''We would just close up and go home.'' An Eastern European envoy added this bit of experience in long dealings with the Soviet Union: ''If they have to go into Poland, they'll go. They won't care about Madrid. They have a great capacity to endure embarrassment.''
Illustrations: Photo of Griffin Bell and Max Kakmpelman at Madrid conference | Several months ago, a Spanish diplomat involved in organizing the East-West conference here on human rights and cooperation in Europe argued that the 35-nation gathering would be a useful barometer of a stormy international situation. With the conference nearly wrecked by a procedural dispute last week, the forecast seems to point toward a chill in East-West relations, not surprising, perhaps, with Soviet troops camped in Afghanistan and a new, determined Republican administration about to take over in Washington. But the Madrid meeting, to date, has confounded other predictions. One was that the United States, sounding shrill and self-righteous on human rights and Afghanistan, would alienate its Western European allies, more concerned about salvaging concrete elements of the five-year-old Helsinki accords that are under review here. The Soviet Union would exploit this breach, according to the forecast, sowing further dissension in the Atlantic alliance. | 5.362069 | 0.982759 | 51.235632 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/31/sports/about-cars-a-designer-his-art.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524084922id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/31/sports/about-cars-a-designer-his-art.html | ABOUT CARS - A DESIGNER HIS ART - NYTimes.com | 20150524084922 | BATTISTA FARINA, nicknamed Pinin, began styling automobile bodies not long after there were chassis to put them on. His son, Sergio, now head of the manufacturing and design firm called Pininfarina, has commemorated the company's long history with a series of designs that are being exhibited through June 14 in ''Carrozzeria Italiana,'' an examination of the Italian coachbuilder's art at Pasadena, Calif. Here, in response to questions, are his comments on the state of that art today.
Certainly there is a change. Things must be much more rounded now. There is a change in what is normally called a beautiful car.
Q. Why is that? Are cars built to suit the public taste, or is the public led along?
This is a difficult question, and I can answer because I am Sergio Pininfarina. But I don't know how I'd answer if I were responsible for design at General Motors. I am a lucky man, because I design cars for a few people. So in my life I always design what I like, because if I design what I like, I sell cars to people who like that kind of car.
If I were selling cars to millions of people, I couldn't probably take the problem so easily. If I had a big factory, probably, I should investigate what people like and then do what they like. But, frankly, I would try anyway to do what I like.
I am convinced that designing a car is a fact of culture, because cars have entered our lives so deeply. If you consider what the automobile did to the world, I think it is the most important revolution in our lives and the lives of our fathers. Therefore, to design a car is a very important thing.
Q. What makes a good design?
Good harmony, classic style, proportion, grace, honesty in using the shape which has to be used when you use aluminum, when you use steel, when you use wood. Not to make things made of metal seem as if they were made in wood. Then, if you are a good engineer, if you know the material, if you make an honest car, and you have good taste, the battle is won.
Q. Which of your designs do you like best?
The first Dino central-engine Ferrari. Definitely. If you are asking what has been designed by my factory, including by my father, then it was the Cisitalia.
The Cisitalia was 1946, and it was a commercial disaster. Only 200 were made, and that was just after the war, when if you were selling four wheels and a steering wheel you were set in America. But from the point of view of style, of elegance, of conception, this car was ahead by years and years and years. You know, in the Museum of Modern Art here in New York, there is only one car exhibited, and this is the Cisitalia.
But the Dino for me was paradise. The car was exhibited in Paris, in 1965, and since then it has been the best story for a prototype. With many prototypes, nothing happens. There are articles, photos in the magazines, even prices - but no sons, no daughters. A prototype is only of value if it generates some other cars, and the Dino conceived a generation of sports cars. Like my father's Cisitalia. And this is why I'm rather proud. These two, my father's and mine, have meaning.
Q. What do you see ahead? Is it harder to design small cars than big cars?
Well, I'm happy to be in this business now, because I think we are in front of a very, very fascinating period. Things are quickly changing. For years and years, nothing very important or exciting happened. I dont want to critize the United States, but actually the cars of the 50's, 60's and 70's were not very different from each other.
In Europe, we used to make very different cars - smaller, because of the much higher price of petrol, narrow roads, old cities, mountains, no speed limit. But you have wide roads, petrol for nothing. It was natural you had big cars. But the concept of an American car and a European car were very different. And now you see, with the energy crisis, the two schools come together.
Q. Will cars become much lighter than they are now?
Dimensions will change. There must be a different ratio between inside and outside. It's going to change; it's already changing, and materials will, too. We made a car for the Geneva auto show that was like a laboratory, using materials with no weight. The new technology is fascinating. The car was an old object and is becoming young again.
Q. How do these changes affect the role of the stylist?
I must admit that a stylist today is facing much more difficulty than before. The margin is getting closer and this is what divides the men from the boys. Many times you will see that a car looks new because of regulations. A new fashion, a new trend has developed for a technical reason. It then becomes modern, because people get accustomed to what is logical. And they are much more intelligent than you think. If you are dishonest, despite the advertising, they realize whether its a good product or not.
The challenge is harder, but a good designer designs steel as steel likes to be designed, and not steel like wood or vice versa. Well, when you do all the things properly, you see in your car a new and different personality, and that is good because there is a fantasy, there is something of the personal pencil.
Some others look alike, and that is a victory of the regulations - no gap, no space for fantasy. But I dont want to be discouraged, because, while it is true that I have less margin, my competitors also have less margin. And one wins anyway. | BATTISTA FARINA, nicknamed Pinin, began styling automobile bodies not long after there were chassis to put them on. His son, Sergio, now head of the manufacturing and design firm called Pininfarina, has commemorated the company's long history with a series of designs that are being exhibited through June 14 in ''Carrozzeria Italiana,'' an examination of the Italian coachbuilder's art at Pasadena, Calif. Here, in response to questions, are his comments on the state of that art today. Q. Are tastes changing? Certainly there is a change. Things must be much more rounded now. There is a change in what is normally called a beautiful car. | 9.304688 | 0.96875 | 70.453125 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/30/books/books-of-the-times-072284.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524085400id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/10/30/books/books-of-the-times-072284.html | Books Of The Times | 20150524085400 | By John Leonard THE SECOND STAGE. By Betty Friedan. 344 pages. Summit. $14.95
BETTY FRIEDAN has been around, talking to people, and people are unhappy. People who are women are especially unhappy. Women who work, when they aren't underpaid and stuck in the typing pool, find that success isn't as fulfilling as they thought it would be, or they are so preoccupied with money and power that they might as well be men. Women who stay home to nurture the children lack autonomy and identity and have a 50-50 chance of ending up divorced, without marketable skills. Women who combine families and careers discover that being a superheroine is exhausting. Is this liberation? Of course not.
Meanwhile, the proposed equal rights amendment has been stalled. The ''backlash'' against feminism looks more like a tidal wave. ''The women's movement as we knew it,'' of which Miss Friedan was a founding mother, ''has come to a dead end.'' It all seemed so much more promising in the 1960's. Who is to blame?
Oddly, Miss Friedan blames the victim. The equal rights measure, she feels, would have been ratified by now if there hadn't been so much noise from strident pro-abortionists and embarrassingly militant lesbians. By mixing up sex with politics, radical feminism frightened the horses and the entire country bolted backward. Fundamentalist reactionaries were permitted to co-opt ''the family'' as an issue, as if feminists wanted everybody to live lovelessly alone. 'Choice to Have Babies'
What is to be done? Miss Friedan proposes a ''second stage'' in which the women's movement redefines itself as being in favor of ''the choice to have babies.'' The family, after all, ''is the nutrient matrix of our personhood.'' A second-stage feminism would acknowledge ''that core of women's personhood that is fulfilled through love, nurture, home.'' It would respect what is ''sensitive and yearning and vulnerable'' in all of us. It would celebrate the ''generative,'' the ''grounding, warming, human realities of daily life.'' It would, in fact, be rooted in ''concrete dailiness,'' in ''awe and mystery,'' rather than in ideology.
Such a second stage - in which shared responsibilities would be encouraged, in which child care centers, ' passionate voluntarism'' and ''split-shift'' jobs and schools, would be encouraged - would actually ''enhance'' the family. Its ''mode,'' moreover, would be ''Beta'' rather than ''Alpha.''
Some explanation is obviously necessary. By ''mode,'' Miss Friedan seems to mean style and tactics. An ''Alpha'' mode is ''masculine,'' based on ''analytical, rational, quantitative thinking,'' relying on ''hierarchical relationships of authority.'' A ''Beta'' mode is ''feminine,'' based on ''synthesizing, into intuitive, qualitative thinking,'' attuned to the ''relational'' and the ''contextual.'' There is nothing ''abstract'' about a Beta mode; it is situational politics, if it is politics at all.
This is confusing, and not only because the relevant 30 pages in my copy of ''The Second Stage'' are printed upside down, in reverse order. It also smells of flimflam. Miss Friedan knows perfectly well that any politics is a combination of the two styles. Is she really saying that the only way to beat the Moral Majority is to pretend to join them? Dead End or a Pause?
Let's back up. Has the women's movement, at whatever stage, come to a dead end just because Miss Friedan thinks so? Ask your 15-year-old daughter. Revolutions of sensibility and structure require more than two decades. ''Evolutions,'' which she would prefer, take even longer. It is amazing that so much has already been accomplished, in the face of a faltering economy and a resourceful opposition, a powerful enemy.
Feminism's enemy is not its radical edge; any movement has and needs a radical edge. Otherwise, it won't think, much less move. If feminism is perplexed, maybe it ought to ask questions about the nature of the institutional forces arrayed against it, as Sheila Rowbotham has done in at least three books. If it is stymied, it might learn something about effective politics from reading Jane O'Reilly. If it is full of blank uneasiness, Gerda Lerner and Linda Gordon have some suggestions. If it is willing to listen to a man, Carl Degler is available; Miss Friedan cites his ''At Odds,'' but fails to mention his gloomy conclusions about the nuclear family.
The radical feminists, in fact, were asking questions about the family in the 1960's, before those questions occurred to Miss Friedan. One doesn't have to agree with their answers to realize that there is a politics of sex, as well as an economics. I have my differences with Kate Millet, Shulamith Firestone and Ellen Willis, but they know that we all come home at night, feeling vulnerable. To what do we come home? I may not agree with Susan Brownmiller on pornography, but I doubt she is exercised about the subject because she identifies, ''in reverse, with the worst, most brutal aspects of male sadism.'' How does one identify in reverse?
If such equality as women have managed to seize in the marketplace suggests to them that most work is fearful and boring, they might read Marx on alienation, and many of them have. If females of college age are ungrateful for priveleges that their mothers, admirably, secured, let us remind ourselves of the trade union movement. If, in a recession, women discover that their jobs are expendable, let them imagine being black. Miss Friedan is sincere; sincerity and clout sometimes get respect; without clout, there is perplexity. Licking the hand that batters you is neither Alpha nor Beta. | By John Leonard THE SECOND STAGE. By Betty Friedan. 344 pages. Summit. $14.95 BETTY FRIEDAN has been around, talking to people, and people are unhappy. People who are women are especially unhappy. Women who work, when they aren't underpaid and stuck in the typing pool, find that success isn't as fulfilling as they thought it would be, or they are so preoccupied with money and power that they might as well be men. Women who stay home to nurture the children lack autonomy and identity and have a 50-50 chance of ending up divorced, without marketable skills. Women who combine families and careers discover that being a superheroine is exhausting. Is this liberation? Of course not. | 8.468085 | 0.978723 | 53.687943 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/25/weekinreview/vintage-speech-by-reagan-and-more-mellow-for-for-the-event.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524090316id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/25/weekinreview/vintage-speech-by-reagan-and-more-mellow-for-for-the-event.html | VINTAGE SPEECH BY REAGAN, AND MORE MELLOW FOR FOR THE EVENT | 20150524090316 | WASHINGTON SIXTEEN years and a huge difference in circumstance separate the two nationally televised speeches that are the major mileposts of President Ronald Reagan's political career. On October 27, 1964, Mr. Reagan spoke on behalf of a Republican Presidential candidate and a hardline philosophy that was about to be repudiated at the polls. On Tuesday, Mr. Reagan delivered his inaugural address as the 40th President of the United States, who, in the hopes of his supporters, can bring a new era of conservative dominance to American politics.
A comparison of the two speeches provides a key to understanding Mr. Reagan's rise to political power. It shows the permanence of his principal beliefs and the dramatic adjustments he has made in his specific proposals for putting them into practice.
This is the fundamental paradox of Ronald Reagan, and it lies at the center of a round-robin argument that has gone on from year to year, campaign to campaign, between Mr. Reagan's senior advisers and the political press. Reporters write that Mr. Reagan has moved to the center in, for example, his views on labor unions and Social Security. Mr. Reagan's associates counter that he hasn't changed a whit in 20 years. From Polemicist to President
There is truth in both arguments. The main themes of Mr. Reagan's thought have changed little. But the details of what Mr. Reagan is for and against have changed with the growth in his understanding of the political process and his movement from polemicist for a lost cause to President, from television spokesman to politician capable of packaging populist conservatism so as to attract the millions of voters who rejected Senator Barry Goldwater in 1964.
Of course, there is a sharp diference in tone between the two speeches as well. ''Inaugural speeches are almost sacramental,'' noted Ken Khachigian, a speech writer in the Reagan White House. Last week's speech, for instance, had none of the 1964 complaints that liberals dismiss all conservatives as ''right-wing extremists.''
But there was broad common ground between the two addresses on one central point. Then and now, Mr. Reagan cast a cold eye on the Government he now heads. ''In this present crisis, Government is not the solution. It is the problem,'' he said Tuesday.
It was a line lifted from his standard campaign speech. And if anything, the new wording was sharper than the wording in 1964, when he warned that, save for a few basic chores such as national defense, ''Government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of our economy.''
The states-rights corollary to this anti-Federal view is played down in the 1964 speech - possibly because the Goldwater conservatives were sensitive to the charge that states rights was a code word for segregation.
But in the inaugural address, as in the 1980 campaign speeches, states rights was a centerpiece of Mr. Reagan's presentation, reflecting the degree to which race has receded as an important political issue in the minds of the American majority.
Both speeches reflect a back-to-basics governmental theory - what Mr. Reagan in 1964 called ''this idea that Government...had no other source of power except the sovereign people.''
That concept was spelled out in an almost biblical series of ''begats'' on Tuesday, as Mr. Reagan noted that the people created the states and the states created the Federal Government. ''It is time to check and reverse the growth of Government which shows signs of having grown beyond the consent of the governed,'' he said.
On such philosophical points, Mr. Khachigian noted, Mr. Reagan had a clear purpose in his inaugural speech. ''He didn't want to step away from long-held principles,'' the speechwriter noted: ''He was very firm about that. At one point, he said, 'I think we ought to make it even more clear that I'm not backing away.' ''
That conviction led to the insertion of the line a third of the way into the address: ''It is time to reawaken this industrial giant, to get government back within its means, and to lighten our punitive tax burdens.'' A Manageable Wild Beast
Such sentiments would have been fully at home in Mr. Reagan's 1964 speech. But the difference in the specific steps he appeared to favor then is striking. Now, for instance, Mr. Reagan proposes a mere cut in prevailing tax rates. In 1964, he wanted to do away with the progressive tax system and suggested that President Johnson favored a Marxist system of redistributing wealth. As for cutting Government costs, Mr. Reagan in 1964 was a harsh critic of the Tennessee Valley Authority and suggested putting participation in Social Security on a voluntary basis.
In the inaugural address, such controversial specifics gave way to a rhetoric of plain speaking that suggested the national economy obeys the same rules that household budgets do. ''You and I, as individuals, can, by borrowing, live beyond our means for only a limited period of time,'' Mr. Reagan said. ''Why should we think that collectively, as a nation, we are not bound by that same limitation?''
It is comforting to think that the economy is not an unmanageable psychotic beast that will gobble up any aspiring tamer. And on another key point Mr. Reagan last week took care to be reassuring, even at the expense of shelving trademark rhetorical flourishes from 1964 and the 1980 campaign.
In 1964, Mr. Reagan asserted that America was ''at war with the most dangerous enemy ever known to man.'' In 1980, he promised to build a defense so strong ''that no nation on earth will dare lift a hand against us.'' But the President and his aides were genuinely stung by Democratic campaign charges that he is reckless and warlike. So this talk gave way in the inaugural speech to the observation that ''no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.''
It is a mellow America that Mr. Reagan describes in such statements, the America of the Frank Capra movies of the 1930's and 1940's - ''men and women who raise our food, patrol our streets, man our mines and factories.''
The liberal populism of the post-New Deal era called for special programs to curb the problems of such people when they were held back by the bounds of race, class or economic circumstance.
Mr. Reagan last week described a conservative populism in which such problems are cured by an unregulated economy, on the theory that a rising tide lifts all boats. What Mr. Reagan and the nation must discover, now that the words of 1981 have passed into history with those of 1964, is whether the tides of the economy will obey his command.
Illustrations: photo of George Bush photo of President and Nancy Reagan photo of crowd photo of ex-hostage | WASHINGTON SIXTEEN years and a huge difference in circumstance separate the two nationally televised speeches that are the major mileposts of President Ronald Reagan's political career. On October 27, 1964, Mr. Reagan spoke on behalf of a Republican Presidential candidate and a hardline philosophy that was about to be repudiated at the polls. On Tuesday, Mr. Reagan delivered his inaugural address as the 40th President of the United States, who, in the hopes of his supporters, can bring a new era of conservative dominance to American politics. A comparison of the two speeches provides a key to understanding Mr. Reagan's rise to political power. It shows the permanence of his principal beliefs and the dramatic adjustments he has made in his specific proposals for putting them into practice. | 9.426573 | 0.986014 | 48.986014 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/01/us/administration-in-swtich-takes-tougher-line-on-clean-air-rules.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524102534id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/01/us/administration-in-swtich-takes-tougher-line-on-clean-air-rules.html | ADMINISTRATION, IN SWTICH, TAKES TOUGHER LINE ON CLEAN AIR RULES | 20150524102534 | WASHINGTON, April 30— The Reagan Administration threatened today to ban construction in metropolitan areas in 11 states because of the states' failure to carry out smog control programs.
Environmentalists immediately charged that the threats were an attempt to bring pressure on Congress to weaken the Clean Air Act. An Administration aide denied the charge.
In letters to 11 Governors, the Environmental Protection Agency said that certain metropolitan areas in their states faced a ban on the construction or expansion of industrial plants because the areas were not meeting deadlines in carrying out annual inspection programs on auto emissions.
In addition, the agency threatened to cut off Federal grant money for clean air programs. However, agency officials said this would affect only $1 million this year because most of the money had already gone to the states.
North Carolina, Nevada, Michigan and Missouri missed a Dec. 31, 1981 deadline for beginning programs to test tailpipe exhausts. The agency said that Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Texas, Tennessee, Ohio and Wisconsin were not making enough progress in setting up stateoperated inspection centers, which are scheduled to be operational by the end of this year. Comes After Committee Setbacks
The Environmental Protection Agency's letters were sent on the heels of setbacks by industry lobbyists and the Administration in the House Energy Committee. The committee has voted in recent days against changes in the Clean Air Act backed by industry and the Administration. One change would have done away with the mandatory sanctions the Environmental Protection Agency is now threatening to impose against the 11 states.
David Doniger, a spokesman for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the letters represented an abrupt reversal for the agency. He said that agency had been telling the states that no sanctions would be imposed until Congress finished rewriting the law.
''Now suddenly the agency is playing the tough cop role,'' he said. ''They are trying to use fear tactics to pry loose things from Congress.''
The agency's letters to the Governors noted that the E.P.A. administrator, Anne Gorsuch, was opposed to requiring states with dirty air to set up exhaust testing programs or to imposing sanctions if they do not. But, the letters said, ''In spite of our opposition to these requirements in the legislative arena, we must enforce the provisions of the Clean Air Act until it is changed.'' Denial From Letter's Author
The author of the letter denied that it was an attempt to bring pressure on Congress. The assistant administrator, Kathleen M. Bennett, said, ''If we really wanted to bring down the world on the Clean Air Act, we would play a much heavier hand than we are now.''
The letters give the Governors 30 days to present any evidence they have that their states are complying with the deadlines. If they cannot, the letters say the agency will publish notices proposing to impose the sanctions. Miss Bennett said she did not expect the sanctions would be in place before mid
The metropolitan areas that could have construction bans imposed are Charlotte, N.C.; Las Vegas and Reno, Nev.; Detroit; St. Louis; Louisville, Ky.; Louisville suburbs in Indiana; Chicago and East St. Louis, Ill.; Chicago suburbs; Houston; Nashville; Cleveland; Cincinnati and Milwaukee.
In all, 29 states have been required to carry out auto emission testing programs in their metropolitan areas. | The Reagan Administration threatened today to ban construction in metropolitan areas in 11 states because of the states' failure to carry out smog control programs. Environmentalists immediately charged that the threats were an attempt to bring pressure on Congress to weaken the Clean Air Act. An Administration aide denied the charge. | 11.571429 | 0.982143 | 27.017857 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/06/01/world/man-in-the-news-compassionate-pastor-of-english-catholics.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524102552id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/06/01/world/man-in-the-news-compassionate-pastor-of-english-catholics.html | MAN IN THE NEWS - COMPASSIONATE PASTOR OF ENGLISH CATHOLICS - NYTimes.com | 20150524102552 | LONDON, May 31— As he waited at Gatwick Airport for Pope John Paul II to arrive on a visit he had fought hard to save from the political difficulties that menaced it, Basil Cardinal Hume was asked by a television reporter, ''And how do you feel personally?''
Cardinal Hume's long, delicate features reflect every nuance of his emotions. For a moment it looked as if he might collapse; it was like asking a mountain climber, l00 feet from the top, if he felt tired. ''All this is for the church,'' he said. ''I can't tell you about my feelings.''
As Archbishop of Westminster and the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England, Cardinal Hume is in a pre-eminently public post, one that has traditionally involved the political as well as religious uses of authority. But he finds it difficult to voice the shorthand enthusiasms that public figures are asked for, even if they are bishops. He could not bring himself to turn his feelings into rhetoric. Attracts the Word 'Saintly'
George Basil Hume is something of a paradox in a job held by such formidably decisive predecessors as Cardinal Manning and Cardinal Heenan, architects at different times and in different ways of the growth and consolidation of the Catholic community in Britain. If Cardinal Hume has a predecessor it is in the different tradition, more thoughtful and open, of Cardinal Newman.
When he was named Archbishop of Westminster by the Vatican six years ago, all the English bishops - the normal candidates in line for the position - were passed over. Basil Hume did not seek the job nor did he expect it. He was a Benedictine monk: the Abbot of Ampleforth, which is both a major abbey and one of the outstanding Catholic schools in Britain.
He is a man whose quality is not so much private as intimate. His warmth, and an openness that verges on the guileless, make the word ''saintly'' turn up with some frequency in the accounts of acquaintances and in newspaper profiles.
The 59-year-old churchman is more pastor than leader, more preacher than administrator. The addresses he made to the monks and novices when he was Abbot of Ampleforth are a kind of old sailor's advice to young sailors, written cleanly and without inflation, with a sense both of love for the wind and respect for its dangers. To those who found themselves struggling with a sense of unfitness for the spiritual life he wrote:
''You are joining a community of extremely imperfect human beings. It is like being in a hospital where the matron, as well as the patients, is sick.'' Becomes a Teacher
Unlike much of the British Roman Catholic hierarchy, Cardinal Hume is not of Irish descent. His father, a distinguished Newcastle physician, was English and Protestant. His mother was French, and a Catholic; and it was her influence that sent him at the age of 11 to study at Ampleforth, and later, perhaps, to choose to become a monk.
Basil Hume's father, Sir William, was dubious. He made his son promise he would quit the order if he changed his mind. He was frequently tempted, Cardinal Hume recalls, during his novitiate.
''But there was an old prior who was about to go into hospital and he asked me to make no decision until he came back. Well he never came back, so I never left.''
He became a teacher and house master at Ampleforth. He was also the rugby coach, and even today his tall, bony figure conveys a sense of springy good health. One former Ampleforth student, who was in Father Hume's house, recalls him.
''He was extremely fair, and fairly disorganized. But he was much more broad and human than most of the monks appeared to be.'' From being monk and teacher, Father Hume went on to become Abbot. When he was consecrated Archbishop of Westminster in 1975 he had been at Ampleforth continuously for four decades, apart from a few years away at university. Because the Benedictines take a vow of ''stability'' - they are attached for life to the abbey they first join - Cardinal Hume is still carried on the Ampleforth register as a monk. Choice a Surprise
The choice was a total surprise at the time. It stemmed, according to church sources, from a feeling both among prominent Catholic laymen and the new Apostolic Delegate, Msgr. Bruno Heim, that the English hierarchy was undistinguished and needed new blood. There was at first, among the London clergy, some complaint that a man who had spent his entire life in a Yorkshire abbey was poorly fitted to deal with the church's mainly urban constituencies.
But what uneasiness there was soon subsided and the choice became highly popular. One of Cardinal Hume's strengths has been his care of the clergy and faithful of his archdiocese.
He has, for example, a telephone whose number is known only to the thousand or so priests in his jurisdiction, and which he alone answers. It is a mechanism for an extraordinarily direct communication between a Cardinal and his priests.
Cardinal Hume is regarded with some suspicion by the more traditional elements of a Catholic community that can be very traditional indeed. It is partly because he is liberal; but perhaps more because his tolerant, open manner differs from the forcefulness that they would prefer. Auberon Waugh, who has most of the curmudgeonly attitudes of his father, Evelyn, and a share of his talent, attacked the Cardinal as ''a profoundly silly man.'' Wishy-washiness was the gist of the complaint. Rome Is Not Receptive
There has, in the past, been some dissidence between the Cardinal, whose views of church government favor collegiality, and Pope John Paul II, whose style is a personal and forceful leadership. Cardinal Hume has sought quietly to liberalize the church's stand on birth control, and found no receptiveness in Rome.
On the other hand, the Cardinal, though outspoken upon occasion, tends to limit the times when he takes strong and controversial public positions. If he is more liberal than John Paul II, there has been nothing that remotely approaches public divergence. ''If I can't go along in my personal thoughts, I toe the line,'' he said not long ago.
Even some of his many admirers wonder whether he is as assertive as the occasion may require. If there is a lack here, though, it is the reverse side of qualities of tolerance, openness and compassion that have worked to dissolve a little of the suspicion that some English Protestants still feel toward their Catholic countrymen.
There is more than a touch of Thomas More's man of all seasons to Cardinal Hume: certainly he is the man for the season of the Pope's visit and the effort to bring the churches closer together.
Illustrations: photo of George Basil Hume | As he waited at Gatwick Airport for Pope John Paul II to arrive on a visit he had fought hard to save from the political difficulties that menaced it, Basil Cardinal Hume was asked by a television reporter, ''And how do you feel personally?'' Cardinal Hume's long, delicate features reflect every nuance of his emotions. For a moment it looked as if he might collapse; it was like asking a mountain climber, l00 feet from the top, if he felt tired. ''All this is for the church,'' he said. ''I can't tell you about my feelings.'' | 11.183333 | 0.991667 | 60.508333 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/07/books/foreign-affairs.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524104541id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/07/books/foreign-affairs.html | FOREIGN AFFAIRS - NYTimes.com | 20150524104541 | CHAMELEON By William Diehl. 374 pp. New York: Random House. $14.50. THE MAHDI By A.J. Quinnell. 297 pp. New York: William Morrow & Co. $13.50.
IN William Diehl's first novel, ''Sharky's Machine,'' an Atlanta cop solved a series of murders whose roots trailed back to certain American military doings in Italy during World War II. The book was gritty, tough, dazzlingly well done, and romantic in the unrealistic way books like this sometimes are, with the street-wise cop Sharky falling in love with the elegant, high-priced prostitute and, of course, vice versa.
The ingredients in ''Chameleon,'' Mr. Diehl's second novel, are considerably more extravagant, although here too the unraveling of the mystery is dependent on events that took place during World War II, this time in the Pacific theater.
Crusty old General Hooker, the unsung architect of MacArthur's Pacific victories and subsequently military governor of occupied Japan, is the recipient of one live chameleon after another, suitably boxed (with air holes) and gift-wrapped. They have been arriving at irregular intervals ever since Hooker's 8-year-old son was captured during the war by a Japanese master spy named Chameleon. When the general refused to play the Chameleon's game and exchange prisoners with him, the child disappeared. After the war, all the bereaved father could discover was that captor and captive had died at Hiroshima. Why, then, do these chameleons keep on coming?
The general, retired from the Army, is now chief executive officer of an international oil consortium, which he directs from an old castle in Japan, the Chameleon's former headquarters. Someone is eliminating many of the consortium's key personnel, as well as engaging in bloody and vicious sabotage. In Italy, a famous racingcar driver is killed when the car he is test-driving blows up. Off the northwest coast of Alaska, an explosion capsizes the world's largest oil rig during a raging storm, killing the entire crew. All this appears to be the work of the Chameleon. But chameleons are not always what they seem. There is a good deal more afoot here, actually much too much more. This book is packed with enough characters, incidents and locations for several movies.
Among the supporting cast: a couple of world-class assassins, one of whom claims to desire a peaceful retirement; a six-fingered piano player in the Caribbean who has a computer named Isadore; a Bulgarian with a poisoned umbrella ensconced in a remote Haitian monastery, which is really an insane asylum; a beautiful Eurasian killer in Bloomingdale's; an eccentric oil consultant who is rescued from kidnappe rs in Caracas, only to be murdered by one of his rescuers in Montego Bay. The hero of the book doesn't even appear for the first 100 pages. He is an investigative reporter and former C.I.A. agent named Frank O'Hara, who is hiding out in Kyoto.
Tracking O'Hara to his lair is a television reporter on the trail of her biggest story, feisty little Eliza Gunn. She is one of those aggressive girlish women before whom vicious killers melt and give incriminating interviews. Gunn is the book's mascot; there isn't much for her to do after she finds O'Hara except to be cute, go to bed with him and get in the way once he starts to track down the Chameleon.
Unfortunately, the sum of all these disparate parts, many of which are excellent, makes a less than satisfying whole. The author has taken his title too much to heart and is at great pains on every page to keep us guessing and off balance. It's certainly legitimate to tease and mislead the reader - indeed, the reader expects it - but here it's wildly overdone. As the red herrings pile up - never mind the chameleons - the result is confusion, not suspense. And the final unmasking of the Chameleon is not much of a surprise.
* The Mahdi is the Messiah of the Islamic world. He hasn't arrived yet, though there have been any number of unsuccessful claimants to the title since the Prophet Mohammed's death in A.D. 632. It is A.J.Quinnell's ingenious and irreverent conceit in ''The Mahdi'' to have British intelligence (MI-6) and the C.I.A. team up to place their own candidate on this spiritual throne. They plan to accomplish that by creating the requisite miracles, the most important of which will occur in full view of the assembled pilgrims at Mecca. Thanks to the marvels of modern technology (top-secret, of course), miracles ar e nolonger exclus ive with God. If the venture succeeds, the West will totally domin ate a particularly unruly and troublesome part of the world.
The British, who have planned the mission and will take the public blame if it fails, want access to American technological breakthroughs; the Americans, who are financing the adventure, are anxious to control the British agents preparing the way for the prophet. As the two play one-upmanship with each other, the K.G.B. director of overseas operations, Vassili Gordik, becomes aware that something is about to happen.
With time running out, the desperate Gordik sends a virgin to do a harlot's job - possibly a first in espionage literature -by arranging the semireluctant defection of prima ballerina Maya Kashva into the arms of balletomane Peter Gemmel, the chief British member of Operation Mirage. When the unworldly Maya's mission is tragically successful and the Russians are in a position to expose the operation, an entirely unexpected sequence of events begins to unfold. There are several amusing surprises as layer after layer of the story is craftily uncovered. The miracle at Mecca does take place, and quite spectacularly, but only after a couple of cliffhangers have seemed to ensure that it won't. At the end comes one more sly revelation, which is not totally unexpected if you've been paying close attention.
Seeing the pieces of this elegant plot click smoothly into place is as satisfying as taking a Rolls-Royce through its paces. But along with the satisfaction comes a sense of emotional distance. The characters are all nice - there are no villains here - and, with the exception of the ballerina, thorough professionals, always in control. The few times they are not, they are quick to apologize. They have no dark forces to play against, either within themselves or in their opponents. Only the fact that their aims conflict causes difficulties. Thus, when Gemmel sends out an assassin, he sighs with regret; and even Gordik is a Russian teddy bear underneath his gruff K.G.B. exterior. The result is that there seems less at stake here than there ought to be. I found myself wishing more than once for yet another miracle - for one of the characters to slip the author's all too expert grasp. | CHAMELEON By William Diehl. 374 pp. New York: Random House. $14.50. THE MAHDI By A.J. Quinnell. 297 pp. New York: William Morrow & Co. $13.50. IN William Diehl's first novel, ''Sharky's Machine,'' an Atlanta cop solved a series of murders whose roots trailed back to certain American military doings in Italy during World War II. The book was gritty, tough, dazzlingly well done, and romantic in the unrealistic way books like this sometimes are, with the street-wise cop Sharky falling in love with the elegant, high-priced prostitute and, of course, vice versa. | 10.5 | 0.97619 | 64.18254 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/05/nyregion/bridge-sweden-s-eric-jannerstein-recalled-for-his-versatility.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524104711id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/05/nyregion/bridge-sweden-s-eric-jannerstein-recalled-for-his-versatility.html | Bridge - - Sweden's Eric Jannerstein Recalled for His Versatility - NYTimes.com | 20150524104711 | One of the great personalities of the international bridge scene, Eric Jannersten of Sweden, died on April 18 at the age of 69. In a long and distinguished career in the game, he had filled almost every possible role.
As a player he won several national titles and represented his country in the European championships. He was also a teacher, a columnist, an author, a publisher, an editor, a commentator, an organizer and a tournament director.
For many years he was executive secretary of the International Bridge Press Association. He should be remembered particularly for his development of the ''bidding box,'' a device that is indispensable nowadays in international tournaments. How to Read the Cards
Perhaps the best of Jannersten's many books was ''Cards on the Table,'' the translated title of which duplicated that of an Agatha Christie mystery. Jannersten dealt smoothly with the mysteries of card-reading -how to judge what the opponents have and how to make use of the information.
In the diagramed deal, played in a European Championship and described in the book, South must exercise considerable foresight. The reader was shown the North-South hands and asked to plan the play in six spades after the lead of the club nine.
At first sight, South can be hopeful. A normal 3-2 club split is all that he needs, given that East has the heart ace for his overcall. But the declarer should look suspiciously at the opening lead of the club nine. West surely has at least one heart, so why did he not lead his partner's suit?
The answer, no doubt, is that he has led a singleton club in the hope of a ruff. If that is the case, the contract can be made, but South must be very, very careful. He should, of course, start by winning the club queen in order to have the chance to neutralize the hypothetical J-10 in the East hand.
South may need to lead three times from dummy, and there are only two obvious entries. To forestall a club ruff, he must play the ace and king of trumps and then continue by leading to the jack. He leads a low club, planning to play low, but East alertly plays the ten.
South can now win and cross to the diamond ace. But his fate will depend on how much foresight he had at the first trick. If his remaining clubs are A-7 or K-7, he will fail in his slam, for East will play his club jack on the eight if that is played.
If South thought matters out fully at the first trick, he will have unblocked the club seven. Then the eventual finesse will leave him in dummy, with the eight or the six on the third or fourth round, to make his heart play toward the king and make the slam. NORTH S J 6 3 H 7 2 D A 10 6 3 C Q 8 6 5 WEST EAST S 7 4 2 S 5 H 8 5 4 3 H A Q J 10 9 D Q 8 5 4 2 D K J 9 C 9 C J 10 4 3 SOUTH (D) S A K Q 10 9 8 H K 6 D 7 C A K 7 2 Neither side was vulnerable. The bidding: South West North East 2 C Pass 2 D 2 H 2 S Pass 3 S Pass 4 N.T. Pass 5 D Pass 6 S Pass Pass Pass
West led the club nine. | One of the great personalities of the international bridge scene, Eric Jannersten of Sweden, died on April 18 at the age of 69. In a long and distinguished career in the game, he had filled almost every possible role. As a player he won several national titles and represented his country in the European championships. He was also a teacher, a columnist, an author, a publisher, an editor, a commentator, an organizer and a tournament director. | 7.5 | 0.988889 | 44.011111 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/08/business/scientific-american-in-ad-drive-stirs-demographic-battle.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105002id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/08/business/scientific-american-in-ad-drive-stirs-demographic-battle.html | SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, IN AD DRIVE, STIRS DEMOGRAPHIC BATTLE | 20150524105002 | Neatly framed and hanging on the wall of the office is the number 1,350 -this year's target for advertising pages in Scientific American, which sold 1,134 pages last year. ''That's so I never forget what we're all about,'' said C. John Kirby, the magazine's advertising director.
Mr. Kirby, a former Marine Corps captain, shows little sign of forgetfulness. For the past few years, he has been sniping at Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report and other rivals for corporate advertising, demanding that they prove their readership claims.
Last month he stepped up his campaign by withdrawing Scientific American from a key industry group and trumpeting the move in a widely circulated, four-page letter.
What draws the 60-year-old Mr. Kirby's fire are the demographic editions of several leading magazines, especially Time and Newsweek. Directed at specific audiences - such as top corporate executives, doctors and educators - the so-called ''demos'' are attractive to advertisers because they claim to give access to an upscale readership. This type of readership is also offered by such publications as Scientific American. 'Easy Pickings,' He Calls It
''They're spawning demos as fast as rabbits,'' Mr. Kirby declared, noting that Time currently has seven and Newsweek three. ''And why not? It's easy pickings. You just gilt-edge it, call it Super-Executive 2 and away you go!''
Mr. Kirby complains that the demos are not properly audited. While most national magazines are subjected to a rigorous check by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, which analyzes readers not only by state but also by duration and price of subscription, many of the demographic editions escape close scrutiny.
Instead, executive editions of Newsweek and Time issue only supplemental reports that evaluate their subscribers by job title (company presidents, for example, or department heads) and by industry. A full audit, Mr. Kirby contends, would sho w that the demos have a less upscale audience than they claim. When t he A.B.C. refused again last month to conduct such an audit, Scientif ic American pulled out of the organization.
In his assault on the news magazines, Mr. Kirby has the advantage of knowing the enemy first-hand. Prior to joining Scientific American in 1975, he worked at Newsweek, where he helped sell space for the newborn executive edition. ''I waited a decent interval, 18 months, before starting to question the audit,'' he said, grinning. Before Newsweek, he was advertising director of U.S. News & World Report. A Wide Spectrum of Foes
The battle has pitted Mr. Kirby against not only the news magazines but also the A.B.C. and a number of advertising agencies. What he really wants, his adversaries suggest, is to get more adverti sing forScientific Am erican.
''All these requests are being made by competitive publishers rather than buyers,'' said Christopher Meigher, director of corporate circulation for Time. Is Mr. Kirby trying to win advertisers away from Time? ''That's his job,'' Mr. Meigher said.
''What's wrong with that?'' Mr. Kirby retorted. At the Audit Bureau of Circulations, which has been taking the brunt of Mr. Kirby's fire, Howard Kutz, senior vice president, detected an element of opportunism. ''It's become an excellent issue for Scientific American,'' he said. ''They appear to want to destroy the credibility of their competitors.''
''Correct!'' Mr. Kirby snapped. Some Madison Avenue people express a cautious interest in an audit, but they add that Mr. Kirby should focus on the geographic analysis and not worry about the price and duration of subscriptions. ''Kirby is running around waving a banner, saying, 'Look how clean we are - why isn't everybody like that?' '' said Art Edelstein, media director of the Campbell-Mithun advertising agency in Chicago and chairman of the consumer magazine committee of the American Association of Advertising Agencies. ''Not everybody can be like that.'' Emphasis on the Price Paid
''This is not a technicality,'' Mr. Kirby said. ''When 40 percent of the subscriptions are short-term, it's physically impossible to determine if they meet the demographic standards. Secondly, is that top executive buying at discount prices?'' He noted that all of Scientific American's readers pay the full subscription price.
The reason the ad agencies have not supported Mr. Kirby's demand for audits, he maintained, is that they depend on advertising for survival. ''They live off their billing,'' he said. ''These are very salable packages. If an agency president says, 'We won't buy advertising until we get answers,' how can an account manager recommend 10 spreads in Time and Newsweek demos?''
Mr. Kirby's two allies - George Green, president of The New Yorker, and James Dunn, publisher of Forbes - expressed disappointment at his latest maneuver, the withdrawal from A.B.C. They suggested that he should have stayed and fought. ''They're upset because who will carry on the fight?'' Mr. Kirby volunteered. ''I said to George Green, 'Perhaps it's time you did, George.' '' Letter Sent to the Bureau
''We're not worried about carrying our side,'' Mr. Green said. Last week he sent the A.B.C. a letter warning that the bureau ''is no longer regarded as significant by many advertising agencies and advertisers.'' He said, ''John's not the only one sending a letter - and mine's a lot shorter.''
Mr. Kirby says he is winning more friends in his fight. Some advertisers have switched to Scientific American from Time and Newsweek demos as a result of his outcry, he maintains.
''I know the campaign is working,'' he declared. ''I wouldn't continue it otherwise.'' He pointed to a pair of gold wings, encased in lucite, a memento of his Marine Corps service in World War II. ''That was another time when clear thinking was called for,'' he said.
Illustrations: photo of C. John Kirby | Neatly framed and hanging on the wall of the office is the number 1,350 -this year's target for advertising pages in Scientific American, which sold 1,134 pages last year. ''That's so I never forget what we're all about,'' said C. John Kirby, the magazine's advertising director. Mr. Kirby, a former Marine Corps captain, shows little sign of forgetfulness. For the past few years, he has been sniping at Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report and other rivals for corporate advertising, demanding that they prove their readership claims. | 11.082569 | 0.990826 | 53.798165 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/10/world/guatemala-regime-claims-victory-in-election.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105309id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/10/world/guatemala-regime-claims-victory-in-election.html | GUATEMALA REGIME CLAIMS VICTORY IN ELECTION | 20150524105309 | GUATEMALA, March 9— Victory in Sunday's presidential election was claimed today by the Government's candidate, and his three opponents were detained by the police as they were marching to the presidential palace to present what they said was evidence of fraud.
They had demanded that the elections be annulled and had called on their supporters to stage a mass protest in front of the palace, an action that the Government warned was illegal and would not be tolerated.
The three candidates, all conservatives like Gen. Angel Anibal Guevara, the nominee backed by the Government, were intercepted by the police shortly after 5 P.M. and taken to a police station. They reportedly were set free an hour later.
About 200 people tried to enter the park in front of the palace to stage their protest but were prevented from doing so by policemen carrying automatic weapons and using tear gas. Shortly before 5 P.M. busloads of policemen had moved into the area, and they were reinforced by heavily armed individuals in civilian clothes.
A woman among the protesters was struck in the face with an automatic pistol, and a man in a business suit was knocked down. Several other civilians were clubbed and taken away by car. Four U.S. Journalists Detained
Four American television journalists, including Geraldo Rivera of ABC, were detained for about 30 minutes and released. Soldiers patrolled the area in jeeps mounted with machine guns, and some sporadic shooting was heard. Earlier in the day, General Guevara said at a news conference: ''We have won these elections freely and cleanly through hard work. I am going to defend my triumph in the streets, if necessary.'' He spoke shortly before the Election Commission announced results from 265 of the 327 electoral municipalities. They showed that the general continued to lead with 37 percent of the vote, polling 270,017 votes.
Second was Mario Sandoval Alarcon of the National Liberation Movement, an extreme right-wing group, with 201,017 votes. Alejandro Maldonado Aguirre of the National Renovation and Christian Democratic Parties was third, with 175,842 votes. Gustavo Anzueto Vielman of the Authentic Nationalist Party was fourth with 72,108 votes. Decision Up to Congress
Because General Guevara will almost certainly not have a majority of the popular vote, which is what the 1965 Constitution requires, it will be for the outgoing Congress to choose the President. With his supporters holding a majority in Congress, he is expected to be named when it convenes next week.
The general would take office on July 1 along with the new 61-member Congress that was also elected on Sunday. The general's three civilian opponents sought to present their charges of fraud to the President, Gen. Romeo Lucas Garcia, as the counting of the votes continued.
(In Washington, Dean Fischer, the State Department spokesman, expressed concern over the charges of irregularities and called on the Guatemalan Government to respond promptly and to insure that the ''vote is fully and accurately counted.'')
In news conferences before today's joint march, the civilian candidates cited what they said were instances of fraudulent conduct by Government election officials, and said the elections should be annulled. Boycott by Leftists
Mr. Maldonado said at a news conference on Monday that the leftists had warned that the elections would be ''a farce.'' The leftists had called on their supporters to boycott the elections, in which only conservative candidates were entered.
Joining Mr. Maldonado at the news conference were his vicepresidential candidate and the presidential and vice-presidential candidates for the National Liberation Movement. | Victory in Sunday's presidential election was claimed today by the Government's candidate, and his three opponents were detained by the police as they were marching to the presidential palace to present what they said was evidence of fraud. They had demanded that the elections be annulled and had called on their supporters to stage a mass protest in front of the palace, an action that the Government warned was illegal and would not be tolerated. The three candidates, all conservatives like Gen. Angel Anibal Guevara, the nominee backed by the Government, were intercepted by the police shortly after 5 P.M. and taken to a police station. They reportedly were set free an hour later. | 5.25 | 0.976563 | 35.867188 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/04/11/theater/stage-view-surrounded-bu-creatures-of-habit.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105413id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/04/11/theater/stage-view-surrounded-bu-creatures-of-habit.html | Stage View - SURROUNDED BU CREATURES OF HABIT - NYTimes.com | 20150524105413 | As I sat in two different playhouses on two successive evenings a week ago, a line of dialogue from the faraway past came floating into my head to haunt me. Suddenly I could hear - couldn't get rid of, really - the sound of dear Una O'Connor's light Irish lilt, so at odds with the exasperation and injury that filled her enormous eyes as she shuffled, in housekeeperly fashion, between the needs of nun Ingrid Bergman and young curate Bing Crosby in Leo McCarey's sometimes funny and always foolishly sentimental ''Bells of St. Mary's.'' What she was saying, as she bemoaned the labor of caring not only for the parish priests but also for the good sisters who taught in the convent school was a musically muttered ''Ah, sure, you don't know what it's like to be up to your neck in nuns.'' She pronounced ''nuns'' almost as though it were ''noons,'' which mysteriously made the line sound even tastier.
Of course the line came back to me because, as of the present theatrical moment, we certainly all do know what it's like to be up to our necks in nuns. On the Tuesday evening we were watching Geraldine Page and Amanda Plummer, both in wimples, wrestling with the psychological mysteries of John Pielmeier's ''Agnes of God,'' and on the Wednesday we were following four youngsters in pleated jumpers turn one by one into the nuns who taught them in Casey Kurtti's ''Catholic School Girls.'' Nor are these the first habited creatures to invade our stages in recent years. We're being inundated, all right.
But the sisters we're getting, I should add in all haste, are nothing like the ones Miss O'Connor had in mind. In Miss O'Connor's Hollywood days nuns might be hearty enough to play tennis or even to go a few rounds with one of the grade school boys, but that was just to show what outgoing, down-to-earth, hail and hearty types they were; otherwise, they lent sympathetic ears to all who came to them with problems and used their spare time to kneel in prayer in the convent chapel. Miss Bergman and Celeste Holm in particular. The current crop is not so well behaved. In ''Catholic School Girls'' the senile and/or neurotic tyrants of the classroom are given to yanking the girls from their seats by the hair, behaving most cruelly to a student already embarrassed by her first and sudden menstruation, and whacking a child across the face smartly for having declared Jesus Christ a Jew. Not quite the Bergman-Holm style. And in ''Agnes of God'' young Amanda Plummer - who is simple and sweet - is being put through psychiatric examination for having apparently strangled an infant to which she gave birth in her convent cell.
''Catholic School Girls,'' I am sorry to say, seems a feeble, giddy and ultimately very tiresome spinoff from the first and genuinely funny half of Christopher Durang's ''Sister Mary Ignatius.'' The performing is jumping-jack amateurish, the material stock and carelessly written. Let us simply wish the attractively spic-andspan new Douglas Fairbanks Theater on upper 42d Street better luck next time. ''Agnes of God,'' at the Music Box, is another matter.
Playwright Pielmeier has, to be sure, made use of a decidely garish situation. Its religious orientation is toward the shocker, toward ''The Exorcist'' or even ''Rosemary's Baby.'' Psychiatrically, it puts you in mind of ''Equus,'' without in any way threatening that play's place in the sun. Yet Mr. Pielmeier is no mere opportunist, literally rummaging through the laundry basket for such dirty linen as he can find. He is quite serious about creating a metaphysical overlay for whatever is penny-dreadful in his plotting and, for his full first act at least, he has devised several exemplary stratagems for bringing the double vision off.
Item. He has dared give his nuns humor. He hasn't made them trustworthy. But he's made them tart, and that goes a long way toward providing them with the intelligence they desparately need if we're to believe a word they say. Geraldine Page is the contemplative convent's Mother Superior, though almost the first suggestion she makes to court-appointed analyst Elizabeth Ashley is that she needn't call her Mother. It has come to her attention that calling a nun ''Mother'' makes people feel uncomfortable today. Wrinkling her nose as Miss Ashley lights her third cigarette in three minutes, she does not deliver the reproof we expect. She remarks instead that she admires the honesty of the unfiltered cigarette-smoker.
As Miss Ashley begins her probe by asking how in the world an entire convent could go for nine months without ever noticing Miss Plummer's pregnancy, Miss Page's reply is not so much lofty as benign. Patting the long front panel of the habit that drops from her chin to her toes, she makes the quite obvious point that she could carry a machine gun there and it would never be noticed.
When it is time for Miss Ashley to question the naive, shy, elusive Miss Plummer, the conversational tone doesn't really change that much. Miss Plummer is indeed other-worldly in some sense, but she can be stubborn, she can make lively images, she can be blunt. When, in a therapy-induced flashback, she explains her reluctance to eat on the ground that she is getting too fat (''I'm a blimp!''), she buttresses her case with a dead certainty that God hates fat people. ''Look at the statues, they're all thin!'' she expostulates, ''God blew up the Hindenburg and he'll blow me up, too!'' | As I sat in two different playhouses on two successive evenings a week ago, a line of dialogue from the faraway past came floating into my head to haunt me. Suddenly I could hear - couldn't get rid of, really - the sound of dear Una O'Connor's light Irish lilt, so at odds with the exasperation and injury that filled her enormous eyes as she shuffled, in housekeeperly fashion, between the needs of nun Ingrid Bergman and young curate Bing Crosby in Leo McCarey's sometimes funny and always foolishly sentimental ''Bells of St. Mary's.'' What she was saying, as she bemoaned the labor of caring not only for the parish priests but also for the good sisters who taught in the convent school was a musically muttered ''Ah, sure, you don't know what it's like to be up to your neck in nuns.'' She pronounced ''nuns'' almost as though it were ''noons,'' which mysteriously made the line sound even tastier. | 5.880208 | 0.994792 | 95.755208 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/12/business/reagan-is-told-time-is-running-out-for-a-budget-compromise.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105530id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/12/business/reagan-is-told-time-is-running-out-for-a-budget-compromise.html | REAGAN IS TOLD TIME IS RUNNING OUT FOR A BUDGET COMPROMISE | 20150524105530 | WASHINGTON, March 11— Democratic Congressional leaders appealed to President Reagan today to compromise on his budget plan and warned that time to reach an accommodation was running out.
The Speaker of the House, Thomas P. O'Neill Jr., Democrat of Massachussetts, in his most conciliatory statement to date, said, ''In the interest of the nation, we the Democrats want to work for a solution. We do not merely want to dialogue. We want action.''
Similarly, Senator Ernest F. Hollings, Democrat of South Carolina, ranking minority member of the Budget Committee, said in a letter to Mr. Reagan, ''Unless you note your approval in the next two weeks, the necessary climate for fiscal discipline will never jell.''
Both Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill have rejected the President's proposed $762.5 billion budget for the fiscal year 1983 because it projects a deficit of $96.4 billion, which they consider too high. Reagan Seen As Inflexible
The President's allies as well as his adversaries in Congress have publicly criticized what they regard as Mr. Reagan's inflexibility on the budget. They believe that it is necessary to scale back the President's proposed increase in military spending and raise taxes in order to reduce the deficit.
The President, meanwhile, has told the House Republican leader that he regarded the road between the White House and Capitol Hill as ''a two-way street.'' In a letter to Representative Robert H. Michel, Republican of Illinois, the House minority leader, Mr. Reagan reiterated his willingness ''to consider any comprehensive Congressional plan achieving further savings and meeting our agreed upon goals.'' Those goals, he told 53 Republican senators Tuesday, included a desire to ''hold down'' taxes and spending and bolster national security, the precise areas of contention between the President and the Congress.
''My visits to Capitol Hill are more than symbolic of my commitment to ensure there is a two-way street between the Congress and the White House,'' Mr. Reagan wrote. ''I will always be willing to work with the Congress to solve the problems facing our nation.''
But in remarks at a White House reception today, the President returned to the attack. He told members of the National Newspaper Association that an informal survey among Congressional committee leaders had indicated they were ''entertaining proposals to add $29 billion'' to social programs in the proposed budget.
''They will, if allowed, bring higher inflation, higher taxes and, yes, bigger deficits,'' Mr. Reagan said. The Republican-controlled Senate Appropriations Committee failed today to reach agreement on the $14.2 billion in spending cuts sought by Mr. Reagan. Thus far, most committees of both the House and Senate have shown a reluctance to make the proposed cuts.
Senator Mark O. Hatfield, Republican of Oregon, chairman of the committee, has proposed a freeze on nonmilitary spending and would deny pay increases to civilian and military Government employees. Mr. Hatfield's proposal was $11.2 billion beyond the President's proposals for domestic social programs, and almost $10 billion below the President's recommendation of $216 billion for military spending.
It is Democratic Congressional leaders who are showing the most urgency about formulating a new budget. Speaker O'Neill noted in a speech before the newspaper association that the President had said on Tuesday that it was ''time to get our sabers and charge.''
''I think, if I were the President, I would say that it is time to get my pocket calculator out,'' the Speaker said. ''Compromise is never an easy road, but politics is the art of compromise,'' Mr. O'Neill said. ''It is time for the President to forget about victories. His program is not working and it is time for a midcourse correction.'' | Democratic Congressional leaders appealed to President Reagan today to compromise on his budget plan and warned that time to reach an accommodation was running out. The Speaker of the House, Thomas P. O'Neill Jr., Democrat of Massachussetts, in his most conciliatory statement to date, said, ''In the interest of the nation, we the Democrats want to work for a solution. We do not merely want to dialogue. We want action.'' | 8.809524 | 0.988095 | 46.72619 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/09/books/a-great-writer-not-a-great-man.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105602id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/09/books/a-great-writer-not-a-great-man.html | A GREAT WRITER-NOT A GREAT MAN | 20150524105602 | THOMAS HARDY A Biography. By Michael Millgate. Illustrated. 637 pp. New York: Random House. $25. By GEORGE LEVINE
THE Thomas Hardy who emerges from Michael Millgate's excellent new biography probably wouldn't like it. Hardy protected his privacy intensely, always slightly ashamed of his origins, embarrassed about his education, secretive about his dreams of infidelity. Even as an old, revered novelist and poet receiving regular visits from the most famous of his day, he bore his fame awkwardly. It would have struck him as just another of life's little ironies that the harder he worked in his lifetime to protect himself from the curious, the more persistently the curious would pursue him after death.
And yet he has been lucky in this biographer, as he was lucky - though he could never perceive it - in his life. For Millgate has written a scrupulously fair and sensitive biography, uncovering almost miraculously facts buried under decades of accumulated gossip and speculation. Hardy, of course, wanted only the biography published in the year of his death, written ostensibly by his second wife, Florence, but in fact largely written by Hardy himself. Millgate's biography is not, after all, uncritical. He quotes Florence Hardy herself as saying that Hardy was ''a great writer, but not a great man.'' Millgate, moreover, deals firmly with the disingenuousness of Hardy's responses to hostile criticism, his exaggeration of his education, his minimizing of his peasant connection, his pleas of innocence to all charges of indecorum in his writing. Yet Hardy remains a sympathetic figure whose failings were, at worst, pathetic gestures at a respectability beneath his true dignity, sad dreams of infidelities he was probably incapable of sustaining, very human longings to be accepted by the culture his best writing exposed as rigid, destructive and unjust. There is, for example, something touching in the fact that the famous Max Gate, where Hardy received admirers for decades, was originally Mack's Gate, named after a local toll gate. The ''subtle Latinization and aggrandisement,'' even if half-ironic, is characteristically classconscious.
It may be difficult to think of Hardy, the poet of loss and tragic irony, the novelist who chronicled the deaths of the Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of the D'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure, as lucky. Yet Hardy did survive a precarious infancy - during which he seemed no ''better than a vegetable'' - and lived from 1840 until 1928. His early weakness turned into a kind ---------------------------------------------------------------------
George Levine is chairman of the English department at Rutgers University. His most recent book is ''The Realistic Imagination: From Frankenstein to Lady Chatterley.'' of strength, for, as Millgate notes, it ''called into question the otherwise automatic assumption that he would become a mason like his father.'' His strategy was an almost passive acquiescence, but he was a man of extraordinary tenacity and strength of will. When his first novel, ''The Poor Man and the Lady,'' was rejected, he almost retreated into his first profession, architecture. But, doggedly, he transformed the novel into pieces of other novels and poems, and, as George Meredith advised, wrote a second novel, ''Desperate Remedies,'' almost to formula. And he never stopped writing. When success came, he made no flourishes, refusing to tempt the envious gods, as Michael Henchard did in ''The Mayor of Casterbridge.'' Instead, he set up residence, not far from his mother and his Bockhampton home, at Max Gate, described by Millgate as ''a modest house, providing neither more nor less than the accommodation ... needed,'' where he remained until he died.
In the long run, Hardy never lost. The combination of tenacity and ostensible passivity worked. He told editors of periodicals to revise as they saw fit when they criticized his work because it seemed indecent. Later, when republishing in book form, he restored all his original readings. He kept himself blind to the audacity of his own work, and the strategy allowed him to continue to take chances and to challenge Victorian conventions. Similarly, he kept to his marriage with Emma Gifford long after mutual hostility had developed, and even after she seemed to grow deranged. His betrayals were largely (if not exclusively) fantasies of love for women who passed more or less briefly through his life. All of them, indeed, became occasions for fiction or poetry and for his persistent preoc- cupation with what Millgate calls ''the realm of the unattainable where his imagination was always at home.'' One might say, then, that Hardy made his luck, turning each loss into gain.
Millgate covered much of this ground in his earlier book, ''Thomas Hardy: His Career as a Novelist.'' But this book is about the life, not the fiction, and, although Millgate takes the often dangerous road of reading the novels and poems in terms of the life, he succeeds impressively, while avoiding distortion of the works. Hardy's special temperament made it inevitable that the novels and poems would contain the revelations he worked so strenuously to disguise. Even to those who distrust biographical reading of literature, Millgate's use of that approach must be illuminating.
Of course, Millgate can locate the the novels' places and characters in the landscape of Hardy's life, but what he does most interestingly lies beyond this sort of gossipy fact. It is fascinating, for example, to trace with the biographer Hardy's remarkable circlings, in his frequent moves from town to town, around his old home in Bockhampton - keeping his distance but never getting too far away. His novels are not romans a clef, but they are ''thick with remembered experience and observation and with family and local traditions possessed so absolutely by the imagination as to be indistinguishable from memory itself.'' Millgate tries to recreate that texture of memory and gives to Hardy's career a coherence that his astonishingly various production would have seemed to make impossible.
Millgate discriminates subtly between Hardy's memory and imagination, and shows that the ''autobiographical'' is not merely a disguised transcription of biographical fact. He suggests, for example, that ''the most fascinating'' autobiographical elements in ''The Return of the Native '' are not Hardy's recreation of his past but his exploration of a ''road he had not taken,'' which allows him to ''see more plainly, and perhaps justify to himself, the course he had in fact chosen to follow.'' In this case, Millgate alludes to Clym Yeobright's decision to ''reject his profession and return to the heath.'' Hardy, of course, did not return - or rather he did, as author and voyeur, not as laborer.
This biography, then, becomes the indispensable guide to Hardy's life because it is also a sensitive work of criticism. Millgate knows both Hardy's work and Hardy's life as thoroughly and intelligently as anyone around, and he keeps himself from succumbing to the uncritical stance Hardy certainly would have preferred. He shows us the impossible Emma Gifford as a sympathetic figure and makes clear that the failure of her marriage to Hardy was not her fault alone. He reveals Hardy's frequent cold self-preoccupation. Yet, in the long run, knowing Hardy to be less than ''a great man,'' he knows him, too, to be very much the ''great writer,'' and at worst all too human. Millgate leaves us an ultimately touching and admirable Hardy -perhaps more than Hardy himself would have expected. | THOMAS HARDY A Biography. By Michael Millgate. Illustrated. 637 pp. New York: Random House. $25. By GEORGE LEVINE THE Thomas Hardy who emerges from Michael Millgate's excellent new biography probably wouldn't like it. Hardy protected his privacy intensely, always slightly ashamed of his origins, embarrassed about his education, secretive about his dreams of infidelity. Even as an old, revered novelist and poet receiving regular visits from the most famous of his day, he bore his fame awkwardly. It would have struck him as just another of life's little ironies that the harder he worked in his lifetime to protect himself from the curious, the more persistently the curious would pursue him after death. | 10.751825 | 0.978102 | 87.547445 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/04/14/opinion/l-two-kinds-of-pressure-on-tv-networks-061569.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524105840id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/04/14/opinion/l-two-kinds-of-pressure-on-tv-networks-061569.html | TWO KINDS OF PRESSURE ON TV NETWORKS | 20150524105840 | By failing to distinguish adequately between a sponsor who wants to shape the public's notions about laundry detergent and a minister who desires to limit the public's access to television programs that do not meet his moral and religious criteria, Walter Goodman's Op-Ed article (April 6) on the proposed boycott of NBC-TV by the Coalition for Better Television seriously misstates the issue.
Mr. Goodman's more general observations are certainly unassailable: programming is, by most measures, woefully lacking in quality; the right to express displeasure with that programming through legal means is unquestioned.
But the facile analogies employed by Mr. Goodman deflect consideration of the profound implications of the boycott.
After all, success of the fundamentalist's effort would impinge not upon the networks, whose ''bottom line'' could be protected by a shift in programming, but upon the public, who would find its viewing options dictated by a sectarian outlook it doesn't share.
This is not to suggest that the boycott be prevented. It is to say, however, that the serious threat posed by the action be more fully understood. Television executives keyed to commercial success may produce bad programs; television executives tied to a parochial viewpoint must necessarily present shows dangerous to the fabric of our democratic, pluralistic society. RICHARD A. STEINBERG, New York, April 6, 1982 | To the Editor: By failing to distinguish adequately between a sponsor who wants to shape the public's notions about laundry detergent and a minister who desires to limit the public's access to television programs that do not meet his moral and religious criteria, Walter Goodman's Op-Ed article (April 6) on the proposed boycott of NBC-TV by the Coalition for Better Television seriously misstates the issue. Mr. Goodman's more general observations are certainly unassailable: programming is, by most measures, woefully lacking in quality; the right to express displeasure with that programming through legal means is unquestioned. | 2.243478 | 0.973913 | 57.652174 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/14/world/general-is-declared-winner-in-guatemalan-vote.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524110033id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/14/world/general-is-declared-winner-in-guatemalan-vote.html | GENERAL IS DECLARED WINNER IN GUATEMALAN VOTE | 20150524110033 | GUATEMALA, March 13— The Guatemalan Congress chose General Angel Anibal Guevara tonight to be the country's next President. The one-house legislature voted 39 to 13 to name General Guevara, who finished first in last Sunday's presidential election, after the deputies certified the results of the popular vote. The formal vote by Congress was necessary because the general did not win an absolute majority of the 1,074,381 votes cast.
But the selection of the general and his civilian running mate, Ramiro Ponce Monroy, was assured since they were backed by the three-party coalition that includes the Institutional Democratic Party, which has been in power for the last 12 years and controls Congress.
General Guevara, a 56-year-old former Defense Minister, who was also backed by the army high command, is to replace the outgoing President, Maj. Gen. Romeo Lucas Garcia, on July 1.
The vote was announced by Jorge Bonilla Lopez, the president of Congress and a member of a pro-Guevara party. Nine members of Congress did not attend tonight's session.
A runoff election between the candidates who finished first and second had been scheduled, but the second-place finisher said Friday that he would not take part in the runoff, charging that the original balloting was marred by widespread fraud. The runoff was almost certain to have given General Guevara an absolute majority.
In last Sunday's election General Guevara received 377,792 votes, 35 percent of those cast. In second place was Mario Sandoval Alarcon, of the extreme rightist National Liberation Movement, with 274,217 votes, or 26 percent. Alejandro Maldonado Aguirre, the most moderate of the four right-of-center candidates and the nominee of the National Renovation and Christian Democratic Parties, followed with 220,244, or 20 percent. Nine percent -98,747 - voted for Gustavo Anzueto Vielman of the Authentic Nationalist Party, who was the favorite of the United States Embassy here because he espouses supply-side economic policies.
Leftists denounced the election as a fraud and boycotted it, asking their supporters either to not vote or to cast a blank ballot. All four presidential candidates had pledged during their campaigns to crush leftist guerrillas in the civil war here.
About 45 percent of the eligible voters cast ballots. Ten percent of the ballots - 103,381 - were invalid or blank. | The Guatemalan Congress chose General Angel Anibal Guevara tonight to be the country's next President. The one-house legislature voted 39 to 13 to name General Guevara, who finished first in last Sunday's presidential election, after the deputies certified the results of the popular vote. The formal vote by Congress was necessary because the general did not win an absolute majority of the 1,074,381 votes cast. | 5.906667 | 0.986667 | 47.173333 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/15/business/british-air-short-on-solutions.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524110048id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/03/15/business/british-air-short-on-solutions.html | BRITISH AIR - SHORT ON SOLUTIONS - NYTimes.com | 20150524110048 | LONDON, March 9— When a Boeing 747 belonging to an American airline crosses the Atlantic, the luggage, cargo and mail will, as a general rule, be unloaded by six baggage handlers. To do the same job on the same kind of plane flying the same route, British Airways will dispatch a crew of 15.
British Airways, which is owned by the British Government, does not compare so unfavorably in all respects, but by every accepted overall measure of efficiency it stands last among the world's biggest airlines, with productivity about half that of major airlines of the United States. By such statistics, the story of the troubled carrier can at least in part be told.
Today, the airline is in the midst of its worst crisis since its formation in 1972 in a merger between the British Overseas Airways Corporation and British European Airways. After a loss equivalent to $253 million last year, British Airways is expected to report a deficit of about $360 million for the fiscal year ending March 31. The airline's debt is approaching $1.85 billion.
To be sure, the entire airline business is suffering under the weight of sagging traffic and cutthroat fare competition. But British Airways, despite the high fares in Britain and Europe, has encountered more turbulence than its competitors. Executive Departures
Following delivery last week of a secret report by Price Waterhouse & Company, the accounting firm, the line's finance director, Roger Moss, has been dismissed, and more departures are widely rumored to be on the way. Among the possible candidates for departure is said to be Roy Watts, the chief executive. And a sharp paring of routes, equipment and facilities already under way is likely to be expanded.
Service aloft, where the line's staffing numbers are in keeping with industry norms, is widely derided. Last spring, the airline tried to introduce carry-on meals for economy passengers in Europe but retreated under pressure. In a survey by Business Traveller magazine here, respondents voted British Airways worst in both longhaul and short-haul service.
''There's too much of an attitude of couldn't-care-less, that passengers are a boring nuisance and interfere with flying the airplane,'' said Nick Parsons, the editor of Business Traveller.
British Airways officials refused to be interviewed. But in the past, they have blamed a variety of factors, particularly the sharp decline in air traffic that began as the line was still expanding and the competition that has driven down many air fares, particularly on North Atlantic routes. In addition, senior officials have conceded that high manning levels have led to excessive costs. Too Many Volunteers
Morale at the carrier has sunk so low and fears for the line's future have grown so large that when the management offered generous payments to employees willing to leave voluntarily, some 14,000 responded, 5,000 more than had been sought. Although not all the volunteers will be accepted, criticism is now heard that the severance offer was too generous and there is also grumbling, among passengers and staff members alike, that the fast pace of the attrition has left workers spread too thin.
But the troubles may have carried with them something of a silver lining. Deeply frightened by the carrier's prospects, workers have begun to respond in previously unheard-of ways. Pay freezes have been accepted.
Most dramatic has been the effect of a strike by 2,000 baggage handlers at Heathrow Airport, who are protesting work rule changes designed to wring out higher productivity.
Other workers have not only refused to go on strike themselves or to honor the handlers' picket lines, but have also been voluntarily transferring the luggage themselves, often on their own time. And according to airline supervisers, the target of delivering 90 percent of incoming baggage within 25 minutes is being met more often now than it had been by the regular staff.
''There's really no point in making it any worse for ourselves than it already is,' said one young executive as he finished a stint of baggage handling at Heathrow recently. ''At the end of the day, we're only hurting ourselves.'' Causes for Concern
The fears among the staff have been further nurtured by the bankruptcy of Laker Airways, which embarrassed the British Government, coming as it did at a time of staggering losses at British Airways. In thinly veiled comments, senior Government officials maintained that they were determined to reduce the Government-owned company's losses and proceed with the plan to sell a substantial holding to the public. That sale is regarded as unlikely before 1983.
''It is clearly the management's responsibility, therefore, to take strong measures to improve their financial performance as quickly as possible,'' said Iain Sproat, a minister of trade for aviation, recently.
In many ways, the problems of B.A., as it is known, reflect those of many of Britain's companies. Its chairman, Sir John King, is only a part-time officer and has no background in the airline business. In the past, the company has been subjected to Government pressure, such as over which planes to buy, and now has 20 versions of 10 different types of aircraft, many of which are very inefficient.
Most dramatically, it was the product of a shotgun merger in an era when bigger seemed better. The two companies were never fully integrated and today separate cabin crew rosters are still maintained.
''The idea was fairly sound, but no one anticipated the difficulty of managing a company with 50,000 people,'' said Anthony Lucking, who has testified at a variety of hearings.
To try to restore the airline to some semblance of fiscal health, Sir John and Mr. Watts are taking drastic steps, in part as a response to criticism that B.A. went on expanding long after the need for austerity became clearly apparent. In addition to allowing the staff to fall from a peak of nearly 60,000 two years ago to a target of less than 42,000 by June, a variety of assets, including two London terminals, have been sold and other facilities, including catering and training centers, have been closed.
Other sales, possibly to include profitable helicopter, hotel and tourist subsidiaries, are considered likely. Unprofitable services are being dropped, albeit slowly. The capital budget has been trimmed sharply.
Illustrations: Graph of British Airways financial data Photo of Roy Watts | When a Boeing 747 belonging to an American airline crosses the Atlantic, the luggage, cargo and mail will, as a general rule, be unloaded by six baggage handlers. To do the same job on the same kind of plane flying the same route, British Airways will dispatch a crew of 15. British Airways, which is owned by the British Government, does not compare so unfavorably in all respects, but by every accepted overall measure of efficiency it stands last among the world's biggest airlines, with productivity about half that of major airlines of the United States. By such statistics, the story of the troubled carrier can at least in part be told. | 9.648438 | 0.992188 | 63.476563 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/14/world/ira-backers-campaign-in-irish-vote.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524110312id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/14/world/ira-backers-campaign-in-irish-vote.html | I.R.A. BACKERS CAMPAIGN IN IRISH VOTE | 20150524110312 | MONAGHAN, Ireland, Feb. 13— Sean Kelly, a young volunteer in the parliamentary election campaign, spent today following a time-honored political ritual - knocking on doors asking for votes. But though Mr. Kelly's method was familiar, his message was unusually harsh.
''A vote for our party is a vote for the liberation struggle,'' he told one voter after another, and some of them nodded their heads in agreement. ''We've got to drive the Brits out of our land.''
Mr. Kelly was campaigning for Seamus McElwain, one of the dozen or so candidates allied with the Irish Republican Army in its violent campaign to drive the British out of Northern Ireland.
Mr. McElwain, who is 21 years old, was not out meeting the voters himself in this final weekend of the campaign because he has been in jail in Belfast since last spring. He is awaiting trial on a charge of having killed a policeman and a militia member, two deaths among the 2,100 that have occurred in the 12-year-old struggle over Northern Ireland. Economy Is Main Issue
In the campaign for the Irish election, which is on Thursday, the serious economic situation is the principal issue in most parts of the republic. Voters are pressing Prime Minister Garret FitzGerald and his challenger, Charles J. Haughey, about the 11 percent unemployment, about the 23 percent inflation rate and about the enormous burden of Government debt and the new taxes needed to help pay it off.
But here in the border territory 75 miles northwest of Dublin, a gentle green farmland with a tranquil air that belies its violent tradition, the Ulster question is always paramount.
''The men of County Monaghan have been giving their lives to the struggle for Ulster for years,'' said an elderly farmer, striding across his sheep meadow this afternoon in the pleasant winter sunshine. ''They'll go right on doing it until the battle has been won.''
Prime Minister FitzGerald and Mr. Haughey have no basic differences on the constitutional issue; like virtually every other politician south of the border, they both favor reunification of the two parts of Ireland. Both are also committed to the continuing dialogue with London over the future of the British province to the north. Haughey Somewhat Tougher
But there are shades of difference in tone and emphasis. Mr. Haughey is considered somewhat more hard-line, and so is his party, Fianna Fail, whose literature usually refers to it as ''the republican party.''
On the other hand, Mr. FitzGerald, during his seven-month tenure as Prime Minister, has launched what he calls a crusade to make this predominantly Roman Catholic country less sectarian, so that Northern Protestants could feel more at home here. Mr. Haughey has vigorously denounced that effort.
In a campaign speech in a town southeast of here the other day, the Prime Minister vigorously attacked Sinn Fein, the political wing of the I.R.A., which is the party that nominated Mr. McElwain, the prisoner candidate.
''Terrorist s are terrorists,'' Mr. FitzGera ld said. ''The party wascreated to support the terrorist movement and does so. They do not recognize the institutions of the state, the courts or the government. They rob our banks and post offic es and shoot our policemen.'' Sinn Fein Broadcasts Barred
The Prime Minister was defending his Government's decision on Tuesday not to permi t Sinn Fein or its candidates to make political broadcasts du ring the campaign.
Members of Sinn Fein are regularly banned from the airwaves in the Irish Republic, a regulation that reflects the Dublin Government's commitment against terrorism and is, in fact, stricter than restrictions on them in Northern Ireland or the rest of Britain.
Supporters of Mr. McElwain, who lists his occupation as ''prisoner of war,'' make no attempt to disguise their loyalties. The McElwain campaign office, above a pub on a main street here in Monaghan, is decorated with pictures of masked, hooded gunmen and such slogans as, ''They may kill the revolutionary, but never the revolution.'' Bernadette Devlin Running
Not all of the republican hard-liners running for Parliament are in Sinn Fein. Among those on other tickets is Bernadette Devlin McAliskey, who achieved international renown more than 10 years ago as a fiery nationalist member of the British Parliament.
Mrs. McAliskey, who still has a limp from wounds sustained in an attack by unionist paramilitary gunmen a year ago, is running on the People's Democracy ticket in a section of north Dublin where former Prime Minister Haughey is also a candidate.
Asked recently whether she supported the I.R.A., which is illegal here as it is in Britain, she replied, ''A vote for me implies sentiment for the right to use arms against oppression.''
Mrs. McAliskey, who lives north of the border, is allowed to run for Parliament here because the Dublin Government regards the entire island as Irish. Two Prisoners Won in June
In the last Irish election, in June, nine prisoners from the North ran for Parliament, and two of them won seats. One of the two, Kieran Doherty, was elected in this constituency, and he died two months later in the hunger strike in Maze Prison in Belfast.
Because the passions aroused by the hunger strike last summer are now submerged, the pro-I.R.A. candidates are not expected to do so well this time. But they could draw support away from the major parties, which would most likely hurt Mr. Haughey's Fianna Fail.
The republican militants thus have a potential influence well beyond their numbers, especially since this election is expected to be very close, as the last one was.
Last June neither of the major parties won a majority, producing the parliamentary instability that caused the FitzGerald Government to fall late last month. A poll published a week later in The Irish Times indicated sentiments that could produce almost exactly the same results this time. | Sean Kelly, a young volunteer in the parliamentary election campaign, spent today following a time-honored political ritual - knocking on doors asking for votes. But though Mr. Kelly's method was familiar, his message was unusually harsh. ''A vote for our party is a vote for the liberation struggle,'' he told one voter after another, and some of them nodded their heads in agreement. ''We've got to drive the Brits out of our land.'' | 12.333333 | 0.989247 | 45.591398 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/20/nyregion/plan-by-democrats-effaces-old-silk-stocking-district.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524111539id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/20/nyregion/plan-by-democrats-effaces-old-silk-stocking-district.html | PLAN BY DEMOCRATS EFFACES OLD 'SILK STOCKING' DISTRICT | 20150524111539 | A redrawing of New York City's political map in which Manhattan's ''silk stocking'' Congressional District would be totally unraveled was proposed yesterday by Democrats.
Replacing the district would be one starting on East 79th Street, crossing Central Park and ascending the West Side into the Bronx, then wandering eastward to Co-Op City.
Once represented by John V. Lindsay and Edward I. Koch and now by Bill Green, a Republican, the district drew its name from its onetime appearance and from its location on the well-to-do East Side.
Comparing their cartography with the previously published Republican version, the Democrats called their ''silk stocking'' realignment less grotesque then their opponents' plan to lump together the West Side of Manhattan (represented by Ted Weiss, a Democrat) and Long Island City, Queens.
The Democrats would also add a Hispanic neighborhood in lower Manhattan to a Brooklyn district and take away the part of Queens now represented by Mario Biaggi, adding a part of Westchester County to his district instead.
In proposing their package, Democrats were taking a bargaining position. Because legislative control is politically split, reapportionment must either be worked out on a bipartisan basis or resolved in court.
Neither party's plan is likely to survive intact. ''Look, this won't happen,'' said Charles Dumas, a spokesman for the Republican-controlled Senate, of yesterday's Democratic lines. ''Somebody has to sit down and talk,'' said Assemblyman Melvin H. Miller of Brooklyn, who laid out the Democratic plan in a news conference at 270 Broadway. Shift of Power Involved
However a decision is reached, the result will affect how New Yorkers are represented in Albany and Washington for a decade. Because of population changes, both plans shift some power to the suburbs. And, because three city boroughs fall under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, both plans, according to their authors, increase the number of districts that could elect black or Hispanic representatives.
To reflect the 1980 census, the state must redraw its 150 Assembly District lines, realign districts to increase the State Senate by one, to 61, and lose five of its 39 Congressional Districts.
Mr. Miller said there was ''one agreement'' on city lines between the two parties - to attach the Staten Island-based Congressional District to the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn, not to the southern tip of Manhattan, as at present.
Each party would do that differently, but politicians think Representative Guy V. Molinari, the Republican from Staten Island, could defeat Representative Leo C. Zeferetti, the Democrat from Bay Ridge. Assembly Plan May Prevail
Political practicality says the Democrat-controlled Assembly will have the major say in drawing Assembly lines. As politicians superimposed their perceptions on the Democratic city map, they suggested that only two of the current seven Republican districts - one on Staten Island, one in Queens -would stay safely Republican.
The Democrats said their plan would increase the 16 city districts now two-thirds black or Hispanic to 19, while the overall city delegation would decrease by four members, to 61.
So intricate is the reapportionment maneuvering that the Assembly Speaker, Stanley Fink, moved in Federal Court yesterday to become a plaintiff in a case in which he is a defendant.
The suit, by the Black and Puerto Rican Caucus, asks that the Legislature be forced to agree on new lines by March 1. Mr. Fink said he agreed with that deadline, so that ''no controversy exists.'' Mr. Miller suggested at the Democrats' news conference that the two parties had staked out publicly opposed positions without actually planning to.
''It's like World War I,'' he said. ''Both sides brought their troops up to the border, expecting that they'd sit there. But then they started fighting.'' | A redrawing of New York City's political map in which Manhattan's ''silk stocking'' Congressional District would be totally unraveled was proposed yesterday by Democrats. Replacing the district would be one starting on East 79th Street, crossing Central Park and ascending the West Side into the Bronx, then wandering eastward to Co-Op City. Once represented by John V. Lindsay and Edward I. Koch and now by Bill Green, a Republican, the district drew its name from its onetime appearance and from its location on the well-to-do East Side. Comparing their cartography with the previously published Republican version, the Democrats called their ''silk stocking'' realignment less grotesque then their opponents' plan to lump together the West Side of Manhattan (represented by Ted Weiss, a Democrat) and Long Island City, Queens. | 4.685535 | 0.981132 | 39.962264 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/23/opinion/in-the-nation-the-man-with-no-pac.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524113733id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/23/opinion/in-the-nation-the-man-with-no-pac.html | IN THE NATION - The Man With No P.A.C. - NYTimes.com | 20150524113733 | Walter Mondale has the Committee for the Future of America. Edward Kennedy calls his the Fund for a Democratic Majority. Ernest Hollings's ''friends'' have organized the Committee for a Competitive America.
All these Democratic clubs may suggest that to run for President these days - even to think about running -a politician needs a political action committee to raise and spend money for him. Such committees spent $131 million during the 1979-80 political campaign, the Federal Elections Commission has reported.
That makes it all the more unusual that Senator Gary Hart, Democrat of Colorado, has no P.A.C. Despite his public contention that he isn't running for President, all political reporters and most Democrats - including Gary Hart, when among friends - assume that he will.
He's universally listed with Senators Kennedy, Hollings of South Carolina, John Glenn of Ohio and Alan Cranston of California, former Vice President Mondale and former Gov. Reuben Askew of Florida as among Democrats sure to go as far as they can in pursuit of the bully pulpit. President Carter's former all-everything, Robert Strauss, isn't and shouldn't be ruled out; and even Mr. Carter himself, some authorities on Potomac fever believe, might yet hear a call to renewed service.
That's eight potentials, not even considering ambitious governors -Rockefeller of West Virginia, Babbitt of Arizona, Brown of Kentucky - or Democrats who might be elected governors in 1982 (Ed Koch for President, anyone?).
But down the stretch of the 1984 primaries and caucuses, so the conventional wisdom goes, front-runners Kennedy and Mondale -assuming they survive that far - are likely to be challenged more strongly by John Glenn and Gary Hart than by any of the Democrats' other ''new faces.''
So why doesn't Senator Hart have a P.A.C.? Because, he says, he plans a different kind of campaign (if, of course, he runs) and expects a different kind of election - both concerned more with ideas and issues than with the kind of politics for which a P.A.C. is most useful.
Every candidate promises a ''campaign on the issues,'' of course. But Gary Hart's intent to wage such a campaign is more credible than most because Democrats generally concede their need for new ideas to remodel the kind of liberalism Ronald Reagan so effectively denounced; and because Mr. Hart has been one of the party's most active re-thinkers.
He believes, moreover, that the perceived failure of liberalism and the hostility he thinks Reagan-style conservatism is beginning to earn will make 1984 uniquely an election year for ideas - one in which the public will be listening more than it looks and judging what it hears in the harsh atmosphere of a decade of political disillusionment and economic trial.
Not that Senator Hart spurns money or the support of other Democrats; he concedes the necessity for both but thinks traditional campaigning may not pay off sufficiently in either. He thinks it may be more useful this time to help develop a sound political program for Democratic Congressional candidates (some are already using his ideas) than to appear for the same candidates at fund-raising rallies (as Mr. Mondale is already doing).
That approach, in the Senator's view, also would help unify the party around a set of ideas - for example, his own approach to military spending and strategy. As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, he has strong ideas for simpler and more reliable weapons, substituting ''maneuver warfare'' for the usual American reliance on firepower and attrition, and breaking down the stifling bureaucracy of today's armed forces.
He'd like to see campaign debate center on such ideas, rather than on the size of the military budget - although his proposals might provide stronger forces for less cost than the current approach. And he's prepared to argue for strategic arms control as a necessary ingredient of national security.
Senator Hart is also proposing an ''economic strategy for the 80's.'' Notably, it would replace the income tax, loopholes and all, with a simpler and more equitable ''progressive personal expenditures tax'' levied against a taxpayer's income plus borrowing, minus his productive savings and investments.
As a weapon against inflation, he advocates tax penalties for price and wage increases exceeding annual target levels by the 2,000 largest corporations - a system requiring no special bureaucracy to enforce but affecting basic national wage-price patterns.
Can such - or any - ideas provide the basic materials of a Presidential campaign? John Anderson didn't get far along that route in 1980, but Gary Hart won't have the frustrations of running an independent campaign. And he's prepared to gamble that both liberalism and conservatism will be perceived as failures by 1984, so that voters will be ready for a new man with new approaches. If, of course, he runs. | Walter Mondale has the Committee for the Future of America. Edward Kennedy calls his the Fund for a Democratic Majority. Ernest Hollings's ''friends'' have organized the Committee for a Competitive America. All these Democratic clubs may suggest that to run for President these days - even to think about running -a politician needs a political action committee to raise and spend money for him. Such committees spent $131 million during the 1979-80 political campaign, the Federal Elections Commission has reported. | 10.031915 | 0.989362 | 47.542553 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/28/business/a-plan-to-save-the-savings-banks.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524120323id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/28/business/a-plan-to-save-the-savings-banks.html | A PLAN TO SAVE THE SAVINGS BANKS | 20150524120323 | WASHINGTON F OR 20 years, Representative Fernand J. St. Germain worked steadily to cultivate his political garden but rarely, despite growing seniority, did he find himself a place in the sun.
The people of Rhode Island's First Congressional District, of course, knew him as their man in Washington. He was the guy with the listed home telephone number who returned to Woonsocket each weekend and who liked nothing better than to drop in at the Ever-Ready Diner in Providence to eat franks and beans with his blue-collar constituents. They kept sending him back to Congress virtually without challenge.
In recent years the lobbyists and bureaucrats involved in banking and housing issues came to know Fred St. Germain, too, as he became an important legislative figure and subcommittee chairman. But except for brief periods, such as when he led an effort to tighten banking practices in the wake of the Bert Lance affair, Mr. St. Germain remained largely unknown.
But no more. Last year the 54-year old Democrat became head of the Committee on Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs, the first person from his state to head one of the 13 major House committees in this century.
Mr. St. Germain joins a long line of highly visible men who have led the banking committee in its colorful history. James A. Garfield, later President, led the committee shortly after the Civil War. There was Arsene P. Pujo of Louisiana early in this century when the Federal Reserve was being created. Then came Carter Glass, Louis T. McFadden, Henry B. Steagall and the populist Wright Patman, all of whom stamped their names on landmark banking legislation.
Finally, when Henry S. Reuss, Mr. Patman's heir as chief nemesis of bankers, announced last year that he would not seek re-election, Mr. St. Germain found himself heading an increasingly powerful, 45-member committee right in the center of the economic action.
Last week, Mr. St. Germain was back in the news, this time introducing a bill under which the Government would set up a $7.5 billion fund from which ailing savings and loans and banks could borrow. To qualify for the loans, an instituion would have to have seen its net worth fall below 2 percent of its assets and would be obliged to earmark half of its net new deposits for mortgages to first-time home buyers.
The plight of the thrift industry was further documented by a Brookings Institution study published just as Mr. St. Germain was dropping in his bill Brookings said over 1,000 more savings and loans, about one-quarter of the industry, would fail or be forced to merge by the end of 1983 if interest rates didn't fall substantially.
They have gotten into this situation by being heavily invested in long-term mortgages at interest rates far below what they must now pay to attract deposits. ''These institutions have a problem today because they lent long and borrowed short,'' Mr. St. Germain said.
But Republican purists think the chairman's plan amounts to little more than the bailout of an industry with which he has long been close, a charge he vigorously disputed during an interview in his spacious office, the Capitol looming through the large window behind him.
''It's not a bailout, oh no, no, no,'' he insisted. ''We're not giving anything away. We're lending the money.'' Did he think Congress had a duty to solve a problem that it, in effect, caused? ''There's no doubt that we created the savings and loans,'' Mr. St. Germain responded. ''We said to them, your purpose, your mission in life, is to provide home mortgage financing. And they did that for many years, successfully. We assisted them with Regulation Q and we assisted them with the differential. And, yes, we said to them you can't engage in commercial lending. All you can do is lend long.
''In hindsight, some might say everything we did was wrong, But who could have conceived of, who could have dreamt, of the fact that concurrently we'd have the Gray Panthers movement and the saver saying, hey, wait a second, I want a larger return on my money, I don't any longer want to subsidize the borrower? That wouldn't have been bad had interest rates stayed at 8, 9, 10 percent. They could have weathered that storm.
''However, in conjunction with that we got this sudden, rightstraight-up change in interest rates. Sure, there are some instances in which we could say its poor management and lack of foresight but I think that's minimal. They did what we asked them to.''
He added, ''We want to preserve the home mortgage lending industry on behalf of the home purchaser.'' It's too early to tell how much support the bill will attract, but a member of the committee's minority staff says he thinks it will ''go some distance'' even though ''an outright bailout is not to our liking.'' After all, he noted, the Government didn't set the ground rules for savings and loans in a vacuum. It did ''what the lobbyists wanted it to do.''
Most observers declare Mr. St. Germain far more sympathetic to the thrifts than to commercial banks. He has loudly maintained, for example, that the banks' prime lending rate has become a meaningless term because of the diverse way it is applied and has criticized the way they have established billion-dollar lines of credit for corporate customers for use in allegedly unproductive takeovers.
One of the things on the committee agenda this year is to extend the Credit Control Act, which gives the President authority to ration credit in an emergency.
But while he complains about the ''ridiculous'' tax cuts that he says represent giveaways to business, Mr. St. Germain also has generally been a strong supporter of the Export-Import Bank, which mainly helps finance the foreign sales of major corporations.
''Yes, on the one hand you're helping General Electric, you're helping Boeing. But on the other hand we're talking about the employment of thousands of people,'' he said.
Mr. St. Germain also worries about - and is partly charged with remedying - the deterioration of the nation's ability to produce industrial products for defense. ''It is more than a little embarrassing to learn that Germany is the sole source for the 120-mm. gun on our M-1 tank,'' he says. He wants the Government to spend several billion dollars to revitalize aging industries and to train workers in needed skills such as machine tools, where the average age is now 58.
He boasts of several Congressional achievements, including the legislation setting up the now privatized National Consumer Cooperative Bank -''nobody will deny it was an almost one-man fight to get that one through'' - and the fact that his district contains more Federally subsidized housing for the elderly than any of the other 434 districts in the country.
''One of his great strengths,'' an aide says, ''is that he knows where the votes are'' and how to trade in them. Last year, for example, he let some Democrats with special problems stray from the party fold on the budget reconciliation bill but only after he knew their votes were not crucial.
His ''greatest legerdemain,'' he said, was on the 1978 bill restricting interlocks of bank directors and preferential loans to insiders by correspondents but he has not had much success on legislation that would restructure the banking industry or that would give regulators more authority to deal with failing institutions.
Above all, Mr. St. Germain (he himself does not use the period after the St. in his name) makes a point of not forgetting the people at home. He has on occasion campaigned in French, Woonsocket's second language; he has made only two overseas Congressional trips for fear of appearing to junket, and he makes it a point to push a shopping cart on his Thursday-afternoon-to-Monday-morning weekends in Rhode Island. ''That's the work,'' he observed of his hand-shaking supermarket expeditions, ''that gets you re-elected.''
Illustrations: photo of Rep. Fernand J. St. Germain | WASHINGTON F OR 20 years, Representative Fernand J. St. Germain worked steadily to cultivate his political garden but rarely, despite growing seniority, did he find himself a place in the sun. The people of Rhode Island's First Congressional District, of course, knew him as their man in Washington. He was the guy with the listed home telephone number who returned to Woonsocket each weekend and who liked nothing better than to drop in at the Ever-Ready Diner in Providence to eat franks and beans with his blue-collar constituents. They kept sending him back to Congress virtually without challenge. In recent years the lobbyists and bureaucrats involved in banking and housing issues came to know Fred St. Germain, too, as he became an important legislative figure and subcommittee chairman. But except for brief periods, such as when he led an effort to tighten banking practices in the wake of the Bert Lance affair, Mr. St. Germain remained largely unknown. | 8.927778 | 0.988889 | 63.944444 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/nyregion/4th-joins-connecticut-s-gop-governor-race.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524123209id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/nyregion/4th-joins-connecticut-s-gop-governor-race.html | 4TH JOINS CONNECTICUT'S G.O.P. GOVERNOR RACE | 20150524123209 | BLOOMFIELD, Conn., Jan. 9— Lewis B. Rome, a former leader of the State Senate, today joined a crowded field of candidates seeking the Republican nomination for Governor of Connecticut this year.
Mr. Rome announced his candidacy to 400 cheering supporters in the cafeteria of the middle school here in his hometown, north of Hartford. He vowed to bring ''leadership with heart'' to state government and said he would control state spending and improve services without major new taxes.
Mr. Rome became the fourth - and possibly the last - Republican candidate in a gubernatorial campaign that up to now has been confined largely to the Republican side.
William A. O'Neill, the East Hampton Democrat who became Governor just over a year ago with the resignation of Ella T. Grasso, is recuperating from open-heart surgery and has not yet said whether he will seek a full term.
In recent days, however, friends of Mr. O'Neill have begun saying that they expect the Governor to be a candidate and that he may soon set up a campaign committee to begin raising funds. A formal announcement is not expected until February o r March.
The Speaker of the State House of Representatives, Ernest N. Abate of Stamford, also is considering seeking the Democratic nomination but has not announced his candidacy.
In contrast, the Republican campaign has started early. Party leaders contend that the Democrats are vulnerable this year without Mrs. Grasso. However, no clear Republican front-runner has emerged, according to some party officials, and some of the Republican gubernatorial candidates have voiced concern that their race may be overshadowed by what is expected to be a lively fight over the party's nomination for the United States Senate.
Senator Lowell P. Weicker Jr. is expected to seek a third term as a Republican, but Prescott S. Bush Jr., the brother of Vice President Bush, is scheduled to announce his candidacy next Thursday.
Mr. Rome and Richard C. Bozzuto, who announced his candidacy last Thursday, are regarded as the best-known Republicans running for Governor. Both are former party leaders of the State Senate and both have run for statewide office before.
The 48-year-old Mr. Rome, a lawyer, sought the gubernatorial nomination in 1978 but was persuaded by party leaders to accept the nomination for Lieutenant Governor on the ticket headed by former United States Representative Ronald A. Sarasin. They lost by more than 190,000 votes to the Democratic ticket headed by Mrs. Grasso and Mr. O'Neill. Mr. Rome served in the State Senate from 1973 to 1978.
Mr. Bozzuto, a Waterbury insurance-agency owner, ran for the United States Senate in 1980, but lost the Republican primary to James L. Buckley, the former Senator from New York.
The two other Republican gubernatorial candidates are members of the State Senate. They are Russell L. Post Jr. of Canton, a lawyer, and Dr. Gerald Labriola of Naugatuck, a pediatrician. The current minority leader of the Senate, George L. Gunther, Republican of Stratford, has said he is available for the nomination but has not organized a campaign.
All the Republicans are regarded as fiscal conservatives, and a common theme has been a denunciation of tax increases being considered by the Democratic majorities in a continuing special session of the General Assembly. Both Mr. Ro me and Mr. Bozzuto, for example, have pledged that they would veto an y income tax, although none of the gubernatorial contenders in either party have advocated one.
Ralph E. Capecelatro, the Republican state chairman, has promised to remain neutral in the race. However, at a meeting with the Republican contenders last Tuesday, Mr. Bozzuto complained that the chairman was supporting Mr. Rome. Mr. Capecelatro insisted that the selection would be made by the delegates to the party's state convention in July, not by him. | Lewis B. Rome, a former leader of the State Senate, today joined a crowded field of candidates seeking the Republican nomination for Governor of Connecticut this year. Mr. Rome announced his candidacy to 400 cheering supporters in the cafeteria of the middle school here in his hometown, north of Hartford. He vowed to bring ''leadership with heart'' to state government and said he would control state spending and improve services without major new taxes. Mr. Rome became the fourth - and possibly the last - Republican candidate in a gubernatorial campaign that up to now has been confined largely to the Republican side. | 6.304348 | 0.982609 | 40.078261 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/nyregion/photography-mix-in-morris.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524123227id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/10/nyregion/photography-mix-in-morris.html | PHOTOGRAPHY 'MIX' IN MORRIS | 20150524123227 | MORRISTOWN GALLERY group shows in which several unknowns are combined with a few ''names'' are not uncommon and generally do little for either side. However, a judicious mix can work occasionally, especially when there are more knowns than unknowns, as is currently the case at the Woodman Gallery.
Here, two prominent photographers, Paul Caponigro and Eva Rubinstein, are accompanied by William Abranowicz, who, though his reputation is growing, is still very much the young photographer-inprogress. Different but not incompatible, the three make a harmonious and quite instructive blend in an exhibition that continues through Wednesday.
Mr. Caponigro is, of course, the old master of the group - not simply by reason of his age (he turns 50 this year) and international fame, but because he is manifestly the most at ease with his instrument and muse.
Some 20 years ago, he was the photographer, to quote John Szarkowski, ''most likely to become an authentic and original successor to Minor White.'' Now, he is an authentic and original presence in his own right.
Most of the prints date from the 1960's and none is later than 1972, but the selection conveys Mr. Caponigro's development well enough. His pictures are less abstruse than those of White's, who, while he drew upon nature, made inner rather than outer landscapes - probably the closest photography can come to Abstract Expressionism and still remain photography.
On the other hand, the 1962 study of a fungus is certainly ambiguous (or abstract) enough, being a pale, flanged shape surmounted by circular forms that could equally be a knothole in a tree or a portent in a black sky.
But if this is standard photographer's Surrealism, the relatively straightforward study of a seeding sunflower, drawn in light on a black background, is no less mysterious. Likewise the rock that suggests an exercise in Analytical Cubism and the shattered ice that evokes the drawings of Lyonel Feininger, as well as the photographs of that painter's son, Andreas.
By comparison, Mr. Caponigro's later work certainly seems objective. But it may be just that his romantic introspection is now expressed through the choice of subject - for example, that mysterious herd of white deer in Ireland - rather than in its handling.
Were there to be a show of art inspired by Stonehenge, the photographer would have to take his place in a line that includes Turner and quite a few other notables. Nevertheless, he is undoubtedly a contemporary metaphor for this weird structure, of which there are three pictures here.
There is also the famous shot of a boulder in the nearby Avebury Circle that is accompanied by a tree in the process of being throttled by a parisitical vine.
Outside of sheer luck, the prerequisites for great pictures are not easily identified. It appears likely, though, that the ability to know when to photograph and when to abstain is crucial and that Mr. Caponigro has developed it.
In fact, he once intimated as much, saying that, ''Of all my photographs, the ones that have most meaning for me are those...for which I did not draw on my abilities to fabricate a picture...You might say I was taken in.''
Eva Rubin stein, who appeared on the New Yor k scene during the '70's, shows mostly interiors taken in this c ountry and Europe. Like Lilo Raymond, Miss Rubinstein is fond of ligh t diffused through curtains and arrangements of furniture that a re serene and spare.
Beneath the surface of these beautiful prints, however, is quite a startling range of mood. There's puckishness in both the rear view of Arthur Rubinstein, the photographer's father, as he sits playing an upright piano in absurdly domestic surroundings, as well as in the shot of a Midwestern parlor. Here, the floral designs on curtains and carpet compete avidly with flowers in a vase.
Miss Rubinstein can be very sentimental, as in ''Young Woman's Grave,'' a monument seen through a window misted with condensation. Yet, when the occasion presents itself, she is capable of grandeur. Her finest print is of the junction of two empty rooms and a passage in a presumably Italian house; it is as fascinating for its geometry as for its gamut of grays.
That William Abranowicz more than holds his own in this company is largely due to his prowess as a printmaker, which he acquired as an assistant to George Tice. His shot of a New Jersey house at night is nothing short of superb, nor is there a flaw in the study, also nocturnal, of a bridal shop whose two lighted windows are echoed by two more windows in a house behind.
All the same, there are pictures like that of Manhattan apartment houses that indicate that the photographer is choosing subjects less to make a point than to show off his virtuousity.
This is an occupational hazard and one, no doubt, that Mr. Abranowicz is aware of, for he seems to be trying for something else in the picture of two cemetery monuments poking up into a cirrusfilled sky.
A warmer sensibility than his master, Mr. Abranowicz may need to take a few more chances in order to find an outlet for that warmth and, perhaps, to discover what in life really ''pricks'' him - to use the late Roland Barthes's term. | MORRISTOWN GALLERY group shows in which several unknowns are combined with a few ''names'' are not uncommon and generally do little for either side. However, a judicious mix can work occasionally, especially when there are more knowns than unknowns, as is currently the case at the Woodman Gallery. Here, two prominent photographers, Paul Caponigro and Eva Rubinstein, are accompanied by William Abranowicz, who, though his reputation is growing, is still very much the young photographer-inprogress. Different but not incompatible, the three make a harmonious and quite instructive blend in an exhibition that continues through Wednesday. | 9.034783 | 0.991304 | 56.521739 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/20/sports/george-vecseysports-of-the-times-bugner-loves-his-manager.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524124741id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/20/sports/george-vecseysports-of-the-times-bugner-loves-his-manager.html | GEORGE VECSEYSports of The Times Bugner Loves His Manager | 20150524124741 | JOE BUGNER's manager never goes to the gymnasium to watch him train. Joe Bugner's manager has seen only one boxing match, lifetime. But every evening when Joe Bugner trudges back from a hard day in the ring, his manager is waiting in the hotel room.
''It can get bloody boring when you're sitting around a hotel room by yourself,'' Bugner says. ''It's much better to be with somebody you love.''
Joe Bugner loves his manager, Marlene Carter Bugner, a journalist and his wife of five years. When they met, the only fighting she had seen had been in Vietnam and Israel - in wars, not boxing matches.
Marlene Bugner is now handling the business details of her husband's latest comeback, at the age of 31. Like any good manager, like any good spouse, she was infuriated yesterday when Gerry Cooney canceled the four-round exhibition he was supposed to have fought with her husband Friday night.
''I have never in my life seen such a pampered fighter with so little ability who gets so many injuries for no reason,'' she en unciated in a crisp Australian accent.
She was upset because Bugner had counted on the exhibition as part of his tuneup for a real fight with Michael Dokes in Las Vegas, Nev., March 15, the same night Cooney will allegedly meet Larry Holmes. She has engineered both those contracts, and she insists that the $10,000-plus expenses contract with Cooney is valid despite his sudden withdrawal.
''Those are the only contracts I get,'' she says. ''I never understand managers who blame the promoters f or bad contracts. How can a promoter rob you if you know what you w ant? We are always well taken care of.''
It wasn't always that way, according to Joe Bugner, who says he was encouraged by a past manager to fight Ron Lyle in 1977 despite having a broken bone in his foot. Bugner, who once fought Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali, says he lost interest in boxing until he found a manager he could love.
In the grand tradition of boxing managers, Marlene Bugner says Joe is ''very intelligent, in A-1 condition, 100 times the fighter he used to be.''
She adds: ''I'm making sure he takes the right vitamins and salt tablets because he never knew anything about diet until we met. He looks at pictures of himself at 19 and says he wished he knew then what he knows now.''
A few boxers occasionally listen to their wives about diet or business strategy, but Marty Monroe is the only other contemporary heavyweight who considers his wife to be his manager. Marlene Bugner wonders why it isn't done more often.
''Might as well keep the money in the family,'' she says. She contends that she has already introduced a revolutionary concept to Bugner's boxing career - a contract. When she worked out a written agreement for his fight with Gilberto Acuna in 1980, her husband asked: ''What's that? I never had one of those with my other managers.''
Following Joe's introduction to a contract, Marlene had her own new experience: watching her husband knock out Acuna in six rounds. ''I wasn't worried about Joe in the ring,'' she says. ''When he watches me play polo, he knows I know what I'm doing. He told me what round he thought he would knock Acuna out, and he did it.''
That knockout, in October 1980, was not totally characteristic of Bugner, handsome, blond Hungarian emigre who usually fought defensively, as if protecting his classic profile. After the disputed loss to Lyle, Bugner retired, to spend more time with his new wife.
Joe and Marlene Bugner had pooled their five children from previous marriages: three of hers, two of his. They have two homes in California and one in Rome, and money was apparently not a problem, but, he says, ''I needed an outlet.'' His good looks and boxer's poise gained him roles in five British films, the most memorable of which is ''Buddy Goes West,'' a kind of a Yorkshire-pudding western. He played a sheriff who tried to steal a gold mine. Even when making movies, he would slip away to the gym to train.
''I could see he wanted to fight,'' Marlene Bugner recalls. ''We went to California and signed with Harold Smith, who was one of the kindest, nicest people I ever met. He paid us every penny we had coming.''
The problem was that Smith, whose real name was Ross Fields, may not have been spending his own money. When Smith ran into legal problems that may keep him out of boxing well into the 21st century, the Bugners waited for their contract to run out, and began planning a major comeback last fall.
After passing a literal audition in a Las Vegas gym - in which television agents inspected his workout -Bugner was signed to fight Cooney last December. He felt good in training but suspected he was too good for his own good when he saw some strangers inspecting his workout.
''I said, 'Marlene, you watch, there's not going to be a fight,' '' Bugner says. ''Sure enough, Cooney said he injured his back, and the fight was off, but I noticed he went out discoing and boogying the same night.''
In some circles, those are fighting words. Even before Cooney's withdrawal yesterday, Bugner was openly claiming that Cooney had ducked him last month in order to protect his health for the lucrative March date with Holmes. Nothing that happened yesterday changed the minds of Joe and Marlene Bugner.
Bugner was furious because he had spent the last week doing roadwork on Manhattan's icy streets when he could have been running in California. Between training sessions, he has been sharing a Manhattan hotel room with his manager.
In the old days, managers used to enforce a number of rules involving their fighters, including the tradition that boxers should be celibate in the weeks before the fight. Asked what his manager says about sex before a fight, Bu gner used to quip: ''Oh, she insistson it.'' This week Bugner reported a new development: ''My manager has bought a 10-pound metal chastity belt and made me wear it. Only she knows the combination.''
The boxer says he is delighted that his wife has become his manager because ''We're all human beings, let's face it, and being stuck in a hotel room, you either go out to dinner and get drunk or you get into mischief. There's no chance of that now.''
The manager says: ''I have no problem divorcing being a wife and being a manager. While he's in training, we g et a room with twin beds. It gives me more time for my writing. I 've written two Harlequin novels under an assumed name. I'm w orking on a third one this week.'' | JOE BUGNER's manager never goes to the gymnasium to watch him train. Joe Bugner's manager has seen only one boxing match, lifetime. But every evening when Joe Bugner trudges back from a hard day in the ring, his manager is waiting in the hotel room. ''It can get bloody boring when you're sitting around a hotel room by yourself,'' Bugner says. ''It's much better to be with somebody you love.'' | 15.707865 | 0.988764 | 44.94382 | medium | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/22/opinion/in-the-nation-reagan-s-great-hinge.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524125056id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/22/opinion/in-the-nation-reagan-s-great-hinge.html | IN THE NATION - REAGAN'S 'GREAT HINGE' - NYTimes.com | 20150524125056 | WASHINGTON, Jan. 21— No wonder President Reagan is reported to have left beer off his list of possible excise tax increases. That's the ''working man's drink'' - and Ronald Reagan, though a conservative Republican, is heavily dependent on support from the ''sons of toil.''
The single most important switch in voting strength in the 1980 elections, in fact, was the shift of blue-collar voters away from the Democrats to Mr. Reagan. This is a constituency the Republican Party, since the New Deal, rarely has attracted; and when it has, theparty has nev er been able to hold it for long - particularly if the economy turne d down.
Mr. Reagan scored among workers for several reasons. Times were hard in 1980, and few approved Jimmy Carter's economic management. Mr. Reagan not only promised to put people back to work and bring down inflation; he also talked about getting tough with the Russians and making the United States No. 1 in the world again. Patriotic workers liked the sound of that, after what they saw as Mr. Carter's weakness and indecision.
Candidate Reagan also was perceived as being unwilling to tax working men to benefit the poor. And he had t he knack of making his promises and stating his goals in homely and understandable - critics said simplistic -terms with which man y ordinary Americans easily identified.
So blue-collar workers and their wives deserted Mr. Carter and the Democrats in droves, and in no small part accounted for the Reagan electoral vote landslide. If he can keep them in the Republican column, the shape of American politics would be profoundly changed; a real Reagan ''revolution'' might be achieved.
But there's the rub. No segment of the population is more vulnerable to economic slump and high unemployment - the reverse of what candidate Reagan seemed to offer - than the blue-collar worker. And for whatever reason, unemployment has surged from 7 percent in July to 8.9 percent in December, with the end not yet in sight. Over 100,000 more workers are jobless now than when Mr. Reagan entered office.
That's why Reagan political strategists were gloomy over the 1981 economic figures, showing gross national product in decline at an annual rate of 5.2 percent in the last quarter, and rising only 1.9 percent for the whole year - well below the President's forecast. The steep fourth-quarter decline calls sharply into question the Administration's predictions that the recession will soon ease, growth will resume in the second quarter of 1982, and unemployment will consequently begin to come down. These strategists are well aware that as inflation began to decline last year, it dropped also as an issue of concern to voters - particularly working-class voters, who were simultaneously feeling the rise in unemployment. Since September, poll soundings have shown unemployment to be the more pressing issue.
Recalling that some historians have labeled Gettysburg ''the great hinge'' of the Civil War, one Reagan political analyst now calls the 1982 unemployment rate ''the great hinge'' of this year's elections - and perhaps even of the Reagan Administration and its hopes to make Republican conservatism the dominant political force in the nation.
If the unemployment rate reaches 10 percent - a figure with much symbolic impact, since it would be the highest since the Depression of the 30's - blue-collar voters might shift back to the Democrats as rapidly as they left them in 1980. And many economists believe the 10 percent rate may be reached in coming months.
If unemployment should stay at or near 10 percent for several months, in this view, the loss of working class support for Mr. Reagan could be permanent, vitally affecting the 1984 Presidential campaign.
On the other hand, if the Administration's forecast of a spring upturn proves accurate, and if by fall unemployment can be seen to be falling into the 8 percent range, both short- and long-term political damage to Mr. Reagan could be held to a minimum. The trend - upward or down - is regarded as politically more important than the level of unemployment.
This view was bolstered by the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll, which reported that 60 percent of the respondents believed Mr. Reagan's economic program had not yet had a chance to work, and that it would eventually benefit the nation. But 62 percent of those polled said that they were not now better off than they were a year ago.
Based on historical averages, Republicans could expect to lose 36 House seats in this off-year election. But based on 1980's apparent conservative tide, and Mr. Reagan's early successes, the party once hoped to win control of the House next November.
Now Republican strategists would be relieved to suffer the loss of perhaps 10 to 18 seats - up to half the historical average. If ''the great hinge'' swings against them, they know it could be a lot worse. | No wonder President Reagan is reported to have left beer off his list of possible excise tax increases. That's the ''working man's drink'' - and Ronald Reagan, though a conservative Republican, is heavily dependent on support from the ''sons of toil.'' The single most important switch in voting strength in the 1980 elections, in fact, was the shift of blue-collar voters away from the Democrats to Mr. Reagan. This is a constituency the Republican Party, since the New Deal, rarely has attracted; and when it has, theparty has nev er been able to hold it for long - particularly if the economy turne d down. | 7.445313 | 0.992188 | 64.726563 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/23/theater/going-out-guide.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150524125219id_/http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/23/theater/going-out-guide.html | Going Out Guide - NYTimes.com | 20150524125219 | There is a quick trip through the looking glass from the grimy setting of today into the gracious upper-class New York past that is on tap every Sunday from 1 to 4 P.M. The place is the Old Merchants House, 29 East Fourth Street, west of the Bowery. The house was built in 1832 and is furnished as it was when the family occupied it, the only house of the 19th century that survives in Manhattan with its original furniture and family trimmings.
The house is much prized by landmark enthusiasts although it is quite unknown by the public. It is a Greek Revival house that was home for the Seabury Tredwell family, which lived in it for almost a century until a daughter, Gertrude, died there at the age of 93 in 1933. The house was maintained as a museum by a relative.
There is a dearth of funds, so it is tenderly looked after by such volunteers as Joseph Roberto, a retired architect who grew up in the neighborhood, and can tell you about the cast-iron stove, gas chandeliers, three upstairs bedrooms and silver-plated hardware that make the visit a reminder of Sunday afternoon's calling of a century ago. Your visit may be topped off with a taste of hot cider against the weather.
The house is also open for groups of at least 20 persons by appointment on weekdays. Sunday admission is $2, $1 for over-65's and $1 for students. Under-12's with an adult can enter with no charge. Call 777-1089. FUN CITY
Nobody looks at New York in the same way that Red Grooms does. On second thought, they do too, at least those who are finding their way to his ''Ruckus Manhattan,'' which they call an art installation but is more of a gigantic cartoon that envelops you in passage through Lower Manhattan. The work is in the long, high narrow space on the ground floor of Burlington House, 1345 Avenue of the Americas, at West 54th Street, where the colorful ''Mill'' used to show us how textiles were made.
You enter ''Ruckus Manhattan'' walking through a 32-foot 16-foothigh Checker taxicab whose huge driver turns his head to give you New York commentary as you pass through. A minute later and you are on a subway car, and it is jolting, tilting and bouncing with familiar in-motion symptoms. Your fellow passengers are outsized but recognizable caricatures of folk you have rubbed elbows with on past journeys. Later, Washington arches over Federal Hall's steps and a table is laid out in Chinatown. The Woolworth Building is perceived as never before, and the Dubuffet at the Chase Manhattan Bank makes as much sense to the uninitiated when done by Grooms as when done by Dubuffet
The show, sponsored by Creative Time Inc., a nonprofit group that helps art go into public spaces, may be seen through March from noon to 6 P.M. Wednesdays through Sundays. Admission is $2, $1 for under-12's, over-65's and students. Call 571-2206. AT THE PIANO
As a producer of musical virtuosos, Israel, a small country, has not been doing badly, putting in front of audiences such as Itzhak Perlman and Daniel Barenboim. Joseph Kalichstein, who was born in Tel Aviv 35 years ago, is another virtuoso.
Today at 8 P.M. and tomorrow at 3, Mr. Kalichstein, no stranger to our town, where he came to study at Juilliard at age 16, will perform with the Y Chamber Symphony, conducted by Gerard Schwartz, at the 92d Street Y, 1395 Lexington Avenue.
Mr. Kalichstein's forte is piano and his work at the keyboard not only has drawn critical approbation but also won him a Young Concert Artis ts' Audi tion (followed by an invitation from Leonard Ber nstein to appear on television with the New York Philharmonic) an d the firstprize in the 1969 Leventritt International Piano Competiti on. He has since performed with a plethora of major orchestras, condu ctors and acclaimed instrumentalists.
In this program he will perform Piston's Sinfonietta, Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 25, and Dvorak's Czech Suite, Op. 39. Admission: $8, $10. Box office: 427-4410 (today, after 6 P.M.). ON STAGE
Fourteen years ago, the Hunter Playwrights Theater was established at Hunter College by Edwin Wilson, head of its department of theater and film and also drama critic of The Wall Street Journal. The theater was designed to put some stage flesh, in the way of staged readings, on the scripts done by students. As the program has developed, it does three of these a year, two of works by undergraduates and one by graduate students.
The play to be read by a cast of 10 at 8 o'clock tonight and tomorrow is by Steven Fechter, who just received a master's, and it is called ''Schiele.'' The two-act multimedia drama - it uses slides - is about Egon Schiele, a fin de siecle Austrian artist whose life was bedeviled by authority because his work was often sexually explicit.
It is directed by Jo Ellen Sheffield and will be seen in the Little Theater, East 68th Street between Park and Lexington Avenues. Admission is free.
For Entertainment Events, see page 14. For Sports Today, see page 18. Richard F. Shepard
Illustrations: photo of Red Grooms at Burlington House | HOUSE GUESTS There is a quick trip through the looking glass from the grimy setting of today into the gracious upper-class New York past that is on tap every Sunday from 1 to 4 P.M. The place is the Old Merchants House, 29 East Fourth Street, west of the Bowery. The house was built in 1832 and is furnished as it was when the family occupied it, the only house of the 19th century that survives in Manhattan with its original furniture and family trimmings. The house is much prized by landmark enthusiasts although it is quite unknown by the public. It is a Greek Revival house that was home for the Seabury Tredwell family, which lived in it for almost a century until a daughter, Gertrude, died there at the age of 93 in 1933. The house was maintained as a museum by a relative. | 6.52795 | 0.981366 | 78.198758 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/01/28/main-denver-airport-bans-sale-marijuana-themed-souvenirs/uIC4A5Q8G8TjQnIhEmHYcN/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150529215946id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/01/28/main-denver-airport-bans-sale-marijuana-themed-souvenirs/uIC4A5Q8G8TjQnIhEmHYcN/story.html | Denver airport bans sale of marijuana-themed souvenirs | 20150529215946 | DENVER — Tourists who fly to Colorado to try legal pot can forget about buying souvenir boxer shorts, socks or sandals with a marijuana leaf on them when passing through the Denver airport.
The airport has banned pot-themed souvenirs, fearing the kitsch could taint the state’s image.
Marijuana possession and any pot-related advertising were already forbidden. Airport executives extended the ban this month after a retailer sought a free-standing kiosk to sell the boxer shorts and similar items that played off Colorado’s place as the first state to allow recreational marijuana sales.
Airport officials feared the souvenirs would send the wrong message.
‘‘We don’t want marijuana to be the first thing our visitors experience when they arrive,’’ airport spokesman Heath Montgomery said.
The spurned retailer is mulling a lawsuit, noting that the souvenirs are legal and that the airport already has a large exhibit celebrating craft brewers, whose product, like marijuana, is legal only for people 21 and older.
‘‘Why is everybody so riled up about the picture of a plant?’’ asked Ann Jordan, owner of High-ly Legal Colorado, which makes the shorts, socks and ‘‘pot flop’’ sandals that are already sold in Denver-area music stores.
But it’s unlikely that Jordan would have a strong claim. Airports have broad discretion to control concession operators, and they can limit free-speech activities, such as handing out brochures.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1992 that airport terminals are not public forums, siding with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey against a religious group that wanted to distribute pamphlets.
The legalization measure approved by Colorado voters in 2012 allows any property owner to prohibit possession of pot, and airports in Denver and Colorado Springs do. Violators face possible civil citations.
Denver International Airport has given no possession citations since legalization, Montgomery said.
Last year, 29 people were caught trying to board planes with marijuana. In each case, police declined to issue citations, and the passengers were allowed to board planes after throwing out the weed.
In Washington state, the only other state with recreational marijuana sales, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport does not ban pot possession or marijuana-themed souvenirs, Sea-Tac spokesman Perry Cooper said.
Colorado’s smaller airports don’t ban marijuana-themed souvenirs, either.
Montgomery said the Denver airport has a special obligation as the gateway for many thousands of visitors to the Rocky Mountain region.
‘‘Frankly there’s a lot more to Colorado than pot,’’ Montgomery said.
Jordan considers the souvenir ban an example of long-standing fear surrounding marijuana.
The airport’s beer exhibit consists of an entire walkway devoted to an exhibit titled ‘‘Colorado on Tap: The State of Brew Culture.’’ It features pub glasses, beer labels, and T-shirts from the state’s 250 or so craft brewers. Governor John Hickenlooper is quoted in the display extolling Colorado as ‘‘a mecca for quality beer.’’
‘‘If you’re opposed to drinking and you walk down [the walkway], you just ignore it,’’ Jordan said.
Airport officials, she said, ‘‘just haven’t come to grips that this is a whole new world and they need to adapt.’’
The airport policy bans depictions of the marijuana plant, items with the word ‘‘marijuana’’ and the sale of publications devoted expressly to pot. But airport officials concede they can’t keep out the ubiquitous ‘‘Rocky Mountain High’’ puns and other slogans.
Said Montgomery: ‘‘There’s only so much we can do.’’ | Tourists who fly to Colorado to try legal pot can forget about buying souvenir boxer shorts, socks or sandals with a marijuana leaf on them at the Denver airport. | 22.935484 | 0.967742 | 22.322581 | medium | high | extractive |
http://fortune.com/2015/06/01/google-cars-grandma/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150601163046id_/http://fortune.com/2015/06/01/google-cars-grandma/ | Google Cars 'Drive Like Your Grandma' | 20150601163046 | Slow and steady may win the race when it comes to autonomous vehicles.
A self-declared Mountain View, Calif.-based motorcyclist recently shared what it’s like to drive alongside Google’s self-driving cars with Emerging Technologies Blog. The anonymous reviewer, who claims to see about a half dozen Lexus-variety Google cars every day (and also claims not to work for Google GOOG , or any other company working on a self-driving car), relates mostly positive experiences.
But that praise is tempered with a few critical observations. Foremost, the reviewer compares the cars’ behavior to that of an elderly person.
“Google cars drive like your grandma,” the purported motorcyclist writes, “they’re never the first off the line at a stop light, they don’t accelerate quickly, they don’t speed, and they never take any chances with lane changes (cut people off, etc.).”
At certain intersections with limited visibility, the cars move slowly and take many pauses, the reviewer writes. “It appeared very safe,” the person continues, describing one such experience, “but if I had been behind it I probably would have been annoyed at how long it took to actually commit to pull out and turn.”
The “overly cautious” and “very polite” cars—also described as an occasional “annoyance”—nevertheless seem to have won over the motorcyclist, despite that person being a self-proclaimed “car-nut” who “love[s] to drive.”
“I actually do feel safer around a self-driving car than most other California drivers,” writes the reviewer, who admits not knowing for certain how to tell whether a computer or human operator is in control.
But for this driver, that doesn’t seem to matter. “I give SD cars 5 stars,” the reviewer writes, abbreviating self-driving. “Would buy.”
Read more of Fortune’s coverage of self-driving cars here. | But that's probably a good thing | 55.428571 | 0.571429 | 0.857143 | high | low | abstractive |
http://fortune.com/2015/06/02/instagram-ads/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150602200117id_/http://fortune.com/2015/06/02/instagram-ads/ | Instagram Opens Advertising Platform to All Brands | 20150602200117 | Instagram’s ad service is now as big a free-for-all as Facebook’s has been for years.
On Tuesday, the photo-sharing network Facebook acquired in 2012 announced it’s expanding its advertising service to all marketers, not just the carefully chosen few it’s been working with since first rolling out ads in November 2013. Instagram is also testing an ad format that lets viewers click on a link to purchase a product or install an app.
Following its launch in 2009, Instagram became popular primarily with teens and young adults as it made it easy to post artistic-looking photos by applying one of the app’s photo filters.
Though Instagram and Facebook held off on opening the advertising floodgates to the photo-sharing network, the move was inevitable. Sooner or later, all the major social networks are flipping the monetization switch to allow brands to pay for their users’ eyeballs and potential dollars. Earlier on Tuesday, digital pinboard Pinterest unveiled a “Buy” button to bolster its monetization efforts after first rolling out ads last year.
The purchasing features on Instagram’s new ad format is likely a welcome tool for many brands who have struggled in the past to convert their followers on the platform into buyers. Previously, brands had to paste shopping links in photos’ description area, which isn’t always as obvious of a call to action.
While Instagram’s ads so far haven’t caused any major complaints, this could soon change. The network has carefully worked with prestigious brands to release only high-quality ads amidst its users’s streams of artistic photos, but that might soon shift as all calibers of brands start to push out ads. | Now anybody can advertise on the platform | 45.857143 | 0.571429 | 1.428571 | high | low | abstractive |
http://www.sfgate.com/72hour-sale-event/article/Woman-responds-to-anti-gay-measure-with-6304934.php | http://web.archive.org/web/20150604033550id_/http://www.sfgate.com/72hour-sale-event/article/Woman-responds-to-anti-gay-measure-with-6304934.php | Act mocking antigay measure cleared for signature drive | 20150604033550 | Photo: Sarah Rice, Special To The Chronicle
The proposed "Intolerant Jackass Act" was given a formal title by Attorney General Kamala Harris’ office — “Sexual Orientation Prejudice. Initiative Statute” — and an official summary that made no reference to jackasses.
The proposed "Intolerant Jackass Act" was given a formal title by...
Act mocking antigay measure cleared for signature drive
An initiative by a Southern California attorney that would require the state to execute all gays and lesbians is apparently headed for oblivion. But a countermeasure that would label the author of any such initiative an “intolerant jackass” and require him to take sensitivity training and contribute $5,000 to a gay rights organization has been cleared by the state for circulation.
Charlotte Laws — a Los Angeles-area writer, television commentator and local politician — said when she proposed her “Intolerant Jackass Act” in March that she was just trying to ridicule the “shoot the gays” author and didn’t intend to circulate her own ballot measure.
But on Wednesday, Laws’ initiative was given a formal title by Attorney General Kamala Harris’ office — “Sexual Orientation Prejudice. Initiative Statute” — and an official summary that made no reference to jackasses. The measure was then cleared by Secretary of State Alex Padilla for signature-gathering, with 365,880 signatures required within 180 days to make the November 2016 ballot.
Laws said Wednesday that she still doesn’t plan a signature-gathering campaign, but has heard from others who may circulate the measure on their own. She said her measure was intended “to support gay rights and show the world that California is an open-minded state, and ... to mock Matt McLaughlin, and I think it worked.”
Meanwhile, the initiative she was responding to may soon disappear.
McLaughlin, a lawyer from Huntington Beach in Orange County, filed his proposed “Sodomite Suppression Act” in February. Warning of “God’s just wrath” for “tolerating wickedness in our midst,” it would require that anyone who touches a person of the same gender for sexual gratification be put to death “by bullets to the head or any other convenient method,” and would authorize private citizens to step in as executioners if the state failed to act within a year.
The measure would also make it a crime, punishable by 10 years in prison and permanent expulsion from the state, to advocate gay rights to an audience that includes minors.
California law requires the attorney general to issue a title and summary to any initiative sponsor who pays the required $200 filing fee. But Harris has filed suit in Sacramento seeking to keep McLaughlin’s initiative out of circulation. She argues that the state shouldn’t give an apparent seal of approval to a clearly unconstitutional measure that would encourage discrimination and violence.
McLaughlin sent Harris a letter in April saying he wouldn’t take part in her court proceedings and might instead take legal action to try to place his measure on the ballot without signature-gathering. With no opposition to her lawsuit, Harris has asked a judge to find McLaughlin in default and relieve her of any duty to certify his initiative.
Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @egelko
Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @egelko | [...] a countermeasure that would label the author of any such initiative an “intolerant jackass” and require him to take sensitivity training and contribute $5,000 to a gay rights organization has been cleared by the state for circulation. Charlotte Laws — a Los Angeles-area writer, television commentator and local politician — said when she proposed her “Intolerant Jackass Act” in March that she was just trying to ridicule the “shoot the gays” author and didn’t intend to circulate her own ballot measure. Warning of “God’s just wrath” for “tolerating wickedness in our midst,” it would require that anyone who touches a person of the same gender for sexual gratification be put to death “by bullets to the head or any other convenient method,” and would authorize private citizens to step in as executioners if the state failed to act within a year. The measure would also make it a crime, punishable by 10 years in prison and permanent expulsion from the state, to advocate gay rights to an audience that includes minors. McLaughlin sent Harris a letter in April saying he wouldn’t take part in her court proceedings and might instead take legal action to try to place his measure on the ballot without signature-gathering. | 2.66805 | 0.975104 | 49.165975 | low | high | extractive |
http://fortune.com/2015/06/03/taco-bell-alcohol-first-time/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150604115432id_/http://fortune.com/2015/06/03/taco-bell-alcohol-first-time/ | Taco Bell Alcohol: The Fast Food Chain Will Serve Beer and Wine at a New Chicago Location | 20150604115432 | A new Taco Bell location in the Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago will serve customers beer, wine, and mixed drinks, according to reports.
The restaurant is part of Taco Bell’s rebranding effort, introducing upscale locations similar to the chain’s outposts in the U.K., Seoul and Tokyo, which feature more open kitchens and fancy serving baskets. The location will have an “urban” aesthetic, with exposed brick walls and murals.
Boozy drinks will be served only to customers eating inside, and they will come in special cups to distinguish them from regular soft drinks.
This isn’t the first time in recent months that Taco Bell, owned by Yum Brands YUM has made moves to change its image: The company has also vowed to eliminate artificial flavors and coloring from about 95% of its U.S. menu.
For more about Taco Bell, watch this Fortune video: | A new Taco Bell in the Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago will serve customers beer, wine, and mixed drinks | 8.047619 | 1 | 14.52381 | low | high | extractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/music/2015/06/02/yankovic-weird-smart-satire-wilbur-theatre-makes-for-musical-thrill/6B6wRW1IM3h9eJhPSWfTbO/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150607200620id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/arts/music/2015/06/02/yankovic-weird-smart-satire-wilbur-theatre-makes-for-musical-thrill/6B6wRW1IM3h9eJhPSWfTbO/story.html? | 'Weird Al' Yankovic’s smart satire at Wilbur Theatre makes for musical thrill | 20150607200620 | The man knows how to make an entrance — and an exit, too, for that matter. When the house lights went down at the Wilbur Theatre on Tuesday, the band vamped while the video screen captured “Weird Al” Yankovic making his way to the stage. He snaked through the downstairs lounge area before finally emerging with a cameraman trailing him.
A comedic genius, Yankovic is the kind of artist who tends to get lodged into certain pockets of our brains. Maybe you fell in love with “Eat It” (his sendup of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It”) in 1984 or “Amish Paradise” (a reboot of Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise”) more than a decade later and then promptly lost track of Yankovic’s work. He never goes away for long and even scored a No. 1 album last year with “Mandatory Fun.”
I readily admit that I walked into Tuesday night’s show, for the first of two sets, prepared to laugh and wax nostalgic about song parodies I sang into a hair brush in my teens. I didn’t expect, however, to come away with a new appreciation for Yankovic’s whip-smart satire, chameleonic showmanship, and stealth musical prowess.
I’ll go further: It was probably the most fun I’ve had at a concert this year. (There’s another show at the Wilbur on Wednesday night, and trust me, you should go.)
The sight gags were loud and loony, from his dozen costume changes to video clips that traced Yankovic’s legacy, usually as a punch line to jokes made at his expense in movies and late-night TV monologues. “Dare to be stupid,” he sang early on, not as a cheap gimmick but as a defiant mantra. For “Fat,” Yankovic re-created its famous video, a remake of Jackson’s “Bad,” and emerged in a fat suit (with his face filled out, too).
Another reality about Yankovic’s so-called stupidity? It’s almost always relevant and clever. Lorde’s “Royals” became “Foil,” an anthem to the aluminum material’s many uses, and “Word Crimes,” set to the Marvin Gaye beat of Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines,” lampooned the grammatically challenged.
Yankovic not only skewered songs and artists, but also a common trick bands deploy to make concerts feel more intimate: the acoustic set. Yankovic and his terrific four-piece band scaled back for stark renditions, including “Eat It,” which was recast to the slack groove of “Layla.”
An encore of songs saluting “Star Wars” wrapped up the spectacle right at an hour and 50 minutes. A line had already formed outside for the second set, with fans blissfully unaware of how much fun — and sophistication — awaited them.
At: Wilbur Theatre, Tuesday night (repeats Wednesday)
More photos from the show: | “Weird Al” Yankovic is the kind of artist who tends to get lodged into certain pockets of our brains. | 26.136364 | 1 | 14.272727 | medium | high | extractive |
http://www.people.com/article/brian-williams-suspension-nbc-firing-unlikely-new-assignment | http://web.archive.org/web/20150612022307id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/brian-williams-suspension-nbc-firing-unlikely-new-assignment | Not Likely to Be Fired, Sources Say : People.com | 20150612022307 | 06/08/2015 AT 12:35 AM EDT
' NBC suspension nears its end and rumors swirl about his fate, network sources tell PEOPLE that he is not likely to be fired – but that doesn't mean he'll reclaim his position at the
A source close to the decision-making process says no decision has been made yet – options are being looked at – which could mean Williams might return to a different job altogether when his suspension lifts in August.
uncovered that Williams' retelling of his time spent covering the Iraq War in 2003 was untrue.
that his NBC News team helicopter was shot down by a rocket-propelled grenade. (The journalist also
However, the flight engineer on the helicopter that was carrying Williams
that the aircraft "never came under direct enemy fire" and that they were traveling 30 minutes behind the helicopter that
Williams apologized in an on-air statement on Feb. 4: "On this broadcast last week, in an effort to honor and thank a veteran who protected me and so many others following a ground-fire incident in the desert during the Iraq War, I made a mistake in recalling the events of 12 years ago," he said. "It didn't take long to hear from some brave men and women in the air crews who were also in the desert."
on Feb. 7. "In the midst of a career spent covering and consuming news, it has become painfully apparent to me that I am presently too much a part of the news," he wrote in a statement.
was announced by NBC a few days after that.
The network declined to comment. | Network sources tell PEOPLE that while a firing is unlikely, a different job may be in order for Williams | 15.85 | 0.7 | 2 | medium | low | mixed |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/06/09/nine-things-you-may-have-missed-tuesday-from-world-business/VIuPdssQBKpk1NUHtYgUlN/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150613021956id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/business/2015/06/09/nine-things-you-may-have-missed-tuesday-from-world-business/VIuPdssQBKpk1NUHtYgUlN/story.html? | Nine things you may have missed Tuesday from the world of business | 20150613021956 | TIVERTON, R.I. — The Rhode Island Department of Revenue has approved 28 new table games at Twin River Casino. Company chairman John Taylor said Tuesday that the games will be added by the fall, creating about 120 jobs. Currently, Twin River has 80 table games. Taylor said 274 slot machines will be removed to accommodate the new games, but more than 4,000 slot machines will remain. Twin River Worldwide Holdings, which operates the gambling center in Lincoln, is seeking to buy Newport Grand and move to Tiverton, closer to the Massachusetts state line. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
A statement announcing a dividend increase appeared on Target Corp.’s website Tuesday afternoon but soon disappeared, befuddling investors, who had sent the stock up on the news. The statement, which also said the company would boost its stock-buyback plan, was posted at about 3:11 p.m. New York time; less than 25 minutes later it was gone. Target, which did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Bloomberg News, told CNBC that it did not issue a press release about a dividend increase. By the time the market closed, Target’s stock was little changed at $78.90. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
The state Department of Transportation’s board has appointed three new members to the MBTA Retirement Fund’s board of trustees, including former state treasurer Steven Grossman. It’s the biggest change on the insular $1.6 billion T pension board in years and gives the Baker administration more influence. The other new members of the seven-person board are Michael J. Heffernan, who was the Republican nominee for state treasurer and is now Governor Charlie Baker’s appointee to the pension board, and Betsy Taylor, a former director of finance at the Massachusetts Port Authority. The appointments “can send a strong signal to the MBTA Retirement Fund about the need to be more transparent and accountable,” said MassDOT secretary Stephanie Pollack. Despite the pension fund’s legal status as a private trust, its trustees must “demonstrate that they can be entrusted to invest that money appropriately,’’ Pollack said. In 2013, the T pension fund failed to disclose a $25 million loss. It has also filed late annual reports with incomplete audits. The fund covers some 6,000 T retirees. Its board consists of two trustees designated by the Carmen’s Union, Local 589, one elected by other union employees of the T, and three “management” trustees appointed by the MassDOT board. The seventh is elected by the other six trustees and votes only in case of a tie. Two MassDOT appointees were replaced in this change: the T’s deputy general manager, Jonathan Davis, and Darnell Williams, president of the Urban League of Massachusetts. A third, Janice Loux, left in April. As treasurer, Grossman, a Democrat, chaired the $62 billion state pension plan during a period in which its returns were strong and established a reputation for transparency and cutting costs. — BETH HEALY.
Two Boston TV stations are among more than 100 nationwide that are banding together to form a streaming service called NewsON that will allow viewers to tune in to live newscasts on smartphones and tablets, starting this fall. Many local news stations already stream broadcasts through their websites and mobile apps, but NewsON is the largest effort yet to consolidate under a single service that can mimic the easy channel-flipping of television and eliminate the need for multiple local news apps. NewsON is a partnership of Cox Media Group, Hearst Television, Media General, Raycom Media, and the ABC Owned Television Station Group. Together, the five media companies own 112 stations in 84 markets, including WCVB-TV (Ch. 5) and WFXT-TV (Ch. 25) in Boston. WWLP-TV in Springfield is also included. The NewsON app will be available as a free download; advertising will support the business. — CALLUM BORCHERS
Shares of Sage Therapeutics Inc. rose 15.4 percent Tuesday after positive data from a small trial of a post-partum depression drug. The Cambridge company reported that four women with severe depression after childbirth made complete recoveries within 60 hours of being treated with SAGE-547, an experimental drug that’s also being tested to treat a seizure disorder. The trial was conducted without a comparison group, and it was ended earlier than expected because of the positive results from the first four subjects. The drug maker plans to conduct controlled clinical trials as soon as possible. — JACK NEWSHAM
McDonald’s Corp., seeking to burnish its image and revive flagging sales, named former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs (left) as its chief communications officer. The burger chain also hired Bacardi Ltd. executive Silvia Lagnado as chief marketing officer. She previously created Dove’s “Real Beauty” advertising campaign for Unilever. Stephen Easterbrook, who took over as chief executive in March, is trying to pull McDonald’s out of a slump. Global sales have dropped for the past 12 months, while the declines have stretched over six straight quarters in the United States. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
Roche Holding AG is weighing a second test for an experimental Alzheimer’s drug that failed in an initial study, after a similar offering from Biogen Inc. showed promise in slowing the memory-robbing ailment. Roche stopped a trial of gantenerumab in December because patients weren’t benefiting more than those receiving a placebo. Four months later, Cambridge-based Biogen said its drug slowed the progression of the disease, supporting a long-held hypothesis that targeting a protein linked to the telltale plaques found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients may yield a treatment. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
NEW YORK — The parent company of Boston-based Santander Bank said it expects the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston to take enforcement action against it, requiring Santander to increase oversight by its board of directors and improve how it manages risk and capital. Santander Holdings USA said it had received a draft of a written agreement with the Fed detailing the requirement. Both Santander and Fed officials declined comment. Santander, owned by Spanish financial services giant Banco Santander SA, has for two years failed part of the Fed’s annual “stress test” on large banks. The bank passed the part of the test to assesses whether it has enough capital to withstand a severe economic downturn. But regulators criticized the bank for “widespread and critical deficiencies” in management and planning for a severe recession. — DEIRDRE FERNANDES
HONG KONG — MSCI Inc. said China’s mainland stocks will probably be added to its indexes once some market-access issues are resolved. That could lure billions of dollars in new investments. The New York-based index provider expects to include yuan-denominated stocks, also called A shares, in its global benchmarks after it works with Chinese regulators to settle certain investor concerns. China has already addressed some of the key issues. It has increased the quota under the Qualified Foreign Institutional Investor scheme and granted a temporary waiver on capital gains levies for stock purchases through the Shanghai-Hong Kong exchange link. MSCI will collaborate with regulators on policies that “effectively resolve the remaining accessibility issues.” Those include improvements in liquidity and clarification of share-ownership rules. — BLOOMBERG NEWS | Gambling
Twin River Casino to add 28 table games
TIVERTON, R.I. | 97.714286 | 0.857143 | 1.857143 | high | medium | mixed |
http://fortune.com/2012/04/27/et-tu-google/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150614011000id_/http://fortune.com:80/2012/04/27/et-tu-google/ | Et tu, Google? - Fortune | 20150614011000 | FORTUNE — Google’s founders announced a plan designed to perpetuate their ironclad grip on the long-term governance of the company.
With the board’s blessing, the company will issue a new non-voting class of shares to existing shareholders. Because the founders currently hold majority-voting rights, the plan does not require that shareholders give their consent to the dilution of their future voting power. The action comes amid ongoing stock sales by Google’s GOOG founders.
While this edict by the founders is important to Google stockholders, users of Google’s products, and owners of other stocks — outright or in mutual funds or retirements savings plans — should also beware.
Other technology firms, like Facebook, and financial firms, like Carlyle, are attempting to gain access to public market funding without giving shareholders a mechanism to keep the founders accountable. In a conference call with analysts on April 12, Google CEO Larry Page took credit for a similar lack of voting rights at other companies. “Given Google’s success, it’s unsurprising this type of dual-class governance structure is now somewhat standard among newer technology companies,” he said.
MORE: Wal-Mart’s board: Can they handle the Mexican heat?
But not everyone buys the “if everyone is doing it, it must be a good idea” argument. Even those with short memories can recall the tech boom and bust at the turn of the last decade, or the financial crisis we are still digging out of.
Google’s founders marshaled the best possible arguments for their plan in a letter to shareholders. Taking a swipe at shareholder governance, they argued that evading shareholder mandates was the best way to keep the company focused on the long term.
The founder’s invocation of the long term was genius. After all, no one in her right mind goes around saying we believe in the short term and the long term be damned. People may act in favor of their own short-term selfish interests but saying so is an inevitable invitation to cries of foul play.
So it isn’t too surprising that the founders’ arguments have convinced some. With Google, shareholders are buying their founders and their ability to create value, says Rob Jackson, a professor at Columbia Law School. While shareholders may have expected the founders to loosen their control over time, they “went into the stock with their eyes open,” he says.
However, many founders do falter. “Google is definitely a genius-based company,” wrote Bob Monks, chair of LENS Investments, in an email. “The question needs to be raised is their failure in the ‘social market’ an indication of the end of genius, a la Edwin Land, Polaroid’s founder. Or is it a hiccup in the style of Bill Gates who launched the Office Suite at the same time as gathering his senior staff to obsolesce the whole technology by going to the web…. Some mechanism must exist to permit outside shareholder reevaluation of the ‘locked up’ voting control,” he wrote.
MORE: Inside Harvard B-school’s startup boot camp
John Whitehead, retired co-chair of Goldman Sachs GS , says that he is a strong believer in one share one vote. “Some managements do a good job. And those who do a good job don’t need special voting arrangements,” he says. “And those who do a bad job need active voting by shareholders to keep them in check. There is no argument to be made for special voting arrangements at Google or anywhere else,” he says.
The Council of Institutional Investors, an association representing funds and managers with over $3 trillion in assets under management, is “no fan of dual class shares or entrenched founders. We believe in one share one vote as a fundamental right of shareholders,” says Ann Yerger, the council’s executive director.
The baseline for good governance worldwide is the OECD governance principles, which were adopted in 2004 by the U.S.and 29 other countries. The actions at Google, Facebook and Carlyle all fly in the face of sections two and three of those principles, which describe the rights of shareholders. Some may argue, “So what — what is a lapse in principles among friends?”
But this issue goes beyond dollars and cents. The FCC gave Google a $25,000 wrist-slap for an inadvertent drive-by theft of personal information. A Google spokesperson said in an email, “It was a mistake … but we believe we did nothing illegal.” The FTC may be readying an anti-trust case, but can we really trust Google’s founders with this kind of power, especially given the apparent weak will of regulators to protect individuals from Google’s and other tech firms’ privacy breaches?
Who could check Google’s authority? Yerger says there are four ways to halt public market investment in the Googles, Facebooks, and Carlyles of the world. First off, the exchanges could refuse to list them. Or the indexes could refuse to include them. The investment banks could refuse to underwrite them. And those who invest other people’s money — so-called fiduciaries — could refuse to invest in them.
MORE: Want a promotion? Make friends at work.
Unless investment banks refuse to underwrite these kinds of shares, as they should, companies will continue to use them, Whitehead says.
Both Monks and Whitehead agree that fiduciaries, who are obligated to protect the invested dollars entrusted to them, should not invest in these kinds of stocks due to the risks involved. But firms like Blackrock and Fidelity certainly are investing large amounts of other people’s money in Google, according to the tech giant’s preliminary proxy filing. And for now, it appears that other fiduciaries are not engaging with Google on the voting rights issue either.
One share, one vote is a “psychologically important part of the free enterprise system,” which helps to encourage market participation, Whitehead says.
The erosion of that trust weakens the market for all stocks.
Google founders see themselves as pioneers in stripping accountability from the capital markets system. But, to quote the company’s own motto, you can make money without doing evil. If Google’s founders intend to do good, accountability should be no obstacle.
Eleanor Bloxham is CEO of The Value Alliance and Corporate Governance Alliance ( http://thevaluealliance.com ), a board advisory firm. | Google’s founders recently announced a new corporate structure designed to perpetuate their grip over the company. Everyone should beware. | 56.454545 | 0.954545 | 2.227273 | high | high | mixed |
http://www.9news.com.au/world/2015/06/17/03/55/six-irish-killed-in-us-balcony-collapse | http://web.archive.org/web/20150620032750id_/http://www.9news.com.au:80/world/2015/06/17/03/55/six-irish-killed-in-us-balcony-collapse | Ireland 'frozen in shock' over six student balcony deaths | 20150620032750 | A flag of Ireland is draped over wreaths at the Library Gardens apartment complex in Berkeley. (AAP)
Ireland is "frozen in shock" after six students plunged to their deaths when a balcony collapsed during a 21st birthday party in the US.
A number of them were students at University College Dublin and had gone to Berkeley, California, to start a dream trip on popular summer working holiday visas.
They were named as Ashley Donohoe, 22, and Olivia Burke, Eoghan Culligan, Niccolai Schuster, Lorcan Miller and Eimear Walsh, who were all 21.
Donohoe was an Irish-American from Rohnert Park, California, while the others lived in Ireland.
They died from multiple blunt traumatic injuries when they plunged 12 metres to the ground.
Another seven were seriously injured in the incident and remain in hospital.
A fourth floor balcony rests on the balcony below after collapsing at the Library Gardens apartment complex in Berkeley. (AP)
In a twist of fate, local police had received a call to reports of noise from the apartment shortly after midnight local time, but diverted to an emergency after a reported shooting in the city was prioritised.
The balcony collapsed less than 45 minutes later.
Philip Grant, consul general with the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs in the region, said the tragedy had touched everyone in Ireland.
"For many of my countrymen (the visa working holiday) is a formative experience and to have this happen at the start of this season is something that has left us all frozen in shock and disbelief," he said.
"We are a very close, tight-knit group. Ireland is a small country and when you have the numbers that we had here today, very few of us have been left untouched by this tragedy."
It is believed there were 13 Irish students on the fourth floor of an apartment complex in the college city shortly after midnight when it came apart from the building.
Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny told parliament 13 people had been on the balcony at the time, citing police.
"My heart breaks for the parents who have lost children," he said.
Do you have any news photos or videos? | Six Irish nationals, believed to be students, have died at a party in California after a balcony collapsed underneath them. | 18.73913 | 0.869565 | 1.130435 | medium | medium | abstractive |
http://fortune.com/2012/06/11/ma-143/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150621055655id_/http://fortune.com/2012/06/11/ma-143/ | M&A - Fortune | 20150621055655 | Telefónica has agreed to sell a 4.56% stake in China Unicom back to the company for approximately $1.4 billion. www.telefonica.com
Technicolor (Paris: TCH) said that it has accepted a deal whereby it will sell around a 30% stake to J.P. Morgan for €169 million. This is lower than an upwardly-revised €179 million offer from JPMorgan, but Technicolor said that the latter deal’s breakup fees and legal structure were less attractive. Technicolor also has rejected a €186 million bid from Vector Capital. www.technicolor.com
Gulf Capital has canceled the proposed sale of its 79% stake in Gulf Marine Services, after being unable to secure adequate offers, according to Reuters. The private equity firm reportedly had been seeking around $500 million. www.gulfcapital.com
Sign up for Dan’s daily email newsletter on deals and deal-makers: GetTermSheet.com | Telefónica has agreed to sell a 4.56% stake in China Unicom back to the company for approximately $1.4 billion. www.telefonica.com Technicolor (Paris: TCH) said that it has accepted a deal whereby it will sell around a 30% stake to J.P. Morgan for €169 million. This is lower than an upwardly-revised €179 million offer from JPMorgan, but Technicolor said that the latter deal’s… | 1.916667 | 0.904762 | 17.380952 | low | medium | extractive |
http://www.people.com/article/joyce-mitchell-under-enormous-pressure-attorney | http://web.archive.org/web/20150623055842id_/http://www.people.com/article/joyce-mitchell-under-enormous-pressure-attorney | She is Under 'Enormous Pressure' her attorney tells PEOPLE : People.com | 20150623055842 | David Sweat (left) and Richard Matt
While law enforcement officials appear to be
after their DNA was found in an upstate New York hunting cabin, prison worker
sits idly in a jailhouse, awaiting her next court date.
"I spoke to her this morning," her attorney, Stephen Johnston, tells PEOPLE. "She is doing fairly well. I say fairly well because she is under enormous pressure."
, 51, a training supervisor at the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York, was
with helping Richard Matt, 48, and David Sweat, 35, escape from the maximum-security prison on June 6. She remains in Rensselaer County Jail on a $200,000 bond.
During a press briefing on Monday, New York State Police Maj. Charles Guess said that police had found DNA evidence on items found in a cabin near Wolf Pond, about 20 miles west of the prison.
On Saturday, police were tipped off that the two men may be hiding in the area when a witness spotted someone running into the woods from the cabin. Police now believe that the person in the woods was either Sweat or Matt.
Police have set up a command center in nearby Owls Head, as they scour the area for the two dangerous killers.
Guess declined to elaborate on the items that were recovered from the cabin, but multiple news outlets are reporting that police found a water bottle and a jar of peanut butter with Sweat's fingerprints on it.
Authorities reportedly found bloodied socks, boots and toiletries inside the cabin, which is owned by corrections officers and is vacant most of the year, the
reports, adding that there is no indication that information about the camp's location was provided to Matt and Sweat.
and other outlets are reporting that a pair of prison-issued underwear was also found inside.
in connection with the escape, with one of them put on leave, police are guardedly optimistic that they may be tightening the net around the two convicts.
"Things are really heating up right now," a source close to the investigation tells PEOPLE. "There's a lot of activity at the command center."
Meanwhile, Mitchell remains in jail, where she has been held since June 13. She was arrested six days after the convicts' dramatic escape. She has been charged with promoting prison contraband in the first degree, a class D felony, and criminal facilitation in the fourth degree, a class A misdemeanor.
Joyce Mitchell leaving court on June 15
G.N. Miller / Reuters / Landov
Court records show she provided the two men with hacksaw blades, lighted glasses and drill bits. She allegedly planned to pick up the convicts when they emerged from a manhole outside of the prison, and she allegedly plotted with the two men to
Echoing the sentiments of other people from Mitchell's hometown of Dickinson Center, New York, her longtime neighbor, Sharon Currier, said, "I can't believe she would help some inmate like that." | As the manhunt for the two convicted murderers heats up after DNA evidence is found in an upstate New York cabin, Mitchell remains behind bars | 22.615385 | 0.769231 | 2.384615 | medium | low | mixed |
http://www.people.com/article/lucy-edwards-blind-youtube-beauty-vlogger-makeup-tutorial | http://web.archive.org/web/20150628022850id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/lucy-edwards-blind-youtube-beauty-vlogger-makeup-tutorial | Blind Beauty Vlogger Posts Makeup Tutorials on YesterddaysWishes : People.com | 20150628022850 | 06/26/2015 AT 07:40 PM EDT
Lucy Edwards went viral seemingly overnight after uploading a
to YouTube. But her cosmetic tips weren't the main reason people were clicking – Edwards is legally blind.
Edwards was born with incontinentia pigmenti, a rare disorder passed genetically that can affect one's vision. She lost sight in her right eye when she was 11 years old; at 17, she lost sight in the left.
Before losing her vision, getting glammed up had always been a pastime for she and her sister Alice. So when Edwards was diagnosed as legally blind, she turned to her love of makeup to find a sense of normalcy once again.
"It was a way of saying, 'I want to cope. I don't want to just sit in bed eating ice cream anymore,'" Edwards, now 19, says in the new issue of PEOPLE.
, a YouTube channel on which she posts makeup tutorial and answers questions about the blind community.
"I want to prove that I can be just as normal as when I had my sight," adds Edwards, who lives in Birmingham, England, and plans to go to law school.
"Going blind has just given me a totally different view of beauty, and I just appreciate it a lot more. I like it when people say I look good, and I want to keep up with it because I can't see in the mirror, and it makes me really determined to just keep doing it and keep feeling pretty about myself – because I'm still in control that way."
Though she admits her beauty regimen takes a lot of "trial and error," Edwards says, "I'm better at it now" than when she had her sight.
She started her channel as a personal endeavor, but Edwards hopes her videos open people's eyes about disabilities.
"I wanted a place on the Internet that was away from the stigma of disability because there was no one with a vision impairment or disability online really just doing something that a 'normal' teen would do," says Edwards. "I was just like, 'Why don't I be the person to start helping others?'"
With the assistance of her sister Alice, who helps her choose the right shades, brushes and products, and her boyfriend Ollie, who records and edits the videos, Edwards hopes her videos bridge the gap between the blind and sighted communities.
Sometimes, "I do feel very isolated, and I think doing YouTube was a major part of me getting into the non-sighted world and community," she says. "I just wanted to show that you can be yourself. Your disabilities don't have to define you." | "There was no one with a vision impairment or disability online really just doing something that a 'normal' teen would," she says of her YouTube channel | 17.290323 | 1 | 16.419355 | medium | high | extractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/06/26/waldorf-astoria-union-reach-million-deal-for-severance-payouts/i1p9zLu7QKfts7pWOrThCM/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150630001248id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/business/2015/06/26/waldorf-astoria-union-reach-million-deal-for-severance-payouts/i1p9zLu7QKfts7pWOrThCM/story.html? | Waldorf Astoria, union reach $149 million deal for severance payouts | 20150630001248 | NEW YORK — When a Chinese insurance firm bought the Waldorf Astoria Hotel for $1.95 billion this year, it said it planned to convert part of the aging building into high-end condominiums, while maintaining a smaller five-star hotel.
Standing in its way were the hotel’s 1,221 union workers, whose jobs were protected by the Waldorf Astoria’s contract with the New York Hotel and Motel Trades Council, a union that represents hotel workers.
Now, the owners of the Waldorf, New York’s largest union hotel employer, have reached a record deal with the union in which the hotel could pay almost $149 million in severance packages to its employees over the next two years.
The average payout will be more than $142,000, with a handful of employees eligible for more than $300,000.
One longtime worker is walking away with $656,409.68.
“It is a great deal,” said Peter Ward, head of the Trades Council. “There are people of retirement age, hundreds of them, that are getting over $200,000 in severance.”
Edgar Infante, 53, a head room-service waiter who has worked at the hotel for 22 years, is one of them.
“It will never be the same again,” he said. “When Frank Sinatra was alive he would ask me always for a Jack Daniels with a splash of Evian. Later in his life, when he got sickly, it was an Evian with a splash of Jack.”
Former president Bill Clinton knows Infante by name, and in Infante’s basement at home, he keeps a Waldorf menu signed by Clinton and former president George H.W. Bush when the two met at the Waldorf after Hurricane Katrina.
Under the terms of the deal, employees will receive 29 days of pay per year they worked or 58 days if they are tipped employees.
The typical union severance package is just four days of pay per year or eight days for tipped employees.
“In terms of days of pay, this is the largest severance package that we have negotiated in the history of the union,” said Richard Maroko, the union’s general counsel.
The Trade Council negotiated with Hilton Worldwide, which operates the Waldorf, and the Blackstone Group, which owns 46 percent of the hotel chain, over several months this spring. (Hilton will continue to operate the Waldorf in a 100-year agreement it signed with the new owner, Anbang Insurance Group.)
As the negotiations were occurring, a bill backed by the union was making its way through the City Council that would have placed a moratorium on hotel-to-condominium conversions like the one the Waldorf is planning.
Then last month, around the time the large severance package was finalized, the City Council approved the legislation, placing a two-year ban on owners of Manhattan hotels with at least 150 rooms from converting more than 20 percent of the rooms to condominiums.
But hotels that had been purchased in the previous 24 months and where the buyers had expressed an intent to convert were exempt, including the Waldorf.
“It was a fortunate confluence of events that a bill we were working on for 18 months was moving in the council at the same time as severance negations heated up with the Waldorf,” said Josh Gold, the union’s political director.
Blackstone and Hilton both declined to comment.
When news first broke that the hotel was sold to Anbang Insurance, “everyone was walking around so sad, hugging each other, talking to people they didn’t even know,” said Sonia Randolph, 52, a telephone switchboard operator at the Waldorf for the past 28½ years.
“But after we found out about the enhanced severance, everyone was so happy, walking around with smiles all around.” | The Chinese insurance firm that bought the Waldorf Astoria Hotel has reached a record deal with the union in which the hotel could pay almost $149 million in severance packages to its employees over the next two years. | 18.4 | 1 | 21.95 | medium | high | extractive |
http://www.people.com/article/christy-odonnell-bailey-donorovich-katie-couric | http://web.archive.org/web/20150702134541id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/christy-odonnell-bailey-donorovich-katie-couric | I Don't Want My Mom to Die in Pain : People.com | 20150702134541 | Christy O'Donnell and Bailey Donorovich at the Atlantis resort in the Bahamas
07/01/2015 AT 02:05 PM EDT
She's afraid of how she will die – and how it will impact her daughter, Bailey Donorovich.
"My biggest fear about my last moments on earth are that ... I'm going to be in so much physical pain that it's going to make my passing traumatic for me and traumatic for my daughter," O'Donnell
Katie Couric in an exclusive interview.
"And that the whole rest of her life, her last moments of looking at me, touching me and hearing my voice," she says, "are going to be a horrible, terrible memory that she's going to have to carry, rather than it being a loving memory of me."
O'Donnell, 46, has Stage IV metastatic lung adenocarcinoma – lung cancer that has spread to her brain, liver, left rib and L1 vertebra, which supports the weight of her body.
If she dies from her lung tumor, she will drown in her own fluids, she tells Couric.
"I grew up in Hawaii surfing," says O'Donnell, a former LAPD sergeant and trial attorney who lives in Valencia, California. "I've been held down a long time. I know what that feels like, and to think about experiencing that scares me to death."
It's why she is fighting hard to get California to allow her to end her life peacefully – and legally – should her suffering become too great.
She testified in support of California's End-of-Life Option Act in March and has
asking the state courts to allow her doctor to legally prescribe the medicine she'd need to die.
A hearing is set for July 24 in San Diego.
Donorovich, 21, supports her mom.
"I want to see her not in pain," she told Couric. "I'd rather see her go peacefully than in pain." | Christy O'Donnell, 46, and her daughter Bailey Donorovich, 21, spoke to Yahoo's Katie Couric about O'Donnell's fight to die her way | 14.185185 | 0.851852 | 1.666667 | low | medium | mixed |
http://www.people.com/article/kendall-jenner-selfie-july-4 | http://web.archive.org/web/20150705153131id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/kendall-jenner-selfie-july-4 | Kendall Jenner Shares Sexy Selfie on Instagram : People.com | 20150705153131 | 07/04/2015 AT 04:45 PM EDT
Well that's definitely not red, white and blue.
celebrated the Fourth of July with a slightly NSFW selfie.
, the 19-year-old model flaunts her toned tunny in a pair of black briefs and a see-through black top. Jenner covers her breast with one hand and snaps with the other, presumably to avoid Instagram's notorious censorship rules on showing full breasts.
The star is standing in front of a wardrobe, and a cup of joe is waiting on the table in front of her.
with a solo shot, besting her big sis
, which had previously held the record for most likes.
Jenner's May photo is now the app's most popular photo, with 2.7 million likes.
A photo posted by Kendall Jenner (@kendalljenner) on May 25, 2015 at 3:51pm PDT | The reality star shared a photo wearing a sheer top on Instagram | 13.75 | 0.666667 | 0.833333 | low | low | abstractive |
http://www.people.com/article/ben-affleck-after-divorce-photo-no-ring | http://web.archive.org/web/20150709223812id_/http://www.people.com/article/ben-affleck-after-divorce-photo-no-ring | Ben Affleck Photo with No Ring After Divorce Announcement : People.com | 20150709223812 | 07/06/2015 AT 08:25 PM EDT
is back in the U.S. – minus his wedding ring.
Affleck was spotted Sunday making a solo Starbucks run in Los Angeles after a Bahamas vacation with
and their three kids. It marked the first Stateside sighting of the Oscar winner since the pair announced they were divorcing after 10 years of marriage.
, the couple was spotted for the first time since announcing their split during a family trip in the Bahamas.
Affleck, 42, had flown back to L.A. on July 3 while Garner and the couple's children – Violet, 9, Seraphina, 6, and Samuel, 3 – left the family's home at the Baker's Bay resort on July 5. Affleck had originally arrived on his own on June 28 followed by Garner and their kids on June 29, their wedding anniversary.
Both stars have a lot of work to return to. Affleck is set to appear at Comic-Con in San Diego on Saturday to promote his latest project,
. Garner, meanwhile, flew to Atlanta on Sunday with the kids, to start shooting the faith-based film
, a source tells PEOPLE. She was spotted still wearing her wedding ring.
For now, Garner and Affleck
on their L.A. estate as they will continue to co-parent their children.
"These are two people who really tried to save their marriage and worked really hard at it," a source
of the couple, who separated months before their public announcement. "Ultimately they had grown apart and they did what was best for their kids."
The two are planning on entering mediation to ease the process of | The 42-year-old star had been keeping a low profile in the Bahamas with soon-to-be ex-wife Jennifer Garner | 12.76 | 0.52 | 0.76 | low | low | abstractive |
http://www.people.com/article/bill-cosby-accusers-barbara-bowman-joan-tarshis-cnn | http://web.archive.org/web/20150709231530id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/bill-cosby-accusers-barbara-bowman-joan-tarshis-cnn | Accusers Barbara Bowman, Joan Tarshis Talk After Quaaludes Reveal : People.com | 20150709231530 | Barbara Bowman and Joan Tarshis, with CNN's Don Lemon
07/07/2015 AT 10:20 AM EDT
's accusers have spoken out after
reveal that Cosby admitted to giving drugs to a woman he then had sex with, and they say that this development is "just the beginning."
, who both came forward in November 2014 with allegations that the actor drugged and sexually assaulted them, appeared
on Monday to discuss the 2005 federal sex-assault case in Pennsylvania that uncovered statements from Cosby that he had Quaalude prescriptions in the '70s he intended to use on women for the purpose of having sex.
in November to share her story, told CNN's
. "I've worked so hard to tell my story and screamed my story onto deaf ears. So after 10 long years, it really was quite amazing to read my email today and it was like everything turned a 180 in a matter of a minute."
Tarshis, who came forward shortly after Bowman with similar accusations, told the anchor that she "never thought this day would happen."
"Now that the truth has come out, that he has bought drugs in order to drug women to have sex with them – I'm just so relieved that the truth has come out," said Tarshis.
have come forward with allegations in recent months. But Bowman believes that the information from 10 years ago that has now gone public is "a game changer, and it's about time."
"To have this long, hard journey of darkness and shame, fighting to be heard, I think we're going to be heard now and I think this is just the beginning," she continued.
were first obtained by the Associated Press on Monday. The suit was
, Andrea Constand, who alleged in 2005 that Cosby drugged and assaulted her. It was settled in 2006 under confidential terms.
Joe Cammarata, who represents accuser Tamara Green and two other women who claim Cosby sexually assaulted and drugged them in
against the comedian, said the excerpts "support the victims' allegations against him."
He told PEOPLE, "It's an extraordinary turn of events which provides much-needed public light on Mr. Cosby's behavior."
Last month, a lawyer for Cosby
of the information in the 2005 suit, "It would be terribly embarrassing for this material to come out." | "I'm just so relieved that the truth has come out," Joan Tarshis said on CNN Tonight | 23.2 | 0.95 | 7.75 | medium | high | mixed |
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/01/19/china-economy-grew-74-in-2014.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150710100112id_/http://www.cnbc.com/2015/01/19/china-economy-grew-74-in-2014.html | China economy grew 7.4% in 2014 | 20150710100112 | China's economy has been grappling with a slowing property market, a deflationary environment and chronic overcapacity problems in recent years.
China's central bank cut interest rates in November for the first time since 2012, surprising markets as the government has repeatedly signaled its tolerance for slower growth with the economy transitioning from reliance on investment and towards domestic consumption.
Many economists are expecting Beijing to set its growth target for 2015 at around the 7-percent level. The World Bank last week lowered its China's growth target for this year to 7.1 percent from its previous forecast of 7.2 percent projected in October.
"The challenge for Beijing going forward is to strike a balance between growth and structural reforms. Beijing wants to make sure there is a reasonable amount of growth for it to push through reforms," Chi Lo, senior economist for Greater China at BNP Paribas Investment Partners, told CNBC.
"In the short term, investors will be watching the growth target that Beijing will set at the National People's Congress in March. Markets have been talking about 7-7.5 percent which is a reasonable range and Beijing will set that as their target to give it flexibility," he added.
More easing, housing remains a concern
With the property sector still sluggish at best, analysts see further aggressive action from policymakers.
Data on Tuesday showed property investment, a main driver of the economy, rose 10.5 percent in 2014 from a year earlier, the slowest pace since the January-July period of 2009. This compared with an annual rise of 11.9 percent in the first 11 months of 2014 and 19.8 percent growth through 2013.
"The property market is still slowing amidst tight funding condition and cooling investment," Qu Hongbin, co-head of Asian Economic Research at HSBC, wrote in a note.
"We believe more aggressive easing measures, in the form of another 50 basis point cut (bps) to the policy rate and 150bps cut to the reserve ratio, as well as more growth-supporting reform measures, will be needed in the coming months to anchor domestic demand and sustain growth," he added. | China's economy grew at its slowest pace in 24 years in 2014, official data showed on Tuesday, undershooting the government's target for the first time since 1998. | 12.8125 | 0.84375 | 1.71875 | low | medium | mixed |
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/03/get-a-room-apps-for-last-minute-hotel-bookings.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150713232028id_/http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/03/get-a-room-apps-for-last-minute-hotel-bookings.html | Get a room: Apps for last minute hotel bookings | 20150713232028 | Read MoreGiving sales a kick, using big data
Hotel Tonight, for instance, is an app that lets users book the day of their stay, or up to a week in advance, despite its name. Users can choose from basic to luxury hotel rooms across a variety of hotels worldwide, according to the company's website.
And Booking Now, an app affiliated with Booking.com, a site owned by travel booking giant Priceline Group, leverages Priceline's network of hotels worldwide and 47 million hotel reviews, according to the company.
As part of their competitiveness, each company pushes the ease of use concept, specifically the number of taps needed to book a room. Users can book a room with two taps using the One Night Standard and Booking Now apps, while it takes three taps and a swipe to book a room with Hotel Tonight, according to the companies. | Last-minute hotel patrons are getting discounted accommodations at luxury hotels thanks to the One Night Standard app. | 8.45 | 0.5 | 0.9 | low | low | abstractive |
http://www.people.com/article/ian-mckellen-mr-holmes-never-too-late-find-yourself | http://web.archive.org/web/20150716163347id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/ian-mckellen-mr-holmes-never-too-late-find-yourself | Ian McKellen Debuts as Elderly Sherlock in Mr. Holmes : People.com | 20150716163347 | Sir Ian McKellen is pictured Monday at the New York premiere of Mr. Holmes.
07/14/2015 AT 08:45 AM EDT
sees a bit of himself in every character he plays – but that goes double for his latest role as the enigmatic Sherlock Holmes.
"If I didn't relate, then I wouldn't be a good actor," the two-time Oscar nominee told PEOPLE at the New York premiere of
on Monday. "I relate to Sherlock's optimism that it's never too late to solve a puzzle and to find yourself. Even though he's 93 years old in the movie, he solves a mystery, and discovers that he has a heart and not just a brain."
, in theaters Friday, tells the bittersweet story of an elderly Sherlock who is struggling to remember the details of his final case as he loses his memory with old age.
costars in the film as Holmes's housekeeper.
It's no surprise that McKellen, 76, took on the role of the legendary detective – in his career, the star has brought to life some of the most prominent and diverse literary characters in history, from Tolkien's wise wizard Gandalf to Shakespeare's brooding, grief-stricken Hamlet.
is the epitome of Sherlock Holmes, both in his latest flick and in real life.
"On set he is so in-character, so focused, just like Sherlock!" Hiroyuki Sanada, Holmes's whimsical guide in the movie, tells PEOPLE. "My character sees Sherlock as a hero. For me, Sir Ian is my hero. I used my actual admiration for him to channel my character."
When asked what other protagonists he might like to portray, McKellen smiles.
"I never want to play certain characters," he says. "I judge everything based on the script. If I see myself as the character in the script, that's the starting point." | Mr. Holmes premiered in New York on Monday; it hits theaters Friday | 28.769231 | 0.769231 | 1.384615 | medium | low | abstractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/06/17/barney-frank-scourge-financiers-joins-bank-board/ylLhlSK8WnpSyn1X0bJf7N/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150717233012id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/06/17/barney-frank-scourge-financiers-joins-bank-board/ylLhlSK8WnpSyn1X0bJf7N/story.html | Barney Frank, scourge of financiers, joins bank board | 20150717233012 | Former US Congressman Barney Frank has been called a lot of names in his career. Now add one more: Bank insider.
Frank, a Newton Democrat, known as much for his brash personality as penning tough post-financial banking rules, has joined the board of Signature Bank in New York.
Signature, a $28.6 billion asset bank serves private business clients and is so low-key that it doesn’t have street signs and its branches are inside office buildings.
So how will this unlikely partnership work?
Signature Chairman Scott A. Shay said Wednesday in announcing Frank’s appointment that the bank seeks, “members whose deep and broad experience will prove impactful … those who share diverse perspectives and possess strong decision-making capabilities.”
Frank’s knowledge and contacts within the financial regulatory world don’t hurt either. Frank co-authored the Dodd-Frank Act, legislation scorned by bankers, and served in Congress for more than 30 years.
Signature would not comment on Wednesday about Frank’s pay. But Signature board members last year earned between $366,650 and $383,317 in cash and stock awards, according to regulatory filings. | Former Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank, known as much for his brash personality as penning tough post-financial banking rules, has joined the board of a New York bank so discreet it doesn’t even have street signs. | 5.390244 | 0.926829 | 12.682927 | low | medium | extractive |
http://www.9news.com.au/world/2015/06/26/03/01/us-mourners-gather-for-charleston-funerals | http://web.archive.org/web/20150721130651id_/http://www.9news.com.au/world/2015/06/26/03/01/us-mourners-gather-for-charleston-funerals | Obama to deliver eulogy in Charleston | 20150721130651 | President Barack Obama is set to deliver a eulogy for the chief pastor gunned down in an apparent racially-motivated attack that shocked the US.
Obama will deliver the remarks on Friday for pastor Clementa Pinckney, who was gunned down along with eight other African Americans during Bible study in a historic church nine days ago.
The shooting was allegedly carried out by Dylann Roof, 21, a white supremacist.
The carnage renewed discussions of racism and hate groups in America and led to a furore over the controversial Confederate flag, which is present throughout the south but that many see as a symbol of racism.
For Obama, the shooting touched a particular nerve because it overlapped with two thorny issues in his presidency: gun control, which he never managed to overhaul, and racial divides.
Soon after the killings, a frustrated and angry Obama condemned the country's lack of action over mass shootings.
Several thousand people, including Vice President Joe Biden, are expected at the ceremony at a university in Charleston near the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church where the shooting took place.
Mourners held the first funeral services Thursday for some of the nine African Americans killed.
Hundreds filed past the open coffin of Ethel Lance, 70, at a funeral home in North Charleston, ahead of an afternoon service for Sharonda Singleton, 45.
Emotions ran high at the Royal Missionary Baptist Church as friends and relatives bid a final farewell to Lance, a custodian at a Charleston arts centre.
"I am here to tell you that we are stronger because we are together as a community," Reverend Norvel Goff told the mourners, the local Post and Courier newspaper reported.
Singleton, a speech pathologist, high school track coach and pastor at Emanuel, was remembered by a capacity crowd at the 2000-seat Mount Moriah Missionary Baptist Church.
"She believed she could change every child," said South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who attended both funeral services.
Seen in the pews were Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, two of the most recognisable civil rights activists in the United States today.
On Wednesday, thousands filed past Pinckney's open coffin at the South Carolina legislature in the state capital Columbia, where he had served as a senator.
Services for the other victims are scheduled throughout the weekend and into next week.
South Carolina has charged Roof with nine counts of murder, one for each victim. He remains in solitary confinement at a North Charleston jail.
Haley has said that she favours the death penalty for Roof if he is convicted.
Do you have any news photos or videos? | Funerals have begun for the nine African-Americans slain last week in a church in South Carolina. | 26.526316 | 0.789474 | 1.210526 | medium | medium | abstractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/theater-art/2015/07/21/found-pittsfield-terrific-production-lost-yonkers/3Ae0Jx9HjTs7t0Irg8Gw6I/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150723145858id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/arts/theater-art/2015/07/21/found-pittsfield-terrific-production-lost-yonkers/3Ae0Jx9HjTs7t0Irg8Gw6I/story.html | Found in Pittsfield: A terrific production of ‘Lost in Yonkers’ | 20150723145858 | PITTSFIELD — If you’ve ever dismissed Neil Simon as not much more than a facile quipster — as I did myself in the rashness and folly of youth — you owe it to yourself to see Barrington Stage Company’s outstanding production of “Lost in Yonkers.’’
Director Jenn Thompson and her first-rate cast mine Simon’s Pulitzer-winning play for every one of its diamond-hard truths about family as a shaping force: maddening, nourishing, destructive, loving, complicated, necessary.
This is the first time in its 20-year history that Barrington Stage has produced a play by Simon. Good choice, and good timing, too. Explorations of Simon’s work by regional theaters are especially valuable now, when he appears to have fallen out of favor on Broadway, which he dominated for so long. (A 2009 Broadway revival of Simon’s “Brighton Beach Memoirs’’ was a flop, and a planned companion production of his “Broadway Bound’’ was canceled due to weak ticket sales.) A theater highlight of three summers ago in the Berkshires was Jessica Stone’s topnotch production of “Last of the Red Hot Lovers’’ at Williamstown Theatre Festival, starring Brooks Ashmanskas and Susie Essman.
“Lost in Yonkers’’ dives into deeper waters, and the Barrington Stage cast gives vivid form to a gallery that includes some of the most indelible characters Simon has ever created. With his adenoidal delivery and quizzical expressions, Matt Gumley excels as 15-year-old Jay, trying to make sense of the strange turn his young life has taken in 1942, when his father leaves him and his younger brother in the care of their grandmother and aunt in Yonkers, N.Y.
Paula Jon DeRose cracks the heart with her exquisite performance as the hopeful, poignant Aunt Bella, limited by an unspecified learning disability and still living with her mother at the age of 35. Lynn Cohen radiates a don’t-tread-on-me force field as that mother, the forbidding Grandma Kurnitz, while David Christopher Wells makes for an enjoyably raffish Uncle Louie, walking on the wrong side of the law and reveling in it.
The play, which ran for two years on Broadway in the early 1990s, is funny and wrenching by turns. Seldom has Simon struck the balance so perfectly between comedy and close-to-the-bone drama, and seldom has the role of wit as a survival mechanism been so central to our understanding of his characters, especially the two boys. Only rarely in “Lost in Yonkers’’ do the trademark Simon one-liners seem forced or contrived; rarer still are the moments when the play detours into mawkishness, though it’s loaded with heart.
Thompson’s staging is artful throughout, especially in the way she maintains spatial relationships between characters that emphasize the emotional distance and communication problems that bedevil the Kurnitz family. John McDermott’s set features not just the tidy furniture you’d expect — including a sofa, bedecked with a lace doily, that opens out for the boys to sleep in — but also a pair of telephone poles whose wires stretch diagonally across the stage and a wraparound photographic mural of a cloud-filled sky that covers part of an upstage wall.
They serve as reminders of the wider world that exists beyond the family’s daily skirmishes, and also of the fact that Jay and his 13-year-old brother, Arty (Jake Giordano), are geographically separated from their father, Eddie, while still mourning the death of their mother. Sensitively portrayed by Dominic Comperatore, Eddie is deep in debt to a loan shark, having borrowed a lot of money to pay for hospital care while his wife was dying of cancer. Now he has landed a job selling scrap iron that will enable him to pay back the loan shark, but it will involve 10 months of travel across the South. So Eddie asks his own mother to take in his two sons.
Neither she nor they are happy about it. An unsmiling Jewish immigrant whose German upbringing is still palpable in her accent, Grandma Kurnitz seems to stab the floor with her cane before each step. When her grandchildren kiss her on the cheek, she winces slightly. Simon’s stage directions for “Lost in Yonkers’’ say that the character is “a big woman, or, hopefully, gives that appearance.’’ Cohen is small, but she projects a presence more imposing than mere physical size could be. Grandma Kurnitz intimidates everyone but Louie, and she maintains a fierce implacability till the end, when she spells out her bleak and unsparing world view to Jay: “You want to hear what my truth is? Everything hurts. Whatever it is you get good in life, you also lose something.’’
By then, however, Jay has done a lot of growing up and developed his own vision of life’s possibilities. So, too, has Bella, a once-childlike woman who, in ways large and small, is inching her way toward independence. This excellent production of “Lost in Yonkers’’ reminds us that such journeys are best measured not by what is lost, but by what is gained.
Set, John McDermott. Costumes, Jennifer Caprio. Lights, Martin E. Vreeland. Sound, Toby Algya.
Presented by Barrington Stage Company
At: Boyd-Quinson Mainstage, Pittsfield., through Aug. 1 | Director Jenn Thompson and her first-rate cast mine Neil Simon’s Pulitzer-winning play for every one of its diamond-hard truths about family as a shaping force. | 31.030303 | 1 | 15.30303 | medium | high | extractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/movies/2015/07/23/sophie-tucker-was-last-red-hot-mamas/rsDOBq4oGqp93uO4J8mJeO/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150728020658id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/arts/movies/2015/07/23/sophie-tucker-was-last-red-hot-mamas/rsDOBq4oGqp93uO4J8mJeO/story.html | Sophie Tucker was the Last of the Red Hot Mamas | 20150728020658 | If you don’t know much about Sophie Tucker — who was like Bessie Smith crossed with your Jewish bubbe — this entertaining if rudimentary documentary is required viewing. Tucker (1887-1966), nicknamed the Last of the Red Hot Mamas, was a household name for nearly six decades in show business. A true original, she deserves a place in the pop-culture pantheon.
Director William Gazecki follows a traditional rags-to-riches formula, but there was nothing traditional about Tucker, whose family emigrated from Russia and opened a kosher restaurant in Hartford. Tucker hit the vaudeville circuit to help support the family. She had a great voice, but her unconventional appearance put her into the racist “coon shouter” slot in music hall shows and necessitated that she perform, reluctantly, in blackface, a common practice at the time. Tucker moved to New York and got her big break with the Ziegfeld Follies. By 1929, she was the biggest female star in the world.
Producers Susan and Lloyd Ecker became fascinated with Tucker after seeing Bette Midler in a 1973 concert perform Tucker’s bawdy jokes at the urging of Midler’s writer, Bruce Vilanch, who appears in the film. The couple spent eight years compiling material from the 400 scrapbooks kept by Tucker, an obsessive archivist of her own life. (Brandeis University holds volumes from 1957 to 1965.) The Eckers, who’ve also written a book about Tucker, appear in the film as talking heads a bit too much. Better to hear from Tucker’s show biz cronies, who offer lively and revealing anecdotes: among them, Tony Bennett, Carol Channing, and Shecky Greene. Greene does a funny impersonation of the throaty-voiced Tucker chastising her ne’er-do-well son, Bert. Barbara Walters discusses her father’s long and loyal relationship with Tucker, a regular performer (and card sharp) at Lou Walters’s Latin Quarter nightclub, in Boston.
The film’s treasure trove of images, film clips, and anecdotes makes for fascinating show business history. Bennett and Michael Feinstein smartly explain Tucker’s gifts for jazz singing; coupled with her ribald persona, she was closer to African-American blues singers such as Smith. No-nonsense and big-hearted, she palled around with gangsters, chewed out presidents, and stood up to the KKK when it threatened a Miami nightclub that had booked Josephine Baker. The most fascinating sections of the documentary focus on how Tucker’s flamboyance and solid business acumen vaulted her to unlikely international stardom, keeping her there for decades. Here was a proudly Jewish woman who sang racy songs about sex and was defiantly large, even turning her size into a signature song (“Nobody Loves a Fat Girl”).
There are other gems: One of Tucker’s great-nephews recounts Tucker’s friendship with J. Edgar Hoover and his partner Clyde Tolson and the night Hoover asked Tucker if he could borrow one of her spangled gowns.
Tucker’s scrapbooks were filled with letters; from US presidents to the many women who were her constant “companions” after her third marriage ended. A soldier during World War II wrote to tell her that his platoon blasted one of Tucker’s most famous recordings, “My Yiddishe Momme,” from speakers over the rubble of Berlin for eight straight hours. “The Outrageous Sophie Tucker” is rich with such tall tales and juicy nuggets, befitting a larger-than-life icon. | “The Outrageous Sophie Tucker,” a documentary, celebrates the life of the singer as “The Last of the Red Hot Mamas.” | 24.481481 | 0.925926 | 3 | medium | medium | mixed |
http://www.people.com/article/lara-Abdallat-miss-jordan-isis-ghost-security | http://web.archive.org/web/20150728205125id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/lara-Abdallat-miss-jordan-isis-ghost-security | Former Miss Jordan Joins Hacktivist Group : People.com | 20150728205125 | 07/23/2015 AT 01:00 PM EDT
You might not have heard of Ghost Security, but depending on how familiar you are with beauty pageants in the Middle East, you might have heard of Lara Abdallat. Abdallat was Miss Jordan 2010 and first runner-up to Miss Arab 2011, though her career has taken a bit of a left turn since then.
Abdallat is currently working with Ghost Security, a "hacktivist" group tenuously connected with hacker group Anonymous. Her work with the group includes trawling the "Deep Web" and "Darknet" – parts of the Internet not indexed by or otherwise hidden from search engines – for activity by the Islamic State.
"It got really sick for me to open the news every day in the morning and see thousands of people killed, and it was getting frustrating,"
. Abdallat, whose father is Jordanian and whose mothers is Turkish-Syrian, is the only Muslim member of the organization, and she wants to protect her religion's image from the damage ISIS is doing.
Ghost Security works to eliminate ISIS's online presence with the hope of jamming their recruitment and organizational networks. "We're locating a lot of the Islamic State's websites and Facebook or Twitter or blogs. We can locate and target [them], and we work on closing them down because they share terroristic information," Abdallat said, adding that the group shares information with the FBI and CIA whenever they can.
"It's about saving lives," Abdallat said of her work. "I don't care if they are Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Buddhist. I don't care. I don't care what skin color you are. It's about protecting people." | Lara Abdallat works with Ghost Security, a group that specializes in disrupting ISIS's deep web presence | 18.444444 | 0.888889 | 2.333333 | medium | medium | mixed |
http://www.people.com/article/bachelorette-kaitlyn-bristowe-shawn-booth-jimmy-kimmel-pledge | http://web.archive.org/web/20150729150454id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/bachelorette-kaitlyn-bristowe-shawn-booth-jimmy-kimmel-pledge | Bachelorette Kaitlyn and Shawn Booth Will Pay Kimmel $1,000 If They Split Up : People.com | 20150729150454 | 07/28/2015 AT 08:15 AM EDT
This is called putting your money where your heart is.
and Shawn Booth were guests Monday on
in the ABC dating show's finale. And they vowed not to end up like so many other
couples – even wagering money that they'll be married, or at least still together, a year from now.
"Twice a year for like 13 years now, we've seen people get together. They come on the show and they seem to be very much in love ⦠And then the next thing we know, we see them on the cover of a magazine with a tear down the center," Kimmel said.
He added: "Quite frankly, my heart can't take it anymore."
So, he had them repeat some comical vows in which they promised to stay together for at least a year – and if they don't, they have to pay him $1,000 (either as a lump sum or, he joked, in monthly installments of $2.77 for 30 years).
Bristowe, 30, and Booth, 29, who grace the
, seem as likely to succeed as any. "I didn't think I could be this happy," Bristowe tells PEOPLE exclusively. Adds Booth: "She just makes me feel different, something that I've never felt before. It's what I've been looking for."
Shawn Booth and Kaitlyn Bristowe on the cover of PEOPLE | The happy couple take a pledge that they'll be married, or at least still together, a year from now | 12.954545 | 0.909091 | 11.818182 | low | medium | extractive |
http://www.people.com/article/girl-drops-baby-bouquet-video | http://web.archive.org/web/20150729151117id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/girl-drops-baby-bouquet-video | Girl Drops Baby Wedding Bouquet Video : People.com | 20150729151117 | 07/28/2015 AT 02:50 PM EDT
It is a well-established fact that weddings bring out the crazy in us all. And now that we are knee-deep in the Season of Nonstop Weddings, otherwise known as summer, some of us are suffering from the bridal bug more acutely than others.
Unfortunately, our nation's youngest – and most fragile – are not immune to the mayhem. In a new
, one girl is so eager to catch the bridal bouquet that she drops the baby she's holding in her arms. (Important note: Baby was not harmed.)
– the YouTube user who posted the video – helpfully slows down the footage so we can see a clear play-by-play of the young girl leaping up to catch the flowers, consequently releasing the dolled-up baby from her arms.
Jamie Jackson, the Utah woman who
for most bouquet catches (46), better watch her back – this girl is coming for her. | Note: Zero babies were harmed in the making of this video | 15.833333 | 0.583333 | 0.916667 | medium | low | abstractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/movies/2015/07/25/documania-kentucky-cambodia-and-points-between/zMxMMYG9Xz9DBfqDJhd5XI/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150730014141id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/arts/movies/2015/07/25/documania-kentucky-cambodia-and-points-between/zMxMMYG9Xz9DBfqDJhd5XI/story.html | Kentucky, Cambodia, and points between | 20150730014141 | Boston-based filmmaker Laurie Kahn possesses an ideal background for a documentarian: a degree in philosophy and experience as a newspaper reporter. She has an eye for everyday details and an insight into their meaning. From the beginning she was drawn to the struggles of the oppressed, working on the PBS series “Frontline: Crisis in Central America” (1985) and “Eyes on the Prize.” Later, she would focus on neglected stories of remarkable women in documentaries such as “A Midwife’s Tale” (1998) and “Tupperware!” (2004). Her latest film, “Love Between the Covers,” reveals the gynocentric inner workings of the romance-novel industry. Here are three films (and one TV series) that guided her way.
“Love Between the Covers” screens Sunday at the Woods Hole Film Festival (www.woodsholefilmfestival.org).
Barbara Kopple won an Oscar for this intimate, immersive documentary about a miners’ strike in the Kentucky county of the title. “Barbara and her crew spent years with the coalminers’ families and had remarkable access,” Kahn writes. “It is the story of a community, not just of the men on strike.”
To find stories worth telling, sometimes you don’t even have to leave home. Richard P. Rogers’s short documentary records the world from his SoHo loft apartment. “It was shot in different seasons,” Kahn writes, “quietly capturing the variations of light, the people outside and the weather. On the soundtrack are voicemail messages from Rogers’s longtime companion, who was risking her life shooting the revolution in Nicaragua, and two other women with whom he was having affairs. Beautifully shot, elegantly edited, and brutally revealing.”
Eyes on the Prize (1987, 1990)
Before producer Henry Hampton conceived of this landmark PBS series, as timely now as ever, most documentaries about the Civil Rights movement concentrated on Martin Luther King Jr. and other high-profile activists. As such, they overlooked the complexities of this ongoing struggle. Kahn, who participated in the making of the first six episodes, writes: “All of us felt we had a responsibility to do justice to these stories. We interviewed people who’d never been interviewed, found footage that had been lost or forgotten, and used music that was sung in the places we covered. The experience profoundly shaped me as a filmmaker.”
The Land of the Wandering Souls (2000)
Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh survived the 1975-79 Khmer Rouge genocide, but the rest of his family did not. This documentary tells some of that story, and also shows that the suffering persists 25 years later. Panh “follows the lives of Cambodian villagers hired to dig a ditch across the country for optical fiber cables bringing in the Internet,” writes Kahn. “They work all day, sleep on the ground and barely eke out an existence. I will never forget the scene in which a mother shakes the branches of a tree to catch ants to make soup. It is a parable of the 21st century: the have-nots toiling to enable those who have everything.” | Filmmaker Laurie Kahn prizes documentaries where the profound and historic reside in the commonplace and everyday. | 35.647059 | 0.647059 | 1.117647 | high | low | abstractive |
http://www.cnbc.com/2009/05/08/The-Oprah-Effect.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150804003708id_/http://www.cnbc.com/2009/05/08/The-Oprah-Effect.html | The Oprah Effect | 20150804003708 | Talk show superstar Oprah Winfrey is one of the most well known cultural and financial icons of our time.If you're lucky enough to create a product she loves - a mention on her show just might make you a millionaire!CNBC's Carl Quintanilla explores The Oprah Effect and how she turns no names into brand names.Visit the "The Oprah Effect"
Posted: Friday, May 8, 2009 | If you're lucky enough to create a product she loves - a mention on her show just might make you a millionaire! CNBC's Carl Quintanilla explores The Oprah Effect and how she turns no names into brand names. | 1.767442 | 0.906977 | 17.976744 | low | medium | extractive |
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/07/31/state-aging-infrastructure-worries-businesses/hsNeGaaqAmif0L51rQ2KWO/story.html | http://web.archive.org/web/20150804032742id_/http://www.bostonglobe.com:80/business/2015/07/31/state-aging-infrastructure-worries-businesses/hsNeGaaqAmif0L51rQ2KWO/story.html | State’s aging infrastructure worries businesses | 20150804032742 | The intersection of Routes 2 and 2A in Concord, known as Crosby’s Corner, is undergoing a $65 million reconfiguration to make it safer. In Reading, workers are rebuilding more than a mile of road on busy West Street to improve traffic flow and replace gas and water lines. At the historic Longfellow Bridge, under construction since 2013, the $255 million in maintenance and upgrades are slated to continue until 2018.
Hundreds of bridge, highway, and tunnel repairs are underway across the state, and an even greater number of projects are slated for coming years. But this work is only making a small dent in the needs of the state’s aging transportation system.
Over the past eight years, for example, a $3 billion initiative to repair bridges has reduced the number of structurally deficient spans in the state by 25 percent. But more than 450 spans were still rated structurally deficient at the end of 2014, according to federal highway data, and the state has estimated the remaining repairs will cost $14.4 billion.
While the state is making some progress, worn-out roads and congested highways continue to make business leaders worry about the reliable delivery of goods, ability of employees to commute, overall appeal of the state as a place to do business, and effect on the Massachusetts economy.
“We need to avoid congestion because congestion costs dollars,” said James Brett, president of the New England Council, a regional business advocacy group. “That’s a consideration for whether businesses stay here or expand here.”
In a new book, Rosabeth Moss Kanter sounds the alarm for addressing the nation’s crumbling highways, failing bridges, choked rail lines, and bottlenecked airports.
Plans are in the works to address many of the state’s problem roads and bridges, but the backlog is significant. Right now, 20 tunnel projects and more than 450 road maintenance, reconstruction, and resurfacing projects are in the design phase across the state, according to the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, although it’s unclear when and whether they will get built.
Massachusetts’ infrastructure issues are fairly typical of those in other states, said Anthony Puntin, executive director of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers Section, a professional association. Still, given Massachusetts’ reputation as a tricky place to do business, any infrastructure troubles can only hurt perceptions of the state, business leaders said.
For many businesses, one of the principal concerns is the timely delivery of goods and services to customers, said Chris Geehern, spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the state’s largest business association. Success today, particularly in a high-cost state like Massachusetts, depends on turning orders around quickly and meeting tight deadlines, Geehern said. Any delays and detours can affect the bottom line.
Cape Medical Supply Inc. of Sandwich delivers medical supplies and equipment throughout the state; traffic congestion caused by inadequate roads and construction makes it difficult to get vital supplies to customers as efficiently as possible, said Gary Sheehan, the chief executive.
“It’s something we are forced to account for on a regular basis,” Sheehan said. “You make every effort to build knowledge about what’s going on out on the roads into your schedule, but it’s challenging.”
Service delays and cancellations the MBTA experienced over the winter, along with highway congestion, also have many businesses worried about employee commutes. Undependable infrastructure, they fear, could lead to an unreliable labor force or keep talented candidates from even considering jobs in the area.
Efforts are underway to overhaul the T’s management and finances, but some business leaders aren’t sure it’s enough. In April, a panel convened by Governor Charlie Baker projected that the T’s costs would continue to exceed revenues in coming years, creating an annual revenue shortfall of $560 million by 2020 if action is not taken.
The state budget passed last month called for the creation of a financial oversight board for the T. Changes in the agency’s leadership structure, including the appointment of Brian Shortsleeve, a former executive with the General Catalyst Partners venture capital firm, were made last week by the Baker administration. Still, some business leaders say more must be done to reshape the T.
“We’re just not there,” said James Rooney, president and chief executive of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce. “There are much broader and longer-term issues about embracing the role of the T in our culture and economic system.”
For businesses and commuters alike, poorly maintained roads can damage vehicles, leading to costly, time-consuming repairs. The American Society for Civil Engineers estimates travel on poorly maintained roads cost Massachusetts drivers $2.3 billion in repairs in 2013.
The Baker administration said it is tackling some of the state’s most pressing issues. Amanda Richard, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Transportation, pointed to the bridge repair program, which, she said, is addressing “some of the largest unfunded bridge reconstruction projects in the Commonwealth, as well as providing valuable lessons on innovative ways of repairing bridges with less cost and with the goal of minimizing disruption.”
Though there is agreement among business and government leaders that the state’s infrastructure needs updating and upgrading, the question of paying for these improvements remains thorny. The result has been a growing ledger of obsolete train cars and potholed roadways.
“There has been a lot of deferred maintenance because funding hasn’t been there to address those problems,” Puntin of the civil engineers group said.
Fuel taxes have traditionally paid for bridge and highway projects. But more fuel-efficient vehicles on the road translates to less gasoline consumed and fewer taxes collected — even as wear and tear mounts.
Furthermore, fuel taxes have not kept up with inflation. In 2013, the Massachusetts Legislature approved the first increase to the state gas tax since 1991, a 3-cent boost to 24 cents a gallon. The law also included annual, automatic increases tied to the rate of inflation, but that measure was repealed by voters in 2014.
The federal gas tax of 18.4 cents per gallon hasn’t been raised since 1993, but support for tax increases is consistently hard to find in Washington. Last week, as highway funding threatened to dry up, the Senate passed a six-year transportation package, but the House only approved a three-month stopgap measure before summer recess.
“Transportation is one of those things that everyone wants,” Rooney said, “and no one wants to pay for.” | Bridge, highway, and tunnel repairs are underway, but this work is only making a small dent in the needs of the state’s transportation system. | 43.448276 | 1 | 11 | high | high | extractive |
http://fortune.com/2010/04/13/jamie-dimons-full-disclosure/ | http://web.archive.org/web/20150806223821id_/http://fortune.com/2010/04/13/jamie-dimons-full-disclosure/ | Jamie Dimon’s full disclosure | 20150806223821 | It’s an important next couple of days for JPMorgan Chase .
The company reports earnings tomorrow morning.
And on Thursday morning, we’ll see how far the $100 billion bank–yes, that’s how big, in terms of annual revenues, JPMorgan has grown through the financial crisis–has surged up the Fortune 500.
I know. But I can’t tell you. Watch for the Fortune 500’s release at 7:30 a.m. Thursday.
So, it’s a good moment to share a few thoughts about CEO Jamie Dimon’s letter to shareholders. It is, except for one other–Warren Buffett’s letter to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway –the best annual report letter out there, in my view.
“Painful and a lot of work” is how Dimon, who writes his letter himself (with a dose of editing help) describes the process. I’ve heard him cite Buffett’s “unbelievable clarity of thinking” as one of his inspirations.
This year’s letter has gotten kudos for Dimon’s candor and clarity about the business. (Even as profits doubled to $12 billion last year, he brands JPMorgan’s results “mediocre.”) Meanwhile, his section on “Developing Leaders” says plenty about his own aggressive personality. “(In a cold-blooded, honest way, leaders emphasize the negatives at management meetings and focus on what can be improved…”)
But the thing that has stuck with me since I read this year’s letter a couple of weeks ago–and pops to mind at every meeting I’m in lately–is this, about the importance of full disclosure inside your own company:
“Anyone in a meeting should feel free to speak his or her mind without fear of offending anyone else. I once heard someone describe the importance of having ‘at least one truth-teller at the table.’ Well, if there is just one truth-teller at the table you’re in trouble–everyone should be a truth-teller.”
I agree, wholeheartedly. He makes a related point that teamwork–which my colleague Shawn Tully wrote about in “Jamie Dimon’s Swat Team”–requires that every teammate can be his own man (or woman). “While teamwork is important and often code for getting along, equally important is an individual’s ability to have the courage to stand alone and do the right thing.”
Besides Dimon’s and Buffett’s correspondences, what other shareholder letter is worth our rare spare time? My colleague Carol Loomis, who has been at Fortune and scouring annual report letters for 56 years(!), names one more: M&T Bank , which Fortune profiled last year in “Banking the Buffalo Way.” | by Patricia Sellers It's an important next couple of days for JPMorgan Chase . The company reports earnings tomorrow morning. And on Thursday morning, we'll see how far the $100 billion bank--yes, that's how big, in terms of annual revenues, JPMorgan has grown through the financial crisis--has surged up the Fortune 500. I know. But… | 7.394366 | 0.887324 | 8.183099 | low | medium | mixed |
http://www.people.com/article/freediver-natalia-molchanova-feared-dead-spain | http://web.archive.org/web/20150807225506id_/http://www.people.com:80/article/freediver-natalia-molchanova-feared-dead-spain | Freediving Champion Feared Dead after Disappearing into the Deep: 'It Seems She'll Stay in the Sea' | 20150807225506 | 08/05/2015 AT 02:00 PM EDT
The world's greatest freediver, Natalia Molchanova, is feared dead after disappearing while diving recreationally off the coast of Spain.
Despite her skill to swim deeply while holding her breath, her family and peers have braced for the worst.
"It seems she'll stay in the sea. I think she would like that," her 28-year-old son, Alexey Molchanova, also a champion freediver with a total of 4 world records, told
Another champion freediver, William Trubridge, said he has already begun mourning Molchanova, a Russian national.
"The world lost its greatest freediver on Sunday, and my friend Alexey lost his dear mother, teacher, and training... " he Tweeted on Tuesday.
The world lost its greatest freediver on Sunday, and my friend Alexey lost his dear mother, teacher, and training... http://t.co/5jmgHCt3YU
by Molchanova's family and AIDA, the international diving federation, said the 53-year-old Russian athlete went diving on Sunday without fins at a depth of at a depth of 30-40 meters (approximately 100-130 ft) off the coast of Formentera and hasn't been seen since.
An alert was raised after 5 p.m. Sunday, and within minutes, special underwater police were deployed from the neighboring island of Ibiza,
Maritime rescue coordinator Miguel Chicon described the operation as "very complicated," according to the Associated Press. He explained that Molchanova could have become trapped by weights she was wearing at the time of the dive.
On Wednesday, Spain's rescue services called off their underwater search and said they would limit their operations to monitoring the surface of the Mediterranean Sea instead.
Molchanova's family has enlisted a remote-controlled submersible robot to continue the underwater portion of the search, police said.
Molchanova is the most decorated freediver in the world. She has 41 world records and 23 world champion titles to her name. Last September she broke the world record for dynamic freediving, swimming 778 feet using just one breath and a monofin. | The world fears it may have lost its greatest freediver, Natalia Molchanova | 30.230769 | 0.846154 | 2.384615 | medium | medium | mixed |
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